The Red Flannel Rag

Aunt Vernie, my Daddy’s sister, frying potatoes in 1949.

(Printed with permission of the National Geographic Society.)

I looked at the picture and realized that I had eaten many potatoes fried in that

pan on that very stove. I had put wood in that stove, had taken many drinks of water

from that very dipper, and had petted the offspring of the cat curled on the rug in front

of the st ove. I wanted to tell Dr. Smith that was my Aunt Vernie, but I couldn’t tell him

then.

I had looked at pictures in the National Geographic many times in school. I

thought the people who got their pictures in that magazine were exotic and special and

lived in faraway lands. Now here was my own Aunt Vernie. I never thought anybody

from my family would be worthy of a picture in National Geographic, but there she

stood stirring her fried potatoes.

I found myself in a bind. If I told Dr. Smith the woman in the picture was Aunt

Vernie, then he would want to know more about my family and me. He might want me

to take him to Aunt Vernie’s house. At the same time, I felt very proud that somebody in

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