VIRGINIA

Gin and I rented an old tenant house from a crop farmer named Luthor. He was seventy eight years old and lived accross the field of cantalopes that was our side yard. There was no running water in either of our houses but we had a well next to our back porch with a bucket attached to a chain-crank. Luthor would walk over every morning to fill two plastic milk jugs for his daily needs.

Luthor was quite a talker and we'd stand next to that well discussing farming, religion, and simple- living for hours. In exchange for part of the rent, we'd help plant, tend and harvest his crops which included tomatoes and watermelons. He told us to eat as many as we wanted and Gin would baby a few special plants for our uses. When harvest time came, we would ride with Luthor in his truck to the farmer's market in downtown Richmond. What a market it was! There were every kind of vegetable and fruit that could be grown in zone 7 displayed from truck beds, rustic tables, and on wooden pallets. Sold mostly by other old black men in ragged clothes, Luthor was an exeption, he'd wear his Sunday suit. We never had to bring any food back with us, it often sold out before noon.

Without running water we heated well water on the stove for our baths until I built us a shower stall in the backyard. It consisted of a plywood room only four foot square and a washtub under a recycled skylight was filled in the mornings to be warmed by the sun. One time Gin and I were taking a shower there when we heard a car pull into the drive. A voice hollered, "Anyone home?" I yelled,"Out back.", thinking it was a friend of ours. We hurried to finish our shower while the man walked to the back porch and asked in a loud voice, "Where are you?" I cracked the stall door open and said, "Just a minute, we'll be right with you." The guy had his back to us so I never saw his face but it wasn't anyone I knew. I shut the door. He must have realized where we were and what we were doing because we heard a mumble and then the sound of a car starting, and squealing tires when it hit the blacktop. He might have been a salesman, or someone looking for directions, we'll never know.

My job with Peterson Construction didn't pay much, we lived from paycheck to paycheck and many times supper consisted of only Luthor's vegetables. Our only Christmas spent there was special though, some friends invited us to help cut some mistletoe and a tree from their land. Ray spotted a bunch high in a tree that had vines hanging down to the ground. He took one end of a rope with him and, hand over hand, climbed up to the branch that hosted the plant. He yelled down to me and I tied on a small bow saw. He pulled it up and cut the limb. On his way back down the vine broke and Ray tumbled into the snow. He was unhurt and came up laughing, "That's how it's done, Keith. You get to cut the next one." We found another and luckily I trimmed it without incident. Two somewhat full spruce trees were also cut and dragged back to Ray's truck. These wonderful people helped us set the tree in our sparcely furnished shack and wished us a Merry Christmas. Gin and Scott said they would make some decorations for the tree while I worked the following day, Christmas eve. I got home about dark and pulling into the drive, I saw Christmas lights shining through the front window, candles lit in others. Stepping through the back door into the kitchen, I found a feast waiting for me, turkey with stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy, hot biskets, and a pumpkin pie! Ray and Judi had bought and delivered the fixins and the lights that day and later stopped by to share the pie. Later we walked across the field to Luthors and sang carols at his door. I'll always remember the sparkling tears on Luthor's face, I hope he remembers the matching set in my own.