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Bonding and Mentoring
Having read and heard of "bonding" and "mentoring" to help prepare children for responsible adulthood, I thought of the folks who helped rear Quentin and myself. I think the first logical person whom I bonded with was my mother, Durell Dickerson Justus, who had the greatest influence upon my life.
As her first child, Mother expected much of me and while bestowing love without measure she required discipline and responsibility on my part. She taught moral and spiritual values that kept me from destroying my life in years ahead. No doubt I added a few grey streaks to her once glorious black hair, but I knew by her steadfast love and care that Mother punished me only to develop my character and resolve to do the right thing. Out of our mother/son relationship grew a lifelong friendship. She passed on to me her love of reading and desire for knowledge that reached far beyond her mountain valley home. Those early years under her mentoring prepared me for a fast changing and far ranging life in the service of the US Air Force.
My dad, Neal Justus, was important but less present during my earliest years. Partly this situation arose first due to the hardships of the depression and then the demands of World War II. Dad was always working from dawn to dusk at public jobs and farm chores if at home, or he was away on defense work during the war. Later, as I grew into a teenager, I followed at his heels on hunts for squirrels and rabbits, or spent nights listening to his Walker hounds chase foxes among the Blue Ridge Mountains. In his retired years Dad and I became closer than in any previous time. We talked more and went hunting and fishing together. Dad grew wiser as he aged, worn by a life of hard work and saddened by Mother's death at age 64.
Papa Jesse Justus, my grandfather, was a mentor in spiritual matters, the work ethic and character. He was a leader in the Mountain Grove Baptist Church for many years, following in the footsteps of his father, James N. Justus, who first bought land in Germany Valley about 1872. Papa led the singing with his clear voice, standing by the organ with white hair gleaming in the lamplight. He was close to the earth and loved farming. He protected the water, soil and animals under his care. As I worked at Papa's side hoeing corn, harvesting hay, or shucking and shelling corn in the corncrib on a winter day, I heard him speak often of God's Word and how we were all stewards - good or bad - and must give an account to God after our lives on earth ended. I knew Papa in his prime mentoring role around the ages 60 -75. When I think of him I see integrity, will power, and a sense of duty to God.
Grandpa Isaac Monroe (Dock) Dickerson was somewhat different from Papa Jesse, yet had the same traits of honesty, self reliance and responsibility that seem lacking in many men today. He was a logger for many years, using a portable sawmill that he transported on a flatbed truck from site to site. Grandpa was the ultimate outdoorsman. His Cherokee strain showed up in his skill in hunting, trapping and fishing. He was closely attuned to nature.
Grandpa grew bountiful crops on a small but fertile farm. He had
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I had other fine mentors with whom I bonded and thereby received many blessings along life's way. There was Mama Lela Dickerson Justus, Nanny Effie Welborn Dickerson, Jim and Dessie Parker (neighbors), and teachers like Louise Parker Hill, Sarah Merle Copeland West, and James Keener. I was enriched by these caring mentors in the one-room school in Germany Valley. "Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses.."