Friday, April 30, 2010

The Rewards of Rural Life

Mountaintop Mary and I had a most marvelous adventure in her big blue truck on a perfect spring day in the southeast Tennessee mountains. She picked me up at eleven, so we could start our day of dawdling with dining. This entailed a leisurely lunch on the Tellico River at my favorite Panini place, Kat’s Deli. Of course, because I’m doing Atkins, I had to forego my own Panini; in its place having a chef salad. But Mary’s Reuben made my mouth water just looking at it.

We met a bunch of Coker Creekers hanging out there, and had a grand old time making their acquaintance and inviting them to our First Friday supper. Mary never met a stranger, so it was easy getting involved in conversation with this bevy of “boys.”
One of the guys with whom Mary struck up conversation was telling her how to catch trout on the Tellico. Mary was very interested in this subject, as she wants to learn to fly fish. She says her favorite part of fishing is casting, so fly fishing would seem to be perfect for her.

Since Mary and I are planning on joining forces for Granny Camp this summer, I was interested in the fly fishing subject as an activity to add to our “keeping kids busy” repertoire. Our informative friend, Joe, suggested that we buy worms from the service station across the road. Mary and I found this funny, as we both know that we could keep the kids busy all morning with unearthing earthworms, with which her manure piles are quite literally crawling.

When I asked Joe whether he lived nearby, he allowed as he lived in the house with the dragon. The dragon he referred to is a huge topiary that faces the Cherohala Skyway. I connected his name and the dragon and almost jumped out of my skin with excitement. I was talking to Topiary Joe, the world-famous topiary artist. I’d been wanting to make his acquaintance ever since I got to these parts. Who knew he was so approachable?

We then wandered over to McMinn County to purchase plants from the Future Farmers of America program at a local high school. What a find that was! These kids start seeds in their school greenhouse, and raise them until someone adopts them. Mary and I scored all kinds of well-on-their-way-to-fruition vegetable plants for a fraction of what they would have cost at a nursery. Mary is just a wealth of win-win information.

While we were focused on farming, and we were so close to the Mennonite community farm in Delano, I asked if Mary had ever been there. I was amazed that she hadn’t been, so we took a little detour. Even though it was still early in the season for their farm stand to have much in the way of garden goods, I was able to purchase some of their outstanding baked bounty.

The sights that we saw were worth the trip all by themselves. There is probably not a more pastoral picture than that of the Mennonites and their beasts of burden plowing and planting in the spring. We were even rewarded with a parting pleasure of finding some of the children playing near their parents in the newly plowed and planted fields. The rewards of rural life…

Thursday, April 29, 2010

The Daring Dandelion

I’m sure God has reasons
For the daring dandelion.
I hear that their leaves make good eatin’,
And that their flowers make fine wine.
Richard says their latex
May be used for industry.
Any useful thing that’s done with them
Would be just fine with me.

When we lived in the city,
It was considered quite absurd
To allow the plants to come to seed
To feed the hungry birds.
We’d attack our lawns with Round-up,
And hunt for the offending critters.
Here, the spent seed spore sentinels
Are our lawn bugs’ babysitters.

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Fairy Wings and Webs

The snowball bush is blooming
At our home in Coker Creek.
The azaleas will need pruning
When their blooms have peaked,
Except for the wild ones
That grow among the trees.
These are always nice surprises
That never fail to please.
There are trees with fairy wings
That drift down on the deck.
I know that I should sweep
Them off, but oh what the heck!
It’s not often fairies come to play
In one’s own back yard.
Last week they were spinning webs;
I have to thank the Lord
That I am here to see this spring
The dandelions and dogwoods.
I’m such a creature of nature’s whims,
The seasons are my moods.

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Technology Tantrums

Now, I’m not ragging on the performance of all technology, all the time, but I do have a few bones to pick with the cyberspace invaders. My GPS did get me to Nancy’s house, which is a good thing because my cell phone only works in areas that are well-populated, with lots of places to stop and ask people for directions. Fat lot of good that does me!

Nancy doesn’t have internet service, probably because the only kind she could get would be dial-up, and that’s almost as good as snail mail -- But not quite because snail mail doesn’t tie up your phone line. This fact makes it necessary to meet with Nancy in person to complete her book set-up. This is good because I really enjoy her company; she’s a very peaceful lady, unlike yours truly. She and her husband call their woodland home “The Sanctuary” for good reason. It does, however, create some interesting challenges.

I downloaded all the templates that we needed to finish formatting her beautifully illustrated book of poetry and prose, and headed over to her neck-of-the-woods with full confidence that we’d simply drop her pages and cover into their respective templates; I’d email the files to Gayle for final edit; and we’d be good to go for our initial printing. But, nooooo.

It seems that some of my programs don’t function properly without an internet connection. “No problem,” I thought. “I’ll simply copy Nancy’s work onto my laptop and upload everything to Gayle when I get home.” This appeared to be an easy solution. Except, as Richard says, “There are so many ways to get busted.”

Nancy was good enough to completely format her work in Word. It was even in an older version of word than what’s currently available. This would make it easy for Gayle to work with it, no matter what version of Word Gayle has. Ha!

Because Nancy embedded her illustrations in her text, the files exceed the maximum size for attachment to my email. I can’t simply attach and hit “send.” I first have to “ungroup” all her illustrations from all her text, and resave it as a text document; then I hope to be able to send it on its way. I still have to figure out how to dump her cover art into the template without messing up all her hard work, but I should probably not think too much about that until I get her text to our editor.

Richard has another favorite saying, “There are no easy jobs.” I guess that’s why they’re called “jobs.” Nancy’s book, Am I Grown Up Yet? -- A Wonder Journal will, hopefully, be available before Memorial Day.

Oh, and another, technology-free gift that my trip to Nancy’s got me was a couple of plants for our “sanctuary.” All these peaceful people have lovely plants that they swear are easy to grow. We’ll see. At least they don’t require an internet connection.

Monday, April 26, 2010

Cruising and Cumulus Clouds

Woke up with a wild hair;
We were going to get out of here.
Spring was calling our names;
It was time for us to hear.
At first I thought that a hike
Would be the perfect way
To see what we could see
And enjoy a sense of play.
After driving down to Tellico,
It was almost time for lunch.
Would we have Sunday dinner,
Or a nice Sunday brunch?
We took a leisurely Sunday
Drive, to Maryville and back.
We lunched at Giovanni’s,
Then we were back on track
For cumulus cloud watching
Over the mountains of Tennessee,
Another dimension to the vistas
Of Appalachian hill country.

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Gardening, Garlic, and Great Guests

Thanks to a gift from my niece Ginette, I finally got around to some outdoor work in my own yard. I’ve been so sedentary with all this driving around and writing that I hadn’t even thrown out the dead potted plants from last fall. Ginette’s gift of phlox and grape hyacinth from her garden got me moving in that direction; I needed the dirt from the potted plants for my new deck décor.

While I was outside potting, I did a little more digging in the dirt to clear some of the “wildflowers” – otherwise known as “weeds” from our flower beds. The dandelions are everywhere this year, including growing with great abandon between the granite chips that make up our front walkway. With a “yard” of over four acres, I rally needed to pick my battles, so I decided that anything green growing in the lawn could stay, while any wild thing growing in granite or my garden has to go.

