Bluegrass Roots:
How we Came and Why we Stayed
A perfect family is seated around a stunningly decorated kitchen table about to tuck in to a delicious Thanksgiving dinner. They smile and laugh, happily passing each other gigantic platters of delicious-looking food, as a slideshow of happy family pictures scrolls on the TV in the den and soft classical music drifts in from the other room. The family dog sits obediently next to the table, head cocked and tail wagging. A timer dings and the mother, wearing a perfectly ironed dress and without a hair out of place, takes a beautifully-cooked turkey out of the oven and gracefully places it in the center of the table with a flourish as the music swells, and the whole family bursts into applause.
Then, the nostalgic Publix commercial ends and NCIS comes back on, blaring through the entire house like it always does. The back door bangs open and my uncle strides across the stained carpet carrying the turkey, which was cooked next door because the oven at my grandparents’ house is broken. My mom, flustered, yanks the mashed potatoes out of the microwave, where they had to be cooked because the stove is broken, too. Jake, the overweight, one-eyed farm dog, barks from his place on the front porch, reminding us where the leftovers will be going. When it’s finally time to eat, half of us gather around the table, some on chairs and others perched on step-stools from the other room. The rest of us sit on the sofa behind TV trays, because the small kitchen table in this hundred-year-old house is nowhere near big enough to accommodate everyone. NCIS is muted to say grace, and that’s when the significance of this moment really sets in for the first time.
Though my most recent Thanksgiving wasn’t quite the same as the ones portrayed in heartwarming holiday commercials, moments like these can be beautiful in their own way. The fact that we’ve outgrown the kitchen table is a blessing that I don’t take for granted. In recent years, family feuds and long-standing grudges have prevented us from all being together. It’s inevitable to have conflicts in a family as huge as mine, but when all those little conflicts and insulted egos and hurt feelings and angry thoughts are connected and compounded, they seem to multiply into something much bigger and harder to work through or move past. The years of fighting and divisions have caused so much pain for all of us, and it’s lead me to question whether deep, deep, down, we all still love each other. That’s why it’s no exaggeration that the occasion of a whole-family gathering was monumental. Even though most of the conflicts haven’t really been resolved, the fact that they were able to be put aside for this one dinner was nothing short of a miracle.
The overwhelming joy I felt about my family finally being back together was only subdued because one very important member was absent- only days before we made the seven hour drive to Kentucky, my grandpa was hospitalized with stroke-like symptoms, which was especially alarming considering he was still recovering from a massive stroke he had the year before. We were relieved to find out it wasn’t a stroke, but the mysterious affliction left him struggling to walk and talk and remember any short term events, and caused him to have to spend Thanksgiving by himself in a rehabilitation center.
We were lucky enough to be able to visit him Thanksgiving morning- another holiday miracle, because up until that very day he wasn’t well enough for visitors. Grandada is the man who is friends with absolutely everyone. He knows every employee at the Walmart in town, and will strike up a conversation with whoever is lucky enough to end up behind him in the checkout line. After the Saturday vigil mass, which he attends each and every week, he chats with every parishioner on their way out of the quaint Catholic church on Paris’ Main Street, and he knows everyone by name. When he was young, he broke his ankle and never had it set, and has dealt with considerable pain walking ever since, but that never stopped him from waking up early each and every morning to run the farm, just like he always had. Seeing the stroke, and now these recent struggles, rob him of his health and independence is the one of the hardest things I have ever witnessed, but seeing his personality and spirit continue to shine is the most inspiring thing I have ever seen. Without fail, he had learned the name of every nurse in his unit at Cardinal Hill Rehabilitation Center, and treats each one of them like a lifelong friend, because that’s just the kind of guy he is, and always will be, no matter what life throws at him. I couldn’t be more proud to know that I share some of his genes.
Sitting on the worn couch on Thanksgiving afternoon, with a roomful of family surrounding me, a plateful of family recipies on the TV tray in front of me, and more blessings than I could ever count, I gave thanks for this wonderful, crazy, gigantic family I’m so very fortunate to be a part of. Though I missed Grandada so very much, I gave thanks that he was going to be okay. I gave thanks that Nana, who was battling lung cancer, got to see her family together for another Thanksgiving. I gave thanks that each and every aunt and uncle was willing to put aside their differences to share this meal together. Though this was by no means the perfect family gathering depicted in that cheesy commercial, in my mind it was infinitely better.
This unforgettable Thanksgiving is only one of countless family memories made in the tiny town of Paris, Kentucky. For such a small place, it sure has played a huge role in my life. Clearbrook Farm, one of many farms in the area, is a place that I hold near and dear to my heart, and have for as long as I could remember.
It was there that seven-year-old-me decided I wanted to be a secret agent, and the hay loft was my headquarters, the horse trailer my surveillance lab, my little sister my spy partner. Isolated from friends our own age, in Kentucky we grew closer than we ever had before, through our walkie-talkie conversations carried out entirely in code, meticulously recording the whereabouts of every single relative present. Grandada pitched in by letting us use his powerful flashlights, and Aunt Sue helped us make top secret ID cards. The whole family was involved in this childhood fantasy, and before I knew it I had a backpack full of “spy gear,” two or three spy bases across the farm, and innumerable amount of adventures that my family created for us.
