The WalMart Preacherman

     An outing to WalMart is an occasion unto itself. You never know who you'll see, what you'll see, or why you'll see what you do see.  Some things are bizarre, some are absurd, some are puzzling, some are incredible. On any given day, the experience will be as uniquely different as the people who shop there, but it will definitely be an experience! And that, my friends, is why I love to go.
     A few weeks ago on a Friday afternoon, I had to run by to pick up some benadryl, kleenex, coffee, and notebook paper. How could you not a love a place where you can satisfy your need to sniff, wipe, sip, and write all in one stop?
     There was a man playing a saxophone that day on the sidewalk between WalMart and Food Lion. He had two huge speakers mounted on tripods that blasted the notes into the parking lot as shoppers entered and left the store. My first reaction was, "How nice. This must be like Friday Cheers in Richmond.....a little free jazz to kick off the weekend."
     I smiled at him as I dashed into the store, not really paying much attention to the cloth-covered table behind him loaded with brochures.
       "That's a nice touch for Walmart, " I thought as I sauntered through the aisles, humming a few bars of the melody while I shopped.
     When I came out of the store with my bags, however, the music had stopped and the saxophone had disappeared. In it's place stood a hellfire and brimstone preacherman. He was marching up and down the sidewalk, waving a Bible and shouting out a sermon that would have scared most people away from hell. The shoppers heading into Walmart either veered across the parking lot to the far entrance, or smiled and nodded to the preacherman, some even offering up an "Amen, brother" as they walked inside.  I wasn't quite sure what the appropriate response to a discount preacher should be, so I simply headed to my car, threw my bag into the back seat, and drove away.
     I returned again the next week, and he was back in business. This time he had several of his devoted congregants sitting behind him, nodding and offering support as he shouted to the sinners in the parking lot, myself being one of them. I sat in my car with the windows rolled down and listened to his sermon for awhile, to see if I could glean any pearls of wisdom from this WalMart preacher. I couldn't quite figure out why he had chosen this particular spot between the world's largest discount retailer and the king of the grocery chains to proclaim the gospel of Christ. His message did not target our sins of mass consumerism, as I had expected, but focused instead on God's grace in a fallen world. Although his choice of location and mode of delivery were not in my comfort zone,  I appreciated his efforts and sincerely hoped God's grace would be felt by someone, somewhere in the midst of WalMart.
     Today, Sissey and I made a quick stop to pick up a few things we needed  before rushing home to finish up some school projects. After a long day at school, she was tired and using her wheelchair instead of her walker. We were zipping through the aisles at a brisk clip, throwing items into the basket as we crossed them off our shopping list. She had been feeling a little blue lately, missing her best friend in Richmond, missing her dad, missing her home, missing her brother, missing going to the coffee shop with her girlfriends.  I had been trying to think of activities that could keep her occupied when those low moments hovered around the corner, something that would make her feel more connected with her new community, introduce her to some new faces, give her some "fun-time" to break up her rigorous study routine. An outing to WalMart wasn't exactly a trip to Disneyland, but it was an outing none-the-less, and it ate up some free time before she had to hit the books again.
     As we rounded a corner between the frozen food aisle and the cleaning products, we ran headfirst into a man in a wheelchair. It was one of those awkward moments when you don't know who's supposed to step aside to let the other pass, so you kind of bob and weave to see who goes first.
      "Come on around, young lady," he said as he stopped his chair and smiled at Sissey, "I haven't seen you around here before."
       "No," she answered, "I just came down from Richmond in August to go to school here. My name is Mary Lapsley Daly. It's a pleasure to meet you."
        She extended her hand for a friendly shake.
       "Hey," he replied. "I'm Lee Carter. It's a pleasure to meet you too! I grew up here, but I left in 1977."
        "Really? I graduated in 1979. We must have gone to school together," I interjected, telling him my maiden name, the names of my brother and sisters, my parent's names, the year I graduated from college, the color and model of the car I drove, the names of my dogs -- everything short of my social security number. It's how we do things down here to find out exactly how well we are supposed to know someone. I didn't recognize him, but after being away for thirty years, some of us have changed quite a bit.
        "I left town years ago to join the army and served 23 years before coming back," Lee said.
        I asked him if he had been injured during his military service and if that was how he had ended up in a wheelchair.
       "You'd think that if anything was going to happen to me, it would have happened in the 23 years I was in the service. But no, I waited until I retired, then fell out of a pecan tree."
     He laughed as he said it, in the way only someone who has walked through hell and come back alive can do.  He then told Sissey about a support group he had founded after his injury, a group that met on a monthly basis, had grown and expanded to include Rock Hill , and that had a party coming up next Tuesday.
      "Come on and join us. It's a lot of fun. We're having Christmas in November next week, over forty-five people will be there. You'll really get a lot out of it and it'll be a great party!"
       He pulled out a business card with the name of the group and his number on it, told her the time and location of the event and said she didn't need to bring anything with her when she came.
      "Call if you have any questions... I'll be looking for you next Tuesday."
        He smiled, waved goodbye and rolled away.
       We paid for our purchases and started to head for the car. I was pushing the buggy, which was loaded with merchandise, while Sissey pushed her wheelchair out the door. We were both struggling with the buggies, bags, and doors, when suddenly, a young man came up from behind and asked,
       "May I help you take that to the car?"
       My first instinct was to say "No," thinking he could be a thief or a scam artist, intent on robbing us of our purchases and purses as we crossed the dark parking lot, but for some reason, I decided to say,
" Absolutely! That would be a big help!"
      He grabbed the buggy and I grabbed the wheelchair as we headed to the car. He unloaded all the bags into the back for me while I helped Sissey get into her seat and then folded up the wheelchair.
      Before he left, he said, "I was in one of those chairs for six months."
       "You were? What happened?" we both asked.
       "I was in the service and had a little too much fun on one of my military leaves.  Had an accident and was temporarily paralyzed from the waist down. I know what it's like having to use a wheelchair. I sat in one for half a year. Ya'll have a good day, now."
      And with that, he left.
     I had to pause for a moment to ponder what had just happened. We had only come in to pick up some school supplies and a few groceries, but we left with an invitation for Sissey to join a support group, attend a party, and make 45 new friends. I left with a redeeming moment of faith in the goodness of man.  I hadn't expected it or been looking for it, but I knew the grace of God had been in WalMart today.
     And that, my friends, is why I love to go.
           

Liquid Gold

     Ladson Stringfellow left a gunny sack of jerusalem artichokes and a bushel of peppers on the porch last week, signifying it was time to make artichoke relish. Each fall after the first good frost, the chokes are ready to be dug up from the ground and turned into a delicious concoction of vegetables, mustard, spices and vinegar-- a tangy relish that enhances everything from turnip greens to pork roast. I only give a jar of it to very, very, VERY special friends, and they only get one chance to decide if they like it or not.  The jar comes with a disclaimer...you must be 100% honest, on your knees before God honest, about whether you like the relish or not,  because I will not waste this liquid gold on people that politely say "Oh, I just love your artichoke relish" then sneak inside and pour it down the disposal.  If I do not believe your response is sincere or truthful after you have tasted your first bite of relish,  it will be the last pint of pickles you'll ever get; if, however, I sense that your response truthfully and enthusiastically comes from the heart, or rather stomach, and that you will secretly dream of relish  when you lay your tired little head down at night, then I will put you on the  list for Christmases to come.  Once on, you're on for life, but if you get cut, it'll be harder than getting tickets to the Master's to get back on my relish list.
     Mama and I started scrubbing dirt off the artichokes, chopping the peppers, onions, and cabbage, and assembling all the spices yesterday in preparation for today's relish making. We got up early this morning, but took time to have a few cups of coffee and a morning chat before delving into the rest of the recipe.  We finished preparing the artichokes, snipping off the eye buds, roots, and other unnecessary appendages, before giving them a final scrubbing. After chopping up the chokes, peppers, onions, and cabbage, all the veggies had to rest for the remainder of the day in a bath of salt water. Sort of like a day at the spa--not a bad ending for a veggie tale.
      We had  a few hours while the vegetables rested, and it was just enough time for a quick trip to WOW! for a little Christmas shopping. Two wicker all-weather rocking chairs, a coat rack, a birch-bark carved angel, a birdhouse, and some assorted decorations later, it was time to head back home and finish the task at hand.
      As we crossed the railroad tracks and turned onto the street headed for home, Mama noticed a huge flock of buzzards circling an old warehouse beside the train tracks. 
      "Beth, look at all the buzzards. There are about thirty of them flying over that building," Mama pointed out, "I wonder what they are doing."
       Sure enough, the buzzards were circling and dipping and soaring all around the deserted building. They were ominous looking black shadows as they conducted their death march across the sky.
      Jokingly, I answered, "There must be a dead body in that warehouse."
      "Do you think so?" Mama asked. "Then I think we should call the police."
      "Mama, you've got to be kidding.  What are we going to say? 'Excuse me, officer, but there's a flock of buzzards flying by the traintracks. Come quickly, there's been a murder!' They'll be locking US up if we do that."
     I tried not to laugh, realizing she was perfectly serious, but just picturing the officers actually responding to our call, then trying to chase down the buzzards for questioning, was too much.
     Officer: Excuse me, Mr. Buzzard, but did you notice any peculiar behavior around the tracks this evening?
     Buzzard: I see nothing, I know nothing.
     I just kept driving and changed the subject.
     Arriving home, it was time to drain the relish mix, boil the vinegar, sugar, and mustard paste, and combine the final ingredients into a big stainless steel pot on the stove.  After bringing the mixture to one last good, rolling boil, we ladeled the golden relish into pint jars, wiped off the rims,  and quickly sealed them with lids and rings.  The only thing left was to listen for the "ping" of the jars sealing, Mama's favorite part of the whole process.  We finished up this, our third batch, with a total of 14 pints and enough artichokes waiting for one more batch. It was a good days work.
     Now we'll have to wait and see which good little boys and girls made the list for this year......