I was really moving along, happily harvesting the weeds when I came upon a conundrum. I greatly admire thistles, and have photographed many a beautiful butterfly on their blooms. Directly in front of my azaleas, right next to our front steps, is a big thistle in all its prickly perfection. There was no way I could bring myself to uproot such a gift. So much for that well-groomed cottage look; you just can’t control Mother Nature.

The evening hours brought hailstorms and bluegrass. The crowd was small at Charlie and Deborah’s Coker Creek Saloon, probably because of the severe weather warnings. The weather didn’t deter Richard’s preparation of dining delights, however. Everyone enjoyed his sirloin tip tacos, even though I was a bit worried about how they’d be received; I had never before seen a recipe that called for a cup of fresh garlic.

His mandarin orange cake was so good and beautiful that Trailrider Nancy declared that she felt like we were back at the Whitestone Inn where we celebrated Charlie’s birthday. A friend of Charlie’s visiting from Alaska ate three pieces. I guess it was better than good!

One of the great things about the bluegrass pickin’ is that Charlie and Deborah host so many people from so many places. I could have spent about a week with these folks from Alaska; they were so interesting. In the brief time we were with them, we learned that he was a home builder to the rich and famous in this life, and that he had a very story-worthy, if not story-book past life.

He lost his parents in an automobile accident when he was two-years-old. After a series of foster homes he “struck out on his own” at the age of eleven without ever having attended school. By the time he was fourteen, he had acquired his first golden glove award. At seventeen, he retired from prize fighting after a concussion so serious that it caused him to stutter. By this time he had also had his nose broken ten times.

Like this wasn’t enough hard luck, within a couple of months, he was drafted and sent to Vietnam. While there, he was stabbed once and shot twice, once in the back. He was released from duty with the prediction that he’d never again walk. He says that a violent sneeze led to the return of feeling and mobility in his legs. Must have been some sneeze!

The up side of his infirmity is that a corpsman taught him to read. He’s been married to the same woman, a professional photographer, for forty seven years. She showed me stunning photographs of their area of Alaska.

Mr. Bluegrass, Charlie Harper, was also in attendance with the demo copy of his latest upcoming CD. It couldn’t have been a better crowd.

Saturday, April 24, 2010

Heady Happenings

How heady is this? I have a second author all set to publish. Nancy and I met only less than one month ago, and she told me then that she was very anxious to get her work in print. Man-oh-man, did she ever mean it! Not only is Nancy a talented writer, she’s also a professional illustrator and graphic designer (or are they the same thing?) She’s already got her pages formatted, her illustrations in order, and her cover created.

For my part, I’ve registered Nancy’s book for its own ISBN number; we’ll copyright it just before sending it to the printer. All she needs now is for me to run over to her house and dump it onto my computer and then upload it to the printer by way of the internet. I’ll arrange for a final edit, and Nancy’s book will be ready to retail.

As unbelievable as it may be to many who spend most of their waking hours in cyberspace, there are still many who choose not to have the whole world invading their living rooms and home offices. It just so happens that a lot of these people are of an age that they have many valuable life lessons for us, but no good way to get their messages to the masses. I may have found a real publishing niche. How cool would it be to be the publisher of the wit and wisdom of the seniors who’ve seen so much change in their lifetimes and survived, with their wit and wits intact, to tell about it?

I’m really excited about Nancy’s book. I’ve been seeking to hear the voices of women’s spiritual journeys, especially as exhibited in the arts. Nancy’s first published work is what she calls a “wonder journal” -- and for good reason. Her poems, stories, and illustrations are whimsical and witty, while still being positively passionate about her faith journey. I like it when people share the laughter of the Creator, not just the hellfire and brimstone.

For those who are anxiously awaiting Jack’s next set of stories, he’s not forgotten. It’s just that it takes a bit more effort to publish anything typed on a manual typewriter. We are slowly getting his work scanned into our computers for first review by the copy editors. I’ve already had a couple of potential editors scared off by the volume of the work coming out of my computer across the wires to their email inboxes. If all goes well from this point forward, we hope to have Jack’s collection of refreshingly righteous romances ready for the fall season of tourists in Tennessee.

My book based on my blog is at the editor now; if she doesn’t run screaming from her office when she gets the entries, we may have it ready for retail by mid-June. Since Susan has edited my work before, I hope my latest recipes and rants won’t be too scary for her.

Friday, April 23, 2010

Schemes and Dreams

Wrapping up Nancy’s book,
Adding recipes to mine;
Sending Jack’s work to the editor.
Where will I find the time
To do anything but write,
And polish, and publish books?
I have classes to plan and teach,
Like the one for couples who cook.
I also have a club to start,
In my native New Orleans.
My days just aren’t quite long enough
For all my schemes and dreams.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Sunrise in the Smokies

A veil over the morning,
Being lifted by the sun.
Puffs of vapor rising from
The Smokies at break of day.

Each mile a bit brighter,
Every turn a bit clearer.
A bright spring day awaits me,
At our Tennessee Mountain Home.

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Passionate Pursuits

I’ve decided that the only way to enjoy my life is to combine business with pleasure, since the only reason I’m in business is for the pleasure of the company of those I represent. I set out this week to make the connections that will make help me succeed in my passionate pursuits.

It was a whirlwind trip, but very worth the drive. Not only did I see Susan and renew our friendship, she also agreed to sign on again on as my editor. We met many years ago at a PBS art auction, and then again in a writers’ class – both in New Orleans, before Katrina. Our friendship flourished, as did our sharing of the love of the arts and our artistic and other skills. Katrina killed both our neighborhoods, so we have had to seek new homes. We finally have a plan that will, hopefully, keep our friendship fresh no matter where we live.

In the Cincinnati area, I have a niece whose company I enjoy in the extreme. She somehow juggles her marriage and four children with a very successful career as a financial analyst at a large publishing house, all with a ready laugh and a delightful outlook on life. She managed to put clean sheets on a son’s bed for my slumber, make a pot of gumbo for me to feast on, take me along with two of her sons on a post-supper fishing expedition at a local park, and still sit down with me to discuss business.

I came away with a commitment from her to handle my business accounts. Now, we have reasons other than familial relationship to get together on a regular basis. She and her children can also come to Granny Camp this summer as an extra perk of her being my accountant.

We lost our dear neighbors, Sheila and Tom, to Katrina’s blows; they’re now in a suburb of Cincinnati. Sheila is an incredibly talented multi-discipline artist, and Tom is a retired fighter pilot and rocket scientist. Sheila was right up my alley and Tom was right up Richard’s. Losing them as neighbors was a primary reason I had no hesitation about giving up my fantasy of rebuilding on the lake.

Our first experience with Sheila was with her voice wafting over the water as she practiced her operatic arias. We’d see Tom coming and going to the glider hanger that he shared with several glider enthusiasts. As we got to know their interests, Sheila and I would share bits of our culinary creations and discuss all manner of arts and philosophy while Richard and Tom would have grand boating adventures and building projects, and bonded over shared volunteer work on the Higgins boats at the World War II Museum. I can’t even express what a great loss they were as our neighbors.

