Tornados, storms, neighbors, loss and Jimmy Durante!

Few, who celebrated the Fourth of July after Madison County lifted its travel warning, seemed to give thought to their neighbors in distress.  Not even the press really covered the impact of it…. although now with trails closed in Brookfield perhaps a few might wonder what happened. People going through Pooleville might think about it as it looks so different. Roads were closed... Hubbardsville Fire Department had to clear trees to get out of its station (30 on one side 60 one the other) Some of the local fire departments and farmers in the area tried to clear roads…the old way of helping your neighbor... but few others.

The tornado that struck in Smithfield garnered all the publicity and the deaths were a heart-rending end to two weeks of thunder, rain and hail, it finally brought the public out…

All these days I had been thinking of my old family and neighbors who would turn out to help at any time of trouble…they are all dead now.  I felt sad to think of them.  In so many ways they were the pioneering stock that cleared valleys and fields to plant and farm.   They survived horrible winters, loss at childbirth, death from diseases they did not have cures for…it made me wonder what they would have said or done.  Brought tractors, saws, food, water and just comfort I guess.  I miss them; I miss that world, a world that didn't need Television to turn them out.

I found myself singing an old tune… I guess going back in time to when families lived close, neighbors were part of the family… and no one was afraid to work.  I remember the phrase “many hands make work light”.

The song was written by Sammy Fein and Irving Kahal and came out in 1938…just before the war.  I think it was sung by every Big Band Singer and continues to be recorded up to this date with renditions by Anne Murray, Brenda Lee, and even Queen Latifah…but the rendition I remember best is by old Jimmy Durante…

So I have put it up with this blog…. To all those who are gone -  my friends, family and to the neighbors in Smithfield…

”I’ll Be Seeing You…in all the old familiar places…”