My Pennsylvania
On cabins, uncles, the woods, and the TV show Task
Remember, it’s super helpful if you heart this (even if you don’t read the whole thing), share favorite sentences, and re-stack. My subscription price is also super low, just 40 bucks for a whole year of original, honest, often funny Carley writing. If I know anything in this world, I know there’s no one like me. AND I know there’s no one like you! If you don’t have the money you can always send me a note and I’ll give you a free subscription. If you can’t do that, there’s the tip jar/buy me a coffee. I’m excited to get a even dollar because that equals two eggs, and two eggs are breakfast! Thanks Pedo-in-chief!
I grew up in Western New York, Jamestown to be exact, an eight hour drive from New York City. Jamestown borders Pennsylvania, and almost all of my mom’s family lives or lived in Pennsylvania, a short drive away.
Last time I checked there are seventeen Jamestown(s) in the United States, so sometimes when I say Jamestown, people think of the most famous one, Jamestown Virginia, home of the first English settlement (occupation?) in America, founded in 1607, nearly destroyed by famine and fire, and the seat of the colonial English Empire.
Jamestown, New York, founded by James Prendergast, on unceded (I’m pretty sure) Seneca land, is the home of Lucille Ball, Roger Tory Peterson, and the 10,000 Maniacs. It was once a thriving hub of furniture manufacturing, but is now part of the Rust Belt.
My Pennsylvania family is from towns called Sugar Grove, Chandlers Valley, and Warren. Since my grandma died a few years ago, I’m almost completely cut off from this part of my family. I suppose by choice, distance, and political estrangement.
Jamestown is a small city (about 30,000) surrounded by rural farms and woodlands. Alleghany National Park is close by. My brother and I once got lost in that park for a few harrowing hours, and I understood how scary the woods are when you can’t find your way back to your Dad’s office picnic.
I grew up around cabins in various states of standing up and falling down. My Aunt S and Uncle M (my mom’s sister and brother-in-law) were ever-present in my childhood. We saw them almost every week—in the summer to float down the Alleghany river, for picnics and cookouts, and when they stopped by to visit and we all went to Taco Hut, our local , much-loved, maybe not-very-Mexican restaurant.
My best friend R and I often went there after school for chips and queso or guacamole, which wasn’t really all avocado, but some sort of addictive concoction that I can taste now as I write about it. Everyone had a set order at Taco Hut. Mine was a combo enchilada with meat sauce, which came with an extra taco shell for dipping, beans, rice, and sour cream. How I loved that dish!
The waitresses at Taco Bell were amazing. They all seemed to work there my entire childhood, called everyone hon, and likely survived on tips. I believe most of them were single moms. I wonder what it was really like to work at Taco Hut? They carried huge trays of super hot dishes, and I never saw one of them loose their cool.
My Aunt S and Uncle M lived on the Alleghany River in a small cabin-like house that smelled like the woods, fire, and motor oil. The ceilings were low, and the house was full of stuff I wanted to explore. My uncle had two entire junk rooms he routinely pulled stuff out of—camping gear, kittens, guns, bicycles, pots and pans, and board games.
My Aunt S’s kitchen had a giant refrigerator, full of things I wanted to eat, mostly picnic food. Jello salads, Hershey’s chocolate for S’mores, homemade relish, hot dogs and chicken for the grill, and potato salad. She also had a set of dishes I loved, which reminded me of the plastic records on my Fisher Price record player—that same kind of plastic, but oatmeal colored with an orange or turquoise edge.
When I was a teenager, they finally renovated, which was something my Aunt had wanted since they moved into the cabin. She was a partner in an accounting firm and we’d all decided the house was beneath her, and it was time. They kept the little house, but renovated the kitchen and added a vaulted living room with a loft and a new porch. The bedroom and junk rooms stayed the same, and probably still have that same amazing smell.
The final five miles or so to their house was a roller coaster of a twisty dirt road that my brother and I demanded be driven fast and called “The Hills!” because its ups and downs made our stomachs drop. The road followed the Alleghany River and passed by some split-level ranch houses, which we considered to be very nice, a lot of small cabin-like houses, and at least one trailer park.
My mom’s half-brothers, who were kind of her first kids because she was thirteen when they were born and loved taking care of them, had trailers for first houses. We never considered these trailers to be trashy. They were new and had giant bathtubs. I don’t think we really knew the word trashy or “white trash” then, and if we did, we never would have considered ourselves either of those things.
If we wanted to float down the river, something we did many times in the summer, my uncle patched and then blew up with a generator inner tubes he kept in the bigger junk room, loaded them into the back of one of his pick-up trucks, and then we either got into the pick-up truck or one of my aunt’s, mom’s, or grandma’s car.
We drove to my uncle’s Aunt Elsie’s cabin a few more miles up the narrowing and even bumpier dirt roads. My uncle always did “The Hills” for us, and my brother and I screamed with delight until someone felt barfy.
