A Conversation With My Mama

 

           

I went to see my Mama today. Since it was late afternoon, I called ahead to make sure she wasn’t eating supper. If she is eating, she will first try to get you to eat and then if you don’t, she will stop eating herself. She has always done this. I think it is a throw back to the days on Horseshoe Bend, when sometimes we didn’t have much to eat and she would not eat until all of her children had.

When I called, they said to give it thirty more minutes and then come. In thirty minutes I was there. She was already in bed when I walked into her room, but thankfully, she wasn’t asleep.

After I hugged and kissed her, I pulled her wheel chair up to her bed and had a seat…preparing myself for the “Who are you honey…do I know you?” questions.

Instead I got a nice surprise…

My Mama knew me!

She said, “Carlene, you are my baby. We needed you. You had the prettiest wavy hair. You are the prettiest one out of all of them!” I had to laugh at that last sentence….

You see…

She use to tell ALL SIX of us that! She would tell us separately, without the others present. It would be many, many years to pass, before we were to find this out! We were all sitting on Mama’s front porch one day, and for some reason, one of us popped up and said, “Well, Mama always said I was the prettiest!” Well, it didn’t take long for the other five to let it be known loud and clear that she had told each one of them the very same thing!  We all laughed hysterically!

Our dear sweet mama had, for all those years, had each of us thinking that “we” were the prettiest!

She went on to ask, “Have you had any sleep?  You are going to need your sleep, because you never know….and I don’t want it to scare you when it happens. Don’t let it scare you.”

I did not ask what she meant when she said this…I didn’t want to know.

“Did you have supper? Do you get enough to eat?” Now, only a mama would ask that of a noticeably overweight lady!

“Did they ever find Walt’s ( my long deceased daddy) car? Now I swear that I don’t know what happened to it, I just seen that it was gone!”  I couldn’t help but laugh out loud when she said this…mama could be sneaky in her old days, especially if she was mad at my daddy!

When I got ready to leave, I told her that I loved her…and she looked me right in the eye and said,“ I love you more, because I had you” 

After more hugs and kisses, I left her there in her bed, with her asking, “Are you coming back tonight???”

Walking blindly down the Nursing Home hallway, I thought about how my son Dan was sooooo right….

I cry when she doesn’t know me, and I cry when she does.

GOD BLESS YOU ALL

LITTLE GIRL LOST

      

                    

It’s funny, but when I walked into Wal-Mart today to get my medicines today, the first thing that caught my eye was the CODE ADAM sign posted on the front door. This means, among other things, that if a child is lost, an alert goes out and each associate works hard to try and make sure that child is found.

You know, looking back, I think God was trying to tell me something….

While at the store,  I decided to get me some new ankle socks. I try to save as much as possible, so I buy my socks in the boys section. (You get more and they are cheaper. )

While I was looking at the different brands and prices, I noticed a little bitty girl walking up and down the aisles. She looked to be about Wyatt’s age…around three…much too young to be on her own.

The grandma in me immediately went on alert.

I stood there looking at the socks, yet also keeping an eye out for the child. She was still walking up and down the aisles. It wasn’t very long before she came up to me. With tears about to spill over, she said, “Do you know where my mommy is?”  I said, “No, but we can go get someone to call her for you.” 

Being right behind the ladies dressing rooms, I quickly walked with her around to the front and sure enough, there were two Wal-Mart associates standing there at the desk. I explained to them that we had a “lost mommy” and one of them immediately took the little girl up to the front of the store to the courtesy desk.

I walked back around to the socks and it wasn’t very long before I saw a lady calmly describing a little girl to a Wal-Mart employee near there. This lady was holding on to a buggy and had two more little girls walking along beside her. I walked over and asked the associate if the lady had lost a child in the store and she told me she had. When I told that lady that her child was at the courtesy desk, and explained to her how she had came up to me asking for my help, she actually seemed more agitated than worried and said, “Well, she won’t stay in the buggy and then she wanders off all the time.”

