I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Category: sports

  • pretty in fine form for new year’s day


    ‘Twas the week after Christmas, and all through the house two creatures are stirring, and neither’s a mouse. Only Spike and I are up so far, and in all fairness we’re probably not even stirring – more staring than stirring. Me at my computer – Spike at the front yard from his panoramic view in the living room.

    Spike, our rescued shepherd mix, is the early riser in our family, but his main goal of being the first one up is to serve as an alarm clock for Pretty, Charly, and me. Pretty has perfected the pretense of ignoring him, I  get up when I hear Spike’s nails clicking on the hardwood floors in our bedroom and Charly makes a great show of jumping out of bed with me as the three of us walk together to open the doggie door in the sun room for the day.

    I usually walk outside with Spike to greet the colors of the sunrise and to see the squirrels he will bark at while he chases them around for a few minutes until they scamper up the huge oak tree to safety. Charly, on the other hand, may or may not come with us, her decision resting on whether she determines breakfast will be served early or later. At the signs of no early breakfast, she turns and runs to go back to get in bed with Pretty whose philosophy is she’s never met a sunrise she liked.

    Today is the first day of a new year, a new decade, I said to Spike this morning when we walked outside. He stood still for a second while I talked to him but then spotted two squirrels that were taunting him with their bushy tails in the yard near the old oak tree. He was off and running, but they weren’t frightened by either his loud barking or thundering toward them. I swear I saw one of them wink at the other one as they chased each other up the tree. Spike’s best efforts were thwarted once again. He turned away and walked back to me. His work was done until the pesky little varmints ventured into the yard again.

    ***********

    Happy New Year, I said to Pretty an hour later when I heard her in the kitchen popping the top on her first can of Diet Coke for the day.

    Happy New Year, Pretty responded and then continued, the first day of 2020 and the first day of a new decade.

    I know, I said. When I was a teenager in Texas in the 1960s, I never thought I would live to be thirty years old. When I had my 30th birthday in 1976, I said well, I will never live to see the turn of the century and now here I still am on the verge of a third decade in the 21st century. What do you think about that, Pretty?

    Pretty looked directly at me and said, I think you must be a drama queen.

    *********

    “We trust that time is linear. That it proceeds eternally, uniformly. Into infinity. But the distinction between past, present and future is nothing but an illusion. Yesterday, today and tomorrow are not consecutive, they are connected in a never-ending circle. Everything is connected.” (Dark, Season 1)

    Lordy, Lordy. Whenever I do pass, I hope I somehow stay connected to Pretty.

    Happy New Year!

    Stay tuned.

     

     

     

  • gold, frankincense and myrrh with a 21st century twist


    I’m a basic Bah, Humbug Christmas person and have been for years.   I’m not clinically depressed during the holiday season, but neither am I joyful.  I resist the pressure to shop ‘til I drop, but that isn’t limited to a particular time of the year, either.  I’m considering the possibility I may suffer from borderline Scrooge disorder or at a minimum, Holiday Harrumphs.

    This year is different.   I’ve been jolted and shaken out of my cynicism and once again believe in the magic that is Christmas.  I think my transformation actually began last year when my new neighbors in Texas on Worsham Street decorated their homes and yards with spectacular exterior holiday lighting.  They adorned trees, bushes, windows, doors, porches, benches, roofs – anything they could find to attach a string of lights – and the little street came alive with white icicle lights and plain white lights and multi-colored lights of all shapes and sizes that glowed and blinked and gave the appearance of a miniature Disneyland.  I absolutely loved them and of course, I had to participate with my own lights on our house on the street.  I felt my Christmas ice melt just a little each time I turned the switch that lit my bright lights.  This year the street is again beautiful, and I thank my neighbors for the inspiration of their lighting traditions.

    I miss my family at Christmas, the family that defined Christmas for me as a child.  That family is gone as that time and place are gone, but the child inside me mourns their loss every time I hear “Silent Night” and other carols sung during this time of the year.  We were musical people and much of our holiday revolved around music in our Southern Baptist churches where my mother was always responsible for the Christmas Cantata.  Sometimes she played the piano for it so my dad could lead the church choir and sometimes she drafted another pianist so she could lead the choir herself.  Regardless, music was the reason for the season for us and we celebrated the season in church.

