Carl Wayne’s Weekly Columns and Newsletter    May 16, 2008

 

 

 

 

 

This week:

 

Daddy would have been 94 on May 15.

 

The Shelby County Master Gardeners Association has a new website:

http://memphisareamastergardeners.org/

 

We enjoyed visiting with Mimi’s parents and going to eat a steak on Mother’s Day, then touring the tornado damage in the Enterprise MS community.

 

We have delivered 65 lbs of fresh nutritious tasty Romaine lettuce to the needy!!!

 

Except for some colds, we all are doing well and are happy and working hard and staying busy. We enjoy being at all four granddarlings’ ballgames and other events. School is almost out. Our plans to recline for a few days on the Redneck Riviera are in process.

 

I will begin teaching a nine week class for Embry Riddle Aeronautical University in two weeks and will begin this Saturday a five week class for the University of Phoenix. I can use the extra money to buy boiled peanuts near Pensacola FL.

 

My plants in containers and in the volunteer garden are languishing somewhat due to incessant rains, cool air, cool soil, cutworms, and lop eared lagomorphs which have eaten all 100 broccoli plants. Neem oil is keeping other insects at bay. We have heavily mulched and put tin foil around most other plants, which slows the cutworms down. We are trying to be true to our sustainability philosophy and not use wide spectrum insecticides like Sevin dust. But I only have so much patience!

Column:

 

Write This On A Rock                                    April 18, 2008

 

“What are men to rocks and mountains?” 

~Jane Austen

 

Jim Blasingame writes a column entitled Write This On A Rock. While the finer details of the financial matters on which he opines escape me,  I understand what he means: remember this; make it permanent.

 

Little seems more permanent within the human race’s allotted time span compared to rocks and stones. They are nothing more than large grains of  sand, small boulders,  broken mountains, or huge silt particles of clay.  Nothing more than a transition phase from dirt to rock to dirt, as we humans go from dust to human to dust. Wind, water, temperature changes, and gravity are continuously reducing rocks and stone to soil. Fire and gravity are making new ones.

 

Gardeners and farmers who practice biodynamic techniques spread pulverized stone dust on their fields for the mineral content, not content to wait until the elements have done that job. Plants need the micronutrients. Earthworms depend on grist to chew organic material in their gut, as in a bird’s craw.

 

Children and adults cannot resist climbing large stones.  My daddy-in-law, Ralph, ignoring his cardiovascular problems, could not resist climbing the house size pile of stones at the entrance to the path to Clingmans Dome, the highest point in Tennessee. Nor could many others; nor I.

 

In my long list of gardening to-do’s for when I retire, is a large stack of stones in my backyard. About six feet wide and deep and four feet high will do. It will have crevices for critters to hide and sleep and small pockets for rainwater to collect in. Some stones will have mosses and sedums clinging to them. Sedums are perfect for that environment and are often the plant of choice for rooftop gardens due to their hardiness and tolerance of too little and too much rain.

 

From my kitchen table I will be able to see lizards and skinks sunning, birds bathing and drinking from the birdbath I will place there, and male butterflies feeding on minerals from the mud I will place in one of the depressions.

 

The stones will remind me of the short span of my existence here on Earth. They will be my Ebenezer, a reminder of God’s protection and providence. But for now I had rather have my precious granddarlings playing in the yard, even if my prize heirloom tomato vines are at peril. The stones can wait.

 

Ain’t God good!

Carl Wayne, Master Gardener, mymaters@yahoo.com

An OLD column/musing:

 

A Midsummer Stroll In the Sun at the WTC                              Aug. 14, 2007

 

“Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun.”

~Noel Coward & Joe Coker

 

Maybe because I was born and raised in the hot humid South, I am supposed to say something like “heat don’t bother me” when asked why I am out in today’s 100 degree noon sun . A record high 106 is forecast for Memphis, but we are twenty-two miles in the hinterlands and in a smaller heat island. It was 73 on my patio this morning when the Memphis airport registered 77 degrees.

 

But today it is not too humid, a light breeze is blowing, and I’m feeling guilty about that Almond Joy I ate to chase the hot plate lunch from the cafeteria. I had been so good at breakfast and ate the fruit and cereal Mimi had for me.

