30

(wow! where has this month gone?
i meant to write this piece a long time ago, but somehow have not gotten a chance to catch my breath until now. kind of ironic, i guess...but here it goes.)

i turned 30 this month. and i have contemplated where these last ten years have gone.
spanning two states, four cities, and five loves.

i left home bound for college a new woman and found out i was still very much a little girl.

i laughed with roomies, fought with roomies, moved in and out.

i lived in small worlds and dreamed very big dreams.

i failed algebra, twice, but some how still somehow managed to get my gpa up to passing with sheer determination.

i watched the blinking lights in the distance and cried into the window hoping he would not see me, my hand resting on the seat beside me, just in case.

i broke.

i read the prophet.

i moved on.

a new state, a new start, a new life.

i lauged with roomies, i fought with roomies, we worked things out.

i walked to the quad and sipped coffee in the piazza.

i went to the shakespeare festival in the courtyard.

i walked to the clb.

i heard my hearts yearning sung in a few emo lines. "lead my skeptic sight, to the table and the light."--JEW

he went to new york without me.

i let go.

we let the big ole texas sky grow smaller behind us and we all put down roots in the magnolia state.

i lost my ole bad fox.

i swam an endless summer away with friends.

i walked to the cafeteria and we laughed at each other's stories.

i passed contemporary math.

i drove to atlanta and saw tony hawk pull a 900.

i sat at gravity and we contemplated our journies.

i dreamed of the next chapters my life would take.

i walked across the stage and in an instant it was over.

i listened to james taylor sing his songs directly to me.

i started anew in the berg.

i mothered my little brood of jay birds at the preschool.

i visited my little brother at southern.

i laughed with roomies, i fought with roomies, i moved back to jackson.

i hosted a party for the rockwell's and the illinois'.

i walked to the park with dusty and may and scott.

i punked wes.

i went to "the hat".

i fell for a broken heart.

i watched my dandy slip away.

i moved back in with mom and dad.

scott and molly finally left for nc after several last night's in town.

i drove to new orleans, and destin and duke.

i stayed up all night and went ice skating in the morning.

a new "little brother" moved in.

i wore many hats.

i loved a little boy genious.

i played pirate games and almost made a movie.

i got a precious puppy.

i taught bible and art and enlglish and journalism.

i pulled my hair out.

i bought a house.

i loved a broken heart until he broke mine.

i flew to europe.

i lisened to music in an irish pub, laughed with a young scot,laid on the beaches of the ligurian sea, and stood on the streets of rome.

i came home better, but broken still.

i wondered where it all had gone.

i moved on again.

i sorted books and sorted it all out.

i grew.

i began to heal.

i laughed with thunder.

i prayed with debbie and linda.

i shared a car.

i smiled at my siblings smiling faces.

i cried tears of joy.

i laughed and laughed until it hurt.

i went to church with may.

i went to church with jacob.

i cried with minda.

i laughed with minda.

i learned the meaning of the word sister.

i drove out to deer field and fixed suppers and tucked in my little loved ones.

i fell again for a broken heart.

i drove around clinton with leslie.

i tried to fix him and failed.

i broke again but my "brother" saved me.

i drove to the berg.

i watched as my evie saw her reward for the first time.

i broke with boo.

i started over yet again, and here i am...

...on the first day of my "next ten years", i received a precious and thoughtful gift from my dearest friend. heh. i just realized it, but its something that will maybe help keep me on a straighter path.

i am hopeful that the next ten years will be just as full.

even to overflowing...

what should i call ya?...

names are one of my most favorite things in the whole world.

whenever a baby is born the first thing i want to know is what they named the child.

sometimes we have to hold our heads high and wear the name we have been given proudly because it is in honor of someone else.

i am named after my aunt's imaginary friend/play name 'jayna anna'. i love it!

i love carrying my anthony last name proudly, but i will most surely take my husband's last name when i marry. i believe this is a woman's great privelidge and gift to her husband to honor his family in this way.

names stay with us!

they are important in the Bible too. lists after lists of names that have stood the test of time. greats like adam, sara, hannah, jacob, david, mary, matthew, mark, luke, john, paul, and my favorite, samuel.

Proverbs 22:1 says,
A good name is more desirable than great riches; to be esteemed is better than silver or gold.

what a precious thing that who we are known as can be eternal. what responsibility to parents! and yet sometimes it doesn't matter what our parents name us, our actions, our surroundings, the people in our lives ultimatley name us. and maybe that is more closely what this verse speaks to.

in Genesis 2:20 it says
So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. But for Adam no suitable helper was found.
in other words, he was not just walking around haphazardly assiging random words to the animals. he was spending time with each one, getting to know them, their behaviors, and then naming them, and still no suitable help mate was found. (but thats another blog.)

my point is names mean something.

and yet, sometimes, the name just doesn't quite fit.

in native american culture the custom is to wait until the child is a few years old to name them in order to see what name is most befitting. you watch as the child develops his or her own personalities or accomplishes a task, and you then name them.

i once heard actor/comedian paul reiser joke that we could not do that in modern american culture. "we would introduce our kids," he quipped, "and say this is my son 'allergic to nuts' and my daughter, 'falls of tricycle'."

and yet we do give each other names.


some of us are just nick namers. we can't help it. its in our blood it seems to assign a name to the ones we love other than the name they have been given.

this too is biblical. jacob to israel. simon to peter. saul to paul.


you know you are loved in my family if we have given you a nickname. matter. manner. katie boo. alley. angle. blade. ya-cub. thunder. robby heart. (im just scrolling through my phone here.)

in our family if you know us three kids well, you might not call us by our given names at all, but rather jay, may and boo. if you know us really well, you might even call us jay jay, merna and boo boo.

my little cousin christopher, who i call chritter, or chrit (he is actually in my phone this way) calls me jay jay, so does his mom and his brother, scott but his other brother, wes, calls me jayna burger. and it all makes my heart smile everytime.

i call my aunt vicki, chrit's mom, kicki, stemming back from childhood when 'v's were too hard to say.

her husband, tom prather, will forever be t.p., because my daddy, tommy anthony, is t.a. and having two tom's (which tom is what my mimi, dad's mom, calls daddy, even though the rest of the world calls him tommy) at thanksgiving has proven to be too much. (confused yet?)

t.p. and kicki's oldest son scott is scotty potty because, sorry, sometimes childhood names just stick, but fortunetely now that he has married molly, sometimes we call them mott and scolly. im not sure which is which actually, is scott, mott or scolly? anyway i guess either is better than scotty potty.

his brother wes has been wesopher to me even before christopher came along. maybe thats why i can't call chrit, christoher. (wait..im just getting started.)

my cousin anthony is a.t. even though he is anthony gene, im not sure where that one came about.

his brother tim is tim-o.

his sister cynthia is c.c.

his mom, paula is aunt polly, ok that one is not too far fetched but..

her sister, my aunt janie, is actually named sara coday hatchett. ???

and her husband, ron, is my uncle big.

and we come by it rightly! (you ready for this?)

my grandfather, mom's dad, whom we all called daddy duke, ( or d. duke or the old bad fox) had eight kids in his family. and no one went by thier given names.

only aunt jeanie whose real name was carmen jean went by anything close.

my grandfather's real name was merl raleigh coday, but they called him duke. except his sister kate called him gick and his sister doe called him bummy. and my grandmother called him dick.( i don't know.)

his daddy, my great, great grandfather, was B. (which stood for Boogerman!)

uncle harold was pete, or wheels, or or woobie, depending on who was talking.

his wife, aunt blanche, was the one who called him pete and he called her trellis.

aunt doe's real name is effie lea.

uncle shag's real name is daniel.

aunt kate's real name is hazel.

and they often called unlce reed, drake.

to this day my mother has no clue what unlce c.'s real name was. she says when she asked her daddy he would just say c. (perhaps, no one knew!)

cousin denny they called hammer or goog, and his brother, phil, was shug.

crazy! and yet, i love it!!

momma says she thinks a lot of those names came from an old book that they read as children.

aren't names a funny, wonderful thing!

i also have a story to tell about a little boy from mississippi who was known as 'squirt', who went off to war as 'al' and came home 'tony'. :)
(but that too is another blog for another day.)

today, i am thinking about how we are known. how a name can shape us. how it can make us smile, take us back, change us, how it can last forever.

i remember a story that we heard as children in this series called the kingdom stories that i can't find online anywhere. it was kind of like a c.s. lewis story (who by the way everyone called jack.) in that it was sort of a parable for the gospel story. it was a story about one that they called scar boy, because of the fires he had endured, and how he ultimatley stood up to the evil one after the savior had changed his name.

