Deborah Hining's Blog, page 4

WHY I’M DITCHING MY GARDENING BOOKS

I used to read a lot of gardening books.  It’s a whole lot easier to gaze at the pretty pictures and the seemingly ultra easy instructions and pretend that particular garden is mine than it is to get out there and do what it takes to make my actual garden look like that.  Gardening  books allow me the pleasure with none of the sweat or bug bites or sunburn or sore back.

But the thing about gardening books is that they eventually make you believe you actually can have a garden that looks like those beauties featured in them, because they give you “easy-to-follow” instructions that allow you to things faster, better, more organically, thereby allowing you time to enjoy just sitting around admiring your handiwork.  One of the “easy-to-follow” bits of advice almost all of the authors of gardening books give you goes something like this: 

“The best way to prevent having to do too much work in the garden is to work in it a little every day. Just five minutes of tending to it every morning means you will nip problems in the bud, and you will be able to pull up any stray weeds before they become troublesome”.  

Five minutes?  Really?  Five  minutes? I don’t think so.  I’m thinking there’s an error that the editor didn’t catch, so I contacted the author of one of my books to let her know I had found a mistake in her book.  Here is how the conversation went: 

Me:  Hi, I have your excellent book here, “Art of Gardening,” and I just want you to know I found a little error in it.  You may want to fix it for the next edition. 

Misleading Author:  Yes?  What is it? 

Me:  Well, on page 12, you say that if you work in the garden just five minutes every day, that’s all the time you have to spend on it.  I’m sure you meant to say you should work every minute for five days.  And you’re right.  It would be nice to take a couple of days off a week. 

Misleading Author:  No, I meant just five minutes a day, every day.  All seven days.

Me:  That’s not possible.  It takes me 20 minutes just to walk around the thing. 

Misleading Author:  Well, maybe your garden is much bigger than mine.  That five minute thing works for a garden about 48 by 48. 

Me:  Well, my garden may be a little bigger than 2,300 square feet, but not that much bigger. 

Misleading Author:  Oh, no, not 48 feet by 48 feet. Goodness, that would mean you have to work in the garden all the time.   I mean 48 inches by 48 inches.  That’s about 8 square feet. 

Me: 48 inches by 48 inches is 16 square feet. 

Misleading Author:  Oh, well, I’m a gardener, not a mathematician.  I guess 8 is more like it.

Me:  But really, your garden is 8 square feet? 

Misleading Author:  Well, I live in New York.  We  count things by the inch here. 

Me:  But all those pictures! 

Misleading Author:  Oh, that’s the garden at Giverny.  I have the same kind of plants in my garden. It’s just that Giverny is so much more photogenic.  More room for getting good angles.  But my garden really does look almost like that.

 Me: You’re telling people that you can have a garden that looks like Giverny by working in it only 5 minutes a day?

 Misleading Author:  Pretty much.  Once it’s perfectly established and all the weeds eradicated and there’s plenty of organic material worked into the soil and you have lots of earthworms and the soil is the proper pH balance and you have the right amount of rainfall and proper drainage.  Yes, once that is all in place, the work is minimal. 

 Me:  (totally bummed) OK, thank you very much.  You’ve been helpful

 Misleading Author:  You’re welcome. Good luck.

 So, at first I’m steamed, but then I get to thinking, maybe she’s right.  You have to start with a perfect situation.  Once you get the garden looking absolutely perfect, with all conditions just so, then maybe you only have to spend 5 minutes a day for every 8 square feet of garden.  Since my garden is approximately 10,000 square feet (OK, I exaggerate. It just seems that big sometimes).  Let’s be  more real and call it only 2,500 square feet.  The rest is mostly grass.  That means 2,500 divided by 8, which comes to 312.  So if I spend 5 minutes per 312 square feet, that comes to 1,562 minutes, then divide by 60 (minutes per hour), that comes to a mere 26 hours per day, 7 days per week that I have to spend keeping it looking good.  That is, provided I start with perfection. 

 I think I’m going to cry.

 

WHY I’M DITCHING MY GARDENING BOOKS

I used to read a lot of gardening books.  It’s a whole lot easier to gaze at the pretty pictures  and pretend that particular garden is mine than it is to get out there and do what it takes to make my actual garden look like that.  Gardening  books allow me the pleasure with none of the sweat or bug bites or sunburn or sore back. 

But the thing about gardening books is that they eventually make you believe you actually can have a garden that looks like those beauties featured in them, because they give you “easy-to-follow” instructions that supposedly allow you to things faster, better, more organically, thereby allowing you time to enjoy just sitting around admiring your handiwork.  One of the “easy-to-follow” bits of advice almost all of the authors of gardening books give you goes something like this: 

“The best way to prevent having to do too much work in the garden is to work in it a little every day. Just five minutes of tending to it every morning means you will nip problems in the bud, and you will be able to pull up any stray weeds before they become troublesome.” 

