A trip to Cousin Beulah's...

A trip to Cousin Beulah's.....

Picking blackberries was our excuse for going to see her.
She would exclaim that bucketfuls would go to waste if we didn't come
that particular Sunday. Rain would take them. She added, of course,
there would be plenty of vittles to go around.

Instant dread.

Beulah's kitchen came to mind...

The trip was about an hour's drive, winding on blacktop that the
county should have seen to condemn. Branches whapped the sides of our
53 chevy as the road narrowed with each turn. Dusty leaves and lost
grasshoppers invaded through open windows. Misery wasn't complete,
though, until we thumped over a flattened skunk. Was this was an
omen?...

Her oversized, rural mailbox marked her sprawling farm.
"Beulah and Hank" it read in yellow enamel. No last name needed in this
neck of the woods. The gate was barbed wire strung on seasoned
two-by-fours. Unlatching the rope and dragging the thing open, brought
a nice etching on the top of my foot. I winced, but did not scream when
I saw the bleeding cut. Instead, I pointed to the well-rutted drive,
hoping that the car would not 'bottom out'. Climbing into the car, I
grabbed a dishcloth from a casserole dish that I had brought, and
clamped it over the gape in my foot.

Beulah had spied us entering her yard, and she squealed with delight
when we piled out of the car. How special she said that she felt. We
had come to sample her home cooking!

She hugged us and pinched the kids' cheeks, telling them to run along
and play with their little cousins. Seeing my cut, she claimed that
some cow salve would fix it, for me not to worry. Hobbling into the
screened porch, I wasn't expecting what I saw. She had scooted her
laundry table into the middle of the porch, and butted up next to it
were two saw horses. A wooden door then spanned them ,dressed in a
gingham tablecloth. The table wore one of her finest bedsheets. In the
center of each was a huge bouquet of peonies and rabbit grass in mason
jars. Ain't they lovely, she ask.

An assortment of plates, all in different designs and colors, and a
spoon and fork in various sizes rounded out the table. Her wash tub was
turned over an orange crate, covered with a dishtowel, becoming the
station for drinks. Her collection of short and tall glasses sat atop,
accompanied by two pitchers. One of tea, one of lemonade, halves of
lemons floating in each.

Following her into the kitchen, she explained that she set up on the
porch, fearing the kitchen would be too hot. I was relieved. Now if the
porch was well screened, I would not have worried so much about flies
or yellow jackets....

The kitchen boasted random smells....Fried chicken, 49 pieces to be
exact, fried in good white lard mixed with the best of her bacon
grease. Pork liver fried in the same skillet when the chicken was done,
then smothered in white onions, that once again bore a hint of bacon
flavor. There was a ham. An old ham. How old this ham was was measured
by the thickness of the grey mold on the skin. It was cured. Cured
right out there in that smoke house, she claimed. A glance at the smoke
house brought back memories of a haunted house that I once visited. The
outhouse looked like it was built by the same architect.

There were beans- - - -green beans that had a devine piece of fatback
floating above now grey strings. More beans- - -shellie beans,
deserving a pot of their own. Red striped legumes that had burst with
flavor from- - -what else, her prize-winning mixture of 2day-old bacon
leftovers. Even more beans- - -Pork-n-beans complete with bulging
slices of little canned vienna sausages. Flavored with a crisp,
maple-flavored bacon slice and a full bottle of catsup.

Along with the beans and multitude of meats, she had the children tend
a fire that was crackling out on the lawn. Seems they had dug a hole ,
lined it with rocks from the creek, and another washtub sat with water
simmering. She exclaimed that she would let them know when to strip
that corn of its pajamas and toss it in for a swim. There were 6 large
kitchen shakers of salt upon the main table. She asked if I thought
that would be enough for everyone to salt up their corn. I smiled
politely and said that they could use pepper if they ran out of
salt.

There were sliced tomatoes, sliced onions, green onions, little yellow
tomatoes, cucumbers in vinegar, and pickled beets.

She made potato salad. Egg potato salad. Onions, potatoes, eggs, and
two jars of mayonnaise. She wanted to have enough to fit in the cream
crock. That was 3 gallons worth. She also added that she just set it
out an hour or so before we drove in so it would be room temperature.
She didn't like cold potato salad and didn't think we would either.
Mayonnaise in this heat made me think strange things.

She had greens picked from her garden and yard. Yes, the yard. There
was about one third dandelions. Yellow blossoms and all. Made the
mixture a little zingy-er she mentioned. She thought that this time she
would leave the roots intact, as we had a few to feed. She was about to
scald the greens with a mixture of vinegar, salt, sugar, pepper, and a
full 12 inch skillet of bacon grease. She did. It scalded them. Yellow
petals and all. This was in a grey-spattered enameled dishpan. She said
it was clean enough, after all they wash dishes in it~!

In her living room, she put up two of her ironing boards, topped them
with some bath towels, and that is where she displayed her baked goods.
Pies- - -Pecan pie, which was a favorite of the flies. An apple cobbler
that she said had scorched on the bottom, but she had scraped out best
she could.

