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Posts Tagged ‘Baw’

Come play in the deep end

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on November 7, 2012 | 12 Comments »

“Do you remember being the only little White girl who would swim in the public pool?”

Three times in as many months I have been asked this question by as many hometown African American lady friends.

The answer? Honestly? No.

“Do you remember teaching the Black kids how to swim?”

Sort of. I remember that if you couldn’t swim, you couldn’t play in the deep end. You couldn’t play with me. I remember that I was lucky enough to get swimming lessons. I remember that everybody’s Mama and Daddy couldn’t afford to give them lessons every summer.

Here’s what else I remember. I remember that I lived right across the street from the swimming pool – the cat bird seat, if you will. I remember that it was a sparkling oasis of ice cold, blue chlorination in an otherwise miserably hot, dry South Alabama town. I remember that I had a lot of friends and we played Marco Polo, and raced, and did crazy dives off the diving board.

I remember that if my grandfather took me to the creek, there were no other children to play with. It was just me. And Baw. And the river.

Now that you mention it, though, most of those pool friends were, indeed, Black. Now that you mention it, I do remember getting called nasty names, names that I will not repeat, because of who my friends were. Now that you mention it, I didn’t care what those hateful people said then — and I don’t care now. They weren’t going to change me. They weren’t going to stop me from playing with my friends. They weren’t going to stop me from going to the pool.

I remember thinking, how sad for them that they feel that way. How sad that they would deny themselves the fun of the public pool because of their prejudice. How sad that they would give up a whole afternoon of playing with some of the most fun people I knew just because of the color of their skin.

Back then, back in the early 70s, a few people felt compelled to say hateful, ugly things, but they had to approach me, look me in the eye, and speak their awful words out loud. They had to risk the possibility of a swift kick in the shins. Now though, thanks to social media, people are able to spew their vitriol right out in public for all the world to see — a glowing screen separating them from the real world and the black and blue consequences. And spew they do. Freely. Recklessly. Thoughtlessly.

Freedom of Speech is a right that we all have. It is a right I am thankful for, just like I am thankful for all of the freedoms we are granted by virtue of the fact that we are Americans. Freedoms that are unique to us, to the United States. Freedoms that many, many other people would give anything for. But just because you have this right, doesn’t mean you have to exercise it. As Granny used to say, sometimes it is better to be quiet and thought a fool than to open your mouth and prove it.

This election season, played out on Facebook, has shown me an unprecedented amount of ignorance, selfishness, and hate. I have seen some of the most disgusting displays of prejudice — racial, gender, economical, sexual orientation — you name it. Forget about the least of these! Forget about loving thy neighbor as thyself! To hell with you, Samaritan!

Well I wasn’t raised that way. I was raised by a Mother who took groceries to shut-ins no matter what side of the tracks they lived on. I was raised by a Father who taught English at a historically Black community college during the Civil Rights era. They instilled in me that you should help those who could not help themselves without question, without judgment. I was raised to stand up for what I thought was right and to defend those weaker than me. I was raised to treat everyone – old, young, Black, White, rich, poor – with courtesy and with respect. I was raised at the pool.

Don’t be alone at the river. Alone with hate, greed, and prejudice. Why don’t you come to the pool and play in the deep end with me?

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Happy Easter…now go stand by that bush

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on April 7, 2012 | Leave a Comment »

As I look back through the photographic record of my childhood, I see a distinct pattern.

To commemorate most every special occasion, I was hauled out in the yard, strategically placed in front of something blooming with seasonal flowers, and commanded to stare into the sun until my retinas burned away, all while trying to smile and not look too sweaty and miserable.

Me and the azaleas

Easter was an especially good holiday for playing fauna to so much spring flora as the azaleas, daffodils, sweetheart roses, and all manner of other gaudy horticulture would be in full bloom. Which makes me wonder sometimes – was the picture really about me as the cute, blonde and all-around irresistibly adorable and charming first granddaughter or was it about the damn azaleas?

Brother maintains that because flash bulbs were so expensive, there was really no other option if one wanted to capture the moment we all got dressed up in our Sunday best to celebrate the resurrection of our Lord and Savior. You had to leave the dark recesses of your dwelling and venture out into the harsh light of day in order to even get a clear picture. I counter that high holidays are just an excuse to immortalize the yard of the month on Kodachrome.

