May 9, 2011: “ONLY AN HOUR”
~ by Father Ron Camarda
May 9, 2011: “ONLY AN HOUR”
~By Margaret R. Camarda (My Mother 1930-2000)
(My mother wrote this short story when we were living in Winchester, MA in the late 1960’s. At the time she had 5 boys and 2 girls all under the age of 12 years. I found this story recently at my dad’s house. It is written with an old fashion typewriter. I share it in order to be a good steward of farm life in the 1930’s in Vermont. The role of animals is quite evident. This “hour” was horrific, but my mother would never have met my father had it not occurred.)
A farm in the midst of Vermont’s Green Mountains was my first home. I lived there for the first few years of my life with my parents, two brothers, sister, Uncle Dan, and a constant stream of relatives and friends who came to visit and enjoy some of the good life of the farm.
It was a life full of fun, adventure, and excitement for my brothers, sister and myself. Every cow, horse, chicken and kitten was our own personal friend and pet. We also had a big collie dog who was probably the best baby sitter my mother could have found. There was a pine grove for picnics, and old gravel and sand pit for building castles, a stream with cool clear water for refreshing tired, hot feet, and a blueberry patch for lots of eating and a little picking. We roamed through large pastures, ran as fast as the dickens over cut hayfields that scratched and pricked our bare feet and played hide and seek in the corn fields.
Bumping along on the way to the barn after being scooped up by my father and tossed like a ball on the wagon full of fresh cut hay was pure joy. Oh, how I used to look forward to the beckon from my Uncle Dan that meant another ride through the woods on the horse drawn sled, picking up maple syrup buckets or wood for the furnace and fireplace.
Just sitting in the warm sun in front of the barn, listening to sounds from the barn or my mother humming in the kitchen gave me such a warm feeling. My family’s talk about, “When we were on the farm,” has always been lively conversation, full of good humor and remembering of the many good times.
While I, because of my young years, remember only the fun and good times, this was not the case with my parents and uncle. They too, remember the good times, and also the struggle and hard work; and hard work it was. Their days started very early, and by the time they sat down to eat breakfast, they had almost completed a full days work. I guess any farmer would say, “A woman’s and a farmer’s work is never done.”
I don’t mean to say that my folks didn’t have fun, they surely did. People in the country are a friendly lot and when they find the time to meet with friends and neighbors they make the most of it. I particularly remember the annual church picnics. They were held in the field behind our house. The long tables were set with white tablecloths and heaps of delicious food. The games for the adults and children went on all day long. Even our collie dog had a good time on that day every year. Everyone had plenty of good-natured talk, a favorite pastime of farmers, and very important to them it was because the newsy happenings of their lives could be relayed from themselves to others.
All this, our life on the farm, changed in one hour on a cold windy day, two days before Thanksgiving. My morning started as usual before the sun rose. I crawled out of my bed on the second floor and finding no companionship from my sleeping sister and brothers, went downstairs to my parent’s room. Their door was always open, seemingly…waiting for my early morning visit. I climbed into their bed and while they pretended to be asleep, I would lie there quietly listening to the sounds of the sleeping house. Before long, my father and mother were up and dressed starting on their busy day. I was quickly assisted in dressing so I too could be off to the barn with my father.
The cold November morning made it necessary to build up the furnace that had died down during the night. A few sparks from the furnace chimney landed on the overly dry roof. It had been a hot dry summer and a fall wind fanned the sparks into flames. My father was coming out of the barn on his way to the milk-house adjacent to the farmhouse when he saw the flames and smoke coming from the roof. He ran into the house and yelled to my mother, “O God, the house is on fire!” He ran upstairs and yelled for my brothers to get out fast and grabbed my sleeping sister from her bed. As he left the room, he heard the rumble of the roof falling and turned to see the bed, still warm from her body, a mass of flames and rafters. My brothers ran down the stairs just ahead of my father with their clothes in their arms and glanced back to see flames fill the top of the stairs.
We stood in the yard that morning and found there was nothing to do except to shiver from the lack of warm clothing as the flames got hungrier and hotter every minute. The town fire engines came but were unable to do anything to stop the fire. They tried desperately to get water from the well that was much too low due to the dry summer. The fire rapidly spread to the barn and that was also completely devoured with such speed that there was just barely time to save the animals.
