Standing winds from the south, across the pasture grown in wheat, and cotton, with a little garden of tomatoes, squash and okra, dill weeds running up and squash vines against the fence.
Up near the house, on the southwest side, near the old back door that slammed when it’s screen door was run through, or walked through, or when the old man just wanted to step outside for that smoke, that pull of tobacco raw and fresh, from his little Kool pack tucked in the bib of his striped blue overalls.
The porch looked like access, with a chair or two on its platform, quick little boards that blended in, two inches wide, and six feet deep. Painted white, or covered in white, where the boots and shoes had printed their marks, and the ma’am and the mister came out and checked their yard.
The house was the home of children, who played in the tall grass, picked cotton, carried wood on sleds from miles away, watered the horse and kept the vegetables from the garden carried in the house, and fussed about the tiny shed out back, but kept it all clean, and ready.
Watching the trees was likely impossible, no green ones on the land, miles and miles away they could see them, the wind cut through their clothesline and dried the clothes from its rush and blow, and sometimes from the sun.
Memories are fit you see, if you can bring them right as rain, across the plains of Oklahoma and the Saddle Mtn. land.
Ralph Peck
Photograph by Chris Hall
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