The Age of Miracles by Ellen Gilchrist Page A

the hall and into the garage and got into her car and she opened the garage door with her genie.
    We arrived at the church just as my youngest niece and her husband were going in the door. We followed them and found ourselves in a wide hall full of costumed people. The main sanctuary was in the midst of a dress rehearsal for the Passion Play.
    There was a sign saying “Wedding” with an arrow pointing down a narrow hall and we followed it and made it to the ceremony just as the bride and groom were approaching the minister for the rites. I slid into a seat by my grandchildren and Momma sat with my brothers. The Baptist minister said a lot of things that burden the ear of an Episcopalian. Then the bridegroom kissed the bride and the recessional began. Everyone marched back down the aisle and the family rose and started kissing each other. I kissed my brother and his three wives and all their children and grandchildren. I kissed the people from Minnesota. I kissed my grandchildren, my ex-daughter-in-law, and her new boyfriend. He was a handsome man, as handsome as my son, who is the father of these children. She can pick them, I was thinking. She only wants the best. She doesn’t care how long it takes. She waits for what she wants.
    The boyfriend kept her close to him, his hand around her waist. He seemed kind, a kind man, the children seemed okay, at least the little girls did, they swirled around him, dancing with this idea of a daddy, even a borrowed one. I tried to get objective, really watch. In these days of reported child abuse everyone is suspect. The idea of a strange man in a house with their small precious bodies bothers me, even the kindest, most civilized-seeming man.
    I pulled my grandson to me. He had gained weight, grown taller, was almost as tall as me. He looked at me as from a distance, resisted me somehow. That has never happened before between us.
    â€œLet’s go to the reception,” Momma said. “They want us to get started.”
    â€œI’ll take the children with me,” I told my daughter-in-law. “Let Mother and me take them in the car.” I pulled my grandson to my side. I held him there. I wanted to overpower him, surround him, make him safe, but maybe this time he wasn’t going to let me tell him who to be.
    Mother took the little girls by the hand. I followed with my arm around my grandson. As we moved down the hall we passed some of the costumed players. A sixty-year-old Mary Magdelene and a pair of Roman soldiers. “What’s all that?” my grandson asked.
    â€œA reenactment of the passion of Jesus,” I answered. “A religious rite still practiced in many parts of the South.”
    â€œI don’t believe any of that crap,” he said. “It’s just myth and superstition.”
    â€œBe quiet,” Momma whispered, and swept us out the door. “This is someone’s place of worship.”
    The reception was held at a lodge in the woods. An open building surrounded by pine trees and dogwoods in full bloom. There was a lake and a pier, which soon was filled with little girls in white dresses. Small boys fanned out along the lake’s edge looking for snakes and frogs.
    There were many delicate small trees just bursting into leaf. There were azalea bushes, pink and white and red with fresh May flowers. Inside were two huge cakes and a marvelous feast spread out upon a table. The bride and groom were shaking everyone’s hands. “I want to talk to the bride,” my six-year-old granddaughter whispered to me.
    â€œIt’s just your cousin, Annie Laurie. You’ve talked to her lots of times.”
    â€œI want to talk to her. Take me over there.” She took my hand and we went over and talked to the bride.
    I have mellowed. I went around to each of my sisters-in-law and embraced them with real tenderness. I danced with my brother. I danced with my oldest grandson and taught him the two-step. I danced