Boo Radley, listening for his dad’s truck at the top of the driveway
Boo Radley is the first of our three rescue Schnoodles. He was found by a landlord, abandoned in a duplex in a neighboring county by his family who had moved out two months prior to his discovery, there in a fly-infested apartment with very little food and water provisions remaining. This may explain his absolute panic mode with flies and any kind of ding or alarm. The rescuers named him Einstein; his hair was matted and went every whichaway. He’s the most human of our three boys, expressing emotion through his eyes, ears, and tail – to a much deeper soul-piercing level than our other two. We named him Boo Radley – – a character “behind the door” in a beloved American Novel, a character who rescued and is rescued in the novel.
And he wants both of his parents home at the end of the work day.
Not one of us.
Both of us.
His abandonment by his former family may explain why he runs for his dad’s truck every afternoon, to make the last little bit of the drive to the house in the driver’s seat with his soul human. He hears the tires a quarter mile down on the road before he ever hears the truck, and runs. His dad knows to watch for him – it’s the highlight of the day for both of them!
Boo Radley
he came with issues
we will never understand
neglected, abused
abandoned, alone
......trembling in a small kennel
we caught our first glimpse
through the matted mess
we fell in love with our boy
and made him our own
Lately I’ve been grounding myself in my rural Georgia blessings by rereading Gladys Taber‘s books about her life on her farm, Stillmeadow, in the hills of Connecticut. Every sentence she writes, it seems, takes me to comforting places that fill me with the joy of memories and the inspiration to carry on the traditions and legacy that my mother left.
In the August chapter of Stillmeadow Calendar A Countrywoman’s Journal, Gladys shares, “Corn stands silken in the field, chicory stars the roadside, and goldenrod mints her coin. The kitchen smells of spices and syrups, ming and sweet pepper. It is the time of “putting up,” a rewarding time for country-folk. I believe it is an instinct in man to store things against the winter, even when there is a supermarket a few blocks or miles away. It is part of the rhythm of life.”
When my children were young, I’d meet my mother at the halfway point so that the kids could visit a week every summer with their grandparents. Just a few weeks ago, as I was visiting one of my girls, we passed a Dairy Queen.
“That makes me think of all those times Mimi would take us to get a Cotton Candy Blizzard,” she shared. “Those were the best days of my life. I loved making strawberry pigs with Mimi.”
My mother had a fig tree, and they’d all go out and pick figs in the back yard and strawberries from a neighbor’s patch. Mom would get out the pressure cooker and a box of clean Mason jars and lids. Everyone had a job to do well beyond the picking – – washing figs, hulling strawberries, slicing fruits, measuring sugar, stirring. It was a day-long event with everyone fully-aproned, and they stocked our pantry and theirs with all the toast topping they needed for the coming winter months.
My grown children still call strawberry figs “strawberry pigs,” from their days of childhood mispronunciations.
When we moved onto the Johnson Funny Farm in 2008, I found a little twig of a scratch-and-dent turkey fig on the clearance rack at Home Depot and bought it for $3.00. My husband put up the orange plastic netting around it to keep from running the tractor over it, and today it stands taller than a clown on stilts and is more solid than any prize bull.
My scratch-and-dent clearance fig
I walk out to the fig tree this morning, inspecting the forthcoming fruits, anticipating their ripening. A fig harvest heralds the end of summer and beginning of fall – my favorite time of year! And I feel my mother’s arm around my shoulders, erasing all distance between heaven and earth, assuring me that the time spent doing simple things with those we love is the best gift of all. The simple act of making memories transcends years, space, and distance and preserves the togetherness and belonging – – the “putting up” of love scooped and slathered freely like a medicinal balm at the twist of a jar lid when it’s needed in the winters of our lives.
Several years ago, my father sent me a stack of books from his collection by Gladys Taber.
“Read these,” he urged. “You’ll see yourself in these pages.”
So I did. And he was right.
