Back on the Farm: 10

I'm here on the porch--at the farm--listening to the cicadas and the occasional nicker of a horse. Things are winding down for the evening. My son and daughter are sitting at the kitchen table playing chess and John is outside giving the last shreds of a tour to Deborah. Yes, we managed to get together, had a lovely dinner, caught up on old times, and put our heads together a bit about the future of FarmFront. We've been talking to various family members about all this during the week. My niece and nephew, in particular, have a lot of enthusiasm and some great ideas. Sometimes, it seems as if this all just might happen.

John was reminiscing with his mother this morning--where else but in the kitchen--and they began to speculate about the ways the old roads used to run through the farm before the bottom land was flooded for the reservoir. There used to be four piles of stone that marked the corners of a large rectangle and a deep circular hole nearby. John used to go there as a child, and always thought that it was an old house and its well so he assumed that the road must have run that way. But Mom said no. That was an old slave house. I guess there's no reason to think there was a road there at all, since I don't imagine there was much of an interest in putting roads to slave houses in the bad old days. I've always known that there was a slave graveyard somewhere on the farm, but the idea of the house makes it all more real. Mom says this house was the overseer's house and that the plantation owner lived in town, in Raleigh. It's hard to truly imagine it all.

Tomorrow is our last day here before we head home to Connecticut. Of ocurse, we didn't do anywhere near as much as we would have liked as far as making progress on the FarmFront project. But there is the reality of being here and seeing (and hearing and smelling) it all again, and that's important too. From the youngest family member--one-year old Elahna--to the oldest--Dad, who will be 87 in September--we got to see just about everyone who still lives nearby. And if all goes well, future generations will be able to reconnect here for many years into the future.