February is the space between the darkest hour and the earliest light. A paper-thin sliver of silver moon. A sensuous world of deep silence.

High in the towering pine, a pair of great horned owls sit with their clutch in the black of night, yellow eyes like ancient, swirling galaxies. In this realm of shadow and mystery — this wintry temple of stillness — they are the wisdom keepers. And they are always listening.

Warm beneath the great horned mother, three white spheres hold tiny, secret worlds. Days from now, the brood will hatch. But in this moment, all is quiet. Until it isn’t.

On the forest floor, movement flickers like a light in the dark. There’s a faint rustling of leaves. The stealthy owl king twists his head until he targets the source, seeing with his ears before his eyes. Hare? Mouse? We’ll never know. Nature holds her secrets close.

February heightens the senses. Silence cradles every sound, and you can feel it — the charged nothingness before the rhythmic hoots of the great horned beasts. The charged nothingness that follows.

Mystery flirts with your mind like wind dancing through metal chimes.

Just before the earliest light, you hear what sounds for all the world like the piercing, primal scream of a banshee. You are half frightened, half delighted, which speaks to your own primal nature. Next, you hear a sequence of yips and yups. A shriek and more yups. Then, silence.

You suspect what you’ve heard is a pair of foxes, but only the owl knows for sure. And in this sacred window between darkness and light — this thin crescent moon of a month — nature holds her secrets close.

 

 

When you listen with your soul, you come into rhythm and unity with the music of the universe.

—John O’Donohue

 

Year of the Ox

Friday, February 12, marks the celebration of the Chinese New Year — day after the new moon. Cue the paper lanterns for the Year of the Ox, a year of hard work and, let’s hope, positive change. According to ancient myth, twelve animals raced to the Jade Emperor’s party to determine which order they would appear in the zodiac. The ox is the second because, well, the rat tricked it. All of this to say, trust your gut — and get ready for a good year in your garden.

 

Winter Bloomers

What is that spicy, glorious aroma, you ask? That would be paperbush (Edgeworthia chrysantha), which gets its name from its bark, not its fragrant yellow flowers.

Paperbush is a deciduous shrub that blossoms in late winter. Native to the Himalayas, China and Japan, this winter bloomer prefers moist, rich soil and a shaded landscape. And with its elegant silhouette and bluish, almost silvery foliage, it dazzles all year.

Speaking of bluish . . . let’s talk about violets. Blue violet, purple violet, hooded violet, wood violet, meadow violet, woolly blue violet. Whatever you call it, the birth flower of February is an herbaceous perennial celebrated for carpeting the winter landscape. They’re edible, too. Although the common violet grows wild along our East Coast, there are hundreds of species of violet (genus Viola), first cultivated by the Greeks circa 500 B.C.

According to Greek myth, hunter-goddess Artemis transformed one of her nymphs into a violet — not, say, a red rose — when the huntress’s twin, Apollo, tried to pursue her. Thus, the violet is said to represent modesty and humility. It’s also been known as the “lesbian flower,” and in 1927, a play called The Captive featured a female character sending violets to another female character. The production stirred the pot, so to speak, with its conspicuous theme of lesbianism and was eventually shut down. But in 1978, the color violet made its way into the rainbow flag for San Francisco’s Gay Freedom Celebration. Violets are for everyone. OH

Never Arrive at the Funeral Home Late

A broken rule and a lesson on love and understanding

 

By Katherine Snow Smith

I watched from the second-to-last basement stair, which was covered in the original short-pile marigold carpet from 1959. My mother ironed my sister Melinda’s tea-length dress. It was the color of orange sherbet, lace overlaying silk. Melinda had worn it to our cousin Melanie’s wedding several years earlier. It would be the last dress she would ever wear, because she was to be buried in it the next day.

We had to be at Brown-Wynne Funeral Home to plan my sister’s funeral in just about an hour. My mother, who painstakingly pressed every tuck and every pleat, was moving in slow motion. Then she stopped ironing to talk.

“First thing this morning, we heard a lawnmower and looked out the dining room window and that sweet Grady Cooper was mowing the lawn. He did the front and back in all this heat,” she told me, referring to my dad’s good friend since sixth grade. Grady knew we’d have people coming over and wanted the house to look good, but more so, he just wanted to do something to help when there really was nothing anyone could do.