"come here, scar boy!" the evil one shouted.
"my name is hero," he said.

and i don't remember any other line.
only that one. and i tear up to this day because sometimes, what our maker will one day call us is the name that matters most.

they say, don't judge a book by its cover, but can you judge a man by how he is called?

be careful! i think sometimes, you can!

poem of the day...

I'm ceded, I ’ve stopped being theirs;
The name they dropped upon my face
With water, in the country church,
Is finished using now,
And they can put it with my dolls,
My childhood, and the string of spools
I ’ve finished threading too.

Baptized before without the choice,
But this time consciously, of grace
Unto supremest name,
Called to my full, the crescent dropped,
Existence’s whole arc filled up
With one small diadem.

My second rank, too small the first,
Crowned, crowing on my father’s breast,
A half unconscious queen;
But this time, adequate, erect,
With will to choose or to reject,
And I choose—just a throne.
--e.d.

its hard sometimes..

Sometimes its hard being the little brother.
I am learning this as i am the nannie for three precious kiddos. Madilynn age 4, Ben age 2 1/2 and Nathan age 10 months.
All sweet children. All so eager to grow and learn and laugh and love.
I guess i relate the most to Maddy. As the big sister in my family i know what it is to feel a sense of superiority. To always be the "teacher", the "mommy", the "boss".
But as i said i am finding out that it is hard sometimes to be younger. to be too little.
To have to watch the door close as daddy takes sister on a big kid outing.
To have to practice staying in the lines with your crayons while bigger hands get to use scissors and markers.
To be told by the "mommy" to go play with your cars when all you are trying to do is rock your baby to sleep.
I'm learning to watch closely. To monitor the very same behavior that i am sure that i once exhibited as a big sis.
Its hard sometimes to be the big sister, too.
To have to share the toys that once were all your own.
To have to wait patiently for your turn while little hands work slower than you.
To grow and learn and laugh and love...with someone else.
This last weekend my little brother and i spent the whole day together.
We went to eat at the bottling company and then had cupcakes at the new sweet shop. We spent the whole day talking,reminiscing about texas and planning for our futures. What a precious day!
It so much easier sometimes to fight. When you know someone so well, when you know all the buttons to push, sometimes love has to be a choice. A beautiful choice.
This week my little brother has had to face some difficult things on his own without the watchful eye of big sis. And maybe this is best, cause the "boss" has a few choice words that she would like to say to a certain someone.
I know that he will handle the whole situation the way that he has all along. Like a man full of grace and integrity.
Madilynn is pretending to be the "mommy" as i write these thoughts down on a piece of blue construction paper. Ben is the "baby" and he is crying this sweet little play cry.
Sometimes its hard to share our lives together. But moments like the one i am watching between Madilynn and Ben, like the ones i had with Boo this weekend, these are the moments that we can step back and say, its worth it.

a sanctified imagination

My grandmother, Mimi, likes to tell the story of the man with the long white beard and black suit who hung in the frame beside her stairs. He was a traveling medicine man who did magic tricks she tells us. He happened one day upon my great, great, great grandparents farm in Winona looking for work. He told them he was from Scotland, his name was Sharron and he turned out to be a hard worker, too. Soon he was married to the couples daughter and my great grandmother, Linda Sharron, was born. And this is Mimi’s favorite part to tell, and mine to hear her tell, he would saw her in half as the final trick in his show!
We have told that story of the Scotch Medicine Man now in our family for generations, only problem is our cousin, who is now studying in Scotland, has looked up the family history and can find no record of any of it being true. Oh, he was a medicine man, and a magician, that part is true, and he cut Great Mother in half! Ha! But how did this “Scotch” man come to Winona and happen upon the little farm? It’s a mystery we may never know. This is just what I imagine….

The Scotch Coin

He didn’t have much to live for now, he thought. He looked around the almost empty bar and took a seat in the back corner away from the other customers. He had never been to a place like this on his own but he had been with his father. When he was younger his father had always left him at the cabin alone when he went out. They lived just outside of Greensboro in rural Webster county Mississippi in a log cabin, which was really more like a shack, that his father had built after he escaped from jail. His mother had left him when he was just under a year old. She put the corner of his gown under the old rocker on the porch so that he could not crawl away and left a note telling the old outlaw that she was sorry but a family from Jackson was going to pay her room and board to care for their six children and since the promise of eating everyday was more than he could give her she was going to take them up on their offer. They would not, however, allow her to bring her own son and since he looked just like the old outlaw did, she had no problem leaving him there along with the memory of her life in the cabin. By no means was he ever a decent man. In fact, it was rumored that he was one who started the fire in the old Webster County Jail, but she had been the only good thing that had ever happened to him. He could hardly stand to look at the boy after she was gone and so the child spent many nights alone in the cabin with the shadows and the noises from the woods.

Only recently, since he had turned sixteen, had his father let him go anywhere with him.
“You are a man now, Son.” He said and turned out this meant his father thought he was old enough to accompany him to establishments like this one to help him cheat at poker. The two came up with a scheme whereby the boy would sit in a back corner of the bar somewhere where he could see one of the players hands and then he would go through a series of symbols and signs that the two had come up with in order to tell his father what cards the other player was holding. A tapping foot meant clubs and the number of taps was the number on the cards. Fingers drumming on the table meant spades. He’d flick his cigarette for diamonds. For hearts he lined the rim of his glass with his index finger. A jack was a pat to the head, a queen a touch of the heart, and king a nod and an ace a smile. It was a pretty good routine and since his father had never carried him with him anywhere before no one even knew that the two were related. The boy quite enjoyed it, not that he necessarily thought it was honest, but what did he care? His father was spending time with him and it was exciting to be so clandestine.

The two did quite well. His father always lost a few hands in the beginning just to throw off the other players and then the boy would come in. Sit in the back. Order a glass of whisky and begin to roll a cigarette. By the third or fourth hand he would have begun the routine and before midnight his father would be winning. For several months the winning was good. All the food and whisky the two could want. The boy loved it. Never before had he felt such excitement for life. It was fun pretending not to know his father, giving the bar tenders and other patrons fake names and of course watching his father smile at him and pat him on the back. It seemed as if his father, too, was more alive than he had been in years.

