Tart green apples and a salt shaker were a summer treat. The low hanging branches, heavy with apples, made it tempting for little hands. Salt shakers disappeared from the cupboard when the apples were green. Mom would yell, "Where are the shakers?!", stopping our game of redlight-greenlight. Behind the garage we'd race, finding the shakers among the cores and half eaten apples. "You've been sneaking Mrs. Mathew's Apples?” Even though we had two apple trees of our own, her’s tasted better because of the daring for one of us to rush into her yard to get them. The excitement would get Major, our dog, barking, giving the game away. Mom, taking the shakers in hand, would send one of us over to Mrs. Mathews to apologize for taking her apples. Every time we were called" “little brats” and told she would have the police on us. A week later, it was my brother's turn to apologize.
Apple crisp was Mom's way of getting us to eat liver, which none of us liked except for dad. He would scoop up the onions and mushrooms while the rest of us just played with our food. “If you eat your liver you will get a slice of crisp,” Mom would say. I liked licking the cake batter from the beater on days she made cakes. It was a treat which required some other little chore, like taking rhubarb to Mrs. Martin. Mrs. Martin was a cheek pincher and a hugger. Sour lemonade and a raisin cookie were my treat there, sitting at her kitchen table, watching her clean up the rhubarb. Answering questions was my part of any conversation we had. She would correct my mispronunciation and tell me where my tongue should be when speaking. Her kitchen windows were full of houseplants. Between the leaves I could see Mr. Schwartz house and his bird houses hanging in her tree. She told me how the songbirds brightened her day. Often she talked about her grandson, Russel, in California. Mom alway told me to visit with the people she sent me to. It was a way of learning, she told us. Mom and Dad were always about us kids learning.
