We had promised to do it for years. We would pack a car with cold chicken and drive south like we used to. But we never had a proper time to do it, somehow. My aunt Edna’s heart was failing. Aunt Juanita had to care for my uncle at home, and my mother, Margaret, did not leave home unless blown away from it by tornadoes. So I was surprised a few years ago when my 72-year-old mother told me to pick up all of them for the trip.
I found the three sisters in the yard, with suitcases in their hands. Edna packed some food including two gallons of potato salad for the two-day trip from Jacksonville, Alabama.
As I drove, they talked of childhood, dirt roads where the dark closed in like a cover on a box, and a daddy who chased the bad things away as soon as he walked in. When we arrived in Montgomery, they had ridden a horse named Bob, cooked a dead chicken named Mrs. Rearden, and fished beside a little man named Jessie Clines. As we drove across Mobile Bay they were remembering their mama and a groundhog that lived under the floorboards.
I wanted them to see the sunset from the Fairhope pier, and as we rolled down the bluff, I heard them go quiet. But the sunset was just a light to see. They were looking at the roses, which were flowering in a circle the size of a baseball field. There were more than 2,000 of them. My mother, who never even liked roses much, said, “Oh, my God.” Juanita looked as if she were about to cry. “So beautiful,” she said again and again. She stayed in the rose garden for a long time, till the sun disappeared totally. She saw the Fairhope roses six times on this trip. The last time, because she was tired , we sat in the car.
A year later, I spoke at Edna’s funeral. For the first time, I knew what I wanted to say in my mind, but the words crashed together inside my head and I lost the fine things I really wanted to say. Her daughters just hugged me, one by one, and thanked me for the roses.
4. Where did their trip start?
A.Mobile Bay. | B.Fairhope pier. | C.Montgomery. | D.Jacksonville. |
5. What did the sisters do when the author drove?
A.They looked back on the past. | B.They fished with Jessie Clines. |
C.They rode a horse on a dirt road. | D.They talked of childhood with their mama. |
6. What attracted the three sisters most during the trip?
A.Walking on the dirt roads. | B.Enjoying the roses. |
C.Visiting a baseball field. | D.Seeing the sunset. |
7. What can we learn about Edna?
A.She liked roses most. | B.She was once a soldier. |
C.She died a year after the trip. | D.She had to care for her husband. |