    Family has been re-defined in my adult life by my wife and four children in furry suits that I adore.  I have a son who now has a girlfriend he lives with and so our family grows together.  Through the past forty years I’ve been away from Texas I’ve been fortunate to have wonderful friends who have become closer than the DNA-linked group I left behind.  In my gay and lesbian community in South Carolina, the term “family” is a word we use to describe ourselves.  The question, “Do you think she’s family?” is translated, “Do you think she’s a lesbian like us?”  Being part of a marginalized sub-culture creates strong bonds within that environment and my friends have been simply the best.

    Coming home to Texas to live has connected me once again with my DNA family and that’s been an incredible experience and part of the magic of Christmas for me the last two years. First cousins, second cousins, third cousins once removed and the people they’ve married and their children are good, and a few questionable, surprises for me.  Gathering for a cousins’ Christmas potluck luncheon or going with cousins to the Montgomery Annual Cookie Walk or having cousins come to our home or visiting in their homes rekindle good memories of the times when our hair wasn’t white and our figures were slimmer and the great-grandparents at the table weren’t us. I see these relatives and I am a part of them, and I feel good to belong to them at Christmas. Our conversations honor and celebrate our heritage and the ones who are no longer with us.  We laugh and cry together because we are moved by our memories. My family is a Christmas gift.

    But just as the familiar story goes of the Wise Men who followed a bright light to Bethlehem and brought gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh to the baby boy in the manger, Wise Women in my life have brought gifts that rocked my Christmas complacency. My wife surprised me with an early gift at Thanksgiving when I went home to her in South Carolina.  It’s worth its weight in gold to me.  It’s a western saddle made of leather and rides a wooden quilt holder that a Worsham Street neighbor gave me when she saw the saddle.  It’s a perfect combination and looks good in my Texas den underneath a picture of a cowboy sitting on a fence.  Whenever I look at the saddle, I think of two of my favorite things: my wife who knew me well enough to buy this treasure for me and my days of riding horses as a child. I feel the love of the giver of this perfect gift.

    Frankincense was used in ancient times for medicinal and calming purposes including treatment for depression.  Burning frankincense was also thought to carry prayers to heaven by people in those days.  One of the Wise Women in my life gave me my own version of frankincense last week when she bought a plane ticket to South Carolina for me to be with my wife for Christmas.  I marvel at this generosity from a friend who surely loves me and who chased away the potential Christmas blues. This gift came from prayers to heaven that were unasked but answered on the wings of a snow white dove called US Airways and the spirit that is the magic of Christmas in the heart of my friend.

    Myrrh is an Arabic word for bitter and it is the resin that comes from a tree that grows in the semi-desert regions of Africa and the Red Sea.  The Chinese used it for centuries to treat wounds and bruises and bleeding.  The Egyptians used myrrh as an embalming oil for their mummies.  Yesterday I received another gift that reminded me of myrrh – not the bitterness nor the embalming properties – but the unexpected present was a live blooming cactus plant that arrived at my house via a congenial UPS driver who I believe thinks he is Santa Claus.  When I opened the box and removed the moss packing per the enclosed instructions, I was stunned by the beauty of the pink blooms and the deep rich green of the plant.  The gift came from another Wise Woman who is married to my cousin in Rosenberg, Texas and was an additional reminder of the magic that lives in Christmas.  Every day I’ll see these blooms and think of my cousins who sent them and the healing power beauty affords us when we take a moment to consider it.  I’ve always loved a Christmas cactus.

    Gold, frankincense and myrrh with a 21st century twist.  The Christmas story of Mary and Joseph’s plight in the manger in Bethlehem has been told and re-told for thousands of years.  Regardless of your belief, it is a tender tale of a family who welcomes a baby boy into a world of conflict and hardship and hopes he will somehow change it for the better.   The same conflicts continue two thousand years later and hardships of every shape and description plague our families today, but we move on.  Sometimes forward, sometimes backward.  But onward we go.  And in this spirit of hope for a better world where peace becomes the norm and hardships are made more bearable, I abandon my Bah, Humbug  with a Merry Christmas to all!

    Stay tuned.

    (Note: this post was published originally in December, 2011)

    picking just the right cookies at the Christmas Cookie Walk

  • dear Santa, send boxing gloves


    “Dear Santa Claus, how are you? I am fine.

    I have been pretty good this year. Please bring me a pair

    of boxing gloves for Christmas.  I need them.