One night they took some of their winnings and went to a show. A magician from New York named The Great O’Brien was in Greensboro. He traveled from town to town with his cart full of wares and goods. He’d roll his cart into town and perform tricks and sell miracle potions and for only a cent you could come to his big show at the theater at night. He did all sorts of magic, selling things to audience members as he performed, a pair of shoes that would make you taller, a drink that would make a bald man’s hair grow, a cream that if rubbed on the nose each night would prevent the common cold. And for his final act he would cut a woman in half with a saw and then put her back together again! The boy was amazed. And he loved how the man sounded when he spoke. He was from Scotland, he said, migrated to New York on a big ship and all the goods were authentic miracle cures from Europe. The boy and his father bought a one cent piece for just ten cents that would bring luck to any man who kept it hidden in his pocket. And it seemed to work! That night the boy and his father won more money than either of them could spend. It seemed that the Scotch coin was just the trick that the two needed.

The next night the boy made sure that the coin was in his pocket and then he headed to the saloon where his father had been losing on purpose for about the last hour. They had gotten into the routine good when one of the players stood up abruptly and threw his chair just over the boys head. It smashed into pieces, the boys heart nearly jumped out of chest.

“Who is that?” The man questioned, and pointed his finger sharply at the boy. His father tried to look alarmed and confused but the boy could see the deceitfulness in his eyes and he hoped that the man pointing his finger at him could not.

“I have no idea who that boy is.” His father lied.

“You rotten sack of lies! He cheats for you! I have sat here all night watching him. And now, now you tell me that you take my money honestly!” The man screamed. The boys father could not find words. He stumbled out of his chair and before he could recover the man pulled out a gun and shot him. Dead in the chest. The man took the money from the boy’s father’s pockets and aimed the gun at the boy’s head.
“If you ever try to take me again, Boy, I’ll shoot you too!” He warned and left the bar without even the blink of an eye. The bartender, the only other person in the room, was hiding behind the bar and the boy, not knowing what to do and still scared that the man would come back for him, took off running. He thought at first of running back to their cabin in the woods but afraid that the man would find him he just kept on going.

He ran all night it seemed, stopping only for moments at a time to rest and then he would run again. When he could run no longer he laid down on the cool grass floor of the forest and slept between visions of what he had witnessed.

He wasn’t sure where to go when he awoke the next morning. A thought like a knife to the heart struck him. What if the man went to the police with his description. He had to leave town, maybe even skip to the next county, but what would he do? Where would he go? Just then the old horse drawn cart the magician from Scotland owned rolled by and much to his surprise it stopped.

“Where are ye headed, Lad?” the Scot shouted down to him from the carriage.
“Anywhere. I guess.” He replied. “ Anywhere away from here.”
“Hop on” The magician said and he waved the boy up. The boy obeyed half afraid the man might cut him in half if he didn’t.
“What’s your name, Lad?”
“Tom.” The boy lied.
“Well, Tom, from now on your name is Shay Sharron and you are my assistant. I brought you over with me from Scotland, you understand.” O’Brien said.
“I, I don’t know if I can learn a proper Scottish accent,” the boy stuttered.
O’Brien smiled and in southern Mississippi drawl he whispered, “Yes you can!”

For the next several weeks the two camped out in the woods of Warren County. All the while O’Brien teaching the boy his tricks, his cons and his way of speaking. He taught him that a good magician has the audience looking one way while the trick is actually done the other. He taught him how to read your audience and sell your goods accordingly. If there are a lot of women in the crowd for example your magic potion becomes miracle wrinkle cream but if there are more men it is guaranteed to grow fuller mustaches. He even taught the boy to curl his feet up in the box at just the right moment before O’Brien cut the box in half.
The boy enjoyed the time in the woods with O’Brien and soon he was almost as skilled as the old con man himself. He had, after all, been a con man for quite sometime at the saloons with his father. He thought about his father sometimes. He had not been the greatest father to him, in fact, he had been down right rotten for most of the boy’s life. But the last several months that they had spent together had been fun. He felt terrible if he thought about how he just left him there at the saloon. He couldn’t let himself think about it and so most nights he just practiced the tricks that O’Brien had taught him and tried to put the memory of his father and his father’s killer out of his mind.
When O’Brien was certain that the boy he now called Shay was ready the two left the home that they had made in the woods and headed for Montgomery county. The scenery in the small towns that they came to was not unlike the scenery that they had just left. Cotton fields and dirt roads as far as the eye could see dotted with the occasional town square seemed to make up most of this part of the country. But each town that they pulled into was another chance for O’Brien and Shay to play their little game with the town’s people and the boy was loving every minute of it.

One night after the pair had taken a few towns for more than a few bucks they rolled into the little town of Winona just as the sun was going down. O’Brien was asleep in the back of the wagon and the boy was driving the horses. As he pulled onto the main street he could see the little shops in the distance. There was a dry goods store, a place that sold hardware and farming equipment and a ladies dress shop. As he pulled closer he was a lone figure on the street walking away from the dress shop. A girl. She must have been about his age, maybe a few years younger. But she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. He followed her as she turned down the old dirt road that ran behind town. She noticed the old creaking cart behind her and looked back. They boy lost his breath to look into her eyes.
“Mam.” He recovered with a nod. She gave him a sharp look and cut across the cotton field to get off the road and away from the strange boy and his odd cart that had been following her but the boy pulled back on the reigns and halted the horses. He watched her walk all the way across the field. Her dress was red and it stood out juxtaposed against the white blanket of Mississippi snow. Her long hair bounced as she walked and the boy could not take his eyes off of her. When he could see her no longer he turned and pulled back the curtain to peek into the cart. O’Brien was still fast asleep in the back. The boy slapped the reigns and got the cart moving again. He would keep on going. No town where an angel like the one he had just witnessed lived should be taken by con men.

When O’Brien awoke the next morning the boy told him that Winona was a nothing town with not much to speak of and that he had instead driven all night to Vaiden. There was no reason for O’Brien to doubt the boy and so he set up like always and the two began to prepare their con. A large crowd gathered quickly as happened quite frequently and soon the game was on. It was going well and the towns people were sucked into the scheme quite easily. O’Brien was selling a miracle medicine that promised to cure anything and Shay was testifying about how the dark liquid when taken twice daily had healed his lame leg when all of the sudden a familiar voice came shouting out over the crowd.
“You!”
Shay looked up with a fear that was driven so deeply into his heart that he thought it would stop. It was the man who had shot his father. O’Brien, not knowing who the man was, said “Yes sir, can I put you down for a bottle of the miracle cure?”
“You!” the man shouted again and he pointed again at the boy. Shay pulled his hat down over his eyes and tried to pretend he did not recognize the man, but the persistence in the man’s fingertip aimed straight at him just as the gun had been before made his face grow hot and his palms begin to sweat. The man began to walk toward the make shift stage and the town’s people cleared a path for him eager to see the new show that was developing before their eyes.
O’Brien leaned into Shay’s ear. “Who is this guy?”
“I don’t know.” He lied but the con man could see through his protégé’s deceit.
“I thought I told you that the next time you tried to take me you would die, Boy!” The man was shouting and reaching into his pocket.
“Now hold on just a minute there!” The local sheriff stepped in calming the man, “This is a respectable town. Not like the town full of criminals over in Greensboro you come from. Now I don’t know who you think this boy is or isn’t , but you had better just calm down or be expected to leave.” Reluctantly the man walked away and O’Brien and his assistant were able to hide out at a local hotel until nightfall.

The boy told his story, the whole story , to O’Brien and the two decided that it was probably best to head back to the cart under the guise of night, pack up their things and be on the way. When they got back to the cart, just to be safe, O’Brien pulled a pistol from his trunk and stuffed it beneath his belt. They boy realized how serious a situation the two could be in and he felt sorry that he had brought his magician friend into harm’s way. Just as the two were almost finished with their packing and the boy had all but forgotten the danger that they were in a dark figure emerged from behind the cart.

