Sundays

Yesterday was Sunday, family day growing up. We’d visit either my Nanny, great Aunt Ruby, Great Aunt Helen, or Grandma Lena and Grandaddy Jess. I loved visiting my two great aunts who lived right beside each other in little old houses built way back before they were newlyweds. Every Christmas Aunt Helen would make everyone a pair of boot-like slippers, maroon or white and maroon. They didn’t have flashing lights, they didn’t make noise, they weren’t wearing pink dresses, but they were the perfect shoes for sliding around corners and under tables while playing “sneakies”. I wanted to learn how to make them. I was about eight when she taught me to crochet. She gave me this yucky green (my favorite color now) anti-flammable yarn to make potholders with. A far cry from sneakies slippers! My mom was a lucky recipient as well as anyone else who wanted one…my dad, I think, needed one. These little squares, well, they sort of looked like squares, were the start of my fibercraft. Of course when Aunt Helen would fall asleep in her chair, I was off to Aunt Ruby’s to stake out her sweets. She was the jovial one, the one with the well-stocked candy dish that could keep you distracted for hours (minutes, at least) as she told stories of my dad’s trouble-making when he was a kid….on to the pound cake. My Aunt Ruby was a gardener. Every year she had a huge garden full of vegetables that she started from the seeds of the year before. Why would anyone want to grow all that yucky food? Now, I’m the one who wants the little green house and the garden full of colorful vegetables! I never did learn to make the sneakies slippers, and now that Aunt Helen has passed I don’t know if I ever will. Unless… my mom has kept a pair all these years.