Oh man…

I wanted so badly to say to this mama..”well then you MAKE her stay in the buggy, no ifs, ands, or buts about it”. I also wanted to say,” your little girl just walked up to a complete stranger and came right along with me when I asked her to. I would rather her be kicking and screaming in that dang buggy than be kidnapped!” But the mama had already left to go to the courtesy desk….leaving me stunned. All I could think, as I watched her walk away was that;  I could have been someone who was not so nice. I could have been an evil person…

And that baby walked right up to me, trusting me to help her.

God forbid, but I would have been frantic had I lost Wyatt or little William. We have entirely too many little ones being kidnapped and worse. We have got to start keeping a better eye on our little children.

This morning,while walking my pups, I saw the mother hen and her eight little fuzzy yellow chicks in my yard again. All eight of them chirping and running all about, scratching around in the dirt just like their mama. The mother hen was constantly rounding them up and guiding them closer to her and at one time she actually nestled down on top of them, to try to keep them all together…

To keep them safe.

Shouldn’t we as humans do at least that much for our little ones?

Thank You God for for helping me be where I was, when that child was lost.

GOD BLESS YOU ALL.

10 THINGS I’VE LEARNED

 

          

We begin our lives by learning….

Why, our very first breath is our first learning adventure, though I believe that we are fortunate not to be able to remember that one.

                

If you stop and think about it, things were pretty comfy for us while still in our mother’s womb. Yep, we are snug as a bug in our own warm, quiet and dimly lit little world. Then all of a sudden we are literally forced out into a place where there is a lot of bright light, a lot of loud noise, and Lord help us, Mom is not our oxygen machine any longer! For the very first time in our existence, we have to breathe on our own in order to live! Now, I tell you what; that first breath had to have been a very traumatic experience! God bless our little hearts, no wonder we usually cry when we are first born.

                

Fortunately, within a very short span, if all goes well, we are able to learn to eat, sit, stand and walk. Yep, we usually get the basics out of the way fast and with no problems.

It is the lessons we learn later on in life that are usually the hard ones, the ones that seem to take us such a long time to get though our heads.

Lesson # 1. Parents were people before they ever were parents and they are smarter than we ever thought.

Lesson # 2.  Parents grow old and pass away. Sometimes we can lose them before they die, so we need to love, respect, and honor them before that happens.

Lesson # 3.  Children are a blessing and they grow up way too fast.

Lesson # 4.  All the important things, like love, respect, honesty, common decency, and being a law abiding citizen, we need to teach our children before they grow up. The ten commandments are a good start. 

Lesson # 5. Sometimes we are lucky enough to find that special someone…someone that our very soul knows is the right one to spend the rest of our life with…to grow old with.

Lesson # 6.  Sometimes God has other plans. So we need to remember to tell our loved one everyday how much they mean to us…not just on holidays.

Lesson # 7. Sometimes GOD does things or turns our lives in directions that we can not understand with our mortal minds.

Lesson # 8  FAITH IN GOD will bring us through all these rough spots…It may be a long journey. It may seem to be all up hill. It may HURT us more than anything has ever hurt us before, but it is then that we need to hold tightly to our FAITH, and we will eventually make it through.

Lesson # 9  GOD IS GOOD.

Lesson # 10  GOD IS GOOD.

Yes I know….

Lesson 9 and 10 are exactly alike.

You see, I  learned these two lessons as a child,

and it keeps coming back to me….

 over and over again.

GOD IS GOOD.

GOD BLESS YOU ALL.

I SAVED A RABBIT TODAY...I THINK.

Well, today has started out to be a pretty interesting day.

On my way home from town a while ago, I saw the big black and tan sheppard dog running up the sidewalk about a block from my home.

This dog is one of the many that run loose around our neighborhood. You wouldn't think that our city has a leash law, but it does. No matter how many times I call the animal shelter to come round them up, somehow or the other, there are still big dogs running loose around here...and chickens..and roosters...and turkeys.  Some people seem to think that just because they come from' far away', that they are above out laws and customs!

