Mamie Murphy Day

The party was even better than I hoped it would be. Leal and I went to the Ruritan hall at eleven to finish setting up. Within thirty minutes, there was a caravan of caring family members bringing offerings of food, drinks, ice and service ware. I could have provided nothing but decorations and the party would have been a smashing success. Somewhere between one hundred five and one hundred fifty people came to celebrate Mamie’s ninetieth birthday. The mayor and the media showed, which one can never count on because it has to be a slow news day to show up all the way in Coker Creek for an old lady’s birthday bash.

How Mamie was surprised is beyond my imagining. All of Coker Creek had been informed, and it was even announced at the church services. Maybe Mamie being hard-of-hearing has its good points. When Mamie’s daughter Jean opened the door for her, Mamie stood there like a deer caught in headlights. Several of us were afraid we’d given her a heart attack. And then she smiled, her twinkly little blue-eyed Irish smile.

I had come to the hall armed with Mamie’s Women’s Study Bible, and a couple of verses marked about women that I felt would be appropriate for Mamie. I showed the verses to Wanda, and was surprised when she questioned the translation that I was using. After checking to make sure she was comfortable with the translation, and being assured that one of Mamie’s granddaughters had given Mamie the Bible, she read through my marked verses, obviously not quite satisfied with them. I suggested that the proverb about the good wife who rises before dawn might also be good, but Wanda pointed out that the verse felt too funereal.

Mamie seems to be comfortable with her preacher preaching from different denominational pulpits because, as she says, “It’s all the same Bible.” But, being raised Roman Catholic, I guess I’ve been exposed to more of the verses about women – as Roman Catholics seriously revere Mary as the mother of Jesus. Wanda and I finally agreed that Wanda could choose whatever verses she found fitting.

Wanda who is not only Mamie’s niece-in-law, but also Coker Creek’s songbird of the south led us in singing “Happy Birthday” as Mamie entered the room with Junior’s son Travis and his daughter Brook. She then read from Mamie’s Bible, introduced the mayor, and asked Mamie’s preacher to lead us in prayer. I wanted a female family member to lead the prayer, but since the preacher was there, Wanda wanted to offer him a place on the program. I sat and basked in the glow of Mamie’s mammoth family celebrating my adopted Mountain Mama.

Halfway through the afternoon, Richard reminded me that I have twenty-four event-free hours before I begin helping Rachel cook for her family’s annual Christmas open house. I offered to do the cooking at our house in the holler, but Rachel insisted on my coming to her kitchen in Atlanta. This is probably, in large part, because Rachel’s husband, Larry, will be on a business trip next week. She has cautioned me that I’m not to bring down any food from our fridge or freezer. I’m afraid that, without the proper ballast, the van may have trouble holding the road on the way down the mountain. We’ll see how that goes.

“Day After” Doldrums

Deviled eggs -- I forgot about Michelle’s deviled eggs at the Big Fat Family Feast. I think I was in denial because I probably consumed a dozen of them.  And Rachel’s simply superb stuffed mushrooms --  I know I ate at least four. It usually takes three days for me to process the events (and the foods) of a week of visiting relatives, but I don’t have time to take to my bed right now.

I expected to attend Mamie’s birthday party, but I didn’t expect to cater it. Mamie’s older son Junior would surely have thrown a birthday bash for his mama’s ninetieth. Then he died. His wife, Greta, his kids, Travis and Brook, and his grandkids are still reeling from the loss of Junior, as is most of Coker Creek. If there’s one thing I know how to do it’s “wing it.”  So I elected myself to organize the “do” – from six hundred miles away – with people I hardly know.  What was I thinking?

I have to help Richard cook for Charlie and Deborah’s Bluegrass night, and I have to decorate the Ruritan hall for Mamie’s ninetieth birthday party. Where’s Elaine when I need to arrange flowers and greenery. Where’s Terry Sue when I need to make ribbons and garland? At least I have Richard in residence to help me cook and carry.

We have no idea who plans to attend or what they plan to bring. Everybody is just coming off of Thanksgiving travel, cooking and feasting. Who really needs another event, or more food -- especially with Christmas less than a month away? But Mamie is my mountain mama, so I want to celebrate that she’s still alive and kickin’. A party will be had – Coker Creek Cajun style.

Judy and Deborah have promised to bring beverages. Mamie’s niece-in-law Wanda has committed to sing. Mamie’s great-grand daughter Brook has sent out invitations and organized the extended family’s participation. Junior’s son Travis is arranging to get Mamie there.  Mamie’s friend Mary Jane has alerted the Ruritan members and arranged to have the mayor declare it “Mamie Murphy Day.”  Leal from Coker Creek Village has informed the area churches and helped me plan the menu.  Jack’s friend, Mark, from the Monroe County Buzz has promised to cover the event.  And what an event it will, hopefully, be.

Charlie and Deborah are having their Bluegrass gathering the night before Mamie’s “do”, so there’s dinner and dessert to prepare for that event. While I set up the tables and chairs for Mamie’s party at the Ruritan hall, Richard peeled and cooked butternut squash; seasoned, browned and sliced pork tenderloin; and made a batch of spiced cranberry sauce. During my short visit home between the Ruritan hall and Charlie and Deborah’s house, all I had to do was arrange the butternut squash base with a crown of pork slices, surrounded by jewels of cranberry and a center of ginger-cran-pear chutney to create a dish fit for a queen. This was a trial batch of the same meal I planned to honor Mamie, our Queen for a Day.

With some squares of carrot cake and our chafing dish, we made it to Bluegrass, but I didn’t even make it to dinner before I had Richard deliver me to my bed. I still have a full “Mamie Murphy Day” symphony to survive.

One Big Fat Family Feast

Individual members of our family are generally not fat, but boy is the size of our family ever fat and getting fatter -- as are our family feasts. It all started with Scott and Buffy offering their home for Thanksgiving because Elaine and Bub are still recuperating from Briton and Jeanne's wedding less than two weeks ago. Elaine has been working non-stop since arriving back in the New Orleans area. Rachel's family drove dpwn from Atlanta and stayed the week with Elaine and Bub.


We drove down with foods from our produce-packed freezer and pantry. These included pickled beets and okra, ginger-cran-pear chutney, spiced pecans, butternut squash, potatoes for oyster dressing, corn, bell peppers, canned tomatoes, pumpkin, smothered okra, and what I thought was a bag of turnip greens, and a bag of cooked giblet mix for making giblet dressing. I also brought some of my loose pepper jelly to pour over cream cheese and serve with crackers.

I had little cooking to do, so I spent much of the week visiting with kids and grandkids, my niece Nikki and her daughter Corinne, and my Godchild Gary. Miya and I made bows for lots of loot on Santa's sleigh. That bag of greens -- turns out it was actually basil, so it didn't make it to the buffet table, but I did make Bub's favorite oyster dressing and some turkey gravythe day of...

Buffy's mother and dad drove in with their RV refrigerator packed. Their offerings included Ann's southern-style potato salad -- the kind I love with as much egg as potato, a huge pan of cornbread dressing, and everything but their kitchen sink for making Dewey's should-be-famous chicken gumbo and rice -- and another bag of poatoes for mashing. Buffy kept Richard busy painting her newly remodeled hallway and helping her clean and set up tables and chairs. Scott spent several days running back and forth to various stores for party supplies -- and staying out of Buffy's way..

Bub glazed and cooked a ham, while Rachel produced pumpkin bread, the best stuffed mushrooms I ever put in my mouth, the requested-by-Sarah saffron rice, and mac and cheese.

Scott's best friend and neighbor Sam smoked a turkey and a ham while Scott got geared up to fry a turkey and roast another for his sister who is a traditionalist. Bub decided that he wanted a full fried turkey to take home to his baby boy who was working. At this point, we were up to two hams and four twenty-plus pound birds; but Bub insisted that Scott get another that could be fried last minute -- just in case.

Sam's sister-in-law baked bread, but we also had store-bought becauseRebecca is partial to Parker House  rolls. Briton arrived with deer chimichamgas that he not only cooked -- he shot the deer. I've never had deer that I enjoyed before, but these were some of the best chimichangas that ever passed my lips.

Just when we didn't think we could fit another dish in the house, Sam's wife Michelle rolls in from three blocks away pushing her kitchen island laden with pies: pecan, pumkin, and chocolate -- and an extra-large casserole of candied yams.

