The Old Feather Bed and Oatmeal Bread

One of my fondest childhood memories is of Grandma's enormous feather bed. As a child, my brother and I used to play on its lumpy mattress, and since I was too small to climb up on my own, my brother would get down on all fours and let me climb up his strong back to the towering bed. The bed seemed to eat you up. I would lie on my back on the puffy white comforter that smelled of violets, rose petals, and duck fluff. There were times that we couldn't see each other because we would each be into the many layers.

One time I was lying on my back when the feathers shifted and I pulled myself up. I began to scream out of fear and cry from frustration, all because I couldn't free myself from the bed's grip, and to add injury to insult, my brother sprained his arm while leaping off the bed too fast as he ran to tell Grandma that I was stuck. This happened often; my brother and I were captivated in more ways than one by Grandma and Grandpa's feather bed.

An obsession we had at Grandma's was of her oatmeal bread. She would bake two loaves; one for my brother and me, and one for her and Grandpa. There has never been bread like Grandma's. To a kid, the forty minutes it took to bake seemed like hours. Every five minutes we would holler out, wondering if the bread was done, and she would always answer with what seemed were the only words she knew when it was bread baking time: Shoo, you two!

When the bread finally emerged from the oven, we knew it must be what heaven smells like. Oaten, buttery, nutty, and brown-sugary with a heaping helping of Grandma Love, spoken as we would sit and wait for it to cool. Due to our impatience, she would always cut it before it was ready; it would be a little squished but it didn't affect the heavenly taste.

We once had a collision with the bed and the bread. There was only one rule that my brother and I had to obey at Grandma's, and that was no food on her feather bed. I don't know if you have ever smelled feathers that have been in contact with anything moist, but believe me, you don't want to know.