Pete Hamill - Loving Women

“First one is on the house,” she said.

I’ m from Kentucky, originally. Breathitt County. Ever hear of hit? All mountains and forests and then the mines later on. My daddy was a Hardshell Baptist and in that little pineboard church of theirs, hit was real strict, I tell you. Women on one side the aisle, men on the other, and a lot of singin and tambourines but nothin you could call fun. There was a preacher came when I was eight year old, a Reverent Woodford, and he was somethin. That’s when they started the footwashin and the snake handlin. The footwashin warnt nothin, really, all of us there watchin, as theyd get down and wash each others feet .

But the snakehandlin, that was a different matter haltogether. They always did the snakes at night and I remember seeing everybody coming through the woods with lanterns and big shadows everywhere until we got to that little board church, just a sign in hit saying “Jesus is Comin” and a potbelly stove and kerosene lamps on the walls. The women almost all wore gingham in them days. And the men — by that time they uz miners — they hung their helmets on nails and got in the aisles and waited for the snakes .

The Reverent Woodford would start hit, holdin a rattler in his hands, and prayin to the Lord, and soon people started wailin, beatin them tambourines, speakin in tongues, and the Reverent uz tellin them that if they uz without sin the Lord would protect them and if they warn’t then they uz in big trouble. Well, my daddy never would do hit and my momma said that uz proof he uz sinnin, he must have him some woman down the hollow, he must be drinkin liquor in the damn mines. But he said, No, he warnt gonna do hit, no snakes for him. And he stuck by his guns, until one night, I uz about twelve, we were there, and Momma uz pressin him, and the music got to playin louder and louder, and someone shouted, and I uz up shoutin, cause they called that The Shouts, hit just come right out of you. And then all of a suddint, Momma had a rattler in her hands, in front of all of them, and Daddy uz a bit shamed, and they were shoutin louder, and then Daddy uz up there too, I guess to get rid of his shame, or maybe to keep Momma, and the shoutin got to be real powerful, and I got real excited, and then pow! I tell you, boy, I know now what happen to me. I came. I just plumb came. Without no cock in me. Without no help at all. I just came, boy!

I uz something else, then, boy. Not what I am now. Boys thunk I uz a lovely girl. And I uz risin again and Daddy had that four-foot rattler in his hands and I felt hit comin again, felt the explosion comin up in me. And then the rattler bit Daddy. First rattled. Then bit him right in the neck. Rattled. Bit him again. And Daddy dropped the rattler and backed up and he had this look in his eyes like he jest seed the Devil and then he fell back and the chapel become quiet and Momma just stood up, she dint cry, she dint run to him. I did. I dint care where the rattler went, I went to my Daddy. I cried at him, Daddy. I cried Oh Daddy get up. Oh Daddy, I love ya Daddy. But hit dint do no good. We buried Daddy two days later with the wind howlin down the hollows and Reverent Woodford singin and all of them lookin at me, and I could tell they uz thinkin, Poor child, her Daddy uz a sinner .

Momma kept on keepin on. She could weave. She knew how to shear a sheep and card the wool and spin hit into yarn. Then she sold the weavins to someone who brung them down someplace to the river and sold them. We lived in a little ole shambly place, a shack really, but hit had a good stone fireplace, and there uz always enough pumpkin and sorghum, gravy and onions, cornbread and shucky beans. Most days I watched the least-uns, while Momma worked the loom. She never did mention Daddy and his sin. She dint mention him at all .

And then one night I come home from the woods at night and hit gettin to be real dark cause we had no electrick in them days, not even radios, nothin up in them hills at all. And then I saw the Reverent Woodford in the clearin out back of the shack and hit warnt snakes he was handlin, hit was Momma’s titties. I stayed all night alone in the woods, cryin mostly for my Daddy, and began to thinkin about goin out to the world .

I knew there had to be a world out there, cause I seen hit in the Montgomery Ward catalogs. I couldn’t read the words, but Cousin Frances could. And I near memorized the names of the things you could get out in the world. Dr. Scott’s Electric Hairbrush, good for headache and dandruff. Don’t laugh, boy! And stuff called Mum and Kotex and Listerine and Odorono. Cuticura soap and perfume called Wild Rose and Shandon Bells and Ylang Ylang and Dr. Fuller’s Bust Developer and Food (I sure never did need that stuff). Most of all I wanted a gown called Moonlight Sonata. I remember what hit said in the catalog: “You, winsome and desirable in clouds of rayon net, your tiny waist sashed with whispering rayon taffeta.” For three ninety-eight. Oh, how I wanted to be winsome and desirable. Down there in the world .

I also knew about the world from Uncle Fred that was married to Aunt Mildred. He’d been down to the world. Actually seen hit, lived in hit, and told me all about hit. How people lived in brick houses and had roads with tar on them and stores with gowns in them better than in the Montgomery Ward catalogs and how everybody went to school and workin people owned cars. I made him tell me over an over about the gowns. And the jewlry. And he could really speak, Uncle Fred, so he made me see all the beautiful stuff of the world .

Then, I met Robert. I uz talkin to him a long time, and then he got to be laying with me crost a bed. Not doin nothin. Jest touchin. But we decided to get married. I said, Okay Momma, but I don’t want that Reverent Woodford to do no service, and she said Why, and I said, Because. So we got us a preacher from over the ridge. He come to the house and did a big praying service for us and later we had a big shivaree and then we moved into the hayloft. Robert war a big strong boy, a woodcutter by trade, but he had him a pindling little dick. That uz so sad. Momma gave me a poke o’ wheat to help me have babies, but hit dint do no good. Hit jest warnt to be. Poor Robert was so worried bout the size of his dick, he couldn’t get hit hard. So he moped all the time and drunk a lot .

He got worse when I started goin to the new school. This got to be round the time Roosevelt sent them teachers into the hills and there was a young man from up North, from Pennsylvania, from out in the world. Eli. He was a Jewboy. Like that boy Max comes in the Dirt Bar. Eli come among us and got us to put up the school. Just a plain board buildin with a tin roof and a stove and no electrick. The girls had to go to the outhouse four at a time to keep them boys out of there. But kids come six, eight mile to that school, and even ef I uz too old, I wanted to learn me something about the world, so I went to that young man from up North and I said I wanted to learn how to read and I’d help with the least-uns if he’d teach me. And he said yes .

Well, you couldn’t learn some of them boys nothin with a pistol in yore hands, but he did his best. Eli. The Jewboy. When there got to be snow on the ground, the kids dint come. When the creeks were up, they stayed home too. But Eli taught us, he showed us words, he had us make poetry, he showed us a great big map of the world. And I’d get all het up and go home and tell Robert. And soon he was sure I was layin for Eli, which I warnt. Robert dint believe me and one night he went down and burnt that school to the ground .