Memoirs from an 80's Childhood

Talent

Daddy says his one talent is he can wiggle his ears. I add “you can do all sorts of things!” I'm eight and walking through the tobacco field beside Silas's house. “Name one.” He says. “You always stick out your tongue when I twist your ears.” He bends over and lets me. But he insists that is not a talent.

Mom is inside listening to Silas and Oney banter back and forth with eachother. Mom never told me her talent but I might make a guess. She spends all her energy helping other people. She cares little for herself. Only a little less than the basic necessities. Mom offers Oney some homemade Daniel Boone Apple Pie. Mom's not a very good cook, so she comes up with names to perk our interest.

Silas is talking about a neighbor who hangs his tobacco before most people cut their tobacco. On the other end of the table, Oney is recanting a tale about the troubled marriage of one of her daughters.

Out in the pasture, near where Daddy and I walk, Anna and Joey are barefoot. Joey jumps the fence followed by rosy cheeked Anna. They grab sticks an d poke the watering troughs where frogs have laid their eggs. I over hear their laughter but I am consumed with the exuberant feeling of nature and its effect on me. Mom comes out and hollers “children, it's time to go back home!” Anna and abets Joey to hid behind the trough. Anna never wanted to leave our farm, which was next door to this one. I think she hatched from an egg herself, a puddle of slimy water, much like the tadpoles.

Joey was there to calmly convince Anna they could not live there forever hunkered up by the troughs. Joey came along to reassure me all was well. People notice his brain when they first see Joey because it's so great. But after a long time I realized it is his sensitivity that is his talent. I doubt he knows it himself.