~Reminiscing~

Anywhere you drive, around here, the farmers are in the fields, harvesting. And as I watch I can't help but think that time went way to fast. I remember when they were planting the fields. As I was remembering the time when they planted, a quote came to mind. I thought I'd share it with you. It's just a simple-pleasures, out-of-season quote but it's fun just the same.

"Having a clothesline sped up the laundry the next day so that she could begin planting the garden. She marked a row with two sharpened sticks and the string from the store packages. With the row marked, she raked under the string, figuring that it didn't matter if there were clods of dirt between the rows. After digging a furrow with the hoe, she showed Eloise how to plant the precious bean seeds, one little-girl foot apart. Eloise did as her mother showed her, brow wrinkled in concentration.
I should have sewn us both us both sunbonnets, Nilda thought as she felt her own nose grow warm and saw her daughter's face turn pink. For us who have never had enough sun, this is a surfeit for sure. One more thing to do in the short evenings.
"See Ma." Eloise pointed to her work.
"Now you must over them up." Nilda used her hand to pat the dirt back over the seeds. "Like this."
Eloise squatted down and mimicked her mother. She held up a blackened hand. "Dirty."
"It's all right. We'll go wash in the river after we finish our rows."
In a minute Eloise stood, a wriggling worm clutched between finger and thumb. "Look Ma, look."
"A worm, you found a worm."
"Worm."

"Ja, they are good for the garden. Put it back in its home."
Eloise looked around, stared at her mother and then at the worm. "Where worm house?"
Nilda laughed and scooped her daughter up to swing her around until she giggled as well. "Worms live in the ground. That's where you found it right?" She set her back down and planted a kiss on her forehead.
"Ja, in the dirt."

Carefully, Eloise put the worm back in the row and drizzled dirt over it. "Worm gone, Ma."

Nilda marked and raked the next rows. When next she glanced over to check on Eloise, the girl was curled up in the grass in the shade of the house, sound asleep. Dusting the dirt from her hands, Nilda picked up her daughter."

~"The Brushstroke Legacy," by: Lauraine Snelling.