I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Author: Sheila Morris

  • Memorial Day Matters


    Last Sunday afternoon Teresa and Spike and I took advantage of the low humidity and spring-like weather that lasts about a minute in Columbia before we hit the days that make you feel like you could melt any second and drove over to St. Peter’s Cemetery downtown just off I-126. Remarkably, this was a cemetery we had overlooked in our graveyard tours in the past because of its proximity to the much larger Elmwood Cemetery which goes on forever.  (No pun intended.)

    What impressed me first was the large number of little American flags standing guard over the graves. It’s a common occurrence for soldiers’ markers to have the small red, white and blue colored flags flying above the veterans’ graves but usually only one or two families bother. Clearly, this was a concerted effort by someone or some group or perhaps St. Peter’s themselves to honor every fallen soldier. Luckily Teresa had her cell phone with her and was able to take pictures.

    Memorial Day Pictures from St. Peter's 7

    I was taken with the names of the veterans and wondered about their stories from the wars.

    Memorial Day Pictures from St. Peter's 9

    What was a World War I army nurse from New Jersey doing in a Columbia, South Carolina cemetery, I wondered.  She was born just ten years after the Civil War and somehow ended up as an Army nurse in World War I.  Now she rests here with an American flag that acknowledges her service to her country and two visitors who would like to know how she came to be in this place.

    Memorial Day Pictures from St. Peter's 3

    James Riley was born in New York  in 1837 and actually served in the Civil War as a Confederate soldier; he died in Columbia in 1924. He is buried here draped with a flag that is the symbol of a country he tried to destroy. Yet, here he is – a survivor of one of the bloodiest wars in American history.

    Then there’s Sergeant Charles Edward Timmons, Jr. who served in World War I and was killed in action. His body is buried in France, but his family has honored him with a beautiful marker and  stone flag that flies every day so boldly it practically reaches out for your attention.

    Memorial Day Pictures from St. Peter's 6

    We also saw one different flag – a German one – lying against a grave in St. Peter’s. Memorial Day Pictures from St. Peter's 8

    Hugo Krause was born in Germany in 1855 and died in 1925 in Eastover, South Carolina, which is a small town south of Columbia. Apparently Mr. Krause was also a soldier but served a different country in World War I. Someone is still proud of his German heritage.

    So the stones tell short stories of a few of the soldiers we honor this Memorial Day which is a day of remembrance for those who cared enough for what they believed in to offer up their lives to preserve those beliefs. I admire and respect these soldiers for their sacrifices.

    My family had members who served in World War I and World War II as well as ancestors who served on both sides of the Civil War and some who date to the Revolutionary War for Independence in 1776. I obviously didn’t know many of them, but I did know my father who was a navigator in the Army Air Corps in 1944-45. He was nineteen years old when he enlisted and sent to officer training school in San Antonio.

    He served with the Eighth Air Force in England and flew thirty-two missions over Germany in the short time he was over the Pond. He was never proud of his assignments – the only thing he ever said to me about it was he felt he did his duty.

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    I am proud of the teenager who left his small rural Grimes County, Texas home town, family and friends to do what he thought was right. His country was proud of his service, too, and awarded him the Medal of Honor when he was discharged. On this Memorial Day I will once again respectfully remember  the young man who became the father I loved and all the daughters and sons, mothers and fathers who served in past years and those who serve today who will not be with their own families because they have a reason that puts them in harm’s way every day.

    Memorial Day matters.

     

  • True Confessions


    When Mrs. Lucille Lee taught me how to read in the first grade at the Richards public school, I was so excited I tried to read anything and everything that had words: newspapers, magazines, comic books about Superman or Archie and Jughead, signs and billboards,The Hardy Boys mysteries, The Five Little Peppers and How They Grew, The Bobsey Twins in Tulip Land, Cherry Ames, Tom Swift Jr; histories of the adventures of Wyatt Earp, Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, Gene Autry the singing cowboy, Daniel Boone, Annie Oakley, Sam Houston and well, you get the picture.

