We drew names on Thanksgiving Day. I got the names of my brothers and brothers-in-law, again. The rest of my shopping list includes a husband, four sons, and 4 nephews.
The men say, “Lucky you! Aren’t you glad you didn’t get any girl names? We men are so easy to please.”
Then they add, “Just remember a few simple guidelines. Here are the things we don’t need: another tie, cordless drill, snakelight, car vacuum, bedroom shoes, or battery-operated screwdriver. Also remember how we like (or don’t like) the collars, pockets, and length of our shirts. Don’t forget we have small necks and 38-inch sleeves. Otherwise, you can’t go wrong, no matter what you get us.”
Lucky me, getting to shop for men. Extra, extra tall men. Their sizes are nonexistent. And their wants are few – which is the tallest problem.
The farmer says, “Just go over to the hardware store and be done with it. Christmas shopping shouldn’t be an ordeal. A couple of hours and it’s over. Why do you insist on overreacting and making such a big deal of everything?”
That, by the way, is the standard speech he gave when I was having babies. Pitching in and helping, though, does not appear in his vocabulary – until I start screaming.
Despite his well-intended advice, it is hard for me to get excited about Christmas shopping. If I go in a store, and am hit by the smell of potpourri, I might as well get out of Dodge. I won’t be able to purchase a gift in that store to cross off my shopping list. If, on the other hand, the store’s speaker system is playing “Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer,” I’m at the right place.
Also, if they have at least 4 varieties of camouflage in stock -- “Mossy Oak,” “RealTree,” “Blaze Orange,” “Advantage Wetlands” – I’ve struck pay dirt.
Women friends imply that I have several problems. They say I am sexist. They say that my Christmas shopping woes are complicated by not starting early enough. They say I don’t play by the Christmas shopping rules.
Unlike the rest of thankful Americans, I opted out of the Thanksgiving weekend shopping. While my friends were lined up outside the stores, waiting to pounce on the Christmas bargains, I stayed home, playing the piano.
“Let ‘em fight over turtlenecks and tranquility water fountains,” I said to myself. “For my part, I prefer to rest and reflect on the true meaning of Christmas shopping.”
Today, with Christmas bearing down on me, I wish I had not been so smug. Our half-decorated tree has nothing underneath it. And I’m having heart palpitations.
I’m sure someone has written a book, besides the Bible, on how to celebrate Christmas without the hustle and bustle. For some folks, however, Christmas is the hustle and bustle. They are called merchants, and I’ll be seeing a lot of them this week.
It started as a simple household operation. The farmer and I, still reeling from the empty nest syndrome, decided to watch a video together.
This bit of togetherness lasted about 18 minutes. His own loud snoring waked the farmer up. So he announced, at 8:49 PM, “Well, it’s getting way past my bedtime. I’ll watch the video tomorrow.”
My decision was to finish watching the video, while its subject was still fresh on my mind. “Besides,” I told the farmer, “one of us needs to stay up to watch the late news -- in case we get a President tonight.”
What I did not take into account was how seriously technologically challenged I have become. And, as the lone female in the household for years, I have logged less than 7 lifetime minutes operating the remote control. Give me the remote control and I could blow up a transformer.
Therefore, when the video ended, my brain froze and my blood pressure soared. Could I navigate from the video to the TV, in time for the l1 PM news? It seemed logical that the following sequence would work: “Stop” the video, hit the “rewind” button, turn the VCR “off,” then select the “TV” option.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. After pushing these buttons, the picture vanished from the TV and the video ceased to operate. No matter how many buttons I pushed, or in what sequence, the only thing materializing on the TV was loud snow.
My second thought (the first being prayer) was to call our 18-year-old son, Miles, in Raleigh. Miles can undo technological meltdowns faster than I can say, “*&^%*# this thingamajig.”
“Leave the children out of this,” I scolded myself. “You got yourself into this mess, and you will get the TV to working, if it takes you all night long.”
An hour and a half later, the boob tube was still not functioning. Thank goodness for estrogen or I would have bawled my eyes out – or shot out the television screen.
Instead, I tried to think like a twentysomething Korean programmer would think. How would they program a remote to turn on a television? They would not use something as obvious as the “TV” button to turn on the TV.
It is so wearisome to be stuck with a linear mind in a digital age.
Finally, I located the instruction booklets for the TV, the cable box, and the remote control. A page called “turning the TV on” did not appear in any of the 3 booklets, obviously written by twentysomethings.
As a last and desperate resort, there was no choice but to reprogram the unholy trinity: the TV, cable box, and remote. This would be more complicated than brain surgery, but there was a .0005% chance I would be successful.
Sure enough, at 2:15 AM, I hit the “on” button and our favorite local commercials appeared on Channel 33. I was ecstatic. It took tremendous will power not to wake up the farmer – indeed, the neighborhood -- with the good news.
The children ask what we want for Christmas. They have ideas about all kinds of gadgets we need to simplify our lives. If one more gadget comes along to simplify my life, I could go ballistic.
The news was inevitable: Mama called to say that a cousin had sold Grandma’s house on the side of an Asheville mountain to a developer.
