Winter/Spring 2015

 

Out in the Country
Before the breathin’ air is gone
Before the sun is just a bright spot in the nighttime
Out where the rivers like to run
I stand alone and take back somethin’ worth rememberin’

Out In The Country
Written by Paul Williams and Roger Nichols
Out In The Country lyrics © Irving Music Inc

 

         When I was nineteen, my suburban parents decided to move to the country. I’d been in college for two years and was suffering from terminal exhaustion, intensified by a steady consumption of amphetamines. Back then, in the early seventies, we didn’t know how bad speed was for you. I should have been able to figure it out, though – I was twenty years old, weighed one hundred pounds and at five feet ten, looked like a walking stick. I had left my boyfriend, run out of money, and my parents, who were having their own financial issues, couldn’t help me. I was sick and tired and decided to take some time off from school.

         My father, Mr. Suburbia, had the idea that he would move his family to the middle of nowhere and become a gentleman farmer. He was concerned about my younger brother and sister who were starting to get into some trouble of their own. He thought by moving to the middle of nowhere, he could find a safe place for them, to isolate them from the drugs and craziness that existed all around them.

         So, my youngest siblings, Laurie, fifteen, and John, sixteen, got shuffled off from glamorous Sarasota, Florida to a hundred-and-twenty-acre piece of property in the foothills of the Appalachians, right outside Ashville, Alabama, population 500. They were both very homesick for a long time.

         I joined them soon after, and got a job in Birmingham waiting on tables in a Shoney’s Restaurant. I had to drive an hour and a half each way to get to my job, but there wasn’t anything closer. All I could think of that summer was how exciting it would be to get back to college in Florida.

         At first, Laurie and John were furious about the move. They couldn’t believe they were stuck in the middle of nowhere. They moaned that they’d never make friends, they’d never be happy again. They made fun of our new home, calling Ashville “Mayberry,” and satirizing the heavy drawls of the students in their new high school.

         Gradually, though, they did find good friends. Our house became the local teenage hangout. In those pre-cable days, kids who grew up in the country were truly isolated from their suburban peers. Their friends had never been to a movie, had never been out to dinner, and in some cases, didn’t even own a television. My siblings were just as much an education for them as the country kids were for Laurie and John. For instance, my family invited the kids over for dinner one night and Mother told them they’d have to cook their own food. At first they were insulted, but soon found they loved fondue. They’d just never heard of it.

         One of John’s new friends, Bobby, took him hunting. He shot his first deer – and promptly vomited, much to the amusement of his country friends. My sister’s new friend, Tanna, encouraged her to ride bareback. She was impressed with Laurie’s white horse, Princess, but thought using a saddle was a waste of time. These country kids were tough, strong and polite. Maybe they didn’t keep up with the latest pop culture, but they knew things my siblings couldn’t wait to learn.

         For me, the country turned out to be a surprise – an oasis of peace. Behind our house, a creek flowed down from the foothills, bubbling through the red Alabama soil past poplar and pine trees, cypress, oak, and hickory. On my days off, I’d walk the dense trail up the mountain in our back yard and see white-tailed deer, opossums, squirrels, eagles and hawks. One afternoon I came across a number of yellow plastic ribbons tied to trees near our property. These ribbons usually meant log-cutting was going to occur soon. I spent hours carefully untying each ribbon and retying them much further away from our trees. My eco-terrorism was subtle, but determined. No one ever bothered to check which trees should be cut once the ribbons were posted, so they didn’t cut down the trees near our property.

         In spite of my father’s oft-repeated desire to be a gentleman farmer, living in the country had its ups and downs. In summer, the air conditioning didn’t work well. We were told to be grateful it worked at all. In the winter, our well went dry. When we called the only man in town who dug new wells, he told us he didn’t dig in winter. He’d see us in March, three months later. So for months, we hauled water to the house for cooking, bathing, etc. There was an artesian well near our house that bubbled over all the time, so we stopped by every day to fill buckets and tubs to take home. A true pioneer experience that every one of us uniformly hated.

         And of course, in the early seventies, there was still a lot of racism out in the country. My sister once gave an interracial couple a ride home after their car broke down. She didn’t know them – she just saw them standing on the side of the road beside their disabled car and decided to help. In Ashville, a policeman (or I should say THE policeman) stopped her car and made the young couple get out. “We don’t give people like that rides,” he said.