    I asked for extra books to take home from school, and I was the first person on the steps of the Grimes County Bookmobile every month – I always checked out the maximum magic number of four. I read whenever I took a break from playing outside or hid from my mother who routinely expected me to be practicing the piano since she had the unfortunate task of teaching me to play. Do not disturb. I was busy reading. I had left hot humid Grimes County for exotic places like snowy New England to check on my new friends Jo and Amy and Beth and Meg who were even cooler than the Bobsey twins. I cried when Beth died.

    One day I read an article entitled How do You Tell Your Child there is no Santa Claus? I was mortified when my mother confirmed that he wasn’t real. I was probably nine years old at the time and had heard rumors at school about it but knew for a fact he was real because I’d seen him on the news on television every Christmas. The news was the ultimate standard-bearer of truth.  Now two  heroes bit the dust at once: Santa Claus and CBS reporter Dan Rather at KHOU. Shattering. What was left to believe in? Who could be trusted? At least I knew Lucy and Ricky Ricardo would always be together with Fred and Ethel Mertz. I took comfort in that.

    Somewhere along the line in the next sixty years reading became less about fun and escape and more about school and studying and work and keeping up with the financial markets which in the waning years of the twentieth century moved at warp speed in a gazillion directions. Reading, for me,  moved from printed pages to computer screens and power point presentations. And gradually over my forty years working with numbers in some form or another, I lost my love for words. When I came home at night, the last thing I wanted to do was read.

    The vicissitudes of life intervened, as they will according to my daddy, and I fell in love with a woman who loved to read almost as much as she enjoyed playing tennis. We met in her bookstore Bluestocking Books in the early 90s. She had a wonderful feminist bookstore located on Gervais Street in the Vista in downtown Columbia before the Vista was a hot spot and yet, her store became a gathering place for the fledgling LGBT community.  My interest in books was immediately revived.

    Alas, Bluestocking closed after two and a half years, but my friendship with the owner who was also a passionate lesbian activist remained strong and endured. We were both involved in other long-term personal relationships and weren’t romantically inclined for the next seven years. Strangely, both of our relationships fell apart at the turn of the century, and Teresa the bookstore owner and I got together.

    When we bought our first house, we had to have bookshelves built in the living room and her office. That set the precedent for every house since then. Built-in bookshelves, bookcases of every size and description in every room now at Casa de Canterbury in the front house and bookcases lining the rooms of the little back house we call our bodega. Still we had books on the floor, books on every piece of furniture that has a surface – books, books, books. Plus, Teresa read every night. While I watched TV and played poker on a small hand-held game I was addicted to, she read books.

    Finally, after six years of being surrounded by books, I decided part of my life was missing. But, the interesting thing is that rather than start reading one of the countless books at my disposal, I took a writing course in December, 2006. Teresa encouraged me and of course, I wanted to do well. I wrote a little story about a revival meeting in my Southern Baptist church where  I heard a preacher rant and rave about homosexuals going to hell, and the teacher liked it. Teresa liked it, too, and the cliché “the rest is history” actually applied. That story became the chapter Payday Someday in Deep in the Heart: A Memoir of Love and Longing that was published in November, 2007.

    Blogs, books, magazines – once again I have a love affair with words. This time around, though, the words are mine.  I write them. I own them. They are sometimes well received by readers, and sometimes they aren’t but they come from a reservoir built steadily by years and years of dams focusing on numbers…until finally the dams broke and the words spilled out.  Apparently, I am unable to stop them from tumbling onto a computer screen that sometimes becomes the printed page.

    True confessions: I still don’t read much. People often invite me to become their Goodreads friend, and I love the site so I always say yes, but I’m a terrible friend. In spite of that, I started reading the Selected Letters 1955 – 1995 of May Sarton this week because Teresa laid it on our coffee table and because I think May Sarton is one of the best writers of the last century. She happened to be an out lesbian but refused to be called a “lesbian writer.” Whatever the label, she wrote fabulous letters to her friends and family. I wish I had written to her so she could write me back. She religiously answered her mail every day.

