A Temporary Home
The Sachels moved into an abandoned Airstream trailer when Tommy was four years old, one year before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. Pa had driven to Michigan from Kentucky and for the first time in his life Tommy thought he was going to live in a house on land. No more Ohio River for him. No more houseboat. Just land and grass and trees and solid ground wherever he stepped.Nothing would remind him of the life his family was leaving except the empty spot at the table where his youngest sister should have been. Penny died in a fire a railroad man caused when he threw some live clinks into what he thought was the river, but turned out to be the Sachel’s houseboat. Pa managed to save all the kids except Penny. Every day he blamed himself for her death, and nothing Ma or anybody else said could comfort him. Now it looked like they would have a new home, and Tommy thought everything was going to be fine.
The Sachels had kin living in Detroit and after the tragedy Ma wrote and asked if they could come north. The relatives said yes, but they couldn’t stay long because their house was already overcrowded with poor southern relatives. Pa said thank you, but they’d find their own accommodations. Chum, the oldest child, was going to stay in Louisville where he had a job cleaning stables. The rest of the family piled into a beat-up Chevrolet given to them by a preacher from the Shepherdsville Baptist Church. Pa drove from US-41 to US-2 to M-28. By the time they reached a sideroad in Brimley, they were out of gas and out of money so where the car stopped is where they stayed. The road was quiet and no houses were in sight. Pa got out of the car and followed a trail leading to a clearing where he saw an abandoned trailer. He pushed the door open and looked around. The place was tidy and inviting. There was no sign of life, and Pa was sure Providence had led him to safe haven. He walked back to the main road and shifted the car into neutral. Ma steered while the others pushed it through the crude path about a half-mile from the road.
“We’re like the Snopes,” Ma said referring to characters in a Faulkner novel. “But we’re a whole lot better.” As the afternoon sun broke through the trees, Tommy thought she looked like an angel with her yellow hair around her shoulders and a few lazy snowflakes touching her face. He thought she was beautiful. Tommy didn’t see the shabby cloth coat or the thin faded housedress it covered. He didn’t know there were holes in her oxfords, tears behind her smile, or that her belly yelled so his wouldn’t. All he saw was his mother—a kind, gentle woman who held him when he had nightmares.
The Airstream was tiny, but someone had built a back shed and installed a woodstove. Pa wasted no time filling it with cedar kindling and dry maple that stood beside it in neat rows. Soon the chill was off the place and rabbit stew bubbled in a cast iron pot. Pa had killed the rabbit with his rifle although it meant someone might hear the shot and come investigating. His daughters complained as they watched the white snow turn red, but Tommy was proud of Pa and one day hoped to shoot as straight as his father. Tommy knew bullets cost money and money was hard to come by and a man had to make his kill on the first try. A man had to take care of his family. Meanwhile, Ma took the sourdough starter and began making biscuits. She willed herself not to think of Europe’s war and what it might mean for Chum. He was draft age.
The dark fell fast. It covered everything so quickly the Sachels had to fumble in crumpled Piggly Wiggly bags to find candles. Pa lit them with Diamond matches he always kept in a little glass jar in his shirt pocket. He was a tall man—tall and thin—with a wild bush of ink-black hair and eyes as blue as the cold Lake Huron water they had crossed on the ferry. He had fine, straight teeth, a strong nose, and whiskers as black as General Lee’s boots. His hands could wring the neck of a turkey as easily as Tommy could squish an ant. They could pull sycamore roots out of the river when the oxen had given up. Tommy could feel their strength when Pa raised him to his shoulders, but he never felt their power on his behind, for like Ma, Pa was of a gentle nature. As the Sachels sat around the table, Pa asked a blessing on their food. He thanked his Maker for their shelter and promised to seek the owner in the morning. He would barter work for this living place. The Sachels were no vagabond nesters. They earned their keep. Pa prayed for a mild winter and good health for his family and the owner of the Airstream. He went on and on, sounding just like the preacher at their Kentucky church and almost put Tommy to sleep. Then Pa stopped and quiet fell around the table as the family ate their first real meal in days. They ate slowly, relishing each bite.
When it was time for sleep, Tommy was sandwiched between his sisters on a worn out mattress. Ma and Pa chose the floor in the shed where they could feed the fire during the night. Just past midnight, Tommy awoke crying from another nightmare about Penny. He didn’t think he had cried aloud, but Ma was there in a heartbeat. She picked him up and carried him to the shed. There was an old rocking chair near the stove. She held him and promised him everything would work out. Eventually Pa traded places with her. The rest of the night passed without further cries inside or out, and a new dawn brought a feeling of peace to the family.
Pa arose early, raked the embers to life, and added more dry wood mixed with some frozen birch he found stacked outside the shed. He heard a shot ring through the woods. He couldn’t tell which direction it came from or how close it was to the trailer, but it wasn’t long before he saw a deer running across the clearing. He raised his rifle and brought the animal down. As Pa and Tommy ran to the kill, they saw a man coming from the opposite direction. Van Rhoades owned the Airstream, the land it was on, and the deer Pa had just shot.
“Hello, there,” Pa yelled. “I guess this is yours.”
Rhoades walked out of the tangled bush. He tried to hide his embarrassment. Not felling a deer on the first shot was the sign of a poor hunter. “You got that right,” he said. “It must have picked up my scent. The thing sprinted as I fired.” He knelt and looked over the buck. “Eight pointer,” he said. “Lots of venison for the winter.” His bullet had caught the deer’s hind flank—not enough to bring it down immediately, but more than enough to make it suffer. He paused for a minute, loosened his jacket, took a swig from his flask, and offered it to Pa.
“Much obliged,” Pa said, “but no thanks. My name’s Sachel. I suppose this is your land.” The chest of Van Rhoades puffed with pride as he declared the land had been in his family for over 100 years, all 175 acres of it, and then he asked Pa how long he planned on staying in his Airstream. Tommy’s heart sank even before Pa said anything because he sensed they wouldn’t stay long. It was the way Van Rhoades grunted as he leaned on his rifle which was leaning on the deer. The smirk on his face and the careless way he treated the animal told the child the man standing before him was unkind. Pa said he would work all winter, felling trees, toting water, mucking barns. Anything Van Rhoades needed doing, Pa would do if they could just winter in the trailer. Tommy kept his eyes on the ground and tried not to listen. He tried even harder not to cry when he heard Pa pleading to stay.
Many years passed and Tommy grew old, but he never forgot the sound in Pa’s voice on that bright November morning when he was told to move on. Pa’s voice was filled with the same tone he had heard the day Penny died. Two more times he was to hear what he came to know as the sound of anguish. A year later when a government man stopped by their Sault Ste. Marie apartment and gave Ma condolences because Chum had been killed in action, and the day Ma died. Some sounds are like that. They’re unforgettable because they tug at your heart and echo through your mind.
The story of the Sachels is an old one. It’s a story of poverty and struggle, two of life’s greatest challenges, but it’s also a story of love and fortitude. Some folks are defeated by hard times and circumstances. Others wade through them, convinced a better life is waiting just around the corner if only they have the strength to turn it.
