Three of a Kind Doors & Bikes Kindasquare Day 2 (Breakfast by Steinbeck)

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Hello Readers

October 2020 = final Squares challenge of 2020.

Here is Day 2: Three of a Kind – Double Doors & Bikes 

 

Okay, so the “Sloppy Joe’s” name and the lady with the pizza made me think of food – and so today’s “October reflection” is Steinbeck’s “Breakfast” and my old post is HERE with some teaching tips 

 

Breakfast (John Steinbeck)

This thing fills me with pleasure.  I don’t know why, I can see it in the smallest detail.  I find myself recalling it again and again, each time bringing more detail out of sunken memory, remembering brings the curious warm pleasure.

            It was very early in the morning.  The eastern mountains were black-blue, but behind them the light stood up faintly colored at the mountain rims with a washed red, growing colder, grayer and darker as it went up and overhead until, at a place near the west, it merged with pure night.

            And it was cold, not painfully so, but cold enough so that I rubbed my hands and shoved them deep into my pockets, and I hunched my shoulders up and scuffled my feet on the ground.  Down in the valley where I was, the earth was that lavendergray of dawn.  I walked along a country road and ahead of me I saw a tent that was only a little lighter gray than the ground.  Beside the tent there was a flash of orange fire seeping out of the cracks of an old rusty iron stove.  Grey smoke spurted up out of the stubby stovepipe, spurted up a long way before it spread out and dissipated.

            I saw a young woman beside the stove, really a girl.  She was dressed in a faded cotton skirt and waist. As I came close I saw that she carried a baby in a crooked arm and the baby was nursing, its head under her waist out of the cold.  The mother moved about, poking the fire, shifting the rusty lids of the stove to make a greater draft, opening the oven door; and all the time the baby was nursing, but that didn’t interfere with the mother’s work, nor with the light quick gracefulness of her movements.  There was something very precise and practiced in her movements.  The orange fire flicked out of the cracks in the stove and threw dancing reflections on the tent.

            I was close now and I could smell frying bacon and baking bread, the warmest, pleasantest odors I know.  From the east the light grew swiftly.  I came near to the stove and stretched my hands out to it and shivered all over when the warmth struck me.  Then the tent flap jerked up and a young man came out and an older man followed him.  They were dressed in new blue dungarees and in new dungaree coats with the brass buttons shining.  They were sharp-faced men, and they looked much alike.

            The younger had a dark stubble beard and the older had a gray stubble beard.  Their heads and faces were wet, their hair dripped with water, and water stood out on their stiff beards and their cheeks shone with water.  Together they stood looking quietly at the lightening east; they yawned together and looked at the light on the hill rims.  They turned and saw me.

            “Morning,” said the older man.  His face was neither friendly nor unfriendly. 

            “Morning, sir,” I said.

            “Morning,” said the young man.

            The water was slowly drying on their faces.  They came to the stove and warmed their hands at it.

            The girl kept to her work, her face averted and her eyes on what she was doing.  Her hair was tied back out of her eyes with a string and it hung down her back and swayed as she worked.  She set tin cups on a big packing box, set tin plates and knives and forks out too.  Then she scooped fried bacon out of the deep grease and laid it on a big tin platter, and the bacon cricked and rustled as it grew crisp.  She opened the rusty oven door and took out a square pan full of high big biscuits.

            When the smell of that hot bread came out, both of the men inhaled deeply.  The young man said softly, “Keerist!”

            The elder man turned to me, “Had your breakfast?”

            “No.”

            “Well, sit down with us, then.”

            That was the signal.  We went to the packing case and squatted on the ground about it.  The young man asked, “Picking cotton?”

             “No.”

            “We had twelve days’ work so far,” the young man said.

                        The girl spoke from the stove.  “They even got new clothes.”

            The two men looked down at their new dungarees and they both smiled a little.

            The girl set out the platter of bacon, the brown high biscuits, a bowl of bacon gravy and a pot of coffee, and then she squatted down by the box too.  The baby was still nursing, its head up under her waist out of the cold.  I could hear the sucking noises it made.