Looking back through even older photos as well, the subjects often do not look terribly happy to be in the picture

Baw and the azaleas

and seem almost secondary to a more important subject, say a horseless wagon. Their squinty demeanors tell me that they too seem to have been commanded to stare directly into the sun in order to properly accentuate the real subject of interest.

In these days of camera phones, Facebook, Instagram and the overwhelming compulsion to share every mundane event, like what I ate for lunch, in all it’s photographic, plastic fork glory, are photographs even special anymore? In fact, once I am gratified by the image on the screen, I find I am hard pressed to ever get prints made.

I have fabulous images of my life…on my phone…on my computer. But what will Sonny have? A box full of yellowed, wonderfully smelly prints of him standing by random bushes? Unfortunately, I doubt it. His childhood will be immortalized in cyberspace or on an obsolete hard drive. It will be password protected.

Granny, me, and a flowering bush

It’s hard to get above your raisin’s though. That’s why every Easter (and first day of school, and Halloween, and 4th of July…) I too drag my child out into the yard, strategically place him on the front steps, and command him to look dapper and happy while staring directly into a ball of fire and trying not to perspire. “Smile,” I bark in the true spirit of Christian charity and motherly devotion, “For the love of Pete, stop squinting and smile!”

After all, nothing says Happy Easter like standing in the yard by a bush and wondering if you’ll be seeing spots all the way to church.

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A Brownie no more

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on January 16, 2012 | 4 Comments »

It’s that time of year again. The time when smart little girls dressed in sashes heavy with the badges of their accomplishment implore you to fund their pursuit of “courage, confidence and character” through the purchase of sweet treats – Girl Scout cookies.

The Brownie Handbook (Photo from bibliocycle: http://www.etsy.com/shop/bibliocycle).

And it is at this time every year I am reminded of one of my greatest failures. My failure to become a Brownie.

When I was about 7 or 8 years old, someone in Citronelle decided to start a Brownie troop. We were to meet once a week at the Citronelle Baptist Assembly (now Camp Whispering Pines) to learn how to be resourceful, clever, and creative young women. We also got to have cookies and Kool-aid, de rigueur for any social gathering of the time.

I went to the first few meetings, received a handbook, and raised my two little fingers heavenward and fervently recited the Brownie Creed:

On my honor, I will try:
To serve God and my country,
To help people at all times,
And to live by the Girl Scout Law.

I was sincere. I was earnest in my study of the manual. I wanted desperately to become the responsible young girl in the illustrations – kind to animals and the elderly, able to create a tourniquet under duress, adept at identifying indigenous trees by their bark.

I remember well the day of my downfall. The day I knew my hopes of sewing and fire-building badges would never come to fruition.  The day I knew that I would never proudly wear the smart brown jumper and striped blouse with the Peter Pan collar. The day I knew I could never become a Brownie.

A page from the Brownie Handbook (Photo from bibliocycle: http://www.etsy.com/shop/bibliocycle).

The end came with these words, “You girls will be excited to know that we are planning a camp-out on the banks of beautiful Lake Chautauqua.”

A camp-out? Outside!? I was immediately filled with dread and horror.

Now many of you may think that because I come from the country, the far-flung recesses of Mobile County, that I just love to sleep out of doors,  on the ground, staring blissfully up into the heavens while the crickets chirp and the little froggies sing their songs.

You would be wrong. It is precisely because I am from the country, the far-flung recesses of Mobile County, that I do not, and will not, sleep out of doors, especially by a brackish, murky body of water.

As our apparently fearless, and obviously deranged, leader went on to explain how we would start fires and roast marshmallows and tell stories, all I could think of was the time when Baw* and I were fishing at my cousin Sister’s pond. We were sitting out on her little pier drowning some worms and having a ball when Sister’s husband Jesse came down to visit. As the men stood on the bank and chatted, I continued to fish, dangling my little toes off the edge of the dock.

The next thing I knew, Baw yanked me up by my overall straps and flung me up onto the grass while Jesse began to frantically beat at the water’s edge with an oar. It was moccasins, you see. A nest of moccasins. Mere feet from where my little piggies had been.

