Loblollie

A Healthy Poverty

2010-07-11T20:05:00.004-04:00

"It is dire poverty indeed when a man is so malnourished and fatigued that he won't stop to pick up a penny. But if you cultivate a healthy poverty and simplicity, so that finding a penny will literally make your day, then, since the world is in fact planted in pennies, you have with your poverty bought a lifetime of days." Annie Dillard

Yesterday while shopping, I overhead a woman explaining to her husband that she was helping a little boy find his mother. He had somehow lost track of her as some more rambunctious children do. A few minutes later and once again by himself, he stopped in the aisle just behind me and said to no one in particular: "A penny! Two pennies! Now I'll have two days worth of good luck!"

Whether or not he found his mother, I do not know. I trust he did. But, in finding those two pennies he gave me a gift as well. He reminded me that true riches lay in seeing joy when joy is to be found. It's a little gift we give to ourselves. It's childlike, yes, in its simplicity. But sometimes the simplest things are hardest to truly understand. For my part, I hope that wonders will never cease.

It is worth noting: Wilderness

2010-06-27T14:10:00.004-04:00

It is worth noting that when men are at their disaster, that is, whatever it is that brings them to their knees in this world, whatever their wilderness is, put upon them by chance or fate into unknown circumstances and territories, men seek their god. And until the storm passes and they have been rescued or some answer or clarity has illuminated them to some point of relief or assistance, they cling to Him. It is the wise man that remembers his trials and his subsequent deliveries. It is the wise man that remembers grace. It is the fool that returns to his ways. Like a dog returns to his vomit.

Folk Art at McDonald's

2009-01-17T22:16:00.009-05:00

l
My mother loves Washington, Georgia. I took her and the fam on a Saturday jaunt to do nothing more than drive down its old tree-lined streets and get a glimpse of some of its 100+ antebellum homes. While out rambling we pulled into a McDonald's to make use of their facilities. What a fortunate bathroom run. For there on the window were hand-drawn Christmas decorations complete with trees and angels and snow. Art to rival any work I have seen from Finster or Nellie Mae Rowe or, my very personal favorite, Myrtice West. Unfortunately, it was cloudy and I just couldn't seem to get a shot that really did this portion of the Christmas scene justice. Hopefully, this small section is enough for you to begin to believe me. For further convincing, click on the pic so you can examine it yourself.

Orange Christmas Traditions

2009-01-02T19:44:00.028-05:00

My daughter got an orange for Christmas from her elderly school bus driver. She was thrilled with her good luck. Mainly, I think, because of its size: as big as a softball with skin as thick as baseball glove. Surely this gift is remarkable on two accounts. One: she received a gift from her bus driver. Two: she received a FOOD gift.

I love what this implies. It means there is a certain level of honesty between parent and driver. That the bus driver has no fear at giving a child food and that the parents will accept it willingly. In this small town of mine, is this kindly bus driver a remnant from another time? One that is only found in small pockets like here. Or is he simply continuing a tradition here in the South that is still going strong?

But what about the orange and why? Surely the gift is as strong as the gesture. Is it a Southern phenomenon to give or receive oranges for Christmas? I received an orange in the toe of my stocking every Christmas. My mother passed that tradition to me because she did as well. That, and a smattering of nuts. She also reports that in her childhood baskets of oranges, grapefruit and apples were often given to neighbors and friends this time of year. As I write this, I realize that while buying provisions for Christmas dinner I noticed pyramids of cellophane-wrapped fruit with ribbons on top.

I consulted this excellent book to help me delve into the history of the "gifted" orange in the South. Excerpted within it are diary entries spanning the Christmases of a Vicksburg woman, Mrs. Mahala Eggleston Roach, from 1844-1860. Her 1854 entry reads "Cakes, oranges, oysters, preserves, etc., etc., have poured in on us today and I am tired of laughing, talking, and playing with my sweet little children...."

I am certain that writing about receiving oranges in a personal diary among other foods like oysters and cakes is enough to attest to their specialness and her family's pleasure at receiving them. After all, they are only in season during the colder months and obtaining them may have been special indeed. Again, she mentions them in Christmas of 1859 among other edible riches of the season, "...New Orleans friends sent me oranges and oysters - I am always in luck."

