Most of you know that I grew up in a lovely little Kentucky town called Pewee Valley. It did not get its name for its size, although it was indeed small. Nor did it get its name from its geography, because it is actually located on a ridge and not a valley. Supposedly the town leaders named it after the Eastern Wood Pewee bird, whose song they heard during one of their meetings. Our town’s growth began in the mid 1850s when a rail line was completed between Louisville and Frankfort. A rail stop was positioned at what was then called “Smith’s Station,” and gradually a community developed, particularly attracting Louisville residents who could build either year round or summer homes and use the rail line to commute to downtown Louisville when a daily line was begun. When I was a kid, Pewee Valley was separated by hill and dale and winding roads from the furthest eastern suburbs of Louisville. Now it is pretty much connected to those eastern suburbs, and suffers from rush hour traffic on roads that haven’t kept up with the growing population.
Our home in Pewee Valley was a large 2 story white Queen Anne style home that was built in 1890. Its interior had been altered several times during its 100+ years of existence, but still retained many old features, like the second staircase that my family closed off and used as an unusual stepped closet. My parents bought this home, moving from their small suburban house in the eastern suburb of St. Matthew’s, about 5 years before I was born. By then they were already the parents of three boys and one girl and I suppose they were desperate for a bit more room. The house was a bargain. In the mid 1950’s new and modern suburban houses were all the rage, and not many young families wanted an old house far from the city and the newly emerging suburban centers. Dad was in the construction business, which must have given him confidence that he could handle any needed repairs and renovations. They filled its large rooms with furniture bought at estate auctions and left over from their own dying or moving relatives.
Our yard was almost 3 acres and filled with large trees of many varieties. But, one of the most beautiful trees was a mature dogwood that filled with pink blossoms each spring. It was situated on the side of our house and could be seen from any windows on that side, including the kitchen window above the sink, where my mother must have spent a good portion of her time. The dogwood was broad and rounded in shape, with lower branches that swept down and almost reached the ground. I have never seen so large and broad a dogwood since. I praise its beauty now, but to the "child me" it was just another of the many trees in the yard and not one that was particularly good for climbing, which seemed to be my tomboy test of a tree’s true worth. It’s downward swooping lower branches did make for good cover when hiding or playing some of the various make believe games children play.
Eventually I came to my adulthood and left little Pewee Valley for bigger and better things. I was ready to delve into the world and like many that age, anxious to venture away from my small town. I attended college in Carbondale, Illinois, a place that its many Chicago-native students referred to as small, but was certainly bigger than Pewee Valley. Carbondale was about a four-hour drive from Pewee Valley, so I usually only returned home for holidays. Even my summers were spent away from home on archaeological excavations. During my last year of college the pink-blossomed dogwood tree apparently became ill, a fact that I hardly noticed on my brief visits home. My mother’s health also began to falter at about this same time. During my senior year of college she quickly progressed from being sickly to severely ill. At some point during that next year the tree died and had to be cut down. Although I have combined these stories here, at the time I did not associate the illness of the dogwood tree and that of my mother.
After many attempts by various doctors to determine the cause of my mother’s illness, she made a trip to the Mayo clinic where she was told that she had an incurable disease called scleraderma. It was too late for treatments that might have brought her comfort or prolonged her life a bit, and several months later she died. But, during my Thanksgiving visit home before her January death, she told me about a connection that she had always felt between herself and the pink dogwood tree. She said that as long as she had lived in that house, which had been about 27 years, she had felt that somehow when that dogwood tree died she would die also. According to her, she was telling this only to me, claiming that I was the only one who would likely believe her and understand that she had always felt this way. I’m not sure that I really was the only one to hear her story. Perhaps she told this to my father and siblings also. But I do know, that I had never known that she had a particular attachment to that tree. At the time I did believe her, but over the years my analytical side has had doubts to any “spiritual/cosmic” connection between my mother and the tree. I’ve wondered if perhaps she used the story, the way parents often use stories with their children, to help them grasp something that is easier learned in the context of a story.
I’ve only lately begun to realize the meaning and importance this story holds for me as a symbolic representation of the peace and acceptance that my mother had for death, even though she was only 55 years old, an age that looks younger and younger to me as I approach it myself. My mother had great faith in God and seemed to have no fear of her impending death. She was so comfortable about it that I felt incredibly comfortable and accepting of it too, despite the fact that I was only 22 years old. There were times—later in my life --- that I felt duped by her---leading me to be so accepting of her death. I think now, that perhaps she was trying to teach me something that I would only fully understand in bits and pieces later, as I progressed along in my adult life without her guidance. Maybe her lesson was, that some things are inevitable, especially death, but that faith is a shield against fear of the unknown. It has taken awhile, but I hope she somehow knows that eventually I did get it, thanks to her.
Often when I think of my mother, I picture that pink flowered dogwood tree in our Pewee Valley yard, and remember this verse:
To every thing there is a season and a time to every purpose under heaven.
A time to be born, and a time to die.
A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away
-Mary
This is a photo of the dogwood tree in full bloom.
One of the last pictures taken of my mother. March 1981- My wedding in the living room of the Pewee Valley home. She died the following January.
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