Five minutes?  Really?  Five  minutes? I don’t think so.  I’m thinking there’s an error that the editor didn’t catch, so I contacted the author of one my many books to let her know I had found a mistake in her book.  Here is how the conversation went: 

Me:  Hi, I have your excellent book here, “Art of Gardening,” and I just want you to know I found a little error in it.  You may want to fix it for the next edition. 

Misleading Author:  Yes?  What is it? 

Me:  Well, on page 12, you say that if you work in the garden just five minutes every day, that’s all the time you have to spend on it.  I’m sure you meant to say you should work every minutes for five days.  And you’re right.  It would be nice to take a couple of days off a week. 

Misleading Author:  No, I meant just five minutes a day, every day.  All seven days. 

Me:  That’s not possible.  It takes me 20 minutes just to walk around the thing. 

Misleading Author:  Well, maybe your garden is much bigger than mine.  That five minute thing works for a garden about 48 by 48. 

Me: Hmmm, (doing the calculations) my garden may be a little bigger than 2,300 square feet, but not that much bigger. 

Misleading Author:  Oh, no, not 48 feet by 48 feet! Goodness, that would mean you have to work in the garden all the time.   I mean 48 inches by 48 inches.  That’s about 8 square feet. 

Me: 48 inches by 48 inches is 16 square feet. 

Misleading Author:  Oh, well, I’m a gardener, not a mathematician.  I guess 8 is more like it. 

Me:  Really, your garden is 8 square feet? 

Misleading Author:  Well, I live in New York.  We  count things by the inch here. 

Me:  But all those pictures! 

Misleading Author:  Oh, that’s the garden at Giverny.  I have the same kind of plants in my garden. It’s just that Giverny is so much more photogenic.  More room for getting good angles.  But my garden really does look almost like that. 

You’re telling people that you can have a garden that looks like Giverny by working in it only 5 minutes a day? 

Misleading Author:  Pretty much.  Once it’s perfectly established and all the weeds eradicated and there’s plenty of organic material worked into the soil and you have lots of earthworms and the soil is the proper pH balance and you have the right amount of rainfall and proper drainage.  Yes, once that is all in place, the work is minimal. 

Me:  (totally bummed) OK, thank you very much.  You’ve been helpful. 

Misleading Author:  You’re welcome. Good luck. 

So, at first I’m depressed, but then I get to thinking, maybe she’s right.  You have to start with an ideal situation.  Once you get the garden looking absolutely perfect, with all conditions just so, then maybe you only have to spend 5 minutes a day for every 8 square feet of garden.  Since my garden is approximately 10,000 square feet (OK, I exaggerate. It just seems that big sometimes).  Let’s be  more real and call it only 2,500 square feet.  The rest is mostly grass.  That means 2,500 divided by 8, which comes to 312.  So if I spend 5 minutes per 312 square feet, that comes to 1,562 minutes, then divide by 60 (minutes per hour), that comes to a mere 26 hours per day, 7 days per week that I have to spend keeping it looking good.  That is, provided I start with perfection.  

I think I’m going to cry.

 

Paula Deen, Language, Culture, and Hearts

Every time there is a newsworthy event regarding the use of language,  I have  flashbacks to the days when I taught Communication Studies classes at UNC-Greensboro.  It was an interesting environment, as most college campuses are, but with slightly higher concentrations of gays, African Americans, and women, it was a little more culturally weighted toward the historically “under served.”  The straight, white, Christian male was a minority in my classes, and even among those, there were a number of nerds, geeks, and non-athletes who knew what it was like to suffer at the hands of others who felt (or wanted to feel) superior.

 That’s why I enjoyed teaching about how culture shapes language.  As a member of some minority, most everyone in my classes had a story to share about being hurt by thoughtless people who failed to consider how damaging their words could be.  Despite the fact that we’ve all tried to believe little rhyme: “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me,”  we know that words can hurt, hurt so much that they can damage a person’s psyche forever.  How many of you still cringe from the memory of an offhand remark made by someone from your childhood?   

Theoretically words SHOULD never hurt us, unless they send us to prison or the gallows.  After all,  language is a contrivance of humankind—entirely artificial and fluid.  Words that have a given meaning in one era,  language, country, state, community, or family have entirely different meanings in other languages, countries, states, communities, and families. How many times have you been surprised that someone was offended or irritated by something you said when you had absolutely no intention to be offensive or irritating?   

