The Crab Chronicles

My Musical Tastes

I asked my father once what it was like to be a young man when Elvis Presley broke into the music business and his records started getting played on the radio. (I have been a big Elvis fan since I first saw Viva Las Vegas on the 4:00 movie when I was in fourth grade in Knoxville Tennessee. His song "Merry Christmas Baby" is my fave Christmas song.)

Dad got a look on his face like he was eating some bad turnip greens. 

"I didn't listen to him. I listened to Frank Sinatra. Didn't like Elvis," Dad said dismissively. [Years later Mom told me they took a record player and one Frank Sinatra album on their honeymoon and they wore that one Frank Sinatra record slap out.]

I was disappointed. I wanted to hear some fun story about the first time Dad heard "Heartbreak Hotel" and he couldn't stop dancing, or something. Fun fact: my parents were known to sometimes do the jitterbug after they'd had a few drinks.

Heck, even my memaw loved Elvis -- she listened to his gospel album until it was worn out. If you've never heard Elvis sing "Peace in the Valley" check it out. My voice teacher said if Elvis had chosen to sing classical music he would have had a big career. (Too bad he settled for a small career.)

Elvis changed the world. He bridged the gap between country, soul, and what would become rock & roll. He imitated "race records" as records by black artists were known in the early 1950's. I love most of Elvis' music. [I must confess, however, that once I heard Big Mama Thornton's version of "Hound Dog" I much preferred Big Mama's rendition. When she sang "you can wag yo tail but I ain't gon' feed you no more" I believed her.]

Dad skipped Elvis. He went right from liking Frank Sinatra to liking Willie Nelson, after we moved from Augusta, Georgia to Knoxville, Tennessee, in 1971. Dad had a 20-30 minute drive from our home in the Knoxville suburbs to the Valley Fidelity Bank in downtown Knoxville every day, and he listened to WIVK, a country station that came in loud and clear. One summer I worked at the bank and rode to work with him every day since I didn't have a car. Eventually I grew to appreciate some country songs, like Willie's version of Stardust. Even though I was not a big country fan. I did appreciate the simple but poignant sentiments Conway Twitty sang about in "I'd Love to Lay You Down" a song with the immortal lyrics "you've got a way of doing little things that turn me on like standing in the kitchen in your faded cotton gown." [Just imagine how excited he got when she wore a nice dress and high heels! She must have had to fight him off so she could cook some fried chicken...]

Now, my musical tastes are all over the place.

I make no apologies for that.

In the mid 1970's my brother bought a cassette tape of the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack and we listened to it until we could sing all the words to classics like Disco Inferno. I liked disco. Don't judge.

When I was a kid my mother bought a series of expensive record sets that she forced me to listen to so I would become familiar with Mozart, Bach, Brahms, Beethoven, and her favorite, Rachmaninoff. I was forced top listen to that music and some of it I actually liked. Mom is why this song -- O mio babbino caro is -- in my opinion -- literally the most beautiful music ever created.

My older brother listened to WIMZ, which played a lot of music with few commercials in the 1970's. So I listened to that too, and I learned to appreciate rock. Funny story. Brother used to leave the radio on a lot and he would fall asleep listening to it. One night he was awakened by a very disturbing sound, the bridge to "Frankenstein" by Edgar Winter, which sounds like the background music to an alien invasion. Bro was joplted awake hearing that and was afraid a spaceship had landed and little green men were going to commence the anal probes, until he woke completely up and turned off the boombox.

I also listened to WNOX, which played pop music and featured Casey Casem's Top 40 countdown every Saturday. I can sing every single word to every pop hit from 1971-80. I remember being able to sing all the words to "Me and Mrs. Jones" when I was about 11 years old. Some might argue I shouldn't have been singing about an extramarital affair but my parents paid no attention to music lyrics and let me listen to (and read) whatever I liked. Compared to today's rap lyrics that song is very tame.

I am lucky now that I work at home and most of the time I can listen to music while I work. I listen to a lot of soundtracks to movies because instrumentals are less distracting. My current faves are the soundtracks to Interstellar and The Cinematic Orchestra's version of Arrival of the Birds & Transformation.

I realized the other day I can sing every word to all the Beatles greatest hits [red album and some of the blue album] while simultaneously analyzing documents.

No matter what your musical taste, music makes life so much richer. I still listen to CD's of my favorite artists like Paul Simon and James Taylor and Mary Chapin Carpenter. I also love going on YouTube and putting in the title of some obscure old pop song and being able to listen to it again. My current re-discovered oldie fave is "Strawberry Letter 23" by The Brothers Johnson.

