Horizon Nonet
one
day we
just let her
explore the beach
chasing seagulls in
surf, taking flight of her
own , freedom not yet tasted
in a big world where horizons
beckon us to follow distant dreams
Family Pictures: Chasing Seagulls
Family Pictures: It’s Been One Year!
It’s been a year. Dad died on Friday the 13th of June, 2025 in the wee hours of the morning, after succumbing to complications from pulmonary fibrosis aggravated by both colon and prostate cancers. He was an avid reader and antiquarian book collector. He never met anything he didn’t want to collect, but he couldn’t live without books. My brother Ken and I hope heaven has a big library since he couldn’t take any of them with him. Dad’s brother Greg, also a collector but who has more of a book salesman approach to managing the accumulation, is helping sell the books and getting them to “all the right targets,” as Dad so famously desired. A book in the right hands is indeed able to change the world.
Heavenly Tanka
today marks one year
that we haven’t had you here
(are there books up there??)
more important: are there dogs?
most important: Mom is there…..
Family Pictures: Swings
A Borrowed Line Poem from Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Swing
Rickety Swings
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
when phones and screens are nowhere to be found
when birdsong and laughter are the sounds
when families gather on rickety swings
Family Pictures: Strong Women
Strong women raised me, and it took a village. Before my mother died, she called her husband’s older sister and handed her the reins to be sure she’d be there for me; she knew I would need my Aunt Ann’s sage advice. Elizabeth Ann Haynes Downing, a retired educator who lives an hour north of me in Atlanta, Georgia, knew well the road I would be traveling as my brother and I would be left to navigate our Dad in her absence. Other than Mom, no other person on the face of the planet had ever done such a thing successfully, and no one has since. But Aunt Ann understood what we were up against. She, too, had tried her hand at it a time or two. I have two other wonderful aunts, but Ann has a keen insight into our family dynamics that no other aunt has lived.
My Aunt Ann has been a strong presence in my life from the beginning. Below is a picture of her holding me in the spring of 1967 when I was 9 months old, and she still “holds” me today! She shops better for me than I shop for myself and has been that aunt who would buy clothes for me and for my children and send boxes of them our way. Throughout the years, her church had an annual “gently used items” sale, and she’d get there early and shop for each of us.
Ironically, she knew both my college roommate’s mother and my husband before I ever did. When I moved to my current town in Georgia to be closer to my college roommate after my first husband and I divorced, Stacey and I discovered that her mother and my aunt went to Tift College together, and they still attend those get-togethers even today. Even more surprising, Ann recognized my husband Briar (Stacey introduced me to the man who is now my husband) as the manager of her grocery store from his younger days when he was a Kroger manager! Briar and I enjoy meeting Aunt Ann and Uncle Tom at the OK Cafe, one of Atlanta’s favorite classic diners, as often as we can get to the north side of Atlanta.
And advice. She has helped me make decisions and provided guidance as my closest relative second only to my parents. In many cases, she gave career advice that only another educator can give – – like how to get to retirement the fastest way when you know it’s time and find yourself looking for the door. I wish every girl could have an aunt as wonderful and loving – and smart – as my Aunt Ann! We keep in close contact with her children, our cousins Elizabeth and John, and my brother and husband and I enjoy getting together with them whenever we can find our way to be in the same place at the same time!
In December 2025, we celebrated Uncle Tom’s 90th birthday, and here we are below in the kitchen of their home in Brookhaven, Georgia.
I’m so blessed by this strong woman in my life, who talks family and education and politics and religion and books and all things life with me. The good Lord sure winked on me when he gave me an aunt this loving and kind!
Strong Women Shadorma
everywhere
I’ve been, you’ve been there
by my side
wisdom flows ~
one woman to another
strength from the tap root
Family Photos: Noah’s Ark
Then God told Noah, “Come out of the ark. And bring the animals with you so they can be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.” So Noah and his family came out with all the animals (Genesis 8:13–19).