Gladys Taber lived on a farm named Stillmeadow in the Connecticut hills, where she wrote for Family Circle, Redbook, Ladies’ Home Journal, McCall’s, Good Housekeeping, and other popular magazines. She published over 50 books.
I live on the Johnson Funny Farm in middle Georgia, where I make a feeble attempt to add to my blog every day.
Gladys was a lover of animals. She raised her precious, spoiled rotten Cocker Spaniels and treated them like her children. She even made friends with 2 skunks.
I’m smitten with our three Schnoodles. We call them our four-legged sons and share our meals with them at every sitting. I watch birds and serve them specialty seed.
Gladys and her friend Barbara Webster exchanged letters for years, even publishing one full year of correspondence between their farms in Stillmeadow and Sugarbridge, sharing details of farm life in the 1950s.
I’m fond of mailing postcards to family and friends.
Gladys’s love of the countryside is evident in every carefully crafted sentence, rich in her descriptions of the simple pleasures of farm life.
We, too, are so fond of our corner of this planet that we audibly say, “Ah, back in God’s Country,” when we come back home from anywhere else. We’re “those folks” who take Sunday evening drives just to admire the landscape and praise the Creator for the rolling hills and the cows in the meadows. We catch our breath with every rustic charm – split-rail fences, old barns, rocking chairs on porches, sweet tea in mason jars, sheets blowing in the wind on a clothesline, clumps of wildflowers at the base of a mailbox.
I turn to the July pages of Stillmeadow Calendar and begin.
“July comes to Stillmeadow clad in silk-blue dawns, blazing gold noons, and violet dusks. Heat glazes the air, leaves droop, and the pond level begins to drop. But night is lovely as a dream, and we can go outdoors without a sweater. Sitting in the garden is inadvisable because the mosquitoes and gnats are busy, but a brief walk is possible.”
I connect with Gladys. These could be my own words now, 80 years later.
I glance out at the drooping leaves, heavy with the heat of the day here in middle Georgia and look to the western horizon, the copper tangerine sun hanging low in the branches and think, “What did I ever do to deserve this slice of heaven on earth?”
And for a moment, I feel the knowing spirit of Gladys here with me, nodding enthusiastically, urging me to love it while I can. She’s smiling from a better place, assuring me that for now, this’ll do.
Saturdays in 2023 are still savory. We begin the day with coffee and a bite to eat somewhere before spending the day together. We are blessed that our jobs allow us to have some common weekend time to get out and enjoy life, and we don’t take that for granted!
Smitty’s in Woodbury, Georgia was our choice on Saturday. Our friend Bob Oxford owns this restaurant, and his brother Mike helps out on weekends. Their mother, “Miss Jewel” Oxford, was the oldest living member of Concord Baptist Church, where we attended years ago. Her fried pies were delicious, and Bob still makes those pies from time to time, taught by the best! When I served on a pastor search committee with Bob, he’d bring those pies to the meetings, and they went lickety-split!
I enjoy rereading some of my rural life go-to books occasionally as we wait on our breakfast to arrive. Yesterday’s choice was Stillmeadow and Sugarbridge by Gladys Taber and Barbara Webster. Their exchange of letters from the 1950s between their homes in Pennsylvania and Connecticut describes country living at its finest. I like to feel part of that, particularly when my biscuit is made from scratch that very morning, and with each bite I think of the simple joys of rural life not afforded in big cities.
We also made a rare discovery: Georgia peaches! Most of Georgia’s peach crop was lost this year, so coming by Georgia peaches has been close to impossible – – until yesterday! We stopped at a produce stand in Woodbury and found them. I bought two large baskets to slice and eat with our yogurt this coming week. It’s breakfast today, before tuning in to You Tube to hear Dad preach at St. Simons Island First Baptist Church. Our son and his family, home waiting on Baby #5 to make her appearance, will be watching, too!
Our time yesterday was spent driving and birdwatching. My husband is a former deputy in the county where we live, and as a current elected official, he also enjoys time to get out and ride the roads to check conditions and washouts on the dirt roads. We both love this quiet time for different reasons, but it works all the same. He reminisces about the experiences he’s had here throughout his life, and I watch and listen for birds.
