She and I agree on just about everything, except politics and mayonnaise.  We’re angered by the same incompetent, idiotic, or inappropriate behaviors.  We both feel the world has gone to absolute hell with little hope of recovery. And we both think Ray Liotta is disgusting.

We’re also a lot alike in appearance and voice—relatives cannot tell us apart on the telephone.  I owe this to her having taught me to speak with an oft-repeated question/answer routine.

Who’s the prettiest girl in the world?

Sis-sy.

I called her Sissy because my parents made me.  They thought it would be oh-so-cute for the baby in the family to have pet names for the older siblings. And it may well have been, had those names had been allowed to develop with any spontaneity.  But they were invented and assigned with no input from me, and I was encouraged—forced—to use them until I was old enough to refuse.

Jenny is responsible for a good chunk of my upbringing—teaching me also to read, tie my shoes, and a whole bunch of intangible stuff like being a good friend and stopping to think about the desires of others.

I once saw her use a perfectly good blouse to help a friend stop a massive nosebleed.  And, one year, as I was wrapping a pair of slippers for my grandmother’s 80th birthday, she was putting together a little basket of nail polishes and lipsticks.

Why are you giving her that?

She might be 80, but she’s still a girl.

She taught me about sex, despite Daddy yelling at her, and switching the TV off right in the middle of an ABC Afterschool Special about puberty.  My parents were, apparently, in blissful denial about my need for sex-ed.  Or maybe they were just too busy thinking up nicknames for body parts.

Jenny also helped me develop my sense of style, which was fairly non-existent until I went to live with her in college.

There are other stores besides The Gap, you know.

She taught me about make-up:

Stop wearing that liquid foundation.  You look like an orange idiot.

And—after much resistance on my part—hair:

Your skull is three-dimensional.  FIX THE BACK.  It’s flat as a two-liter Coke back there.

She remains my personal stylist.  Not counting my Grandmama Clara, and that one woman in the Savannah mall that time I got hooty on buy-one-get-one daiquiris at Ruby Tuesdays, no one else has ever touched my hair. She has prepared me for the prom, my wedding, and when my child was born, she bought me a quilted, pink bed-jacket for the hospital.

It will look great in the pictures.  Real retro—like Doris Day.

Sadly, I never wore it, because I was too gorked-out on Demerol to sit upright.

She is also my advisor on everything from business etiquette:

If you sent that e-mail, you’re an idiot.  I’m sure your supervisors have nothing better to do than sit around trying to think up ways to uniquely persecute poor little you.

To entertaining:

Take a Coke can and swirl it around on a stack of napkins to fan them out.

To not wallowing in self-pity:

You’re coming with me to this New Year’s Eve party, mopey.

No, I think I’ll just stay here and watch movies.  I got ‘A Fish Called Wanda.’

Well, I got a bitch named Lynne. And she better get in the car. NOW.

Jenny’s not easily angered, but if you do manage to push that button, watch out.

Like the time she went to pick up two strawberry pies at Shoney’s. She waited in the lobby while the hostess brought the pies out of the kitchen unwrapped, laid them on the counter, and proceeded to check out some other customers before boxing them up.

Here yo pies.

Those pies? Those pies are not my pies.  I ordered fresh strawberry pie, not nasty cashier-elbow pie.

I long ago stopped calling my brothers Bo and Bubba, but Jenny still has a nickname.  It’s one I picked out once when we went to the greyhound races in Jacksonville, where I lost ten bucks on Clara’s Joy, the lazy mutt.  On the way, we passed a hot-sub deli, and the name of it somehow seemed to suit her.  And so, she became Lubi.

The original Lubi sandwich—a steaming hoagie roll filled with ground beef, mayo, mustard, cheese, and hot pepper sauce—is a classic.  There is nothing else like it.  It has been described as a “messy wonder,” and it’s been said people who have one will never forget the experience.

That sounds about right.

Everything depends on timing and good hair.

It’s difficult to say which of the two is the more important, but in a pinch, I’d trust a good ‘do over happenstance.

The Bible says hair is a woman’s crowning glory.  I’m not real sure what all that entails, but I do know that you can spend seventeen hours getting ready —make up magazine perfect, clothes and accessories finely matched, shoes just right—but if your hair looks like crap, you may as well be wearing a burlap sack tied with crime scene tape and Birks with black socks.

It makes me worry (just a little) for that faction of women who don’t have good hair.  My late aunt, God bless her, had hair so thin you’d swear she was wearing a frosting kit cap all the time.  And that was before she got the cancer.

The ones with Tina-hair are the most pitiful, though.

When I was about 6, I had this babydoll.  I named her Tina because the company that made her—Softina—had stamped their name on her behind.  She was one of those dolls that peed out of a grommet hole between her legs when you gave her water to drink.  Long about the third refill and diaper change, I got tired of that particular feature and stopped giving her a bottle.  Instead, I took baths with her, held her under until she stopped bubbling, and lifted her up so she could just piss straight into the tub.

The end result was Tina’s hair taking on an appearance and texture unlike anything else on the planet. The closest thing, I guess, was that old brush my daddy used to scrub the grill.  And no matter how much I washed it with strawberry Suave, or rinsed it with Wella Balsam, it stayed matted and stiff as wire.

A few years back, I came across a woman with bathtub babydoll hair.  She had been to the “girl doctor,” and brought in her prescription, from which I gathered her husband brought home more than a paycheck.  A nasty divorce ensued, and during her visits she would relay this or that tidbit about her ex.  I would listen, and be sympathetic (being a pharmacist is a lot like being a bartender, without the tips) but it was hard not to wonder if the other woman had better tresses.

I’m not even sure if I’d find it worse to have Tina-hair, or no hair at all.

On that subject, I asked my sister if she would shave her head in a show of solidarity if I ever had to take chemo.  She thought about it for maybe five seconds.

Shit, no.  But I’d buy you a truckload of wigs.

Who knows? Maybe we can even time it so they’ll be on sale.

I wore a dress my mother sewed by hand, and the only other thing I can recall is that it was mostly yellow with some sort of floral pattern.  And it had a little jacket of white eyelet.  At that time, all of my dress clothes were sewn, not purchased.  A few of my casual clothes were sewn as well, and this was a never-ending source of delight to the miscreants at my middle school, whose clothes were embroidered with horse heads and alligators.

And so, scrubbed and starched, with an admonition to mind my manners, I toddled off to my engagement.  The evening passed without notable incident, and I climbed aboard my pumpkin and went home.