I will never be as badass as George Jones but I can live with that.

 

The Legacy of Tina Turner

I remember seeing Tina Turner on the Ed Sullivan Show when I was a little girl and loving seeing her dance. She looked incredibly strong and powerful. I had no idea when she was with Ike Turner he was beating her up constantly. I was shocked to find out years later that she had to literally flee from him, in fear for her life, to get out of that marriage, as she wrote about in I,Tina.

Here's a bit of truth that makes people very uncomfortable: in the old days, which many people refer to with great fondness as "the good old days" women getting hit by their husbands or boyfriends wasn't discussed. It was considered nobody's business. The mantra "mind your own business" covered a multitude of sins, from domestic violence to child abuse, to child molestation, etc.

Tina's courage in walking away from Ike signaled a change in society, a huge shift in how women allowed themselves to be treated.

My mother told me when I was a teenager and starting to date "Never, ever let a man hit you and get away with it. If it happens once and you take it, it will happen over and over. Get away from him. If you're married, walk out, and take your children. NEVER put up with it, not for a minute."

It seemed obvious to me.

Skip ahead a few years and I am a Freshman in college. One of my friends returns from a weekend at home with a black eye where her boyfriend hit her. She was a cute little blonde, very funny and feisty. I was shocked. I told her she had to break up with that boyfriend "But he said he was sorry and it wouldn't happen again!" I got so frustrated with her. Several of us told her to break off that relationship, but I don't know if she did. I don't know what happened to her because I transferred schools.

My dad had a cousin who was a beautiful lady, very smart, a prominent businesswoman in her small hometown, and her husband beat her. She told no-one except a close friend, and that friend also had an abusive husband. The small town where they lived was [probably still is] very old-fashioned and judgmental.

What many young women don't realize nowadays is that abuse still happens, and shame and embarrassment keep many women from talking about it or doing something about it. I've told my own daughter she must never put up with abuse.

God Bless Tina Turner for taking something so personal and painful out of the shadows, and holding herself up as an example of strength. NO WOMAN should put up with abuse, not even one time.

There is a National Domestic Violence hotline and the number is 800-799-7233 -- if you are being abused, call it. There are women's shelters everywhere, and there's no shame in asking for help.

You Either Win Or You Learn

A few years ago I was hired to work for a local law firm and I completely ignored the Inner Voice telling me not to take the job. I had not pursued the job, actually. I had been looking for a good job ever since my mother died, a regular full-time position. A recruiter called me and said she had seen my resume somewhere and she had a terrific opportunity to tell me about. I should have realized that what was actually happening was that the recruiter was desperately trying to fill a position at a firm where nobody wanted to work. That should have set off alarm bells in my head. I just didn't connect the dots until later.

A bit of background.

Sometimes in life you go through a really difficult experience and realize later that you learned a lot, so the difficulty was worthwhile. When I came to work here in Atlanta years ago I spent 6 years working for an attorney who was very demanding. None of the other paralegals in the firm could understand why I took the job. It was simple, actually. I lived in Knoxville and I had been trying to move to Atlanta for several years, since I had finished paralegal school here. So even though I realized -- even in the interview -- that that lady was wound up pretty tight, I took the job. It got me to Atlanta, where my paralegal career could advance. Then I spent 6 years working for an attorney who was not only very demanding, her own insecurities caused her to be harsh and caustic, which I hated. I learned a LOT, however. Those years gave me an advanced education in so many ways. I learned how to really analyze records of all kinds -- medical, employment, school, etc. Those analysis skills have made every paralegal job since then more enjoyable. I am really good at analyzing records. It's the most fun part of being a paralegal. I also left on good terms, instead of telling the attorney to go pound sand and walking off the job. A few years later I was again on the job market, after a layoff, and the attorney wrote me a very nice letter of reference.

When I left that first Atlanta job, finally, it was to work at a much bigger firm for another very demanding female attorney, and I immediately realized I had to keep looking and find a different job because she was a screamer. She once screamed at for a solid ten minutes for something the paralegal who had the job before me had done. I had done nothing wrong but she wanted to scream at someone and I was a convenient target. My predecessor in that job had left without notice, fled, and left no forwarding information. I'd like to say I learned a lot in that job too, but I didn't. I cried every day, from the stress. (The next job was much less stressful because I went in-house at a large corporation.)

