Goin' Down to Mama's

Pharmaceuticals on My Food Pyramid

When, I ask you, did Advil become a food group? It's just part of my morning routine now: wake up, take blood pressure medicine, brush teeth, start coffee pot, feed cat, take Advil, watch 10 minutes of news, go to Story Shack. About a month ago, I was on a photo shoot and sat down in the floor of the house where we were working so I could send a quick email on my laptop. All was well till I tried to get back up. "You know what?" I told the photographer. "I can remember a time when getting up required absolutely no forethought or pre-planning on my part. I could just do it—whenever I felt like it." Not any more. There's the trick knee to think about and the ankle that's always a little achy and you sure don't want to strain that lower back again and you REALLY don't want to lose your balance and fall—that could take you straight to a hip replacement. When did this happen to me? When I whine about my ailments to my friend Dianne, she says, "You're how old again?" Merciless. I've decided on a two-pronged approach to middle-aged aches and pains: I will manage them with medication and I will lie about their origins. That trick knee? Gotta lay off the mountain climbing one of these days, or at least stay out of the Rockies. The ankle? Nothing like a figure skating injury to make you break out the ice packs (that triple toe loop is killer on the landing). My back? Don't you hate it when you're THIS close to yet another diving championship and an old injury costs you the freestyle? I'm sure I can make those stories stick. It's all about attitude. And the older I get, the more of THAT I get, too. (Or as a friend of mine recently put it: "You know you were sweeter before you hit 40.") Yeah, yeah. Take it to the complaint department, buddy.

Soldiers in the Family

Last night, Dave watched Sergeant York with me for the gazillionth time. It's one of my all-time favorite movies, and I can usually count on a broadcast Memorial Day weekend. I know the dialogue is Hollywood's interpretation of Southern dialect ("I be agin it"), and there wasn't much location shooting back then, so the rolling countryside is often a painted backdrop—but somehow even that adds to the movie. And there's never been a more sympathetic actor than Gary Cooper. What I love so much about this movie is the way it makes war intensely personal. York is just a country boy sent far away from home to fulfill a duty he doesn't really understand until he gets there. The greater good he is sent to serve requires an immense sacrifice—from the soldier himself, from the mother who loves him, the girl back home waiting for him, the friends who miss his company, even the family farm that's dependent on his labor . . . I think I appreciate this movie so much because I know that all the soldiers in my own family were just country boys sent far from home for a greater good. Not all of them saw combat, thank heaven. Uncle Ferrell did, and I've heard my mother talk about Grandme opening long-awaited letters from him, only to find everything blacked out except "Dear Mother" and "Love Ferrell." He was stationed in the Pacific during World War II, and the Army had to censor all the mail. Uncle Guy trained as a pilot. Uncle Dale was in the Air Force. Daddy and Uncle Chick were both stationed in France between wars, with Daddy serving in the signal corps and Uncle Chick working on trucks and equipment. They were both with me when I looked through Mother's picture box yesterday, and just about every memory of their time "in the Service" ended with "I just wanted to get back home." I couldn't help noticing the way they almost never say "in the Army"—it's "in the Service." And that's really where every soldier, sailor, airman, or marine is—in the service of you and me. Because whatever might be wrong with this country—and yes, I know, there's plenty wrong with it right now—we wouldn't even be free to argue about how to fix it without all the men and women who have said goodbye to their families, left their homes and their children behind, and boarded a boat, train, or plane in our service. There are places all over the world where the people live in fear of their own military. But here, we feel safer when we see men and women in uniform. Maybe I sound a little "Yankee Doodle Dandy" this morning, but that's alright. I wasn't born on the Fourth of July, but I am a patriot. I think I owe it to the soldiers in the family.

Sunday Morning Serenity

Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the LORD, till he come and rain righteousness upon you. Hosea 10:12

Thinking this morning about my own "fallow ground" and what might grow there if I were willing to work at it . . .

Simple Gifts

This morning, as I made my way through the yard to the Story Shack, I spotted this lone gladiolus. I don't know how it got there, a solitary bulb somehow finding a home in the middle of the mondo grass, but there it was. I've loved these flowers—which we always called glads—since my mother used to grow them in a flower bed by the front porch at Grandme's house. When I told one of my gardening friends I planned to carry them in my bridal bouquet, he said, "Those are FUNERAL flowers!" I assured him that I would not be carrying a spray and that there would be no ribbon with "Gone But Not Forgotten" emblazoned across it. But I did have some glads in my bouquet. I love the colors and the ruffly blooms some of them have—and the way you can put just one in a vase and feel like you've brought your garden inside. When I saw this one, that old Shaker hymn "Simple Gifts" popped into my head (which reminds me how long it has been since I've listened to Aaron Copland's Appalachian Spring):
 

'Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free
'Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,
And when we find ourselves in the place just right,
'Twill be in the valley of love and delight.
When true simplicity is gain'd,
To bow and to bend we shan't be asham'd,
To turn, turn will be our delight,
Till by turning, turning we come 'round right.