Sheila has agreed to have me help represent her visual arts. I’m so hoping that she’ll also teach some classes on her passionate pursuits. At least, we’ll now have a reason to see each other again soon.

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Palest Pastel Plateau

The Cumberland Plateau
As rainy night descends.
Mists settling over all.
New leaves-- lime sherbet green.
Lavenders, blues, and mauves.
Like Monet impressions
In the palest pastels.

Monday, April 19, 2010

Cremation Cooking

Lilting laughter is the best way to spend a day, in the company of friends who work as hard as they play. Susan, Mark and I had a creative and luscious brunch at a Louisville restaurant called Wild Eggs. Many of the dishes were rather wild, but also delicious – like my Creole omelet with andouille sausage and Creole hollandaise sauce. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised that Louisvillians can cook, like New Orleanians, they are proud to display the mark of French influence on their city in the form of the fleur de lis.

We discussed our belief systems, and shared our grief over our New Orleans losses. We also celebrated our great memories of that wonderfully crazy place, expressing hope that we’ll one day see it fully functional again. Susan and Mark have a son still there, so we spent a good deal of our time cooking up a scheme for regular Lucy/Ethel adventures to see our sons and the city we so love. Susan is the original Lucy/Ethel, so it’s only fitting that I share these adventures with her.

Susan took me on a grand tour of her hometown; this is a return to her roots. Louisville is a lovely city with a great variety of neighborhoods, and still much pastureland on the outskirts. There’s a great expanse of the Ohio River running through parts of it. And, as I find is typical of river towns, every kind of ethnic neighborhood and restaurant you can imagine.

Susan’s mother Eve lives just around a couple of corners from Susan. We picked up this magically effervescent lady and began laughing immediately. This light approach to even the deepest conversational subjects continued on through the trip to pick up Susan’s equally magical and talented daughter Katy. After a short tour of Katy’s new home, we headed to the primary destination of this trip, a presentation by the most magical of us all, Maya Angelou.

We laughed, we cried, and we cheered as Ms. Angelou wove a web of her troubles and triumphs around the audience. It is so inspirational to hear and see those who have succeeded against all odds and exceeded their own wildest dreams, especially when they can present their journeys with great humor, as well as great pain.
Susan is also quite a storyteller, and can usually find something funny in everything. At supper, her mother asked how dinner went the night before. This question was in reference to the delicious dinner Susan had served me. Susan admitted to her mother that the chicken had not cooperated in being the perfect broasted bird. Because Susan wasn’t used to her new convection oven, the skin was nicely browned while the breast had stayed relatively raw in places. This prompted Susan to regal us with her “cremation cooking” tale that is one of our favorites Lucy/ Ethel moments.

The four of us, Susan, Mark, Richard and I had gone on a supper cruise on Richard’s boat. The wind started to kick up on the lake, so we decided to head back to the marina and eat supper dockside. Susan and I were both good Girl Scouts, so we concocted a plan to cook beef stew in foil pouches placed on the cockpit deck barbeque grill. I got the coal lit; we placed the pouches on the grill rack, secured the lid, and away we went. We were thrilled with the prospect of dinner dockside as soon as we arrived in port.

When we opened the foil pouches, little remained but chunks of char. We should have factored in the convection factor, but we didn’t. It was like we had tried cooking dinner in a blacksmith’s fire with the bellows going full blast. That convection cooking can be a tricky thing.

Sunday, April 18, 2010

Appalachia Awakening

The appeal of Appalachia is everywhere in the spring. All along the highway, the stages of earth awakening are absolutely breathtaking. It almost makes up for the difficult winter when we remember that the worse the winter the more spectacular the spring.

Although our early spring is almost over in Coker Creek, going north to Louisville, I was able to do spring all over in a backward progression. By the time I got to Berea, spring was barely breathing its first breath. The leaves weren’t yet in evidence on many varieties of trees, and the redbuds were still in their baby stages of blooming.

All this splendor growing out of the rocks and into the gorges put it in my mind that God must have created the Appalachias to have a permanent place for all these species of trees. We can’t cut down what we can’t climb to.

Berea is beautiful, no matter the season; it’s where I first saw, many years ago, the winter wonderland of ice-encrusted trees. There are signs everywhere proclaiming the presence of the arts in this area. I do wonder if the creative energy in places like Berea and Coker Creek is a result of all that waiting as winter tamps down activity, bursting forth into music, song, painting, pottery, textile, and all the other arts at which these artists excel.

Going toward Lexington, the mountains give way to the rolling hills of horse country. While the fenced and groomed pastureland is beautiful, especially when the horses are out on the greens, I still prefer the cradle of trees surrounding our holler home.

How fortunate I’ve been this spring to have the freedom to travel, experiencing the earth’s awakening from the flat Gulf Coast to the higher altitudes of the Appalachias!

Girl reporter Susan’s new home is in a suburb of Louisville, and backs up onto pristine forest land. I was greeted as I exited my van with the sights of the woods and the smells of home cooking. I already felt at home.

We had her house all to ourselves, as her husband was out with their daughter. We reminisced about our days together in pre-Katrina New Orleans, and made plans for future creative pursuits as partners in writing projects. We met at a writers’ group in New Orleans and both still have strong ties in the area, including each having a son there.

Scheming and dreaming, we had a wonderful herb-roasted chicken, sautéed crimini mushroom caps, and spicy stir-fried greens with sweet red peppers and onions. Susan is a great cook, and was my partner in a cookbook that never made it to the publisher. How nice it was for her to, not only cook for me, but to remember that I’m doing Atkins.

No matter how many years or how many moves have conspired to separate us geographically, friends don’t get any closer than this. I am one lucky lady.

Saturday, April 17, 2010

Mistress of the Manor Mamie

Richard got instruction from Travis on how to use the tractor, and completed the tilling before lunch. We’re already a bit late getting in the “early crops,” and I’m leaving for Kentucky and Ohio for five days, starting Saturday. I really wanted to help get the planting done because I know a little more about gardening than Richard does, which isn’t saying a lot. But, more importantly -- unlike Richard -- I can communicate with Mamie.

Richard likes to converse in sequence, Mamie and I sort of bounce all over in and around issues until we’ve gathered whatever we’re trying to share. Mountaintop Mary calls this “going down bunny trails.” It may be more akin to chickens scratching in the dirt for some good grit. Combine Mamie’s conversation patterns with her hearing problems and Richard’s voice that he says, “doesn’t carry farther than my nose,” and communication can be decidedly difficult.

I had been telling Mamie that her contribution to the garden was going to be as a boss lady sitting in an easy chair, under an umbrella, with a cool drink in her hand. When we showed up at her house, ready to work, she admitted to me that she was “wore out” from doing so much already that day.

I told her that I had a chair with an umbrella all set up for her and that all she needed was the cool drink. I suggested that she drive down to the field with her beverage, but she’d have none of that. She grabbed her hoe and some seed and sashayed herself down to the newly tilled plot where she stood in the dirt, leaning on her hoe, waiting for an assignment.