Then there was the time when Baw and I were swimming at Puppy Creek. Tired of playing in the water, I was digging clay out of the bank with which to fashion little cups and saucers so that we could have a tea party. Baw was sitting in his harvest gold folding chair about thirty feet away watching me.

Now Baw always carried his pistol with him when we went to the Creek. After all, you just never knew what sort of person might wander up. River people. I never really thought much about him carrying a gun until this day when I heard him say calmly and quietly but in a tone I had never heard before, “Stand up slowly. Don’t look behind you. And come to me. Now.”

I looked over at him, and the gun was leveled in my direction. As I did as he had told me, “POW!” Baw had fired and shot the head off a cotton-mouth that had crept up right behind me.

As if this weren’t enough, I knew all about the rattlers, alligators, wild boars, bobcats, and black bears that shared our woods with us. Not to mention the less menacing but still disturbing armadillos, skunks, fire ants, and mosquitoes, all of which were guaranteed to be spending a warm summer night on the banks of bucolic Lake Chautauqua with a horde of little girls and their crumbs and noise and Kool-aid. A positive siren song for disaster.

Not me. Not then. Not now.

For you see, it was at that moment that I realized I was really only in it for the beanie, and beanies can be bought. Common sense cannot.

 

*”Baw” is what I called my maternal grandfather.

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Talking to the dead

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on January 11, 2012 | Leave a Comment »

I recently found myself alone in a car traveling a bleak and rainy back road with the ashes of a man whom I have never met. Alone for two hours.

“What did you do?” said my friend, as I relayed to her my somewhat odd circumstance.

“I talked to him,” I answered, honestly.

I mean, what else are you going to do? It seemed impolite to do otherwise.

So we (or, rather, I, since it seemed to be a decidedly one-sided conversation) discussed the inclement weather, his new home, and some general current events. I wondered if he already knew what was happening, but since he didn’t interrupt me, I carried on. We (or I) sang along to the radio some as well. After all, two hours is a long time to keep up an amiable social discourse.

You would think my friend might be vaguely surprised that I had spent the better part of two hours chatting away with an urn, maybe even shocked. But she was actually only vaguely amused. She had, after all, implored her husband to dig up her beloved cat’s carcass and move it across two states to their new home in Alabama. He obliged because he, like we all do, understands that Southerners seem to have a unique relationship and fascination with their dead. It’s almost as if they are not. Not really.

For instance, I called Mama shortly before Christmas to coordinate our holiday festivities. High on her list of things to do was getting fresh flowers to the cemetery to decorate the graves of her parents and Daddy’s. And when I say high, I mean high, as in after shopping but before menu and wardrobe planning. After all, everyone needs some Christmas cheer even if they are looking down on it from Heaven. Or up, as the case may be, but we always hope down.

When I was a little girl, Mama, Granny and I spent endless hours in old country cemeteries searching for the final resting places of distant relatives. They would recount generational relationships with such detail and accuracy that it made I Chronicles seem dubious in its recounting. We would also examine the graves of strangers and try to figure out who they must have been in relationship to their neighbors and what their lives must have been like. Lost children. War dead. Widows. All with real lives to be imagined and stories to be told.

Later on, after visits home from college, before I drove back, I would always stop by Pinecrest Cemetery to talk to Baw for a little while. Then I would drive over to Mt. Nebo and say hey to Sarah, my childhood caregiver. I would brush away the debris and the occasional errant fire-ant from their headstones, pull a weed or two, and be on my way assured that they were watching over me as a traveled. Who needs therapy when you can air out all your problems to a marble slab and invariably come around to a solution?

Southerners remember and recognize the birth dates and anniversaries of the dearly departed. We celebrate them, even if for a fleeting moment, as if they were still with us. In the case of those taken too soon, we imagine what they would be doing had they lived. For the elderly, we are thankful for the end of suffering, pain, and dementia and imagine their great reward found in a land of cloudless day.

We plan ahead for Decoration Day so that we can make our rounds to visit everyone. We surround ourselves with their belongings. Granny’s wedding ring. Pawpaw’s shotgun. A crocheted doily. A family Bible with notes scrawled in the margins. We remember our loved ones in the prime of their lives. Happy. Healthy. Carefree.

In the South, with its history of war and poverty, disaster and disease, death is just as sure as the fact that grits is always plural. We’ve learned to cope with and even embrace the inevitable with resignation, respect, and, often, humor. Is there really any other choice?