When my children were little, my parents had wooden arks and every kind of animal you could imagine to go on the ark. They didn’t limit ark tickets to animals, either; they weren’t concerned about the Biblical accuracy of the species. We were an inclusive family who had the entire set of the California Raisins and Disney characters (and I think we really did have 101 Dalmatians) from Happy Meal toys, Calico Critters, Where’s Waldo figures, and even Pac Man pairs – in addition to the standard elephants, giraffes, monkeys and so forth on our arks.
The only things my oldest daughter wanted from the house when we were cleaning were the California Raisins. I managed to find several and send them to her, and today they sit in her home in Henderson, Nevada. These memories of ark days still bring joy to her, and in the photos I can see the grandmother/granddaughter bond of love as they chat and spend time – something my mother always did well. Mom could have taught a Masterclass on embracing all kinds, even those who may not appear to belong on the ark. She made room, just like I’m sure Noah did back in the day.
Calling All Animals: A Noah’s Ark Golden Hinge Poem
so Noah and his family came out with all the animals
Noah brought animals of all kinds ~ California Raisins, 101 Dalmatians,
and even PacMan and Waldo – – all kinds, not just
his own ideas of what was ordinary…..he surely looked at all his own
family and knew all their ways of belonging, then
came to decide that all creatures, even those
out of left field or from off the beaten path, and all those
with their own quirks and all their issues, yes,
all ….all….all….should be welcomed onto
the ark, for all of God’s children are, truly,
animals, after all……
Family Pictures: Seamstresses
My grandmother Haynes was a master seamstress. Georgia Lee Harris Haynes made most all her own clothes until her later years, except the Toughskins jeans for her wild-acting boys. Even Sears and Roebuck had to double down on strong threads for boys who ran the dirt roads of rural Georgia barefoot, fishing in creeks and sliding into the water on rocks. It was a skill that served all homemakers well back in those days, and as children of the Great Depression, these were the women who hoarded spools of thread like they were silver. Understandably. I would have been one of them, too, holding tight to everything I had.
I don’t remember my grandmother Jones ever sewing anything, but my mother sure did! She made us matching dresses throughout the years just like Maria and all those children in The Sound of Music wearing the living room drapes all through the town. She made most of her formals, including her own wedding dress and veil. Instead of carrying a bouquet, she fashioned a Bible with ribbons streaming down – the one thing I saved along with her wedding album.
And she tried to teach her daughter to do so much more than buttons and shoulder ties and elastic waists and bias tape for reversible wraparound skirts, but I threw my hands up in holy hell at zippers and cried real tears of frustration just like I did with piano lessons and the clarinet, and that was that. I made it through basic sewing training, but I never became a master seamstress in the footprints of the women before me. Now, I mostly make flannel rag quilts for my grandchildren on my mother’s prized Bernina machine, one of her most beloved treasures, and I think she’d be proud to know that it’s currently being used to make a stars-and-stripes-and narwhals quilt for her great grandson due to arrive July 4, 2026.
Sewing Zeno
wraparound skirts or buttonholes,
shoulder ties not
a hard
sell
elastic waists
serve me
well
I flee fast from
zipper
hell
Family Pictures: Water, Water, Everywhere!
Water.
As I go through family photos this month in the process of digitizing to share with other family members, if I had to choose the most common motif of place and setting in terms of geography, it would be water. It seems logical since I grew up on the coast that there would be water in our activities, but even in places that weren’t all that watery, we still managed to somehow find the water of a place wherever we went.
As a child, I’d go with my parents and grandparents to Fernandina beach to camp and fish. After a number of years of doing that, my parents and grandparents bought a place on the Sapelo River in Georgia so they could go there instead – – they traded in tents and the camper for their own place on the river and built a dock so they could leave the boat right there instead of hauling it around all the time.
