Time

This past weekend was our (flexible) Christmas meet-up with my best friend and his LONG TERM girlfriend (for those of you accusing me of hiding eligible bachelors from you). We met at a restaurant in Lithonia armed with bags-o-presents. Although I had seen David several times last year this was the first time since our last holiday get-together we had all been together so we caught up on all of the goings-on of each other. Laura talked about her trip to Europe last May, I talked about my trip to Bahrain, Iris about her daughters and other family and David about David. After several hours we exchanged gifts and when it came time for mine, David and Iris both were watching me, rather intensely I thought, and when I opened it I saw why. It was in a small box, in which was a leather drawstring bag, out of which I pulled a silver pocket watch with chain & fob. My breath caught in my chest. It. is. beautiful. It has an intricate engraved pattern, and the dial features the day of the week at the top and date to the right. David explained that he had been wanting to do something special for me, for being there for him when his Dad, and then his Mom passed away. He almost started crying and I had to fight from starting. I mumbled something about what are friends for and then the moment passed and we went back to chatting about this and that.

David and I met when I was a freshman in college (we can't decide if it was late '80 or early '81). He was a few years ahead of me. At the beginning of my sophomore year we became roommates. He would occasionally invite me home for the weekend and so I met his family. His father and uncles were the 2nd generation of craftsmen making furniture. David would take me to the shop and once in a blue moon I would help them on a project - I've helped glue-up desks they were refinishing for the Georgia Senate, I've helped David pull pews out of a church for them to fix and refinish. His father spoke slowly & deliberately, and had a wealth of knowledge at his fingertips about almost anything you cared to talk about. David's mom was as sweet as they come. From the beginning she treated me like one of her own children. When I visited she'd tell me - you know where everything is. Help yourself, you're not company, you're family. When I met and married Laura and brought her to visit, she was welcomed as a new daughter in the family. Through the years when passing through this part of the world we would always visit - and there was always a place for us in their home.

David lost his parents within a year of each other. In both cases, he was living with them, taking care of them. In both instances I took some time off of work and went up to be with David. I didn't do anything special, just hung around and kept him company. I wanted to do more, but didn't know what. I miss his mom and dad, they were among the few constants I've had in my life of moving around. They were always there, glad to see me. I wish I could've done more for them, been there more often but daily life got in the way, raising a family and earning a living - Conyers was always just too far for a spontaneous visit.

At each of their funerals I was reminded of how much they had meant to me and how much David means to me. No matter where I've lived, nor of all of people that have come and gone in my life he's always been my best friend. We were talking Sunday about how we'd be telling each other years from now all of the different ailments we had and what pills we were taking instead of what concert we'd like to see or what bar to visit and I realized that - we would. That no matter what the future held for us, we'd be a part of each other's.

And the pocket watch will be a reminder of that - as if I needed one.

Happy New.....well, luke-warm, no actually cold like a dead fish new year

Sorry for the absence, but I kinda took a break from writing this blog when we went on vacation to spend Christmas with Laura's family. We had a great time, (almost) everyone was doing great. I got to meet my new nephew and he is quite the handsome young man I must say. His sister is a precocious two-year-old who likes PINK! Everything must be PINK! She wanted a train set for Christmas (PINK!) but Santa didn't find it until after, so it will have to be a birthday gift (if she remembers that long).



All in all our trip to KC was great. There was lots of snow (great) but a good bit of ice (not so great) and lots of family (super-great). We got to see everyone and still had time for the new museum addition and BBQ! Twice, even. Laura and I celebrated our 23rd wedding anniversary while there (I'll have to check, if I haven't related the tale of our wedding I'll have to do so sometime). We're a bunch of old farts, all we did was go out to dinner (japanese steak house, the only part of which Laura talks about is where they were tossing shrimp into the upturned mouths of customers). We are planning to make our 25th an event with a trip to Greece (where our marriage took off and the kids were born). Anyway, we had fun in KC and left it as we found it - being snowed on.

