I told her okay, but I wasn’t sure I believed her.
When we got home, Mama told BJ that his new electric train was a Christmas present and belonged underneath the tree. He could play with it on Christmas day. My stomach had a knot in it for the next two days. I kept thinking how embarrassed I would be when BJ opened the gift I had made for him.
The picture in the paper showed the basketball player sitting on the hospital bed with his arm around BJ. BJ’s eyes and mouth both grinned. Him and the basketball player held up the train box. The article said that a company donated toys for all them sick kids. Basketball players took time out of their busy schedules to deliver them. Mama put the picture and story in a old picture frame. She hung it in his bedroom. I felt real thankful that I didn’t have to go in there and see it.
On Christmas day, we drank hot sassafras tea and ate cinnamon rolls while we opened our gifts. Mama said, “BJ, you hand out the gifts this year. You already know about your electric train, so why don’t you save that for last.”
BJ sorted the gifts into piles in front of us. Mama told me to open my gifts first. I forgot about the knot in my stomach. I opened a crinoline Gran sewed for me. (I used to call them stick-out slips when I was little.) Mama made me a new blue dress (my favorite color) with a big white muslin collar and white cuffs on the sleeves. I knowed I would look like them kids in the magazines at the company store, even iffen it was a feed-sack dress. I held the dress up to me and ran to kiss Mama and Gran.
Mama also made me a pine jewelry box lined with felt. Gran gived me a pearl ring that she always wore on the pinkie of her right hand. She said her grandmother gived it to her and now it was time for me to have it. I unwrapped a new whittling knife from Uncle William and Aunt Ethel Mae. BJ had drawed me a picture of me and Mama standing in front of our make-do house. There was a big heart drawed around us. Him and Gran stood off to the side. They had just let go of purple balloons.
Then it was BJ’s turn. A knot tightened up in my stomach again. First he unwrapped the train whistle from Mama. He blew it. Whooooooo whooooooo! It sounded just like a real train. Then he opened a Jacob’s ladder, two string puzzles, and a marble puzzle that Gran made him. “I don’t know why I bother,” Gran said. “That boy’ll have them puzzles figured out afore day’s end.” Gran winked at BJ and he winked back.
Mama had also whittled a dancing mountain man for him. A mountain man is real fun. His knees and arms have hinges so’s he can fling all around. He has a stick that you hold glued to his back, and he dances on a wood paddle. One end of the paddle is under your leg, and you hold him on the other end like he’s onstage. When you tap the paddle with your fingers, he bounces on it and sounds like he’s a-clogging his fool head off.
Then BJ found my gift. I had wrapped it up in Sunday funnies Uncle William always saved for us. The knot in my stomach turned into dancing butterflies. I felt tears come up in my eyes. BJ tore off the paper and held up the train. “Wow! A train!” he said. “Lyddie, did you make this for me?”
“Yes,” I whispered. I couldn’t hold back a few of them tears, and they rolled down my cheeks. “I’m sorry, BJ. I didn’t know somebody’d bring you a fancy store-bought one.”
BJ giggled. I looked hard at him. “Did you forget we ain’t got no electricity, Lyddie? I’m going to have to take it to Uncle William’s house to play with it.”
I had plumb forgot about that.
BJ took the magic penny from his pocket and put it in his left hand. Then he picked up the train with his right hand and held both of them up to the window so the sun shined on them. “This is my magic train,” he said. “When I hold my magic penny, this train will be the one that takes me anywhere I want to go.” He put the penny back in his pocket.
Then he commenced to pushing my train around the floor. “See, Lyddie? It don’t even need no track. It can go anywhere. It can even flyyyyyyyyy!” he said as he rolled it over the couch and pushed it through the air. He picked up the train whistle with his other hand. Over and over he said, “Clickety clack, clickety clack, going down the track.” Then he blew the whistle. Whoo whoo!
Me and Mama joined in:
“Clickety-clack, clickety-clack, going down the track.
Whoo whoo!
Clickety-clack, clickety-clack, going down the track.
Whoo whoo!”
