Sweeping the back patio, behind the shop under the madrone and cedar, I was reminded of my grandma's house, and of my great grandma's house (the grandmothers I have never really known or been known by).
When the idea for the new patio was surfacing, I thought of my grandma's kitchen floor. It was more than dirt. It was polished clay, worn solid through years of use and care. It was a floor that could be cleaned and wiped up.
The kitchen table was there, and I ate strange and wonderful things, my feet kicking the air in the darkness below, wondering what was being said between she and my mother, and loving her smiles and back rubs. She found "The Little Prince" in English on the television for my brother and I. It was a wonderful night.
Great-Grandma had a tile floor on a foundation of concrete. I'm pretty sure the home complex was owned by an uncle who looked over Great Grandma and Great Grandpa, because there were younger but still old people who lived in the adobe structure sitting by the building with the concrete floor.
The back yard was clean compacted dirt that the aunt-lady swept while Great Grandpa sat under the trees and laughed at the roving chickens. They seemed real nice. They all gave me hugs and kisses and smiles and sweets. I tended towards rotund after grandparent visits.
Their floors, their spaces, were used and kept and decorative and cool and calm. I want to capture some of that, weave it into the manzanita border of the patio and make it welcoming to readers and chatters and thinkers and singers and tutors and students and those stopping for a spot of tea.
Though the back patio looks like dirt now, I have plans. It will
take time and constant care, but it will be burnished clay. It will be
water repellent and solid. You will be able to walk barefoot, the
outside floor feeling like leather under your feet, cool and forgiving. I
will battle falling leaves and feral cats. It will be joyous.
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