“The first thing they did was burn the house down,” Mama reported. “I reckon they also tore down the barn and the sleeping house.” A separate building, the sleeping house had housed boarders, Grandma’s quilting, and the pump organ.
“Well, that’s progress,” I reminded Mama. My brother said it didn’t faze him that they sold the place, but then drove straight to Asheville to video what was left of our memories before the dozers leveled them.
Last week, my itinerary took me to Asheville for a meeting. Afterwards, I found myself exiting I-40, onto Old 74 toward Rose Hill and Fairview. The Sayles family home place had been located at the foot of the mountain known as Cedar Cliff, across from A. C. Reynolds High School.
Progress is overtaking the Rose Hill community. There are video houses, 24/7 convenience stores, and in keeping with the “New Asheville,” bagels and cappuccino places. This ambience is a far cry from the neck of the woods where Mama, nicknamed the “Rose Hill Mountain Lion,” had grown up.
In the good ole days, the mountains were believed to have a strong influence on character development. In my mother’s case, she earned her nickname the day a boy drew a line in the dirt and dared my mother to cross over. She did – and then cleaned his plow. I am told that to whisper, “Marie is back in town,” still strikes fear in those hills.
Then Mama married a Baptist preacher, had four children, and moved away. Rest assured, however, that the mountain streak exists under the surface, ready to bubble up at the least provocation.
The farmer says that my siblings and I, being Asheville natives, have similar inborn tendencies.
Certainly we have many fond memories of visiting our grandparents-- and hearing the tales of rattlesnakes, eating Grandma’s pole beans, and listening to Granddaddy pick the banjo and sing his original gospel songs.
The granddaddy of our mountain memories, however, had to be those times when Granddaddy led us on a climb up Cedar Cliff. He carried the shotgun, in case the rattlesnakes cooling on the rocks got out of hand. My job consisted of getting to the top without breaking the Kool-Aid jar. Half-sweetened Kool-Aid (Grandma was a Republican) went well with the ham and jelly biscuits that she packed for us.
Such were the memories that flooded over me last week as I stopped by the side of an old mountain road to see what was left of my grandparents’ home place. Cedar Cliff is still there, but the house, the outbuildings, and the gnarled apple trees are gone. A few old tires waiting to be recycled were scattered in the mud, the only reminders of Granddaddy’s Mercury.
Of course, I cried. And snapped as many pictures as I could of what was left. “We have our memories,” I had told Mama. Yes, but in the midst of progress, why does grief for the old ways bubble up?
Something like the cold mountain spring under the spring house, where Grandma stored her milk…
Though no one has taken it to court, yet, a Baptist Sunday School teacher should have some rights. Maybe even some perks.
Taking our class to the annual Pottery Festival in Seagrove seemed like an inspired idea. The ladies updated their medical release forms and were raring to go. Then I discovered a troubling fact over the Internet: Seagrove’s one-day Pottery Festival takes place 9 to 5 on the Sunday before Thanksgiving.
I promptly e-mailed our class with the news that we were on the horns of a dilemma. To play hooky or not to play hooky from Sunday School, that was the issue.
One member said that, theologically, it would be OK to go if we could prove that “our ox was in the ditch.” Between us we have 2 goats, 14 peacocks, and 4 spoiled cats, but no ox. The “ox in the ditch” excuse would not fly.
Unfortunately, in a Baptist church, it’s hard to figure out whom you go to for permission and/or forgiveness. So, finally, I made an executive decision: we would have a sunrise Sunday School class at our house. Afterwards, the pottery hounds would go to Seagrove, and the other class members could take a nap before preaching.
No sooner did we finish our lesson, than the sun came up and the snowflakes began coming down. The farmer, who had been glued to the weather channel since 4 AM, told the ladies not to worry.
“There won’t be any snow east of Charlotte,” he announced. ”And even if there were, the snow won’t stick because the roads are too warm. Ya’ll just go on to Seagrove and ignore the snow.”
One class member was reluctant to set out, wondering whether God was trying to tell our unorthodox class something. Quickly changing the subject, I assured her that the tires on my Toyota were in good shape.
“Besides,” I said, “if there’s one thing you can count on the farmer knowing, it’s the weather.” By the time we got past Charlotte, the snow began picking up instead of ending. It was clear that the farmer was losing a lot of credibility.
Not to worry, we would just call the Highway Patrol on our cell phones. They were, however, a tad less helpful than the farmer, letting us know they had a lot more important things to do than to measure the snowfall on NC 49.
As we drove by cars in ditches, I assured the 5 ladies in my car that I had had lots of experience joyriding with the 5 men in our family during blizzards. “I could drive in Antarctica, if I had to.”
Eventually we got to Seagrove, along with a mob of other determined pottery hounds who had braved the blizzard to beat us out of the best face jugs and Rebecca pitchers.
With our haul complete, it was late afternoon and the snow was still falling in the Asheboro area. There was nothing to do but eat and head home.
At the Jugtown Café, as we ate our Jugtown burgers, one of the ladies pondered the blizzard and observed she was sure we would be just fine since, as she put it, “we have a Sunday School class teacher/driver who isn’t scared of the devil.”
