November Writing Challenge Day 14
The test results.
When you’re little, it’s all about what the U.S.S.R. stood for and the capitals of the 50 states. Then it was what value did x stand for and please list thirteen characteristics of a positive neutron.
{The first actual life changing test is taken at 16…some of us had to take it a couple of times. Stop signs are overrated.}
And it all boiled down to what you scored on the ACT that would determine the rest of your life. Or so we believed. Oh, how our naive minds believed. What we didn’t know is that these were the easiest tests to pass…the ones we actually had some control over.
On to college, the days of relentless testing of the essay variety. What did this particular poem mean to you and what is the most significant symbolism in Dante’s manuscript to his mother? And all for what? So we can get a job where they don’t even glance at our GPA or ask for verification because they’re gonna give you the bottom of the barrel position and tell you you’ll have to make your way up the food chain…or if you’re a girl in a man’s world you may get lucky enough to be told the truth: “There’s no ladder to climb”, even though they’ll hire several men behind you who move into supervisor roles that don’t have your education level or experience…Oh, sorry, I got off topic. We’re talking about test results.
As we mature (well, physically, anyway) we may perhaps have to take a pregnancy test.
As we grew up, we maybe discovered that the most important test results aren’t the ones where we give answers on paper, but it’s the tests where we submit to blood and tissue sampling…and we wait. Just like when we waited on the teachers to grade our papers and we had to wait on scores…you wait for an envelope in the mail or you wait for a phone call from the office or you call a number when an automated voice gives you your result. Is it the big C or is it just a spot? Is it an ulcer or is it acid reflux? Is it a heart attack or anxiety? Is it pregnancy or is it constipation? (I’m serious. That happened to TWO DIFFERENT girls I know!)
Lets not get hung up on test results. They only matter in the moment. Live all you can while you can. Because tomorrow is not promised, and life is but a vapor. Drive like you stole it.
November Writing Challenge Day 13
Water flowed
My house is old, as I have mentioned a few times. We frequently have plumbing problems, especially in the sinks. I think we’ve got everything all fixed up now, after many years of not having a working bathroom sink in the bedroom, and then several of not having one in the main bathroom. That means brushing your teeth in the shower and washing your hands in the kitchen sink. The first year I ever cooked a turkey for Thanksgiving, I had a bucket under the sink until we could get Johnny’s buddy Scott the plumber over. I would have cried if it would have helped. Thankfully Johnny is pretty handy and has fixed all the issues that have come our way. Even when he had to cut the backs of the cabinets out and taking a saws-all to my pink bathroom wall. But it’s a small price to pay, I assure you.
I remember when we were dating and he was working over in North Carolina, the shower stopped up. I had done everything I knew to do (pouring a gallon of Drain-o in the vicinity of the drain and praying) and it was just at a standstill. I was bemoaning my troubles to him even though he couldn’t do anything. I could clearly visualize the tub rotting and falling through the floor into the basement and then how would I get clean? The creek was cold and I’m way too lazy too heat water on the stove and bathe in a stock tank for cattle. There’s this picture of a cowgirl in one of those, you know, long legs slung over the side, blonde hair cascading with a cowboy hat perched jauntily on top, boots parked at one end…
Yeah, I wouldn’t look anything like that. More like a Charolais heifer belly up from falling in.
But as I’m chatting with Johnny I hear this godawful gurgling and chug-chug-chug noise and after I collected my wits from the ceiling I figured out it had to be the tub so I poked my head around the corner and sure enough….
Water flowed.
November Writing Challenge, Day 12
It evaded me.
Being a bit of a flake, thoughts evade me constantly. Sometimes I’ll be smack dab in the middle of telling a story, get distracted by whatever it may be, and couldn’t tell you for love or money what I had been talking about twenty two seconds prior. I also keep the dictionary app open on my laptop when doing any writing because I can almost think of what I want to say….almost. So if I can put in the word I can think of, I can usually come up with the one I can’t.
I’ve never been a hunter, other than that one time, so I don’t have any thrilling stories of how my prey evaded me. What? You wanna hear about the one time? Well sure, I have nothing else to do, besides read a 291 page book by Wednesday for book club.
