Foundations

 

A photo to inspire my morning writing rambles - on this day it's this one –  the flower bed at the foundation of the big porch that stretches across the back of our home. 

I took this picture on Friday - a sunny, breezy warmish day as weather pundits warned of a weekend of cold temperatures, wind driven rain and general gloom while organizers of outdoor events fretted. It tells the story of October - mildewy squash leaves, vigorous nasturtiums that threaten to overtake the drive behind the house and lots of weeds.

But today, my eyes went first to the stonework that shows up on the lower right. Arthur and middle school-age son Joey spent much of a summer laying that foundation as we embarked on the never-ending rethinking of this old farm house.

The stones for this project were carefully curated, foundation stones from long-ago buildings around the farm and rocks from moss-covered piles that grew in forgotten corners of the crop land with each turning of the soil. In the corners are huge chunks of sandstone pulled out of the rubble when the Potter County Jail was renovated some years ago. 

Building foundations from salvaged materials was a topic of conversation around the dinner table  as an old friend joined us for homemade deep dish pizza. We had years of catching-up to do and shared experiences to remember. 

But it was his story of sourcing foundation rocks during his construction of the gazebo on the courthouse square that reminded me.

"We should probably write that down someplace," I had said all those years ago as the great stone foundation grew in our backyard. 

And this is the writing down of it.

with one of the ever-present barn cats
and sweet Julie our second black lab mix

 

Heritage

 

See that fellow on the right? He's my maternal grandfather who was just 29 years old then. My memories of him are as a very old man, with a wrinkled face and enormous ears. 

But lately, he's been close by, much closer than in his lifetime, as I mine the papers and photographs he left behind when he departed this realm in 1969.

My grandfather - known as Grand-daddy to his grandchildren - died while I was a student nurse at Robert Packer Hospital in Sayre. I was not happy in nurse's training and was determined to complete the term in order to harvest my college credits, and then leave the program. It was December just before the holiday break and my mother chose not to tell me my grandfather had died.  I came home to the news that he was gone and the bedroom he had occupied just off the dining room at our home on North East Street was back to being my parents' bedroom. 

He wasn't at his big rolltop desk in the front office of The Potter Enterprise when I went to work there, writing 'society' news to give Mary Domaleski a break. Obituaries, births, meeting recaps were all handed to me and I worked from a ramshackle office on the second floor of that drafty old building, typing copy on an old Underwood manual typewriter.

Access was gained through the office of the new editor - Del Kerr - who taught me a lesson that I still use today. A cigarette guttering in an overflowing ashtray on his broad desk, he handed me a slip of paper. He instructed me to write one word on that paper - it was simple. THE. He reached out his hand, took it and I watched as he crumpled it and connected with one toss into a nearby wastebasket. "When you write, throw that word away!"

The time working at The Potter Enterprise between nursing school and beginning at Penn State Behrend one year later brought me many things - a love for small town newspapering, journalism, writing and the love that has shared my life. It was in that old front office on a wintry Saturday morning that I first made eye contact with Arthur as his grandmother sent him into the office to pick up her tax collector notices. 

The October issue of Potter County Historical Society's Quarterly Bulletin features some excerpts of Grand-daddy's unpublished memoir recounting his time in Cross Fork during the lumber boom. I have been transcribing from that old yellowed sheaf of newsprint, held together by a row of corroded staples and rusted paper clips.

There are more stories to mine and more pictures to copy but I look at this picture and am immediately drawn to notice his posture with his hand on his hip. That's a look many of his descendants have inherited.