Churning, 1948

“Grandmother, whatcha doin? What’s that thing?” I point at a brownish-gray barrel in front of her.

“It’s a churn, honey.  I use it to make butter. See, the cream is inside.”  She opens the top of the churn, and I, not much taller than the churn, look in.  I smell warm milk and wet wood. 

“Can I do it?”  

“It’s a lot of work, dear.  You have to push the paddle up and down very fast and hard to make butter.”  She looks at me, eye to eye, from her seat in the chair, sitting forward, feet planted firmly, knees pressed into each side of the churn, holding the paddle handle.

“I can do it.  Please, please, please let me do it.”

“You can try for a little while.”  Grandmother smiles and gets up from the chair.  I scramble to take her place.  I sit forward and hook my knees over the front edge of the wooden kitchen chair.  My 5-year-old legs dangle down.  Grandmother pushes the churn closer so I can reach it.  I scoot up to the chair’s edge to squeeze my knees into the churn like she did.

I take the churn handle.  I push down and pull up.   Ugh!  Cream is heavy.  Sa–losh, sa-losh, sa-losh.  I churn, making butter like Grandmother does. Never mind that the sa-loshing goes slowly.  Never mind that the paddle stays low in the churn.  Never mind that the chair begins to rock. 

“Here, honey, let me finish.”  Grandmother reaches for the paddle.

“But, Grandmother, I just started.”

“ Oh, it’s been a good ten minutes. You seem to be getting tired. You can do some more tomorrow morning after Granddaddy milks the cow and I strain the milk and skim the cream.” 

“Okay.  What can I do now?  Can I get the eggs?”

“Maybe later. We’ll go together.   Want to sweep the porch?”

“Okay.” I grab the too-tall broom and drag it outdoors, humming. 

Boy, Grandmother has fun things to do.