I reckon, on occasion, that can be a blessing.
Worry can be so worrisome. What compounds worry is that the stuff we waste time worrying about seldom, if ever, materializes. It’s the stuff we never anticipated that we ought to have worried about!
A good case in point is the Millennium. I don’t know what you were thinking about as the clock struck midnight on December 31, 1999, but I was in uptown Shelby, expecting the lights, telephones, and possibly even the moon and stars to go out.
As I wrote then, the farmer was hog wild about capitalizing on this disaster. He was out at Shelby’s court square in full force – i.e., 4 buggies – to haul folks home when the computers in their cars failed to start. The joke was on him. It took until 3 am for him to haul his horses, buggies, and drivers home.
Other folks stockpiled generators, money, and Great Northern beans in anticipation of this disaster. For my part, I’ll confess to refilling my estrogen and taking $100 in $20s from the ATM. For his part, the farmer says my actions were very prudent.
Looking back over the Year 2000, how much of what we worried about has actually happened? 1999 was a year of worry and what do we have to show for our paranoia?
The only significant millennium bug I remember being reported was that the computer went out in a spy satellite. Unless an action movie comes out, we will never know how vulnerable we were while we nonchalantly watched football games and devoured our stockpiled Great Northerns.
And of course there was the Panama Canal. My mother was among those who worried about our having to give it back on December 31, 1999. I don’t think she thought this signaled the Coming of the Apocalypse, but, being a history teacher, she worried that the possibility was there. Indeed, one of Mama’s life dreams was to travel through the U.S. Panama Canal before it changed hands.
But life confronts us with choices. Mama and I went to India instead of to Panama. Thus, Mama entered the millennium without reaching one of her life’s dreams. The last time I talked with her, Mama was OK with the Panama Canal.
Conversely, while worrying about the millennium, who among us had the foresight to worry about the right things, the things that we have had to contend with in 2000?
We were worried sick about another 500-year flood; instead we got a 500-year drought. Some of us worried whether the First Lady would survive the scandals of the end of the century; she begins the new century as a US Senator. We were worried about who would be elected President; we did not worry that we would end the year with boxes of ballots and no president in the box.
As we enter the Thanksgiving season, I reckon we ought to be grateful that most of ours past worries have not amounted to a hill of beans. We survived the Millennium in fine order. And even amidst our current national confusion, we are under girded by law and blessed with a system that ultimately will sort it all out and produce a President, I think.
Mostly, on Thanksgiving, I’m grateful that despite what may be swirling in our personal and corporate lives, we are sustained by a loving God whose power is greater than the worries we lay before Him.
The sad news of the death of C. J. Underwood took a backseat to other gut-wrenching news last week. My generation remembers his “Carolina Camera” feature, which introduced us to North Carolina’s heroes, oddballs, and “genuine articles.”
Some 20 years ago, C. J. called our house, wanting to do a 3-minute feature on a young farm family. He chose us, he said, after learning of the farmer with his 80 cows, a city wife and a Civil War house. To add to the color, we had a gang (4) of little boys who could milk cows with the best of them.
My contribution to the segment was to make iced tea and bake a pound cake. Although I don’t remember, I’m sure I polished everyone’s boots, including my own, and sprayed down the boys’ 7 cowlicks.
While I was distracted by preparations for the shooting, our boys decided they would get ready for a little shooting of their own. So they threw gunnysacks over their bikes and set off down our old dirt road, hunting for targets; i.e., beer cans.
While I was inside, primping for the TV cameras, the boys lined their beer cans up on the picnic table in the back yard. With their BB guns loaded for bear, they were ready to star in a Western, a sitcom, or whatever.
This was 20 years ago, when beer cans raised more eyebrows than they do today. Imagine her horror, therefore, when my mother tuned to Channel 3. Like the rest of North Carolina, she was greeted by the voice of C. J. Underwood, touting the virtues of country living. While C. J. expounded on the wholesomeness of rural America, the camera panned over rows and rows of beer cans on the picnic table under the old pear tree, his remarks punctuated by the sound of little boys’ ferociously firing their Daisy BB guns.
This was not the message I wanted to get out to the people of North Carolina.
To his credit, C. J. seemed to take our inconsistencies in stride. However, he was clearly taken aback by the farmer.
Until we married, the farmer had made a stab at becoming a city boy, living almost 10 years in Raleigh, first graduating from, and then working for N. C. State. No sooner did we marry than the farmer quit his city job and moved us to the farm.
C. J. commented to the farmer that returning home to farm must have been quite an adjustment.
My husband looked straight into the camera and answered: “Yes, C. J., it was a very big adjustment. All those years I was living in Raleigh, there was nothing to do. That’s the biggest adjustment you face when you live in a big city: there is absolutely nothing a man can do. When I came back to Cleveland County, there was so much to do on the weekends that I like to wore myself out. I had to learn to pace myself. Yes sirree, it’s been a heap of an adjustment.”
That was 20 years ago. The day C. J. died, our youngest son sent an e-mail. “I’m coming home this weekend. There’s nothing to do here in Raleigh. Reckon you could bake a pound cake?”
