I think I like you mostest
when you get in your
storytelling mode
like you did tonight,
your eyes on fire
and dreamy,
talking about
the good ol' days
with Grandpa Biscuit.
I love to just
lay next to you and listen
as you weave me stories
about cucumber sandwiches
and calf brains,
liver and onions and
homegrown tomatos.
Playing baseball and
riding bikes and cutting
your fingers on catfish
whiskers, freshly caught
in five gallon
pickle buckets,
rolling coffee cans
filled with salt
up and down the drive
to make homemade
ice cream.
Something about your stories
takes me back to being
ten years old and
at Grandma's house
in Missouri, listening
to ball games on
transistor radios,
eating freshly baked
gooey desserts,
swinging on porch swings,
catching fireflies.
Nickel ice cream cones
and flavored sodies
at the town drugstore,
listening to Grandaddy
tune his guitars and
fiddle with his lawnmowers,
all twelve of them.
Sitting in the small
living room watching
HeeHaw every night
and after that,
sleeping by an open window
rocked to sleep by crickets
and the ocassional
clickety-clack
on the nearby
train tracks
that pierced
the night air.
And the old saying
still holds true...
the one about
there being two things
money can't buy--
true love and
homegrown tomatos.
In our modern day of
never being further
than a cell phone
or a mouse-click away,
we've broken the connection,
the human experience,
the Sunday afternoon
that once was the
heartbeat of
America.
We've killed
the apple pie
by placing it
in a cardboard box.
All for the sake
of saving time.
We've cut too many corners
in order to expand
corporate America.
What a shame!
I can never go back
to white tights
with ruffles on the butt
sitting under an irridescent
pink Christmas tree
smelling bacon frying,
knowing that Grandma
was just around the corner
in her housecoat and hairnet
making memories that
I didn't even know then
would matter so much now.
All a road trip away
down country roads
that led to nowhere~
