Day 201, Thursday, December 22

This is probably going to be one of the longest written entries of the entire blog. Today I revisited more memories from my childhood than I have in probably 25 years. Much of the stories won’t carry meaning to anybody other than my immediate family, but for me, the memories are such an important part of this trip that I have to write them down. Through out this odyssey, I’ve know that possibly the most important part of the entire trip for me would be visiting my Grandparents’ house in Auburn, AL because of the memories it would bring back. Today is that day, and thus today’s journal entry is going to be extremely long.
Dinner last night with the Perrys was a great experience. I’d only expected to see Bo and Mary Elizabeth, but to my surprise all three sons, Wade, David, and John were there also. As I mentioned before, the Perrys were good friends of my parents from our church, Government Street Presbyterian when we lived in Mobile. For a while, the Perrys lived just down North Reed Avenue from us but they moved a couple of miles away some time during my elementary school years. I enjoyed dinner and catching up with them and got some information from them about some childhood peers of mine that completely rescheduled my morning today.
When I was in elementary school, one of my best friends was a girl who lived across the street from the Perrys (one block down from my house.) I don’t remember how many years I knew Shannon Manz, but she and I went to school together for our 5th grade year. Last night, the Perrys told me that she’s back in Mobile working at a nursery/garden shop. This morning, on my way out of town, I stopped by for a short surprise visit with her. We had a great time catching up and replaying some old memories. The ride to and from Forest Hill Elementary school in the back of a neighbor’s old blue pick up truck, (The neighbor, Dixie Carlson had a son, Reve, who was in school with Shannon and me.) playing imaginary games in my front yard (many years before fifth grade). I also remember recess time at school when Shannon was both the tallest and fastest person on the field. Shannon had no idea she was my first childhood crush. Of course she didn’t, girls still had cooties back then! I parted company with Shannon leaving behind a commitment to get back in touch again with her and to stop by for a better visit next time I’m in Mobile.
From Mobile, I headed up to Auburn AL to visit the house where my maternal grandparents (Grandpops and Grandmother) lived and also the house where Grandpops’ sister, Aunt Emma, lived. The trip to Auburn was uneventful but the visit to Grandpops and Grandmother’s house was very emotional for me. I’ve not been back to that house since sometime between 1980 and 1982. 1980 was the year Grandmother died and 1982 was when Grandpops moved out of the house and down to South Florida to be with my soon-to-be step Grandmother. I knew visiting the house was going to be a powerful emotional trip for me but I didn’t know how powerful it was going to be.
The house, inherited by Uncle John, is now rented out to a young couple with a baby. When I pulled into the driveway, the wife (several years younger than I) was home with her baby and came out to see who’d pulled into the driveway. I told her who I am, that I’d not been back to the house since shortly after Grandmother died, and asked if she’d mind if I walked around the yard to take some pictures. She totally surprised me by asking me to come inside. I thought I’d prepared myself for the memories that would come back from seeing the outside of the house, but I’d definitely not prepared myself to see the inside of the house. I probably hadn’t taken more than two or three steps into the house when a huge flood of emotions and memories came back to me and I just broke down sobbing.
When grandmother died in 1980, the way my 3rd grade mind coped with the pain was, in essence, to put all my memories of her in boxes and store the boxes deep in a vault where they couldn’t be found. I literally had and still largely have no vivid memories of her other than memories of photographs of her that I’ve seen. I’ve tried to recall them, but they’re just hidden too well. Walking into the house was a HUGE trigger for me and brought back a bunch of the memories from that vault. It also brought back the pain I felt when she was dying of cancer and when she actually finally died. I even remembered where I was standing (in the bathroom at 14 North Reed) when Mom told me Grandmother had died. With that flood of memories coming back all I could do was to lean back against the door frame, bend down with my head in my hands and my elbows on my knees and sob until I thought I’d come to grips. Key word there is *thought.*
When that wave had passed, I walked back into what had been the two guest bedrooms and before that Mom and Uncle John’s old bedrooms. That wasn’t so bad, but what I’d definitely not prepared myself for was opening the door to what had been Grandpops and Grandmother’s bedroom. I didn’t even think twice about opening the door but as soon as I opened it, I suddenly realized what I’d done. While my eyes saw the room in its present state, my mind ignored what my eyes were seeing and painted the last memory I’ve got of that room: grandmother lying in the bed dying of cancer. That just about floored me. If I thought I’d broken down when I walked into the front door, this was a far bigger wave than the little first one I waded through. It took several minutes before I stopped crying. I think that if my childhood mind hadn’t obscured all the memories I was reliving that it might not have been so hard for me, but as it was, I was pretty much flailing in water way over my head.