Last year, the process began with eyeballing the rows, which created confusion when it came time for tilling between the rows. Tillers operate best in straight lines, not on random bunny trails. I took her aside and reminded her that Richard is a scientist, and likes to do everything in a measured manner. I admitted that it takes longer, and she added, “But it looks so much prettier.” This was a good enough reason for Richard’s rational approach in her mind, so we went with it.

As Richard measured and marked, Mamie sat with me discussing what should go where in the garden based on companion planting methods and the need to keep her chickens away from some crops. She was so cute sitting in the shade that I told her next time I’d bring a recliner for her to nap in. She insisted that she wasn’t sleepy, just “wore out” from working, and got up to go to the house for a glass of water. Next thing we knew, Mamie was back in her big white car with a pitcher of ice water and drinking cups for her farm hands.

She watched and advised, but I did catch her napping; so I took a picture of Richard in the foreground with her dozing in the background. I told her I need that photo to defend my honor when she tells everybody that whenever there’s work to be done, I leave town and leave the work to Richard. We got a good laugh over that.

We put in potatoes, carrots, beets, radishes, onions, spinach, and lettuce – in all twelve rows with ten varieties of vegetables. After Mamie went inside, I planted a few gladiola bulbs as summer surprises. We’ve completed our first crop creation foray this spring.

Friday, April 16, 2010

Travis-less Tractor

We went to Mamie’s to harrow the fields in preparation for planting. I set up camp chairs with umbrellas for me and Mamie to sit like ladies of leisure while Richard traversed the fields with Mamie’s tractor. The only problem was that we couldn’t figure out how to disconnect the plow and attach the harrow.

Mamie’s tractor is an oldie-but-goldie from the nineteen-fifties. There are several peculiarities to starting it when it has gas, but it was out of fuel. Richard remedied that situation with fuel from home, and returned ready to remedy the problem.

He was able to move the tractor into position for swapping the implements, and Mamie was sure that it was an easy fix to change them out. What had been easy for her son Frank and was still easy for her grandson Travis wasn’t so easy for those of us who had never done it. Richard decided to wait on Travis to tutor him in tractor transformation techniques; and Travis has a full-time job an hour away. So much for our plan du jour.

Mamie and I decided to run the roads together in search of seeds for our garden. She keeps seeds from year-to-year, but there are some vegetables from which she doesn’t collect seed, so we have to buy them every spring. We started at the hardware store in Tellico Plains, and made our way all over Monroe County from there.

Mamie is old school, from a depression-era economy. She doesn’t believe in paying for packaging when loose-pack seeds are less expensive. It doesn’t matter that we may have to spend all day and a tank of gas to find these bargains. It also doesn’t matter that we need very few seeds of any single vegetable for the three of us eating from our garden. A deal is a deal.

I was looking for lettuce of the romaine variety, and Mamie craved carrot seeds for extra large carrots. Our local hardware store had neither, so we set out for Sweetwater.

We did have a lovely day together, enjoying the roadside scenery on the way to Sweetwater. Mamie insisted on stopping for lunch at her favorite seafood place, Captain D’s. She grew up with fresh seafood on the Gulf Coast of Texas, and still craves seafood, even if it is from Captain D’s.

The Sweetwater vegetable market was bursting with colorful plants and so many seed varieties, but we couldn’t find carrot seeds. It was time to loop over to our last resort, Wal-Mart garden center. Success was ours at last. We headed home, but not without a stop on the way to pull up clumps of fern from one of Mamie’s properties for transplanting into our yards.

There are no dull days with my Mountain Mama Mamie. At ninety, she’s still up for adventure, and enthralled by all of nature and humanity. She’s proud of the fact that she only takes two pills per day. We should all be so successful at life.

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Motel, Mountains, and Mamie

We woke in a nasty motel room from which we were anxious to make our escape -- but not nearly as anxious as we had been to bed down the night before. The sheets seemed clean so we stayed -- even after finding ashtrays on the dresser and burn holes on the bedspread – in a non-smoking room.

There was a desk and free wi-fi, but no electrical outlet free for plugging in anything without disconnecting a necessary light or refrigerator. It wasn’t until I went to potty at midnight that the toilet seat slipped off the handicap-height commode.

As we compared notes on the motel at breakfast (not at the motel, I should add), I pointed out to Richard that this had been a handicapped room. He suggested that I had misunderstood; that it was a room that, instead of catering to handicaps, caused them.

All was well as soon as we stepped out into the glorious spring day we were given for returning to our Tennessee Mountain Home. As we progressed into the higher elevations, we commented more times than I can count on how three-dimensional the mountains seem with the many shades of spring in their foregrounds and backdrops. As spring matures into summer, the wooded hills will become more uniformly dark, lush, forest green.

It’s amazing how much can be missed in one week away. Our dogwoods which hadn’t begun to show white had flowered and were now mostly leafy green with a few remaining blossoms. The very talented local artist and photographer, Judy, is faithfully photographing the progression of spring, so I am, thankfully, able to catch up with her postings of flower photos on facebook.

As soon as Richard unpacked the van, he headed over to Mamie’s. He was chomping at the bit to discuss the garden with her. Mamie continues to insist that the garden at her house is ours to do with as we wish; it looks like she may mean it. Apparently, Mamie was just waiting for our return to get the garden going; within a couple of hours of Richard’s visit, she called with news that her grandson had just plowed the plot.

We’re starting First Friday Coker Creek Community Suppers next month to take advantage of our excess garden production. We’ll be inviting others to contribute food, entertainment, and work fellowship. In addition to the free-for-the-taking produce that Ken leaves in front of the Welcome Center, and the excess production of many other residents who garden, there is a community garden going in at Coker Creek Village.

If we can’t get donations of meat, there’s always Lynda’s church’s Angel Food Ministries for purchasing it at a reduced price. We should be able to feed multitudes for very little cash outlay, and have a great time getting to know our neighbors.

What I miss most about south Louisiana is the sense of celebration. It’s time for me to stop whining and start slinging hash while bringing in singers and other entertainers to add a little more fun to the faith, family, and food that form the backbone of the value system in these hills.

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Gayle, Gardens and Goodbyes

We had fun in our old stomping grounds
But it was now time to go.
As always there were last minute things
To share before we parted.

Gayle had gardened and took me on a
Nice tour of her handiwork.
We made Gayle some orange, ginger beef
Before we headed for home.

We drove flatlands of Mississippi --
The same in Alabama.
We’re looking forward to the forests
As we head for Tennessee.

Mamie and her garden are waiting
As are our two faithful pets.
Appalachian springtime beckons us;
Today we’ll make it home.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Goodies for Gayle -- and Chuck

We’re at Gayle’s to fill her freezer and pantry. Richard was also recruited by Chuck to help him stop the squirrel party going on in their attic. After the hole in the eave was patched, putting a dead end on the squirrel highway, Richard and I took over Gayle’s kitchen.

In the last three days, Richard has managed to bake five batches of biscotti, the last two for Gayle. These batches were a part of an experiment with alternatives to wheat flour for baking. Gayle was thrilled with this gift. Now that that project is complete, hopefully, we won’t be bandying that “B” word around for a while.

