{"id":56495,"date":"2014-11-16T13:32:29","date_gmt":"2014-11-16T18:32:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=56495"},"modified":"2014-11-16T13:32:29","modified_gmt":"2014-11-16T18:32:29","slug":"holler-folk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=56495","title":{"rendered":"Holler Folk"},"content":{"rendered":"

This past Veteran’s Day, a dear and trusted friend of mine, in her usual subtle manner, suggested I return to my roots when writing. I spent this morning perusing the Bunker archives. It just may be that my honest broker and most favored critic is correct and I have wandered some. Thank you my good friend for the reality check.<\/em><\/p>\n

From the Bunker Archives:<\/p>\n

Some days, I need time and a quiet place to think. When I do, I find a nearby holler and drive the pick-up truck up it. Usually, I can find a good place to sort things out. Yes, we call them hollers over here in Wild Wonderful. Not hollows<\/em><\/strong>. A holler is a narrow valley carved out from a creek flowing through it. The local folk might call the creek a branch so if you come visiting and someone tells you a branch washed over the road, don\u2019t go looking for tree limbs. A narrow road usually trails along side of the creek. Wherever the landscape is wide enough or flat enough to allow for it, houses spring up. They used to be old wood framed, clapboard houses, but nowadays you\u2019re likely to find a double wide or one of those new modular homes. A person doesn\u2019t live in<\/em> the holler, they live up<\/em> it. The entrance to the holler is the mouth and when you run out of road, you\u2019re at the head of it. Consider that as your free holler geography lesson. Jerry West, NBA Hall of Famer, is one of our most famous holler folk. He\u2019s from Cabin Creek. There are other famous holler folk out there among you (thankfully), but those who\u2019ve left generally don\u2019t brag much about their humble holler beginnings.<\/p>\n

Hollers are more advanced today than they were when I grew up on Skin Fork. They\u2019re mostly paved now. I remember them being dirt that was occasionally sprayed with a mixture of water and oil by the county road crews to keep the dust down. The environmentalists would have a conniption fit about that nowadays. It\u2019s common to find cable television, satellites and yes, even the Internet up most hollers. Our holler folk are as well informed as most, but they\u2019re happy about the distance they are able to keep between themselves and say Paris Hilton. Up hollers, you might find hogs still being slopped, cows milked by hand and hound dogs that are not leashed or caged. Holler life is maybe the last vestige of sanity and peaceful living one can find.<\/p>\n

Traveling up the holler, it isn\u2019t long before I spot him. He\u2019s always there, sitting on the porch in a straight backed wooden chair. He\u2019s a composition of the influential men in my young life. My Dad, a couple of my uncles and some others I listened to during my holler rearing. He\u2019s wearing bibbed overalls of faded denim and a red and black checked flannel shirt. On the back of his head sits an old train engineer\u2019s cap, cocked slightly to the right. He\u2019s wearing a pair of ankle high work boots, might even be steel toes. Hanging out of one of his rear pockets is a red bandanna. In the pouch pocket on the front of his bibs is his smoking tobacco and a plug of chew. The smoking tobacco isn\u2019t anything fancy. In my younger days, it would have been Prince Albert in a can or Bugler Boy. He might stuff it in a pipe to smoke it or roll his own. Either way, when this tobacco is smoldering it smells like someone lit a cat. The chew is Union Workman or Mail Pouch, neither are brands for the meek. His look hasn\u2019t changed over the years and I expect his outlook hasn\u2019t changed much either. He\u2019s honest, straightforward and not too complicated.<\/p>\n

Lying on the porch beside him is an old hound dog of no discernible pedigree. Could be part beagle from the long snout, big ears and eyes. Maybe part red bone from the drooping jowls and the color of his face. Then again, the slender waist and speckled markings makes you think there might have been a blue tick in the family. Holler folk will just call him a hound dog and leave it at that. If he can hole a groundhog or chase a rabbit from a thicket or a prowler from the back yard no one much cares if he\u2019s pure bred or not.<\/p>\n