Okay back to the subject...

On my way home, I saw the big black and tan dog running up the sidewalk.

Only this time he had a huge white thing hanging from his mouth. At first I thought it was the beautiful solid white cat that had been hanging around here, but then I remembered that it had been killed a couple of weeks ago. I took a closer look and the big white thing was a rabbit that was dangling helplessly from that dog's mouth... and it was still alive..

I really needed to get home, but I could no more let that poor rabbit go to it's fate than if it were a child...

Sooooo.... here I go up the street in my car blowing my horn  and yelling constantly out the window at the dog to "DROP IT!"  The  dog turns around and heads back down the street, the rabbit still helplessly dangling from it's mouth, so I slam my car in reverse and chase the stupid dog  backwards...screaming; " DROP IT! " 

Well, I be danged if it didn't turn around again and head back up the street!  Soooooooo... I throw the car back in drive and chase it back up the street. This time I was able to corner it in my mom's old home place's yard. 

It was then and only then that the stupid dog finally, blessedly;

 "DROPPED IT".

The poor rabbit runs around to the side of the house and I now see  yet another dog running towards it. By this time I am out of my car and on my way to the rabbit. The new dog must have seen the fury of hell that was shining in my eyes, because one look at my face and he just cowards down and walked back across the street!

I go up to the poor rabbit, thinking this thing is going to claw me up, but no it did not. Poor little guy just cuddled way down into my arms. I could feel it's heart racing ninety miles an hour against my jacket... and mine wasn't far behind it.

Thinking back...I bet the folks who may have been looking out their windows at me driving wildly up and down the street, honking the horn and screaming out the window to "DROP IT"   probably thought I was deranged or on drugs... or both!!! lol

I take the rabbit and get in my car and go to the Mexicans' house that I had seen white rabbits running around out in the back yard in a fenced in area. When I knock on the door, a young lady answers and I ask, "is this your rabbit?" As she nods yes, I say, "the big black dog up the street had it and was going to kill it, so I chased it down and got it back" She nods  again and backing away from me  says, "wait a minute" and goes in another room, to come back with a young man. He comes up to me and I give him the rabbit and explain again. By this time, the young lady is now half hiding behind a door to the side and I don't know if she is scared of me or the rabbit! Soon enough, the young man tells me thank you and I leave feeling better.

After all, I saved a rabbit today!

Now, when I was a little bitty girl on Horseshoe Bend, my daddy would go rabbit hunting and he would come home loaded down with rabbits in his hunting jacket. That night, mama would cook those rabbits that my daddy shot, skinned and cleaned and we would have either stewed or fried rabbit for supper. And you can bet I ate it. We were hungry and very grateful to have such good   food for supper!

But this situation today was totally different...

This was a pet white rabbit and a dog was going to tear into it.

And besides....

I buy my food at INGLES now.

When I got home and told my son of how I saved that poor little white rabbit....

He informs me that he thinks those folks that I gave it back to...

 Eat those rabbits.

After all this...I sure hope not.

For mine and the rabbit's sake.


GOD BLESS YOU ALL.

MY GRANNY'S HOUSE

This is the house that my Granny lived in when I was a  little bitty girl still living on Horseshoe Bend. It is on the  Madison Hwy, State Road 12, across from Mr. Phelps old house. Me and my sister Dorris stopped out there today to get a picture. 

While there, we couldn't help but look inside the window. I saw way past the mounds of  trash, old rags, clothes and an odd assortment of stuff that was strewn all over what is left of the floors. Instead of the old bare wooden walls, my mind's eye saw the walls that Granny always kept papered with clean news paper to help keep the cold wind out.

I notice that there is still no running water in the house to this day...over 50 years later. Granny always made a trip down to the spring that ran close beside the house with her bucket for her and my Uncle Tommy's water. Water that was used for bathing, washing their clothes on the scrub board and also for cooking. Can you imagine?

Her old upright piano sat just to the right of the front door...the piano my mama learned to play by ear on ...just like her mama.

