My Americana
within a summer’s wind
the corn waved its silence
as a distant train passed by
unnoticed,
yet it bellowed
to prevent trespassers
from crossing its path.
and there was a wonderment of eyes
that my sister and I had
as we sat upon
grandfather’s lap
counting its cars.
there was a also a simplicity
and a complexity
at the very same time.
everything was
just as it should be.
but today,
nothing is the same.
the realms of silence
tell us nothing more
than that which we hope to see,
comprehend,
and remember….
-------------------------
John
There are points in time that permanently fixate themselves within the depths of the mind, and yet bring themselves to the forefront of memory upon a single thought. Whether it is about a death or about a life, those thoughts are as vivid as the visuals in front of you today.
I passed a barren field yesterday; it had corn in it last season. And across the brown furrows, worn by winter’s edge and speckled with cut stalks, my memory brought forth a time within childhood. A time where I sat upon my grandfather’s lap, in his recovered, brown lazy boy chair next to the picture window looking over the cornfield next to his house. His chair was always a bit stale and musty. The footrest had a bottle of whiskey in it that he received at Christmas, and it took him to the following Christmas to finish it. A little snort once in a while was all.
Corn stalks waved firmly in the summer afternoon winds. And, this field stood for something, like my grandfather. A firm man, whose hands were too large for a wedding ring, and yet not overweight. He was a master plumber in a time that rewarded men for hard, honest work, not relegating it to near-do-wells and filling it with shame. He retired in his early forties, making money in real estate, even during the Great Depression. There was no shame in it.
He was not perfect; my grandmother was sure to tell you that a time or three. “Your grandfather,” she’d say in a voice that quivered from age, “only said ‘I do’ once in his life, and that was when we got married. Ever since then he says ‘you do.’”
And for some reason, unbeknownst to me as a child, my parents didn’t find it funny when we’d pass gas like my grandfather did.
He was famous for sleeping in his lazy boy, falling asleep somewhere around early evening, snoring to shake the rafters. Of which my grandmother would yell at him, because she could not hear the television or the conversation, “Johnny, roll over.”
Couple of snorts, a bit of harrumph, and he’d roll onto his side, fart, proclaim, “you did that,” and then go back to sleep. Of course my sister and I thought it was quite funny, and every once in a while you’d catch my parents smirk when they thought we were not looking. But, this lost its charm when we did it. My father would remind us of the disciplinarian my grandfather was when he was a younger man and shaping a family. He had to do this at one point in life.
Yet none of this silliness really mattered when it came to what was important and why cornfields are important. Or, why the simplicity and the straightforwardness of the countryside is what often shape a man.
I have spent much of my life, traveling the backcountry roads, to discover where America, life, simplicity, remembrance and God all intersect. It is a search for simplicity and understanding.
Yet, in the simplicity of youth, I had not realized my discovery might have happened years ago when sitting on the old gray wood farm wagon that rested beneath the 100-year-old maple tree in the back yard. The cornfields surrounded this, as well.
To this day, as if it was just yesterday and I was ten, I remember sitting next to my grandfather on this wagon, counting the number of train cars as they passed in the distance, the heat waves made them look wrinkled. There was nothing extraordinary about this, except the fact that we spoke about simple things and enjoyed simple aspects of living.
The barns across the quiet country road my grandparents lived on were filled with life as birds called to one another in the hot, late summer air of Michigan. You could smell the decomposing hay and dripping diesel when you got close to these structures. They etched the farmland with their fading red, weathered wood. Americana persisted here, or was at least struggling to hang on here, as time slowly peeled away the layers of strength these structures once held.
Americana persisted beneath the maple tree, too, as we threw rotten tomatoes in the field from his garden, or stuffed ourselves with grapes and raspberries from the vines and bushes that edged their property. And somehow I think that is why I now grow blueberries and have old barns that smell of decomposing hay because these all represent something: childhood and simplicity. My Americana.
But stories have an end and a beginning, all at the same time. He died in his lazy boy chair. Though memory is sometimes whitewashed; I think my mother told me he was lying on his side, like he always was when he’d roll over. That meant he was facing the cornfield…I think his soul waves within the stalks as they bow to the summer winds.
And I have walked amongst the stalks, in August, with my children. Hoping to remember, and hoping to pass along the same simplicity I received many years past.