It was a week or so later when my friend confessed to me that her mother had been told, “Neither of the girls knew how to properly use a fork.”   I was chagrined by these alleged fork faux pas, but more than anything, I was shocked to learn the woman had  spoken about it to someone else.

I could see, I suppose, the mentioning of it in an effort to correct horrible offenses in etiquette, but I had not chewed with my mouth open or talked with it full.  I kept my napkin in my lap and started with the outer fork and worked inward, and at no time did I use my utensils for “shoveling.” I spoke only when spoken to, and I maintained good posture.  I could not discern at what point I’d gone rogue with my silverware.

Plus, she didn’t even mention the ten or more minutes I’d spent absent from the table,  taking a crap the size of Pittsburgh.  I mean, between the two, I think excusing yourself to the restroom and being gone long enough to lay pipe from here to Alaska is the more egregious.

Several years later, I dated someone who, in retrospect, was a closeted homosexual who liked to pretend he was European, but that’s not entirely relevant.  He, too, felt it was necessary to comment on my flatware technique,  prompting me to think of many other uses for my fork.

I have appropriate table manners.  Why these two people took it upon themselves to correct me I cannot fathom. I feel it shows far less tact to comment on one’s mealtime shortcomings than to gracefully ignore them.  I mean, beyond puking, farting, snorting, making out, passing out, picking boogers, or eating with your hands, most table actions are forgivable.

Maybe one day, with a little practice, I’ll be properly presentable.  After that, who knows? Perhaps I’ll find a job as a lady’s maid or in a flower shop.

Wouldn’t that be loverly?

Originally published 11-12-2009 as Fork You on Where Insulin Meets Insolence

And I believe the reason we all turned out so well is about 38 inches in length, an inch wide, has 5 or so holes, and a buckle.  My father, a minister, and Mama, a teacher, were firm proponents of spare the rod and spoil the child.

We were raised with a certain set of values and code of ethics—a canon for proper behavior if you will.  And deviances from it were punishable by spanking.

Daddy was a consistent belt user, without fail.  Mama, on the other hand, varied her tool of choice depending on what was handy.  She’d rip the ball off a paddleball game and come at you with the plywood, flap you with a fly-swatter, or—and this was the worst—make you go pick out your own switch.

Getting a whipping with a switch was bad enough, but being forced to select your own instrument of torture was dreadful.  And you better not come back in the house with a twig, either.  You returned with a proper switch, or got extra licks for being impudent.

Let’s be clear, though.  None of us were mistreated. We were not beaten into submission.  There was nothing abusive or violent in these acts.  In fact, quite the opposite.  They were performed out of love, by parents who were actually parenting.

And the thing is, we really didn’t get that many.  After one or two, the thought of getting another one was enough to keep us in line.  My older brother will allege Daddy spanked him before church for “General Principle.” To this day my brother says if he ever meets up with that particular soldier, he’s going to kick his ass.

But me?  I can only remember three of note.  And they all came from Daddy.

The Fig Newton Incident

The earliest one I recall happened in first grade.  Daddy had returned from the grocery store with a box of fig bars, possibly his favorite cookie.  He was sitting at the kitchen table, enjoying a few, when I walked in.  He gave me one and I ate it, and asked for another.  I ate it, too.  When I asked for the third, he cautioned me.

Your eyes are bigger than your stomach.

He threw a lot of sayings like that around, some of them quite cryptic.

Do as I say, not as I do.

You’re not too old for your wants to hurt you. (?)

Children are to be seen and not heard.

It’s too cold to snow.

He went on to remind me if I took another cookie I should eat it all, not waste it.

Yes, yes, fine, whatever, just give me the thing.  I bit a sizeable hunk off and began to chew.  And it seemed the more I chewed, the more there was to chew.  Maybe Daddy was right.  My eyes were bigger than my stomach.  Oops.

I wasn’t about to admit I couldn’t eat it, so, I put the rest of the fig bar behind my back and sidled over to the trashcan. I pretended to look out the back door, hummed a little, turned my back to the trashcan, and dropped the half-cookie in.  A quick glance over my shoulder confirmed it fell down far enough I didn’t need to cover it up. I thought, as all six-year-olds do, I was a master of deception.  Victorious, I headed toward the den.

Did you eat that cookie?

I stopped and turned toward him. His tone was pleasant, as if he were asking had I enjoyed the cookie.

Yessir.

All of it?

Yessir.

You didn’t put any of it in the trashcan just now?

Nosir.

Suddenly, he morphed into a giant raccoon, knocking the trashcan over, dumping its contents onto the spotted tile floor, and rooting through it.

Ah-ha! He said it as though he’d discovered electricity.

There was the cookie-of-doom, surrounded by coffee grounds and crumpled paper towels, my teeth marks visible along its edge.

Two life-lessons were gleaned from the events that followed.

Do not lie.

Do not waste food.

The Eyes Have It

We were forbidden to use any sort of mild-expletive that sounded like God or Jesus. This ruled out gah, gosh, golly, geez, gee, sheez, and lord-y.

One day, while Daddy was reading the newspaper, I was having the That’s-not-fair-all-the-other-kids-get-to argument with Mama over something or other, and expressed my disgust with the situation by saying one of the forbidden words.

GAH!

Still behind the paper, Daddy reminded me not to use such words.  Irritated, I rolled my eyes and sighed.  He was still behind the paper, mind you, and yet, he jumped up, sparks flying from the friction made as the leather of his belt cleared its loops, and gave me the what-for for rolling my eyes.

For a time after that, I stewed about the unfairness of it all, and thought that had to be the stupidest reason for getting a whipping I could possibly imagine.  I thought Daddy had gone mad, perhaps from years of digging through garbage for evidence. I continued to think it was ridiculous well into adulthood.  Until the day a cashier at Wendy’s rolled her eyes at me when I returned my wrongly prepared sandwich to the counter.

I can’t go to that Wendy’s anymore.

Life lesson?  Respect. It’s what’s for dinner.

A Time to Dance

The final incident happened when I was thirteen, when I was certain I was too old to be spanked.

I was wrong.

It was suppertime, and we were having sloppy joes, one of my favorites.  Both my brothers and my sister were home visiting.  Fueled by the familial excitement and the thought of gooey cheese cascading over a mound of Mama’s delicious spiced beef, I could not be still.  I was dancing around and Daddy told me to stop because we were about to pray over dinner.

I stopped.  For a microsecond.  When everyone closed their eyes, I returned to wiggling my behind and bobbing my head in tempo to an unheard disco number.