 

There was a small crowd and an unusually low average IQ at the Table of Knowledge in the company cafeteria at noon today, basically just me. So I had time to spare to walk back to my work space in building 80 after circumnavigating the lake.

 

Exiting the acfeteria to the north I saw a skink. Since they are carnivores like me, there must be enough bugs and worms nearby for them to eat. I imagine it lives in the English ivy, which covers the wall under the windows on the southeast corner of building 20.

 

One wonders if we could be more colorful and name the buildings. If this were Colorado, the buildings would be named for mountains. I suggest bird names, and may start calling building 80 Kingbird.

 

It is very dry, but most of the WTC is irrigated. I saw very little wildlife. Besides the skink, I only saw a few dabbling ducks, a cardinal, a juvenile robin with its yellowish breast, an eastern kingbird, a sulfur butterfly, a painted lady butterfly, and a swallowtail butterfly. Wikipedia says dabbling ducks are “…so named because its members feed mainly on vegetable matter by upending on the water surface…”

 

The lake level is so low the irises are above the water line. I imagine the catfish to be so dry as to have ticks on them.

 

The morningglories are doing well on the bamboo trellis over “the rock.” They could use a drink of water today.

 

The great swards of monoculture grass are closely cropped. The creek banks in the southeast corner are chemically scoured and eroding badly. One wishes for pleasant meadows and creek banks and biodiversity and more of Nature’s beauty to enjoy.

 

The fields behind Kingbird (building 50) have been cleared for the extension of Shea Road and the future Porter Farms subdivision. We may never again see the small herd of deer grazing there. Someone cleared the land to build my house, so I cannot complain.

 

On a different subject the sun and rain and soil have yielded a beautiful bountiful harvest in our volunteer garden on South Rowlett next to the railroad tracks in Collierville. We volunteers have raised and donated 1,723 pounds of fresh produce to the Food Pantry and the Page-Robbins Alzheimer’s Adult Day Care Center.

 

The people who patronize the Food Pantry seldom get fresh produce, and the Food Pantry had never had any to give away before. A lady at the Food Pantry told us about a client who was given one of our watermelons. He broke it open, sat down on a bench, and ate half of it right there. That’s what keeps us going!

 

We harvest twice a week. The biggest harvest is Thursday mornings when we take it to the Food Pantry. On Monday mornings we take it to Page-Robbins. They take the peas and beans and spread them out on a table. One by one the people who had been sitting alone drift over to the table and begin shelling and snapping and talking.

 

Herbie Krisle of Page-Robbins says:

“Though none of our clients are physically hungry, they are hungry to be productive and active. And that is where this fresh produce has come in. We have enjoyed shucking corn, cutting it off with plastic knives; shelling peas and snapping beans; making homemade salsa. All while talking and reminiscing about days gone by.” This, too, keeps us going.

 

We have begun our fall garden, and soon will have more okra, squash, cucumbers, eggplants, tomatoes, and crowder peas. Next we will start greens and cabbages and turnips and rutabagas.

 

Fresh produce essentially comes from the sun as plants use photosynthesis, water, and soil nutrients to produce sugar to grow the produce. So who am I to complain about the sun?

 

Carl Wayne Hardeman

rowsofbuttercups@yahoo.com

 

 

 

Editorial opinion:

 

None for this week as I ponder running for Alderman in the fall election.

Latest web gleanings clickable links:

 

Humor:

 

Country humor video:

http://www.komando.com/videos/2-20.asp

 

Some feel good funny laughs:

http://www.komando.com/videos/4-28.asp

 

 

 

 

Gardening & Eating:

 

Raising chickens in Atlanta:

http://www.ajc.com/living/content/living/homeandgarden/stories/2008/05/01/hgchickens_0503.html

 

 

Science and Technology:

 

 Tennessee organ donor registry:

http://www.tndonorregistry.org/index.aspx

 

Sweet sorghum: clean miracle crop for feed and fuel:

http://www.physorg.com/news129876999.html

 

Megapolitan: Arizona’s Sun Corridor:

http://www.physorg.com/news129999759.html

 

 

 

Conservative News:

 

Moving patriotic song:

http://www.greatdanepromilitary.com/Battle%20Hymn/index.htm

 

 

 

Miscellaneous:

 

Laminin glue holds us together, shaped like a cross:

http://hsiapin.blogspot.com/2006/10/laminin.html

 

Good inspirational/motivational short presentation:

http://www.eagleschoolmovie.com/

 

HD Thoreau on Simplicity:

http://www.lichtensteiger.de/simpleness.html

 

Beautiful Beijing Olympic Gardens:

http://babytulip.multiply.com/photos/album/483

 

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Carl Wayne’s Weekly Columns and Newsletter    May 09, 2008

 

 

 

 

 

This week:

 

The big event this week is Mother’s Day, and men that means wife, too. Don’t forget.

