The Crab Chronicles

A Letter to My 19 Year Old Self

Above, me and my parents and brother in Athens at a family reunion in 1981

Now that I have a 19 year old son who rarely listens to anything I say, I decided to wish/hope/pray for time travel to whisk me back to 1981 when I was 19 years old and talk some sense into my youthful stupid head.

The summer I turned 19 I worked at the bank -- in the back, counting and filing checks all day -- and I saw firsthand what it looked like to be stuck in a dead-end job for years and years with no way out because of a lack of education. Even then, a college degree mattered. I was willing to get that degree but I still wasn't fully connecting the dots.

Dear Dee:

Since you are 19 I know you think you know everything and nobody can tell you anything but I am going to try. This is your 53 year old self talking. I've been through a lot of crap and you SHOULD LISTEN TO ME.

First of all, don't major in Drama. Yes, doing plays is fun, but you are never going to get cast as the ingenue because you're lumpy and not pretty enough. You won't get cast in character parts because you look too young. You can't really be a playwright yet because you have nothing to write about. You're never going to be a techie either. So just set aside that stuff and concentrate on what you're going to be good at one day: writing and editing.

Get yourself into the UGA journalism school.

Yes, I know they make journalism majors take some weird core classes like basic accounting and economics, but tell your dad to pry open his wallet and pay for a tutor, so you can get through those classes and get a journalism degree. You will not regret it. If you can't deal with that, major in marketing, so you can get into advertising. Being funny will really help there, and you are funny.

These decisions will affect your life for years to come.

When the girls in the dorm invite you to pig out, say NO. Eat a salad, not Skittles or M&M's. The eating habits you develop now will be habits that will help you in the long run.

DELAYED GRATIFICATION -- learn it, live it.

Go ahead and get involved in campus activities NOW. Don't wait until next year, or your senior year. Go ahead and join the literary society and the university union, and get OUT. Athens is a fun town. You are not having enough fun. You are too shy. Get over it. You shouldn't spend your college career watching TV and doing homework and eating pizza.

Quit being so judgmental. You are. Quietly. Not all of the students who are really different from you - like the ones with blue hair - are wackos. Some of them are just different and creative. They have more courage than you do. Get to know some of them. Also, don't reject the sorority girls automatically either. Some of them are worth knowing too. Be friendly and approachable to every kind of kid on campus. Don't be aloof.

Get out at least once a month and go to the 40 Watt or some other club and DANCE. These are the dancing years.

Don't drink so much beer. Bad for the waistline and yucky hangovers are not worth it. Ditto for Diet Coke. Not healthy.

Budget your time so you can study and make good grades AND have fun.

I know you don't believe it but at 19 you CAN have the best body of your life. Get out and play sports. Swim more. Play more tennis. Get outside. Enjoy your body and appreciate it NOW - because it's all downhill after 25. By 30 you will start having little aches and pains. By 40, unless you are a workout fanatic, it will NOT BE FUN to have your body. Prevent that now. 

Do not hang out with anyone who does any kind of drug. I know you don't do drugs, you just like to watch others act stupid. Just avoid folks who are using. Too hazardous.

Write every day, about everything. Start the habit now, even though you don't have a computer. Observe.

Go out and LIVE. Fall in love. Play. Write. Learn. Don't wait for your life to start. It has already started.

Dee

  me in 1985, after college

Easter Memories

My favorite memories of Easter are not egg hunts or goodies in the Easter basket. My favorite memories are of being together with family and having a relaxing and fun day, after church of course.

One year we had an egg hunt in our yard and our dog found and ate most of the candy eggs...

This was made in Augusta, about 1968. Mom liked to spray things with gold paint.

We have a few photos of our entire family made on Easter Sundays, when I was small, but none are great. Kids who are forced to pose for photos instead of gobbling down Easter candy and usually scowling, is all I can say about that...

I was looking through my Easter photos of my kids and I decided not to post any here, because they make me sad. I had a long conversation with my daughter last week and it was not good. It breaks my heart that she is with a "fiance" that I know is utterly wrong for her, and she cannot see that. After our conversation I cried most of the rest of the day. I pray for her every day, for her to make good choices in her life.