“And then that wonderful Glenn Keever insisted on going with your father and Alean to the funeral home this morning,” she said as she placed a tulip sleeve over the tip of the ironing board.

Alean was the housekeeper who had stayed with Melinda and me while our parents worked. She was still coming once a week when Melinda died at age 31 in a car crash. After my father told her the funeral would be closed casket, Alean asked if she could see Melinda once more. He complied immediately, later telling me he wouldn’t have done that for anyone but her.

Glenn was one of my father’s closest friends. He had identified my sister’s body for the authorities after she was killed by a drunk driver. My parents were out of town, and I was living in Florida. This all happened more than 20 years ago, and as every well-wisher promised me at the time, the pain has lessened. The gaping hole will never be refilled.

I still remember how the basement smelled that day with the stiff, clean fragrance of Niagara Spray Starch as my mom ironed. It was a familiar scent because the ironing board was always in our basement, where Melinda and I had spent hours, thousands of hours, playing.

To my right was the big brick fireplace, devoid of ashes in June. I pictured it two decades before, lined with produce boxes my mom procured from Winn-Dixie so Melinda and I could stack them three high and eight long to build empires for our Barbies.

Finally, my mother was done ironing Melinda’s dress. She carefully hung it on a padded coat hanger. Now if she could just change clothes quickly we could leave in 10 minutes and get to the funeral home almost on time. But then she placed a pair of white cotton underwear over the ironing board and gingerly touched the steaming iron to the fabric, an inch at a time.

Nobody, I mean nobody, was even going to see the underwear. What was she doing? And then I got it. I was only four months pregnant with my first child, but I got it. She wanted to be Melinda’s mother for five more minutes. She wanted to keep ironing, caring, teaching, defending, celebrating, helping, consoling, praising. This was the last thing she would ever do for her daughter.

“I love you so, so much and so did Melinda,” I said as I rushed to my mother and hugged her.

“Thank you, Katherine. I love you more than you will ever know,” she said through tears.

We were a good half hour late to the funeral home. Nobody complained.  OH

Katherine Snow Smith is a North Carolina native who has worked as a journalist throughout the Carolinas. She currently lives in St. Petersburg, Fla., where she is a freelance editor and writer, but visits her parents and friends in the Tar Heel state every month. This essay was excerpted from her first book, Rules for the Southern Rulebreaker: Missteps and Lessons Learned, which was published by She Writes Press in 2020.

The historic T. Austin Finch House blushes anew

By Cynthia Adams

 

Today, Thomasville’s Renaissance Revival mansion of the T. Austin Finch house is a favorite photo location for blushing brides, who smile radiantly for the camera from the Juliet balcony.

Exactly one century ago, the elegant home was built for another blushing bride, Ernestine Lambeth, the newly-wed wife of T. Austin Finch. Although the house was built as a symbol of their union, it also represented the fusion of two families’ successful companies: Lambeth Furniture and Thomasville Chair Company.

According to Winston-Salem historian Heather Fearnbach, the Finch-Lambeth wedding unified “two major North Carolina furniture-manufacturing dynasties.” And it firmly solidified Thomasville Furniture as a furniture megabrand.

 

 

But that was in another era. In succeeding years, the North Carolina furniture industry became a shadow of its former self. T. Austin Finch House languished, and then sat empty, serving as a poignant reminder of the decline of manufacturing in the state and in the Triad.

That’s when another young couple, Hilary and Andrew Clement, entered the story. They knew it wouldn’t be easy, but with an infusion of love and cash — not to mention strong backs and helping hands — the Clements vowed to restore the T. Austin Finch House to its former glory.

How that transpired is quite a saga.

The Clements were living in Greensboro when, in 2016, Andrew took a teaching job in Thomasville, which was close enough to commute. It wasn’t long before he learned about the historic Finch house, which had been on the market for several years.

No one wanted the house to be lost, including Thomasville’s city leaders, recalls Andrew. It was a valuable piece of the town’s story, and over time, it became a siren call to a man itching to see the old beauty saved.

