For the Love of Sunday | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's note: Please join me in welcoming Author Michele Rhem, who presents us with her poignant mémoires of the Rabbit Patch, where her diaries weave tales of a simpler, expressive life lost to many, but gathered together in her most familiar environs - the Rabbit Patch.

    A light rain is falling on the rabbit patch today. It was much needed and it cooled things off nicely. Sunday dinner is over and I am at the morning table, watching it rain through the morning window. Cash and Christopher Robin are sleeping and all feels right with the world in this moment.

    I took a chance and cooked crowder peas . My boys like everything-with the exception of crowder peas. I hardly ever have them because of that, but today , I thought mama and daddy would help me eat them-and they did, but wouldn't agree to take any home. When you can't give something away, it tells you something. I did fix cheese biscuits for mama as she especially loves them. I came close to burning them because I was listening to Christian play guitar and got caught up in that. Thank goodness, I smelled them and knew they were ready. I had a raisin cake for dessert. Daddy loves raisins-and he did take some of that home.

    The coolness of late September has slowed the grass down and the leaves are not yet a force to be reckoned with, so of course, I write.

    For the love of Sunday, I am happy as a lark when a day unfolds like this one. I read a lot this morning, while I was cooking those crowder peas. The morning was so gray and still for a long while-just the right weather to think great thoughts-and so I did.

    I did not even hear mama and daddy drive up-and neither did Cash and Christopher Robin. They love Sunday mornings, when the house smells like all sorts of dishes and I am not showing any sign of going anywhere. They did not budge from their favorite place to rest-by the morning table, in front of a box fan. Maybe they knew that nothing much can go wrong when you are napping by a fan.

    We all took our places at the kitchen table and Christian listened to our stories about things that happened a long time ago. Mama talked about her mama -and daddy told us the unique way he shelled crowder peas when he was young. I told them I cooked the pork chops the way grandmama did. Mama told us about the first time she got her drivers license, then daddy told us his own story.

    A lot happens around a kitchen table at a Sunday dinner. I didn't want Christian to miss one detail. He was hearing "his own story" told. He was hearing about his people, before him. Well, it was as dear to me as anything. It was a precious time-and it seemed sacred, too. For the love of Sunday, it was just beautiful.