A Day in the Country
With more than a hint of fall in the air, we head to Grandma’s house for a visit. “You better come before it gets too cold and everything in my garden has died!” she warns. What she’s really saying is, “What’s taking you so long to come visit me?” Finally finding a date that works for everyone, we bake a batch of Grandma’s favorite extra chewy, double-fudge brownies, pick up a pot of her favorite yellow chrysanthemums at the nursery, and began the two-hour drive to the country. Traffic is heavy as we funnel into the line of cars whose drivers have the same idea of one foray in the outdoors before the onset of cold weather.
Turning off the main highway onto the road leading to Grandma’s house is like entering what some might call “the good old days” when life seemed simpler, more filled with the rhythm of nature than the frenzy of urbanization. A mile of unfilled potholes gives our seatbelts some unfamiliar practice and makes us wonder whether tax dollars are taking a vacation. Hearing the car near her gate, Grandma is out on the porch to wave us on. After hugs all around, assurances that we’re fine, and offerings of something to drink, we putz around the place, soothed by the notion that some things never change. Aside from overgrown morning glories hanging over the porch roof and scraggly holly bushes obstructing the two front windows, the house looks much as it did 20 years ago. Its ground floor kitchen, parlor and Grandma’s bedroom, topped by a cozy attic study reached by an almost vertical staircase, are filled with furniture, pictures and memorabilia of a remembered life, now content with the joy and predictability of routine. The graying wooden frame could use a coat of paint, and a crumbling corner of the cement foundation needs patching, but the house and Grandma are growing older as partners, each trying its best to take care of the other.
Lunch is on the table with the last pickings of lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, onions and dill from Grandma’s garden added to plates of turkey, cheese and fresh bread. “Are you sure you’ve had enough to eat?’ she asks as she fusses around refilling our glasses. The conversation leads to “Do you remember when?” stories as Grandma leads off with her favorite anecdote about when a hard-of-hearing store clerk mistook her request for a double light fixture with a double-D bra! “ ‘I think you are in the wrong department,’ he shouted at me,” laughs Grandma, then repeats the line a couple of more times, holding her side and throwing back her head as the laughter overtakes her.
We spend the afternoon driving around the countryside, stopping to buy pumpkins at roadside stands and pottery at the local factory. A neighbor invites us into her backyard to handpick our own bouquets of late-blooming flowers. “And don’t you need some fresh eggs?” she asks, already leading us to the chicken coop.
Ending the day with homemade ice cream, brownies and cups of Grandma’s brewed tea, we leave amidst hugs, kisses on the cheeks and promises to return soon for another day in the country.
The question is which country? As familiar as this outing sounds to us here in America, especially in rural Arkansas, this experience actually happened in Russia. Dividing our time between Greenbrier and Moscow, my husband, Drew, and I have had the opportunity to develop friendships with several Russians. Zhenya and her husband, Matvey, invited us to spend the day at their dacha (country house), 75 miles east of Moscow, where Zhenya’s mother, Faina, lives during the summer months. All the events happened as I described them, with a touch of storytelling to glue them together. As my real grandma used to say, “We’re more alike than different.”
