Davenport

I was just looking through Craigslist and suddenly I was transported to another place and time. Someone was selling a "davenport and chair". Suddenly, I was a little girl, sitting on my grandparents couch or davenport, as my Gram called it, watching The Price is Right. The fan on a stand is running and we are snapping beans while we watch Bob Barker announce the winner of the showcase showdown. We will eat dinner soon...not lunch...dinner. We will have cucumbers sliced the long way and tomatoes sliced into wedges along with our boiled potatoes and maybe roast beef. Gram will ask me how many corn I will eat, because she won't want to cook any extra ears...just what we will eat. When I say three she will smile at me and indulge me. My grandparents always indulged me in the littlest of ways that felt big to me. For dessert we will have a bowl of fresh raspberries or maybe some rhubarb sauce served in the little green and yellow plastic bowls. I will dry the dishes while Gram washes them. I love to put them away, so that I can look around in the walk in pantry. That way I can look up at the pretty dishes on the top shelf. I am hoping to get to settle onto the davenport again and watch the soaps, but Grandpa will probably have other plans for me...plans like weeding the garden or just following him around outside and doing whatever he asks me to do. And he will do it at his own pace, not mine. He doesn't really care if I get to watch the soaps. He thinks I need to make myself useful and he likes a little company...someone to visit with. Eventually, he will let me go back in and I will get to find out what Victor is up to today. I will settle onto the davenport, next to Gram in her chair. Grandpa will come in after a while too and sit in his chair over on the other side of the door.

What a lucky little girl I was. What wonderful memories my grandparents gave me. Nothing big or flashy or expensive. Just fried potatoes and golden grahams and rhubarb sauce and time and patience and love. God has been so good to me.

In which I grab summer while I can

This week has been one of those "I wish summer would never end." weeks. I have enjoyed kayaking, long walks, reading on the glider and having the windows wide open. Sheets have dried on the line in minutes, and I ask you, what smell in the world is better than fresh sheets from the line? Well, maybe a newborn baby, but that's about it. We've had fires in the fire pit and ate yummy marshmallows and s'mores and watched the stars fill the night sky. We've feasted on corn on the cob, fresh tomatoes and grilled chicken, burgers and hot dogs. Summer is such a wonderful gift here in the North Country. Yes, it is. But...Fall is quickly approaching, so I intend to grab as much summer as I can... I am off to pull the sheets in and bury my head in them again. God is good!