After the prayer, I was promptly escorted to my bedroom where I received a lecture on the evils of juking of any kind, much less during a prayer. When Daddy went for his belt, I tried to talk him out of it.

I already knew this life lesson:  there is a time to be serious, and a time to be playful, and never the twain shall meet.  I merely had a momentary lapse of judgment.

I don’t need a spanking, really.  I’m sorry.  I’m so sorry.

He continued to remove his belt.

Really, Daddy, I promise.  I won’t do it again, ever.  I’m sorry.

He formed it into a loop.  Bend over.

But, DADDY!  I’m THIRTEEN!!! I don’t WANT a whipping!!!

Only then did he pause to consider my plea.

Well, then…He took a step back.

…You’re not too old for your wants to hurt you.

My daughter, barely seven months old, bounced nearby in her baby lounger, eyes fixed on a singing dog on TV. My husband was chopping vegetables in the kitchen, his knife falling into to the rhythm of the puppet’s song. All in all, a normal weeknight for us.

The phone rang, and it was my father.  I assumed he was returning my earlier call, and led with my usual greeting.

Hey!  How y’all doing?

Not too good, I’m afraid.

Uh-oh. He had adopted preacher-voice.  His normal speaking tone is light and playful.  Preacher-voice is staid and 100% business.  We were used to hearing it in church, but rarely at home, unless something unpleasant had or was about to happen, or one of us was in trouble.

Once, during my grandmother’s final illness, he’d phoned my sister and me with the daily deathwatch update, and gotten our answering machine.  We were in the habit of recording silly outgoing messages for it, and preacher-Daddy had been the unfortunate recipient of our latest effort, an Andy Griffith Show parody.  He expressed his disgust in full pulpit fashion.

THAT IS NOT A PLAYHOUSE AND THIS IS NOT A TOY PHONE!!!

So, with preacher-voice on the other end, I knew something was up.

What’s wrong, Daddy?

Your brother has been shot.

I dropped the pillowcase I’d been folding and sank into the sofa.  There was no question as to which brother. It was, of course, the police officer.

Daddy continued.

He’s okay, but he’s been shot three times, and has lost a fair amount of blood.

I said nothing.  It was one of those times you hope the person on the other end of the conversation lets you off the hook by saying April fools!

But it was May.

Daddy said he and my stepmother were leaving for Columbus and they’d call when they had more news.

I clicked off the phone and just stared at it, like it was something evil.  Like any minute, Freddie Krueger’s tongue would writhe out of the mouthpiece. I’m your brother now, Lynne.

What’s wrong? My husband walked toward the couch.

Mark’s been…shot. I whispered the last word, the way society ladies lower their voices for unmentionables like cancer and alcoholism. 

What!? How?

I don’t know.

Is he okay?

He’s alive. Daddy’s leaving now.  They’ll let me know as they find out more.

Within the next few minutes, I received calls from my other two siblings, and we discussed our separate travel plans as though it were Christmas, and this trip nothing more than a holiday meet-up.  No one acknowledged the situation at hand, except to ask a central question:

Who’s gonna call Mama?

Not It! None of us wanted that task.  We love her like no other, but she is the original worrywart.  If there is nothing to stew over, she will flat out create something.  And, she not only worries about things that are important, but also those of little or no significance, and you can never be certain on which she’ll fixate.

She had a wreck when I was in high school and nearly totaled the car. It was towed away, and she was taken to the hospital, but released. Hours later, I found her in the bedroom, sobbing.

What’s wrong, Mama? I asked her, expecting some sort of I-almost-died post-trauma revelation.

My luh-luh-lunchbox—the coooooler I take muh-my food to work in—it’s in the b-b-backseat of the carrrrrr!

So, who could predict how she’d react?  Would she come unglued over his injuries or fret about the bloodstains on his uniform?  In the end, my other brother volunteered for the task, God bless him. He is retired from the Navy, and I’m certain he used sailor-voice when he spoke with her.

She took it surprisingly well, threw an overnight bag together, and set out for Columbus herself in a matter of minutes.

With my husband deep into spring semester, I knew the baby would have to go with me, so I decided to wait until morning to leave.

The waiting was excruciating.  I had no information and it was driving me nuts.

I wanted details. I had questions.  Medical questions.  Pharmaceutical questions.  I wanted my grubby little Pharm.D. hands on his chart.

I tried to recall if any of my colleagues might work at the hospital, but couldn’t think of anyone, much less someone willing to commit a HIPAA violation.  I thought about pretending to be at work myself, and tried to craft some plausible reason a hospital in Atlanta would need medical information about a patient in Columbus. I came up with nothing,

I decided to try, of all things, the truth.

I dialed the hospital and spoke with the operator, giving her my name and explaining I was inquiring after a family member.  Naturally, I used pharmacist-voice.

How can I help you?

I know you can’t give out medical information, but he’s my brother, I’m several hundred miles away, and cannot get in touch with anyone in town.

I can ring the ER for you. hold please.

*Pan-flute music*

I’m sorry. There’s no answer at that extension.

Can you confirm for me he’s there?

Yes, ma’am.  He is here. He’s listed in stable condition, and that’s all I am allowed to say.

I thanked her for the information and hung up.

Stable condition did precious little to satisfy my need for info.  Besides, people on Law & Order in “stable condition” always die before Elliot and Liv get a chance to  interview them.  I turned to my old friend, Google.

It seemed my brother had been hurt during the aftermath of a robbery.  These brilliant criminal masterminds robbed a bank and then headed straight for the local mall, where my brother and his officers waited outside for the shopping spree to end. When the suspects exited the mall, they were ordered to the ground, and the two who were armed opened fire.  Four other men were captured, but the gunmen escaped.

I would learn over the next few days the men were pursued by state and federal agents to a hotel in Conyers. It was determined only one of the men had fired his weapon at the scene.  He came to a nasty—albeit just—end, at the hands of FBI officers.  He’d shot at and wounded one of theirs, too, and I don’t imagine the feds took too kindly to that. The other suspect surrendered and was sent to prison.

When it all began, my brother had been sitting at home eating dinner. He got the dispatch, and, as he was leaving, his wife said the same thing she said every time he went to work. Don’t get shot.

After having done just that, when he realized he was injured, he put in the call for a downed officer.

One of his men heard and ran over.

Who got hurt?

Me.

He was hit three times: shoulder, hand, and chin.  There was blood all over the trunk of the car he’d been using for cover. The other officer took of his own belt, and secured Mark’s bleeding arm in a makeshift tourniquet.