Way back in the day, Flat Shoals was filled with hundreds of people on weekends (“mostly drunk,” my husband added, thinking back on the times he had to respond to calls out in this area). It was a popular place to bring a cooler and an inner tube or raft and find a spot in the rock shallows on the shoals to stay cool all weekend. Today, you might see a few fishermen angling to stock their freezers for the next fish fry.
We were there for the birds.
I logged seven new species in the county yesterday along the waterways here at Flat Shoals. Through birdwatching and long Saturday drives followed by coffee together in the morning, I find that I get through the stress of the work week better when I know I have the weekends just around the next corner.
While others are packing our local air-conditioned movie theater to see Barbie, we have a front-row seat to the birds!
Our host for the second day of the July Open Write today is Mo Daley of Illinois, who inspires us to write Fibonacci Sequence Poems. You can read Mo’s prompt and the poems of others here. A Fib is written in six lines:
1 syllable
1 syllable
2 syllables
3 syllables
5 syllables
8 syllables
I love the short forms! I was out way past my bedtime cheering on my favorite baseball team at Truist Park in Atlanta, and then sitting in the horn-blowing traffic where people were actually playing recognizable songs on their car horns when no one was able to even creep out of the parking deck for a lonnnnnggg time. I say all of this to say that this true fib is especially dedicated to my Illinois writing buddy, Mo Daley. Cheers!
Take Me Out to the Ballgame
balls
strikes
homeruns
major leagues~
our Atlanta Braves
……..lost to the Chicago White Sox!
Even though the Braves didn’t win, there was one particular winning moment for me.
It wasn’t the hot dog, even though a hot dog at a ballpark is a grand-slam homerun all by itself, with a cold beer and a bag of Cracker Jack.
It wasn’t walking around the park looking at all the great things to see, either, from the jerseys for sale overhead moving along on a clothes belt similar to a dry cleaner’s, or the Braves Hall of Fame or the tribute to Hank Aaron with the waterfall.
Sometimes, it’s the fans who hit the home runs………Once in a Blue Moon Cheers!Braves Hall of Fame Tribute Wall
All of that was amazing, too, along with the friend who gave us the free tickets to enjoy a night of major league baseball. We saw a few home runs, but none greater than the one hit by a fan – not a player.
What grabbed my heart was the boy with the white jersey in the picture below. He was, perhaps, about 14 years old. At the inning changes, he grabbed the hand of the little fellow in front of him with the blue baseball cap on (a younger brother or cousin, maybe?) who were sitting behind us, and they ran down to try to catch a ball; the players throw a few up into the stands to all the open gloves waiting to catch a real game ball for a minute or so as one team takes the field and the other retreats to their dugout. The older one tried and tried and tried to catch a ball for the younger one. By the seventh inning with no ball, I’d already been praying for three or four of those inning changes – Lord, please let this boy catch a baseball for this little guy.
They returned empty-handed every. single. time, including the time the ball glanced the glove of the young teenager and landed in the hands of someone else.
That was YOUR BALL, one lady encouraged the teenager, when he came back up and sat down after losing one that had been so close.
This became my ballgame. Not the game on the field between the Braves and the White Sox. Here with these two young boys and the quest for a treasured baseball was the game to be won.
And then, as I was watching the game during an inning, my husband nudged me.
Look to your left, he urged.
I turned and watched. A young fan seated in the front rows and his mother brought a game ball up to the top of the section. They passed it right down the row to the young boy who had been so hoping to get a game ball. Then, as they headed back down to their seats, they turned around halfway down the section and waved up, smiling.
In the eyes of one who doesn’t cry often (and almost can’t, officially, with a recent diagnosis of dry eye and a practically unaffordable prescription to go along with it), I felt the welcome tears of gratitude welling as I witnessed this exchange.
That, readers, is American baseball.