I remember walking in that front door as a little girl, and although sparse, my Granny would have this little house so clean. I  remember the crocheted doily's she use to make that would be on every chair arm. It seems like there was always a coconut cake on her table with a lacy white doily placed neatly under the plate that held it.

I guess this is why I find it so hard to understand how people around my neighborhood can let their homes go. They throw beer cans and trash all in the front and back yards. I realize that they don't own these old mill houses that they live in here...but my Granny didn't own her house either....and you can tell from the photo that it wasn't a grand manor!

To have so little, to be so poor, she still worked very hard to make it into a cozy little home...

and

She kept her house clean.


GOD BLESS YOU ALL.

SUNDAY, JAN.29, 2012

I got up this morning with a lightness to my soul.

As I walked the pups in the early morning mist, I pondered why I felt such ease, such calm...and nothing came to mind.

Later on, as I sat here at the computer checking on my friends and family, I could see the first rays of sun begin filtering in through my bedroom window blinds..and I thought, 'that must be it..the weather has turned out so nice here lately. More like Spring than the winter that we are suppose to be having', but still I had this little nudging..that there was more to it than that.

A little bit later, I went into the kitchen and began fixing me and Dan a bite of breakfast. I got the bread down, buttered it and placed it in my oven to toast while the skillet heated up for the bacon and eggs. I got my special little grits pot that I like to use and put some water and salt in it to boil for my Quaker Grits...real grits...not those instant things...

The thought that, 'Danny would climb out of the grave', had I used instant grits briefly flickered across my mind.

And that is when it hit me. Today marked the 6th year that Danny had been gone. He died on a Sunday, a Sunday that was in all aspects just like today. Just as we were on our way to lunch at the Waffle House, he had a massive heart attack...and in only a couple of hours, he was gone....way too soon.

We were suppose to grow old together.
Well, I got the breakfast cooked and placed on the table and by this time it was nearing 10:30 am so I hurriedly ate mine and placed a clean towel over Dan's plate. I went into my bedroom, changed clothes and headed out the door.

You see, it had came to me clear as a bell, that I needed to go to church..and when GOD calls, I listen...or at least, try my best to. And He had called me this morning..rang up my soul just as good as ... no, better... than if He had a high powered cell phone ringing it's number.

Even though I had gotten such a late start, I walked into Church at 10:55...a full five minutes before Church service was to begin. One of the first songs we sang out of the hymnal, was one my mama played on the piano almost every Sunday at Penfield Church when I was a little bitty girl on Horseshoe Bend;  'Love Lifted Me'.

(How fitting for today!)

Anytime I hear or sing these old hymns my mama played, it never fails to bring a peacefulness deep within me. How well I remember her letting me sit with her on that old piano bench, as she played in that little country church.

I couldn't have been much older than Wyatt or Will and she let me sit there with her the whole time she played....talk about being brave!

Today, when it came time for the Choir to go to their places, no one moved. Even the preacher's wife stayed seated next to me...whispering that her husband would be singing this morning.

The very first song he sang was; 'Knowing You'll Be There' , which speaks of getting to meet your beloved again and how much you have missed them here on earth. The next was, 'Go Rest High On That Mountain'...about how one suffers here sometimes, until their final day on Earth, when they can finally find peaceful rest.

When the preacher finished singing and stepped down from the alter, he stepped right up to where I was standing, and told me how he missed so much fishing with Danny...and how he missed him just being here. 

Then he told me how he had been having Danny on his mind when he chose those two songs to sing.

( I have been away from church for over a month now. When the preacher chose those songs, he had no inkling that I would be sitting in that pew today. )

But GOD KNOWS our future.
He plans it.

I firmly believe that God called to my soul this morning. I believe that He wanted me to be in His house, so I could remember His message...

His promise.

That though I will always miss Danny, we will see each other again one day...

'And in that day, there will be no more tears, no more suffering, no more pain and no more death.'

Oh Hallelujah!

To God be the Glory!

GOD BLESS YOU ALL