    Your friend, Sheila Rae Morris”

    “That’s a good letter,” my grandmother Dude said. She folded it and placed it neatly in the envelope. “I’ll take it to the post office tomorrow and give it to Miss Sally Hamilton to mail for you. Now, why do you need these boxing gloves?”

    “Thank you so much, Dude. I hope he gets it in time. All of the boys that I play with have boxing gloves. They say I can’t box with them because I’m a girl and don’t have my own gloves. I have to get them from Santa Claus.”

    “I see,” she said. “I can understand the problem. I’ll take care of your letter for you.”

    Several days later it was Christmas Eve. That was the night that we opened our gifts with both families. This year Dude, Mama, Daddy, Uncle Marion, Uncle Toby and I went to my other grandparents’  house down the hill from ours. With us, we took the See’s Candies from Dude’s sister, Aunt Orrie, plus all of the gifts. I didn’t like to share the candy, but it wouldn’t be opened until we could offer everyone a piece. Luckily, most everyone else preferred Ma’s divinity or her date loaf.

    The beverage for the party was a homemade green punch. My Uncle Marion had carried Ginger Ale and lime sherbet with him and mixed that at Ma’s in her fine glass punch bowl with the 12 cups that matched. You knew it was a special night if Ma got out her punch bowl. The drink was frothy and delicious. The perfect liquid refreshment with the desserts. I was in heaven, and very grownup.

    When it was time to open the gifts, we gathered in the living room around the Christmas tree, which was ablaze with multi-colored blinking bubble lights. Ma was in total control of the opening of the gifts and instructed me to bring her each gift one at a time so she could read the names and anything else written on the tag. She insisted that we keep a slow pace so that all would have time to enjoy their surprises.

    Really, there were few of those. Each year the men got a tie or shirt or socks or some combination. So the big surprise would be the color for that year. The women got a scarf or blouse or new gloves for church. Pa would bring out the Evening in Paris perfume for Ma that he had raced over to Mr. McAfee’s Drug Store to buy right before he closed.

    The real anticipation was always the wrapping and bows for the gifts. They saved the bows year after year and made a game of passing them back and forth to each other like old friends. There would be peals of laughter and delight as a bow that had been missing for two Christmases would make a mysterious re-appearance. Ma and Dude entertained themselves royally with the outside of the presents. The contents were practical and useful for the adults every year.

    My gifts, on the other hand, were more fun. Toys and clothes combined the practical with the impractical. Ma would make me a dress to wear to school and buy me a doll of some kind. Daddy and Pa would give me six-shooters or a bow and arrows or cowboy boots and hats. Dude always gave me underwear.

    This year Uncle Marion had brought me a jewelry box from Colorado. He had gone out there to work on a construction job and look for gold. I loved the jewelry box. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any jewelry.

    “Well, somebody needs to go home and get to bed so that Santa Claus can come tonight,” Daddy said at last. “I wonder what that good little girl thinks she’s going to get.” He smiled.

    “Boxing gloves,” I said immediately. “I wrote Santa a letter to bring me boxing gloves. Let’s go home right now so I can get to bed.”

    Everybody got really quiet.

    Daddy looked at Mama. Ma looked at Pa. Uncle Marion and Uncle Toby looked at the floor. Dude looked at me.

    “Okay, then, sugar. Give Ma and Pa a kiss and a big hug for all your presents. Let’s go, everybody, and we’ll call it a night so we can see what Santa brings in the morning,” Daddy said.

    “Is it time to get up yet?” I whispered to Dude. What was wrong with her? She was always the first one up every morning. Why would she choose Christmas Day to sleep late?

    “I think it’s time,” she whispered back. “I believe I heard Saint Nick himself in the living room a little while ago. Go wake up your mama and daddy so they can turn on the Christmas tree lights for you to see what he left. Shhh. Don’t wake up your uncles.”

    I climbed over her and slipped quietly past my sleeping Uncle Marion and crept through the dining room to Mama and Daddy’s bedroom. I was trying to not make any noise. I could hear my Uncle Toby snoring in the middle bedroom.

    “Daddy, Mama, wake up,” I said softly to the door of their room. “Did Santa Claus come yet?” Daddy opened the door, and he and Mama came out. They were smiling happily and took me to the living room where Mama turned on the tree lights. I was thrilled with the sight of the twinkling lights as they lit the dark room. Mama’s tree was so much bigger than Ma’s and was perfectly decorated with ornaments of every shape and size and color. The icicles shimmered in the glow of the lights. There were millions of them. Each one had been meticulously placed individually by Mama. Daddy and I had offered to help but had been rejected when we were seen throwing the icicles on the tree in clumps rather than draping them carefully on each branch.

