This week I paid a fortune (in gas) to go back to my roots; the trip was well worth it. Memories like diamonds glistened as the kids and I traveled back west to my hometown Iredell-population 336. I showed the kids where I went to school and where I taught when Hayden was just a baby. I showed them the old grocery store where I worked as a teen. I remember getting my first rose from Jason working there one Sunday. Jason and I bought our first house in Iredell.
We drove by my Granny's house and took pictures in front of my dad's air filter shop. Both structures are aging. But it is the cracked paint and crumbling stone which reveal a history rich in beauty.
It is in my Granny's house that I remember baking my first (and only ) apple pies. I took the kids down the now overgrown road where my cousin and I sold those apple pies. I recounted how Leah and I had just rounded the corner when we watched our first customer feed her apple pie to her horse. It was at that moment we wondered if we might should have peeled the apples.
My dad's shop is where I learned to work; I mean the kind of work that brings about sweat. I can remember the feeling of pride upon receiving payment that was well-earned. I smile thinking that my impatience is inherited from my dad as I hear his voice in my ear urging me to move faster. "The sun is going burn out in a hundred million years, You'll be finishing in the dark... " he would say as he urged me to make filters faster. The old smells of chipboard dust which once held no meaning now fill my senses with sweet memories.
We took a trip to Hico to see Jason's grandmother who we fondly refer to as Bebe. In the tree out front the banana fairy didn't disappoint. Regardless of the weather she faithfully leaves a banana in the front yard for each kid. And as always Bebe's dining room table was dressed finely as if to greet us. The kids and I scanned each wall looking at old pictures, not to miss the one of their dad at the age of four wearing a Texas-size bow tie and tux.
On to Brownwood with my mom in tow, we spent time with my sister and her family. We visited with Meme and Grandad. I hardly think about them without reflecting how time at their house always resembles the feeding of the five thousand. There is always room and food for one more in their little cabin.
I sit now in the house where I grew up.
It seems smaller now though the memories created here loom large in my mind. Tomorrow morning we'll pack up and drive down the bumpy dirt road that takes us to town. The dust beneath us, like the memories deep within us will be stirred and rise -forming a trailing cloud. Slowly as we approach the paved road, the dust will settle. And it will wait. Because we'll be back.