1962 or '63
Mid-March. I always think of my father working at the woodpile, and myself tapping maples. Snow's half gone, some bare ground, some crusted snow drifts flecked with a winter's worth of wind driven bark and twigs stripped from nearby trees. Out in the middle of the field, less debris, but still bits of straw or feathers, or whatever skims the fastest on thin crust. What's left of winter's drama is fossilized in March's freeze and thaw -- a broken stem of Queen Anne's Lace lies in its cold imprint, the scant remains of a kill marked by its frozen blood.
I notice these things in March. It's the time between seasons, a place between worlds: out from under the blanket of winter, yet not merged into the moment of summer. I see the shortening shadow. I count even paced footsteps.
I hang my sap buckets made from my father's old George Washington pipe tobacco cans with homemade wire bails. I hang my buckets from the maples that line the stone wall that runs from the barn, past the well, and to the wood pile. The maples follow the curve of the knoll just south of the farm buildings. To the eat, I look out over John's Bay to Pemaquid Neck. In the stillness after a northeaster, I hear the "rote," or sound of the sea, as it piles on the ledges.
My father is steady. He is an old man, measuring his time, linked in thin footpaths, from chore to chore, seldom varying, ever deepening. When it comes to firewood, he knows just how many trees to cut, to buck up, to split -- how long to season, when to put it in, what it takes to get us through. He is close with a penny, but a year ahead on wood.
My father lived on the path of one necessity to the next. He measured out the winter's wood stroke by bucksaw stroke. I was collecting maple sap on my own route more for the spirit of it than for the eventuality of maple syrup.
This time of white light, with lakes and ponds still frozen, rivers are breaking up and small streams open. Water is running, roads are posted against heavy loads.
I remember my father would lay a log across the mouth of our long dirt driveway to keep vehicles from entering and getting stuck. And I would spend hours each day after school with my hoe, cutting channels, draining dammed bodies, slicing sod, cutting through mud ruts, working the water down, working towards the day the ground would finally be free of frost, and the farm once again open to the road.
- Jay Robinson, 1995
I notice these things in March. It's the time between seasons, a place between worlds: out from under the blanket of winter, yet not merged into the moment of summer. I see the shortening shadow. I count even paced footsteps.
I hang my sap buckets made from my father's old George Washington pipe tobacco cans with homemade wire bails. I hang my buckets from the maples that line the stone wall that runs from the barn, past the well, and to the wood pile. The maples follow the curve of the knoll just south of the farm buildings. To the eat, I look out over John's Bay to Pemaquid Neck. In the stillness after a northeaster, I hear the "rote," or sound of the sea, as it piles on the ledges.
My father is steady. He is an old man, measuring his time, linked in thin footpaths, from chore to chore, seldom varying, ever deepening. When it comes to firewood, he knows just how many trees to cut, to buck up, to split -- how long to season, when to put it in, what it takes to get us through. He is close with a penny, but a year ahead on wood.
My father lived on the path of one necessity to the next. He measured out the winter's wood stroke by bucksaw stroke. I was collecting maple sap on my own route more for the spirit of it than for the eventuality of maple syrup.
This time of white light, with lakes and ponds still frozen, rivers are breaking up and small streams open. Water is running, roads are posted against heavy loads.
I remember my father would lay a log across the mouth of our long dirt driveway to keep vehicles from entering and getting stuck. And I would spend hours each day after school with my hoe, cutting channels, draining dammed bodies, slicing sod, cutting through mud ruts, working the water down, working towards the day the ground would finally be free of frost, and the farm once again open to the road.
- Jay Robinson, 1995
Comments
Post a Comment