The Home Place in Camden

Good morning and come on in for a cup of coffee and a visit.  We are having wonderful weather in South Georgia for it has been in the 60s and 70s this week and feels like Spring.  I know it is going to turn colder this weekend but we are enjoying it while we can for we are surely saving money on the heating bill.  Raising the windows and enjoying the fresh air is so refreshing.

We went home to Camden, AL a couple of weekends ago to our family's home where we grew up.  Since Mama and Daddy died it has become the home place or where we can gather or grandchildren stay in for short periods of time. Our grandson is living there now for a few months and we visit when we can. 

Our nephew, Jason, came down and joined us and our son and his wife for a very good visit.  It was fun and quite interesting since I am now the oldest and supposed to remember who, what and when of our family.  This is a stretch for my "remembering" is not as good as it used to be and it never was great.  Those of us who are ADD tend to not listen carefully all the time and therefore don't remember a lot of information.  

The boys, actually young men Jason and Jimmy, were looking in every nook and cranny, behind the furniture, in the attic, up at the barn and traipsing through the woods exploring and seeing what they could find.  Now you can find most anything in one or more of these places for daddy was a pack rat and never threw anything away and mama was almost as bad.  The saying among the family is that if it ever came on that 40 acres, it never left and that is almost the truth. 

They found a couple of old pictures, and I mean old, behind the piano and wanted to know who they were.  I knew they were from the Polk side of the family and figured out they had to be our great grandparents, but which ones are still a mystery.  Of course there was nothing written on the back of the pictures and they are in bad condition but trying to place facial expressions and features with the current generation was a challenge.  I made a pretty good guess but that is what it is going to be for I don't think mama has a cell phone in heaven so I can call her.  I think they are just going to be great grandparents on the Polk side which I plan to restore and hang in our "rogues gallery" at the house.

Now these boys, or young men, are always making fun of daddy and mama for not throwing anything away but Jason carried some of this "stuff" home with him and the choices were rather eclectic.  From the attic he took an old Army blanket that I can't remember where it came from, a veg-a-matic like  that mama had in the 70s, some coffee mugs, and a box of Mason jars.  He said his mama used to have one of those choppers and he sure could use it even though it was in that horrible green of that era.  The jars are to be used for drinking glasses and I am afraid his daddy and brother may get a mug with a "P" on it for Christmas or birthday. 

As they tromped through the woods, down to the creek to look at the beaver damn, they were scouting for some wood to take his daddy to make "something" on his lathe.  Several small logs were found and a piece of beaver chewed wood for a walking cane were loaded in his truck.  Then off to the barn to locate a piece of the old barn and half a door was added to the pile.  Jason is coming back in a couple of weeks to get some slices off trunks of trees for a project and maybe some more jars. 

It is amazing what treasures they found as they explored and it did my heart good to see them "treasuring" some of the old things  that have been kept through the years.  They retrieved the old rocking chair that our great granddaddy Sam used to sit in on his front porch and not sure where it is going but hopefully someone will sit in it, rock, and play checkers like granddaddy.  I am sure there are other wonderful treasures in that house and on the place and I hope other grandchildren will discover their value, take them to their homes and use them.  Those which stay will be treasured by our son and his wife when they retire back there in several years. 

There are lots of memories there to remember and treasure.  I told Delaine that we had lots of good and bad memories but revised it to lots of happy and sad memories for even the sad memories were not "bad" just unhappy ones.  That is life - happy and unhappy for "stuff" happens as a family lives and loves together but you keep on loving and living and get through it as a family. 

Thanks for stopping by and come back to see me.

Nuff said,

The Georgia Peach