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Monday, 07 December 2009

Whispers of a Blizzard

By Ann Berger

Our driving mare, Lady, knew her way home as she had proven when Father courted Mother in 1915-1917. Father would drop Mother at her home after an evening out, tie the reins around the buggy whip holder to settle in for a nap and wake up in front of his own barn. The sweethearts married on September 19, 1917.

Into the 1920’s and several children later, Lady still knew her way home. Minnesota winter mornings when snow was too deep for us to wade through snow drifts for the three-quarter mile walk to school, Father would hitch Lady to the cutter, tuck us under cowhide robes and send us off with eldest sister Helen holding the reins.

At the schoolhouse door, we’d wriggle from under the robes and skitter into the schoolhouse stomping snow off our boots in the bell-tower entryway. Helen tied the reins around the whip holder, patted Lady and said, “Go home, Lady.”Lady went home.

Her horse sense could not be trusted to return to school to pick us up later in the day. Who knew where she might wander off in search of oats or four-footed play mates? When school dismissed, the west wind carried us homeward before dark.

Then came the one and only day we were allowed to skip school. A beastly blizzard threatened. I knelt between four-year-old Paul and seven-year-old Donna at an upstairs bedroom window taking in our very own fairyland. In my six-year-old wonderment, I mused, “Why do things look more real under snow?” They both nodded, not uncupping chins resting in their hands.

With elbows on the broad windowsill, our eyes scanned the blanketed lawn, barnyard, windmill and out buildings. Rows of evergreens making for a wind break in front of the grove of butternuts, oaks and maples now seemed closer under a shroud of undisturbed snow. Donna whispered, “See how close the windbreak looks now.”

Silently, Paul’s and my chins dipped in our hands.Looking. Discovering. Wondering. More silence.

Paul's tiny voice squeaked, “What’re those humps on top of the sheep barn?” We girls looked. We shrugged. Looked some more.

The storm door of the back porch banged with a winter thud. Father, with ear flaps pulled down and his brown wool cap covering his eyebrows, stepped into the snow. His boots made deep tracks to the cistern pump beside the back porch. He knotted a long rope to the crook of the pump handle.

We three turned worried eyes to each other, shivering with dread about our neighbor who froze to death in a blizzard trying to find his way from the corn crib to his house.

We watched Father lean into whirling ground squalls and stomp to the barn dragging that long rope across the lawn, across the barnyard to the hitching post outside the barn door. He looped the rope into a horseman’s knot and gave it an extra tug.

Donna whispered, “Now he won’t get lost.”

I nodded.

Paul bragged, “Bet Lady could find home.”

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[INVITATION: All elders, 50 and older, are welcome to submit stories for this blog. They can be fiction, non-fiction, poetry, memoir, etc. Instructions for submitting are here.]

Posted by Ronni Bennett at 02:30 AM | Permalink | Email this post

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