 

The story of the house’s revival began in the summer of 2017, when Andrew began making repeated visits to the 1.5-acre property. He peered through the windows, admiring the architectural details and sensing the mansion’s former grandeur. Then he began wondering what a little love — or, more like a lot of love — could do for this vacant old house. Basically, Andrew Clement had fallen irrevocably in love with the Finch House. To get some perspective on his infatuation, Andrew decided to call Jim Howard, a Realtor and longtime friend, to walk through the mansion with him.

“It was an incredible deal,” says Howard. But what would Hilary think? Howard recognized it just might be a perfect match for the Clements, who were no newbies to restoration projects. In fact, buying and flipping houses was more than a mutual passion and avocation. “In 20 years as a remodeling contractor, I have repaired and renovated over 500 homes,” says Andrew. And together, Andrew and Hilary had renovated 17 properties — all distressed and most in foreclosure — including a 1938 bungalow in Glenwood, which they documented online.

Between Andrew’s experience and Hilary’s artistic eye, Howard became convinced that the couple could work some real magic on a property that certainly needed a lot of love.

Hilary is a rare bird: equal parts scientist and artist. She is a skilled Realist painter by night and manages a high-pressured DNA lab by day. Andrew is a third-generation craftsman who says he “was born” to become a renovator. Together, they complement one another’s strengths. 

Which, as it happens, is a good thing when undertaking something as daunting as a well-known mansion languishing in a sad state of neglect and disrepair in plain view on Thomasville’s main street. 

Indeed, this was no small undertaking. It was enormous — scary big even for someone with the Clements’ track record. Six bedrooms, nine bathrooms and 7,000 square feet of all sorts of issues, including rot and moisture. And that’s not counting the carriage house, former servants’ quarters or garage, which would add another 1,300 square feet of space to the project.

“There was some caution and a lot of due diligence,” says Andrew.

They decided that the only way they could make things work financially would be to revitalize the house as an event center. But they would have to battle mold and decay before the first new couple could stand inside its once lovely plaster walls and murmur “I do.”

Perhaps the resident ghost might have whispered in their ear that if they loved the house, a home would one day love them back. 

Who can explain love?

In any case, the Clements ultimately responded with a yes — they would love the house back to life. They purchased the Finch property on October 20, 2017.

Andrew had renovated his first old property when he was only 22-years-old — a house even older than the Finch house — a 1902 Queen Anne McLeansville farmhouse. The work inspired him to earn his general contractor’s license, and Andrew has focused upon renovations since. 

Now 42, he had 20 years of experience to his credit as proven by scars, scrapes and bruises. 

Yet nothing compared to such a grand mansion. And, it seemed karmic.

Inside the Finch mansion’s plastered and paneled walls was a century of history and the physical remnants of its former grandeur. For instance, original wormy cypress was used in a magnificent, intact library, part of an addition made in the late 30s. Fireplaces and surrounds had survived, thanks in part to the fact that there had been few owners and renovations. A delightful and mysterious star motif repeated in the public room. The home’s charming pastel-tiled bathrooms were in surprisingly good condition. Leaded glass windows and rare Jefferson windows were intact, too.

As Andrew grew more convinced it was viable to take on, Hilary was unnerved. “Hilary had a lot of reservations about the property,” admits Andrew. “She didn’t want the renovation to sink us financially, which it almost did. She was also concerned about me stretching myself too thin, which I did also,” Andrew admits. Ultimately, Hilary became persuaded that with their combined talents and determination, they could pull the project off.

“Hilary is our secret weapon,” confesses Andrew. “She has driven and controlled ‘the look.’ We agree on most design decisions, but I defer to her insight. Hilary built our website and runs our social media. This is so helpful in an image-driven business.”

In 2018, the couple hired historian Heather Fearnbach, whose professional assistance furthered the process of getting the home listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The listing was a crucial step in terms of securing important tax credits, which would make the project more feasible.  The application was aided by the fact that the Renaissance Revival home and its occupants were well-documented.  Given the Finches role within Thomasville’s history — Thomas Finch having even served as mayor — the provenance of the restored house was almost synonymous with the town itself.