One hundred and fifty five years later, I am left hopeful about the giving of oranges here in the South. They symbolize so much of our rich traditions. The best of which is remembering one another. An orange always tastes sweeter with the thought of a loved one or friend lingering in your mind.

Angel You May Have Heard On High

2008-12-24T00:07:00.020-05:00

We lived in NY state a few years back. While there, mother was inspired to really start painting again after around 10 years of letting her talent lie fallow. When she picked back up, she went for heroic-sized canvases. This is one of the first things she did.

In the right corner of the painting is a small suggestion of a town. Though the angel addresses the viewer, she has not forgotten the flat-roofed, sand-colored homes below her. Rather she looks to the viewer to discover his purpose and interest. She then extends the viewer an invitation by acknowledging, then igniting the divine spark within, so he may also empathize with her task and become a caretaker himself.

This is not a (clearly definable) Southern post

2008-12-16T22:09:00.003-05:00

Increasingly, I want to write about my mother's dilemma.

She has been on the same anti-psychotic for years. And it works. It just causes severe side effects - like weight gain, then diabetes, increased high blood pressure, back pain, stiffness. (It is killing her, she says.) But it gives her her sanity back.

So it is a hard call. To know which effect is the lesser of the two evils: life as herself, because this medicine REALLY has given her life back. Or life in a corner, tortured by demons, wringing her hands while my daughter and I sit and watch helplessly?

What about an entirely different anti-psychotic, you say?

There isn't one she hasn't tried.

The one that is "killing" her is the one that gives her life.
What to do?

Pure Alabama

2008-11-29T18:55:00.014-05:00

I love this photograph of William Christenberry's. Its title is Pure Alabama. I couldn't agree more.

Inspired by this shot which I first saw at a lecture he gave back in June, I started keeping my eyes open for these signs. Specifically, I started looking for how their placement creates an idea of a "pure" locale.

Here's one I took:

Unlike Christenberry, I haven't limited myself to Hale County, Alabama. I have been looking for them wherever I am. This one I found in the Northeastern corner of Alabama (though I have seen them in Georgia and South Carolina, too.)

Also, unlike Christenberry's version, this oil sign overlooks a man-made portion of landscape. Even still, I don't think too much was lost in translation.

A Quiet, Hidden Center

2008-10-07T17:18:00.016-04:00

I have been so plagued.

Today, in the car, on the way to the hardware store to buy some paint and some chrysanthemums, I realized that I was not present. I am an expert at living in the 'yet to be,' for it is there I dwell most of the time, regularly making plans to decorate this, or write that, or cook this, or visit that place. All in the name of filling my life with good, pleasant, enriching experiences; thereby, not living a trite, mundane forgotten life.

But, oh to be ordinary! To live quietly. To not seep into anyone else's existence except those in my home and already around me - giving energy to them and them alone. Being careful when my energies are required to be pulled away from that quiet, hidden center that is a home where something as weighted as memory forms the fragile, precious lives of those inside it.

And so, in my car, being plagued with good intentions, I realized that I was not really even seeing the road that I was driving down. I have never even noticed the grain of the dashboard in my car that I have driven for four years, or really been listening to my daughter when she tells me she doesn't like taking piano lessons.

And so, I have decided that it is time to regroup. To take account of what is real for me and for those in my care and start nurturing from this still, quiet spot.

In the midst of my awakening, I've remembered a long beloved poem that now takes on new meaning. I have always loved Emily Dickinson and feel connected to her in a way I do not with other writers. She speaks words that my heart nods in agreement with. I am convinced that her whole life, a small, solitary one that she kept close, gave her everything she needed. From there she revealed her truths, which, as it happens, are very often mine as well.

So here's to remedy, heart's ease, and understanding the poet:

I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us - don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know. How dreary to be somebody!
How public like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!

-E. Dickinson

A Few Figs from Thistles

2008-09-30T21:09:00.010-04:00

I wanted to say a note about figs before the change of season is so noticeable that it would no longer seem appropriate or relevant. I have two fig bushes. They are wedged between two rose bushes: an aggressively prickly Don Juan and a wild, pink rambler that is festered with the tiny, pinprick sort of thorns.

As I did not plant these fig bushes, rather, I purchased an old Southern homestead full of unknown fruit trees, bushes and flowers, I cannot be sure what variety they are. From the small amount of research I have done on them, their description and growing habits suggest they may be Celeste. This is according to Georgia's Coop Services.

