My family grew tobacco when I was barely a teenager for a couple years in collaboration with my grandparents…

Long back breaking days, plagues of grasshoppers during growing season, cooling off in a 55 metal drum of water, the smell of he dried leaves in the fall during grading season where you take them off the spears in the photo & grab a handful, taking a leaf wrapping it around the stems of the hand of leaves, & at the end of the leaf part the hand, pulling the end of the wrapping leaf up into the part tightly & up the other side to create what was know a hand (ful) of tobacco, that was then stacked & tied onto squared off circular fashion on the woven baskets that they were then sent to market on. The Earthy smell of the dried leaves, & the adults drinking thermoses of hot coffee in the crisp air are the only fond memories from grading season.

Those are the memories that spring up from the depths with that photo. Some good & many not, but all a part of