I grabbed two white buckets this evening.  I noticed that the lima beans needed picking, and I had an hour before small group started.  The most time I ever spend out there is about a half an hour.  Tonight was different.  I finished after most of our small group had arrived.

I found the beans, hanging full and plentiful.  I filled both white buckets, and then got the third one.  Each was filled to overflowing.  From our ten pole lima bean plants.  And I sang my “bean-pickin’ song” and thought about my Daddy.  He would have been so proud of the bean patch that Youngest Brother is tending this year.  He would have laughed at my puny row, but if I told him that my ten plants yielded me six bags of beans for our freezer from one picking, he would have said, “Naw!!!  How ’bout that!?!?!  I don’t know what to say ’bout’cha!”  And if I would have told him how Loretta and Donna and Calvin and Kathy and Li’l Emily had helped me to shell those three buckets of beans after small group, the smiley crinkles would have deepened around his eyes and he would have been so pleased with that kind of friendly help and co-operation.

Oh, my Daddy.  I hunt those beans in and around the vines and think about the golden days I let slip by without even thinking of how precious they were and how quickly you would be gone.  I never really thought about life without you and how it would change everything for us — but how, because of how constant you were, everything would have such a familiar, tender timbre to the melody of every day.  I sometimes still cry for all we’ve lost, but more often I find myself smiling at the sweet, good memories and the knowledge that I’ve been given so much.  Heaven really isn’t so far away, is it?

Oh, one more thing.  My “Bean Pickin’ Song?”

It would be this one.

I may not be every mother's dream for her little girl,
And my face may not grace the mind of everyone in the world.
But that's all right, as long as I can have one wish I pray:
When people look inside my life, I want to hear them say,

She's got her father's eyes,
Her father's eyes;
Eyes that find the good in things,
When good is not around;
Eyes that find the source of help,
When help just can't be found;
Eyes full of compassion,
Seeing every pain;
Knowing what you're going through
And feeling it the same.
Just like my father's eyes,
My father's eyes,
My father's eyes,
Just like my father's eyes.

And on that day when we will pay for all the deeds we have done,
Good and bad they'll all be had to see by everyone.
And when you're called to stand and tell just what you saw in me,
More than anything I know, I want your words to be,

She had her father's eyes,
Her father's eyes;
Eyes that found the good in things,
When good was not around;
Eyes that found the source of help,
When help would not be found;
Eyes full of compassion,
Seeing every pain;
Knowing what you're going through,
And feeling it the same.
Just like my father's eyes,
My father's eyes,
My father's eyes,
Just like my father's eyes.
My father's eyes,
My father's eyes,
Just like my father's eyes.