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Rudy ------------------------ Sarah House Tate 3dµ*^·6·^4||8*^ CD. ++ RURURUDY gu gu gu goh gah gahsh gosh GOSH DARN he would say, my friend Rudy Davis from Harlan up on the hillside in the Harlan coalfields Rudy set hisself to being a architect I never knew why and they told him they told him three times down in Lexington at the University saying boy you just not Cut Out even Walter Willingham Pennsylvania coalcountryboy architect went to England to study one year and come home speaking High English come home to teach us all how to be architects even Walter Willingham said RUDY YOU JUST NOT CUT OUT OF ARCHITECT MATERIAL (cut out of a coalfield, he was, and painful for Willingham, too soon) S 44 but Rudy had a bright young wife name of Sharon to provide for and a bright young son name John David to father but his biggest obstacle to his mind was he couldn't talk High English he couldn't talk no english at all b b bu bu buca bucause he STUT STUT STUT STUTTERED so bad couldn't nobody hardly understand him gu gu goh gah gahsh gosh darn it Now they sent Rudy home Christmas sent him home crying Christmas and told him to think about it about what else he might want to make of his life what he really did was design him this woodworking factory for one of those mountain sites that was in his bones working out everything with gravity how the processes worked out on the downhillness of the mountain and after Christmas he said to them th th thi this is wha what I wah wahn want to do pie plea PLEASE (the downhillness was still in Walter Willingham Pennsylvania coalcountry boy architect singing high english "let the boy stay") I love my rememberances of Rudy, we worked close together our last year Rudy chewing his tobacco, bringing the RC can to spit in gosh darn it, he'd say, now there's Corbusier, he would of. . . Rudy Davis is the First Davis ever to get a College Diploma It came just in time times was hard Sharon was the only daughter of the Rexall Druggist in Nicholasville and had given up her straight A degree work at the University to be his wife and mother and Big John Sharon's daddy was losing faith in Rudy because he wouldn't design him a mansard roof for his storefront when he was in charge of the remodeling and the electrician told Big John he didn't think the boy knew much, that's the trouble with a college education 45 LIt came just in time Opal and Leland came Sharon and John David, Big John and Sharon's mom came all came to Lexington to the Commencement Exercises and after to the Dean's tea in the conference room at the Architecture School Opal and Leland said right then Son We saved twelve thousand dollars and we want you to build us a house for our retirement with your college degree GIVE THE BOY A CHANCE THAT'S THE LEAST WE CAN DO SON WE KNOW YOU CAN DO IT MAKE US A FINE HOUSE SON WE KNOW YOU CAN Now there's Rudy Davis. . . three and four layers and a sweat suit over it all sitting with his legs wrapped around a beam four stories off the ground ripping up the old Sears Roebuck Farm Store on Main Street in minus 8 degrees tore it down with his crowbar and his breath frosting all by himself and loaded it all in a rentall truck for the beautiful old wood pieces so big you can't buy them anymore and I saw him disassemble the Ashland Street Elementary School that same January and drive off with it to Opal and Leland's and I saw him approach that hillside SON YOU BUILD US A NICE PLACE NOW WITH YOUR COLLEGE DEGREE WE KNOW YOU CAN I listening to him hammering next to him 46 Rudy's joined the Jehovah's Witnesses spends Tuesdays GU GA GAU GAUSH GOSH DARN IT I LIKE TO THINK OF THIS PLACE AS A MODEL OF A CITY he was making first a honeycomb of wood on the hillside in and out and among all the shagbark hickories I JUST HOPE THE DEPRESSION DON'T HIT BEFORE WE GET THIS HOUSE BUILTl and he began filling it in making roof planes and floor planes and walls with volume I hated watching him do the flashing because he hated doing it Sharon made him stop chewing I COULD FLASH ALL DAY IF I COULD JUST CHEW BOY THE DAY'S WORK GOT THE SWEETEST TASTE WHEN I CHEW Opal would walk up the hill in the evenings from the house trailer and talk about what a house means I can remember she'd say I can remember pulling up my dress to sit on my grandmother's warm hearth and they'd go out and collect hearth stones from fallen down houses all around the county and I don't want anything has to be put away so they'd make her walls like beautiful boxes to exhibit her life in Opal's tired of living at the foot of the hill in the house trailer It's 1974 now and winter's setting in again Leland moved his beers from under the house trailer to under the house back in September so he's all moved in it's all done IT'LL BE MAY, MOM IT'LL BE MAY{ FORE SURE, IT'LL BE MAY MOM 47 KNOCK KNOCK KNOCKlN ON STRANGERS' DOORS SAY SAY SAYING DO YOU DO DO DO YOU BELIEVE it's all over Friday Saturday and Sunday he's back home raising cows I got chickens now forty chickens we get ten eggs a day preparing to be a SURVIVOR when the Armegeddon happens dancing Jehovah's rhythms now Arm arm arm e ged ged on On Mon Mon Monday, I'll be back Mom For sure mom I'll be back ham ham hammerin IT'LL BE MAY MOM IT'LL BE MAY Sarah House Tate continues to live in Nicholasville, Kentucky, and consider her friends in Harlan County, Kentucky.) 48 ...