 

Still raining and garden plants look waterlogged. Mine in containers in my backyard look OK since they get good draining through the straw plus I gave them each a nice dose of homemade alfalfa tea.

 

We have delivered 20 lbs of fresh nutritious tasty Romaine lettuce to the needy!!!

 

Some pix of my recent activities:

 

http://targetphoto.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=ipipyxq.62xdh76&x=0&y=-4lfpu6&localeid=en_US

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=5jpx39n.bygq9smb&x=0&y=y5qs86&localeid=en_US

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=5jpx39n.9pmwmjb7&x=0&h=1&y=4182ey&localeid=en_US

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=5jpx39n.6wfmz3q3&x=0&y=-xamhkq&localeid=en_US

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=5jpx39n.76hdaoqj&x=0&h=1&y=-ju63bh&localeid=en_US

 

 

 

 

 

Column:

 

Things My Grandkids May Never Know                   April 10, 2008

 

” We could never have loved the earth so well if we had had no childhood in it.”

 ~George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss

 

My granddarlings may never know many of the sights, sounds, and scents etched

deeply in mine and Mimi’s memories. How pleasant they are in our recall.

 

Some I remember as Belle,  Mimi’s pom-a-poo, and I rest in the recliner, planning

this year’s garden and my next column. Mimi thinks we are asleep.

 

The feel of the warm freshly plowed dirt. The smell of rain in dust. The sound of rain on a tin roof while lying abed. The laziness of napping in the hay loft of a barn.

 

Opening or closing the outhouse or shed door with its rotating wooden handle. 

Shelling corn for the chickens with the heel of your palm while walking in circles

with chickens scrambling in circles behind you.

 

The early wakeup call of all the roosters crowing nearby. A hen’s contented cluck

as she roves the yard seeking a seed or a fat worm. Her warning clucks as you

lift her with the back of your hand to gather her egg, making sure to leave the false

egg. Her jubilation after laying an egg. Chicks running under her spread wings.

Shelling corn by the backdoor then grabbing a pullet by the legs for supper.

 

Knowing what a pullet, shoat, and heifer are. Calling the hogs and cows to be

fed and put up for the night. The earthy sweaty smell of hogs and their grunts

and squeals as they snuffle up their food from the trough. The ammonia odor

when cleaning the henhouse.

 

Drinking warm milk fresh from the bucket after milking the cow. The acrid taste

of milk from cows which have eaten bitterweed.

 

A mule’s silky soft muzzle. A horse’s soft nickering. The way a horse twitches

the skin on its withers. The clop clop sound of a horse pulling a wagon.

 

The sweet juicy taste of a tomato or heart of watermelon fresh from the garden.

Washing the porch of the juice and seeds with a broom and water to reduce the

fly population. The dying buzz of flies after they eat the pink poison crystals.

 

The unforgettable aroma of hot fried tenderloin for breakfast from a hog killed

and cleaned that cold clear morning. Hot biscuits and redeye gravy.

 

The pleasant aches in one knees and back from picking peas and butterbeans.

The soreness and purple stain of your thumb from shelling those peas and beans.

 

Drinking cool water from a ladle out of a bucket hanging on the porch drawn from

your well. Trying to not put your lips where poppa and mammaw had been drinking, since they dip snuff.

 

The pleasing rasp of metal on metal while sharpening your hoe and the glint of the newly exposed metal.  The clean cut of a cockleburr plant with a sharp hoe.

 

The smoky smell and cracking of a fireplace and the heat on the back of your pants. The exciting anticipation when the fireplace is “tromping snow” when  outside temperature and barometric pressure is just right.