I’ve got to wonder what the tenant thought, seeing me break into a sobbing mess after I walked into the house. “Is this man emotionally unstable?” or “Are my baby and I safe?” I don’t think so, though. Each time I broke down, I managed to explain to her, through my sobs and tears, what I was seeing and remembering. She was extremely understanding about it and told me I was about to make her cry also.
As I walked through the house, it was amazing to me how many little things brought back memories from my childhood. For instance, when I looked out the kitchen window onto the side yard, I saw a bird feeder placed in front of the window. Seeing that, I suddenly got back the memories of Grandpops filling the feeder that had been in the exact same location when I was a child.
By far, the strongest memory that came back to me, after walking into my grandparents old bedroom, came to me as I was about to walk out the back of the house. Between the kitchen and the back door of the house is a little windowless room with doors to the kitchen and to the back steps. As I reached for the door knob to walk into the room from the kitchen, I found I couldn’t bring myself to open it. That room was Grandpops study and pipe smoking room. He used to have a big dark desk on the left side of the room where he’d sit, smoke his pipes, and if we were lucky, blow smoke rings for my brother and me. Somehow, opening the door in my mind, I was convinced that I’d still see Grandpops sitting there at his desk, with his big fuzzy white beard, with his pipe hanging out of his mouth and that the room would still be full of the sweet smell of pipe smoke and tobacco. I could barely twist the handle. And yes, I was sobbing uncontrollably again as I finally did open it. In reality, the room had been converted to a laundry room and didn’t even bear any resemblance to the room of my memories. But what matters to me is that I got back the memories.
Outside, most of the memories weren’t so strong, but there were three that rocked me again. Grandpops and Grandmother had, at several places in their yard, planted Chinese Chestnuts. These trees bear their nuts in pods that look like sea urchins. Brown pods, several inches in diameter, absolutely covered in needle sharp brittle spines. Spines which, as kids running around the yard, we frequently managed to get lodged in our bare feet. Also, in the back yard, there were scuppernong (sp?) and muscadine grapes and a catalpa tree.
Walking out into the back yard through Grandpops’ old study, I immediately saw the grape vines and the catalpa tree and more memories came flooding back. As kids, eating the grapes was great, but it was the catalpa tree which was the REALLY cool back yard plant. You see, the Catalpa tree was attacked each year by caterpillars. Grandpops, who was a limnologist (look it up), was a professor in both the zoology and fisheries departments at Auburn University. As such he had access to the university’s farm ponds when other people didn’t, and catalpa caterpillars just happen to be incredibly good fishing bait. They’re apparently super tasty to the fish and they’re really tough so they don’t come off the hook. Grandpops would take us over to the ponds with cane poles for an afternoon of fishing for bluegills and collecting the crawfish out of the traps he’d set. My favorite picture of him, which I keep on the wall of my bedroom, is of him holding up a huge crawfish and one of those traps. Seeing the grape vines brought back those memories and I had to take a knee in the back yard. When I recovered from that, still kneeling down, I looked at the ground and saw the Chinese Chestnut burrs. That got me going again. As I mentioned, we used to get those spines lodged in our feet as kids, and it was Grandpops who would take one of his super sharp pocket knives and get the spines out for us.
Further into the back yard is the garage. Opening the door of the garage, I found it still smelled the same as it did in my childhood when Grandpops’ and Grandmother’s old VW station wagon was parked inside. Grandpops used to have his wood working shop at the back of the garage and I had to go back there to see if there was anything that would remind me of him. Grandpops had a penchant for labeling his workshop, indicating exactly where each of his tools, especially his wood carving chisels, went. While his tool cabinet was gone, sure enough, there on the wall was a picture he’d drawn of the chuck key for a drill press hanging from its cord with the label “Drill press chuck key here”. Somehow, knowing that Grandpops himself had drawn that reduced me to a sobbing mess again!
After taking some pictures, I hopped back on my motorcycle and headed over to the house where my Aunt Emma lived. My parents now own that house but my memories of it aren’t as strong as those of Grandpops and Grandmother’s house and the tenants weren’t home so I just took pictures from the front.
This evening I rode over to spend the night with some of my father’s close friends Nancy Nusbaum, her husband Ken, and their two young girls. Nancy is one of Dad’s best friends from when we lived in Ft Lauderdale. I’ve not seen Nancy for many years and don’t think I’ve ever met her husband or their kids. I joined them for dinner and had a wonderful visit with them. After dinner, Ken drove us all around Auburn for a short tour of Christmas light displays and of the university. I really enjoyed their company and will definitely keep in touch with them.