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Amy
Halloween. Chester’s Gotcha Day. I took the day off to celebrate the latter. I detest Halloween. But I do enjoy seeing the fun costumes. And I ain’t gonna turn down a Reese’s Cup, pumpkin or bats or standard shape, I have no preference. So we’ve had the bacon and fried taters, he’s opened his four presents, representing one for each of his years here (although I’m sure he would have preferred the number in dog years equivalent), we’ve been to Chickalay for the requisite fluff cup and nuggets, and have napped in between all activities. Although it was over 80 degrees today, the breeze is cool, more so because I’m in the shade. But I’m watching the chickens wade through the fallen leaves from my formerly showy sugar maple. They’re all so unique in color and patterns. I find their gentle clucking therapeutic. I was never permitted to have chickens, I don’t remember the reasoning. Prolly ‘cause I’d cry myself dehydrated when the hawk made a meal of one of them. And in my family, we revere hawks and other wildlife above domesticated animals. ‘Cept groundhogs. They never were tolerated. It was the holes they dug, they’d hobble a horse or kill a cow. There’s a ball game tonight. There’s a ball game most nights. I don’t mind the noise, people are having fun and united, politics hopefully a long way from their thoughts…
Friends, Americans, Countrymen, lend me your eyes. Thanks to all the loyal readers and friends who have reached out to me in the last several months, checking to make sure everything was okay. It wasn’t, but it was. Nothing to alarm anybody about. Some of my undoing was my own doing, some of it wasn’t. It was a trifecta of loss, two friends and a leg injury got me down just as spring was cranking to full throttle. As I said on this day in 2021, life will kick you in the teeth time and time again but I just picture myself crawling to my knees, bloodied and disheveled, motioning for more, and grinning madly.Because weakness is fear. And I ain’t skeert. You ever win one of those goldfish at the fair? Like, when you weren’t even trying to win a goldfish, you were going for bragging rights against an old high school nemesis, or maybe the carnies offered some grand cash prize. But carnivals are twisted, and you have not a snowflake’s chance in the Sahara of winning what you really want. And you’re presented this sad little goldfish in its tiny plastic bag. If you’re unlucky, and the goldfish has a supernatural will to survive, it makes it through the jostling of the carnival, staring out and swimming madly but going nowhere, until you make it home and dump it in an old vase filled with chlorinated water…
It’s raining again.A week ago, we’d have been jumping for joy. Today, we quiver and pray.I see that TVA has declared the Nolichucky River flood a “one in 5,000 years flood event”. And I guess that’s good.I don’t know how people can sit on Facebook day in and day out, looking at all the trauma that unfolds across the world. I have been inundated with information for three days straight now and it’s proving to take a toll on my mental well being (some probably question how well it was to start with).Wednesday was downpour day for us in Sevierville. I had a bit of excitement getting through Frog Alley, but that was the extent of it. Thursday was more rain, but nothing unusual, really. Perhaps for the time of year. And all these warnings coming out about not traveling Friday unless it was critical. Schools were closed. We scoffed. All for some rain.And “some rain” is all Sevierville and my neck of the woods got.But just two counties away, upstate….Unicoi.Greene.And our neighbors In Cocke County, with little warning after Hartford Dam failed and downtown filled with water. Scary situation to see inmates being marched through downtown clutching their bedding.One of my board members lives in Cosby. He’s at a bit of a loss. Cosby ain’t got squat to speak of…
It is not my intention To make you think I am miserable I am merely tenderBecause I am a little sadI feel untetheredI am a little angryWith all of usAnd honestly I am quite tiredOf myselfAnd that is why I can sayI am everything I also Do not wish to conveyI am feeling Light spiritedOr apathetic The last thing I want Is to appear insensitive But I have to keep somewhat busyOr the ants in my brainTurn to termitesAnd then I’m goneJust like this morning There was no rushTo make coffeeAnd start my daySo I laid there awhileWondering if I could go back to sleepAfter only five hours One would hope soBut when I started to curl like a snailAnd my eyes began to wellI flung back my quiltAnd shook my headI will not allowSadness to overtake meLife is for livingI can embrace another dayEven if it does pale To ones beforeEven if it isn’t filledWith what I would chooseIf I had all my druthersI have notWent off my feedI have not Lived breath to breathThis timeAnd I thank God for thatMay I never drown In emotionsEver Again I have elaborated on this before, but this was in my memories today and I felt led to share. so you want to be a writer? by Charles Bukowski if it doesn’t come bursting out of youin spite of everything,don’t do it.unless it comes unasked out of yourheart and your mind and your mouthand…
