*Is There An Undertaker In The House?

I believe it was in March that we drove over there in the rain, my grandfather and I on that Sunday. It was the sort of rain that just pours down for hours and then suddenly stops and the sun pops out. As I remember, it was roughly thirty-five or forty miles to the little town of Hazlehurst, Georgia from the farm where we lived. In 1952, none of the roads were paved They were just sand - and Georgia red clay, which usually was found only near the tops of gentle hills.

The car was a1950 Dodge 4-door sedan, big, boxy and black, and as heavy as a tank.  In those days the saying went, ‘You can order a car in any color you want so long as it’s black.’  It was rare then to see a car in any color other than black or dark grey. You could say it was mostly a monochrome world back then when it came to automobiles.

The car was one of those solid feeling ones which only acknowledged bumps by remembering to bounce and sway after you passed over the bump by twenty-five yards or so. I don’t think they make cars that do that anymore. After encountering a bump, the car would surge just a little, then noticeably give a gentle bounce and afterwards give two or three more little dos-i-does before peaceably settling down again. In a way it was like a 70 foot fishing boat going over a ground swell in the ocean. You would hear the leaf springs squeaking when they rubbed in their brackets and against each other as the car dipped and swayed. That was routine and not remarkable then, but I believe you might be alarmed today by such a noise. Even back then the noise bothered some people who would periodically oil their cars’ leaf springs to prevent, or at least dampen the squeaking. My grandpa didn’t do that so we just squeaked and swayed our way along.

That car was nice and heavy, and Papa, which is what all we grandchildren called my maternal grandpa, said the car body was ten gauge metal.  I didn’t know exactly what that meant until after I was nearly grown. But I know that Papa thought it was particularly good and that Dodge automobiles were superior to cars built by other manufacturers. He always liked the Dodge brand as long as he was alive.

I drove to start with. I was then eleven years old and loved nothing better than driving a car, truck or tractor. My grandfather thought nothing of putting a kid behind the wheel of an 8000 pound automobile in his time. Nothing whatsoever at all, and as far as I know, he had always gotten away with it his entire life.

My grandfather and I were each dressed in our Sunday-go-to-meeting suits, ties, shined shoes and all. We were only going for the day and planned to return late that afternoon. My Aunt Emma had died. She was really my great aunt, my grandmother’s (Grannie’s) sister. Grannie had already gone over a day earlier and my grandpa and I were heading for the funeral. The plan was that all of us would return together later that afternoon.

My grandpa seemed satisfied with my driving as long as it rained that day, but as soon as the sun came out he had me stop and he took over the driving chore. Maybe we were running later than he wanted or something, or maybe he suspected what lay ahead. Anyway, there we were tooling along with him at the wheel when we came upon some new road construction going on. A few hundred yards before where the road made a sharp right turn, the state highway folks were building a more convenient shortcut by creating a new stretch of road about one-quarter mile long, which went across at diagonal. Instead of a sharp right hand turn, the new stretch of road now had a turn angle of forty-five degrees at each end. But, there were several problems for us using this new stretch of road. First, it wasn’t open yet, and had barricades at each end, and several idle bulldozers scattered alongside it. Secondly, it was loose and un-compacted red clay, and thirdly, it was soaking wet and ‘goddamned slicky’ as my grandpa called it. The only things I know slicker than wet Georgia red clay are black ice, fresh snot and the contents of old-fashioned bar room spittoons. I don’t think they make those anymore either.

But, no matter to Papa, off we went around the barricade. My grandpa never met a shortcut or muddy road he didn’t love. There was something about them that always lured him in like a magnet. I knew in my heart of hearts that we would never make it, but to my amazement we actually got about halfway through the new stretch of road before we bogged down hopelessly to a dead stop. Even though Papa had the gas pedal to the floor, the car just kept going slower, and digging deeper and deeper in until at last it just stopped with a sort of ‘oomph’ and sagged tiredly into the oozy mud.

‘Goddammit!’ Papa said.

I already knew what to expect. I mentioned that my grandpa never met a muddy road that he didn’t want to challenge, didn’t I? So, I removed my shoes and socks and rolled up the cuffs of my pants while Papa did the same. Then the we got out to survey the situation. The mud was cold and wet and we went in up to our ankles. Papa looked around until he found a pine sapling about four inches in diameter and fifteen feet long, which had been knocked over by the ‘dozers. He had me gather pine boughs and sticks while he took both hubcaps off the rear wheels, which left the axle hubs protruding out beyond the tires - as car axles did in those years. He hunted up some chunks of wood for a fulcrum, and after arranging things to his satisfaction, he placed the end of the pine sapling under the axle end, and pried the wheel up until it cleared the mud. It was my job then to shove the sticks and pine boughs under the tire while he held things up. We did this for both sides.  Of course I got mud all over my suit, and Papa’s suit got plenty besmirched too.

We got back in the car and Papa floored things again. We got maybe fifteen or twenty feet before we are bogged to the hubs again. We repeated the process two or three more times, by which time I had abandoned all hope for my suit and began crawling around on my hands and knees in the mud shoving the debris under the tires; Papa’s suit was almost as bad off as mine. All together we moved the car maybe fifty feet and we still had a couple hundred yards to go. It became very clear we weren’t going to make it and I figured all was lost and we’d spend the rest of the day and night right there.
Oh, but not Papa!

Papa was nothing if not resourceful, and under his rough tutelage I learned so very many things which got me out of so many dire situations since. The most valuable thing I learned is to never give up and throw up your hands. If you look around yourself, and think a little, you can almost always find a solution to your problem - especially if you learn to think outside the box as they say these days. Papa’s solution that day was very simple. He just walked over to one of the bulldozers, jiggled a couple of things and fired it right up, and then brought it over in front of the car. I was both amazed and scared at the same time.

The bulldozer already had some kind of chain or cable on it which Papa fixed to the front of the car. I got behind the wheel of the car and Papa towed it out to solid ground again in just three or four minutes. Just like that! Then he replaced the 'dozer to where he’d found it and we were back on the road again!

We were not far from our destination then, which was my Aunt Emma’s house where the formal funeral ceremony was actually to be performed. Both my grandpa and I stood outside the house in our muddy clothes as my grandma fussed and poured water over our clothes from a bucket, and rubbed us off as well as she could. I don’t think my suit ever recovered from the Georgia red clay stains, but perhaps a good dry-cleaning may have restored it; I just can’t remember now.

The other thing I vividly remember are the shiny nickels someone had placed on my Aunt Emma’s eyelids to keep them closed. Back in the 1950’s in rural Georgia, a funeral was expensive if done by a funeral home, just like now. Only the finer ‘city folk’ could afford them. I don’t know if it’s done anymore - actually, I don’t think it is, but it was common then for many poor people to prepare their own relatives’ bodies for burial. No embalming of course, but they would wash and dress their relative, do their hair and makeup nicely, and either build, or ask a neighbor to build a wood coffin. Then, folks would have a normal funeral with preacher, either in church or at home as in my aunt’s case. Meanwhile, some of the younger menfolks would have prepared (dug) the grave in the church cemetery where the loved one was laid to rest.

My Great Aunt Emma, who I’d only met once or twice during her lifetime, looked nice and peaceful in her knocked together wood coffin placed between two straight backed chairs. She was dressed in her nicest Sunday-go-to-meeting dress and the nickels on her eyes were removed for the ceremony. It was a little spooky for an eleven-year-old boy, but there were a couple other kids my age there and we hung out together, each pretending it was just everyday routine for us. And other than the overall spookiness of a funereal in the first place, it was a very nice funereal.

“Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” as they say.

*This story is totally true to the best of my recollection.