I was in 5th grade and had just completed the Hunter’s Safety Education Course with the rest of my classmates. We’d went out to the dam and shot clay targets with a .410, which was not a big deal, since I’d grown up around a bunch of men that were outdoorsy. Uncle Dale had had me shooting BB guns since I was about 5. (But I still don’t bait my own hook). Anyway, he’d had this idea (dream?) of taking me on the juvenile hunt once I passed the hunter’s safety course. I wasn’t opposed. Until it came to getting up at 4:00 am and setting out for parts unknown in Middle Tennessee. I started the day off deaf, according to him, when he told me to shut the gate and I was probably already nodding off in the dark warmth of the old Ford.
We arrived at our destination and began walking. I had my own personal twenty eight pound backpack to heft, along with my gun, in borrowed boots. Of course it was fall, and there was about ten inches of leaf litter on the ground, disguising lethal rocks and holes. Leaves are slippery, themselves, and I went down once, jamming the end of the gun in the ground. After we got that cleaned out, I think we walked about sixteen miles, but it was still dark when we stopped for the sunrise overlooking a valley. I was relieved to stop, if only because I was tired of being told to make less noise tromping through leaves. Hello? Impossible. I’m more Irish than Indian.
The good thing about walking was I stayed warm. The bad thing about stopping was I got cold fast. Sitting there on that slab of limestone, I had three thoughts: #1) I was cold. I shivered, trying to keep my teeth from chattering required concerted effort. #2) I was hungry, but the thought of pulling my backpack off and rooting around for the peanut butter and crackers was exhausting. I was tired already. And Uncle Dale had told me to be still. And quiet. It was hard for me to be either. #3) I had to pee. And I didn’t want to tell him, because he had asked me when we got to our destination and I had said no…but now I had to.
My eyes were tired, and there wasn’t anything to look at besides the field, devoid of anything besides knee high grass, so I shut my eyes. I guess I drifted off, because next thing I knew he was poking at me, telling me to open my eyes and watch for deer. *Yawn* Why did I have to watch, if he was watching too? Couldn’t he just watch for both of us?
When that particular location didn’t work, we were on the move again and I had to GO. I was dreading this, too, being layered in all these borrowed clothes that I wasn’t entirely sure how I got bundled into in the first place. I finally managed, and got everything pulled back up with minimal bunching. Off we go.
I remember crossing a creek. I remember being drained, with a headache on top of that. We had eaten, I think it was just the stress of the day. The only reason I even wanted to shoot a deer was to impress my uncle, but I wasn’t looking forward to all the additional work it would require…and all the guts. Ew. The guts.
So I began to pray we wouldn’t even see a deer. No deer, no deer, nodeernodeernodeer, I chanted with every step. And it worked for awhile. We’d crossed the strip mine field and were following a creek bed when we spooked up a spike. I hadn’t been paying the slightest bit of attention, other than watching the sun get lower in the sky and trying to decide what time it was. Uncle Dale got really excited, though, and was telling me to shoot. I was fumbling around and couldn’t remember where the safety was when he took it from me, flipped the button, and handed it back.
By this time, the spike with his white flag tail had bounded to safety. Although, truth be told, it was never in any danger from me. Uncle Dale was disappointed, I think he cussed a little, but I was secretly relieved. Now we could go home. The little deer lived to tell all his buddies and I could take off this ridiculous itchy blaze orange toboggan. And take a little nap on the way home.
So we went by the farmhouse and met the property owner, Mansel, told him of my almost-adventure, and set back off to East Tennessee.
I can’t remember if Grandmother bought me The Yearling before of after this escapade, but I remember cherishing the book much more dearly than the trip. Get yours HERE.
I haven’t set foot in the woods since with an intent to kill. Uncle Dale still goes right regular, he just got back from Catoosa, as a matter of fact. The closest I’ve come to going with him again is when we rode over to the Hicks property and hung a tree stand a few years ago. We don’t share this particular hobby, although I do appreciate the fact he tried.
I love deer meat, but I really couldn’t have less of a desire to go kill one. If I was hungry, on the other hand…well, hopefully I wouldn’t be telling any evasiveness stories.
Something else that has evaded me is fame and fortune. But that’s probably for the best. I’m insufferable enough as it is.
If you’re one of those readers who has to have a character you identify with, or at least like, this book is not for you. Come to think of it, Gillian Flynn is not for you.
The book dragged for me in the middle, hence the four stars. Otherwise, probably her best one. What a tangled web of deceit she weaves! But beyond depressing.
What is it with these families in Kansas murdered in their house? Maybe it’s just because I finished In Cold Blood the other day. I do appreciate Gillian Flynn for giving us answers and tying up loose ends…even if they aren’t the answer or the ending you want.
