"Biscuits" by Lukey

Hi Max.
Hi Hanky.
Hi Chicken.
Hi Kitty Kitty.
Big red door opens.
I play piano.
All done.
Biscuits!!
I make biscuits with mommy.
Stir stir stir
Stir the biscuits.
Cook now.
Sit in my seat.
Sissy in her seat.
Butter now.
Jelly now.
Honey now.
We eat biscuits.
All done.
Big mess.
Boots on.
Help daddy.
Barn.
Feed chickens.
Bok Bok Bok Bok
Big cow.
Moooooooo.....
Walk with daddy.
Cow poop.
Pond now.
Throw rocks.
POW! Wow.....
Walk now.
Hi horses!
Carrots.
Mmmmmm.....
Walk now.
Walk with mommy.
Tired.
Farmhouse!
Boots off.
Rest now.
Bed now.
Nap nap.......sleeeeepy sleep.....dreamin' of......
BISCUITS!!!!!!

Jesus and an Ice Cream Sandwich

Conversations with a 4 year old.

Me: "Ya'll wanna split an ice cream sandwich?" Rebekah: "Can I have the biggest piece?" Me: "Well yes, but if you want to know what Jesus would do- He would give your brother the biggest piece." Rebekah: "Well I'm not Jesus."

You never know what a four year old will say. Or a two year old for that matter, but for this conversation we're talkin' bout my four year old.
So THIS conversation got me to thinkin'. WOULD Jesus have shared the bigger half of his ice cream sandwich?
Now I'm not talking about Jesus at 30 when he was an adult. You know the "Adult" Jesus who hangs on crosses in churches and is very, very serious in antique Bible books. I'm talkin' bout FOUR YEAR OLD Jesus. Would HE have shared his ice cream sandwich. We do a lot of talkin' about baby Jesus and died-on-the-cross Jesus. We don't do a lot of talkin' about four year old share your ice cream sandwich Jesus.
So let's talk. What do you think??

Little Cabin in the Woods

Little Cabin in the Woods - I remember...

How do I love thee
Let me count the ways
I love thy dirt and cracks
And mouse droppings
I love the birds chirping
And the chicken hiding underneath
I love the outhouse
The bear hanging oh so cleverly
I love the blue moon
Knocking it's entrance
I love the rock pathway
to the garden overgrown
with tomatoes and weeds
and the oversized Boy Scout swing
Made of tree trunks
And the old wicker swing
Homemade wood to replace
It's decrepity
I love the bentwood lounge
Rickety and never quite level
I love the old coondog
The mutt dog
The annoying cat
named after my grandfather
to no fault of his own
I love the three mile walks
Past the creek
Past the old cabin
the doctor built but never visited
I love Grandpa and Grandma's
70 year old white farmhouse
Full of their patraticky things
they never threw away
And the five broken down lawnmowers
Waiting for the depression to strike once again
I love the shed full of moss covered
Garage sale items waiting for
Miss Suzy to come and open once
Again for summer. Monday through Friday 9am-1pm
With lemonade to spare
I love the oil lamps burning
Warming my cottage like a
Painting by Norman Rockwell
and the smell of the
Wood stove
Cooking breakfast
with black iron skillets and
my husband with his apron
And his boyish smile
I love the owl hoo
The wolves' crazy wild parties
When all is sleeping
I love the creeking doors
The fact that none of the doors
Have ever locked
And the shotgun holes
through all the entryways
I love the well pump
And the sound of dogs lapping
After a good romp chasing
The airplanes
I love the wild turkey families
And the baby deer
But most of all
I love my free spirit
My wandering mind
In all of it's aloneness
Swinging in the trees.

My Poems Hide...

My poems hide in the bubbles
The Epsom salt box
The toothpaste container
The carton of half-n-half
My poems hide in my daughter's
See and Say
With the rooster and the cow
My poems hide in my dog's eyes
At the bottom of my sheets
In the corner of my bedroom window
They hide in my grandmother's attic
In my childhood homes
All sad and lonely
Waiting to be discovered
My poems hide in the deep
Recesses of my mind
All subconscious
Growing slowly, like an avocado
My poems hide
Sideways like peppermint
Popping up in the most peculiar
And embarrassing places
My poems hide in the
Left center of my chest cavity
Lurking around the corner
Waiting to stand up and be counted
My poems hide
Sickly and worn
Beaten down by air and brush
And the mean places
They want to come out
But my poems hide
They hide from the sun
And from people
And from life itself
They come out at Carol's house
When they are dug up
With a shovel and a hoe
And with caring hands
But on all other days
They hide
Shy and wondering they hide
Like a worn out child
They hide
Looking for a rescuer
They hide
They found shelter
So they hide
And hide
And hide

So Nashville...