    I held my breath. I was afraid to look down. When I did, the first thing I saw was the Roy Rogers gun and holster set. Two six-shooters with gleaming barrels and ivory-colored handles. Twelve silver bullets on the belt.

    “Wow,” I exclaimed as I took each gun out of the holster and examined them closely. “These look just like the ones Roy uses, don’t they, Daddy?”

    “You bet,” he said. “I’m sure they’re the real thing. No bad guys will get past you when you have those on. Main Street will be safe again.” He and Mama laughed together at that thought.

    The next thing my eyes rested on was the Mr. And Mrs. Potato Head game. I wasn’t sure what that was when I picked it up, but I could figure it out later. Some kind of game to play with when the cousins came later for Christmas lunch.

    I moved around the tree and found another surprise. There was a tiny crib with three identical baby dolls in it. They were carefully wrapped in two pink blankets and one blue one. I stared at them.

    “Triplets,” Mama said with excitement. “Imagine having not one, not two, but three baby dolls at once. Two girls and a boy. Isn’t that fun? Look, they have a bottle that you can feed them with. See, their little mouths can open. You can practice feeding them. Aren’t they wonderful?”

    I nodded. “Yes, ma’am. They’re great. I’ll play with them later this afternoon.” I looked around the floor and crawled to look behind the tree.

    “Does Santa ever leave anything anywhere else but here?” I asked. Daddy and Mama looked at each other and then back at me.

    “No, sweetheart,” Daddy said. “This is all he brought this year. Don’t you like all of your presents?”

    “Oh, yes, I love them all,” I said with the air of a diplomat. “But, you know, I had asked him for boxing gloves. I was really counting on getting them. All of the other boys have them, and I wanted them so bad.”

    “Well,” Mama said. “Santa Claus had the good common sense not to bring a little girl boxing gloves. He knew that only little boys should be fighting each other with big old hard gloves. He also realized that lines have to be drawn somewhere. He would go along with toy guns, even though that was questionable. But he had to refuse to allow boxing gloves this Christmas or any Christmas.”

    I looked at Daddy. My heart sank.

    “Well, baby,” he said with a rueful look. “I’m afraid I heard him say those very words.”

    (This is an excerpt from my first book Deep in the Heart: A Memoir of Love and Longing that was published in 2007 when I was 61 years old. The following Christmas one of my best friends Billy Frye gave me a pair of boxing gloves – better late than never, Santa.)

    From our family to yours, wherever you are and whoever you call family, Pretty and I send our warmest wishes for love and laughter to you during this holiday season.

    Stay tuned.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • ROAD TRIP! GRANDBABY ON BOARD!


    Over the spirited reservations of both Papa Williams (NanaT’s father) and NanaSlo (me), NanaT (Pretty) moved full steam ahead with her plans for our granddaughter’s first car trip “up the road” as we say in our family whenever we drive to the upstate foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Landrum.  Mama Caroline gave NanaT just the encouragement she needed to override my worries about packing our grandbaby Ella who is just 11 weeks old today into the back seat of our old Toyota Camry yesterday for the wild adventures of her first road trip.

    I’m wondering what this contraption is? 

    Thank goodness I have my cap, blanket and favorite pacifier.

    My NanaT has the prettiest smile – 

    she’s so happy I’m in the back seat with NanaSlo

    our first stop was to get NanaT an iced tea for the road from Rush’s

    NanaSlo whispered to me that NanaT never went anywhere without 

    picking up an unsweet iced tea from Rush’s

    are you telling me I have to watch from the Back Seat

    and Face Backwards until I’m TWO Years old?

    If I could walk, I’d stage a protest march.

    Hey, hey, ho, ho – facing backwards has got to go.

    Papa Williams and his wife think I’m a Rock Star!

    I think Papa Williams is the Bomb – he’s focused on the Big Things…

    like milk and impeachment.

    it’s a big responsibility being the entertainment for an entire family

    Aunt Darlene thinks I’m up to the challenge, though

    all good things have to come to an end so I said goodbye to the upstate

    and got back in the car to go home.