November Writing Challenge Day 11
Walk the dog.
I’ve never lived in a place where I had to walk a dog. I did, as a child, have a Greyhound that I entered in the dog show at the fair because I couldn’t enter my Chow Chow; he was a little temperamental. So I walked her in a circle and won a Purina dog bowl and a blue ribbon.
She won best in class because she was the only Greyhound anyone had ever seen. Sevier County in the days of yore aren’t like today with all these rescue groups. The majority of dogs spent their life on a chain. The good life meant they had a fence to run around in. One that lived inside was a novelty….and people whispered behind hands not to eat what they brought to dinner, because “they had a dog in the house”. ☺ Now you’re weird if your dog lives outside, and hated by your neighbors if it’s tied.
On the other hand, my momma is a yo-yo queen and she can Walk the Dog.
All I can do is get tangled.
November Writing Challenge Day 10
Used tea bags.
Are you kidding me with this? What weird little topics they’ve come up with.
Well, I do have one thing to say: I do think about reusing them. It seems such a waste to just use them the one time. Especially since I buy the big pouches for the gallon size container. But I also know that tea will mold if left out of the fridge….although I guess I could put it in the fridge but that’s too much aggravation. Then it would be like the half-onions that accumulate in there that grow things after a time.
I’ve also heard they’re good for under eye circles but I haven’t tried them. I liked those little fabric cucumber slices that you could keep in your fridge for that. I don’t think anything works but Rodan + Fields, honestly. Their lash boost has made a believer out of me.
So. Used tea bags. Hmm. That’s about all I’ve got to say about that.
November Writing Challenge Day 9
No, you don’t.
This morning I had a conversation that has haunted me all day. I have the feeling it’s going to last a lot longer. I knew part of his story, but not all.
This is the story of a man who changed his life twice.
He was a young man with a good job, working as a team lead in the receiving department of a sizeable company. Benefits, decent wages, and a workable schedule. He had a girlfriend with a baby on the way. Not a glamorous life, but an honorable one.
And then, as things do, something happened. He met the wrong people, went to the wrong places, and began to do the wrong things. He started selling drugs, which led to doing drugs. He lost his job. He sold a sports car for eight pills. (The equivalent of $200). He lied. He stole his momma’s laptop to hock for drug money. She let him come back. He fleeced her for $350.00. She let him come home. He stole his daddy’s pistol, and that was the end of coming back home. He had changed his life. His path was no longer clear.
He lived under a bridge off Broadway, where the KMart used to be. His mother came every day and picked him up and took him to the Pilot to take a hot shower for $7.00. He got so cold at night he wrapped his feet in toilet paper then stuffed them in his shoes. He slept during the day so he could hit the streets at night with his girlfriend. He would do whatever drugs he could get his hands on, and used intravenously for six years out of ten total years of drug abuse. He was so destitute he would hunt discarded cigarette butts, shake the tobacco out, and roll them into a new cigarette. That’s pretty desperate for a smoke.
“Did you ever think about what you were doing?” I asked him as he just looked at me levelly, not ashamed, just matter of fact. The past is just that- the past.
“Yeah. The baby was three days old. He’d been taken from {my girlfriend} because she tested positive for drugs…so he did, too. It was suboxone, which is what they give pregnant women who are users, but she didn’t have a prescription for it, so they took him.”
“Who had him?” I pressed, imagining he was in custody of the state.
“My ole lady’s ex-boyfriends parents. They had the other kid too. And I just thought, ‘Who are you? Somebody else is raising your kid. You’re living under a bridge. You stole from your parents.
“So I called my momma to come get me.”
This is where our conversation ended for the time being.
The Junkyard Cat***, as I affectionately call him, has been clean, sober, and proud for just over three years. He’ll tell anyone his story, knowing that the more people who know, the more people who will keep him accountable. He also wants to help people. He wants everyone better, because it’s a dark, dark road. We had gotten started on the topic because he brought up this guy he knows who has relapsed again. “He had everything give to him. I didn’t have no help. I mean, I know I lived with my dad, but this guy–his parents bought him a brand new car when he got out of jail. They bought him a trailer. He was hanging out with his brother, his brother kept him occupied and out of trouble…he always only lasts three or four months. As soon as he quits hanging out with his brother, he finds trouble.”
“Do you still think about it?” I always wonder how difficult it is to break that kind of habit. I could never start, because I could never stop. I can barely quit Facebook for three months during Lent.
