Molasses in January
My mother took a drag on a Pall Mall, exhaled, and told the story of my birth. These Boots Are Made for Walkin’ was playing on WJOY, and it was my fourth birthday. She proclaimed, “You were like molasses in January.” We were idling at a red light in a green station wagon on Main Street in Burlington, Vermont. I wasn’t yet familiar with the properties of molasses, but I knew it to be an important ingredient in ginger snaps; it seemed exotic, unlike maple syrup. The youngest, I was always beside her in the kitchen, watching, standing on a chair or peering over the counter, sticking my...
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The sweet aroma of horse and hay in half-light: barn cat spats, the clatter and scraping of rakes mucking stalls, scoops coming from the grain bin water hoses snaking up and down the barn aisle. This is a discipline for health, a way to keep daily practice of fresh air, sunshine, and amble. It starts with the murmur of walk-on, permission to pass through stall doors swung wide, hooves clop-clopping along cement then stepping out quickening pace through the gravel barnyard. Up the hill, beyond hot electric fence, free from halters they kick heels, thrilled to frisk and run together or deftly,...
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