HEARTBURN IS A SOUTHERN TERM Pinto beans, fried ‘taters, and cornbread again. It seemed lately that this was the only cuisine that my Mother knew how to fix. It wasn’t so much that these were foods which I hated, it was just the fact that Momma would prepare a big pot of pintos on Monday, and we would end up having them on Tuesday, and sometimes Wednesday too, if we weren’t hungry enough on the prior two days to finish them off. The potatoes were the variable, some days they were mashed, or boiled, but most days they were like today, fried with onions. Meat was scarce, and when it did show up on our plates, it would invariably be in the form of a hamburger, or a fried salmon patty. Momma’s cooking philosophy was typical of most Southern households of our income level during those days. Fry everything . . . It didn’t matter what it was, Southerners had a way to fry it. As long as there was Crisco and Wesson oil to cook with, any Southern boy or girl could be assured of their meals at least being hot . . . and greasy. There was fried chicken, fried taters, and fried okra. We had fried bacon, or fried sausage and fried eggs for breakfast. There was gravy made with the left over grease from the bacon or sausage, or whatever meat had just been cooked. One form of gravy called redeye, was made with the grease left over from country ham, (if you could get any) and was mixed with coffee, of all things. Even dessert could be fried, in the form of fried apple or peach pies. These were like little mini pies with the dough folded over the top of the filling, and either fried in a skillet, or deep fried, depending on how much oil was around at the time. A lot of foods that were not fixed with Crisco or Wesson oil were fried in the grease that was derived from an all-purpose piece of pork known as “fatback.” This aptly named hunk of extremely salted, white, fatty looking meat could be sliced and fried in a frying pan, rendering a tremendous amount of grease with which to further ply the Southern culinary art. The resulting piece meat which was left, presented a challenge to eat, especially to those either very young, or very old, who were for some reason loose of tooth. For some bizarre reason, I developed a taste very early in life for this hard, crispy little piece of meat, and would rather eat it, than the resultant dishes, such as green beans, etc., which were cooked with the grease. As previously stated, it was especially good when there was a baby tooth which was just hanging in there by a thread that you wanted out before nightfall, so that you might hope for a nickel or dime out of the tooth fairy. One good bite on a hard piece of fatback usually produced the desired result, with a minimum of blood and pain. “Look Momma, my tooth finally came out,” I would gleefully state while standing there holding a piece of fatback, with a baby molar or canine stuck to it. If I ever come up with clogged arteries in the neck or heart, I’m going to blame Southern cooking, with a special emphasis on fatback. Heck, I’ve heard that some of that stuff the Doctors are now digging out of people’s carotids, looks just like fatback! CHOLESTEROL By Larry Bowers Read it in the newspaper Seen it on T.V. Cholesterol and fatty foods, Are killing you and me! We oughta’ sue the doctors, Who told us years ago, “Drink milk; eat cheese, and beef and eggs,” “And cook using Crisco.” If we thought it about it hard, We’d really kick their asses, Instead of paying those same Docs, For triple-heart bypasses! Even though we might have wanted more variety in the foods that Momma cooked, we were reasonable satisfied with what we got. Daddy always managed to get some kind of “treats” for us every week at the grocery store, even though he sometimes didn’t have a nickel or a dime in his pocket to buy himself a Coke at work. At least he was working regularly now, getting in his forty hours, and sometimes a little overtime. Back during some of the “Eisenhower” years, it was much tougher. Ike had been a good general, but Southern textile plants never seemed to have enough to do when he became president. I really believe that it was during these lean years that Daddy formulated his belief in being a lifelong Democrat, even if they ran a dead man for President! One incident I can vividly recall, that happened during that transitional era, is still a reminder of the kind of things that can affect the actions of people in a little mill town, when times are hard. We were still living in the little section of town on top of hill opposite of the mill, which people called ‘Hot-Town.’ I believe that this nickname was bestowed upon this portion of town due to the fact that there was fewer of the gigantic old oaks, elms, and walnut trees in this area to provide shade, therefore it was hotter here during the sweltering summer afternoons, than in other parts of town. Various other portions of our town had their own nicknames to contend with: there was ‘Frog-Town’ which was down near the Chattooga River, on the same flood plain as the school. There was ‘Gay-Town,’ which was just up the road from the mill, and which derived its name from the fact that the residents were happy, and not from the modern day connotation of the word. There was ‘New-Town.’ (That’s right, you guessed it!) There was ‘Happy-Top,’ whose residents, I’m sure, were as gay as the ones in Gay town. There was also ‘Waterville,’ ‘Welcome- Hill,’ ‘Dry-Valley,’ ‘Dickeyville,’ ‘Pennville,’ ‘Springcreek’ and ‘Mountain-View.’ Bear in mind that these names were just the ones we had in and directly around our little smidgen of a town. If I went into detail about the entire county, it would be a tremendous undertaking. Imagine the confusion of someone not totally familiar with our town, who was told to: “Go down through ‘Frogtown’ and take a left on the old highway, then take a right at ‘Newtown,’ go on by ‘Happytop,’ and that’ll lead you straight out into ‘Dry Valley.” It was one of those scalding Saturday afternoons in hot-town, and Daddy, Momma and I had just gotten back from the Big Friendly, with five brown-paper sacks full of our supplies for the week. Daddy averaged spending about fifteen dollars a week, which back in 1955 would buy enough to fill five ‘pokes.’ One of these pokes contained a tin tub of the snack I loved the best: “potato chips!” Even back then nobody could eat just one! I was clamoring to open the tub, and light into these goodies, but Momma demanded I wait until after supper, so the chips went into the cabinet with the rest of the supplies. Later that afternoon, we all came in from sitting out on the front porch and Momma went into the kitchen to start supper. She peeked back out into the living room and queried: “Which one of you got the ‘tater chips?” Being the most likely suspect, I was quick to renounce my involvement: “It wasn’t me!” I rapidly announced After also getting a denial from Daddy, we conducted a fruitless, or rather potato less search of the kitchen, and then the entire house. I was heartbroken. No Lays Potato Chips while watching Uncle Milti on T.V. that evening. Daddy had pity on me, and walked the two blocks back to the Big Friendly, and bought another can of chips. He also had a hunch about the whereabouts of the previous package. After placing the can on the counter, Momma and I went back out on the front porch, and Daddy hid behind the bathroom door. It wasn’t long before the perpetrator showed. The back screen door opened ever so slowly and a small, slim, bedraggled figure crawled into the kitchen. It was six-year-old Billy Lassiter, our next door neighbor’s son. Billy crept over to the counter and lifted the can of chips and slowly started to creep out the back door, when Daddy closed the bathroom door, and spoke: “What do you think you’re doing, Billy?” asked Daddy nonchalantly “Aeeeyaaahh . . . !” squeaked Billy as he dropped the chips, wet his pants, and fled. Upon further investigation, Daddy found several empty potato chip tins, other assorted food packages, and quite a number of my missing matchbox cars and other toys, along with various and sundry other items which had once belonged to us or someone else in the neighborhood, under Billy’s house. It was sort of like all of the stuff they were supposed to have found in Al Capone’s vault, but didn’t. Although Mr. Lassiter had been getting as many hours in at work as my Daddy had, he apparently didn’t place the same emphasis on satisfying his son’s apparent yearn for snacks and toys. Therefore, Billy and his younger brother Donnie began a career of larceny. Even though Billy had been caught, red handed, Mr. Lassiter still found it hard to believe that his two boys had been stealing. However, after a long talk with my Dad, Mr. Lassiter had Billy and Donnie bring all my toys back to me. It was like Christmas all over again, as I hadn’t seen some of those toys for months! It wasn’t long after that until Daddy brought home a cardboard box with something in it, stirring around and scratching, and making whining noises. Ol’ Bullet had arrived! Ol’ Bullet was my first dog, a half-German Shepherd, half Collie mixed breed which my Dad had gotten from the Kelley’s, who were farm owners who supplied us with raw milk and fresh eggs. Raw milk being defined as that milk coming directly from the cow into the bucket, and from the bucket into a milk jug, without being pasteurized. Fresh eggs were those which had only that morning been up the hen’s rear end. At that time some people, including my folks, still thought these kinds of farm fresh goods were better for young growing bones. Although I think there may have been some kind of law against selling it that way, the government didn’t have a big enough bureaucracy at that time to check everything like that out. Back then, I don’t think the IRS even had a dozen people working for them. At least it didn’t seem like it. Me and Bullet took to each other like green to grass. Every time I hit the door, Bullet was faithfully waiting. He quickly learned the parameters of our yard, and it became his territory. He instinctively knew from our attitudes toward people who belonged at our house, and who didn’t. If you didn’t belong there, Bullet would give you one warning in the form of a low growl, and bared teeth. If you didn’t heed this warning, you had better be faster than a speeding bullet! Needless to say, we didn’t have to worry about anything being stolen from our yard or our house with Bullet around. We had only had Bullet for a little over a year. I think it was one of the best years of my life. One day when I went outside to play with him, Bullet was acting strange. He could barely move, and he crawled over to where I sat on the back steps, and put his head on my leg. “C’mon Bullet, let’s go boy,” I encouraged. But Bullet could barely raise his head. He wouldn’t eat or drink anything. Finally he got so sick he couldn’t move at all, and Daddy rushed him to the only veterinarian in the county. The Vet told Daddy somebody had fed Bullet rat poison in with some food he had eaten. He would have to be put to sleep to keep him from suffering. I can still remember how I felt when I got the news. I couldn’t breathe, nor could I utter a word. It was as if some giant, choking hand was stuck deep in my chest squeezing my heart like a vise. Finally when that little heart couldn’t take it anymore, it broke in half, and the tears started spilling out of my eyes, like water over Niagara Falls. Why did Ol’ Bullet have to die? Who would do such a thing? We never found out who poisoned Ol’ Bullet. I am certain of one thing, however, and it is this: God doesn’t like people who would poison a little boy’s pet! He might forgive them, but somewhere, somehow, they will have to pay for it sometime down the road. It was several years, and a move to another neighborhood later, before Daddy had the heart to get us another dog.
Posted on: Tue, 08 Oct 2013 23:27:39 +0000
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