Pookie's Place, Part IV

This beautiful porch, swing, American flag and hedgerow belong to a lady I visited with last weekend, Miss Pookie.

Mathews Mark probably had no idea that a one-hour visit with his mother could turn into forty days and forty nights such a long series of blog posts. In fact, when he said he wanted to schedule another tour (of his friend's old store) the same day as the meeting with Pookie, I started to stress, because I knew for sure this one visit would generate a year's week's worth of blog posts, and each place deserves the proper time and focus attention.

The bottom line is I can over analyze talk the heck out of something that most people would otherwise skate right through. And when I say talk I mean write because in person I won't say two words. On paper I can't stop. But this is not about me, it's about Miss Pookie's house, which was built in 1915.


The light fixture pictured above hangs in Miss Pookie's dining room. Her grandfather spied it hanging in a bar an establishment in Norfolk, back in the days when the waterways were the roads and there was practically an interstate freeway seaway between Norfolk, Mathews and Baltimore and various ports in between. He purchased the fixture and carefully cradled it in a blanket for the potentially rough boat ride home to Gwynn's Island. From the dock he carried the fragile fixture on a horse and buggy to its final destination here in the dining room.

One of the first things Pookie said after, "Come on in, there's no such thing as company in this house, everybody come on in and sit wherever you like," was "That fixture in the dining room? It will never, ever leave this house." Then she relayed the details of its magnificent journey from Norfolk to Gwynn's Island. "My sister and I decided a long time ago that if we ever sell this house, that fixture stays. It belongs here."

Pookie also said that Son Mathews Mountain Man once scrambled atop the dining room table and began fervently dusting off the fixture thinking it might be a Tiffany. He didn't find any conclusive evidence, but you never know.

Either way, it's priceless.


A person could spend an entire day with Pookie in her dining room and never get around to talking about the history of each piece on display. This particular picture caught my eye, it's a beach house from her native South Carolina. She mentioned that during one hot, sweltering summer, she put Mathews Mark's playpen underneath this house for shade.

Remember playpens?

That's Mathews Mark there in the background probably wondering why on Earth any human being would take a picture of another picture.

That's because he didn't know it was really a picture of another picture held by a woman telling a story, while the sun bounced off the mirror, which hangs over a mantelpiece, which adorns a gorgeous fireplace, with a firescreen that says RUSKAY across the front, representing a very unique blending of two names. (Deep breath due to lengthy sentence.) The mirror reflects a sunlit window draped in lace curtains, behind the photographer, as Mathews Mark looks in another direction.

See what I mean about over analyzing? See?

Yesterday I promised a post about light fixtures, tractors, strangers in the night and playpens. We can check off light fixtures and playpens; tomorrow we'll cover the tractors, and a hedgerow. The strangers in the night will be covered another day, it's a post in and of itself.

There are many treasures in this house, and they're all wonderful people.

Can you think of a treasure or a sentimental item that is meaningful to you or your family?