Let Me Out of This Handbasket! A Rant

I don't want go where it's going! For a trip into the surreal mind of Alabama state senator Erwin, check this out.

As if Roy Moore weren't nutty enough! Senator Erwin registers up there with Pat Robertson, preaching that hurricanes Katrina and Rita were the wrath of God, because...
'New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast have always been known for gambling, sin and wickedness.'

Well, heck, we've got places like that all over the world that are still thriving. Why not LA, Las Vegas, Rio de Janeiro, Monte Carlo (or does God really like the French after all?), and Atlantic City? And what about San Francisco? And, really now, come to think of it, why not Washington DC? Senator Erwin needs to open his mind to the possibilities.

You know, I heard on NPR that the Bush adminstration is trying to speed aid to the hurricane victims by cutting red tape, specifically with outside contracts. They want to change the limit at which oversight/audit/higher approval has to be done. The limit now (I think NPR reported) is $2500; they want to increase it to...wait for it....$250,000. Add this little tidbit to the fact that companies doing the reconstruction (Halliburton, KBR, other subsidiaries) do not have to pay the going rate to employees, and it starts to look like somebody's pockets will be well lined for winter. I know contracts this small are barely worth Halliburton's time, but they aren't the only sharks in the water.

And I am still a bit confused as to why we have the 82nd Airborne patrolling streets in New Orleans, while about half of Louisiana's national guard units are patrolling middle eastern deserts. Oh, yeah! I remember now. Bush has put the push on making the DoD responsible for handling disasters. (Maybe he wants to try them on the natural ones, since they haven't been so good at the, uh, cough, man-made ones.) If this doesn't worry you, it should. To find out why, look here .

I'm gonna get off my soapbox for now.

Focket!

Did you know it is impossible to make the 'p' sound (you know, puh), while wearing a wide grin on your face? Try it...I'll wait...

Didn't work, did it? Sounded like 'fuh', didn't it?

Wanna know where I learned that?

No, not in speech therapy, and not in a linguistics class. My son taught me this, in all his two years of teaching experience...(yeah, yeah, yeah...don't laugh. I probably learned more from him during those first two years than I ever learned in two years any where else.)...but I digress...

He was a busy-minded boy...still is, come to that, and he studied everything he saw from day one. At the time of this particular lesson, he was working on language. He loved to learn new words. At any item for which he didn't know the term, he'd ask, "Mommy, what's dis?" We went through this all day long sometimes.

One morning we were getting him dressed for his trip to day care. We had just got his shorts and t-shirt on, and I was hurriedly working on the socks and shoes, afraid I'd be late for work. He looked down at his purple shirt and pointed to the little patch over his chest. "What's dis, Mommy?"

"That's your shirt. You know that," I said. He'd learned that word a long time ago.

"No, Mommy," he said,exasperated, grabbing the entire patch in his pudgy fist, "DIS!"

"Oh! That," I said, finally catching a clue ( just haven't been the same since I had those kids, you know...I think it's from the doctors installing the eyes in the back of my head.), "That's your pocket."

"Oh. A pocket?"

"Yes, a pocket."

He practiced it a bit, rolling it over in his mouth, getting used to the feel of it. When he had it down pat, he positively beamed with pride that he had learned yet another word. "Mommy, look," he grinned, pointing at his chest, "focket!"

I gasped, thinking of the obvious connotations. "No, no, no. Not focket, pocket."

But it was a lost cause. He was entirely too pleased with himself to keep from grinning. He bounced around the house shouting, "FOCKET! FOCKET! FOCKET! I HAVE A FOCKET!"

I was frazzled and running a little late, so this was a battle I chose not to fight right then. He did calm down for the ride to the daycare center, so I didn't have to listen to him shout it all the way there. However, I knew he would have to show his new word off to all the providers and other kids at daycare. So...I took him inside and signed him in. I didn't have time to explain the whole thing, so I told the woman at the front desk, who was also the manager, "No matter WHAT you think he's saying today, TRUST me, he's not swearing; he's saying POCKET."

She gave me a quizzical look and said, "Pocket?"

"Yes," I said, "Pocket. You'll see," and I was out the door.

After my shift was over, I stopped back at the center to collect my busy boy and go home. The manager saw me from across the room and made a point to come and talk to me. All she said was ,"I know what you mean."
He must have overwhelmed her with his favorite new word all day. Well, at least she got a warning; I didn't.