“I told you if you ever tried to take me again, Boy, I’d kill you.” The figure whispered. The boy froze with fear but O’Brien reached his for pistol. He shot but the man shot too and then he shot again. Before the boy knew what was happening he felt like he had been kicked by a mule in the chest and he was laying on the ground beside his friend. It was dark but he could see a black pool forming beneath O’Brien’s head. He laid there for a moment. Was he dead too? He could see the man who had killed his father, who had killed the magician squinting into the dark night expecting his work, trying to see if they were both in fact dead. They boy lay silent and did not move and the man turned to walk away. The boy reached for his chest were he had been shot but there was no blood. He didn’t understand. He reached into his shirt pocket and there he found the Scotch Coin with a bullet lodged into it. At that very moment it hit him, this was American currency. It could not have come from Scotland it looked just like the coins he and his father had cheated the pokers players out of and just like the coins that he and O’Brien had conned from the town’s people, except now it really had brought him luck. He sat up all but forgetting about the killer in amazement at his discovery and the man turned quickly back around . Thinking that they both were dead he was slow to react and the boy reached without thinking and grabbed O’Brien’s gun. Before he could even blink he had shot the weapon and the man was lying on the ground.

That night was even more restless than the night he had spent running from the man who shot his father. He drug O’Brien’s body to the woods and buried him. He would not leave his friend the way he had left his father. He did not quite know the words to say in order to honor the Mississippi “Scotch” man who had taken him in and so he just stood silently for a long while over the grave that he had dug. He also buried the other man. He had no respect for the ill tempered outlaw who had shot his father, his friend and whom he himself had killed, but he feared being found out to be both a thief and a murderer.

He drove all night in the cart thinking. He thought about the little cabin in the woods were he had lived with his father, but decided that he had better not go back to that town full of criminals. It had been no good to him and there were too many memories there. He thought about his father. He never really knew him, he realized and he felt sorry for this. O’Brien had been more like a father to him. But now they both were gone. He drove until the sun had come up and as he was pulling into the next town he thought that maybe he had better go into the local saloon and have a drink. He was sitting in the back corner thinking about his father, about how wrong it was for them to have cheated like they did. At least O’Brien entertained the people he thought. He may not have really given them exactly what they were promised but they were smiling when they left and they had seen a good show. It was a good show, he thought. He had so enjoyed being Shay Sharron. He never wanted to be associated with his old life in Greensboro again. And that’s when he decided that it did not have to end. Of course, he would do things a little differently. No more selling miracle cures that didn’t work. He would just do the magic. He could get a job, an honest job, maybe as a farm hand to earn his meals and put on the show just for a little extra and for the fun of it. And who knew, maybe he would even learn a little about actual medicine and really help people cure what ailed them. He would have to still pretend to be Shay, though, that part he would keep up. Just a little white lie, after all he had gotten so good at the accent. And so off he went with the cart, his lucky scotch coin and a new dream bound for Winona and the girl in the red dress he could not get out of his head.

trick or treat...

we just finished passing out a whole basket full of candy to literally hundreds of kids at mom and dad's house in poplarville tonight. they come in to go trick or treating by truckloads from all of the neighboring communities and have such fun.

i heard this week that the tradition of trick or treating started in the u.s. to cut down on the number of pranks pulled on all hallows eve; instead someone came up with the brilliant plan to give out "treats" to keep the kids from "tricking" the whole town. hence the famous,"trick or treat!"

i dressed schmi up in a spider costume i found at the local consignment shop and she got many compliments! i have to admit, she was adorable!

we had lots of fairies and pirates, pumpkins and puppy dogs, butterflies and monsters. the little girls eyes danced as they walked timidly up to us in their snow white and cinderella gowns and the little boys couldn't keep the grins off of their faces as they demanded candy behind masked super hero faces.

even the parents got into the act. what fun to see mothers proudly holding up lady bugs and poodles! fathers dressed in funny wigs to make little ones laugh and carried bags to the door apologetically for sleeping ones who had long since passed out for the night.

we had our fair share of scary creatures also and i think that is fun too. i remember reading in Nevada Barr's non fiction work about her life how important she thought it was for all of us, even little ones, to have one night where we have to face down our fears. not that i think its ok to just go around scaring little kids unnecessarily, that's not what i mean at all. its just that i think it can be really wonderful to have chances in our lives to look uncertainty in the eye and stare it down. perhaps our fairy wings or our super man muscles will help us, or so we hope. its a good feeling to let your heart race sometimes, to feel the blood pumping through your veins and keep on walking, to be someone else for one night, someone who maybe has the courage to the face the fears we may not have in everyday life.

and there is just something magical about walking down an otherwise dark and scary, moonlit street holding your fathers hand. knowing that he is protecting you from the older kids up ahead in scary costumes. knowing that he knows the timid one behind the mask who is tyring hard to be brave.

i think sometimes the things we dressed as when we were children are really not masks at all, but mirrors. the princesses just want to feel pretty. the monsters just want to feel empowered. the heroes just want to feel purpose and mission. if only we could dress ourselves in our passions, as well as our fears in order to stare down them both. aren't they the same things when you really think about it? i know sometimes when the road seems to stretch ahead of me and God pulls back the veil just a bit for me to see the next step, i get so excited, but also, so scared.

this week my very best friend bought a house and it got me thinking about life and uncertainty. about how hard it can sometimes be to grow up, but how we have to make those big decisons none the less. and about the things in my own life that i fear. but that i am also passionate about. sometimes its easier to wish we could go back to the days where we can throw on the muscles and masks when its time to make those tough decisions.

its never easy to decide to walk down dark and scary streets when we don't know for sure whats up ahead.
trick? or treat?
but i have to remind myself, the Father is there holding my hand. He knows my timid heart and the ache its felt. He knows the fears that no one else knows. and He is the reason that i can be brave. after all He has made the way so that we can walk with no fear. as His children we have nothing to fear. even death itself has been conquered by Him, and so why would we fear our very lives?

as i look up at Halloween's full moon tonight i am reminded that ultimately it reflects our Lord, and i pray that i might reflect him too.

POEM OF THE DAY:

AFRAID? Of whom am I afraid?
Not death; for who is he?
The porter of my father’s lodge
As much abasheth me.

Of life? ‘T were odd I fear a thing
That comprehendeth me
In one or more existences
At Deity’s decree.

--e.d.

a sparrow and a jay...

its a funny thing the words we throw around. like invisible balls bouncing all over the place, in and out, up and down. we duck, or swerve or ignore them completely, but every now and again one hits us square in the face.

when i first heard the word i was just a babe myself, too young even to understand what was really happening. momma has told me stories, of course, of how i was so excited. how i played alone in my wading pool that summer and cried because no one was with me to play with. how she had to explain to me that when the baby did come it would be her baby and not mine. even before she was born i tried to boss her, "well when my baby comes!" "no, jayna lea, its my baby." but i think i still thought she was mine. you can see it in my eyes in pictures.

i remember colorado. sleeping together in the big bed. how she would never keep her mittens on in the snow. how she looked sitting up there on our horse, flame, as daddy held her. my cuddle bunny. my banana incident accomplice. (you will have to ask someone who knows.)my snow angel.

i remember meridian.how we spent endless nights skating at the gym. how we played endless days on the swing set. how once i tried to move to my "own room". momma tried so hard to make a comfortable bed in the laundry room for me so i could have my own place in our small three bedroom house, when i begged her, but i only lasted one night. we had to move everything back in the morning.my play mate. my bravery. my security blanket.

i remember the carousel horse wallpaper in little rock. how we felt so special. like princesses in our castle. how we would whisper across the room to each other from our twin beds. i remember how responsible i felt for her. how i hurt when she hurt. how hard it was to watch her grow and leave me for her own independence. my shadow. my secret keeper. my giggle buddy.