Elsie was fat, gorgeous, and gray-haired in an aquamarine one piece. There was another aunt there too, I can’t remember her name. Maybe Kay, less fat, but stylish too. Their cabin was giant, set back from the river and facing it diagonally, with a diamond shaped top. It looked to be made of real-life Lincoln Logs, and had several giant dogs lounging on the porch, who barked ferociously until they saw my uncle or Elsie and Kay told them to stop.
I was inside of that giant cabin once. It was dark and beautiful with a wood stove, woven rugs, and rocking chairs. Maybe what Cracker Barrel was trying to imitate.
Elsie had a shallow spot along the river, easy to launch from, although there were often hilarious tube tippings because getting onto the inner tube required a jump from the shore or shallows onto the tube back or butt first.
For little, old, or people new to floating, my uncle tied a long rope around the tube to make sure nobody got stuck or floated too far away from the group. The trip down took about two hours, and there was one little rapids part that was pretty mild but still offered a thrill, and also were we might scrape our butts.
“Butts up,” someone yelled.
The river was slow and cold, even on the hottest days. Mostly, I couldn’t see the bottom, except for large, what I imagined, were prehistoric rocks. Sometimes we brought snacks, and other time we saw snakes which made my mother scream. She has always hated snakes.
We paddled and changed positions in our tubes so that our arms and heads were the only things above water. My aunt and uncle wore flippers so they could go fast if anyone needed help. We floated alone or hooked onto someone with feet or arms.
My uncle was a trickster and a lot of other bad things, but also a maker of childhood dreams and except for tickling, very good to me. He could have his own book, if I ever wrote it.
My mom and step-dad have a cabin in the woods, built by the Amish, who are a big part of rural life in Western Pennsylvania. It’s also at the end of a dirt road, next my cousin’s house. Their cabin is a big rectangle with a front and back porch. They put in a toilet before COVID, but we have to bring your own drinking water. If we walk down the dirt road, we’re in the deep woods pretty quickly.
Growing up, one of my mom’s best friends Jeannie, had a cabin on Chautauqua Lake. We spent a lot of time there, especially on Friday afternoons. My mom left work at four, we’d drive to get ice cream at the Super Duper, and then to Jeannie’s cabin. Also, ramshackle, and with its own great smell, maybe beer, dog, and fire.
Jeannie loved and drank a lot of cans of beer, and had fiery red long hair and freckles. Her husband might briefly appear, but on those nights it was mostly her, Sylvia (my mom’s best friend,) my mom, me, my brother, and Sylvia’s boys, Jason and Brian who were our best friends growing up. I was probably in love with both Jason and Brian in that kid way of proximity. They were also really funny.
The kids fished. The boys used worms, and I used corn because putting the worms on the hooks made me gag. We had contests to see who could catch the most fish with corn or worms. Sometimes Brian used corn with me. We caught only sunfish. Sometimes we cooked them in butter and ate them that night. Often we threw them back in.
I mostly liked to throw them back because when they flapped on the dock and looked at me with their beautiful eyes I felt something yucky in my stomach. Maybe that they were at our mercy and were too beautiful to be eaten. Maybe guilt. Maybe I felt helpless like they did when they flopped around on the dock. I was really sick then, and prone to my own flopping.
I couldn’t bear to take them off the hook because it made them bleed, so one of the boys did that for me.
“Throw it back in!” I might have said. Sometimes we kept them in a bucket to decide their fates later.
I’ve been thinking about cabins and the deep woods because I’m watching Task on HBO Max. I’m going to try not to spoil it, but it’s set in Delaware County (Eastern PA, not my Western PA), but they look the same to me, and involves an FBI Task Force investigating house robberies and murders.
Mark Ruffalo is the head agent, and of course he’s amazing. One of the “bad guys” is named Robbie (played by Tom Pelphrey) and he makes me cry a lot because he is like so many men I knew growing up—an incredibly smart fuck up, abandoned, and a father who did his best with a lot of anger issues. His accent in the show is perfect. There’s also his niece Maeve, who reminds me of myself a very long time ago.
Here’s a tiny bit of dialogue (spoiler in bold here, so please skip if you don’t want that):
“What was that bird you fucking called me?”
“A vagrant. You can still go home Robbie.”
“Even if I wanted to go home, I don’t know the way no more.”
So much of the show takes place in run-down houses, falling apart cabins, a quarry, and the deep woods around rivers. The landscape of much of my childhood.
It’s show about whiteness and white male masculinity, how fragile and brutal that can be. There are three Black characters who play somewhat important roles (though I don’t think this show is there yet with these characters). The women are complicated and smart overall, so that’s good, but their lives are determined by the violence and mistakes of the men around them, which also feels especially right for the hellscape that is 2025. This is the writer who created Mare of Easttown, so I guess I’m not surprised.
Remember this hilarious and genius essay about whiteness and femininity by Sarah Mesle called “Mare’s Hair.”
Watching Task on a recent morning made me want to write about my woods and cabins. I miss my brother and my uncles, but we are divided people now, like so much of the country.
Enjoy the typos!
xoxo
Carley
Gorgeous! I want to visit kinda?
Also watching The Task. Also grew up with woods & cabins & trailers in the Northern Catskills. Also remembering the smells, thanks to your essay. Thank you.