After we got home I almost immediately got sick. AGAIN! The nerve of those cold bugs, hitting me before and after Christmas. This time it is even worse. I went from having a sore throat to thinking I was going to die from the pain every time I coughed, to loosing my voice (some people count that as a positive!) to being a lethargic, unproductive lump up until today, when I am a merely partly productive lump. I am attempting to work today (although I don't know if my boss thinks so or not) but I am not sure I will last the day out. To top it off, one of the meds the doctor gave me is playing havoc with my prostate and urinating has become somewhat a chore. (I know, TMI, but if I'm suffering, so will you) So, who knew the price to pay for getting my voice back was restricted water works.

In brighter news (and not so personal) this weekend I am meeting with my best friend and his clan (or maybe just his girlfriend - I don't know yet) to do Christmas/New Years/birthday(his). No drunken debauchery as we both are driving but I think we'll manage to have fun.

I'm sorry for having dropped off of the face of the earth, I don't have but a few readers as it is to risk losing them for lack of presence - I promise to do better. cross my heart and hope to... well, no need to go that far.

.....finish last?

damn. I can't believe it's been two weeks. I am all scattered these days.

I am so scattered, in fact, it has taken me a week to acknowledge that Liv was sweet enough to give me this:




she is, of course, utterly delusional - but as she's been under a wee bit of stress lately, what with the moving and being near-death with the crud and all, I'll not burst her bubble.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised, I've always been the nice guy. I.e. not the one the girls fight over, but the one they complain to when he didn't pick them. So I suffer silently and hold their hand and tell them what a jerk he is not to recognize what a great catch she is and that he's not worth it anyway.

ANYWAY.

I have just spent a gajillion dollars on plane/car reservations for our trip to Kansas City. We are spending Christmas with Laura's family this year. It'll be the first trip since Laura's mom passed away and it'll be.....weird. I offered Laura a chance to go over labor day weekend and she wasn't ready for that first trip back yet. But by December I think enough time will have passed,Laura will have had time to prepare and having her family around will help. Maybe it'll be a white Christmas!


P.S. What exactly is in that picture? It looks like a woman's bare back w/brastrap and a ?knee? in the foreground, or maybe she's got scoliosis and has an extremely narrow posterior?

Hilton Grocery

I was reading a blog post the other day that mentioned an old-fashioned country store. My grandaddy owned a country store, and portions of my younger years were spent there. Maybe I can paint a picture of it (as I have aboslutely no photos of it. I'll have to check with Mom to see if she does.)

It was situated at an intersection of a state road and two county roads on a gravel lot about 10 miles from town. Across the state road was the post office. (or post shack - it was tiny. My uncle ran it until it was closed.) The store was built of wood and had a front shelter where two gas pumps and a kerosene tank were located. You entered through the front screen door (with the Colonial Bread logo painted on it) or the side screen door - there was no air conditioning. I can still hear the slap of the screen doors closing. The wooden floor had worn where years of traffic had worn paths around the store. There were two windows across the front, one on either side of the front screen door behind one of which I would sometimes sit to watch for cars to pull up for gas. (I would race my brother to the pumps to see which of us got to pump the gas).

Just inside the front door in the left front corner were the drink coolers. When I first started going/working there there were no can drinks, you got either 8 or 10 ounce cokes (all soft drinks are coke in the South) and Pepsi had a 16 ounce-er. There was a crate beside one of the coolers to put your empties into. Along the left wall beyond the 2nd drink cooler was the milk cooler (with other dairy products, eggs, etc.) and then the gas heater with chairs around it - my grandmother used to sit by the fire during the winter and crochet (she taught me to crochet there) when there were no customers. This was where people would come to chat during all times of the year. There was almost always someone sitting there. Papa used to hitch one leg on the counter and talk with the current sitter(s). After the heater was the the wall phone (it was on a party line, so to make a call you picked up, listened to make sure folks weren't talking and dialed 4 digits for those on the same party line or 7 digits for town folks.). Next was the side entrance and finally a passageway to the back of the store.

