The Greenstraw Letters
A short glimpse at a strange family—in a new style: personal letters.
The Greenstraw Letters
By Samuel Sullins
April 1934
New York
Dear Uncle Mark,
You might not know who I am, since I have never met you. My name is Olivia and I am twelve years old. My birthday was last week.
I am writing to ask you a question.
Who are you?
Father says we will never meet you. Mother says it’s because you are a little odd. Mother and Father both say that I am ordinary, that we are all ordinary. But why do they tell me that, if it’s true?
They do not want me asking questions about you. So I’m not asking them, I’m asking you. I want to know why we’ll never meet you, or Grandma, or Grandpa.
Let me explain my question. Yesterday I was in our attic. It is very small up there, and dark. I found a box of old letters. One of them was from you, Uncle Mark, to Mother. I read it. In the letter, you wrote something strange. This is what you said:
“People will always say we are strange. They always have, you know. Our name will always be cursed. Why do you think you can escape that, in New York? Please come back. The family has always been more powerful together.”
Father told me not to make assumptions about other people. He says they will always be wrong. So I won’t assume anything. Instead, could you explain that letter to me? I have enclosed a copy of it, in case you want to see it.
I hope you are not mad I wrote to you. I didn’t tell my mother I was writing you.
Olivia Caramelo
P.S. I hope your farm is doing well. Mother says it is very dry in Oklahoma. She always reads the paper to check the weather there. It is quite wet here right now.
April 1934
Oklahoma
Myra,
I know I haven’t written in a while. It’s hard to find time these days. It hasn’t been raining enough here, and the farm is a lot of work. I know you don’t want me to mention this in a letter, so I won’t, but…I’ve done what I can to…help the crops here, and even that’s not enough. Mother and Father aren’t able to help with that anymore, so it’s just me now. Maybe you know how hard it is, if you’ve ever tried. I’ve been tired, so tired, for the last few weeks.
I don’t mean to complain. I suppose I just haven’t talked with you for a long time. I haven’t written since the telephones went out, but…neither have you. They say they might get the telephone lines fixed sometime next year. I’ll be calling as soon as I can. It’s been too long since I’ve heard your voice.
I remember what you used to say about how we could all leave, and go to California or New York and work in the factories or the shops. Now and then that still sounds tempting, but we really can’t leave the farm. Mother and Father would never leave, and I can’t leave any more than they can—I’m the only one taking care of them now, and the farm would collapse without me here. And…I don’t think I want to leave, anymore
I hope New York is treating you well. Sometimes, even all these years later, I forget you’re not here. I don’t know why. I do want to come visit you sometime, if I get the chance. Though…it seems that I might be unwelcome.
Farming’s in your blood, isn’t it? Doesn’t look like you can escape it, even if you want to. You went all that way to New York, and you ended up starting a farm after all that. I hope it’s going well for you. I don’t know anything about growing flowers—but I’m sure it’s hard. I hope you get rain—and if you don’t have any, I hope you can get some, alone. Rain’s not like the other things. It’s terribly hard and you’ll be tired for weeks, always tired. Unless your daughter could help. But I don’t think you’d want her to help, would you?
Your daughter is my real reason for writing to you. I know her name now: Olivia.
You must be wondering how I know that. Well, she wrote to me last week, without you knowing. She asked me a question about a letter I sent you a long time ago, in 1917.
She says you tell her she’s ordinary.
How dare you tell her that? Why would you hide her from herself, never tell her what she really is? What do you hope to gain?
I know you’ll never be able to give it up, Myra. None of us ever can. Why would you hide it from your daughter? She’ll find out. She’s trying hard.
She told me you didn’t want her writing to me. She asked me to explain that old letter—she even sent me a copy of it.
You know you shouldn’t lie to her, Myra. I want to tell her the truth, but I’ll wait to reply to her letter until you reply to this one, if you get the chance. I don’t often have time for writing. Maybe you do. It’s near midnight right now, and the typewriter doesn’t do so well with the dust here.
The storms here are something terrible. We haven’t had rain for months, and the ground is terribly dry. This farm is getting harder and harder to run, even with—you-know-what. I’ve been forced to hire a hand to help with the work. He’s a quiet fellow and doesn’t ask questions, which is good. The neighbors still wonder how I manage to run all of Greenstraw Farm, ten times the size of theirs, with a fraction of the manpower.
The droughts are getting worse. We all know this isn’t going to end soon. Just north of here they had a storm, a dust storm, that destroyed the last of the crops. If we get one of those here we’ll be finished. I won’t be able to do anything against a storm that size.
I want to ask you to come home. At least for a visit. Mother and Father would be overjoyed to see you. You’d make so many things better—you could bring Olivia and explain everything to her, start teaching her. With the two of you we could keep the storms off and get some rain and finish the planting.
I know it’s selfish to ask. But we need you here, Myra, we really do. It’s been so long since I’ve seen you. You could bring Alberto too—surely you’ve told your own husband the truth about yourself?
I’ll mail this when I get the chance. Probably within a week or two. I wish you a good season—and please tell Olivia the truth. She sounds like a good girl.
Love,
Mark Greenstraw
P.S. It’s been a week since I wrote this letter. I’ll mail it today. I have very bad news, Myra: Father died yesterday. He asked about you, and I told him that you loved him Then he died. Mother is very ill now and says she wants to see you. Please come if you can.