I Miss Manners

    The captain announced light rain and temperatures of 71 degrees as the plane touched down in Charlotte. Only an hour and fifteen minutes earlier, I had left a cold and windy Chicago, temperatures hovering around 50 degrees,with a  wind factor making them feel more like 40.  I unlatched my seatbelt, jumped into the hurried crowd in the aisle, and opened the overhead storage hatch to retrieve my overpacked suitcase.  It had been a successful shopping expedition, and my carry-on bag was bulging with bargains. It had shifted to the space above the seat behind mine during the flight, and as I struggled at an awkward angle to pull the bag from the bin, the young man who had been seated behind me watched.
     "Do you need to get that bag down?" he asked.
      "Oh yes, thank you, it's really heavy and stuck in there." I replied, thinking that help was on the way.     
      "Then let me change places with you." he said.
       Whoa.....what did he just say? Let me change places with you? Did I hear that correctly? Yes, it was Let me change places with you, not, Let me help you with that. I narrowed my eyes and stared at him for a moment, not quite sure how I wanted to respond.  I considered making him wait while the rest of the plane deboarded as I deliberately and slowly struggled to remove my bag, but I could hear my mother's voice saying "Two wrongs don't make a right."
       I gave up my spot in the aisle so he could hurry off the plane, then continued my struggle to retrieve the bag.
     People are funny creatures, but we used to be funny creatures with manners.  Our behavior is less amusing when the manner element is missing. 
     Daily, I am surprised at how people will practically knock Sissey over to get through a door that I am holding open for her.  Perhaps I just didn't realize how many extremely important people there are in the world, but I have to wonder what  is so important at the mall that they have to practically knock a disabled person down to get there? A 10% discount on panties at Victoria's Secret? Two-for-the-price-of-one shoes at Macy's?
     I miss manners. I miss living in a gentle world, in a society that taught it's children to say "please" and "thank you", where respect for adults was the norm, where compassion for others was more important than individual rights. I don't know when it became unfashionable to have manners, when  "I'm more important than anyone else, so get out of my way" replaced "Can I help you with that?"   or "Let me hold that door for you."
     Every once in a while, I will find someone whose parents cared enough to go through the painstaking process of teaching them manners and respect for others: the student in class who gets Sissey's special chair and adjustable table for her, the teenager who runs ahead of me to get the door for Sissey,  the gentleman in the security line at the airport who steps aside to let Sissey and her walker get by. Those glimpses give me hope that we don't live in a world gone mad.
       Greed and self-importance may be your individual right, but I'll take a compassionate, polite piece of humble pie over that any day, thank you very much!

Hallelujah! The greens are in!

Hallelujah, the greens are in! It's turnip green season in South Carolina, and the crop this year has been more than fine, it's been abundantly fine. Mama made the mistake of letting people in town know that I love turnip greens, and now, bushels and bags and barrels of freshly picked leaves are showing up daily on the front porch. I'm not sure if it's generosity, or just an opportunity for some good souls to unload a morning's worth of work on a willing body. Oh, I do love them, yes I do, but it's a time consuming process in order to get them to the table. It takes a mountain of greens to make a mess. That means for every one serving of greens, you have to cook about a bushel of leaves, which must be washed, and washed, and washed again, then rinsed, and rinsed, and rinsed again. Unlike baptism, where one dunk will do, these earthen greens need a more thorough dipping to wash away the dirt.   All evidence of nature must be abolished, all sins of the earth wiped away, and even after all that, you still  have to strip them down to their barest soul.  The tender "eatin' part" has to be carefully stripped away from the fibrous, tough stalk that runs up the center of each leaf. Finally, they are thrown into a liquid purgatory and slowly boiled while chasing a piece of ham around the pot, until all the bitterness is cooked out of them.  It's a heavenly moment when they are lifted from the stove and served up at the table, especially if you've got a jar of Mama's artichoke relish and some hot cornbread on the side. If you haven't ever eaten a fresh pot of greens, shame on you. I pray that someday you'll be given the chance to experience a little dish of heaven right here on earth.

Gentlemen of the Marsh

    The following will conclude our unit on poetry. There will be a test at the end of the semester.

    Some traits in life are acquired, such as a love of poetry, others are inherited. There is a genetic factor inherent in anyone with a South Carolina heritage that predisposes one to love swamps and marshes, slow moving waters, Spanish moss,  the smell of plough mud. My son, Christopher,  inherited this gene, as did I, and we found it necessary to succumb to the call of the swamp on an annual basis. We would take yearly jaunts to explore our nation's great swamps and backwaters...the Okefenokee Swamp in Georgia, the Florida Everglades, the lowcountry marshes and backwaters of South Carolina. When travelling, we would compete to see who could be the first to spot South Carolina's official state tree, the palmetto, or  to site Spanish moss dripping from a live oak, to spy yellow jessamine crawling up a loblolly pine,  to get a whiff of pungent marsh. That aroma of plough mud, or as I called it, the sweet smell of heaven and the greatest scent on earth, would prompt me to turn off the air conditioner, roll down the windows, and fill my nostrils with the earthy fragrance of marsh mud, a healing aroma.
      Christopher is a true swamp rat, loving the still black waters, the centurian cypress trees and their knobby knees, the alligators waiting for their prey, the stalking heron, the greyman's beard that  brushes your arm as you canoe silently through the swamp. He understood that having a twin sister with a physical disability meant that I had to spend more time helping her, but he accepted this graciously and with an understanding that must come from the secret bonds of twinship. I made a commitment to him, however, that each year he and I would take a swamp trip, just the two of us, with binoculars and cameras, Tilly hats and Tevos, fishing rods and mosquito repellent, for a week of exploring whatever backwater or marsh we could find. We would spend all day searching for Roseate spoonbills, which fly the highest of all birds, or seeking out the rookeries of wood storks, herons and egrets,  the slides of stalking alligators, the towering nests of eagles and osprey. At night, we spent hours driving deep into the bowels of the Everglades, or circling backcountry Georgia roads through the Okeefenokee,  trying to spot the rarely seen panther. I would try my hardest to convince Christopher that with thousands of acres of swamp, it would be almost impossible to catch a glimpse of one of the fewer than one hundred cats left, but he was determined to beat the odds. We are still searching.
     One morning, we got up early to hike around a pond tucked into a marsh deep in the Everglades. It was quiet, the sun just rising, the birds  beginning their morning chorus.  We watched small brown marsh rabbits enjoy a breakfast of tender grass, nibbling quietly on the sweet stalks growing along the edge of the trail. The great blue herons were beginning their dance of parry and thrust, searching for a morning meal of fish or shrimp hidden among the edges of the pond. As we rounded a bend in the path, we encountered a site that was one of nature's rare treats, reserved for the early riser, the dedicated observer. It was a hidden moment in time, a natural routine not usually seen by human eyes. Three racoons were waddling down a path, side by side, like three old men heading to town.  They followed a well-worn trail to the pond's edge, and began their morning rituals of washing up before breakfast. It was a simple act, but stunning in it's symmetry as the trio moved in perfect unison, nodding and bowing to each other as they bathed. We observed them as they completed their morning toiletries, completely oblivious to our presence before  they turned and ambled back down the trail, communicating with each other in the secret language of animals. Upon returning to Richmond, Christopher captured this memory in a poem, which I will share with you  in the hopes that the love of poetry, and nature, will be passed on.

Gentlemen of the Marsh
by Christopher H. Daly, jr.

I ambled slowly through the marsh
     The rising sun gleamed gold.
The heron's cry was shrill and harsh,
     The gator's stare was cold.

When in the reeds I found a path
     I did not know its cause.
Perhaps strange creatures once had passed;
     Then movement made me pause-

Three bandits, masked in black and gray
     Stumbled side by side
As they approached they looked away
     And journeyed to the tide.

Then not concerning me at all
They washed their small black paws
     As if three noble little lords
      Preparing for a ball.

They let each other have his turn-
    Each tried to look his best,
But at his heart each one did yearn
    To shine more than the rest.

And as they washed themselves with glee
   The truth was soon revealed to me:
The mask upon their face was harsh
But they were gentlemen of the marsh.