    Letter writing is a lost art, but I suppose Facebook and other social media render it superfluous. My sense is that blog comments are like mini-letters and I love the interaction with those of you who are my pen pals; I am thankful for every reader. Do not disturb. Somewhere someone is reading.

    Thank goodness for the Bluestocking Bookstore owner who continues to inspire my love for words – and for her. I think I should marry that woman. Oops! I forgot. I just did.

     

     

     

     

  • Running to a Hundred


    When we moved to Casa de Canterbury in the summer of 2009, I was not a happy camper. The house had four gigantic white columns on the front porch that I felt made it look like a Tara wannabe from Gone With the Wind which wasn’t a statement either T or I wanted to make as our first impression with company. But the vicissitudes of life, as my daddy would say, brought us to the intersection of Canterbury Road and Manning Avenue; and we moved our belongings and four dogs to the house we would call home.

    The columns are still there, but their visual impact has been lessened over the past seven years with our attempts to get people to lower their gaze to the steps and porch with flowers, rocking chairs, benches, an old school desk and black bird sculptures on the porch.  I’m not sure if it works for our visitors, but I know it helped me adjust. I have made my peace with the house because Teresa’s touches can make any place homey, and the dogs and I gradually settled in together in harmony with each other and our home.

    One of the unexpected bonuses we’ve found has been our neighbors across the street on Canterbury and behind our house on Manning Avenue.  We have seen Debbie and Mark’s children marry and have grandchildren that they adore. We saw Norma and Alan’s two boys play soccer in their yard when the boys were in middle school and high school. Now we’ve seen them graduate from high school and leave home for college. The cycle of life passes before my window in my office on the second floor, and I like my neighbors on Canterbury Road.

    The neighbors behind us on Manning Avenue are also special.  Monroe and his son Anthony have the most wonderful flowers every year – Monroe, a stately African-American veteran about my age, tries to help me do better with my back yard which is always a disaster. Last year we had a contest to see who could keep their flowers alive and beautiful for the longest time. Monroe won, of course. Not even close. Anthony and I share a passion for sports and politics – topics we love to talk about when we gossip.

    Dorothy lives next door to Monroe and Anthony.  She is an elderly tiny frail African-American woman who always has a smile and a hug for me. She, too, loves to have flowers growing in her yard and makes a point every year to pull any weeds brave enough to grow next to her lilies and daffodils.  I have seen her many times laboring in her yard with her back bent to hoe the weeds she calls her devils. Dorothy still lives alone, but her family takes turns staying with her now. She has a dog she named Sheeva which she claimed she named for me.  Spike loves Sheeva and waits for her to make an escape from Dorothy’s yard to his fence.

    Last week on my birthday I walked over to invite Dorothy to stop by the house for a piece of birthday cake and champagne later that evening. I knocked on her door and waited for her to open it. Sometimes it takes a while because she has days when she moves at a snail’s pace. I have those days, too, so I don’t mind the wait.

    She came out of her door and we visited on her front porch. I told her today is my  70th. birthday and I want you to come over for a piece of cake and champagne around 7 o’clock. Her eyes lit up and she smiled at me while she gave me a big hug and kiss.

    “Happy Birthday,” she said. “And would you believe it? Yesterday was my birthday, too.”

    “You’re kidding me,” I exclaimed. “Well Happy Birthday to you, too! How old were you?”

    “Eighty-seven,” she said. “And I’m running to a hundred.”

    ” What? To a hundred? Really, Dorothy?”

    “Yes,” she nodded emphatically. “And I want you to run with me. I want you to stay right behind me. Don’t you try to get ahead of me. We’re running together.”

    I wish everyone could reach the age of 70 years, but not everyone is so fortunate. My dad wasn’t. Teresa’s mother wasn’t.  They didn’t live long enough to have family and friends say exceedingly kind things about them in person and certainly not long enough to have heart-felt posts in cyberspace about their birthday on social media.  I don’t often use the word “blessed,” but I really can’t think of a word that describes my feelings this week any better. Fortunate. Content. Peaceful. Lucky. Grateful. Blessed.