We threw cast nets and trawled for shrimp, fished, and set crab pots. We could have lived pretty much off that river. Fresh seafood was always what was for dinner. My favorite part was going through the shrimp net when they pulled it up. You never knew what was going to be in there, from squid to shrimp to crabs, eels, octopus, fish, jellyfish, and even horseshoe crabs and the occasional turtle. The critters we weren’t keeping got tossed straight back into the water quickly, and that was part of my job. I had a pair of long tongs that I could use to get these things.
The day the river property sold, I wrote about it here. I also wrote about Ootie the otter, who lived in this bend of the river and naturally seemed to take to other animals and made his home base the eagle rehabilitation center run by Emmy Minor a few docks down. I loved visiting that place.
Lowcountry Boil was dad’s specialty, and it was sometimes what we had for holidays, too. It’s hard to eat turkey when there is fresh catch, all free straight out of the river, for the taking. And it’s tastier.
I miss those days of endless shrimp and crab.
Sapelo Cinquain
river
meandering
like life blood through the veins
it stays in the heart forever
calling
Family Pictures: Georgia Lee Harris Haynes
Georgia Lee Harris Haynes was my paternal grandmother. She was a pastor’s wife straight to the core, and she loved cats more than anything else in this world. Although I grew into cat allergies in my preteen years, I wasn’t allergic when I was younger. I learned my first great lesson about feline feistiness when I pulled the tail of her Siamese cat named Fye. I got a painful clawscratch from one side of the face to the other, and I never did that again.
Georgia Lee was a devout As the World Turns fan. That hour was my nap time, too, if I was staying with her. When I heard the show’s theme song come on, I had to go to my dad and uncle’s growing-up room and crawl in the bed. I wasn’t allowed to watch all that kissing. That was her laundry hour – her ironing board stayed set up in the living room, and she spent the hour ironing clothes she’d pulled in off the backyard clothesline.
And she made those thin layer cakes – chocolate or caramel would be waiting under the aluminum cake cover with a dent in it each time I visited. Her choice of clothing matched the shades of her cakes always ~ browns, tans, chocolates, caramels. She wore snap-up dusters and terry cloth sock slippers with plastic soles and almost always appeared to be doing a variety of household tasks, but you’d never find her house clean. Ever. Everything was everywhere, S&S Greenstamp books included – – the complete opposite of my other grandparents, whose motto was A Place for Everything, and Everything in its Place. These two grandmothers were opposites in so many ways, but one thing they had in common was that they loved their grandchildren and great grandchildren!
Georgia Lee didn’t talk a whole lot, but I’d often look over and see that she was smiling or laughing to herself, as if she were self-amused about something only she saw. Her favorite expression: My Lands!
I love these pictures of her, rocking me in 1966 and giving my daughter, her first great-grandchild, a music box for her first birthday in January 1988 as my grandfather Haynes looked on. It seems like it was jut the blink of an eye ago, and I can still see the wonder in their eyes as they watched her fall under the music box’s magical spell.
Music Box Tricube
the wonder
of a child’s
music box
to listen,
watch wide-eyed
to each note
to watch them
listening
mouth agape
Family Pictures: A Kid in a Candy Store
Throughout my life, the Haynes Grocery candy case was a treat. As a child, whenever I stayed with my dad’s parents in Waycross, Georgia where I was born, they would always walk me down to the grocery to get a piece of candy from the large oak and glass case that sat on the counter. If you look closely at the photo above, you’ll see a wood and glass case that drew every child from all around for a sweet treat. Parents would have to pick up their children to let them get a good look, and sometimes they would pull out the containers for kids to get a better look, as you can see above. Ansley is carefully considering what kind she would like. I can’t remember what she chose, but I do remember my choice was almost always plain M&Ms. And I remember the joy of seeing my own daughter choosing candy from that case. (You could get an ice cold bottled Coca Cola, too, and we would put salted peanuts in ours to make it better).
