What do you remember about being eleven? Summer has come to Appalachia, and I found myself in the company of these girls as we battled mosquitoes and found lady bugs in high grass below round topped mountains. Eleven. I see it as the steepest cusp. Some may bestow that to twelve, but no, it belongs to eleven.
When I was eleven, we were required to become one school instead of two. In an unlikely pairing, Vikings and Road Runners were sent into the Swarm and some how Yellow Jackets emerged at the end. I was at the graduate level of Sunday School...ever so close to being part of the Youth Group. I learned to love the radio, and I agreed that Mickey was so fine he blew my mind. But, in the same month that I became eleven, I heard "Billie Jean," for the first time, and the innocence of eleven let me love it just for the sake of sound without needing to understand. I loved Bo Duke and knew my mom would never let me dress like Daisy. And, at eleven, the world came to Knoxville, and we had a fair. My dad also got stuck in the traffic at Red Gate that summer after Alabama (not the Tide) came to Union County. Hate you missed that.
And now, many years after eleven, I look at these girls. Just the land where they're sitting represents so much more than a pretty, trendy back drop. To see eleven with forty-five year old eyes is a favor from God. These girls giggled, leaped, and spun for what seemed like mere seconds. Elbows and knees and wrists were all over the place as they tried to select how to pose them. The two sisters, twins in fact, would drift among their guests and always find their way back to each other as Momma delicately stepped back to take it all in because moments like this are fleeting like a blink from a lightnin' bug.
They were gracious, kind, and polite at all times. Their perfectly southern white tunics and tops not once showed evidence of dirt because by eleven you have that skill mastered. At eleven now, there are selfies to be taken. What's it like when you don't see the photo as it's being taken? Peculiar? Perhaps? We figured it out, and still I found myself wanting to beg them to love every second of eleven. I knew each one probably had a favorite doll at home that would soon rest easy because dolls and twelve sometimes aren't pals. I wondered if they were as confused by mascara as I still am, and I wondered if they believed how beautiful and smart they are. Without a doubt, I knew each knew she was loved far beyond the stars and back.
We hiked our way through a place created with, I suspect, at least a dash of ambitious children in mind. We didn't cover a lot of acreage, but every phase could have been a chapter. One spot already offering fruit, one preparing to do the same, another waiting for guests, and the final housing generations of farmers' sweat in the soil. It seemed like one complete circle mirrored life at its youngest and oldest, but I don't know if that was the intention. The girls stood before me holding hands as they navigated a hill side. What looked like a modern scene from Little House actually represented the years they have ahead. It's going to take them a minute to reach that sunset, but if they hold on tight, they'll get there. And with each step, they monitored the other, because at eleven, you start to do that at a heightened state for your friends. They were curious yet cautious around each corner. They preciously waited for the tiniest of the tribe to catch up.
I wondered about their Momma's day. Had she cooked, crafted, entertained, and hosted to the point of exhaustion? No. I would have been the one to expire had I been charged with such a challenge. She was yet to break a sweat. In the same way she always has, she gracefully soaked in every image, even the ones I didn't catch. I know she was thinking ahead. I know she was wondering about how this would be at thirteen, then sixteen, then eighteen, and then twenty-one. I hope to be there for those milestones, too.
Thankfully, there and here, I'm managing to hold back much advice to offer to an eleven year old. If I were them, I'd focus on the unicorns today and anxiously await the arrival of more tomorrow. This is exactly what eleven looks like.
