Wild mountain boys

 

“We didn’t get much meat in the depression. If we got a ham, mom would hang it up over the table on a rope, and us boys would fight it out to get bites” That was how my dad told it, anyway. Pretty sure that was a tall tail. But many of the stories were not that light hearted. 

Nine boys would be a lot to deal with in any time and place. This was during hard times. They had a good sized garden, but being in town limited raising animals or hunting. Their dad had a steady job setting up the tooling at a furniture factory. He also took on extra work in his small blacksmith shop out back. 

Grandma had that old time holiness religion. That came with a lot of restrictions. One time my dad brought home a library book, and his mom threw it in the stove, burned that devil book, because it wasn’t The Bible. My dad had to find odd jobs and pay the library back himself. 

One day when they went to sit for dinner, one of the boys pulled the chair out from under another one. When he fell, it caused some kind of spinal damage. He lived a shortened life in bed. I was told they never had the doctor for him, only prayer. I don’t know if that was a decision made based on religion or finances. 

I never could keep the stories straight between the names. I’m not sure I ever even met some of the uncles. I can’t remember which ones had lost finger parts. 

One day, some of the boys were out in the woods, messing around with a hatchet. Somehow one of them got half a finger chopped off. So they buried the finger and wrapped a rag around the stub and kept it secret. 

A few days later, sitting at the supper table, that brother just fell over on the floor. He fainted and was burning up with a fever. The wound was badly infected. 

Church ladies were called in and they cleaned it up and bandaged it. They laid on hands and prayed. But the fever persisted. One of the ladies asked “When you boys buried that finger, what direction was it pointing?” 

Well, they looked at each other puzzled. So they were ordered to go out and dig it back up and make sure to bury it pointing north. Everyone knew it wouldn’t heal otherwise. Must be true, or prayer, or plain old luck; because the boy survived. 

Because they had an extra lot, they sometimes rented out part of it for a tent revival. An itinerant preacher would come through with his old tent and preach and take up collections. My dad didn’t have much respect for them. He said they would preach against makeup and jewelry and pass the collection plate to hungry people. The whole time there was the preacher’s wife all dressed up wearing makeup and jewelry. 

My uncle Everette was playing around one day while his mom and a neighbor lady sat talking in the shade of the tent. My uncle noticed a hole in the canvas. He had some matches and figured he could burn off the threads and keep it from getting bigger. Of course, it caught on fire. 

“Mama! Mama!” he shouted. But with all those rowdy boys, she didn’t listen. “Mama! Mama! MAMA!!!” He persisted and began to jump around in panic. Still, she ignored him. 

Up the hill a lady called from her porch “Mrs. Co-oombs! Ye’r tent’s on far!”  She finally heard that. Thankfully, no one was injured that time, and the tent survived. Of course, he got a good beating that night. 

Good beating, what a sad phrase. They laughed later, but much of it was horrifying. My dad and the uncles I got to know were not left unscarred. They drank a lot, had unpredictable tempers, and problems with relationships. They also served during WWII. Poverty, abuse, and war; trauma that was barely understood during their lifetime. 

Some people think kids today need to be beaten more. They don’t believe in the long term damages caused by trauma. They think kindness and encouragement makes kids too soft, spoiled. I have spent most of my life trying to overcome the scars such thinking left on my heart and mind, a few on my body.  I think it might be time to try more love and compassion. Maybe we can have some happier stories to tell.