Stick Horse Cowgirls

I just finished reading “ The Help ” by Kathryn Stockett.  This book is written mostly from the perspective of black maids in Jackson, Mississippi in the early 60’s—just my era.  I could not put this book down.  I identified with so much in it.  This is an uncomfortable subject for me.  It was our life back then, but looking at it from 21st Century eyes, I see just all kinds of vestiges of slavery in the way our society was structured those days.  It is, as I say, “uncomfortable.”  Still, it is history, and I”m going to tell you what my life was like in this respect. My father was a lawyer—Southern country lawyer.  I remember him going to court in the summer time in blue and white seersucker suits and light (white or “light buck”) shoes.  This was not unusual for attorneys of the day.  Courtrooms were hot, and a dark suit would have probably been unbearable.  I also saw lawyers back then with straw “panama” hats, although my d...

At the risk of sounding even older than I am, let me say that there are things I miss about “the good old days” of my youth.  Yes, life had its trials back then, too, and—especially having just finished reading “The Help,”—I realize that being white and growing up in the 50’s and 60’s was a whole different experience than my black friends had.  But, still, there are by-gone things that I miss.  For example… Each year we had a Halloween carnival at our school.  And, no, we did not call it a “fall festival;” it was a Halloween carnival.  As I recall, it was a fund-raiser. It started out with dinner of some kind in the “cafetorium,” which doubled as a lunchroom and auditorium for plays and programs.  It had a stage at one end of the large room with the kitchen and serving window at the other end.   In between stood long folding tables with chairs to accommodate the school kids at lunch each day and, on this occasion, the community din...

  Cowgirl V:  Shortly after the tornado that struck Tuscaloosa, AL, I asked my sister if she would consider writing a guest post about her experiences there.  She is a registered nurse who previously worked with Hurricane Katrina refugees. V   Enormous, menacing killer tornado looming over Tuscaloosa, Alabama April 27, 2011   Well, it has finally started happening.  I knew the day would come, but it has taken much longer than I expected.  You see, I live in a tornado ravaged city.  The April 27 devastation that occurred in Tuscaloosa, Alabama did not destroy my home.  In fact, we had no damage.   We were out of town when the storm hit but were glued to the television as we watched it begin to tear across the city.  I cannot describe our feelings we had as we watched this giant storm make its way across the city.  Then we had to come home.  We actually came home a day early to see what we could do to help. ...

  If you’ve read Stick Horse Cowgirls for very long you would know that one thing “C” and I are in complete agreement on it is the importance of “sisterhood” –the enduring  friendship of women.  Life IS hard sometimes and we need each other!  I hope our friends out there do not get tired of hearing that message, but lately we are getting constant reminders of how vital it is to have that connection—sometimes for our very survival! Let us cheer each other on!     In the blogging community, two neighbors, have come forth recently with their stories of desperate domestic situations.  Brenda, of Cozy Little House  http://www.cozylittlehouse.com , and Belinda of Ninja Poodles http://www.ninjapoodles.blogspot.com are both strong, smart women who have found themselves in a bad predicament.  I hope you will visit these women and peruse their archives—you won’t be disappointed!  They are both profound writers and exemplify the ta...

Hearken back to your Greek-mythology/literature-study days.  Do you recall Cassandra?  She was the daughter of King Priam and his Queen Hecuba of Troy (Remember?  Iliad ??) A stunningly-beautiful woman, she caught the eye of the god Apollo; and it’s always a dangerous thing to catch one of those gods’ eyes. Apollo, so infatuated was he, bestowed upon Cassandra the gift of prophecy, of foresight.  And, then, when Cassandra did not react to Apollo in the way he desired (can you spell S-E-X?), he put a little twist on his gift to her.  He cursed the gift so that, although she was unfailingly right in her predictions, she would never be believed.  Her life was not good… This picture is supposed to be of Cassandra.  See how she’s tearing her hair out?  I thought about Cassandra the other day and wondered if the literary figure might be a metaphor for the wisdom of age. I sat in my office just this week, listening to a very wise older-than-...

  Summers in the late fifties and early sixties were slow paced and hot.  We played outside all day long, coming in only to eat and then back outdoors again to play games and catch lightening bugs til bedtime.  Running barefoot through the sprinkler to cool off, moms made Kool-Aid for us to drink, and we ate watermelon on the backyard picnic table.  Great memories of growing up in the 50’s and 60’s--  except the nights when it was too hot to sleep before air conditioning!     This was the last generation to see door to door peddlers, as most mothers were working at home instead of the office.  I barely remember the Standard Coffee salesman, and am a little too young to remember the Jewel Tea man, who sold loose tea in vintage tins like this, but this was the day before the large grocery stores.     How well I  remember the milkman (yes, milk tasted SO much better in the glass gallon jugs from Prickett Dairy), who...

    Nobody wants to be called judgmental!  Nobody!  So, I’ve been wondering just what does it really mean to be judgmental?  We’ve all heard the scriptural teaching that it is wrong to point out the speck in your brother’s eye, when you have a log in your own.  Jesus rebukes the accuser saying in Matt.7:5 “You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.”    So it seems that hypocrisy in judging others is the point of this rebuke.         Since I’m sticking my toe  into the waters of theological territory here, I’d like to point out the distinction between correction and judgment as I see it .  I’m no expert, so it’s just my opinion— for whatever that’s worth!  Speaking out against wrong doesn’t seem to be the problem here.  After all Jesus and the Apostles were bold and rebuked sin and condemne...

When my son was a child and my husband was out of town, one of our favorite things to do was to sit in the bed together early and watch what he called “nature flicks.”  We enjoyed the Trials of Life series, National Geographic animal specials and all things such as might be found these days on Animal Planet.  I love seeing into the social habits and ways of animals.  Often I see parallels to our own lives or hints at how we humans might could manage a little better than we do if only we’d take cues from our non-human brethren.  I thought about this aspect of nature study the other day when I saw a documentary on elephants. In one scene a zoo elephant was being prepared for the delivery of her first calf.  This was one tame elephant—they are so huge that they’d better be tamed.  Her keepers were loving and attentive.  They had trained her to submit to restraints, fearing that her domestic life away from the herd  setting that nature had inte...