Sifting through the current barrage of political ads is a challenge even for the most open-minded voter. Code words and litmus tests, and pollsters and spin specialists, compound the voters’ problem.
Voting is akin to a nightmare I once had about playing Scrabble. In that dream the letters were floating everywhere, but just when I thought I had nailed a word, the letters changed with the wind.
I reckon I shouldn’t fault candidates for changing their priorities with the wind – and their audience. The older I get, the more I realize that sticking to one’s guns is a challenge for all of us, from politicians to programmers to potato farmers.
Most of us can state our priorities. Some could list them in our sleep. Living them out in the daylight is the rub.
If you ask, I will tell you in a heartbeat that my priorities are the Lord, followed by family, health, job and community.
But if these are my priorities, then why do I watch “Millionaire” three nights a week? Why don’t I do sit-ups instead? Or why don’t I bake fancy cookies for the children, my coworkers, and the mayor? Wouldn’t such activities match up better with my priorities? Then take spirituality. If spiritual growth is a priority, then why do I spend so much time reading Southern Living and National Geographic, and so little time reading the Bible?
As for touting the community as a priority, I’m afraid there are other obsessions that interfere with my helping save the planet. My intentions are good, but how does obsessing over the weeds in the cracks in my driveway square with the above priorities?
However, my greatest inconsistencies concern health priorities. Doctors have warned that my arteries are closing up due to the high levels of bad cholesterol that runs in our family. I would probably swear on a stack of Bibles, or American Heart Association brochures, that I am committed to keeping myself going.
But if health is a priority, why are the walking shoes I bought off the Internet still in the box? And why is shopping for exercise gear on the Internet a hobby, while my YMCA membership card is unused due to lack of time?
The other day I decided it was time to get serious about my health. It took an article about unhealthy feet to get me started. After getting scared out of my wits by a toenail article, I launched an all-out attack. I even bought a brush to scrub my feet and toes. I really am committed to saving my feet through vigorous scrubbing, followed by towel drying each toe.
This takes so much in my morning ritual hat there is no time left to floss my teeth, exercise or eat oatmeal. I realize that this is ludicrous – a case of misplaced priorities if there ever was one. If I put half as much effort into tuning up my cardiovascular system working as I do on polishing my toenails, I would live longer and healthier.
That’s the problem with priorities. You can figure them out, talk about them till the cows come home. But how do you work them in?
A young friend and university student called the other night for help with a term paper. Her call scared me to death – you could write a book about what I don’t remember about term papers.
As it turns out, she was looking for a “local” to interview; and I reckon I qualified by virtue of being her mother’s talkative Sunday School teacher. I agreed to answer her questions to the best of my middle-age memory. When she said her research would help Chapel Hill, I almost bailed out; then I gave, in realizing Chapel Hill needs all the help it can get.
Her questions were about my perspective on work, responsibility, and relationships, especially family. One of her questions really threw me for a loop. She asked, “Has the fact that you are married ever affected your career? If so, in what ways?”
I’m not sure even Chapel Hill is ready for the answers that came to my mind.
Being married affects everything I do, from the way I floss my teeth to the way I slice bananas for sandwiches. It saves a lot of hassle to give in on passels and passels of small things. Therefore, when it comes to dental floss and bananas, I go along with my husband’s preference for waxed, unscented floss; and perfectly shaped banana circlets.
Being married also affects everything that happens in the yard, from what kind of bushes to plant to where we place the birdhouses.
However, until the interviewer asked me this question, I had never mentally ticked off the ways my husband has affected my career.
His influence starts at 6 am with the first cup of coffee in the morning. Even the snazziest new alarm clocks don’t hold a candle to the farmer. Nor is there a rooster anywhere who is better at rousting me out of the bed in the morning.
His influence affects my next choice: what to wear to work. Although it took him a while, he now has more horse sense than to advise me on how to dress for success. Now he knows the wisdom of dropping subtle hints, such as, “Oh, are you going to work today? The way you are dressed, I thought you were going to hoe the garden.”
Once at work, the farmer might appear to be invisible, but that is an illusion. More than once, while working on a knotty problem, I’ll fall back on some bit of advice the farmer has given. Such as his all-time favorite from his years as a dairy farmer: “Remember, Kathryn: The more you stir it, the more it stinks.”
By the time I had finished answering my young friend’s question, I was exhausted from thinking how a spouse’s influence is interwoven in one’s work.
It may seem like just a romantic photo opportunity when you put that small ring on halfway through the wedding ceremony, but that small ring ends up encircling your life. Choose wisely, and your life will be enriched. Even when you are not together.
The embroidered sampler in my bathroom states it well: “Choose thy love; love thy choice.”
Until our third son came along, no one in our family had the genes to be mechanically inclined. To be sure, the farmer could tinker with tractors with a sledgehammer as the need arose. And Papa could patch your car back together, inside or outside, with clothes hangers.
From his babyhood, however, Spencer showed signs of being our fix-it man. At 18 months he was assembling jigsaw puzzles for kindergarteners. At 6, he learned to read music while sitting on the piano bench with his older brothers.