Anyhow, back to the job I started off talking about. I knew from the first day forward it was not the job for me. I should have quit immediately, but I figured well, I will stay and work until I can find something better, then quit. Instead, I spent weeks being miserable. One day the office manager called and told me I was being terminated, which was actually a relief. What she said to me in that call shocked me to the core. The office manager said "You are being terminated because you ask too many questions."

After I hung up the phone I had to just sit for a while and process what I'd been told. My father once told me that he liked to hire people who would ask a lot of questions, because then he knew they were learning. My dad ran the trust department in a bank for many years and he was a very savvy businessman. He knew that someone who asked questions wasn't stupid and they weren't trying to be annoying. They were interested in really understanding and learning. About 95% of the time when someone starts a new job they will have questions because nobody [except maybe a CEO] starts off on day one knowing everything. Most of us need to learn the company, learn the product or service offered by the company, learn the personalities of those we are working with, figure out how to coffeemaker works, etc.

It took me a while, but I eventually realized that the office manager who terminated me from that miserable experience actually did me a favor. You see, in life you either win or you learn.

I learned not to ignore my Inner Voice when it told me not to take a job.

I learned several new software programs that I used in subsequent jobs.

I learned to immediately be wary of an office manager who described herself as "the REAL CEO" of the law firm. She was on a real power trip and she delighted in making everyone around her miserable. She wanted minions, not colleagues. Everyone was afraid of her, and ruling by fear indicates a terrible manager.

An agile mind is always asking questions.

I have an innate curiosity about everything that I can reasonably comprehend. It makes me a good writer and it enriches my life. When I go to work for a new attorney I can't help but wonder if there are ways things can be done better. When I can discuss that with my supervising attorney, it makes for a far more pleasant working environment, even if she vetoes my ideas. At least I am heard.

Attorneys sometimes want paralegals to simply be a cog in the machine, silent and efficient. Sometimes that's a good arrangement, for a paralegal who simply wants to work that way. I always prefer feeling like I am part of a team, and we are all working towards the same goal. Collaborating makes me happy.

There are plenty of people who learn faster than I do, but I prefer to take my time, figure out the right questions to ask, and then really settle in to learn and grow, not just hit the ground running until I am bored and then move on.

If you are a newbie paralegal, you might find it useful to read my newest book, Paralegal 411: Tips, Tricks, and Timesavers for the Litigation Paralegal, available on Amazon.

#paralegaleducation, #paralegaltips, #howtomanageparalegals, #questionsaregood, #howattorneysshouldmanage, #acuriousparalegal

Understanding the Struggles of the Past

Most of my cousins think that my interest in genealogy is downright peculiar. I go nuts over old family photos. I loved to hear my mother and daddy and grandmother and aunts and uncles tell stories about the time before I was born, about what life was like in the early part of the twentieth century, particularly.

I saw a photo a few minutes ago of a young girl cooking on a wood stove. It sparked a memory, of trying my hand at cooking on a wood stove. My father bought a woodburning stove for our lake house and put it on the back porch. That way he could sit out there when the weather was cold. One winter we lost electricity and I tried cooking on that stove. It was horrible. I had no idea how to regulate the heat, and I burned myself. Mom tried to show me how to figure out where the hot areas were and move the pots around accordingly, but it was scary and I never got the hang of it. That brief period of time changed me forever, although I didn't know it then. It gave me a fascination for the past. Cooking is pretty easy nowadays. Imagine having to cook on a stove where you had to stir up the fire to cook your food!

In her memoir, Singing to the Cows, my mother talked about doing without plumbing and electricity during World War II:

"During most of the WW2 years, we lived on a farm --- so many of our memories stem from there, for lots of reasons. Our house, new I guess, lacked running water, gas, and electricity. There was a wartime shortage of pipes, wire etc. One had to get on a list and wait. There was a bathroom, but no running water etc. At first, we had to haul water from a well and heat it on top of the wood range. I still have burn scars on my arms from that stove. Our best source of heat was the dining room fireplace so that was mostly where we lived. Dad placed 3 or 4 big oil lamps in the middle of our dining room table. We ate there, did homework, and read the newspaper there."

When my grandparents were young and living in Philadelphia, they saw a lovely dining room table in a department store but they couldn't afford it, even though my grandfather was a major league baseball pitcher. In the off season, Papa made his own version of that table, and they used it for the next 50 years, and then my uncle and aunt used it. It's still in the family.

I digressed.

The moments in my life that have taught me the most indelible lessons about the struggles of my ancestors were sometimes literally just moments.