I have a friend coming for lunch today so I need to get moving and finish cooking. I made deviled eggs and green bean salad yesterday, and I am going to make a quiche...

Happy Easter y'all!

 

Life on the Farm

We didn't have storms last night but we had a lot of heavy wind and some blowing rain late in the afternoon - just enough to knock out the power.Fortunately, it happened about 7:30 when we typically eat dinner, and I had heated up the chili on the stove and Mother was in the breakfast nook, seated and ready to eat. Also, it was still light outside although that was fading fast.

Michael was out with friends. He is rarely home for dinner nowadays.

I was so glad the chili was hot. I got us settled in and we ate dinner quietly, the back door open to let in some air.

After I ate, I called Georgia Power and the automated response thing said we would have power back by 10 p.m. I like that we have the ability to be reassured about that. Years ago, there was no such thing.

When the power goes out here at my house I always feel nostalgia. The darkness is more inky black. The sounds of nature drift in from the back yard. There is no hum of the refrigerator or sound of the icemaker or dishwasher. The quiet is quieter.

After dinner we lit some candles in Mom's room and I got her settled with a book.

Years ago I bought each one of us miner's lights, and stashed them around the house. They are a godsend.

You put it on your forehead and you have your hands free. I think I found them at Home Depot, on sale. I highly recommend them for everyone.

I came upstairs to my room and read a book for a while, then went back downstairs to chat with Mother about 9:30 while we waited for the power to come back on.

 

Mom is a great storyteller. She told me about the time her family lived for about a year in a home with no electricity or running water. It was during World War II and my grandfather had been offered a job managing a farm in Moore, South Carolina. One of the perks was a nice new little house for the family. It had plumbing and gas lines and electric wiring. The problem was that because of the war, none of it was usable, for many months. The family was on a waiting list for getting all those services turned on.

My grandfather was born in 1896 and grew up on a farm, so he knew how to function without electricity or water.

He put the gas stove in a corner of the kitchen and put in a wood-burning stove. [Note: my parents put a wood burning stove on the back porch of their last house in Knoxville, and enclosed the porch. I tried to cook on it once. What a nightmare...]

Out in the back yard there was a deep well, enclosed in a pump house. The water had to be pumped with a big metal lever. Papaw had the water tested frequently by the county agent to make sure it was clean and drinkable. I asked Mom how they washed dishes, and she said someone had to get a bucket of well water and heat it on the stove. The water came out of the well icy cold, which was great in the hot weather but not in the winter, obviously.

After a time Papaw put a second story on the pump house, and big containers on the roof to catch rain water. After it rained, he and the boys would go out there and take baths. (Mother didn't do that because she was a little girl and it was considered indecent.)

The guys used an outhouse. Mom and Mamaw used a chamber pot in the bathroom, at least at night. In the daytime she and Mamaw often walked outside to the outhouse, which was out behind the tractor house. Papaw never put an outhouse close to the house. He kept lime in the outhouse, and it was moved every few months. My grandfather was very particular about germs and cleanliness. [Note: my Thompson grandmother, Cordelia, also lived in a house with an outhouse - they didn't get a bathroom until WWII. When the outhouse was moved, she would plant bushes and flowers where the outhouse had been, and her flowers always won prizes at the county fair. Manure is great fertilizer, no matter where it's from...]

Anyway, back to the farm in Moore... for bathing, they usually put a basin of water in the bathroom and took sponge baths. Obviously the pump house roof wouldn't work if there hadn't been any rain for a while or if it was cold.

After a time, Papaw rigged up a pipe to go from the pump house into the kitchen sink, but there still had to be someone out in the pump house, pumping. They would put a pan in the sink, often, and catch water to wash the dishes.

Mother (third grade) did the cooking (or Bobby did it) after Mamaw hurt her knee from stepping into a hole. Mamaw couldn't walk for a long time, and then only to the bathroom. She tore ligaments in her knee. Papaw had to carry her to the car to go to Spartanburg, to the doctor. The doctor just said he couldn't do anything but give her pain pills, and she'd just have to stay off of it. It was very painful.