Gran pulled out a couple of spoons from the silverware drawer and bounced them in her fingers to sound like a train. I runned and got the mountain man and made him dance on my lap. Mama grabbed her dulcimer and started playing a tune. She sang:
“I’m going to get me a ticket, a ticket, a ticket
On engine number seven, on seven, on seven.
My gold and silver ticket, it’s one way, it’s one way, it’s one way
To take me straight to Heaven, to Heaven, to Heaven.”
We had us the best Christmas ever that day. BJ did take the electric train to Uncle William’s and they played with it a few times. But it was my train BJ took to the hospital. When I saw him for the last time at the funeral parlor, I laid the train beside him.
9
It’s about giving and getting.
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 2, 1953
Cora Lee walked into Mr. Hinkle’s class today with two dresses over her arm. I tried to figure out what in the world she’d need them for. She had this evil grin on her face, the kind where the grin looks happy, but the eyes look mean.
She walked all biggety right up to my desk in front of everbody—excepten Mr. Hinkle. The bell hadn’t rung yet, and he stood out on the porch talking to a parent.
“Lydia, my mother said I should give these here dresses to you,” Cora Lee said in a real loud voice. “They’re out of style now, so I don’t wear them. Your mother’s in jail, so we decided you probably need them more than anybody else.”
My face got real hot. I wanted to do what Anne of Green Gables would do. I bet she would have grabbed them dresses and shoved them in Cora Lee’s face. She would have said, “I don’t want your dresses. If I washed them fifty times, I’d never get your stinky smell out of them.” I didn’t say nothing, though. I grabbed me a book out of my desk and started up reading. I pretended like she weren’t even there.
Mr. Hinkle walked in the room just then. Cora Lee throwed them dresses on my desk and runned to her seat. I tossed them on the floor.
“Whose clothes are those?” Mr. Hinkle asked, pointing to the heap on the floor.
“I gave those dresses to Lydia, Mr. Hinkle,” Cora Lee said with her eyes all sad and her mouth puckered up. “But she won’t take them. She threw them down.”
“Did Lydia ask you to bring her some dresses?” Mr. Hinkle asked.
“No, but I know she needs them because of her mother being in jail and all.”
“Lydia looks fine to me, Cora Lee. She’s neat and clean. I think that dress she has on is pretty. I suggest you take those dresses and put them in your locker. Maybe you can take them to your church charity collection.”
Cora Lee had to pick up them clothes with everbody watching. I didn’t look at her, but I could feel a grin creeping up my lips.
That’s just not right what Cora Lee done. Me and Mama had us a talk about giving and getting one time.
Each and ever Christmas, Mama and Gran always made toys for two kids named Betsy and Sylvia that lived down the road from us. They’s real poor. Their daddy’s been real sick for years and their mama is so sad she ain’t up to doing much for her young’uns. When I was in first grade, I seen Betsy stealing and eating food that other kids had throwed in the trash after lunch. I cried when I told Mama about it.
“She didn’t steal iffen she took it from the trash. That means it didn’t belong to nobody no more. You didn’t say nothing to her about it, did you?” Mama asked me as she wiped my tears with her apron.
“No, Mama,” I said, all choky.
“Good. That was right kind of you, Lydia. She’d have been real ashamed and embarrassed iffen you had. You w
as real little when the church took up a collection for us. Do you recollect that?”
“I recollect. Brother Andrew had us stand up in front of everbody. You had BJ in your arms. Me and Gran stood next to you. Brother Andrew said how hard up we was on account of you and BJ being at the hospital in Charleston. He said everbody was real good to help us out and that the Lord would be pleased. Then he counted the money out loud afore handing it to you.”
“That’s right. How did you feel?”
“I was glad they was a-helping us out, but I also felt kind of sick to my stomach.”
“I felt the same way. Pastor John apologized later. He said he didn’t know Brother Andrew would call us up to the front like that.”