I love to pick figs. There is something very Biblical about it all. And standing by the bush, biting into soft, warm flesh is nothing short of heavenly. They must be picked when ripe, though. If picked green, they will not develop. Once picked, they will only last, refrigerated, about three days. Freeze them on a baking sheet before storing in a ziplock bag.

When You're Hot's, You're Hot's

2008-09-25T21:15:00.003-04:00

I have driven through Lagrange, GA's Southside for the past four years and have meant, everytime, to stop and take a picture of Hot's Barber Shop. It is a veritable Mecca for the what's-going-on-crowd on Saturday nights. I often see a bbq smoker sitting right outside the door wafting great plumes of savory smells down the block. A group of worn, happy men are seated outside in the chairs to accompany it when the weather's right.

This shot is from last Sunday. I didn't expect anyone to be anywhere near it, but, just as I got out of my car, this gentleman waved and obliged me a picture. I'm not sure I have ever seen anyone come out with freshly cropped hair, but whatever is going on inside, they always come out smiling.

Garments of Salvation

2008-09-17T20:38:00.009-04:00

In the catechism, man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. Daryll's Place in Toccoa, GA gives men the opportunity to accomplish this task not just in deed or in word, but in the very fabric with which they gird their loins.

Along the same lines for ladies, the book Crowns:Portraits of Black Women in Their Church Hats by Michael Cunningham and Craig Marberry(2000) reveals the dignity and strength of women who carry on this tradition through 50 different portraits and stories.

Both are worth checking out.

I delight greatly in the Lord;
my soul rejoices in my God.
For he has clothed me with garments of salvation
and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness,
as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest,
and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. (Is 61:10)

Martin, GA

2008-09-09T17:52:00.019-04:00

Martin, Georgia may not be big in size, but what it lacks in largesse, it makes up for in character. According to Wikipedia, Martin has a total area of 1.5 miles and a population of 311. Most of it is viewable just driving along Main Street. The challenge is to try and take in the number of historic homes, mostly Victorian, nearly all listed on the National Register. There are 11 within view of the road.

Also along this road, is about two blocks of old downtown, which is where these adverts were found. They grace the entry to a second-hand store. I was unable to resist exploring it. Inside, I found and purchased a puffy, fabric picture of two grouse.

He may have been a big-city Charleston man, but Rhett seems right at home here in small-town Georgia.

Decoration Day

2008-09-08T22:02:00.003-04:00

Earlier this summer I visited Lebanon Cemetery in Lebanon, Alabama where many generations of my relatives are buried. It was mid-June when I photographed this. Decoration Day, in this part of Alabama, occurs the third weekend in May. I have often wondered how long all the plastic beauty that folks lay out stays on the graves before someone (who???) cleans it all up.

I guess the answer is about three weeks.

Sick

2008-08-27T20:52:00.006-04:00

Here is a sad thing: I only really love my mother when she is taking her medicine. "Really love," I suppose, means that I am outwardly affectionate to her and can stand to be in the same room with her, or make polite conversation with her.

My mother is bold. But only when she is stable. My mother is shy. But only when she hasn't had her med.

One year, with my daughter, we returned to a school she had attended in fourth grade. We had not seen the school in three years. Katie, my daughter, said to me, "This building used to seem a lot bigger." For me, I knew that Katie's child eyes were gone, had sunk deep down inside herself to be used for the purpose of memory as an adult.

Sometimes, when the conversation is right, I refer to this time with Katie as "Before the building had shrunk."

I have lived with my mother's illness since the time before my own buildings shrunk. Somedays, I am really, really sick and tired of it.

Me and William Christenberry

2008-07-28T00:20:00.021-04:00

On Wednesday, June 25, I got a chance to met one of my heroes, the artist, William Christenberry. In my last post, I mentioned the book Let Us Now Praise Famous Men and how it buffered some homesickness while living in Upstate New York. I came to this book through Christenberry's work. Christenberry, whose work was inspired by Famous Men is a Hale County Alabama native. While an undergraduate art student at the University of Alabama, he read James Agee's short story "A Mother's Tale" for an English class. He told me "I was struck by that story and Agee's writing."

Shortly after that story, he came across Famous Men and in it, recognized the people Agee had written about and Evans had photographed. He told me, "I knew those people." Whether or not he meant he really knew them or he knew who they were was not clear to me. Perhaps it was a little of both. Sometimes, in rural areas of the South, relationships were and can still be this way: you know a person because he is a member of your community: you claim him as your own because you talk a certain way, know the same neighbors and see the world through similar eyes.

