Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain...

​         On March 31, 2022, my grandpa, James Townsend, would be one hundred and twelve.     My grandpa was tough as nails, but had a heart of gold.          He adopted people in need once in a while. He’d feed a hungry family and invite a hungry child to his dinner table.         He ran his own business most of his life. He was a carpenter or maybe handyman is a better term. He could build pretty much anything.         He was retired long before I entered the work force or I probably would have followed in his footsteps.         He put a wall up in my mom and dad’s house that hasn’t changed in forty-nine years. He built the screen door on the back doorway that has been repaired at least a dozen times.         My uncles all worked for him growing up and they all had a good share of his knowledge, but my uncle Frank was the only one who made a living doing it for a while after grandpa retired.         My grandpa worked all over Peru and knew most of the business owners in the sixties.

​ My maternal grandparents had nine children that reached adulthood. Of the nine, eight of them had children. Four of them had two children. The other four of them had three or more.       I knew all my first cousins and their children.    I knew many of my mom’s cousins. My extended family was around eighty people when my grandparents passed away.      My dad’s side was small. His sister that passed away when he was in his late teens had two children. His older sister had five children and married a man that had two. His brother never had children.       The dynamics of my family changed when my grandparents passed. The big extended family splintered into smaller groups. My mom still talked to her siblings and visits them once in a while, but we don’t get together as a group anymore.        I have moments that are locked in my memory that are as clear as the day they happened. These memories are about family I didn’t see often.       My cousin, Joe Townsend, passed away earlier this y

​ If you've lived in Peru for many years, you've probably passed the Paw Paw Church in North Eastern Miami county.  My grandpa told me this story.  Is it true? I don't know, but it's one of my favorite memories of my grandpa's story telling. Grandpa went fishing one evening.  He parked at the Paw Paw Church and grabbed his stuff from the back of the truck. He walked through the graveyard, crossed the fence, and made his way to an old sycamore tree on the bank of the creek.  It was one of his favorite spots. He sat down on the roots of the tree and made his first cast.  He caught his first fish a few minutes later.  Cast after cast, he caught a fish.  He got so carried away, that it was almost dark when he caught the limit. He gathered up his pole, his tackle box, and a stringer full of fish, and headed for the truck.  After crossing the fence between the creek and the graveyard, he saw a white shape raise from behind a tombstone and dash off into the dark.  He stopp

         Sondra and Bobby were my best friends before I became a teenager. Sondra was one of the biggest tomboys Oakdale ever produced. When she discovered that she was a girl, we drifted apart. Cousins of opposite sexes tend to do that I think, but tomboys drift further away. Everything you have in common just kind of disappears. One day there’s this girl you don’t know standing where the guy you hung out with yesterday was standing.         Bobby, Sondra, and I had hundreds of adventures before we hit our teens.    We built a treehouse in her front yard. She climbed the tree without fear and nailed boards into its fork fifteen feet off the ground. It was just a floor with no walls, but we spent hours up there playing games that I can’t remember.         We started digging a hole to China when we saw a cartoon character do it. We buried a time capsule in it when we got tired of digging. We were about four feet down next to a mulberry tree. I don’t remember exactly where it was or what

Car seats, booster seats, bicycle helmets, knee pads, elbow pads, and all that other newfangled safety equipment makes me wonder about the kids that were forced into wearing this crap.      How do kids have any fun these days?  My neighborhood friends and I didn’t have all that safety crap.  There wasn’t a car made whose rear seat didn’t hold at least six to ten kids back in the 70’s. You didn’t need a booster seat to see out the window. Just stand up. Better yet, you just stretched out in the rear window.       My friends and I rode our bikes through the Dormitory trails. If you don’t know what the trails were, how did you have fun?        The trails were cut through a small patch woods next to the railroad tracks. A small swath of mud with trees and raspberry bushes thrown in here and there. Hit a turn too fast with the slick tires all bikes back then, and you were coming of the trail and probably the bike. If it had rained, you we definitely gonna get muddy. Oh, and we didn’t need n

​ I remember my first prize possession. My mom took a picture of me holding something in my hand when I was four. We were looking through some photo albums years later and saw this picture. She didn’t know what I was holding. I told her it was a little green and white boat.       I don’t know where it came from, but I loved that little boat. It was the most important thing in my life for a short while. It disappeared from my life soon after that picture was taken, but I can still see the green hull and white deck in my mind. I’ve never lost the boat in one of the sink holes that are slowly taking over parts of my long term memory as I grow older.       I guess these little stories about my family and my childhood are my attempts to outwit those sinkholes. The memories are still there, but it takes something to pull them out of the abyss. Something like a picture of skinny four year old holding a tiny toy boat usually works.      Sometimes these memories tend to possess  you. In jr high

​ My memories of my grandma are almost all visual. She spent much of her day in the kitchen. She made breakfast for grandpa, herself and whoever else showed up.  Whatever daughter was there got to help.       After breakfast, it was lunch for grandpa and his boys that came in from local factories and job sites.       After lunch was dinner for her, grandpa, and whoever showed up.       Where I hear my grandpa’s voice in my head, I see my grandma. The only thing I hear clearly is her saying “oh, Jim” when grandpa was teasing her. He teased her a lot.      I see her in the kitchen standing at the sink doing dishes, sitting by the potbelly stove peeling potatoes with the knife that was almost worn in two, and cutting homemade noodles after rolling them out.   I also see her sitting outback on the swing, sitting in the living room watching the Price is Right, and on the porch with grandpa.       At harvest time it was snapping beans, peeling tomatoes, and pickling beets. At least I think t

​        I heard John Mellencamp’s song “Small Town” on the radio this morning. I always thought of Peru as a small town, but I just realized I’m wrong.          There are currently six incorporated cities in Miami county. There are twelve unincorporated cities. There are twenty-seven dissolved cities. At one point, Miami County has had forty-five cities inside its border.         Amboy, Converse, Bunker Hill, Denver, and Macy join Peru as incorporated cities. Signs still declare the unincorporated cities like Mexico and Chili. Dissolved cities like Erie and Tin Cup are still marked by signs, too.         Peru, being the largest city in the county became the county seat. So, truth be told, I actually live in the big city.         At least, it was a big city at one time. Dozens of stores that sold shoes and clothing have closed over the years. Mom and pop restaurants followed.        The past few years have brought back some mom and pop restaurants as well as some locally owned shops. I