         That night someone burned a cross in our yard. Just to be sure we got the message.

         Shortly after I moved in for the summer, my dad decided to buy a pig that we could raise, then butcher for the meat. It turned out the pig wasn’t neutered, so he had to call the local vet to do the deed. This pig weighed hundreds of pounds, and the vet didn’t weigh much less. The old guy, who looked like the villain in a John Wayne western, showed up in an ancient rusted truck and climbed out holding a black doctor’s bag. He told my brothers and some of their friends to grab the pig and hold him down on his back. They did so, wrestling the animal to the ground, flipping him over and laying on him as the pig squealed and screamed and tried to bite them. They assumed the vet would give the pig a shot to knock him out. The old man opened his black bag, took out a flashy knife and a flask, took a large swig from whatever was in that flask and shouted, “Now boys, y’all hold that pig.” A castrated pig is not easy to hold. None of us ate pork for years.

         My parents were thrilled that I was living at home for the summer, even if I wasn’t. They decided since I was there to take care of the “little kids,” this would be a good time for them to take a vacation. They wanted to visit friends in Sarasota, and planned to be gone at least a week. (When I asked if they were going to pay me, Dad said, “Yes, by not charging you rent this summer.” Hmmmm.) Laurie and John protested that they didn’t need a babysitter and I pointed out that, with my work and long drive, I wouldn’t be getting home till midnight most nights anyway. “At least you’ll be around in case of an emergency,” Mother answered.

         So, there I was, pressed into unwilling service, babysitting my irate brother and sister. After Mom and Dad left, I tried to establish some ground rules. In the morning, before I went to work, I told them they could have their friends over, but they couldn’t go anywhere without checking with me first. Just to be sure, on that first night, I got off work early to check on them. As I came in the door, around 8 p.m., my sister cornered me. “I want to go over to Tanna’s house.”

         “Now?” I said. “It’s too late.”

         “I’ll ride my horse over.”

         “No way. Forget it.”

         “Well, then drive me.” I didn’t want to drive her anywhere – I was too tired.

         “Listen, Laurie, I’m exhausted,” I said, stretching out on the couch in front of the television. “Why don’t you visit your little friend some other time?”

         I think it was the “little friend” that did it. Yes, I’ll admit I was arrogant, condescending, and supercilious, but I was in charge. Settling down in front of the TV with its flickering country image, sipping an iced tea, I ignored her. I was watching Magnum PI, wishing I was in Hawaii, when I heard hoof beats. It took me a minute to realize Magnum wasn’t riding a horse in this episode. I jumped off the couch just in time to watch my sister fly down the road bareback on her horse, Princess. I ran out into the front yard and screamed, “Laurie, what are you doing? Get back here right now.”

         She waved. “I’ll be back soon,” she shouted, her blond hair flying as she rode off into the moonlight. I thought about getting in the car and chasing her down, but was afraid I’d spook the horse. I could just imagine what my parents would say if their precious baby girl fell off her horse while I was chasing her down the road in my Datsun B210.

         So I waited. And waited. And waited. My brother, John, called Tanna’s house. She hadn’t shown up. I started to panic. What if something happened to her? We were in the middle of nowhere. I said to my brother, “What if someone pulled her off her horse and raped her?” John and I thought for a moment, considered my sister’s temper, looked at each other and said, “Nahhh.”

         Laurie was a champion horsewoman. She’d won rodeos and placed in dressage events. It was much more likely that she was riding around somewhere in the dark woods, enjoying her freedom, relishing the torture she was putting me through. When she didn’t return, John and I drove around the two-lane mountain roads, screaming her name out the car window.

         We grew increasingly fearful as the night wore on. Finally, a little after 2 a.m., we heard the muffled sound of hooves outside. We ran outside and there was my sister, limping to the house, leading her horse. Both horse and rider were covered in mud so thick you could hardly see them. “What happened?” I cried. Even though it was a warm night, Laurie’s teeth were chattering. “I’ve got to walk Princess,” she said, dragging the horse along by her halter. “She needs to warm up.”

