A Story

“Aunt Jemima and Her Pancake Toppings”

            “Aunt Jemima, do you think you could make the pancakes sweeter?” questions Aunt Jemima’s six year old nephew named Luke.

            “Yes,” says Matt, Luke’s seven year old brother, “Just add more sugar.”

            “I can not just put three cups of sugar in that would just ruin the pancake,” laughed Aunt Jemima.

            “We tried that before when we were girls,” Amy, Luke’s mother, tells him, “Grandma said that we ruined the pancakes and you have to agree with her.”

            “Clear your places boys and go help your father and older bothers with the animals” Aunt Jemima orders the boys.

            “Listen to your Aunt Jemima, boys. Five boys helping your father rather than three would get things done a lot faster.”  Amy agrees with her younger sister.

            “Yes Ma’am!” yell the boys as they run outside.

            “I’m going to go out and collect some firewood if that is fine with you,” Aunt Jemima tells Amy as she puts her jacket on.

            “While you do that I will do the dishes,” compromises Amy.

            Aunt Jemima walks along the maple trees picking up their dead branches to use as fire wood.  She thinks about Luke’s and Matt’s wish to have sweeter pancakes. Well I could put butter on it but we do not have enough. The little we have must be used sparingly. Jam would be an answer. Then we run into the problem that Luke is allergic to strawberries  and Matt blueberries. We could have pumpkin jam but there is not enough pumpkin to make jam.

            As she is walking and thinking and not quite paying attention she trips over a root.  While falling she grabs a low maple tree branch.

            “Ouch,” Aunt Jemima cries.

            As she stands back up she notices where the branch snapped of there was a liquid substance. She reaches out to touch it and realizes that is sticky. A chipmunk appears and scoops a bit away and begins to lick it off his paw. Alright if chipmunks can eat it maybe it is safe for humans too. Aunt Jemima carefully licks her finger. The sweet sensation fills her. She runs back to the house with the firewood, drops it off at the front door, goes to the shed grabs the bucket and a nail.

Fifteen Years Later

            Aunt Jemima sits down with her sister’s family while they all eat breakfast together. The table is filled with food such as oatmeal, bacon, sausage, grits, eggs, and pancakes with syrup. Ever since that day Aunt Jemima found the tree sap. Amy’s family had gone out and collected the sap to use as syrup for the pancakes. Now twenty two year old Luke and twenty three year old Matt have been selling the syrup using their aunt, Aunt Jemima, as the name. The End.

See even I can write a fable.