The Road Home – Lisa Colodny

It has been said over and over that you can never go home again, but whoever wrote that never went to Campbellsville. There, life is simpler. It has an easiness like no place else I have ever been. Sure, their way of talking might lead you to believe that there exists a backwardness, but that is as misleading as are the tales of Kentucky’s bluegrass. Trust me, it is green, just as green as you can imagine. 

Close your eyes and picture red brick houses with white columns gently enclosing the front and black shutters surrounding every window. There, off behind the house, outlined against the blue sky and white puffs of clouds that hang just off the horizon, is a barn painted just as red as the bricks of the house. From behind the house a beaten path through the grass trails fondly to the doors of the barn. Just to the right of the barn parked next to a newly unearthed mound of soil is an old rusting tractor. From the porch of the house the thin silver line of an electric fence can be seen darting in and out along the boundaries of the field behind the barn. The field has been newly plowed; huge mounds of new soil make nearly perfect lines up and down the rows of the field. Skeletons of last year’s tobacco stalks lay scattered throughout the entire field.

Beyond the field marking what has to be its boundary is a huge oak tree with branches that reach up to the heavens and must surely embrace God himself. Secured firmly in the tree exists a fortress of boards and nails created to form a type of loft. Brightly painted patches of yellow and red form the shadow of what looks like it might be a scorpio,n but I suppose only the children themselves know for sure. The area of the tree is unlike the field, it encompasses a massive arrangement of smaller trees and thick underbrush. A faintly visible path beaten through the thicket leads right up to the great tree and stops perfectly to where the first wooden rung of the tree meets the ground. Scattered throughout the thicket, small patches of yellow and white quickly gather the attention. About the same time, the honeysuckle scent invades the senses and sends an intoxicating message right to your very soul.

It is spring now and alarm clocks are no longer needed. Every morning the sound of the tractors announce the coming of the day. The garden has been sowed, flowers have been planted, and once again prayers have been answered. Evening falls gently just like a cool summer rain, and it is easy to sit on the porch and rock carelessly with the wind. Soon the lightning bugs will be out to perform their summer sonata, and after dinner the children, with jars in hand, will attempt to put a stop to the bugs’ performance. Try as they might the children are outnumbered, grow tired, and return discouraged into the house. The bugs go on as if the children were but a distraction and make a solar system of their own all over the yard and nearby field.

Yes, it is a different life here. Here, life means something. It is more than a paycheck on Friday or driving down to the Keys for the weekend. Here, it isn’t unlikely to see at least one person you know at each and every place you go. Not only do they ask about you but they ask about your family as well and they genuinely wait for your reply. Here, neighbors care about each other. They have to because, sometimes, all they have is each other.

Here you can still pull up to the gas station and have someone actually come out to your car. There is no pay at the pump with your credit card stands here. The young raggedly dressed attendant will not only pump the gas for you, but he will also wash the windows and check the oil. All without you even getting out of your car. Pretty incredible, huh?

I know I must have looked pretty out of place. I am ashamed to say I have been gone much too long, and I had forgotten how majestical it can be here. I had forgotten that someplace like this exists, that everyday here is truly a day worth living. The people here look at life differently. They don’t want to be millionaires. They love their children with a passion that only God himself would understand. Next to their children, they love their land. They ask God to provide them with a decent living, to keep their children safe from harm, and to forgive them their sins of both present and past.

I don’t want to say that life is simpler here; simple implies somewhat less, and if anything, it is more. But life here is calmer, less stressful, and more peaceful than any place I ever imagined. There is a cleansing sensation here that I can’t explain. Maybe that explains how the people here are always so sure God has forgiven them for their sins. He reminds them every day they wake and again each night before they fall asleep.

The big events here are high-school football and basketball games as well as county events, especially the fairs. Each fall the fair proclaims that magical time we call Christmas is fast approaching. Quilts are big here too.  The people here love to make and give quilts as special gifts for their family and friends. Funny thing about quilts is that they take so long to make. It is so much easier just to visit the mall and pick something up.

They bake cakes and pies here without Betty Crocker’s help. They pick and peel apples from their own trees to make cobblers, but for some reason, these just don’t taste like the ones I buy from Winn Dixie’s frozen food section. See, this is why I don’t think life here is simple, just simplistic.

And holidays, you’ve never experienced the fall until you have had homemade chili after a Halloween hayride. There would be four or five wagons following each other along some pre-destined road to where the accidental “breakdown” would occur and the adults dressed in some terrible costumes would come charging out  at their children. Halloween usually meant, too, that it was nearly time for the leaves to turn colors. And what colors they did turn. There is a stretch of road along Highway 88 between Campbellsville and Greensburg that at this time of year is unlike any picture I could describe. Imagine if you can, trees three or four deep lining the road from one end to the other. Every imaginable shade of orange, yellow, and brown are mixed charismatically in a blinding fury of colors. There is no point where one ends and another begins. All along the road, the colors battle for control until finally the conflict ends with an explosion of fragmenting colors that somehow signals the end of the road.

After Thanksgiving one expects the first freeze of the season. And that same old oak tree with leaves so plentiful that the children’s refuge was nearly hidden in the spring now lies somber against the heavy whiteness of the sky, the darkness of the branches disguised behind the silvery glaze of ice. The sickles start small toward the trunk of the tree but grow increasingly larger as branches point outward. The fields as well are covered with the silver shades of ice. True, it can be very cold outside; but from the window of the house, it is beautiful. It looks like something from a dream.

All this means that Christmas is not far away. The smell of fresh pine and wood burning in the fireplace bring a smile to the children’s faces. Red faded stockings with the names barely visible are hung anxiously along the white wooden pane of the fireplace. With the lights twinkling randomly in an indiscernible fashion and hot chocolate in huge cobblestone mugs, the presents appear carelessly atop a red tree skirt crocheted many years ago by grandma’s mom. Friends and relatives drop by throughout the holiday, the picture of the tree changes constantly as new packages are placed under it, and others destined to leave are removed. For all these images I am thankful, I have been fortunate. From that snow fight with Leoda to the lightning bugs with Allen, each is like a photograph of a particular place and time. The memories that I have will forever be special to me, and I regret it took a trip home again to make me remember. My family, my past, and my present as well are equally important to me. Thank you, God, for blessing me with so many special people in my lifetime. You know I keep them with me inside…… I always have. I’ll look forward to my next visit home.