American Honey

I can't hear this song without thinking of the place where I grew up, and I can't drive over the hills on highway 59 without thinking of this song.  Sometimes a place, a song, a scent, a chilly wind...these things can find a way to speak directly to your soul.  This past Christmas, snow fell on the upstate of SC for the first time since 1963.  I was there to see it because I was there to say good-bye...to a place, a feeling, and to a grandfather who had called this area home for 91 years.  

We snapped these pics on December 26, 2010.  We were headed over to my brother's property to take the kids sledding.  I literally just stuck the camera out of the truck window as we were riding down the road.  I'm glad I did.  These scenes were already etched to memory being that I grew up seeing them literally every day for 17 years.  I've never thought to photograph them before.  But I know one day, this little area, so small you can't even google it, won't look the same.  And the day will come when my mind will have replaced these memories of "the grove" with all of the other places I've since called home.

Maybe you're not familiar with the song, "American Honey" by Lady Antebellum.  If you're not, I'm including a link here http://www.myspace.com/ladyantebellum/music-player?songid=62532059&artid=6419951&albid=14735490  So hop on over there, click the play button to hear the song.  Minimize it, then sit back and enjoy scrolling through another time and place while you listen. 

Check back tomorrow as I hope to upload the sledding pics, too!

-Leah

And P.S. Go easy on me, these pics aren't here for "pro" purposes today.  "Mr" Eiden Photography wasn't holding the camera on this particular day!

At least back to the 1890s, my family can be traced all over the Upstate.  But, we landed on this little patch after the stock market crash of the 1920s.  According to my grandmother, when the banks lost everybody's money, including her father's...land was offered in exchange.  He and his brothers took the land, farmed it, and made a good living on it.  When they passed on, my grandfather started farming it.  My uncles and cousins continue to farm the same land today.  The little yellow house behind the barn in this pic is "Granny Barker's" house.  My daughter was named after her and  my aunt and uncle live there now.

"Grandaddy's Barn" is a tough memory.  Tough because it just doesn't look right on the side of the road without him plowing the garden in front of it with a mule.  When you go down the road, he's supposed to be there walking in front of an old chevy or fixing up a tractor and throwing his hand up to wave hello as you drive by.

Hay bales, hay bales, and more hay bales.  And did I mention "the grove" has hay bales?

God blesses little country churches, I have no doubt.  The only time my grandfather missed a service was for my wedding in 1999 and the Sunday after his stroke, before he passed away.  He was buried on a Sunday,  7 days after I took this picture.

The view on the way "to town".

Also on the way "to town", on my brother's property.  They plan to build their house on the hill behind this swing in the next year or so.  And there, they'll raise their little kiddies where they can "grow up good, grow up slow, like American Honey".