I Think I've Lost My Appetite

Dear Boo and Bubble,

Just when you think the well of family stories might be running dry, somebody kin to you offers up tales you’ve never heard before.  The other day, when all of us were visiting your cousin Jamie Bryant and his wife Lisa at their home in Linville, we were reminiscing about Hamelfields.  When Jamie was 12 and his younger brother, Frank, was 10, their family started the tradition of leaving their home in Charlotte, NC, and visiting Uncle Dick and Aunt Annie Mae for the week of Thanksgiving.

On this first occasion, the two boys thought they had literally found paradise.  The thousands of acres offered unfettered exploration.  At any moment, one might spot a deer or rattlesnake or possibly a gator.  Never one to let rules and regulations get in the way of fun, Uncle Dick plopped license-less Jamie down in the driver’s seat of his stick-shift Jeep and let him use the entire property to learn the hard way how to tame the car’s bucking and choking. 

The day before Thanksgiving, Uncle Dick approached the boys with a serious proposition.

“I need you two to go wrestle the turkey for Clem,” he said.  Clem was the maid and cook at Hamelfields.

“Sure,” Jamie and Frank nodded in unison.  How could they refuse? 

“Just go in the kitchen and get with Clem.  She’ll tell you what to do.”

The boys found Clem and she took them out to a pen back behind the house.  Sure enough, a turkey unassumingly roamed around in the space, fattened by effortless eating from several months prior. 

“You boys git in dat pen now and chase dat turkey ‘til you catches him,”  Clem instructed.  “When you catches him, you gots to hold him down.  Understand?”

Jamie and Frank looked at each other a little bewildered, but it sounded like it might be fun.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Clem opened the pen.  When Jamie and Frank set foot inside, the turkey spooked and started racing from one corner to the next.  They chased him around and around, diving and missing, grabbing and losing, sliding headfirst into the dirt.  Finally, after what seemed an eon, the two collided on the turkey at the same time and dragged him to the ground.

…..at which point, to their citified horror, Clem pulled out an axe and chopped the turkey’s head off.   The boys’ arms flew back.

…..at which point, to their further citified horror-stricken eyes, the turkey (sans head) began to run around the pen frantically, just like that proverbial chicken.

The next day, at Thanksgiving dinner, nothing – not the dressing cooked to perfection – not the beautifully bronzed skin – not the smell from the kitchen that filled the house which normally would awaken such yearning in the stomach that one could not stand it – nothing could make Jamie and Frank taste that turkey.