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I’ve talked about how my parents split up when I was around 4. And I’ve talked about how my younger brother and I lived mainly with my grandparents (on Dad’s side) for a couple of years after that. But I’ve never mentioned how my Grandmother forced me to work all hours of the day and night. And how she made me snap green beans till my fingers bled.

But that’s only because that never happened.

Well, I DID snap green beans.

But it was only when the beans in my grandparents garden were ripe enough to pick and snap. And it wasn’t all hours of the day and night. Just a little while until a large bowl full of beans were all snapped. But here’s the kicker…

I liked it.

If you’ve never snapped fresh, ripe green beans, you don’t know what you’re missing. That snappy little “snap!” sound they make after they’re briskly washed under cold water…Oh yeah.

My mom (who’s not doing well right now) recently told me a story about me helping her snap green beans, too. She said we snapped ’em so long one day that I must’ve dreamed about ’em. Because, in my sleep, I was telling my brother he wasn’t doing it right.

Yeah, that sounds like me alright.

See, you can’t just break ’em in half, toss ’em in a bowl, and you’re done. No, not hardly. It’s important to get a quick overview of the bean pod. A few, quick, but precise and mindful calculations. If it’s really short, maybe then you can snap it in half. But a lot of the bean pods are up to four inches long. Some even longer. And then you gotta snap one pod into three or four pieces. Or more.

It’s not just a science. It’s an art.

But you might never snap any green beans, so I’ll get to the real reason I’m sharing this with you.

What I remember, distinctly, about my snappy time with Grandmother, on her front porch, was her “old person’s” advice. That’s how I saw it back then. But I loved her. And I listened.

And I’ll never forget how she said, with a large bowl of beans sitting on her handmade apron in her lap, “You should always hug your loved ones goodbye when they leave. And tell ’em you love ’em. Because, before you know it, they won’t be around to hug anymore.”

Of course, I remember thinking, “Why do old people talk like that?”

But, wouldn’t you know it? Her words came to pass. And way, way faster than I could have imagined.

Now, I’m actually older than Grandmother was when she told me those things. And almost all the adults I knew then are gone. In some cases, long gone.

So, what’s the moral of this story?

Time sure flies. Everybody dies.
Nobody ever cheats death.
So…
Snap green beans, and yes, by all means,
Trust God before your last breath.

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