“Yeah, but not like I want to go back to it, just…I remember how it made me feel, you know?” He cocks his head and squints an eye like a junkyard cat would, and I nod, even though I don’t know.
He now has a better job than he had before, driving a company truck, and is a spokesperson and salesman for a family owned company. I applaud him, and I pray that he stays strong. I know he will. He’s in the light. It’s a “No, you don’t, Satan,” kind of story. A battle.
So he’s changed his life again.
I started to begin this by saying, “I know this guy who was homeless at one time.” But he’s not defined by that, and he doesn’t deserve that. He deserves his good job, and the love of the Lord, and his son in his arms at night. He deserves this better life.
***the Junkyard Cat nickname is derived from traits people share with animals. This man isn’t big enough in stature to be a junkyard dog. He’s pretty thin, and looks just a little bit mad all the time. Like an old tomcat who’s seen his share of hard living. The kind of cat who isn’t any particular color, but at one time may have been calico. He’s missing patches of fur here and there. He’s got scars from old injuries and fights, maybe a healing scab or two. His tail is kinda crooked and his eyes are permanently squinted from being suspicious his whole life. One ear is flicked in aggravation, the other is barely hanging on from a scrap years ago. He doesn’t scamper; he slinks, he skulks, he stalks. He saves his energy for when he needs it. His true pleasure is stretching out in the sun and making mice nervous. If a cat could have tattoos, he’d have a bunch, symbolizing where he’s been and how far he’s come.
November Writing Challenge, Day 8
Dot, dot, dot…
I have approximately 779 stories bouncing around in my head right now to elaborate upon. I know that it’s not necessary for me to only tell one, but I don’t want to wear out my welcome. Not everybody has hours upon hours to loiter online reading ramblings of the resident redneck. So let’s get down to it.
First of all, I have several prayer requests on my mind. And I know y’all count on me not to get all religious but one of my very-good-oldest-friends in the world lost her dog today. Well, technically it was her husband’s dog first, but she knew Buster from his earliest days. Emme and Buster were buddies when M&M’s relationship was blossoming. (This is also poignant-Emme had a last visit today with her old friend. And this is getting complicated, but the reason she doesn’t live with them is because she was a little short on patience when the girl children came along, so Emme relocated the grandparents farm). Anyway, the children are understandably upset-it’s their first close death experience, I’m sure MBM is distraught, he’s had Buster for like, fifteen years, and M is quite miserable with her own grief plus dealing with the girls’ trauma. So there’s that. Next is a lady I’m close with who lost her mother a week and some days ago. She is definitely having a hard time coming to terms with it, as you can imagine. Please lift her up. And lastly, Joe Woods. He’s broke his hip twice (I’m unsure if it was the same one both times or different) but really, I think he’s doing okay…I want you to pray for his caregivers as I’m sure he’s not the sunniest patient they’ve ever encountered.
Now, back to your regularly scheduled blog.
At first I pictured easing y’all into some different scenarios and leaving you hanging. Like, putting you on a rooftop balcony in the French Quarter in a robe, sipping a café au lait and watching the city come to life before you while the fog rolls in off the Mississippi, wondering what the day would bring in your new position as a Jazz performer at Preservation Pub…
Or what would it be like to wake up looking at the road every day. Climb out of your cab behind the wheel and take to the interstate for another ten hours, just rolling across America’s deserts and plains…
Or to wake up looking at the ocean, waves gently lapping in, bringing with it storms and treasures…
But I finally settled on this. I’m changing the lead character’s name to something I know it’s not even though I don’t really remember his real one.
It was a typical day at 911 dispatch. We were sitting around one Saturday eating Cheetos and Pop Tarts. The phone rang. A phone ringing in the dispatch center is unlike what you’re accustomed to, obviously. It’s a wailing, screeching, piercing, set-your-tongue-against-your-teeth alarm. Amazingly enough, you get used to it pretty fast.
“Sevier County 911, where is your emergency?” Possum answered. (We called her Possum because if she got mad at us, she’d sull up for awhile).
“This is Lonsdale Adams, 924-86-0000, and they’re tryin’ to arrest me!!!”
“Sir, where are you?” WpH2 (back in the day GPS) was placing him on a residential street in Gatlinburg.
“This is Lonsdale Adams, 924-86-0000!!!” Came his belligerent voice again. We’re all looking at each other incredulously. There were four of us in there that day, and the three of us that were muted were quickly conferring in a whispered tone what the hell the guy was talking about.