Teachers said there was a correlation between musical abilities and mathematical abilities. All I know is that Spencer tackled the problems we couldn’t fix with a claw hammer, crow bar, or extra wide duct tape.
By majoring in engineering at NC State, we felt he had found his calling. Now he works for Caterpillar, designing parts for the backhoes and the other equipment that were the stuff of his childhood dreams and the boys’ sand pile.
No sooner does Spencer come home for a visit than we hand him our “Fix It” list On his last visit, I couldn’t wait to show him the new piano purchased one Saturday when I had delusions of winning a lottery. As Spencer was admiring the piano, I began ticking off the bugs in the new piano, hoping against hope he could engineer a solution to my “New Piano Woes.”
“Listen to this A flat,” I lamented. “It isn’t working right. Whether I hit it loud or soft, A flat rattles. I can’t live with this tinny sound. Don’t you think I need to send the piano back to Korea?”
Like a true engineer, Spencer was emotionless, speechless, and expressionless. Eventually, he simply said, “Hit A flat for me.”
So I did, and began whining, “See! See! See! A flat sounds awful…This is just not acceptable. I may be a big girl but I can’t take this.”
Then Spencer said, “The piano is fine. What you have is a loose screw – in the living room light fixture.” To our amazement, Spencer tightened the living room light fixture, and then played “I Swear” by memory --- in 3 flats without a rattle.
Then he hit a few more piano keys, and tinkered with the knick knacks that were vibrating inappropriately, thereby interfering with our other favorites, “Tennessee Waltz,” “Alabama Jubilee,” and “Beulah Land.”
As Spencer explained, “Mama, don’t you know that everything and every body will vibrate at a certain frequency? Just be glad we don’t all go off on the same frequency, or the world couldn’t function.”
I had always known there would be some sort of return on our investment in his college education.
In my liberal arts education at Wake Forest, however, no one ever mentioned this. The gist of my education there was this bit of philosophy: “Go with the light that you have.”
At NC State, they would add, “Just remember this truth about light waves: that the energy per unit volume (W ) stored in a wave motion of light is proportional to the square of the amplitude (A) so that, with a suitable choice of units, W = A2.”
When the sales person from Sam’s Club called on the office, I was might near rude. “The last thing I need is a 3-gallon jug of salsa or 24 pounds of frozen chicken tenders,” I said arrogantly.
“Well, if cheap chicken doesn’t excite you, what about a deal on a tub of 3500 generic ibuprofen?” the saleslady asked. She hit pay dirt when she found my hot button.
Prior to age 50, I had prided myself on not having “aches and pains” or “cricks and creaks.” Besides, if God meant for us to use ibuprofen, why did Grandma hoard aspirin?
Not surprisingly, the farmer sampled ibuprofen first. When he started buying 8 tablets for $6.50 at the gas station, I capitulated, putting the generic painkiller on my grocery list.
Then I hit 50, and a few symptoms of middle age began showing up. Specifically, I started falling asleep at 10:02 pm on the couch, with my head at a 76-degree angle. Though this isn’t listed in the medical books, several nights in this position quickly gave me a stubborn case of “corduroy couch neck and shoulder syndrome.”
The farmer came up with a clever plan to keep me from sleeping on the couch. He would turn the air conditioner to 50 degrees. Unfortunately, his cure made things worse, giving me “frozen corduroy couch neck and shoulder syndrome.” As my complaints escalated, the farmer issued an ultimatum: either have an MRI or an ibuprofen.
Having an MRI would be foolish. Besides, how would you explain to a medical professional that your neck is “all stove up” because you fall asleep on the couch at the drop of a hat?
After 3 months of ibuprofen, my neck limbered up. What happened next was that I resumed engaging in risky behavior. Specifically, I got the notion that I could lie on the couch and watch the Presidential Debates without falling asleep. I don’t presume to speak for you, but these debates have literally torn my neck out of the frame. Unless this election gets here soon, I may have to make another run to Sam’s Club for ibuprofen.
Frankly speaking, at my age, there are plenty of other joints getting out of whack. When the farmer talked me into getting myself a baby grand piano, I didn’t know that there would be a price to pay physically, too.
Spending 4 hours straining to see the notes and reach the chords of “Beauty and the Beast” has given me a severe case of “Baby Grand Piano Neck.”
What are the effects of “Baby Grand Piano Neck?” In a nutshell, I could win an Al Gore look-alike contest.
Thank goodness for the farmer, who now serves me a handful of ibuprofen with morning coffee. It’s because he is tired of my complaining. However, I know not to push the envelope too far. In other words, he is clueless about the other maladies he is treating: “File folder elbow.” “Grandbaby hip.” “Computer back,” aggravated by “Butter bean back.”
The Sam’s Club saleslady predicted that I would become a regular, citing their middle age special: a washtub of ibuprofen with a free side of emu oil. For the flip side of middle age -- flakiness.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t cotton to people who don’t take to the Cleveland County Fair. Maybe it’s because the farmer is 59 going on 17, but no sooner did the fair open than the farmer and I went. Actually, we left work early – and stayed long.
