Backward Glances...

I love [and I think I always will love] the sensation of going back and reading a book you're done writing. Age seems to blunt the rough edges and mellow the sharpness of editing until you can scan through the pages of your novel thinking, "Well done indeed." :) It's grand, really, and something that should only be indulged in periodically so you don't get used to the feeling. :) You find bits of gold that you had only seen as another hunk of rewriting, and you can rest in the fact that until the editor tells you otherwise, your story is whole and complete. A Mother for the Seasonings is that way for me. Enjoy some backward glances at my first child! :D

  ........We children sat down to divide the three pomegranates. At first it was easy enough. We each had a half, but after that, we fell to arguing over who should eat the last piece.

“By virtue of my position, I really ought to get the privilege.” I said, taking possession of the fruit.

“The oldest people always get everything,” Dill said, “and I’m not in any sort of an important position. Can’t a fellow get a privilege for being `the least of these?’”

“I’m the middle child, I ought to get the extra half,” Angie said.

“Well, I’m da’ youngerest here. An’ I’m still hungry,” Fennel said.

                                   ~A Mother for the Seasonings 

.......At last, rounding a bend in the road, we came upon an ancient India rubber tree at the foot of a hill. The thick, dark leaves rattled merrily as a wind swept through the treetop. It seemed to usher us up the sloping grade to the Huntington House. For, at the top of the ridge, standing like a king atop a throne, was the massive, white, building.

An awed silence enveloped our group for a full five minutes. Finally Fennel spoke. “It looks like a castle Rosie, see the towers?”

Rosemary smiled. “It surely does Fennel. My, what a grand house.”

“The paint’s peeling off the porch pillars.” Dill observed. “And they let the ivy grow up onto the balcony. Now it looks like an old man with a scraggly beard.”

 “Not a bit of it, Dill.” Angie scoffed. “This house is what you call ‘picturesque.’”

“I’ve never called it any such thing,” Dill argued.

                              ~A Mother for the Seasonings

             Angelica routinely spent the sermon studying the people around her. I craned my neck, trying to see who it was this time that had so absorbed her attention. Deacon Clemmens’ wife sat directly in front of Angelica. So that was it. Angie had told me many times of a mole that Mrs. Clemmens had on her neck.

            “It’s the most fascinating thing, Basil,” she always assured me. “It’s just the shape of Africa.”

            For an instant, I was possessed with a powerful curiosity to see the much proclaimed mole. 

                                            
                                        ~A Mother for the Seasonings

The next morning, despite my assurance that all would be tickety-boo, I felt we should do penance in some way for our behavior. I scoured my mind for some appropriate punishment. Starvation perhaps? But Dill would never agree to that.

                            ~A Mother for the Seasonings

We followed behind our sister, and a couple of very old women immediately took Fennel captive. I tried to stifle a chuckle. They definitely looked the type that would stare a little child out of countenance and feed her peppermints periodically to make up for it. I knew the kind all too well. The memory of my own childhood, in that respect, was not so long forgotten.

                       ~A Mother for the Seasonings