I missed telling stories at Sweetfields Farm this spring because of the quarantine. I think they had a limited admission policy and required social distancing while going through the maze. When the earth stops trying to kill us all, I highly recommend taking the family out to the farm. It’s lots of fun. Sitting at home trying not to get sick, I recall all the interesting people I’ve told stories through the years. One particular group sticks in my mind.
There I was under my tent canopy telling stories at the farm as visitors went through the five-acre sunflower maze. A group of young adults came up and sat down.
They were in that delightful age between twenty and early thirties when no one could accurately tell how old they were. All of them were about the same height, had straight brown hair and wide friendly brown eyes. Their faces were a pleasant olive color with no blemishes. They could have been of Hispanic background, Italian or from the Middle East. They had pleasant smiles and impeccably clean white shirts and pants.
One young man, who acted as the leader, took out his smart phone.
“Do you tell your own stories or something else?” he asked, revealing perfectly straight white teeth.
“I tell stories I make up and sometimes I steal stories from people who have been dead for a long time. Right now I’m telling Native American legends.”
“I like to ask questions,” the leader said, holding up his phone, ready to punch the record button.
“Oh sure.” I was hoping they would notice I had a basket with a sign “Storytelling Fund.”
“How old are you?” he asked in an even, very respectful tone.
“I’m sixty-nine years old. I’ll be seventy in October.” I didn’t mind telling my age. I was proud to have made it to be an old man. Besides, if I were agreeable enough, maybe they’ll leave a dollar tip. I remembered when a dollar was still a lot of money.
“Where did you grow up?”
“In Gainesville, Texas, north of Dallas and Fort Worth. It was a small town.”
“What was it like growing up?”
For some reason, I decided to talk about legal discrimination in the South of the 1950s and 1960s. I described segregated schools, whites-only restrooms and colored water fountains.
“I was so young I thought black people were getting free Kool-Aid and we weren’t.”
All the lovely young people gently laughed. This was odd because when I had told that joke before, people acted like they didn’t get it or if they did get it they didn’t think it was funny.
I told them I was called a N-word lover because I didn’t understand why black kids had to go to separate schools.
The lovely ladies in the group wrinkled their brows and murmured in sympathy.
At that point I said I didn’t know why I decided to talk about the cultural situation back at that time. I usually tried not to say anything that could be interpreted as being political. If I upset anyone, they wouldn’t leave a tip and I needed the gas money to get home.
“That’s all right.” The leader nodded and smiled. “We like to learn things.”
I became aware of an awkward pause in the conversation. Since they enjoyed asking me questions, I thought I’d ask them a few things. “So, are you visiting from another country?”
“No, we live here,” he replied.
“Then you must be from Tampa Bay?”
“Yes.” He nodded. “Orlando.”
Okay, I told myself. Nobody from Orlando, which was in the middle of the state of Florida, would ever think of themselves as being a part of Tampa Bay any more than they would say they were from Cape Canaveral. It was at this time I officially became uncomfortable.
“Are you doing a college research project or something?”
“No, we just like to ask questions.”
“How nice.” I smiled, thinking of the many Twilight Zone episodes where strange new people in town just liked to ask questions.
How the hell do I get rid of these weirdos?
Maybe there was something wrong with me instead of them. Maybe I’ve watched too many Twilight Zone reruns. In either case, I felt it best to go into my usual spiel to prod visitors politely to move on.
“Thank you very much for dropping by and visiting with me. I hope you’ve enjoyed your day at Sweetfields Farm. Be sure to ride our tractor tricycles, shoot the potato cannon, play the water pump game and watch the pig races. You might also want to come back next October when we have the cornfield maze and pumpkin patch. I’ll be telling a new batch of stories then.”
The leader put away his cell phone. They stood and shook hands with me. Nice, firm, friendly handshakes from attractive young people with nice friendly smiles. They each put a dollar in my tip basket.
That night I told my son about my close encounter of the third kind as he was dressing for his night shift job. I asked him if I awoke in the middle of the night and found these young people dressed in white standing in an iridescent glow in the middle of my bedroom should I go with them to their spaceship.
“Sure,” he replied, “why not? But leave your credit card with me.”