Stick Horse Cowgirls

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-...

  The rain this morning seemed somehow to reflect my somber mood.  Just have a case of the blahs the past couple of days.  We just returned from our trip to Alabama to see my mom and sister.  We brought my mom’s two beloved cats with us because she will soon be moving to a special unit due to the Alzheimer’s Disease.   The cats are old and confused too.   I can’t help it!  When I see them, I feel a little sad.  They are  isolated in a spare room until they hopefully acclimate to their new home which includes two cat friendly dogs!  Actually, the female cat has always been somewhat antisocial, and hides out.  The friendly orange tabby, Chester,  just lays on the daybed.  Poor thing, he seems so confused and sad.  The only option besides traveling to Arkansas with me, was euthanasia, and I just couldn’t do it.  Not many people want to adopt a senior animal, and Tuscaloosa is overrun with homeless pets due ...

V and I had a wonderful Saturday!  Last night my two young nieces spent the night with me, the plan being to visit our local Farmer’s Market early, before the heat set in too much.  I invited MIL and my mother to attend—both declined, having heard the triple-digit weather report and knowing the energy and stamina of my nieces… V, the girls and I were down there by 8:30, and the heat was rising already.  We breakfasted on pastry and French toast (the girls) then perused the lovely display of fresh vegetables and fruit and the array of  other goods in small booths.  Mom had “ordered” some locally-grown okra and tomatoes.  She likes to make this stewed okra-tomato thing ( ugh ! I have to have my okra fried or in gumbo).  We found the former but discovered that there are NO local tomatoes.  The story goes that the heat here has caused them to split, so vine-ripened ones had to be trucked in.  Mom had to make do with tomatoes from the next st...

I've always loved summer! Here it is mid June and I don't have to go back to work til August! I love to putter around the house and garden, try new recipes, go the Farmer's Market, etc. Eldest daughter is expecting her baby daughter very soon, so I am taking granddaughter to horseback riding camp this week! I would have loved the opportunity to attend a camp like that! "C" and I would play outdoors and get so dirty that the sweat and dirt would accumulate and make grimy rings in the creases of our necks--we called them "sweat beads"! I love my memories of summer growing up in the South! "C" and I are old enough- ahem- yes, I'm afraid we are are old enough to remember the days before air conditioning ! We played outdoors from sunrise to sundown--even after sundown some days and we had no neighborhood pool to go to cool off! Of course, with no air conditioning in our homes we were somewhat acclimated to the heat. We spent many afternoons run...

I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead, but some things just are what they are. Truth is truth, and if it’s part of the story, then so be it. My people are country folk.  My grandmother, Gertrude, (I’ve written about her before here ) had two sisters, Anis (yes, that’s right, “Anis,” and she’s another story…) and Dona (pronounced with a long “o,”) but always called “Donnie.”  Gertie was the eldest girl; Donnie was the youngest.  And you could tell. Gertie was a “take charge” type of girl, being big sister and without a mother by age 12.  Donnie, on the other hand was, as we used to say, “nervous” and “high-strung.” Gertie was upright and moral—to a “t.”  Donnie, on the other hand, took up with Fred, a previously-married man with children—remember, we’re talking the early 1920-s, here.  Donnie and Fred eloped, eschewing the traditional church wedding, probably because they knew that folks were looking askance at them.  Not the least of all, Gertie....

Before I get back on the holiday theme from last post, let me share with you what I saw when I stepped out on my back porch to feed my kitty this morning about 6 a.m. It was just coming light. As I look at these pictures, what I now see is a yard covered with leaves that need raking (YOU are charged with being non-judgmental about those, if you please.) I know these don't compare with the beautiful fall photos on other bloggs. What I was doing when I snapped these was trying to capture just a bit of the peaceful solitude I felt this morning as I went out there. I love where I live. As you can see, I am surrounded by forest (there's a tale coming next post about the woods!). Do you think that mysterious circle in the bottom one could be one of those supernatural orbs??? (How exciting!). Enough digression; back to holidays. Joolzmac of Simply Joolz commented on my previous holiday post, saying that in Australia they have fewer holidays and, hence, fewer times of gathering wi...

After Halloween, I always feel like I am in some kind of "home stretch," with the race culminating at Christmas. For some reason, New Year's Eve/Day are a bit anti-climactic. We hustle and bustle for Thanksgiving, picking up speed for Christmas, and then New Year's is a sort of time of rest after the holiday frenzy. This year is going to be different for me, and I am so looking forward to it. I don't mean to imply that I did not like my Holidays Past. To the contrary, I loved them. We have strong holiday traditions which I may write about in another post. But the last "normal" holiday season we had was in 2007, before my husband took a powder. The past two have been tinged heavily with the flavor of a family in distress. I'm thinking this year will be the first "good" season in several years for my son and me; I can just feel it. My home was the gathering spot for a lot of my family at Thanksgiving, and I kept my two ovens humming ...

A couple weeks ago we had a real girlfriends’ night out. My mother, mother-in-law, sister, niece, V and V's two daughters and daughter-in-law (have I left anyone out???) went to see Julie and Julia . I liked the movie because for me it was a “double whammy.” I love blogging and I am a foodie/cook, although not of the Julia Child caliber. Although I enjoyed the humor and the victory of the movie, the most prominent thing I took away from it was the image of Julia’s kitchen with her husband marking a peg board to outline where each and every pot should hang. Man! That image would not leave my mind. My son and I are NOT (let me repeat, NOT) housekeepers. When we put pots away, they are generally “chunked” into the space beneath my range. No careful placing of the pots for us! What that means, of course, is that space turns into a nightmare. Nothing can be found without getting down and digging through pot upon pot, and things topple over and out of the cabinet with alarming ...

It's drizzing rain here today, but yesterday was glorious. The weather was just perfect, and we spent the day burning our burn piles of fallen logs and sticks. Slowly, ever so slowly, my little farm is taking the shape I want. It is becoming tidier as my son and I (with help from friend Ryan) work to remove aged fences, tame underbrush, and keep the place mowed. Yesterday's effort was extremely satisfying. Shifting focus from myself (so hard to do--I have been just a tad self-absorbed!), let me say that my mother-in-law is improving daily! She's able to dress herself and move about the house. She is allowed to put 50% of her weight on her hip until she sees the doctor in two weeks so he can assess if she should put full weight to bear. We are learning about walkers and sliding bath benches, long-arm grabbers and other devices to help people with daily activities when they have had this surgery. In her home, MIL has physical therapy three times a week, occupational th...

Just when you thought levity was going to reign for a while in this blog, I have to have a middle-of-the-night rant episode. Sorry. I've just had it. It has been a long week, and this one has been particularly full of sorry-men stories for me--even for a divorce lawyer, they've been coming out of the woodwork at an amazing rate. A bunch of them in their 50's and, I can tell you, I am relating...as you know... ad nauseum , I'm sure. And I'm helping women deal with the wreckage of their lives that they don't deserve. This week has caused me to think on this subject on a larger scale. Look at these folks: Here's poor SC Governor Mark Sanford. He's just lookin' for love...in all the wrong places. See how sorry he is--wipin' his tears away an' all? Yesterday Politico website reported that, according to recent polls, half his constituency favor his stepping down as a result of his affair with the Argentine bombshell. Only about a third...