Moments

“Sit down in there!” I can still hear her voice when I look back on my adolescent years. Those words will forever ring in my ear when I think of Aunt Minnie yelling at me, my brother, and two sisters as we peeked around the corner while she prepared bowls of ice cream. We laughed hard as we tried to guess which one of us would get “the spoon” that neither of us wanted. Aunt Minnie had what was known as a sugar spoon. It was round with a tarnished gold color and looked like no other spoon we’d ever seen. I’m not sure why it tickled us so, but just the mention of the spoon today still causes us to burst out in laughter.

Next to being in a pool of water during the hot, dog days of a Mississippi summer, there was nothing like hanging out at Aunt Minnie’s house. She always had goodies for us kids. Being around her sometimes meant we’d be around water. Although I couldn’t swim, I loved being in the water. I took one swimming lesson around the age of 11, and never tried again. It might have been a bit different with a female swim teacher.

I have yet to learn how to swim or even dog paddle. But, whether it was jumping into the clear, refreshing water at the shallow end of a pool or wading into the dark, muddy waters of a creek, there was nothing like being in the water to find relief from the summer sun. Growing up in a small town with just one elementary, middle, and high school in the public sector, it was only natural that we saw the same kids at school, the pools, and lakes almost every day.

It was a time to laugh, frolic, and splash water with friends, without worrying about homework assignments or which outfit we’d wear to school the next day; a moment for sharing popsicles and snow cones, without worrying about calories that causes fat cells to become confused about where they’re supposed to be; and a time for catching insects and placing them in a glass jar with holes in the lid as they relaxed on a bed of grass in the bottom of the jar. I’m sure they found nothing relaxing about being in captivity.

It was also a time for catching crawfish, digging for worms, and going fishing with Aunt Minnie, who happened to be one of our elderly neighbors. She and her husband, whom we called Uncle John, were not related to us, but those were the names we always called them. They never had kids of their own, so Aunt Minnie took to the four of us as if we belonged to her. Their home became our home, even more so after Uncle John passed away when I was about seven or eight years of age. We would often look up and see Aunt Minnie making her way across the yard to ask mom’s permission for one of us to spend the night at her home.

If we annoyed her too much, she would send us home. If we didn’t go next door for a day or two, she would come knocking on our door and ask, “Y’all not playing marbles today?” It was one of our favorite games to play on the big circular rug that she had on her living room floor. The grooved rug held the marbles in place and kept them from rolling around during the game.

We never knew what adventure Aunt Minnie would take us on—from going to the store or to the laundromat. Since she didn’t own a washer or dryer, we would pull her basket in a little red radio flyer wagon. She loved to fish, and it seemed we always made our way to a pond of water someplace where she did the catching. Once we returned home, she would have us kids scrape the scales on the outside of the fish. She would then clean the inside and wash and fry them. It’s no wonder that I’m a vegetarian today, and I can only eat a whole piece of fish maybe once per year. Although I enjoyed our adventures, I was not a big fan of fishing, and I would never touch a worm. I’m now disturbed by all those creatures that were once disturbed by me.

I was much older when I thought about how lonely Aunt Minnie must have been after losing Uncle John. She was born in 1898/99, and they had been married for a long time. She was well into her 60s when we became her surrogate children. I think she needed just enough noise in her home to fill the void left by Uncle John. She was in her 90s when she passed away. I had moved away by then and was saddened by the news, but I will forever cherish those moments with her.

You see, life is a collection of moments. There are moments that we would relive over and over if we could, and some that we do live over and over because we can. And then, there are moments that we never want to relive or be reminded of again—like those moments of guilt, shame, embarrassment, humiliation, or moments of losing people that we know and love, whether through death or when a relationship ends.

Parents often become irritated when their children, particularly those over the age of 18, use their moments in a way that’s not beneficial. But, parents also have to remember that those moments are for their children to collect, and not them. It’s their story to tell, and sometimes parents don’t have a role in the script. God knows what will take place at every moment in our life. Good or bad, never forget to take a moment to thank Him for each one. He never said every moment would smell like a bed of roses, but He promised to be with us no matter what moment we find ourselves in.