”We do not remember days, we remember moments.”
The rain makes the day gloomy. Right now it is 41° and foggy. The birds are back. They were missing for a while. This morning I saw several chickadees and Mrs. Cardinal. Yesterday I filled one of the feeders with a different seed. It is supposedly anti-spawn. I put the seed in the feeder the spawns usually sit on to dine, the one the chickadees favor. I’m thinking the seed might have some hot pepper which deters the spawns.
Chickens are dirty. They are also creatures of habit. That comes into this story later. In Ghana, I had chickens. The first sitting hen was a gift. She was a horrible mother and lost her chicks, a few at a time, probably to snakes. We ate her. My next hen was a good mother. All her chicks lived and spent the nights roosting in my backyard. Other volunteers often visit. If they stayed overnight, the custom was they either brought food or gave a little money. One of the volunteers I trained with came to visit. I was cordial though I wasn’t fond of the guy. I don’t think any of us were. He was haughty and annoying. He went to John’s Hopkins and told us that all the time. We weren’t impressed. It was the harmattan when he came. I was sleeping outside on my mattress. I put another one outside for him and carefully placed it in the yard. Early the next morning I heard him scream. I wasn’t surprised. I had placed his mattress where the chickens always walk to go out the gate. The chickens jumped on him. He was directly in their path. I pretended to be surprised.
Sometimes I have a flash, a picture, from my memory drawers. When I visit where I grew up, I take a nostalgia ride passing the places from my childhood. I always go by the duplex where we lived for so long. I can see my father raking the front yard and my mother hanging up laundry. The small hill where, to my father’s consternation, I’d ride down on my bike is there. All it is missing are tire tread marks. I go by houses where my friends used to live. I remember their names and can see their faces. Some even still live in town.
I am sometimes surprised by the memories I have of when I was young. They aren’t of life changing events. They are small memories, ones I didn’t realize I was making, but I am always glad for them. They give me joy.
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February 14, 2025 at 2:03 pm
When I was 2-1/2 my father was assigned to France as a liaison to the de Gaulle government. The whole family went except me. The Bonus Baby. My brothers and sisters were all over 12.
They parked me with my Anglo grandmother on her Primitive Baptist farm. I’ll never forget the scene. I was wearing one of those muslin shorts with suspenders sets. Pastel blue with a white pleated shirt. And Buster Brown saddle shoes. The family was in a hurry to get to Dallas and catch the plane so small talk was short. As soon as the family car was down the road “Sister Willie” taught me how to catch a chicken and hold it safely. Then she had had me chase down a rooster and bring it to her. I stretched the rooster over a stump and she lopped off its head with a hatchet. Countless chickens lost their head on that stump. Well the headless chicken did what headless chickens do and began to run. In a final fit of revenge it chased me into the Elephant Ear plants and trapped me. Spraying its final heartbeats in a bloody spray of pique. My short set went into the burn barrel. I was fitted out with a pair of coveralls and clodhopper shoes for the remainder of my two years living with her.
February 14, 2025 at 6:49 pm
Beto,
That is a great story. I can see the whole thing unfold. I can’t imagine putting a 2 1/2 year old through that with all the blood. I guess it was time to give up pastel blue and white pleated shirts though I bet you were cute!
I had a couple of dead chickens who hopped out of the bucket without their heads. I hadn’t thought that was real until I saw it. There they were on the ground after hopping out of the bucket. I knew it was nerves but that’s didn’t make it less eerie.
February 14, 2025 at 3:49 pm
Ahh… the ‘memory’ drawer reference
The Memory Drawer
I pulled a first remembrance from the mem’ry chest
And set it on the table for a while
We reminisced for hours of the time we met
The both of us were sitting with a smile
But soon the sun was setting and the shadows crept
And I returned the mem’ry to its place
Then somewhere in the mem’ry chest, the mem’ry wept
But seems those tears were painted on my face
I looked into the mirror o’r the mem’ry chest
As light was fading softly from the day
Then hushed my tears and counted all the ways I’m blessed
And took the mem’ry out once more to play
February 14, 2025 at 6:56 pm
Wow!! Sometimes that is exactly how I feel when those memories jump into my head of times, people and places I hadn’t thought about or even knew I remembered. They bring joy.