Down the middle of the store from the front was a shelving display unit (bread on one side, odds and ends on the other) and at the end of the shelves was a place where bags of dog food as well as extra bales of sugar were stacked. (sugar came in 100 lb bales - 20 5lb bags or 10 10lb bags) (I used to sit at the top of the stack and pretend to be driving a stage coach.) After the sugar/dog food stacks was an aisleway in front of the meat cooler. Displayed in the cooler were souse meat, sausage meat, pork-chops, balogna, bacon, and a few sundries (now that I think on it, he didn't sell beef). The balogna, souse, and bacon were sliced to order. I can remember on weekday mornings when I would go with Papa to open the store I sliced a ton of balogna for lunch for the crews going to work on the nuclear plant being built nearby. They also bought a lot of potted meat and crackers, or vienna sausages. (both are uniquely southern comestables eaten on crackers with hot sauce). I would catch the bus from there to go to school.

On the right just inside the door was a passageway leading behind the right counters, first of which was the candy counter. Candy bars, bb's (they go together, right?) and a few candy-type items. Inside of a glass display case above the candy bars was where the penny candy was kept (some were 2-fer's). Next to the candy were 3 tall glass jars with heavy glass lids that held cookies. Behind the cookies was the cash register (that didn't work except for the cash drawer) and the hoop cheese cutter. The cutting of this cheese was reserved for Papa as he liked giving the customer ONE slice of cheese exactly the amount requested. The cutter had a flat round table on which the cheese wheel sat, it had a perpendicular handle that you pumped to and fro to move the cheese under the hinged cleaver used to cut the cheese (no jokes, please - this cheese cutting was a serious business!). Next to the hallowed cheese cutter was a brief expanse of counter, a passageway through, and then more counter at the end if which was the adding machine, complete with a handle to pull after each number entered. (I can still remember when it was upgraded to an electric model. Boy, were we in high cotton!) All behind these counters on the right were the shelves lining the wall from floor to ceiling where most of the groceries were. On these shelves also were cigarettes, loose-leaf tobacco (to roll your own) and snuff. (we sold a lot of snuff.) There were also the hanging displays of shoe strings, doan's liver/back/whathaveyou pills, plastic sunglasses, wallets, etc. A customer would come in, stand at the counter and would call out their order setting me or whoever else to fetch it. Their order was added up on the adding machine and bagged. Some folks were allowed to carry a "ticket" that was expected to be settled up at month-end. It was a big deal to me to be allowed to fill out the ticket.

Beyond the adding machine on the right was where the meat counter that ran across the back of the store met the right-side counter. Under the counter at this corner was where the cash box was kept - with a pistol on top. NOT TO BE MESSED WITH. Across the back of the store behind the meat counter was more floor to ceiling shelves. In the middle was a band saw to cut hams into slices, pork loins into chops and chickens in half. I was rarely allowed to do this, but I was always allowed to clean it. ugh.

Behind the store was a old burnham van body (off of the chassis) used for storage (sugar bales that didn't fit in the center, cattle feed and salt licks) and the outhouse. Yep - an outhouse. Although we were modern in that we kept toilet paper in it. During the summer Papa would send me home in his truck to get the tractor to bush hog behind the van body/outhouse to help keep the snakes and vermin away.

I would most often ride the bus down to the store after school and work there until closing at 6:00 PM. Sometimes during the spring and summer he would take me to the house, get out the tractor and start me plowing the field and then leave me to it while he went back to the store. (Papa also farmed corn and peanuts). Sometimes during the summer if I didn't go with him to open the store I would sleep in and then walk the railroad tracks the few miles to the store. Occasionally he would get up an order for someone and ask me to take his truck to deliver it - down a miriad of dirt roads that I knew by heart. Other summer days I would play with my brother and sister on his farm, frequently getting out his hunting jeep to ride around through the woods. Across the state highway beside the post office was a railroad siding. The train would stop there most days after switching and the crew would come over to get a coke & crackers. (I would go over and put coins under the engine's wheels to flatten them.) Empty boxcars would be left there for the papermill. Mr. Y.T. would come from town to clean them out. I would help him (in mid-summer heat) because he would let me drive his truck.