Scott's cradle mate Kathleen stopped by, as did another of my nieces, Melanie, with her two-year-old and eight-month-old baby boys. Elaine road in with her daughter Gloria and Gloria's boyfriend. Michelle's brother and his family were visiting from Arkansas. Even Buffy's ninety-two-year-old great uncle made an appearance on the arm of his daughter, with his granddaughter carrying his great granddaughter.

Rachel summed up the family feast, spreading her arms to include the whole event, with, "I just love being back in this part of the country for a holiday." After we finished feasting, each guest left with enough food to feed their families for a week. We all agreed that it was obscene the amount of food we had, but we can't wait to do it again.

A Day of Delight

Here it is late November, and Elaine's flower beds are in  full bloom at her home on Lake Pontchartrain. I was lucky enough to be left at Elaine and Bub's when Rachel, Rebecca, Scott, Buffy, and Bub went grocery shopping for Thanksgiving fixings. This gave me a full afternoon in one of my favorite places on earth with three of my grandchildren, Nicholas, Sarah and Miya.

Nick and Sarah began by serenading me with saxaphone music, as they're currently both studying the same instrument. Sarah then played tunes on Elaine's piano and began tutoring Miya in music reading. This was before Sarah and Miya decided to go peddle boating, leaving me and Nick to enjoy the cool salt air breezes from the swing on the dock.

While I stayed to watch the girls, Nicholas went in and made himself a grilled cheese sandwich. While he was gone, Sarah and Miya managed to foul the propellor so badly I needed to affect a rescue. Watching me attempt to throw the rescue ring got lots of laughs from my granddaughters.
Upon Nick's return to the boat dock, he discovered that I was in the process of rescuing Sarah and Miya, and decided to offer his assistance. The next thing I knew, Nick was chasing Bub's white German Shepherd puppy around the yard, throwing shoes and yelling at the puppy for eating his sandwich off the plate that Nick had left on the table. I managed to get the girls, but had to abandon the boat until help arrived. I made Nick another grilled cheese sandwich. He ate, watched a bit of TV and fell asleep.

While Nick slept, his cousin Sarah decided to enlist her cousin Miya in a project of squeezing all of Bub's oranges into fresh-squeezed orange juice. Since we could find no juice squeezer, we improvised with an overturned ribbed cocktail glass in a glass bowl. The girls had great fun with this, but it must have tired Miya, as she curled up in my lap for me to rock her and sing to her. She promptly fell asleep in my arms, at which time Sarah continued her piano serenade. I felt like I'd died and gone to heaven.

Upon her return, Rebecca went with me to retreive the peddle boat. She detangled the line from the prop while I held the boat up. I enjoyed sharing with Rebecca wonderful memories of our years at Richard's and my house on the lake as we peddled together back to Bub's dock.

At the end of the day, I was able to begin the Thanksgiving Feast food preparations with Rachel and Buffy. My days don't get more delightful than this.

Scott's Spa

Food, glorious food. We got to Scott and Buffy's house, and the first thing Buffy did is show me the leftovers that they saved for me: smoked redfish dip, grilled redfish, sushi-grade tuna, and kickin' chicken salad. She had also cooked a huge pot of her Buffy's Best Butterbeans and put them in the freezer. Yum! What an orgy of fabulous flavors.

We went shopping for Thanksgiving table cloths and turkeys while Richard prepared Scott's hallway for painting. We purchased three twenty-plus pound birds. On the way back to Scott's, I checked in with my niece Melanie, who lives down the street from Scott with her husband and two baby boys. She asked me if I wanted her to bring her turkey to Thanksgiving dinner. Four turkeys, one ham, chicken gumbo, potaoto salad, and two pans of dressing are only the beginning of what we'll feast on come Thursday.

Rachel's family is heading down from Atlanta for the festivities. We're expecting over thirty people, so we're busy relaxing in Scott's hot tub to work up the energy for more food and house preparation.

Rockin' and Rollin'

Adam emailed me that he hopes Richard and I are rockin'. We're rockin' and rollin', but mostly rollin' -- from one friend and place to another. Of course, the van is rockin' more than we'd like on the extremely uneven streets of New Orleans and vicinity. Movin' on to Mississippi.

Home Is Where the Happy Is

Some days happy is just bursting all around us, waiting to be scooped up and carried around. Some places exude that kind of happiness. Pat and Will’s house is a happy house. They live by the philosophy of “Peace to all who enter here.” Now, that doesn’t mean that we don’t have some spirited conversations, seeing as I lean toward the libertarian in my politics and they lean far far away from the left. I also adhere to no specific religious practices, where they are very devout Roman Catholics. We’re such good friends that we’re actually interested in each other’s views.

Every room in Pat’s home is ringed with large windows letting in views of God’s creation. In front there are flower beds lovingly tended by Will. On one side is a rose garden, on the other fences full of flowering vines like in the secret courtyards of the French Quarter. Both the living room and the dining room open onto a patio through French doors that can be thrown open to the natural environment of a contemplation garden on the banks of a lagoon where egrets frequently are sighted catching their dinner and the rays of the sun.

Inside is a sanctuary. As we entered after a day of travel, we were greeted by the beautiful melodies, played by Pat, emanating from the grand piano. When Pat is not at the keyboard, she and Will quite often have classical music wafting through the speaker system. There are inspirational reading materials all through the house, and both Pat and Will are happy to interrupt anything they are doing to sit and chat for a bit.

I’ve never known how Pat achieves this, but her house is always in order. For me, order is necessary to my sense of serenity. It never mattered whether I showed up unannounced or with several weeks notice, the feeling of open arms welcome was always the same. I have always loved coming to Pat’s house, and I secretly grieve every time Pat and Will talk about moving. Moving has been especially tempting to them since Hurricane Katrina, as they’ve had to see so many of their family and friends relocate.

I feel like I’ve been in the world’s best bed and breakfast sipping wine, looking at the natural beauty, and discussing our philosophical views. I could stay here forever, but we have many places to go, people to see and things to do before going to Mississippi. I do love life in New Orleans.

Slugs in a Sleigh

No matter how you slice it, twelve hours enroute to anywhere is a long ride. We prefer the drive from our house to New Orleans to the drive from our house to the Gulf Coast of Mississippi. The topography of eastern Tennessee is much more interesting than the flatlands of Georgia and Alabama, and the hills surrounding Chattanooga are full of hardwoods, now in their last throes of fall.

We typically start this journey with a ride along the Ocoee, but this has been precluded by a rockslide from the hillside to the highway. This decreased the scenic factor and increased the time factor for an already long one-day trip of six hundred miles. Not surprisingly, Richard does have a protocol for our long drives, trading off driving every hundred miles. This keeps us from falling asleep, except for our butts and lower extremities.

Now, my brain is another problem; the slower my body moves the more hyper my brain becomes. After a while of running free, my brain sets up a pinball machine in my head, bouncing random ideas from one synapse to another. In my usual perpetual motion mode, I can guide the brain balls by bumping the body machine every so often. It’s hard to focus when the nearest goal is hundreds of miles and thousands of minutes away. I come up with some of my most exiting adventures this way. By the time we reached our destination, I needed a nap to recuperate from being a slug.

But a nap was not in the cards. Our first stop was to load Elaine’s freezer with food from Mamie’s garden to share at Thanksgiving. Then, it was across Lake Pontchartrain and the Mississippi River to Pat and Will’s house on the far side of New Orleans, where they were taking us to English Turn Golf and Country Club for Friday’s fish feast. I felt strange entering the club at night without a bunch of boxes.

For over ten years, we lived in a neighborhood near English Turn. Pat and I were very involved in volunteer work with an agency that worked to stabilize homeless families, and our major fundraiser was an annual evening auction and dinner held at English Turn. Our long-suffering husbands toted boxes, collected tickets, and listened to endless hours of grief and gossip while we proceeded to spend months of madness and much money to make our auctions a success.

Unbeknown to me, Richard had become enamored of a particular part of the club’s hardwood flooring, and immediately insisted on visiting the exact spot he had so loved. This was the first time we were all together at the club since Katrina. The agency that we had worked so hard for lost its mission in Hurricane Katrina; Richard and I lost our home; and all of New Orleans lost family and friends.

After dinner, we stayed up until midnight talking, but we stayed away from the topic of our losses of home and community. I guess it still hurts too bad.

