Why The Fern Hanging On the End of The Porch Looks Like It Is About To Die

I come from a long line of people who have spent a lot of time growing things. Not one summer of my life has slipped by without some discussion, detailed or just in passing, with some family member about the garden they are growing or the flower bed cared for with lots of time and love. Sad to say, and a bit ashamed to say, this piece of family know-how didn’t seem to make it down to me. Even a middle school stint in the Future Farmers of America didn’t help me that much in this regard. I just don’t seem to have the ability or patience to grow much of anything.

My wife is no help in all this either. She claims no green thumb. She tries and has succeeded with a few plants and some herbs but nothing very elaborate. We do try though at least on some small scale. Usually every spring, we bring home some baskets to hang on our porch. Usually somehow we end up allowing this plant life to slowly wilt away in summer’s heat. And yes, we do that even with ferns. Ferns seem to be pretty resilient. They stand a lot of heat, a lot of water and can stand some neglect. We speak from experience as we have made some nice ferns endure all three. This year four plants, two hanging baskets of petunias and two fern hanging baskets, came into our care.

While we can do enough damage on our own to hanging baskets we have found one other thing limits the growth of hanging baskets at our house. Birds, and in our neighborhood, we have lots of birds. The last few years we have been bombarded with birds from seemingly every direction and they seem to really like nesting in baskets hanging on our porch. No doubt the faulty workmanship on our chimney which allowed water to damage some siding probably also helped attract birds to our house. These winged foul would interrupt Sunday afternoon naps with their beaks bouncing off the outer shell of the chimney as they searched for bugs or as they tried to make enough of an indent into the crumbling exterior to create a hole where they might infiltrate and nest for awhile. It all was maddening and caused me to declare war on the birds in my yard although all I really could do was glare at them then snarl and plead with them to not do that anymore making me feel like a parent whose child has pitched a fit at the most inappropriate time and place while the rest of the world happens to be watching. Over this past winter, we remedied our bird problem with some extensive house repair. Since then, the neighborhood birds and I get along.

No doubt ferns everywhere were pleased with the great bird truce of 2010 as this likely increased their odds of surviving the long summer days on our porch. Surely, the thought must be that these two folks, minus the bird issue, can provide enough water and care to carry a fern’s life from scorching heat into fall’s first frost. And, honestly, we do try.

This year though, one fern is not going to make it much longer.

A few weeks back, I came home one evening and as I pulled into the driveway, rain began to fall. I rushed into the house past my wife and out to the porch. There, I lifted each hanging basket off it’s hook and sat each at the bottom of the steps so each basket could soak up some of the rain that was falling. As I placed the last basket, a fern, on the ground, I noticed a bird’s nest with three small blue eggs embedded underneath a secret veil of fern leaves. The rain began to beat down then so my instincts drove me back onto the porch and then into the house. There I began explaining to my wife the reason I rushed through the house to the porch was so that the hanging baskets might get some water this week. As an aside to her, I noted the one fern basket which a week or so earlier we realized housed a bird’s nest now had three small blue eggs in it. Jennifer then looked at me and asked me if I had left that basket in the rain. Sure, I replied, slow to grasp my own stupidity. I then walked into our living room. Through a window I saw a bird perched on the porch railing underneath where a fern hung moments earlier. The bird turned her head from side to side as if she were lost. Stupidity grasped. Without further thought I took myself out the door and into the rain where I retrieved the fern holding the bird’s nest and the three small blue eggs and returned it to it’s hook, safe on it’s perch from heavy rain or other enemies, such as human stupidity.

I have kept a closer eye on that fern and the nest since that evening. One day I noted two more eggs in the nest. Another day five tiny but ugly wads of birds were crammed into the intricate tangle of twigs and sticks constructed with a mother’s love. Now I watch that mother bird flit around the fern feeding five mouths while another fern slowly turns brown.

So, just in case you come by our house and upon inspection you see that the hanging baskets on our porch don’t look so healthy and you wonder why, well, now you know. We’re not that great with plant life, but we do try. And while our porch this year may not be quite as adorned as it could have been, I don’t mind. I understand that the sweet song of the birds speaking to one another in their native language has a beauty and richness beyond what any eye could ever see.

'Dead of Summer, Almost High Noon’

If July had it’s own clock it would read ‘Dead of summer, almost high noon’ and then it would parenthetically add, (‘during a rather long day’).

The heat of the sun reflects off the pavement and appears to bounce in slow-motion waves toward the sky. Kudzu, with green prickly vines, grows out of the scorched earth making the places and things it covers appear overgrown and snaky-looking. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers play in the background over the speakers, jangly guitars set against subtle keyboards and persistent percussion. A bead of sweat appears then rolls past my temple onto my cheek tickling my face just enough for my brain to tell my right hand to stop the moisture in it’s tracks right there. Meantime, mosquitoes and other winged invaders make a run at any exposed skin they can find, jabbing at rough skinned ankles or darting at eyes just far enough away to cause constant misery.

Sometimes in one of these moments, I am twenty years old again. It is summer break, that time between semesters when I could taste a small bit of the real world but just enough so the taste wouldn’t linger past the first day of classes in a few weeks. Here, everyone I know is young again, or at least younger. The places here are familiar but still mysterious enough to be worth visiting sometime. I feel alive. Here before me also stands the whole world just waiting for a life to get started. And I am there, kind-of-sort-of ready to start that journey but still a bit wary to venture out too far because the summer haze has set in making it difficult to see too far onto the horizon.

A sweat bee, as we called them back in that day, nips at my left ear lobe bringing me back to the here and now…crazy heat in the part of summer just before all the overgrowth, except the seemingly-eternal kudzu, dies down. A Tom Petty song jumps through my head while sweat runs down my face attracting seemingly every insect alive within a two mile radius. Here, I find myself in the middle of summer, now, in the middle of life. Still feeling very much alive, I look onto the horizon and notice the haze of a July summer has settled in like it does each year. As the heat bears down, it feels as if the summer will have no end although I know otherwise from summers past when I stood at the edge of the whole world and, unable to see beyond the haze, cautiously set out on this journey.

Still, now, I can’t help but consider whether or not July has it’s own clock. If it does, I know what it would say. ‘Dead of summer, almost high noon’ (‘during a rather long day’). And I know it would be truer today than ever before.

We Don’t Make Of Summers What We Used To

Summer’s sun stretches her gold-plated rays down from the baby blue sky and through the maze of leaves landing on the fading green blades of grass in seemingly each yard I pass by. I drive through our neighborhood squinting from time to time as those rays sometimes find their way through the windshield. During the three or four minutes it takes to make the drive from the turnoff into our neighborhood to our driveway I pass three or four dozen houses on both sides of the street. Occasionally, a sprinkler will spew water skyward then down in a rhythmic pattern across a yard as I drive by, a synchronized sport, of sorts, for the weary. Now and then, someone will be in a yard riding or pushing a lawnmower trimming the excess grass the ground has yielded since the last mowing time. Mostly though as I pass through the neighborhood, I notice most of the yards are empty.

It is summer and no one is outside.

That realization makes me a bit sad. Back in my day, summer was so much fun. Before I begin to reminisce on summer days back on red clay Georgia hills now faded into a monochrome memory I stop myself from going down that road. Maybe I am too nostalgic for my own good. Maybe I was bitten by some bug a long time ago that somehow idealizes times and places as more special than their worth to others. After all, rehashing old memories only seems to reinforce what I want to believe and while some who shared similar experiences might enjoy that trip it only seems to alienate those who can’t relate. To them I imagine they see those with other memories and experiences as out of touch with how things really are now or how they seem to really be to them. Two types of people, two types of thinking, yet more similar in how they view things than either type would ever admit. Still, the realization that summer is here and no one is outside sinks in and I can’t help but wonder why nowadays we seem to abandon summer when it finally comes.

