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MERRY CHRISTMAS!
God bless you,

Athena

An Emma Christmas

An “Emma “Christmas


That Christmas Eve, Emma was supposed to be picked up by Linda Meredith Carter at Pavlic’s Florist to be driven to the Greyhound station so she could go home for Christmas. The weather was damp, foggy and cold, and I talked her into staying with us. “Can’t you go just as well for New Year’s?” “I s'pose so," she said, looking at the bad weather outside. We invited her to church, to see the Pageant, and to eat with the family at my sister’s house, but she didn’t want to go. I said, well, you can sit and wait for us, enjoy the Christmas tree, have some eggnog, look at the Nativity, and we will bring back some Christmas dinner. She liked the idea.

When we returned at 10 p. m. she was sleeping upright on the sofa in the dark, but for the soft glow of Christmas tree lights. I gently woke her up. In her hand she held the baby Jesus from the Nativity set to her heart. I helped her to her room and replaced the infant King in the manger with a silent prayer. For some reason, I was a bit ashamed. Emma had grasped the meaning of Christmas, and Christ Himself, far more than we had. The next morning, she enjoyed watching us open presents, opened some for herself, and we all had Christmas Dinner, herself in the kitchen again. Then she went back to her room for a long winter’s nap.
.....

Blueberry Tea with Lorelei Stoble

Blueberry Tea with Lorelei Stroble Welcoming us into the lovely dune-level condominium in Santa Rosa Beach, Mrs. Lorelei Stroble was wearing white slacks to match her soft hair, and a blueberry and white blouse, to match her blue eyes. She offered my friend and me a tall glass of freshly brewed blueberry iced tea and relaxed in her reading chair to reminisce. "It was after Emma went to the Carter Inauguration, she began, that Emma helped me. She was at my home every day for about three years. She didn't room with us, but we carried her to Ms. Kelly's house in the evening. Emma stayed in a greenhouse-like cottage which was once a carport, apart from the main house." "My former husband was in the liquors business. We had a large cabinet of bottles. Emma used to say, "Mr. Bill, I be'n ironing all day, and the chillun have been terrible. I need a drink!" My husband marked a bottle, because we once had a maid that would pour for herself. So, he'd say," if you'll wait to the end of the day, I'll pour you one." The next story she told reminded me of my favorite Peter Sellers movie from 1968, called "The Party." It starred a very sober, but inept, Indian actor played by Peter Sellers, who for religious reasons never touched alcohol, and a tipsy waiter serving glamorous starlets and studio wives at a ritzy party given by a big time Hollywood producer. The movie was was a madcap comedy of errors, set in a serious, dignified setting among people trying terribly to remain cool, calm and collected. While the waiter was mute as he drunkenly navigates a maze of obstacles and causes others to have embarrassing accidents, Emma was not playing a silent part. "One night Emma served for me at a dinner party I was giving. I made roast duck, and vegetables, and for dessert, homemade peach icecream. We were having two doctors over, a psychiatrist and a pediatrician, with their wives. One of the wives was about 20 years younger than the other one. Emma told one, "Is dat your daughter? She looks JUST LIKE Yoo." But that wasn't all. "Emma was in the kitchen, finishing what was in the glasses, and was feeling no pain. While she served the second course, one of the doctors fished out a twenty dollar bill and tried to discreetly pass it to her behind his chair. Noticing, she announced in a loud voice: "Oh, Thank Yoo! Dat's so nice of yoo. None of these other S.O.B.s would've give me dat! " "After we had finished eating and were talking, it was time for the dessert." "There were two brick steps leading up from the dining room into the kitchen. Emma was supposed to serve the tea tray with pretty little crystal bowls filled with the peach icecream. As she walked down the stairs, she must have tripped and the whole tray went one way, and all the icecream and cups went everywhere, all over the carpeting." My husband said, "That's it. Get finished up, get your purse, I'm taking you home." "He didn't even wait to let her stay to clean up the icecream. I had to do that." Are you sure we are talking about the same Emma? I wondered aloud. She told me that she never drank. "Well maybe she doesn't now, but she sure did back then!" Thinking about it later, I did seem to remember Emma talking about a party like this one. So I hope she doesn't mind my telling the story, which everyone thought was humorous, even Emma. Emma loved being different, and she liked to laugh at her own antics. She certainly could be a lot of fun. I asked where Lorelei was from. Churchhill, Louisianna, she told me. I asked her since she had seen "The Help" movie, and whether there was the same type of prejudice there. Oh no, she said. We had them help us all the time. My grandmother was raised on a Plantation with 14 children. They ironed, and cleaned and a teacher came to school them. As I left, the soft spoken Lorelei (whose Germanic name means the Mermaid of the Rhine), had another thought. "I once had on a dress that Emma really liked." She said, admiringly, "I'll race you for that dress." We laughed because she'd said that to me once, too. That meant high praise. It was nice to know that Emma never changed. She was the same Emma from the very beginning. (c) 2012. Athena Marler Creamer. All Rights Reserved.

