Soldier's Son

8. "Get Some Black-Seeded Simpson for Us to Sow, Benny"

"GET SOfllE ILICISEEDED SimPSOfl FOR US TO SON, BEflflr Harbison Avenue Masontown, Pennsylvania Those who engage in joyous love often must endure its shocking loss. The ones affected most powerfully by both experiences are the innocent, generous souls, those of tender heart and deep passion. In our family my dad's mother was such a figure. A striking young woman from a prominent family, she graduallylost her {77} 8 {78 } "GET SOME BLACK-SEEDED SIMPSON" way in the world, and then eventually lost her health. Through it all she clung to a steadfast faith in God. We kids never knew why she became progressively unable to read the compass points, why she lost her mental sharpness. My brother seemed to have the best guess: "Grandma Carrie never got over our dad's death." That hunch wasall wehad to go on until the phone call with Dad's younger brother, Uncle Jim, who had just turned eighty. I hadn't seen or spoken to him in over twenty years. My sister, on the other hand, had visited him and Grandma at his home in Florida just before Grandma died, had exchangedcards with himregularly, and had occasionally spoken with him on the phone. Mary Jane dialed his number, greeted him, explained that we wanted some information about our dad and about Grandma, and handed the receiver to me. After breaking the ice with pleasantry, we began talking in earnest about family history as if there had neverbeen a decades-long hiatus. Hespokein afriendly but educated, almost formal, manner, carefully enunciating his words and pacing them in ameasured way. Severalminutes into the hour-long conversation, when I explained that we had been speculating about what caused Grandma Carrie 's plight, he revealed a family secret that helped us "GET SOME BLACK-SEEDED SIMPSON" { 79 } understand, after all these years, part of what sent Grandma Carrie askew.When he told it, I clapped my hand over my mouth and stared, bug-eyed, at my sister. "One night when I was a youngster, I was awakened by a commotion downstairs in the kitchen. When I went down, Mother and Father were having a terrible argument . I heard her using language on him that she never spoke. When my father sawme come down the stairs, he ordered me to go back to bed. But Mother said, 'No, come in here, James. I want you to hear all of this.' "She proceeded, using awful language (Mother was a Sunday school teacher for years and years) to accuse him of cheating on her. Shetold him how disappointed she was in him. She said she had devoted herself to our family and this washow he treated her. Shevowed never to sleep with him again." Besides revealing the secret, Uncle Jim chatted on, giving us more details about Dad and the family. Uncle Jim recalled, with a note of complaint, that during their high school years the family's routine revolved around my dad's year-round sports schedule: football, basketball , and baseball. Local athletes were valued as blueribbon stock and Dad became well known as a talented and tough competitor. In all his high school years as { 8o } "GET SOME BLACK-SEEDED SIMPSON" center on the football team, he was out of the lineup only briefly when he suffered a broken arm. Mom was good friends with Dad and his older sister Anna; they were in the same high school class and Sunday school class. Mom and Dad sang together in school programs, with Anna accompanying them on the piano. Dad, who also liked to hunt, had a bird dog that Uncle Jim claimed Dad neglected until hunting season; all other times Jim was expected to take care of it. Among Dad's firearms was a Mazda rifle with a telescopic sight. He especially loved hunting small game with Doc Wells and his boys. If Dad wasn't playing hard, he was working hard. In Uncle Jim's words, Dad was always industrious. As a schoolboy, he had a paper route and delivered the Uniontown Morning Herald. When he decided to go to college, Dad was expected to pay his own way. He worked in the mine with Grandpa, saving up until he had enough money for a year of school. He attended college in Berkeley, California, studying optometry. A newspaper reported his college as the University of Southern California. According to Uncle Jim, Dad attended a...