Heigh-ho the Derry-O

As far back as anyone can trace, my mother's people in Minnesota were farmers. They were the kind of farmers who could work the frosty and belligerent land of northern Minnesota so well they continued to eat during the Depression but more impressive, they were able to throw a sizable wedding for my grandmother during the depths of those dark times. In my veins flows the blood of ancestors who could look at a cloud or a seedling and know everything they needed to know.

This morning, I weeded the front yard. I looked at a plant and wondered, "Is that the annoying weed with those nasty thorns?" so I stuck my hand into it to find out. It was. A moment later, I shrieked in terror because a spider got on my ankle. To remove said spider, I ran in circles until it became motion-sick and jettisoned itself. Then I blotted my hand and spent several minutes removing a particularly obstreperous weed which turned out to be an exotic and expensive herb I had planted last year. Finally, I started to itch and had to stop weeding because it was Benadryl time.

Leaving the yard, I heard a sound from somewhere above me. It was probably a squirrel chittering at me from the sycamore tree, but it also might have been my ancestors, sobbing into their capable, spectral hands.