The story begins once more.
within a summer’s wind
the corn waved its silence
as a distant train passed by
unnoticed,
yet it bellowed
to prevent trespassers
from crossing its path.
and there was a wonderment of eyes
that my sister and I had
as we sat upon
grandfather’s lap
counting its cars.
there was a also a simplicity
and a complexity
at the very same time.
everything was
just as it should be.
but today,
nothing is the same.
the realms of silence
tell us nothing more
than that which we hope to see,
comprehend,
and remember….
-------------------------
John
There are points in time that permanently fixate themselves within the depths of the mind, and yet bring themselves to the forefront of memory upon a single thought. Whether it is about a death or about a life, those thoughts are as vivid as the visuals in front of you today.
I passed a barren field yesterday; it had corn in it last season. And across the brown furrows, worn by winter’s edge and speckled with cut stalks, my memory brought forth a time within childhood. A time where I sat upon my grandfather’s lap, in his recovered, brown lazy boy chair next to the picture window looking over the cornfield next to his house. His chair was always a bit stale and musty. The footrest had a bottle of whiskey in it that he received at Christmas, and it took him to the following Christmas to finish it. A little snort once in a while was all.
Corn stalks waved firmly in the summer afternoon winds. And, this field stood for something, like my grandfather. A firm man, whose hands were too large for a wedding ring, and yet not overweight. He was a master plumber in a time that rewarded men for hard, honest work, not relegating it to near-do-wells and filling it with shame. He retired in his early forties, making money in real estate, even during the Great Depression. There was no shame in it.
He was not perfect; my grandmother was sure to tell you that a time or three. “Your grandfather,” she’d say in a voice that quivered from age, “only said ‘I do’ once in his life, and that was when we got married. Ever since then he says ‘you do.’”
And for some reason, unbeknownst to me as a child, my parents didn’t find it funny when we’d pass gas like my grandfather did.
He was famous for sleeping in his lazy boy, falling asleep somewhere around early evening, snoring to shake the rafters. Of which my grandmother would yell at him, because she could not hear the television or the conversation, “Johnny, roll over.”
Couple of snorts, a bit of harrumph, and he’d roll onto his side, fart, proclaim, “you did that,” and then go back to sleep. Of course my sister and I thought it was quite funny, and every once in a while you’d catch my parents smirk when they thought we were not looking. But, this lost its charm when we did it. My father would remind us of the disciplinarian my grandfather was when he was a younger man and shaping a family. He had to do this at one point in life.
Yet none of this silliness really mattered when it came to what was important and why cornfields are important. Or, why the simplicity and the straightforwardness of the countryside is what often shape a man.
I have spent much of my life, traveling the backcountry roads, to discover where America, life, simplicity, remembrance and God all intersect. It is a search for simplicity and understanding.
Yet, in the simplicity of youth, I had not realized my discovery might have happened years ago when sitting on the old gray wood farm wagon that rested beneath the 100-year-old maple tree in the back yard. The cornfields surrounded this, as well.
To this day, as if it was just yesterday and I was ten, I remember sitting next to my grandfather on this wagon, counting the number of train cars as they passed in the distance, the heat waves made them look wrinkled. There was nothing extraordinary about this, except the fact that we spoke about simple things and enjoyed simple aspects of living.
The barns across the quiet country road my grandparents lived on were filled with life as birds called to one another in the hot, late summer air of Michigan. You could smell the decomposing hay and dripping diesel when you got close to these structures. They etched the farmland with their fading red, weathered wood. Americana persisted here, or was at least struggling to hang on here, as time slowly peeled away the layers of strength these structures once held.
Americana persisted beneath the maple tree, too, as we threw rotten tomatoes in the field from his garden, or stuffed ourselves with grapes and raspberries from the vines and bushes that edged their property. And somehow I think that is why I now grow blueberries and have old barns that smell of decomposing hay because these all represent something: childhood and simplicity. My Americana.
But stories have an end and a beginning, all at the same time. He died in his lazy boy chair. Though memory is sometimes whitewashed; I think my mother told me he was lying on his side, like he always was when he’d roll over. That meant he was facing the cornfield…I think his soul waves within the stalks as they bow to the summer winds.
And I have walked amongst the stalks, in August, with my children. Hoping to remember, and hoping to pass along the same simplicity I received many years past.
The story begins once more.
EjG