I rarely see a natural tan anymore, one so deeply bronze I can’t help but speculate when I see one just how many hours the person wearing it has spent outdoors. No one chases and catches bugs anymore; the kind of bugs only seen in the summer, funny-shaped bugs, speckled with vivid vivacious colors and with weird antennas and more legs and wings than it seems they can easily manage. Wide, sprawling yards no longer seem to have a home plate at the edge of the walkway with first base being a rock by the driveway, second base being a shrub with funny smelling leaves at the yard’s center and third base being a tree near the edge of the woods anymore. Folks no longer go barefoot outside for any length of time other than maybe to step outside onto the front steps to briefly speak to a neighbor, and then only if they can’t find their flip-flops or house shoes, so when they do go shoeless the bottom of their feet is so tender they come hopping back into the house vowing to never step outside the house again without some form of shoe.

Yet I know, too much sun is not good for you, and neither is extreme heat. And I know some people weird out over the sight of bugs of any kind. And I know baseball can be a tedious and hot sport to play in the summer and besides someone might drop a bat on their knee and get hurt. And I know the risk of stepping on something that might really hurt is a legitimate concern, splinters and bee stings are never pleasant.

So, nowadays we flip on the TV and watch a mind-rotting “reality” show because we have hundreds of channels to choose from even if there’s still nothing worthwhile to watch. Or we open up a laptop and stick our nose there and whittle away time as if this is what we were made to do. Or we sit anxiously beside a cell phone or some other electronic device with some cool exotic name waiting for a response from a text message we sent only a minute ago frozen at the thought of doing anything else until we get a response and slowly freaking out when the response doesn’t seem to come quick enough. Or we listen to the drone of the air conditioner pumping cool air into each room of the house as it fights off any heat which may try to come into the house and wilt us into a puddle of goo while all along a voice inside us faintly contemplates why life is passing us by so quickly.

And I know the inevitability of things. I know how change comes with the passing of time. I know how every generation has to do it’s own thing and learn it’s own lessons. Seasons come, seasons go. Time marches on. Clichés become clichés because some truth rings through them.

Still, it’s summer. We’ve shaken off the chill-lined gray clouds of winter. We’ve left behind those short days of daylight where we longed for a warmer time and a sunnier day. And we got what we wished for. Isn’t this what you hoped for on December 28 when the cold rain saturated your shoes and made your feet feel like blocks of ice? Wasn’t this what you hoped for on February 2 when you mumbled and grumbled how you hoped a groundhog predicted the weather better than the professional weathermen on TV as you, without gloves, scraped a thin layer of ice from your windshield? Wasn’t it on March 11, as you dug your winter coat out of the closet again, that you imagined red Kool-Aid and fireworks and June bugs and swimming and an Independence Day picnic with hot dogs and cold watermelon? Wasn’t it then you remembered that summer days had just enough sunlight for you to do all you wanted to do in a day before darkness came for an overnight stay? Wasn’t it then that you recalled the summer sky at dusk changing colors from blue to purple to black with silver stars overhead winking at you like a shameless flirt? Shouldn’t now be the time to loosen up some? Shouldn’t it be the time to look caution square in the eye and say, take the rest of the summer off, I’ll see you in the fall? And then shouldn’t it be the time that, being the rebel you are at heart, you actually walk to the mailbox without any shoes on your feet?

My drive through the neighborhood ends as I pull my car into our driveway and then into the garage. As I unload my work gear from the day, the garage door closes behind me and I feel that crush of cool air from the air conditioning seeping into my skin like some indispensable injection intended to slow me down and keep me off my feet for awhile. Once inside the house, I locate the laptop and turn it on. Before getting cozy, I search and seize the remote control hitting the power button to open up another world; a world distant yet not quite real and just removed enough from the real life I know that I keep going back to it. Finally, I place my cell phone on the arm of the chair and make sure the ringer is turned on just in case someone tries to reach me. As the laptop boots up I flip through the onscreen guide on the TV in hopes of finding something to run harmlessly in the background so as to not distract me enough to stop me from what I am doing. Now and then, I glance at my cell phone as if my looking at it will reassure it, but more likely to reassure myself, that I am here if needed. And just before all these things come together to form the rest of the day, I can’t help but wonder why we really don’t make of summers what we used to…

Summer Reading List

Gulf Shores, AL, May 2010

The waves slam against the damp sand and dissolve into an almost calm pond of water and foam at land’s edge. Before we could absorb that process more waves came ashore and then a moment later, even more waves follow. Walking in the ankle deep water grew interesting as we tried to watch every step and time our strides with the next wave washing in yet mostly all we could do was feel a bit dizzy and use all our power just to remain steady on our feet.

Walking away from the water our feet touch dry white sand, toasty warm from the heat of the sun. We take our seats under an umbrella and proceed to pull out books and read. For me, the reading is something to do in between watching the passing parade before my eyes.

I place my finger in the book on page 36 and hold my place as I watch a child make his first visit to the beach, wide-eyed in sights and alert to the various sounds of this place he had been told about. Later, I watch some brave soul charge into the water and try to leap above the wall of waves rushing for the shoreline only to be defeated by nature’s will. Now and then, someone strolls by with a dark tan and confident stroll making me wonder from their complexion and their countenance if this place, or somewhere almost like it, is a place they call home. At the edge of the water, an older couple walks by slowly and so close to each other they appear to be leaning on one another and I imagine they have made so many visits here they lost count many years ago and look back at all those years and all those visits now and laugh, and smile, about it all.

I dig one of my feet into the sand, down into the place where it is clammy-cold and darkly-damp, and burrow it out enough to catapult sand onto her foot. She has been diligently reading away while I have been preoccupied with everything else going on around us. She looks up from her book, uses her feet to toss some sand back onto my feet, smiles, and returns to her book. I smile back, reopen my book, and continue reading as well.

The warmth of the sun makes me drowsy, so I place my finger in the book on page 39 to hold my place. I close my eyes and sense a pale red glow all around me. I sluggishly fight the urge to fall asleep. Overhead, a plane chugs by and the sound causes me to open my eyes just so I can read the sign the plane is pulling behind it. I discover it is the same local restaurant sign advertising fresh shrimp the plane has been dragging the last half hour. I take off my sunglasses so that the colors I see are the true colors of what is here. Each time I do this, I am spellbound by the blue-green of the water at this distance and how as it stretches out in my line of vision it becomes inseparable with the color of the sky at the same distance.

And so it continues this way for hours. Plastic sand buckets and shovels, water wings, boogie boards, beach grass, sand castles and picking through the sea shells washing ashore. Dump some sand on her foot; expect some sand tossed onto my foot; read a page or two of the book in my lap; then watch the people go by. The woman on her cell phone walking by and demanding from the person on the other end of the phone line, “Guess where I am right now.” Then there’s the group of people just arriving on the beach with their cooler, their elaborate folding chairs and over-sized, neon colored towels who begin their search for just the right spot to settle down for a time. And the guy who walks and from just a glance you can tell that he forgot sun block and will realize this without a doubt himself tomorrow morning in a very painful way.

