Une Envie de Sel

The other day we heard the over-loud, echo-y sound of a cricket trapped inside the house...which always makes me a little sad. A few hours later, Q came running into my studio pointing to the hall and wrinkling her nose. The cricket had showed itself.

When I was just a little older than Q, and my parents and I were traveling through Spain in our old khaki Land Rover, there was a man with a cart by the side of the road, selling crickets in tiny carved wooden cages, with bars no bigger than toothpicks. My parents bought me one, and we listened to it sing for the first day and night. Then we opened the cage and released it in a fragrant russet field by the side of the road.

So Q and I caught the cricket in a cup, and I set it in a bouquet in our mudroom for the afternoon, so she could watch it.
When evening drew close, and the other crickets' voices rose in chorus amid the gathering dusk, we took him (her?) outside and set him in a rosebush among his friends.






Is there anything more magical in this world than childhood? Well, motherhood, I suppose!