Cracks between the Floor Boards

There was a time, a time I think back to, more than a half century in the past; as a child of 6 years or so, on any one of what, at the time, seemed to be an endless succession of cold winter evenings, lying on the floor by the fire place feeling too hot on the side facing the fire and too cold on the side away from the fire. The fireplace was the only source of heat in the old shotgun house. There were cracks between the floor boards. Now these cracks served useful purposes. The boy had seen his mother utilize the cracks to her advantage on many occasions. When she swept the floor, if she swept in a direction perpendicular to the direction the floor boards ran, she did not have to move the dust and dirt she collected, very far before it simply disappeared. If the Preacher or some other dignitary was expected, the lady would scrub the floor. She would pour a lot of soapy water on the floor and move it around with a broom. And again the dirty water would disappear into oblivion through some unseen fourth spacial dimension, or maybe it was the cracks between the floor boards again. In any case, the VIP would be welcomed by a clean, well-scrubbed floor. If the child lay on the floor on one of these cold winter evenings and kind of rolled around, the cold wind blowing up through the cracks between the floor boards would mitigate the heat radiating from the fire and result in  something one might interpret as comfort. Cracks between the floor boards are very good things.

From his position on the floor the boy would see a number of things, depending on the direction the endless battle between the fire and the cracks required him to face. If the boy found himself facing away from the fire he would see the legs of straight back chairs and the feet of adults siting on them. In a slightly different direction he might see the legs of table or two. If he rolled so that he looked up at some small angle, he might see the underside of the quilting frame his mother may have hung from the celling by four ropes, each suspending a corner of the rectangle made up four strips of wood and of a size suitable for holding a bed sized quilt in place while any number of women worked on its construction by the fireside. If there was a quilt to be made at the time, the boy, from his position, could see the lining but, the cotton and the work of country art which would be the top, would be out of his field of view from the place of bliss he would have been enjoying after a long day in the cold. Looking off to a slightly different angle he could see the hand-turned legs of a small table. Standing in the place of prominence at the center of the table he could see an oil lamp. The lamp would be made of decorated cut glass. The base would be heavy with a substantial oil reservoir. A metal burner with a cotton wick would be screwed on the lamp base. A glass globe would be mounted on the burner. He might see a glowing flame burning on the wick. Next year it would be possible to look underneath the house and see bright lines projected on the ground, through the cracks between floor boards, from electric lights.  But electricity was a year in the future.  For now the grand oil lamp was the only light source. If the boy could see the flame on the wick he would see the legs of straight back wooden chairs around the table. He could also see the feet and lower legs of adults sitting on the chairs reading or doing some close work which required better light. From his position of affection for the cracks between the floor boards, he would be unable to see the King James Bible which would surely be open on the table by the oil lamp, but he knew it was always there. If the feet were not there, there would be no flame burning on the wick. It would have been extinguished, or maybe never ignited, to save oil. The fire light was good enough for conversation or dozing or most other things which might be going on a winter night.   He could sometimes see other children rolling around to find their own perfect comfort zone. All the sights might change from evening to evening as people came and went, but he took comfort  in the knowledge that if he looked toward the fire, the scene would never change. On any evening there would be a stick of firewood, they only call them logs in the movies, lying across the dog irons.  Some of the less well educated people who came along from time to time called them fire dogs, but this boy knew they were dog irons. The fire would always be made by placing a large back stick on dog irons at the rear of the fire place. This was supposed to throw the heat out. Smaller sticks of fire wood were placed on the dog irons in front of the back stick. This provided the fuel source for the fire. As the fire burned, it consumed the little sticks first and they would be replenished several times before the back stick was reduced to a point where it was pulled forward and forced to join the ranks of the subordinate fuel to be replaced by a new back stick. Now the dog irons were made of brittle cast iron. This set of dog irons had been the victim of the accidental dropping of an unusually large back stick which had broken the upper right side of front part. Its repair had required a 2 inch diagonal weld across the damaged area. The boy could always be sure to see this example of the blacksmith’s skill. 

And of course the ever present black cast iron kettle steamed on a bed of coals in front. Every fireplace in every farmhouse in the world had one of these, but this one had been a wedding gift to his parents from some well-wisher on their happy day.