Longing

     I hope that poetry never disappears from our culture, although I fear it is slowly slipping into oblivion. We have become so fast and furious with the pace of our lives that few people take the time anymore to enjoy the ebb and flow, the rhythm and cadence of poetic verse. I have always had a love affair with poetry, especially the manner in which poets paint pictures with words; they are the true artisans of language. Learning to appreciate poetry is an acquired taste, much like developing an appreciation of fine wines or  good cigars, and it has to be developed with time and patience.
     As children, my grandmother would often read poetry to us, and we especially loved anything by South Carolina's former poet laureate, Archibald Rutledge.  He had grown up hunting and fishing on Hampton Plantation, which was near my grandfather's family home in McClellanville,SC. Rutledge wrote of life in the lowcountry, the people and customs there, and how it had captured his heart. Rutledge's poems were magical to us, because my grandfather would tell us his personal stories about the people and places of which Rutledge wrote: Old Jim Alston, Prince, and the swamps of the Santee delta weren't just names and places-  they were people and paths my grandfather had known well, and he brought them to life for us through Rutledge's words coupled with his memories. My grandfather's heart had been captured by Rutledge's sister, Mary. They were engaged to be married, but she refused to wait for him to return from the war and married another fellow instead. He met my grandmother years later and their marriage was a love poem all it's own.They shared a love of the words of Rutledge, as most native South Carolinians do, and passed it on first to my mother, then to us.  I have taken my children on pilgrimages to Rutledge's ancestral home, I collect first editions of his works or any printed copy I can find, and I will go to my grave reciting the works of Archibald Rutledge.
     My mother made us memorize poems- Robert Burns, Robert Frost, Edgar Allen Poe, Carl Sandburg. The favorite of my father was, and still is, Percy Bysshe Shelley's "Ozymandias." He can recite it in it's entirety, and portions of it have been etched into my mind as well....
                                                                   "I met a traveller from an antique land
                                                                    Who said--Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
                                                                     Stand in the desert....."

     I have tried to carry on these family traditions with my children in a quest to develop their palettes for poetry.  They both have acquired my love of all things Rutledge, and have dabbled in writing some poetry of their own. The following is a little poem Sissey wrote long before we moved down to South Carolina to attend college. She was missing her Gans and Pop, her Carolina kin, and the simple pleasure of being in the company of the ones you love, even if there is nothing else to do.  It gives me a sense of deja vu reading it now, as the longings she wrote about then have all become our reality, even down to the double entendre of being in Carolina while attending Carolina! I hope she will continue her journey into the realms of poetry, savor the experience as fondly as I do, and carry on the poetic torch to the next generation.

LONGING
By Mary Lapsley Daly

I have in my heart a longing,
a place that I long to be-
A place where I find comfort
with friends and family.

There's not a lot to do
but I really just don't care.
I lie on the sofa
while Pop sits in his chair.

Gans is in the kitchen
getting out the china;
Supper's on the table,
and I'm in Carolina.

Capturing Virginia

         
    I get a kick out of going to see Aunt Virginia and Uncle Henry. They have been together so many years she'll begin a sentence, and he'll end it, as they holler back and forth at each other while furiously adjusting their hearing aid dials. They fight like all old married couples do,  arguing over who cut the lights on, who shut the door, who turned off the TV, who answered the telephone, who moved the newspaper, who lost the remote...you know, the important things in life.  It's just an act, though, to keep the world separate from their relationship.  Peek in the back door window before you knock and watch them.  After sixty-five years, they are still sitting side-by-side in matching recliners, shelling butterpeas and chatting quietly at the end of a long day.
   It was a little bit of Irish luck mixed with Yankee curiosity that brought them together.  During World War II, troops in training were sent around the country to learn combat techniques.  The men, divided into Red and Blue armies, would engage in mock combat against each other.  They would stay several months in different areas of the country, the Reds fighting the Blues during the week, but reuniting as comrades for the long weekends.  The young soldiers were then free to roam the towns they had invaded, looking for ways to ward off homesickness and hunger. They longed for home cooked meals and pretty girls, and local familes were more than willing to supply both.
     Henry was a nineteen year old boy who'd never left Wisconsin when he joined the army.  He had grown up with winter snows so deep he had to crawl out of the second floor window, shovel off the roof , then jump down into the snow to shovel his way to the front door. He had never experienced the scorching heat and humidity that welcomed him to the south. When he first came to South Carolina for  manuevers,  he had also never seen a pecan tree. He thought pecans grew on bushes until one day he spotted a grove of trees in front of the old Spence home. His troop had been marching drills up and down the old McCandless Road, which was still just a gravel path at that point, when he saw trees with nuts dangling from the branches.  Curious  to find out about that oddity,  he returned to the house that weekend to ask  the owners about them.
      The Spences were first generation Irish immigrants that had settled on some fertile ground in upstate South Carolina. When he was not farming to feed his brood of twelve children, Mr. Spence worked as a blacksmith. They were an industrious family, as were all families of that generation, and completely self sufficient. They raised what they ate, made what they wore, built what they lived in, and completely took care of themselves.
     Arriving at the house, Henry had spotted Mrs. Spence out by the well, talking into the hole as she raised the bailer and emptied water and trash from the bucket.  Not quite sure what she was doing, he watched from the road's edge, until the head of Mr. Spence popped out  of the hole, and he realized they were cleaning out the well.  He walked up to the house, introduced himself to the Spence's and told them he was interested in learning about their strange trees. They invited the hungry young army private to stay for dinner, promising they would tell him all about the trees while supper was cooking.  What was one more mouth to feed in a household of 14? And what hungry young soldier would refuse? Mr. Spence, being a smart man and the father of eight daughters, was not about to let the handsome young private escape. Henry happily agreed to stay, not realizing his life was about to change forever.
      He settled in by the stove in the kitchen, eager to learn, and was sitting there when Virginia, one of the eight Irish daughters, arrived home. Henry was interested  in the nuts,  but it was the red-headed Irish lass that captured his heart.
      A spark was ignited by that old stove, and they kept it burning for the next 2 years while Henry was shipped overseas for duty.  They wrote each other faithfully while Henry crisscrossed Europe as a medic in the 42nd Infantry Rainbow Division. He called her "Ginger", more for her spicy Irish attitude than her auburn tresses. She was five years his senior, but declared she wanted  a younger man so she could train him right before he got ruined by someone else.
     Returning from war, Henry went straight back to South Carolina to see Ginger. They courted for 7 weeks before it was time for Henry to return home. Mr. Spence, not about to let an opportunity for marriage escape, had insisted that Virginia travel to Wisconsin with Henry.They slipped up to the dells of Wisconsin, met the Denruyter clan,and quietly wed. The blue-bellied Dutch boy had finally captured the wild Irish Rose. 
       Henry and Virginia were never blessed with children of their own. They were each one of 12 children, and I always imagined that God had decided after growing up in such large families, they needed a little break and some quiet years together.Then, as fate would have it, we moved into the house right across the field, and their quiet days were over.  They now had four little children constantly running in and out of their house, running all over their yard, climbing through the barn, climbing up the pecan trees, picking their figs and grapes off the vine, stomping through the vegetable gardens, and begging to spend the night on weekends.  Thankfully, they could always send us back home when they needed a break, but bright and early the next day, we'd be back, coming and going through elementary school, high school, college years, and marriages.
     Now, the next generation has picked up where we left off.  There are eleven grandchildren that beg to go see Aunt Virginia and Uncle Henry every time they come to town, and when they go, they are welcomed  with open arms, warm hearts, and lots of ice cream.  I tell their story not because it has great historical value that will impact the world. I tell it because they were loved, and they will be remembered, and that is what matters.

A Guide to Road Trips for the Mature College Student

     Drop the backpack,  Mama's going to Chicago!!
     Don't get me wrong, I am loving my return to college life, and the time I'm spending with the university kids is priceless, but I am really, really, r e a l l y looking forward to my all adult weekend jaunt to the Windy City. It's time for Mama to take a road trip, the adult kind, fall break from freshman, no kids, no classes, no schedule,no homework.
      I'm flying up to Chicago on Thurday for a little R and R. A quick trip, but time is precious and I'll take what I can get. Unlike the average college student, I have no interest in getting into a car to drive 30 hours to a fraternity party in East Egypt. I'm way past those crazy capers. My son and his fraternity brothers took a  trip like that last semester and it bordered on insane. They left UVA on a Wednesday night, drove to the University of North Carolina, the University of Georgia, Ole Miss, and Vanderbilt in two days.....for the heck of it.  Just to do it. Just because they could.  I'm not talking roaring through town non-stop, either. They actually visited friends along the way, stopped in at a few parties, did a little sight-seeing.  I'm just so thrilled we're paying to send him to college so he can learn that it is probably not a good idea to take a thirty hour road trip on a Wednesday night.
    So, nope, not this old goat. I'm not driving thirty hours to go anywhere. At this stage of the game, it's gotta be fast, comfortable, and have a restroom on board. "I'm leaving on a jet plane."...oh, sorry, I was digressing. Back to Chicago....
       I'm going to stay in an adult hotel, eat in adult restaurants, take in some adult theater (and I do NOT mean porn, get your mind out of the gutter)and do some adult shopping with my adult credit card.  Strolling down the Magnificent Mile, I won't stop at a single Aeropostle, Anthropologie, Banana Republic or J. Crew. I plan to browse through Neiman Marcus and Lord & Taylor to check out all the new adult fall fashions, then zip over to Filene's to see if I can find them for a 70% discount. 
     I am going to sleep late, then have brunch- a real, leisurely, full pot of coffee brunch, not a biscuit from Bojangles while driving down Highway 9. I am going to read a real newspaper, the black and white, printed, hard copy kind, instead of surfing the net to catch the day's headlines. I'll do this, of course, while I'm having my leisurely brunch, enjoying my full pot of coffee, which I will sip slowly, savoring the aroma of freshly roasted beans, hand plucked from trees grown in the sweet Ecuadorian earth.
      That night at the theater, I am going to close my eyes and smile while the strains of "Big Girls Don't Cry" and "Oh What A Night" take me back to my college days. I'll be dreaming about shagging on the boardwalk to the sounds of Franki Valli and the Four Seasons until the curtain comes down on "Jersey Boys,"  then it'll be off to the Redhead Piano Bar for a little late night jazz before bidding good night to that toddling town.
     Oh, I'll be ready to come home again on Sunday and jump right back into the college routine. But until then, Chicago, Chicago, that's my kind of town!