Let me tell you something If you are targeting womenI would not selectTwo middle aged redheadsWho are supremely tiredOf everyone’s shitAnd wearing heelsThat hurt their feet Because not onlyAre they packing bad attitudesOne is packing a 9 mmAnd isn’t afraid to use itSo sit your ass downOn that park benchAnd decide if it’s worthHaving at least one bleeding holeTo make a woman uncomfortable Because she has a take no prisonersKind of policyAnd Shoot now Ask questions laterBecause life has not been Especially kindIt has been a good dayAnd I’d hate to ruin itWith a trip to prisonFor the likes of youLove from Appalachia,~Amy…
By Angela Hardin, via text 4/20/24 9:53 am Imagine. A probably 68-70 year old man. Glasses. Waxed down wispy hair on top, and a narrow ring around the outside. Thin and upright. Wearing a black leather jacket zipped halfway over a starched white button up. Straight cut, fitted starched jeans. Tight but not too tight. Strutting into the grocery store like Tony Manero in his alligator boots on an apparent rebuilt heel. I presume all of his attire is original from the eighties and that he takes his jeans to the cleaners to have pressed. Nothing about him was slouchy. He rolls into the check out with a case of Guinness and asks for a pack of Camel! I thought to myself, “This’ll go quick with two items and I can get out too” so I get in line behind him. Nope. He pulls out HIS CHECKBOOK! I’m like…. Um…… but I said hi so I can’t back out now. I gotta stand there and wait for him to write it out and ask what the total was twice😵💫 I was done in less than 90 seconds and bop out to the car. I notice he is corralling his buggy. And then he gets into a jeep. Like old school jeep. Like he probably bought new in the seventies. No top. IT’S RAINING. It has been raining so it’s not like this should have…
On my second patio of the afternoon I laughed for the first timeIn a few daysWhen my cousin texts meI try to say yesI will always brave the pollenTo eat sushiAnd drink beerAnd catch up on lifeWe will understand And have the hard conversations And tell the honest to GodTRUTHBecause no sense in sugarcoating it nowIt was supposed to rainBut I’m so glad it didn’t And now it is twilightThere is no moonNo starsBut I know they’re still thereJust like me Love from Appalachia, ~Amy…
I don’t know what I can sayIf you tell me I have sad eyesIt’s because I am sadIf you say I look tiredIt’s because I amIf you comment I’m short temperedI would cock my eyebrowBecause that’s not newsSo this afternoonI have lain my t-shirt quilt Underneath my stunted redbudI have sat upon itAnd tried to find some tranquility It’s not workingBut I don’t have anything elseI really want to doI am thankfulMy allergy pills seem to be workingAnd there has not been an invasion Of Boxelder bugsFor a few years nowI admire my ColumbinePink and yellowIt’s the little things, you seeDo I deserve to write of a battered heartOr restless nightsWhat are appropriate topicsYou reckonIf I could write of trite happinessWould my intentions shine through?So yesLush cloverInches from my faceBut still no four leaf-ers YetI wonder if you foundWhat you were looking for“You normally have to be bashed about a bit by life to see the point of daffodils, sunsets and uneventful nice days.” Alain de BottonLove from Appalachia,~Amy…
TuesdayOn ThursdayBecause TuesdayI was a jumbleAnd the last thing I wantedWas to sit in front of a keyboard and bleedBecause that is what I doIf we’re being honest about itBut TuesdayI had a horse to seeAnd I wanted softer edgesSo I blurred the lineWith Colorado Kool AidI’m no cowardBut sometimes I need a breakFrom facing life straight onI still didn’t sleepNot in the bedOr on the couchOr in the floorOr on the porchEven though I tried them allDid you knowThere are birds that sing all night?I do nowI’ve heard themBecause I saw 1:15And 3:30And seventeen other times I was awakeI was awakeBut I didn’t lookTo see if they had a bad eyeOr a wounded heartSo I didn’t mean to give you hopeThat I had given upOr that I would stop BleedingI’m sorry if you thinkI could quit that easyThank you to the friends who Know me well enoughTo know if I don’t have something to say I have lots to sayWho aren’t scaredOf my caustic tongueWho scoop and cup my spirit in their handsAs you would a hummingbirdGently, gingerly, delicatelyAnd ask, “How’s your heart today?”So I send them a poem And they say “I hate you had it in you to write it”I do too, I do tooBut I didAnd I’m still hereLove from Appalachia,~Amy…
I am so tired—And I am so thirsty—I don’t think of you,I don’t think of youI get upI get readyI don’t think of you,I don’t think of youI drive to workI check my phoneI don’t think of you,I don’t think of youI eat, I read, I fileI talk, I giggle, I smileI don’t think of you, I don’t think of youI come homeI pet my dogI don’t think of you,I don’t think of youI sit on my porchI paint my toesI don’t think of you,I don’t think of youI sigh, I drink, I cryI don’t think of you,I don’t think of youAnd at the end of the nightWhen I have made it another day,I lay downAnd I dream of you, I dream of youLove from Appalachia,~Amy…