I had seen pictures of my traveling companion as a young man. Blonde and tanned. Wearing his military uniform. Holding his baby daughter. It was this person with whom I talked during that long car trip from Georgia, not the inanimate jar of dusty remains strapped into the passenger seat. Had he lived, he would have been my father-in-law, and I wanted to make a good impression.

I know it may seem odd, but you know you do it too. It’s really perfectly natural. At least in the South.

Until they start talking back, that is.

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Happy New Year and pass the innards, please.

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , on December 30, 2011 | 2 Comments »

Y’all know I’m about as Southern as they come. And those of us reared below (way below) the Mason-Dixon Line are defined by many aspects of our culture, chief amongst them being our traditional foods. But one thing that I have never been able to stomach, literally or figuratively, is the idea of eating innards.

Yes, I said it. Innards. In-erdz, which are defined as “the internal parts of the body, entrails or viscera.” Yum.

Now I understand that New Year’s day is a time to partake of the symbolic food item. I get that greens represent monetary good fortune. I will douse them in pepper sauce and lap them right on up. I will feast on the humble black-eyed pea, which is said to swell with prosperity as it is cooked. And I will more than likely indulge in a bit of bacon or some other sort of innocuous processed pork product so that I will forever move forward just as our porcine friends do as they root.

But I will not, cannot, ingest an innard. Tradition be damned.

I remember Granny and Baw were often known to ring in the New Year by enjoying a big steaming plate of brains and eggs for breakfast. Brains, y’all. Not bacon, not sausage – brains. The very idea is enough to put me off breakfast entirely. Scrambled eggs are just fine on their own, even runny ones. But mix them up with chunks of gray matter, and…well…there’s just not enough ketchup in the world to disguise that.

And I must apologize to all of you lovers of the chitterling, or “chitlin” as they are commonly called. I have smelled them cooking and cannot overcome it. I have eaten some truly foul-smelling cheeses that turned out to be just divine once you got them past the olfactory gland, but between my knowledge of this particular innard’s function and its fragrant nature, I’ll just have to say “no thank you, ma’am.”

Now Mama and Daddy will surely spend the first day of the year as they always do – indulging in head cheese or souse. Now there are two words that I firmly believe should never, ever be used in conjunction. They are “meat” and “jelly,” which is just what souse is – a meat jelly. The long and short of it is this: you cook the creature’s head until all the remaining meat bits give up the ghost and fall into the stock which will then congeal due to the natural gelatins in the skull. My parents will sprinkle some vinegar over this cold, pink gelatinous slab of meat goo (because that makes it better, she says as she rolls her eyes to the heavens) and gobble it up! Not me, brother.

Now I will confess to have eaten, when I was very young in the pre-nugget days, a pickled pig’s foot or two, but that is more of an extremity than an innard. I have very nearly relished a vienna sausage perched atop a Saltine cracker, but that was on a fishing trip. And I really don’t even mind the occasional smear of pate’, but I was in a foreign country. It is there, however, that I must draw the line.

If it looks like an innard and smells like an innard, then by Granny it must be an innard. And somehow I just can’t get my arms up around the fact that eating innards will bring you anything more than a swift gag reflex, much less a whole year’s worth of happiness, health and prosperity.

Which is exactly what I wish for all of you, dear readers. And thank you for reading my little stories, sharing your thoughts and memories, and indulging me in this little folly. I am truly honored to have shared this last year with you and look forward to many more.

Now can somebody please pass the cornbread?

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Uncommonly good

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on October 27, 2011 | 1 Comment »

I heard on the news this morning that new legislation has been introduced by several New England senators making it a felony to sell fraudulent maple syrup made from, as the reporter put it, “common cane syrup.”

Here’s what I have to say about that – Fine by me!

I think should be a crime to taint perfectly good cane syrup with any sort of flavoring, including and especially maple! In fact, I think it should be a crime to disguise the nectar of this divine grass as anything other than what it is: a nearly-perfect gift, multi-purpose gift from the gods. Common? Hardly.

Sugar cane and I go way back. Baw* planted a big field of sugar cane every year. He and I would go down to the garden to check its progress and he would always cut me a piece of the stalk with his pocket knife and peel back the greenish purple peel so that I could chew all the sweet juice out of the fibrous interior. I would gnaw on it until it was practically dessicated for fear of missing even one drop of sugary goodness.