Even though I know this, taught it in the classroom for years, there still are certain words that make me cringe.  Swear words using God’s name offend me so much that I can’t even read the ubiquitous “omg,” or worse, “omfg” without wishing people would learn a few manners.  As an East Tennessean, I don’t like it when people imply that those of us who grew up in rural Appalachia are ignorant and ornery.  People recoil when they hear a nice little old lady use the “f” word, and the “c” word is forbidden in “polite company,” although both sure abound in music these days.   Why do people take offense at words? The only meanings words have are the meanings each of us, individually, assign to them.  “Fat” means something entirely different to my ultra skinny friend than it does to someone just this side of obese.  You can think of a thousand words that we Americans use in different contexts and which have different meanings, and none of us see any problem with that.  If we are offended by any of those words, if they are spoken from an inoffensive perspective, the problem is ours, not the person who uttered them.  The real meaning lies not in what is said, but the intent behind the words.  My sister would sometimes call me a bitch, as in, “You bitch.  I tried that dress on and it made me look like a stump.”  When she did, I would laugh and preen, because I knew she loved me deeply and that what she really meant was she thought I was beautiful. 

But some words have been singled out as offensive to society in general, and that puts them in a different category altogether.  No longer are some words just “words,” but  icons for something much more important to the psyche of our culture.  There aren’t very many.  The only really big one today is the “n” word (with the “c” word and maybe the “r” word close seconds, but only in some circles).  This word is considered so taboo that if any white person utters it, no matter what the context or the feeling behind it, that person is, according to our hyper-sensitive culture, a pariah deserving of being stripped of all honor,  financial assets, and social standing.  People have been ranting for weeks about Paula Deen, an “elderly,” (forgive me, Paula, that probably is offensive to you, but “elderly” is one of those words with fluid meaning.  I think 66 is getting up there, but you may think you’ve just hit your “prime.”) southern, not terribly educated about cultures (will I get into trouble here? She graduated from high school, but most likely did not have the advantage of college classes promoting cultural sensitivity) who admitted that some years ago she used the forbidden word.  She didn’t kill anybody.  She didn’t even threaten anybody.  At the time she uttered it, it was considered an impolite word among white people, and she probably had no clue of how it affected Black people. Really, her biggest crime was that she was unaware that one day in the future, American society would find the word beyond abhorrent. 

She has her supporters, people who don’t understand that we’re not dealing with just current issues here.  Many bring up the double standard African Americans apparently have regarding racial slurs.  And they do have their point, but to belabor it obscures the fact that the issue is much more complex.  We need to stop looking at the surface of the name-calling and go deeper into the cultural history which has made this such a sensitive issue. 

The truth is that for about 200 years slavery in its most shameful form was an accepted practice in the United States.  The overwhelming majority of slaves were of African descent.  After the Civil War, people of color were still regarded by some as inferior for at least the next hundred years.  Certainly many people of Paula Deen’s generation and of her culture harbored, however deep and secretively, feelings of racial superiority.  No matter what terms anyone used to describe Black people,  the feelings of racism were always there, lurking under the surface.  It’s hard to get over the things you were taught from an early age.  Northern or Southern, rich or poor, educated or ignorant, you were fortunate if you were never “programmed” to believe that white people are superior to dark ones.  You were also fortunate if you eventually learned that any kind of elitism ultimately rots the soul and destroys the fabric of the larger society. If someone taught you about the moral decay of  Germany in the 30s and 40s, and how American elitism which relegated the Jew to substandard standing contributed to that moral decay, you had an advantage far beyond most people of the times.  And if someone taught you that Jesus loves everyone equally and that He requires that we do, too, you have the advantage of  untrammeled friendships with people of many racial backgrounds.   

The upshot of racist and elitist thinking is that it makes us harbor unkindness in our hearts, and that no matter how we refer to anybody, if that unkindness and lack of grace is there, the words we use are going to come out as hateful.  The words used by the most hateful people are the ones that are eventually going to have the most painful and offensive feelings associated with them.  The “n” word has come to us as an icon. It was used as the primary descriptive term by people who wanted to justify murder and oppression by robbing the people to whom it referred of their humanity.  And so it became the symbol of something rotten and ugly and mean.  

As white people, we need to understand that it isn’t the word, it’s the history behind the word, and if we think African Americans unjustly “get by” with using racial slurs to refer to white people while we don’t have the same privilege, we don’t fully understand the history of pain that Africans suffered at the hands of white people.  Never mind that your ancestors never owned slaves or that you have been racially tolerant your whole life.  The fact is that one culture abused another culture and the abused culture is still reeling from the effects of it.  We need to get over it if they still want to vent a little. 

