Visit To Duffield & Aunt Callie's Birthday!

Duffield, VA is a hidden, rough-cut gem of lovely Appalachian beauty where we enjoy going to visit Aunt Callie. We delight in its tree-clad, time-worn mountains and hills with cabins clinging to the sides of the hollars and coves reflecting sunlight from their rusted tin roofs. We love to see their chimneys sending up thin lines of trailing smoke that hover above their precariously-placed foundations high over the cold, rushing rivers below that bound over rocks that sometimes shimmer nearly hidden remnants of the tons of coal still lying beneath the ground.

Uncle R, his sweet sister, YooDee, and I will be heading there for Aunt Callie’s 97th birthday party that will take place this Saturday. I am looking forward to the ride with my sister-in-law, YooDee, as much as anything else! I can’t wait to hear her cheerful and loving sharing of family news, H’ville happenings, books she’s read, what she will be growing in her huge backyard garden this summer and other tidbits that come up along the way.

I’d like to think that besides hugging on Aunt Callie and the other relatives that will gather together on her birthday, that Uncle R., YooDee & I could sneak away for a short time and snoop around the little towns of Big Stone Gap and Appalachia, VA. These are intriguing little mountain coal towns that beg for exploration. Big Stone Gap has a “caution walker” sign at one corner that has a person reading a book. Do people frequently need to cross that intersection on foot while reading at the same time?!? Bibliophile that I am – I would LOVE to know!

Will Uncle R & I have the chance to walk up to the tracks that cut across the side of the mountain facing Aunt Callie’s house where we always hope to catch the coal train up close with our camera? This train has labored up one side with more brimming cars of coal and wheeled down on the way back with a free, unfettered rattling of iron emptiness for more years than anyone around that area can remember and that never ceases to amaze Uncle R & me.

Maybe Uncle R, YooDee & I will walk the back field past Aunt Callie’s barn, hop across the winding little creek and hike to the nearby hump of land that is home to an old family cemetery – serene and dignified with its circle of cedars and rampant wildflowers and is elegant despite leaning, broken and worn headstones. The still visible intricacy of their carved decorations forever whisper of the devotion of those left behind.

We dearly love Aunt Callie and want to see her every chance we get, but I know who I will think of most of the time that we are in Duffield and whose face Aunt Callie’s will constantly bring to my mind and that is Mama S, Uncle R’s mom. I really feel her presence in the beautiful rocky mountains of Virginia where she grew up and think about stories told about her years there as a child and later as a young woman. She dearly loved to visit there and she and her sisters would gather then and laugh and cook and ply their families with food that no one could resist.

The beauty of the Appalachians was no match for her warm, dark eyes, sweet smile and soft, curling salt & pepper hair in the years that I was blessed to call her mother-in-law. Beautiful pieces of her painted china grace Aunt Callie’s house and I love to see those reminders of her talent and generosity. Many times while at Aunt Callie’s - when all the relatives are stirring around her small, cozy house and plates of food are covering every surface in the kitchen and dining room, I thank the Lord for placing me with Uncle R and in this circle of precious family affection and respect.


Love to the Pamela’s Girls,

Auntie J.