Grandma's Temper and the Turkey

                My grandma, Gladys Vivian Rainey Smith, experienced a radical change, following her father’s death, when she made a commitment to Jesus at age 30. Frequently, I heard her relate the incident that she viewed as the “litmus test” proving she had a genuine spiritual encounter amid her grief.

                During the wheat harvest, following her conversion, my grandparents had cut their wheat crop and “bundled” it. An unsaved neighbor had come to help them shock their wheat on Sunday. (My mother explained shocking as setting or stacking the cut ends of the several bundles together so the wheat heads were up and erect.) Grandma disliked laboring in the field on the Lord's Day, but what could she do? In those depression days, neighbors had to help each other. Sunday was the day their friend and neighbor could be there to help them, so she would just have to miss church. 

                Grandpa busily worked in another area of the field. Just as Grandma and their neighbor resumed the back-breaking task of shocking wheat that Sunday morning, Ada Forrest’s flock of turkeys invaded the wheat field. The unwelcome birds swarmed the already shocked wheat, devouring the precious heads of wheat, ruining and wrecking my grandparents' hard work! The unsaved neighbor immediately huffed, “Boy, I wouldn’t let those Forrest turkeys do this to my crop!” 

Ada Sparks Forrest. This photograph
was in my grandmother's photo album.
She was my mother's teacher in the 
early grades.

                Those words turned up the heat of my hardworking grandma’s anger. She couldn’t believe this destruction was occurring to their winter feed! Ada knew what those turkeys of hers could do to a wheat crop. How could she just let them roam into her neighbors' wheat field?

                On the heels of that thought, with all the vengeance of anger propelling her, Grandma grabbed the closest offending turkey, wrung its neck, and threw it into the air with all her might. As soon as the lifeless bird fell to the ground, Grandma's heart stopped as she realized the terrible thing she had done! She had allowed her rage to fuel her temper's explosion, resulting in a serious infraction against her friend, Ada.

                Grandma began stewing inside, recognizing she must let Ada know what she had done. Boy, she knew Ada would be mad. During the Great Depression, every  family in the Big Bend worked from sunup to sundown, in harsh conditions, with back-breaking labor, to put food on the table. As a young Christian, Grandma prayed the best way she knew that night for humility and strength to deal with this self-created catastrophe over Ada’s turkey.

                The next day with a heart full of trepidation and regret, Grandma trudged to Ada’s house. Upon glimpsing Ada, her friend, Grandma blurted out, “I am so sorry I killed one of your turkeys yesterday.”

                With open arms, Ada replied instantly, “I shouldn’t have let those turkeys get over on you.” At that point, Grandma realized she was the recipient of God’s forgiveness and her friend’s, too. Grandma often recalled learning, through that early spiritual crisis, the importance of listening to the quiet impression of the Holy Spirit instead of the voices of those around us, especially those who are not followers of Jesus.

                As a preteen, I remember when Ada and her husband returned to the Bend, my grandparents were exuberant over their visit. In spite of the rampage in the wheat field during the 1930s, the godly resolution of it by Grandma and Ada Forrest forged a friendship that lasted until Ada’s death in 1977.