Sangin' critters

I love summer. I love how the grass feels cool on your feet after the sun goes down, and if you lie down in it, you start to feel a little itchy.

I love the faint blue light that seems to hover on the horizon for a bit until the fireflies wake up.

And here in Tennessee, I love the sound of the crickets and the katydids in the woods at night. If I were a better "earthy" writer, I’d know the sounds of the bird calls, which chime in occasionally, but I don't. Okay, fine, I knew the katydids and the crickets because I googled them as I wrote this.

Thinking about summer nights like this often makes me think of my grandmother; we call her "Nana." When I was little, we’d spend the night at their log house on Tall Pine Road.

I had a powerful imagination, so going to an older house on the densely wooded hills creeping into Unaka Mountain was terrifying. I was the kid who’d turn the lights off in the basement then sprint up the stairs because when the lights go off, the monsters have free reign to attack (I don’t run up the stairs as an adult, but the hairs on my neck can attest to still being scared sometimes).

I remember one specific evening after supper; the mess of feeding three young boys was no match for Nana’s patient toil in the sink and Dee Daw scrubbing the stovetop. With the day’s work done, the beds turned down, and the smells of meatloaf replaced again by the sweet scent of wooden walls, Nana wanted us to go out on the porch. Yes, out into the pitch-black mountain night.

“We’re going to listen to the critters,” Nana would say. I think to her they sang.

My mind conjured images of giant bugs and hungry bears waiting for the unsuspecting humans to come out. Nana was walking us into a death trap. But my older brothers went, so I went (straight for the safety of Nana's lap). And we sat there on the swing and listened to "the critters." Thanks to my Google search, I now know they weren’t giant bugs or hungry bears; they were katydids and crickets.

There’s no adventure or climax to that story; no drama or tension or emotional swings. We did something, and that was it. But I remember it now, 25 years later. There are more intense stories from my life, higher drama, deeper resonance, and more entertaining endings, but I’ve forgotten many of them, and yet, I still vividly hold on to this one.

Maybe it’s because my deepest longings aren’t for the adventures. Maybe the drama gets old rather quickly. Maybe what I want most is the peace I felt on Nana’s lap as she transformed roaring monsters into critters who sing.

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