Mama sat down at the dining room table, and I sat beside her. She covered my hands with hers on the table. “Lydia, the Lord says it’s better to give than receive. For most of us, it’s also easier. But they be times we all need help,” Mama said. “Your gran and me was always used to making do for ourselves. When BJ got sick, we come to realize that we needed help. I ain’t sure why it’s so hard to ask for it. Pride, I guess. But we come to recollect that God doesn’t want us to be alone in this life. He gives us other people to teach us, support us, and comfort us. It ain’t right to build a wall around ourselves. Needing help reminds us that we are not sufficient in ourselves, as the Good Book says. That keeps us humble.
“They also be times we can give help to others,” Mama went on. “We must be just as humble at those times. Do you remember the story Jesus told about this very thing?”
“The one about them men making sure people watched when they prayed real loud and gived some money to beggars?” I asked.
“That’s the one. Jesus said they didn’t need a reward from God. They got their reward from making people think they was special and better than everbody else.”
“Mama, I don’t want Betsy to be hungry.”
“I know,” Mama said. “I don’t want her to be hungry either. Let’s make us a plan to help that won’t hurt her feelings. How does that sound?”
“That sounds real good, Mama.”
So here’s what we done. Mama would pack a little something extra in my lunch poke. After I ate my lunch, I’d tell Betsy that I felt full and Mama would get mad at me iffen I wasted food. I asked her iffen she could eat it so’s I wouldn’t get in no trouble. It weren’t no lie. Mama didn’t want me to waste food.
Betsy always said yes, she’d be glad to help me out. One time, I asked her why she always saved most of it in her pocket. She told me it was for her little sister. Mama started packing even more food after I told her about that.
At Christmas, me and BJ—when he felt good—got to be secret elves. Gran and Mama always made Betsy’s family a couple of quilts for Christmas. On Christmas day, we’d wrap up the presents and food in them quilts. Then, all four of us, we’d sneak over there afore the sun come up. Gran and Mama would hide in the woods. Me and BJ would tiptoe to their house and leave them bundles in front of the door. We would have to keep a hand over our mouths so’s the giggles wouldn’t come out and wake them up.
It was almost the best part of Christmas. We could picture them opening up them quilts and thinking Santa had brought all them goodies. We kept it a real good secret.
I pray for Betsy and her little sister sometimes. I hope that somebody else will be secret elves for them now that Mama and Gran and BJ and me won’t be around at Christmastime.
Mama and Pastor John taught me that giving ain’t about showing off. Giving is about getting a real good feeling for reaching out to somebody in a humble way. I feel kind of sad for Cora Lee. She missed out on that real good feeling.
10
It’s about what happened to Gran.
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1953
Gran left this world two years ago today. Uncle William and Aunt Ethel Mae ain’t said nothing about it. Maybe they done forgot. I wish I could go up to the cemetery on Paradise Hill, where Gran be buried, but it’s too far a piece to go by Shank’s mare.
Sometimes when I first wake up in the morning, I think I hear Gran a-calling to me like she used to: “Lydia, get them lazy bones up out of that bed. The day’s a-wasting!”
I’d open one eye up and look at her. The morning sun always sparkled out of Gran’s eyes. She’d flash me one of them toothless grins and say, “Up and at ’em. Rise and shine. Get some peppy, grandchild of mine!” Then she’d lean over and give me a kiss right smack-dab on my nose. Her knobby finger would reach up under the cover and give me a tickle under the arm.
I’d start up giggling. “Okay, okay, Gran. I done gived up. I’ll get up!”
One time I told her I was too big to get kissed on the nose and tickled. “Oh, so someone’s getting too big for her britches, is she?” she said. “We’ll just see about that!” She started giving me smoochy kisses all over my face and tickling me with both hands. We both laughed so hard we was a-crying.
“You win! You win!” I said. “I ain’t too big! I ain’t too big!”
“And you just see to it that you never get too big for some lovin’, Miss Smarty-Pants!”
“I promise, Gran,” I told her. “Not never.”
I sure wish I had me some of her loving right now.
My favorite times was our walks in the woods. From when I was tiny, I remember how Gran would pull her long salt-and-pepper hair into a bun, throw on Gramps’ old overalls and boots, and grab the tote she had sewed for carrying herbs. She’d throw in some gardening tools to help her get them out of the ground. Mama would dress me in blue jeans, a shirt, and some rain boots from the Salvation Army thrift store.
