I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Category: Life

  • Lost – and Found

    Lost – and Found


    We took a road trip last week from our homes in Columbia and West Columbia, South Carolina, to Orlando, Florida, to celebrate granddaughter Ella’s sixth birthday on the first day of October, 2025. Parents Drew and Caroline with grandparents Nana and Naynay left on a Monday with granddaughters Ella and Molly two days before Ella’s birthday and returned on the Sunday five days afterwards which meant we were gone for seven days in case anyone is counting. We stayed on the premises of Walt Disney World for a fabulous, fun time arranged by Ella’s mother Caroline with the help of a woman she met in her business networking group.

    The 450-mile drive down the I-95 corridor should take 6 hours and 30 minutes (unless you stop several times along the way including an hour visit to one of the countless Buc-ees in Georgia where Ripley’s Believe It or Not should know it’s possible to spend $8. per minute.)

    and I have the receipt to prove it

    Ella the Birthday Girl looks happy to climb a light pole

    in Buc-ees parking lot

    are we there yet? not yet

    Day One: Typhoon Lagoon at the Orlando water park

    Ella leaps from a canoe while Molly a bit more cautious

    Both Ella and her younger sister Molly (three years old, will be four in January) are water lovers – what could be easier to start the magic of a Disney vacation and work out the kinks from ten hours in the car on Monday than a Tuesday at a pretend beach with a pretend ocean to begin to get a sense of the fun we would experience every day for a week? What could possibly go wrong?

    Sigh. These days, if there is a way for me to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, I am apt to do it. Day One took a frightening turn for me when I wandered around the entire circumference of the Typhoon Lagoon with little Molly in tow while I looked for our family in their beach chairs. The more we walked, the more every part of the lagoon looked the same. I realized we were lost.

    Suddenly Molly broke free from my grasp and ran toward one of the large water slides. I had a sickening feeling as she climbed the steps with the much older children, smiling at me when I yelled for her to get down. A teenage girl who was the life guard sat at a little table at the top of the stairs but seemed oblivious to my calls and gestures for her to stop Molly before she reached the big slide.

    Then she vanished. By that time I was also moving as quick as I could through the water to climb the stairs. I can’t see my little girl, I screamed at the lifeguard. I think she just went down your slide, and no adult was there to catch her!

    What color suit was she wearing? Pink, I answered.

    I think I see a little girl down on the beach in a pink suit. She looks like she’s crying. You can’t see her unless you go back down the stairs, she added.

    I turned around, flew down the stairs (again “flew” is subjective for a 79 -year- old woman), and there stood a tearful Molly with a kind random couple who were trying to understand her tears. Molly’s look was relief mixed with what? I’ll never know for sure, but I do know she was happy to see me.

    Minutes later the search party of Molly’s daddy and Nana reached us to rescue us from our wanderings. Frantic cell phone calls from Nana had identified our location. Once upon a time we were lost, but now we had been found. All was well at the Typhoon Lagoon.

    Ella was happy to have her little sis safe in her arms

    Travel tip: make sure Naynay remains where you last saw her. Trust me – she did.

    *******************

    Mystery of the Missing Legacy Award Solved by Pretty and Drew

    Teresa found the award in Drew’s truck when we were packing for our trip. He didn’t know we didn’t know he had it! It’s appropriate for us to place it in our den in front of Drew’s high school football picture, don’t you think? Whew. So thankful to have it home where it belongs – not nearly as grateful as I was to find Molly, though.

  • The Mystery of the Irregular Butterfly Visitor

    The Mystery of the Irregular Butterfly Visitor


    Migration? Visitation? Celebration?

    photo taken Sunday, September 21, 2025

    An irregular visitor to our backyard, startling me with its beauty and attempts to communicate something that remains a mystery since my first sighting of this butterfly in August, 2018, followed three years later in September, 2021, and then again in November of 2023.

    Even with my rudimentary knowledge of butterflies, which is less than rudimentary, I understand this is not the same butterfly because the life cycles of adult butterflies are measured in days or weeks, rarely months, and never years.

    But sometimes my mind takes flight in a fantasy which allows me to feel this particular butterfly that flew around me yesterday was an old friend who pops in for a visit periodically to remind me that the spirits of my family buried in the Texas soil of Fairview Cemetery in Grimes County have never been totally gone from the person I became because of them. Somehow this butterfly comforts me, gives me hope.

    And that’s a good thing, as my Aunt Lucille was fond of saying.

    See you next time, my butterfly friend. Safe journeys.

  • The Beauty of September: Embracing Precious Days

    The Beauty of September: Embracing Precious Days


    Oh, it’s a long, long while from May to December, but the days grow short when you reach September. When the autumn weather turns the leaves to flame, one hasn′t got time for the waiting game.

    Oh, the days dwindle down to a precious few: September, November. And these few precious days, I’ll spend with you. These precious days I’ll spend with you.