         “She needs to warm up?” I said. “Never mind the horse.” I gave the halter to my brother and led Laurie inside where I helped her off with her clothes and into the shower. After she was warm and dry and wrapped in towels, she told me what happened. She’d dashed off into the woods, trying to find a path she’d been down once before, a shortcut to Tanna’s house. Somehow, she missed the turn and she and the horse got lost in the woods. She thought about turning back, but just then Princess swerved to avoid a rat that crossed in front of them on the path. The clay path was slippery and before Laurie knew what was happening, she and Princess slid off the trail into a deep bog. She managed to jump off as the horse sank into the brown, syrupy pond, and she ended up sitting on the shore holding Princess’ head above water. “I shouted and shouted,” she cried. “Didn’t you hear me?”

         “Of course I didn’t hear you,” I snapped. “If I’d heard you, I would have come helped.”

         “I could hear you,” she said. “I heard you calling my name.”

         “Why didn’t you answer?”

         “I did answer. I kept yelling, but no one came.”

         For hours she held the horse’s head above water, crying, trying to encourage her to climb out. “A couple of times she almost made it,” Laurie said tearfully, “but then she fell back in. I was afraid to go for help because I thought if I let go of her head, she’d drown.”

         Probably true. I have never been impressed with a horse’s intellect. A dog would never let you ride around on its back. A cat would never fall in water while avoiding a rodent.

         Eventually, though, Princess gave a Herculean effort, got her front hooves on dry land, and Laurie was able to pull her out of the water. She was cold and covered with slime, but she’d walked that horse miles to warm her up. I wanted to be mad at her for running away, but somehow, I felt owning a horse was its own punishment.

         My mother called the next morning before I went to work. “How are things going?”

         “Fine, fine.”

         “How are your brother and sister?”

         “Oh, just fine,” I said, staring at the couch where Laurie lay wrapped in a dozen blankets.

         “Can I speak to them?”

         “They’re sleeping right now. And I’m just about to go to work. Are you having a good time?”

         “We’re having a wonderful time,” Mother said. “Listen, why don’t you ask the kids to call me tonight, just so I can say hello.”

         “Sure,” I answered, worried what my sister would say about the horse incident. We didn’t want to ruin Mom and Dad’s good time.

         The next day at work, I was beat. The adrenaline rush of my sister’s flight from the night before had drained me of energy. By the time I clocked out and drove the hour and a half to the house in the country, I was so tired I could hardly see straight.

         But walking into the house, I smelled a strange odor and was instantly on red alert. The house smelled overwhelmingly of oranges, and something else I couldn’t identify, but which I had smelled before. In bars.

         There were orange peels everywhere; I mean everywhere. Orange peels on the floor, orange peels on the massive flagstones of the walk-in fireplace, orange peels scattered like rose petals on the dining room table, and on the living room couch. Something was obviously up. I called Laurie’s name and there was no answer. I found her sleeping in her bedroom, snoring loudly. Then I looked for my brother, John. He wasn’t in his bedroom. I went back across the living room and as I did, I noticed something glinting by the fireplace. I stared in disbelief. There was a small pile of hypodermic needles stacked on the edge of the fireplace. Now I really panicked.

         I ran to my parents’ bedroom and flipped on the light. There was my brother John, in bed with what I thought was a girl. I shrieked at my little brother, “What are you doing?” He rolled over, and leaped to his feet. “Wha?” he said blankly. The person sleeping next to him, turned out to be his long-haired friend, Bobby. When he heard my voice, Bobby startled and fell out of bed onto the floor.   Then he staggered to his feet and ran into my parents’ bathroom. A moment later, he emerged, chugging a bottle of Pepto Bismol. Then he gave us a strange look, and ran back into the bathroom. I’ve heard many people vomit, but never have I heard anyone get that sick.

         John groaned and fell back on the bed. “Stop yelling,” he said clutching his head.

         “What were you doing with the needles?” I shrieked.

         “Nothing. Vodka. We shot the oranges up with vodka.”

         “What? You’re drunk!” I shouted. (I was relieved they weren’t shooting heroin, but I couldn’t believe my sixteen-year-old brother was drunk out of his mind on my watch.)

         He cocked his finger at me as if he was shooting a pistol and made a wet little clicking noise. “You got it,” he said.

         “What the hell is the matter with you?” I shouted. It would take me years to learn that screaming at a drunk is an exercise in futility. Far, far better to lean over and whisper into their precious little ears something like, “Is the room spinning yet?” But at the time, all I could think of was, I can’t believe this flagrant disregard for my authority. Bobby staggered out of the bathroom and went into the kitchen. John followed. They both drank massive quantities of water while I stood there haranguing them

         Abruptly, my brother said, “I’m leaving.”