I worked on supper on the other side of Gayle’s kitchen. Once again, I did the slicing and dicing – and the whipping. The knife work was for Burgundy Beef, the last batch of which was made in the holler by Richard. There, we used whatever beef happened to be in our freezer, in that case stew meat. Knowing that Richard had done significant trim work to get the randomly chosen chunks of bovine to behave, I chose an easy-to-prep eye of round. The results weren’t nearly as flavorful as Richard’s batch; and here I was without my pantry of potions for flavor enhancing to remedy the situation.

I had promised Chuck a dessert of floating island, a lovely Julia Child concoction that requires a dozen egg whites to be beaten to soft peaks. This is baked into an “island” of meringue. Little did I know when planning the menu that any kitchen could exist without an electric mixer. I had to make do with a wire whisk. I must have beaten those egg whites for forty minutes before sliding them into a baking dish. Gayle said upon awakening that she thought the noise was squirrels caught in a trap in the attic, trying to make an escape – apparently with fancy footwork.

The second half of the dessert calls for a Crème Anglaise (otherwise known as custard sauce) for the island to float on. Gayle also can’t have dairy products, so another science experiment ensued. The first batch of sauce, I made with coconut cream, which turned out quite well. The second batch tasted delicious, but the texture was a bit too tight.

These culinary quirks don’t happen to Richard as often as they do to me because he knows he can’t multi-task, like walk and chew gum at the same time – or talk while tending a custard concoction. I act as if I can juggle tasks, but only end up renaming things that don’t come out right. I didn’t have to bother renaming this one. The island did float, even if it was on a slightly chunky sea. Besides, Chuck had never had this dessert before, and wasn’t any the wiser about my version’s variations.

Gayle loved her coconut cream Crème Anglaise which I had finished of with a sprinkling of toasted coconut flakes. Unfortunately, these weren’t the only flakes at the supper table that night.

Monday, April 12, 2010

Birthday Boil and Bread Pudding

Saturday night we went to a real New Orleans style party. Karen’s fiftieth birthday
bash was held at a stately uptown mansion that is now used as a function hall. The food was all the stuff that made New Orleans famous for its food, oyster patties, mini-muffalettas, jambalaya, real Italian meatballs in red gravy, shrimp Bienville and gumbo over rice, to name a few of the items on the buffet tables. Karen and Mickey are fabulous dancers, and the band they had hired was up to the task of playing all manner of music for swinging and swaying.

When we arrived back at Elaine’s, her newly wed son Briton and his wife Jeanne were at her waterfront resort with plans to accompany us to Scott’s house for a birthday boil in my honor. We woke Sunday at a leisurely pace, sipping café au lait and reading the newspaper while luxuriating in the sight of the sun on the water.

The scene that greeted us at Scott’s house in Mississippi was a pool full of people playing with children of many ages. Melanie had her babies in the tanning ledge that they use as a baby pool. Mel’s husband, James, was tossing Miya’s new neighborhood friends into the air to the great gleeful sounds of laughter and splashes. Nick, Cole, and Clayton played tag around the pool’s perimeter.

When Miya’s friend Dakota came to me with word that Miya told her that I play board games, I told her we had much more important games to play in Miya’s kitchen. We headed inside where Miya and Dakota helped me measure eggs, sugar, vanilla, and milk into a Ziplock bag. After making sure that the zipper was very securely set, the girls tossed the bag back and forth to mix the ingredients. They then tore the bread into a bowl, at which point the whole mess was mixed together and poured into a pan. Thankfully, we didn’t have any disasters like the time that I was doing a similar kids-in-the-kitchen caper on television with another of my nieces, Alyssa.

I labeled the cooking demonstration “Mexican Hat Dance Bread Pudding” because I was going to have Alyssa assist me in breaking up the stale French bread by dancing on a bag of bread. All went well until the bag broke and bread was sent flying all over the studio set.

I knew that Julia Child had dropped much worse, like a whole raw turkey on the set of her show, so we simply picked up the bag with the remaining bread and proceeded to the kitchen. I told this tale to the girls as they played toss with the bulging bag. I figured that Dakota just as well find out up front that Miya’s Granny “ain’t right.”

We had all come together for the celebration of three birthdays. Fun in the sun and a backyard boil are the best ways we know how to celebrate on the Gulf Coast.

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Water Ways

It’s hard to imagine a five-mile-long, flat expanse of concrete being beautiful, but the Twin Spans over Lake Pontchartrain were wonderful to me for two reasons. The first is that they are another sign of Louisiana, quite literally, rising above the devastation caused by Katrina. The second is that the bridge, unlike the roads leading to it, is smooth as glass, providing a nice quite, bump-free glide across the lake that I so love. This is the first bit of the drive to New Orleans from where we’re staying on the Northshore of the lake.

I was on my way to play Thelma and Louise (or maybe we were playing Lucy/Ethel) with my sister Michelle. We rented a ten-foot U-Haul truck to drive back across the lake to our niece Nik’s house where we were picking up a sofa to deliver to another niece, Melanie, in Mississippi.

Richard was spending the day at the World War II Museum where he’s been volunteering since before they officially opened, so I figured I’d take care of the sofa. It was a really large sectional sofa that Nik and Tom were generously donating to Mel, but Mel had no way to get it. Michelle and I wanted to spend the day visiting with each other; we combined the efforts, and away we went.

I really didn’t do the math before I reserved the truck, but, in my defense, I didn’t think I had a lot of options. Richard and I arrived in Louisiana in one vehicle. I figured that he would drop me at the truck rental facility, and the he’d head across the river (the Mississippi) to work. He’d then have to come get me when I got finished with the truck. These two facilities, even though separated by a river are only about five miles apart, so this made sense at the time – sort of.

As it turned out, while I was sleeping, and Richard was up baking biscotti, Bub offered Richard the use of his SUV. I could have rethought my plan, but noooo.

Michelle and I had a wonderful visit, and we were very successful at delighting Melanie and her family with their nearly-new sectional sofa. The only downside was that I had driven the truck almost three hundred miles, round-trip. And the rental companies do charge for mileage. I probably could have bought Melanie a sofa for what the truck rental cost, but it wouldn’t have been anywhere near as nice – and I wouldn’t have had Michelle as a captive audience for nearly as long.

Michelle was about to be in trouble with her husband by the time I dropped her off. She still had to change for a dinner engagement with the company that employs him; and they were due to leave in ten minutes. I hope she’s good at applying make-up in the car.

I headed back across the river and then across the lake to dress for the friend’s fiftieth birthday party that had precipitated our trip down – which was again across the lake, but not across the river, in Uptown New Orleans.

Saturday, April 10, 2010

The Day's Delicacies

Richard’s biscotto baking is reaching epic proportions. It seems that every woman we know absolutely loves biscotti; and when they hear that Richard can make it, they absolutely need for him to bake them some. Richard has become quite proficient at baking, but this becomes a bit complicated when one is in a kitchen other than one’s own. Richard took on the making of four batches of this treat in Elaine’s kitchen on lake in Louisiana.

We had to search a bit for all the necessary baking implements, but by the time Richard got started, Elaine had arrived on the scene. I think Eda would have been amused that he had a real Sicilian assisting in the incorporation of just the right amount of flour before baking.