To my Black friends, and all of us who are sensitive to certain terms may I add this:  Words really are artificial contrivances, meaningless without intent behind them.  If I call someone a term which seems offensive to you, the meaning can vary so significantly that you really don’t know what I mean unless you know me and what is in my heart.  It’s justifiable to be sensitive to the use of the “n” word because we are still living with the residue of the culture of racism in America, and we see it as a symbol of that culture.  But please, let’s all try to look beyond the words and understand what someone really means, what kind of background he or she came from to cause him to be so culturally blind, what kind of hurts he or she is carrying around before we jump to retaliate for a slip of the tongue. 

The Last Gift From My Mother

I suppose that most mothers are different and weird and special only to their own children. When we are small, we tend to regard another’s mothers as simply the person with the flour on her hands when we visit before dinner, or the person who comes into the principal’s office looking harried every time her budding juvenile delinquent has gone and done something again. Other people’s mothers are ordinary people, sort of faceless and nameless, other than “Sally’s mom” or “Mrs. Harris.” Occasionally, someone may have an exceptionally pretty mom, especially if we see her going out looking glamorous in jewelry and beautiful clothes, but for the most part, in our youth, we view moms as just part of the furniture at our friends’ houses.

I think my mother was different enough so that my friends realized it as soon as they reached the age of consciousness, when people with whom we are not directly engaged begin to emerge from the shadows and become slightly more animated than their surroundings. My mother was pretty, funny, and fun, always up for some adventure. She was also canny in the way women are canny when they see a situation they cannot control and find a circuitous way to control it anyway. She was a feminist, a sexist, really who disdained men, but doted on my father because he enthusiastically acknowledge that men are shits. Together, George and Marynell Griffitts harbored the notion that women were better than men, and the world would be better off if women ran things

She died 14 years ago. Of course, I still think of her frequently, perhaps even daily. I still remember exactly the extraordinary color of her eyes and the way they always lit up when she looked at one of her children or grandchildren. I remember the sound of her laugh and what her fried chicken tasted like.

A few years ago, I had an occasion to think of her more often because she suddenly came back to me in an unexpected and delightful, if troublesome way. So like her.

My father was 12 years older than my mother, and she always referred to herself as his “little curly haired darling.” I don’t know if that was a term he had introduced to describe her, or if she made it up to describe herself. At any rate, it was an accurate description. He doted on her and spoiled her in the way uxorious men used to spoil their wives in the days when wives were considered merely extensions of their husbands. He overindulged her and let her be the Queen, running their little fiefdom with absolute authority. If anyone sniggered at his calm acceptance of her control over him and the household, her merely smiled and commented that she was smarter than he was. That wasn’t true, but Daddy had a gift of self-effacement. He hid his intelligence behind a mask of humorous reserve; Mama wore hers like a coal miner wears his headlamp—not with self-conscious hubris, but merely as one of the tools in her arsenal. She just looked bright, with her flashing golden eyes and a face usually pink with laughter or exertion or heat from the kitchen stove or indignation. All kinds of passions were given equal time and consideration, rotating across her features regularly.

She was 54 when Daddy died, still young enough to feel surprised and betrayed at being abandoned by her lover. After his death, she lost all control over herself and the circumstances of her life. She went berserk, and within 6 months began marrying a succession of men, all of whom were supposed to replace the man who had been George Griffitts. None of them lived up to expectations, and so she ditched them one at time, but she never gave up trying. She married two men twice and divorced them both twice. She married one man once and had the marriage annulled shortly after the ink had dried on the marriage license. Five marriages in the course of her widowhood, and she was considering marrying again when she came down with her final illness at age 77.

The man she was married to for the longest stretches was named Louis. He was good looking, younger than she was, financially secure, and generally nice, but he had the unfortunate traits of a jealous streak and of not being George Griffitts. He was doomed from the beginning by either.

A few of years ago, one of Louis’ daughters-in-law called me. Louis had recently died, and his heirs were trying to settle his estate. Apparently, at one time during one of their marriages, Mama and Louis had bought a piece of property together. At their last divorce, Mama sold Louis her interest in the land, but for some unbeknownst reason, she maintained the mineral rights. In a separate document apart from her will, she named me, her youngest daughter, as the heir to those rights. Now that Louis was gone, his heirs wanted to sell the land, but they found this small encumbrance, a gift and a legacy to me from my mother, popping up surprisingly and irritatingly.

