A Small Preview...

 ...of the book I'm currently working on. 

It's just a small preview, because I've just now started on it, but putting it out here in the universe will ensure that I keep at it. 

Anyway, please enjoy.

No Promises: 

Being Smack Dab in the Middle of History and Living to Tell About It.

“Well, shit” Edna said aloud to no one in particular.

Her eyes were still closed, but she could hear the morning birds announcing a new day. Last night, like every night as long as she could remember, Edna had gone to bed and said her prayers before going to sleep. The last months, she’d hinted broadly to God that she’d lived a good long life, and she was ready to go if he was ready to have her. Then, she’d closed her eyes and drifted off…hopeful.

And every morning, upon hearing the happy little chirping and with the hard knowledge that God didn’t want her yet, she’d say, “Well, shit.”

Slowly, she sat up and pushed her feet into her slippers, then stood up, got her bathrobe on, took off the silk bonnet that kept her hair nice, put in her teeth, and started the coffee in the kitchen.

Her little dog danced frantically around her feet, and Edna opened the door and watched the fluffy tiny dog fly out into the morning sunshine, barking as though she was the Queen of the Universe bossing every other living thing into order.

Edna sat at her little table for two in her little house for one, looked out onto her vegetable garden and her rose bushes, and sipped her coffee, smiling.

She knew she was confused a lot of the time, now, and seemed to be living her whole life over again, and while it confounded those around her, it made perfect sense to her and didn’t bother her one bit. She liked living in the past; even the hard bits, because now she knew how they ended, when they ended, and that she lived through them and went on with her business. Even if people she loved hadn’t.

She concentrated now, probing her brain back as far as it would go, and there she was: Mama.

Chapter One: Mama

Mama was the most beautiful woman in the world. Everything about her was small and delicate, except for her eyes, which were violet blue with a hint of desperate fortitude.

Pa had known the minute he saw her that he was in love with her, but it took some convincing before Mama was won over. She thought he was crazy, just plumb crazy.

In rural Oklahoma in 1915, no one had much of anything to speak of, and courting was a simple affair. One evening, while walking Mama home, Pa had stopped and taken her hand, then pointed up into the sky. “See that? That big ol’ moon? That’s mine. I own it, and I’m giving it to you. I ain’t got nothin’ much else to give you and for sure nothin’ that’s permanent, but that moon is regular as can be and I’m giving it to you. Every time I see your pretty face, it’s like the sun rises in my heart, so the least I can do for the gal who makes the sun rise for me is to give her the moon.”

And just like that, he had her heart.

Mama told all her kids that story hundreds of times; sometimes after a very good day, and especially after a very bad one. “Lots of things happen, babies, and lots of things end. But the sun always comes up and the moon always lights the darkest night.”

They were married in the whitewashed church they’d both been baptized in, and Pa proudly carried Mama over the threshold of the weather-beaten three-room house shaded by three giant oak trees. The main center room had a rough wooden table and chairs, a dry sink and counter, and an ancient wood cook stove. Off to one side was the room that would be Mama and Pa’s, and the other side would be the children’s bedroom, housing up to seven at one point.

Outside was a water pump, a chicken shed, a three-sided lean-to shanty barn, and an outhouse, all clustered nervously around the main house against miles and miles of Oklahoma prairie.

Pa had leased the farm, like so many other small farmers, and, with the bravado of love and youth, had visions of supporting a family off of this piece of windy forlorn desolation.

Within a year, Mama gave birth to a son.

The following year, a daughter.

The next year, Edna.

The year after that, a tiny stillborn daughter.

Then another son.

Then a son who lived for a few days before his little light went out forever.

And then, another daughter.

Mama was 35 years old.

In between each baby and during every pregnancy, Mama cared for the other babies, tended the chickens, washed all the clothes, kept the house as clean as she could muster, and cooked for everyone.

Edna remembered her Mama at that big old stove, pale and looking completely wilted with her hair coming undone and sweat dripping from the tip of her perfect nose, cooking mid-day dinner for Pa and the men who’d been working in the fields. By the time the men came into the house, loud and stomping and hungry, Mama had her hair brushed and put up and greeted Pa with a smile that did, indeed, fill the house with sunshine.