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By: Jim Fitzpatrick |
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Email: jim@nunica.com |
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Local Farmer in Polkton Township writes for the Coopersville Observer. |
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Along Brandy Creek By Jim Fitzpatrick
The Coopersville Observer April 11, 2011- - No. 107 |
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The month of April brings to mind Aunt Frances and the wild flowers that bloom in the woods during this time of year. She was especially fond of the Trillium. She knew the best places in the woods to find all of her favorite spring flowers.
Aunt Frances never married. She spent most all of her life on Elmwood farm where she was born. When her youngest brother Morrie got married, the interior of the farm house was redone so as to be a two-family dwelling. Grandpa and Aunt Frances occupied the east wing and Morrie and his new wife settled in to the two-story portion of the place. Three baby boys arrived one by one over the next few years.
During their growing up time, the three young ones spent a lot of time with Aunt Frances. To get to her and Grandpa’s part of the house they had to go out onto the front porch and enter from there. That short interlude into the outside air sometimes meant snow, cold winds, rain, and brief moments in the pitch dark of the night. But, it was always worth it. Their aunt kept a candy dish for Grandpa filled with pink peppermint candies that he was always willing to share with them. In the evenings you could find him seated in his easy chair in the dining room reading the Grand Rapids Press. Aunt Frances often made an apple dumpling-like dessert that came hot out of the oven in her turquoise crock-like baking dish with matching lid. They had a telephone attached to the wall over a low built-in bench. You had to turn a small black crank around several times to ring up the operator to place a call to anywhere. On birthdays, at Easter time and Christmas, there were always presents waiting in her front room.
One of the best things that happened almost every spring for the three boys and Aunt Frances was when she took them picnicking in the woods over on Bernard Culligan’s farm. In his woods could be found the best and most prolific wildflowers of all. Those times on the hillsides among the trillium in that woods seem like only yesterday. Those dazzling white flowers, along with many others, still grow under the maples, just like the long ago spring times when Aunt Frances took the three of us there. |
