DADDY'S BARN

The first time I told a story to a general audience was at the 2011 Kentucky Storytelling confernece. My dear sweet husband and good friend threw my name in the hat during the open mic session. Mine was the last name to be drawn. The story I told was one I wrote about Daddy's Barn. I think I did pretty good. At least THEY told me I did :-). the story, as it was written, is here for you to read. Of course there were changes made to make it tellable and to fit the time frame. Let me know your thoughts in a nice constructive way. Thanks and have a grea day.          

 

 

Children growing up on small farms in the Appalachian foothills didn’t have a great deal of sanctuaries, or a place that was special, a place to keep in the mind forever where memories are stored to grow in grandeur.

            I did… My very special place was the barn. I could go there alone and be at peace away from nine brothers and sisters or I could be there with my family, all of them either working or playing or maybe just one person, someone to talk to. The grandest person to spend time with in the barn was with my father. For you see, in my mind the barn belonged to my father the way our house belonged to my mother. It’s an ingrained lifestyle about gender and responsibilities. 

            The last time I was in the barn with my dad his mind was focused on disrepair of the aging structure. “Mom’s afraid the barn will blow over in some of these windstorms we’ve been having”, he said. “She worries about it. She’s scared it will fall on your brother’s home or maybe a piece of tin will blow off the roof and crash into someone. It seems to fill her mind. I don’t have the money to get it fixed the way it should be so we may have to take it down”.

            My heart sank as I heard my father’s voice tremble. His lifelong companion, his soul mate his wife of more than 60 years and her peace of mind was the most important thing to him. And mine, the same for both my parents.

            The soft glow of evening sun danced through cracks between rough sewn oak boards weathered by years of fighting the harsh elements of the changing Appalachian seasons. Rays streaked across my father’s face, worn and wrinkled from almost a century of being in the sun working the rough terrain of his mountain farm.

            “It doesn’t matter that the doors hang a little crooked daddy, what matters are all those times you opened and closed those doors”, I said. This barn is about so much more than an old building about to fall. Inside these walls lives the spirit of a farmer whose best friend was a giant mule.

            “That stall, the one on the end, was reserved for Old Tobe. Even after working from dawn to dusk, you lead him there, and although you fought with him much of the day, you never forgot to pat him on the head to say “good night”. I swear that mule would snort as if to say “see you tomorrow, you haven’t broke me yet”.

            That forked hickory limb isn’t just something nailed to the wall. I still hear the clank of chains as you hung Tobe’s gear on it. The energetic beast that God teamed you with proved to be a lasting relationship.

            When we cleared the hill for a strawberry patch there was one stump that proved to be stubborn but not so much as you. Tobe had pulled out all the others. You hitched him to this one, patted him on the rear picked up the check lines and called out “Pull Tobe!” He lowered his head, pointed his ears, dug in his feet and pulled until every muscle in his body was bursting. He tried. But you saw his pain and stopped him. With your mattock and pick you whacked and cut around that stump. Then you hooked another chain to a root. Instead of picking up the checklines behind Tobe you bent beside him, you clasped onto that chain over your shoulder and you yelled “Pull Tobe”. Together you buried your feet in the dirt, pointed your heads, and pulled with all the strength God gave you. It seemed as if a gasp came from the heart of the earth as the roots of the stump came flying out. You patted Tobe on the head, loosened the gear and walked him to his stall. No words, no more work today.

            This barn was the day’s beginning and the day’s end.  The day Tobe died was the first time I saw you cry, and that was here Daddy, right here in this barn hall.

             “Those feed boxes aren’t simply boards nailed together. The cows ate from them while you milked them. I remember the cat sitting on that rock right there,  its mouth wide open, waiting for that first squirt of milk, you never missed. I recall the time you let a little blond haired girl milk, but only once because she couldn’t hit the bucket. Event though she couldn’t milk she was the best at holding the cow’s tail so it couldn’t sworp you through the face. That was an important job.

            “You designed the barn with a hole in the loft. Gosh, I wonder how much tobacco I pulled through that hole from the bed of that old green truck that only you could drive. And even though we had to push start it first thing every morning, it brought in the crops. Blue smoke came barreling around the side of the hill, sometimes with just two tires touching the ground. “Hang on” I remember you yelling just before you thumped a ditch….we held on tight, I don’t remember ever losing a stick of tobacco or a brother or sister.

            Those old saw horses now stacked in the corner once held boards we used as a stripping table. The picture is as clear in my mind as if it were hanging on the wall. You and Mom standing side by side pulling trash, the older ones pulling the lugs and then there was Roger and me on the tips. My hands felt as if they would fall off from the cold. And even though you told me to go home, to warm by the fire, I wouldn’t leave, I couldn’t.

            But you know Daddy, It wasn’t about my hands being cold or being tired or being little or being young, it was about hearing Pa Huff tell his stories and watching him dance a jig while making sure every hand of tobacco was tied to perfection. I still am in awe of how he made those long leaves bend and twist and stretch without breaking as he fastened a bunch of them together to form a hand. Then he would place them on the stick and ask me to help him with the press. I stood beside him and with every ounce of body and muscle and “grunt” inside me, I pushed! The press, its still here on the wall, too. I wonder how many pounds of tobacco went through it. Pressed until all the leaves were mashed flat then placed in a round until the day it went to market.

            I learned to climb in this barn, Daddy. And when our cousins would visit from Detroit or Columbus, we taught them about rural life, about living on a farm and we played chase and hide and seek…and we became friends with mutual respect while trying to outdo each other.

             It’s here in this barn, more than any where else, that I remember you and mom being together, side by side, a team, strong and committed to each other and family. You worked for your children, and those who weren’t yours, but needed a home and the love of a family. Yes you and Mom, husband and wife, co-workers and the whole time, you were teachers. Because it’s here that I learned responsibility and how to get along with others. It’s here that I gained a knowledge and appreciation of work ethics, honesty, and diligence, and family values. It’s here within these boards of oak that I was shaped as a person, a parent, and a citizen. It was here on this farm that I learned to love, to give and to take, to share and to ask forgiveness. I learned to appreciate life and all the blessings that have been given to us. This barn is much more than an old building about to fall. It’s part of our heritage, a part of our family.

            I regret not having this conversation with my father. I remember him saying “The barn needs some work. Mommy’s afraid it’s going to blow over in the wind, that it might hit the car or hurt someone” All I said was “let me know when you want to work on it Daddy and I’ll help”.

            I should have known better, I should have offered to get the barn repaired because a few weeks later I got an e-mail from my sister saying “Daddy tore the barn down”. There’s a hole now, one that can never be filled, one that might never have appeared if I had spoke my feelings instead of letting it pass by. I have a memory of the barn…a bookshelf made from weathered oak. Doug Doerrfeld planed the boards, left some nail holes and places where worms had crawled, finished it with a soft sheen. When Daddy heard I was having it made, he looked at me with his deep blue eyes and said “do you think he would have enough wood to make something for me? It doesn’t have to be much, he said, just a memento”. I had a tool box made for him, oh not one to carry, its much too heavy for that, but one he can store his father’s tools in…those precious things he wants to keep in his memento of the barn.

My hopes are that others don’t have to have mementos of a special place, that we can preserve and protect these pieces of our culture called barns.