Eventually, these images bring me back to my roots, the perspective from which I most like to sort things out. I\u2019ll find me a quiet spot along the creek, get out of the truck and go sit. I\u2019ll grab a hand full of pebbles, watch the squirrels chasing one another, listen to the birds sing and the running water and ponder the problems of the day while I chuck the pebbles one at a time into the creek. I\u2019ll imagine myself asking the old gentleman about those problems\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do you think about this war we\u2019re in?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWar you say? War is an odd thing. I was in WWII, you know. With General Patton. Every American knew we were in a war for our lives then. Every American knew who the enemy was and knew that we had to beat him to survive. This terrorist thing, now that\u2019s different. It\u2019s a war about us surviving OK, but \u2018bout the only people that believe we\u2019re at war are the Soldiers. I don\u2019t expect any terrorist is going to come up this holler and that\u2019s part of the problem. People don\u2019t feel threatened when they should. They can\u2019t point and say there\u2019s the enemy. They cry to high heaven about being searched at the airport and don\u2019t even give up a thought as to why. And the politicians, they\u2019re not much help. They should be out there every day, all of them, pointing Americans toward the enemy, but they ain\u2019t. The next time we\u2019re attacked, instead of figuring out how to fight back they\u2019ll start investigating each other. I just fear the next attack\u2019ll be much worse than the last. But, by then, the last one will have been at least well investigated. Yep, this war\u2019s rather peculiar and I ain\u2019t sure all of us are into winning it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do you think about the politicians? Especially those trying to be President?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think much about them. They have nothing in common with me, matter of fact, they don\u2019t have much in common with most anyone \u2018cept one another. One side\u2019ll tell me how good I got it, the other\u2019ll tell me how bad it is. Problem is, things never changed much one way or the other here in the holler no matter who calls his self President. I just look at\u2019em and ask, do you reckon he\u2019s ever seen an actual hog pen? Or, changed the oil in a truck? Caught a catfish and skinned it? Hoed weeds from a garden? Ever had less than 10 dollars between him and hunger? These people insist they know what I need? Most of\u2019em are politicians for the sake of being politicians and they\u2019ll do desperate things to get what they want. If you find one that you\u2019re convinced is truly interested in taking care of you, me and America, vote for him.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat about us Americans as people, are we doing OK?\u201d<\/p>\n

He\u2019ll pull out his pocket knife, cut a piece from his chewin\u2019 plug and pop it into his cheek. He\u2019ll hold it there for a while pondering the question while it softens up. He’ll bullseye the spittoon, then he\u2019ll answer.<\/p>\n

\u201cI read once where President Lincoln said that God must love common folks, that\u2019s why he made so many of them. Most Americans are common folks. See this old hound a layin\u2019 here? I bet there\u2019s five or six different breeds in this one, if you could even track\u2019em all down. This here\u2019s an American hound dog and just like most men, he\u2019s far from being a pure breed. I\u2019ve seen\u2019im run and hunt with all different kinds of hounds and get along good with all of\u2019em. Now we could call him a Beagle-American hound dog, a Red-bone American hound dog, or some such nonsense, but at the end of the day, he\u2019d still be a hound dog a chasin\u2019 groundhogs and cold biscuits for a livin\u2019. He\u2019s friendly, likes to be scratched behind the ears. Whenever a stranger wanders into the yard though, he\u2019ll be out there to get a smell and make sure he ain\u2019t threatening. When he confronts danger, he turns into a fierce, tenacious animal that defends his territory and won\u2019t quit the fight until it\u2019s over. He never makes a mistake about danger. Men could take lessons from him. Especially nowadays.\u201d<\/p>\n

By the time I chuck my last pebble into the creek, it\u2019s suppertime. I hop back into the pick-up and head down the holler. The old-timer\u2019s chair is empty when I pass by this time. I get the image of him sitting supper with the rest of the family, saying grace and giving thanks for what they have and where they are. I take a moment to give my own thanks for the good sense of holler folk. Then I feel better.<\/p>\n

Copyright\u00a9 JD PENDRY 2004 All Rights Reserved<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This past Veteran’s Day, a dear and trusted friend of mine, in her usual subtle manner, … Holler Folk<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":648,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-56495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/648"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=56495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56495\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=56495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=56495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=56495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}