even when we had seperate rooms i snuck into her bed at night. i was such a chicken and she always made me feel safe even though she is younger. we stayed up late sneaking around and watching mtv. we had slumber parties at the obriens. we took pictures and thought we were models. my confidence. my counterpart. my safe.

in texas there were enough rooms for each of us to have our own, but most of the time we shared anyway. we grew. we talked on the phone to boys. made up fashion trends. we snuck outside to talk to talyor and ryan. we passed each other notes in the hall at school. we were queens of the youth group. my bff. my partner in crime. my cheerleader.

i remember i cried when she went off to school. sure i had gone two years earlier, but only 45 min away. she always was the brave one. i know crosby thought i was crazy, but i cried the whole way home to belton the night she left, bound for daddy's alma mater in mississippi. when he broke my heart later that semester it was her call that made me decide to go back to school and get my grades pulled up to passing so i could transfer and have the courage to leave him behind. she took me in. shared her life with me. her dorm room. her friends. my strength. my savior. my light at the end of a dark tunnel.

and so began the long years we would spend in ole clinton. who would have guessed? but would we have planned it any better? all the frustration. all the sharing. all the ups and downs. and we both are better off for it. my roomie. my co worker. my helper.

and now its so surreal. dreams of memphis and hattiesburg and new beginnings that we know are God ordained, and yet, there is this sense of loss.

our whole lives everyone has told us that we are just like evie and mimi, different as night and day. but it was mimi who was there for evie until the bitter end. who would not leave her side. and when i think about it, where would the day be without the cool whipsering hush of the night's steady calm and where would the night be without the faithful rays of day's persistant promise?

in sarah ruhl's version of eurydice, she says that the word father is like the word tree. i think that is so true. but sunday on my drive down it hit me square in the face, something i have told her before. i may not know what is next for me and she may feel the same way too. we may not fully understand the years that have preceded today but one thing i know to be true. she is like the word bird to me. my nest. my feathers. my flight. my sister. and few words are greater.

smoke and ashes...

passions.
in the greek orthodox faith the word passion has more of a negative connotation. i have been told they believe that it is a powerful word that carries such strong meaning that it should almost not be used.
i can understand this. we throw words around all the time.
i love chocolate.
i love my momma.
i hate sin.
i hate broccoli.
really? the same word?
its kinda the same thing with passion.
its like you can say all day long you are passionate about something, but what do you do on a daily basis?

ive been thinking a lot lately about my passions.

i have these crazy dreams i sometimes dream...

like, i watch the trailer for whip it, drew barryomore's new movie about roller derby, and i think, i could do that! i used to rollerblade almost everyday keeping up with and sometimes even beating the boys. i have the scars to prove it~ and i look super cute in knee highs. heh.
i also have this crazy idea about auditioning for a bit part in a play or musical of some kind. i mean, even if it was just a small role, how cool would it be to say you sang in the little orphan chorus line of annie? or you were one of the nuns in the sound of music?
i also have this secret dream to be some sort of jazzy, bluesy, singer in a band like kitty, daisy and lewis, she and him or elizabeth and the catapults. singing lead while the guys in my band wail on a guitar and pound the keyboard. we would have so much soul you'd hardly be able to stand it!

i have lots of things i really like to do..
and some of them i am even decently good at.

knitting. ive made like a dozen scarves, a couple of coin purses and have a half knitted little red riding hood cape i am working on for the winter. i even have a name for my line, knit-witty.

painting.its something i have always liked to do. very abstract of course. no real mona lisa's or anything. just fun.

sewing. ok i sort of suck at this. but i still really like the idea of it and i have a few shirts that i have actually finished that are wearable.


but, are these my passions or just things to pass my time with?

ben taylor, son of james taylor and carly simon, has a voice just like his dad. you've probably heard him and just thought it was james. you hear him sing a line clear and smooth with that effortless grace his father has and you know instantly. its as if the genes were so strong that unintentionally his father passed down this gift and just like with james, you can hear instantly what his passion is. (i know someone else i think this about.)


but i guess for some of us, no matter how old we are or where we have been, its harder to figure out what our passions are.

i was talking to a good friend the other day about what she would do if she changed jobs. she's had the same job, and done very well at it, for 20 plus years, but its not necessarily her passion.


they say you should ask yourself what would you do if you won ten million in the lottery and then whatever your answer is thats what you should do with your life. i guess that sort of works.

this week the house that momma and daddy lived in when they were in raymond burned to the ground. its so strange, but it almost hurt as bad as if we were still living there. my best friend in high school had the home his daddy built burn his sophomore year and they lost everything. i remember him saying with tears in his eyes that it had struck him that all they had left were the things they had given away. i will never forget that.

i think maybe that is a better way to think about what is it that you are passionate about? what if you lost everything,not just material possessions, but everything, and all you had left were the things you had somehow managed to give away?

it reminds me of hannah in the bible and how she finally figured out that sometimes we can't obtain the desires of hearts until we get it straight and realize that ultimately nothing is our own and all must be given up to the Lord.

i guess sometimes providing for our family, putting food on the table, paying for schools, etc.. becomes our priority, but still, i think we all have something lying just beneath the surface. if we pushed back the grime that has covered our weary and laboring souls there is something there that we were created to do, something that an all knowing and intentioned father put within us as a gift to be passionate about.

so i guess what i am saying is that i am praying to finally obtain the desires of my heart. ive got things, sure, that are fun that i take up my time with, and thats ok, but im ready to live daily like i was created with purpose. at the end of the day i want to come home saying i gave of my self in such a way that if it all went up in smoke tomorrow, there'd be something still that i left behind.

today i am listening to:
ben taylor-deeper than gravity--digest
she and him--volume one-why do you let me stay here

today i am watching:
glee

today i am reading:
1 samuel 1:1-2:11

poem of the day:
Paradise is that old mansion
Many owned before-
Occupied by each an instant
Then reversed the Door-
Bliss is frugal of her Leases
Adam taught her Thrift
Bankrupt once through his excesses.
--e.d.

once upon a hillside..(for the bunny collector)

Momma has a poem called Hill After Hill. In it she says “and years from now you know they are what made you.”

A.T. challenged me to think more upon what it is about those hills that haunts me, haunts us all.

These are just some of the memories that were made upon those hills.



I think sometimes the memories are getting blurry, but then I start to think about them, and they all come back to me like that freight train passing quiet through the night. When I remember it most clearly I am about 10 or 11 years old, a little freckle faced, red headed girl with a head full of dreams. If I was 11 that would have made the one we sometimes called Mary Poppins about 13. I wanted to be her so badly, with her beautiful brown eyes and her soft spoken ways. The Tom Boy, her, sister would have been about 10, just six months behind me. Strangely, I wanted to be her too! So wild and free, the complete opposite of her older sibling. And I could never quite make up my mind which one I wanted to be more.

The Bunny Collector was grown by then, or so we all thought. Sixteen years old and long since leaving behind those childhood games for basket balls and guitars. But still the sweet, genuine boy was there who had cared so dearly for his bunny friends, only now he was trying hard to be a caring man.

My little shadow would have been about nine. I had still had a few years before she would rebel against me in attempt to strike out on her own. In my mind she still thinks I hung the moon and stars and she follows Mary Poppins and the Tom Boy and me around as we pursue the Bunny Collector through the hills of the Ozarks.

It is Autumn in the Hills and when we find him the Little Man is with him. He is about five or six but he looks eight. He is so grown up but still there is wonder in his eyes. Wonder and wisdom and love. Its no surprise the two are hiding together under the fort they have made from sticks and fallen trees. They are versions of the same song played in different decades but with the same soft melodies.