I look up and notice she has stopped reading. I place my finger on page 44 of the book to hold my place and look more intently at her. I see the freckles on her skin that the last few days in the sun have made more visible. Lost in thought, she looks straight ahead at the waves crashing in, never noticing I am watching her. Instead of the book in my hands, I now try to read the look on her face. The serious look she has makes me think she is thinking our time here will soon be over for now. Soon, we will have to return back to the everyday world and the challenges, worries and opportunities it holds. Just thinking what her thoughts might be makes me reconsider the look on her face as more reflective than I originally thought.

I dig my feet into the sand again and toss some out onto her feet. She breaks her gaze away from her thoughts, looks at me, smiles and tosses some of the sand back onto my feet. I smile back then we both open our books and begin reading again. Some birds fly around in a mid-air dance while others run around on their skinny legs staying just out of reach of the cool water. Beyond this, the ocean rocks water onto the shore pushed by never-ending rows of waves creating a symphony loud enough to drown out the world we have to return to soon enough.

Amidst Car Fumes and Checkered Flags

One day this past week I happened to be walking from one building at my work to another. I ran across the husband of a co-worker. Other than just exchanging pleasantries I really don’t know this man at all. But for about ten minutes we stood and talked despite the fact that I had plenty of work I needed to be doing at that moment.

The topic we mostly discussed was dirt track car racing. I admit it’s been years since I have been to a dirt track race. I do remember those times well though. Hot summer nights, cigarette smoke hanging in the air between the crowd and the giant lights reaching toward the sky, twangy country music filtering out over scratchy public address speakers, hard concrete bleachers and enough noise to not be able to hear the person sitting right next to you. Down below sat an oval track where a big truck watered down and packed dirt turning it into red Georgia mud while cars, some looking as though they had been through the pummeling of a gauntlet, drove round and round slinging that water and dirt mixture behind them with each lap.

He eventually talked about some of the more celebrated drivers of the past like Bobby and Donnie Allison, Neil Bonnet and others he had seen. This gentleman regaled me with some tales of local drivers and local racetracks going back into decades long gone. I shared a tidbit now and then even making him aware of one or two distant relatives who got behind the wheel and spent weekends on their second job, driving dirt tracks for fun. Mostly though, I spent some time listening to this man’s memories and experiences.

I admit the discussion piqued my interest some in those dirt track memories. Maybe I’ll locate a book that discusses some of those days and I can read it and relive those memories in some way. Maybe I can find some clips on YouTube that will remind me of those dirt track days.

What I really took away from these ten minutes in the middle of the day was how I enjoyed those ten minutes. I enjoyed getting to hear someone else’s memories. I enjoyed seeing the gleam in the eyes of someone as he talked about something he obviously enjoyed. I enjoyed getting to know someone better. Now this gentleman and I will have a starting point for discussion when we run across each other again.

Digging deeper though I think I probably needed this ten minute conversation. This week has been a tough one. Friends in other parts of the state and the South saw their homes and businesses wracked by flooding. Work has run long almost every day and been a bit more stressful than normal. A co-worker’s mother passed away after a brief illness Monday morning. This followed the news of the death of someone else that we worked with a good bit. His death was accidental and totally unexpected. It all has been a reminder of how life can change in a moment. It has been a reminder that serious stuff happens and sometimes stings and how sometimes it all piles up to make a body begin looking for the next bad thing to happen. It just seems to turn up the noise level to whatever else is happening in life, sometimes even muting the important things. So while maybe I enjoyed the discussion for various reasons, maybe that discussion was something I needed at that moment.

Amidst the recollections of car fumes and checkered flags was ten minutes of not thinking about the bad things that seemed to be beating down on my brow. It was ten minutes away from my phone and email and the other work I am trying to complete but can’t seem to finish because the phone won’t stop ringing and the email won’t stop coming. It was a nudge for me to slow down enough to listen because life is passing by. Of course, the trick is to listen not to the compiled noise of a bunch of engines drowning out all the important things in life but to focus my listening enough to hear above it and to hear the cheering crowd, the individual engines striving to get to the finish line and to also hear and comprehend what the person standing next to me is saying.

April 2010: Chicken Fingers For The Soul Or More Mileposts Marking Meanderings Made Along Life’s Metaphorical Highway

Happiness is…pulling up at your ATM at 5 PM on a workday and not having to wait in line…at all.

Greater happiness is…realizing the balance at the ATM machine is more than you first thought, enough in fact that you take out an extra $20 without any guilt.

I love living around people who don’t do a double take or flinch when they hear the uniquely Southern phrase “fixing to”.

I have no singing voice but if I did I think I would like to be one of the Pips singing background vocals to Gladys Knight’s “Midnight Train to Georgia.”

Is it time we change the phrase “April showers bring May flowers” to include something about all this pollen that also comes around this time of year?

Why is it that when I sometimes hear the phrase “put yourself in his shoes” I find myself hoping that the person in question isn’t wearing bowling shoes?

How come I can only grow weeds in my yard yet in the cracks of the concrete driveway I can grow nothing but grass?

People who pace the floor make me as nervous as an old cranky rattlesnake on a caffeine binge.

Watching people laugh is good feeling. Making people laugh is an even better feeling.

It’s disheartening that political discussion today, on any side of almost any issue, pretty much boils down to the level of a bunch of six year olds calling each other names. It’s a shame that so many we elect engage in this as well. It’s a crying shame that we don’t expect better of ourselves and those we elect.

Some days it really is hard to beat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

This time of year features a small window of time when you can let a peaceful feeling come over you by simply listening to the rain softly falling outside through an open window which lets gentle breezes blow past the curtains while the whole moment lulls you into the feeling that all you should do is close your eyes and take a nap.

Being Brothers

We do look alike. We have heard that for many years. I suppose our voices could be mistaken for the other as we do sound a good deal like each other when we talk. People, even family, sometimes look me in the eye and carry on a conversation with me, and then call me by his name. When that happens, I’ve learned to not flinch, but to just accept it and smile. That’s all just part of having a brother.

You should know if you don’t know already, that there’s a few years difference between me and my brother. When I was born, he was around junior high school age. Even though there are a few years between us, we didn’t have the normal brother-on-brother feuds and fights. Not to say there haven’t been times when we didn’t get ticked off with each other and share sharp words. I imagine it took a good deal of restraint, and maybe some running interference from our parents, for him not to throttle a snot-nosed kid who smashed some of his prized model cars or who scribbled gibberish in one of his high school yearbooks.

I have a lot of memories of me and my brother ranging from some of my earliest memories right up until the most recent time I saw him. Usually when I think of him I think of all those years ago, when he was approaching adulthood and I was his shadow. It was a time when he was the big brother and I was the kid brother. I suppose I felt closer to him then because we were in closer proximity to one another. I guess close proximity is sharing a room with one another, which we did when we were both at home together. Now we live in different states and only see each other a handful of times during a year. We both have wives. He has kids and, now, grandkids. He owns a business. My job takes away much of my daylight hours. I suppose our roles have changed a bit through the years. That is just how life plays out over time.

Still, I know who taught me how to ride a motorcycle. It was his late 1960s-model red Honda trail 90. It felt like it weighed three thousand pounds but my brother taught me how to balance it and then let me ride it, even if he may have felt he was turning Evel Knievel loose on our north Georgia neighborhood. After I first crashed into a bush in our backyard he then taught me how to stop the thing with it’s only working brake.