The next morning, I heard myself bragging unashamedly about the fair to an outsider – an urbanite. “It’s the biggest county fair in NC, the South, possibly the whole world,” I said. “If you’re lucky, you’ll get to take in our fair while you’re in town.” This urbanite reacted as though I were an ole-timey hick.
“Sure, Kathryn, and I guess the next thing you’re going to tell me is that Shelby has the best BBQ in the world…”
A man with an attitude isn’t going to get any BBQ secrets from me. So I said, “Actually, no. If you want good BBQ, you’ll have to head up to New Hampshire.”
Perhaps it is understandable that outside ignoramuses might not appreciate the Cleveland County Fair. What is mind-boggling is that not all the natives fully appreciate the world-class treasure in our backyard.
“My husband and I have more important things to do than go to the fair,” a local said to me. Sure, like watching your okra toughen, I wanted to respond.
The majority of folk, thank goodness, realize that Cleveland County is entitled to bragging rights over our fair. In fact, there are locals who go plum crazy over the fair.
Some brag about their years of perfect attendance at the fair. It’s probably good that the fair doesn’t hand out perfect attendance pins. That might give a few Baptist churches a run for their money.
Then there are the nut cases who simply cannot get enough of the fair. They fight the traffic to get to the fair every night, whether they have cows out there or not. Some of our children fall in this category. In fact, our youngest son called from Raleigh the other day with a sure enough dilemma. He warned me that it was a heavy, philosophical matter.
“Mama, I really hate to miss math class Friday, but the Demolition Derby is Thursday night at 7:30 pm. I’m thinking of driving home for the Derby and skipping math. Besides, I made 79 on the last math test. Help! Tell me what I should do.”
Mama, a Demolition Derby freak herself, took a deep breath and weighed the moral options. There will always be math, I thought, but how eternal is the Demolition Derby?
Then the ole-timey Protestant work ethic kicked in, and I heard myself say: “Miles, if you cut math class, you could miss that one piece of vital information that will unlock calculus for you. You are young. You can go to the Demolition Derby another time. This is a decision that calls for delayed gratification.”
When he could speak, Miles simply said, “What you’re saying is I can’t come home. Not even for the fair. Life isn’t fair, is it?”
No, but thanks to the Cleveland County visionaries who keep the fair humming, there may be another chance. Next year.
Year after year, I can count on my brother Broadus for a zinger of a birthday card. This year, at least he remembered that our granddaughter was born on my birthday.
On our September 24 birthday, Broadus wrote: ‘Kathryn, everybody will be focusing on its being Morgan’s 1st birthday and will forget about how old you are getting. But I know how old you are and I will always be younger.”
Brother, “it ain’t over till the fat lady sings.” He will be 50 in two weeks, and I’m already searching for the get-even card. Or maybe I’ll take out a home equity loan and hoist a nifty-fifty billboard. In Charlotte.
The farmer says that at our age, it’s time to let bygones be bygones. What I’m beginning to wonder if it isn’t easier to quench a raging forest fire than it is to squelch sibling rivalry.
To be honest, my brother is right about my age. Last Sunday, I was tickled pink to (1) wake up and (2) know what day it was.
My part of the birthday celebration started with the farmer, who proposed a tradeoff. He’d cook breakfast if I would cook Sunday dinner. He even had the nerve to request my baking him a lemon buttermilk pound cake for my birthday. At 54, I’m thinking of retiring as “Miss Southern Magnolia.”
So I said, “Thanks for the suggestion, but the fat lady has sung. I’m baking myself a blackberry cobbler, because that is what I want.” The farmer wisely sized up the situation and asked, “And how many packs of blackberries shall I get out of the freezer for you?”
The children, who were in earshot, moaned. I actually heard one of the boys say, “Yuk. Mama will probably bake herself the meatloaf recipe on the back of the Quaker Oats box, too.”
For better or worse, our tradition allows the birthday boys and/or girl to select their birthday menus. They dread my birthday because I like to cook the Baptist parsonage recipes my mother prepared in the 1950s and 1960s. I literally cut my teeth on meatloaf – and other delicacies that country boys hate: Brussels sprouts au gratin, popovers, lime Jell-O salad with cottage cheese, and pigs in a blanket.
Sunday, in the interest of family harmony, I cooked the farmer’s favorites with all the trimmings – plus blackberry cobbler.
Another tradition at our house is after dinner coffee. But no sooner did they gulp down my cobbler than our youngest son mysteriously disappeared in his pickup truck. The farmer sat on his hands, refusing to make coffee, saying he was on strike.
Miles finally returned, carrying a grocery bag and reeking of hazelnut. He presented me with a coffee grinder, adding that he had thrown in an $8 bag of gourmet coffee because I was “somebody special.”
I cried. The farmer, a straight Folgers man, turned green. When he could speak, he said, “I can’t stand to smell, much less drink, coffee that’s been tampered with.” He even hinted that he might take back the birthday present he had given me: a 20-pound commercial barbecue chopping board.
Thank goodness for another son’s gift: bath oil and aromatherapy. With a family like ours, an Aging Magnolia can use a good soaking.
Forty-eight years ago, my parents signed me up for piano lessons and bought the first of the John Thompson piano series. Some of you remember John Thompson and piano lessons, 1950s-style. The 1950s: the decade when mothers believed that “making you practice” would not warp you for life.