    I tried to sleep going home but NanaT stopped the car and NanaSlo woke me

    to feed me my last bottle.

    Did somebody say Last Bottle?

    Get me outta here, Percy.

    And so we did get Baby Ella home safely last night after an awesome day with lots of smiles from everyone in the upstate. NanaT was brave to make this first trip, and I freely admit my trepidations were unnecessary. Ella is a trooper just like her NanaT. They are lucky to have each other. I predict many more trips to the upstate and look forward to sharing our love of the foothills and family with our granddaughter.

    Stay tuned.

     

     

     

  • OK, BOOMER? let’s see what you got first


    Pretty will be the first to tell anyone that I am the world’s last to know anything about pop culture because I am not a twitterer, instagrammer, pinterester, redditer, or snapchatterer. I am not linked in, tik tokked, or tuned in or up on most days. I’m not passing judgment on any of these or the countless other social meda platforms nor am I necessarily proud of being uninformed although I remain stubbornly committed to Facebook regardless of whether anyone is bothering to influence my vote in the 2020 election. Just try. Please try. I will get you.

    I do, however, continue to watch CBS Sunday Morning faithfully because it is one show that Pretty and I can enjoy together. (Remember she continues to boycott all real news programs since the 2016 elections but instead gets her news information from Twitter.) So yesterday Pretty half watched CBS Sunday Morning by herself until I straggled in from our bedroom in a semi-conscious state thirty minutes into the broadcast. Segments came and went as I ate leftover sweet potato casserole from Thanksgiving for breakfast before taking my morning meds.

    I was shaken out of my television reverie by the Faith Salie commentary called OK, BOOMER in which she humorously described ok, boomer as a recent put down by the Gen Z (1995 – 2010) population of their aging Baby Boomer elders (1946 – 1961). Hm. What up, Gen Z?

    Apparently we the Boomers are being blamed for “rising waters, disappearing species, crippling debt and crumbling democracies.” Whaat? That’s all our fault? Easy for you to say, 48-year-old Faith Salie (Gen X 1961 – 1981).  Where were you guys when we were ruining climate change? Ho, ho, ho – and a merry old millenial (1981 – 1996) to you all for a holiday season free of guilt for any of the world’s most dangerous threats. The Boomers did it.

    Anyhow, as my now deceased Greatest Generation friend Libby Levinson used to say whenever she was about to change the subject,  Faith’s sally struck a nerve that I usually reserved for my free-floating anxiety over the current criminals in charge of the country. It was a bridge too far.

    I can’t bear to be thought of as old and irrelevant, I ranted to Pretty who was quite familiar, of course, with the OK BOOMER memes. Then I got irritated with her for not feeling disrespected because she was, after all, one of those Bad Old Boomers herself. The only person who can ever make you feel disrespected is yourself, Pretty said. Oh, sure, I said. Go ahead and quote one of my favorite Eleanor Roosevelt quotes back to me. Sigh. I could feel the air being let out of my anger. That Pretty.

    Today I sat in the pedi chair that belongs to the great pedicurist/philosopher Esther Isom who was responsible for the title of my last book: Four Ticket Ride. I couldn’t let the Ok, Boomer thing go so I was still raving about it from her chair which reminded me somewhat of a throne so I’m sure I had my proclamation tone in full force. I couldn’t believe Esther hadn’t heard of the funny haha put down from our children either, because she also was always in the cultural know, but she took it with a grain of salt.

    Tell them let’s see what you got first, she said with a laugh. Of course we won’t be around to know how they’ll do, she continued, but they’ll learn life isn’t as simple as they think it is.

    Point taken. I am not unaware of my generation’s shortcomings – we have been poor stewards of our planet, insensitive to the needs of the poor, squandered the earth’s resources to keep gasoline in our vehicles, failed at equality for people of color, elected corrupt public officials at every level of government – to name a few. I sadly recognize and confess my Baby Boomer sins.

    But hey, we’ve been on the front lines marching against the Viet Nam War, opened up amazing opportunities for women in the work force and athletics,  secured marriage equality for same sex couples, fought for civil rights; and worked, worked, worked to achieve the American Dream. We were competitive but with the spirit of a rugged individual. We were the original gangsters so… before you write me and my cohorts off as ancient and irrelevant, let’s see what you got first, kids.

    In the meantime, show some respect.

    Stay tuned.