Despite all the hardships, Mom said some of her happiest childhood memories were of the family after dinner at night sitting at the dining room table, three big oil lamps in the middle of the table providing enough light for everyone. She and her brothers would do their homework, and her parents would read or sew, or whatever.

Finally, after months, they were able to get electricity and water turned on.

After that, they moved to Myrtle Beach and Papaw managed Trask farms. Myrtle Beach was a small town at that time, not the touristy place it is now.

My grandfather always felt his family would be safer during the war if they were on a farm, away from big cities which might be bombed. He also knew he could keep the family fed if they were on a farm. He put his baseball days behind him and worked very hard, managing big farms and doing a lot of the work himself, too, because he felt it was best for the family.

above, Papaw and Mom and Bobby and Don in Myrtle Beach, a few years after Moore

Amazing Chicken Salad

My son likes cold salads. This is a very Russian thing, where cold vegetable salads are an integral part of Russian diets.

In America we are accustomed now to being able to buy fresh vegetables year round. Of course, in January they have likely been shipped from California, but they are on the shelves. Russia, despite being a vast country, has traditionally not been able to get fresh veggies so easily in winter - unless you are very wealthy and have access to pricey imports.

Now, to be fair, I last visited Russia in 2004 so maybe things have changed radically and normal folks can get fresh veggies year round. I don't know.

I do know the Russian tradition has been to can or pickle veggies in summer, to see folks through the long winters. Nothing wrong with that. Both my kids were happy to eat vegetables when I adopted them, because fresh veggies were considered a big treat. They would pick onions and tomatoes from the garden and just eat them raw, right then and there. Of course, I was delighted by that, after admonishing them to rinse the veggies off with a hose, at least.

So a few years ago my friend LeeAnn gave us some chicken salad she had made. I am not a big fan of cold salads, but Michael LOVED it. He inhaled it.I didn't even get to try a bite. I put it in the fridge, and the next time I checked it was GONE.

LeeAnn puts chopped celery, chopped pecans, and grapes, in her chicken salad, so it's fairly healthy.

Last week I went to Honeybaked Ham for my lb. of turkey I like to keep in the fridge for a snack. Great low-carb high-protein snack, smoked turkey. They had some small containers of chicken salad in the cooler, and the salad looked like it had grapes in it, which is how LeeAnn makes hers. 

I got home and looked at it and that tiny container was $8! Michael ate it all in less than 24 hours.

I decided yesterday to just find LeeAnn's recipe and make my own chicken salad, to keep in the fridge for Mike. He is never home for dinner these days, always out with friends, but he often comes in at midnight hungry. I'd rather he eat chicken salad than just a granola bar.

So I found the original email from LeeAnn where I had asked how she made her chicken salad.

"I just salt/pepper/boil boneless chicken breasts, shred in food processor, add mayo, pecan bits, a little bit of diced red onions and celery, and a pinch of pepper and salt and a bigger pinch of sugar.  At the end I add celery salt until I like the taste.Then I add the grapes last so they don't get smooshed."

I used rotisserie chicken because it's easier to pull chicken off the bone - and Lola was happy to eat the skin and gristley bits, of course. I went right by LeeAnn's instructions, but I also added some squeezes of fresh lemon juice to the chicken, and some onion powder and Lawrey's seasoned salt. I made Mom taste it. She said it was good. (I couldn't taste-test it because my stomach won't tolerate raw onion, no matter how finely chopped.) The grapes were rather large and I asked Mom if I should halve them. NO. Of course, Michael said I should have chopped the grapes. He ate a big fat sandwich when he got home, though, so it was a win-win situation for me.

I used up a good bit of mayonnaise, and Lola had a great time using her incredibly long tongue to lick the jar...

Gardening and More

It could not possibly be more beautiful outside, and I am itching to get out there. The other day I planted seeds of zucchini, cherry tomatoes, Brandywine tomatoes, and basil, in paper cups. I have some green beans seeds I may just plant in the soil this afternoon. They aren't hard to get to grow. I ordered seeds from Amazon of butter lettuce and brussels sprouts.