That Very Kettle

 If he rolled to a slightly different position, he would see the churn placed to the left of the hearth and at just the right distance from the fire. The right distance was determined by the size of the flame at any given time. A churn is a ceramic container used to make butter and buttermilk. Raw cow’s milk is put in the churn and left to curdle. The milk had to be kept warm to sour and this was the only warm place in the house in winter.

This is the churn he saw.

The boy’s mother was diligent in her duties regarding the churn. She would move it closer to or away from the fire as may be needed to keep at the right temperature. She would   dutifully turn the churn on a regular basis to be sure the contents were warmed on all sides. But the usually faithful old churn would sometimes renege on its promise of new butter and buttermilk to refill the one gallon bale jar which held one of the family staples. When this happened the boy might see mom lift the kettle from its resting place on the bed of coals. The churn was equipped with a lid which had a hole in the center to accommodate the dasher handle. When a little water from the kettle was poured through the hole and allowed to run down the dasher into the reluctant milk it would usually stimulate the fermentation process and achieve the desired result. But if this did not work, a little buttermilk from a bale jar which retained some of the last churning’s product would follow the water along the dasher handle. This was sure to make things right and few nights later the boy would be able to look up from that sweet spot over the cracks between the floor boards and see the legs of another straight back chair next to the churn. He knew he would see mom’s feet, one on either side of the churn, and hear the splashing sound of the milk and the bump of the dasher hitting to the bottom of the churn. The dasher was a simple but effective device consisting of wooden handle of a length to reach from the level of a seated person’s hands to the bottom of the churn. The end of the dasher which was inside the churn would feature a pair of crossed wooden blocks which would strike the milk as the dasher was moved up and down during the churning process. This would break up the fermented milk fat. After several minutes of this the boy could see the dasher propped with its handle on the floor, its business end and the churn lid resting over the churn to allow residual liquid to drain back to its proper place.

The churn would be allowed to set for a time so the butter would rise to the surface. It would then be scooped off and placed in some container. Maybe this would be a mold of some sort if butter was to be sold. If it was intended for home use it would likely be just a bowl or cut. But in whatever form it would be put aside to cool and harden. The buttermilk which remained in the churn would be poured into the one gallon bale jars. And, of course, the churn would soon be refilled with raw cow’s milk and placed back by the fire side.

A decade more than a half century has passed, and that place of perfect bliss were the forces of the fire and the cracks between the floors boards come into balance, and all that is right with the world is only a distant memory, but the kettle and the churn can still be found.

For Heavens Snakes

Mark 16

[18] They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.
[19] So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.
[20] And they went forth, and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them, and confirming the word with signs following. Amen

The year was 1975 I think. I was living with my family in Brevard NC. There was a discount store in town, at that time, called Sky City. Sky City was just one of those businesses in small towns all across the country just waiting to become cannon fodder before Wal-Mart, but at that time it was the place in Brevard to go for a number of things including cameras and film. I was in the store on some forgotten errand when I passed the camera department and overheard an elderly lady talking to the young man behind the counter. The story she was telling him ignited my natural attraction to the unusual and interesting. She was telling him that she was a member of a church in Georgia which took Mark 16 18-20 to be for real. They practiced snake handling as the center piece of their worship service and she wanted to photograph an upcoming event. She knew nothing about photography, but she was there to buy a camera and film and was hoping the sales person would teach her how to use it. Now it was obvious to me that the guy’s knowledge of cameras ended with the price. For sure the worshiper was not going to get any photos that would convince anyone that these were God fearing snake handlers and not fishermen baiting their hooks with night crawlers. So I decided to offer my services as photography instructor. In short order it became clear that the finer points of camera craft was not something this lady was going to master, so I grabbed the opportunity to do what I wanted to do from the beginning. I offered to do the photography for her. I wanted to experience this thing. She accepted this offer at once and invited me to go to the service as her guest.

The event I would be photographing was to be two day home coming for the extended congregation of the church. It would take place over a weekend at a little country Holiness Church outside Rome Georgia. Rome is in western Georgia near the place I grew up in eastern Alabama so I have some knowledge of the area. Services were scheduled for Saturday night and Sunday morning. Those were the starting times. Who could guess when they would end?

