Lasting Impression
While in church this Easter morning, Sue and I both realized that 51 years ago (1968) she invited me to her home for Easter Dinner and to meet her family. This was serious stuff, so I put on a suit, white shirt and tie, and polished my dress shoes (as my mother would have expected) and then drove three miles out of town through farm land on CoRd 1302 to the designated mailbox. There I turned back a 5/8’s mile lane and crossed a small stream to a one-and-a-half story farm house with a tin roof, built in the early 1800s. There was an accompanying red barn, other out-buildings and a few pieces of farm machinery in the yard along with a large garden plot. It was difficult to miss the two horses behind a fenced next to the driveway and the sheep up near the barn. The kitchen was a single-story addition to the house with an entrance off a porch (the original kitchen apparently was an area in the basement with a fireplace). On the way up an embankment to the porch, I was greeted by a dog and multiple cats.
Though my father was not a farmer, his father was and I grew up in a farming area of southern NJ that produces blueberries, strawberries, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, peaches, apples, etc. - so called "truck farms." But the Stauffer farm in Ashland, Ohio (actually multiple farms) was completely different. Sue’s father and his son (later his grandsons in addition) grew corn, soybeans, wheat and hay on acreage they owned and some they rented. Additionally, upon walking through the kitchen door this kid from NJ immediately realized he was "overdressed.” Jeans with flannel shirts, t-shirts or sweet shits would have been the appropriate attire. Then there was the size of the family. Our “family” Easter dinners included the immediate family of five with the occasional aunt/uncle. Sue is the youngest of four children - two born before WW II and two afterward. All of her siblings were married and at that point in time the two older had six children among them. Then there were extended family members. In total, the gathering was close to a couple of dozen - much larger than I expected. Guess I should have asked about that, also.
One person was missing from the gathering - the oldest sibling and son, Leroy. He was in the field behind the house on a combine cleaning up the corn he was not able to harvest before winter weather hit. When dinner was ready, Sue's mother, Helen, opened the back door to the kitchen, waved at Leroy, who soon shut-down the combine, walked across the field and into the house. He washed his hands at the kitchen sink and sat down at the table still dresses in his coveralls. Helen said grace and the dinner was underway, with the kids taking plates of food into the living room to talk among themselves and watch TV. There was a lot of family talk around the table, especially questions for the kid from NJ in the suit and tie. All things notwithstanding, I must have made an Okay first impression. The family made a very good impression on me.
It has been 51 years and I continue to look forward to visits with Sue’s family, now comprised of four generations as shown in the accompanying photo from a 2015 family reunion at the farm. The next reunion will be this coming July at the farm, now the home of Leroy's daughter and her family.
My April 8, 2019 Blog Entry was in memory to Leroy.