Photograph: Emma Lee Irby (1976)

Two Angels at the Door from The Help of Destin: Emma Irby

Two Angels at the Door



When Christina was born, I was 30 years old and didn't have a clue. I was as prepared as a mother-to-be, could be, with the nursery decorations. But after one "false alarm," crazy race to the hospital, the real birth came on suddenly, three nights later and I had forgotten to do enough laundry. Coming home from the hospital, there were no lingering oohs and ahhs because everyone who had attended the birth had to be somewhere else...the dock, the post office, the Gulf, the bank, the gift shop, answering the business phones, buying groceries, filling prescriptions. My mother said, will you be okay until later? So, feeling totally alone, just me and Jesus, I sat on my sofa with my precious baby in my arms and shed a tear. I needed help, and a lot of it.



I must say later that night, everyone came over, but the next day, even my dear mother could not be there for long. It was March 14th, Spring Break, and Emmanuel party boat business had to be run. Exhausted and weak from labor that was long and "precipitous," it was hard to even get out of bed.



Someone must have told Emma that I had a baby.



Just when I was desperately crying out to God, she knocked on the door. I could have kissed her. She just started "doing" everything that needed to be done, including laundry, answering the phone, bringing me things to drink, and holding the baby. She made life beautiful. Happy days were here again.



That day, I had two angels entering my life. Christina, my firstborn, and Emma. I have no doubt both were heaven-sent.

....

Out of Africa

Out of Africa

Reading all of this, sometimes you don't see the obvious. Emma's people are from South Carolina.

Possibly but not conclusively, one of the "7."

Another interesting thing was that within the Irby slaves, there was a set of twins born in 1862, both male. One was named Lum, or Lumsi (meaning "excellent" in African). And the other might have been Cal.

It was feared that fresh slaves from Africa would have re-Africanized the American bred negro slaves they came in contact with, those that had become "sweeter" in disposition over time, like wild honeybees bred with other docile honeybees. No one knew what would happen. But, they adjusted better than was thought.

408 from the Wanderer, and 106 from the Clotilde ships. They were astonished to see men with their own skin color wearing white men's garments.

After 50 years, the forgotten phrases, drumbeats and ring dances would begin again. Just like I heard on Music from Beyond the River, recorded in Gee's Bend in 1941.//
(Photo- The Wanderer, from Wikipedia. Creative Commons License.)

Kindly Mr. Irby? Free Book Excerpt

Kindly Mr. Irby?

Who was this slaveholder, turned landholder? If Mr. Irby picked a time to pick cotton in Rehoboth, he might have waited a mite too long. Yet, we know he did, because we have Emma.

Born in Marlboro in 1818 (the same year importing slaves were banned by the way), in 1850 Census he lived as a single man with 31 slaves in Lexington, Dallas County, Alabama.

One decade later in 1860 I found him at home in Rohoboth, Gee's Bend, (post office box Prairie Bluff) and his 31 slaves had grown from 31 to "47 plus 7." That "plus 7" interested me very much, since the Wanderer had landed 2 years earlier and the captives trekked through his home state. Those 54 slaves lived in 12 houses on land he purchased from Mr. and Mrs. Christian.

Enter the war.

"His people" must have earnestly waited for him to return from the Civil War, not knowing their fate. Cal, Emma's future grandfather, being too young to know.

Josiah was a foot soldier, and an older one at that. He volunteered to join the Confederate Army at age 44, went in as a 2nd Lieutenant, Alabama, Company A, 4th Infantry Regiment, muster date 1 August year 1862. The war had begun at Ft. Sumter in 61 and he saw much action. I honestly felt sorry for him. He started with the Battle of Manassas which lost all field officers, Yorkton, Seven Pines 2nd Battle of Manassas, Seven Days Battle, Chickamauga, Antitem, Fredericksburg, Gettysburg, Ft. Sanders, The Wilderness, and Spotsylvania Campaign. Miraculously he did not die, although he may have finally have been captured and surrendered with 300 others at the Battle of Mobile Bay in 84.


After 1865, he applied for a Presidential Pardon which cost him $2,000.

His slaves were now free, in theory at least.

In 1870, he lived in Rehoboth, with $10,000 worth of land, paying taxes of $1,800 to Mileax County. He was 52 years old.

He was living with a "mulatto" freed woman and her (their?) son, Duncan, also "mullato," and in his last will and testament in 1870, he gives Emeline Gee, quite a bit of property, and she is named preferentially before any of his other heirs. Her occupation on the 1870 Census is "dorm servant."

His will began with the words, "In the Name of God, Amen!"

He died the following year.//
(Photo The Battle of Mobile by Louis Prang. Library of Congress. Used by Creative Commons, Wikipedia.)