Friday, August 05, 2005
YELLOW HOUSE INN One of the inns built in the river town called Port Republic, in Rocking ham County, Virginia after the Civil War took such a name unto itself, perhaps, because the enterprising Port people had a well established traits acquired for many years of commercial association with people downstream including the Bay in the Baltimore district. It might have been that a Port person acquired such a odd color of pigment with which to make the new in stand out as being unique among building which were general drab, even unpainted. It's name was built-in or plastered on, you might say. The original builders had no way of knowing it but they seem to have built in some other unusual features which disturbed ordinary folk. It appears to have been common among so many houses constructed during that Victorian era that many of them proved to be haunted. Not so with the Yellow House at Port. There, only the front porch was subject to visits from an apparition of an older lady who took possession of one of the sturdy, wooden rocking chairs which were a main feature of the spacious hotel porch. There was only on thing about the old lady which made her of special interest. She lacked a head. There have always been doubters in every community and the three men stepped forward and volunteered to sleep all night long on the Yellow House Inn porch to disprove the existence of such a headless hag. They selected rocking chairs and arranged them around the one the old lady always sat in; boxed her in, one might say, with her ghostly feet almost touching the porch rail. No one could get in or out without them knowing it. We think we know, now, what actually happened but they did not want to see it that way. Along a bit after one-thirty in the morning when all three of the men were asleep, one of the men started to snore; sat up sharply and called out. This noise startled a cat sleeping on top of the railing. The cat jumped from the rail top, ricocheted off of the upright back of the chair, and took off across the floor. All thee men were aroused at the same time and, looking across at each other saw the central chair rocking away steadily. By their own admission, they all three “grabbed their hats and got outta there!” The old Yellow House Inn was torn down in 1914, but some old say the headless lady still wanders around the area. Another thing: no one has ever seen a live cat within twenty feet of the place where rocking chairs used be a main attraction. Fact is they take a wide circle around the spot. A.L.M. August 5, 2005 [c474wds]
Wednesday, August 03, 2005
NIGHT VISITOR There is a story about Abraham Lincoln spending spending a night in the Shenandoah Valley which has no historical basis whatsoever, but that doesn't stop it from being told and re-told now and then. The usual account tells of a time when Abraham Lincoln "was on his way back to Washington" suggesting he had frequently traveled in the southland area. The basis of the story seems to hinge on a letter said to have written by Lincoln to an innkeeper in the Valley - some tellings insist that the keeper of the inn lived at what is now known as Lacey Springs. It is also said he told Governor Stewart, of Virginia, that he had spent the night in an inn operated by none other than one his own cousin. Acting then on the urging from the Governor of Virginia wrote such a letter regrets to his cousin the innkeeper. The letter explained that he had not been aware of the connection at the time of his visit. One reads of people who say they had seen and handled the letter but not the past fifty or more years. We known not where it ended up; who might have it. No one seems to want to know. Abraham Lincoln was about eight or nine year old when his father Thomas Lincoln was killed by Indians and he'd been about three or four when they left the Lincoln homestead near Linville, Rockingham County, Va. The boy had sopped up family history eagerly, however, and, most likely, would have actually sought out and found a relative with whom to spend the night had he been that close to the home place in his adult years. The majority of Lincoln-lore writers tell the story but mark it as fiction... some was one's fantasy... some local person who was, ,perhaps, seeking some way to establish a closer relationship to a famous name. They speak of the story as being a fable and I have yet to find one such writer who points to a major flaw in the story. The Commonwealth has never had a Governor named Stewart - either elected or appointed! No siree! Not even a Lt.Gov!. A.L M. August 3, 2005 [c355wds]
Tuesday, August 02, 2005