I need to carefully plan a trip to Pike's to get my gardening mojo really going. I started a list on my phone of everything I need.

I have been composting most of the winter, and much to my amazement, I have some really healthy looking volunteer plants that have come up, that I cannot identify. Can you? If so, dorp me a comment. I took this photo a few days ago and these are already about 6 inches high!

Now, these are the veggie scraps that get thrown out a lot around here: asparagus, onion [already seeing those come up], garlic [seeing those too, yay!], brussels sprouts, tomatoes, bananas, potato peels, lemon peels...

Of course, these little plants may not be any of those.

Not a lot going on around here, but let's see...

Lola has been having a lot of peeing issues - like, lots of accidents in the house, excessive water drinking, etc. We finally got her to the vet yesterday and he diagnosed her with a likely bladder infection and gave us some antibiotics for her. Huge pills. Flavored. She gobbles them down. With our last babydog, Coco, we had a horrible time trying to give her medication. She was so tiny [like, 8 lbs.] and her mouth was tiny, and she wouldn't take pills, not even bathed in butter or peanut butter. It was a nightmare. However, 60 lb. Lola is a breeze. Hallelujah!

I say "finally got her to the vet" because we were all set to take her the other day and we postponed the trip because Michael lost his wallet and was in a complete tizzy. He eventually found it, and learned a lesson. That's all I can really say about THAT.

I am reading a terrific book by an author I really like, Susan Meissner, called Stars Over Sunset Boulevard. We recently read another book of hers, Secrets of a Charmed Life, and it was excellent. Mother read the Sunset Boulevard book first, which often happens. She pointed out something we both thought peculiar. One of the main characters is from Alabama. She fixes what's supposedly a typical southern meal, and there are two issues there. One, she fixes succotash. I've never eaten succotash and I've lived in the South my entire life. Two, she shows an Alabama girl eating fried chicken with a knife and fork. Huh?!? Dear Susan Meissner, please don't write Southern characters that do such non-southern things! I've never eaten fried chicken with a knife and fork. Yikes.

I have become an expert maker of pimento cheese, something my mother used to make but I never liked. I like it now. I don't like pimentos, however. It's a texture thing. Ugh. I have learned to drain the pimentos and liquefy them with a hand blender, along with a couple of cloves or garlic and some tabasco. Yes, our pimento cheese has a bit of a kick, y'all. Michael, who spends most evenings out with his friends and is rarely home for dinner these days, will eat my pimento cheese late at night when he comes in. Hallelujah! I can leave his supper on a plate wrapped in foil and he won't nuke it. He wants food that literally you don't have to fix at all - easy food. Hoisting some pimento cheese onto a piece of bread fits the bill. He also likes chicken salad, but I have not mastered that, yet. [My friend LeeAnn gave us some chicken salad a while back and Michael practically licked the bowl clean.]

I have also -- after years of practice -- finally become a fairly decent chili maker. Our chili is different than most, in that we never use tough beans. Only Bush's pinto beans labeled chili beans. There is a crock pot full of chili cooking right now. I chopped up almost an entire onion, and threw in a can of Rotel along with several cloves of garlic. I like to liquefy my tomatoes and Rotel. I also use good ground sirloin.

Yes, I will admit it. I don't like chunks in my food. I liquefy a LOT of stuff around here. Of course, I am feeding my mother who is 82 and has a lot of teeth problems, so she appreciates it. We don't eat a lot of chewy food here or tough meat. We cook "low and slow" too - which is really more tasty, in all honesty. Even if Mom weren't here I would probably cook about the same way.

Below, an old photo I recently unearthed, taken just before Mom and Dad married, late 1956.

 

Close Encounters of the Irish Kind

March 17th and there is no corned beef in the fridge. Yay! I am not fond of it. Nor do I care for boiled cabbage. However, that's what we had for dinner every St. Patrick's Day when I was a kid. You'd think I would have embraced corned beef and cabbage, since according to 23 and Me I am 64% Irish and English, but no. [Not sure why English and Irish is linked together in 23andMe but genetically the two must be indistinguishable; fascinating, given their stormy history, but then again all families fight..]