I drove to Rome with my wife and daughters on the appointed Saturday and checked into a motel in Rome. These kinds of services are usually conducted in the dog days of mid to late summer. This one was no exception. The service was scheduled early evening so we left the motel and started out to the church just as the sun was setting. There had been light rain earlier in the afternoon and the country road which led to the old clapboard church was now mostly slippery red Georgia clay. We passed a house with a county sheriff department car in the driveway, presumably the home of a deputy, but no one seemed to care. Snake handling services are technically illegal in Georgia, and all other states accept West Virginia, but local law generally looks the other way. 

We arrived at the place where so many people had for so long gathered to worship in their way. And somewhere along the way Mark 16: 18-20 had become a part of their lives and the center piece of their faith. Snake handling, as a religious ritual is only about 100 years old. It started when a reformed moonshiner in Tennessee, seeking forgiveness for his life of sin, came across a rattlesnake in the mountains and having just read the banner passage from Mark, decided to test his faith. He picked up the snake, and to his amazement, suffered no harm. The story spread across the rural south like wildfire and many fundamentalist believers picked up on it and tried it. For some reason, they say by an act of God, the serpents did not behave in the way usually expected of their species. Who can say? The practices are the same age, and have more Biblical support , than the doctoring of the assumption of Mary, which is dear to the hearts of millions of Roman Catholics. Neither is a part of my faith but there seems to be more evidence to support the snake handlers. Anyway I pass no judgments. I am here to observe and learn. I park my car in a damp grassy field surrounded by tall southern pines. There was a number of vehicles already in the field, all bearing evidence of the sticky nature of wet Georgia clay. I could see that a large tent had been erected next to the little church building. This was a special service and the usual building could not possibly accommodate the expected number of worshipers. This was reminiscent of tent meetings of the past, both those I have read about on the American frontier of the nineteenth century and some from my childhood. There were a number of people milling around the tent and the old church building. These were people of the land. Farmers, just from the fields and happy that the cotton was laid by so they could knock off before dark with having to choose between their deeply held religious beliefs and feeding their families, loggers and pulpwood cutters who made a hard living in the forest, and people who worked various, usually unskilled jobs around Rome. The men wore bibbed overalls or blue jeans, a few wore their best slacks and a good shirt. The women all wore dresses of at least knee length. There was already a lot of sound to be heard, people talking, tree frogs and insects in the surrounding trees, and musical instruments being tuned up in the tent. We walked across the field to the tent. Along the way we were greeted by people who did not know us but who were very friendly and assured us we were welcome. I know this kind of people. I grew up with people who, except for the snakes and poison, were very much like the worshipers I met there. They were simple poor honest hardworking people with, for the most part, very little formal education. But they have strong faith and take the Bible to be the complete and true word of God.

On entering the tent we saw a large open area with folding chairs setup in a way to maximize their number.  They were closely arranged in circles following the contour of the tent walls. Facing the semicircles of chairs was an open area, where a podium or lectern, surely borrrowed from the church building, had been paced. A crucifix, which would have looked more at home in a Catholic church, hung from one of a tent support poles. There were several tables scattered around the open area and enough high powered audio electronics to make a hip teen’s mouth water. This was for sure not going to be a quite service of meditation. We soon met the lady who had invited up. She was very happy to see me with my camera equipment. I think she was not sure I would show up and this service was very important to her.

                                                                  My Hostess

 She was getting on in years and I think she thought of this as some as getting ready to meet her maker. But she was very friendly and introduced us to many of her friends and to the church pastor who would be conducting the service. The pastor was a likeable young man with an obviously committed faith. I think it is unlikely that he graduated with high honors from Harvard Divinity School, but he was a man who could quote long passages from the King James Bible and he seemed to truly believe all of it. He welcomed us to his church but he offered his apologies for the inadequate service he was about to conduct. True, they had rattlesnakes, copperheads, and some other snake he said came from Mexico, with venom he could vouch for, but the man who was expected to bring the cobras had experienced car trouble and was unable to get there. He would do the best he could but you just can’t compensate for missing cobras. He assured me that they were happy to have us with them and that there would be plenty of snakes, such as they were without cobras, and that even though I was not a member of the church, I was welcome to help myself any time I felt the call to pick one up. I thanked him but thought that was an opportunity I was unlikely to avail myself of.