Whether your team wins or loses the game, the spirit of winning is most alive and well in the goodness of those who will sacrifice a game ball to sear into the heart of a youngster an unforgettable moment he will carry with him for the rest of his life.
Grand Slam, lady and son! I don’t know who you are, but you won the game for everyone who, like us, had been watching and hoping and praying, cheering for this sideline ballgame.
Atlanta Braves: 5
Chicago White Sox: 6
Baseball fans in Section 116: Faith in Humanity Restored
Mo Daley is our host at ethicalela.com today for the first day of our July Open Write. Two things came to mind when I read her poem, in addition to all the memories of previous generations’ masks: the poem A Bag of Tools by R. L. Sharpe (a favorite since high school), and a birdwatching excursion in Palo Duro Canyon State Park in Texas over the summer, as I sat behind a bird blind counting birds. I chose a Golden Shovel poem using one line of Sharpe’s poem today.
Blinders
behind the bird blind, watching unaware, counting each
species, observing, admiring, appreciating, pondering: is
this what would happen if people were given
the same fanfare over the wonder of our beauty? a
way to admire all our brilliant feathers, to regain childhood’s shapeless
notions of race, share the same branch, and remove the mask?
Fitz; “Wait, what? Why am I here? I know this place. I don’t like this place.”
CUPS Disease has claimed my dog’s spirit. Canine Ulcerative Periodontal Disease produces painful, life-altering mouth ulcers caused by a reaction to the plaque buildup on a dog’s teeth.
For several months now, Fitz has taken to the underbed and doesn’t want to come out and live life.
This four-legged son of ours is no stranger to medical conditions, either. When we rescued him, he was recovering from a badly broken back leg, and later developed a growth on his back that was a benign tumor – which was surgically removed. He had such bad breath (his top end smelled worse than his bottom end) that when we took him for a dental cleaning, the veterinarian ended up removing eleven rotten teeth. Our mission was to love him and give him the best possible life, so as part of our commitment to treating our animals like family, we have spent a small fortune keeping him healthy.
This morning, I took my soul dog to have his canines removed, which will help reduce the contact between gums and teeth, thus reducing the intensity of the ulcers that he will develop. There is no cure for CUPS Disease, but there are ways of managing the symptoms, and removal of teeth is one.
On our way to the vet this morning, we had a heart-to-heart talk. Fitz made it clear that he wants no part of any of this, but I’m pretty sure I convinced him that it is the right choice, and equally sure that once he feels better in a couple of weeks, he will forgive me for all I have put him through today. I’m thinking I’ll coax forgiveness while he is still on medicine and has no idea what he is saying.
I could tell when I handed him off to the veterinary technician, Fitz was not happy. Just look at that face!
This is my boy who lets NO ONE kiss his mama, who is a fierce and mighty lizard hunter who brings down trophy lizards from the brick walls outside, and who chases off all the deer and wildlife so that they pose no threat to his family. The dog who snaps at his brothers for barking at “his” deer, because it’s “his” job to keep us all safe – and he puts them in their place. The dog who sleeps right next to me so that no night ghouls or goblins or ghosts would even think about coming close to me.
I’m spending some time with one of my grandsons this week, and we’re getting outdoors by day and watching movies, reading, and playing board games by night. Today, we took a walk along our county’s nature trail and did a little bird counting and rock finding before visiting our bookstore on the square to support a local business!
Our time on the nature trail was the one brief window of the day when it was pleasantly cool ~ although it was raining, the canopy of trees gave us a nice umbrella that shielded the rain down to a mere drizzle. During the school year, students frequently participate in identifying trees and shrubs along the path, and often members of the community paint rocks with colorful images and inspirational messages to leave along the trail.
My grandson helped me locate the sounds of bird calls, and we were able to spot a Red-Bellied Woodpecker we’d been hunting by following its song.
Then, on the way, home, we saw a sign for Silver Queen corn grown less than a mile from our home, so we stopped and bought a dozen ears and shucked the ears together on the front porch this afternoon. They went perfectly with our steak, sliced tomatoes, and green peas.