St. Patrick's Day actually has great significance at my house because it's the anniversary of the day in 1956 when my parents met, at a St. Patrick's Day party. [The photo below was made months later.]

My father told me many years later that the first time he saw my mother he knew he was going to marry her. Mom says basically the same thing, although she wasn't too impressed with Dad that night. She went to the party alone, and Dad was talking to the hostess' father when Mom got there, and he wouldn't leave the kitchen and go out to meet Mom. She went back to the kitchen and said hello eventually.

Mom was 22 years old and Dad was 25.

They were married less than a year later.

If there had been no St. Patrick's Day party, what would have happened?! Well, Mom was dating a guy named Bell who was quite a bit shorter than Dad, so likely my name would be Bell and I would be much shorter than my majestic height of 5'3...

The irony of it is that Mom and Dad's paths had crossed before.

In the summer of 1937 or 38 my grandfather was managing a baseball team in Cordele, Georgia. One of the players on that team, Woody, was married to Dad's cousin Fleta. Mamaw and Papaw were living in a boardinghouse that summer and Fleta would sometimes babysit for my mother, who was about 4 years old. Since my Thompson grandfather was from Cordele, trips there during the summer were common for my father's family, and undoubtedly they went to a baseball game where Fleta's husband Woody was playing. If 8 year old Dad saw 4 year old Mom I doubt there were any sparks.

At the University of Georgia years later, Dad was in graduate school when Mom was a freshman, and he had a job in the Psychology Department testing freshmen, so it's likely their paths crossed there, too. The school was not nearly as big in 1952 as it was when I went there many years later.

So it's possible when they formally "met" in 1956 that Mom and Dad simply recognized each other from earlier encounters. Who knows. Doesn't matter. They were married nearly 40 years, until my dad died in 1996.

Dad still seems to be around, though, in spirit. A few days ago he woke Mom up at 6 a.m. shouting "BOOTS IN SADDLES! TIME TO GET UP! WE'RE BURNING DAYLIGHT!" - the sweet phrase he used to awaken me and my brother our entire lives, every morning.

Mom still dreams of Dad sometimes. I do too, on occasion. He is still around, I am sure of it, in spirit.

Happy St. Paddy's Day, Dad!

Elva in 1955

Dad in 1952, in Europe

  Mom and Dad about 1980

What I Always Wanted

There's a great line from an old movie that has always resonated with me, said by a young man who falls in love unexpectedly with a young woman of another race and class: You're everything I never knew I always wanted.

I was thinking about that last night as I was saying my prayers before sleep. I always pray for everyone I love right before I go to sleep. It's part of my sleep ritual. (I was trying to explain to Michael the other day why a sleep ritual is important, but he looked at me like you old fuddy duddy...) I ask God every night to just look out for and guide everyone, because that's what I feel is the right way to pray.

What I wanted to explore this morning is the idea that telling God what you want, specifically, is pretty arrogant and often leads to dissatisfaction. It's taken me years to learn that. Years and years and lots of tears, as the song might say.

I think Atheists and possibly even agnostics use the idea of unanswered prayers as proof God doesn't exist. I would argue that God always answers ALL prayers, but he does it in his own time and in his own way, and it's not up to us to dictate to him.

For example, when I turned 40 I knew I was running out of time to be a mother. I wasn't married.I was in a relationship that I knew wasn't going to lead to marriage. I wanted to be married before I had children. My ovaries weren't getting any younger. The whole situation was hopeless and depressing. I simply told God I wanted a family and I needed a miracle, and then I LET IT GO. Within a couple of years I became a mom to Alesia, and a couple of years later I adopted Michael.

I THOUGHT what was going to happen was that I was going to get married and get pregnant. God didn't see it that way. His solution worked out better. Much better.

God knows the inner recesses of our hearts far better than we do. He knows what needs to happen if we are to be content, or even happy. We are flawed, fearful, and fallible. God is not. I also think of the world as a huge million-piece puzzle and within each piece there are a million more pieces. The complexity is mind-boggling - to us humans.