Men...Oh! Pause...

     We're in the mountains for the weekend, it's 38 degrees, the forecast calls for snow flurries tomorrow, and I'm standing out on the deck stripped down to a tee-shirt, dripping like I just walked out of a sauna.  Pop, Gans, and Sissey are all inside, wrapped up in blankets on the couch, huddled before the fireplace, watching Wheel of Fortune while drinking hot chocolate.
     Me? I'm out in the dark staring back in through the fogged up window. Just standing out on the deck, staring up at the billions of stars visible in the clear, autumn sky, desperately trying to lower my internal thermostat.  I watch my breath turn to smoke as it crystallizes in the chilly night air, my body hotter than a stoked furnace, and I'm wondering why only women have to experience some of life's greatest mysteries...pregnancy, nesting syndrome, child birth, empty nest syndrome, PMS,... we survive making babies, having babies, raising  babies, missing babies,  finally thinking we're going to survive it all, when WHAM! The next milestone comes along, and we're back to square one,  furiously fanning away while trying to figure out how to get through life's next big change.
     Meanwhile, the men are just dog-paddling through life,  having little more to deal with than squeaky voices, pimples,  and facial hair. The biggest problem they face through all of life's changes is hair....either excesses where they don't want it, or shortages where they do.  Why don't they have to deal with all the woes of mood swings, hormonal imbalances, swollen body parts, exhaustion, and emotional upheavals that are dealt to the female member of the species? Why, why, why? Why not them? Why not men...Oh, pause....
    What am I thinking....they're MEN. M.E.N...the less defined specimen, two letters short of a woman.
    MEN:  Definition: Man with no woe; incapable of dealing with stress, emotional upheaval, distorted body parts, or any type of syndrome; prone to sports; genetically predisposed to competitive behavior; able to make some vocal sounds but not capable of complex language or speech; more agressive, but less evolved than the superior, more advanced species, Woman.
     
     Men..oh, pause. I'll have to  reflect more on those creatures after I get through this hot flash.
   

We were fairly good girls....

     This week has been busy. Woolly Worm Festival on Saturday, State Fair on Tuesday. It's getting really hard to keep up with the classroom studies with all this extracurricular field work, and  things are starting to fall a little behind. I realize none of the syllabi have "Attend All Festivals and Fairs" listed, but I am a strong advocate of educational field trips, so Sissey and I are not going to miss any opportunity for cerebral stimulation that comes our way. After our disastrous attempt at racing worms, we decided to try our luck at the fair.
      Tuesday was a gorgeous fall day, perfect fair weather, so we headed to Columbia, where Sissey was determined to accomplish two things:

     1. Eat as many food products as humanly possible that have been heavily battered,
         deep-fried, and coated in powdered sugar
     2. Win something really  big.


      I am a strong advocate of becoming completely immersed in whatever activity in which one partakes, for the educational benefit of course, so if Sissey had a goal in mind, it was my parental duty to do whatever possible to help her accomplish her dream. We hit the fair running.
     We had a plan to pace ourselves so there would be no obvious side effects.  That meant we had to start with a healthy lunch, in order to coat the stomach in preparation for the rest of the project.  We had not only a balanced, nutritional meal, but an international one at that: Gyros. We chowed down on some mighty good fair-fare, noting that all the major food groups were covered: dairy ( tzatziki sauce), vegetable (lettuce, tomato, onion) protein (lamb), grains (pita). We were pretty pleased at ourselves for such a healthy start, and earned extra points for the educational benefit of the international, Greek angle.
      But wait! What about the most important food group of the day- Dessert! Not to worry, we rushed to the nearest heart-attack-on-wheels-stand and ordered up a deep-fried Snicker's Bar.  Whew, that was a close call, but we were successful in scarfing down a gooey confection of melted chocolate, nuts, and nougat, dipped in a sweet batter, dripping in trans-fats from partially hydrogenated oils, rolling in a bed of sweet powdered sugar, resting on it's own little stick.
     After checking "Healthy Start" off our list, it was time for a little exercise, so we took a few laps around the Midway to check out the various games and select the vendor that offered the biggest stuffed monkeys on the lot.  I advised Sissey not to attempt any game for which she had not been solicited by the carnies, and for which she had not been promised a prize, any prize, just for playing.  I also had a mental limit on the amount of cash I was willing to forfeit on a stuffed animal that I wouldn't even consider buying in a store. The carnies may have been working us, but at least I had a counter-offensive planned.  She threw a few quarters on a board, trying to win an orange gorilla, but no luck there.  Next she decided to chuck a baseball at a stack of milk bottles, simply because the carney had lured her over with empty promises of giant panda bears and life-size doggies.  Again, and $10.00 later, no luck. I'm not quite sure why she thought she could out-throw the varsity baseball players that had just been duped, but you have to give her credit for optimism.
She tried a few more games, lost a few more dollars, and was starting to give up when we walked by the "Pop-A-Balloon" booth.
     Now I have to give you some background history here.  Sissey has a complex, deeply imbedded, absolute hatred of balloons. She lives in fear that a balloon is going to pop, which will cause her to jump out of her skin, in a way that will hurt anyone sitting or standing in her vicinity. The only balloons she will even get near are the tough-to-pop mylar ones, because she finally realized they simply die a slow, gasping death instead of exploding like the cheaper latex versions. This is not just a phobia-du jour, but a nineteen year, fully developed balloon-a-phobia. I think it began in the NICU when balloons with puppies and kittens were tied to her incubator. Some repressed, trapped, I'm-in-a-box-and-can't-get-out-while-monsters-float-above-me kind of thing.
     However, as we walked past that booth, the carney started to reel her in.
     "Hey!", he called out to Sissey, " this is the easiest game in town. Just pop a balloon, any balloon, only a dollar a dart!"
      She made the mistake of turning her head to listen, making eye contact with him.
     "This is your lucky day," he purred,  "You're already a winner!"
     He waved her over and pointed to the gi-normous monkey, popping out of a banana peel, swinging from the front of the booth. Casually tossing a dart, almost without effort, he demonstrated how easy it was to pop one of the ballons pinned to the wall, telling her over and over that she could win this, win this, win this. She didn't even jump when it popped. Her eyes had started to glaze over, she was having visions of carting that five foot primate proudly through the fair, and it was all over. She was hypnotized.
      "Mom, come on, I think I can do this," she said.
       I stopped, speechless, stunned.
       These were BALLOONS. She hated balloons. It could have taken years of therapy to de-sensitize her to balloons, and yet, the promise of a polyester primate from a mesmerizing carney had cured her in seconds. I plopped a ten dollar bill on the counter and told her to fire away.
     She ended up popping one of them, just one, which netted her a 12 inch green and white chimp. It was not the five foot King Kong she was gunning for, but it was worth every cent just to see her  conquering that latex monster that had chased her for years. It was also much cheaper than the $125/hour fee for therapy.
     The effort had taxed us a little, so it was time for some nutrional stimulation.  Being a health conscious parent, I insisted she eat her vegetables, so it was off to find some fried mushrooms and ranch dressing. Vegetable plus a dairy product, who can complain about that? In addition, I added a freshly squeezed lemonade, in order to avoid scurvy, which is always a danger at the fair.
     It was then time for the hypnotist and his hypno-dog show, so we ran off calories by rushing to the big tent just in time to grab some prime seats.  I am sorry to say we were not selected to go up on stage and become hypnotized, but Sissey had already participated in that routine, and I think it had some impact on my state of consciousness anyway. My reasoning skills became severely affected after watching not one, but two, of the mesmerizing shows.  We had spent an entire day at the fair, and it was time to go, but I insisted on the way out that Sissey could not leave without trying the deep-fried Reese's Cups.  She protested, but I was still in a hypnotic state and determined to complete our deep-fried project, so off I marched to the cart with banners proclaiming "Deep-fried Dough. Deep-fried Snickers, Oreo's, Reese's Cups, and Pepsi." Yes, it said Pepsi. Deep-fried Pepsi. Don't ask me how.
      I wasn't that hypnotized, so we passed on the fried Pepsi, but grabbed a couple of piping hot, protein-packed fried Reese's Cups and almost made it to the exit gate.  We would have made a clean get-away, if it hadn't been for the apple cart.  How can you go to the fair without getting a caramel apple? Excuse me, it is a fruit, it's on the food pyramid, for pete's sake, and we had to cover all our bases.
      Mission accomplished, we waddled back to our car at 9:00 that evening, completely saturated, and exhausted with our efforts. We graciously accepted defeat in the "Win Something Big" category, and adjusted it to read simply "Win Something."  Never completely straying from a healthy food plan, always conscious of the nutrional value of our selections, faithfully adhering to our financial strategy, restraining ourselves when tempted, sticking to our budget, and accurately completing our project, even though somewhat mesmerized....I must say we were fairly good girls at the fair.

