Green Bean
By DAN LANGFORD
Tomorrow (Dec. 9) is my 46th birthday. I should have passed that milestone three weeks ago, but back in 1962, I seemed to want to stay put. I was born on Mama’s third trip to Griffin Hospital, on a Sunday evening after she had gone to church, come home and eaten a big Sunday dinner prepared by my paternal grandmother, and gone out into the woods of Hilpine Farm in Brooks, our family homestead, to root kindling stumps up out of the ground with my daddy — partially because the family was low on the fat pine, and partially to see if they couldn’t force her into labor. It worked, and I was born about suppertime that Sunday night.
She nearly died, and was unconscious for several days. When she finally came to, a cleaning woman was in her hospital room mopping the floor. Seeing Mama’s eyes open for the first time in days, the janitress cast down her mop and headed for the bedside. Exclaiming over how relieved everyone would be when they learned Mama had come to, the woman was suddenly struck with the realization that Mama, who had been knocked out for the birth, had absolutely absolutely no memory of what had happened. “Honey,” the maid exclaimed, “I bet you don’t eebm know what you had!”
Mercifully remembering nothing of her long ordeal, nor realizing exactly where she was or why, Mama’s mind went back to the last thing she remembered with any clarity — Sunday dinner. “Yes I do,” she declared weakly. “I had roast beef, green beans, mashed potatoes…..”
Considering I’m from rural Brooks, GA, a place where folks have all sorts of nicknames, I’ve always considered it a blessing that my own isn’t “Green Bean.”