Even Santa Gets Grumpy

Okay I’ll admit it; I lied. Richard actually wrapped thirty-two picture perfect packages to load onto Santa’s sleigh. And you may not know this, but even Santa gets grumpy – especially when every time he thinks he’s on the last gift I remember someone that I almost forgot. I could use a few elves right about now; they could begin by sweeping the floor.

We’re taking Mamie, Charlie, Deborah, Mountaintop Mary and Don to dinner at Coker Creek Village the night before we head south. Since our trip is a ten-hour ordeal, we plan to leave before dawn; so everything had to be stuffed into the van before dark. With careful balance and placement, we got all the gifts in with room to spare for Mamie to ride over to the village with us. Between the seats, I found room for some of our Irish potatoes and a couple of butternut squash. The ice chest still has to be loaded and put in the van, as do our toiletry bags. If I grease them up really well, they should slide right on in.

Adam emailed me that he thinks our trip with an overloaded sleigh will be a good test of the integrity of our new motor mounts – the ones we’ve already replaced twice. Richard is threatening to put heavy duty shocks on the van and add extra air to the tires.

Mamie’s ninetieth birthday is the Saturday before Thanksgiving, but we won’t be here to help her celebrate. When I asked her some weeks ago about her favorite cake for her birthday, she requested a pie instead of a cake. A year ago, I had given Mamie a slice of a pear and custard pie made from her son Junior’s pears. She declared it the best pie she ever ate. I happened to have one jar of pears left from last year’s harvest in Junior’s yard, so I recreated the pie to present to Mamie when we pick her up.

We’ll also take the last of our leftovers to Mamie. She says that she’s gotten to where she checks her outside egg refrigerator before cooking to see if we left her any supper. To go with her birthday pie, we hope she enjoys the pork with ginger-cran-pear chutney, whipped sweet potatoes and turnip greens as much as we enjoyed them when they were just made.

We’re hoping that all these mini celebrations of her birthday keep Mamie from guessing that we’re giving her a surprise party the Sunday after we return. As far as any of us knows, Mamie is the oldest person in Coker Creek, so we think she deserves a little recognition for simply surviving. We’re organizing the party because Junior, who would have done it, isn’t still physically with us. Mary Jane called to say that the mayor is attending the party to proclaim the day “Mamie Murphy Day.” I think Junior will be smiling about that.

And, I'm pretty sure he'd be laughing at the sight of his little mama stuffed in with all the gifts as Richard goes on about needing new shocks.

Stuffing Santa’s Sleigh

Richard’s got the kitchen table jacked up like a redneck’s truck. He put it up on cinder blocks so we now look like true trailer trash. I know it’s to save his back from all that bending, but honestly, what will that man do next?

There’s a blizzard of Christmas paper all over the floor. What started out as forty pounds of candy in various bowls and boxes is now down to maybe twenty-five. Roughly half of what was one thousand sheets of tissue paper have been lovingly folded around individual gifts and candies, and carefully stuffed into crannies for cushioning. No box is complete without Jelly Bellies and at least one jar of jam, and everyone on our list expects some Cajun roasted pecans. Richard’s version of the stimulus package is gold-wrapped chocolate money for all.

Santa’s sleigh will soon be pulled up to the back door for loading, beginning with the twenty-five boxes that will go with us on our trip. None of them will get their complementary ribbons until we reach our destination, so our ten rolls of ribbon also have to fit in the van. We must take an ice chest for the frozen bounty from last summer’s garden that will be served at Scott and Buffy’s Thanksgiving in Mississippi. Somewhere, I’ll make room for our clothes.

In case Richard refused to take the trip down south with me, I had an offer to ride down to Mississippi with Rachel, Larry, Rebecca, Sarah, and Cinnamon in their Ford Escape. But their provision was that I couldn’t take an ice chest. When I got to discussing loading our freezer onto Richard’s trailer and towing it behind Larry’s van, Richard reconsidered. He’s coming along for the ride, sharing the driving of Santa’s sleigh with me.

When we arrive back in Tennessee, there’s a surprise birthday party to participate in before we begin decorating our house for the Holidays in the Holler. There will also be more macaroons to bake and barrels of bourbon balls to prepare for the remaining loved ones on our list. Approximately twelve more packages will be created, and prepared for mailing to those we won’t see during the Christmas season. This is in addition to the gifts that we’ll give to relatives and friends coming to see us before the end of the year. At some point, I’ll get around to cleaning our kitchen before heading to Atlanta to assist Rachel with cooking for her Christmas open house.

I’m not sure how to end the growth of our Christmas list. What started out as surprise boxes for immediate family members and their living-in-the-same-house children has grown to include the new households of married members of our ever-increasing family. We may set a personal record this year, topping the list at fifty boxes wrapped by Richard. And then there’s the “little somethings” that we’ll want to give our neighbors and new friends. But Richard won’t have to wrap these; I’ll just stuff them into stockings for personal presentation.

And to think, I once wanted to buy a Miata. What would we do without Santa’s sleigh?

Bitten by the Book Bug

My dancing days may be over, not that I ever really knew how to dance. Every bone in my body aches. I’d give anything to be able to read and write all day until my achey-breaky body is better, but Santa’s sleigh is pulling out in two days, and I have to help load it. While batches of macaroons bake, I take aching bones breaks. This is when I make phone calls arranging visits with Louisiana friends and check emails.

My first friend call was to Karen and Mickey. Mickey was one of Richard’s partners, and we’ve so enjoyed their family’s reaction to our Christmas boxes over the years that we’ve continued the tradition of “the box” for over a decade. Two of their children are now adults, but we hope they’ll never outgrow the wonder of Dr. Dick’s Christmas gift.

Karen had me screaming with laughter, as usual, over the trials of motherhood when your husband works seventy hours a week and you have four kids. The latest is that Karen is undergoing rehabilitation therapy post-surgery for a shoulder injury. She recently found out that her ten-year-old daughter’s school has been learning about drug abuse, and that they’re now all praying for Madeline’s mother Karen, who is in “rehab.”

We try to see Louie and Janie when we go to Louisiana. Louie, with Elaine’s help, literally saved Richard’s life when Richard had the “big one.” And Janie brought me deodorant and a hairbrush at the hospital. Could you have a deeper bond than that? Even though Louie is Jewish, we began giving him Christmas macaroons years ago. To say that Louie loves our macaroons is quite the understatement. When I called with the news that the macaroons are on their way to town, Janie jumped at our offer to take them to dinner in New Orleans.

All of this is good news, but the most excitement I felt was about my niece Nikki. We’ve been in an informal book “group” for years, trading books back and forth. Nikki devours books and teachers English to eighth graders. She knows I’ve started publishing a blog and that I published Jack’s book. She’s now planning to start a group writing project with her class. This should reap some publishable stuff. But, even more exciting, Nikki has started writing her own book. As soon as the holidays are over, I know how I’ll be spending my time.

Jack already has enough material for another book. My friend Susan has promised to pick up where she left off on the book she started when we both lived in Louisiana, if I continue the book I started back then. Kathleen is blogging, as is her mother Gayle; I hope these blogs will become books. Sherry has been blogging about her Down’s Syndrome son – a book in the making that I hope to help publish. And now, Nikki is providing me with her prose.

I may never have to look out of the window when the weather gets really dreary. I’ll be too busy staring at my computer screen.

Richard's Wrapping Routine

I had planned on having some of our Christmas boxes ready to go when we went to the wedding. But, I still hadn’t made the bourbon balls and Richard hadn’t purchased his Jelly Bellies or chocolate coins. On the way home from the wedding, we completed Richard’s candy collection. Now, I must get back into the Christmas kitchen and complete my cooking.

All the way to back to Tennessee, I had envisioned spending our first day home creating tasty treats as visions of family fun danced in my head. But, first, we had to unearth the packing supplies which we store in an outbuilding several hundred feet from the house. The storage bins are too many and too clumsy to carry, so I wanted Richard to transport them in the van. And this couldn’t be done until everything we took to the wedding was removed from the van.

Everything we took out of the van needed further disposition to make space for spreading out “Santa’s Wrapping Room.” Suitcases were unpacked -- which led to laundry to wash, fold, and hang. Mail needed sorting -- which created a desk full of filing to be finished. The filing was important because we need every flat surface in our house for spreading out our array of gifts purchased throughout the year. I know you might think that I could just put the files in what Terry Sue refers to as a “Houdini” box until Christmas is over. I did that one year, and only found out that I had inadvertently stowed our unpaid electric bill when Richard came home from work to a house without electricity.

