Grandpa Joe chuckled and called to his wife.
"Did you hear that, Ma? Those three stars are the Wise Men."
"Aren't they?" A crinkle of worry appeared on the little boy's forehead.
"Oh, you bet they are! It's just that Grandma never got a chance to study up on all this when she was your age, so I wanted to make sure she heard."
The boy asked whether Grandma went to school and Grandpa said sure she did.
"But it was different where she went to school, over in the Ozarks. The school was just a cave up in the hills and all the kids wore animal fur to keep warm."
"Really?"
"Yep, and they had shoes made out of potatoes. And you had to travel in packs to make sure the wolves didn't eat you up!"
"Uh-uh!" the boy squealed and toppled over laughing.
Grandma came out on the back porch carrying the boy's little sister. Freshly bathed, the girl's eyes were closed, lips tight around her binky.
"Don't get him all riled up before bed."
"Oh, come on, Ma. It's summer."
They all sat and listened to the crickets chirp. The boy asked if they could talk to his mom and dad again on the computer.
"It's about four in the morning over there now," said Grandpa. "Your folks need their rest."
Grandma got up to take the little girl back inside.
"Don’t stay out too long, Joe. The bugs are starting to bite."
_____
Image: Evenings On The Porch, by talented Flickr user Lizard10979, used under a Creative Commons license.
No comments:
Post a Comment