There's money buried in the yard......

That was what we grandkids believed -- that there was buried treasure in the yard of the house on Avenue Z. But....was it true, or was it just a fanciful tale, told to a house too full of children, with the hopes that some of them would dash outside and, hopefully, spend a couple of hours searching for gold -- which is excatly what I tended to do when that statement was thrown at me. I'd grab my brothers and any nearby cousins and out we'd go, with $ signs filling our eyes. What a gullible child I was. Sheesh! Yet, even now, when the bills start piling up, I think of going back for some digging in 212's yard. But.... the older I get the more suspicious I'm becoming about the veracity of the claim. :) Does anyone else like to believe in fairy tales -- even as an adult?

I can't remember who started the rumor about the buried money. Was it my grandmother? My mom? One of the cousins I was closest to? Was the motive to get us out of the house so my grandmother, my mom, and the aunts could have some peace and quiet, or was it to play a joke on us and have some fun at our expense? Who's to know.

The story was, that whoever had lived in the house before my grandparents, distrusted banks, so, of course, they had buried all their money around the yard. (As I'm typing this, I'm seeing my grandfather's face. Could it have been him who started the whole thing?) I remember thinking that whoever this person was, he went around buring piles of money all around the, rather sizeable, yard. The odd thing is, I don't think our search for buried treasure ever involed any actual digging. As I remember it, we would amble around the yard discussing where the probable sites might be -- stopping to suck the sweet nectar from the flowers on the huge honeysuckle bush in the center of the side yard. I don't know if we were too lazy to dig, or if we knew better than to dig up Gindaddy's yard.

The house at 212 Avenue Z was on a corner lot. In the front yard were two huge pink crepe myrtle trees (one on either side of the front steps). I used to enjoy squeezing the round buds to see the flowers that were compacted inside. The 10 or so front steps led to the front porch and the front door, then the porch curved around on the right side of the house. ( Like the floor furnaces, those front steps had left its own kind of brand on many a cousin. I lost my bottom baby teeth when I fell down the front steps. This earned me the admiration of the other cousins my age, and even a couple of older ones. An odd sort of badge of honor.) Walking around the yard to the right led you to the side yard (where the money supposedly was buried). There was a two-lane dirt road running along the side yard, then a small hill beyond the dirt road, and then the railroad tracks. Across the railroad tracks, it sort of leveled out and you could walk a short way to the next street where the bus stop was.

If you went to the left of the front porch, you would find the other, much smaller, side yard. There was also a dirt road (more of an alley, actually) along that side of the house leading to some houses that were up the hill in back. Just across the dirt road was my godmother's house. There was a backyard, too, but I don't remember going there much. My grandmother had a garden in the back. The road in front of the house was a paved road. There were sidewalks along the front and one side of the house.

212 had three porches, a big porch running across the front of the house and curving around and along half of the right side of the house. There were big, sturdy rocking chairs and a large swing that was hung from the porch ceiling just where the porch curved -- perfect for reading and people watching. There was a smaller side porch off the big room in the back of the house. And there was that back porch off the kitchen that I remember not being allowed to step on. I think it was rickety from age, and there was a fairly steep set of stairs from the back porch to the back yard. At the foot of the back steps was a fenced in area where my grandmother kept chickens . She would actually wring their necks when she needed to cook one -- or so I understood, I never saw it happen. Thand G-d! I did, however, eat many a fried chicken leg in her kitchen.

Speaking of chickens -- and my grandfather.... Gindaddy was quite a joker. MomP was not. I can remember Gindaddy joking at the dinner table and MomP just continuing to eat, as the rest of us laughed at Gindaddy's joke. To her defense, the time period I'm talking about is the 1950-60's and many of the conveniences we take for granted today, weren't available. MomP had raised five children and always seemed to have a house full of grandchildren and greatgrandchildren to deal with and prepare for, so maybe she was just plain tired. Having four children of my own (not to mention a teaching job), I can relate. But....moving on.... When MomP would place her platters of fried chicken on the table, my brother and I always wanted the legs. Two kids, two chicken legs. Works out, so it would seem. But, we noticed that there were extra, small 'legs' and asked about them. (Of course, they were chicken wings, but since chicken wings weren't popular at the time, we would never have touched it if had known the truth.) Gindaddy would tell us they were the chicken's third leg. I can hear his laughter as he said it. My brother, T, and I weren't that dumb. We sensed something was up, but didn't know what, so we left that 'third chicken leg' for whoever else wanted it. I did, however, sneak many a glance at the live chickens to see if any of them did indeed have three legs.

Pratt City (where my mom was from), Ensley (where my dad was from), Fairfield (where my uncle raised his family), were planned industrial steel towns. I think one uncle worked at TCI most of his life, and I think my dad worked at TCI for a short period after the war, but all-in-all, remembering back, by the time my parents entered the work force, more options were available and they moved to Birmingham. I would guess that my great grandparents worked in the steel industry, or why else would they have settled in those areas. I always thought of my family members as business owners so I was surprised when my husband once said that when he first met my extended family he thought them to be a tough breed. I still can't see that.

Here's an interesting link to the history of the area where my grandparents chose to raise their families. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ensley,_Alabama


Thinking back, the house on Avenue Z served us well. Many souls were nurtured within its walls, much fun was had on its lush green lawns. It was a shelter in every sense. Realizing now, how much my memories of this house mean to me, it hurts on an even deeper level thinking about all those an hour south of me who lost their homes--their histories, due to Katrina. My hope is that they carry whatever good memories they have with them as they create new shelters and begin anew making many, many more memories. May they all be good ones.

But, back to the yard on Avenue Z. My intelligence, of course, tells me that there is no buried money. But....sometimes....late at night....when my mind is still....my imagination is still tantalized by the possibility. Some might call it greed....