Tuesday, May 6, 2008

A time set apart...


I debated on posting about this but I just want to share it, though I doubt if I can make you understand the way I feel about this place.
Once upon a time, when my husband and I were young and had stars in our eyes and thought all things were possible, we decided to quit our jobs here in Terre Haute, Indiana and move to Tennessee, my home state. We moved to the little house/cabin in the top picture. I have no idea how old it is, but I have loved that place since I can remember. I still love it, and would move there in a heartbeat--though I don't know what I would do with all my sewing and my husbands things would not fit anywhere there. But there is no house on earth that I would trade that place for if it were mine.

The other picture is one of the views we had from our front yard. And you go on up the holler past that barn to get to the place that Neal and all of us lived...he was actually born there. I, however, was born in an actual hospital. And I only lived up that hollow about 3 or 4 years.

When we lived up there, my mom's best friend lived at this house pictured here.
In our case, my best friend/sister-in-law lived less than half a mile on down the road from us, and my mom a little bit farther. I visited with both daily, either by phone or actual face to face...and it took me forever to be broke from that when we moved back to Indiana. But it was so good while it lasted.

Out by the barn, I had a garden that would be by most standards a big garden--I had potatoes, tomatoes, sweet corn, hickory cane corn with cornfield beans growing up those stalks, bush beans , cucumbers, and what all else I cannot remember. I canned beans, and sold beans, and canned sliced green tomatoes and made tomato juice. We bought peaches and I canned those.

My husband could shoot his guns off the front porch if he wanted, though he always got out in the front yard and used a picnic table as a rest. He could get in I think 500 yard shots to sight in his rifles....he could shoot his bows in the front yard as well...it was the ideal for us.

I got to stay home while he first got a job at a local college, and from there a lumber yard, and then he got to go to a vocational school and learn to weld. Well, being a little older than the students out of high school, he got along real well with his teacher who was a wonderful man.

There was also machine shop classes taught there--and it had a remedial course it taught two nights a week for people that needed refresher courses.
Roger talked to that teacher and he agreed to let Roger come and set in on those...he would not get credit or anything but he would still have some knowledge of lathes, etc. So he really took advantage of everything he could there and it has served him well throughout his life.

I do not know what the hold is that this place has over me...most of the time autumn makes me so homesick for it. And I dream about it...not as often as I used to, but often enough. And I don't like to wake from the dreams. I always try to go back to sleep and dream more. There is just a feel to the place...it has always had a hold over me.

When we were kids, the owners of this place lived in Michigan and we mowed the yard for them. I loved having that excuse to go up there and go in the house. It never seemed to get hot enough to matter in the summer...about all we ever did when we lived there was open the window in our bedroom and open the back door. The cool air coming off that mountain cooled everything out.

Enough reminiscing--I need to go feed Clover, whose eyes opened today.
ETA: I don't know what I was thinking last night--apparently I wasn't thinking. Neal was not born up the holler from the barn--he and I were the only two of all us kids that were born in a hospital.

11 comments:

  1. Nice post Rose - and yes, I think I do know how you feel about the place in the photo.
    Places I loved as a child evoke the strong feelings I still feel today about places.
    Your picture captures a different time and place - a world removed almost from today.
    I loved reading about it.

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  2. What a beautiful place to live. A heart warming post :)

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  3. I rememeber when we were kids and had to go to school. We walked by that place every day and walked a little bridge (probably 1.5 feet wide x 20 feet long) across a creek that run right beside that house. As you can remember when it would rain a lot that creek would get out of it's banks and be up in the yard of that little house. There was a spring about 100 feet from the house that used to never go dry no matter how dry it was that year.

    Our grandpa & grandma lived in that house (best I can remember in the late 20s and early 30s) and mom and dad lived in another house just behind that house. I've worked(and played) a lot in that old barn. I have several pictures of it also. As you know, I don't think of that house as you do but I do think of that holler and all the good times we had up there. I go back up there just about every time I go back to TN.

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  4. I loved reading this post and quite liked when you said " (...) were young and had stars in our eyes and thought all things were possible (...), because I think we should always keep trying ... of course I know not everything is possible but sometimes believing is a very good help!
    Did you ever got to receive the Versailles photos?

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  5. Precious memories, Rose. I don't blame you for not wanting to wake up. Never give up those dreams! You're lucky that you still remember them when you're awake. ;-)

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  6. Looks like Home Sweet Home to me! Lovely memories.

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  7. Nice post! Wonderful memories. I enjoyed reading this.

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  8. Hi again, Rose. I want to make sure you know that the "cowslips" I wrote about today are different from the cowslips that grow in the British Isles. ;-)

    I'm glad you're enjoying the wildflower posts. I'm enjoying your memories!

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  9. There is no place like home...lovely post.

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  10. I enjoyed reading this post. It looks and sounds like a lovely place, and you described it and your memories of it beautifully.

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  11. I can understand a hold such a place can have... it says a lot about you as well.. A home bird, would your birth sign be Cancer the crab by any chance?

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