The town was abuzz with news of the shooting, and underneath it all beat a racially-charged pulse. The suspects were African American, and my brother, white. Every mention of the shooting, from news reports to private mumblings, carried a hint of the age-old conflict.

If a white man had shot a black officer, they wouldn’t be chasing him all over the state.

A wounded black officer wouldn’t get so much attention.

Born and raised in the South, I’ve been fed a steady diet of White v. Black my whole life, and, after a while, it just tastes bad. And this time, it was especially vile.

While the citizens of Columbus argued about skin, the surgeon sliced my brother’s. After the surgery, Mark had a ton of visitors. The Chief of Police, many city officials, several other officers, and a handful of friends and family streamed in and out of his hospital room. He was touched by the outpouring of well wishes from everyone, though he claims my daughter was his favorite visitor, and her toothless grin the best medicine of all.

After another procedure and several months of physical therapy, Mark recovered and was honored by his department.

He received several awards and mementos, among them the life-saving belt.  He was also awarded the department’s Purple Heart, and honored by the FBI with their Star medal, reserved for those seriously injured in the line of duty. And my uncle, a Vietnam veteran, re-awarded his own Purple Heart to Mark.

He was also given a football—personally autographed by coach Mark Richt of the Georgia Bulldogs—by his officer buddies.

There was another gift, too.

While Mark was still hospitalized, a soft-spoken, polite gentleman with graying hair approached a group of us—my father and his wife, her daughter, my sister, my other brother, and me—in the hall outside the room.

Are you Officer Starling’s family?

My father answered. Yes, we are.

I don’t want to disturb him, but I would like to leave this. He handed my father a blue envelope.

I’ll make sure he gets it. Daddy extended his hand and the man shook it.

The man thanked my father and left as he had come, without fanfare or flourish.

Inside the envelope was a card, and Mark read it aloud. The inscription praised his actions in the bank robbery, and thanked him for his bravery and sacrifice in protecting the community.

We were all moved by this man’s sentiment, and marveled at his taking the time to express appreciation to someone he knew only through news reports and rumor.

This man wasn’t anyone of note.  He wasn’t with the Mayor’s office, or on the City Council.   He wasn’t a local celebrity bucking for PR, or self-serving in any way. And, of all the things he wasn’t, what he was made a greater statement than any government official or bureau leader ever could.

He was an appreciative and concerned private citizen.

He was kind and he was gracious.

He was thoughtful and selfless.

And…

…he was black.

My awkward adolescence stretched itself into awkward adulthood.  My first real boyfriend didn’t come along until I was 19.  I liked boys, sure, but they never seemed to return the favor.  And, if they had, I wouldn’t have known what to do about it.  So pining away in my room, scribbling names in a notebook while listening to Chicago 17, and later, Peter Gabriel’s So, was the crux of my teen dating experience.

It was just as well, since my father was rather anti-boy.  The one or two times I did grab attention —in the form of a phone call—from the opposite sex, he interrogated me afterward to the point of exhaustion.

Who was that?

A boy from school.

What did he want?

To talk.

What’s his name?

Brian.

What did he want?

To Talk.

Where does he live?

I don’t know.

Who are his parents?

I don’t know.

What did he want?

To talk.

But I understood he was doing it out of love, and perhaps even fear, so I didn’t throw a fit and ask him why he hated me or fling myself across the bed at the unfairness of it all. I was beyond clumsy at boy-conversation anyway, and it was handy to be able to cut a call short, blaming it all on Daddy.

I did, however, in middle school, have the opportunity to say I went with someone.  That’s what everyone called it then, going together, though it was rare to actually go anywhere.  Nobody was old enough to drive, and most parents or older siblings were loath to oblige.  So sitting by each other in class, holding hands at lunch, and maybe stealing a kiss on the bus was the whole of it.

The handholding I could manage, the kissing, not so much. I had already gotten my first kiss, in the afternoon shadows of my best friend’s playroom while she pounded out some power ballad from Fame! on her piano. Surely no one else in history had such a well orchestrated—in both senses of the word—first kiss.

There we were, his green Army jacket arm around my Members Only shoulder, and we kissed.  Well, I kissed.  He more or less washed my face with his tongue. I was unprepared for this impromptu facial, and blurted out the first thought I had.

“YUCK!”

Well, I was not about to endure that again.  So, I agreed to go with a boy from another school, all the way across town. Crazy like a fox.

His name was Jayce, and we met at a Halloween party thrown by a mutual friend. I walked into her house dressed as a “baby doll,” clad in a pullover jumper, a blouse with a Peter Pan collar, and Keds, sporting a red circle of rouge on each cheek.  I wasn’t paying attention and ran smack into a werewolf.

His flannel shirt was ripped, his jeans torn, his hair was wild, but he was the cutest boy I’d never seen.

Throughout the evening, we performed the delicate mating ritual of the thirteen-year-old.  I would say something about him to my friend, she would relay the message, he would reply, and she’d come back and tell me what he said.  By the end of the party, he had my number, and said he’d call.

And he did, a few times. But most of our communication took place on college-ruled notebook paper, folded tight with the flap tucked in, marked clearly For Your Eyes Only.

Our pas de deux continued.  I sent him my eighth grade likeness, and he sent me a shot of him leaning against a white ’83 Mustang.  I sent him some stupid Smurf key-chain I’d gotten at the mall, and he sent me his ID bracelet.

And I agreed to be his girlfriend, despite never having seen him in person without fake blood dripping down his chin.

Then, the most terrible thing that could have happened did.

He asked to see me.

The sky thundered.  The ground shook.  All my careful calculations, the intricate strategies, the deliberate planning designed to keep this boy at arm’s length had failed.

Why me, Lord?  Why me?!

And so it was arranged.  To spare Jayce my father’s Gestapo tactics, I suggested he drop by the hospital where I volunteered, while I took my lunch break.

Reducing the likelihood of an ambush, I swapped with another candy striper so I could work the front desk that day. As noon approached, every whoosh of the automatic sliding glass door made my stomach hurt.

There was a BOY, and he was going to be HERE, and I would have to TALK to him and LOOK at him and OH.MY.GOD!

WHAT IF HE TRIES TO KISS ME?!?!?!?!?

Just as another volunteer came to relieve me for my break, Jayce walked into the lobby.  We said hi, and exchanged an awkward shoulders-only hug.  I suggested we move to a sofa in the waiting area—figuring he wouldn’t try to kiss me in the open. He bought me a Coke, and himself a NuGrape.  We sipped, hemmed, hawed, and managed a stilted conversation about the weather. I stared down at the bracelet it had taken me 15 minutes to put on that morning and fiddled with its silver links.