There were two cakes- - -One chocolate cake, iced and decorated with
yellow marshmallow chicks that she had saved from the kids Easter
stuff. This was August. The flies and gnats liked the cake too. So much
so it seemed that she gave one of the kids a quarter to stand by the
pies and cakes to shoo them away. The other cake the flies avoided.
Must have been that it was a fruit cake. You could smell the liquor
from 3 feet away. I mentioned that all this baking must have sent her
kitchen into a massive heat wave. She said that's why she did most of
the baking 5 days ago. And, she added that the fruit cake was in their
smoke house in a tin. It would be fine, she said, cause the spirits
would rule out any mildew. But which Christmas, I wondered.

Checking on my own kids, I found them arguing about which kitten that
they would be taking home. I told them that would be discussed later,
if at all. I tried to be diplomatic about it, but the kids all insisted
it would be OK, cause Cousin Beulah has 17 little kittens, 4 mama cats.
The 5 dogs that were lolling on the driveway when we arrived came to
mind. I wondered what sort of relationship they entertained.

Soon, she exclaimed that it was vittle time. She handed everyone a
bath towel for a napkin. She said that she knew her family. They would
be messy. She directed me to set out the pickles and there were four or
so varieties. Watermelon pickles, tart but sweet, too. Zucchini pickles
with chunks of garlic strewn thru the jar. Her 'ice-box' pickles that
she used extra alum to make them 'pucker up your whistle'.

The breads were cornbread with tiny chips of bacon and seasoned with
bacon grease. A couple of pans of biscuits. Buttermilk biscuits, and
drop biscuits with grated cheese and bacon pieces.

Something told me that I would be oinking when I left.

One of the younger kids came in from the outhouse and announced that
my kids had dropped the toilet paper into the hole. Now they would have
to use newspaper. All this he spouted as he was washing his hands in
the kitchen sink next to the biscuits that were on the powdered cabinet
top. They were waiting under a fairly clean tea towel to be baked up
next. He yanked the towel from the biscuits, dried his hands leaving
questionable stains, and then gently placed the towel upon the
biscuits.

I then drew a big sigh. What's wrong, honey, she asked are your
allergies acting up or was the ride a little tiring? I was unable to
answer without sounding frightened, so I said yes and let her believe
that the country air was too much.

The men had already gathered at the table. All of their smoking was
beginning to help with the gnats and flies. Now if we could get to the
yellow jackets that were insisting on circling the lemonade, we would
almost clear out the porch. I spoke too soon.

From under the house came the kittens. How? Through the holes in the
porch floor. They lived under the porch, and the kids had scared them
with rocks and they were coming up for safety. They scattered and
before I could get a broom on them or snatch them, they started
clinging to the sheet that was on the table. Climbing their way to the
top and across each and every plate on the table. About 10 of them.
Some disappeared under the stove, some clung to the screens on the
porch.

Beulah screamed out through the kitchen window asking the kids to make
that corn naked and give it a bath. Squeals from all of them as corn
husks and silks filled the air. Their hands never washed, but I felt OK
thinking about the hot water. That should get to any stuff that would
be dirt. She warned that she would come out and bring them in, for them
to just watch them swim for a while. When the time come to gather her
ears of corn, she took a huge cut of oilcloth from the shelf and placed
it next to the washtub. She harvested them with a long kitchen fork and
tied them up, bringing them into the porch and laying them down on the
floor. Be careful she said, they are hot and try not to step on them. I
drew another sigh.

Dinner was a blur. I didn't worry much about my kids. I knew that they
were up on their shots. The mosquito and flea bites I could deal with
later. A little calamine lotion.

I'm not sure what everyone ate, I just know that bowls of beans passed
freely around the table. I chose the chicken. The thought of that slab
of pork liver was too much of a challenge for me. I ate as much of the
greens that I could tolerate; passed on the potato salad.

Later in the afternoon, Beulah insisted that the blackberry patch
stood waiting. Armed with various sized buckets, we walked about half a
mile to the edge of one of their fields. Beulah carried a flour sack,
and Hank the shovel. They wanted us to have uninterrupted pick, while
they would chop or scoop the black snakes for us. That made me feel
special.

Back to the house with about a bushel of blackberries. We loaded them
into a cardboard box lined with newspaper. Beulah had to dump out some
spiders, but she insisted that the box wasn't all that dirty.

It was to be dessert time says Hank, but we exclaimed that the road
was a little winding and we wanted to get back before dark if we could.
That would be no problem for Beulah. She wrapped the apple cobbler in
foil and said that she would retrieve her baking dish when she came to
visit us. I wondered when that would be.

About half-way home I did an inventory on the car. A trunk full of
blackberries, an apple cobbler, a milk jug filled with peonies, stalks
of cattails, 11 rocks from the creekbed, a kitten meowing in a shoe
box, 5 jars of pickles, and kids sleeping with chocolate smiles.

I closed my eyes, relaxing my foot that was still swollen, and counted
the many ways Cousin Beulah used bacon.

Copyright....Margaret L. Hall....2003