The sacrifice I had to make in all of this was that I lost my sous chef, and had to do all my own slicing and dicing for making the day’s delicacies. The ingredients for the shrimp and coconut soup with butternut squash were mostly pureed in the food processor, with the exception of the squash. If Richard had been on board for my prep work, every square of squash would be a uniform size and shape. But with me wielding the knives, the diners will have to settle for “wing-it woman” chunks.

The second dish I had decided to make was mu shu pork. I should have known better than to attempt this on my own! All Chinese food takes endless hours of slicing every morsel that will go into the wok into teeny tiny strips of uniform size. This is ostensibly because the Chinese believe that no one should have to work for their dinner once it reaches the table. Have you ever seen a table knife at a Chinese restaurant?

For hours, I accompanied Richard’s biscotti baking with various veggie tales. The crinkly cabbage of the Savoy variety was relatively easy to handle, while each scallion had to be individually sliced into pieces of precise dimensions. The mushrooms were supposed to be slivered. I was glad that these were the only three vegetables that needed my ministrations with a knife. This left me enough courage to tackle the pork.

Have you every tried to cut a piece of uncooked pork into matchstick–sized shreds? I can tell you that it’s not for the faint-of-heart. Pigs are wiggly, even when they’re called pork ribs. The strips did resemble matchstick dimensions when I finished cutting them, but they mutated when they hit the hot pan. They’re now more the size, color, and shape of fat earthworms (which are also sometimes referred to as wigglers).

Once I got it all together with a nice portion of homemade hoisin sauce, it’s all quite good, but it doesn’t look like any Chinese cook was in the kitchen doing the cutting. Last I looked, Richard was still rolling along with his biscotti baking, but I needed a nap.

Friday, April 9, 2010

Hearts and Highways

It’s quite remarkable that we can travel through so many diverse ecosystems and still be in the southern half of the United States; and that we can travel all this in less than half of a twenty-four hour day. On our way to Louisiana, we passed through Mississippi. We traveled several interstate highways, and rode from rolling hills to swamp land. The trip from our mountains to these flatlands is like that last hill on the way home on a roller coaster -- a rather thrilling ride, but glad to be still for a while when you get to the bottom.

Richard and I share driving when we’re both on these six- hundred-mile excursions. I spend most of my passenger time looking for items of interest for my blog. The interstates are generally not great places to find excitement of the local color kind, so I was busy recording the differences in wildflowers and their blooming seasons as we headed south-west from South East Tennessee.

There’s still a great deal of uninhabited earth between our two homes. While I suspect that the Central section of Mississippi and points south have much biodiversity, much of it is not in evidence from the interstates.

It seemed that most of the trees were pines planted after the forests had been clear cut for their timber. The lack of difficulty getting to the timber in land so flat must have made it very tempting to the land owners to sell every tree in sight – and you can see a long, long way in southern Mississippi.

Redbuds and dogwoods followed us almost all the way down, as did dandelions. Red clover and thistle, which we won’t see in bloom for several more weeks in the holler, are already glorious down south. Since we are in Mississippi, it’s not surprising that the trees that will soon bear the state’s flowers, the majestic magnolias, grow wild interspersed among the pines.

Something that let’s me know we’re getting close to my childhood home is the appearance of the yellow Carolina jasmine and the purple clusters of wisteria flowers, all growing up the pines and peeking out of hedgerows. It’s certainly a more welcome sight than the kudzu that is choking so many interstate byways.

However, my all-time favorite gift of the trees in the southern springtime would be the Tung tree bouquets. What extravagance! Every twig is adorned with a full bouquet of bold blooms of the palest ivory with deep, delicate throats of blushing peach.

The Tung oil that comes from the baseball-sized seeds pods was a major Mississippi cash crop from the nineteen thirties until the nineteen sixties. The orchards were wiped out in Hurricane Camille, but some trees have sprung up, especially against the fence lines.

We had a Tung tree in the yard of our New Orleans home. Just as the redbud signals spring in the mountains, our Tung tree blossoming said southern spring to me. It is only fitting that the blooms are followed by the heart-shaped leaves for which the tree is named; Tung is Chinese for heart.

Thursday, April 8, 2010

These Magnificent Mountains

Carpets of color, violets and vinca
On the winding drive down Towee Falls Road.
The falls drop off to a cascading creek,
Lined with every sort of flowering tree.

The trees of Pear, Plum, Dogwood, and Cherry,
Are both weeping and otherwise growing.
The yellow daffodils -- mostly dying --
Bright blankets of phlox have taken their place.

Various turns in the tight forest roads
Reveal views of pastoral perfection:
Cattle and calves graze in green pastures with
A backdrop of mountain springtime grandeur.

Redbuds peek out of the waking landscape
With their pale purple lacy flower fronds,
Until we’re west of the Hiawassee
Where another nature treat lies in wait.

The highway to Chattanooga begins
A corridor of the colors of spring.
Every shade of new green and red oak bud
Is displayed on the mountainsides’ canvas.

The pastureland opens mountain murals
Extending as far as the eye can see,
And the redbuds, the resplendent redbuds
Beautify the boundaries of our high-way.

This is a sensational spring season,
Made more so by the bitter winter’s cold --
Reminding us that these mountains may be
The most magnificent places on earth.

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Returning to Our Roots

We are hitting the road again;
We’ll be gone for a solid week.
It’s time to clean the fridge
Before the microbes reach their peak.

There’s lots of food for Mamie,
And lots of goodies for Jack.
This should tide them over
Until Richard and I get back.

Mary wanted potatoes that had
Begun sprouting out of their eyes.
I offered, in addition, a butternut squash
For its seeds, and as an edible prize.

Richard went over to Mamie’s to
Remove last year’s tomato cages.
In this gardening business everything
Has to be done in proper stages.

I hope that by the time we return
Richard will be able to plow --
That is, of course, if Mamie doesn’t
Decide it needs doing now.

Now that spring has sprung it’s hard to
Leave the Cherokee Forest splendor.
But with our roots growing deep here,
We feel like real community members.

We’ll have fun away with old friends
But we will surely be coming back.
None of them will ever replace
Mountain Mama Mamie or our Jack.

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Beef Bourguignon and Other Blessings

If allergies are the price we pay for the beauty of the East Tennessee Mountains, I’m not complaining – not too much, anyway. I went back to Lenoir City to work with the very talented writer/ illustrator Nancy, and the drive was even more resplendent with the colors of spring than it was three days earlier. The redbuds were in full bloom lining long swaths of Highway 68 from Tellico Plains to Interstate Seventy-Five. It’s all I could do not to jump out with a shovel and dig a few up for our driveway.

The drive wasn’t nearly as much fun, though, without Mountain Mary to play Lucy/Ethel with me; but I also didn’t get myself lost. I had our GPS and paid attention to were I was going because I didn’t have Mary’s tales of her horses, grandkids, and mission trips to entertain me.

Nancy lives in what she refers to as her (and her husband’s) “Sanctuary” near a lovely campground called the “Cross-Eyed Cricket.” The adventures in enjoying Nancy’s work begin with adorable illustrations on the campground signs; a cuter cricket you’ll probably never see. Her home is filled with beautiful artwork, mostly of her and her sister’s design. All of this partially prepares one for the delights that Nancy has tucked away in binders and booklets all neatly stored in her writer’s room.