Does the name go out so people can see it, or in for me to see?

Out? Or in? Out. No, in. No, out…

He noticed I was wearing it.

“Hey, you’re wearing it.”

“Yeah.”

“It looks nice on you.”

“Thanks.”

After another five minutes of absolute silence, he stood up to leave.

“Well, I…I better go.”

If it had been a John Hughes film, this would be the part where I’d stand up too, and say, “Wait.”  Then we’d stare at each other while time seemed to stop, mesmerized, until one of us leaned in for a kiss while The Thompson Twins whined about teen angst in the background.

But it was not a John Hughes film.  It was not even a “very special episode” of Growing Pains.

It was me, gear stuck in high-awkward.

And so, true to form, I sat there staring at my wrist and said, “Bye.”

That was the last time I saw Jayce, or heard from him, or even heard about him.

I don’t blame him in the least. I was hopelessly hopeless.

But what doesn’t make sense is that he never asked—or sent word—for me to return his bracelet.

I still have it, somewhere.  Last time I saw it, I was packing my things up after college, getting ready to be married.  I ran my thumb along the nameplate where Jayce was etched in careful script, recalling the season of my endless ineptitude.

I popped it open, slid it over my hand, and tried to snap it shut.

It didn’t fit.

Truth be told, it never did.

I roll over and open my eyes.  As the old chiffarobe comes into focus, so does the realization of my whereabouts. I’m at Grandmama’s.  Cradled in the soft valley of the mattress, I have to roll and fight my way out of bed rather than just sitting up—the reason I love this bed and Daddy hates it.  He shuns any level of cushion, citing his “bad back” as a reason.  I imagine him in the furniture showroom, trying out on the various floor models.

Is this really the best support mattress you have?

Yes, sir, it is our most popular orthopedic brand.

I need something…more…solid…

Well, there’s a concrete slab in the warehouse…

Do you have anything firmer?

Not deterred by the audacity of bed manufacturers providing actual comfort, he built his own solution—a torture device made of plywood sheets. It is hinged, so it will fold and travel, and can be inserted between any offending mattress and box spring.

But he’s not here, and neither is Mama.  They’re off at some contrived Methodist “resort,” where he will spend his days in Building a Better Sermon workshops while she works crosswords near the TV in the hotel lobby.  And so, I’m with Grandmama for a week, as I am most every summer.

My brothers and sister are grown now, so this time together is ours alone.  I “spread-up” the covers—Mama’s phrase for half-hearted attempt at bed making, cousin to “bathe-off,” and “rinse-out.”

Before fluffing the pillow with the bright yellow daisies on it, I hold it to my face, breathing in its detergent-and-bleach perfume.  Nobody else’s sheets smell as good as Grandmama’s, and I’ve been known to sneak to her linen closet and take in big huff when I’m sure no one is watching.  That policeman at school assembly said not to sniff glue or paint.  He didn’t say anything about sheets, and, though I’m pretty sure there’s no rehabilitation program for linen abuse, I have to be careful because my mama tends to over-react.  After the forty-five minute scripture lesson I got for saying, “Crap!” at a friend’s house, and the I’ve-never-been-more-disappointed-in-you talk following my pantomime of smoking a cigarette, I don’t take chances.

One more whiff, and I pad over to the window-unit air conditioner and switch it off.  The room has cooled during the night and I feel goosebumps form as I wiggle out of my Holly Hobbie nightgown into a t-shirt and shorts.  Stepping out into the hall, I hear the squeak-squawk of Grandmama’s rusty glider as it brays like an old mule.

On my way outside, I pass through the living room.  With each step,  trinkets on the bookshelf and sideboard rattle. I scan the many photos of children and grandchildren scattered about, noticing she has already made a place for the new picture of my brother in his Navy cracker-jacks. Daddy gave it to her yesterday when he and Mama dropped me off.

I walk outside and find her rocking there, hands cupped around a mug of caramel colored coffee, a quilted green housecoat over her pajamas.

“Mornin’, Grandmama,” I say. She stops the glider so I can climb up next to her.

“Mornin’, baby.  Sleep good?

“Yes’m.”

She’s a small thing—at ten I am already taller.  She slides her slender arm around my shoulders and gives me a squeeze.   I’m her youngest grandchild and, therefore, her favorite.  Well, that, and I’m named after her

“I wouldn’t have named a dog Clara!” she scolded Mama and Daddy when they told her.

Five minutes later she was on the phone, calling each of her friends.

“You’ll never guess what they named the baby.”

She turns up her cup and sips out the last golden mouthful. “How ’bout some oatmeal?” she asks.

“Yes ma’am!” She makes the best oatmeal in the world—the real double-boiler kind—sugar and butter forming steamy, glittering pools on its surface.

As she stirs around the kitchen, I go back into the bedroom to get my book.     This used to be Pop’s bedroom.  Long before he died, Grandmama got tired of his incessant snoring and booted him into the guest room.  A picture of Florida’s Miracle Strip hangs above the bed.  A smiling water-skier waves, beckoning all onlookers to Panama City Beach.  I’m not taken in by her game-show-girl grin or the alleged miraculousness of the Panhandle.

I grab the paperback Mama let me order from a Weekly Reader flier at school and move into the den.  Grandmama used to have a beauty shop, and still does hair for her closest friends in here from time to time.  So I’m not fazed by the salon hair dryer next to the window, or the movie-star mirror with light bulbs that go all the way around.  God Bless Clara—a poem written by one of her long-time clients—hangs above the vanity where Grandmama works her own miracles.

“Oatmeal’s ready,” she calls from the kitchen and I toss my book on the couch and head to the dining room table, which is covered with a green vinyl cloth.  A bowl of waxed fruit graces the center, and while I shovel spoonfuls of warm, sugary goo into my mouth, I search it for the bite mark a younger cousin left on one of the bananas.

“Thanks, Grandmama,” I say, and lean back in my chair, full and content, my spoon clattering against the Blue Willow bowl.

“You’re welcome, sugar.  I’m gonna get dressed now and then we’ll decide what to do today.”

“Okay.”

I rinse out my bowl, put it in the sink, and walk back through the den toward the bedrooms.  Grandmama is already dressed and in the bathroom, her back to the sink’s mirror.  She is holding another smaller mirror in one hand, and deftly wielding a pick with the other, fluffing the “sad spots” in her hair.

“Reckon we might go fishin’?” I ask her.

“Fish don’t bite much when it’s so hot,” she says, “But we can see what Miz Ernest says.”

