Of Days Gone Past

On the way to where my mother lived as a child, there is an old farm with several old barns, outbuildings and gray, weathered homes. All are in disrepair, some worse than others. I remember this little stretch of road from my childhood. I was always fascinated with this farm. It is in the middle of a huge pecan grove. The main road, shaded by pecan trees, runs through the middle of the farm with fields behind that stretch as far as you can see. It is in a rural area of south east Georgia, where farming has been a way of life since the earliest settlers. I have no idea if the same family from many years ago still owns the property, or if it has bought by one of the large farming corporations. My grandmother told me we were related somehow to the original owners, but I have no idea how. I do know that it is still an active farm, often seeing the self-propelled irrigation system doing its job of watering the various crops. A few times in passing, I have seen a modern tractor out in the field with a cloud of dust behind it from plowing. There are a couple of occupied homes and barns on one end of this farm that are obviously much newer than the old, graying buildings of the past on the other end.

But the new places don’t really interest me the way the old places do. I have often wondered if many years ago they were slave quarters, but again, I know more rural southern farmers than not back then were too poor to own slaves, so perhaps these old homes were for sharecroppers? My grandfather and my great grandfather were sharecroppers. They were just poor dirt farmers working long, hard and dirty hours to provide for their families and make money for the other fellow. They moved often, never owned much of anything or had a permanent place to call their own. Not much of a life many would say, but they were happy. I take pride in the fact that both were in demand in the area as they both were blessed with the proverbial green thumb and had a good work ethic that they passed down to their own children. By the time I came along, my great grandfather was gone and granddaddy had failing health, had moved to a bigger town and only had a home garden. But, oh, how I remember that garden!


I have often wished that I could go and just sit in one of these old homes or stroll around the outbuildings, perhaps to see if I can absorb some of the memories trapped inside. One of the homes is much larger than the others and sits closer to the road. It has a beautiful corner porch and still has its original wooden shutters at all the windows. Situated towards the back of the group is a large two story with lots of windows and a porch that goes all the way across the front of the house. The others are smaller, a couple probably not more than 2 rooms, but each of them surely has a story to tell. Scattered amongst the old homes are outbuildings such as tobacco barns, corn cribs and pack houses, and sheds for storing farm equipment and such. From the road, I can see an old hay rake that was pulled by mules or horses, or if using two men, an old tractor, resting and rusting under one of the sheds.

I have quite the imagination, especially for old things and old places. I can smell the fresh turned earth and the sweat on the mules. I can smell the smoke coming from the smokehouse and almost taste the sausage and ham that will come out of it. I can hear the children running through the pecan orchard after church on Sunday. I can see little boys using old pecans they dug up in their homemade sling-shots and little girls sitting on the porches shelling peas or learning to sew. I can see the fresh laundry that was hand washed this morning with homemade lye soap waving in the breeze on the clothesline. I can see the dogs laying around, often in the shade just under the porch, willing to bark at any possible visitor, yet all the while hoping not to be disturbed.

I can see the men in their overalls and brogan boots coming up to the back porch to wash the dust from the mornings work from their faces before going in to eat dinner, or lunch as it is called now. Most times, clean shirts for all the ones who worked in the field and a clean apron for the woman of the house were in order before they sat down to eat. I can hear the dinner bell being rang letting everyone know that dinner was on the table. I can hear the women calling the children in to get ready for their baths in the wash tubs in the middle of the kitchen. I can hear the breeze rustling in the pecan trees and the clucking hens in the chicken yard. I can imagine a group of children sitting on the edge of one of the porches waiting patiently to be handed a slice of fresh watermelon in the late evening of a summer day. I can taste the wonderful meals that came out of these kitchens, fresh homegrown vegetables, smoked meats, and homemade jelly, preserves and cane syrup for the wonderful buttermilk biscuits. I can also appreciate the work it took to make these meals happen.

In days past, many of the things we take for granted simply did not exist. The sheer magnitude of what these earlier people accomplished is staggering. The way they lived was filled from before daylight to dark with not much more than hard work. The whole family had chores to do, even the young children. Yet, when you get a chance to read the diary of someone from times past, or hear the stories told by a much older relative, you’ll find they were mostly happy. Crime was never an issue, juvenile delinquents were unheard of and marriages lasted till death. Communities were not filled with unknown faces. Everyone knew everyone in the community and helped each other out whenever it was needed. People now often live right next door to each other for years and never even exchange a friendly hello. It really makes today’s modern way of living seem somehow wrong.


It makes one yearn for days gone past, for simpler times, for peaceful living with no crime, no worries about electric bills or replacing one of our broken, must-have mechanical gadgets; a time before computers, cell phones and video games. When living was what you actually did, not simply surviving as we do today. Yes, they worked harder and they were mostly poor, but the payoff was worth more than what any amount of money could ever hope to buy. The riches they enjoyed are worth more than gold. They had restful sleep without pills. They enjoyed the simple beauty of early morning sunrises and were able to actually see the fruits of their labors and took pride in them. In days gone past, the men, women and children were all working together for the good of the family. Oh, how I wish I had been born in Days Gone Past...