MEMORIES OF SNAPPING GREEN BEANS

 

Most kids who grew up
   in the thirties and forties
had mothers or grandmothers
   who gardened and
raised their own veggies

and they remember nights
    all gathered around the Philco
or later the RCA...while momma
    "snapped the beans" there
in the pan in her lap       and
    she was still wearing
her wet apron from supper
   and washing the dishes...

This was ever etched on my
    mind from simpler times....
times when Americans
    were acting like Americans,
and

several days ago BE walked
    into my Writing Place
and set down this awful big
    clear plastic sack
of nice green beans!

and she said "Snap these for me
    and we'll have 'em
for supper!"    I, being a sous chef
   in my own right, calculated
an hour of sous work at best
   and said "okay,"
with limited enthusiasm....

Then an idea hit me. And I reached
  for my Fiskar Orange Hunting
Scissors, from their secret place...
     then--- whack, whack, whack,
was clipping five or six beans
     at a time    and I'll swanny,
the air  was green and filled
    with beans and half beans,
and especially ends of beans
    going every which way---
flying thru the air

For a time the whole world was
    just GREEN    how else
can I say it?

My dear mother...and even Ocasio
    would be proud of me
and
   to this very hour,
      not a day passes
          that green bean ends
still turn up from.... somewhere
    around my writing place.
----------
MIL
15 MARCH 19