The sudden knowledge of this secret, long-hidden gift felt like a hug sent to me across time and distance, and suddenly the room I am in is filled with Mama’s presence. I can feel her, simultaneously sly and straightforward, direct as a man, manipulative as a woman who is repressed but determined, and I wonder why it was the she retained these rights and why she bequeathed them to me. Did she really think there might be gas or gold or oil on the property? Did she do it to get in one last insult to Louis? Did she want to leave a tiny surprise to her daughter to pop up out of the blue as it did?

And what should I do about it? My first impulse was simply to sign away the rights. Louis’ children were in the depths of grief —why make their lives even more difficult by hoarding this tiny consideration? After all, Mama could have done this just to needle Louis. I can see the possibility. There is no need to carry the battle to his children. Mineral rights are essentially worthless unless something of value is actually found on the property, and I think such a find is unlikely. So why would I saddle Louis’ children with a sticking point when they try to sell, and why would I want to keep a legal right in property several hundred miles away? It sounds like the makings of a future headache.

But something gave me pause. The joy that I felt when I was reminded of how much I was cherished by both my parents made me realize that love sustains itself forever, and that little reminder is precious to me. You can tuck love away into a memory, but now and again, something will dislodge it from its hidden place, and you can see it vivid and in full flower, blossoming in your heart is if it were May and the glories of the earth jump up and shout, “Surprise! I never left the room! I was just playing peek-a-boo!” Maybe I should not mindlessly give away what my mother so carefully wrapped up and handed to me. What was she thinking? What should I do?

My first thought was that I needed to speak to my sister, Rebekah. I know she would have a strong opinion about it, one way or another, but which way I could not venture to guess. That thought sent another jolt—Becky had been gone for 5 years at that time, and I was even more painfully aware of how bereft I am without the wisdom of both these remarkable women. My life has been shaped by their presence and their influences, and I feel crippled without their counsel. I will have to spend the rest of my life without the hope of knowing the discernment of their hearts and without sharing my own with them.

So I called upon others—the women I have known and trusted for years and who I have blithely called “friends” without really recognizing the full meaning of the term. Now I am aware of how much friends stand in as sisters and how much I rely on their love and their wisdom to help me in times of pain or trouble—or joy. I realize they stand in as mothers, too, using their own love and the resources they have so carefully cultivated and stored up over the years to give those they care about the best advice they have. I suddenly feel inundated with love from these surrogate mothers and sisters, and from my biological mother and sister, and I am humbled and thankful for what they offer.

And they have given good advice, as I knew they would, advice that came from different places in their hearts and minds and which gave me different paradigms from which to examine the problem. I think the best advice I got was from Pabby, my friend from long ago when I lived in Baton Rouge. “Listen to your mother,” she said, and her words pierced me with their practical wisdom. Others reminded me that mineral rights are not as much of an encumbrance on the sale of land as I had thought they might be. And that I should never discard a gift, especially one given with such deliberate care. Everyone had some kernel that I listened to and am grateful for. And they made me even more grateful for the simple fact of friendship.

So I decided what to do. I would not relinquish the mineral rights if it is at all possible. If Louis’ heirs want to sell the property, they can do so with transferring the rights to the buyer. This is most likely the last obvious message of love I shall ever receive from Marynell, and I don’t want to let it dissipate. That message can be passed along to others in the long line of mothers and daughters that are here now and those yet to come. It would be silly and fruitless to pass the rights, worthless in any material sense, to my children and grandchildren in general. This would just leave a muddle of spit interest down through the generations. But I do hope to leave a tiny legacy of love and a miniature portrait of my mother’s character to someone who can claim it as her own.

I intend to try to see that the youngest daughter of the family receives these mineral rights, and the accompanying hug and beam of love that shines from Marynell down through her daughter and granddaughter and great granddaughter and great-great granddaughter. Mary Elizabeth is my daughter. If she has a girl child, or two or more, I intend to give the rights to the youngest. If Mary Elizabeth does not have any girls, the rights will pass to the youngest daughter of the youngest daughter of Rebekah. For a time, the rights were to pass to my niece Britt’s daughter, Elsa, but since then, Rebekah’s youngest daughter Sarah has had a baby girl, so aptly named Marinella. At this time, Marinella is the heir to this gift handed down from her grandmother Marynell. If Sarah or Mary Elizabeth come though and give me another grandniece or a granddaughter, that claim will shift to one of them.

It is my hope that this wish is honored through the generations, in direct line, if possible, to nieces or cousins if not, not because I hope to pass along anything of material value to the daughters and granddaughters of the future, but because I want a little girl who doesn’t know me, who doesn’t know Marynell, who may feel small and insignificant next to her big sister(s) and brother(s) or cousins, to feel a special touch from someone who thought of her and loved her and hoped for her generations before she was even conceived. The fact that no one knows what treasure may be there is important. I want her to dream about the possibilities that arise when she knows that she, and she alone owns all the gold and silver and precious gems that may lie beneath the land once owned by her grandmother generations back. And I hope that knowing she is loved and remembered by strangers from long ago makes her aware of the treasure pulsing beneath her own skin.  