We’ve spent a whole day back and have not one bourbon ball or gift box to show for it. This is what Richard refers to as the “infinite regression of steps.”

After the coconut macaroons come out of the oven and the bourbon balls are counted into cans; once the gifts are laid out for choosing; the tissue paper is stacked within reach; the candy and coins are sorted into categories; and the various tapes are laid out -- It’s showtime!

Those who have never received one of Richard’s surprise boxes may think all this preparation is a bit excessive, but it takes a lot of coordination to get somewhere between thirty and fifty boxes created, wrapped, and shipped in time for Christmas – especially the way Richard does it. Each family gets a carefully selected assortment of goodies and gifts. Each small gift is wrapped by Richard in colorful tissue paper, as is each candy and coin. All these small packages are then strategically placed in the proper size box -- and the detail work really begins.

Each box is sealed with packing tape into which Richard incorporates a “pull tab” for ease of access. He then chooses the right wrapping paper for each recipient’s tastes and for how the pattern will line up on the box. Using his right angle measuring tool, he measures the box and pattern before making the first cut on the paper. When he’s satisfied that the alignment is good to go, he begins taping – making military perfect creases in each corner and end. The boxes are then given to me to receive a color-coordinated bow and name tag. The box is actually one of the most delightful parts of the wrapped-by-Richard gift experience.

He calls himself the best “white wrapper “ that he knows.

Processing the Passion

Whew! I think I have a hangover – and I don’t mean of the alcohol withdrawal kind. All that emotion in such a short time is enough to make my head and heart explode. One of the best things about retirement is that it gives me the gift of time. Even though Richard didn’t retire until he had his near-death heart attack, I was able to retire as soon as Richard “adopted” me. I stayed busy with volunteer work with family and the community, but I was able to pull back and process whenever I felt the need.

For a while after Hurricane Katrina, I forgot about that need for processing time. After this past year of emotional roller coaster rides, I finally put my passions on hold for a two-week period last summer while I floated on a sea of pure pain. For me, even the pleasures of life can be so intense that they explode my over-full heart. Richard has a friend who used to tell me that she had to take breaks from conversations with me because she would become “over-stimulated.” Elaine has told me that I make people tired. Well, imagine if I make other people emotionally exhausted how I make myself feel.

Elaine and I relaxed together for a couple of days before everyone else descended on her. Richard and I were on call for the next couple of days, in case Elaine needed a back-up band of buddies for her pageant production. She really had everything under control, so we took a break the morning of the wedding to take a trip with Scott and Buffy. Nicholas was playing in the last game of his pee-wee league football season. We jumped at the chance to see him and his sister Miya, with the fairy princess hair. , That night, Rachel’s family joined us on the dance floor, where Sarah twirled in her sparkly party dress, and all the young marrieds did some version of mildly dirty dancing. Elaine, Rosita and I have known each other since we were fourteen. At receptions end, we three couples who call ourselves “los tres amigos y amigas ” toasted the end of the party in Elaine’s room -- as we began planning for Rosita and Eddie’s daughter’s wedding in less than a year.

I had planned to stay in family visit mode for two and a half weeks, which would include a visit to my Aunt Mabel on the bayou to wish her a happy eightieth birthday. Lucky for me, Richard insisted on us taking a mental health break between the big, fat Italian wedding and the big, fat family feast for Thanksgiving at Scott’s house in Mississippi.

All the way home, I let the shimmering bubbles of memories of the five-day trip float across my consciousness and pop into magical memories lodged in my brain. It was a nine-hour trip, but I know I’ll be floating for days. Thank goodness, all I have to do this next five days is prepare Christmas packages for family that we’ll see during Thanksgiving week.

One Wild Wedding

Elaine kept calling it “A Big Fat Italian Wedding.” Whatever anybody wants to call it, it was fabulously fun. There’s really no similarity between WASP wedding and the South Louisiana version of letting the good times roll. All major events in New Orleans are celebrated with song, dance, food, and laughter – lots of laughter. And we pray – lots of praying. The Saints are losing – Don’t worry about it; have a laugh, and say a prayer. The Saints are winning – Let’s laugh, and say a prayer. You’re sick? – I’ll tell you a funny story to cheer you up, after I pray for you. You’re dead? – I’ll tell everybody something funny about you to cheer them up, and I’ll pray for you and your family.

Elaine refuses to face life any other way. In her professional life, she’s a very serious doctor making life and death decisions every day. She works very hard, and plays even harder. Any event Elaine touches has a special sparkle – some of it from the fresh flower arrangements and flickering candlelight, but most from the imprint of her passion for life, love, and family. And now that Elaine’s children are old enough to help plan the pageants, we’re in for a really wild ride.

No New Orleans party takes food lightly. You don’t go to a tailgate party with just a bunch of chips and dips. Every event calls for a fabulous feast – for all the senses. You must wear your team colors; you must bring your team spirit; and you must bring good food – lots of good food. For Mardi Gras, families cordon off picnic spots days before the parades and station a family member to guard their territory until parade time – many complete with living room sofas. All day people are barbequing to go with the gourmet fare they bring from home.

Wedding receptions are smaller versions of Mardi Gras. Everybody gets in on the act. My Godchild Gary coordinated the music with the DJ to optimize the potential for dancing, and dance we did. Everybody who can walk is expected to dance. Who knew that Elaine’s older brother Tony, a very dour doctor, could line dance?

And the food at both the rehearsal dinner and wedding reception was fit for kings (and queens). In the span of two nights, we feasted on velvety oyster soup, lobster ravioli in seafood Alfredo, lamb chops, and crab cakes followed by cannolis and amaretto panna cotta. The reception food was no less divine. I’ve never been to a wedding buffet with prime filets of beef, béarnaise sauce, and mushroom wine sauce – as much as you wanted to eat. And the wedding cake was not standard almond flavored white – it was carrot cake! This was accompanied by a groom’s cake of half lemon doberge and half chocolate doberge lovingly carried from New Orleans Gambino’s Bakery by some of Elaine’s best friends, Rosita and Eddie, built a special wallboard platform to cradle it on its journey. Did I tell you the food is important?

The wedding was as perfect as a wedding could ever be. The bride was a movie star straight out of the forties movies. The groom was the perfect leading man of dark Italian good looks. The attendants were glowing in their wine-colored strapless gowns. The sunset ceremony under a centuries-old oak tree at water’s edge was personalized, solemn, and meaningful. Then, we moved in for the reception.


We get together and blow off steam, and make marvelous memories that will tide us over through life’s hard work and sorrows. Then we pack away our party clothes and head back to our realities, carrying the glow of fun, food, laughter and longing that has to last us until next time.

I do know what it means to miss New Orleans. We’ll be back for Thanksgiving.

Modern Marriage

I remember when we used to all assume that marriage meant the same things to everyone, and everyone struggled to play the roles assigned to them in the play. Then, Women’s Lib came along and we admitted that not all men can overhaul a carburetor, and not all women are natural nurturers. We now have women going off to war, and men who are quite comfortable with being “Mr. Mom.”

We discovered something remarkable along the way. Men and women can actually stand toe-to-toe as friends. There are lots of jobs to be done in maintaining a family, and someone has to do each job. It may not work in society at large, but in families, the Marxist doctrine of “from each according to their abilities; to each according to their needs” may be better than pretending that the magic of love solves all problems -- and cleans the bathrooms, to boot.

Life is an adventure, and family life is even more so. We need to hold tight to a buddy’s hand as we go into each dark cave of the unknown. Briton and Jeanne have worked as a couple for years now. They know each others abilities and disabilities. They’ve held each others hands and laughed and cried as they fell down, got back up, dusted each other off, and tried again.

I wish we could help them write a contract addressing everything they will face as a couple, but none of us ever know what life will throw our way. What I do know is that we need to continue being there for them as they progress through life as a family. We need to let them know that we still “have their backs.” And they need to continue to be the best of friends.

I know a lot of people think that the golden rule is a great way to run a relationship. I disagree, especially since some of my friends are as thick as bricks about what I want and need. If we do unto others as we would have them do unto us, I may be getting tickets to the Saints game when I’d really rather a day strolling along the lake.