Welcome to the Woolly Worm!

     "Welcome to the Woolly Worm!" 
      The banners lined each side of the winding road that headed down to Banner Elk, NC and the annual Woolly Worm Festival. We sat in a long line of traffic on a snowy Saturday morning, trying to be one of the 23,000 people determined to claim the $1000 prize at the annual worm race, a charity event sponsored each October by the Kiwanis Club and the Avery County Chamber of Commerce. According to legend, and with an 80% accuracy rate, the intensity of the winter cold is predicted by the furry bands of black and brown on the Isabella Tiger Moth caterpillar, affectionately known as the woolly worm. More black than brown forecasts a severe winter, and the winning worm has the honor each year of making that prediction based on the stripes he proudly displays on his champion's body.
     Sissey was so confident of winning that she had already spent the prize money, and only needed to show up at the race for the minor technicality of actually racing the winning worm. That was when we had our only stroke of luck for the entire day.  An officer directing traffic saw Sissey's handicap parking placard and motioned us out of the creeping line of cars. We drove past a yellow police banner, onto a side street, and slipped into a parking spot two cars down from the admission gate.  Thank you, Sissey!
      We paid the $5.00 fee, grabbed our tickets, and entered the festival amid flurries of snow. The tent-lined field was covered in straw, which did little to stop the melting snow from creating a mud bowl as we pushed Sissey's wheelchair through the muck. She and Gans headed to the registration line while I ran to the worm corral to select the winning racers.  I searched through the sawdust, bypassing the tightly curled balls of sleeping worms, and found two perky fellows crawling around the corral.  They looked like winners to me, so I invested $2.00, and scooped them up in a pile of sawdust. For an additional $5.00, you could purchase a nicely constructed cage for your woms to live in, but I have been known to be a tightwad, and bypassed the worm condos. I grabbed an empty cellophane wrapper that had contained hot, roasted pecans from a nearby trash can, sprinkled the sawdust into the bottom,  plopped the two worms on top, and  ran back to the registration line, hoping we had not missed the entry time.  Our last bit of luck occurred when Sissey and Gans were able to secure a slot in the last heat of the day, Race #42. Our worms, Clarence and Booger, were in!
     It didn't take long for Sissey to notice the brightly painted cages the other entrants were toting around the festival, proudly displaying their worms nestled comfortably in fluffy piles of sawdust.   She was clinging tightly to the cellophane wrapper containing our worms, which we would occassionally open and blow air into so they didn't suffocate before the race.
     "Mom, why do those worms have cages?" she asked, "and why are our worms in plastic?"
      I had to confess that I refused to invest in the declining worm condo market, realizing there would be no investment return on that venture.
     "So we are racing homeless worms?" she snarled back at me, completely disgusted that I had forraged through the trash dumpster to create their tent city. I knew she would much more appreciate the steaming hot chocolate I planned to purchase after the race, but delayed gratification is a slow lesson to learn.
   Since this was our first venture into worm racing, we watched a few races and some of the waiting entrants in order  to pick up racing tips.  To race a woolly worm, you place the critter on a vertical string attached to a racing wall and encourage him to crawl up. There are 25 worms per heat, and the first fellow to inch up to the top of the string is the winner.  Racers have various techniques: clapping, yelling, snapping fingers, but the one that seemed the most effective was to blow through a straw to gently "puff" the worm up the string.  So off I raced to the nearest food vendor to grab a handful of straws. 
     A couple from Charlotte, NC had wandered over to stand beside us, and the husband struck up a conversation.  I realized he was doing exactly what I had been doing, fishing for information.  I also discovered they were in the same heat as we were, and would be racing their worm on the lane right beside ours.  He casually asked where I had gotten the straws.
      "I'm not telling you that"! I laughed, realizing I had a bargaining tool.
      The race took place on a raised platform, with six metal steps leading up to the track. I had been trying to figure out how I was going to get Sissey, Gans, and the worms up those steps without somebody getting squished in the process.  I had found my answer.
   "OK, I'll make a deal with you," I told the fellow. "I'll show you where I got the straws if you'll help us get up those steps."
      "Deal," he quickly answered, and we rushed off to the food tent to grab the straws.
       When it came time for our race, we lifted Sissey out of her chair and up to the platform, intending to hold her up while she raced the worm. The woolly worm volunteers knew we couldn't race a worm while trying to hold Sissey, so they lifted her wheelchair up onto the platform and helped get her situated before the race. 
      We were ready; unfortunately, our worms were not.  Gans had decided prior to the race that our worms needed to be warmed up, so she had taken them out of the bag and gently puffed and prodded them into action, making them crawl up and down her hand.  I think that had used up all their energy. They refused to uncurl and hop on the string when we placed them in the starting position.  Clarence fell off and landed in a crack on the platform. Gans started hollering, "Help! I've lost my worm!"  while I was struggling to get Booger to latch on.  When I let go of Booger to look for Clarence, he plopped off the string and landed in a ball on the ground. We fished both of them out of the cracks and coaxed them back onto the string.
     No one had told us that worms have a front end and a back end.  I had placed Booger upside down on the string, but didn't notice until he started to crawl in the wrong direction. When I tried to turn him around, he fell off.  Gans had finally managed to get Clarence going, and she was puffing away using Lamaze breathing that got Sissey and me so tickled we knocked Booger off again. It was all downhill from there.  We'd put Booger on the string, he'd plop off. Back on, back off.  By the end of the race, Gans had managed to get Clarence up about one inch, while we had never even gotten Booger to cling to the string. Seems homeless worms don't make the best racers.
     We were laughing so hard by the end of the race that Sissey fell out of her wheelchair and landed in the same spot on the ground that Clarence and Booger, those worthless worms,  had favored.  Every woolly worm festival volunteer in sight rushed to the platform to help plop Sissey back in her chair and haul her down the steps.  Our worms may have been losers, but the volunteers definitely were not!

      We didn't win the race, but we got more than $1000 worth of laughs out of the process. We finished the day with a hot ear of roasted corn, a sugar-topped funnel cake, and three cups of steaming hot chocolate to warm us up on the ride home. We laughed all the way back as we drove down the parkway, the fall foliage in it's full glory, the mountain tops covered in a frozen mist, Booger lost somewhere in the back of the car, and Clarence doing sprints across the dashboard.  

A Mid-term night's dream : an ode for Sissey

Fall break has come and gone

We've made it through eight weeks.

We're halfway there

without despair

as wisdom Sissey seeks.

The knowledge men have known for years
professors do impart.

The scholar learns

as memory  burns

each lesson on her heart.

The choice is yours. The path you claim
must be the one YOU make.
Life won't be fair,
the world won't care,
but TRY for heaven's sake.

So carry on, keep up the race,

with effort you'll prevail
With your degree
you soon will see
the world can't make you fail.

The dream is real, the chance is yours-

it's right there in your hands.
Don't doubt, don't fear-
just perservere
and grab it while you can.

Don't be the one that bows to fear
Face it and go on.
Courageous smiles
will cross those miles
Now go! Be Swift! Dream On!

One problem just leads to another....call the professionals, we need help!