“It’s really overwhelming at times when you think about who has been in the building and what it has meant to the community,” Andrew told the Lexington i in an interview.

It took the couple a full year to make the house habitable again.

Was there a moment when they thought, “what have we done?”

Oh, yes.

 

Two-thirds of the way through the project, Andrew admits he “hit a wall,” so to speak.

“I had some serious health issues, and we started to run out of money to complete the work,” he says. “It was at this point that I believed buying this property was the worst decision I had ever made.”

But this love story was written in the stars. Thankfully, at the perfect time and in the perfect way, the Clements were able to complete the renovation.

With the encouragement of family and friends, they hosted the first event in October of 2018. 

No longer the private address for the Finches, a powerful couple who entertained North Carolina’s affluent and influential, the historic home is now open as a public venue. 

The beauty of the home and carriage house, with an enormous reception tent out back, has attracted a flock of lovebirds, hosting more than 50 weddings over the last two years. 

The property is thriving, accommodating as many guests as can be safely organized with the constraints of a pandemic. Given that the story of this house is a tale of two couples, it is so fitting that the property has become a venue where other couples make vows that will determine the course of their lives. And it is uncanny how many parallels exist between the original owners and the couple that brought their home back to life.

Whereas the Finches were instrumental in modernizing and growing the furniture business, they were also deeply civic-minded, like the Lambeth family. The Finches lent considerable money and support to public projects, ambitious ones ranging from schools and hospitals to libraries.

Like the Finches, Andrew had also had a long commitment to public service. Howard notes, “He’s always chosen his career by the contribution to society.”

Andrew balances work as a project manager for Community Housing Solutions, a nonprofit that provides home repairs and new houses for low-income homeowners in Guilford County. “Community Housing Solutions (CHS) began in 2002 under the name Housing Greensboro,” he says. “CHS was formed in partnership with the Center to Create Housing Opportunities, Greensboro Housing Coalition, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Greensboro and the City of Greensboro.”

The house was formally listed on The National Registry of Historic Places on August 26, 2018.

 

“Grandson David Finch has visited to see the restoration. Great grandson Justin Finch has also visited with his wife. Both have been appreciative,” says Andrew.

Former Thomasville Furniture employees have also come to see the house, which was occasionally open to them long ago for special Finch-family events.

Hilary keeps an art studio upstairs where she paints on weekends. She also chooses treasures for the house. Ones that “feel right,” says Andrew.

Would the house’s resident ghost approve of them?

The rugged Andrew pauses, smiles, then admits something as long shadows fall across the dining room, which retains its triple-hung sash windows.

“We have never spent the night and have no intention of ever living in the house.”

After being pressed, he merely grins — or grimaces — enigmatically. 

“Some of the local police and other residents swear the house is haunted. I do have to admit I’ve been weirded out a few times being in the house all alone when it’s dark.”

With darkness falling, Andrew flicks on a flashlight, gives a little shrug, and we both make a hasty exit.  OH

For more information about the T. Austin Finch House, visit www.the-finch-house.com. To see Hilary’s artwork, visit www.hilarypaints.com. And to view the Clements’ renovation of their Glenwood bungalow, visit bungalowandbackyard.blogspot.com.

 

Feature photograph by Brittany Butterworth

By Mélina Mangal  
Illustrations by Harry Blair

 

First time I saw it, I knew right away it was hurt. Else it would’ve flown away like any other sensible bird when it seen me coming with the hoe. It fluttered and cowered in the corner of the garden, in between the rows of pole beans. Probably fell out of the tree, like so many baby birds come springtime. But I didn’t see a nest in the sweetgum behind the fence. I would’ve noticed it.

The bird was squat and black, like a lump of furry fat. It looked like some kind of duck, but I couldn’t tell for sure. Its tiny tail feathers was caked with mud. Dark marble eyes stared at me. Could it smell the chicken fat, liver parts, bone bits and blood sunk into my skin from years coating my smock?

It had been so bad when I’d started at the Royal Poultry Emporium, couldn’t nothing take the smell away. No matter what I tried — Jovan Musk, coconut oil, even Frank’s aftershave — I still smelled that raw, bloody chicken as I drove back across the border to South Carolina every night with Aunt Della and Sheryl Caldwell. After a few years, couldn’t notice the difference no more. But everyone outside the plant could.

