Copper Pots

I know I am long overdue but what can I say, things must get done and you can't always sit at the computer.  I was cleaning our Florida room the other day, washing the doors, cleaning away the cobwebs and washing the floor, in order to get it ready for bringing in all of mama's tropical plants.   You see my mother had a green thumb and could grow anything.  She had grown every boxwood on our farm from cuttings from the original 2 boxwoods.  People would throughout bushes and mom would bring them home, plant them and by the next year they were beautiful.  So back to the florida room, every year the plants go outside in the spring and back inside in the fall before the first frost.  It is quite an undertaking and I always teased her and called it the jungle when all was done.  One year I even got her a monkey to hang from one of her hibiscus trees.  This year I am doing it alone in the quiet,  thinking of all the wonderful things mom had taught me.  She taught us to work hard so I cleaned the room and the pots and cleared away all the dead from the plants.  I was cleaning her copper buckets which hold plants when I remembered her telling me about carrying water in those buckets.  There was a well in the center of town and mom would carry these buckets on a yoke across her shoulders from town to home.  You can see where the handles have worn the hole in an unusual pattern.  She must have been very strong at a young age.  Then I thank God that we have running water, and realize how blessed we really are.  I also remember her telling me about the copper cake pans that hang in our kitchen. During the war her grandmother and aunt took them out and buried them in the garden so the Germans could not take them for ammunition.  If they saw something that could be used for the soldiers or melted down for bullets they just took it. These would be a few of the things to survive the war.  Who would have thought cleaning some windows and copper pots would fill me with so many emotions and thoughts.  What used to be a chore now became an expression of my love for her and all her hard work.  She always wanted her plants in a particular place and sometimes we would argue about what should go where, boy did I miss that, so I hope she likes where I put everything!. I will post a photo of that cake pan later.  You can see the holes where it is worn away, mama said they were bullet holes but I think it was just worn.  Peace to all, ciao, Maria