Summer Nights

© 2006 soonerluv


It was a mild summer night in the mid 1970’s. In southwestern
Oklahoma a family sat in a backyard. Some were in rocking metal lawn chairs,
some sitting in the freshly whitewashed, low slung Adirondack chairs.
The adults watched as groups of rambunctious children ran around the yard
acquiring dirty faces and mosquito bites. The fresh grass tickled
between their toes and stained little feet green. As the sun began to go
down, the air cooled a little, a soft breeze would blow and the children
began to tire. One by one they would drift towards the feet of their
parents and lean back to have their heads lazily stroked as the
storytelling began.

The oldest among us were telling the tales, but they were doing more
than that. They were giving us a sense of our history. They told of
times long before we were born, of people who were long gone and places
they lived in another time. We heard about covered wagons, land runs,
outlaws, babies who died before they could walk and families who lived on
the sparest of incomes. Their lined faces would crinkle as they smiled
at the memories of their youth. They became wistful as they spoke of
“mama and papa”.

Often a large group of us would gather at one of the campgrounds at
the Wichita Mountains for an evening sitting around a campfire roasting
hot dogs and marshmallows. The crickets would chirp and the coyotes
would howl. You could hear the lonesome “whooooowhoooo” of the owls. It
seemed magical to be a child in that place at that time.

When we would head out to the campgrounds of the Wichita Mountains
Uncle Lon would amaze us by feeding the raccoons from his hand. Lon was
my great uncle. He was a wiry old man with black-rimmed glasses and a
balding head. He was something of a novelty to the small children. He
taught us how to play checkers and to blow bubbles with our gum.

Until I was six we lived in the house where my father had been born
in 1932. Directly across the alley from us were 2 great-aunts and one
great-uncle in 2 houses. One of these was built by Pop Stephenson, my
great-grandfather. The one next door was the home of the Smith family. Two
of the Stephenson girls had married two of the Smith boys and a circle
of family continued as well as began.

I remember many evenings spent in the company of this family with
their legends and stories. Other aunts and uncles who lived further away
would come and visit. Sometimes there would be watermelon; homemade ice
cream- hand cranked that afternoon to be served with angel food cake.
Iced tea and lemonade sat waiting in giant pitchers to whet the thirsts
created by the sultry summer air. The sounds and smells of summer were
punctuated with the tastes of these delectable summertime treats.

It seems as if those days are gone forever. There are very few
gatherings of relations. Watching television or surfing the Internet in
air-conditioned comfort has replaced the simple pleasures of a summer
evening spent outside watching lightning bugs flicker in the darkness.
Families have become smaller and now they scatter to different
corners of the country as if blown by the wind. It is as if there is nothing
to weight them in place; as if they cannot stay put without the strings
of a large extended family tying them to their roots.

The truth is that life now is different than it was even 30 short
years ago. It is no longer a world where it is easy to stay in one place
all of your life. Staying employed now requires going where the job
takes you. It is so easy to travel from one place to another why shouldn’t
we move away? Coming home is as simple as hopping on a plane or sliding
behind the wheel of your car and getting on the interstate.

I look around at friends and acquaintances and wonder if they even
think of their family history anymore. Are they sorry that their children
are missing out on the times spent with grandparents, aunts and uncles
who live hundreds or thousands of miles away? How can I give my own
children a sense of their history when their father’s parents are gone and
with them the stories of their lives and the pasts of their families?

There is a saying:

“Little one,
I wish two things.
To give you roots
And give you wings.”

I look at pictures with my children and explain to them who they are
looking at and what role they played in my life, how they are related
to us and why they are still an important part of our lives today. The
black and white of these photos speaks of times gone by. When I do this
I am hoping that I am giving the roots they need to stay grounded when
they spread their wings.

Those summer nights of long ago may be gone, but they are not
forgotten. They are remembered in the smell of freshly cut grass, the Dove
soap with which our mothers scrubbed the dirt from our bodies and the
calamine lotion that they dabbed on our mosquito bites. The memories live
on in the stories we were told and those, which we tell our children.