Mrs. Mary J was my absolutist favorite participant. We were at her house working for about three weeks, and while we were there we blew insulation into her roof, replaced a huge picture window in her living room, and built an 8x10 porch with a roof for the back door. It was my favorite kind of work - fast-paced, interesting, pretty easy to figure out but sometimes pretty challenging to implement (I have a great memory of my coworker T lying on her back on the house roof, trying to screw things in under the overlap of the porch roof, while I stood on the ladder under her holding her feet up because if I didn't, she'd slide right off the metal roof that was totally covered in sawdust - and of course, both of us giggling and snorting up sawdust and coughing and commenting that "this would be a super interesting way to die!"). Leaving Mrs. Mary J's house was a little heartbreaking. Back to slow, boring jobs - back to grumpy participants - back to groups (oh BOY.)
I'd like to try and paint a picture of Mrs. Mary J, but I think that I'll probably fail. She was a short, stoutish lady with wispy grey hair and wee little spindly glasses. She rocked out Kentucky fashion better than anyone I've met here, with her denim skirt, baseball hat, and her husband's camo t-shirt. She made it look classy and practical. Probably the greatest thing about her was how often she said "well." Except she said it "way-uhl!" And she used it for everything. It could be a question, or a statement, an expression of shock, disapproval or pleasure, or just a filler word to let you know that she saw still listening, depending on her intonation.
Most of what made Mrs. Mary J so delightful was how un-self-conscious she was, and how simply she saw the world and herself. Very trusting of all of us (sometimes I had to retract a joke that I made, because she widened her eyes and said "WAY-uhl!" and I knew that she thought it was true... oops), deeply genuine, super kind, really joyful, hospitable (let me tell you about her delicious venison that we got to eat for lunch several times!) and grateful for everything that happened to her house. She was like a kid on Christmas morning, every single day - "Wah-uhl, these here windows you'uns are puttin' in are like $500,000 dollar house windows!"
This is my favorite story about Mrs. Mary J. We're putting up gutters on the side of the house, and she comes out to tell us that there is a festival coming up soon that Elvis will be playing at. (Impersonators are sort of everywhere in Kentucky - Elvis and Michael Jackson were both in Berea a few weekends ago).
So she gives us the news of the festival, then wanders back inside and we keep up working. Ten minutes go by. Then - the door bangs open! Mrs. Mary J flies out of it! Her eyes are wide and her mouth is open!
"Way-uhl!" she gasps, "Elvis is dead!"
Oh my goodness me, the look on Steve's face.
What I'm really curious about is the first thing that went through her mind when she realized that Elvis is dead AND that Elvis was playing at the festival. Oh, lovely.
I really miss Mrs. Mary J.
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