It tore me apart to see my own baby girl shrivel and cry whenever I came near ’cause of the smell. Seemed like she only let Frank hold her and give her the bottle. Maybe if I had just fed her my own milk, she’d be alive today. Preemies better off on formula, they’d said. But maybe she could’ve gotten used to my smell. After all, Frank did. Wasn’t the smell drove him away. It was the operation. After they cut my baby girl out, they cut out my womb. To save my life, they said.

I raised the hoe, wondering if there would be a sound as it came down across that feathery skull. I didn’t need no bird getting into my vegetables, ’specially since I had to live off them now. The company had barely paid my medical bills, and the court said the state didn’t need to pay nothing, even though they had never inspected that poultry pit. Not once. I needed the money, but Lucifer’s serpents couldn’t drag me back to a place like that again.

Didn’t never want to touch no more meat, no matter how it was cooked. Couldn’t stand to think about it — that frying in hot oil, boiling, barbecuing. Hellish flames burning and tearing at flesh, burning screams and dreams right off the bone. Fire trapping and slapping bodies into a smoldering ooze.

I looked down at the dirty lump staring at me. Was it a haint come from the bloody ashes to get me? Had to get rid of that bird, that nasty smelly bird.

I could still smell it, like it was just yesterday, stinking up my hair, my skin, my air. From where I’d stood near the front entrance, I’d heard the rush of gas as it lit a wall of fire all around us. Heard the fire killing screams. Pushed and ran and ran. Hot, hot, black smoke, frying flesh, screaming screaming screaming. Donna Basnight Sheryl Caldwell Vonda Truelove Laquita Fearington Annie Gibbs burning at the door marked Fire Exit Only. I saw them pounding, faces twisted and trapped from where I crawled outside. Smoky mess, couldn’t open the door for them — blocked — my arms still on fire as I looked down.

That bird stared up at me, glassy black eyes accusing. “Why me?”  I steadied the hoe between my shaking arms and raised it again, like a pickax. Had to get rid of that stinky bird. No more fowl. No more feathers. No more flesh.

The bird inched away, toward the fence, toward the ashes of the Royal Poultry Emporium. “Fly you, damn it! Why can’t you fly, you devil bird?”

I closed my eyes and with all my strength brought the hoe down. The sound of screaming filled my ears.

Stop. Stop the screaming. I brought the hoe down again and again, my eyes closed tighter to block out the cries. All I saw was black smoke.

Run. Run. Keep running. Stop. Stop the screaming. Stop.

I’d run clear across the field and was next to the highway. I leaned on the signpost to steady myself and catch my breath. Then I read the sign. Adopt-a-Highway. This portion of 177 adopted by Mason Hog Farms. The oatmeal I’d eaten for breakfast lurched up and out. I stood there until a horn honked at me.

My sister’s brown Dodge pickup stopped in the middle of the road. “Marilyn, what are you doing here?” Sandra’s soft voice coated me as she touched my arm.

“Just taking a walk. That’s all.” I knew what she was thinking. You never go nowhere. You’re afraid to leave the yard. But I couldn’t tell her what I was really afraid of.

I got in the truck with her and she drove me back home. After they released me from that burn center in Charlotte, Sandra let me stay in Michael’s room since he’d gone to the Marines. But my nephew’s room was right next to the kitchen. I couldn’t live that close to those smells. So Sandra’s husband had fixed up their old shed for me. I went right there and stayed the rest of the day, reading my Burpee’s seed catalog.

Next morning I went back out to the garden. The hoe lay in the dirt, next to five deep gashes where the blade had landed. I stopped to pick it up, so I could get back to my work. Felt like Grandpa Chaney, the way he used to bend to pick the beans and potatoes he’d planted earlier.

That’s all I want to do. Dig, plant, grow. Like Grandma Chaney too. Used to snap beans as fast as she knit. Snap plink snap plink as she dropped the beans in a bucket in summer. Click click clack when her needles connected in winter. And every so often she’d grab a chicken from the yard and twist and snap —

I heard a rustling in the dirt. I looked over and those hard wet eyes looked back up at me. Birds don’t blink but I thought it was dead. Should’ve been. The bird looked the same as I left it, a muddly black blob. Could’ve been a lump of dirt. Maybe it was.

