This is one of my favorite family pictures. My cousin Grey asked me to find some shots of the farm back in the day, and I ran across this one as I was looking through my iPhoto files. That Grey's dad, my Uncle Bud, on his brand-new picker. My Uncle Clyde is standing to the immediate left, and my Aunt Grace's dad, Mr. Defford Morris, is to the far left. I'm not sure who that is on the right, wearing glasses. (Oh, cousin Jimmy? I'm sure you can identify:)
I think this was Uncle Bud's first cotton picker, which he told me he bought in 1961. It could only pick one row at a time, but compared to picking by hand, he said, that was REALLY moving up in the world!
I always look forward to this time of year, when the fields are white and the pickers start rolling. I still get a rush of childhood giddiness when Mother or Daddy says, "Y'all want to ride down in the field and watch 'em pick a little while?" And I still pester whoever's driving (usually Grey these days) for a ride on that big John Deere. If you were raised on a farm, I guess tractors and cotton pickers are sort of like rides at the fair—you never really outgrow them. I miss the rumble of the old Harpersville cotton gin across from our church. It doesn't run any more, and they tore most of it down. Everybody hauls their cotton someplace else now to be ginned.
Here's another one of my favorite harvest shots—members of our congregation picking the church field by hand. On the fourth Sunday of this month, we'll celebrate Harvest Day, which is our annual homecoming. We always hold it in October because the church was built when many members were farmers, and they could make an extra-generous contribution to the offering plate once the cotton was in. I love the way they all look like they're having such a good time together, even though they're working hard. And I love it when you can see and feel a connection between a piece of land and the people who love it.
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