Little did I know at the time that this reedy confection from which I derived an uncommon amount of enjoyment could be used as fuel, both for people and machines. In India and Central and South America, various derivatives of sugar cane are food staples. Staples. Not condiments. Staples. Rum, a human fuel on a whole other level,  is made by fermenting and distilling molasses. More intriguing to me, however, is the fact that Brazil and the United States lead the world in the industrial production of ethanol. The United States makes it from corn; Brazil makes it from…you guessed it…sugar cane! Yes, sirree. The Brazilians are driving around in cars powered essentially by the same juice that fueled a rambunctious, tow-headed little girl on a farm in South Alabama.

Now the juice of raw sugar cane has a particular, peculiar flavor that is incomparably good, but cook its juices down until they are exquisitely coffee-colored, vaguely burnt tasting, and viscous and, well, that’s damn near perfection.

In November, before the first frost, the sugar cane would be cut. Baw had it hauled over the state line into Mississippi to Mr. Brannon, who had the all of the syrup making equipment and the know-how. On the appointed day, early in the morning, we would ride over there to watch the magic happen. To begin with, the men would feed the cane through a big mill to extract the juice which would then be strained to make sure there were no errant leaves, twigs or yellow-jackets to sully up the final product.

If I was good and didn’t get in the way,  I would get a cup of pure, unadulterated cane juice to sip on. I could be really good when I wanted to. And boy, if there was a cup of cane juice at stake, I wanted to.

Mr. Brannon had a long vat with divided compartments that sat over a hot fire of lightered wood. As the juice fed through the different chambers it would slowly cook while Mr. Brannon walked up and down the length of the vat, skimming, testing, watching until the transformation from liquid to syrup was complete. Waiting for it to get right.

Many hours later, when Mr. Brannon gave the signal, the men would leap into action putting the hot syrup into cans, and Baw and I, smelling like wood smoke and candy, would head home with our share.

Now I have had a lot of fancy desserts in my time, but not one of them holds a candle to my all-time favorite. Take careful note of this complicated recipe and maybe you can recreate it. Take a pat of soft butter and put it in the middle of a plate. Pour a few tablespoons of cane syrup on top of the butter in the middle of the plate. Mash it all up together with a fork. Get you a hot biscuit (homemade, not canned), cut it in two, and slather the butter/syrup concoction on the halves.

Then lap the whole gooey mess up with a reckless disregard for the sticky, buttery bits that drip back down onto the plate. After all, those can be sopped up with another biscuit. Afterward, be sure to lick the last tenacious crumbs from your fingers and marvel in how good and satisfying the whole experience was. Uncommonly  good.

Just try to get that from a tree.

*For those of you just now coming into the story, “Baw” is what I called my maternal grandfather for some reason long forgotten.

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Love, Me

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on October 9, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

We were cleaning out her house. Packing up the dishes, the linens, the cutlery. The books, nick nacks, and bridge sets. Her mother’s wedding dress and her daughter’s baby dress. A forgotten shoebox filled with Borax and zinnias. Nearly a hundred years of living to be parceled out, stored away or sold.

Her closet was emptied of its Alfred Dunner suits for church, house dresses for every day, and model’s coats for lounging and pulling the occasional offending weed. Dress shoes and slippers all packed up for Goodwill. A final sweep of the floor, dust off the shelf, and this cheerless chore will be nearly done.

Reaching back into the far, dark corner of the shelf, she touched something. Something that had gone unnoticed during the cleanup. It was a little wooden box. It was locked.

Later that evening at home, she pried the lock open and lifted the lid. Letters. The box was full of letters. The letters were tied with a ribbon.

These letters told the story of a young lovers who were always “old folks” to me. Teasing and flirtation. Spats and apologies. Endearment and devotion. Plans and dreams. Reality and survival.

Was it a tear that smeared the ink? Did she laugh at his pet names and silly jokes? A whole new story of my grandparents crowded my imagination and warmed my heart – the prequel to the white hair and bifocals I had always known. The ones I loved so much were now young strangers to me.

