On Neff Road: Love comes in remembering

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Focusing on Valentine’s Day just around the corner, once again I turn to love. Nothing could be more worthy of my attention.

Yes, it was long ago that I was a child back that lane on Neff Road, but there are things that crop up from those years that almost catch me breathless. Little acts of love that I had forgotten or taken for granted. We sat at the table ready to eat. I usually sat by Dad. He would cut up my food (an act of love) and tuck the napkin into the neck of my shirt. Wow, I had forgotten about that tuck. My small frame dwarfed by the large piece of cloth placed there to keep me a bit neater, placed there by hands that loved me. Love comes in a piece of cloth.

Mom loved to make her pies saving the scraps for a very special reason. She squished the odds and ends together then rolled them out with her old rolling pin. She dusted the dough with sugar and cinnamon then rolled the dough tightly finally cutting the pieces into small rounds. After baking these to a soft brown, she gave the hot, little rolls to her children. We were at her elbows through the entire process. Sometimes she allowed us to complete the process on our own. I think she enjoyed seeing her daughters learn the beginnings of baking. She loved to give us sweets from her hands. Love comes from flour and a rolling pin.

Doris Lavy watched over me. She sat on the porch and watched for me from my earliest memories to the last when I came as an adult. Margaret Stager saw me in her house almost as much as she saw her own children. She was my other mom who scolded me as well as loved me. I never doubted these neighbor women’s love for me. Love comes from the front porch.

Aunt Welma Johnson played cards with me, made cookies with me and allowed me to play beauty parlor as I combed her hair. She taught me what it was like to have the complete attention of an adult. Aunt Kate Loxley taught me about respect. She loved me with all her heart from the beginning until the end. Uncle Phil Barnhart took time with a little girl answering her questions and listening as no other adult ever did. Love comes in the interaction with adults.

I laid my head across the front seat, resting my head on Dad’s lap and my feet on Mom’s. (good way to get your head crushed) We often took to the road on a Sunday afternoon. Love comes in the touch of a hand.

My sister June was the other part of me from my childhood to now. She teased me and loved me by those very actions. Even though years parted us, our hearts grew closer together. Geneva Lavy Yoder held me when my father passed. She loves me like a sister and perhaps holds that other part of my heart. Love comes in the embrace of a sister.

A napkin tucked, a mother’s purse filled with wonderment for a little girl wiggling on a church pew, a voice raised along with your own song, a mother’s hands on a rolling pin covering those of her daughter, a few coins tied in the corner of a handkerchief, a large sugar cookie straight from the oven, a string and a Cat’s Cradle, a licked finger wiping a bit of chocolate from a cheek, a large hand lifting some leaves to reveal baby bunnies, a hand reaching out to hold your own, all of those little things we knew but didn’t understand as the ways of love. Love comes in quiet moments.

Little things do reflect love. Truly I believe they are the reasons we all try to stay in contact by mail, Facebook, all those ways of saying I love you. I remember. Pictures of the old neigborhood from Janet Rhoades, a letter in the mail from Janet Douglass filling me in on the family news, Cousin Patra Loxley Sengsy finding me after all these years, reconnecting with the Eliker kids, Linda Newbauer, friends from high school and relatives and friends after years and miles of separation. A column for the local paper and old friends. Love comes in remembering.

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By Pamela Loxley Drake

On Neff Road

Pamela Loxley Drake is a former resident of Darke County and is the author of Neff Road and A Grandparent Voice blog. She can be reached at [email protected]. Viewpoints expressed in the article are the work of the author. The Daily Advocate does not endorse these viewpoints or the independent activities of the author.

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