This was also the decade when a child who whined “I want to quit” got her piano sentence doubled instead of commuted.
Ten years later, I was reconciled to piano lessons. Mama promised that music would enrich my life. Probably the other reason I persevered was that practicing Rachmaninoff often got me out of drying the dishes.
In college, my piano career floundered when a well-meaning professor said I wasn’t concert pianist material, adding that I played “a la Spencer.” (A disparaging reference to my railroad hometown.)
Therefore, instead of piano, I loaded up on extra Spanish courses, and to show the professor, learned to play “La Cucaracha” in a Southern, Latin style.
Next I got married. No sooner did we park our trailer in Boiling Springs than my mother-in-law gave us her piano. PaPa had traded a mule for the piano early in their marriage, in the 1930s. The 1930s: the decade when a mule had buying power.
This heirloom became if not an icon, a jumping off place for our 4 little boys. During those glory years, playing the piano was a great stress reliever. It is hard to be mad at children while you are playing “It Is Well With My Soul.” Of course, my theme song during those years was “I’ll Fly Away.”
Then the children flew away and the piano took a backseat to the computer. Maybe the time had come to get the old black upright, a decorating nightmare, out of the den.
Maybe at 50+, I could finally quit practicing the piano. But what would life be without a piano? I have never lived in a home without an old ebony upright. And all the while, I’ve held on to the dream of owning a new piano.
Several weeks ago, the farmer and I were discussing life’s dreams while eating breakfast down at Mr. Waffle in Gaffney. “How much money could a baby grand piano cost?” the farmer asked. “Let’s go pick you out one and haul it home.”
What a husband! He never dreamed that a new piano would cost as much as an old tractor, or a used pickup. As it turned out, we were fixing to have a case of sticker shock. We left the showroom, tempted by the harmony and the beauty. Hint: if you go to the showroom to test drive a new piano, you might as well go home, rearrange the furniture and make a place.
Three weeks later, I simply told the farmer, “Well, I’m going to get it.” He knew what I was referring to, and said, “Good. But we’ll have to count that as your early birthday present.”
The salesman at the music store said, “Good. Who are your credit references?”
The children said, “Good. Now Mama can show out playing ‘Walking the Floor Over You.’ "
Morgan, our one-year-old granddaughter and child protégé, simply sat in my lap and played “Clair de Lune,” or something close.
Mama said, “Good. Music enriches your life.”
Even if you do play Tchaikovsky, a la Hot Water Town.
Folks have asked what in the world I will write about anymore. The cows are gone, your children are history, and “we all have grandchildren,” they say.
Such comments cause a writer to wonder whether she has a life, or whether she should go out and “get a life.” Then it hit me. Though the brain matter may be going, I still have subject matter.
Actually, at least 3 sources of subject material come to mind: the workplace, my Sunday School class, and the farmer. So, if you are in one or more of these affected groups, consider yourself forewarned.
Of course, these groups often overlap. Sometimes carried-over thoughts from Sunday School save the day, or someone’s life, at work. Or vice versa.
However, the most common overlap is when thoughts of the farmer invade the workplace.
My mind goes into high gear every time a pickup truck with a diesel engine circles our building. Even after 30 years of marriage, the sound of a diesel engine is exciting.
I don’t know about you, but a diesel engine has a certain “cachet” … making me wonder whether the farmer is dropping by with flowers and/or a picnic lunch. That’s why the racket causes me to leap from the chair and fly expectantly to the window. Nothing in “Career Advancement Workshops for Women” prepares you to handle such phenomena.
However, when the farmer drops in at the office, mostly what he drops off is bits and pieces of whatever is on the back of the truck: clumps of hay, oil, and other stuff that drives city slickers bananas. Ask the office.
There is another time of the day when thoughts of the farmer invade the workplace. Working women know the routine. It’s 5 PM, the phone rings, and someone says, “It’s your sweetie on the phone.”
It is indeed Sweetie. And this is what he wants to know: “I was just wondering what you’ve been thinking about fixing for supper.”
One day, I’m going to unload the following menu on the farmer. This is what I will tell Sweetie: “Big boy, this won’t take a minute because there are 2 other people on hold. What I’m fixing to say will surprise you. Although I do a lot of strategizing at work, none of the decisions are even remotely related to whether I’ll boil cabbage or make slaw when I get home. If this day is any preview of future attractions, microwave yourself a plate of fish sticks.”
Granted I was a full-time homemaker for half of my working life. Even then fantasies of fixing supper did not consume me.
Last week’s phone call to the office was different. Actually I was in a major out-of-town meeting -- the only woman present. Midway through, the secretary came in with a big pink stickie, indicating that she was bearing a very important message. The men stopped so that I could read the stickie. It said, “Your husband says to tell you not to worry. He is picking out the house paint.”
Then I did the most unprofessional thing a woman can do at work: break down. Professionally speaking, I had to fake being nonchalant. “Oh, this is not life or death,” I assured the group.
I lied.
To myself I said, “But if the shutters are fire-engine red, this time Sweetie’s history.”
