Granny Mitchell's House

When my children are my age, they may have vague memories of one of their great-grandparents. I, on the other hand, have vivid memories of 3. Yesterday, as I watched my husband climb the stairs to the back porch of my Granny Mitchell's house, my mind was flooded with memories of the times I spent there.

There were memories of the way that porch (or actually the one that was there before) was wrapped in black tarpaper, or at least heavy duty garbage bags, that blocked out all light. My four-year-old self, climbing those stairs with trepidation, holding tightly to my mom's hand, while the sound of my pounding heart was greeted by the slow jingle of Bouncy's dog chain. I'm not certain how many encounters that old dog and I had, but I never knew what color he was or how big he was, because our only meetings were there in the darkness, with the sound of his movements and the smell of his dog-ness, just before Granny would open the screen door. With the opening of the door, there was an invitation into another world.

In Granny's house there was a record player which often produced the sounds of The Chuck Wagon Gang singing songs like "I'd Rather Have Jesus" or "I'll Fly Away" and Granny would always let you know when you should sing along and when you should just sit quietly and "listen at how good that sounds."

In Granny's front room the furniture was wrapped in plastic that your legs would stick to in summer and there was the most marvelous pump organ with a stool that twisted so you could go up and down. One of the great benefits of beginning piano lessons in second grade was that Granny would invite my sister and me to play for her. At the time it was a team effort. One of us would sit in the floor to "pump" while the other would play and then we'd trade positions. Granny would saddle up to that organ and sing tunes like "Humpback Mule" as her feet would pump and her fingers would move easily from key to key. She would smile and cackle and the Topps snuff would trickle down the creases at the corner of her mouth, but we weren't disgusted, we were entertained. After a few songs Granny might invite you to the kitchen for a little snack.

In Granny's kitchen you could expect to get a glass of cold, almost sweet, well water in a little jelly jar or other "fancy" cup. She'd also offer you something warm from the stove if it was close to lunch or dinner time. It might be green beans and potatoes with "just a little bit of pork" (about half her pinky finger's length, to be exact), or Spanish rice. But if you were there between meals, she might just bring out the Nutter Butter cookies wrapped in tin/aluminum foil (one of my cousins was convinced for years that "Granny made those little peanut shaped cookies" since she never got them out of a package, only out of the foil).

In spring Granny would walk around the yard with you, stopping by the wild strawberry patch to pick some of the tiniest and tastiest berries I've ever had. If the flowers were in bloom, she'd help make a bouquet of hydrangeas, forsythia, Cherokee roses, and whatever else grew in her yard. Then she'd wrap the stems in wet paper towels and a layer of tin foil around that to "keep 'em fresh." She might sit with you for awhile on the front porch, rocking in the green chairs that bumped forward and back since the rockers weren't quite a smooth curve. That's when she would tell tales of the wampus cat, the ghost on Poole mountain, or slunks that were "lookin' for little girls your age just to snatch up quick as lightnin' and ne'er been seen again." It was on Granny's front porch that I first remember hearing the word "rape", but as a five-year-old, I had no idea what that could possibly mean. I just knew it was awful from the way Granny said it. My best understanding was that it had something to do with a rake and it made me fearful of any men that ever came to collect pine straw from the acres of loblolly pines that surrounded our home.

On rare occasions, Granny might let you come into the front bedroom. I don't think she ever actually slept there. If she walked with you to the front bedroom, it meant she might pull some dresses out of the closet or let you try on jewelry from her jewelry box. I don't remember ever seeing her in any of those dresses or wearing any of that jewelry, but there are pictures that show that she did. I remember her wearing house dresses with a flannel shirt over top.

My Granny Mitchell was quite a character. She was an excellent story teller. She "fear(ed) the Good Lord" but I think she feared life more. She had quite a sense of humor and more than a few eccentricities. When I see her house now, from the outside looking quite similar to the way it did many years ago, I wonder what other memories those walls hold. It's kind of like Granny in her later years, after Alzheimer's had captured most of her mind. It has known many things and been witness to many changes over the years, and yet it sits, silently, as time continues to wear away various parts.