I remember - The Big House

This is a picture taken by a cousin my age with whom I grew up. This barn wasn't nearly as picturesque with its bright red dress until recent years. It was always the typical New england weathered barnboard gray.. beautiful. I remember when we were kids and the 'bathroom' was located just inside that small door on this end. Most of the barns I knew in New England had 'basements'. This particular bar had a large door on the far end where the cattle spent the winter, kept warmer by being insulated by the earth. Our house in Maine had this same.... amenity... where apparently previous owners kept their cattle in winter, enjoying the benefit of the rising heat from the cows to help heat the house. Along the fence to the right of this barn was the biggest 'snowball' hydrangea I've ever seen. When we were little they used to tell us there was a prize for whoever could count the number of snowballs on that bush. The picture is taken from the side porch down the path to the barn. To the right of the path was a huge stand of lilacs. Between the barn and the road was a long bed of flowers. I remember seeing my first iris there.. great big, multicolored flowers. Just to the right and left of this porch were hollyhocks, lilies, peonies and assorted other old fashioned cottage garden flowers.

This house is a huge old two story house with a full 'cellar' and full attic, filled with wonderful old treasures. I can remember going into the big kitchen from the side porch and the house having a unique smell.. friend eggs and bacon, pipe smoke, fireplace smoke.. The dining room had windows all along one wall with a view of the lilacs and pasture out back. A huge living room had a beautiful well used fireplace, a small "secret room" which we kids loved, and it lead to another porch on the other side, this one screened and used as a summer sleeping porch. The 'front room' was used as the telephone office when they first had telephones. If we were really good, we were sometimes allowed to put in or pull out the plugs when people requested a number. I remember our number was one long ring, one short ring. It was a sad day when they became fully automated and the big switchboard was removed.

The house was on a hill, set back from the road. That hill provided us with endless pleasure. In the winter we learned to ski and would slide all the way down the hill and off into the pasture to the right. In the summer, we would lay down and just let ourselves roll down as far as we could. Apparently this was wonderful entertainment because I can remember every child doing it through the years. Off to the other side of the house were three huge boulders.. New England has a bit of soil tucked in among the rocks. In one of the huge maples we had a swing attacked to a very high branch. We were sure we could swing high enough to touch heaven as we would swing out from the higher ground looking down to the lower parts of the hill.

I've just been revisiting Judith's site: http://web.mac.com/knitagarden/iWeb/weedsbetweenthecracks/Welcome.html and things she mentioned brought back such memories of being in the Berkshires in Massachusetts in the fall. Looking at one of her photos of a fall garden, I could almost smell that unique fall smell. I guess its a combination of the drying of leaves, those last strongly scented flowers enticing frantic bees preparing for the winter.. We used to say "Fall is in the air".

We spent most weekends and summers in Otis, at the time an extremely small -what they called - hill town. The center of town lies along the Farmington River - normally a peaceful well behaved small river - Across the road from our house up on the hill there is a small stream which empties into the Farmington and then goes on down to the Connecticut River and out to the ocean. In the spring when the snow melts that little brook... Soames Brook.. turns into a raging torrent so loud you have to shout to a person 2 feet away from you in order to be heard. During the summer it turns into a very small peaceful brook with 2 or three 'holes' where we would occasionally go swimming. Since most of this water came from springs deep within the mountains, the temperatures were always "refreshing".

My cousins and I used to spent most of our time 'exploring the woods' . If we followed this brook (about 12' wide at the widest part) backwards, it led up into the higher mountain where it was mere trickles bubbling up from underground springs. We loved to go up there and would pick thing like the wintergreen berries growing wild, and find small the small springs where we could take a drink of the clear, ice cold water. We also discovered caves up there and one time brought my uncle back to appreciate our discovery. We hadn't been in the caves, but he ventured into one and came out, brought us home and forbid us to ever go up there again. Apparently there was enough light for him to see a mountain lion in that cave. There had been rumors for a long time about a mountain lion killing dogs in the town and apparently we had found his den.

In looking back, this uncle contributed a lot to our love of the outdoors. Each fall he would take us to 'find a bee tree'. He would make a small device from a small wooden box with a sliding top which came filled with dried codfish for codfish gravy. He would make a small baffle in the box, put in some liquid anise, and leave the top open. When the honeybees were attracted to it, he would watch which direction the bees flew when they headed back to their hive and close the last few in the box. A honeybee will feed on the nectar, go up about 4 feet, go in a circle and fly directly in a line to their hive. We would then walk about 30 feet in the direction the bees flew and repeat... as many times as needed until we found the tree. For us the pleasure was in the hunt, but our grandparents used to wait until colder weather and go out with "smokers" which made the bees groggy and they would take half the honey for winter use. I can remember being in my great uncle's attic which had that amazing fall smell mixed with the honey smell. He had a very primitive device for spinning the honey combs to extract the honey and canning jars filled with that golden liquid would line the shelves . He always saved a good amount still in the honey comb which we were allowed to 'chew' like gum.

I now realize that our uncle wasn't merely making fun for us, but instilled in us a sense of adventure, appreciation and wonder at all we could find if we just ventured out.

In the age of digital photography, I am sad that it wasn't available back then. I don't believe I will ever go back there and at this age, etc, know that all that exploring is not longer an option except through others pictures and descriptions... Now I explore and travel through others pictures and descriptions. I have to say it saves gas and I get far fewer mosquito bites. Thanks for the memories, Judith.