    Running to a hundred with Dorothy? I doubt it. But I wouldn’t bet against Dorothy, if I were you.

     

     

     

  • Is It Time for a Tune-up?


    My grandfather told me many times that he never understood why my daddy avoided regular maintenance on any of his automobiles.  At least change the oil, I heard him say to my dad a thousand times. Now I’m not sure why my dad who was scrupulous about his shirts and ties that he wore every day to work at the school  and who was fastidious about having not one smear on his eyeglasses in the morning had such a total disregard for getting the oil changed in his car, but I will say I remember we changed Chevrolets more frequently than the oil.

    With that in mind, I try to make sure we maintain our 2006 Toyota 4-Runner we’ve had for eight years and our “new” 2007 Dodge Dakota that replaced the old 2004 Dodge Dakota which finally gave up recently after eight years, umpteen thousand-mile trips back and forth to Texas and almost 200,000 miles. Now, that was a truck I loved…and maintained.

    Next week on the 21st of April I will be 70 years old.  I can’t tell you how old that makes me feel, but I can tell you I never thought I’d live to see 30.  And here I am forty years longer and wondering if I’ve had enough maintenance during the past seven decades from 1946 to 2016 to keep me running for a little while longer. My  Medicine Men (and Women) – the doctors, dentists, dermatologists, psychiatrists and ophthalmologists who faithfully prescribed my Magic Meds for the past forty years and the pharmacists who faithfully dispensed them have certainly done their part.  As my longest-serving doctor Frank Martin, Jr., says, “You are the healthiest person I know considering the terrible shape you’re in.” Now that’s a compliment to be proud of.  Thanks, Frank.

    So at 70 I am very happy to be able to negotiate the activities of daily living, as we say in the jargon of post-retirement life and in the language of the long-term care insurance policies I sold in a time long ago but not so far away. I may congratulate myself and  think  “cleared it” when I step out of the bathtub these days, but at least I have taken one small step for mankind when I don’t have to call T for help to make that step. My attitude toward bathing has undergone a kind of metamorphosis over the past few years from “daily” really means “daily” to “gosh, did I take a shower yesterday?” to “Hey, T, are we seeing anybody today?” I love a shower after I take it, but I consider that time to be one of the most boring activities of daily living ever created.

    I have more fears as I approach 70.  My grandmother suffered from severe depression in her late sixties and early seventies and was supposed to be taking Librium in addition to the electroshock treatments she received at various mental hospitals in the 1960s.  My mother always assumed and accused her of deliberately refusing to take her meds, but now I wonder if she didn’t take them because she couldn’t afford to pay for them. Medicines have always been expensive, and my grandmother lived on a very small Social Security pension since she had been paid a pittance for her years as a clerk in the general store. So did she refuse to take them, or was she unable to pay for them…a mystery I will never solve.

    Fast forward one generation and my mother’s dementia that became the thief who robbed her of her memories and dignity began in her early seventies and finally ended  shortly after her 85th. birthday. Needless to say, heavy, heavy hangs the dread of dementia in this daughter.  I am hoping that somehow in the genetic mishmash that belongs to me the genes of my father will swoop in, take over and beat back  the bad ones of my mother; of course, there’s that little heart problem on his side of the family. Sigh.

    I belong to the Baby Boomer generation, a name derived from the overwhelming population increase in the years immediately following WWII. I have read about our excesses and expectations ad nauseam and can best describe my cohorts and me as a hot mess. Our importance has not necessarily been marked so much by our achievements but by the collective influences of our sheer numbers on society as we blundered along from one century to the next. We trampled all over ourselves and did it right out there in front of God and everybody. We have adapted to and embraced technological changes reluctantly but have commandeered entire communication systems for our personal advancement and entertainment.  Think Facebook. We have preached self-reliance all our lives but now most of us rely on Social Security programs as the main source of our retirement income and medical safety net.