     Sometimes when you think you have found a solution to a problem, actually, you have just created a bigger one.  Such is the case with Mr. Big and the TV.  As you may recall, Biggie lost his TV privileges because he was staying up all night to watch old westerns, and it made him grumpy the next day. I gave him a 40 day treatment plan to cure his addiction, after which he would return to his well-behaved, pampered poodle status and his privileges would be restored.
     As part of the program, he had to come straight up to bed each night when Sissey and I retired for the evening.  He'd been extremely obedient lately, scampering right up without even being called.  Even my dad had noticed, commenting that although he missed having Mr. Big as his "pardner" during the late night western-a-thons, he sure was scooting right off to bed like a good little doggie.
     In the meantime, Pop (as she calls her grandfather) decided that Sissey really needed to have cable installed in her bedroom upstairs.  She had been watching DVD's on her computer, but the sound was scratchy, the selection limited, and the quality poor.  He also secretly knew that he was a TV hog who was not about to share his remote- even with the grandkids, and that she preferred to watch programs with the sound on. He called the cable company on Monday and had a line run up to her room. (Editorial note: I had to wait for my sixteenth birthday just to get a phone installed in my bedroom; asking for a TV was out of the question, cable unheard of, and getting something on a Monday just didn't happen. Ever.)
     But Hallelujah! and clap your hands, she now got over a hundred channels, in color, and with full volume!! That was one happy little camper upstairs, fully aware that grandparents were a wonderful part of God's creation.
      That is where the good intentions started to go bad, and solutions mutated into problems. 
      I knew Pop was only doing what grandparents did best, spoiling the grandkids in ways that made the parent's jaw drop and ask," Where was that fella when I was growing up?", and it sure was working for Sissey. She came by her love of TV in the natural way, through DNA, from both her father and her grandfather, and this was making her college life rock!
     She loved that TV so much that she left it on all night.  I would wake up in the morning and hear it blaring away at full blast, with Sissey giving it some strong competition in the snoring department. I also noticed that Biggie was no longer sleeping in my bed.  He started out each night like a good little doggie, going straight to bed, obediantly finishing out his TV restriction for bad behaviour, giving me furry little night-night kisses before we would fall asleep. But when I woke up, Biggie was gone.
     It didn't take me many nights to figure out I'd been punked. I went straight to Sissey's room this morning and saw a little white fluff sticking out from under her covers. Pulling the blankets back, I found Biggie snoring as hard as Sissey, both exhausted after their late night entertainment. It seems that after I fell asleep,  Biggie had been hopping off the bed, sneaking out of my room, and running over to Sissey's. The two of them were having  movie marathons, all night premieres,  regular cable orgies. I always knew poodles were smart, but this five pound genius had figured out a way to beat the system. He was escaping each evening to feed his addiction, secretly, silently, in the dark of night. How sad, how very, very sad.
     "He's not really breaking his restriction," Sissey informed me, "because we aren't watching westerns." Oh really?  They were into "I Love Lucy" reruns at the moment, so technically, he hadn't fallen off the western wagon, but I wasn't falling for that comedy routine.
      So this morning, I had to haul a comatose nineteen year old and a pooped poodle down the steps, with both of them moaning and groaning, and I'm wondering how in the world did this entire family become so addicted to TV that even the dog can't tear himself away? We're in need of professional help, so I'm taking drastic action and doing the only thing possible: I'm calling Dr. Phil.  Make sure you watch your TV tomorrow...we may be on.

Mr. Big has a problem

     Mr. Big has a problem. He has become addicted to the old westerns my father watches late at night, and now he won't come to bed. He used to always scamper up the steps whenever Sissey and I headed up for the evening, making sure he could claim his territory before anyone else moved in.  Usually, he slept with me, but sometimes he liked to visit Sissey and sleep on her genuine faux mink blanket. I think it reminded him of Sugar Pie, although the genuine faux mink is blonde, and Sugar is platinum.  Anyway,  wherever he decided to settle down for the night, he always came with us and never missed bedtime.
    The first time he missed bedtime, I thought he was just waiting to take one last trip outside to visit his special little bush before turning in for the night. Thinking he would be up as soon as his mission was accomplished, I hopped into bed and quickly drifted off to sleep.  Around 2:00 a.m., Biggie announced his arrival at the bedside with his single, high pitched "woof." I scooped him up, let him spin around three times to get settled, and went back to sleep. 
     Several nights later, it happened again. Biggie didn't come up to bed with us, even when I called for him. After a few "Come on, Biggie" commands hollered down the stairs with no response, I shrugged it off and fell asleep. Sure enough, at 2:00 a.m. he arrived with a  "woof,"  ready to be airlifted into bed.
    It soon became a regular pattern. Night after night, Sissey and I would start up to bed, I'd call Biggie, and he wouldn't come. We'd go on, off to our seperate rooms, and  fall asleep. Around 2:00 a.m., Biggie would arrive and wake me up with his coloratura "woof."  I'd haul him up into bed, he'd do his triple spin, and we'd soon all start snoring.
     The next morning, however, when we had to get up for classes, Mr. Big would not want to get out of bed. I'd have to shake him awake, haul the comatose poodle down the steps, and force him to go outside to complete his toiletries before we left for school. He'd be grumpy, I'd be grumpy, and heaven knows in the morning, Sissey was going to be grumpy.
    This couldn't continue.  The next time he didn't come up for bed, I stomped back down stairs to get him. I was tired of being waked at 2:00 each morning, and was going to put an end to that routine. We had class early the next day, and I needed to get my full allotment of REM sleep.  I wasn't sure what was detaining him each night but was determined it would be the last time it happened.
     First, I looked all over the kitchen, thinking he was secretly raiding the pantry, but Biggie was nowhere in sight. I checked the dining room, the living room, the hall. No Mr. Big. Finally, I headed to the den. He was perched on a pillow on the floor, eyes glued to the television set, in a trance. Beside him was my dad, stretched out in his recliner, eyes glued to the television set, in a trance. The two of them were watching John Wayne duke it out with a drunken cowboy over some stolen guns that were buried in the desert.  Neither one of them even looked up when I entered the room.  They were too busy helping the Duke knock out the bad guys, round up some horses, kiss a few pretty saloon dancers, get into a bar fight, and rescue a family from a burning farmhouse.  Two sets of eyes, one human, one canine, were tracking every move on that screen, not missing a beat.
    No wonder he didn't want to come to bed.  He wasn't about to leave until the last punch was thrown. Besides, who could sleep when all that action was taking place right underneath your bedroom? I gave a little snap of my fingers for him to come, knew he heard me by the way his ears twitched, but he didn't budge.
  "Biggie, come on, it's bedtime."
    I spoke sternly, in my "I mean it" voice, but he didn't even glance up at me.  I couldn't believe he was ignoring me. He was so mesmerized by the action on the big screen that a plate full of liver and pig's ears wouldn't have gotten his attention.  I did manage to get a glare out of my dad, signaling that I was interupting their movie. I was miffed, but left both of them there with the Duke, and stomped back up to bed.  When he arrived at 2:00 a.m., I ignored him. He "woofed" and "arfed" and cried, but I gave him a taste of his own medicine and ignored him. He spent a cold, lonely night on the floor.
      The next night, I didn't even call him to come.  I knew he wasn't budging, and I wasn't even going to try.  I marched right up stairs without so much as a "Goodnight", shut my bedroom door, and went to bed.  He could "woof" all he wanted to at 2:00 a.m., but this cowgirl wasn't going to open that door if it was John Wayne himself out there begging to get in. 
       It's not that I mind Biggie watching westerns, it's just that I mind how it makes him behave the next day.  He's tired, and irritable, and snappish.  He doesn't want to get up after his late night entertainment. He has disrupted his circadian rhythms, his sleep cycle is off, and it is affecting his personality.  It's affecting my personality. It's affecting Sissey's as well. We have morning classes every day of the week.  We do not operate well on a shortened sleep cycle. We can only take naps on Sundays, unlike some people and canines we will not mention by name that get to sleep all day while we are laboring away at college.
     So Biggie is going to lose his TV privileges for a while, until he has been through TV detox and western withdrawals.  It will be hard and painful, but I am committed to helping him get through this. He will cry; he will beg; he will pout; but I am going to be strong for him and keep him away from all cowboys, horses, and pretty saloon girls.  It is for his own good, and one day, he will thank me for it.
      As for the other person we will not mention by name that stays up all night watching westerns and is tired, irritable, and snappish the next morning,  I am going to let my brother, the Psychiatrist, handle that one. He is, after all, the Golden Haired Boy, the only son, the medical doctor, trained in the intricate workings of the inner mind and personality, adept in cognitive therapies of all kinds, master of classical conditioning and trained responses,  and the only one that can get anywhere with some people. I've done all I can do, I can barely train a dog,  and now, I'm going to bed.

To The Fields: the final observation

I will close my field observations with a poem, because that doesn't take as long as writing an essay, and we have to drive back from Richmond to South Carolina today.  Sorry, Sissey, you still have to do the paper. 

Final Field Observation. #4: To the Fields, a recollection of taking my then three year old nephew out to watch Uncle Henry as he plowed the spring garden.


To The Fields

Uncled Henry sat proudly on
the old, green John Deere.
The spiraled disks trailing behind.
We had brought Michael here

to watch him plow. Perhaps
to ride along and lend a hand.
Uncle Henry wouldn't mind.
He lowered the disks into the land

and turned the soil upon itself
into the dark, blue-black rows,
taking Michael out to find
the place the tallest corn would grow.

