Moments

Moments holding memories of fireflies slowly filling a mountain evening twilight with points of twinkles growing in number by the minute. Moments evoking the heady smell of the thick green grasses growing between our house and the creek that separated our home from the rural road running past us. Each school day we crossed a small, wooden bridge that spanned the width of the creek. The road climbed a small hill disappearing from view as it wound its way deep into the valley we shared with our neighbors. At some point the paved road gave way to a rugged, dirt road which forked out in different directions leading to homes set back deep in the valley. These homes were often surrounded by the beauty of God's artistry.
 Poverty was a given. Yet it  gave way to pastures bordered by old wooden fences  held together  by notches cut deep into the end of the  horizontal railings.   The fences bordered pastures ripe with the scents of sweet, thick grasses peppered with the colors and scents of mountain flowers. The occasional old gnarled apple tree grew along the side of the dirt road with a stream of cold, delicious mountain water flowing nearby. Farther back down the valley the stream would be polluted by outhouses straddling it at its' narrow points. Bits of tissue paper and the occasional page from a Sears catalog clung to the detritus of broken limbs and the jagged rocks strewn  along the banks and the  bottom of the creek.  Mountain folk chose practicality over pristine water.