The leaves are crunching below us as we try to sneak up behind them; they give us away. The Little Man smiles but I think I see a bit of disappointment cross The Bunny Collector’s face, no doubt he has enjoyed the time away from his crazy girl cousins. We huddle close to them intruders upon the fort, but soon we are all laughing. The hills are alive with colors but we are so consumed with each other that we hardly notice them.

There will be a feast for dinner later, Cornish hens, mashed potatoes, parsnips, me-maw rolls and pumpkin pie. We would be allowed to sit at the table if we could keep our napkins in our laps and sit up straight. “Now, Girl!” Old Bad Fox would say and look at your elbows. Quick! Get them off the table! He smiles.

Later there is snow on the ground. It is Winter in the Hills. Momma says she heard the snow fall in the night and when we look outside we are thrilled to see that she is right. We all live in places in the South like FL, GA, TX, MS and TN so snow is an old friend we rarely see. We all bundle up and I’m jealous of Mary’s white fur coat. The Shadow throws a snow ball at The Bunny Collector’s head and it breaks The Old Bad Fox’s car window. She lies when she tells him that she didn’t know there were rocks in it and we all keep our mouths shut.

We hike slowly down the old hill to the lake below. Careful to hold Little Man’s hand so he won’t fall. The lake is frozen but not solid enough to go out on it. Our noses are cold and our hands are freezing even through our mittens. The Bunny Collector wanders off into the snowy woods and I wonder what it must feel like to be a teenager. We head back inside for stew and cribbage.

Its Christmas Eve in the Hills and I am lying beside the Tom Boy on the pull out couch that Me Maw calls a divan on the sun porch. The old clock is singing its night time song in the distance and I can’t wait to see what Santa has brought. In the morning there will be cheese bread and coffee. Christmas Sweaters. Family Sing a Longs and some one will read Grandma Barker’s old poem.

The Three Girls are all home. The Music Maker at the piano, the Singer of Songs holding the hymnal, and The One Who Marches to Her Own Beat making them laugh.

The Bunny Collector’s older siblings are here too. Sweet Sister. Ok, that settles it! Forget Mary and the Tom Boy, she is the one I want to be just like. With that curly hair and great laugh! I hope I will be so cool when I grow up. I have a secret crush on the Second Son. I think he is so handsome. His new wife is with him and she is pregnant with their baby. She is beautiful to me. Before we go to sleep The Oldest Son and his wife tell us the most amazing story I have ever heard. I love how they tell it together. How one finishes the others lines. I would realize later that it was C.S. Lewis’ The Silver Chair.

Its Springtime in the Hills and My Shadow and I have on the sister dresses Me Maw gave us. Little Man in in a white suit. And oh my! Look at The Old Bad Fox in his pink suit and Easter egg colored tie! He clips roses for the girls to pin to our dresses and we feel like we are little ladies. So pretty. “Pretty is as pretty does” Me Maw reminds us. Where have I heard that before? We all take pictures with the iris and then off to church.

Spring time means lots and lots of flowers and we follow The Old Bad Fox through the garden as he snaps pictures. “You see that stump over there, Girl?” He asks. And I smile. “I’m never cutting it out.” I know why and he hugs me.

I sleep in the Red Room with My Shadow and Little Man. We bundle together in the in the twin beds and fight over who gets to sleep in the middle.

It is Summer in the hills and Me Maw is taking us on a picnic. We pack our lunches and head to Kabool to the park. The mayonnaise on the sandwiches has gotten hot but I eat mine anyway because she packed it for me. Later she takes us down to the old creek and we wade out in the water rolling up our pants legs we go out too deep. On the way home we pick Queen Ann’s Lace. When we get home we discover we have leaches from the creek!

We go over to the to Uncle Bob and Aunt Nita’s for fishing. He has rigged up an elevator of sorts to get up and down their steep hill. It creeks and moans. What fun! They never had children of their own and so it is fun to play with them. Aunt Nita shows us her paintings and I love to just sit and listen to Uncle Bob talk, his handle bar mustache moving as he speaks.

Later there will be watermelon from the garden.

As I think back I realize it is the people who come to mind. It is the hills, yes, but the people I loved who lived among them. And maybe it is the hills that I could see in them that I long for now. They grew up in those same hills. The same seasons passing. An Old Bad Fox and his Bride. Over fifty years of passing seasons and still I saw him cry when we laid her down into those very same hills.

I guess it’s the passage of time that I long for. The innocence of childhood that I seem to have left there somewhere along the way. It seems as though Mary and The Tom Boy, Little Man and My Shadow, The Bunny Collector and his older siblings, The Three Girls-The Music Maker, The Singer of Songs and the One Who Marched to Her Own Beat, The Old Bad Fox Himself and His Bride, it feels in my minds eye that they should all still be there, playing with the little freckle-faced red-headed girl, shaping her dreams.

Once upon an
Ozark Hillside
Lived an Old Bad Fox
And his Elegant Bride.

Nesting upon that hill
Three girls at their feet,
A Music Maker, a Singer of Songs
And a Little One, Who Marched to Her Own Beat.

The three would grow,
Each with her turn to shine.
Each would have her own brood
In her own time.

And year after year
No matter where they had gone
Each would return to that old hill
And bring their children along.

What joys! What laughter!
Memories that will never fade!
The Old Bad Fox telling stories
And oh! The suppers he made!

And his Bride, our Me-Maw
Was there ever a sweeter sound made
Than to hear her soft voice whisper
That you were her Babe?

I don’t think they knew the impact
That hill would make
No matter how far our roots run
Or which paths we take.

Once upon an
Ozark Hillside
Lived an Old Bad Fox
And his Elegant Bride.

Resting now upon that hill
Their beloved Ozark pride!
Home with their Maker
And forever side by side.



.

another friday night passes..

i remember writing in my journal how the losers lingered a little longer on the field than the winners did that night back in '97. how i watched the lights go out on the field standing there on the astroturf in college station with lara, the quarterback crying beside us. just two away, i wrote. two away from state.

the hornets would go on to win the texas state championship in '00. i stood there on that freezing december night with matt and the family. i had driven seven hours to be there. the brutons had brought their gas powered space heater and the whole stadium seemed to be sharing the same blanket, huddling beneath it together only to throw it off every five minutes as we stood in a fury to cheer. in the final seconds taurean henderson ran the ball into the end zone and the whole arena erupted. one giant cheer of hometown boys and girls long since gone from the place they had once known, but home now coming together in one common victory to share in this great night when a small town seems bigger than the biggest city. taurean would go on to play for texas tech and then the vikings and the falcons; our very own home town legend who put little ole gatesville, tx in wikipedia. but i bet even he would say his greatest win was that night. there is just something about texas high school football. if you haven't lived it, you might not understand. it stays with you.

in my novel i am writing, justus loudbach's father, rw, the high school kicker turned preacher has a state championship ring in a case over his diploma in the church office. his brother wain has one too, proudly hanging in its case over his bed in the j crew room his mother has not touched since he left home to marry liz and become a lawyer and the father of perpertually crying twins. justus dreams about that night when it came down to the last kick. about how the whole world seemed to slow down. the home movie in his head flickers a bit but he can still hear johnson yelling "send our baby home through the uprights, j!" he can still see the ball clip the corner and fall. he can still see the lights go out. i guess despite that win after i was in college that loss in high school has still lingered a little longer with me.