I don’t expect my server in restaurant to guess what I’m in the mood to eat; why would I expect my friends to do so? Richard is fond of saying, “I’ll give you whatever you want; just tell me what you want.” This goes both ways. In everything we undertake as a team, we assign officer and enlisted status, based on whose project we’re doing. Then the officer has to define very clearly how to achieve the desired goal. Makes me think twice before beginning a project…

The standard marriage vows admonishing women to obey their husbands may need a complete overhaul. How about replacing them with the Albert Camus quote, “Don’t walk in front of me; I may not follow. Don’t walk behind me; I may not lead. Just walk beside me, and be my friend.”

Gift Giving

The bride and groom arrived and Richard and I took the opportunity to present them with their present in private. Briton was going to marry his long-time girlfriend Jeanne, and I wanted to give them a special gift – something with deep meaning. We gathered on the balcony of Briton’s room for the giving of the gifts. Jeanne did seem a bit puzzled went she unwrapped a roll of duct tape, followed by a fifteen-foot length of rope. After the following explanation, she seemed happy to find that there was also wedding money in the bottom of the bag.

Before Elaine married Bubby, I spent a fair amount of time at her house with her four children. One day, while visiting their home, I observed Briton tormenting his toddler brother Gary by putting a strip of duct tape in the baby’s hair. Gary is my godchild, so I’m rather protective of him. I let Briton know that whatever he did to Gary, I’d do to him.

Shortly after this, I agreed to a week-end trip to the beach with Elaine and her kids. First, I was facing an hour in the car with someone else’s kids. Second, I was staying for two days in a cottage with the same four children. The closer the time of departure got, the more jangled my nerves got. The date arrived, and I had found a cure for my case of nerves.

I picked Elaine’s family up in my van, informing the kids that it was my van, so it was my rules. I expected them to behave. I also let them know that I was armed – with rope and duct tape. We proceeded to the beach without incident.

The following morning began with Gary’s blood-curdling scream coming from the children’s room. Peeking into the room, I found Briton on top of his brother. Without any warning, I flew across the room, tied Briton up with my handy rope, and put him in the cottage closet. Elaine and I took the other kids out of the room, leaving Briton alone in the closet. Upon our return, Briton was out of the closet, beaming. “Aunt Yvette,” he said, “That was fun. Do it again.”

It then dawned on me that we were dropping Briton off at school at the end of the week-end. I could just hear him when asked how he spent his week-end. “Well, my aunt took me to a hotel and tied me up.” I’m sure that people have been arrested for less.

Briton is extremely passionate about life, and may sometimes need to be gentled. We hope Jeanne never has to use it, but it’s good for a new bride to have some hope of keeping her husband in line.

Best Friends Forever

The way life works, you just never know who will end up being your best friend forever. How was I to know when I walked into the governor’s mansion selling seafood over thirty years ago that Holly and I would bond for life? She became one of the only friends I could share my family with while living in Atlanta. Only Holly enjoyed the river rafting and camping with my kids that I needed a buddy to do. My kids are grown with kids of their own, but sharing them meant baring and sharing our souls. The people who help raise your kids are soul sisters (and brothers) in a special kind of eternal way.

Elaine and I became bonded forever in September of nineteen sixty-five. With forty-four years of friendship, she’s my longest lasting soul sister and my only blood sister with different parents than I had. My four other sisters shared my blood by default. Her children are my children; my children are her children. She fixed me up with Richard; I fixed her up with her husband, Bubby. I was with her when she received her last child into her arms; she was with me when Richard received his new heart. How could we not attend each other’s children’s weddings?

Getting to Holly’s we were driving toward a hurricane, which didn’t bother Richard who told Jack that was because he (Richard) travels with a hurricane. The trip to Alabama began with an ominous cloud cover, but by the end of the drive, at the end of the day, we were headed directly into the blinding sun. We’re now in Alabama for the wedding of Elaine’s oldest child, Briton. The ceremony is scheduled to be outside at the water’s edge, so we’re grateful that the weather is promising to cooperate.

Elaine, Bubby, Richard and I began our reunion with meeting for a meal at a very quaint old restaurant in Point Clear called the Wash House. For the first time, I tasted tomato grits, which were even better than cheese grits. The service was wonderful, and the food was very good, but we could have just as soon eaten at a McDonald’s for as much attention as we gave the fare -- except for Bubby’s insistence that we go to a restaurant without a bunch of kids. After raising six of the little critters, Bub wants a respite before the next set of grandkids comes along.

After dinner, we returned to The Grand Hotel which is hosting the wedding. Here we sat for hours --outside, with a breeze blowing off the bay, warming ourselves around patio fire pits, toasting our friendship, our spouses, our children, and our grandkids. The long-burning glow of our memories could probably have kept us warm, but the fire was, none-the-less, nice.

Elaine is talking about retiring in less than two years. To begin this new phase in our lives, we’re planning a European victory trip together. Elaine is a very artistic person with little time to nurture her talents. So, to give her extra incentive to carry out her retirement plan, I’m plying her with promises of classes in all the arts and crafts practiced by our new and very talented friends in Coker Creek.

Like the Girl Scout song says, “Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver, but the other’s gold.”

Perfect Practice Makes Perfect

One of Richard’s favorite sayings is “Practice doesn’t make perfect; perfect practice makes perfect.” He must really believe this because he creates protocols for everything he does, including leaving the house for a road trip. He has a list on his computer that he prints and uses as a checklist as he loads the car and secures the home front. Richard’s toiletries - check. Richard’s clothes – check. Adjust thermostat – check. Navigation system in car – check. We rarely leave and have those “Did I turn off the iron?” moments.

Our over-the-hill neighbors take care of our pets when we leave town. Richard has a protocol for getting our pet supplies ready for our pet sitters. It’s nice for me that I don’t have to worry that in the middle of my drive to wherever, I’m going to have a panic attack wondering if I remembered to put out the cat food.

Our first stop was Atlanta to deliver donations to the family members who lost all their household possessions in a flood. Holly and Don have been receiving donations, so we added an overnight visit with them to our mission of mercy. The plan was that Richard and Don were to drop me off for a haircut while they made the donation deliveries.

We had driven through rain all the way to Atlanta, and Don wasn’t at home when we arrived. Their second floor guest room overlooks the hardwoods that were shimmering with raindrops on the last of the fall foliage. I couldn’t resist the temptation to let ourselves in and nap through the rainy afternoon. One of my favorite sayings is “Tomorrow is another day.” -- Besides which, we have to pass relatively close to the flooded family’s new residence on our way out of town. And I can always put my hair in a bun.

Holly is the chef for the Georgia governor’s mansion, and she and Don usually cook for us. But, their house is in the process of being put back together after a full house interior paint job, so Richard offered to take us all out to dinner. Aspen is a good steakhouse owned and operated by a local husband and wife team. Holly and I have enjoyed a meal there before, so we braved the short drive through the rain to get there. A gas log fire greeted us in the dining room. How cozy!

We started with very nice chopped salads. I then had wonderfully prepared grilled scallops – caramelized on the outside, butter-tender on the inside served with crusty polenta and endive. Don enjoyed his ancho pork loin chop, but thought the kitchen needed a course in chorizo and potato casserole. Don and Holly make several to-die-for versions of potato, sausage and cheese casseroles, so I’m not surprised that this wasn’t up to their standards.

Holly was dissuaded from getting her usual rib eye by the prospect of trying a special bone-in filet glowingly described by our waitress. It was nice that Holly was asked to check for proper doneness before the server left our table. Richard had the flatiron steak with a gorgonzola topping. As he got to the halfway point in his meal, the waitress brought over extra gorgonzola for the second half of his entrée.

We had a very nice evening, and the waitress was wonderful, despite Richard’s declaration that her “Minnie Mouse” voice felt like chopsticks being shoved into his eardrums.

Poor Richard’s Life of Leisure

All the greens we got from Mamie’s and all the turnips given to us by Deborah had to be cleaned and cut. I had packing to do before we head down south for a family wedding, so guess who had the job of cleaning and cutting? It was my job to season and sauté -- since I’m substituting healthy ingredients for hog jowl or ham, attempting to duplicate the southern soul food flavor without cardiac arrest. Now, Mamie can tell everybody that I not only had Richard do the planting and weeding, he also had to be my prep cook. I’m so spoiled.