The store has held wide appeal for generations, and unfortunately, though the building is still there, my cousin Lucy could not continue on with the store once her parents died, so it closed and stayed in a state of disrepair for some time. Her father, my great uncle Laverne, ran the store with his wife Lucille, who died when Lucy was a young child. Laverne was the butcher, and everyone got their meats from the Haynes Grocery and Meats. I’m not sure whether Lucy has sold the store yet, but I know everyone wanted that candy case. I also don’t know who the highest bidder was or where the candy case is today, but it sure made a lot of eyes light up in its day. Once a kid in a candy store, ALWAYS a kid in a candy store.
There are two photos of the Haynes Grocery Store below, dating way back to the early 1920s/1930s era, and the one beneath it was taken in the 1990s. I look at that photo today and remember so vividly the way there and back from my grandparents’ house: out the door of the grocery, go left. Turn left at the corner, and walk down the dirt road on Creswell Street to the last house on the left before the road intersects. And if you looped the block, Great Granny Haynes’ house was on Prescott Street. And that was how fast I could get to candy back in the summers of my youth in a dirt road railroad town in the Deep South, where to this day I still don’t know how they never had central heating and air. I can still see the curtains billowing in the moonlight, hear the fan in the window and the horn of the train as it rattled down the tracks.
And every single time, I still choose the plain M&Ms.
An Abecedarian Candy Case
What to choose from the candy case? Let’s see…..
Almond Joy
Baby Ruth
Charleston Chew
Dubble Bubble
Fun Dip
Gumdrops
Hershey Bars
(I loved just looking at all the choices…..)
Jellybeans
Kit Kat
Lemonheads
M&Ms
Now and Laters? Necco Wafers?
Oh Henry!
Pixie Stix
(Quite the mix, but not so hard to pick!)
Reese’s Cups
Sugar Babies
Tootsie Pops
Unicorn Pops
Victory Bars
Whoppers
Xtreme Sour Warheads
York Peppermint Patties
Zero Bar
so many choices…..but I always picked
…..the plain M&Ms
Family Pictures
I’m sorting family pictures this month, making piles of who-might-want-what from the Haynes family photo albums. After Dad died, my brother and I discovered tubs and shoeboxes and plastic bins and entire furniture drawers filled with ephemera, memorabilia, sentiments, and photos. And just about everything else (he never threw anything away). Ken and my sister-in-law Jennifer have done the daddy lion’s share of the work of sifting and sorting and all the things that go with closing down a life or two, so these tasks of what remains that can be done from my home five hours north are gratifying and fulfilling to be able to contribute.
Photos were all over the place in the house, but figuring out what to do with them is no small task. I should be more grateful: I’m likely among the last generation of humans who will ever do this sort of thing now that pictures are mostly digital. I wish all of these snapshots were reduced to one simple thumb drive, but the upside is that I’m walking down memory lane and have found a theme for the month of June (and the rest of 2026, in a way): family pictures. Perhaps the easiest way to let go of old photos is to give them their proper moment in the spotlight and then share with others who can decide what fits into their lives to carry forward, and whether to keep or discard them. I have already tossed many, but the remaining ones landed in our truckbed to bring home on our most recent trip south.
If you’re a blog reader who has ever dreamed of taking pen to paper and writing, or if you’re a reader with a blog of your own and would like to join me in sorting your own family photos and sharing your stories, I invite you to come along and see what we can all unearth from the annals of time as we welcome the month of June. There’s really nothing quite like family photos to spark memories that inspire stories and writing.
So to start, I’ve created a system that I hope will help me simplify and sort. Below are the blog logos and themes I plan to use for the remainder of this year using family photos to drive poems and stories. I’m using them to designate piles to sort my photos and begin writing. Under each logo is a caption with the category I’ll use as I sort……I invite you to use the same system and share your photos and stories, too, allowing the memories to drive the writing and the writing to preserve all our family stories and traditions.
Memory Lane Nonet
come walk with me down memory lane
resurrect family members
relive all the best moments
bring the past back to life
then pick up the pen
write the stories
release them
to the
world
Common Threads 