Life on the Island

Virginia Dare at Hatteras

We lived in a 2 story house with a wrap-around-porch typical of east coast beach homes at that time.  I remember there were gas lamps in the living room and the second floor bedrooms but I remember very little of the house except the kitchen and occasional shadowy stairwells climbed reluctantly by tired sleepy children.  I hated going to bed, probably because I had been forced to spend so much time there alone recovering from pertussis.  So I would always fight it and beg to sleep with whoever would take me into theirs.  Many years later the opposite would be true and my bed would be my refuge; a place of solitude that I defended with all the resources at my disposal.  But when I was 3, I wanted to remain connected to others, to life, especially to my mother, who I felt was slipping away from me, further and further every day.
The kitchen was a place of constant activity.  My mother continued to bake bread and rolls and sell them to the mainland restaurants in Morehead City and Beaufort.  Her specialty was Parker House rolls: buttery circles folded over to form a pocket where more butter and jam could be tucked inside and consumed like heavenly mouthfuls of comfort.  These were for the dinner houses frequented by more wealthy tourists from the north who came down the east coast to sport fish and bask on the sunny beaches.  She also created a hamburger-like bun that could be sliced in half for a lunch menu that specialized in "Hot Taylor Sandwiches":  thick rounds of fried baloney placed atop big slices of tomato with lettuce and lots of mayonnaise.  Oftentimes she would pick up what had gone stale and take it back to the kitchen where she would combine the chunks of stale bread with milk, eggs, butter, sugar and cinnamon to make bread pudding for our breakfast or to return to the restaurant for their dessert menu.
She would deliver her trays and go to the store to buy more supplies.  Flour came in large 40 pound bags of printed cotton.  As the bags were emptied, this material became dish towels, quilts, aprons and our clothes.  My sister and I took turns choosing the print on the flour sacks for our  blouses, skirts, playsuits and rompers. Alice was always looking for the pink flowers and delicate patterns she associated with her girlhood, while I preferred the blue checks and plaids, or better yet, a green stripe or solid  yellow.  Alice liked ruffles with additions of lace or fancy buttons, I liked plain and simple or, at the most, pleats and tucks.  Occasionally I would have to give up a plaid or a stripe to my brother Joe who couldn't have cared less except that my mother insisted he have a button-up shirt or 2 for church and family gatherings.

Ollie Mae, Calamathelda, Dallas Daniel, Alice Rae, others

There were lots of family gatherings on Harker's Island.  We had numerous aunts, uncles, but mostly cousins twice and thrice removed with interesting names that illustrated the minimal acculturation that had occurred between those native to the island and their mainland relatives.  I am sure my mother must have been viewed as something of a "worldly woman" by some of them because of her wide travel and experience with my father who had carried her off to honeymoon in New York City and live in his home town of Auburn, Maine when they were newlyweds.  We had cousins named Clamathelda, Ollie Mae, Dallas Daniel and Alice  Rae. They had thick, unusual accents and quiet, serious ways.  My mother was none of those things.  She was full of life and fire.  Although always smooth and graceful, she was fully engaged in whatever she did and, like her mother, wanted to laugh and be surrounded by life.  My mother's best friend, who I never really knew whether we were related to or not, was called "Sparksie".  She was married to a man with the last name of Sparks who operated the draw bridge on the  bridge that opened after we moved to the island.  Before that bridge was built, people went back and forth from the mainland by boat, or infrequently by ferry.  The ferry served all of the islands up to Nags Head and Hatteras.  Ferries continue to this day, connecting island to island along the barrier islands of the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Sparksie was a real "downeaster".  She always wore rubber boots for walking through the marshy fields where her cows and ours grazed.  You never knew when a cow would get caught in one of the many sand traps on the island where the movement of earth, sea and sky would create pockets of air in the marshy grassland forming powerful "quicksand" that could pull in a full grown heifer in a few minutes or a young child in a matter of seconds.  So Sparksie kept a  close  eye out on whatever living things were about.  I learned a lot about island life and safety from Sparksie.  She taught me about the fields; their beauty and their dangers; paying close attention to teaching me what to do if I ever came upon a patch of quicksand.  The more you fight the pull, the quicker you will get sucked in.  Stand still as possible while reaching for some strong marsh grass or tree branch while yelling like the devil for help.  When trying to pull someone out, make sure you are on solid ground before throwing them a rope or branch and pull slowly and steadily, backing away from the trap as you pull. She taught me how to milk a cow and while demonstrating, she would squirt the warm liquid at my eyes, laughing gently and good naturedly.  She taught me that cows are proud and intelligent and extremely faithful to those they love.  I had the opportunity to learn this firsthand while living on the island.