Other things drift through my mind when it comes to thinking about my brother from years gone by. We used to toss a baseball around in the backyard and shoot hoops and play H-O-R-S-E from time to time. I remember looking at his Car Craft and Hot Rod magazines only after he was finished with them. It seems he always had a roll of Wint-O-Green Life Savers or Certs handy, and was willing to share them with me. When we went anywhere, he would often buy me a Coca-Cola and never seemed worried that I was too young to pay for it myself or that Mom and Dad probably didn’t want me to have one. He could always make me laugh and I have often thought he was the most humorous person I personally knew. And during times when I would get discouraged and want to give up on something he would tell me “can’t never could”. It is a phrase I repeat to myself to this day when something frustrates me to the point of giving up which usually leads me to give things at least one more try.

We used to go fishing. Nothing elaborate or fancy, just two brothers loading into an old red Army jeep he had restored, with two inexpensive fishing rods and a can of corn or tub of worms heading out to Fightingtown Creek or up Aska Road to some out-of-the-way fishing hole. Neither of us has a trophy trout mounted on our walls from those days but we do have memories of cold creek water running through our minds with the additional memory of how we occasionally ditched the fishing for just spending the time together riding through the mountains.

My Dad gets the credit for my love of older music from such artists as Jimmie Rodgers, Kitty Wells, the Carter Family and Hank Williams since, as we were growing up, I recall him listening to them. That music though grew on me over time and became something I appreciated later in life. When I was growing up it was the music that my brother listened to that I remember really enjoying then. He owned a deep blue Plymouth Barracuda, complete with a Hemi engine and a ready-to-play eight track player. It was in that car with the eight track playing where I learned to appreciate Percy Sledge’s “When A Man Loves A Woman” and the Drifters’ “Under the Boardwalk” and Charley Pride’s “Crystal Chandeliers,” “All I Have to Offer You Is Me” and “Is Anybody Goin’ To San Antone?” I mostly though remember my brother listening to Creedence Clearwater Revival, which seemed to meld the raw, earthy energy of my Dad’s favorite music into an electric form palatable to a new generation. Today, when I hear the opening licks of “Green River” or “Down On The Corner” I can’t help but smile and wonder whatever happened to that car. Luckily, I know what happened to the two guys who used to cruise the streets of our home town in that car. For now, we’re alive and well.

We’re older. Even with age, we still look alike, or so we are still told. Our voices could be mistaken for the other with ease. Now with more frequency, people who know both of us, engage me in conversation and often without realizing it, call me by his name. I can only smile when that happens.

This week my brother celebrates a birthday. In some way I suppose thinking about his birthday caused the flood of memories that you have just read. There would be some truth to that statement. The deeper truth though is the understanding that just because my brother has a birthday this week doesn’t mean I just spent a few minutes thinking about him just this week.


The real truth is I think about him every day of my life. And that is just part of being brothers.

Good Life

The sun streams brilliantly in invisible beams onto my shoulders. The warmth it provides slowly heats up the joints and muscles which seemed to have taken leave back in the winter. Over the course of the day, the neighbors pull out every imaginable gardening instrument and motorized cutting and chopping device that has been sold over the last dozen years and work and worry over every square inch of their yards.

Bees fly around anything now in bloom seemingly playing tag with spring’s harvest. A thin yellow layer of pollen settles on anything not fast enough to get out of the way. The reawakening of the earth, in the form of springtime, eventually settles in my nostrils where a slight tingle causes a sneeze now and then.

Kids ride their bikes up and down the street. Other kids shoot hoops in their driveways. A car glides by with the windows down and the radio up just enough so I can make out the words to Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “They Call Me The Breeze”.

Seventy-five degrees, blue skies and a slight gust of wind now and then that makes the chimes on the front porch dance. My wife stands a few feet away, her body framed in sunlight as she smiles at me. Then, for awhile everything in the world, from the rancor over politics, the bitterness over failures, the consternation over unexpected things and all the hurts and aches and bumps and bruises that drain time and energy in my world fade away. And I realize life is good. Real good.

News On A Strange Phenomenon

I normally would not use the blog to print something I just received but I know many of you use social networking sites and thought this might be of interest to many of you. It is a bit long, but please read through to the end.

Scientists and medical personnel are studying a phenomenon which seems to be slowly spreading across many highly industrialized nations. It is referred to it as “digital photo arm” or DPA. A 2009 study has concluded that social networking sites and the proliferation of smaller digital cameras and phones and other electronic devices with cameras are leading to more and more arm injuries. According to the report, professional photographers are also lamenting that the DPA phenomenon not only causes physical pain but also makes amateur photography really look bad.

So what is “digital photo arm”? The report defines DPA as “the process of taking one’s own photograph with a digital camera or other electronic device with a built-in camera for the purposes of publishing it on a social network site such as Twitter or Facebook or sending the photo via a cellular phone by means of a text message.”

The 2009 study includes this quote about “digital photo arm” from respected doctor, Dr. Jorge Blanco: “It is mostly arm injuries we are seeing. When we looked at the data from a major metropolitan area recently we have determined that approximately seventy percent of arm injuries in local emergency rooms over a four week time frame occurred after someone had tried to take their own photo with a digital camera or some sort of camera phone. We have also seen instances of some vision issues with some of these arm injuries. We believe this is due to the fact that some people do not realize how to properly set the flash on their camera. I dare say this is a scary phenomenon in today’s world.”

The report indicates such entertainment-type injuries are really nothing new. In the 1970s, medical personnel saw truck drivers and CB radio users who suffered from cramped hand syndrome (CHS) which occurred when the user gripped the handheld microphone for too long. In the 1980s, doctors saw a rise in what was called repetitive joystick button thumb trauma (RJBTT), this occurred when home video game users often and rapidly used the same thumb on a button on the video game’s joystick. Doctors and researchers were somewhat relieved as the video game industry designed more sophisticated gaming devices in the 1990s but with the expansion of cable and satellite television, these same doctors and researchers noticed an increase in what they refer to as video comas brought on by long, quiet hours of watching the same TV channel or network without a break. Children often slipped into Nickelodeon comas, adult females often slipped into Lifetime Network comas while adult males often found themselves in ESPN comas. The turn of the century and the increased use of the internet seemed to usher back in the age of people being able to injure themselves with devices meant mostly for entertainment purposes.

A respected kinesiologist, Dorothea Legg, recently said at a San Mateo conference on digital photo arm: “We could really stem the tide of all these arm injuries, if only those who were so eager to get their latest photo on Facebook or Tweeter (sic) or whatever would just ask someone to take the photo for them.” Legg’s remarks brought the conference attendees, seventy-five in total, to their feet in agreement.

Of course, some people may not have another person nearby when that photo just has to be taken. Doctors and photographers agree that investing in an inexpensive tripod and a camera with a timer should suffice. They also tend to agree that using makeshift tripods out of books or ladders or even chairs is not a good idea since doing so may lead to yet other injuries. Still, doctors do not believe the occurrence of digital photo arm will decrease anytime soon.

The study indicates this type of injury is here to stay. Some in the education community are scrambling to integrate a proper one-arm photo technique into digital photography and social networking workshops and classes with the help of professional photographers. Chester Voight, Professor of Monochromatic Themes in Modern Photography at the Weinheim Schlupp Institute of the Most Fine Arts says, “We have seen the data and believe this phenomenon should be addressed. We hope the effort we make to insert this good info into workshops and classes doesn’t get held up in a committee somewhere along the process because this type of information can help so many people. Today, DPA is a phenomenon but tomorrow it could become an epidemic. We believe educating people about this issue is a good first step, and in turn, we believe this will ultimately slow the number of DPA injuries.”