this year the starting quarterback and the homecoming queen for gatesville are both two precious kids that i baby-sat once upon a time. little jake has stood on those side lines with the big boys watching his daddy coach the hornets since almost before he could walk. in fact my memory of this is inspiration for parts of my novel. and now its his turn. and mary, my little mary alice. homecoming queen for all of two days, but our little drama queen forever. i can still see those big blue eyes looking up at me with those big crocodile tears. i hope, for thier sakes, those will be the only kinds of tears those big blue eyes will ever see.

im old.
i was so young then. u never realize it until its too late.

if i could write mary and jake a letter, and maybe i will, i would tell them "stay there in those moments for as long as you can. soak up every ounce of gateville. the drive-in theater and the way audi smiles and nods when he hands you the ticket. main street, with the way it sneaks up on you and then its gone. the old courthouse square. the parade where the whole town comes out. little girls and boys pointing and smiling. mommy, daddy he's the quarterback, look mommy a queen! the hornet buzz on monday after a victory. the drum beat of the band warming up on friday morning. the pep rally on friday afternoon, oh feel it for everything its worth. never again in your life will you be so united with any other group of people. and those friday nights. listen for the old train that goes by in the distance when you play la vega. watch for the goats that graze just to the left of the field when you play china spring. be sure you make fun of the troy trojans. sing the words to oh christmas tree when the robinson rockets play their school song. go get kalaches when you play in west. catch a mini football that the cheerleaders throw after a touchdown. and never, never fail to join pinkies across the stadium and proudly sing your alma mater. do you know most people i have met in life don't even know their school song? sing it proud and be sure to sing it right, changing that last line from gateville, all hail, to gatesville, all hell.

i don't know why. i can't explain it and you won't be able to either, but you will never be able to forget them."

im friends with lara now on face book, but we never really talk. she has two little boys and lives in florida. im pretty sure our homecoming queen moved off to utah. our quarterback went of to a&m but never played. taurean broke his leg and got sent to play in a league in europe. cody and clay and gip and matt all got married. and guess what! the great class of '98 is turning 30 this year!

i left too. bound for the magnolia state with a broken heart trying hard to leave gatesville behind. its been almost two years since i crossed that state line and gosh, almost ten since i left for mc. its been too long since i saw the sky grow big before my eyes. my heart still smiles to think of it now.

time passes.

in the tv show friday night lights the first couple of episodes they would write at the bottom of screen, monday morning, 8 am, 5 days away. tuesday afternoon, 3 pm, 3 1/2 days away. and so on...those early writers of that show understood the dynamic of a small texas town. every week in early fall you get the chance to start over.

maybe thats what i am still waiting for...

Jake Truss hit 13 of 19 passes for 280 yards and two touchdowns as the Hornets held off the Connally Cadets 44-34. Truss hit a 15-yard touchdown pass in the first quarter and a 64-yard scoring pass in the second quarter. Truss also ran for touchdowns of 6 and 1 yards, and nailed a 23-yard field goal for the Hornets (4-1).

source-wacotrib.com

today i am listening to:
adele-19-hometown glory
bruce srpingstein-born in the usa-glory days

today i am reading:
my novel, maybe i'll work on it some!

up in a day and back in forever...

(i stole that first line from scott's emo poem about his summer in texas. but i think it can be said as fitting here too. maybe its a lack of sleep, or too much time to think in the car, but tonight i am feeling i see things more clearly in the rear view mirror too.)

a whirlwind trip to the berg and back to do some more apt and job hunting has got me all contemplative. all in my head and feeling lost.
where am i going? what am i doing?
what do i want?
i don't know a lot of things...
i don't know how to do really hard math problems.
i don't know how to fix most things on my car.
i don't know what its like to wake up beside someone and have them whisper i love you.
i don't know how to finish my novel.
i don't know if i will ever finish it at all.
i don't know where the road will lead next.
i don't know if i will have the courage to take it.
i don't know what God is doing.

i try to believe still in all the things i believed as a child. in white picket fences and green eyed babies, and the knight in shining armor...i guess

here are some things that i want...
i want to be good.
i want to be someone that people find to be a source of encouragement.
i want to be a girlfriend and a wife.
i want a man who i can throw my arms around at the end of every day and say how was work?
i want a family to love and take care of.
i want children to bless and who my parents can spoil and love.
i want to know that i may not know where the road is going, but i have a best friend to walk it with.
i want to know that i can finish my novel with a happy ending because i have a happy ending to my own life.

cc once said that he was tired of living the same old short stories. i think i feel that way too.

im ready for my life to take this crazy turn of events and all of the sudden some of my wants turn into haves. i don't feel like its a lot to ask. i don't want money, or fame, or any of those types of things... just a fair shot at loving someone and being loved in return.

ah, well. the night is tired and so am i.

maybe my plot twist is coming...

poem of the day:
Longing is like the Seed
That wrestles in the Ground,
Believing if it intercede
It shall at lenghth be found.
--e.d.

today i am reading:
the hattiesburg american and craig's list

today i am listening to:
adele-19-chasing pavements
annie and the beekeepers--a pirates life
she and him-volume one-sentimental heart

a bobolink and a noted clergy...

yesterday was wonderful.
it is so good to be at momma and daddy's church and be with them on sundays.
momma did not tell us she was singing a solo with the choir! but she did and it was wonderful. it was funny because during one part of the last congregational hymn she sang an alto line that none of the other altos sang and with out looking up i knew immediately it was her sweet voice. i sat there and thought how probably no other person in the church could have picked her sound out that way, except for maybe daddy and boo, but that i knew it with no question. that same soft voice i had heard since before birth. then to have her walk from behind the loft and pick up a mic, i was so excited to get a public showing of the very singer i was just remembering so dearly from youth. so beautiful.

it is always good to hear daddy preach.
in my about me i describe myself as the daughter of a man who is not afriad to speak the truth. it is true. i could also describe myself as the daughter who sometimes cringes when he does. i have a tendency to be all talk and no action. i can get fired up at home, but its scary to speak your mind in public. its even harder to speak the Lord's words. its even harder sometimes to be the little girl sitting in the first pew listening to her daddy "step on toes". but also it is wonderful. it is inspiring. i think in human experiance there are opportunities to be decent, there are opportunities to be extraordinary, and then there are chances to touch on the divine. moments where we can look at a road before us and choose not to take it, to take it with hesitance, or to barrell through it like a wild sheep through a hedge! yesterday i watched daddy follow in the footsteps of violent sheep our family has known and loved.

the sermon was out of the book of james. following the litergy. but isn't it like God, it was exactly what the church needed to hear. sometimes the hardest thing to preach is what the church needs to hear. but preach it he did. he didn't bang the pulpit like jonathan edwards or dramatize his plight in life like hawthorne's minister in a black veil, but he stood up there like a man who had lived this last week in the presence of the divine. bowed with his wife in silent prayer, renewed. humbled within the walls of his office in study of the word, refreshed. transformed before he took the stage by the holy spirit, his lips no longer his own, but changed into an instrument of the Father. simple. profound. bold. truth speaking.

emily dickinson, whom i have enjoyed quoting as of late, stopped going to church as an adult.
it greatly shamed her father, a popular amherst lawyer, that she so publicly shunned the practice of her faith in a community setting, but emily believed that she could not worship with hypocrits. it delights me to consider the thought that she might have joyed in a fellowship under a preacher like the one i heard yesterday.

today my monday was better because my wonderful parents helped me renew my soul in fellowship yesterday. i pray that the rest of the congregation allowed the same renewal, but like emily, i fear that perhaps some did not.

today i am listening to:
ben taylor--deeper than gravity--nothing that i can do
rosie thomas--these friends of mine--much father to go
coday anthony--the forgotten album--beneath

some keep the sabbath by going to church
i keep it staying at home
with a bobolink for a choister
and orchid for a dome.

