The Richardsville Chronicles III

The Weedons were not the only cousins who made regular pilgrimages to the old house from Maryland. My grandmother Mastin (whom I never got to know, she died in 1951 - that’s another story) had several nieces and nephews who clustered around Annapolis. And usually some week in the summer, they’d head down to Richardsville for a week’s visit, and we often were there at the same time. Though we were both in Maryland, for some reason we only got to see them when we travelled to Richardsville, and when the Collins visited, the house always seemed to come alive.

Pete and Sidney came, and Sidney never arrived without baking some of her famous molasses cookies and putting them in tins. She doled them out to us youngsters, or I fear we boys would have made off with a tin and polished it off in a single sitting. They were that good. Melt in your mouth. I confess that as nice as it was to see Pete and Sidney, it was the cookies that made my day.

One day when the Annapolis folk were visiting, the adults all trooped into the living room, and cousin Betty sat down at the piano and they began singing. Naturally, the young folks came along too. The living room had a grand box piano on one side, a reed parlor organ on the other, two couches on opposite walls and a couple chairs here and there. The adults took over the proper seating and we children were happy to sit on the floor. I wish I could remember all the songs sung that day. I mostly recall that I didn’t know many of them. Oh, I’m sure we sang “She’ll be Coming Around the Mountain” and maybe “Carry Me Back to Old Virginy.” I could sing along with some of those. For me that afternoon was tense. I didn’t know then that I was a profound introvert. I just knew that I didn’t like being with a big group like that. In fact, whenever I visited, I usually sat in the kitchen alone with George rather than eat at the big table with all the adults. So the crowd in the living room made me a bit uneasy, but…music. I have always been drawn to the music. Then, horror of horrors, as things were clearly winding down, cousin Betty turned to ME and asked: “Well, Bill, what do you want to sing?” I don’t think I hesitated, but also I remember just grasping for the first song I could come up with. “Silent Night.” There was an awkward silence. It was a hot day in August. But Betty’s silvery laughter rippled through the room, and she said: “Well, why NOT?” And we all joined in singing it.

Now, among the Annapolis relatives was one particularly mischievous cousin: Virginia! Laughter seemed to follow her wherever she went. I can still hear her gravelly voice. Now, remember that I told you how everyone enjoyed setting Aunt Fanny off? Well, not just us kids, but even an adult like Virginia. One day she decided that it would be fun to hide Aunt Fanny’s slippers. But where? She cast about and came up with the perfect spot: the pee pot. (Yes, boys and girls, in that house the pee pots were still very much in use; if you had to do number 1 in the middle of the night, you did not wake up the house stumbling around to get to the bathroom. You just used your handy chamber pot.). Surely, Aunt Fanny would never think to look in there for her slippers. Oh, but Virginia did it one better. She took the pot and set it out on the tin roof of the porch. There it baked in the sun all day long. I’m afraid that Aunt Fanny did NOT laugh when she finally discovered what became of her slippers, but all the rest of the family did. I believe Aunt Fanny’s indignant words were: “I think that was right ugly of you, Virginia.” And that only brought another burst of laughter. 

They’re all gone now. But visiting with them in Richardsville that one week of the summer was always a highlight of the year.