Concerned photographers are also weighing in on the digital photo arm debate. Roy Len Clyde, regional manager of K-Mart photography studios in southeastern Texas, had this to say, “When people had those clunky Polaroid cameras something like this DPA never happened. People would take a photo, set a timer and wait to peel off a strip of film to reveal the picture you had taken a minute ago. When we had those cameras like that at home this stuff didn’t happen because the cameras were just too darn big. Today, somebody might actually break an arm or suffer a concussion trying some of the stuff folks try with a digital camera. Hey, and we aren’t even talking about all the “armchair” self photographers who never take into consideration such photography staples as background and light and getting your blamed arm out of the shot. Maybe once we can get control of the digital photo arm phenomenon we can tackle issues such as the basics of good photography. Maybe the rise of DPA will ultimately lead to better photography skills for the whole world, professionals and amateurs alike. That is my hope.”

So, what can a person do to avoid the dangers of DPA? Those interviewed for the report, provide five options.
1. If you can, ask someone to take the photo for you.
2. If you do not have someone available to take your photo, then use a lightweight tripod and a camera with a reliable timer.
3. If neither of these options work for you and you just must take your own photo those in the know insist you use basic math skills to determine the appropriate distance of your camera lens to the tip of your nose remembering to factor in any zooming you may do with your camera. They add there is no shame in understanding you may need to use a protractor, calculator or a square rule, or all three, to get this measurement precise.
4. Enjoy April 1 by having a happy April Fool’s Day and not always believing what you read on the internet, or on a rare occasion, on this blog.
5. Smile and say “Cheese”.

March 2010: Chicken Fingers For The Soul Or Quick Thoughts While Waiting In Line At The Drive-Thru Window of Life

I spend a lot of time behind a computer monitor. Between that fact and the fact that age creeps in on all of us, I now have reading glasses. I suppose the next thing to begin to slip away will be my memory. Recently, I forgot my glasses and had to spend the day at work contorting my head and squinting my eyes like I was trying to read the bottom line of an eye chart. Moral of this lesson: this part of getting older isn’t any fun.

I don’t mind my own gray hair especially when one alternative is it falling out. I don’t even mind the gray hair even if my ‘do some days looks like a bad toupee. No, really, it is my own hair. Really. Do you think I would buy a toupee that looks this bad?

It is 2010, are we under-using the phrase “Back at the turn of the century?”

Having been in the workplace since my teenage years, it fascinates me now when the electricity goes out or a computer or network goes down how we all stand around wondering what we are going to do.

So, the deadline to return census material to our government is April 1? April Fool’s Day and our government. What bureaucrat approved that deadline?

Aww, lush freshly clipped green grass, white lines of chalk partially outlining a diamond, yes, it’s almost time for the regular major league baseball season. And, of course, after about a month, when my team is out of contention for the playoffs, I will be ready for football season.

Did I tell you one day recently I left my reading glasses at home and spent the day squinting at everything I tried to read? I can’t remember if I mentioned that before.

“Dueling Banjos” is a simplistically simple yet splendid piece of music.


I fight the urge some days to keep from saying “I told you so” to some people. I find that sometimes I fight the urge so much that I am shouting it inside. And sometimes, I am shouting it so loud and so often, it gives me a headache.

One of the best things about getting older: spending hours inside your mind telling people “I told you so”.

I wonder if someone else is secretly shouting “I told you so” at me.

Has anyone seen my reading glasses?

Smoke and Mirrors

He held the cigarette between his fingers like a pair of scissors holding an object just before it performs it’s designed duty. Smoke whirled from the white stick’s end, thick enough to form a momentary milky white curtain; a hazy guard from intrusion from anyone nearby except for those who might enjoy the same pleasure. The sweet scent of the moment a flame first touches tobacco hung in the air, a strong, alluring smell that quickly vanishes into a more repellent odor of burned ashes, a stink so powerful it quickly creeps down one’s nostrils and seemingly into the taste buds.

He looks out beyond the smoke and haze. The look appears to be one where he has tuned out the world to savor one more pull from the addicting fusion of flavor found only in these narrow manufactured cylinders. Now and then though he does step to one side or the next but only a step at a time and just so people won’t have to walk over the top of him to get out of the rain and to the warmth and dryness that rests past the doors behind him. He finishes the cigarette and without thought slides what’s left into the tangle of his crusty, yellowed fingers where he flips it without abandon into the space away from him. It lands on wet concrete, still smoking, rolls belly-side up then stops all lonely-like yet still surrounded by others like it scattered all up and down the walkway. There it smolders, lingering for some final extinguishing act.

He looks at his watch and determines he has more time than he realized, enough time in fact to burn another one down. He pulls out a pack from his shirt pocket and palms the small rectangle of a box in his hand enough to cover the warning label. He shuffles the container in a way mysterious to those who have never felt the power a package of smokes holds. Out one ends slides another cigarette. He places it between his lips as he digs into his pants pocket to retrieve his trusted lighter. He spins toward the building in order to avoid the wind and the rain as it angles into the place he has staked out. As he faces the doors of this building, he stands face to face with the written notice on the door proclaiming the building a “smoke-free environment”.

To a casual observer watching nearby, this man appears to be someone burning his life away three minutes at a time. He appears to be someone chained to a habit that robs him and his family of money and time, now, and in the future. To the observer, he appears to be someone willing to put a stick of death in his mouth time after time and then to hold a small fire in his hand and near his face just so he can experience the euphoria this tiny bit of tobacco wrapped in paper brings. To the observer, this man’s compulsion is so strong it forces him to light up on this rainy day and stand an arm’s length from the door to the building where signs read “No smoking within 50 feet” forcing everyone who comes in and out of the building today to share in the smoky goodness that is second hand smoke. To the observer, he cannot fathom someone needing something so bad.

The observer shakes his head, turns up his bottle of Coca-Cola to drain the last drop, then takes the empty container and tosses it into a garbage can before walking into the building through the smoke, thankful he doesn’t have such an addiction.

Feel It

Rain had fallen overnight and on into the time when darkness surrendered to the gradual breaking of daylight. I inhaled deeply, not the least bit concerned about sucking in any dust or pollen or any other intrusive matter which might induce watery eyes, an itchy nose and an unwelcome urge to sneeze so fast and hard that my neck might launch off my shoulders. The scent of wet earth infiltrated every empty spot in my nostrils. Deep within, I could feel a churning.

Oh, I feel it coming back again…

Birds flew overhead dodging the intermittent raindrops while other birds skipped and danced along the ground. Some feathered creatures squawked, while others whistled in song and still others communicated in starts and fits that somehow, amidst the chaos, sounded like I was listening in on some secret language. These sounds blended in with the noise a new day makes as it settles in for a stay. Inside, I could feel something taking hold.

Like a rolling thunder chasing the wind…

Moving ahead, my steps slipped around shallow reservoirs from the earlier rainfall and despite my careful attempts, I still found some way to get part of me wet. My shoes were soggy and my umbrella was soaked. A droplet of moisture from the rain found it’s way to the back of my hand and trickled down my moist skin until it traveled enough to thinly disappear from sensation. More than before, I could feel something inside me telling me to pay attention.

Forces pulling from the center of the earth again…

I stopped for a moment, hopeful that the moment might also stop and remain so I could experience it just a little longer. I looked around to see tiny buds at the tip ends of ornamental trees and then looking upward I saw a swirl of gray and white clouds pass by with a trail of mist. My eyes reflected a moment in time that could only be replicated in memory. Seeing these things made the feeling deep in my gut grow more certain.