 

Our granddarlings may indeed never know these memories we cherish, but I know

they are building memories of their own to share with their children and grandchildren.

 

Ain’t God good!

Carl Wayne, Master Gardener

mymaters@yahoo.com

 

An OLD column/musing:

 

More Blessed To Give Than Receive        Aug 13, 2007

 

“It is more blessed to give than receive.”

~The Holy Bible

 

Many people were so good to our family when I was growing up with Momma and four more children in a shotgun house after Daddy died. Relatives shared government commodities. Friends sometimes gave us a ride to church. We shared hand-me-downs.

Ethel Huey bought me clothes when she bought for her son. I will forever appreciate those kindnesses.

 

It has been my joy to be blessed this year along with several other volunteers. We have grown a garden and given most of the the produce to the local Food Pantry, some to the Page-Robbins Adult Day Care Center, and small quantities to needy neighbors, the rehab center, and to a firehouse.

 

As of Aug 13, we have grown and donated 1,723 pounds of first class produce: corn, potatoes, sweetpeas, onions, cabbages, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, beets, squash, zucchini, peppers, eggplants, peas, beans, tomatoes, okra, and watermelons. Lord willing, we will continue to grow and donate from our fall garden.

 

We have given our first fruits and taken only a few small samples ourselves to test the quality. We have donated large beautiful red, pink, and mahogany tomatoes we could just

taste, but had promised to charity.

 

A lady at the Food Pantry told us about a client who was given one of our watermelons. He broke it open right there,  sat down, and ate half of it. That’s what keeps us going!

 

Herbie Krisle of Page-Robbins says:

“..Though none of our clients are physically hungry, they are hungry to be productive and active. And that is where this fresh produce has come in. We have enjoyed shucking corn, and cutting it off with plastic knives; shelling peas and snapping beans; making homemade salsa. All while talking and reminiscing about  days gone by…” This, too, keeps us going.

 

Several good souls contributed money and services this year, and deserve as much credit as those who worked in the dirt.

 

We can always use more volunteers and donations for seeds, settings, fertilizer, and the water bill. Make checks out to the Food Pantry. Or bring us newspapers, grass clippings,

tomato cages, stakes, and pea vine poles.

 

Many hands make small work. We use sustainable gardening practices to reduce need for water, tilling, weeding, and insecticides. While we have had twenty volunteers, there were from three to seven most weeks. We would love to grow even more next year if we have enough volunteers and supplies.

 

Ain’t God good!

Carl Wayne

mailto:mymaters@yahoo.com

 

Editorial opinion:

 

A friend asked me this question that made me ponder:

 

What happens when a large percentage of Americans max out they credit cards and have to reduce they spending? Will that be worse than the subprime mortgage problem?

 

I don’t know the answer.

 

Anyone have an opinion?

Latest web gleanings clickable links:

 

Humor:

 

Annoying car:

http://www.freshplaza.com/news_detail.asp?id=21203

 

Top 10 “Yo momma is so…” lines from Reader’s Digest:

http://www.rd.com/yo-momma/article39993.html?trkid=LAUGH1015

 

 

 

Gardening & Eating:

 

 

Nothing this week.

 

 

 

Science and Technology:

 

Maybe biochar (charcoal) in the soil has negative sequestration effect:

http://www.physorg.com/news128925813.html

 

Almost free government health insurance plan (pig in a poke):

http://www.physorg.com/news128926184.html

 

 

Conservative News:

 

Senator Obama’s S.2433 Bill to tax US citizens for overseas aid $845billion:

http://www.americandaily.com/article/22065

http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=184728&src=

 

Chuck Norris on Oprah’s New Religion:

http://www.townhall.com/Columnists/ChuckNorris/2008/03/04/oprahs_new_easter

 

New book: The Energy Non Crisis:

http://www.reformation.org/energy-non-crisis.html   (links to all chapters)

Chapter 1:

http://www.reformation.org/energy-non-crisis-ch1.html

 

John McCain: where he came from and who he is in his own words:

http://www.standardnewswire.com/news/697512490.html

 

 

Miscellaneous:

 

Amazing strings band video:

http://www.bowfire.com/

 

Jay Jay’s (next door neighbor) new puppy:

http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/mountainfeist.htm

 

Corey roller hockey pix; he got 5 of our 9; we won 9-7:

He’s no 5 white helmet  Pic 4, 20-25 turn shoot,  30-38 steal, 47-48 defense.

http://picasaweb.google.com/aaroncichocki/HurricanesVsLightningPlayoffs1?authkey=a8Yp1NfiAM4 

 

I see I am on public record in PA for having contributed to my company’s PAC:

http://www.campaignfinance.state.pa.us/CFReport.aspx?CFReportID=58057&Section=IB&StartRow=4001&RowsPerPage=1000

 

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Carl Wayne’s Weekly Columns and Newsletter    May 02, 2008

 

 

 

 

 

This week:

 

Another good week for all of us except we postponed our trip to Nashville.

Karli and Courtney (same team) and Corey won they ballgames last night, and son Michael’s church softball team was tied after 2 innings when we had to leave late last night. Kristen had an amazing assist from midfield and they won they soccer game.

 

I have all my plants in containers planted. The Collierville Community Victory Garden is all planted except for the second half of the purplehull peas. The Plant-A-Row garden in Shelby Farms is 2/3^rd planted. Now we are waiting for the Lord to give the increase.

 

Mimi took Belle for her summer trim. I had thought she had gotten fat, but after the trim, she almost looks skinny. We’re making plans to be in the Redneck Riviera (Orange Beach AL, Phoenix IV), Lord willing, June17-20.

 

Backyard plants:

Tomatoes:

Amelia, Better Boy, BNH 640 (2,) Bonnie Original (2),

Bradley, Caspian Pink (2), Celebrity (1), Early Girl,

Fletcher (2) Goliath, Health Kick, Jet Star, Marglobe (3), Mort Lifter (2),

Rutgers (2)

Other:

Zucchini (2) Yellow squash (2) Bellpeppers (6)

Highbush eggplants (2) Rosa Bianca eggplants (2)

Parsley (2) Fennel (2) Oregano Farmer Meyer lettuce

 

 

Column:

 

Opal’s Flowers                                                              April 04, 2008

 

‘Tis my faith that every flower enjoys the air it breathes!

~ William Wordsworth

 

Opal loves her flowers. She’s Mimi’s momma and lives near Hurricane MS.

Gardening was a large part of their living through the years, so nowadays she has some extra time to plant a few flowers.  The many potted tomato and potato and okra plants keeps her busy watering and picking and calling to tell us about their harvest, so I can go out and fuss at my tomato plants to hurry up and just one of you get ripe so I can call back and tell them.

 

Her asparagus ferns at the corners of the front porch are a sight to see. They die back to the soil each year then quickly scale the iron porch supports to the porch ceiling and spread they tendrils wide by the end of summer. The tiny red flowers attract hummingbirds as do the feeders she has for them hanging under the porch eaves.

 

Her buttercups have bloomed and began growing strength in their bulbs for another welcome early Spring display next year. They grow during what is called strawberry winter or dogwood winter by some. It’s the cool snap in early spring after the first early warm days and nights when we start thinking about planting tomato seeds. As the names imply, this is when strawberries bloom and dogwoods bloom. It’s the spring version of Indian summer in the fall.

 

Blackberry winter is in May when the blackberries bloom, but with the weather the way it is, who knows. It’s also the name of a must read collection of stories

Blackberry Winter by Southern writer and literary giant Robert Penn Warren.

That’s almost as good reading as Opal’s delicious blackberry cobbler. I used to pick blackberries for her to cook from along the fence rows. Ralph has more convenient vines in the yard now.

 

Opal’s tulips and irises bloomed just after Easter and were gorgeous. Now we await the lilies, red hot pokers, and zinnias of summer to beautify their mailbox bed and light post bed.

 

She and Ralph used to have a large zinnia bed until it got to be too much work for them. The large circular zinnia patch would be ablaze in different colors and heights and abuzz with bees and aflutter with butterflies and goldfinches. People would stop when passing by to admire them, both zinnias and Ralph and Opal.

 

Ain’t God good!      

Carl Wayne, Master Gardener, mymaters@yahoo.com

An old column/musing:

 

Going home                                                                   Aug 06, 2007

 

My first day of first grade I was 5 years old going to be 6 in December, in Mrs Sams’ class in Union City TN 1952. Since Momma was a former schoolmarm, all five of us could read before we started school.

