They Shrunk Mama Leake’s House
This morning, I’m sitting in an upstairs lounge area in Hellfighters USA Motorcycle Shop in Laurel, Mississippi. Downstairs, my bike is being serviced, so I grabbed a chance to jot down a few words. I must say, this place is fascinating, to say the very least. If you like motorcycles, guns, Jeep, veterans, or America, you should stop in some time.
Recently, in South Mississippi, the weather cleared and the temperature warmed. Finally, a Sunday rolled around with the promise that weather would be clear and in the mid to late fifties in the afternoon and I decided a short ride was better than no ride at all. The day probably didn’t get as warm as the forecasters prognosticated, but I bundled up and hit the road. Generally, I prefer to have a destination in mind. It just helps me to gauge how long I should be gone so that I don’t venture too far from home. But on this day, I just started out going east toward Hattiesburg, Mississippi.
The ride was chilly, but I was glad to be in the wind. As I came upon Rocky Branch Road, in Lamar County, I made a snap decision and took the turn. This road is significant to me you see because it is the road my grandmother lived on years ago.
My grandmother was Leake Baxter Lott. Mama Leake, as she was known by many, many people. Mama Leake retired from teaching school, to help out with my twin brother and me while my mother completed her own teaching degree. I have memories of Mama Leake, but it is with great disdain for myself, that I have allowed time to rob me of many of them.
Over the years, I had been down the road several times, including a few family reunions that were held at a community center just across the road from Mama Leake’s house, but I don’t recall paying it much attention. On the bike, however, the point of view is just different, and on this day, I slowed to a crawl as I came by the house and paid some real attention to it. I looked at the house, the yard, and the woods surrounding the property. I pulled over and stared at the place. I thought, “It shrunk!” “The whole damn place shrunk.”
I searched for my memories of the place. I remembered a barn in the back where Mama Leake coerced Johnny and me to plant mustard greens for her. I remembered a “car shed” behind the house. I remembered the oak tree into which my cousin shot a British 303 rifle bullet. The yard, the huge yard where Mama Leake somehow convinced us to rake up all of the leaves, seemed tiny now. The woods where, as kids, we built fires and filled coffee cans with water and boiled berries, leaves, and bark, was just an area of scrub brush and gum trees. I thought how could this small house have been so big at one time? The house was big enough to hold all of the grandkids, the parents, uncles, and aunts at Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter. Even Mr. Frank’s store up the road, which was once at least 2 miles away when we were children, was in reality, only a quarter-mile away. We walked there for ice cream and Mr. Frank’s wife would go on and on over the fact that my brother and I are identical twins.
I guess it is the way it is with the world. Computers, the internet, cell phones, and four-lane highways have co-conspired to shrink the planet. I mean, vehicles are capable of going three hundred or even four hundred thousand miles when once 90,000 miles was considered worn out. Such is the advance of time and space. I always thought it was a long trip to Mama Leake’s, but now I’m there in about half an hour.
As I look across this museum-quality motorcycle store and see all of these old bikes amongst the new ones, I think about watching The Jetsons when I was young. Almost sadly, I consider just how close we are to being right there. It won’t be long my friends, it won’t be long. With that consideration, a slight chill advances up my spine and I wonder what is next? Then to shake off the chill, I wonder what our version of Rosie we will be like.