Jack will receive a sampling of this fare. We’ll also share this vegetable wealth with Mamie, Josie, Adam, Deborah, and Charlie; and give some to our across-the-hill neighbors. The rest we’ll freeze for the hoards descending during the Christmas holidays.

Poor Richard; I really don’t think he knew what he was signing on for when he said he wanted me to bring “life” into his house. Richard had lived a life of solitude for forty-six years before I came along. Once I entered with my family and friends, solitude was not an option, and neither, I feared, would be his sanity.

It wasn’t enough that we spent our first ten years together with a revolving door of bawling babies, breastfeeding moms, and disillusioned dads coming through our home and eating at our table. His retirement years have only served to increase the amount of time allotted to nurturing “life” in our homes. I say homes because circumstances beyond our control led us to several moves. The first being when he became disabled enough to need a heart transplant.

The disability leading up to the transplant also transplanted us. I did allow him a small reprieve for his heart transplant, but our retirement home on the lake drew guests like fish draws flies. There seemed to be a party every week-end, and we still had a constant flow of the aforementioned babies, mothers and dads. I was in heaven; Richard was in shock.

Hurricane Katrina gave him his best opportunity to reclaim some semblance of solitude when the mermaids claimed our home for their underwater playground -- if he had only agreed to live in an RV. Now, I do understand that living in a thirty-four by twelve foot space with my mouth could be a bit confining, but at least it was just the two of us.

He said he was afraid that I’d start letting the grandkids have the RV beds, and he’d be sleeping outside in a tent if we didn’t move into a house. When we have guests, it’s true that we move out of our bedroom for them, but we don’t have to move into a tent because we have our RV “apartment.”

Now that we have a house in the holler, I’m thinking of having Richard install a revolving guest door -- but not until we finish harvesting and cooking turnip greens.

Small Town Food and Friends

Coker Creek isn’t big enough to be called a town; it’s really only a hamlet in the woods. We’re barely big enough for a public elementary school, and the students have to go “off the mountain” to Tellico Plains for high school. But if you want to feel a sense of community, Coker Creek School is fairly bursting with civic pride.

For the last few years, a major PTO fundraiser has been the November turkey dinner in the school cafeteria. Attending for the first time this year, we were served generous portions of turkey, cornbread dressing, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, roll, tea, and a variety of cakes and pies -- and it only cost six dollars per person. It seems that every family in Coker Creek came to get some of this good grub to either eat there or take home. Betty ate there and bought a second dinner to share with her dog later in the evening. Her dog always gets some of whatever Betty eats.

Richard asked Greta how the PTO could make any money serving such a large meal for such a small price. Greta told him that most of the food is donated by local families. We sure enjoyed our share. I wish we knew who donated the food; I’d love to be able to thank them.

Adam and Josie ate with us, and Adam tried to swap the cake he got at the dinner for last piece of Richard’s caramel cake, which was at our house. He didn’t seem at all impressed by the fact that we were down to one piece because we had shared the cake with so many friends. We declined that deal, but we are trying to entice him and Josie to attend the upcoming Ruritan supper to try the chocolate malted cake that Richard will be presenting.

Mamie came in with her daughter Jean who, I’ve been told, was a wonderful quilter. Since Jean is beginning to divest herself of some her seventy-five years of accumulated possessions, I’m hoping to purchase some of her quilt tops to use as tablecloths. I reminded Jean of this, and she told me to stop by anytime. I'm looking forward to getting back from my trip, so I can sort through Jean’s work.

We also ran into Anita and her Italian mom, Evie, who makes the world’s best biscotti -- which we usually swap for some of our Cajun roasted pecans and bourbon balls at Christmas. Come to find out, Evie is going to celebrate her ninetieth birthday this spring. I’d better get on the stick and take her up on her offer to teach me to make biscotti. Times-a-wastin’ for me to learn all the secrets of these wonderful pioneer women.

With full stomachs, we went to Mamie’s to divest ourselves of our full trailer of Nancy’s gift of garden gold. After accomplishing this task, we harvested lots of turnip greens to add to the turnips from Deborah. And Jack wants us to come get some of his pumpkins before our trip. We may never get rich in money, but with our wealth of friends, I’m fairly certain we’ll never be hungry or homeless.

Living Large

The word is out that Richard and I collect other people’s poop – not from them, from their horses. Nancy called to give us the opportunity to collect her garden gold. The day dawned bright and beautiful, so we took her up on her offer.

On the way to Nancy’s, we dropped by our across-the-hill neighbor’s house to drop off dirty rice stuffed peppers and noodle pudding. Their granddaughter Cassie was being motivated to clean her room by the prospect of going to Nancy’s to help scoop the poop. Now, that’s a new one on me: If you clean your room, you can go clean poop out of a pasture. Whatever works; Cassie showed up at Nancy’s in short order.

We could have spent the entire afternoon strolling through the woods to enjoy this perfect weather, but we chose to get up close and personal with nature. Richard and I had a little system going. He’d hold the snow shovel while I raked the meadow apples into it; empty and repeat. Two and three quarter hours of walking and talking while shoveling shi_, and the pasture was almost feces-free. Richard commented that the horses must feel really important that four people were so interested in their droppings we spent a whole afternoon collecting them – by Richard’s estimate, about two thousand pounds of poo-poo.

Because we so enjoyed the barbecue shrimp and cakes the night before, we wanted to share the experience with more friends. We had packed leftovers for Nancy and Jim, for Deborah and Charlie, and for Jack. When we finished loading our trailer, we began to make our meals-on-wheels rounds. Nancy agreed that it was a pretty good trade: predigested food in exchange for what her ponies had already processed. Deborah traded fresh turnips and Jack gave us a head of his home-grown broccoli for our leftovers.

Deborah had also asked me to share my wing-it secrets to creating a flapper costume, as this was my attire for last year’s Halloween party. Since Deborah is so tiny, she’d fit on my jeans pocket, she certainly can’t simply borrow my costume. We spent a little time discussing options and trying on her pieces of potential costume pieces. Richard and I were pretty happy with our afternoon’s activities.

Dusk was settling by the time we got to Jack’s, so we sat on his porch a while and enjoyed the mountain vista. It was such a perfect ending to our day that we decided to put off spreading the garden gold until the morning. As Richard is fond of saying, “A great pig like that, you don’t eat all at once.” We’re retired; it’s about taking time to smell the roses -- and the fertilizer they grow in.

We hardly had to dirty our kitchen to enjoy a feast of steamed broccoli, leftover salad and re-heated barbeque shrimp before collapsing on the couch for a bit of TV before bed.

McGruff, Mary, and Mamie

The day started out at Coker Creek Elementary School to see Adam as Officer McGruff. Although Adam is one of the least gruff people we know, he somehow got selected to be the canine crime fighter at the health and safety day at the school. They sure didn’t create this much excitement when I was in grade school. Every community hero group and their equipment, from a fire department ladder truck to Tennessee National Guardsmen in uniform were available. I learned more than I hope to ever need to know about meth from a presentation shown on a huge inflatable movie screen in the school gym. Josie was in attendance take pictures. We got to talking about marrying some of her photos to my blog and creating a book.

Richard and I have been talking about having Mamie to our house, and Adam had been asking me to cook some Cajun shrimp for him. Mamie’s ninetieth birthday will occur while Richard and I are out of town, so it semed fitting to have Mamie, Josie and Adam over for dinner before we leave town. Upon my arrival home from the school, I found an email from Mary me with an invitation to stop by her place for some of her apple rum cake.I called and invited Mary and Don to join us for dinner. They agreed.

Teamwork prevailed. Richard drove to Tellico Grains for great bread, baked a caramel cake, made salad, and set the table. Adam and Josie chauffeured Mamie, and Josie presented me with a sampling CD of her Coker Creek photos. Mary and Don arrived with Mary’s apple cake.

In honor of Mamie’s birthday we began with an appetizer of banana peppers from Jack’s garden stuffed with a taco stuffing that Richard had made for Bluegrass. We followed this with Richard’s remarkable salad, served tableside by its creator. The main dish was New Orleans style barbecue shrimp which are traditionally served with the heads and shells intact, but I removed all but the tails because serving food with eyes and whiskers seems to freak out inland dwellers. We served the shrimp over warm bread from Tellico Grains, and accompanied it with Cajun dirty rice and some of the maque chou that my followers have read so much about.

