a chaw of sweet gum

in 2005, i wrote what was my version of "the tribute" to my mama in booklet form called "I Remember Mama*."

a dear friend who read the booklet keeps talking about this one story.  sharing it with you today is like a little slice of summer's past on a cold winter day.

I remember....a chaw of sweet gum (and certainly recall the smell of it, as well). This "chaw" was expertly made by you from mixing the hardened sap with very sticky fresh sap in your mouth until the right consistency was achieved.  The sap was handpicked off a sweet gum tree we'd find in the woods of a park or down a dirt road somewhere and you said we had to find a tree that had some injury to the bark.  I learned to identify the leaves of a sweet gum tree so I'd know where to help you look.  You'd always encourage me to make one (a "chaw") myself but that just never quite worked out, because yours was always the best.  Once the right consistency of the gum was achieved, you'd pass the gum to me to chew.  When my jaws were tired out, which inevitably they'd become, the "chaw" was oft' times passed back to you, or even to a brother or sister.

ever had a chaw of sweet gum?

*title used without permission from an old black 'n white movie, 1948, starring irene dunne as a norwegian mama in san francisco (i highly recommend it!)