Yesterday summer took a tentative step into Northwest Arkansas. It was a warm day! I brewed up a pitcher of iced tea, the staple drink of the South during hot weather. It was easy to get ice cubes from the freezer and I thought about how people used to cool down a long time ago before the days of electricity and ice makers. One of the stories my mother told me that I later put in my book, The Heritage of Etta Bend, was about the spring that provided water for the Latty family at Etta. Remember, the voice telling the story is that of Mom, Susie Latty Day:
“The spring itself, cold and pure, sustained our family through the years of our life at Etta…It bubbled forth from the ground, silently swelled into a still pool and trickled over its rock bed then on down through the pasture as a shallow, sparkling branch. Papa built a little house over the stream at the point where it flowed from the spring. He built the first springhouse of logs and a later one of boards. The springhouse had no floor, just walls, roof and shelves. Mama set bowls of butter and eggs on the shelves. She put crocks of cream and milk on the gravelly bottom. Stepping inside the cool, dark springhouse was like suddenly stepping from the blistering heat of summer into the coolness of autumn.
“Sometimes a hard rain sent the branch on a rampage and the springhouse would be washed away. Casualties of the storm were milk, cream and butter which went floating away on the current. Then Papa would have to gather more boards and nails and rebuild the springhouse.”
So the Latty family’s refrigerator was across the road in a small, dark building without floors. That good spring was known for miles around and was the source of life for the Latty family. Horses and cows drank from the branch as it flowed downhill from the spring and through the pasture. Any hot traveler passing by was welcome to stop for a drink at the spring. I always cringe when I see natural springs polluted. God gave us everything we need to sustain life on this planet. A source of water bubbling or seeping up from the ground is not something we can make, with all our technological know-how. Only an all-wise Creator could do that.
When I pour amber tea into an ice-filled glass, I’m thankful for the convenience of electricity and all its wonders but I sometimes think about those long ago days when a glass of cold buttermilk from the springhouse was just as refreshing. It’s good to remember.
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