Heathersleigh Homecoming by Michael Phillips

emerging adulthood. And her soul responded accordingly. The remarkable change that slowly stole over her was so gradual that Amanda herself scarcely saw it.
    Accompanying this subtle shift in outlook—from being served to wanting to serve—two things began to happen.
    Hands of service always bring lightness to the step and a song to the heart. Amanda found unexpected bursts of joy springing up within her heart. She had, of course, had moments of what she might have called happiness in her life. But not like this. These were sensations she had never felt before. Never had she truly desired to do for others above what she wanted for herself. Without realizing it, such was exactly the effect of the sisters’ kindness. The greatest transformation of human life was occurring within her—the transition out of the dungeon of self into the sunlight of selflessness . It simply made Amanda happy to help, to smile, to lend a hand. Work itself became enjoyable. It filled her with a fatiguing kind of pleasure to have hands and muscles busy, even with chores she once might have looked upon as a drudgery.
    At the same time, she found now one, now another memory arising out of her past. Yet they did not bring with them a flood of confusing emotions such as had stirred within her for the last five or six years, but rather were tinged by the quiet glow of nostalgic fondness. As her past gradually came to life again within Amanda’s memory, its reminders were sadly pleasant, rousing no anger as before, but instead calling forth vague longings she could not define.
    The first morning she joined Sister Marjolaine in the chicken shed gathering eggs, she happened to glance up after a minute or two. Marjolaine was watching her curiously.
    Amanda smiled in puzzlement.
    â€œYou’ve collected eggs before,” said Marjolaine in answer to Amanda’s wrinkled expression. “You handle them like an expert.”
    â€œWhy do you say that?” laughed Amanda.
    â€œI’ve been watching you,” replied the small woman in her characteristic high voice. “You pick each one up gently, then brush or blow away the loose dirt, and then set them gently onto the straw in your basket. And you’re careful they don’t roll into one another. You look like one who has gathered eggs all your life. Where did you learn it?”
    Amanda returned her question with a curious expression of her own spreading over her face.
    â€œI . . . I don’t know. I don’t think I’ve ever . . .”
    Slowly a memory dawned from years before.
    She paused, an egg still clutched between her thumb and two fingers. Amanda’s mind drifted back.
    The image of a child filled her mind. The little girl was eagerly tromping out to a chicken hut alongside a stout woman dressed in a blue-and-white frock.
    â€œCan I get the eggs? Let me get the eggs, Sarah!” the little girl was saying in an importune voice that rang out in that debatable region between question and command.
    â€œEggs are easily broken, Miss Amanda,” replied Sarah Minsterly.
    â€œI’ve watched—I can do it.”
    â€œThen I shall show you again,” said the lady as they entered the hut. “If you are careful, you may place the eggs in the basket. Now watch very closely, Miss Amanda. You must pick them up one at a time, with very gentle fingers,” Sarah went on, taking out a single brown egg, carefully brushing it off and blowing upon it. “When itis clean, lay it gently inside the basket.—There, you see. Just like that. Each one . . . very slowly. Now it is your turn, Miss Amanda.”
    Amanda smiled and glanced again at Sister Marjolaine, who was so tiny that beside Amanda she almost appeared as a child herself.
    â€œYes . . . now that you remind me,” she said, “I have done this before. But it was many years ago, when I was a girl.”
    â€œI was sure of it. I could