Maxine Marshall - Sep 1919 to Dec 2009

Maxine Marshall - Sep 1919 to Dec 2009, originally uploaded by Dixon Marshall.

A Tribute to the Ultimate Mom

By Dixon Marshall  (To be read by John Marshall IV at Mom’s funeral)

Maxine Marshall.  Her first name was really Mildred, but her contemporary friends and siblings knew her as Maxine, because she preferred her middle name.  In truth, she hated the name “Mildred.”  Sadly, nearly all of her dear old friends have been gone for a while now.  There was almost nobody left to call her “Maxine” for quite some time before she passed away.  I know she missed them all—but this is a price we pay for longevity.

Born as Maxine Wolfe, then going by the Marshall surname after marrying her beloved John Marshall, the rest of us knew her as either Mom, Mama, Mommy Marshall, Grandma, Aunt Mack, Meemaw or Granny--whether related to her or not. This is because nearly all of her adult life had been centered around her children.  When I say “her children,” I say it loosely, because I do mean all of the children that she knew. Whether grandchildren, great-grandchildren, step-grandchildren, nieces, nephews, sons-in-law, daughters-in-law, or even just friends of her children—we were her children.  We were all the same to her--she loved us all with equal passion and gusto.

Her passion was not just reserved for her “children,” though.  Her lust for life had an uncanny depth and breadth.  Maxine Marshall lived her life with a passion, and possessed a roaring sense of humor; this trait was firmly ingrained—she knew of no other way to exist.

Maxine was tough.  Petite in body, but huge in personality, she was born in and of the mountains, not too long after the turn of the 20th century.  She was the daughter of subsistence farmers.  Her birthplace was her childhood home on that farm on the mountain, nearly ten miles from town.  All of her formal schooling was had in a one-room school on that same mountain (but she did take classes in town, and received her GED, much later in life).  Her driveway was something much less than a wagon trail snaking from the summit of Wolfe Mountain for seven miles.  Her childhood transportation consisted of her own two feet, but when she got “old enough,” she did at least acquire four-legged transportation, in the form of a horse she called “Ol’ Jet.”

I have walked that same rugged trail to her home place several times myself, hoping to capture some of the magic, but only failing to capture my breath less than halfway up.

At the tender age of ten, it was not unusual for her parents to send her to the store in Fisher for beans and coffee, or to the old grist mill at the South Fork River bridge in Moorefield for flour.  I am not talking about a one pound bag of beans, or a five pound sack of flour.  What she had to fetch would be up to twenty-five pounds of beans or flour, packaged in rough burlap sacks. 

As she described it, the storekeepers felt sorry for her, as they knew that this little girl had to haul the goodies back up the mountain on her shoulder—so they would give her an extra empty sack. That way she could place half of the product in each.  She would then tie the bags together, styling a sort of harness, which she said helped her keep her balance on the rocky road home.

McGyver had nothing on this resourceful little mountain girl. 

She had to make several rest stops along the steep uphill climb, but she nearly always made it back to the top of the mountain before dark.  On those times that she didn’t beat the dusk, she said it got spooky when the owls started screeching and hooting after sunset.

She always spoke of these things as wonderful adventures, not as hardships.  You could tell by the gleam in her eyes, and the bright little smile, that when she spoke of these sagas of long ago, that she truly wished she could re-live them.  To Maxine, those were days of freedom and independence.  Freedom to roam was bliss to this remarkable woman, even in the golden autumn of her life.

Mama was very transparent.  Love us she did, but make no mistake about it--when we did wrong, she did not hold back.  Thus she gained our respect—we knew that there was no fluff to be found here.  Mama Marshall was a woman of real and tangible substance.  She was truly a rose with all of its thorns intact—and we loved her all the more for that. 

When she wed John Marshall, she had married a die-hard Democrat, but she had been raised by staunch Republicans. Apparently, Dad successfully converted her, because she was also very much of the Democratic persuasion. Oddly, she in turn raised very conservative children.

