Some of my fondest and most memorable holidays are those of Thanksgivings at my grandmother’s home in Middle Tennessee. Way back in the ’50s, when I was, as my Uncle JT used to call me, “knee-high to a grasshopper.”
JT was my favorite uncle. He was actually one of six great-uncles, all brothers of my grandmother, Miz Lena. He was the youngest and certainly the most colorful of the bunch. JT told blue jokes and had an eye for the gals. They used to say that JT could talk you into or out of anything. He was always getting me into trouble.
When JT came home from the war, Grand Mom gave him two pigs and cut off 20 acres from her farm to help him get started. He grew from there. JT ended up with three places, not counting his home. Two of them were strictly crop farms. Corn, cotton and tobacco. The smallest of the three was a pig farm.
JT cared more about his pigs than he did pretty much anything else. He raised prize Herefords and Hampshires. There were a half-dozen little potbellies running around as well. JT told me that I could have one, if I could catch it. I wore those little pigs out. Never did catch one.
JT would lie back on the porch, pop open a PBR and watch me. He’d yell out words of encouragement and laugh real big. He was one of those ruggedly handsome men. A farmer’s tan. Not that tall. Kinda stocky. Million-dollar smile. Twinkling steel-blue eyes. A mop of sun-streaked wavy hair. He looked like a movie star.