I remember being in a history museum as a middle schooler and there was a dress there that was over a hundred years old. It was for a grown woman but I wouldn't have been able to fit into it. The waist was TINY. Women were expected to wear corsets to fit into those dresses, and sometimes rich women would have ribs removed, to make their waists smaller. I can still see that dress, in my mind's eye.

When I was in first grade I went on a field trip with my class to somewhere way out in the country. I don't recall the purpose of the trip, to be honest. However, at one point we were off the bus and standing beside a field full of ripe cotton, ready for picking. We were supposed to stay in the group but I snuck around and examined a stalk of cotton and tried pulling the fluffy white cotton boll out of the pincer-like grip of the plant, and it was very difficult, even with my tiny nimble fingers. Years later I remembered it when I saw the movie Places in the Heart, about everyone on a farm pitching in to get the cotton picked. Backbreaking labor. My ancestors, most of whom were small farmers, had a tough time of it.

[left, my great-grandfather Hasty's syrup mill in Cherokee County around the turn of the century.

My power steering went out on my car once when I was in my twenties and it scared the pee out of me. I could barely get the car steered over to the side of the road. How on earth did Mom learn to drive on one of those old cars?!

[Right, my mom and the car she learned to drive in]

I remember my immense frustration at trying to learn to sew because my grandmother died before she could teach me. I tried to learn. I took a sewing class at the mall, at a fabric store. I was awful at sewing. I couldn't imagine having to sew my own clothes as a necessity! Yikes.

I watched my mother one afternoon making homemade jelly. It took all day long and she was frustrated and sweating. At the end of the day she had 2 small mason jars of grape jelly. She looked at me in disgust and said "Well I won't ever try THAT again! Smuckers is just fine."

[She always at toast with her breakfast and it always had jelly on it, BTW!]

When I was in 5th grade I came down with scarlet fever. It was going around the middle school. I stayed home for a week and felt crappy, but I survived. A hundred years before, when there were no modern medicines, and I might not have survived. I remember being a bit scared, because I read a lot and back in the day scarlet fever was often deadly.

These are just a few of the moments that have given me a fascination for the past.

The City of the Future

When I was a kid I was rather shy and I didn't have many friends. To stay busy, I participated in as many school activities possible. I was in the spelling bee. I sang in the chorus. I wrote for the team magazine. I participated in speech contests. I took piano lessons. I did plays. I was always busy. My middle school years, 5th through 8th grade, were particularly difficult because I was bullied mercilessly for being fat. I wasn't horribly obese but I was a it chubby, and worse, I looked several years older than my peers. I had boobs before anyone else. It was a time filled with anxiety.

For the Social Studies Fair in 6th grade I made a poster and called it City of the Future. I wish I had taken a photo of that poster, but back then photos were not easily taken. Dad controlled the camera and film and as he often said, picture developing cost money. Back then, kids, you took a bunch of photos, rewound the film, popped it out and took it to the drugstore or camera store, and waited a week or two. Then, the shots might be great or they might all be blurry. Nobody could make a photo with a phone -- to suggest such a thing would have provoked snickers or derisive laughter. Photography was mysterious and it required patience. 

I digressed.

The City of the Future, as suggested by my poster, was basically a shopping mall with apartments on the top floor. In 6th grade the cool kids went to the mall all the time.

I was not a cool kid. I rarely went to the mall.

In Knoxville, Tennessee, in the late 1970's the cool kids hung out at West Town Mall. I can close my eyes right now and tell you where every store was located in that mall. My mom liked shopping at JCPenneys, where she had a charge account. There was also a department store called Millers, where the merchandise was a bit more expensive than Penneys. I knew when I found empty Millers bags around the house before Christmas that I was getting some nice stuff and my heart leapt with excitement.

Now, if you really had some money you bought stuff at Proffitts. We rarely ever bought anything there because my dad was tight-fisted when it came to money.

In my daydreams [remember those? they were how we entertained ourselves before smartphones, kids] we lived in a fabulous apartment just above the mall, which was awesome because:

1. We could leave home and walk downstairs and be in the mall, the mecca to every middle-schooler in Knoxville. There, we could get snacks at Orange Julius, and giggle at all the naughty merchandise at Spencer's, and if we needed anything from the drugstore, Walgreens was right there.
2. We could roller skate everywhere in the mall! Roller skating was a very important social ritual. If you didn't roller skate on Saturday you were a social nobody. Skatetown USA was one of my favorite places, and I could do the hokey pokey all day long and not fall, which was important. I could also skate backwards. Unfortunately, I never got to skate with a boyfriend, in semidarkness, under the great twinkling disco ball, while the sound system boomed out a classic tune like the Bee Gees How Deep Is Your Love? [I can still sing all the words to that one]
3. No more yard work!! No more pulling weeds, or getting green feet from walking in newly-mown grass, or cleaning out the garage. I hated yard work with a passion. There were no "lawn services" back then, there were dads and kids.
4. In my fabulous City of the Future the mall roof would be our playground and garden where we could all shoot hoops, play tennis, maybe even swim, in an egalitarian space where we could dash home and use the bathroom very easily. There could even be concerts there, and we could hang out with friends, unsupervised!
5. We could have dance parties on the roof and dance to great tunes like September, by Earth Wind and Fire.