 

Momma put me on the bus with my older sister and gave me strict instructions what bus to look for at noon to get back home. My sister had to stay all day. Of course I got on the wrong bus, but those were simpler times and the bus driver took me home when he finished his regular route.

 

I remember indelibly the teacher asking us our middle names. I told her I didn’t have one, since I thought my Southern double name was one word. The teacher asked me to go home that night and ask my Momma if I had a middle name. Of course Momma and the whole family, except me, got a big laugh out of it for years to come.

 

I often think of coming home to Momma and the other kids after living alternately with my grandparents and my aunt and uncle in the country near Milledgeville TN.

 

After Daddy died in a car wreck, all but the youngest of we five children were divided up at the funeral and sent to live with relatives. Momma had no money, insurance, income, job, or place to live, and was stuck far from her people in Southern Louisiana. I don’t know how she paid for the funeral. My sister believes the dear Watson family did.

 

Though she had two years of college, “exposed to a college education” she would say, she had never written a check, and Workman’s Comp refused to pay up for obscure reasons that were settled in court years later.

 

After she got some social security and settled in a shotgun house in the old Binghampton area of Memphis, she sent for us kids one at a time.

 

It was always thought I would live with Uncle Charlie and Aunt Cora, since they had no kids of their own, but after gardening, taking care of farm animals, chopping cotton, picking cotton and doing the work they would have wanted  their own 12 year old son to do. Their one child, Max, died as a teenager. I decided to go home to Momma and try the city life. But I will always cherish my time with them.

 

They gave me the $12 I saved from chopping cotton after buying some new clothes. I paid fifty cents for the mailman to take me to Henderson TN and bought a bus ticket to Memphis. They told me to tell the bus driver to let me off at the corner of Summer Ave and Bingham St just over the Summer Avenue viaduct, or vidock we called it.

 

He did, and I managed to follow their instructions to Aunt Alene’s house. She took me to Momma. Momma didn’t need the extra mouth to feed in that shotgun house on Tutwiler.

 

I soon has an afternoon paper route, delivered prescriptions for Doc Bailey’s drug store on Broad St, mowed yards, and unloaded trucks at the Scott St Farmers market. I soon graduated to a morning paper route and doing cleaning up a yarn shop and a barber shop on Broad St mornings before school after delivering papers. My senior year of high school I worked forty hours per week as a bellboy at Admiral Benbow Motel on Union.

 

I suppose we were poor, but too young or naive to know it. We had plenty to eat and our clothes were always clean. Or as Momma said if we complained about anything: “What are you complaining about? You have food on the table, clothes on your back, and a roof over your head.”  I know now she was right. She wasn’t the nurturing type, but I wouldn’t trade for the world the independence she instilled in us. The Good Lord has blessed me far beyond what I could have ever dreamed of or asked for, but if I lost all my earthly possessions now, I would just be back where I started.

 

I will always remember Ethel Huey, the mother of one of my friends. She didn’t have much, but she sometimes bought me clothes when she bought for her own son, David.

 

Momma’s mother Mammaw lost her first three children all in one week, all under five years old, to something that most likely could be easily treated  today. Her mother-in-law who lived with them told her: “Mary, I’ll never get close to any of your children again.”  And she didn’t. Mammaw must have steeled herself the same way.

 

She raised six more children to be adults, and lost one in WWII. They farmed, drank from a well, used an outhouse, ate from their garden, washed clothes and children in tubs on the back porch, made their own soap, milked cows, made butter and pickles and sauerkraut, chopped their own kindling and firewood, and cooked in a wood stove. That sounds quaint today, but it was hard work, which may account for her and Poppa living into their 80’s.

 

Momma used to budget one dollar per day for meat. She cut a chicken into parts people wouldn’t recognize today such as the back and the wishbone, and fried the liver, gizzard, and heart. She often didn’t eat meat, saying she wasn’t hungry.

 

For our candy she fried the strip of rind off each strip of bacon and kept them on the stove.  I remember her making jelly out of crabapples she sent us out to gather along Jackson Ave near Springdale. She boiled the fruit, put it in a cheese cloth bag, hung it over a pan from a broomstick stretched across the back of two chairs, and wrung the juice out by hand.  She said you can make jelly out of most anything if you use enough sugar.