I closed my eyes tight and counted to 10. When I opened them, the lump was still there. And it moved. I backed away. And kept walking, until I reached my little house.

I was shaking when I lay down on my cot. That damn bird. Fixin’ to eat up my seedlings. Sent here to scare me. I sat straight up again. No. No haint or bird or nothing was going to ruin my garden. I went back out to the far side and worked on my flower beds. Tulips, daffodils and iris about to bloom. This was my garden, no matter whose land it was on. I worked it, watered it, cared for it.

I lay down in it next morning before the sun come up. I felt all misty and cool and new, like the morning glories before they open up to the day. Like the deep purple pansies shiny with dew. I pretend to be one of them, with fresh new skin. Velvety soft and smooth, so smooth you want to lay your face next to one and breathe pure sweetness.

After the sun come up I got my tools and returned to the vegetable side of the garden. I inched closer to the bean patch. But I was going to work on the peas first. My fingers sunk into the damp black dirt. It felt good to not feel pain no more. I saw a flutter in the corner of my eye but didn’t want to turn. I kept playing with the dirt, letting it sift through my fingers.

I heard a tiny sound from the bean patch. I didn’t want to see nothing ’cept dirt and seedlings. But I saw the bird.

It was still a dirty black lump. Its head lurched forward and grabbed a thick graybrown worm. It snapped its beak and swallowed. The bird’s skinny throat bulged where the worm got sucked down. My hands were shaking. This bird wouldn’t die.

I backed up and ran to Sandra’s house. Had to do something, clean. Had to do laundry. I threw all their clothes from the basket into the washing machine, then ran across the yard to get all of my clothes. I did four loads and hung each batch to dry outside.

The next day I went to weed near the turnips and collards. The ground was still wet from rain and the plants looked all clean and green. I smiled at them. Then I stole a peek at the bean patch. The bird was still there but farther away this time. And it looked different.

I walked over to the bird and saw its shiny tail feathers. The rain must have washed all the dirt off. I moved in and looked at it even closer. It shivered. I saw myself in its mirror eyes. A hulking creature with stained and stretched skin holding a hoe in her hands.

Water leaked in through the door when it stormed that night. I cut out the light and stuck my toes in the cool puddle. I watched out the window as thousands of droplets fell from the sky. A rain parade showered my flowers and vegetables, like confetti in those New York parades on TV.

A flash of lightning lit up a corner of the garden, and I smiled at how pretty and silver it looked. But I jumped when a clap of thunder struck real close. I couldn’t stop shaking after that. Why couldn’t it have rained the day of the fire? Water would have poured over the flames, dousing them quick. Another bolt of lightning flashed and thunder crashed again, even closer. Why’d it have to happen?

Lightning lit the bean patch before me, and I strained to see from behind my window. That bird would be pelted out there, if it was still alive. Seconds later, I was out in the garden, sloshing around in the mud, looking for the bird. Rain washed over me, soaked through me, seeped into me.

I nearly stepped on it as the bird tried to hide under new tomato plants. I scooped it up and it pecked at me, but I ran all the way back to my little house with it.

I dried it with my towel and set it down on the braided rug next to my cot. It set there, still shaking, looking all around. After I dried myself and changed, I stepped over it to my bed. I lay there looking down at that shiny black mess of feathers. It smelled just like me, wet and muddy.

I didn’t get up for my morning walk in the flowers like usual. I was too afraid of stepping on the bird in the darkness. So I lay there until the sun poked in through the windows. The bird didn’t move when I stepped over it to get breakfast. I bent down and touched it, thinking it might be dead. Its eyes opened, but this time it didn’t shake or flutter away from me. Or try to peck. I stroked the back of its neck and was surprised at how soft it felt. Like a kitten.

After making toast for myself, I crumbled up another piece and put it outside my door for the bird. If I just fed it a little and looked after it for a while, it would fly off on its own when it could. I went to the bean patch right away after that and worked all the rows of vegetables.

