will it be here? there?
swinging back and forth -
people pendulum
phone call to old friend -
reminiscing about days…
she’s sharp as a tac!
precarious love -
insecure and delicate…
don’t they both apply?
hands and heads touching -
love’s precarious balance…
green, yellow, and red
she asked for flowers -
he gave her packet of seeds…
mixed communique
connections by chance -
brought together for reason…
unexpected friends
I know her I said -
she smiled a cheshire cat smile…
Hattie dropped the runes
2009/08/01
be fully aware -
of a man in a white truck…
story began there
I was 8 years old
My parents were taking a day trip to Wichita Falls
for reasons unknown to me
I was to stay with my aunt and uncle
After school, I walked to my father’s store
My aunt was employed there
I sat at the table and watch her work
while she carried the conversation
We had many conversations at that table
over our years together
Some very deep
Some very light-hearted
At closing time we drove to her house in the country
My uncle was waiting there for us
wearing his overalls and lace-up boots
He was a funny man
I loved to hear his stories
They had no children of their own
so I think they enjoyed having me there
and treated me in grand style
I helped prepare dinner as best I could
thinking it was more fun than work
My uncle sat, drinking his room temperature canned iced tea
(now known to me as beer!)
at the white iron kitchen table
entertaining us with song while we worked
He loved to sing about Aunt Myrtle, who wore a girdle,
and had a turtle
because it made me laugh
I had never heard quite a song!
I listened wide-eyed
We all laughed
After dinner, we made popcorn balls
My aunt was the BEST at popcorn balls
Of course we would eat several over the course of the evening!
I loved being at their house
It was such an adventure
There were so many things there so different from home
A BB gun with glass bottles to shoot,
a windmill that you could get water from
and drink from a metal dipper,
a party-line phone,
horse saddles, a new litter of kittens,
a player piano,
a screened-in sleeping porch
It was such a wonderful place to explore
You could weave all kinds of stories in your head
A daydreamer’s world
As night went on,
we settled in to watch some TV
and wait for my parents to return
My aunt and uncle had the first color TV in the family
It was very exciting to see color
where only black and white had been
I had a wonderful visit
But as twilight fell
so did my spirits
I was very attached to my parents
and couldn’t stand to be away from them for long
especially after dark
As we sat and watched TV
and time lingered
my eyes welled with tears
wondering how much longer
Where were they?
Why so long?
Before anyone could see my tears
we heard my parents drive up
RELIEF!
They came in carrying a box for me
A surprise!
I sat on the couch and slowly opened the box
New shoes!
(yes… I was a shoe addict even as a child!)
But, new shoes were not that frequent as a child
And mostly they were either black or white
depending on the season
So, this was a very special treat
I will never forget how they smelled
and felt
soft suede
that you could draw designs in with your finger
They were the most spectacular shoes I had ever seen
multi-colored patches of bright pastel suede
neatly sectioned off
And a crowning jewel… a shiny silver octagonal buckle
We gathered our things and drove home
me smiling, holding my box of treasure
Colorful song
Color TV
Shoes with Color
It was a very good day
2009/7/26
My favorite quiet time with my dad was in the fall.We would go out in the back yard to the tall pecan tree, and he would lift me up so I could reach the branches. That was the only tree that I couldn’t get into myself… and believe me I tried! I was a tree climbing enthusiast! If there had been an olympic event for tree climbing, I am pretty sure I could have gotten the gold! Anyway… My dad and I loved pecans. But, mostly, I think, we loved “fetching” them. There were always a lot of leaves on the ground, and it was like an Easter egg hunt to find them. It was always so exciting to find just one more hiding under a leaf somewhere when you thought you had found the last one already. After we found all the pecans we could find on the ground, he would gently put me up in the tree, and I would climb methodically to each limb shaking it as best I could (I was a “scrawny” kid and didn’t weigh enough to make the big old limbs bend too much!) But, I worked on it has hard as I could! After I shook as many limbs as I could shake, I would climb down and he would take me in his arms and give me a big hug. Then, back to the hunt. We filled lot’s of brown paper grocery bags full of pecans. And ate a few while doing it! He could crack them in his large hands. I always found that amazing since I didn’t have the strength to make those shells crack. We spent hours out there fetching pecans. I doubt that we spoke a dozen words. But, we didn’t need to. We just knew.
