Eddie Lowe
Just A Thought
I was born and raised at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and I have traversed their slopes—whether by car or by trail—all my life. Like my ancestors before me, I have stayed close to the shadow of these mountains. Through the early years of my life, I gathered the tales of those who came before me.
As a child, I had no idea of the wealth of knowledge the old folks had accumulated over the years just by daily living and, for the most part, scraping by. With the passing of years and elders, I have found it important to write about their sayings and beliefs before they are lost to time.
I was blessed to have a grandpa named Talmadge Lowe, who was born in 1888 and lived a full century, passing in 1988. He served as the janitor at Beulah School for many years. On my mother’s side, both Granny and Grandpa shared stories and remedies that many have forgotten—or perhaps never heard at all.
Maybe I was raised differently, but in my youth, when one of us was sick, a call would go out describing the symptoms, and soon a remedy would arrive. I remember one instance when both my mother and I were affected by poison ivy, likely brought in on firewood. Someone sent a treatment, which seemed to consist mostly of white liquor, though it supposedly included some sort of root. To this day, more than fifty years later, I can still feel the burn of that concoction as I swallowed a teaspoon of it. The amazing thing is—it worked. How or why, I do not know, but within a day, the rash was gone.
Now, I am not promoting these old remedies as safe or even effective by today’s standards. I simply want to record them as part of mountain folklore. One particular cure came from my mother’s grandfather concerning warts. As a child, my mother had a wart on her hand. Her grandfather told her to steal her mother’s dishrag and bury it. He said the wart would go away. Did it work? According to my mother, it did. Can we explain it? Probably. But I still love the tale.
Another I remember involved my great aunt Ruth. People would bring their babies to her if they had thrush, a common mouth infection that still occurs today. It was said that Ruth would blow into the baby’s mouth, and the thrush would go away. I once asked my mother why Ruth could do this, and she explained that Ruth had never seen her father. That was the supposed reason Ruth had this gift. People came from all around with their babies, and Ruth would blow into their mouths—and they were cured. Fact or fiction, and certainly not CDC-approved, but this is what the old timers relied on.
There was also the belief that certain people could “take the fire out of a burn.” If you were burned, you sought out someone with the gift to whisper over it. They could do it in person or even over the phone, and the burn would heal. Whether they whispered a prayer or a saying only they knew, no one could say. The story goes that once the person with the gift told someone else how it worked, the gift would disappear. Again, I am not recommending these practices, but if I am the last generation to remember them, then they must be shared before they are forgotten.
So, what about the dog days of summer and the superstitions surrounding the hottest part of the year?
The old folks referred to the later days of July and into August as the dog days. One tale said snakes were blind during this time and fish would not bite. Interestingly, there is some truth to both of these claims. Snakes shed their skin during the summer, and while shedding, their eyes become milky and their vision is impaired, though not completely lost. As for the fish, they often recede to deeper waters and become less active in the heat. We now understand that this behavior is due to changes in water temperature, which slows their metabolism and reduces feeding.
The term “dog days” traces back to the seventh century and the rising of the star Sirius, also known as the Dog Star. This bright star rises and sets with the sun during the peak of summer. Ancient people believed Sirius added to the sun’s heat, making the days even hotter. Today, we know the star adds no actual heat, but I still find it fascinating that its name comes from the Latin Canis Major, meaning “greater dog,” and from there we get “dog days of summer.”
What are some old tales passed down to you? I would love to hear them. Please send them to me at my email, newventurewoodworx@gmail.com. And as Granny would say, stay out of the heat.
