The Gift of Oatmeal

Mixing brown sugar into oatmeal this morning, and a memory rose up with the aroma: early mornings at my Mamaw's house. I stayed there as much as I could when I was in high school because I worried that she was lonely. I stayed in the cedar bedroom, reading Trixie Belden and Nancy Drew well into midnight. Then a flood of sunshine in the morning, the sun burning through fog on the lower pasture, the sparkle of frost on the tractor, vapor rising like spirits from the tin roof of the smokehouse, the ticking of her mantle clock and the smell of strong coffee. Her oatmeal pot on the stove, without fail. It could be counted on to be there, like the coffee, like the soup beans at lunch, like the way she would pool salt or coffee grounds into her palm and dip one fingertip to taste. I would wish more than anything that I could just stay there instead of going to school, but when time ran out I'd give her a quick hug and head out to my '73 Beetle. She would stand there on her porch in the rear view mirror, waving, until I was out of sight.