    Writers Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson wrote these haunting words in 1938, eight years before I was born. The days do grow short in September, more precious with each passing year. I choose to spend them with you…

  • How a Bottle-Baby Kitten Became Our Summer Star

    How a Bottle-Baby Kitten Became Our Summer Star


    Remember the three little kittens that lost more than their mittens but were rescued by Pretty who cannot refuse any creature in distress? They made their first appearance here in June.

    Motherless, tiny, hungry, sleepy –

    the kitten invasion began innocently

    My allergies to cats are well documented, but these kittens were going to be temporary, Pretty assured me with one of her smiles that has always motivated me to say yes to whatever she wanted. She promised to take care of them herself without subjecting me to allergy-producing contact, and she was true to her word about their care.

    She bottle-fed them for weeks, carried them with her to work in one of her storage boxes every day from where they lived in our kitchen until…

    They outgrew the box. Kittens seemed to me to have multiplied because suddenly kittens were everywhere. Dashing thither and yon with reckless abandon. They were fearless. Clowns, too. They entertained me endlessly with their antics.

    Neither Pretty nor I was prepared for the resistance my immune system had for the kittens, however. I took Zyrtec every morning and gradually added afternoon and evening doses of the high powered Benadryl with extra antihistamines to provide relief for the sneezing, wheezing, redder than usual itching eyes, headaches that have become unwelcome visitors this summer of 2025.

    Luckily, two of the kittens were adopted to homes that passed Pretty’s ownership criteria in July. Then there was a sole survivor in our house. I named him Bennie, short for Benadryl which if I could invest in stocks, I would choose Johnson and Johnson, its manufacturer. Oh, yes, and don’t forget Kleenex which I consumed in quantities that produced shortages in my Instacart grocery stores. Out of stock. Seriously?

    Our dog Charley became obsessed with Bennie in a good way – he motivated her to move around again – to leave the comfort of her best friend’s Spike’s favorite places in the living room which have been empty since his passing in March. Bennie’s playfulness has been contagious to our elderly dog who chases him from hiding place to hiding place.

    Pretty fell in love with Bennie, too – who’s surprised – but the person who begged to keep him because she loved the spunky little kitten without reservations was our five year old granddaughter Ella, but sadly she suffers from allergies like mine which prevented her parents from adopting him.

    The hot summer days rolled on, and Bennie remained with us.

    how can I write a blog post when you are standing on my laptop?

    I was beginning to think Bennie’s forever home was with Pretty and me when our upstate family rode in on a white horse to save the day. Darlene and Dawn, part of our family from Spartanburg County, convinced one of their neighbors she needed to add Bennie to her cat family. Pretty vetted their recommendation and approved Bennie’s transfer to the higher ground at the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

    Bennie in a favorite laundry basket today

    Bennie feels safe with us

    “Dogs come when they are called; cats take a message and get back to you.” Mary Bly (Fun Facts About Cats)

    Despite my whining about allergies, I will be heartbroken to say goodbye to Bennie who has grown on me as fast as he has developed that special personality he owns with joy and spunk. Fingers crossed his new forever home will welcome him with open arms and hearts. His temporary home will not be the same without him. Pretty, Ella, Charley and I look forward to seeing pictures of our little guy who gave us a memorable summer in 2025 ..we love you, Bennie.

    Onward.

  • From Small Towns to Legacy Award: A Love Story of Advocacy

    From Small Towns to Legacy Award: A Love Story of Advocacy


    Teresa and I were totally caught off guard when Harriet Hancock called to tell us we had been nominated and chosen for The Legacy Award from the Harriet Hancock Center in 2025. Surprised, delighted, blown away by the recognition of the contributions two lesbians from the small towns of Richards, Texas, and New Prospect, South Carolina, who grew up in a time before Stonewall, could be celebrated today by one of the defining organizations of the LGBTQ+ movement in Columbia.

    No person has meant more to our community than Harriet Hancock, a friend Teresa and I have admired for more than three decades. The Center which bears her name continues to serve as a safety net for young and old alike in the march toward equal justice for all South Carolinians.

    The Legacy Award is an affirmation of our efforts to live authentic lives together in a time and place before Will and Grace.

    I met Teresa when I wandered into Bluestocking Books in the early 1990s. We were both in other relationships at the time, but we shared values that gave us common goals for our community and ultimately provided the foundation for a personal bond that led to sharing our lives to create a family we both cherish.

    We have no words to express our gratitude to the Harriet Hancock Center and our nominators for The Legacy Award in 2025. You are the future we worked for, and we promise to continue the struggle against the enemies of silence and apathy that have always tried to divide us.

    Please join us as we celebrate six other award recipients for 2025: PJ Whitehurst, Community Advocate of the Year; Elliott Naddell, Youth Advocate of the Year; Senator Tameika Isaac Devine, Political Advocate of the Year; Rainy Day Fund, Community Partner of the Year; CAN Community Health, Health and Wellness Organization of the Year; The Nickelodeon, Arts and Culture Organization of the Year.

    Onward. Together.