Windylane was the family homestead my folks set up in Mother's home town of Nauvoo, Illinois. We moved there in 1947 when I was 11. It was a beautiful little town at the time, completely undeveloped, consisting of many small fruit farms nestled in a bend of the Mississippi River. We bought two acres right on the river, and converted a barn located on the riverbank into a cabin for us to live in during the summer. We used to sit on the porch of our cabin in the evenings and watch the Burlington Zephyr go up the other side of the river, about 9 in the evening, this was our signal to go to bed. It was quiet, peaceful - and cheap. Now all gone completely.
Mom and Dad called our property, which was mostly weeds, Windylane, because of the lane coming into the property from the gravel road the City owned, and had great plans for it. Windylane was going to last forever - and it would be part of the American Dream. Like the rest of the American Dream, it was eventually abandoned and forgotten - but I am getting ahead of my story.
America in the Forties was something the young of today would not recognize, and I have a hard time remembering it myself. We had just won WWII, the biggest event in American history, and we were the most powerful nation in the history of the world. Nothing like it had ever been seen before, and all that power went to our heads. We didn't realize this at the time, of course, we just rushed into the future, the glorious future, like the devil was behind us. Which in a sense it was: the Great Depression, which was remembered all too well. Windylane was going to be part of that future.
Someone published a book at the time that purported to show how a family could be self-sufficient on three acres of land: growing their own food and raising their own livestock. And actually, there were still people living in Nauvoo at the time, who were doing just that: living all year on the money they made during the fruit-picking season. As a matter of fact, there are people still doing that down here in Central America. The Orosi Valley is full of them now picking coffee, many of them indigenous people, the women wearing their traditional dresses, and some from Nicaragua. They are very poor people.
American was full of poor people too - after the Depression, but being poor was not considered a disgrace, it was so common. But you were expected to work your way out of it. After the war, this was easy. Good-paying jobs were plentiful, and a college education was cheap: like many others, I worked my way through college - and then had my pick of jobs. Real Estate was booming and my family, like many others, made their family fortune by simply owning some valuable property. Nauvoo was quickly filled with people with their savings from the War, buying up property. My extended family, including my mother's mother, and my mother's sister's family, the Ourths, who bought an old farm just down the river, were part of this land rush. Everyone assumed that small businesses, including above all the family farm, would continue to be profitable and useful.
No one realized that the small business world, including above all family farm, was doomed, and would soon disappear. I felt, at the time, this was a great American tragedy, but I seemed to be the only one who felt this way. No one else noticed, and to this day, they steadfastly ignore this disappearance of a whole way of life - preferring to believe in an illusion: the Great American Dream - which to me seems more like a nightmare. But who am I? A nobody exiled to Costa Rica, sitting at his laptop, pecking away. But once again, I am getting ahead of my story.
I am having trouble remembering just what went on in the Fifties and Sixties, partly because I had left home to find my way in the world - there was obviously no future for me in Nauvoo or Windlylane. Dad had built up a nice little business making whole wheat flour, and a whole wheat bakery with lots of baked goods people liked, and he employed a couple of local women, who were grateful for the jobs. Nauvoo was hardly the ideal place for a business like this, but business, especially on weekends, when people came out for the scenic drive along the River, was brisk. Then for some strange reason, the Folks decided to abandon Windylane and sell the house, for a nice profit, and the business - and retire to Mexico.
Later, they said this was because of Dad's failing health. But as I recall, Dad's health wasn't so bad at the time. I think they just noticed the obvious: that the small business world was over. My Uncle Arnold had died earlier, from trying to run his family farm, and other farms were failing all over. All the other small businesses in Nauvoo were failing too. They saw it was time to cash out and get out. You couldn't live on dreams - including the dream of Windylane.
No comments:
Post a Comment