I've
mentioned before that I live on the same farm as my family, the same farm where my father brought us when I was just 6 months old. In July of this year, that will be 50 years ago. My oldest brother has some memories of our home in Nashville. However, I think my other brother and I share all our memories of being on this farm, since he was 3 when we moved here.
My father was raised about 20 miles from our farm in the Pinewood community of Hickman County, TN, on Defeated Creek in Centerville (picture below). He graduated from the same high school that all his children and his grandchildren (and soon great grandchildren) have graduated from. My daughter said it felt like her family was watching her as she walked the halls of Hickman County High School, since graduating class portraits hang above the lockers and there always seemed to be a Lewis graduating about every 3 years.
The picture below is at my daughter's graduation with my parents and my son, standing in front of my father's graduating class portrait.
He moved to Nashville after graduating a year early, worked as a mechanic, went to auto diesel school, lived out of his truck, and met the woman who would become his bride of over 50 years. After 3 three children and spoiling his "city-girl" wife with a nice home in a cul-de-sac division, he brought up the idea of returning to his roots and living on a farm. He and his father found the perfect place, a 70 acre farm with a standing house (barely). Oh, it needed some renovations since it was about 50 years old, no in-door plumbing, a few holes in the walls and floors, a real fixer-upper.
My mother was not too keen on the idea, so she left the decision to move to the country up to God. As she lay in bed, waiting for my father to come home from the night shift job he held at Ford Glass Plant, she told God that if she was suppose to move from her nice, comfortable house, to a place that had seen better days, an hour away from her mother, HE was going to have to do something major. Before she said "amen", the phone rang.
It seems that my mother had held one of those home decoration parties that were so popular back in the 60s at her house and one of the ladies attending had fallen in love with the house. She convinced her husband to call and ask my parents if they would be willing to sale the house (sight unseen by the husband).
Mom got her answer. With the requirement that the only closet in the house be turned into a bathroom, we moved into our little house, July 1964,
By Easter of the next year, my father had his dream of a cattle farm and there have been cattle on the farm ever since, along with chickens, ducks, and horses.
All of the original buildings (the barn, garage, and two little out houses) are still standing today. They've been updated with a coat of paint and some tin, but they look pretty much the same.
My mother came to love the farm and wouldn't have lived anywhere else.
In the background of the picture below, two of her children (my oldest brother and I) have now built their own homes and where now Mother is laid to rest. Her other son (the middle child) built his home a littler further down the road.
The thing about living such an idealistic life, is that you don't realize how wonderful it was until you are older. Our little world was perfect. We were having the time of our lives and didn't even realize it.
My brothers would ride their bikes to Montgomery Bell State Park or to my grandparents' home, both some 20 miles away and think nothing of it. My cousin and I would saddle our horses and ride nearly every afternoon. We played in forts built in the woods, on the river banks and in every neighbors' yard up and down the road. We left after chores were done and came home when night was falling, without a cell phone, (on foot, bikes, horses) or even an idea of where we would end of during the day, just playing and having fun. We could hear Mother "holler" for us to come home and we came. Her voice carrying through valleys and over hills. Our ears forever trained to respond to her "you-whooo" call from the porch.
The little house changed over the years, remodeled and made larger, but the memories all remain.
We each left, went off to school or work, married, had families and we each returned, one at a time. We are all home now, living down the road from the home my father still lives in. Some of our children are still here, the rest close by. We've all come full circle and will one day join our mother in the little grave yard by the pond.
It's still a pretty perfect life.
To be continued - The Family Farm - Part 2 (what we are doing now)