In thinking about my adolescent dream of the future, I realize that I was chasing a dream of nobody judging me for the size of my house or the neighborhood, or even my clothes. I would be able to check out all the sales at the coolest store ever, Merry Go Round, and dress cool.

I only ever achieved cool in my shoes and clothing a few times, as a child. Dad took me shoe shopping once when Mom was sick, and we bought shoes at Baker's Shoes. We came home with brown suede platform shoes that made me 3 glorious inches taller. I was beside myself with 1970's joy. I wore them to school, fell and sprained my ankle. My mother said I could never wear them again. Great anguish! I put them in the closet where they remained for years. Below, a photo I made a couple of years ago when I cleaned out a closet preparing to move. When you never wear shoes they stay pretty nice.

Below right, me in 8th grade. I was starting to worry less about being a cool kid.

Ironically, I have now lived for years a very short distance from what was once a very nice mall here in Atlanta, Northlake Mall. I went there many times, over the years. I haven't been there recently, though, because now I buy pretty much everything online. The mall is being converted to office space for Emory. I don't want to live in an apartment at the mall any more. I don't worry about being cool.

I know I am getting old, though, because in my mind, I see those kids just like they were back in middle school -- and a lot of those kids are now my friends on Facebook. The cool kids have grandchildren, many of them. I like music like D-35 by Mary Chapin Carpenter.

Maybe one day I will have a grandchild to love and spoil --  and that's the epitome of cool, to me, now...

To Know the Place

It has taken many years, but I am finally learning how to really see and feel the glories of this beautiful place, earth. The journey was worth it.

When I was 8 years old and my family moved to Knoxville, Tennessee, we started spending most Sunday afternoons in the car. Mom liked to “go to ride” on Sundays, after church and after Sunday’s big lunch, we would typically go to ride and stay gone all afternoon, exploring beautiful East Tennessee. The mountains were everywhere, even at home. Knoxville is in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains and you could stand at the back windows on the second floor of our house and see the foothills in the distance.

I hated going on Sunday drives. I was always bored. My parents couldn’t figure out why I didn’t appreciate the beauty of the mountains.

[left, me in 5th grade]

Soon after we got settled in, Mom and Dad realized there was a terrific little town an easy drive from home. We often drove to Gatlinburg, which in the early 70’s was not the congested tourist mecca it is now. I loved to go to the candy kitchen and watch the mesmerizing machine that makes taffy, or go to Ripley’s Believe It Or Not Museum, or the tacky gift shop known as Rebel’s Corner. Even before we got to Gatlinburg there were fun places to explore. On the way to Gatlinburg we went through Pigeon Forge, which had a restaurant in an old train car, a mill that still milled cornmeal, and a little family-owned restaurant where you could get a wonderful meat n’three -- of course that was years before Dollywood. I found places where I could put my face close to what I was seeing far more fascinating then the hulking shapes of the mountains.

In fourth grade, I failed the eye exam given to all the kids. The ophthalmologist discovered I was quite nearsighted, and I got glasses. Suddenly, the mountains were not just a blur. Mom told me later she felt terrible because she and Dad hadn’t realized that my vision was impaired and that’s why I found the Sunday drives so boring. Of course, I was a kid -- and sitting in the car staring out the window was boring even with my glasses, I reassured her.

I could never understand, until the last ten years or so, why anyone would want to just sit and stare at mountains or anything else in nature. I found sitting and staring at anything [other than a book or movie] incredibly boring.

My dad used to come home from work [he was a bank VP] and fix himself a drink, and go out into the backyard and just stare, and sip. He was usually out there at least half an hour before he would be ready to come in for dinner. I had no idea why he did that. Of course, as an adult I understood the importance of unwinding after a busy day. Mom usually joined him, and I know she liked being outside in the quiet, too. Her life as a SAHM was stressful but just different from Dad’s life, of course.