It was there that eleven-year-old-me decided to be a professional soccer player, and spent hours in the expansive front yard practicing my juggling until Blue, the creatively-named Blue Heeler, who was loving to all people but vicious towards sports equipment, popped my soccer ball. I tried to show off for the farm-workers, who indulged in my childhood dreams by saying I was good, even though I most definitely wasn’t. Without fail, on every visit Grandada asked me if I was the fastest on my team (which I wasn’t), or if I played for my school (which I didn’t), but with the amount of praise and congratulations I received for practically every dribble of the ball, it felt like I was the best there ever was.
It was there that thirteen-year-old-me decided I wanted to own my own farm one day, following Uncle Bill around in the morning as I tried to help, and undoubtedly hindered, his completion of the day’s work, asking a million questions about every single chore, always laughing at his unfailingly sarcastic answers, constantly discovering new favorite parts of the farm with each excursion, like the feed closet with a family of newborn kittens, or the vegetable garden where I could pick tomatoes that I would clean and cut up and add to Nana’s salad at supper.
It was there that seventeen-year-old-me conquered my fear of driving, seeing my dad expertly maneuver our family’s minivan down the winding, hilly, narrow Kentucky roads to get us to 1970 Clintonville Road each year, cutting the grass with the riding lawnmower, and then driving aunts’ and uncles’ cars around the paved paths of the farm. My grandparents gave me the money to buy my first car, and no one was as excited as they were when I finally got my license.
Though Clearbrook farm wasn’t where I grew up, it’s where my growing up occured.
I remember one night when I was little, after unpacking the van and greeting all the relatives, lying on my back in the squeaky bed of my uncle’s old bedroom, staring at the textured ceiling and trying to wake up from the dream I must have been in, because the possibilities of a week at the farm genuinely seemed too good to be true to my little-kid mind.
Clearly my ancestors felt the same way. My great grandfather, Johonn Sigfrid Andersson, left his home of Längjum, Skaraborg, Sweden on March 24, 1887 at the ripe old age of 15, all by himself, and arrived in “amerika”. I don’t know why he came here at such a young age, why he was traveling by himself, or why he chose Paris, Kentucky as the destination of such a life-changing journey, but I hope to find out when I interview my grandfather. I’ve always known that Paris is special, and Johan must’ve known it, too, because he crossed an entire ocean all by himself to find it. The seven hour car ride from my home sometimes feels endless, so it’s hard to imagine what his interminable voyage must have felt like. The courage and determination he needed to complete that journey is demonstrated each and every day by his son, my grandfather, who faces each day, despite all roadblocks and obstacles, with that same resolve.
My grandmother’s ancestors have lived in Kentucky for much, much longer. Their journey here started when Francis Roberts, my 8th-great grandfather, was sponsored to move from Hertfordshire, England to Dames Quarter, Somerset, Maryland in 1650 by Sir Thomas Lunsford, a former fugitive of the law, who later served in the English army and was eventually knighted. The fact that my distant relative trusted a former criminal (accused of an assassination attempt no less!) to sponsor his journey across the pond doesn’t shock me at all, because that ability to see the best in people and an unending willingness to forgive is something that I see in Nana all the time, as she unconditionally loves all her children despite any way they could ever wrong her. Francis Roberts was one of the first settlers of Dames Quarter, the southernmost region in Maryland, where he bought land that was used to grow tobacco. It’s probably no coincidence that tobacco is a also main export of the Bluegrass region of Kentucky, where his grandson, William Roberts, would eventually move, and where the family would live ever since.
Every family has their share of struggles, difficulties, arguments, and grudges, and my family is no different. That doesn’t mean we don’t love each other. Sometimes we just get caught up in life and its everyday problems and our own, small selves, that we forget to look at the big picture: the huge expanse of family history that leads up to this day. That certainly puts our small disagreements into proper perspective. The life we live today is a culmination of the efforts of generations and generations of ancestors- the long routes they traveled and the deep roots they grew. We owe it to them to live the best life we can, and not to take their descendants, our family, for granted.
This is not just an English project. This is not just a journey of self discovery. This is a mission to bring my family back together, not just for one dinner, but for the rest of our time here on earth, to show them how important they are to me and how we’re part of something a lot bigger than ourselves, something that’s been around for a lot longer than we have. I love them, imperfections and all, way too much to let us ever grow apart, and I know that deep, deep, down, they all love each other, too.
Interview Questions (in no particular order):
- How long have you lived in Kentucky?
- Do you like it here? Why?
- What’s your favorite part about living where you do?
- Tell me your funniest Kentucky memory.
- Why did Johan Andersson come here from Sweden all by himself?
- Was there ever a time when you didn’t want to live here? Why?
- What was it like growing up in such a huge family?
- Is it a good or bad thing that you have so many family members living close by? How come?
- What are some of the worst parts of living on a farm? What are some of the best parts?
- What are some stereotypes about people who live in Kentucky?
- Do you think any of these stereotypes are true?
- Why have you/your family stayed here for so long?
- How have you seen this area change during your lifetime?
- Do you think change is good or bad?
- Is there anything that would convince you to move somewhere else?
- How have you incorporated parts of your family history into your daily life?
- Share a favorite memory from your childhood.
- How much do you know about your ancestry?
- Who was the tradition bearer in your family?
- Is important to know about our ancestry? Why or why not?
- If you could re-do your life, what is one thing you’d do differently?
- How did you get into the business of boarding racehorses?
- If you could live anywhere else in the world, where would it be and why?
- What does your family mean to you?
