Guns were drawn, the players determined to settle the game.
It’s a historic picture, one of my favorites. Uncle Don sneering and Uncle Bill yelling, fooling
around at the North Forty, circa 1965, “Pollyanna to the Death". It captures some of the essence of my version of modern family history.
My Grampaw and Mamaw Hemphill dwelled in that white house with
the long front porch at that rural corner fifteen miles from Marion. It was the
gathering place of the seven children of Hicks and Nell and a large collection
of grandchildren. In the context of my atomic family, that particle existed
only from the earliest to last memory of the place, roughly 16 years, 1956
to 1972. The small piece of earth on which that house sat is still there, but the
house is long gone. I recently tramped around the weedy ground looking for an
artifact and found only the concrete cover of the well. It was an amazingly
small piece of space – far too small to contain my memories. The house is gone,
along with my Grampaw, Mamaw, Dad, Mom, Uncle Walt and Uncle Carroll. The other
key people of that place are in or approaching the twilight.
In this morning’s waking contemplation, I wondered about how
the North Forty got its name, what it even means. I know the phrase ‘north
forty” is not unique, so I googled it. How’s that for juxtaposition – googling north forty? Apparently, the phrase dates back to at least the
mid-nineteenth century when a homesteader’s 160 acres of land was divided into
four equal quadrants of 40 acres, thus generating named places like North
Forty, South Forty and Back Forty. The urban dictionary says north forty means
“way the hell out there”. Side note: My
mamaw would not approve of “hell” appearing in this essay. She told me so when
I was thirteen.
I don’t know the longer history of our North Forty, just
that Uncle Don acquired it from the Nanny family before my memory came into
play; so, before that place was our North Forty, it was the Nanny Place. At
some point in my early childhood, Uncle Don moved from the Nanny Place to
another family home on Cove Road and, I suppose, because the Nanny Place
remained a part of his holdings and it was somewhat northward of the house on
Cove Road, he began referring to it as the North Forty.
In the orbit of my atomic family, the North Forty has a much
longer physical presence than Grampaw’s house at the corner of Cove Road and
Greasy Creek – 50 plus years as opposed to 16 years. Since I was a teenager,
Uncle Don has maintained the North Forty as a kind of family retreat. In the
decade of the Sixties we gathered there for Thanksgiving meals, board games and
rabbit hunting. It became a nucleus for it’s own atomic family encompassing
multiple lines and generations. Since the Sixties it has hosted gatherings
small and large for birthdays, anniversaries, smoking barbecue and molasses
making. There is still a functioning farmhouse with kitchen, bathroom,
furniture and the famous “Pollyanna to the Death” photograph. If there is
such a thing as the nucleus of a nucleus, it might be my Great Uncle Don, still
a sharp wit at the age of 92.
Warning: here comes one of the benefits of writing. This
morning I was amazed at how fleeting life seemed. In my mind, that porch (with
all the jokes, gossip, teasing and tales swapped by those who propped
themselves on chairs and leaned back with their feet on the bannister) has
lasted forever. But the place only existed for 16 years – maybe an eternity
when I was 14, but just a blip in time to a much older man. But now, as I write
this, I feel it profoundly and see it clearly. Who knows how long an atomic
family lasts? It is not a physical thing, like a real atom. At some point the
atomic family as metaphor falters. But the atomic family as reality lives as
long a memory can hold it.