Marynell, on her 70th birthday

SHEETS TO THE WIND

There’s something about seeing a clothesline that makes me feel really good. I don’t think I have anything but happy associations with that homely object, once ubiquitous throughout the rural and suburban South, but now almost nonexistent. To me, they are a token of childhood and summer days and the smell of sheets fresh off the line, all crisp and scratchy.

 

And they remind me of my mother when she was young and vital. Of course she got a clothes dryer in her later years—who didn’t?–and so the times I remember her being at the clothesline, arms in the air, mouth full of clothes pins, she was beautiful and young and strong. I took her youth and beauty and strength for granted, indeed, considered her pretty old and far beyond the pleasures of childhood.

 

But I know she did find a lot of childish pleasures in those years. She was a fast runner and loved to race with me. It seems it got harder and harder to win as we both grew older. Just seeing her children and their friends run through the flapping sheets, playing hide-and-seek surely brought her pleasure, for I’m sure she played the same games as a child. It was always thrilling to run out to the clothesline to gather in the nearly-dry laundry as the thunder growled and the skies darkened and the big, fat, solitary raindrops began their dusty, wet dance. The minute the clouds rolled in, we all would eye the sky carefully, and if the wind picked up and the air grew menacing, we all, as a family, dashed to the back yard, laughing, breathless, and gathered all that damp, white, clean laundry, smelling like sunshine, and carried it into the house feeling like heroes. Sometimes we spread things out over the furniture to dry in the house; sometimes we merely waited for the day to lighten again so she (never we) could go hang it back out again.

 

Clotheslines were once in everyone’s yard. As children, we used to take sheets and blankets out on summer nights, pin them up over the lines, and make tents, and inside them we would snug down with more quilts and sleeping bags and pillows and flashlights and a copious supply of potato chips and cookies. There we would tell stories, sing, eat, and play games until the crickets lulled us to sleep. Many times we would raid the neighbor kids who also were camping out under the clotheslines, and suffer through their raids. We never got much sleep, and we were always a little damp from dew, groggy, and itchy the next day because we had rolled in the grass, sweated, and sometimes got into chiggers.

 

I love the smell of fresh laundry dried outside, and I still hang mine out every chance I get. Right now the white sheets are dancing in the wind, and I can actually see them growing whiter under the April sun. Chlorine bleach actually yellows things over time, but sun restores whiteness, and the smell of sunshine certainly beats that of Clorox. Oddly, my children don’t like the smell of sheets dried outside. Once, when Mary Elizabeth was in middle school, I held a pillowcase up to her nose and said, “Oh, honey! Just smell this!” and she turned away, saying, “Ugh! I hate that! It smells like boys that have been playing outside all day!” I was astonished. How could you not love the smell of boys that have been playing outside all day? Let alone clean sheets that reek of sunshine. I mentioned this to my friend Delores the other day, and she said she had just about the same conversation with her grown daughter recently.

 

Despite the distaste the younger generations show for line-dried laundry, I hope the custom is not a dead one, and I can only hope that the energy-conscious kids of today and tomorrow will embrace it. I don’t have a lot of hope, though. It seems that everyone recycles, but I see few clotheslines in the suburban landscape these days, despite that fact that clothes dryers are huge energy hogs, and heat up the house to boot. But sadly, they are out of favor because there’s something about them that seems to shout out: “Low class! Ignorant!” A friend my age came to see me not long ago, and when she saw my underwear swinging in the wind, she commented, “Oh, Deborah! That isn’t your laundry hanging out on the line, is it?” Clearly, she was embarrassed for me, redneck that I have proven to be.

 

I hope she gets over that, because if she comes to spend the night with me, she’s going to be sleeping on sheets that are stiff with wind, smelling of sunshine and pollen. And I want her, and everyone else, to find it as soothing as I do.

 

 

TEA AND BIRDSONG

Little Wren

TEA AND BIRDSONG

I learned to love afternoon tea the summer Mike and I spent some time in the Yorkshire dales, the home of the famous veterinarian, James Herriot. I have been a Herriot groupie ever since I discovered his All Creatures Great and Small books and made it a ritual to watch the BBC series on Sunday nights back in the 80s. So of course, it was a real joy to make a pilgrimage to the beautiful place immortalized by Herriot’s lovable patients.