Mary and I had been enthralled by Nancy when we paid her our first visit. She generously shared many of her poems with us, not just by letting us read them; she read to us in her musical, magical voice. It has often been said that poetry must be read aloud to truly be enjoyed; so much better if the voice reading it is the creator of the “voice.”

Nancy’s work is a walk through whimsy, wonder, and woe; but the woe is never depressing. Instead, it’s uplifting with the use of scripture, sweetness, and a bit of silliness to always indicate hope and joy. Her illustrations are of little old people, merry mice, bouncing babies, wonderful wildflowers, and all manner of Creation’s gifts. Her words reflect what she calls her faith journey that she has been on for over thirty years, but never in an evangelizing way. From her richly written Nan-o-Grams for her grandchildren to her reflections on death and dying, her work is full of grace, wit, and the wisdom that only experience can impart. I left Nancy’s so excited to be able to assist her that I fairly floated home.

My “Wonderful Wichard” was busily putting together Beef Bourguignon when I arrived at home. Mountaintop Mary and her husband Don were scheduled to come over for Mary to try out our scanner for working with Jack’s stories. (She had a newer “improved” scanner that had been “improved” by deleting an important text recognition feature.) Richard offered to cook, so we had them stay for a meal of one of Richard’s super salads, roasted garlic mashed potatoes, and the fragrant and fabulous burgundy beef.

How many blessings should one be allowed to stuff into one day?

Monday, April 5, 2010

Cavorting With the King

Cabin fever can really take its toll on couples (and singles) who have nothing to occupy themselves indoors. It had been thirteen weeks since the Bluegrass musicians and their groupies (that would be us) had gotten together at Charlie and Deborah’s Coker Creek Saloon. We were all in a celebratory mood feeling that winter may finally be over and we had all made it through alive -- and those who went into winter married were still married.

Richard and I hadn’t had the chance to share all our Mardi Gras goodies and our New Orleans delicacies of mini-muffaletts and king cake. Charlie’s birthday was also looming, so we decided to have a celebration fit for a faux king (and his queen). If it’s good enough for the New Orleans carnival krewes to crown kings and queens; it’s also good enough for Coker Creek.

I arrived dressed in my most magnificent Mardi Gras attire, complete with feather boa and mask; Richard wore a “Bless you Boys” T-shirt to rub it in that our team won the Super Bowl. We brought beads for everyone, with special beads for the king and queen, in lieu of crowns.

I recruited eleven-year-olds Prince Eugene to crown King Charlie and Princess Cassie to crown Deborah, his Queen of Coker Creek. Eugene’s twin brother Prince Billy then rained beads down upon the king’s royal subjects as the king cake candle was lit. The royal minstrels played while the court jesters cavorted in the gallery (otherwise known as the porch). There was much merry-making in honor of the king (at least for the night) of Coker Creek.

The following day we were invited to accompany Charlie and Deborah on a mystery tour to celebrate Charlie’s birthday. Hopalong Nancy, Jim, Deborah, Charlie, Richard and I all piled into Charlie’s truck and took off without any but Deborah knowing the destination. All she would tell Charlie is where to make the next turn. We drove for well over an hour through the rural Tennessee countryside with foals and calves cavorting in freshly greened pastures and miles of redbuds, Japanese magnolias, cherry trees and Bradford pears all in full bloom. The farmland fields were freshly plowed in many cases, and in others already sprouting.

Our destination was the magnificent Whitestone Country Inn on Watts Bar Lake. The springtime colors of the budding and blooming trees were reflected in the lake’s mirror-smooth surface with panoramic views of the Smoky Mountains. We had a delicious lunch at Lamb and Lion restaurant next to the adorable wedding chapel on the 600-acre property. The food was great; the dining room was beautiful; and the views were fabulous. We had a grand time, and to top it off the chef came by and inquired about our experience. I felt like we were all royalty.

On the way back, we took the scenic route, as Charlie is prone to doing. We were shown the many entrance and exit points for the old Tennessee Highway 68 as it crisscrossed New Highway 68 while Charlie regaled us with tales of local historical events and the characters involved in them. Who knew that Stokely Canning Company had its first-ever canning plant in Tellico Plains, or that Scott Fertilizer was developed in conjunction with the Stokely operation right down the mountain from our house in the holler? What a delightful tour guide Charlie makes! It’s nice to hang with the king of Coker Creek.

Sunday, April 4, 2010

Tracking Jack

The most amazing people have been happening to me since I became Jack’s publisher. Mrs. Mary has speeded up the process of these happenings, and now I have a really wild tale to tell.

Friday morning I got a frantic email saying, “Would you help these people please??” It was from Betty, the president of the Coker Creek Heritage Group. She had forwarded an email that read, “I am on a mission to find Jack Darnell, the author. A friend sent me an article and a video of Jack Darnell. I too am a writer, and would like to meet the man whose name I have been using for over 70 years. I noticed the article said he lives on Coker Creek. I will travel back down 68 to see if I can locate him.” The email was signed Jack Darnell.

I immediately answered that I was Coker Creek Jack Darnell’s publisher and that I’d attempt to set up a meeting. I gave directions to Jack’s home on Coker Creek with instructions to “Look for the banks of daffodils. If you get to the bridge over Coker Creek, back up; you’ve found Jack’s house.” Today, on Jack’s front porch, we had that meeting of the men who have shared a name for seventy years and a passion for writing for much of that time. We were all like kids at Christmas; we were so excited to make each others’ acquaintance.

What a study in contrasts were these two Jacks! The visiting author was extremely gregarious with a bald head covered by a skipper’s cap, while our Jack is soft-spoken and shy with a beautiful head of neatly combed hair. Coker Creek Jack is clean shaven while our visitor was well-whiskered. Our local author is a dedicated homebody while this fellow scribe definitely loves to travel; he and his wife Sherry live in an RV. Before retirement, RV Jack spent his career traveling with the Navy; our Jack’s only time living away from here was his two-year stint in the Army.

The total tour was in order from drinking water out of the spring to explanations of the various types of kerosene lamp wicks in Jack’s room-lighting methods. Roving Jack even insisted that his wife take a picture of him sitting in Jack’s outhouse (fully clothed). The two men autographed books for each other, and laughed a lot at each others’ stories.

Both write, and both are published through a division of Amazon called CreateSpace; although, unlike our Jack, “Jack the Younger” writes a travel blog. Much of traveling Jack’s work is non-fiction; all of our Jack’s work is pure fantasy. I can’t wait to read some of “Jack the Younger’s” work, but it is kind or eerie to see the same name on two such different types of writing.

As usual, Jack Darnell of Coker Creek’s Appalachian Folktales The Book That Jack Built can be purchased at local retailers or ordered through Amazon. To check out traveling Jack’s blog, see http://shipslog-jack.blogspot.com/

Saturday, April 3, 2010

Artists' Adventures with Mountaintop Mary

Mrs. Mary (Jack’s GED teacher, and not to be confused with Mountaintop Mary) is so excited about Jack’s book being published that she’s taken to spreading my name to all her friends who have work that she feels really should be published. This lead to a call the day after I met Mrs. Mary from a woman named Nancy. Nancy is an author and illustrator, and Mrs. Mary wanted me to meet her “right away.” One thing about dealing with matriarchs is that they don’t take kindly to denial or dilly-dallying when there’s important work to be done.

