Faith, Folklore, and Friends

Labor: productive   activity,   especially   for   the   sake   of   economic gain; the body of persons engaged  in  such  activity, especially those working for  wages;  this body of persons considered as a  class  (distinguished from management and  capital);   physical   or   mental   work,   especially   of   a   hard   or   fatiguing   kind;   toil;  a   job   or   task   done   or  to   be   done. Labor Day was created to honor the American  Labor  movement.  Since 1887, it has been  celebrated on  the first Monday in September. Labor Day marks the unofficial end to summer,  but  around here, the temperature appears to    be  in  denial. Still, if you are a proper Southern  lady, you  need to ...

Last Thursday, we were in Tennessee visiting with family.  I found this beauty in the the garden of my nephew, Brandon Ford. The summer has been long and hot and some are going weary of it, hungry for fall's cool breezes.  Today, we begin August, and September is usually like summer here.  So try not to get impatient. There is still lots of living going on, and much to be done before summer is over.  Let's squeeze every day until we have used it completely up.  This summer won't come again.

~Florence Main Street photo                           I do not like the cold North breeze or temps low enough to freeze the pipes, the plants, and the parts of motor cars that make them start. I do not like the freezing rain that makes the roads a major pain to try to get to work and school. I do not like it, and I’m no fool. I do not like the mushy snow. It doesn’t set my heart aglow. Instead, it just makes me mean as I pine for something green. I do not like the low, gray sky. Sometimes, it makes me want to cry when I think of all the blue skies gone and weeks of winter yet to come. I do like the summer, humid and hot; long lazy days and temps that do not fall below seventy, even at night! Hurry up, Summer! It’s nowhere in sight. ~ Wanda Stricklin Robertson

  Summer ends, and Autumn comes, and he who would have it otherwise would have high tide always and a full moon every night; and thus he would never know the rhythms that are at the heart of life.  ~Hal Borland

I posted this blog about morning glories about this time last year. This morning, as I wandered in the backyard wet from yesterday's soaking rain, my Grandma Gean was heavy on my mind. Would she smile at my feeble attempts? Morning Glories may be the flower I have known and loved the longest. My maternal grandmother, Mrs. Georgia Gean, was a great lover of morning glories. She lived in a little four-room house that had been converted from an old church/school house. The front porch, with boards for the floor and tin on the roof, was built across the front of the house, which faced directly west. Grandma had dug up beds running parallel with the porch, on each side of the front door. Each spring, she would plant these beds with morning glory seed she ordered from a seed catalog. Long before the little plants were ready to send out tendrils, she built a trellis for them to climb on. Grandma knew what days in early spring would yield the highest sap, and that is w...

"Oh, that men would give thanks to the LORD for His goodness, And for His wonderful works to the children of men! For He satisfies the longing soul, And fills the hungry soul with goodness." Psalm 107:8-9 Sometimes, boring is good. The heat and humidity in Alabama August is fierce...it can drive you back inside quickly if you get too adventuresome. We're not really lazy, we're just waiting for the cooler air of autumn before we do anything that requires moving or breathing. We miss our Sunday afternoon walks at the TVA reservation. I've always loved walking in the woods, but we live in the city. TVA provides wonderful walking trails, a wildflower garden that is almost always cool, and facilities with a water fountain. It is one of my favorite places. Walkers abound in our neighborhood, and after we're finished with our walk, I like to sit on the front porch with a book and wave at all the walkers as they come by. It's too hot to do that right now; there ar...

Peas. They have been a staple of my diet all my life. My siblings and I even sung about them: Peas, peas, peas, eating goober peas . Thankfully, I don't remember the rest of the song. From July to early October, in good years, they were on the table at dinner and supper. Beautiful peas. After the season had passed, we would have them canned or dried. Oh, NOW I remember why we didn't get bored during the summer. We shelled peas for canning! My parents planted rows and rows of peas, their purple hulls calling to us. We picked them in half-bushel baskets and five-gallon buckets. Because our family liked the purple hull variety, our thumbs and fingertips would retain their purplish color for weeks. After Mama had canned all she needed, the rest of the peas were allowed to dry on the vine. When they were completely dry, we would pick them and store them in tow sacks (burlap bags). On some cool October Saturday, when the sky was so blue you cried and a brisk breeze was blowing, we ha...

Today is July 31. What a month July has been! It has been full to bursting. . . . *Celebrating our freedom, which never gets old, and I pray never will. *Teaching a full course at UNA in little more than three weeks: intense but successful. *Lightning striking our house during an afternoon thunderstorm, melting the computer while I sat right in front of it, burning a streak from top to bottom of the huge poplar right off the deck, knocking off part of the deck in its anger, running through copper pipes in the house until it burned an exit, spending its energy in a second that seemed like an eternity. *Cucumbers and squash perishing in the record heat. The tomatoes dug in and continue to fill out biscuits and salads. *Sharing hurt and losses and joy and music with dear friends. *Finding a new connection group full of strength and kindness. *Watching granddaughters grow brown and tall as they soak up the summer. *Enjoying music at Handy Fest, tapping our f...

W e waited as the darkness of winter relented. We waited longing for leaves, for warm nights sleeping with the window open, insect songs and the smell of honeysuckle. We cleaned debris from the deck, envisioning friends in lounge chairs, sipping iced tea. We cleaned perennial beds, searching for green. We stacked the leftover firewood, winter's detritus in a dustpan swept up like the icy wind. Summer was born, a painful birth with pangs of thunder. When summer was new, we went for walks, caught fireflies, cranked up the grill. As she grew, with heat and humidity, we ran to hide in air-conditioned rooms, and we forgot. Then, while we weren't looking, summer leaked through our lives like water through our hands. Now its dead, ended, not a trace remaining. The block party, the week-end trips, Saturday afternoon cook-outs. Horseshoe games in the backyard, building a water fountain, transplanting vines. All the things we meant to do that are not going to happen this year. God grant...