When the fire got completely out of hand; my mother, sister, brothers and myself were hustled into the family car to get us away to safety. The car wouldn’t start and had to be pushed down the hill leading to the farmhouse until it sputtered to a start. We were driven to the closest neighbor about a half-mile away. From there we watched what was left of our home burn to the ground.
My mother never took her eyes off that terrible sight. She watched and wept and talked about all her treasures and possessions that were burning. She wept for the wedding gifts she had received years before, the 550 jars of preserves she had worked all summer to put up, the new shoes for us that she had bought only the day before with the price tags still on them. She was transfixed and couldn’t look away, but just kept watching, crying, talking and thinking. I cried too, because my usually happy mother was so miserable watching everything she had worked with my father to build, being wiped away in one great wave of fire.
My father and uncle and a few neighbors tired to save as much as possible but were to learn later that the tiny pile of savings was of little or no value. There had been no time to decide the value or importance of the things to be saved.
One hour from the time my father first spotted the flames on the roof there was nothing left of the house that had sheltered us in those happy years. There was nothing except the smoldering ashes, empty foundations and the tiny pile of furnishings saved by the men. If only I had saved this or that was heard many, many times in the next few days.
When my father and the others had finally felt that the fire had spent itself and could do no more damage, he came over to the neighbor’s house where we were waiting. I didn’t know what to expect, but by that time I was thoroughly frightened by the events of the day. Dad was covered with black soot; his clothes, face, hands…everything. That tired, worn man who had fought the losing battle to save the work of years with always the vision of a small girl’s bed aflame and his sons’ room a blazing inferno, stood with his arm around my mother and did not cry at all. He prayed that evening, not for anyone to hear, but in a quiet soft voice: “Thank God, I still have my family,” over and over, again and again.
It took weeks, months or even years to find out just how good or bad the situation was after the fire. Friends and neighbors who had heard about plight were more than generous with food, clothing and most important; their encouragement. To give only one example; Reverend Day, who was not of our faith, was one of the first to come with his arms full of new clothes for us.
We stayed with our neighbors and friends for the next few days and then moved into an apartment in town for the rest of that winter. There was no money and through an oversight, the insurance on the farm and furnishings was inadequate to take care of anything except outstanding bills at the time of the fire. During the summer and fall my father had shipped bailed hay to Leominster, Massachusetts and was counting on the money from the sale of the hay to tide us over that winter, but by a strange coincidence, the same morning our house burned, the barn it was stored in burned too. My father was able to find an occasional odd job or logging job when the weather permitted the men into the woods. The farmlands were sold to the Morgan Farm that spring and the money used to settle mortgage and bills of the winter.
Although they had nothing and were starting from scratch, my mother and father never changed. My father still laughed easily and my mother still hummed while she ironed or cooked. They managed to make Christmas happy and merry that year, even though they certainly were worldly poor. I can still remember that wonderful hearty laugh on Christmas Eve when my father tossed the cheap tree into the car and how swell it looked decorated with popcorn balls the next day.
As I got older and understood better, I asked time and again, “How could you stand to lose everything like that?” The answer was always the same, “I have you and the rest of my family.” Then he would laugh that deep hearty laugh, “I know how to work for the rest!”
Beloved, as I typed this from my mother’s original manuscript, I went back to how difficult it was in the depression and yet there was such hope. My grandfather, Moses Duffy, would have been 120 years old on May 28th of this year. He died in 1949 on January 1st, which happens to be the Feast day of St. Moses who was a priest. My grandmother, Mary Josephine (Crowley) Duffy was born in Youghal, Ireland. I am off to Ireland for the first time to celebrate Sister Patricia’s golden jubilee with her family not very far from where my grandmother was born. “Nanny” left Ireland and her family when she was only 15 years old (just like the song) in 1905. She never returned and her mother died shortly after she arrived. I will be celebrating 21 years of priesthood on May 19.
Have a most blessed week as we continue to celebrate mothers. I will be on a kind of retreat for the next two weeks. I look forward to sharing my journey when I return.
Love, joy, peace,
Father Ron Moses +
Father Ron Camarda is a retired Naval Chaplain and author of “Tear in the Desert,” a powerful book containing his memoirs of life and death at the Battle for Fallujah. Father Ron appears on EWTN and recently won the Silver Medal from the Military Writers Society of America.