Miz Ernest is a good friend of Grandmama’s.  I don’t know her first name, because everyone calls her, “Miz Ernest.”  Miz Ernest has a pond shaded by thick-needled pines.  Fat bream flip and twist beneath its surface. When we go fishing, Grandmama and Miz Ernest wear straw hats that tie at the chin.  We fish with worms and cane poles because they think rods and lures are for cheaters.

Grandmama calls Miz Ernest, who also thinks it’s too hot to fish.

“Let’s go check on the worms anyway,” Grandmama says.  She keeps a small compost pile in the backyard, under the shade of a pomegranate tree. We walk to the kitchen where she empties the grounds from her coffeepot into a bowl and head outside to the “bait shop.”  She dumps the coffee bits onto the pile, and stirs it up with a stick.

“Look alive,” she says, and a handful of thick brown worms wriggle to the surface and then tunnel back into the cool earth.  “Too hot for the worms, too,” she says.

We go back inside and for the rest of the morning, I read my book, and she reads the paper.  Her police scanner crackles on low.  Near lunchtime, the phone rings, and I can hear enough of the conversation to know my other brother is coming for lunch.  He moved in with her after Pop died, but soon got married and moved out again.  He works for the police department in town, though, and drops in on her a few times a week.  About thirty minutes later, he walks through the door, dressed to protect and serve.

“Hey, baby sister,” he says, nearly picking me up off the ground as we hug.

“Hey, Bubba.”

When I was a toddler, Mama and Daddy decided I should address my siblings by nickname.  These pet names were assigned, rather than derived, and I had no input in creating them.  I wouldn’t have named a dog Bubba.

“Hey, Grandmama,” he says, kissing her on the cheek.  “What ch’all been doing?”

“Just sittin’ around,” she answers.  “Too hot to do much else.”

“You make sure you keep that air and those fans on, Grandmama.  They’ve had three heat stroke calls to 911 already this week.”

“Heard you had an 820 last night on River Road,” she says, moving into the kitchen to start lunch.  My brother had given her the scanner so she could monitor his whereabouts.  She memorized most of the codes.

“Just some kids congregating in front of a shop too close to closing time.  Made the owner a little nervous.  Nothing major.”

“Well, you be careful, anyway.”

“Yes ma’am.”

Grandmama fries up some of her greasy and delicious homemade burgers, which we wash down with glasses of Royal Crown. While we eat, Mark tells us his latest car chase story from beginning to end.  It’s better than an episode of CHIPs.  After lunch he heads back to work.

I help Grandmama clear the table.  As she washes the dishes, she says, “How ’bout a game?”

“Okay.” I don’t have to ask what game.

While she dries, I go over to the sideboard, open the lower cabinet, and pull out a box of dominoes.  Grandmama calls them “bones.”  She refills our glasses with ice and more RC, then meets me back at the table, dumps the bones out of the box and starts turning them face down, thunk, thunk, thunk. She swishes and swirls the dark wooden pieces—clickety clack—and they do sound a little like rattling bones. I watch her hands, timeworn from years of operating both shuttle and shears, moving back and forth across the vinyl.  Dragons on the back of the tiles dance beneath her tiny fingers.

“Draw ten,” she says, fishing a notepad and pen out of the cabinet. We carefully select our pieces.  The rest of the dominoes get pushed to the side and form the “bone-pile,” we’ll draw from later.

I flip my pieces upright and begin to arrange them in a semi-circle.  Long ago, Grandmama painted each set of dots on the dominoes a different color so Pop could tell the numbers apart faster. She’s serious about this game and won’t stand for any lollygagging.  I turn over my last piece and eighteen angry green circles glare at me.  I’ve got the double-nine and I hate it.  It’s impossible to play, and, even if I can find a way to play it, Grandmama will find a way to score off of it.

The object of the game we play is to leave multiples of five showing on the free ends of the domino chain.  We each draw a tile to see who will lay down first.  She wins, and places a six-four in the center of the table. “Ten points for me!” she squeals, marking a big “X” on the score pad.   We trade a couple of plays before she can’t help herself, and starts to coach me.

“Three-four’ll get you five…One-seven’ll get you ten…”

For someone who dropped out of school in third grade she sure can do some quick math in her head. I can’t even look over my pieces before she’s telling me what can score.  If you don’t have one of her suggestions, efforts to score are futile.  I stare at my tiles anyway, hoping to find a loophole in her arithmetic.  I never do.

We keep going until she wins, which she always does, but I don’t mind.  I like watching her morph from matriarch to child, clapping and laughing like the cymbal-playing monkey I got for my birthday.

***

It’s near the end of another summer, and I roll over and open my eyes, the old chiffarobe coming into focus.

“Ya’ll gettin’ up?” Daddy asks, sticking his head in the door. My grandmother—lungs destroyed by a lifetime of breathing in cotton fiber and permanent wave solution—lost her latest bout with pneumonia.

“Yessir,” I answer and poke my sister, Jenny, in the back.  She stirs, grumbles a bit, and brushes past him toward the bathroom.

I roll over and sit up, twenty-two year old legs dangling from the edge of the bed.  I have defeated the mattress a final time.

“Everybody coming back here after the service?” I ask.

“I imagine so.  Better straighten up in here.”

“Yessir.”

This time I make the bed in full, snapping the sheets tight, tucking and smoothing. The daisies have faded, and I can hardly smell bleach at all.

I glance up at the Miracle Strip poster.  The edges are yellowing and the frame has begun to separate.  Florida seems less appealing than ever.

The rest of the morning passes by in a rush as well-wishers and neighbors stream in and out with platters of ham, bowls of butter beans and potato salad, mounds of Jell-O, and foil pans lined with brown-and-serve rolls.  As I’m sliding into my dress, I notice my sister perfecting her hair with Clara’s comb and I swallow a lump.

As Daddy drives us to the church, Mama hum-sings On Jordan’s Stormy Banks just under her breath.  Jenny reaches over and grabs my hand, holding it in her lap like she did when I was little.  She notices I have something curled in my palm.  She looks down at it, up at me, and winks.

We get to the church a little before the service starts.  The sanctuary is a low-buzzing hive of grandbabies, great-grandbabies, daughters, sons, husbands, wives, and friends.  Stories are shared in small groups, resulting in hushed laughter or quiet sobbing.

One of my lunatic cousins (Our name is legion, for we are many) paces up and down the aisle, aimless and forlorn, clutching a Solo cup of clippings from Clara’s rose bush and dabbing at her eyes with a wad of toilet paper.