Mamie commented that she should have known something was up when I asked about her favorite cake and invited her to dinner. The truth is that we had already invited her and Richard had already begun baking a cake when it occurred to me that we’d miss her birthday. This was a spontaneous celebration, but I am known for being the “wing it” queen.

We added ice cream to the dessert menu, and after singing “Happy Birthday” to my mountain mama, gorged ourselves on two homemade cakes from two different kitchens and Mayfield vanilla ice cream. Mamie’s twinkling blue eyes began to droop, so Adam and Josie departed with the guest of honor. Mary and Don sat to chat a while before their departure.

When the guests were gone, I was tempted to turn the lights out on the mess, but I had no good excuse to be such a slob. Mary had rinsed the dishes, so I put as much as I could in the dishwasher and retired for the night -- with great memories to relive as we face tomorrow’s kitchen clean-up.

Driving Ms. Mamie

Mamie’s been having back trouble, but Mamie isn’t one to take pain pills, or to take pain lying down. She says that, in the morning, she can’t straighten up. Since she’s already walking humped over, and she has to bend to make her bed, she makes her bed while waiting to straighten up. Now, that’s a “can-do” attitude. She figures she can work through most of life’s adversities, but she has seen a doctor about this back problem. The doctor prescribed physical therapy and a bone density scan.

Junior used to be Mamie’s chauffeur and companion for these appointments. Since Junior’s death, she’s been driving herself to therapy. But she agreed to let me drive her to what she thought would be a doctor’s appointment with her bone scan – only because she says that, with her poor hearing, she may not be hearing everything the doctor says. I arrived at the appointed time, and she wasn’t quite ready because she had already had two visitors and had made and canned a batch of muscadine jam. She gave me a jar of jam, and she was right; it was a pleasant color.

When Mamie was ready, she handed me the keys to her new car; she had her whole route mapped out. We’d go to the bank to deposit a check, and then we’d have lunch. Her choice of lunch venue was a place where we could get “something light” -- Captain D’s – where she insisted on paying for my meal because the bus driver is supposed to eat free. I guess in some universe fried fish and hush puppies are light – as long as you have slaw instead of fries.

After lunch, we swung by Wal-Mart for me to pick up a few things, since we had time to kill. We then headed for the clinic. Upon arrival, Mamie realized that we had a half hour before her appointment, so she had me backtrack to the post office to mail payments for her bills. This mission accomplished, we went back for her test. After her scan, she wasn‘t happy when the doctor didn’t have time to burn off a skin cancer while she “was there anyway.” Before she left, the clinic did give her an appointment for this procedure to be provided in a week, closer to her home.

We now had two choices: home or another adventure. Mamie had read in the Co-op newsletter about the biggest vineyard in Tennessee, which happens to be between where we were and where we were going. We detoured to check this out, and Mamie noted their methods of pruning for use on her grape vines.

One last stop at Dollar General in Tellico because they “have nice birthday cards that are less expensive than anywhere else.” Mamie was appalled that the price had gone up to a dollar from fifty cents, so she only bought one instead of the two she’d gone in for. She says she’ll write her own verse in a plain card for her second birthday buddy. She doesn’t like that prices keep climbing in this bad economy. Mamie raised a family on hard work, frugality, hope, and prayer. She knows a thing or two about making ends meet.

I told Mamie that I intend to spend a lot of time with her so that she can pass down to me all the knowledge she’s amassed over her almost-ninety years. And since she’s still acquiring wisdom, I may have to become her permanent chauffeur.

Baskets for Our Babies

Baskets and that dead space that kitchens used to have above the cupboards and below the ceiling – now I know what they’re for. All these years, I’ve saved baskets for the occasional use as a substitute for a potato chip bowl or for use as a cute bread basket. I can’t even count how many women I’ve known who’ve gone ga-ga over Longaberger Baskets. And Ken and Kat Dalton of Coker Creek are world renowned for their basketry work and classes. Mostly, I just looked at baskets as kitschy kitchen décor – something else to dust -- and something to store between holidays.

I have no designer baskets and have come very close, on several occasions, to throwing my baskets into the waste basket. Couple this with the fact that many modern kitchens now have cupboards all the way to the ceiling, and I could have missed out on the perfect storage solution for our sweet spuds. Instead, I now have decorative storage for our sweet potato babies. I’ve already used the tops of our cupboards to display the butternut squash until we use it. Now, I’ve added baskets of sweet potatoes to our kitchen décor. And we’ll still have sweet dreams on our jams under the bed.

One of our neighbors returned home after several weeks in the hospital following a stroke. I brought the family lasagna and red beans. Upon returning to our house, I was pleasantly surprised to find an order for Jack’s books on my email from the Coker Creek Welcome Center. This quickly became two orders when Richard remembered that Designs by Baerreis had asked him to relay the message that they needed more books. Looks like Jack and I will cover the cost of my last overly enthusiastic order before Christmas, after all. Needing Jack to autograph the books before delivery, it was time for a trip to Jack’s house.

Charlie and Deborah live on the way to Jack’s, and they hadn’t experienced Muscadine Madness yet, so I dropped some of this scary jam off to them. I then headed over to get Jack’s signature on the ordered books. I caught Jack returning from the spring with two buckets of drinking water. He teased that if I’d shown up just a couple of minutes earlier, he’d have had me go fetch his water. I reminded him that according to Mamie, “We’ll help,” means I’ll send Richard, and let him know that I’d have been happy to send Richard to tote Jack’s water up the hill. He signed the books and offered me some pumpkins which I said I’d pick up in a day or two. Then it was off to the welcome center, where I spent my share of the book profits on small pieces created by local artists to give as Christmas gifts.

Mamie lives in Murphy’s Corner, where the two shops needing books are located. After making my deliveries, I stopped at Mamie’s for some of her wonderful free range hen eggs. She looked so much more chipper than she had since Junior’s death. I think a few days of sunshine have been good for all of our moods.

To cap this happy day in the holler, Richard and I enjoyed a delicious dinner beginning with Richard’s salads. Our entrée was salmon with a mixture of leeks, fennel, ginger and peppers that Richard put in the freezer before harvest season. We accompanied this with butternut squash that we found in the field while pulling up sweet potatoes. How good will that be -- baked butternut squash mashed with margarine and orange juice, seasoned with orange zest and nutmeg – alongside salmon with aromatic vegetables?

Porch Potatoes

Will I ever get finished pampering these potatoes. Sweet? -- my hind leg! Our Irish potatoes know how to behave. We dug them when we were ready. With very little dusting off, we put them in mesh bags on a lower shelf in the kitchen. Here, they patiently await our dining pleasure. And there are so many ways to serve potatoes of the Irish variety. I can think of less than a dozen ways to fix these roots. Why can’t the sweet potatoes be as versatile and well-behaved as the Irish spuds?

First, the little darlings can’t stand to have soggy vines left on them after the first frost. Then, they demand that we pull them up in short order or they’ll spoil because they don’t like wet feet. Of course, they didn’t like being covered in wet clay out of the ground either. We carefully separated them into trays that allowed air flow for them to dry. Apparently, they found the temperature and barometric pressure in Mamie’s garage to be less than ideal. When we started moving them to Mamie’s laundry room, we found that many of them had already rotted. Oh joy! Another opportunity to interact with our “sweet” spuds.

I hauled our share home -- residual mud, rotten babies and all. I sorted them, yet again, into edible versus compost-ready. The still-good potatoes, I laid out on our metal mesh table in the sun on the porch. Hopefully, a little sunbathing will get them ready for their long winter’s nap. I didn’t know where they’d go after that, as the root cellar is too damp for them.

Mamie suggested hiding them below our bed, but the jams have claimed that space. I told Mamie that I was reluctant to move the jams for fear that they were the origin of our sweet dreams. She reminded me that these potatoes are, after all, sweet potatoes, so I should move the jams to the RV and allow the potatoes the under-bed option. Mamie also reminded me that I could go ahead and cook and freeze them for later consumption. I’d love to do this, but then I’d have to invest several hundred dollars in another freezer to store several dollars worth of potatoes.

Very few of our crop made it to the big-boy stage, which greatly disappointed Mamie. I told her that we shouldn’t be too worked up over this, as there was a real market for fingerling potatoes in gourmet foods. Crop failure is probably what led some genius to create demand for “baby” vegetables. If only we were raising potatoes for sale, we may have made out better this way. Even with all the waste, we did end up with several bushels of sweet spuds, fingerling and otherwise. Shirley gratefully accepted some, as did Leal when she dropped by for a chat.