I'm still digging up old journals trying to spark my creative writer who is dying to get back out. I enjoyed reading this entry from a few years back. :)
Ron took me to the Grand Ole Opry, the mother church of country music tonight and my brain automatically started fantasizing about how skinny I would look if my five foot four frame got stretched out to six foot two like country diva Terri Clark’s kick butt self. Then when Lorrie Morgan started singing with her mouth open real wide I started wondering if her dentist ever had to remove any big nasty gold fillings and what if she got a gold front tooth with an ‘L’ engraved on it and started rapping with Snoop Dog, kind of like a Sheryl Crow and Kid Rock duo. And then I wondered how many days a week she gets to go to the Hendersonville spa she promotes in the Nashville Scene with only her robe on and how many times she gets a mud wrap and a paraffin facial and a full body salt scrub and falls asleep in Chinese meditation land on comfy three thousand dollar sheets laying inside a leafy garden with a brook running through the middle.
Then I started to think, I really did grow up in this hick filled, goo goo sellin’, honky tonk big small town. Seems like my whole life I have been trying to get out of here and everybody else seems to be moving mountains to arrive. I do love Minnie Pearl though. I know she is dead but man do I love her. How-dee!
Then this little Ricky Shroeder looking dude that looked like a substitute teacher from Topeka, Kansas, came out and sang a few heart wrenching ballads and the crowd went wild. The gal next to me raised her hands and started doing spirit fingers and I started remembering how cute Ricky Shroeder was and how I really hoped I had a little boy that cute and endearing one day and how I won’t let him get involved in boxing.
Then this really old dude named Jim Ed Brown entered stage right and I started to think how this would really remind me of my dad if he was dead, but he’s not dead. There is something about those old Jim Reeves sounding voices that make me think of dad and his guitar and his old Red Sovine records and his storytelling and his hot sauce and how he would fart in the kitchen right at the most opportune moments when one of my friends and I would be playing Mrs. Pac Man in the living room on my Atari 1800.
Rhonda Vincent, the queen of bluegrass, sang a super speed version of Dolly Parton’s “Jolene” and tears started hotting up behind my eyes and I started thinking about my dad and when he took me up to Dolly’s house up on top of a big ole mountain in Townsend, Tennessee because he knew I loved her music as much as the ice cream at Bobbie’s Double Dip on Charlotte Avenue. I listened to that “I Will Always Love You” record with Dolly and her red bandana head and bandana blouse on the floor of our River Plantation condo in Bellevue, right across from the miles of cow and corn fields that now holds a huge shopping center that has now unfortunately contracted the deserted mall disease. At five years old I was swept away into Dolly’s life and soul and escaped to a world of Holly Hobby record player bliss when I didn’t know yet there was something to escape from. Who would have ever known I would live in a cabin so similar to hers twenty four years later trying to find my roots and simple things and a chance get that family feeling and a coat of many colors, not made from rags, but from conversations with my husband and with dreams of what life ought to be like. I have always been a dreamer and an idealist of sorts trying to live in yesterday and in tomorrow. It is just recently I have been learning the art of living in today, in this moment, in today’s skin. At the moment, the Rhonda Vincent band is playing a song as fast as an old Charlie Chaplan movie on speed and I think I’ll go home and write an album full of old country songs that make me think about the Shiloh trip Daddy took me on when all I did was complain when he was just trying to teach me a little history and where we have come from. Songs that remind me of the Jim Reeves statue Daddy took me to go see. He never told me Jim Reeves was his hero, but somehow sitting in that old church downtown makes me know. After all most of the songs Daddy sung for me on my guitar were old Jim Reeves songs and Jim Reeves stories about how he used to record unreleased songs for his wife in place of life insurance, because apparently they didn’t have any. Songs that remind me of the farm where my Daddy took me to see where his parents lived in a tent before building their first house and having their first baby and the tree where Daddy sh-- on his big brother’s head after waiting all day for him to stand underneath the limb without noticing his bare behind squatting like a zoo monkey.
All the rhinestones at the Grand Ole Opry must make Porter Wagner awful proud. Is he dead yet? Seems like most of these artist could be dead or are on their way to being dead. Just sitting in these pews makes me want to go home and make a pan of black skillet Martha White cornbread and a pot of beans with a ham hock in it and enter a 4-H beans and cornbread contest. And Marty Stuart’s rockabilly self makes me want to dance with a beer in one hand and the Bible in the other. I think he invented bed head.
After waiting all night I got to hear my favorite of all acts, The Sweet Harmony Traveling group that consisted of all my musical influences. Emmylou Harris, who I get to stare at when I see her at the Green Hills Wild Oats drinking coffee and driving off in her topless jeep driving in the rain. Patti Griffin, whoo God broke the mold when he installed that voice. Gillian Welch, who reminds me of Popeye’s wife Olive Oil, except she can sing cowgirl songs like nobody’s business. And Buddy Miller, who makes me wonder if my toilet needs plumbing. He sings like an undiscovered plumber, except he is discovered, or rather he discovered himself.

