One Cotton Picking Day
The watercolor painting that hung in my hallway for years highlights a child and three adults in a cotton field with long white bags slung over one shoulder. I was a grown woman when I found it in an art gallery while visiting relatives in Mississippi. And from then on, I hung it in a prominent place in our home whether we lived in Florida, Colorado, or Texas. Why? To remind me of a never-to-be forgotten Saturday when I was in the fifth grade in a small town–picking cotton.
World War II was in full force in the 1940s and there was a shortage of cotton pickers to gather cotton necessary for making uniforms and other clothing. So, on this particular Saturday we kids volunteered and boarded buses at the school which transported us to a cotton field on the outskirts of town.
I had never even seen anyone pick cotton. But like the other students, I thought it was a good way to earn some money. But in reality, as the smallest in the class, I was the least likely to make much cash picking it. The boss gave us “how-to” instructions to pick the soft fluffy fiber by grasping the cotton and twisting it out of the boll. So, we set out to our allotted rows, laughing giddily because this might be fun.
Before long as the sun began to bear down, I wiped beads of sweat off my face with my sleeve. Pretty soon my hands were so pricked from the cotton boll hulls, they bled a bit. Soon after nine o’clock hunger pains drove me to gobble up the baked sweet potato mom had packed for my lunch.
When our sacks became too cumbersome to drag, we pulled them to the scales where the bookkeeper weighed and recorded our poundage so he could later tally up our earnings. I kept going back and forth to have my pitiful little bit of cotton weighed.
After we had picked for what seemed like forever, I could barely walk to the bus to ride back to school that late afternoon. For my one cotton picking day I earned fifty cents. Fifty cents, mind you! I didn’t consider it much for my hard work.
At home that night I doctored my scratched and bleeding hands, rubbed my aching muscles, and decided I’d find something less painful to do with my hands when I grew up– like maybe use a typewriter.
I also determined to always maintain a deep appreciation and compassion for those who work with their hands doing tough outdoor jobs—farming, building, logging, climbing utility poles. On and on I thought about various jobs.
I eventually worked two jobs to put myself through college to earn a journalism degree. I even passed a typing test that qualified me to work for the Navy in Washington, D.C area during another war—the Korean conflict. Over the next decades I used my typing skills for magazine and newspaper assignments and once in Germany I even wrote an article on a borrowed hotel typewriter.
Over the years I returned to Mississippi from time to time to visit relatives. One day while there, I saw a giant machine whip through a cotton field in nothing flat, gathering rows of the white fluffy cotton, rolling the loads into big balls and finally dropping them onto the ground for later pickup. This time-saving picker fascinated me.
And it reminded me once again of myself as a skinny fifth grader who probably didn’t even deserve the fifty cents I got paid on that “Cotton Picking Day.”
When my husband retired and we moved to a smaller place in another city, I passed my cotton patch watercolor painting on to my brother for his law office wall. I told him what it signified for me: appreciation for all who work diligently, no matter what their occupation.
Life’s lesson learned: Appreciate and applaud people who are faithful in their job–any job– because by using their skills and experience they often help others of us to enjoy our lives more and/or to accomplish our own destiny. We need each other!
Prayer: Thank You, Lord, for the jobs we have had over the years. Bless all those who labor and hold down jobs so necessary for our society. Help us to appreciate each other and the roles we play in performing our own occupations by doing our best. Amen.
Scriptures: And let the beauty of the LORD our God be upon us, and establish the work of our hands for us; yes, establish the work of our hands. (Psalm 90:17-91:1 NKJV)
He has made His wonderful works to be remembered. (Psalm 111:4 NKJV)
That you also aspire to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you. (1 Thessalonians 4:11: NKJV).
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