I was thinking the other day about a lady Mom told me about when I was adopting Alesia, an older friend of Mother's who lived in Augusta and I think was in her garden club. This lady had never married or had children. She reached middle age and had to quit her job to take care of her mother who was in bad health. She wrote me the sweetest note and said she was praying that my adoption would go through, and she had asked all her friends to pray. She explained that when she was young, she had wanted to be a mother, but single women simply didn't adopt children. I remember thinking what a sad and miserable life, just taking care of an old lady, with no husband or kids to help.

I knew as soon as I got Alesia home other dreams would come true, like a big house, a handsome husband, a brilliant writing career. I was on a roll, finally!

God in his infinite wisdom taught me a lot of lessons related to those thoughts.

First, Mom and I bought a house together. Second, Mom has gradually needed my help more and more in the past few years, and so I have become a caretaker, too. It's not a terrible life. I don't feel put-upon or unlucky. Her companionship more than makes up for whatever imposition it might be to care for her. We have to watch our pennies carefully, but I have time to write now, and my writing efforts have paid off. Working as a writer and editor now is a dream come true. I don't care about being a best-selling author - I don't have the ability to travel right now, and that's no big deal. I love my home.

Mother lived alone for 9 years, but she got tired of taking care of a big house in Augusta, and doing everything for herself. I was an answer to her prayer to not live alone the rest of her life. She was an answer to my prayer for help as a single mom.

My kids wanted a family. I am the answer to their prayers. I wanted children. They are answers to my prayers.

We are all inter-dependent on one another.

I was thinking yesterday as I sat on the back patio watching the birds in the backyard, Lola asleep at my feet, feeling the sunshine on my face, hearing the wind in the trees - this is everything I never knew I always wanted. This is contentment.

Thank you God.

 

Twenty Questions With Davis McCollum

I can’t remember how I stumbled across the Old Marietta Facebook page months ago, but I was quickly fascinated by the wealth of historical photos [over 8,000 of them] and information about the area where my mother was born. My Butler and Hasty ancestors are from the Marietta Georgia area, and so it has great significance for me. The man who runs the page, Davis McCollum, has deep roots in Cobb County – back 6 generations or more. His family trees include names like Stanley, Dobbs, Durham – all longtime residents of the area. His Ancestry.com family trees have more than 600,000 names.

Davis: “Stanley Road in Kennesaw is named after my Great Great Grandfather and his farm was what is now "The Overlook" at Marietta Country Club and Barrett Green subdivisions.”

Davis is a true Renaissance man, a native son who loves building projects (he is a real estate and marketing professional), history, historic photos, historic preservation, and much more. Davis’ passion for the past extends to the present. He hates to see historic homes demolished (not documented) in the name of unplanned progress. He was actively involved in the effort to save the Acworth Depot. He has also been on the Board of Directors of The Marietta Museum of History, the Georgia Historical Society, the Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation, Georgia Genealogical Society, Sons of the American Revolution, Alpharetta and Old Milton County Historical Society. He was also honored in January 2014 by the Cobb Landmarks and Historical Society for his contributions.

It didn’t take too much digging to determine that Davis and I are cousins, through my great great grandmother Nannie Putnam Phillips, whose sister Joanna married William McCollum. I found that out by looking at a website called Find a Grave, and Davis has his own page there – and more than 284 messages have been left on his page.

Davis got started doing genealogy research about ten years ago, after his mother passed away. As he explains, “It started just after my mother died. I got into the family history after looking at the family bible. That family bible went all the way back to England.”

He explains further, “It continued by me going to Facebook and seeing a blog where everyone was talking about Marietta.”

After Davis started his own Facebook page in 2010, things really got busy. The page now has over 10,000 likes and 4-5,000 visits daily. “It’s a resource now for anyone researching Marietta and Cobb history,” he explains. “The Marietta Daily Journal and several private entities have contacted me many times about using my photos.” There are 35 different albums and more than 5,000 photos.

Davis is related to not only me, but some famous folks, too, like Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, former Atlanta Mayor Maynard Jackson and former Secretary of State Dean Rusk. He likes speaking to groups, and enjoys particularly speaking for and meeting senior citizens. At one speaking engagement he was able to prove that most of the audience was related to him, one way or another.