Rules of the South

I feel sorry for people who move here. To the south that is. You know, the folks that come from California, from New England and Ohio. They come down here and get all shnookered with our howdy's and our hello's, our yes sugar's and our flashy smiles. "Oh it's just so friendly! The people are so NICE." Oh honey...
Ten years later and they are just BEGINNING to get it. Somebody needs to teach a class on the rules of the South (and other dangers of Southern Living.)
Let's just start with Rule #1. (And for all you southerners out there that think I'm breakin' all the rules? Yeah well somebody has to.)
Rules of the South-
Rule #1:
Just because the lady at the Pancake Place called you "Sugar" doesn't mean you are moving to Mayberry, or Heaven, or that everybody in the south is going to have you over for grits and coffee. Half the time she's not even thinking about what she is saying and truth be told she just wants her feet to stop hurting and to have a smoke break as soon as possible. It's not personal, it's just a word.
Rule #2:
Unless you are a complete and total athiest, you might as well sign up for "Church Membership" as soon as is humanly possible. Because I promise you the first words out of anybody's mouth around here will be "Hi. Nice to meet you.... (they turn their head one way, back the other way...) And what church do you attend?" DO NOT I repeat DO NOT look at them with a blank stare, or you will immediately be put on the local "We're prayin for you honey" list. Now. You need to understand. They are doing this out of the kindness of their hearts. (Sort of.) This is the culture of the south. Do not take it personally. Trust me honey either walk down the aisle, fill out the paperwork and start makin' casseroles or just have a church name ready to ROLL OFF YOUR TONGUE as soon as humanly possible after the question is asked. You could even use The Church of (enter your street name of your home address). Then they will say, "Oh. I haven't heard of that one yet." There are so many churches around here they will never know the difference, but the importance is to have the name come out of your mouth quickly and easily. You can then proceed to have a conversation about not a whole lot.
**NOTE TO SELF: (And when they ask you to dinner- Somethin' like this (big huge smile, draw out the last word)... "YA'LL HAVE TO COME OVER FOR DINNER SOMETIIIME!!!" That means absolutely nothing so just let it fall to the floor, into the air and let it disintegrate- don't hold a grudge- they are SOUTHERN and 98.5% percent of the time you will never, ever see the inside of that person's home for supper. It is the equivalent of weather talk. Like... "Yeah the weather is lookin' kinda' blustery out there. See you later." Again, it's not personal. It's the SOUTH.
Rule #3: If you came here to get into the "Music Business", I am so so sorry. Turn around. Do not pass Go. Go to your nearest bus station and get the heck home. It's not what you think it is. You can either take my word for it or get stuck here like the rest of the million and four folks who refuse to admit it. I was BORN here. I can SAY this. Go home. Bless the socks off your local area. If you are fabulous, come here and train, record, have meetings, whatever. If you are SUPER fabulous, you will know it is the right thing to do to move to Music City. But for the love of God do not just get in your car and move here thinking you are going to be the next God-Knows-Who. I'm a lover, not a hater, but I'm tellin' you. Grey Hound.
Now, having said all that. I was born and raised in the South. My family is here. My long time, precious friends are here. There are sweet, loving people here who walk slow, talk slow and know how to make a mean pot 'o beans with ham. I have actually wanted to move to New England until about a week ago. Why? The scenery, the "intelligent" people, the history, the beauty, the NO B.S. But somehow by the grace of God, I have learned (last week..I know I'm a little slow), that the grass really isn't greener. That New Hampshire is beautiful but my beautiful friends and family won't be there. That it is cold as a freaker. That I am blessed where I am. My granny was southern, her granny was southern. I'm southern. My daddy is REAL southern. So I've decided to embrace my heritage. Ham hocks and all. You know what they say, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. So here's to you SOUTH. Looks like I'm here to stay...

"I'm proud to be from the South - where tea is sweet and accents are sweeter; summer starts in April; front porches are wide and words are long; macaroni and cheese is a vegetable; pecan pie is a staple; Y’all is the only proper pronoun; chicken is fried and biscuits come w/ gravy; everything is darling and someone is always getting their heart blessed. Have a good day y'all!..."

The Journey is the Reward

"The Journey is the Reward ”
by Stacy Jagger

All of my experiences
One by one
All locked up together
Meaningful and few
Precious, like stones
Diamonds among them
Taking each one
To make something beautiful
Time is not lost
Lost is not time
I am on time
Not late, nor early
I am neither young, nor old
Depending your stature
Compared to Mathusala
I am a mere child
Wisdom I have sought you
Though too stupid to know if I have any
Smart enough to know
The only problems I have
Lie between my ears
Seeds thrown
This way and that
Water them and watch them grow
For there is no easier or softer way
The road is slow and easy
Bends from nowhere
Just to see them
And for no other reason
For the journey is the reward
And I am in it