I can feel it…

Standing there, I knew I was lost in thought, yet my eyes tilted upward with my mouth gaping open, amazed at the scene, slowly, yet surely, opening before me. Rain fell again colliding with my nose, my ears, my hands and my mouth. A single drop of rain landed on my tongue, one single drop, not even enough to know for sure that it landed there one second after it had landed. Still, I felt more convinced than before about the feeling inside me.

I can feel it, I can feel it, I can feel it…

This winter has felt longer and harsher than recent winters and this is why, in large part, the return of spring is highly anticipated. God, without fail, always moves the seasons along but He moves them along at a pace He determines. No matter how long and dark this winter has seemed, it should be no real great surprise this year that spring once again follows winter. Sometimes though, what is surprising is when deep inside you, and then emanating from each of your senses, you feel one season making way for the next one.

I can feel it, I can feel it, I can feel it…

Lyrics from “Lightning Crashes” by Live

I Ran Across An Old Memory The Other Day

It was sometime in the early 1980s. It was a stretch of state highway 5 between Blue Ridge and Ellijay near Whitepath. On the car radio was my favorite radio station at the time, Atlanta’s 94Q. The song was “Waiting For A Girl Like You” by Foreigner. The car’s dashboard lights illuminated a tiny space in the car while outside darkness fell in a velvety black covering. Above, away from the lights on street corners, the stars twinkled in silver flecks against a bluish purple sky which looked more like backdrop painted by an artist.

I don’t really remember any more about all this than what I just wrote. I don’t recall whether it was summer or winter or spring or fall. I don’t remember the exact time of the evening. I don’t remember if I was with anyone else at that moment or not. I don’t even remember which direction I was headed. As a matter of fact it probably wouldn’t take much to convince me that the song on the radio may have been Foreigner’s “Urgent” and the radio station may have been 96 Rock.

That memory passed through my mind the other day out of the blue. Strange, isn’t it? So many things nowadays a body has to remember and out of nowhere a few seconds from thirty years ago comes up from behind crowding out all the space reserved for remembering and makes itself at home.

I’m not sure why that specific memory crept back in after all these years. I can’t board some time machine and go back. Although I loved my life then I’m not too sure I would even want to go back if I could, even for a brief time.

I know these things. Today, that stretch of road is still there. It is off the beaten path nowadays, thanks to a four lane highway connecting the two mountain towns. 94Q and 96 Rock are distant memories on the radio dial, replaced by a different generation of personalities and music. I am certain at night the stars still shine silvery-like against a dark mixture of colors along that same stretch of road even with the modern newfangled dashboards of our cars today.

I wish I could find some deep hidden meaning in that particular memory. I don’t really find any the longer I think about it. I do know I’ve got a lot of snippets of yesterdays like that floating around between my ears or fluttering around somewhere between my heart and my head or wherever such things reside. Now and then one of them pays me a visit, causing me to slow down for a moment and to look back. Sometimes I pause and reflect and can discover something to help me along my way today. Other times, I find I can only look back and smile before looking ahead and moving on.

February 2010: Chicken Fingers for the Soul or A Few Thoughts From the Shallow End of Life’s Wading Pool

I wonder how modern life would be different if yodeling had caught on instead of rap.

About a year ago, Jennifer and I went to a restaurant for dinner. That evening I ordered a BLT, which I understand stands for a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich. After I ordered the young lady taking my order looked at me and asked, “Would you like lettuce and tomato with that?” “Uh, yeah, that would be the L and the T!” Fast forward to a few weeks ago. Same place, different person taking the order. I order another BLT. The young man taking the order looks at me and informs me, “We’re out of bacon, is that okay?” “Uh, no, that would be the B.” Maybe next time we go there and I order a BLT, they will tell me the bread is optional.

How do you react when after helping a co-worker they pause then tell you, “I hope you never retire.”

They say that good fences make good neighbors and I see the truth in that. It might also help if those neighbors can get their dog to stop barking before 9 o’clock at night.

At the start of February, most of our country stops to see if a furry varmint sees his shadow or not and the outcome then determines for some whether or not we will have another month and a half of winter weather. To each his own in this regard and I can imagine that animals living out in the wild may have some innate something or other to gauge the weather somewhat. This though makes me think if we have to poke that animal with a stick and drag him out of his bed to see if he can see his shadow then maybe the lesson we should really learn is that dragging him out of his bed to begin with might mean he’s not ready to come out for spring yet.

Of course, my Dad will tell you when he was a kid, the real groundhog day was February 14, you know before Hallmark took the day over. And then they would shoot the groundhog for dinner. Okay, they would not really shoot the groundhog.

When did wearing pajama bottoms became okay to wear in public?

I know they are necessary sometimes but there are times when I had rather visit the doctor and the dentist on the same day and follow that up with a two hour wait for a five minute haircut than attend a meeting.

I remember when I took my driving test many years ago. It consisted of actually proving that I could drive and then parallel park the car. I wonder if that is still done today. I wonder because many people can’t seem to park a car by simply pulling in between two lines much less backing a car between those two lines.

Some things in life may be “slower than Christmas” but time sure is flying by, isn’t it?

I spend some time on Facebook. The people who operate Facebook like to change how it functions and looks from time to time. When this happens I am always amazed at how some people have a near meltdown over something that is provided to them free and is something in which they choose to participate. It makes me wonder how these folks react to change in things that really matter.

We have had our most wintry winter here in many years and I know lots of people are ready for warmer and sunnier weather. It’s been nice though to feel the cold crisp air the last few months. We really do live in an amazing world where an unexpected snowfall is just a beautiful as a colorful sunset.

Anything But Routine

By this time into the year, habit has crept in enough for me to write the correct year on checks. Now when I say ‘twenty ten” it no longer sounds like some totally new word I am a bit apprehensive to say in case I mispronounce it. While the year is still new, right now it is losing some of it’s sparkly shine, some of it’s new car smell. The promise and hope that the turning of a calendar page brings still lurks nearby but without much notice or effort it is blending into the space occupied by peripheral vision.

This makes me consider how the end of one year and the start of another sometimes seems like a place where the day-to-day world forgets briefly. Holiday festivities seemingly stretch across every aspect of life, personal and otherwise, and even stretch out for weeks. Neighbors you barely know smile and wave when you see them, co-workers want to have potluck lunches and you just want to grab the hand of someone near you and break out into a verse of “I’d Like To Teach the World To Sing”. Overall, people seem to ease up a bit and breathe easier. Then comes the new year. What follows in the background of life for a short time then is a slow motion sprint to get back to the place you were before the season really started.

That change of pace the holidays bring often seems so well-timed. It’s a breath of cool, fresh air when the room has grown stale and stuffy. It’s a quick stretching of the legs after sitting for a long time. It’s the refresh button on a web browser.

In time things eventually do get back into a rhythm. Despite the needed change, comfort often comes in the routine, the every day. While now and then things need to be shaken up, it seems it’s the everyday things that keep things grounded. It’s the cup of coffee with a drop of dairy stirred slowly four times before the first sip. It’s three minutes of calm at the end of the day in the easy chair before everyone else gets home. It’s the knowing without thought how far up the wall to reach in the dark to find the light switch.

This whole idea came into focus recently, as I was driving to work and I found myself subconsciously guiding my car between two shingles that apparently flew off a truck at some point last summer and via time and heat and traffic had become affixed to the pavement. As I did this it dawned on me that I had done this before. Although my routine had been broken now that things were getting back to normal I realized that every day if I am in that lane of the road at that particular place I subtly slide my car into the turning lane a few feet so my wheels can avoid running over those shingles and then slide the car back into the proper lane.