 

She made sure we were at church services every time the door opened. We walked the few miles to church. Sometimes in bad weather one of the elders would come get us. The six of us were too many to fit in the car with another family.

 

The church made sure we were not in need. Nowadays I appreciate their bringing us a Christmas basket. But at that time, it was hard for a teenage boy to be “cool” when his Sunday school classmates delivered it. I now enjoy telling my granddarlings that story.

 

When we children were in school, Momma made a little money keeping other people’s children while they worked. When we graduated, she took some courses and became a substitute teacher. She had taught in a one room schoolhouse in Montezuma TN when she got out of college.

 

She walked many long miles in hot and cold all over that part of Memphis to teach. She only rode the bus to schools she couldn’t walk to.  After the rules changed, she was demoted to a teacher’s aide. She spent many years at Springdale School until she was past 70 years old, and had been robbed twice in broad daylight while walking home from school. She said: “I stared down the barrel of a gun more than once.”

 

She would never give her age, just said: “I’m the same age as my gums and a little bit older than my teeth.”

 

I remember her buying socks and underwear for poor AfroAmerican children out of her own pocket. She had a kind heart. Many came up to her on the street and in the grocery store years later and hugged her.

 

She was an accomplished sewer. She make some of our clothes. She taught us how to cut out patterns, sew them together, and hem and baste. One of us still has some of the embroidery she did. And like Mammaw, she could tat, the most amazing needlework feat I have ever seen. I cherish the poinsettia design tablecloth she spent ten months crocheting for Mimi and me, and the beautiful quilts she made for each of us and her grandchildren. She did well, “raising us alone”.  Three of us completed college. All of us have Christian homes, love family, and try to help others when we can.

 

She died the way she lived, independent until the end. She lived alone in an apartment, still cooking and washing, and cleaning, until she succumbed to congestive heart failure just a few days shy of 88 years young. Still independent, she died her way, refusing all treatment except a little oxygen. Though too weak to talk much, she would perk up and put on her glasses whenever her soap opera came on that last week. And while lying quietly we could see her hands knitting in the air, still working.

 

Momma had a mockingbird she shared her leftover cornbread with. She put it out on the back patio. When we cleaned out her apartment, a mockingbird fussed at us from a bush  next to where we parked. When we got home across town and began to unload, there was a mockingbird in a tree beside our driveway fussing at us. We had not noticed her before. Nowadays Mimi shares our leftover cornbread with her.

 

Ain’t God good!  

Carl Wayne, Master Gardener  mailto:mymaters@yahoo.com

Editorial opinion:

 

Reasons Not To Vote for Any of the Presidential Candidates:

 

John McCain:

 

            Does not understand most Americans are tired of the war and are looking for an honorable solution in the short term, and do not care one whit about turning Iraq into an American style democracy.

 

            Has supported legislation legalizing mass illegal immigration.

 

Hillary Clinton:

 

            Bare faced liar and known for cover ups like “misplaced” papers, etc.

 

            Unashamed socialist who believes in redistribution of wealth from those who worked hard to profit from their efforts to those who have not or will not.

 

            Deep and abiding disrespect for the American military and our great industrial complex, which built and sustains American wealth, jobs, and peace.

 

            Will raise taxes steeply including those of middle America. Will continue to add to the almost half of Americans who pay no income taxes while expanding existing and creating new entitlement programs making a huge number of Americans dependent on the US government.

 

Barack Obama:

 

            Does not respect the American flag (will not wear a lapel pin) or the national anthem because he doesn’t want to take sides. Is he on our side or not?  Same question for his wife Michelle, as evidenced by the content of her Princeton dissertation and public statement about not being proud of America.

 

            Unashamed socialist like Hillary who will raise taxes steeply and redistribute wealth from the achievers to the non-achievers.

 

            His actions are louder than his words proving his racist leanings through his church and mentor Jeremiah Wright, and the written statements from his wife in her graduate dissertation.

 

            Has convicted terrorist Bill Ayers as a personal friend.

 

            Actually believes he can go talk with Hamas, Al Qaeda, Taliban, etc and they will become our friends. Same scary ignorance as Jimmy Carter and his rec