Just about the time we were getting adjusted to the empty nest syndrome, college turned out school for Labor Day. The farmer and I counted the hours till our baby son would return home. Subconsciously, we competed to see which one of us would get to see him first.
Of course the farmer won. He has a hangout to die for: an old dairy barn converted into a male bonding headquarters. Father and son undoubtedly had a great time sitting in rusty tractor seats, catching up the changes in Raleigh, the amount of rainfall here and there, and the price of horse feed in Shelby.
Once Miles got to the house, I piled up brownie points by cooking his favorite foods: potato salad and roast beef. I should have served him tofu instead. One look at him and you could see that this freshman was fleshening up. As Papa would have said, “The boy’s getting stout.”
When the empty nest had hit, I had had to go cold turkey on doing laundry. You can’t imagine what a joy it was to once more put out an all points bulletin for dirty laundry – and have enough laundry to sort. During those years when 3 loads of laundry a day was the norm, I never envisioned the time I’d make a big splash over laundry.
No sooner did Miles get home than he decided he needed to make up for lost time, so he went hunting. Like he told us, “I’m glad to see you, Mama, but I really came home to go dove hunting. It’s opening day, you know.”
What happened next was that the empty nest got crowded to the gills with camouflage clothes, muddy boots, and shotgun shells. My question is: if camouflage really works, then why does it create such a mess of visible clutter?
Being the mother of a hunter means your peace and quiet takes a backseat to what must come next: reloading the shotgun shells. Within a day of Miles’ return, I was about ready to skin him alive.
But I bit my tongue and simply tried to rearrange the camouflage and hunting paraphernalia for best effect. Eventually Miles got dove hunting burnout, and switched to the other standard male project: working on his truck. Labor Day weekend ended all too soon, and he asked if he could just leave the toolbox and sound system in the den until he’s back this way.
Lastly, after filling up your empty nest, emptying your refrigerator, and giving your washing machine a workout, grown children have the audacity to ask for your stuff. Before he left, Miles pulled out the kitchen utensil drawer and said he needed the following items: the pastry blender, biscuit cutter, vegetable chopper, and baking stone.
“You have two legs and a truck. You are perfectly able to go to town and get your own pastry blender,” I said.
“But, Mama,” Miles asked, “Wouldn’t you rather have me down in Raleigh making biscuits instead of getting into other stuff?”
When he put it that way, I was ready to give him the whole enchilada. “Take the bread machine, too,” I said. “You don’t need to be stuck in Raleigh without one.”
Friends say that the empty nest never really stays empty. Periodically the children return and make your life topsy-turvy.
Plus meaningful.
Immediately after graduation from college, I lucked up on an unusual part-time job that lasted for 15 years. Working out of my apartment, then trailer, then farmhouse, I was a correspondence school consultant. My job was to devise grammar and writing courses, and grade papers for Western Electric Company, Princeton, NJ.
Over the years, I graded corporate correspondence school assignments while sitting and/or shivering by the wood stove in our farm house -- and no one was the wiser. I’ll have to confess this Southern country housewife took a certain glee to in taking Northern execs to task for their grammatical correctness.
However, when the government took a chain saw to ATT, I was one of the first casualties. Teaching Mother Bell’s employees the King’s English went right out the window.
I thought that losing this part-time job was the worst thing that could happen when the government decided to save us from the Mother Bell.
Of course, I was wrong. Losing my job was small potatoes to what has happened since. I don’t know about you, but 20 years later, I couldn’t be more wired – and more confused.
If competition was supposed to save us money, then why have our monthly bills escalated? It now costs the farmer and me more to communicate than it does to eat and drink coffee.
In the good ole days, we had one phone. We thought we had hit pay dirt when we got an extension phone. Since the government busted ATT up, the farmer and I have enough phones in the closet to have a booth at Hamfest. Only one of them works, and not 100% of the time. Keeping the phones operational is a challenge for fiftysomethings who are electronically challenged.
The same day that the empty nest hit, lightning struck our one working phone, which zapped our answering machine. Luckily we still have a teenager – somewhere. We are counting the days till Miles comes home from college, punches the right buttons and unzaps our answering machine.
The farmer tried to unzap the contraption. He got out a flashlight, magnifying glass and knee pads. He punched lots of buttons. He even resorted to reading the instruction manual for the answering machine. In the end, all that transpired was that his back went out.
Besides choices in phones, consumers have choices in phone companies. From the commercials, how do you know who has the best phone service? Is it the fake cowboy who shoots out numbers with a long distance water gun? Or the shepherd herding sheep across the plains on the back side of nowhere?
The telemarketers aren’t much help either.
Then cell phones and cell phone bills were invented. Talk about simplifying our lives. Once you finally get a call through, the call gets dropped -- dropped from everything but the bill. My theory is that the calls go circulating in cyberspace, until they ultimately land on your bill.
Which brings me to the biggest challenge of all – making sense of the phone bill(s). Granted it was a long time ago, but even with the invention of new math, I made straight A’s in calculus. Nevertheless, I am clueless when it comes to ciphering our family’s phone bills.
In a world of mass communication, I don’t think I’m alone.