One drizzly, cold day, when the mist worms its way through your inadequate summer sweater and clear through to your bones, we drove through the dales and into a small village where the scent of coal smoke hung low, drenching the village with that old-fashioned feeling that we Americans rarely experience. We stopped at a small tea shop/inn and had a cozy, comfortable cup of tea and one of those cherry tarts that the British do so well. After 20 some-odd years, I still remember how it felt, smelled, and tasted in that ancient room with the low ceiling and the coal fire glowing in the little fireplace, and ever since then, I have loved the tradition of British tea.

A year later, I spent a month in Wales, teaching a performance course at the Welsh College of Music and Drama, and every afternoon we would break for a few minutes for tea. That was always an ad-hoc affair, usually just tea purchased from a street vendor, but my, oh, my! Was it ever good! The tea was very hot, strong and black—none of this silly, perfumey stuff Americans seem to like, but deep, dark, tea, richly oxidized, laced with hot whole milk and a lump of sugar. I quickly came to appreciate the boost it gave you without the heavy, lingering aftertaste of coffee.

I rarely have a chance to enjoy afternoon tea in America like I did in the British Isles, because few Americans know how to do it. If I order tea at a restaurant, I rarely can get real tea. Assam is the best, but I will be happy with any good, strong, black tea, as long as it is hot. But American restaurants don’t know what real tea is. They offer a a selection of several “gourmet” teas, which are gussied-up, nasty blends of berries and flowers, serve it lukewarm, and they try to foist lemon on you. If you beg for milk, they bring it to you cold. I end up settling for plain old lukewarm Lipton, made even cooler by the milk straight from the refrigerator, and weep for the memory of that day in the dales. Believe it or not, I have had worse tea here in the Triangle than I did once in Texas where, not wanting to disappoint, they heated some strong ice tea in the microwave for me. And they microwaved the milk, too. At least it was hot and black.

The history of the European teatime (not terribly different from the Asian tea, for the soul of both is good company and ceremony) is kind of interesting. Originally, in Europe, and particularly, Great Britain, the meal called “tea” was served in the evening, between 5 and 7 PM, and basically stood in for what we call “supper” today. Back then, there were only two meals served: breakfast and tea (or dinner or supper). The aristocracy, having the luxury of being able to party long into the night, and not having to hit the dockyards or coal mines early the next morning, began to eat dinner later and later, until the established time for an upper class dinner was around 8 pm. Light luncheon was introduced, but still, ladies found it to be a long wait between a noontime luncheon and an 8 o’clock dinner. Afternoon tea came into being to fill in the long gap between the meals in France in the middle of the 17th century. The custom was picked up in England a century later by the Dutchess of Bedford to stave off that “sinking feeling” she got in the middle of the afternoon. Ultimately, “high” tea, so named because it was served at the high supper table became the mainstay meal of the working classes, and “low” or afternoon tea, so named because it was generally served from low tables in the drawing room, salon, or garden, was a social snack enjoyed by the upper classes. Although it may be counterintuitive, considering the connotation between “high” and “low,” you might want to remember that the queen NEVER attends a “high” tea, and chimney sweeps rarely enjoy “low” tea. Being the pedantic snob that I sometimes can be, I am amused that some tea shops in America call afternoon tea “high” tea and wonder if the Brits consider it much of a faux pas.

But enough snobbery and pedantry. The beauty of afternoon tea is of pleasantries and good company, not a quibbling over outdated terms and manners. Not only is tea itself a wonderful beverage, but the ritual of afternoon tea is such a pleasure as well. So civilized, so energizing, so tasty. A full tea with finger sandwiches, scones, a little cake and a good friend is a very pleasant way to spend part of an afternoon. And it is especially pleasant if you have it in the garden on pretty china when everything is in bloom and the birds are singing and the friend(s) who have joined you are happy and full of good conversation.

Yes, I love afternoon tea. I love the way the silver gleams in the sunlight and the clear “clink!” of a china cup against the saucer. I love the feel of crisp linen napkins that I have lovingly ironed and the flutter of a tablecloth in the breeze. I love settling back and listening to the laugh of a good friend and the taste of the strong black Assam and the buttery sweetness of a scone. The only thing that makes these moments more perfect is include my beautiful granddaughter Corinne into the mix. The sound of a friend’s laughter is made all the sweeter when you add in the higher octave of a baby’s laughter. The conversation is made all the more interesting when you add in the singsong babble of a little girl. The linen appears crisper and more elegant when nestled against baby skin. And what better ritual can I use to teach my granddaughter the gentle art of conversation, the appreciation of beauty, and the pleasure of a good table? That’s why my little Wren joins me every week as I host afternoon tea.