Papa's store is gone now, as is he. There are times I miss the hell out of him - and his store. In retrospect it was idyllic. Excepting those few years living with Papa (and Mama, and Mama & Papa Smith (great-grandparents) and my great-aunts & uncles, cousins, etc. etc. etc.) I was a city boy. My grandaddy was one of seven children all of which (but the one killed in WWII) lived within a few miles of each other. So living with him put me slap in the middle of a huge family. Despite spending most of my life moving from city to city I most often identify with these country roots - much more so than the years spent in suburbia. They are the clearest and most cherished memories I have of growing up.

Ellen Mae Woodford

Ellen Mae Woodford was born on October 28th, 1927. She had a difficult childhood, not only because she was raised during the depression, but also because she was from a broken home. I still don't know a lot of the details, but I do know that it fell on her to raise her younger siblings and that her sister Bev lived with her for some time after Ellen married.

I guess that the one thing that was discussed this past week was that she believed in family. In a big way. All told, she had 8 kids of her own (one of which was premature and did not survive beyond a few days).

She is survived by all but 2 of the eight children. They came in 2 batches with almost 10 years in between. There were 7 girls and one boy.

Some would say though that all of the kids in the neighborhood were hers too. She babysat for local families and ran the daycare at several churches. I'm sure you've all met someone who was great with kids, who could get them to behave and someone that they would listen to when all else failed. That was my mother-in-law.

I met Ellen in December 1984 3 days before I married her long-haired daughter. Before the day was out, she knew about my siblings, my parents, their siblings and parents; as well as how and where I was raised, etc. Her appetite for family history was voracious - and she remembered it all. If I mentioned someone was ill, the next time we talked (maybe months later) she would ask specifically about that person, their illness, etc. Her memory was amazing.

She rarely met a stranger. During a trip overseas to see us, she met a lady on the airplane that she had not seen since, but corresponded with for years afterward. When I was working swings and mids she would often get up early and walk on-base to get breakfast and would sit down with people (especially those with babies) and introduce herself and ask about them. For months after she left people would ask after my mother-in-law. Lee Greenwood came to Crete to put on a USO show while she was visiting us there. After the show MIL somehow managed to walk up and introduce herself to him and chatted for a few minutes. She didn't know who he was as she didn't listen to the radio and the only kind of music she professed any interest in was gospel, but she frequently mentioned in later years that she liked him and enjoyed the show. (I was in bed sleeping off a mid-shift at the time. She did this on her own.)

Her trip to visit us was an amazing thing unto itself. Ellen was a homemaker whose only income was her babysitting. But somehow she saved her money and made a trip to Crete to visit us after my daughter was born. She had made earlier trips to England and California, all by herself and all with her babysitting money. She did not have a driver's license as she was afraid to and had to be driven everywhere she went. My wife tells me that the only reason her dad bought her a car when she turned 16 was so that he could make her take Ellen everywhere she wanted to go relieving him of the chore.

Now I don't want to imply that she was a saint. I have mentioned elsewhere that I have had to mediate between my wife and my mother-in-law. Her magic with kids didn't always work with her own kids. Most of her kids have had some emotional problems of some sort and I believe that she did too. She also would often criticize the grandchild in her sight and praise the ones out of sight. (so, sometimes our kids were pariahs and sometimes they were saints!) Also, for many years if my wife complained about me to her mother, her mother would ask my wife what had she done wrong. My wife used to complain bitterly that she wished her mother would take her side in an argument instead of mine.

