The Annals of Ann

by Kate Trimble Sharber

Toward evening we got to a fine place in the branch to wade and Mrs. Young said, oh, let's do it; it would remind us of our childhood days. So we soon had our feet bare, with our thoughts on our childhood days, and never once stopping to remember that we didn't have a thing to wipe them on. Nobody said so much as towel until we got out, and then it was too late, so we were very much pained and annoyed every step of the way home on account of our gritty feet.

Another morning early we decided to go out and see the sun rise, like Thoreau. (They tell me how to spell all the odd words.) We went up to the tiptop of a high hill, and when the sun was just high enough to make you squint your eyes Mr. Young remarked that he realized his life was "replete with glorious possibilities," and he said in such moments he felt that he could "encompass his heart's desire." He said he fain would be a novelist. Now, this is the only subject they ever fall out about, for he's always wanting to be something that he is not. Last winter when he met Doctor Gordon at Rufe's he decided he wanted to be a doctor, for he said they could always make a living, no matter where they were, while a poor college professor had to stay wherever he had a chair to sit in. So he went to a store where you buy rubber arms and legs and things and bought a long black bag like Doctor Gordon's, full of shiny, scary-looking scissors and knives which cost seventy-five dollars, to lay away till fall when the doctor's school opened up again. In two weeks Mrs. Young had got the store man to take the things back for half price because Professor Young had decided he wanted to study banjo playing instead of doctoring and had bought a banjo trimmed with silver.

She knew whenever he said he wanted to be anything it would cost as much as two new dresses, and then have to be exchanged for something else, so she asked him if he would have to buy anything to begin this novel-writing business with. He proudly told her no, for his "Mother Nature had endowed him with a complete equipment," and he thumped his forehead between his eyes and his straw hat. Then she told him to go on. He said it would be a good time to get material from the study of the "primitive creatures" around here in the country.

I hoped these "primitive creatures" were not the kind of insects you would have to empty the lunch box for, nor be careful not to pull off their hind legs while you were catching them, not knowing just what they were.

I was scared good when he said he thought the girl that milked Mrs. Hedges' cows would be a good one to begin on. He said if Marie didn't mind he would go over to the farthest pasture where he could see her then and draw her out to see what was in her! This sounded terrible to me, knowing that he used some sickly smelling stuff on the bugs that killed them before they had time to say a word, and I thought maybe because Emma Belle was a poor servant girl he was going to do her the same way.

He had always seemed such a kind-hearted man to me, and I saw him and Emma Belle standing at the fence talking and he was not trying to hold anything to her nose, still I didn't feel easy till he got back. Mrs. Young asked him what he had learned, and if his novel would be along "socialistic lines" or a "romance in a simple bucolic setting." That "bucolic" reminded me of Bertha's little innocent baby, and I wished I was at home nursing it even if it did cry, rather than be out sun-rising with such a peculiar man. He said it would be a "pastoral," and that the girl's eyes were exactly like his first sweetheart's, which was remarkable. Mrs. Young spoke up right quick and said there wasn't anything remarkable in that, because all common, country girls looked alike and they all had about as much expression as a squash.

We haven't been out early acting like Thoreau any more, for Mrs. Young said it was the most foolish of all the foolish things Augustus had made her do, and he could continue to associate with milkmaids by himself if he wanted to, which he has. This morning she came over to our house early to ask mother if you singed a picked chicken over a blaze or what, and if she didn't think Thoreau was an idiot. Mother said yes, you did, if it had pin feathers on it, and she didn't know much about Thoreau, but she preferred men that paid taxes and ate off of white tablecloths. Mrs. Young said she thought all men that read bugology and admired pictures like Hosea were a little idiotic and she wished she had married a man like father. Mother said well, she better not be too sure, for they all have their faults.

After a good long time Professor Young came in, not finding Marie at the bungalow, looking awful hot and cross. The sight of him seemed to make Mrs. Young feel worse than ever and she told him she had just come over to consult mother about her journey home to-morrow, although she hadn't mentioned it to us before. She went on to say that he might spend the rest of the summer, or the rest of his life if he wanted to, boarding over at Mrs. Hedges' where he could see Emma Belle morning, noon and night, instead of only in the morning. He said why, he was utterly surprised for she hadn't mentioned such a thing to him before, but she told him he hadn't spent enough time with her lately even to know whether or not she still retained the power of speech. He said right quick, oh, he never doubted that! She said, well, she was going and he needn't argue with her. He said he wasn't going to argue, he was only too glad to leave such a blasted place, for he wanted material for his novel, but the farmer's girl he had talked with the first morning, and the plow-boys he had been associating with ever since were all such fools he couldn't get any material from them.

The minute he said that she seemed to feel better and change her mind. She said Augustus ought to be ashamed to talk that way about poor ignorant things which never had any opportunities! He said he wanted to go back to the city anyway where there was a bath-tub, but she told him he was very foolish to think about leaving such a cool, "Arcadian" spot; their friends would all laugh at them for coming back so soon. She said she had merely mentioned going back for his pleasure, for all the world knew how she loved the country. He finally said he loved it too, so they would stay, but he would be forced to give up novel-writing because the country people around here are all fools.

I've heard Professor Young talk about sitting in a college chair being a hard life, and Doctor Gordon says doctoring is a hard life, and Rufe says that editing is a hard life, but, my diary, between you and me, from the looks of things this morning, I kinder believe that marrying is a hard life, too.