         “Excuse me?” I asked.

         “Leaving – as in, bye bye. As in walking to the door now.”

         I stood in front of him. “No, you’re not,” I said. “You’re not going anywhere. I haven’t finished with you, Mister.” Oh, my God, I thought, my mother’s voice. My mother’s voice just came out of my mouth. I was still marveling at this miracle of channeling when my six foot six brother put a hand on my head.

         “Well, I’ve finished with you,” he said. “Me and Bobby –”

         “Bobby and I,” I corrected automatically. It was as if my mother had flown from her hotel in Sarasota into my body via astral projection.

         “Bobby and I,” John said sarcastically, “are going to his house.”

         “Oh, no you’re not.” I looked up at him. He looked down at me. I stepped aside and he and Bobby went out the front door.

         I figured, well, fine, let Bobby’s parents deal with this. Bobby was their child. Let them lecture him on the evils of alcohol. I had met Bobby’s parents one time. I knew they were a little country, and I knew it was possible that they wouldn’t discipline their boy at all. But I didn’t care. All I wanted to do was sleep.

         The next morning, Bobby knocked on the door around noon. “Hey,” he said when I opened the door, “I just wanted to tell you how sorry I am for what we did last night.” Only, it was more like, “I jes’ wanted to tell yew how serry I em fer what we did lest naught.”

         “Okay,” I answered. I was in no mood to be gracious.

         “We shouldn’ta drank while you wasn’t here.”

         “Bobby, you’re sixteen. You shouldn’t’a drank at all.”

         He shrugged. Sarcasm was lost on this kid. “Anyways,” he said, “Can John come out?”

         “What?”

         “I know we’ve been bad, but we sort of had planned to go to fishing today. And my dad said it was okay with him if it was okay with you.”

         So, maybe John came back to our house in the middle of the night and I was just too tired to hear him? I ran into his bedroom. Nothing. I checked my parents’ bedroom. No John. “Bobby,” I said, semi-hysterically, “John didn’t spend the night with you?”

         “No, he said he was coming back here.”

         I shook Laurie awake. “Did you hear John come in last night?” I asked.

         “No, leave me alone, I’m trying to get some sleep.”

         “Laurie, your brother is missing. Did you hear anything last night?”

         “No,” she moaned, and rolled over, pulling the covers over her head. So much for sibling concern.

         I didn’t know what to do. Where would he go? He had no clothes except the clothes on his back, no money that I knew of. Bobby didn’t have a clue where he could be. We checked all the places he might hang out. We went to the school, to a stand of woods where, Bobby admitted they’d been guilty of hanging out to smoke, to a lake where they’d gone fishing. Nothing. My little brother had dropped off the face of the earth.

         Mother called that afternoon. She told me how she had visited with old friends, how nice the weather was, how hot it was in Sarasota. “How is everyone up there?” she asked. “Good, good,” I answered.

         “Well, let me talk to your bother for a minute.” What was she, clairvoyant?

         Before she could ask any further questions, I said, “He’s in the shower. Do you want to talk to Laurie?” Laurie and I had agreed that we wouldn’t mention John’s disappearance. I forgot to tell Laurie that she shouldn’t mention her near-drowning adventure with the horse, either. After she regaled my mother in great detail with this incident, she handed me the phone. “She wants to talk to you.”

         “I’ll bet,” I muttered, picking up the receiver. “Hi, Mom. Yes, I know it’s dangerous for her to ride her horse at night. Yes, I know I should keep her in the house after dark. Yes, I know she’s only fifteen.” Suddenly, I had an idea. “By the way,” I said, “Do you know where the fuse box is?”

         “No, why?” my mother asked suspiciously.

         “Oh, I was ironing my waitress uniform in the bedroom and I think I blew a fuse. Could you put Dad on for a minute?”

         When my father got on the phone, I burst out, “Dad, just act like nothing’s wrong, okay. John’s missing.”

         It took a minute, but I have to say, my father got the idea immediately. “Really?” he said noncommittally. “That’s very interesting.”

         “You’re supposed to be talking about the fuse box.”

         “Okay, that’s out in the back room behind the kitchen. What exactly happened?”

         “We had a fight,” I explained. “He was drinking. I thought he was going over to Bobby’s house, but Bobby came over today looking for him.”

         “Okay, well, you’ll want to flip the red breaker first.”

         “Don’t you think we ought to tell Mom?”