I realize now that those middle years of life, roughly from ages 20-50, are the busiest times for most of us.

Now, having sold my house in 2021 and living in an apartment since then, I realize that the lovely backyard of my house, with it’s trees and flowers, was a haven. Why didn’t I stay out there more, staring at the yard, the creek, the hydrangeas, the great magnolia tree, the squirrels and cardinals that lived there? Why didn’t I enjoy that peaceful place more?

[right, the blooming apple tree in my yard]

There are several lessons here. Really seeing nature is a great gift. I have friends and cousin/friends who literally crave getting outside and away from their busy lives. They feel a pull, a longing, to see mountains up close, to see flowing water and huge trees up close, to feel the sunshine on their faces while they hear only bird songs and insects drone. I wish that I could easily slip away to bask in the places where I feel most peaceful.

The folks of my mom’s generation are almost all gone now. I don’t have the luxury of staring down the road and seeing scads of time left to calm down and appreciate this amazing world God designed for us.

As the years have passed, I’ve slowed down a good bit. I am far less of an energetic dervish like my dad and far more able to sit and just be still in nature, without constantly checking my watch or worrying about getting insect bites. Now, I am not so impatient. I pay attention to blooming things, to birds, to the subtleties of nature and the peace that’s found by water.

One day my ashes will go back into the soil and water of this place, of North Georgia, where I will join the crowds of my ancestors that worked hard all their lives before finally being able to rest. The thought doesn’t frighten me in the least. I welcome it, in fact.

“We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.” T.S. Eliot

Mama's Apron

It kind of makes me sad that my son has never watched me put on an apron and cook. I used to watch Mom do that and I always knew she was going to make something delicious, something memorable..

Ironically, since he is a cook in a restaurant, my son wears an apron every day. He views it as part of his work uniform, of course.

My apron memories are vivid and happy. I remember hugging my mom or my memaw when they were wearing an apron. The aprons always smelled like food -- in a good way, of course. I remember being a little kid and trying to hug my mom and ending up pressing my face against her apron, the softness of the cotton against my cheek.

Apron pockets always held something good.

My mom wrote about aprons in her blog, talking about her childhood and young years [1933-53]:

"Every day outfits for women were dresses , or skirts and blouses. They either had to be washed and ironed or dry cleaned, which was expensive.  Thus aprons were important.

We had everyday aprons that covered pretty much everything -- some with bibs, some without – or there was just the skirt type which Mother favored. She was so short that bibs were in the way.  During the World War II years, when we lived on a South Carolina farm, Mother sewed feed sack aprons, some with cheery, nice prints, as she was a good seamstress. She always added a large pocket, which was helpful. [at right is a photo of a flour sack apron made by my grandmother]

From about the time I was nine or ten, I was as tall as my mom [4’11], then much taller ‘til I got to be 5’3 or 5’4. So her aprons fit me just fine.

From time to time, my dad helped her in the kitchen, so she made aprons to suit his 6ft. 4in frame. He preferred plain white aprons with bibs. I still have one of the last ones she made him.  For years, I hung it in my kitchen so I could hug it from time to time. Seemed to bring him closer.. He mostly helped her on Sundays, after church, since he needed to protect his good clothes. We usually had a big Sunday dinner, in the middle of the day, that involved heavy lifting of roasts etc. Most of the cook pots and frying pans were heavy iron, especially the Dutch oven.

We often had guests for meals, so like most women, when it was time to eat the soiled apron was removed and replaced with a “company one” that was kind of pretty, often starched and ironed."

I have never come home from church, left on my "church clothes," tied on an apron and cooked a big Sunday dinner. I need to do that sometime, to keep the tradition alive and honor the women in my family who came before me, who did that just about every Sunday of their lives.

 

Some Sundays they packed up the food and went over to Chastain Park and had a potluck Sunday dinner. Below, Memaw and some of her sisters and kinfolks at the park. Memaw is in white. [I left it big so you could see the faces] I think, based on the shape of the shadow, that my mother took that shot..

Ghosts of Christmas Past

When I was about ten years old my mother was really sick over Christmas. I think she had the flu. I was still young enough to be very excited about Christmas. Gifts were everything.

I cannot tell you a single gift I got that year, but I can tell you this: Christmas was a somber, depressing day that year. Dad tried to cook us dinner and we had cold hamburgers and canned soup. With Mom out of commission the holiday just wasn't fun. I learned a valuable lesson that year.

I learned that gifts have nothing to do with Christmas joy.

Other Christmases that stick out on my mind are ones where things were unusual or just plain bad.