No one is perfect. I think that it is a mistake to deify someone after they pass away. You love someone despite their failings, knowing it takes all parts to make the whole. The wholeness of spirit that was Ellen lives on in each of us that knew her, and will continue to do so as long as we remember her. The following is quoted from the guestbook on Ellen's obituary in the Kansas City Star:

My family first met Ellen 3 years ago when we moved in next door to the Woodford's. At that time, our little girl was just turning 2 years old. We threw her a big birthday bash in our front yard and Ellen, who was joyfully being pushed over by Woody in her wheelchair, brought over a Fisher Price picnic basket full of magic markers to celebrate her birthday. Lauren was thrilled! To this day, she still talks about it and plays with the picnic basket nearly every day. Through the years, Lauren always got excited when we would see Ellen sitting outside on a pretty day and she would run up to her side and just gobble up the complements that Ellen would give her, telling her how pretty and smart she was. Most recently, Lauren and I dropped by to see Ellen when she came home from the hospital and Lauren didn't really know what to think of Ellen in her hospital bed. She asked me a lot of questions about why she was in bed and why she didn't talk to her like she use to. I did my best to explain to her about the stroke that Ellen had endured. Well, two days ago, after hearing of Ellen's passing, I had to find a way to tell Lauren the sad news. I decided just to tell her that Ellen had gone to heaven. Lauren's eye's lit up and she said, "Great, I'm so glad that she doesn't have to lay down anymore and that God gave her back her voice again!"

My wife broke down and cried for the first time since her mother died after having read that. So did her other sisters to whom she was reading it.

Ellen died on Monday, December 4th at 1:30 PM central. It has to be some comfort knowing she is no longer suffering and that (if you so believe) she is now where she can once more ask you about your kids and tell you about hers.

now we'll gather at the river...

I am hot and awake at 3 in the morning. I am hot because my wife insists that unless the room is 80 degrees it is cold. (This comes from a woman who just a few years ago would go out in 30 degree weather with short-sleeves on. I think the change must be a-happenin'. I digress). All the way up here she would jack the heater up and down, up and down. I had to take my sweater off and ride in my t-shirt. All I needed was a pack of cigarettes rolled up in the sleeve and a hound dog in the back to complete the picture. I am awake because we spent 15 hours on the road and even after 3 hours I can still feel it.

Here is Kansas City, icy and snowy. Here is where my in-laws live. Here is because my mother-in-law passed away yesterday afternoon. Some would say she lost the battle at last. I would prefer to think she finally won one.

I will be in the midst of family, making arrangements, buying a winter coat, listening to everyone tell their favorite stories as one does at a time like this. And as sometimes happens I will be escorting her to her final resting place for I have been honored to be asked to be a pall bearer.

I will try to absorb and maybe relate some of this sometime soon. I am not talented in that way and I don't have the words now anyway. I am tired and sad and....happy that she is no longer trapped in her failed body. I am not a religious person, but I know she was to her core. So I choose to think that she is where her belief promised her she would be. I take comfort in that.

Happy Thanksgiving

We are doing the last few loads of laundry, getting things together for our trip to the gulf shore. My sister lives in Orange Beach. My brother, who lives in San Diego, flew in with his family last weekend. My parents went down ?last weekend - I can't keep up with them half the time? taking their truck and 5th wheel. Thanksgiving on the beach! This will be the first time the three siblings (me, my brother and sister), our families and our parents have been under one roof in 4 - 5 - 6 years? I am really excited about it. And I am really glad it isn't my house.

Actually my family (wife, kids - not brother, sister) have made a tradition of going to the beach over Thanksgiving. We usually leave from wherever we are having Thanksgiving dinner at and head down Thursday evening. It takes about 5 hours to get there, so we get 2 and half days to wander around. It is lovely. No people, no crowded roads, no 100 degree heat, and even though half of the restaurants are closed there are enough open to get some good food. It is quiet and peaceful - no sounds except the surf all day and all night (and the hotels rooms are at off-off-season rates). I have become convinced that anyone who goes to the beach during the summer is a loony. Don't get me wrong, I know from summer at the beach. We lived on a Mediterranean island for two years and the summer/tourist season and I are well acquainted. I don't miss it. Well, okay - maybe just a little. I used to be a sun-worshipper in my youth. I have matured.

So, Lucky is off to the kennel, the cats have clean (and extra) litter boxes and extra food/water (with a check-in from neighbors) and we are almost packed. My son has to work until just after midnight, so we are off tomorrow morning at 6:00 AM (just like any other work day!)

I wish anyone who reads this, and everyone else who doesn't, a very Happy Thanksgiving.