         “Oh, no,” said my father heartily. “Absolutely not! No way! Just flip the red breaker first.”

         “Are you sending me a code?” I asked.

         “No, not at all.”

         “You’re just not going to tell Mom?”

         “That’s right.”

         “What if something happens to him?”

         “Ha, ha, well, then, we’ll both be in trouble, won’t we?”

         “I don’t think this is a good idea.”

         “Well, you just do as I say. Flip the red breaker first and if that doesn’t take care of the situation, tomorrow we’ll try the blue breaker.” I figured if my mother was listening to this and couldn’t figure out something was up, she must be stone cold stupid.

         The next morning Mother telephoned early. “So, how are the kids?” she asked.

         “Just fine,” I said.

         “Let me talk to them for a minute.”

         “Okay, well, here’s Laurie. John’s in the shower.”

         Mother and Laurie chatted for a while. Then my sister handed me the phone. I heard my dad say in the background, “Let me talk to her for a minute. I want to see about that fuse.”

         As soon as my father said hello, “I can’t find him,” I moaned.

         “Well, you’re just going to have to keep trying,” he said grimly.

         “Dad, we’ve got to tell Mom. He’s been missing for two days.”

         “Oh, no, that’s not a good idea. Just flip the blue one.”

         “Should I tell the police?”

         My father laughed. “Sure,” he said. “Remember where you are.” I thought about that. The town of Ashville had one police officer, and he’d been responsible for causing a cross to be burned in our yard. It wasn’t likely he’d be much help.

         “Maybe I should report him missing to the Birmingham police?” I said.

         “Sure, honey, you do that,” my father answered.

         “You don’t think they’ll care, do you?”

         “Nope,” my dad said. “Get your brother to do it.”

         “What?”

         “Remember, he’s a big kid. Six feet six. He’ll be fine.”

         “Dad, he’s been missing for days. I’m more worried about what’s going to happen when Mom finds out we’ve been lying to her than what he’s been up to.”

         “We still have to do this,” my father said, a warning tone in his voice. “We don’t want all hell to break loose.”

         You coward, I wanted to shout. What happens if we don’t find John before she comes home? You don’t think she’s going to be just a little pissed off at us?

         The Birmingham police wouldn’t even take the report – out of their jurisdiction. I tried to think of where else to look, but mostly I just bit my fingernails until they bled. I figured if it turned out John was okay, I was going to have to kill him for making me worry so much.

         Early the next morning, my mother called again. The woman was relentless. “So, how are you doing?” she asked.

         “Just fine,” I said in my fake cheery voice.

         “Good. Let me speak to your brother for a minute. I want to tell him something.”

         “Oh, he’s taking a shower.”

         “Hmm,” said my mother, “he’s unusually clean these days, isn’t he?”

         “I guess.”

         “Well, go ahead and get him out of the shower,” she said. “I have something important to tell him.”

         “Mom, I –“

         “Yes?”

         “I just remembered. He’s down at Bobby’s house.”

         “Really? Well, that’s interesting,” she paused for effect, “because he’s standing right here in front of me.”

         “What?” I didn’t know whether to cry with relief or scream in frustration. But that’s okay. My mother was quite capable of screaming enough for both of us. She berated me for the next hour solid. And then started on my dad.

         Sometimes, truth really is stranger than fiction. Apparently, Mom and a friend were driving down the Tamiami Trail through the center of Sarasota when my mother noticed a kid hitch-hiking on the other side of the road. “Barbara, could you turn around for a minute?” she she said to her friend. “I think we just passed my son. But we couldn’t have just passed my son because my eldest daughter just told me he was in the shower. In Alabama.” They turned around and there was my idiot brother, hitch-hiking out to the beach in Sarasota to visit some friends. Needless to say, he never made it.

         My mother was furious with all of us. Her fury wore us out. “I’m never babysitting again,” I shrieked.

         “You’ve got that right,” she answered.

         Eventually, we all worked out our anger. My brother apologized for getting me in trouble, I apologized for yelling at him, my dad apologized for making me lie, and my dad and I both apologized to my mother for lying. As usual when things resolved themselves in our family, it was just one big apology-fest. John became a little bit famous among his country friends for being the only kid they knew to run away and run smack into his mommy. One thing to note, though – I stuck to my guns. I never, ever offered to babysit my siblings again. And my parents never asked me. Go figure…