    At 70 I am dealing with feelings of invisibility and incompetence. In a social gathering it’s best for me to be seen and not heard, which is part of my problem. Last night I was at a small get-together at a friend’s house for a birthday party. The group of eight was sitting outdoors on a deck overlooking a beautiful Columbia yard in the springtime at dusk. The weather was perfect – the champagne excellent and the conversation lively.  Two of the women had just gotten back from vacation and were talking about their cruise in the Cayman Islands. There was a lull, and I asked them what a “Dizzy Cruise” was – that was a new one on me. The entire group stopped talking and stared at me. Teresa said “Disney Cruise, Disney Cruise” and I was rescued. But clearly I don’t hear like I used to.

    And in the middle of the health, social and financial issues we Baby Boomers are experiencing as we turn 70, we also have to worry about our legacies. How will we be remembered? Will we be remembered? Why should we be remembered? Yikes. Enough already. If 70 isn’t a year for a tune-up, I’d be shocked with the plugs my daddy never replaced. In fact,  I think I’ll keep a maintenance journal  this year – so stay tuned in for more tune-ups.

     

     

     

     

  • Cayce Festival of the Arts


    I usually reserve pictures for the Old Woman Slow’s Photos, but I thought I should share these with all of you who wished me well for the Cayce Festival of the Arts today…my good friend Donna Magrath of Evergreen Mosaics finagled around and arranged for her friends (including me) to be in the booths next to her. Good job, Donna.

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    Edie and Jenn and a recruit from another booth during set-up

    (while Edie’s partner Dawn supervised)

    Donna insisted we all be there at 7:15 a.m. which is very early for me to be anywhere other than bed these days. Oh, well. It was only one day. Anything for the arts.

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    Donuts and coffee my first stop at the Festival

    The mini-donuts were fried and a smaller version of Elephant Ears at the State Fair.  Thank goodness I only got a small order. Delicious – but somewhat of a shock to the digestive system at 8 a.m.

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    Mosaic Artist Donna Magrath setting up her booth?

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    Wonderful Booth Neighbors Edie and Dawn – multi-talented – super nice, too

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    Donna and her partner Jenn Kirby put finishing touches on their booth

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    My booth much easier to set up

    Thanks to my good friend Brenda Jo Bowen for loaning me her tent which would have been perfect if not for the 100 mph winds that blew ALL DAY LONG.  I had to hold my posters or try to catch them as they flew toward State Street and the Donut truck. After several hours of this, my friend Kati VanAernum dropped by for a visit and suggested the tent had to go before it took off like a kite and landed on an innocent bystander. I had visions of lawsuits swimming in my head so a man I didn’t know who happened to be chatting with me and  who turned out to be a sweet young Republican running for office in Lexington County helped Kati take down the tent while I watched.  This was a day of high drama.

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    Over 90 vendors participated in the Festival this year

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     State Street Baptist Church towered over us in the background

    Interesting tidbit about this church – I was the Minister of Music and Youth there in the mid 1970s – forty years ago…a lifetime ago…for three years. I never could have imagined at the time that I would be sitting in a booth in 2016 selling my books right down the street from where I led the choir for three worship services every Sunday. Unbelievable. Inconceivable.

    Thanks so much to the friends who came out to see me and especially to my friends Dawn and Karen who actually bought one of the two books I sold! The other one was bought by a woman from El Paso, Texas, who had come to South Carolina to visit her daughter who had just had a baby. I think she bought a copy of my first book Deep in the Heart because it has a picture of the state of Texas in the background on the cover.

    Thanks to Teresa for driving me to buy the four 40-lb bags of sand last night to hold down the tent today and for getting up at the crack of dawn to take me to Cayce to set up the booth and for spending two hours with me during the day to see that I had a lunch break and for coming back at 5:00 p.m. to break down the booth and carrying those same four 40-lb bags of sand back to the car along with all the books I didn’t sell and for taking care of Spike at the house when she wasn’t seeing about me or going to yard sales. Whew. No wonder she’s sound asleep tonight.

    Which is where I probably should be, too. I had a great adventure, met lots of really neat people and shocked a few others who didn’t like the “L-word” on a book cover; but then you can’t please everyone all the time.  All in all, a memory maker of a day, as Granny Selma used to say, and I wouldn’t trade for it.