The Gap in the Wall
1The stone wall around Linden Park was older than anyone in town. It was waist-high and made of gray stones stacked so carefully that no cement held them together. People sat on it to eat their lunch, and small children walked along its top while holding a grown-up's hand.
2One windy night in April, a large branch from an oak tree crashed onto the wall. In the morning, a gap as wide as a car stood where the stones had been, and a heap of rocks lay in the grass. Town workers set orange cones around the gap.
3Ten-year-old Kofi Mensah saw the cones on his way to school. That afternoon, he told his aunt Ruth about the broken wall. Aunt Ruth was a stonemason, someone who builds and repairs things with stone. "The town called me this morning," she said with a grin. "Want to help me fix it on Saturday?"
4On Saturday, they started early. First, Aunt Ruth had Kofi sort the fallen stones into three piles: big flat ones, medium ones, and small chips. "The big ones go on the bottom," she explained. "The small chips fill the cracks."
5By midmorning, they were setting the big stones along the base. Each stone had to lean slightly inward, toward the middle of the wall. Kofi lifted with his legs, the way his aunt showed him, and pressed on each stone to test it. If a stone wobbled, they tried another one.
6After lunch, the wall began to rise. Kofi tapped small chips into the gaps between stones, and Aunt Ruth placed long stones across the whole wall to tie its two sides together. Finally, they laid wide, flat stones along the top.
7As the sun went down, Kofi climbed onto the wall and sat on the newest stone. It did not move at all. "Someday," Aunt Ruth said, "you can bring your own kids here and tell them you fixed this."