April 1934
New York
Dear Mark,
Father gone. It’s hard to believe. I still imagine him as master of Greenstraw farm. But I suppose that’s you now, isn’t it? It’s really your farm now. When I read that Father was dead I cried quite a lot. It makes me cry now, thinking about him dead, gone forever, and you and Mother alone in that big house. I wish I could have seen him before he died. I hope he knew I loved him; thank you for telling him I did.
Our farm is doing well and business is good. We’re still selling pressed flowers saved from last year. I’ve enclosed one for you.
I am sorry to hear about the droughts in Oklahoma. Like you said, I don’t want to talk about these things in letters, but we always have…enough rain here. I know how tired you must be—I can’t believe you manage to keep that whole farm going, alone. You should hire more help, or perhaps sell a few fields. Because I will not come home. I cannot.
I wish I could help you, I really do. It sounds really terrible there. If I came, I might be tempted to embrace our old ways again. You were right when you said that I could never give it up. I tried, once. Now I know that it’s a part of me like you said—but a deadly, sickening part of me. I don’t think I ever loved it the way you did, the way Mother and Father did.
You talk of the terrible conditions there, and I’m sorry for you. But don’t you understand why? It’s because of you, because of us. We will never fit in, anywhere. Everywhere we go, we are strangers, outcasts, dangerous people. I’ve done some research in the libraries, looking through old Continental newspapers. People feared the Greenstraws once, centuries ago, though we weren’t called Greenstraw then. Our great-grandparents came here so nobody would know us. But people will find us out. They’ll fear us again, even hate us, unless somebody ends it all.
That’s what I’m doing. I tell my daughter she is ordinary, Mark, because she is ordinary. She will be ordinary, if she never knows the truth. It’s not likely she will discover it on her own. If nobody helps her, then she’ll never know. I am determined that she should have the best life possible, Mark. I don’t want her growing up the way I did, even if there are some…benefits. Alberto doesn’t know either. He never shall.
I’m not denying who I am. I am a Greenstraw to my very heart (even if it’s not my name anymore.) But I will be the end. I want it to end here. In a world of ordinary people, my daughter is going to live an ordinary life. That’s what America is all about, isn’t it?
Greenstraw Farm is still my home. I wish I could come back, I really do. But I’ve made my choice, and I’m determined to stick by it. If my daughter met you or met Mother, she would find out. I will not bring her to you, and I also cannot leave my family and come to you alone.
I remember the old years at Greenstraw Farm. I remember mornings, planting a hundred acres of corn alone in the sunshine. I remember the combined power of our family. I remember that anything was possible. Nothing God threw at us could ever stand against us. Once, that felt like hope, boundless freedom, but now I know it is a burden and a curse. It always has been, and it always will be. It hurts me to leave you broken—but it is necessary.
I have gone my own way, Mark, once and for all. There is no use in my pretending anymore. I don’t think I’ll ever see you again, unless you come here. You would be welcome. You can count on it.
You might hate me for my choice. I wouldn’t blame you. In your place, I would likely do the same. I still hope you can understand, though.
Olivia doesn’t know you wrote to me, and she doesn’t know I’m writing you. Respond to her letter if you like, but I’m going to read your reply before she sees it.
Give Mother my love, and see if you can get her to understand why I can’t come home. If they do fix the telephone lines, call me. And…good luck getting rain. Try earlier in the morning, maybe. That works for me here.
Much love,
Myra Caramelo
May 1934
Oklahoma
Dear Olivia,
I barely remember writing that old letter. It was almost seventeen years ago, you know—you weren’t even born yet!
Back then, we’d had some bad years here at the farm. We grow wheat, mostly, but sometimes we grow corn too.
I was quite angry at your mother back then. She had just left our farm, and I wanted her to come back. I still miss her.
But she did the right thing. She didn’t want to be stuck on a farm for the rest of her life.
To answer your question: I’m just a farmer. I don’t know why your father thinks I’m odd. I’m afraid I’m even more ordinary than you are. Maybe he doesn’t want you asking questions, since it would be so hard for you to visit here.
We have a drought here in Oklahoma right now, and we’re having some terrible dust storms now. It would be best if you don’t come visiting, at least for a while. You might get caught in a storm, and they’re very dangerous.
I’ll probably stop farming one of these days, and come visit you in New York.
Grandpa died last month, but your Grandma is doing fine these days. She wishes she could come visit you, but it’s not good for her to travel.
You should probably tell your mother that you wrote me. Show her this letter. It’s not good to keep secrets from her.
Tell her that your Grandma and I send our love.
Write to me anytime. The farm keeps me very busy, but I’ll write back when I get the chance.
Love,
Uncle Mark
P.S. I’ve put some corn seed in here for you to try growing. Your mother will tell you how to take care of it.
Author’s Note
I wanted to tell a story through letters (you know, those bits of paper people used to send each other.) I also wanted to use as few letters as possible to keep it compact.
In the end, we get this short interaction between estranged family members. You, as the reader, have to try to figure out what’s going on and understand the broader subtext.
Reply (or leave a comment) and tell me what you think of this kind of story.
— Samuel
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