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of a calving heifer. It startled me. And then it was gone. You could see it retreating. The energy folding in upon itself and moving backwards, down and in, leaving those crystal-clear eyes as languid, placid as troutless ponds.
    “Hey, John,” I said, shopping wildly for any bargain conversation. “Welcome. You’ll like it here. It’s nice. Town, I mean. Maybe you can come out to the farm sometimes. Wanna?”
    “Corn,” he said so quickly I almost missed it.
    “What?”
    “Corn,” he repeated, still looking at the toe of his right foot, which was now doodling a small, loose circle. “You grow corn. Squash.”
    “Well, no. We grow cows mostly, chickens, a few pigs. My ma, she grows vegetables in the garden.”
    “No corn?”
    “No. Well, yeah, some. A few acres, I mean. For the cows.”
    He looked at me puzzled, and then lowered his head again. I was lost for words. The adults were standing frozen like mannequins around the back stoop and only the faces of my parents were animated.
    Harold looked at the two of us and smiled, patted me firmly on the back and pushed us both towards the house. “You boys head on in there and dig into some of that good food these ladies have brought for this shindig! Joshua, introduce John around to the other kids, will you?”
    “Sure,” I said. “Come on, John. Eats.”
    We threaded our way through the grownups and the kids scattered through them. Most just looked at us, but my mom and dad stepped forward to meet us.
    “Well, well, so this is John Gebhardt. Hello there, John,” my dad said and stretched out a big, worn hand to shake with him.
    “This is my father. His name’s Ezra,” I said. “And this is my ma. Martha. This here’s John Gebhardt.”
    “Hello, John,” my mother said in her quiet way. “John’s a strong name. We’re really happy to have you with us. Welcome.”
    He performed the ritual perfunctorily, hands extended then retracted with the barest of contact with either of my folks. He simply offered a purse-lipped nod and pocketed his hands, shifting from foot to foot, while all of us searched for something more to say.
    “Eats,” he said finally.
    “Yeah. Eats,” I said, grinned at my parents and headed into the house. “Come on, John.”
    “Those were your parents?” he asked as we entered the house.
    “Yeah. Nice, huh?”
    “Yeah,” he said. “Nice.”
    And that was that. John was introduced around to the rest of the kids and he was as tight-lipped and nervous as before. His parents seldom spoke at all, to each other or to anyone, and Harold made the rounds as the proud, gregarious host, as happy and comfortable as small-town shopkeepers generally are when surrounded by those they know, trust and count on. There was a world of difference between him and his son. Harold with the ruddy face of health and optimism, and Ben so sallow and tired looking that you wondered who was really the sick one. Mrs. Gebhardt remained as mousy and retiring as she was on her arrival, merely nodding in agreement through most of the evening and offering little or no return of chatter. We kids played hide-and-seek, and although I noticed that John was particularly adept at disappearing, there was nothing in his manner besides his silence and curt return of questions to mark him as any different from the rest of us.
    The night passed in the flurry of childhood with nothing extraordinary to remember, no alteration to the rhythm of things. I guess the significant moments in life are like that. They come and they go in such random anonymity that their gravity and consequence are lost upon us. They’re masked in simplicity, in the slouching, casual day-in, day-outedness of our lives, so that you greet them in an unfeigned openness. Because they’re simply moments. Yet they lay on the highways and byways of our lives like stones, singing their histories, clamoring for the comfort of our attentions, the nurturing of our remembrances. And when we return to them,