Part 6 The Move and the Spoon

We were moving from the house on the curve into the village of Valley Falls. Everything was hectic, and again nobody had any time for kids. Our parents were piling what they could into our old car, and I think maybe Matt was helping. Of course, a moving van was not even a consideration, and anybody we knew drove only the standard passenger car. What belongings you couldn't fit into a car or on its roof, you left behind. The way of the migrant. I wanted to help, but nobody could take the time to explain or listen, so I went out to where the cage holding my pet rabbit was and started to think of how I could help move. I saw a large wooden spoon that someone had used at one time to stir green paint, so I put that in the cage, and maybe even a few other things. I thought I was doing something important and tried to tell somebody about it when suddenly some big person came along and rolled the cage end over end into the trunk of the car. I was devastated because I thought the spoon would fall out. But it didn't and when we got to our new home I retrieved it, grateful that my bit of helping had survived the move. So far, so good. But on a morning not long after,maybe the next day, I was admiring the spoon and how the green paint made it look pretty, when my mother, harried and on her way out of the door to do chores, saw me with the spoon. "What are you doing with that old thing?" she scolded, and lifted up the lid of the wood stove and threw the spoon in, as she left the house to do outside chores. Once again, I started crying and Joseph came to my rescue. Maybe he felt sorry for me, or maybe he just wanted to play with fire. He lifted the lid of the stove, reached in, retrieved the spoon, only slightly singed as the fire was low, and handed me the hot spoon. "Here," he told me, "but don't ever say I had anything to do with it." I stood frozen with fear, terrified that my mother would come in and see me with the spoon she'd just tossed in the stove. I knew I had to get rid of it. I ran out the door in the living room which then opened to the deserted part of the house that was later the store, but at the time held the remnants of what had been the old barroom. I threw the spoon down into the open floorboards, in a hot and guilty flush. I never told and I never saw the spoon again. Years later, when the store was being demolished, I did sort of look for it, but it stayed buried.