(no subject)
“Dad, you really shouldn’t stay out all day in the heat, you’re libel to give yourself a stroke.”
“I know it, but the yams’d die if I didn’t.”
From over the laminated kitchen counters, the wrinkled woman who’d never held job nor license gruffly chimed, “He’s out there ever’day, rain or shine, reckless fool. Eighty-three years old, and still tryin’ t’work like a young ‘un. Lucky if he don’t keel over with another pneumonia perty soon.”
“What’d you do with that last bushel of beans, Dad? Y’all can ‘em yet?”
“Naw, we give most of ‘em to the Bartletts. With Jim in the hospital, them kids’ve had it rough.”
A familiar Sunday with father of 83 and son of 65 in calf-high black socks and cheap easy chairs chewing the familiar fat.
Thirteen hours, thirty-three minutes, and fifty-seven seconds later, in a much larger city 457 miles to the south, I am driving home from someone else’s girlfriend’s house after a coffee and a movie, contemplating the meaning of life and why the first half of a tank of gas goes by so painfully quickly. The second half seems to be almost immortal, through pain and prayer and thrift. A starving coffee house artist living paycheck to paycheck seems to be everyone’s favorite summer night entertainer.
“I know it, but the yams’d die if I didn’t.”
From over the laminated kitchen counters, the wrinkled woman who’d never held job nor license gruffly chimed, “He’s out there ever’day, rain or shine, reckless fool. Eighty-three years old, and still tryin’ t’work like a young ‘un. Lucky if he don’t keel over with another pneumonia perty soon.”
“What’d you do with that last bushel of beans, Dad? Y’all can ‘em yet?”
“Naw, we give most of ‘em to the Bartletts. With Jim in the hospital, them kids’ve had it rough.”
A familiar Sunday with father of 83 and son of 65 in calf-high black socks and cheap easy chairs chewing the familiar fat.
Thirteen hours, thirty-three minutes, and fifty-seven seconds later, in a much larger city 457 miles to the south, I am driving home from someone else’s girlfriend’s house after a coffee and a movie, contemplating the meaning of life and why the first half of a tank of gas goes by so painfully quickly. The second half seems to be almost immortal, through pain and prayer and thrift. A starving coffee house artist living paycheck to paycheck seems to be everyone’s favorite summer night entertainer.