Jenny looks at me and rolls her eyes. I nod. One of my other lunatic cousins calls the cup-hugging weeper over, so we seize the opportunity for a last visit with Grandmama.

“Your hair looks good,” Jenny whispers to Grandmama, then turns to go find Daddy.

I stand there a moment more, worn piece of wood in my hand.  I move my thumb back and forth across the dragon carved on its back.  It’s a seven-eight—half red, half yellow.  I lean over and put it in Clara’s hand.

When they play bones in heaven, if she gets to go first, that seven-eight’ll get her fifteen.

Please note: This story may seem familiar, but it is not plagiarised. Unless you can rip your own self off, which I’m not sure is possible. Anyway, it is an original work of mine, but was actually written in 2006. I have reworked it to appear here. So, depending on how long you’ve been putting up with reading me, you may have seen some version of it in the past.

We never wanted for anything, though. And by that, I mean we had a roof over our heads, food, clothing, and plenty of playthings.  I may not have gotten every thing I desired, but at no time did I go without.

Shelter was a given.  Back then, in the Methodist church, it was expected of the congregation to provide a home for the pastor.  Most churches held ownership of a house next door to, or down the street from, the church itself.  Giving a housing allowance is now the more common practice, but in those days, you got what you got.  Most of the time it was nice, a few times it was adequate, and once or twice it was abysmal. (If you ever meet my mother, do not mention Bainbridge, Georgia. Trust me.)

For food, in addition to what Mama and Daddy could provide, we were blessed by the generosity of our congregations.  At one appointment, there was a meat packer, at another, the owner of a local grocery, and at another, a farm with an endless supply of fresh corn, peas, and snap beans. Plus Daddy usually tended a garden of his own with tomatoes, cucumbers, and squash.

My parents were (are?) also staunch supporters of buying in bulk, back before wholesale clubs even existed. (My mother, now in her 70s and living quite alone, nevertheless continues to purchase ketchup in a giant can.) They’d buy and freeze gallons of milk, stockpile bags of sugar and flour, and amass bars of soap and tubes of toothpaste.

In my early childhood, clothing wasn’t an issue, either. Mama was, despite firing the occasional expletive at her Singer machine, a skilled seamstress.  She handcrafted all of my dresses and play clothes.  Everything else—jeans, shirts, and shoes—came from Sears or JC Penney.

I had a particular set of overall shorts made of striped fabric with big buttons on the straps, and I wore it every time I could get my hands on it.

Until one day, my sister said, “I’m sick of watching you try to pull that thing out of your crack.  It doesn’t FIT. Stop wearing it.”

I did stop wearing that jumper, but all through elementary school, I continued to wear Mama’s other creations without a thought.  I often received compliments, especially on my dresses.  I was a princess with a royal clothier, flitting about my realm in finely stitched ruffles and bows. Life was bliss.

And then I started sixth grade…

We moved that summer, from a small, rural town to one a good bit larger and more commercial, and my kingdom was dissolved.

Because of Mama’s job at the neighboring high school, the school board allowed me to attend junior high outside the designated zone.  So, instead of matriculating with kids who shared my socio-economic status, I was thrust in with the children of lawyers, doctor, and stockbrokers.

My initial dealings with them were the social equivalent of that swamp-mired house in Bainbridge, complete with biting insects and snakes-hidden-in-the-hedge, popping out when I least expected it.

Heyyyy, nice dress, Laura Ingalls!

Where’d you get that skirt?  Goodwill?

You’re the biggest Holly Hobbie doll I’ve ever seen!

The girls whispered and mocked, the boys kicked peach-halves at me under the table at lunch.

I was often reduced to tears, which I would try to hold until I got home. Then, flung across my bed, I released them in heaving sobs.  It wasn’t just embarrassment that made me cry, either.  In attacking my clothing, they were maligning Mama.

And that broke my heart.

Nevertheless, at Christmas, I begged for designer jeans and name-brand sneakers.  And, against every frugal ounce of their collective depression-era beings, they bought them. Never one to hide his true feelings, Daddy called my purple-and-white Jordache sweater, “That horseass sweater.” But he bought it anyway.

I traded Toughskins and Bug-Off! for Calvin Klein and Izod, and returned to the adolescent war, clad in my new armor.  And, though I was still held in some level of new-kid disregard, I now provided little in the way of fodder for ridicule.

As an adult, I find it almost amusing—and telling—that no one really cares what you wear, brand-wise.  In college, if you have a t-shirt and a pair of flip-flops, you’re golden.  In the real, grown up world, as long as you’re tidy and well groomed, not showing too much of either end’s cleavage, and wearing clothing that fits well, little else matters.

On a recent shopping trip with one of my few real friends from middle school, I was reminded of the encapsulated hell that is junior high.  At 13, I had no foresight.  What teen does?  All you can see is the immediate.  And I let those other kids shame me into conformity.

But standing with my friend in the check-out at the fabric store, watching her scan the directions on the back of her pattern, mentally checking off each spool of thread, zipper, and button she needed, I realized something that escaped me years ago.

Sewing isn’t something you do because you have to.  Sewing is something you do because you can.  It is a real talent, and a true craft.

And all those—past and present—who would hold hand-sewn goods up to ridicule…

Can kiss my Jordache.

Declining my acceptance to pharmacy school, I announced I would become a doctor instead. Which, on the surface, seems worse in terms of vacating the nest, but I had formulated an ingenious plan. Instead of having to leave home for Athens and live alone, I would go to Georgia Southern, where I could board with my sister.  Somehow, I convinced my parents to agree.

My time-to-grow-up-and-face-the-real-world crisis was averted for a few more years.

Or not.

Jenny and I moved into an older house on the opposite end of town from campus—with a few unwelcome roommates.  We were not aware of these other occupants, however, until we were fully settled and bound by a lease.

The prior tenant had used the house as a dance studio, and had all but sublet it to a tenacious group of field mice.  At first, we had a rare sighting here and there.  A tail ducking around a corner, a nose poking out of a crack in the baseboard.  One or two beady-eyed scavengers, late at night—nothing out of the ordinary for an old wooden farmhouse.

And so, we set about to catch them, in the most humane way possible. We placed sticky-traps laced with peanut butter in various locations, with the intention of releasing any captives into the wooded area behind the house.  We were awarded three detainees, and let them go as planned, watching them scuttle under the Japanese privet at the edge of our lot, never to be seen again.

And that was that.

We thought…

One or two at the time still scuttled about, but never enough at once to cause real concern.  After all, it was a farmhouse and we were on the edge of a wood.

