The first Sunday in December was warm for the season. Our family had planned for it to be a special day, but little did we know just how special it would turn out to be. We were having one of our occasional family gatherings at my Grandparents’ farm. Since we got together only a few times a year, this would be a very exciting day. My parents and I didn’t often get to see Uncle Ross and his family, Uncle Ralph, and Aunt Dorothy and her family (cousin Dale was only a toddler, a little over two years old). As usual, Grandma had made far too much food, including a roast turkey and a baked ham, mashed potatoes and gravy, candied sweet potatoes, corn, peas, green beans, a sour salad (Grandpa always liked something sour with every meal), and pie and cake for dessert. The wonderful odors alone literally made my mouth water. As the saying goes, the table was groaning with all the food, and by the time the meal was finished, so was everyone at the table. There was no running water in the h...
My alarm clock goes off every morning at eight, except for the few times when I have a breakfast date. Usually I wake up about an hour before that, or at least I partly wake up. It is important that I remain in a “not quite awake but not quite asleep” state, because I consider that time as the germination period for whatever seeds happen to have blown into my head.