Come the end of the life, he who moves fast may have the most toys, but he who moves slow opens the greatest gifts and wins.
It’s May. The sun’s warming. We go looking for flowers. Hanging baskets of tangled hues, tomato plants verdant and leafy, onion shoots already spiked, exclamation marks. We wander back a few gravel roads. We go looking for the quiet people.
The greenhouses are humid, alive. The parsley bushes healthy. Cucumber tendrils seek. We speak in hushed whispers.
“This one, Mom?”
“It’s a dollar a pack for marigolds — can you loan me one dollar? I’ll pay your right back.” “You think this is the best variety of watermelons?”
“I’d like to buy snap dragons —- for a gift.”
I nod, for who can say no to growing dreams?
I can hear the creak of wagon wheels slow, horse hooves leading. I turn. A boy in a straw hat sits in the buggy patient. His bearded father steps into a nearby shed. A girl pushes a stroller down the lane from the house.
“Can I ask about seed potatoes?” Caleb breaks my reverie. Yes, that’s good, seed potatoes, yes.
I watch the little girl slip shy down the far side of the greenhouse.
A doll peeks over her shoulder.
“Come again this year have you?” her father, the Gardener in Suspenders, smiles, his German accent thick, his straw hat pulled down over blond hair. He remembers us? I smile in turn, stammer nervous that it’s Caleb’s birthday, that when asked where he’d like to spend his day, he’s asked for plants from the Mennonites.
“What an honor.” The Mennonite thanks Caleb with a friendly nod. The two stand at eye level. I squeeze Caleb’s shoulder, his smile a flash of bracing silver.
The black-booted daughter inches closer. Closer to her Father. I step aside, try to catch her eye.
Her braids are so fine, the plait so small. I want to touch them, the two braids tied. Did her mother cross each strand early this morning, this little one standing still in early light, hair gilded? Her rose-colored pinafore falls to her ankles.
She hardly dares look up. She holds her blue-ginghamed baby close, her chin touching the doll’s forehead. I bend over careful not to startle, lay my hand gentle on the head of her plastic doll.
“She’s beautiful.” I whisper, look into the child’s sapphire eyes. Does she know who I really mean? Can she read my eyes searching hers? Does she understand English? She has a smudge of chocolate at the corner of her lips. We just look into each other. The moment extends, enfolds.
She doesn’t move.
I can’t.
I am unfolded.
Malakai’s chosen one magenta geranium, Levi has his marigolds. “Mom?”
I’m called. I stand.
Both boys look anxious, their hands clasped around doubly-counted coins. The girl walks slow around the long way to the table at the door. She knows that’s where her father is. Malakai looks at me, and I nod assuringly, and he sets his geranium down on the table.
“That’s two dollars and ten cents.” The Mennonite Gardner reaches for a margarine container, a whole slit through the lid. The change clinks. Malakai glances unsure.
“The ten cents is for the government.” The Mennonite smiles and I hear the echo in his words, to give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and Malakai digs deep in his little leather change purse, looking for a dime. Shalom finds me, slips her hand into mine. Levi kneels down with his marigolds, counts his rounds of silver again.
I watch the braided girl lay her dolly on the table, reach for a pen. Kai finds a dime, hands it to her father.
The little girl inks large, cursive loops across a scrap of cardboard. “See her writing?” I whisper to Shalom. Shalom nods shy too. This kind of writing makes me happy. A deliberate, unhurried alphabet of curves, recording.
Caleb sets down his flat of onions. The father mentally calculates, pulling numbers down out of the air. The little girl tries to push the flat. “Oh Cale — it’s on her writing.” I step to the table. Caleb swoops up his flat, mumbles his apologies.
“There — your masterpiece…” I smile. She tucks her toy doll into the crook of one arm, loops another line. I can cipher this moment; I can read her script. Thanks notes for grace are universal. Her Father laughs softly. Caleb hands him exact change.
I carry my two hanging baskets, trailing pink verbena and blue million bells, to the van. The boy still waits in the buggy for his father. Cale hands me his flat of onions. I arrange. He watches the boy in the buggy.
“They live the best life, don’t they, Mom?”
I close the van door, turn too towards the boy waiting in the open carriage.
“I think it’s the pace of their lives. Aren’t all gifts greater when you open them slowly?”
Caleb sticks his hands in his pockets. Nods towards the boy now watching us. “Thanks, Mom,” he says it soft. “Today’s been a good birthday gift.”
I wrap an arm around him, smile, and we’re unwrapped.
We drive slow out the lane.
slowly unwrapping more of His endless gifts…
#1592 – #1612
silk of a lipstick
boys hunting for food in my kitchen
talking in the dark until you fall asleep, hands-still-laced
gingham pillows
open windows on Sunday afternoons
dicing stalks of rhubarb in morning light
fog at five a.m.
copper book darts to mark the I-must-remember-this-passage
egg sandwiches
clean toilets
boy whispers long after the lights have been turned out
old, familiar birkenstocks, life-molded to the heel
the hope of new birkenstocks
fields of dandelions, all the world sunny
a morning dove egg in my hand, fragile and warm
ironed shirts for church
fresh candle wicks
the unexpected bestowing …
and the ordaining of children.
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