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The little girl walked up to the wooden table on the back porch and flounced down on the chair across from her grandmother. She had been bothered about something all morning and Mamaw was sure it was just about to pop out of the child's mouth. Mamaw waited, watching the shadow of the late morning sun creep across the lawn. She knew that what ever was bothering her granddaughter would come out sooner or later. And sooner it was. The little blonde head tipped back looking at her grandmother and she opened her mouth as if she was going to say something, but she closed it again and looked back into the little truck garden near the rocky little path that led out to the well. She went through this a couple of more times. Finally Mamaw said "Spit it out, child. You're looking like baby robin waiting for is mother to feed it. Now what's bothering you?" The little girl pushed her hair back behind her head with her hands then looked up. "Mamaw, ever since you took me to church yesterday I've been thinking about religion, and I'm all mixed up. You and Papaw have been married a long time, but you don't do the same thing about religion. You go to church on Sundays while Papaw doesn't. He just goes out into the woods and walks around. If you believe in two different things, how can you stay together?" Mamaw sat for a minute thinking then said "It has always been your grandfather's belief that you can talk to God in the woods just as easy as in the church. He sees God in every marvelous thing he finds out there. He's been a hunting man all his life, and there was a time that those trips of his into the woods meant whether we'd have meat on the table that week. Things have gotten better, so he goes hunting, but a lot of the time now he doesn't bring anything home but a peaceful nature. "As for me, well. I like to cook and I like getting together with people. When I fix the biscuits, or cook up a shepard's pie or what have you for the potluck social after church, my morning starts out productive, and I look forward to seeing what others have brought to the table. "But before that we're all joined together praying and singing and holding hands and praising the Works. It's almost like magic to me. I just don't know how else to explain it." The little girl almost popped out of her seat. "That's what I mean!" she said "You believe in two different things, and its ok! That's what I don't understand." Mamaw looked back down at the shadow again, and just at that moment her granddaughter shifted in her seat and the sun crept over the roof, and suddenly the little one's hair seemed to be made of gossamer cloth. The sudden change gave Mamaw an idea. "You wait here I want to go get something inside." She stood up heading for the door, her steps surprisingly light for a stocky woman who'd grown up and grown old working in these rural parts of Mississippi. She was gone less than 5 minutes, returning with two glasses of Kool-aid, a treat she enjoyed as much as her granddaughter. She set the orange drink down in front of the child, and put the lime flavored down in front of her place. The two drinks weren't much more than three or four inches apart. The little girl reached for hers, but she was told to hold on. Mamaw took the candle, its holder, and a pack of matches. She set the candle in its holder between the two drinks and carefully lit the candle's wick. "Now put your head down to the table" she said, "and look at this candle through your Kool-aid." As the little girl did this she was asked "Alright now, what color is that flame through your glass." "It's orange." the little one said promptly. "Alright, now come look through my glass and tell me what it looks like." The little girl did as she was told. "It's green." She said in a puzzled little voice. "But isn't it the same flame? In the same way whatever color the flame looks through everyone's glass of Kool-aid, its still going to be the same flame." The little girl's eyes popped open wide and she turned around and gave Mamaw a big hug before she picked up her Kool-aid and began to drink it between her giggles. At times she put it on the table to look through it at the candle. "Mamaw, do we have to blow out the candle? Can we just let it keep on burning?" "That's the idea, hun, that's the idea." |
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