The Old Terry Home Place

Many years ago I walked down an old childhood memory of my mothers with her as she shared what it was like growing up on the hill. As we walked in the yard at her old house in Terry, Mississippi, she told me about her childhood growing up in that old house. She said it was one of the best  memories she had as a child. It was one of the nicest new homes in Terry  back then, built on 69 acres of land. It had a two story barn, a big creek with an Indian trail and the house sat on a hill. In the front lawn hedged in green bushes, were roses and gardenias that always made everything smell so good. They even had an apple and peach orchid . Mom said the old place took a lot of hard work and all the kids had chores they had to do back then but it  also had its rewards. She said that at noon they would take breaks and she would lay in the  green grass looking up at the clouds. She said you could hear the airplanes practicing friendly war fare. They would dive at the treetops and look like you could almost touch them.
They always had a garden, a  couple of cows, and lots of chickens. My grandparents would sell vegetables and eggs to help make ends meet.  They would can their bounty from the garden and smoke meat in the old smoke house.
My mom was one of two sets of twins.  My mom, Zadie and her twin , Zanie.  Then Myrtis and Myrtil, the other twin set. She had another sister, Louvinia, and two brothers, Marvin and Jewell. All of which made seven children growing up in that house. Marvin left first, joined the military. Jewell followed close behind one day after working in the fields, he just kept walking. The girls all married and left home.
Mother told me that every Christmas they would all get brand new shoes, an apple and an orange, bananas,  a candy cane, and sometimes chocolate and nuts. She said one Christmas there must have been extra money because she got a  black doll with a poke-a-dot dress and her twin got wooden soldiers.  The doll must have been all that was left since she  was a black doll, but she didn't care. Mom loved that doll! Her twin was somewhat jealous that she didn't get a doll also so she cut the dolls hair one day when mom wasn't around. This upset mom so much that she buried her doll and her twins soldiers in the front yard just to teach her sister a lesson. Momma said she still remembers the spanking she got for that and she never remembered where she buried those toys, but always longed to find that secret grave.
She also told me about the watermelon patch and that every chance the children got when granddad wasn't around, they would sneak into the watermelon patch and share one of those sweet delights. Granddad always told them to stay out of the watermelon patch. One day when he wasn't home her twin and she ran off to the watermelon patch alone. Mom was carrying an old butcher knife she had sneaked out of the kitchen. As she and her sister were laughing and running she tripped and fell causing the butcher knife to slice her chin open. Moms twin helped her back to the house but hid her in the smokehouse , trying to stop the bleeding because they both knew that granddad was going to use the  strap on  them for disobeying. After the bleeding wouldn't stop, her sister went and told granny. Granny ran to the smokehouse and pulled handfuls of spider webs from around the old place, stuffed them into moms open wound which did stop the bleeding. Later, they both did get that strapping from  granddad.
Mom’s eyes would light up when she talked about the old Terry place. It wasn't easy for all those children but the lessons of life could never be taken away from her heart.
Today, the old Terry house still stands. It has been remolded and updated. The old smoke house and chicken coop were torn down by my cousin Edit’s husband , Bill, and turned into a little house that displays  some of Granny and Granddads belonging as if walking into their small life of memories. What a treasured gift that he built not more than a  few steps away where Edith and her husband  now live , next to the old Terry house.

I had the chance to visit the old Terry home not long ago with my sister, Margie. What a joy it brings to my heart to remember that time our mother walked there and reminisced about growing up in the Old Terry Home up on the hill.