It soon became apparent that the former inhabiting dance troupe had been practicing The Nutcracker, and had, at some point, brought forth the ire of the rat king.

We sealed every hole we could find.

And still they came.  One or two became five or six. Their nighttime slinking turned into brazen foraging at all hours.

We bought every sticky trap Winn Dixie had, but needed more.

They chewed holes in our cereal boxes.  They left crusty little ‘gifts’ everywhere—even the lampshades.  The rattled and rustled and squeaked, and made the entire house smell of stale saltines.  Which was ironic, considering we could no longer keep crackers in the house.

We never even discussed calling a professional.  We were determined to be victorious on our own, because it had, somehow, become personal.  This was our house—MY house—and I wasn’t about to give it over to those brash beasts.

One evening, I reached into a small cabinet in my room to get the glue I kept there, and extracted an empty bottle with a hole gnawed in the bottom.  Dried glue encrusted the other items in the cabinet, among them my field guide to North American birds—my thesis subject.

Of course you know, this means war.

I took the bottle out into the den and showed it to Jenny.

She looked up from her book, snapped it shut and said, “Let’s go.”

We drove to the store and bought real mousetraps.  The ones that make the loud, satisfying, mouse-smooshing THWHACK! when triggered.

Within ten minutes, the traps were full.

Twhack! Twhack! Twhack! Three up, three down.

Jenny emptied the traps into the garbage can, and we reloaded.

Twhack! Twhack! Twhack!

Little bodies in, little bodies out, again and again, until we had disposed of seventeen mice—counting the four Jenny beat with the broom and the one I flushed down the toilet.

Afterward, I pulled the plastic drawstring tight, tied several knots in it (just in case) and lifted the bag out of the garbage can.  Swinging it back and forth, I happily took out the trash.

Jesus loves me.

This true meaning of Christmas is not, however, the impetus that stirs me today.  Today, as I half-slouch on my sofa, nursing my morning cup, accented with gingerbread creamer, I am reminded of places and things I strongly associate with the holiday season.

Over the River and Through the Woods

When I was a child, little more than six but much less than ten, we would travel to my Grandmama Starling’s for Thanksgiving.  In her small two-bedroom one-bath home, our family would join those of both my uncles, overlapping one with another and merging together like the portions on our Chinet plates, until we were one celebratory mass.

The meal was shared, around the dining room table for as many older adults as would fit, on chairs and couches in the living room for the thirty-somethings, and on TV trays or sitting cross-legged on the floor in the den for the rest of us.  What held our attention between forkfuls of cornbread dressing and candied sweet potatoes was no great football contest or tv show marathon. On a black and white set with rabbit ears and a dial, we waited for the climactic harbinger of the Christmas season.

The appearance of Santa at the end of  Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Until that moment, the season hadn’t begun. Until that moment, stores did not sell lights, ornaments, hooks, and ribbon.  Until that moment, lots marked off with wire and strands of naked 40-watt-bulbs didn’t offer spruce and cypress.  Until that moment, no carol was heard on doorstep or air wave.

Until that moment, it was not Christmas.

Away in a Manger

For many, many years Mama put out the same nativity scene, composed of inch-high characters and disproportionate angels with harps.  Always in the same configuration: gigantic angels at the head of the manger, the baby Jesus sandwiched between Mary and Joseph, shepherds to the left, Magi to the right, and a lone donkey lurking in the shadows.  I loved to play with the figurines, and would act out the story atop whatever piece of furniture was chosen to bear the poly-resin birth of our Savior.

Oh, Christmas Tree

Returning home after the trip to my grandmother’s, my mother set about decorating our Christmas tree.  Fraught with impatience, I watched Mama and Daddy unpack the coffin-sized box limb by limb. I waited in excruciating anticipation while each bough was placed in its color-coded hole and properly fluffed.  And when the shape of the tree was complete, I waited still more for the adding of the lights.  Daddy carefully clipped each tear-shaped bulb onto this or that branch, tier by tier, until he reached the tree’s top…

At last it was time for the ornaments, a sundry a mix of childhood craft and store-bought shimmer.  And then, an unlikely marriage of burlap and sequin, the blonde angel was set at the top, and the orange bulb behind her swapped for white while Mama muttered burned-fingertip oaths.

When the tree was done, I’d lie beneath it and gaze into its glittering depths, much like the Grey’s Anatomy characters some thirty years later.  But long before Izzie Stephens existed, tree-gazing was, for me, a Christmas staple.

The Chipmunk Song

In my elementary school years, when Christmas greetings were received with warmth and grace, rather than scorn and reproach, we’d have parties at school. They weren’t holiday or seasonal parties, either.  They were Christmas parties and referred to as such by all involved. Usually scheduled just before the holiday break, the festivities lasted most of the day.  The morning began with a race to see who could form the most words from Merry Christmas, followed by an exchange of misshapen, tinfoil wrapped parcels. After lunch, goodies sent in Tupperware were set out for us to enjoy—an array of cookies, candies and cups of too-sweet punch.  We’d jam our cheeks full of gumdrops and chocolate, chewing and laughing. Then, sugared-up and half-nauseated, we’d climb into cars or bounce onto busses and go home, new dollar-store toy tucked in our bags and the taste of peppermint lingering on our bright red tongues.

Angels We Have Heard on High

When I was just five or six, in a crowded fellowship hall, I lumbered onto stage, white bed sheet draped over my jeans and zip-necked tee.  I stared at my scuffed brogans while I sang all three verses of Away in a Manger.  With my tinsel-wrapped-around-a-coat-hanger halo, aloof from the plastic baby in a much-too-modern crib, I performed this chore in exchange for a few minutes on the lap of whatever member of the Methodist Men had been asked to play Santa.  I wanted my own television, so I could watch something else—anything else—while my parents viewed HeeHaw.

These seasonal memories still warm my heart and fill my thoughts with visions of sugarplums and the magic of Christmas morning, though I now have a family and Christmas traditions of my own.  Now it is my child who huffs and taps her foot, anxious to put the ornaments on the tree, and my baked goods sent to school in Gladware bowls.   But I still believe Christmas doesn’t begin until after Thanksgiving, and refuse to put up one sprig beforehand.

Well into my adulthood, Mama replaced her nativity set with a glazed ceramic crèche and gave me the other.  By then the angels had long since lost both harp and wing, finally succumbing to a pre-move closet cleanout.  But the rest of the set is still intact.

And, hovering over my credenza in soft candlelight, if I am patient and very, very careful, I can still get Mary to balance on the donkey.