BIRD POOP ON MY HAT

I am not good at winter. As far as I am concerned, I could just sleep from New Year’s to Easter, fantasizing that the Sandman is erasing away all the wrinkles I had accumulated in the summer before, and then be ready to emerge with Mr. Groundhog when he wakes up from his second nap, all refreshed and ready to dig.  I’m not the only creature that feels this way. Birds don’t much like winter, either, and the ones that don’t fly south are always seeking a warm place to hang out on frigid nights. (Why on earth they don’t fly south is beyond me. If I had a condo in San Juan and no responsibilities here, I certainly would be there during the dark months.)

One such warmish place is our garage. A pair of Carolina wrens (apt, don’t you think?) have discovered that if they slip in before we shut things down for the night, they can cozy up in my straw hat that hangs by the back door and avoid the howling winds and sleety rains.  It isn’t a bad gig, particularly since someone (not me, of course) is always up by the crack of dawn and available to open the garage door so they can fly out and hit the bird feeder for breakfast.  If no one appears in a timely enough manner and they start to get hungry, they stand outside the back door and chirp loudly to remind us that their stomachs are growling. That is, they used to, until they discovered my stash of bird seed in the closet. Now they are content to just stay in the garage 24/7 on dreary days, lolling around in bird seed and snuggling up under my hat, and, in the process, pooping wherever they feel like it, usually in and on said hat, or if they are feeling adventuresome, the cars.

 I finally got out into the garden last weekend because it was one of those glorious March days that fools you into thinking that Spring has arrived and it is time to come out of hibernation. Of course, I grabbed my hat because the sun was out, and I am, after all, a redhead. As you may imagine, I  was much chagrined to discover that not only would I be wearing the dear, old battered straw thing, but also a copious amount of bird poop. But given the choice of a bit of extra weight on my head or a certain sunburn, I chose to brush off what I could and save my skin.  It wasn’t so bad. Kind of a decoration, really.  It made me feel kind of—you know—at one with nature, striding around the farm in my Wellies, pulling up weeds, admiring the blooms that are brave enough to pop out so early, planning where to plant the blueberry bushes, and very much being at home under my poopy hat, under the unexpectedly glorious sun, under the marvelously blue Carolina sky. Can life get any better than this?

I’M TIRED OF BLOODY MARYS. CAN WE BREAK OUT THE CHAMPAGNE NOW?

I’M TIRED OF BLOODY MARYS. CAN WE BREAK OUT THE CHAMPAGNE NOW?

Today is a day for celebration. After 25 or so years of on again/off again writing, with babies and grandbabies and building careers and house projects and gardens and just fielding all the things life throws at you in between, I finally finished the next-to-the-last series of edits of my novel. After I go through it one more time, like obsessively checking to make sure the stove is turned off and the doors are locked, I am packing it up to send it to the proofreader editor, who will probably send it back with the admonition not to be wanton with my commas.

Who knew it would take this long? After all, as one author (Who can tell me which one?) said, “Writing is easy. You just sit in front of a typewriter and open a vein.” Yes, once that vein is opened, the blood, and the words, can flow freely, but nobody it said it wouldn’t be painful. Sometimes the story nips and gnaws at you with its sharp little teeth until you have put it down on paper. Characters you don’t like, who have no regard for your sensibilities, do and say things that embarrass or hurt you. Messy accidents shape events, just like they do in real life. You, the writer, helplessly stand aside and bleed as the story puddles on the page. You have little to do with that part of it, except sacrifice your life essence and wonder if it is worth it.

But there is more to a good novel than just the story. The story might come gushing out, but literariness takes slow, deliberate effort. Lots of sweat, in other words. Aside from all the aforementioned time-sucking events, it took me forever to find the right words, the right images, the right flow, the right grammar to not only bring the story to life, but to bring it to life vividly, and with class. Thankfully, I have a kind and enthusiastic–not to mention hardworking–editor who shortened the process. Although she asked me to do some things I frankly didn’t want to, she at least was willing to jump in there and help me slog through unpleasantness. If there was a bad image, she uncovered it. If there was a split infinitive, she put it back together. If there was an overblown metaphor, she took the wind out. Her work cut a couple of years off my publishing schedule. Thank you, Elizabeth Turnbull of Light Messages Publishing Company!

Now, I put this baby to bed, for tonight, anyway. Tomorrow, I’ll go through it once more, then hand over my much bled over, sweated over manuscript to the proofreader. I would like to say my long journey toward publication is nearly at an end, but I suspect there is still a ways to go. Perhaps we are at least at the beginning of the end. I hope so, anyway. Champagne isn’t meant to be aged.