As I continued my drive that day I felt a certain appreciation in the same ol', same ol', in the everyday. Soon enough, I'll need that breath of fresh air but for now, the comfortable place where I find the routine seems like a good place to be.

The Unintentional Eavesdropper

Growing up, my family was on a telephone party line with one of our neighbors. It was tempting to pick up the phone receiver quietly enough to not be found out and then to listen in on a conversation that wasn’t intended for my ears. I don’t really recall doing that because we had enough respect and love for that neighbor not to do such a thing. Still, listening in on a conversation not meant for your consumption is tantalizing.

Confession time. Recently, I found myself eavesdropping. Please understand I didn’t do this on purpose. I just happened to be somewhere where I needed to be while at that very moment a conversation went on near me. By chance, I was an eyewitness to two old friends who had not seen each other in a long time just happening to run into one another.

In this mostly public setting these two friends caught up on the details of the other’s life. Five minutes in a day at the start of a week spent tightening the connections that extend through the years between these two people. There was some talk about health concerns. There was some talk about family matters. There was some talk about professional issues. Although I know both of these people I did not fully understand most of what was said as my friendship with them doesn’t span as much time and effort as they have invested in their friendship.

What I could understand was the smiles on two faces, the laughter of two voices, the interest revealed in four eyes and the knitted layers of intangibles, both simple and complex, that allow a friendship to bridge across things such as time and absence. Even though technically I was eavesdropping, I couldn’t help but feel encouraged by being a spectator to this whole encounter. It is too easy today to get caught up in how effortless it is to get and stay connected electronically with people we know that sometimes it all feels somewhat detached and mechanical. And due to some limitations, such as distance, keeping in touch through a text, email or social networking is a surefire way to keep friendships alive. Still, nothing beats the feeling when you experience a friendship where eyes sparkle on first sight, where a handshake or hug happens without thought, where the sound of a voice not heard in awhile is as comfortable and relaxing as your favorite easy chair, where the memories flood in like an overflowing river and where two people pick things up right where they left them the last time they were together.

Good thing great friendships work the way they do...overcoming various obstacles such as time and distance...and even an occasional unintentional eavesdropper.

January 2010: Chicken Fingers For The Soul Or Fleeting Thoughts From A Not Always So Fleet Mind

If someone prefaces what they are about to say with “not to be rude, but…” rest assured the next words out of their mouth you will likely find to be rude.

I was driving recently and the Phil Collins song “In The Air Tonight” came on the radio. There I was…neon colored clothes, an open sunroof with the wind blowing through my feathered haircut as I glided my sports car in between other cars at a high rate of speed while the lights of the Miami skyline in the summertime shimmered off the immaculately clean exterior of my car. As the drums pounded ominously I realized it was just like a scene from “Miami Vice” except I was wearing brown pants. And I had the sunroof closed. And I kept glancing in the rearview mirror at how my cowlick is accentuated by my recent $6.99 haircut from Great Clips as I dodged an empty Hardees bag someone had dumped in the street while the glare of a neon sign from an auto-title pawn business bounced off the hadn’t-been-washed-in-six-months exterior of my car. Other than that it was just like a scene from “Miami Vice”.

It seems there is a lot of talk these days about how much money “greedy rich people” have and often those comments seem couched in some snide manner which seems to question the fairness of one person having lots of money and the commenter apparently not having as much money. Maybe that is valid, maybe not. It does though seem to me that being envious of someone else or wanting what someone else has are not sterling personality traits either.

Three words to finish off any dining experience…bacon flavored toothpicks.

I took my car by the shop for a regular check-up the other day. While I waited I noticed one of the guys working there looked familiar. After a few minutes I realized the man somewhat resembled 1970s comedian Rip Taylor. From that point forward I expected him to slam a hood on a car and then go through the garage tossing confetti at everyone. I was a bit disappointed when this didn’t happen.

Unless you are the one popping bubble wrap, listening to it being popped is really annoying.

What’s the deal with folks saying things like “I am officially over this” or “I am officially through”? When we hear this should we expect trumpets to blare from out of nowhere and news alerts to break into the latest episode of “Judge Judy”?

I left work after a rather long day recently. As I made my way through the spacious parking lot I stepped on something. Rather haltingly, I looked down not sure what to expect. As I lifted my foot I was surprised to find a chicken bone. I wasn’t sure if it was Colonel Sanders’s top secret recipe. I didn’t take time to investigate as I was worried I might step in some mashed potatoes next.

Sometimes it is nice to choose to just sit in total silence and let the world race by.

I caught myself chuckling not long ago when someone referred to me as Mr. Dills. From his tone of voice he did this in a respectful manner, not in a manner of a sixteen year old that does so because Mom and Dad are in the room and expect him to be that way because they are there. He didn’t say it in a manner which included the roll of the eyes as if he were saying what he was saying just to be sarcastic. Later, I considered how instead of chiding this person for referring to me with a name I feel should be reserved for my grandfather that I should have accepted his good manners graciously with the good will he intended. I hope I remember this lesson learned the next time it happens.

I wonder if someone walked into their kitchen today and muttered, “You know I need to do something with that leftover fruitcake.”

The months of November, December and January seem to last so long to me because I often leave for work in the dark just before sunrise. While I enjoy the spring and summer months more I must admit I find it hard to take my eyes off the sky as the sun begins to rise during this time of year. The view of an unveiling morning sky, and the promise a new day holds, never gets old.

The First Day of Class

Back in the day, the first day of class always seemed like such a letdown. Summer was ending. No more sleeping late, no more peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with orange flavored Hi-C for lunch under the backyard shade trees and, in such a young mind, no more freedom…until next summer. All these things would be replaced with long bus rides and chalk dust and desks with slightly uneven legs. The first day of class would then be about used textbooks with the names of those who traveled down this same road before inscribed inside the front cover. It was about the inevitability, subtle or not, of trying to determine where you fit in the popularity pecking order with your classmates while you also tried not to do something that would make your own standing drop you down that list in the eyes of those ahead of you in that order.

Thinking more about the first day of class makes me think of new notebooks with plastic covers and yellow number two pencils and cheap, leaky Papermate pens. The first day of class also brought new clothes, which hopefully fit in with the cool style of the moment, and new tennis shoes that had yet to get enough wear or tear on them to turn them from an eye-shielding white to slightly white. I think of seeing friends after what seemed like years although it had really only been a few weeks. Then there was the anticipation of who would be in your class and who your teachers would be. Hopefully, in the midst of all this, the importance of learning during the time ahead seeped into my brain.

College brought more first days of classes. Here those first days of class began to change. Goals actually came into sight. Reasons for taking certain courses made more sense than ever. Still, there were textbooks to buy and sometimes use. There was a need to fit into the college world. There were no ringing bells signaling the end of second period. There was one class on one side of campus and the next class on the other side and virtually no time to get from one to the other. There were class notes and comprehensive final exams and study groups and group projects and no Wikipedia or Google. There was learning how to balance a bit of adulthood and freedom with the reality and pressure of starting and finishing a journey of study and research and writing and reading that ended with enough hours and credits deemed to be worthy of a degree.