The first year my brother was on active duty in the military was awful because he was in Texas and couldn't get leave to come home for Christmas. My mom was stoic about it but Dad just cried most of the day.

The first Christmas after Dad died it was just me, Mom and Bruce, and the whole holiday was "off." Dad loved Christmas, like a child. With him gone, there was just no energy there, no spark.

Of course, there were the traditional Christmas fights each year.

Every Christmas when I was a kid, I always wanted my brother's presents. He got cool stuff like Hot Wheels and I got girly stuff like clothes. There would usually be at least one meltdown before lunch.

When I was a kid we always had a real tree, and Mom and Dad would have a big fight about the cost of the tree, who was going to water it, etc.

Every year Dad would watch us decorate the tree after he had put on the lights and helped us put the decorations at the top [he was 6'0 tall]. Then he would make himself a drink and say "I believe that's the prettiest tree we've ever had!" Every year.

On Christmas Eve, Dad would always say "Let's all just open one present! Just one!" and Mom would remind him we always open presents Christmas morning. A brief argument would ensue.

My grandparents usually came over a few days before Christmas and left Christmas around noon to drive home to Atlanta so they could spend the rest of the day with Memaw's siblings.

The Christmas after 9/11 my mother gave me and my brother each an expensive chafing dish from William Sonoma, so if we ever lost power for an extended period of time, we could cook over sterno. When I told my uncle about it he said "Why didn't she just buy you a camping stove?" and I had to remind him my mother never in her life went camping and had no idea such a thing existed.

My mother also loved Christmas too, in a big way. Below, an excerpt from her memoir, Singing to the Cows:

With the exception of the World War II years, we were always in Georgia for Christmas. The Butler family (my mother's family) always spent the holiday together. We always spent the night of the 24^th with my Aunt Hazel or her family with us. Often, the Dan Butler family was in the mix too. Kids often slept on blanket or quilt pallets, on hardwood floors … and I do mean HARD wood! Sofas were a luxury.

         It always seemed to me that there were huge amounts of food. The sisters (my mother had 6 of them!) would talk and plan ahead, mostly deciding about the meat. Think they brought the sides they wanted to bring…. Veggies and salads and my mother always made cakes. There would be sweet tea and coffee, but never alcohol. At Aunt Hazel’s, kids ate at the big kitchen table and some of the men ate at the big table on the screened porch when the weather was nice.

         There was always a big tree with half a room of wrapped presents around and under it. They would be given out after the big noon meal. They drew names by family, but every family had a present for Granny Butler, usually in addition to some money.

         During those years, Uncle Dan and Aunt Estelle plus Danny, Jack, and Jeannine spent holidays and other times with us. Carol was born after or near the end of World War II. I loved that family and loved the time they spent with us. They lived in Largo, Fla. where Dan worked with Stelle’s family -- they owned orange groves. They always arrived with big bushels of wonderful, tree ripened fruit.

         In later years, the war years, we lived in South Carolina, and partly because of severe gas rationing and difficulty finding good tires, we did not travel much at all.

         Guess that’s when I learned about Santa. Don and I were sometimes left with Bobby to babysit. As soon as the folks left the house, Bobby and Don would start looking for their hidden presents -- and would find them. That year, Santa brought the boys real nice toy tractor sets which they took out and played with. By the 25^th , the toys obviously showed wear and tear. They showed me my doll once but wouldn’t let me play with her.

         One Thanksgiving when we lived in Georgia, the folks decided we would spend the day driving through the mountains, then stop at one of the hotels and have dinner. Well, we did that, but the dining room was closing. Thankfully, one of the men recognized Dad and served us the delicious leftovers! Then they got autographs and visited with the folks. Later, as we were driving home, they spotted a pretty pine tree, stopped, and cut it down. They tied it to the roof of the car, for our happy Christmas tree. Can you imagine doing that in a national park these days?!

In summary, what makes any Christmas special is not gifts, but people. Family and friends. Swapping stories. Eating a communal meal. Relaxing together. Praying together. Loving each other. That's what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.

Labels for Children

As a child, I was a female nerd, long before I ever heard that word. I was also a tomboy, a bookworm, Miss Priss [Mama's nickname for me], The Dee Dee [Dad's nickname for me], Doll [my grandfather's nickname for me] and An Early Bloomer. My mother and my memaw were constantly on my case about being a Little Lady, but eventually they gave up on that. I preferred playing in the dirt to being ladylike, any day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We love to label children. My teachers told Mom and Dad I was precocious, conscientious, creative, and sometimes my attention wandered. Newsflash: my wandering attention was a result of me not being challenged in school. (I learned by 4th grade to always take a book to school so when I finished my classwork I could just read.)