Together they endured the death of a baby child and grave illness. They raised a beautiful, intelligent daughter and sent her to college. They gained a handsome, bright son-in-law and saw two grandchildren born. They had their differences like all couples do, but they always had each other. Then, one day in November, she buried him.

But she still had the letters.

The love letter is a lost art. Lost to lives that are too busy (or too lazy) to take time to pick up a pen or go buy a stamp. Lost to technology. Lost to ways that are easier, but not better. Lost right along with beautiful language and heartfelt sentiment.

What will tell the story of your life? What will your children find? An email, text or tweet? A cd or flash drive? A Facebook message with a little  ♥ and an xxoo? Maybe…if your past is not password protected.

Or will they find a yellowed envelope enclosing a faded letter, worn on the edges from rereading and smelling faintly of Midnight in Paris, inked with the inscriptions of adoration, devotion, and love. Just what will they find?

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Guilty pleasures

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on August 17, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

Last Friday night, Husband and I had the good fortune to eat dinner at Satterfield’s in Cahaba Heights. From the cheese plate to dessert, I have to say that every little mouthful was just divine, but I most especially enjoyed one of my guiltiest pleasures – rabbit.

Now Husband doesn’t eat anything that once had fur or feathers, and I can’t profess to be much of a carnivore either. For me, it’s a taste thing. I’m just not a big fan of meat, don’t like it, never have. But, there are some things I love, and rabbit is one of them, especially when said bunny is citrus braised and paired with ricotta gnocchi, baby radishes, and oyster mushrooms! Nevermind the cute, floppy ears, soft fur, and big eyes. I can get past it every day of the week.

In fact, I even had a pet rabbit as a child. The Easter Bunny brought me his little brown and white cousin one warm, spring Sunday morning. Baw and I made it a home in a hutch built in the chicken yard. We fed it, petted it, and tried to play with it. You should note here that rabbits don’t much like being held, and, if they decide they are ready to be put down, will lay your arm open with the claws on their big old hind feet. Nevertheless, we took good care of it, and it lived high on the bunny hog.

One day, I went out to the chicken yard to visit our rabbit, but the hutch was empty! I ran to find Baw and tell him that our pet had escaped. But it was not a jailbreak. Baw told me very solemnly that the Lord had taken our little furry friend to bunny heaven and that he would be happy forevermore in paradise.

Of course I was as sad as sad could be, but who could argue that a rabbit wasn’t better off hopping across heavenly meadows than he was in an earthly cage? Plus, that day Sarah made one of my favorite dishes for lunch – fricasseed “chicken” – and the world was right again.

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Why I love crime (The redux)

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on August 11, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

A doll is boring. And vaguely scarey with her fixed, blinking eyes. She just lies there. Staring.

A fingerprint. Now there is something flat interesting!

Here’s what a doll has: hair plugs.

Here’s what a fingerprint has: whorls.

Which sounds more interesting to you?

Baw had had the misfortune of contracting tuberculosis and spent many years recuperating from it and the surgeries recovery required. This process required long stints away from home and isolation from family and friends, both hard on a gregarious and affable man. To fill his time, Baw did many things. He drew. He wrote stories of his childhood. And he studied becoming an amateur detective.

He sent off for a fingerprinting kit that included dusting powder, some brushes, little white cards, and an instruction booklet, all packed in a neat little black case. He practiced around the house, dusting, transferring, studying, and comparing. Hours were spent peering through a magnifying glass at unique terrains of lines and ridges. He made notes on the little white cards of who was who, when the print had been taken, from what surface, and any distinguishing characteristics.

Years later when I came along, Baw showed me how to lift a latent from the refrigerator door, and the two of us cogitated over our findings. Together we solved such domestic atrocities as the mystery Baby Ruth and the dastardly fiend who had abducted her from the icebox.  Little did we know that Baw would be able to put his skills to use to solve an actual crime.

We lived on a corner of the main intersection in Citronelle in what was commonly referred to as “The Lily House” after the family who had built it in the late 1800s. One day Mama came home after work to discover that the little black and white television that we kept in our kitchen was gone! Mama called the police, then called her daddy. When the men all arrived, an investigation of the house revealed that the only other thing missing was a pack of cigarettes and that there was no evidence of forced entry at any of the doors or windows.