Having washed, peeled and prepared the damaged potatoes that had some salvage value, I must admit that whipped with a little syrup, butter and cinnamon they were quite a nice accompaniment to our pork chops and mixed greens.

Hard Workin’ Women

These mountain women are real worker bees. The town of Tellico Plains was in danger of losing their Christmas Candlelight Walk, so the Cherokee Women’s Club jumped into action. Josie invited me to come with her to a planning meeting at Center Presbyterian Church. I accepted because I like Josie and because I’m already invested in the event’s success in that Jack is signing and selling books there. Josie and her Jeep picked me up at my house in the holler, and off we went.

This group was a wonder to behold. I’m so used to volunteers with no business experience that it was a new treat to listen to these women run their relay race. Each committee member gave her report in a concise manner and passed the baton to the next runner. This committee person ran with the baton and handed it on. This went on until all issues were addressed; then the meeting was adjourned.

Someone made coffee, but it was most definitely not a coffee klatch. If you wanted coffee, you could get your own. Anyone who wanted lunch brought their own. This was definitely a focused work meeting. I came away thinking the candlelight walk would continue to be a success if these women had anything to say about it.

It’s always a joy to be with Josie; she exudes adventure and creativity. Every time I admired a piece of wearable art on one of the women at the meeting, it turns out that Josie either made it or taught the wearer to make it. You name the artistic medium, Josie is into it. She quilts, sews, knits, paints, and she never goes anywhere without her camera. It seems that in all the media she attempts, she excels. I feel positively artistic just being around her, and I can’t even color inside the lines.

Neither Josie nor I brown-bagged our lunches, and both of us are always hungry. So, after the meeting, we headed up the Cherohala Skyway to my favorite spot on the river, Tellico Kats -- I’ve become addicted to their paninis. My policy is that if Josie drives, I buy her lunch. This pays great dividends for me.

Even though Josie was very clear during lunch that she intended to head straight home for a nap, she must have gotten a second wind as we stepped back into her Jeep. Instead of pointing the nose down the Skyway, Josie headed up and hung a right at the ranger station. We wound around in the forest, through gurgling streams and dancing waterfalls until we came to a bit of heaven – a sweet cemetery at the top of a bluff overlooking all of creation. There, a picnic pavilion and meditation benches awaited the families that may want to spend some time with their loved ones who have passed over to the next life. Josie called this “homecoming.” I had never heard this term in relation to a cemetery, but it’s certainly a soothing thought.

Perfect Day in Paradise

If Coker Creek became a monarchy tomorrow, Charlie would be King of the Mountain and Deborah would be his beautiful and kind Queen. In order for kings to conquer foreign lands, they had to be great adventurers.

Charlie came from Florida and created a kingdom in the hills that he loves to share with all his loving and loyal friends. King Charlie holds great feasts with much music and mirth in his dining hall with many round tables. He also invites noblemen and their wives from surrounding kingdoms to share in the wealth of the land. He is a fearless leader, and all who know him love him and the Delightful Deborah.

King Charlie took upon himself the sharing the enjoyment of God’s cloak of many colors that is draped across this fall landscape. This being a very small kingdom, the king and queen have no men or ladies-in-waiting. They spent many hours planning this adventure and sending word to all area noblemen, many of whom spent their youth in defending their families and country, to mount their steeds with their fair ladies and follow him on an adventure to brighten their failing eyes and gladden their still-young hearts.

When all the knights were assembled in the sight of those who have become infirm, King Charlie allowed the infirm time to enjoy the spectacle of the noble steeds in full parade dress. This gave joy to those less fortunate folks.

At last, it was time to mount up and ride through the land. King Charlie and Queen Deborah led the way with the great warrior, Lord Adam, directly behind him to assist in keeping the royal entourage on course. This being a modern fable, Lord Adam’s Lady Josie led the steed on which they road, so that Lord Adam could ride shot-gun. This gave Lord Adam easier access to dismount and guide the followers. My king and I, with King Richard’s faithful Bronco, were blessed to be part of this following.

What beautiful sights abound in Monroe and McMinn Counties – miles and miles of rolling hills with contented cows and laughing llamas grazing in pastures surrounded by hills of fall fire! In the midst of this beautiful cattle country there lies a dairy farm that was beset be hardship when the patriarch fell ill. The daughter, a fair maiden living in a far-away land, took pity on her mother, and began a new life at the family farm. This new life is the company called Good Fortune which makes natural products for soothing and cleansing the body and spirit.

Many bought products knowing that their purchases help sustain, not only the family farm, but also part of the proceeds will help others to begin similar new life enterprises. Others took away nothing but photos and memories of the incredible view of the surrounding vista. This was a perfect place to see the mysterious mounds that cross the counties like scoops of clay planted by a playful potter.

King Charlie and Queen Deborah plan their adventures with resting places for the steeds where the noblewomen of the group will find enjoyable activities. Leaving Good Fortune behind, we traveled on through the lovely landscape to Englewood and honored the heritage of women working in the textile industry by stopping for a visit at the Englewood Textile Museum. We were then led to a great banquet at Nut ‘n Fancy back in the kingdom of Tellico Plains where King Charlie thanked the presidents and members of the attending chapters of the Antique Automobile Association of America for joining him in his grand adventure.

King Charlie and Queen Deborah could then retire to their kingdom of Coker Creek, tired but happy to have been able to share their blessings.

Halloween Hilarity

Every other Saturday, Charlie and Deborah go all out to make sure their friends have a good time at Bluegrass pickin’ sessions in their Coker Creek Saloon -- and all without the help of alcoholic lubricants.

How they manage to provide food and fun so many days of the year is beyond me. Charlie seems to never stop building and restoring his property. This, in addition to their very active involvement in the Antique Automobile Club of America in which Charlie is a Grand National winner and judge would make the average couple too pooped to pop. It all energizes Charlie and Deborah; they redefine country hospitality and work ethic. They play hard and work even harder.

Musicians, young and old, come from miles around just for the love of playing, and play their hearts out for three hours. We pay them in food cooked by the attendees, but most musicians also contribute what they’ve cooked. It’s like what we used to call a fais do-do on the bayou, just good clean family fun. The youngest musician is fifteen; I don’t even want to hazard a guess as to the age of Charlie Harper, named “Mr. Bluegrass” by the governor of Tennessee because of his many years’ commitment to the art of Tennessee Bluegrass.

This is the third Bluegrass Halloween that we’ve attended at Deborah and Charlie’s Saloon. Now, I know that some people have religious objections to celebrating October 31, but I’ve always had a special place in my heart for that date, as my son, Scott, was born on what he called “Hadoweenda.” I never could resist the temptation to make my life easier by having “trick or treating” as Scott’s birthday party activity. And the loot the kids got substituted for favors – cheap and easy. Why resist?

It’s always a challenge to find the right costume when you’re as cheap as I am. One year, I dressed Scott in pajamas to which I sewed a tail l and a towel tummy, and called him “The Diggingest Dog.” For Richard’s costume this year, I found a Gepetto outfit on deep discount because it was missing the Pinocchio companion costume. Costuming me on the cheap presents special challenges because I don’t have an “off-the-rack” body, but also on deep discount was a partial puppet costume with the marionette string rigging. We tied the strings to my arms and legs, and let Richard pretend -- just for one night -- that he was controlling me by pulling any strings other than my heart strings.

Deborah decked herself out as a darling angel and Charlie was Sheriff Schnoz. Connie came as Berl Ives’ “Most Wonderful Toy,” while Nancy arrived as an enhanced version of her favorite self, an elegantly outfitted horsewoman. Move over Big Valley’s Audra! Harriet was hilarious describing how she turned her one-dollar strawberry costume from the thrift store into the ladybug costume that she had on. Her husband masqueraded as a gorilla that walked around sticking a banana up his nose.

The music was marvelous. The crowd was happy. The food was fantastic. Richard must have been feeling somewhat Jewish when he chose the dessert he’d make. Everyone raved about his apricot kugel. He then traded his yarmulke for a sombrero to make the main dish which combined dairy and meat in a complex-flavored topping for tortilla chips.

We ate; we posed; the musicians played; and we all returned to our childhoods – for just one night of food, fantasy, and fun.