The Gingham Apron

She wore a gingham apron when she worked, blue and white squares across sturdy cotton fabric worn soft by decades of washing. In her pocket, she kept pointed silver scissors and her mother’s handkerchief, never used but always with her. In July, her pocket would hold bunches of zinnias in bright colors. In August, their seeds.⁣
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We’d sit in the shade, she and I, and listen to the sound our ice cubes made in tall glasses of lemonade while shadow birds soared across the grass. We’d talk about babies and funerals, the weather and books, or what it was that filled our minds during the long, impossibly quiet morning hours. Loves lost and loves yet to come.