The Corn Whisperer

In the depths of interminable winter, there was no sound. No words schussed across the silence, no song delighted the heart. No voice, mysterious and enthralling, beckoned willing and wary alike into the heart of the fields. Winter crackled with stubble and ice, purified herself with snow, hid away her fields. Dark and loamy, smelling of glaciers and frost, the earth remained empty as a night without stars until the season turned and the earth warmed, and voices returned to the land.

“Here? Is this where it goes?” “Yes, child. That’s where it goes, the seed that will become the corn. Remember the rhyme?”

“In rows long and lovely, in rows long and straight,
in rows that reach out from the house to the gate…”

He wasn’t someone who flattered you with his answer, someone you felt reached out to pull down a word here and a word there like plucking cherries, throwing them into the bucket of your mind just to make you happy. His answers seemed good and wise and true, born of knowledge older than the corn.

Those Books Before Facebook

In her latter years, my mother often seemed to be engaged in an on-going conversation with herself.  Her streams of thought flowed like a hidden river, subterranean and unnoticed until a few words bubbled to the surface, spilling over and inviting response.

We were folding freshly laundered towels one afternoon when she surprised me by breaking the companionable silence to announce, “We had Facebook when I was in school.”  “What?” I said. “Facebook? There wasn’t any Facebook when you were in school.” “Of course there was,” she said. “We just had another name for it.”

Bemused, I asked if she meant her high school annual, and heard the slight intake of breath that always signaled impatience. “No, we didn’t have those. I just can’t think of the word right now. I’ll think of it.”

A Taste of Pimento Prose

Edging as I am past middle-age, I take my Saturday nights slow and easy. Content to enjoy occasional dinners with friends, a bluegrass concert or a book, I prefer weekends to be relaxed and spontaneous, an approach that differs considerably from the more disciplined social routine of my parents.

In our long-ago household, Friday night meant dining out, often at the Masonic Lodge, where dinner was followed by music and dancing to a live band. Sunday night was set aside for television – the news program See It Now, then Disney and Kraft Television Theater. 

But if Friday and Sunday nights were for family, Saturday was reserved for my parents and their bridge club. The games rotated from home to home, with the first cards shuffled at 7:00 p.m.  The game ended at 10:00 p.m., or as soon after that as the last hand allowed. After scores were tallied and the winners declared, coffee and dessert were served. Then, the couples headed home to rescue their baby-sitters.

William Morris and the Naked Toaster

If it hadn’t been for the mouse, I might never have had the memories.

Caught by its tail beneath the kitchen sink, desperate to escape but unable to flee because of the plywood and metal spring holding it fast, the poor creature cowered before the shrieking woman who’d discovered it.   Unable to bring herself to carry it outdoors to free it and even more unwilling to dispatch it in place, the woman – my mother – made a reasonable choice. Grabbing her white enameled dishpan with the rusting edge and the unfortunate dent, she plopped it over the mouse. Slamming the cupboard doors closed she turned and looked at me, the only witness to her bravery. “There,” she said. “That’ll hold him until your father comes home.”

A Pair of Olympic-Caliber Chickens

I’m rarely sentimental about towns I’ve never visited, but Benton Harbor, Michigan is an exception.

Benton Harbor was named after five-term Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton, who earned the honor by helping Michigan achieve statehood. His grand-nephew, also named Thomas Hart Benton, is one of my favorite American painters and muralists. The younger and more artistic Benton was the son of Maecenus Benton, who served in Congress himself after a stint as prosecuting attorney for Newton County, Missouri.

It’s at this point in the Benton/Benton Harbor history that my sentimental twinges begin. Maecenus Benton lawyered in Newton County, Missouri, while I was born in Newton, Iowa.  My little Newton happened to be home to the Maytag Company, my father’s employer for decades.  In 2006, Maytag was sold to the Whirlpool Corporation, whose administrative headquarters still are located in Benton Harbor, Michigan.

In one more lovely, serendipitous complication, Benton Harbor is located along the eastern edge of Lake Michigan on the Paw Paw River. When I lived in Liberia, my whorled tabby cat was named Paw Paw because she loved to knead sofas, pillows, people and other animals with her paws, just as if she were kneading bread.