THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, December 17, 1995 TAG: 9512150236
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Random Rambles
SOURCE: Tony Stein
LENGTH: Medium: 82 lines
People tend to over-indulge this time of year, but I was careful at Catherine Howland's pig-pickin' the other day. I ate a balanced diet - a whopping heap of hush puppies on one side of my plate and a whopping heap of barbecue on the other. It was a down-home version of manna from heaven.
Catherine is the wonderful lady who lives across the street from me on Ashley Road. Each year since 1989, she has celebrated her birthday with a pig-pickin' attended by a ravenous regiment of friends and neighbors. We chat and chomp for hours. I tell you true, the pig perishes in a good cause.
By the numbers, Catherine is in her early 70s. Personality-wise, energy-wise, she is a blossoming, white-haired debutante. Born on a farm in Battleboro, N.C., she was brought to Virginia when she was in the third grade. Widowed twice, she has two children. There's Barbara Gosman, a fine guitar teacher, and Edward Gosman, who has a thriving landscape business.
Not only is Catherine secretary-treasurer of the landscape business, but she works part-time at Ann's Hallmark Shop in Great Bridge Shopping Center ``to keep busy.'' Then there's her work with the Pilot Club of Chesapeake, a group of professional women. She's fund-raising chair for them and for the Chesapeake General Hospital Auxiliary. When the Women's Division of the Chesapeake Chamber of Commerce named her ``Woman of the Year'' in 1987, they made a good choice.
She is a people-person to the core, which is why she has the pig-pickin'. When she got her first Social Security check, she figured it was much more fun to be social than to be secure. Thus, the pig-pickin' was born.
The 1995 edition got its sizzling send-off at 6 a.m. last Saturday when R.B. Cutler and Tommy Gray gulped coffee and dumped charcoal into a fat black cooker. Once the coals were ready, it would take six hours to turn the 124-pound pig into pork paradise.
Members of Catherine's legion of friends, R.B. and Tommy are both ex-farmboys and veterans at pig-pickin' cookery. Three hours on one side, turn it, and three hours on the other side, they agreed. Obviously, Ph.D.s (Doctors of Pig Hottening) were at work.
I had to admire Tommy's hat. ``Genuine Antique Person'' it said, and ``Been there, done that, can't remember.'' Actually, Tommy is 60 and not all that antique. However, he's a fervent Washington Redskins fan and the 'Skins' third consecutive miserable season must be aging him prematurely.
After a while, Dycie Childs-Melton joined us at the cooker, now belching fragrant smoke like a pork-perfumed Vesuvius. She and her husband Lester used to live in Chesapeake, but moved to Medford, Ore. She's visiting and noted that while everything in Virginia is age and heritage, everything in Oregon is pioneer spirit and new and ``We're from somewhere else.'' Dycie told me Oregon has license plates that say ``Been in Oregon Since...'' and the oldest one she's seen is maybe 1990.
A little bit of Virginia culture headed back with her. Lester loves collards, and Dycie fetched home a batch made by Tommy's wife, Beverly, who can elevate collards to an art form. Beverly wasn't telling the whole recipe but mentioned sugar, fatback and spices.
In fact, nobody was telling recipes as Catherine was concocting Brunswick stew in the kitchen and R.B. and Tommy were creating that corn meal caviar known as hush puppies out by the pig cooker. Another volunteer cook, Pat Bradt, was arranging chickens on a grill and when you sniffed the accumulated aromas, you almost wanted to swap noses with an elephant.
By about 1:30 p.m., the pig was perfection. I knew because I had gotten myself appointed official taster. It was one of those tasks brave journalists like me are willing to accept for the greater good of humanity and an early opportunity to bless our taste buds.
By mid-afternoon, people were streaming to Catherine's house like it was give-away day at the Internal Revenue Service. The guest list ran to about 150. They hugged and helloed and howdied and then grabbed plates for the serious business on hand.
Catherine, sporting a gift sweatshirt labeled ``Party Queen of Ashley Road,'' was all over the premises with smiles and laughs and good neighborliness. She had a moment for everybody there and even one for two folks not there. She asked me to mention that old friends Tom and Martha Tobey of Myrtle Beach, S.C., called to say they were sick and couldn't make it.
There was a lot of good food at the pig-pickin' and a lot of laughter. But the most important item on the menu was friendship, served up warm and abundantly. And that's Catherine Howland's favorite recipe. by CNB