Past and Present- My Wonderful Life

Resch Plantation

Notes From My Residency Journal

From my Cousin Carol Resch:

With a few other dishes, this is what we had at Christmas growing up on the plantation, Lake Woodlawn in Mt. Pleasant, SC. So in writing this poem for the Old Fashioned Christmas poetry book, I wanted to include my family's traditon of hunting and some of the types of food we had on a southern plantation. This is in celebration of my friends who still hunt and fish, and enjoy 

the life as an outdoors person. This is copyrighted.

We’ll Hold Christmas Dinner
til the men folk come in 
from hunting the woods.
The pumpkin pie and
cherry flan will keep
beside the cider tank
We’ll sit here around the fire
and tell tales from long ago
when snow was flying and
Santa’s elves retiring
and reindeer asleep from
the long night’s flight
We’ll keep the turkey in the oven
and candied sweet potatoes
in their orange half shells
the ambrosia the men cut up
yesterday will mellow in
mama’s old punch bowl by the
window sill
We’ll keep the collards in their pot
and the corn bread beside the turkey too
and all the cranberries inside their shells
awaiting the tables’ decorating do
we’ll hold dinner for the men folk
and act surprised when they show up
all bloodied from the hunt
holding up their marsh hens, deer,
turkey and a few squirrels too
prizes for jobs well done as we
know we’ll eat them after this
Christmas day with grateful
hearts and then be happy we did
the holding and happy we did
the surprize for Christmas time 
is special and no other time will
we hold dinner
for the men folk.

My cousin Carol grew up at this plantation along with her siblings, my Aunt Annie Ruth and Uncle George. I was allowed to visit any time I wished to and begged my parents to take me. I had a slew of cousins there and the freedom to roam the land and fish in the lake. Many of my happiest childhood memories are of this plantation, now long gone. I have many stories of my cousins and Uncle George who was colorful, to say the least.

 It struck me profoundly when I saw this image and read Carol's poem that this is the reason I fell in love so deeply with Fair Oaks in Evinston six years ago. I am reliving those happy times, each time I arrive. They have been under the surface for me without my true understanding until now.  They say that our childhood memories can shape us as adults, and that is quite true in my case.  My love for trees and the land began early and grew as I matured. There has never been a time that I haven't been attached to the land and the wild places of the South. I must be the luckiest person on earth to have found Fair Oaks at my age. I am deeply grateful to Rick for sharing it with so many of his friends.