This photograph of me and Christenberry was taken at a friend's home in Sewanee, TN. Christenberry had just returned from giving a lecture at a Shakerag Workshop at the St. Andrews Sewanee school, where James Agee was a student. I was very privileged to be able to spend the evening talking with both him and his wife. We spoke of his time in NY getting to know Evans, of William Eggleston and of the late, great Samuel Mockbee, whom he referred to as "Sambo." He and his wife both remembered Mockbee fondly and lamented the fact that the remaining monies of his McArthur Genius Grant were taken away from his family after his death.

Though we were in Tennessee, we spoke the same language, talked of the same people, and, as we're both Alabamians, I've claimed him as one of my own.

Problems with Fact and Self

2008-07-09T16:39:00.022-04:00

So, I'm currently in John Jeremiah Sullivan's creative non-fiction class and have a assignment to explain "the problem of the fact and the self in..." The ellipsis is, in my case, James Agee's and Walker Evan's Let Us Now Praise Famous Men. You have to know that I love this book and it may be hard for me to try and distill it into something academic that does not betray my mad love for it.

My own personal copy of this book sits on a shelf in the hallway of my house. Occasionally, walking through the hall, I will stop, pull the book down, open it up to a random page and start reading aloud whatever I happen to hit upon. The language never fails to immediately pull me into its undertow. And sometimes it resonates a swelling in my throat, just from the sheer beauty of his descriptions. Reading them aloud is just as fine as reading any piece of poetry I have ever encountered. It is no wonder then that Agee suggests it be read this way in his introduction. In doing so, he explains, the reader hears the cadence of language which he wrote with a sort of musical theatricality in mind.

This book sustained me through my years living in Upstate New York when I was afflicted with a homesickness. It documents the lives of 3 tenant farming families living in Hale County, Alabama during the Depression. But, I have to say, even though they are the focus of the work, they nominally appear. Instead, Agee, the author, paints an intimate portrait of the holiness of their world from his perspective and the sublime act of being alive and in their presence.

Garden and Gun

2007-05-19T22:08:00.007-04:00

This is the title to a new magazine subtitled "21st Century Southern America". It is written to appeal Southern men and women who possess an innate love of the land and are driven to protect it. Aspects of created world - architecture, gardens, food traditions, literature- are acknowledged as inheritances to be proudly and gracefully protected.

The first issue takes us afield with a seasoned turkey hunter from South Carolina, then fly-fishing the Soque river at the exclusive Brigadoon, to Jefferson's Monticello, and is rounded off by a very decent brief biography on chef Frank Stitt of Birmingham's Highlands Bar and Grill.

To me, the most unique facet about this new magazine is that the boundaries of the South have been extended to include the Carribean. A quote by Charles Reagan Wilson, director of the Center for the Study of Southern Cultures at Ole Miss, gives an eloquent explanation into this geographic inclusion:
"“The South and the Caribbean flow into each other culturally, economically, and socially … The merging of the two through music, dance, language, sports, and political aspiration … serves to give birth to a New South …”

Chocolate gravy: Exclusive to Alabama, Appalachia or beyond?

2007-05-16T19:50:00.001-04:00

Was reading an old blog post in the AJC today on chocolate gravy and was a little shocked to see it mentioned as a veritable recipe. I once ate it as a breakfast dish at my sister's house in the mountains of North Alabama.

Initially, I thought my sister was joking at what she intended on serving me for breakfast, and I was very hesitant about trying it. But, it turns out that it was really good and, well, perfect on biscuits. My sister explained her mother-in-law had showed her how to prepare it after her husband kept insisting on having it.

I doubted that anyone in that family had ever bothered writing the recipe down and thought that perhaps it was just something exclusive to their family when I came across it in the AJC. I read some of the blogger comments and saw that the bulk of the comments came from North Alabama. However, there was a mention of another person from Ellijay, GA who made it (also in the moutains). I searched the webs for other mentions of it and found a lady in Kentucky who eats it for breakfast.

Soooo, I was wondering what is the diaspora of this recipe? Where can it be found, what are its geographical boundaries?

Here is a link to the recipe that was prepared like I remember it being made the day I ate it.