Dirt Road

Where the Pavement Ends Grandma's House Begins.

A wood stove, broken down barn, a garden, jars of M&M's and other assorted candy, same spots on the floor creaks, same wallpaper since at least the 1970's, and Fox news. We call her Memaw, always have.

Vegan diets, smoothies, 4am mornings, smell of dew on freshly cut grass.

Fire wood cutting, ranking it, jeans and sneakers. I may have only been able to carry a few pieces of wood at a time, but I made many trips.

Pantyhose, heels, slips under long skirts, fancy sparkly jewelry...

I use to say the smell of a dirty dusty car smells like home, but it really just smells like my grandfather. He was a plumber his entire life. Black calloused hands and finger tips, no matter how much he washed them. He didn't smell bad, just earthy.

He drove F-150s, and I always thought the radio was broken in every car he had. My pappy doesn't listen to music, probably from his Mennonite upbringing, and now in his later years, his hearing is gone. If mentioned, he'd sing you a crazy song and whistle. He wasn't much of a singer, though I think he intentionally sung off tune. He always got you to laugh from his silly singing; very old school.

I've always known this rocking chair for as long as I've lived. I was rocked countless times in it as a child.

He always calls me Pirsten. {P-ear-stin] You know my name, but with a "P" and not "K". My personal nickname. Unless he was serious, which has only happened a few times. Once, after my suicide attempt at their home, he used my first name and told me he didn't want anything to happen to me with angry yet calm tears in his eyes.

I don't know why he got three daughters, his farm-boy life style really fit the need of sons with muscles. My aunts and mother have complained a lot of their up bringing; about how mean and angry he always was. Luckily that isn't the grandfather I know. He has always been gentle and silly with his grandkids. Sadly, he still treats my grandmother poorly. I'm not sure if the women in his life really softened him at all. I wonder how much of this impacted my mother and aunts in their love lives? Did this play a role in who they choose to marry? I know seeing my mother in her third domestic violent marriage as well as one aunt also having a marriage end from domestic violence definitively makes me question things.

If you search the back bed room closets, you will find old clothing, not worn in years, still in their plastic covers from the dry cleaning! Typical grandma stuff. While dating my grandmother, my grandfather bought her all sorts of things, including genuine fur coats and fine jewelry. You'll probably find a gun or two hidden in there, too. He collects them. I say he hoards them. He was the owner of Wilson's Gun and Trap before retiring, where he mostly just displayed his dusty collection "for sale". He was known for not selling much, apparently his prices were ridiculous. A mountain man indeed. People say if my grandfather never married, he'd be a hermit. With his now poor health, he'd likely be dead by now and no one would have known it. Just a man with his dog in the mountains.

My Grandmother's 80's hair bows!

My grandmother was the office secretary for their two businesses: Wilson's Gun and Trap, and Fred's Plumbing and Heating, typing away her days while answering phone calls for plumbing emergencies. She kept snacks like dried banana chips, raw cashews and Gibbles potato chips near by, in addition to bottles of lotion and finger nail polish. Her nails were almost always painted. This was in the same building my grandfather displayed his old collection. He liked cookie jars, crystal kitchen wear, glass oil lamp shades, and giant crocks. The crocks were filled with bear and coon traps, old dead spiders and newspapers. Why did he collect so many newspapers?

I remember once one summer day when we were off of school, he commissioned my brother and I to cut out all the food recipes from his hundreds of oldnews papers while we were in his shop all day. He said it was for my grandmother, though I've never seen her use a newspaper recipe before. We were promised pay, so of course we listened. It took hours, and by the end we were tired, there was a mess of cut up newspapers and our fingers were black from the transfer of ink. We went to let him know that we had finished and were ready to be paid, only to be taught a lesson to "always discuss payment before you start work." We weren't paid that day, and we were really confused. But I suppose that was just his ploy to keep his grandkids busy and out of trouble for the day.

There was a single bathroom in the back of my grandparents "shop" down a long hallway that was small. My grandmother kept it clean, but to this day it has been the only bathroom I've been in that had shag carpet. It was a working man's bathroom, not my grandmother's stylish standard. I remember it always being hot as hell in there because she put a space heater in a 3.5ft by 5ft bathroom with a sink. You had to leave the door cracked as to not to break a sweat taking a poop! My grandparents were two totally different people, yet they got along somehow.

I remember sitting with my grandfather in his truck on the way home. He was mad about not being given the correct change at the local grocery store. His words: "that n*gger didn't give me my nickle." My grandmother referred to "Brazil nuts" as "n*igger toes". I was 12 and in middle school when I learned that those passed down words for a tree nut are totally wrong and offensive. Yup, my grandparents are racists. And there isn't much I can do about it but let them know when they say things like that, I don't appreciate it.

New Years Eve smelled of Old Bay. The kitchen table was covered in black trash bags for the huge crab and shrimp feast they held every year. Us kids hid in the basement, away from the terrible smell, watching the NYC New Year's Eve with Dick Clarke on TV. I still, to this day, hate Old Bay seasoning and do not eat things that live in the ocean/water. The basement was their entertainment place, with their sofas and TV. So many VHS's. On the other side of the basement was more of my grandfather's hoarding. It was a cement floor and unfinished walls. One upright, very tall freezer, and one chest freezer, for all his food and dead animal collecting. I remember opening the freezer and seeing a paw and toenails.... it was a racoon. Ugh. My grandfather is a weirdo. Some of this area has since been remodeled a bit and has a beautiful finished wood bathroom, as if out of a Log Cabin catalog. I couldn't find any photos, so that will be in an edit in the future.

You could always find my pap outside working in the garden, feeding the deer and birds or tinkering with something. He wasn't one for sitting still. He loved to grow sun flowers, tomatoes, corn and zucchinis. Those are the veggies I remember most.

I'm told that I have unusually vivid detailed memories of my childhood, as if I'm unaware.... One of my favorite memories of my pappy and I was when he would take me alone on drives and trips home and to work. He once looked over at me and asked "How old are you now, hoss?" I said "Nine!" He replied "You're getting so big, so what grade does that make you?" I replied " 3rd grade." I remember having a tear in my eye during that short conversation. I don't know why, but that was the year my parents divorced, so it was likely just comforting to have an adult ask how I was doing. It was so simple, but that is my memory now.

A similar experience happened later when I was a teenager. I had spent the night over at their home. I'd usually wear one of my grandmothers old big T-shirts and she'd say as she'd close the bedroom door, "say your prayers," and I always did. My grandmother and I bonded over our religion when the rest of my immediate family stopped going after the divorce. I was her closest relative that went to church, usually in my own city, but sometimes with her. For as long as I can remember, my grandfather never went to church, except for the occasional Easter and Christmas. And one morning after the sleep over, my pap was about to take me to school on his way to work. The sun was rising and I leaned against this

wall (in photo) with my forearms on top, just staring at the tops of the trees, listening to the birds chirp. He saw me admiring the morning and he said "Whatcha doin', hoss?" I was a bit embarrassed caught doing nothing and replied "ahhh, looking at the tree's..." He said calmly "it's pretty, ain't it?" and smiled for a second before he asked me if I was all packed and ready and for me to get in the truck.

Some people didn't grow up with grandparents. Longevity and hard work runs in my family. And at 26 years old I still have all three sets of grandparents. I think I'm okay with that.

My grandmothers cat, Precious

Special Thanks to my editor: MC_hammer