                                                           The Pastor

           

The tent soon started filling up with people and the service got under way. The pastor opened the service with some announcements. He expressed his deepest regrets for the absence of the cobras. He also stated that if anyone got bit to night the unfortunate worshiper could choose to go the hospital in Rome if they wished. If so someone would take him or her to the emergency room, but “if I get bit, just pray for me”.

      

 With that the action was on. Much of it was like a fundamentalist revival meeting from my childhood. Very loud, long emotional prayers and singing, and people would get to testify, tell personal stories of their faith and beliefs, usually with strong emotion and tears streaming down their cheeks. I had seen all this many times before but then things got unique. Boxes were opened and all manner of snakes were dumped out on the tables and on the podium. The music was still and several people would be testifying all at once. No one could be sure what anyone else was saying but there was high excitement. Someone would come forward, often while still testifying, and pick up the snake of his choosing from whichever pile was handy.

People of all sorts came forward to proclaim their faith in very dangerous ways. Now there was nothing physical going on to prevent any snake from biting anyone at any time. I have heard attempts to discredit these people and religious snake handling as some sort of hoax. Without question, the snakes still had their fins and venom sacks. I have heard it claimed that as snakes are cold blooded, if you put them in the refrigerator for a while they will go to sleep and not be aggressive. That did not happen. I saw the serpents in the open on a hot Georgia night for several hours. If they had been cold they had plenty of time to warm up. And they were completely active. They moved around and behaved as one would expect a snake to behave in all ways except, for the most part, biting people. As I will explain later, they were surely capable of biting people. I am sure these people truly believe they are doing the will of God. This is real to them and it is definitely not about money. They didn’t even pass a collection plate during the entire two day event.

The service started about sunset and went on until past midnight. Sometime in the wee hours they took a break and came back on Sunday morning. They outlasted me. We left some time after midnight with the service still going on. I only know they took a break at some time because when we got back on Sunday most of the people had changed clothes. 

Early on in the evening two men got bit. (At least 50 or 60 others did not) One of the bitten men panicked and wanted to go to the emergency   room. So, as promised, someone put him in a car and drove him to the hospital. The other man got both fangs of a large rattlesnake between the thumb and forefinger of his left hand. He simply put the snake down and confessed that he had been sinning and said he was going to pray and repent. He sat down in a chair and started his contrition. I watched his left swell and turn black. This went on for 2 or 3 hours and then the swelling started to go down and the color returned to normal. And before we left, he was up with more snakes in his hands. He got no more bites. When we returned the next day, I ask about the man who had gone to the hospital and was told he was still in the ICU. Who knows?

                             This Fellow Got Bitten

                              Repenting

                      Forgiven

Anyway the service went on and on. Mark 16:18 also talks about drinking poison and these people were determined to be complete.

                           A Handfull of faith

Several of them started drinking a clear liquid from one quart bell jars. They said it was strychnine. Now I was not the only nonbeliever present that night. There was a grad student from the University of Georgia there do research for his PHD thesis in some related subject. He came over to me and asked if I thought that was in fact strychnine.  I told him I could only see a clear liquid in the bell jars but I do know what rattlesnakes and copperheads look like and I was willing to take the pastor’s word for their Hispanic associates, so I assume that was the claimed toxic. The inquisitive student had a small bottle with him and he just walked up to the pastor and told him he wanted a sample of the liquid to take to the university chemistry lab to be analyzed. The man of the cloth did not hesitate. He filled the sample bottle from one of the bell jars. I never saw the student again, but I am sure the sample tested positive for strychnine.

This was a weekend to remember, a chance to experience something uniquely American and from the hearts of good, strong people who hold a strong personal faith. I do not claim, nor do I deny, that I saw a miracle in Georgia. I only report what I saw.