Travelin': AKA Little Pitchers With Big Ears

When I was a kid we lived about 180 miles west of where my grandparents lived, and where my parents grew up. Before the interstate was built in the late sixties/early seventies, cutting our travel time almost in half, we had to take US highway 64. It made for a long trip; Mom, Dad, and usually me in the front seat of that enormous (at least to me) Plymouth, and my sister and brothers in the back.

On one occasion, we were heading toward Grandma's, I can't remember what season, but I seem to remember it being hot and muggy outside. You'd think it was summer, but sometimes it's like that in Oklahoma, regardless of the season...We were, all six of us, packed in the old Plymouth, only this time, I was in the back with the other three kids. It was hot, sweaty, and tight. at some point along the way, I'm sure Dad stopped and let us all get a drink at some roadside gas station, most likely a Phillips 66. We all piled back in.

I was about three or four, and I was happy; I had my very own bottle of Grapette, just for me, and all was right in the world. Dad pulled out onto the blacktop, and away we went. I was drinking my pop (We called it pop, not soda, and not Coke. And sometimes my Dad would call it 'bellywash'.) and trying to look out the windows, not a care in the world, just along for the ride.

Now, I had a habit of swinging my legs on benches, and wiggling my feet around while sitting still, especially when there wasn't anything else to do. On a three-four hour trip, stuffed in the back seat with two adolescent boys and an older sister who didn't seem to like me much, there wasn't a whole lot to do but stay quiet and mind my own business. I thought that's what I was doing.

Then, out of the blue, Dad pulled over to the shoulder, turned around in his seat, and, red-faced with veins bulging, bellowed at me, "If you don't stop WIGGLIN'. YOUR. FEET. under my seat, I'm gonna whup you!"

I was stunned for a moment, but at no loss for words. I answered back, "It won't do no good, Daddy, 'cause I'd jus' cry an' you'd jus' pet me." (I had overheard Momma tell him this before, regarding whether he should spank me or not. She was right, you know. it broke Dad's heart to spank us, and he always wound up comforting us and apologizing.)

Dad's mouth snapped shut, and his face started turning a new shade of red, sort of a purplish color, really. All the while, the other kids were hooting with laughter. Mom sat in the passenger seat, with her hand over her mouth, but still unable to disguise her mirthful eyes and shaking shoulders.

After a moment or two, Dad laughingly admitted defeat, and we were back on the road. I made particular effort not to wiggle my feet under his seat the whole rest of the trip. No reason to take chances.

I paid for that little remark, and, no doubt, many others, later on, after I had my own kids. Momma would say I'm "payin' for my raisin'". But...that's another story.

Missin' Momma

I don't have much to say today, but I figured I ought to try. You know, work some of that rust off.

I've been thinking about my mom a lot lately...probably because one of my sons is making me nuts, and I have a million questions to ask her. But she's been gone a long time, and never got a chance to meet her only grandsons. On regular days, I don't think much about that, but it's been a stressful week, and it's always worse when I need parenting answers, the kind that don't come from books. You'd think after 18 years, I'd be better adjusted, but...I guess not.

I guess I can just look at the old faded pictures, willing myself to remember her voice and her humor. I have a few favorites for this purpose. There's the one where she'd donned the belly dancer/I Dream of Jeannie costume and laid herself under the Christmas tree for Dad. This one was taken long before I was born, but I still get a kick out of it. Then there's the one taken around New Year's. She and Dad were about to go out with her cousin and husband to celebrate. They had already primed themselves a bit for the occasion, and were all dressed up. It would be a fairly classy picture, except that Mom and her cousin were both jumping up and down to see whose boobs bounced higher. I don't remember who won. I just remember laughing at the silly grown-ups. There's another with Mom and Dad on their anniversary, I think it was their 25th. Again, they were getting ready to go out and celebrate. Both had that mischievous gleam in their eyes, and the easy smile at each other that comes from 25 years and four kids together. I think that might be my favorite. All the photos are from the early days, before the gas crunch, before we moved to Arkansas, before Dad got sick, and the mischief and smiles faded for all of us.

I have the photos, and I have memories. They're not enough sometimes, but they'll have to do.

Purple Hull Peas

Purple Hull Peas



I really miss purple hull peas.

I miss pickin' 'em on muggy summer mornings, on Uncle Bill's hill,
Listening to crickets, locusts, mockingbirds, whippoorwills.
Feeling the heat of the sun seep through my clothes,
And watching the sweat drip off Momma's nose.

I miss shellin' 'em in the early evening, on the porch swing,
Peas filling the bowl, and my fingers blackening.
We froze some, and canned a lot,
But we always kept some for a fresh pot.

