Interstellar

TWO

"Corn, sure," the old lady says. "But dust. In your ears, your mouth." We move from her to an old man's face, his watery eyes searching through decades for the road marks left behind him.

"Dusts are just everywhere," he says, nodding. "Everywhere."

Donald swept the dust from the farmhouse porch, knowing in the back of his mind that it was pointless, that in a matter of hours it would be covered again. Yet simple by surrendering to it seems even more pointless.

This porch - and the sturdy two-story farmhouse to which it was attached- had sheltered generations. It deserved care. Wind and dust had nearly gnawed through the last coat of white paint, and it wasn't likely to get a new coat anytime soon. And it needed bigger repairs than that, work that he was too old to do and Cooper was too busy to see to.

But he could sweep the porch. That much his aging body was still capable of doing. He could beat back the dust, although each assault was a temporary victory at best.

He straightened up and surveyed his work, then loosened the kerchief that stood between the grime and his lungs as he turned and swung open the farmhouse door.

So much for the porch, he thought. It was time to fix breakfast. He made his way to the kitchen, running his fingers through what little bit of thin hair remained on his balding head, feeling the grit matted in it.

Inside, he went to the table, where bowls lay upside down, covered in a thin film of dust, and turned their clean insides up. Then he turned his attention to the stove.

For Donald, the kitchen was probably the most comforting room in the house. His wife had once stood in front of the sturdy enameled ivory oven and stovetop, and in time his daughter had joined her, at first straining on her tiptoes to stir the pot. Then later, as a strong young women with both feet firmly planted, feeding a family of her own. Both women now gone, but both still here, somehow.

He put the grits on and stirred them as they came to a boil, then turned down the heat so they would simmer, remembering the times when breakfast had been a bit more... varied. Oatmeal, waffles, pancakes. Fruit.

Now, mostly grits. And without a lot of things that made grits worthwhile - the butter, sorghum molasses, bacon for Chrissake. But there wasn't much point in bawling about the things that were gone, was there? And there was plenty good remained. Time was, a bowl of plain grits was more than most people could hope for in a day. Those days were past, too, and he didn't miss them in the slightest.

Count your blessings, old man. He could almost hear the old woman saying. No sense moaning 'bout what you can't have. And by the time the grits were done, counting the better end of his blessings was easy enough - they were all right there in front of him.

There was his grandson Tom, of course. Donald's grandson was always there when food hit the table/ His fifteen-year-old boy seemed to travel on two hollow legs. The boy was always hungry - and so he should be. because he was a hard worker, too. He didn't complain about the lack of diversity in breakfast.

Grits were fine with Tom.

His ten-years-old granddaughter Murph was a bit slower to arrive. Her copper hair was wet, and she still had a towel around her neck from the shower. At times he thought her the spitting image of her mother, but then she would turn in such way, or say a particular thing, and he could see her father there. Like now. She was fiddling with the pieces of something or other as she sat down. Which she oughtn't be.

"Not at the table, Murph, he admonished, without any heat in his voice. But Murph more or less ignored him and looked instead to her father, who had been there all along - before either of his kids - getting his coffee. Cooper was Donald's son-in-law.