A week passed before Pansy walked without looking like she’d topple over. I’d started feeding her corn and cereal and other scraps. She loved them. And her feathers looked silkier and shiner than I ever guessed they could. I still hadn’t figured out what kind of a bird she was. She had to be some special kind of duck.

When the mailman came around to my little house, I was holding Pansy in my lap, stroking her sleek feathers. He held out the white envelope and I took it with my left hand.

“Got yourself a new bird there, Ms. Marilyn?”

“Just nursing it till it can fly again.”

“You know chickens don’t fly much. That’s a Bantam. My brother raises ’em.”

He ticked me off when he started laughing. So I didn’t answer. I looked at the envelope. It was from Cameron, Tate & Howell, lawyers for the plant. I knew from the size it couldn’t be a check. So I set it down and stroked Pansy with both hands. I heard a cheer-cheer-cheer and saw a red bird land in the sweetgum. I blew it a kiss.  OH

(From the book All the Songs We Sing, celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the Carolina African American Writers’ Collective published by the Blair/Carolina Wren Press.)

Working at the intersection of nature, literature and culture, Mélina Mangal highlights those whose voices are rarely heard, and the people and places that inspire them to explore their world. A graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill’s School of Information and Library Science, Mangal opened up the first joint Public/School Library in Carrboro at McDougle Middle School. She has authored short stories and biographies for youth, including The Vast Wonder of the World: Biologist Ernest Everett Just, winner of the Carter G. Woodson Award. Her latest book is Jayden’s Impossible Garden.

Custom chocolates sweeten the deal in downtown Gibsonville

By Maria Johnson   •   Photographs by Amy Freeman

Relax, last-minute lovers. Debbie Stephens, the owner of Once Upon a Chocolate in Gibsonville, has your back at Valentine’s Day.

After nearly 30 years in the chocolate business, she knows what to expect.

You’ll saunter into her corner store on V-Day — or the day before, if you’re the plan-ahead sort — looking for confections to express your affection. Some of you will appear to be rather desperate.

You might ask Stephens what kind of chocolate she thinks your beloved would like — an indication that you might have issues that chocolate alone can’t fix.

But, being an experienced businesswoman, the type with a soft-centered heart, Stephens will be kind. She’ll ask what sorts of sweets your sweetie savors, then she’ll guide you through a vast selection of velvety truffles and crunchy nut clusters arranged, in regimented rows, inside a gleaming glass case.

If you’re looking for a more direct statement of purpose, she can show you hearts, Cupids, roses and lips wrapped in bright foil skins and glossy cellophane bags.

She will have stocked up for the holiday, having hand-poured more candies than usual. Her small-batch method — along with her ability to mold custom chocolates in almost any shape you can imagine — sets her apart from most retail chocolatiers, who buy their wares from wholesalers.

“It’s what enables my website to thrive,” she says.

Her success embodies a sort of Forrest Gump Paradox. Gump, the movie character, famously quoted his mother as saying, “Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re going to get.” Stephens didn’t realize, until she was in her 30s, that she could make a second career of allowing people to know exactly what kind of chocolate they were going to get.

Back in the 1990s, she was living in Florida, working as an office manager for a home improvement chain, and looking for an exit ramp from corporate life. Her mother, a small business expert with the state of Mississippi, suggested that she buy a chocolate shop franchise.

Stephens had no experience making candy, but she liked crafting, and she figured she could learn to get creative with cocoa.

Debbie’s Chocolate Delights opened in Tampa in 1992 and quickly became popular with people who wanted edible favors for weddings, bar mitzvahs, bat mitzvahs, bridal showers, baby showers and business gatherings.

Custom candy bars — done in dark chocolate, milk chocolate or white chocolate — also were a hit.

Debbie Boggs, the wife of All-Star baseball player Wade Boggs, used to order hundreds of candy bars, with a family photo printed on the wrapper, for a Christmas party they hosted every year.

Within a couple of years, Stephens bought the store from the franchiser. Personalized chocolate was a good fit for her. Local customers kept her busy, and as online shopping took off in the early 2000s, people started locating the hard-to-find shapes on her website.