I miss eatin' 'em, just like a soup in a bowl,
and fightin' with my sister, just after school,
About who ate more. There was never a winner,
We'd both have to explain why there were none left for dinner.

I found some in the store once, 'field peas' they called 'em.
It had been a long time, so I went ahead and bought 'em.
I took 'em home and cooked 'em with some bacon in a pan.
But they weren't as good. I didn't have purple hands.

Who Needs Church?

I found this little poem, written by an acquaintance on a message board I frequent. I reprint here with her permission.


My Grandmother's Purse

a recipe, yellowed & ragged
written in a long-remembered hand
slips of papers, tossed into a junk drawer
notes pressed between rarely opened pages

an embroidered, neatly folded hankie in a dusty, shelved purse
a 1957 dollar bill tucked into a tattered wllet
left there by sentiment in my Grandmother's purse

a valentine from an 8 year old, now past 56
pictures of her at MY age with me...
looking older than her years

a loved one,long gone now, who was so much
the tangibles that remain.. faded pictures,aged paper, fabric
insignificant stuff lingers..saved because it's hers


This little poem brought some memories back for me. For instance, cleaning out my Grandma's and Mom's old purses, looking for old treasures. Back then, the treasures were those of a child: gum, candy, gritty loose change, lost in the black hole to be deposited in its depths and forgotten, sometimes on purpose, for me to find. Later on, after Grandma and Mom had passed on, the treasures most definitely changed: grocery lists penciled on torn envelopes and cigarette carton pieces, ragged recipes ripped from magazines, tattered address books, wrinkled handkerchiefs, have become the prizes now. Did they know how much of themselves they left behind in those discarded purses?

From that memory flowed a bunch of others. As a kid, I used to spend summers with my grandparents, out in the country. On Sundays Grandma and I would go to Sunday school and church. I didn't like it that much. I didn't fit in with the other kids in Sunday school, and, yes, even in church, they picked on me. I was always glad to get out of there and sit next to Grandma for the sermon. I must say, I can't remember any of those sermons. I didn't really listen to any of them.

I used to sit in the pew next to Grandma, tugging at my dress (I still hate dresses) and swinging my legs. I always swung them alternately, never swinging both in the same direction at the same time. Sometimes, she'd take a stick of Doublemint out of her purse and, tearing it in half, share it with me. She gave me half because it wasn't enough to have any real fun with; popping it or blowing bubbles was not an option. She would often end up dozing, and I wondered why she didn't just stay home instead. She'd drift a bit and her head would sink slowly down toward her chest. When it touched, she would sniff and wake up. The waking was just as graceful and surreptitious as the dozing off. Then she would notice that I was swinging my legs a little too hard. Without a word or a direct glance, she would lower her left hand and place it gently on my bare knee, my cue to stop. We'd go through this ritual every Sunday till I had to go back to the city and back to school.

When we got back from church, the aromatic sweet rolls Grandma had prepared and put out to rise were ready for the oven, and she would set about cooking up what amounted to a feast for the whole family, you know, the kind that fills you up just right to take that lazy Sunday afternoon nap. I remember fried chicken, roast beef, baked ham, vegetables fresh from the garden (my favorite was always purple hull peas), and freshly brewed iced tea, usually followed by one of her luscious cakes (coconut was a favorite).

Once everyone had had their fill, the women would put away the food and clean up while the men meandered out to the porch. Grandpa would settle into his red metal chair, next to the ashtray stand, and roll himself a Prince Albert cigarette. He would roll it lightly with his gnarled fingers, bring the cigarette up to his toothless mouth and dampen the edge of the paper with his tongue. I can still smell the sweetness of the tobacco as he opened the can. My uncle would stretch himself out on the old green porch swing, too full to sit upright. He'd share the swing if there were a lot of us around, but more often than not, by the time the women were done in the kitchen, he'd be stretched out and sleeping. Depending on my aunt's mood, she might wake him up and make him share the swing and be sociable. He always made a show of being put out, but he'd always comply. This, too, was a ritual.

Funny, how love disguises itself in the little rituals.

What the hell am I thinkin'?

I haven't put any of my musings in print for ages. This could get scary. Forgive me for being scattered and out of practice. To think, I used to write all the time...It was a way to pass time for a confused, nerdy and unusual teenager then. There wasn't much else to do back then in that three stop light town. So I got pretty good at it, fancied myself becoming a writer who actually got paid, even went to college with that intention. I lost my motivation, and soon after the money...and 20 or so years later, here I sit...Not where I thought I'd be at forty, not where I intended to be at forty. It's been an interesting journey, not altogether bad or good, but a fair mix of both enough to remind me I am alive.