Field Observations

     For her next English composition, Sissey has to complete a series of field observations, record her findings in a notebook, and compose an essay using these observations. She plans to complete this assignment while on fall break by heading to her favorite coffee shop, Cafe Espresso, and spending several hours observing the actions of clientele as they come, fuel up on pure caffeine, chat for awhile, and then go out into the world pumped up on the only legal over-the-counter narcotic available in our society.After several hours of recording while sipping the best Italian cappuccino in Richmond, she'll be wired enough to knock out the complete assignment in one night!
     I told her I was an expert in field observations, having grown up surrounded by cotton fields, soybean fields, cow fields, garden fields, hay fields, There wasn't a field in town I hadn't observed at some point. It was not quite what she had in mind, but I felt compelled to share my observations with her anyway.
    Field observation #1: The field next door. This was the field that, as I have mentioned before, connected our house to Aunt Virginia and Uncle Henry's. In the spring, it would be covered in buttercups and Queen Anne's lace, which we would gather in bunches to take home to Mama, presenting our wilted treasures to her with the innocent pride only a child can possess.  There were turtles to catch and bunnies to chase, and at night, a horde of lightning bugs that could make a Ball jar glow better than a flashlight.  Never mind the ticks and cockle-burrs you had to battle in the process, it was well worth the effort. In the middle of the field, there was a pine tree that we would try to jump over every time we ran across the field on our way to Aunt Virginia and Uncle Henry's house.  That tree is a towering old fellow now, and it makes me sad to realize my leaping days are over.
     Field observation #2: Cotton Fields.  John Clarke and his family managed the cotton field on the right hand side of our house.  In the spring, it was deeply plowed for planting, and when the spring rains fell, that freshly tilled soil turned to the best black mud you ever saw. We would sneak into the field and stomp around, trying to see who could sink the deepest before Mr. Clarke caught us destroying his rows and chased us out. One spring day, after a particularly heavy rain, the field was in perfect condition for our latest escapade.  Our youngest sister, Ann, was easily manipulated into our schemes, since she would agree to anything just to get to play with the older kids, and that day, we had a plan that needed her cooperation.  We had convinced her that there was nothing Mama would like more than a great big ole chocolate cake, especially if she were that cake. Of course, she enthusiastically agreed, and we proceeded to roll her in the mud, slapping and smearing it all over her from head to toe.  There was not an inch of skin or clothing or hair that was not completely covered. Upon finishing our work, we led her up the steps of the front porch, and told her she had to stand  there, dripping mud while holding a stick on top of her head, which was supposed to be the candle on the cake.  We rang the doorbell, then ran and hid in the bushes to watch as Mama opened the door and Ann sang out "Happy Birthday." Mama was not amused.  It was not Ann that got into trouble that day, as of course, being the "baby" of the family she never did. Mama seemed to always know that Ann was just a pawn in one of our schemes.  Part of our punishment was to not only hose all the mud off of Ann, but to also scrub the entire front porch from one end to the other.  There were no more chocolate cakes after that.
     Field Observation #3: Pet Cemetery.  Although the fields were prime hunting grounds for all those turtles, bunnies, and bugs, we quickly found out that the lifespan of animals in captivity was short.  Also, living near the highway, the family dogs were prone to accidents while chasing the passing cars. Something had to be done with all the corpses, and the obvious solution was to create a cemetery for all of God's deceased creatures, domestic and wild. We gathered stones from the field, cleared a little patch of grass near the edge of the woods, and built the McElwee Family Pet Cemetery for All God's Deceased Creatures.  We rimmed the border of the burial grounds with the stones, saving the biggest and smoothest to be used as monuments, dug a few fresh graves, and opened our final resting place for animals.  It was a serious operation.  Upon the passing of a creature, the grave had to be dug, and a tombstone with the deceased's name had to be chiseled into a rock.  This task was completed with the aid of a hammer and nail. It was hard work carving  "Buddy" or "Rex" into stone, but they all deserved lasting memorials that ensured their brief lives were remembered into perpetuity.   After the final preparations had been made, the funeral had to take place.  We would get the family Bible, gather the mourners together, and march through the field to the cemetery in a solemn procession. One person was always anointed preacher for the service, and the ordained individual would read selected passages from the Bible and close the funeral with an appropriate prayer, sending the deceased into eternity with the blessing of Our Lord and Saviour and the appropriate amount of tears and grief. It was a sad day when we moved into town and had to leave the pet cemetery behind, since Mama had put her foot down and said "No" to our request to move the  corpses with us. May they all rest in peace.
     I will save the rest of my field work for another project. It is time now for Sissey to get to work on hers, and we are off to the coffee shop to observe the more urban side of wildlife.  Humans on caffeine will be as interesting as the wildlife we used to play with, just in a different sort of way. We are all, after all, God's creatures, great and small, interesting in our own unusual ways, worthy of observation, especially while infused with caffeine.
    
         
   

Granny Land

     Life is terminal.  I have probably lived over half of mine, a startling reality that never fully materialized until I started spending every day with the 18-24 year old college crowd. The daily infusion of youth, energy and optimism is wearing me out...I can hardly keep up with the pace of Generation Y.  Being the only student  that needs reading glasses, invests more money in Botox than I-Tunes, and thinks gray hair can pass for blonde streaks puts me in a class all my own. I missed the drop/add date, and now I'm stuck taking Middle Age America 101 all by myself, while the rest of the class is taking University 101.
      Suddenly, I am keenly aware that every single student thinks I reside in Granny Land.  To them, anyone over the age of 25 is a fossil, a dinosaur, practically a mummy.  They have never lived without cell phones, laptops, Skype, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and YouTube.  We don't come from the same planet, much less talk the same language.  I use complete sentences, with punctuation. I like vowels and consonants that form real words.  I use those real words to talk to real live people. They talk to faceless internet personas and speak in text: OMG, AFAIUI, NIGI,U R KDDN. LOL. It takes longer to decode that mess than if they just spelled it all out or, heaven forbid, actually said it.  Evolution will soon see the disapperance of vocal cords, but people will have thumbs the size of watermelons from video games, tweeting, and texting.
     I'm really not that old. At least not in my mind. It's not as if Baskin-Robbins only had two flavors when I was a child. I have always thought I was pretty progressive, up to date, current, cool.  Of course, that is a dead give-away. Anyone who actually thinks they are as hip (do they even use that word anymore?) as the younger set is already stepping into Granny Land.  These kids don't want you in their time zone, much less speaking their language or living on their planet. If you weren't born after 1990, you might as well quit trying.
     They are confused when I walk into class with Sissey. I must be either a teaching assistant or a spy. They can't figure out which, so they treat me politely but with deference.  They tend to ask me questions if the professor is busy, as if anyone over the age of 25 should know the answer to any subject.  If I don't know the answer, I make something up, and say it boldly, and with authority. I'm not about to let them in on a universal secret....that grownups don't really know everything. They'll figure that one out in their own time.
          So I let them watch me with confused stares as I sit in class with my nineteen year old daughter. I'm at the age where it doesn't matter. I can barely see them without my tri-focals, and  if they whisper behind my back, I'm not going to be able to hear them, I don't speak their language, and I really don't care. I'm here because my daughter needs me; it has nothing to do with them, for them, about them, or because of them.  That's another little lesson they just might learn one day down the road....it's really not all about them.
     By the time they learn that lesson, though, they'll probably be my age, living in Granny Land,  trying to understand the current language spoken by the next generation whatever, trying to manage a schedule too busy to cram onto a daily planner, trying to remember if they took their blood pressure pills and high cholesterol medicine, trying to remember if they gave the dogs their heart pills and flea medicine,  just trying to try to manage life. By the time you get done with all that trying, you're too tired to care if someone is talking to you, much less about you, and besides, it just doesn't even matter anymore.
     And I'm saying that boldly, and with authority.

Top Ten Reasons I Love College

Top Ten Reasons I Love College

10.       No Classes on Friday
9.         Only 3 hours of class each day
8.         Monday/Wednesday classes don't start until 11:00!
7.         I get to live back in my hometown
6.         I don't have to do the homework!
5.         Christmas Break (yes, I said Christmas, not Winter)
4.         3 months off in the summer
3.         Spring Break
2.         Long Weekends

AND RIGHT NOW
THE NUMBER ONE REASON
IS........