As Baw and the detective walked around the house looking for where the thief had entered our home, Baw noticed that one of the old windows to the living room seemed to be up just ever so slightly. In a house as old as ours, the windows didn’t lock any more, but we never worried about it. We just kept them down…all the way down.

Out came the fingerprinting kit. After a careful dusting, some teeny tiny little fingerprints appeared on the window sill, prints too little for even a small man. The prints were, well, childlike.

The detective remembered taking a call that very morning from a man reporting that his 15-year-old son had stolen his car and was gone along with his two brothers, one of whom was only six years old. The boys and the car were nowhere to be found. The detective and Baw surmised that the two elder Pew boys, who were known to be a little wild, had boosted their baby brother through the window to get the television and the cigarettes.

The detective put the word out that if the television appeared on on his porch before the next morning the Pew boy would not be arrested and charged with driving without a license. Sure enough, when he got up the next day, the little television was sitting on his stoop, missing only the UHF antennae, which was never recovered.

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Why I love crime (Part I)

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on August 8, 2011 | 2 Comments »

I love crime. That is not to say that I enjoy it when acts of crime are perpetrated on the innocent. In fact, I hate and despise any and all acts of victimization, think it is bad bad bad, and believe that criminals should be thoroughly punished in a manner befitting their charge.

What I do mean to say, however, is that I am flat captivated by all manner of reality crime television. “Lockup,” truTv, “Biography,” any sort of televised trial, and, of course, that old standby “Cops” all leave me spellbound. I can’t look away. Why is it that I meditate so intensely on what caused the lawbreaker to launch down the slippery slope of malfeasance? Why do I imagine the culprit as a child and how, if raised under different circumstances, he or she might have turned out differently? Why am I so drawn in by the sad, the scourge, the disenfranchised? For the love of Pete where are their broken-hearted mamas?

Well, I’ll tell you why. After some serious reflection, I have come to realize three things. First, I spent a good deal of my childhood at a police station. Second, while other little girls were playing Barbie, I was playing detective. And third, I have known more than one criminal in my life, and they were not all bad people.

I’ll start at the beginning, when crime and criminals were right across the street and not hiding in the picture tube.

Me in the parking lot of The Office with the police station behind me.

Baw and Mama owned an independent insurance agency that just happened to be opposite the Citronelle Police and Fire Department (behind me in the picture at right). I loved it when Baw would bring me to “The Office” for the afternoon because it usually meant a 6 oz. Coke in a bottle and maybe a trip to the dime store on Main Street. More often than not, it also meant that we would walk across the street to visit Baw’s friends at the police station.

The front door of the police station opened into a small, dark waiting room. To the right was a little hallway through which you could see the cell door. Sometimes when I stole a glance toward it, some reprobate would be staring back through the little, barred window. It was scary but thrilling, like riding the swings at the Greater Gulf State Fair. Mostly, however, the cell was empty since crime was not especially rampant in our little town.

If I stood on one of the brown, vinyl waiting room chairs, I was tall enough to see the wanted posters with black and white pictures of devious culprits on the lam from certain and swift justice. Bank robbers, kidnappers, thieves, and murderers all with fingerprints, descriptions of their crimes, identifying scars and tattoos, and occasionally the warning “armed and dangerous.” Menacing stares. Deadly limbs. Way yonder more interesting than Captain Kangaroo could ever hope to be.

Then there were the men of the Citronelle Police and Fire Department. Shiny badges, starched uniforms, guns. Jolly, joking, and smelling of Vitalis, cigarettes, and stale coffee. They would give me a Starlight mint or some confiscated brass knuckles, tell me a few tall tales of bravery and might, then send me to sit with Eva, the dispatcher, to wait for calls of grease fires, car accidents, or shootings that thankfully, more often than not, never came. The men would smoke and talk of all the latest news about town, sometimes with loud, boisterous laughter, sometimes in hushed and somber tones. Who was caught with dope down at the river. Who was running around with who. Whose kid was a trouble-maker and just plain bad. Who had a few too many and got in a fight down at Old Glory. They whispered the secrets of a small town, and I got to hear them all. Of course, I never told.

Many of those men who protected our town have long since retired or have died, Baw included, and there is a new police station which I’m pretty sure has two cells now. But the stories told by these very real people about their friends, neighbors, and families, their crimes, their passions, and their foibles, are all still very much a part of my reality.

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