Mommy Marshall was a Christian, and she truly enjoyed church.  She wasn’t able to attend much in the latter couple of years, but she spoke often of the two pastors that she admired—she felt in her heart that they were true men of God—Ken Owens and Glen Berg.  Mom had accepted and loved Jesus, and she knew she was going to heaven.

Aunt Mack knew how to survive.  Not merely how to survive, though—she knew how to live, how to love life, and how to enjoy living despite not having many material things at all early on in life—and despite the unending curse of severe rheumatoid arthritis that reared its ugly head in her young middle ages.  She handily fought off health demons and catastrophes that would have conquered anyone of lesser spirit, and I believe that would include most of us here today.

If ever you saw an odd piece of vegetation that you had not encountered before, you only needed to show it to Granny Marshall.  She was the ultimate field guide—a walking botanical database; I can not remember ever showing her a plant or weed that she could not identify.  She always knew what was safe, what would make you itch, or what might kill you.  I can see how this was important for her survival early on, considering the ecosystem that she was a part of as a child.

Meemaw finally got her drivers license in her 50s.  My brother John, and his wife Terri, still speak of the horrors of teaching her to drive.  Everyone else that had ever been a passenger in her car came to understand the meaning of “white knuckles.”  To Mom’s credit, she never had a serious accident, but just a couple of minor benders.

Grandma Marshall was a lover of animals.  At various times she had kept some pets that would strike terror in the hearts of visitors.  Of course, I encouraged this as a child.  Mom has had a Raccoon, an Alligator, snakes and lizards (which were really mine), many dogs of all species and sizes, and numerous cats. One of those cats many of us think was just evil, but nobody can remember its name.  Her last cat, named Tom, weighed in at thirty-two pounds.  Oddly, Mama had an unnatural terror of spiders.

Mom lost her husband too soon.  She had sorely missed the love of her life from the time he passed away, in 1972.  She had a couple of flames, and had dated a few times in the intervening years, but she never managed to replace John.  Honestly, I do not believe she even wanted to, because she certainly did not try very hard.  She made sure that arrangements were in place, so that she could be buried next to John.

We have all learned from Maxine.  We have inherited her savvy nature, her honesty, and her transparency—but we cannot equal it.  This is something that has been passed down not so much in our DNA as it was in simply how she touched our lives.  Mama set an example for all of us, yet we are hard put to compare to her example.  She was the real thing.

Maxine, Mama, Granny, Meemaw, Mommy Marshall, Aunt Mack, Mom, Grandma—but never, ever Mildred.  She will be sorely missed.  She was something special, no matter which name we used.  In her presence, we all felt very special.  We can only hope to live by her example.

Goodbye, Mama.  I miss you.  I will see you on the other side one day.

Letter to the Moorefield Examiner, published this week.

Concerning school uniforms and "good Germans."

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I am ready to receive criticism for my viewpoint, which seems diametrically opposed to those prevailing views expressed in the correspondence in the Examiner. Thank God we have not yet lost freedom of expression in this country. We still have the constitutional right to publicly make fools of ourselves, so here is my humble contribution to the latest local subjects of controversy:

I find it amusing how sensitive certain people are about their race or culture. I am writing about the offense taken to an ad in the Weekender metaphorically describing the policy of wearing school uniforms as an act of being “good Germans.” I realize that stereotypical racial profiling is no longer politically correct, but I’m still laughing as I write this—not at the content of the ad, which is quite frankly a little tasteless, but I do find humor in the reactions to it. It appears that many people don’t understand that the content of the ad was written by the opposition to the school uniform policy, and not by the Examiner, based on the letters.

I am of equal German and Irish heritage, so I feel that I have as much right to voice an opinion on this “good German” issue as the people who took offense. I love a good stereotypical Irish joke about excessive libational intake, and I even enjoy watching the campy old TV show Hogan’s Heroes, which features a shtick that doesn’t exactly elevate the prestige of the Germanic race. No matter how much someone might make fun of my heritage, it doesn’t change what I am and where I came from, and I’m frankly rather proud of my ancestors, as most everyone should be. I feel that if people didn’t tend to take themselves so seriously, the world would be a much better place.