“It’s gotta be his social,” one of us said.
“I’m a ref-u-GEE up here from Katrina and they’re trying to take me to jail!!!!”
“Sir, where are you?” the dispatcher kept repeating. That is absolutely the first thing you have to establish with any call before the location is lost, because you can always send the cavalry to an unknown problem, but if you don’t know where to send anybody, there ain’t much you can do.
Thus begun the cussin’, the likes of which will not be repeated here. We gathered he was on an (adjective, adjective) trolley, minding his very own (adjective) business, trying to get home. It became clear around this point that he was quite inebriated. Code for that is ETOH on board. We could hear scuffling in the background and directly a stern, agitated sounding gentleman informed us that he was in custody of the Gatlinburg Police Department and thankyouverymuch. We disconnected with an audible sound of relief. What the heck?! People are crazy. We talked about him for the rest of the shift, speculating on what may have happened. We even listed to GPD’s radio traffic for awhile trying to glean more details. He continued to give his social in the background to anybody new. We decided he must have been in the military or something since he recited it so readily.
Weeks went by, and although we talked about Mr. Adams from time to time, he was eventually forgotten, lost in the shuffle of all the other crazy drunken phone calls we received on a daily basis. Evidently it’s not just exes you drunk dial, it’s 911, too.
It’s the height of summer and everything is booming in our tourist town.
“Sevier County 911, where is your emergency?” Again, same dispatcher.
“Hey, I’m up here in front of Puckers, and this guy fell in the middle of the road and he won’t let anybody help him…he’s pretty mad.”
“Is he hurt?”
“No, but I think he’s drunk.”
We can hear a man caterwauling in the background.
“Sir, without endangering yourself, could you check and ask if he needs an ambulance?”
“Uhhh…I think he’s alright. He’s just mad.”
You can tell there are a crapton of people witnessing this spectacle. And our caller kept saying, “I’ve got 911 on the line!” This was before YouTube was a sensation, or I’m sure I could provide you a link.
“Can you ask him his name?” Our dispatcher requested.
“Uhhhh…..sure….Sir, what’s your name?”
“Lonsdale Adams 924-86-0000!!!” he thundered clearly in the background. “I’m a REFUGEE from Louisiana!!!”
“Didja get that?” our good Samaritan asked as we all broke up laughing in dispatch.
“Yes sir.”
We sent the call on over to the police department and of course eavesdropped shamelessly on the rest of the call till they got there. It was highly entertaining. He really could cuss like nobody’s business.
So he goes to jail. Again.
A few nights later, I’m working and we get a request for a patient transport from the Gatlinburg jail to the hospital. Patient is complaining of chest pain. Sometimes they did this just to get a field trip, and really, I didn’t blame them. Imagine our surprise when gathering information for our card it was our good buddy Lonsdale Adams! Not to forget the 924-86-0000 part. If memory serves, he got halfway to the hospital and told them never mind, turn around, he didn’t think he was dying after all.
All is quiet on the Lonsdale Adams front for a good six months. Then one day…
“Sevier County 911, where is your emergency?” Possum again, of course. Because that’s how coincidence works.
“My wife’s not breathing!!!!”
“Sir, where are you?”
“This is Lonsdale Adams, 924-86-0000, in Gatlinburg!!! Send someone!!! Hurry!!!”
Everybody’s jaws dropped as our eyes bugged.
“Sir, what is your address?”
“We’re refugees from Louisiana!! Send an ambulance right now! She’s not breathing, she’s just sitting in her chair.”
Long story short, we finally extract the address, send help, and in the meantime we’re trying to get him to do CPR. Seems like he told that she had choked on her false teeth. I’m not trying to be funny, it really seems like that’s what he said. Anyway, the ambulance gets there along with the police, she is in cardiac arrest, and probably had already died but I reckon paramedics are obligated to perform CPR until a doctor is present to declare one dead. I’m not really sure. Maybe they don’t want the responsibility. Can’t say as I blame them. Or maybe they’re hoping to save one more.
Either way, they couldn’t save poor Mrs. Lonsdale Adams that day.
There was something fishy about the call and I remember we all were playing Angela Lansbury for quite some time afterwards. Her death appeared in the paper as “under investigation” and that an autopsy would be performed, but evidently that’s commonplace when someone dies of unnatural causes, or if they hadn’t been sick, at any rate.
I never did hear the verdict. And I think I recall seeing his obituary in the paper a few years ago.