These summer days, though hot and humid in the Georgia heat, are the times of our lives – the peaceful, carefree hours of reading, talking, sharing meals, and embracing the simple pleasures of living.
All except watching 47 Meters Below Uncaged.
This Nana’s heart doesn’t do well with all the stress of a thriller, which I used to absolutely love!
This morning’s plan: sharing a breakfast of cinnamon rolls and coffee at our coffee shop on the town square.
At the end of each month, (or beginning), I review my yearly goals and spend some time reflecting on how I’m doing in living the life I want to live ~ a way of becoming my own accountability partner and having frequent check-ins to evaluate my progress. I’m still in the process of revising some of my goals as I encounter successes…..and setbacks. I’ve worked on learning new photography techniques, and that knowledge is being put to great use for my nephew’s new dog business website (success!), but it’s hard to travel Route 66 with all its burgers and fries, coneydogs and shakes….and great desserts….without gaining weight (setback!). So new goals have asterisks for the month of July, when I will report on them in a few weeks. For the month of June, here’s my goal reflection:
Category
Goals
My Progress
Literature
*Read for Sarah Donovan’s Book Group
Send out Postcards
Blog Daily
* Write at least 2 chapters for writing group’s book
Ethicalela.com has a new book group! First Book: Healer of the Water Monster by Brian Young (https://shorturl.at/coAHN
I continue to send out postcards – I would estimate about 30 this month alone, with travel along Route 66!
I continue to blog daily, and the daily writing and reflecting is a wonderful habit for me. I don’t feel complete without some form of daily writing,
My writing group is writing a series of new books, and I will spend time writing chapters for these in July.
Creativity
Improve blog photos
*Make a rag quilt for a new grandbaby
*Create Shutterfly Route 66
My nephew asked me to make photos for his new business website, so maybe the new techniques I’m learning mean that I’m improving in photography!
I am having a new grandbaby this month, so a new quilt will be on the month’s menu!
I’ll create a canvas or two, along with a photo book using our Route 66 photos! (Oh, and I got creative with spray paint, too – graffiti is fun!).
Spirituality
Tune in to church
Pray!
Keep OLW priority
We will tune in to church by radio or YouTube and catch up with services missed while on the road traveling.
My car is still my prayer chamber for daily prayer, but I’m shifting it to the shower for summer, since sometimes I my habits change when I’m off contract at work for the summer. I’m still keeping my OLW my priority: pray!
Reflection
Write family stories
Spend time tracking goals each month
I’ll be sharing more family stories through small moment experiences along Route 66 in the coming days.
I’m tracking goals, revising, and considering some new categories as I look at my goal table.
Self-Improvement
*Reach top of weight range
This is a setback for me this month. Part of May and all of June was not a good one for weight. I’ve gained back about a third of the weight I had lost, and I need to transition to Weight Watchers point counting, which has been the plan since starting Optavia. I need to make the shift for July – and stay out of the retro diners with burgers, fries, and shakes.
Gratitude
Devote blog days to counting blessings
The gratitude category was strong for the month of June. At every turn of the corner along Route 66, I realized the beauty and wonder of our great nation and its history. I shared the amazing experience of travel with Briar’s brother and his wife this month. I also visited one of my children last month in Kentucky and will visit another one this month in South Carolina. Life is good!
Experience
Embrace Slow Travel
Focus on the Outdoors
While I covered a lot of distance in the month of June with road trips through Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, and New Mexico (NINE states in ONE month!), the pacing was relaxed. I didn’t try to do too much in one place – – I enjoyed the moments! I visited Dunbar Cave State Park in Tennessee, Palo Duro Canyon State Park in Texas, and Sandia Peak in New Mexico to enjoy the outdoors and the grand views of nature and experience time in the great outdoors. I’ve been way far up and way far down on landforms and in goals, but it just goes to show that the peaks and the valleys can both be beautiful places that give us unique views!
Common Threads 