God speaks a noted clergy
and the sermon is never long
so instead of getting to heaven at last
im going all along.
--e.d.

the drive down...

today i slept in late. i stayed up too long watching episodes of top chef on the internet.

when i finally got up i packed a few things and got in the car. headed down to the berg to do some apartment hunting with boo.

as i drove that strecth of highwway 49 between jackson and the hub city that i have driven so much in recent months i thought about other strecthes of highway i have become familiar with over the years.

when we were children we alsmost never lived in the same town, or even the same state, as our grandparents. (as a minister's family you go where the Lord calls you know matter how far from family and friends He may take you.) the roads between wherever we were and lake of the ozarks, missouri and canton, mississippi, where both sets of relatives lived, were as much a part of our lives as children as the people waiting at their end. in that time we lived in what buechner would call once below a time. that magical point in our lives when we are still young and innocent and we know nothing really of time and space dimensions, only what we see and what we feel on a daily basis. "how much longer?" we would whine from the back seat. "its like two sesame streets and one mr. rogers to go." Our wise momma would tells us when we were two and half hours away. and we got it. that kind of time made since to us back then.

you knew that mamal and daddy duke's house in the hills of MO was getting close when you began to see the rocks form on the sides of the highway reaching up like mini mountaians on either side. our hearts raced as these mini moutains got higher and higher until at long last we were pulling up that old familiar hill that was their driveway. passing lake. passing iris. passing stump. home.

the "big golf ball" (mc's coliseum) was the sign on the way to mimi and dandy's. (its so strange to think now that i have made my place of dwelling not five minutes from this very spot for almost ten years now.) next came the lee's water tower; in the days long before madison's eiffle tower this was the next big landmark on the horizon. then came the railroad tracks. then the rolling greens. passing lake. passing azalea. passing golf carts. home.

i also traveled a lot in college. my early years of college i spent at mary hardin baylor about 45 minutes from my parents house in texas. i lived in the dorms but traveled home to gatesville quite frequently with crosby. he played piano at our church and so most sunday and wednesday nights i drove with him that long stretch of highway between g-ville and umhb. the flashing yellow lights in the distance as we left fort hood headed for lake belton. then waving goodbye behind us. did they signal what was ahead for us both? i was in love with him back then. in what buechner would call once upon a time. i had known what it was to break, no longer innocent to time, space, distance and pain. hesitant to reach out across the seat that seemed to stretch out between us in my mind longer than old highway 36. i studied hikus in my creative writing classes. and when i told him he composed one on the spot.
"there are two cities.
and one man lives in them both.
a bridge connects them."
i knew that this meant we would never be togther. not because we didn't fit, or i didn't love him enough, but because i knew both men. both what he had been and what he wanted to become. he was talking about the bridge over lake belton, but he was talking about me too. i was the line he connected his dots with. that night i cried silent tears into the window praying he could not hear me. today a silent tear again. i weep because he has become the man he set out alone to be. passing lake. passing blue bonnet. passing youth. home.

i think sometimes home is not so much a place where we settle, as it is the things we pass along the way. i think that this is what buechner would call once beyond a time. what donald miller would describe as beginning to see the lines in His face. i think i am closer now than i was back then. i think the highway stretches long before me still...


Today I am listening to:
avett brothers--emotionalism--paranoia in b minor
lucreo--tennessee--sweet little thing
van morrisson--brown eyed girl--i love you

Today I am reading:
buecner--a sacred journey
donald miller--blue like jazz

Poem of the Day:
A little road not made of man,
Enabled of the eye,
Accessible to thill of bee,
Or cart of butterfly.

If town it have, beyond itself,
’T is that I cannot say;
I only sigh,—no vehicle
Bears me along that way.
--Emily Dickinson

circle games...

its raining today in mississippi. i think the whole state has seen scattered showers and will see them all weekend.

ive always had this kind of love affair with the rain. when we were little momma had an old record that she would put on that had thunderstorms on it and we would cry and scream, but we loved it! there was something about that feeling of your heart pounding when the thunder would crash and then the sweet comfort of minda's little hand in mine with that wild look in her eyes. we also loved it when daddy would put on our hap palmer record. what a wonderful thing on a rainy day when we could not go out to play! we'd laugh and sing along with sweet hap as he sang the "opposite song" and we played the "circle game." safe from whatever threatened outside because Daddy was watching us from where he was studying in the next room.

frederick buechner has said that he loves the rain for how much more cozy it makes the indoors feel. i think i am in love with the rain for this reason too. to lie in bed on a lazy afternoon or during a thunderous night is just about the most wonderful thing i can think of. blankets never feel so warm. pillows never feel so soft. and a book is never quite so good. even music is better when its raining outside. haven't you ever seen dirty dancing? the part where they go running inside to patrick swazye's little cabin to beat the downpour and then dance to soloman burke's, "cry to me"! that would not have been nearly as romantic if it had not been raining. i am convinced. (only here in my little world will you get dirty dancing and buechner in the same paragraph!)

today on my lunch break i drove over to the cemetary where my great aunt evie is buried. its a beautiful place with large live oaks and little ponds with ducks and geese. it was a crazy day at work and i could not think of a better place to get away to for a moment and clear my head.
the rain in those big old trees was so calming. i think if there is anything i love almost as much as the rain, it is trees. they are such an example to us as humans, don't you think? anyway, it was so nice to stand there for a moment under my umbrella with my friends the trees, with evies wind chime sweetly singing beside me, drawing strength from she who walked before me. it just occured to me how precious a thing death can be when a life has been well lived. what i mean to say is that the death of a person who has lived such a great life can become a catalyst for those who come after. like there is this void that is almost instanteously felt when a person passes that calls out for the next generation to step up and carry on. we do a lot of that as humans, don't we? carrying on. its a circle we all draw over and over together with our families and friends. maybe the rain should be a reminder to us that the heavens and the earth create thier circles too and that the Father is always there. watching over us as we play our circle games.


today i am listening to:
patty griffin--rain--1000 kisses
louis armstrong--what a wonderful world--what a wonderful world
hap palmer--the circle game--getting to know myself

today i am watching:
its always sunny in philadelphia

today i am reading:
frederick buechner--a sacred journey

poem of the day:
The Lightening is a yellow Fork
From Tables in the sky
By inadvertant fingers dropt
The awful cutlery

Of mansions never quite disclosed
And never quite concealed
The Apparatus of the Dark
To ignorance revealed.
--Emily Dickinson

one small step...

well so i decided to create a blog. heh.
i'll hopefully be sharing things on here with myself, with family, friends, anyone who cares to listen.
i decided to call it running low on ink since this is an electronic version of the journals i have so long kept. i think emily dickinson's heart would be sad if i stopped keeping them all together, so i will still write some in them too; but since i keep them hidden under the bed i will also share thoughts here for you out in the open. maybe not quite so secret, but my sincerest thoughts none the less.
i can't promise any award winning pieces, but i do give my vow that i will write what is in my heart, keep my soap box rants short and always save room for your comments at the end.
so...here goes...

today i am listening to:
adele - 19--chasing pavements
jens lekman - night falls over kortedala--opposite of halleluja
kitty, daisy and lewis--self titled--going up counrty

today i am watching:
my so called life on hulu

today i am reading:
sing a song of tuna fish by esme riji

poem of the day:
your thoughts don't have words everyday
they come a single time
like signal esoteric sips
of the communial wine
which while you taste so native seems
so easy so to be
you cannot comprehend its price
nor its frequency--
emily dickinson