From what I have read, people seem lukewarm to, or even unaware of, the fact that we are gradually losing certain freedoms in this country that we once fought for and that are now taken for granted, such as our constitutional right to privacy--but they are outraged that someone might take away their boys’ right to wear their waistline around their thighs, or their girls’ right to sport poured-in looking jeans and micro-blouses. Okay, I am exaggerating there with comedic intent, but I just want to make a point. It amuses me that these issues would be the subject of such vociferous controversy, considering how many real problems we are facing today.

I would urge these people to lighten up, as should the clamorous group who opposes school uniforms. Folks, these are not life-changing issues that are a threat to the well-being of yours, and all future generations, such as a new health care policy might be. There are much better causes to expend energy on.

Let me add a bit more controversy to this subject: not only do I think uniforms are a good idea for Moorefield Middle School, but I would gently advocate that this policy be applied at all county schools, from elementary through high school. Incidentally, I do have a son who attends Moorefield High School, so I am not an outsider looking in. As I noted above, I can’t expend a lot of energy on this minor cause, because there are other issues more important, such as my own unemployment due to the rotten economy.

For those who do not have the resources to purchase uniforms, I suggest the schools conduct fundraising events, where the monies received would be used to help those in need to purchase the uniforms. It works for raising funds for athletic uniforms, and various other causes. Though I am a poor German-Irish American boy, I would be happy to contribute, as would other members of the silent majority. There are those that would boycott such an activity, but I believe those people would be the few members of a vocal minority who oppose the uniforms.

Disclaimer: All of the opinions in this letter belong to me alone, because nobody else seems to want them.

Dixon Marshall

Starting Over - Who says life can’t begin (Again) at 55?

After 19 years as an Engineering employee, Yours Truly is one of the many soon-to-be victims of corporate downsizing, due to the shrinking economy this year. 250 of us will be released to the economic wild in the near future; many will go to another branch of the company, and many will find employment elsewhere, albeit with difficulty in this economic climate. I intend to take a different path.

Most of the projects that I have done as an engineer there started as a joyfully creative process, but then became dry and rote once it was fully integrated into our production. I did always get a kick out of tweaking the code in a CNC machine to the point that the output is a high-quality work of art. Or getting a molder adjusted to the point that the cut in the wood is flawless. But once done, and the product is being cranked out, the excitement goes out of the process.

I guess I’m an artist by nature, and never did truly fit in to the corporate culture – despite the fact that I closely followed that culture for all of those years. I made a good living there, but it is time to move on. I feel that I won’t pursue work in the same field at any company.

I’ve decided to become a full-time student in the near and foreseeable future. I will be studying the graphic arts, with emphasis on Web design. I may belatedly get my Photography shingle, so that I can become an instructor in that field.

I have to thank my soon-to-be ex-employer for the generous severance pay that will enable me to pursue my dream. I have no hard feelings toward them, and I have truly enjoyed working with some very fine people for the last two decades. It is a chapter in my life that helped make me who I am today, and I think that I’m a better person for it.

American Woodmark Moorefield Plant Closing

American Woodmark has announced two plant closings; one of them in my hometown of Moorefield. They are closing the oldest component plant, and laying off all of the 250 hourly and salaried employees. They are also closing the oldest assembly plant, and laying off the 300 workers there. The current depression has lowered cabinet sales so much that Woodmark claims they cannot afford to keep their current level of excess capacity.

There will still be two American Woodmark component plants operating in Moorefield, and one of them, I hear, will be hiring some people from the ill fated Moorefield plant, if not from Berryville as well. Most will simply be laid off.

Over the Top

Over the Top, originally uploaded by Dixon Marshall.

I took a drive over the mountain on Fort Run Road on Saturday. In many place, I had to use 4-Low to negotiate the steep, rutted terrain.