New Grand Son Hayes Bone McMullen Born July 15 2011

Hayes Photos

Madagascar Turning of the bones

The year was 1968. I was 23 year old and was interested in adventure. I was working at the Kennedy space flight center in Florida at the time and had been on the launch team for the first 2 Saturn 5 moon rocket launches. These were test flights, not the Apollo 11 moon landing. I had an opportunity to leave the launch operations and join the remote tracking and support network. At that time technology was primitive by today’s standards. Any orbiting space craft, manned or unmanned, required a lot of ground support. NASA built a network of ground racking stations around the globe. In 1968 I was offered a job on the NASA station in Madagascar. I was there for 4 years. I got to know a lot of new and different people of many different cultural backgrounds and mind sets. One of these was my wife, Nachin ( Maddy). She is not from Madagascar. She is from the British Commonwealth island of Mauritius and was in Madagascar teaching English.

I also got to know the Malagasy people of the big red island. Nineteen distinct tribes live on this exotic land. The high plateau where our tracking station was located is the home land of the Merina People. We employed a number of local people on the station and I became friends with many of them. The Merina have a custom which, as far as I know, is unique in the world. Ancestor worship is a very important part of their culture. And they take it to higher level than anyone else I know of. One each year, in the southern hemisphere winter, July and August, it’s time for Famadihana, the most important ceremony in these people's family and religious life. They open the tombs and invite the ancestors to a family reunion. They take skeletal remains of dead family members out of the tomb and spend long hours singing, dancing and talking with the bones. This is a very deeply felt sacred occasion to these people. A typical family will spend up to half their annual income of the affair. By custom, in addition to all the extended family members, the entire local village will be invited and is expected to attend. For a Merina, skipping a Famadihana would be a serious breach of etiquette. For an outsider, especially a non Merina to be invited to this once a year high ceremony is a great honor and act of friendship. I was invited to several Famadihana exhumations during my time in Madagascar.

On arriving in the village on Famadihana day a visitor will find every one gathered at the home of the family hosting the event.

                               

There will be a lot of food on outdoor tables. Several zebus will and a number of chickens will have been recently slaughtered and the smell of cooking meat will be heavy in the air. As at any Malagasy meal, rice will be boiling in large pots. Although Madagascar is a tropical island, the elevation on the plateau averages 1350 m (4500 ft) and Famadihana season is the coldest part of the year; fresh tropical fruits and vegetables are not in season locally but no expense is spared on this day so bananas, mangos and other good things are shipped in from coastal lowlands so that their sweet aroma blend with all the other fragrants of this happy day.  

                               

  There is also a lot of sweet cakes and desert type things. And of course the local beer,  wine and whiskey flow in great torrents. I once attended a famadihana as the guest of a friend from work and when we approached the tables with all the food I was told “no that’s not for you. You are an honored guest” I was escorted into the house to a smaller table where the senior family and some of the local political leaders were seated. This was the gourmet table for VIPs. There was nothing on this table but insects. My favorite was the roasted grasshoppers.

Now get them out. As a result of being handled many times, the bones are no longer connected as a skeleton, but each body is just a loose bundle of bones. The bundle is wrapped in cloth shroud. If it has been there for a while, the shroud may have rotted so that it can no longer hold the bones, so a woven straw mat is slipped under, and wrapped around the package  before it is lifted.

                                  Catching up on family news.

                                    

And, of course, there is music and dance.  

   

One of the reasons for famadihana in the cold season is the ancestor need for new garments to keep them warn. Here they get colorful new shrouds.

The children wear their best

                                         

At long last the band can take a break.

These photos hark back to my youth, a primitively time when cameras use film and did not record sound. So here is some links to a modern famadihana which can give the reader a sense of the sound and movement.   

http://journals.worldnomads.com/worldfestivals/story/32602/Madagascar/August-Famadihana-(Turning-of-the-Bones)-Madagascar



http://www.uofaweb.ualberta.ca/newtrail/nav04.cfm?nav04=46799&nav03=46609&nav02=46604&nav01=46603

                   

      

 But all this feasting will go on for several days. It is soon time to invite the real guest of honor. The tombs are always located within walking distance, or on this day parading distance, of the village.

The tomb is usually a stone structure with the doorway underground. So it is necessary to dig the dirt away from the opening.