Davis is not just my cousin he’s one of the most interesting guys I’ve ever met.

 

 

What is your full name?

Davis Eugene McCollum [for a long time he wouldn’t reveal what the “E” stands for but he was named after his mother’s father Ernest Eugene “Hop” Dobbs – “That’s where I connect with Maynard Jackson, through the Dobbs family.”

Where would you live, if you could live anywhere in the world?

St. Simon’s Island Georgia. My uncle had a house down there. That’s where we went on vacation every summer.

What is your favorite movie and why?

Cold Mountain. It relates to my 2nd great grandfather William Pickens Stanley. He walked home to Kennesaw after the Civil War. Stanley Road in Kennesaw is named after him and ironically, my brother lives on Stanley Road now.

What was your least-favorite subject in school when you were a kid?

Science, never could get into it.

What was your nickname when you were a kid?

Bugsy – my cousin gave it to me, years ago, after I made a remark about Bugsy Siegal, the gangster.

Do you believe in God?

Yes. I was born a Baptist and all the pretty girls were Methodist, so I’ve been to both churches.

What sound or noise do you love?

The sound of a creek running

If you could do anything other than what you do, as a profession, what would it be?

Professional golfer

If heaven exists, what do you think it is like?

The Augusta National [where the master’s tournament is played]

Do you have siblings?

I have a brother and sister

What is your favorite memory of childhood [something specific]?

Going out to the family reunions at Old Marietta Campground. The Stanley family, the McCollums and the Walkers, every year there would be 200+ family members, all weekend. There’s a photo of me at 1 year old, on the lap of Mrs. Rusk, mother of Dean Rusk, who was born in Cherokee County. He’s part of the Stanley family, a cousin.

If you had to choose between one week traveling around the USA by car, or one week traveling around Europe on a train, which would you choose and why?

Europe by train because I want to go to the homeland, Scotland. My McCollum ancestors are from Argyll.

What inspires you?

Being successful – not just professionally, but personally, at all sorts of things - finishing a meal, closing a deal, finding a grave – whatever it entails.

Which holiday do you prefer, Christmas or July 4th?

I would say Christmas. I like July 4th because of weather but Christmas – too many memories there..

What project or idea are you most passionate about, right now?

Development, building, construction. Personally, my work in genealogy and history, what I’ve accomplished in ten short years.. When I’m dead and gone that will be my legacy, more than any warehouse I’ve built.

Do you know how to cook?

Yes, I love to cook local meats and create dishes – pastas, goulashes .

What is your favorite thing to cook/eat? Crawfish.

If you could go on vacation anywhere in the world, for 2-4 weeks, all expenses paid, where would you go and why?

Probably County Galway Scotland, just to tour the homeland

Who do you love the most in the world?

My dad. He’s 84 years old.

What question has nobody ever asked you, but you wanted to answer?

Would you like them in large or small bills?

 

Mrs. Nancy Stanley Rusk (1873-1962) The Stanley Reunion at Old Marietta Campground in 1960

 

 

Davis, brother Andy McCollum and sister Angie McCollum Durham

 

 The Stanley Reunion – 1962 – Old Marietta Campground

Thompson Aviary Estate

Are you a small bird looking for a comfortable place to build a nest this spring? Do you enjoy the quiet beauty of the Atlanta suburbs? Househunting is SUCH a chore! As the old saying goes, though, location is everything!

We have just the place for you! The Thompson Aviary Estate is just inside the perimeter, close to good schools and convenient to Northlake Mall, the CDC, I-85 and I-285. The statues of downtown Decatur are just a short flight away!

The Thompson Estate offers great amenities you won't find everywhere.

There is a lovely birdbath in the back of the estate, and a creek.

Free Food is not available, due to the intrusive squirrels and creek rats, but the homeowners plant gardens every year and the soil is full of nice fat worms!

This is Lola, the spoiled and adored security system for the property. She will not bother you or your family, but is diligent about barking at squirrels! She also doesn't allow cats to come in her yard.

