Mrs. Rosemary

“Wow…she would remember the Great Depression,” he said slowly, speaking of an elderly lady in our church. “She might even remember Black Sunday.”

“What’s Black Sunday?” the littlest one breathed, leaning in.

“The worst storm of the Dust Bowl,” he said matter-of-factly.

“What’s the Dust Bowl?” she squeaked.

“It was, you know, the years of drought that caused all the dust storms in the 1930s,” he leaned back on his elbow.

“Yeah, that’s why people who lived through that used to turn their cups upside down in the kitchen cupboards even years later,” her big sister said from under her blanket. ”To keep the dust out. Right mom?”

I loved that she remembered that from a documentary we had seen a few years ago. “Some people did do that,” I agreed. “Living through experiences like that can really change you.”

The littlest one nestled into her pile of stuffed animals and pillows. I took it as a sign to squeeze in just a little more.

“There were accounts of people in the Great Plains having to tie ropes from their home to their barn, so they could reach their animals and not get lost in the dust.”

“It was that bad?”

“It was so bad they sometimes couldn’t see their hand in front of their face.”

“…Wow.”

“Animals suffocated, people were sometimes lost in the storms, dust came into the cracks of homes, disease rates increased, and some people experienced breathing problems for years afterward. When the droughts and the dust storms got too bad, hundreds of families had to move, leaving farms sitting empty. Add that to the other issues of the Great Depression….and it would explain why some people thought the world was ending.”

Silence.
Beautiful silence as I watched the three of them process this strange and unprompted bedtime story.

“So….people will talk about Covid like that one day, right?”

“Oh definitely.”

“I mean, Covid wasn’t as bad as the Great Depression though.”

“Well, it depends what you consider ‘bad’ and it depends who you ask. Don’t forget—we haven’t seen the full effects of the Covid years yet. Economically, socially, politically—there could be really long lasting effects.”

“That’s true. I hope I live to be as old as Mrs. Rosemary so that I can tell people what it was like. I mean, those people who would want to know about it aren’t even BORN YET. This will all just be in the history books for them.”

“We’ll be in the books….wow.”

(Perfect. PERFECT connections!—I resisted the urge to fist pump this excellent example of historical empathy. And they came to this place all by themselves. 🤌🏻)

“Whenever you hear about things in the past, don’t ever forget there were real people with real families who went through them, ok? People just like us.”

“I won’t, mom,” the littlest one replied solemnly, as if making an oath, as her big sister nodded quietly from her nest of blankets. Our tall and gangly son rose with me to say goodnight to the girls.

“Do you think we can ask her about the Dust Bowl soon?” a sleepy voice said from beneath the twinkly lights.

“Oh, definitely. Let’s talk about that tomorrow.”

“Goodnight, mom.”

“Night night.”