Some of my earliest memories are working in their fields of cotton, peanuts, corn and oats, riding their mules, playing in their barns, swimming and fishing in their pond, milking their cows, running barefoot behind his plow in the cool, fresh, dark soil, drinking cane juice as he made syrup, and helping kill and clean their hogs. He was a teaser, always poking, pinching and joking. I made my first thrashing efforts to swim when he swept me off my feet and threw me into Chotawhatchee Springs.
As a child, I looked up to him more than any other man except my father. He helped me grow up. When my father wouldn't allow me to take his rifle to the woods alone, Uncle Virgil let me take his double barreled shotgun. He let me wear the sweat-stained felt hat that, with brogans and faded denim overalls, were his work uniform. He taught me how to plant tomatoes, clean a catfish, drive a tractor and, using his worn Barlow pocket knofe, helped me learn to whittle.
He lived alone after Blanche died, continuing to pick up pecans from the trees around his house and do chores, until a couple of years ago when, after a couple of falls and failing health, Norman and his wife, Teresa, took him to live with them. A light in his life went out when he left his home. Soon he rarely moved from his chair and for the last year, he has been uncommunicative, rarely recognizing his two brothers who visited once a week.
Those four Williamson brothers are now two. I'm glad I knew them all and cherish the memories of them in the flat, sandy back yard of their parents' home, between the barn and the smoke house, talking, laughing and being the brothers that they were.
His death saddens many, especially his family and his two brothers. It saddens me, too, not so much because I will miss him in my daily life because I was not close to him in recent years, but it saddens me because I miss the uncle he was when I was a child.
..rww..
1.21.09