SAINTHOOD - POEM IDEA Saints are made, like trees, by God alone not set aside by the votes of papal men. Saints are those who, oft by constant prod, are doubly endowed with Soul, and then sent among us all to fulfill God's unerring Will. In special, urgent times of human need when all for help and guidance beg and plead; when God provides as suits the victims basic want. Saints grant heed. They stay as spaces set apart. Saints are human vessels laid aside to serve as repositories each of God's own Love with special dispensation for all - tired and tempered by life's searing heat - seeking surcease in changing sorrow into joy.. .and etc..... I find it awkward when men, together, set about naming a person to be a "saint". They are always, I feel, a bit late. It is my feeling that an individual man or woman who has achieved certain goal in his or her lifetime, is already a saint in the mind of our Maker. The namers are just beginning to realize what has evident, had they looked for some time. The Pope of the Roman Catholic Church has died, and Man is led to call a series of conclaves to designate the man as becoming a "saint." John Paul lived a life of selfless sainthood. Children of God all over the world received ble ss ings from his being what he was to his closest followers. Many people of different faiths were benefited by simply being what he was, receiving blessings from his presence. By his way of living John Paul lived as a saint. Different, deftly interwoven threads of his love and guidance are there to be seen and cherished in his relations to others. The total concept of sainthood is exemplified in the sweeping glory of the principles by which he lived and which he held high so that all mankind may see and known them as well. It is something that is best said in poetic with its binding restraints and special demands for exactness. Some day ahead I may be able to re-fashion those opening lines to tell the "why" of it all when it comes to the condition of having an angelic presence among us at times. A.L.M August 1, 2005 [c385 wds]
Monday, August 01, 2005
FAT FISH STORY Last month while riding south on Interstate 77 in Virginia on our way to the annual Herman-Arndt Families Reunion in the Hickory-Newton-Conover tri-town area. Along the downgrade toward the New River I saw a road sign which brought back pleasant memories from my childhood. It is just a few miles south of I-81 before you get to Fort Chiswell. South on I-77-77 there is a road leading off to the right but I'm usually busy looking in the opposite direction to get a good look at the old Shot Tower there on the bank of the ancient river - the oldest on the North American continent -ironically named the "New." I remember going to that fish hatchery many years ago when I was just a little kid and seeing what, to me was something unusual - and still is today. a real natural. I saw the world's largest fish bowl and possibly the fattest fish, as well. We called them "goldfish" - not knowing any better and compared them to the pair we had in a small, glass bowl at home. We fed ours sheets of tissue paper food but the ones we saw that day were among the steak and potato-eaters, at least. The "bowl" was a metal tank; rock-fringed all around and set deep within the floor of the foyer in the first large building on the Hatchery grounds. The tank was alive and throbbing with interweaving fish of an average length of about a foot and half as wide! With each of many collisions you wondered which one was going to pop first! We learned that very day, of course, that me of the official name of the fish was, of course, was "carp." I've learned since that they are long-lived creatures, but I would imagine the fat has taken that batch of golden swimmers to fin and flipper paradise by this time. I'm going to stop in at the old hatchery the next time we head trip-town way to check it out. A.L.M. Aug. 1, 2005 [c359wds]
Sunday, July 31, 2005
THE GREEN THAT GROWS ALL AROUND I'm having my entire yard covered with flat, heavy flagstone. I'm having each slab cemented firmly to fit over ever inch. I'll tell you why. My neighbors don't like the way I cut my grass. When I cut it during early morning hours, they say: "He's inconsiderate! Sane people are sleeping! Clackity-clank! He has to mow his lawn!" Cut it at night: "Money hog! Works all day! Afraid he'll miss out on a dollar! He has to work nights too!" Early evening: "Anti-social guy! Too good to mix with us common folks at the softball game or the P-TA! Cut on Sunday - at any time: No peace and quiet! He' ir-religious! Regular scoundrel! Makes me nervous! C'mon, let's go to the stock car races! On a holiday: "Show off! A national disgrace! Can't let us rest on a legal holiday! Got to show hard he can work! Mid-afternoon: "lacker! Takin' time off from his job just to cut his grass! Wait until I tell ole Smedley at the office. On company time! Imagine that!" If I pay someone to cut it: "Uppity! We have to tend to our own! Old money bags hires all his work done!" If I get the wife and kids out there to help: "Slave driver! Just look at him ordering those kids around! Oh, and that poor wife I just would not put up with it all!" As I said. I'm installing flagstone over every grassy inch! I any of you have a nice, reasonable estimate you can sneak in to me? Free lawn mower with deal. (Note) Not responsible for any neighborly insults likely to be incurred. A.L.M. July 31, 2005 (redone from summer '51) [c301wds]
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