A heartbreak to remember for my father and his knife
My favorite Christmas story is in many ways a singularly sad one, although in the end despair eventually gives way to delight. Still, in the spirit of the season it seemed better to delay it until the New Year, where perhaps each of us, as we ponder its message, will resolve to make 2017 a bit brighter.
In December of 1916, hard times held the high country in a stranglehold among other vast world affairs. But the little boy living on the headwaters of Juneywhank Branch in the the Smokies was blissfully unaware of ominous world affairs. Nor did he fully appreciate the near-desperate financial straits of his large family.
His father, a willing worker, found jobs providing cash money elusive. Cutting acid wood, gathering chestnuts by the bushel for sale, digging a few ginseng roots and seasonal gallacking (gathering galax leaves for holiday decorations) were about the only types of endeavors where money changed hands. Almost everything else was on a barter system.
With Christmas approaching he did have a desire for a single gift. His father had periodically let him use a pocket knife. His apprenticeship with it involved practical matters such as cutting up seed potatoes for planting and whittling wooden pegs to hold barn doors in place, but there had also been pleasures such as shaping a dogwood fork into a dandy slingshot and, with a bit of help, crafting a whammy diddle.
To the boy’s great delight, his father had also commented, more than once, “First thing you know you’ll be ready for a knife.” With those words and experiences firmly implanted in his youthful mind, he expressed a single wish for Christmas — a pocket knife as his gift.
Come daylight on December 25, the boy, along with his numerous siblings, rushed to the fireplace area of their simple log home to check stockings their mother had lovingly knitted.
The starry-eyed boy immediately noticed a tell-tale bulge in the shape of a pocket knife. Eagerly he dug to reach that item, only to be disappointed. It was indeed a pocket knife of sorts — a piece of hard candy shaped and colored to resemble the real thing.
Heartbroken, he ran so no one would see the tears. That disappointed little boy was my father. Yet his lasting credit, a testament to the toughness and resiliency of mountain character, his dismay did not result in lasting bitterness. Instead, he managed to turn that into an enduring moment .
First with his sons and then with his grandsons, whenever Christmas rolled around Daddy made sure a knife of some type — first a quality pocket knife with two or three blades, then later fixed-blade hunting knives — appeared under the tree. He continued this forall of his 101 earthly years, and one of the highlights of December family gatherings was hearing him relive that sad yet shaping moment from his youth.
“I never want my offspring to be without a good knife,” he would say. “It’s a companion that will serve you well in some way, every day for all your years.” Whenever one of us pulled out a pocket knife he had given us, Daddy’s eyes lit up with sheer joy. He took immense pride in of the Eagle Scout rank attained by each of his grandsons and was delighted they had knives to complement those he gave them.
At his funeral service, family members all carried a knife he had given us or that came from his collection. Afterwards, we bushwhacked to his boyhood home deep in the bosom of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. There we toasted his memory from the spring that once served the family.
As I did so, one hand grasped the cup of water while the other held a tangible link to the man — a knife embodying his spirit and memory. I suspect others who were present did the same.
This story was originally published December 31, 2016 at 6:19 PM with the headline "A heartbreak to remember for my father and his knife."