One year, a helicopter-related company in the Netherlands ordered a fleet of chocolate choppers.

“I was thinking, ‘Is there no one closer to you that has chocolates? You’re in a candy country,’” says Stephens, who happily obliged the company nevertheless.

Another memorable order came from a mall management company in the U.S. For a grand opening, they wanted custom-wrapped chocolate bars, some containing golden tickets for prizes, like the candy bars in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.

The biggest order ever — 2,000 boxes, each containing five custom chocolates — came from a marketing company that was handling swag for a funeral home company headed to an industry convention in Las Vegas.

The boxes — which included a chocolate bar with the company logo, a chocolate golf ball and a grand truffle with a money sign on top — went into the hotel rooms of company guests.

In 2010, Stephens sold the Tampa business — including the name and molds — and she and her husband moved to Burlington to be closer to family.

“I started over from scratch,” says Stephens. “I didn’t have anything but a little bit of knowledge about things that worked and things that didn’t work.”

She set up shop in Gibsonville at the corner of Piedmont and Burlington avenues, a short hop from Main Street.

“The small downtown setting appealed to me,” she says. “We have a wonderful merchants’ association, and the town is always striving to be better. There’s a sense of community that isn’t found in a big city.”

The railroad-flavored business district, with its signature red caboose and garden train, draws a steady trickle of visitors, many with children. For them and other youngsters, Stephens keeps a ready supply of chocolates resembling the superhero Falcon, the folksy Thomas the Tank Engine and the robotic Transformers.

Area businesses — including The Inn at Elon, Cone Health and Duke University — count on her for candies bearing their logos.

But the majority of her business — in non-COVID times anyway — comes from out-of-staters who find her shop online and call in their orders. Stephens handles the details by phone to ensure accuracy.

“I have customers telling me all the time that it is refreshing to talk directly to an owner,” she says.

Her top seller is the gold foil-wrapped figure that’s billed on her website as a “chocolate Oscar-style statue.”

The stand-up figure is a winner with people who host Hollywood-themed gatherings and watch parties for the annual Academy Awards show, which has been moved to April 25 this year because of COVID.

Six years ago, Parade magazine mentioned Stephens’ chocolate statues in a story about Oscar parties. She was inundated with calls the next day.

“It was so bad that Monday morning, we had to take the phone off the hook,” she says. “That was a case where too much publicity was a bad thing.”

Stephens has shipped the statues as far away as Paris, France and Azerbaijan.

She also helps customers who want to celebrate specific films.

“I enjoyed an order the year the movie Titanic came out,” she says. “The client was having a party, and I made cruise ships for each person, as well as a large block of white chocolate that looked like an iceberg. She placed it on a mirror on her table.”

Stephens’ bank of about 5,000 molds made from food-safe plastic makes it highly likely that she can turn out whatever shape her customers might want:

Dinosaurs.

Butterflies.

Cell phones.

Pipe wrenches.

Slot machines.

“I have an artillery regiment in Kansas City that orders chocolate cannons for their event every year,” she says. “The (chocolate) handguns have been ordered by a group in Atlanta who holds a concealed-carry convention every year.”

Business gatherings have plunged in the past year because of COVID, and that has taken a huge bite out of Stephens’ sales. Her business is down 75 percent, but the remaining 25 percent is enough to keep her melting and pouring.

The raw material is a chocolate base that comes from a supplier in 50-pound cases. She liquifies the tear-shaped, chocolate discs in melters that hold the molten mixture at a steady temperature while she dips and pours.

The chocolate takes 10 to 20 minutes to set up, and it keeps for three to four months. Stephens uses no preservatives.

There’s not much need; her creations disappear quickly, though not by her own hand, which answers one of the most common questions she hears: Aren’t you tempted to eat your work?

Stephens says no.

“At work, I’m thinking of food like chicken, burgers; nothing sweet,” she says. “I have a tendency to want chocolate at home, but I just don’t take it home. It’s rich, and you can’t eat tons, plus if I’m sitting around eating it, I just have to make more.”  OH

Maria Johnson is a contributing editor of O.Henry. She can be reached at ohenrymaria@gmail.com.