Coop_ A Year of Poultry, Pigs, and Parenting - Michael Perry [103]
You won’t find many hay-baling songs out there, but Fred Eaglesmith wrote a dandy called “Balin’ Again,” and there’s a line in there about a man surveying his hayfields while having an imaginary conversation with his father. Sure could use your advice on how to raise a couple kids, he says, I’m tryin’ to raise ’em just the way you did.
So I’m thinking of Fred as I watch my poor daughter again a week later, snipping more timothy and, yes, weeping. The things we do to the children.
Will it pay off?
I don’t know. Looking at her there, I’m thinking maybe I’ll write my own hay-making song, only call it “Wailin’ Again.” I am an imperfect father. This afternoon Anneliese asked if I could fold a batch of clothes before disappearing back into the office. I complied, but with slumpage.
CHAPTER 8
At some point every Sunday evening of my childhood there would come from the kitchen a steely rapping as Mom knocked a clot of Crisco off a soupspoon and into the popcorn pan. Like an albino slug, the white gob rode a self-perpetuating slick across the scarred pan bottom until it lodged at the low spot and puddled out. Sometimes Mom let me roll the spoon against the side of the heated pan. The residual Crisco clarified and ran from the widening hot spot until the spoon bowl shone clean, a modest but potent magic trick.
Mom kept the popcorn in a tin canister. Holding the canister against her body, she peeled back the plastic lid and—using a battered aluminum measuring spoon—dipped out a quarter-cup of kernels and poured them in the pot. They cascaded against the hot steel with the hiss of sleet pellets driven against a tin roof, sizzling electrically until Mom placed the lid, muting the spatter. Now and then we heard the abrasive scuff of the pan against the burner as she shook it to redistribute the kernels and oil. Eventually the first tentative pops came, and then a few more, and then like a metronome on a runaway came the frenetic firecracker rush like the whole string lit, miniature bull-snorts of steam escaping the lid until the expanding corn boosted it clear. Pressing the lid down with one hand and grabbing the handle with the other, Mom shook the pan again, coaxing a few more unspent kernels to blow. Then she dumped the contents into a stainless steel bowl big enough to bathe twin babies. The corn tumbled with a snowfall sound, an occasional old maid pinging the steel.
Then Mom gouged another knob of Crisco from the can and repeated the process. Between batches, she sliced apples and cheese, requisitioned one of us kids to move a stack of bowls to the table, and dumped sugar into the Kool-Aid pitcher. Whoever helped mix the Kool-Aid got to pick the flavor and lick the inside of the packet—a face-twisting treat that stained your tongue some fraudulent primary color. As ever, Mom was trying to do sixteen things at once, so the kitchen was often stratified with smoke from the inevitable burned batches. Anything short of cinders went in the bowl, and perhaps as a result to this day I fancy browned popcorn; the partial incineration imparts a malty nuttiness. When the stainless steel bowl was overflowing, Mom salted the whole works down, hollered, “Popcorn’s ready!” and there was your supper.
The other delightful part of the Sunday night tradition was that everyone was allowed to bring a book to the table. The idea of being able to read while eating was delicious in every sense. My brother John read Jack London books and Rascal by Sterling North—you will not be surprised to learn he once fashioned a hat from the skin of a skunk and currently resides in a homemade log cabin. Dad usually