no good

My eyes are glued to her photo. I gasp. I smile. I gloat. I'm in the midst of an extreme moment of karma, physical evidence that what goes around, comes around. "I knew it," I convince myself. I knew in my heart that God never forgets, and He takes care of his small birds, mustard seeds, and the like. I have been vindicated. It is pay-back time for the grief, and yes, downright craziness, she caused me. We're even now.

A night passes.

Really? I put on my big girl panties and breathe. Really?

Does a cloudy, unflattering mug shot for stealing a hairbrush in Wal-Mart (I'm just guessing since she looked so forlorn) actually make up for the hours of pain, tears and fear I experienced some ten years ago - almost to the day? Can a bond of $1300 be equal to the thousands that I lost? And not mention the years stolen from my life? What about my children? Can it replace their grief?

Hours have passed since my initial revelation, and the sun is rising. The mama bird flips up to her corner nest and then flies down again to the porch railing, heading out to find food for her young. The horses pass by the upper field, grazing and every now and then, raise their heads to make sense of an unknown sound and quickly, once they determine everything is okay, resume nibbling. The cat sits at my feet, all cuddled in a ball. Never impressed by the movements of the birds or the horses. He only moves when I do. He is only moved by me.

I realize that I am no different from yesterday morning, even with my new-found knowledge. Every thing I've tried to discover, every one that I had informed, every high-five I lifted are movements and thoughts that I surmised would make me a different, more satisfied person. One with a new sense of worth and made greater because of her atonement. Nope. Didn't happen.

Knowing something bad happens to another can't increase my value. If my mom were here, she'd tell me it diminishes mine. I should be the lofty one. I should be the better one. And I will be known by my thoughts and deeds. And at this moment, I change gears.

I'm sad that people don't lose their spots. That they don't change. That they don't understand that good is the only road to follow. I guess people become so cemented to a certain path that veering off is never an option. Doing what is right is the only option.

So, I will forgive my thoughts - they will come to no good. I haven't been able to forgive her yet. Nor the others, but in time, I will. I have forgotten to the point that I can get through any given day without thinking of the day my world ended. It gets better - even with a pop-up reminder of her terrible face.

My bird, my horses and my cat don't have time for her - and frankly, neither do I. 

stronger than death

“I believe that imagination is stronger than knowledge. That myth is more potent than history. That dreams are more powerful than facts. That hope always triumphs over experience. That laughter is the only cure for grief. And I believe that love is stronger than death.” ~Robert Fulghum, All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten

I went to a funeral. A man of 92. A man who had lived a long, good life. A Godly life with a wife and five children.  His family was there, holding onto their mother, joining together to say good-bye. Even though I didn't know the man personally, I knew his brother and sister. I know the strength of the family.

I thought of how things have changed. Family numbers aren't staggering anymore. I do have three children, but since I'm an only child and so is their father, there's no close or distant relatives for that matter. They mostly have each other. There are no long lineage of brothers and sisters, no massive Thanksgiving or Christmas celebrations with women and men and children struggling to add seats around the dinner table. No mountainous pile of Christmas presents for the grandchildren or great-grandchildren. Where has the family gone?

And what about faith? The minister read from Tom's Bible that Tom, more than likely, read from every day of his life. It was comfort, strength and guidance in a world that had grown more and more complicated. If there ever was a question, there was always an answer within these pages. Where do we go for answers these days? I have faith, but my children do not. Most think of the church as the last choice for advice. Most search the web, flip through the magazines, comb the self-help section of Barnes and Noble or make a split-second decision based upon what someone has done previously. None of those are true and lasting. Where are the answers?

Tom Carter

This conundrum baffles me. I have no answers. I don't know what will happen when the older generation leaves all of the young ones to carry on. They relied on their 'guidebook', the Bible, and the only attention it receives these days comes in the form of the History Channel.

How do we carry on so that when our 92 years are over, we're okay with everything?

sunrise morning

it's easter weekend. although it's cool, spring is coming on soon, and i can't be more ready. my thoughts have been living in the past for most of this week for unexplained reasons. possibly, the popping of the pear trees, the azalea blooms warding off the cold, the aroma of spring floating through the air. and i think of mama and daddy and spring in clarkesville.

right around this time of year, i always observed black dots in our pasture. newborns. dropped whenever time came. nothing made daddy prouder than waking me way too early in the morning and squealing to "come" see our newest baby calf. he loved on the mama cow and made sure she was as comfy as possible. and he didn't take his eye off the baby until it was on all fours. he was a good daddy.

on good friday, we always planted our garden. this meant hours in the field, driving the mule, dropping the corn, and complaining a lot. however, i didn't complain months later as i slathered butter on my perfectly formed ears of sweet corn. i strangely forgot about the heat and the dirt. i still try to plant my few tomato plants on good friday, a long way from the ten acres i walked as a child. i thought everyone planted on this exceptional day. if you were southern, you did. occasionally, i forget that everyone is not that lucky.

it was the sunrise service on sunday morning that always tested my faith. rising early on the weekend never made sense to me, but on this weekend, it did. in the middle of a golf course, on the tallest hill around, church members watched the sun squeak over the hill. i grumbled, but that defined my easter. then, daddy and me would rush home. i'd put on my bonnet, my froufrou of a dress and my always too-tight shinny black shoes, and we'd head to church. as i grew older, i sang in the choir - sans froufrou - and it was always the most spectacular song for that morning. after the service, the three of us would then return home where sunday dinner and laughter would season that day and all the ones that would follow.

