Momentary Memories

So I'm feeling slightly nostalgic tonight, and seeing as how we haven't had a good ole' heart-to-heart in awhile, I thought it would be nice to chew the fat.

Tonight I went to this dinner party thing out in Brantly County. It was a Cane-Grinding Party. They make cane syrup out there and were making some and invited people over for breakfast food, with fresh cane syrup. Well, that stuff is very different from Aunt Jamima's I can tell you that much. Very bitter, sweet and thick. A lot like molasses. The food was great though. It got me to thinking. See, whenever I get the chance to be in an environment like that, I go crazy. It's like sunlight for Superman. It rejuvenates my soul. This place was a 1,000 acre plantation with old barns and sheds and lots of open land. It seems to always remind me of childhood.

Every year I was a kid, I looked forward to Christmas time, naturally. About 4 days or so before Christmas, my family and several others would get a big dump truck and fill it with hay. We'd all party at someone's house until dark, and then about 20 of us would pile into the back of this truck and we would ride around St. Simons Christmas caroling. I pity the soul who has never had the opportunity to go on a hayride. That smell of hay still brings back the strongest memories. I can remember clear as day my aunt's fighting over the words to such popular titles as "Deck the Halls" and "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer". I still know every single word to "We Wish you a Merry Christmas" because we were always forced to end each house with another loud and out-of-tune rendition of the "closing song". The best part of the night came at the end however. Seeing as how we were in a dump truck, we discovered early on that with a slight push of the lever we could fancy a rather nice slide ending into a big pile of hay.

It's been several years now since I've been on a hayride. I vote we start the tradition back up. Who's with me? I have an idea where we can find a dump truck big enough. I got first dibs on the slide!