Now, I go to school every working day. I am not sure I ever imagined I would be doing this after I briefly considered and dismissed becoming a history teacher many years ago. Today, I don’t teach but I do support faculty and students with my skills. To me, going to school every day is all just part of the day to day of my life. During the past decade I have witnessed around thirty first days of class. On these first days of class I have noted notebooks and pens and pencils have been replaced by laptops and other electronic devices. Now many young women try to fit into clothes excessively tight and many of the young men try to wear their jeans so loose the jeans droop around their knees, all done seemingly to fit into some social pecking order they value. Chalk dust has been replaced by marker smudges on white boards and by smart boards that react to your touch. Some things change while some things really don’t change much or at all.

Of course I see the first day of class much differently from this side. I see a bit of chaos from this side. I see a million puzzle pieces coming together at the same time. It’s a roller-coaster ride, a bit scary and intimidating but still exhilarating and thrilling. What I now note that I sometimes failed to see when I was on another side of the first day of class is all the potential, all the possibility that is just there for the taking. Maybe I saw that when I was a student. If I did, it wasn’t very often. It sometimes seemed it was all about reciting some list or rehashing cold, hard stats that didn't really have much meaning beyond their place in achieving a grade. It all seemed to be overshadowed by the goal of getting to the final bell at 3:14 in the afternoon or getting through that paper to the next one or through that project to the next one and ultimately on to that degree.

I suppose time has helped me appreciate each first day of class for being about more than the latest styles, who’s in and who’s out and having the right protractor and slide rule. Over time, those who don’t care or don’t apply themselves will be revealed by their own apathy. Now, with the appreciation of the potential of a first day of class seeped into my brain, knowing how some will squander the opportunity before them disappoints me when before I probably wouldn’t give it a second thought. On that first day of class there is still time, still the opportunity, still the possibility of learning things that can make a difference in how a person thinks, feels, behaves and lives. It can also open the door enough to spur a person to continue to read and write and research and study beyond the last day of class.

And it’s there where the real learning truly begins.

Everybody Complains About the Weather But Nobody Does Anything About It

It's as cold as a mug outside. The last two weeks have seen much of the country host the coldest temperatures in twenty or twenty-five years. Then as this week neared an end locally, we actually saw a bit of snow and ice while much of the rest of the country saw a rather heavy snow storm.

As the wintry weather approached here, kids and adults who still have a bit of kid living inside them flushed ice cubes down commodes, wore their pajamas inside out and backward and did some sort of mysterious snow dance in order to assist the process of making it snow. At the same time, the local grocery stores had a run on bread and milk. This happens every winter in the South with just the mere mention of either snow, ice, sleet or freezing rain since if bad weather does come and we get stuck at home we like nothing better than to apparently sop the bread in the milk to form some really bad bread pudding. I have never quite understood this. I understand the thought that the weather may be bad enough to actually keep people in for a few days but if that is the case then I am willing to try to live on Pop-Tarts, Cheetos and saltine crackers washed down with some Cherry Coke. If I have to go to the grocery store to stock up to be barricaded for a few days I might as well have some food to really enjoy.

As the inclement weather arrived, the local news shows were a typical sideshow of unintended hilarity providing us with repetitive live shots from various locations around the area where believe it or not...news flash...it was snowing. Thanks to that crack investigative effort I didn't have to get out of my easy chair, walk to the window and see that for myself.

The snow and ice that did arrive amounted to maybe an inch at the most. At our house, we could still see the tip-top of the blades of grass in the yard as they were surrounded by the icy white of snow. It was enough snow and ice so that neighbor kids, bundled up in their heaviest coats and caps and boots, braved sliding down the hill in front of our house in homemade sleds made out of anything that might be slick enough to slide.

Since this is the South this small amount of snow and ice shuts down most everything. Those who no longer live in the South or have never lived here like to poke fun at us here because things come to such a standstill for something that to them is so routine. That's okay with us though. At least when we talk we don't talk with weird accents like they do.

This down time saw my work close for half a day one day and totally for the next. While there was some work I could do from home I soaked in the unexpected time off. I watched some television, read some and wasted some time on the internet. I also think I napped briefly only to awake when I dreamed I had run out of milk and bread.

Now two days into this bad weather event, some snow and ice still linger as the temperature struggles to get near the freezing mark. This morning I stood on our porch and surveyed the neighborhood. In so doing I noticed a lone icicle hanging off the front of our house. This icicle and the wintry mix that is still around made me recall the saying I used to hear when I was kid likely from my father, who likely heard it from his father. That saying is something akin to "if a snow is on the ground for three days, then it's waiting around for another one." That's fine with me if that old saying comes to truth. That old saying though made me think about my Dad and snow and cold weather and work in light of the freezing temperatures and the extra day and a half off from work I had this week.

My Dad worked with the same company for forty years before he retired. In that time I do not recall him missing many, if any, days from work, and especially none when the weather turned foul. Lots of rain could fall, storms could rage, snow could pile up and the temperatures could boil or freeze and he would be there. Much of the work he did he performed while in the elements and their extremes.

Standing on the porch this morning looking at that icicle I thought about Dad and that work ethic. He worked because he had to, yes, he worked because he enjoyed doing what he did, yes, but I also believe in some part he worked because he wanted his children to have a better life than he did and he understood one way he could do that was by working hard and being dedicated to the work he knew how to do. His hard work would then enable his kids to have opportunities he never had which would open us to opportunities to pursue careers and lives we wanted to pursue and feel fulfilled in doing so, not to settle for a life and job to just get us from one week to the next. I believe he understood his hard work and the dedication to doing what was expected of him in that work would someday stand on it's own to be seen for itself, even if the only ones who may have seen it were his children.

In light of this, I have to chuckle thinking about how me and my generation complain so easily about so many things. My Mom and Dad weren't unique in wanting their children to have things better than they did. Most, if not all of my friends, had parents who wanted the same for their children. And guess what? For the most part, they succeeded. We have cars with seat warmers, in-board DVD players and a system that tracks the car's movements from a satellite. We have phones that provide more information than the most-loaded computers did a just few years ago. We have home entertainment set-ups that bring images of people into our homes that are as lifelike as if they were standing right beside us even though we wouldn't really invite these people or their values into our homes for anything. We have more time on our hands, more money to use in a discretionary manner and more opportunities to do whatever we really want to do than any other generation in recent times, yet we grumble and complain constantly. We do this despite our parents working and sacrificing for years so that we might have it better than they did. And our parents succeeded in providing us such a world but we don't really understand or appreciate what we do have.

Right now, most of us are grousing about the cold weather. And it has been cold even though...news flash...it is winter and this is how winter is supposed to be. And while the cold weather is biting I understand I didn't have to stand in the cold for six hours fixing a broken water line, knee deep in muck and mud with water dripping all over the place as my feet and hands numbed from the cold and moisture. I didn't have to risk my neck driving to work on slippery roads surrounded by drivers sliding along on a wing and a prayer. I couldn't help but think that if my Dad did dream of his kids having it better than he did that he did succeed in this significant way, at least one of his kids didn't have to get out in the snow and the ice and the mess like he did, time after time, year after year.

On this Saturday afternoon, I gaze out the back wall of our house which is a wall of large windows which provide a view of the woods behind our house and into the subdivision several hundred feet away which is slowly creeping toward us. I walk toward these windows looking toward the sky, noting it as overcast. As my eyes drop I follow a rogue snowflake or two all the way to the ground below which remains an icy cover of snow. "If a snow is on the ground for three days, then it's waiting around for another one." I suppose this old saying will be tested soon enough as it appears some snow may still be around Sunday. If it does come true and another snow day happens that also means it will have to be cold. Cold as a mug. I hope that will be fine with me because while outside it may be cold, I plan to be inside. And, thanks to my Dad, inside it will be warm.