People always ask me what my craziest call was. This one definitely takes the cake. It was the series of calls that made it so incredible; like a soap opera for 911. We would get “frequent fliers” aka drug seekers, but he was absolutely the most astonishing. I still wonder if he killed her…
November Writing Challenge, Day 7
Sculpted.
Meet Oliver.
Oliver hails from Newport Bay, Oregon. He was bought on a windy, rainy June day in an art gallery housed in a hundred year old building. I loved him at first sight. (As opposed to Johnny’s reaction when I trotted him out for their meeting: “Cool. Where’s the pot go?”) Oliver was promptly named after the acquisition and I was terrified his tentacles would break off if I left him packed up and stored in my checked baggage, so he endured a cross country flight nestled in my lap. He was sculpted by Michael Hopko in 2005. He has several brothers and sisters I would desperately like to acquire so I could have a whole octopus family here in Appalachia, but alas, I can’t hardly justify that kind of expenditure. Oliver is one of the coolest and most beautiful things I own. I wouldn’t say I’m into art, but I do love gorgeous pieces as much as the next hillbilly. Sometimes you need something perfectly weird to offset the mundane.
November Writing Challenge, Day 6
The carpet.
The carpet was ugly, and it would have to go. The sooner the better. The living room carpet had long since been torn up and thrown out, exposing golden Clear Grade oak hardwood flooring. It wasn’t beautiful and perfect anymore, though. After almost 40 years of being suffocated by a truly hideous parade of carpeting ranging from a puke green to what was once a burnt orange shag, the hardwood was marred by spots where the rubber backing had stuck and countless staple holes. But it cleaned up okay, and until I could afford to have it refinished, it would have to stay. Strategically placed rugs were lain. The first rug was almost as bad as the carpet-a blood red rose design knockoff Oriental that what it lacked in beauty made up for in size. But it would have to do.
I had been promised that the hardwood floors ran the length of the house, except in the kitchen and bathrooms. I was fixing to find out. Next was the bedroom I was taking over, due to it having an en-suite bathroom. I had stayed in the master bedroom for years, but there was no discernable difference in size. The closet was the main attraction in there. I enlisted some help and it didn’t take long to rip the decades old carpet out. We got the hallway while we were at it. Indeed, the same hardwood greeted me under layers of grime. The bedroom didn’t take a lot of scrubbing to get the bits up, but I remember there was one staple that nearly broke me. I was ready to chew it out of the floor by the time it was done. The hallway was worse, as it had seen more traffic over the years. But it wasn’t too bad.
I was working on a deadline; I had furniture to be delivered the next week and I wanted to have everything clean as possible and the walls painted so I wouldn’t be having to navigate around a bunch of obstacles. I got done (nothing like the last minute to banish my procrastinator tendencies), but when I would lay down at night, my arms would burn and quiver and I would have to eat an Ibuprofen to soothe the ache. It was the first true manual labor I ever performed. And when I finished the library floors, it was the last. I don’t know why the library was the hardest, but I was again working on a time constraint and I remember sitting in here scraping black gunk and pulling staples out with needle nose pliers and crying. I would snot into the bleach solution I went over the floor with twice before the pine sol and then wax and just keep going ’cause there wasn’t anybody coming to help me. I had to do it. And it was just work. At least it kept me occupied. It kept my mind off my Grandmother being gone forever, and Johnny being gone for what I thought was the rest of time. Maybe I was mourning for them, maybe I was crying because my arms hurt, or maybe I was crying because the elastic in my pantyhose was shot {Steel Magnolias plug}. The paint on the walls was still wet when the furniture was delivered, and I didn’t get the bookshelves moved over for a week. It was probably a month before I got all my books situated into some semblance of organization. Hardwood is hard work. Or it was one time, anyway. Thank God for Shug!
My Grandmother built this eight room, two story house as a newlywed, and somehow managed to pay it off in the midst of raising two heathen young’uns and working second shift in a factory. She divorced her husband before it was commonplace, and shot the dirt from under his feet when he called her bluff that the .38 wasn’t loaded.
And y’all think I’m crazy.
Our tastes aren’t similar, although that may have more to do with it being 1962 when she built this place, but I think both of us made it a home. She just didn’t like the work she thought you had to put in to maintain the gleaming floors (she had a buffer, for Pete’s sake), so she covered them up. I just let them peek out and don’t worry about the spots and stains. They’re still beautiful to me.
