undivided attention, what I knew I would never be able to give any of them again. That was the sorrowful part of being a mother, each of your children had to move up a notch toward some end of childhood with the birth of the next child. And so I wouldn’t get mad at any of them, wouldn’t holler and carry on about getting a switch or holding back the quarter for a movie and popcorn in town Saturday if they didn’t straighten up, all of them.
No, this morning, I would only love them. Soon enough they would know what was coming.
That evening, supper spread across the table in steaming bowls and plates of hot food, we gave thanks, Leston at the head of the table, me next to him. The children, starting with Anne next to me, were seated around the table by age, so that James was sitting next to Leston, all of us holding hands. “Dear Lord, ” Leston said, his voice as low and even and empty of fear as every other night, “hear our prayer, we give You thanks for the many blessings You bestow on us each and every day, and ask that You bless this food to the nourishment of our bodies.
Amen.”
The children let go each other’s hands quick as they could, but Leston still held mine. I looked up at him, saw him smiling at me.
“Almost forgot, ” he said. He closed his eyes, still smiling, and held his empty hand out to James, who looked at me. His face was his father’s, the same spray of freckles Wilman had gotten, the broad forehead and giving eyes the same green as my husband’s. I smiled at him, but it didn’t change the puzzled look he’d taken on, mouth slightly open. He said, “Momma? ” and slowly moved to take his daddy’s hand. My eyes fell to his hand as he placed it in Leston’s, and I saw the calluses and cuts, evidence of the hard work he’d been doing for over a year now at the lumber mill. But even those scars were only pale imitations of the ones Leston’d had for years, his big, red hand now swallowing up James’. And I remembered for a moment James’ soft, white hands when he was a child, remembered my firstborn at my breast, suckling to keep himself alive, drawing deep my milk with the same mighty purpose each one after that’d had.
James’d dropped out of the high school last January when the first men left for the armed services, back when Roosevelt was making the big pleas for all able-bodied men to join up, and many a job needed doing around here went begging. He was only fifteen, but neither Leston nor I minded much his quitting, he’d learned to read and write and figure quicker than any of my children so far, had enough common sense about him to pick his way through whatever this life would give him.
But he and Leston hadn’t spoke much to each other since then, and I knew it was because James’d chosen to take on at Crampton’s, and not follow his father out to the woods, not bore holes into tree stumps with a hand auger, then shove in pieces of dynamite and light fuses, scatter like scared bats. A piece of me was glad for that, too, Toxie’d already lost three fingers on one hand and the hearing in his right ear, this the result of a fuse too short and too fast. James’d chosen instead to head out each morning to the mill, to walk the two and a half miles there and tend saw, shove in boards at one end all day long.
I knew the reason they didn’t speak other than to ask for the salt or comment upon the weather, though, had more to do with Leston than James.
Something in Leston made him want the family with him, wanted his sons to be there to take up what he’d grown to consider a firm income, an honest trade. Many’s the night we would . lie awake and dream out loud for what we wanted, and though my own desires had more to do with seeing my children grow up with their parents alive and well, loving brothers and sisters surrounding them just those things I never had Leston’s was always about his own company, run by him and his boys. He imagined them all in old age,
No, this morning, I would only love them. Soon enough they would know what was coming.
That evening, supper spread across the table in steaming bowls and plates of hot food, we gave thanks, Leston at the head of the table, me next to him. The children, starting with Anne next to me, were seated around the table by age, so that James was sitting next to Leston, all of us holding hands. “Dear Lord, ” Leston said, his voice as low and even and empty of fear as every other night, “hear our prayer, we give You thanks for the many blessings You bestow on us each and every day, and ask that You bless this food to the nourishment of our bodies.
Amen.”
The children let go each other’s hands quick as they could, but Leston still held mine. I looked up at him, saw him smiling at me.
“Almost forgot, ” he said. He closed his eyes, still smiling, and held his empty hand out to James, who looked at me. His face was his father’s, the same spray of freckles Wilman had gotten, the broad forehead and giving eyes the same green as my husband’s. I smiled at him, but it didn’t change the puzzled look he’d taken on, mouth slightly open. He said, “Momma? ” and slowly moved to take his daddy’s hand. My eyes fell to his hand as he placed it in Leston’s, and I saw the calluses and cuts, evidence of the hard work he’d been doing for over a year now at the lumber mill. But even those scars were only pale imitations of the ones Leston’d had for years, his big, red hand now swallowing up James’. And I remembered for a moment James’ soft, white hands when he was a child, remembered my firstborn at my breast, suckling to keep himself alive, drawing deep my milk with the same mighty purpose each one after that’d had.
James’d dropped out of the high school last January when the first men left for the armed services, back when Roosevelt was making the big pleas for all able-bodied men to join up, and many a job needed doing around here went begging. He was only fifteen, but neither Leston nor I minded much his quitting, he’d learned to read and write and figure quicker than any of my children so far, had enough common sense about him to pick his way through whatever this life would give him.
But he and Leston hadn’t spoke much to each other since then, and I knew it was because James’d chosen to take on at Crampton’s, and not follow his father out to the woods, not bore holes into tree stumps with a hand auger, then shove in pieces of dynamite and light fuses, scatter like scared bats. A piece of me was glad for that, too, Toxie’d already lost three fingers on one hand and the hearing in his right ear, this the result of a fuse too short and too fast. James’d chosen instead to head out each morning to the mill, to walk the two and a half miles there and tend saw, shove in boards at one end all day long.
I knew the reason they didn’t speak other than to ask for the salt or comment upon the weather, though, had more to do with Leston than James.
Something in Leston made him want the family with him, wanted his sons to be there to take up what he’d grown to consider a firm income, an honest trade. Many’s the night we would . lie awake and dream out loud for what we wanted, and though my own desires had more to do with seeing my children grow up with their parents alive and well, loving brothers and sisters surrounding them just those things I never had Leston’s was always about his own company, run by him and his boys. He imagined them all in old age,
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