My Grandfather was a farmer. His life was a hundred seventy-five acres of cruel, rocky land in Southwest Texas. He would not have had it any other way.
On a scorching July afternoon in 1955, I stood next to him at a fence row along the south pasture, watching anvil thunderheads form in the West, behind the Santana Mountain Peak, the namesake of his town, Santa Anna.
Little rain had fallen the past few years. The stock tanks were dry, animals were suffering, crops were dead or dying, and the town’s soul was faltering. The prayers on Sunday were plentiful and to the point: Please bring rain.
There was talk of bringing in a rainmaker at the domino parlor, but the town had little money for such a wild idea. The town folk felt as though the good Lord wasn’t listening. A miracle was needed, even if it was a small one.
We had been standing at that fence row for a good hour, Grandfather not flinching or diverting his eyes from those clouds.
I wanted to see what he was seeing, but I couldn’t. He seemed to be taunting those thunderheads to come over that mountain, staring them down, challenging those clouds to bring what they had to his farm.
Looking away from the clouds for a moment, I looked at his weathered face. Just like his land, deep furrows everywhere. It’s as if each wrinkle was his reminder of a furrow that hadn’t produced a crop. He was only sixty, but his face looked decades older.
He glanced down and caught me staring. Embarrassed, I said the first thing that came to mind,
“Grandfather, why are you a farmer?”
Still staring at the clouds, he cleared his throat and said,
“I’ve always been a farmer boy; it’s all I ever knowed. One night, when I was about your age, the good Lord sent a tiny angel to my bed. She lit on the quilt and said Jasper, you’re going to be a farmer, and you will grow food to feed the children and the beast. This will be your life. How can you argue with the Lord boy? So, here I am.”
Until then, we had never had a real conversation, and I liked the kindness in his voice. I wanted to know this man who had been so elusive and indifferent to me.
“Does the good Lord always tell people what they will do?” I asked.
He replied, “It’s what I here’d,” Now you best go tell Granny to get the cellar ready; it’s going to come up a cloud tonight.”
And with that, our first visit was over. Even though it was short, I now felt a closeness to him that hadn’t been there before, and I was eager for the next time.
I came round the barn and saw Granny carrying an armful of quilts and pillows to the storm cellar. She already knew a storm was coming. She always knew.
Grandfather missed supper, unwilling to leave that fence row, afraid those thunderheads would retreat if he did. They didn’t. The first crack of thunder shook the walls and sent me and Granny running for the storm cellar.
Grandfather wouldn’t come with us. He stood at that fence row until the hail stones pounded the cellar door. Only then did he come down, wet and bleeding from the cuts on his scalp. Granny fussed over him for a few minutes, and then he laid down on a cot and fell asleep.
We passed the night in that damp cellar. Granny, sitting, reading her Bible by the light of an oil lantern, Grandfather snoring, and me slumbering between fitful dreams of thunder and lightning. The storm did what it was sent to do.
At dawn, we came out to a sea of water. The fields, flooded, reflected the sunrise like a new jewel. The farm animals rejoiced in unison. Grandfather checked the rain gauge on the fence,
” Seven inches” he yelled.
Granny cried into her cupped hands, and I can’t remember why, but I cried with her.
Around lunchtime, we loaded into the old Ford and drove into town. People lined the sidewalks. Women hugged each other, old farmers patted one another on the back, dogs barked, and children laughed. The town had regained its spirit and hope overnight.
The Biscuit Café was alive, as was the domino parlor and the feed store. Everywhere, the people of Santa Anna rejoiced and gave open thanks for this small miracle.
At the café, Grandfather treated us to a nice chicken lunch. Pastor Bobby and his wife came in and, standing in the middle of the café, offered a prayer of thanks for the rain. Grandfather, not a church-going man, bowed his head and gave a hearty “amen” along with the rest of the patrons.
As we returned to the car, Granny’s old friend Miss Ellis came up to Grandfather, hugged him tight, and in a weepy voice said,
“it’s a miracle Jasper, God gave us a miracle.”
He politely endured her hug for a minute, then we moved on towards home.
That seven-inch rain didn’t end the drought for Santa Anna, but it gave the farms enough relief for the crops to stand tall again and the stock to survive that summer and fall. Grandfather became a church-going man, never missing a Sunday, and his farm produced the best crop in years.
Sixty-seven years later, my wife and I took a day trip back to Santa Anna. I was curious if the town had grown and prospered. It hadn’t. The Biscuit Café, the feed store, the domino parlor, and most of the other shops I remembered were gone. The old church still stood, showing its age but still holding its head high.
We drove out to the old farm. The house, the barn, and the smokehouse are all gone, lost to a fire. The only thing left was the windmill and the cellar. The fields were taken by scrub brush and weeds. Not a furrow survived.
I stood at that old fence line and looked west to the Santana Mountain. Just like that day in 1955, thunderheads were building behind the peak. It was going to “come up a cloud.” I never forgot that conversation with my Grandfather that day, and sadly, I never got to know him better before he passed away a few years later.
I have always believed that the power of prayer can produce miracles, and on that day, standing at that fence line, Grandfather and the Lord struck up a deal. The town got their small miracle, and Grandfather got religion.
Notes From The Cactus Patch 