Grandma's Glass...

     ...As I cleaned up the garden area by my kitchen door, I rediscovered the colorful chunks of glass that were part of the decoration in my garden.  Fist-sized glass pieces had been layed around the base of a larger rock to add both color and texture to the garden design.  My Grandma Jesse had always had bright glass chunks scattered around in her gardens.  When she died I asked for the glass pieces from her gardens.  No one else in my immediate family showed an interest in the colored glass, so it was easy for the glass to come to me.  If only the others had know the story as to how Grandma got the glass, they might not have handed the color chunks over as readily.
     Jesse and her siblings were originally from Byesville, Ohio.  In nearby Cambridge, there had been a glass works factory.  At one time or another various people in my family came to work at the glass works.  When I was a little kid Grandma took me and my cousins to visit the factory.  Piled in the factory yard like giant glass montains were the rejects and the mold extrusions of colored glass globs and chunks.  I can remember climbing ont to the mounds of glass looking for some special treasure to take home.  It was like finding piles of diamonds.  Everyone in Grandma's family had their own treasures of colored glass placed around in their gardens for decorations and added color.  Growing up with colored glass in the garden, I assumed that everyone had the same color chunks to brighten up their garden areas.  It always seemed as though something was missing when I encountered other people's gardens that had no glass gems sparkling away in their gardens.  Now I fondly clean off and reagrrange the glass pieces as part of my spring gardening rituals as I remember Jesse and her great glass- finding adventures.  Diamonds in the garden...both the colorful glass, and the adventures with Jesse...