About JB by Julianna Rowe

About JB.

Recently, I was sitting in my kitchen thinking. Mainly because I forgot my phone in the other room and didn’t want to go get it. I live alone, so the door was open to the porch, and I could see clearly through my apartment to the outside world and parking lot. The foggy scene brought to mind another time.  The day JB brought me a stalk or three of dried corn stalks. He was eighty or more years "old." It was some twenty years ago when I looked out that same kind of window I was looking out today that brought back the memory. There was a small incline off the main sidewalk, and JB decided to take the grassy incline versus the cement sidewalk with four steps down. I suspect because the base of the stalks were uneven and might have caused him to fall.  He once told me he never broke any bones when he fell because he learned how to roll when he went down.  Then he would snicker, and his dimples would become deeper and sweeter.  Falling on cement didn’t give much room for rolling so he opted for the shortcut of the three-foot grassy slanted incline. I recall it as though it were yesterday.  I held my breath when I realized he was too dang old to be doing what I had asked.  Which was, “Dad, would you bring me some corn stalks and a couple of bales of hay for my porch decorations.”  It was October and every year he brought me the stalks, hay, and pumpkins.  But this year he was struggling.  I felt bad watching him attempt to be the man he used to be.  And I wonder if I appreciated him in the manner, he was due.  Now that I am headed toward that age and trying to remain able to do the things I did last year I am reminded.  Maybe my children will appreciate me more after I am gone.  Am I laughing?  Yes, just a little because one never knows. All one can do is their best, like JB did staggering down that incline carrying three large corn stalks, turning around, and going back to his little Chevy Love truck and making the trip again and again with heavy bales of hay for his only daughter.

So, there I sat staring out the window that brought back to life a beautiful story from days gone by.  I think leaving my cell phone out of the room more often might be a good idea.  I could never find a memory like this on my phone.  Below are the original stalks and bales.