            We filled our plates, poured bacon gravy over our biscuits and sugared our coffee.  The older man filled his mouth full and he chewed and chewed and swallowed.  Then he said, “God Almighty, it’s good,” and he filled his mouth again.

            The young man said, “We been eating good for twelve days.”

            We all ate quickly frantically, and refilled our plates and ate quickly again until we were full and warm.  The hot bitter coffee scalded our throats.  We threw the last little bit with the grounds in it on the earth and refilled our cups.

            There was color in the light now, a reddish gleam that made the air seem colder.  The two men faced the east and their faces were lighted by the dawn, and I looked up for a moment and saw the image of the mountain and the light coming over it reflected in the older man’s eyes.

            Then the two men threw the grounds from their cups on the earth and they stood up together.  “Got to get going,” the older man said.

The younger turned to me.  “’Fyou want to pick cotton, we could maybe get you on.”            “No.  I got to go along.  Thanks for breakfast.”           

The older man waved his hand in a negative. “O.K.  Glad to have you.”  The walked away together.  The air was blazing with light at the eastern skyline.  And I walked away down the country road.

            That’s all.  I know, of course, some of the reasons why it was pleasant.  But there was some element of great beauty there that makes the rush of warmth when I think of it.

 

Care to join in with the Life of B’s squares this month?
Here is some info:

  1. The theme is KIND
  2. Take a square photograph of something that reflects the theme
  3. Create your post for any day in October, and pingback to one of my daily squares
  4. Include the theme’s tag – #KindaSquare
  5. Leave a comment and link on Becky’s blog (here)
  6. Make time to visit others and check out the square galleries

 

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41 thoughts on “Three of a Kind Doors & Bikes Kindasquare Day 2 (Breakfast by Steinbeck)”

    1. Oh I like the way you said feeling the earth like that! So fitting and cheers to a classic author, eh? And speaking of authors – I was going to ask you if I could post part of your “October 10th” journal post on October 10th ?
      It would fit so well

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  4. A great post Yvette. The doors…I wasn’t going to mention the less than three of a kind but someone else did lol
    I smell the coffee bacon and the earth in my senses as I watch the woman at the stove which sounds like the first stove we had here. Day two with images and a story of kindness. Fabulous 🙂 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

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        1. thanks – and her comment was a little vague to me – but here is how I look at it – I never said “exactly” – they are similar – they are double doors and were likely exactly the same when they were put up – and “close enough” for me – lol

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    1. Hi joy roses – this story was pulled from the grapes of wrath – I don’t love all of his books – but parts of them – snippets like this – are part of his signature style 😉

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    1. Hi – is good have noted it in the post- this is from Grapes of Wrath
      —
      And side note – on my soon to read lost is Steinbeck’s “Travels with Charley” where he travels the US by covering 10,000 miles on a road trip!
      The book has come up a few times this summer and i tired reading it years ago when my son had it in paperback for school but at the time it was “yawn yawn” but I want to
      Try it again- 😉

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      1. I have it in French, my parents’ copy. Sounds a bit silly to read it in “Frog”. Come to think of it, most my Steinbecks are in French. I guess I’ll buy a paperback copy on Amazon.

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    1. Hi – this piece was in my son’s literature book years ago and it made me pause – and reminds me that authors make great long works with lots of little great sections (and now I wonder if Steinbeck has bathroom scenes – hahah) I am getting read to read Steinbeck’s Travels with Charley – have you read it – ?

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  15. Sloppy Joe’s is a clever name for an eating establishment. It should be “Neat Joe’s” as the doors are totally synchronized and look perfect. Gee, Steinbeck could write couldn’t he? The descriptions of the people in this story to the food – I could smell the tantalizing smell of this meal. The first book I ever read by Steinbeck was “The Red Pony” and that was probably my first “big girl book” having graduated from “The Bobbsey Twins” to real literature. 🙂

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