[lyrics by Elder Joseph Brackett, 1848]

Mama Says: "You're Gonna Do Fine"

Yesterday I spent a few hours with Mother and Daddy before I had to play for a wedding rehearsal at a beautiful old church in a neighboring town. The groom's grandmother, Yvonne, is the pianist there, and she asked me to step in for her because her grandson wanted her to be part of the wedding party. Yvonne is one of the best musicians around. Stepping in for her is kind of like having Ginger Rogers ask you to dance a number or two with Fred while she sits in the audience. Daunting. And as I was sweating Pachelbel's Canon and other classical pieces I don't play very much any more, Mama said, "Oh, you're gonna do fine." You can't imagine how many challenges she has gotten me through with that one little line—piano recitals and church solos, semester tests and final exams, school presentations, work presentations, my first business trips, my own wedding . . . She has a way of saying it so that I believe it. There's something about the way she says "fine" that makes it downright ridiculous to think things could turn out any other way. She's saved me a fortune in self-help books. I don't need a life coach to tell me I control my own destiny. I just need Mama to tell me I'm gonna do fine.

With Love, From a Grateful Daughter

My mother has loved me, supported me, led me, inspired me, taught me, made me laugh, made me crazy, gotten us lost in Nashville, gotten us a duct tape window repair in the Mississippi Delta, walked on the beach with me, sung by the piano with me, prayed for me, bragged about me, shopped for Easter dresses and prom dresses and bridesmaids dresses with me, read to me, rocked me when I was sick, bolstered my courage when I was scared, set me straight when I needed it, let me go when she had to, welcomed me home whenever I could get there, waited patiently for me to find my way . . . Here are a few postcards from life with Mama, with love.

 

Sunday Morning Serenity

MY SHEPHERD WILL SUPPLY MY NEED
My shepherd will supply my need; Jehovah is His name;
In pastures fresh He makes me feed, beside the living stream.
He brings my wand’ring spirit back, when I forsake His ways;
And leads me, for His mercy’s sake, in paths of truth and grace.

The sure provisions of my God attend me all my days;
O may Thy house be my abode, and all my work be praise.
There would I find a settled rest, while others go and come;
No more a stranger, nor a guest, but like a child at home.

[Lyrics by Isaac Watts, 1719, based on Psalm 23]

"I Love to Hear Tell"

One of Eudora Welty's novels—I think it's Losing Battles—has a scene where a group of adult relatives are gathered around talking, and as one of the family kids sits down to listen, she says, "I love to hear tell." I'm right there with her. I've always loved to hear tell. The first time Dave went to a family gathering with me, years before we married, he asked me what yard games we were taking with us. I told him we didn't need any. "Well, what do you do all day?" he asked. "Well," I said, "we eat and we talk." Some of my friends knew I was hosting a family "hen party" last Saturday—our periodic cousins-and-aunts reunion—and they asked me how it went and what we did. What we did was raise the roof off my house, laughing and talking and telling stories all afternoon. When I was at Baylor, I remember a Sunday School teacher telling our class that he had decided to start an oral history project for his family—organized storytelling. And that seemed so strange to me because I grew up with oral history floating in the air all around me. You've heard the expression "if these walls could talk." Well the walls in my grandmother's house just about could. Aunt Joyce, Uncle Ferrell, and Uncle Guy—the three in the center of the picture above—are gone now, but I can hear their voices just as plainly as if they were in the room with me. Aunt Joyce's wry wit and the way she would exclaim, "Oh-good-lord!" when she found something utterly ridiculous. (That lowercase "l" on "lord" was intentional, as Aunt Joyce would never take the Lord's name in vain.) Uncle Ferrell's love of mischief and fun and "Great Scots!" Uncle Guy's innate politeness and kindness and the sound of his laughter. Those are things you'll miss in a text message or an email. And that's why I love to gather on a family porch. That's why I love to hear tell.

Sunday Morning Serenity

I'm especially thankful this morning for cousins—for the older ones I looked up to and the younger ones I helped look after. My aunts and "girl cousins" on Mama's side of the family got together yesterday. Some of us only see each other a couple of times a year, so on those rare occasions when we're all together, we make the most of it. A whole lot of laughter and storytelling. My mother and I share a strong attachment to our extended family—maybe for different reasons, since she was the youngest of eight, and I'm an only child. That's her with her cousin Jimmy sitting on a tractor. They used to race each other swimming across Wyatt's Lake. Now they race each other to the coffee pot when they get together to visit. I really am grateful for all the cousins I grew up with—and for the don't-even-think-about-telling-me-you-can't-make-it grandmother who drew everybody together. Sundays, in particular, were family gathering days—after services, of course. Maybe you can't round up your cousins for a visit today. But say a little prayer for them. Give a little thanks for them. 

"Mercy Drops 'round Us"

I woke up this morning to the sound of rain, peaceful rain. It means that today, I won't have to water the hibiscus or the rose bushes or my fledgling little Cherokee Purple tomatoes. It means everything in the garden will get a hefty dose of lush. It means I won't mind finally getting to the housecleaning that has been on hold for, well . . . a while. I've been working long hours, so I haven't been Goin' Down to Mama's as much as I'd like or cleaning as much as I need to. Daddy's mother, who hated housework, used to call and tell me, "Honey, the dust is rolling down the hallway like tumbleweed." I'm with you, my Granny. But now the rain is doing a little housecleaning outside . . . so I won't mind staying in and addressing the tumbleweed while those "mercy drops" from that old hymn "Showers of Blessing" are falling.

P.S. When my mother's mother—Grandme—used to get aggravated at us, she'd say, "I'll bet y'all are gonna sing 'Showers of Blessing' at my funeral!" We didn't, of course. But we think about her every time we hear it.
[Image by Chance Agrella at freerangestock.com]