I had tried to get to Nancy’s the day I got her call, but ended up on a sightseeing tour to Townsend instead. I had never been to Lenoir City or to the Cross-Eyed Cricket Campground before, and our GPS was in Richard’s Bronco II. It’s dangerous for me to drive in unknown territory when I’m in my creative zone because my analytical self stays behind; and the prospect of meeting a talented artist always sends me into La-La Land, or Townsend Tennessee, as the case may be. I had a lovely drive along the Little River, but I finally returned home, determined to meet Nancy the next day.

I had been meaning to check in with Mountaintop Mary regarding the resolution to the problems she’d been having with scanning my and Jack’s work, and I also thought it would be fun for us to take a trek together, in what my friend, Girl Reporter Susan, calls Lucy/Ethel style. She agreed, so we set out a little before lunch yesterday.

Forsythia! Quince! Daffodils! Easter! Spring is happening in the holler even if it’s still too wet to plow. I wouldn’t have known the name of the magnificent magenta blooms next to our spring-fed creek if I hadn’t been with Mountaintop Mary yesterday. I had been calling it weigela until Mary and I got to telling tales of what’s blooming in our back yards. Mary’s place is atop a mountain, and her bushes blooming still hasn’t begun. I wonder if even a couple of hundred feet of altitude change can affect what’s in bloom and when.

Our first stop was at Donna’s Old Town Café in Madisonville. They always have good food and I wanted Mary to meet the proprietress of this successful mother/daughter business. I was able to recruit Donna’s daughter for teaching kids’ cooking classes and promoting our upcoming Coker Creek Cooking Classes. I also scored some additional bagitudes (handbags with attitude) for my granddaughters. It’s never too early to start having them act out their individuality.

We spent a lot of time going down what Mary calls bunny trails, both literally and verbally, before we finally found Nancy, but was it ever worth it when we got there! What a talented woman! She’s written scores of poetry pieces and illustrated innumerable of her stories. She also showed us a method she’s found for making resplendent reproductions of her water colors – on her home computer and printer.

I’m now chomping at the bit to get our next New Orleans trip behind us so that Nancy and I can get her poetry anthology to the presses.

Friday, April 2, 2010

The Men of the Matriarchs

The bravest men in the world are those who remain married to matriarchs. They are not only subject to the displeasure of “She Who Will Be Obeyed,” they also have to put up with confusion of, and possibly ridicule from their peers.

A matriarch is a woman who will stand up to anyone – sometimes even her Creator—when her loved ones are threatened; she is definitely a force with whom to be reckoned. The bravest among their men know how to “batten down the hatches” when the hurricanes start brewing with those steamy tropical depressions and duck and cover when the volcanoes start to rumble. They realize that when the skies have cleared or the earth-scorching is complete, new life will emerge, probably more vibrant than the last. These are the real heroes that you read about in fairytales.

If “She Who Will Be Obeyed,” deems it necessary to slay dragons, the real hero will sharpen his sword, swallow his fear, and head out – with or without a trusty steed or fellow warriors. Many brave men are vanquished that way, as they may not have the kind of friends who are brave enough to be their posse.

It is very important that the “Queens of the Universe” encourage and allow their knights to develop a round table of like-minded men; otherwise, they will continue to lose all the good, brave men who are their only hope of having a protective perimeter around their women’s circles that are formed around the crops and the kids.

It is true that there are many men who are better at doing the heavy lifting around the homeplace, entertaining the offspring, and teaching the trades than their women. It is also true that there are many warrior women in the matriarchal matrix. We must be able to join hands, focus on the fights which are important on a world-wide basis, and start circling the wagons, lifting our voices in songs of gratitude, community, and hope; all the while lifting our hands in earth-enriching partnerships with our Creator and all of creation.

We in Coker Creek have our forested land, our clean water coming from our springs pouring out of the sides of the mountains, our manure and loam-rich soil, and our neighbors who live by the values of faith, family, friends, and fun. We even have local honey bees and milk cows living off the fat of the land and leaking their gifts all over it – there for the taking, if we only care to collect our share. I don’t know how you get much closer to the Land of Milk and Honey where manna falls from the skies.

Every one of us can grab a hoe, a plow, a pot, a spoon, a chain saw, or a hammer and work side-by-side with all our fellow travelers to create a better place for not only our local neighbors, but all who want to come and taste the goodness of Creation here in Coker Creek. If we women want it, and our men think it’s good, nothing can stop us from expanding out like our ancestors did. We are, after all, at an intersection of one of the greatest and earliest trade routes in North America.

Now if we only had a bigger table…and a round one, at that.

Thursday, April 1, 2010

Matriarchal Mind Meld

There’s really little I like better than visiting with matriarchs. I wouldn’t say this without including their men, except most men of the matriarchs let their women do all the in-depth discussion stuff, or they’re no longer around to tell their tales.

I love to get male viewpoints on life, especially from men who have well-learned life’s lessons, but trying to get a man to spill what he knows without another man present is really like pulling hen’s teeth, or trying to herd cats; and I don’t know which is more difficult.

I got a double matriarchal mind-meld yesterday; it may take me a while to process all the wisdom I collected. I began the day with a call from Mamie informing me that she’s following my example and leaving Coker Creek for a while. I admitted that I knew wanderlust was contagious and asked where she was heading. She was delighted to tell me that she decided to break with the rest of us who fled the mountains during the cold weather and go south now that it’s getting warm.

When I expressed concern that she may not return in time for the ground to be dry enough to plow, she wasted no time in giving me an garden preparation assignment “for Richard” while she’s away. I guess she really has given up on me ever being useful in the manual labor department. I dropped by her house to tell her bon voyage, and then headed to Vonore to meet the inspiration for Jack’s publishing efforts.

What a delightful woman! Mary is eighty years old and still going strong. Even though she walks with a cane, there’s nothing pitiful about her. Her eyes and mind are as lively as one could ever wish to have, no matter what one’s age. When I asked if she was still tutoring GED students, she revealed that she’s not tutoring, but is substitute teaching. Can you imagine the drive that she must have, still entering the classroom at age eighty – with the help of a cane? She says she may give it up this year – much like Mamie threatens yearly to give up her chickens and egg empire, I suspect.

One of my favorite topics to discuss with these lovely ladies is the partnerships they had with their husbands. Both Mamie and Mrs. Mary are long-time widows that are quite in love, to this day, with the men they married. It’s so refreshing and informative to hear how they over came life’s challenges and celebrated life’s successes together.

Mamie still loves to recount the nights they planted the crops necessary to she and her husband Frank Sr.’s , and their family’s survival by the light of their truck and tractor lights. Even though I just met Mrs. Mary, she shared beautiful memories of her childhood on Citico Creek, her education at the Quaker school in Tennessee, her chance meeting and subsequent courtship and marriage to the love of her life and some of the challenges they overcame as a couple.

What generous souls! I need to keep these stories coming; I can use all the advice that I can get on keeping my hero happy– or he may stop waiting for me when I go on my adventures without him.