I was also a bedwetter, for many years. It was embarrassing, especially when visiting someone else's house. At my own house, I woke up wet, got up and cleaned myself off and put on a fresh gown, and got in bed with my parents. I was reminded of that reading Sean Dietrich's column, Sleepless in Nashville.

I had stopped wetting the bed around age 11 but I was very sympathetic to the child who wrote Sean. It's super embarrassing. It's also, though, an instant barometer of the adults around you. Mothers tend to be sympathetic and kind, but fathers aren't always so nice, at least in my observation.

I wet the bed for the last time at age 15, while trying to sleep in a hotel room with both parents, who snored like crazy. Thank goodness I was on a cot.

Being a bedwetter also, I am convinced, makes for a more compassionate adult. If you are a bedwetter you feel intensely sympathetic to the child who is nerdy, or who wets the bed, or the little bookworm who hates being the last chosen for a sports team.

I always felt self-conscious and freakish in elementary and middle school. I could never feel good about myself except in the spelling bee or sometimes when onstage singing or doing plays. I grew fast and was taller than all my classmates until 8th grade. Then some of the boys started sprouting, so I didn't feel like She-Hulk by the time I got to high school. 

Parents, if your child wets the bed, trying to make them feel ashamed does.not.work! Set an alarm and get the child up to tinkle in the night. Or restrict liquids before bed. or whatever works. Children need to feel empowered and safe in their worlds. Shame and humiliation don't work.

Being a kid is tough, but being a nerdy kid, a bedwetter, a giant -- those make childhood a real trial by fire. I was also chubby so I got those labels too, which hurt.Try to always speak to your child with Love -- that's the quickest was to effect change.

A Celebrity Encounter

Before anyone carried a cell phone around in their pocket, encountering a celebrity meant asking for their autograph or perhaps just chatting with them for a few minutes. My grandmother Cordelia Henderson Thompson encountered a very famous singer/actor when she was going through a very difficult time in her life in the late 1950's. Her husband, my grandfather, had developed emphysema and was an invalid for about the last ten years of life.

I was scrolling through looking for a movie to stream the other night and I saw that White Christmas was an option. One of its stars was Bing Crosby, who was a huge movie star starting in the early 1930's. He almost always sang in his movies. He sold tons of records. Even though he had pretty much quit making movies when I was a kid, and his records weren't charting any more, I watched his Christmas specials every year. I loved his smooth baritone voice. He sang easily and seemingly effortlessly but I can tell you as a trained singer myself, making it look easy is the toughest trick to pull off.

I didn't know until I was in my 20's and my mother and I were watching White Christmas on TV that Bing was the all-time favorite singer of Grandmother Cordelia.

I also never knew any details of the death of my grandfather because Dad would never talk about it. Dad was only 27 when Grandaddy died, and it haunted him.

My mother knew a great deal about it because she was there when Grandaddy passed and she had watched Cordelia struggle to nurse her husband. Mom was only married to Dad a couple of years when Cordelia died but they had become great friends and Mom talked about her often, to me. I am named for her, in spirit. My name is a shortened version of "Cordelia."

Mom said the love story between Cordelia and Thompson was extraordinary. They didn't meet until Grandaddy was 35 and Cordelia was about 31. At that time she was considered an old maid, certain to never marry, according to the standards of the day. Grandaddy had never married likely because he sent money home to support his mother after his dad died.

They married in 1922 and had my uncle Lewis in 1923 or 24. My grandfather was not an education man and he had always struggled to find work. Cordelia came from a prominent family and had attended college and was a successful teacher. Despite those differences, it was true love match.

When Thompson was hospitalized sometime in the mid 1950's Cordelia sat with him all day in the hospital. She told my mom years later that she was coming out to get into her car one day and saw two golfers walking along on the adjacent golf course, and she realized it was Bob Hope and Bing Crosby! They were friends in real life as well as co-stars in the movies. They were both golf fanatics. They saw her and they walked over and chatted with her for a few minutes. She said they were really kind and friendly. She was going through a seriously difficult time in her life -- Grandaddy would die just a couple years later -- and both those superstars took the time to chat with her. I love that story. I now think of it every time I see a mention of Bing or Bob or White Christmas, one of my all-time Christmas songs. You can sing along with the song if you click here. 

#bingcrosbyencounter, #bobhopeencounter, #atruebingcrosbyfan, #whitecristmassingalong