For those who have issues with finding good nesting materials, the estate offers free yarn and dog hair, conveniently located a short flight from your home:

Now, security is always a concern. We offer Window Home high up, far away from predators. Although it is a plain home, it is right above the hydrangeas, and very close to Elva's Computer, a source of music at all hours of the day and night:

For those who prefer a more scenic location, there's the lovely Magnolia House:

This house has been beautifully decorated by Erick. Note the springy moss all around, and there are daffodils!

For those who prefer suburban living with neighbors, we offer a variety of options -- a tiny home, a groovy hippie pad, new to the estate, and an older home, which has housed several happy families over a period of almost 10 years!

For those customers who are really discerning and prefer the understated elegance of cedar:

These are high-quality homes, brand-new construction, in the highly-desirable front patio area, which offers views of lush flowers usually sometime in April - geraniums, impatiens, etc.

For the really discerning bird, who values style and elegance, we offer Michael's House, located in the patio area [shown while still under construction] under the eaves, atop a sturdy brick column. Close enough to fly over to visit neighbors in one of the Cedar Homes, yet offering privacy and a wonderful view of the azaleas at no extra cost.

For the best location, greatest price, and incredible variety of housing options, you cannot go wrong by choosing a place at the Thompson Aviary Estate. Fly on over and check us out!

 

The Allotment of Tears

There are a lot of things I should be doing - laundry, dishes, paying bills - and they will all get done eventually, today. I am thinking about Pat Conroy, however, and I'm a little weepy. Pat died last night, from pancreatic cancer.

Last October Pat wrote this in his blog: "I’ve spent my whole writing life trying to find out who I am and I don’t believe I’ve even come close. But that knowledge grants me insight and causes me no despair. The journey has defined me, inspired me, and forced me to write on."

I was thinking about that a lot this morning as I walked Lola.

How do we figure out life on the page? That's a question all writers struggle with. I know I've struggled with it.

Just when I think I might have a handle on it, something throws me for a loop, and I have to try to re-evaluate, revise my thoughts and opinions, and discern how to do things differently, to be at peace with myself and my life.

The state of serenity most people aspire to - including me - is really not conducive to good writing, I don't think. Most of us have demons we keep at bay as best we can, with varying degrees of success. Writers learn to manage their demons by writing about them. I don't know why it works, but fashioning strings of words together and painting pictures with them somehow creates enough distance to make things bearable.

Pat wrote about his brutal childhood over and over. When the people who are supposed to love and protect you are abusive, you never get over that. Some people just shove those feelings as far down as they can and pretend like nothing happened. Eventually, though, doing that turns those memories to poison and that poison has to be released somehow. In releasing his poisons, Pat famously infuriated or alienated a lot of people in his family. I hope before he died, however, that he was reconciled with his daughter Susannah, because I know how it feels to be estranged from your child. Nothing can be more painful. I had a lot of fights with my dad when I was young but we were never estranged.

A lot of people in my parents' generation were raised by folks who grew up with 19th century attitudes and ideas about things, and that's sad. When my grandfather Thompson died and the family was gathered in a small room at the hospital a few minutes after he died, his widow - my grandmother Cordelia - said bluntly if you're going to cry, go somewhere else. When her boys were growing up she would go in the closet if she had to cry. That wasn't unusual for someone of her generation.

My mother has an absolute horror of crying in public, which is why she won't attend funerals. I've tried to talk to her about it, but it's no use. It makes me mad seeing people ignoring their emotions for the sake of propriety, but it's not something Mom can control, so I try to cut her a lot of slack.We couldn't have any music at my dad's memorial service because Mom was afraid it would make her cry.

I told Mom not long ago we will have LOTS of music at her memorial service, and plenty of Kleenex.

Dignity and propriety are not bad things, but they often come at a price.

Pat Conroy's genius was in being able to write about his emotions, which most men simply won't - or can't - do.

“American men are allotted just as many tears as American women. But because we are forbidden to shed them, we die long before women do, with our hearts exploding or our blood pressure rising or our livers eaten away by alcohol because that lake of grief inside us has no outlet. We, men, die because our faces were not watered enough.”
― Pat Conroy, Beach Music

Amen, Brother Pat. You spoke the truth. I hope we can do better, the future generations.