THE LITTLE FIELD

My mother’s crust lips moved around while she spoke and chewed her white, stiff bubble gum. She had been chewing it so long it qualified to be hers and not just a bubble gum. We had been in the field before the sun even joined us. The plan was to work from 4a.m to midday. But life followed its own plans and 4p.m found us standing in the half done field. I had heard most of the stories she was telling me many times before and at this point I was just listening because that is what we did, she spoke and I listened. It amazed me how she managed to tell the same old stories with the vigour she had the first time.

My back wasn’t aching but I knew it was a matter of time until it started to. It was Friday, when I planned my day earlier, 4p.m was the time to get perfumed and ready for a relaxed evening with my almost boyfriend. I was as horny as I was happy about his existence and Friday night was going to be the night he finally saw Titanic the movie. Titanic was a classic and I found it sacrilegious that he hadn’t seen it. However, I had no plans of him making it to the part of the movie where the Titanic actually sinks. I had alternative plans of having him sink his titanic in my ocean on our virgin voyage. My plans were naughty and I wasn’t ashamed, I even picked out the French lace.

The stark contrast between my fantasy and my reality was painful. I was in a field, labouring with my mother wishing I was elsewhere. She kept talking, telling me legends and fables and then telling me about relatives that died before I was born. I just agreed and pretended to listen. I don’t know when my mother and I became these people. People who planned together, executed our plans and had secret pacts. We were not friends, we were mother and daughter. She saw too much of my father in me and it annoyed her so much she prayed over me while I snored in bed. Sometimes, I heard her pray and it amused me that she thought being like her husband was such a bad thing. I mean, she chose and married the man after all.

We looked the same but were different. My mother’s love was the source of her passion and drive. While passion is what drove me to love. At 4a.m when we started our day she made me read the bible and lead the prayers. I read from Isaiah until my vision was unclear because of tears. I don’t know why but praying and reading the bible that morning brought tears to my eyes. It sent a shiver down my spine, the early morning air and the assuring old poetry of the King James Version woke me up. I naturally have the emotional depth of a tablespoon so it blew my mind that I was in tears. My mother sat next to me quietly and trying her best to act like she couldn’t see that I was crying. I don’t even know why I cried but after my breakdown I was filled with hope. The little field meant the something to me. Each acre represented a chance to work, I love work. I saw a chance to see something constructive come out of my sweat. I saw it as a chance to say something more useful than ‘I don’t know’ or ‘I don’t have’ to my younger siblings who were always needing something. I had a chance to start something that could change my whole family’s life and I wasn’t going to let it slip away because of the love of sleep. In the field my mother saw a chance to continue what she had always been doing; taking care of her children.

When we passed the half way mark my mother stood up and saw a whirlwind brewing in the opposite direction. It was vicious and rattled the roofing sheets there. When I finally stood up, it was headed our direction and instinctively my mother and I raised our pinkie fingers towards it. Many years ago she told me that when you raised a pinkie finger towards a whirlwind it changed direction or died down. The whirlwind probably didn’t know the legend because it came right us, raising dust, sticks and plastic bags in the process. My mother ran right behind me and used me as a shield. I still don’t know whether she did that because I am taller or because she finally chose herself over me. The whirlwind was merciless, it battered us both and by the time it left we were covered in dust and had twigs in our hair. My mother finally spat out her bubble gum because it was too dusty to keep chewing. Dust entered her mouth because she was laughing too loud. I didn’t know what was funny, I was still recovering from the dusty assault. My mother eventually stopped laughing and said, “I forgot to tell you, the trick only works if you are last born child. Your youngest brother should have been here to stop the whirlwind.”