A blog for the midnight epiphanies and idle thoughts of a hopeless wordaholic.
Tuesday, November 3, 2020
NOVEMBER MEMORIES
November in the farmland was a time for preparation for the harsh middle Illinois winters.
The crops had been harvested, and fields prepared for Spring. Mother’s garden had been
cleared. The shelves in her larder showed an array of canned meats, vegetables, fruit,
jellies and jams and the bins were filled with root vegetables and apples. There was
fresh straw in the barn for animals, baled hay in the loft for their food. My mother
excitedly prepared for November 11, Armistice Day, which happened to be the first day
of pheasant season in our part of Illinois. Mother’s brothers were great hunters, and
she looked forward to their annual visit from southern Illinois to hunt pheasant and
quail, plentiful in the fence rows of the little farms that provided them a haven.
Happy meal times ensued and family stories were told round the table. After a couple
of days, the hunters headed home and all was made ready for Thanksgiving, which was
almost an anticlimax after the excitement of the hunters’ visit.
Mother’s hunter brothers are long gone to their happy hunting grounds, the fence rows
are long since gone as are many of the little farms. My Novembers have been spent
in cities, but they are always a time I recall those happy family times, and life as
it was then all those many years ago.
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There is such a strong sense of nostalgia and belonging in this poem, Bev. Beautifully penned. 💝
ReplyDeleteThese are treasures - such lovely memories of Thanksgiving.
ReplyDeleteI hope you have a good one this year.
Thank you for sharing your November memories which are so evocative of a happy childhood!
ReplyDeleteA lovely nostalgic prose poem, Bev. Once again, you have transported me to the Illinois farm where you grew up. How lovely to see and feel where your food came from – supermarkets are soulless. Being a vegetarian, I wouldn’t be keen on eating pheasants – we’ve given names to the ones that frequent our garden!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Kim. It was such a bucolic era, and I feel a need to record some of my memories, lest it fade completely. I like to think it makes for an interesting peek into that time and place.
DeleteSo interesting to hear of those November days with your uncles hunting and your mother preparing for Armistice day. The childhood memories always burn the brightest and should be penned to paper (or blog).
ReplyDeleteThanks, Tricia. My memories burn very bright in NOvember!
DeleteThere is the nostalgia and the contrast and all speaks of November thankfullness
ReplyDeleteStay safe
Much💙love
This sounds so distant from the life we are living today... I wonder how pheasant tastes... we see some of them around here every now and then
ReplyDeleteVery much like chicken, sometimes a bit "gamey". Mother's hunter brothers used to hunt squirrel in the woods, and my grandmother would fry it up for breakfast. Life at that time in that part of Illinois was not far removed from providing for one's family by going out and hunting dinner!
DeleteHi Bev! I love reading your stories .... as we share the same age demographic and where we grew up demographic .... I relate to so much of it. And I miss those days ....
ReplyDelete