The Road Home
By Q.O.E.
August 23, 2018
Like all the well-worn paths we tread our whole life’s journey long,
The road that leads us home is like an old familiar song.
Through pasture, woods and orchard was a trail that we would roam,
As children, when the summer drew us back to dear Mount Thom.
And from the highest point, we took another to return
Back home for bread and butter, fresh from someone’s ancient churn.
There were others to the outhouse, to the barn and minnow pool,
And an old one we had heard of that our parents took to school.
Then shift to Country Harbour, where my Mother’s people dwell,
Where faded lanes might lead you to the fox pens or the well:
Where other paths were so well trod – all shiny, clean and neat –
By the innocent meanderings of little wooly feet.
And the barn, where daily milkings filled up many a dented pail,
Led on to fertile gardens in the river’s intervale.
‘Twas there that countless cabbages in regiments would grow,
For them, Grandfather Mason was christened “Cabbage Joe”!
The path he took to sell them all – or sauerkraut instead –
Twenty miles by horse and wagon from his dooryard to Drum Head.
In time, the younger folk dispersed to settle far and near,
And so, the longing to go home consumed the passing years.
Haying time was cause to make the scattered cease to roam,
To turn their anxious faces toward the mecca of their home.
My parents’ lone vacation was for one great purpose spent…..
To go where they most wished to be…so, home is where they went.
At first, the roads were primitive….dirt stretched eternally,
Our picnic lunches were the norm with thermoses of tea.
No restaurants or fine hotels in which to lay our heads..
But a rustic tourist cabin gave us shelter and a bed.
And when my Dad’s vacation was too short or money tight,
We’d sing ourselves awake and keep on driving through the night.
From Troy to Bennington, Vermont: from Bennington to Keene:
Then further on to Concord, little villages between.
We used to drive the coast of Maine, from Portland to Machias,
Where keeping Daddy wide awake would oft begin to try us.
Finally, to Calais, and the ordeal of the border:
Great were our “Hallelujahs” when we rolled on, safely over.
Not that we were guilty of a high stakes smuggling caper…
For our contraband was cigarettes and reams of toilet paper!
Saint Stephen to Saint Andrews: Saint Andrews to Saint John:
Sussex led to Moncton and our race was nearly run.
The way back then was difficult, conditions could be harsh,
And my Mother nearly wept to see men haying on the marsh.
Tantramar, then Sackville, then Amherst was in view;
And though they’d seen it all before, each year the joy was new.
Ninety miles to Pictou, was the shortest route to choose..
Or a little more through Wentworth, as we’re dying for a snooze!
Then somewhere in the fog of night, or in our weary minds,
We’d sing out, “County Pictou!” from that holiest of signs.
They’d meet us and they’d greet us, as we pulled up to the door:
Uncles, aunts and cousins from every portal poured.
It was though our other fifty weeks were simply an illusion,
For the true reality of home was bred in this confusion.
Haying and card playing and the old familiar yarns;
Children tramping down the hay and romping in the barn;
Women feeding dozens, baking cookies, cakes and bread,
Keeping oil lamps clean and filled and falling into bed.
Sleeping bodies everywhere each summer night and then,
Waking up, all rumpled, just to do it all again.
Performing one’s ablutions from the pitcher and the bowl,
Not sure which was cleaner…was it body, mind or soul?
Or, to the brook occasionally, as cool as one could wish,
To fully scrub the dirt away and mingle with the fish.
I travelled with my parents every year they journeyed home;
I have shown my own dear children Country Harbour and Mount Thom.
Their children, too, have been there and retain sweet childhood dreams
Of the woods and ripened gardens, of the rivers and the streams:
Of the woodsmoke in the evening and the call of owl and loon,
Of the taste of seafood suppers and the fiddle’s Celtic tune.
But, they did not know the Old Ones, feel their joys or sense their
strife,
When winter blows in through the cracks of houses and of life…
When music that they made themselves was all they knew of fun,
When neighbors helped each other for there was no 9 – 1 – 1.
But, deep within my heart and mind is knowledge of that time,
With feeble hope to capture it in story and in rhyme.
For all my years, I’ve clung to them, each loving, much-loved face,
And to my Nova Scotia, just because it was their place.
For going on eight decades, many highways I have roamed,
But the dearest of them all is still the road that leads me home.