I asked Mama why she didn’t go with us. She said she wanted me to have the same special time with Gran that she had when she was a little girl. Mama said her part of the walk to the woods was to make us a good lunch. She would tuck sandwiches and pieces of pie or cake wrapped up snug in wax paper in Gran’s tote. She’d also tuck in jars of root beer or sassafras tea.
Gran would sling the tote over her shoulder, and off we’d go. I’d stick my hand in her overall pocket to keep close to her while we walked. We’d sing songs. The one I liked best was about a dog named Rattler, I guess on account of wishing I had me a dog. That’s why I liked playing after school with that big brown dog that lives down the street. I sure wish he was mine. Anyways, the song me and Gran sang goes like this:
Rattler was a good old dog, as blind as he could be.
But every night at suppertime, I believe that dog could see.
Here, Rattler, here! Here, Rattler, here!
Call old Rattler from the barn. Here, Rattler, here!
Rattler was a friendly dog, even though he was blind.
He wouldn’t hurt a living thing, he was so very kind.
One night I saw a big fat coon climb into a tree.
I called old Rattler right away, to fetch him down for me.
But Rattler wouldn’t fetch for me, because he liked that coon.
I saw them walking paw in paw, later by the light of the moon.
Here, Rattler, here! Here, Rattler, here!
Call old Rattler from the barn. Here, Rattler, here!
We’d pretend like we was really calling Rattler when we come to that part. Gran and me would put our hands up to our mouths and yell real loud. Sometimes I expected old Rattler to come a-running through the woods.
Gran always said she was taking me to nature’s school, and she was my teacher. She learned me real good. I know about good mushrooms and bad toadstools. I know that the milkweed’s root can be used in a tea to help you breathe better, but the sap is dangerous for your heart. Heal-all is a mint that can help a sore throat. Dandelion leaves be good to eat in salads or boiled. They help clean the poisons out of your system.
Bittersweet is a devil’s weed. They’s nice to look at and have pretty berries, but them berries could kill a young’un. Bittersweet also strangles other plants. Gran heard that it was used in witch’s brew. And the devi
l’s trinity is three leaves. I stay away from them plants.
Gran also learned me about animals. Sometimes we would stop what we was doing and just listen. Then I’d know we wasn’t alone in the woods. We’d hear chipmunks arguing about a acorn. Sometimes we’d follow some tracks and find a deer drinking water from a creek. My favorite was the birds. We’d see cardinals, whippoorwills, chickadees, bluebirds, and nuthatches. Their whistles and calls filled up the woods with songs. The woodpeckers’ rata-tat-tat kept the beat.
BJ comed with us on the walks when he was old enough. But sometimes I was glad that BJ was in the hospital so’s I could have Gran to myself. I feel like crying just thinking that I felt that way.
Losing Gran was real hard for me and Mama, but I think it was hard on BJ most of all. Gran tried her best to help him get better.
We had to take BJ to the hospital in Ohio more and more. And he stayed longer and longer each time. Uncle William finally got so tired of driving back and forth that he learned Mama how to drive.
When BJ had to go to the hospital, Uncle William would bring the car to the cabin. Mama would take him home, and we would drive to Ohio.
Gran hated them doctors at that hospital. Gran’s mustard plasters and special tea helped BJ a whole lot more than them doctors did. Gran worked real hard on that tea. Me and Mama helped her gather up coltsfoot, horehound, lungwort, licorice, and pleurisy roots. She added some honey to it so it would taste sweet. BJ started drinking it when he was real little, and he drank it like most grown-ups drink coffee.
But the first time BJ went to the hospital in Ohio smelling like a mustard plaster, them doctors and nurses got real perturbed. “You’re not going to cure that boy with witchcraft,” one of them doctors told Gran.
Gran raised herself up real tall so she could look him square in the eye. “I ain’t no witch, you sorry excuse for a no-account doctor,” she said. “I’m a God-fearing woman who loves the Lord with her whole heart. I sure ain’t seen you doing nothing to make this boy right.”
Child of the Mountains Page 6