1.         FALL BREAK!!!!!!!


(this list subject to updates at Christmas)

Auggie the termite

     This just might be a needlepoint day. It's pouring down rain and I am dreading the drive to school. Thank goodness on Monday we have classes all in one building, so Sissey won't have to put her walker in 4-wheel drive to wade through the muck and mud. As soon as we get home, I'm putting on a pot of coffee, hopping on the couch, whipping out the needlepoint, and hunkering down until the sun comes out again. I'm working on the very last cover for my dining room chairs, a project that has a history all it's own, and began with the birth of my twins.
     My children arrived three months early and would be spending several weeks in the NICU before coming home.  The rules of the hospital dictated that parents could not enter the ward until 11 am and had to leave when certain procedures were being performed on their pint sized infants.  In order to stay sane during those dreaded waiting periods , I started a needlepoint project destined to keep my hands and mind busy. It was an ambitious undertaking....petit point covers for my dining room chairs, patterned in intricate flora and fauna. That was 19 years ago, and I'm finally on my last one.
     After several weeks at the Medical College of Virginia, the children  arrived home and grew into happy toddlers. When they turned three, we decided it was time to add dogs to the family mix in order to teach the values of responsibility, compassion, patience, and respect.  Our first dog, Gus, was perfect.
Half-human, brilliant, obedient, protective, and gentle, "Augustus, Prince of Kensington" was loved by everyone who knew him.  When he died from pancreatitis, his death was deeply grieved by our family and friends. We received sympathy cards, flowers, phone calls, visits, and even had memorials given in his memory.  He was the greatest dog that ever walked on earth.
     Then came Auggie. "Augustus, Prince of River Road" was supposed to be the heir apparent to Gus the First.  Looks can be deceiving. Those two poodles couldn't have possibly come from the same gene pool. Gus was fiercely protective of our family. Auggie would personally escort  Jehovah's Witnesses to our front door at 8:00 on a Saturday morning.   Gus slept under Sissey's bed to protect her each night. Auggie would jump right in the middle, all 85 pounds of drooling fur,  completely take over and push her out of bed.  Gus would greet guests with a handshake. Auggie would knock them over and drop a wet tennis ball in their lap. 
       Normal dogs ate shoes. Shoes were easily replaced. Auggie ate furniture. He was an 85 pound termite, gobbling up anything made of wood that he could sink his sharp little fangs into.  Cujo with a wood fetish.  He chewed all the fringe off my oriental rugs.  He ate the legs off my drop leaf table. He chewed the knobs off my dresser. But he almost died the day he ate my dining room chairs. 
     I had gone to the grocery store that morning, leaving three peaceful poodles sleeping in the den. I wasn't gone long, perhaps an hour, just long enough to pick up  the eggs and cream cheese I needed to finish making a cream cheese pound cake. Upon returning, I  unloaded the car, put away the groceries, got the cake in the oven, and walked into the dining room to set the table for supper. That's when I saw my chairs, my beautiful walnut, Chippendale chairs, covered in my cherished needlepoint, gnawed down to stubs. Lying on the rug by the french window in a warm puddle of sunlight was Auggie, panting from his efforts, bits of wood clinging to his muzzle. Grinning. He was looking at me and grinning like he had just retrieved a brace of geese and laid them at my feet, waiting for a "Good dog" response.  I had 19 years invested in this project, and he had ripped through them like a box of Milk Bones. I sank to the floor in stunned silence. Just for a minute. Then rage took over, and I took off after him like the Orkin man.  I chased that dog out the house, through the flower beds, across the field, wielding a broom and screaming like a madman.  I chased him until neither one of us could breathe. He was lucky I collapsed before I got hold of him.  I would not have been responsible for my actions if that had happened. Guilty by reason of insanity would be my only defense.
     He disappeared for awhile after that, tail tucked between his legs, quivering under the bed, too scared to even come out to eat.
     I considered having him defanged, but realized he was just going through a phase, a latent termite phase, that hopefully he would outgrow before he got to my piano. If that ever happened, better have the sympathy cards ready. I didn't believe in second chances, and unlike cats, Auggie did not have nine lives. I cried over the chairs for awhile, then convinced myself that the gnawed-up chairs simply looked antique, with an aged look that would have taken more than 19 years to obtain.  I sanded the teeth marks down, added a little walnut stain and a fabricated story about how they had survived the Revolution and the Civil War.
     I bought a huge box of pig's ears for Auggie and started working on the last of my needlepoint covers. I plan to get that one finished before Sissey graduates from college.

Boy Tests

     Each morning on the way to school, Sissey and I drive past the house I lived in from kindergarten through fifth grade.  It was two miles outside of town, situated between a cotton field and the path to Aunt Virginia and Uncle Henry's house, and was the best place on earth for a pack of kids to grow up in. As we drive by, that old house talks to me, and I have to tell Sissey what it's whispering about my life before I was "Mom."
      I was the middle child in our family of four siblings, at least the middle by my count.  First, there was the perfect older sister that never got into trouble. Next, the golden haired boy who didn't figure into the equation because he was THE BOY and in a category all his own. I came along after that,  and finally, my younger sister who got away with everything because she was the baby.   So technically, I was the middle sister; not perfect, not golden, not the baby, just the middle.
     My brother and I were Chinese twins. Born eleven months apart, I always knew I was the accident. My mother found out she was pregnant with me when she went for her post-partum checkup after delivering the golden haired boy. Suffice it to say, I was not anticipated.
     Planned or not, here I was, in a family of unbalanced genders.  I decided to change that.  I was going to become a boy.  I adored my brother and wanted to be his best friend. Obviously, being just a girl, that could not happen, so we devised a plan the summer I was nine and he was ten to change all that.
     My brother, who was always much smarter than I, came up with a brilliant idea.  He would formulate a series of "Boy Tests" which I would be required to pass.  Upon successfully passing all the tests, I would then be declared an "Official Boy", allowed to play with him in all games, and be his very best friend. 
     To begin with, I cut my hair just like his, and whacked off my eyelashes.  I started dressing just like he did in the official boy summer outfit: cutoff jeans, white tee shirt, tennis shoes.  We were convinced that we could now actually pass for twins. Of course, he was blonde, I was brunette, in addition to the other obvious differences, but we were confident we looked identical.  The test involved walking up and down York Street to see if anyone we passed would say, "Oh, look at those twins." We lived in a small town where people knew when you flushed the toilet. How in the world we thought there would be anyone who didn't know us, much less would think we were twins, was beyond comprehension, but as I said, we were confident it would work.
     The tests became progressively harder. For the next test, he blindfolded me, took me out into the woods,  spun me around a few times to confuse my sense of direction, and left me. I had to wait a specified amount of time before I could remove the blindfold and try to find my way home, all without being eaten by wild dogs or bears or any other monster lurking in the underbrush.
     We had a large, prickly juniper bush in our yard that covered an area the size of a trampoline.  It was a dreadful thing that constantly ate our kickballs, footballs, and any other errant toy. Retrieving them from the clawing, biting branches was a nightmare. For this test, I had to conquer the juniper by taking off my shirt and crawling all the way through that nasty old bush, without turning back or complaining, because everyone knew boys were tough and had to do that kind of stuff in the army. 
     I had successfully completed all my tests, when he presented me with  the killer.  I was deathly afraid of heights, and my brother was well aware of that fact. I had climbed to the top of a lighthouse that summer and gotten stuck, unable to move every time I looked down those winding steps.  After refusing to budge,  my uncle finally climbed up to get me, and held my hands as I bumped all the way down on my bottom.  Fortunately, when you are nine those things don't embarrass you. I just wanted to get down without dying.
      The ultimate challenge was this: I was to climb to the top of a towering  pine tree in our front yard, without stopping, until I reached the very top branch. Once I had reached the highest branch, I was to yell down to Joe, get his approval, and start back down.Going up was not a problem. I scampered up like a little monkey, fearless and confident, until I reached the highest point. I hollered "Made it!", and he hollered back, "OK! Come on down."  I turned around to start down, and knew I was in big trouble.  My head started spinning, my stomach fell to my knees, and I was paralyzed with fear.  I could not have moved down a single branch of that tree if Paul Bunyan were chopping it down.  I stayed up there all morning, with Joe yelling at me to move, until my brother realized I was not coming down.
      He fetched my sisters, and the three siblings tried and tried to talk me down.  No such luck. I wasn't moving one inch.  I had latched onto that top branch and was holding on for dear life.  They had no choice but to go inside and tell our mother what was going on.
     Mama came out, looked up into the tree, and could just barely see me sitting up there swaying in the top branches.  She tried her best to talk me down, bargain with me, bribe me to move, but that was going no where.  She finally decided she was coming up after me.  So here came Mama, climbing that ole pine like it was nothing, until she reached me at the top.  She grabbed my hand, tried to pry it loose, tried to talk me down, but I still wasn't budging. 
     Then, Mama looked down, and uh-oh, we were both in Big Trouble now.  She couldn't move; she was paralyzed with fear.  She had latched on to the branch below me and turned deathly pale. 
           "Someone go call your father," she slowly said between clenched teeth.  We all knew this was not going as planned.
       My older sister ran into the house, and called dad at work.  He was in a meeting, but she told them it was urgent and to please have him pick up the phone.  Explaining the situation, she  begged him to come home quickly and get Mama and Beth out of the pine tree.
    To this day, I do not know what he told them at the office when he left.  As the father of four children, I am sure he did not have to give much of an explanation, just "emergency at home" would do.
He arrived in his suit and tie to find Louise, Joe, and Ann peering anxiously up into the branches of the tree, with Mama and me hanging on for dear life up in the top .
      He climbed that tree in his suit and tie without batting an eye.  I will never forget that.  He got Mama down first, then came back up for me. He talked me down branch by branch, holding my hand, telling me not to look down, until we were firmly planted back on the ground. He then calmly brushed off the pine tags and dust and went back to work.
     I didn't even get into trouble that time. I don't know the reason why. Maybe it was because he was really afraid we both were going to fall out of the tree, maybe it was because he knew how badly I wanted to pass this last boy test.  I spent the rest of the summer in a dirt-caked  blaze of glory, running wild with the boys, an official member of the gang, and having the absolute best time of my life the summer I was a boy.