my rote movements through the years, i'm afraid, have failed my parents and myself for that matter. i still survey pastures this time of year for the arrival of black dots, and i can't help but smile and remember daddy. i try to plant when the weather allows, but i have left behind the sunrise service and songs of resurrection. i can't say why, only that i know it's not as i had intended. i watch, i listen, i inhale the heralds of spring and i remember. i stand amazed at how years change us, how circumstances mold us, and how what we think will never vanish, always does. although my stirrings are quite different than before, the hollows those early traditions carved in my heart remain. there's not a day that goes by that i don't recall from where i came and know that with a little effort and inspiration, i can be back on that tall hill beside daddy watching the sunrise.

i drive your truck

for my children, their best times growing up meant they were a stone's throw from their grandpa troy. hanging onto his coat tails as a youngster, driving the tractor (sort of) with papa watching closely, plowing the fields in the spring and dropping seeds for corn that they would eventually have to pick. the work wasn't fun, but being with papa was.

once he was gone, those old traditions sort of vanished. but because of him, they will know how to plow a field, change the oil, drive a tractor, build a shed, fix a lawnmower, use a tool, appreciate clint eastwood films, grill a steak, sit a spell, and give it their all.

for ty, he's got his papa with him everyday. in his truck. the truck papa drove every day of his life. the one that lingers with cigarette smoke and a dirty ashtray, a radio station tuned to old-timey country music, the glove compartment left exactly as it was. ty wouldn't dare change a thing, and he will move heaven and earth to maintain this truck. not because it gets him from place to place, but because his papa is a passenger. for life.

Lee Brice - I Drive Your Truck

Eighty-Nine Cents in the ash tray
Half empty bottle of Gatorade rolling in the floorboard
That dirty Braves cap on the dash
Dog tags hangin’ from the rear view
Old Skoal can, and cowboy boots and a Go Army Shirt
folded in the back
This thing burns gas like crazy, but that’s alright
People got their ways of coping
Oh, and I’ve got mine.

I leave that radio playing
That same ole country station where ya left it
Yeah, man I crank it up
And you’d probably punch my arm right now
If you saw this tear rollin’ down on my face
Hey, man I’m tryin’ to be tough
And momma asked me this morning
If I’d been by your grave
But that flag and stone ain’t where I feel you anyway.

I drive your truck
I roll every window down
And I burn up
Every back road in this town
I find a field, I tear it up
Til all the pain’s a cloud of dust
Yeah, sometimes I drive your truck.

my corner memory

it was sitting all alone, in a warehouse. cold and damp. a place every pianist knows a piano should not be.

however, it was a rescue, so forgiveness is key. a woman had been forced from her home and a good samaritan happened by at the exact moment her possessions were being moved. he thought the old upright intriguing, unique, a piece of history. so, he heaved the monstrous weight onto his truck, brought it to where the elements would not harm it and now it sits, quietly, in a warehouse.

i was there on business, and i didn't notice it as first. then i glanced. immediately, i remembered my first ivories.

my mama and daddy, always lacking money but never ingenuity, purchased an old, reconditioned upright from a man in town. i was around eight and my mama said i was going to learn to play the piano. it was not anything this farm girl had in mind, but when mama instructed, i knew better than to argue.

it was delivered one day while i was at school. mama and daddy had placed it in the living room, a room that was never used and always cold. it was the home to daddy's parents' red velvet settee and chairs. they, like the room, were untouched. up until this point, i used it for day-dreaming. a place where i could go after dinner, close the door behind me, turn on my record player and listen to the old 45's i had borrowed from friends. the easter parade mixed with i'm an american band belted by grand funk railroad.  i'd pretend i was on stage, singing the most beautiful tune, bowing to the incessant applause from the crowd.

lessons came first. i don't remember the teacher's name, but i remember traveling to cornelia, about a 30-minute drive, and walking into this old brick ranch house and being met by 'her'. she was ancient, wore matron-like baggy dresses and smelled of moth balls. so did every inch of her dark-paneled house. the piano room was small, and so was the piano. not an upright like mine, but a small spinet, slammed tightly against a wall. on top was the clicker, the metronome, i hated it. she kept the wrist weights there, too. i hated them even more. she would sit on the stool next to me, shouting out time and notes, her breath as rank as dead meat and her fingers as wrinkled as an un-ironed cotton shirt.

lessons continued and i grumbled every tuesday. for my first recital, i played in my own little corner because i loved cinderalla and that was her song. i think it was my song, too. i continued lessons for about three years until finally my mama couldn't stand my complaints. i persuaded her i could do it on my own and i promised i would never stop playing. i kept that promise, for it is there that my love for music was born.

today, i rarely play, but when i do, i never forget that old upright that was bought with my parents' love. i never forget the moments in that vacant room when i was a star.

i swear the piano i discovered in the warehouse belonged to me once-upon-a-time, for i don't know what ever became of mine. i'm probably wrong, but i like to think my ivories made it through the years still standing tall and making music. it seems a shame that it will spend its final days in a warehouse. i might be able to change that.