I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

storytelling for truth lovers

  • Rooted and Winged – poems by Luanne Castle

    Rooted and Winged – poems by Luanne Castle


    Unbelievably Pretty and I didn’t lose power during the winds and rain of Hurricane Ian as it passed through our neighborhood two days ago. I held my breath and feared the worst: I wouldn’t be able to finish the Sidney Poitier documentary on Apple TV+ or watch A Raisin in the Sun afterwards. I needn’t have fretted about the telly, though.

    During a rain recess I walked to the mailbox and was pleasantly surprised to find a copy of Rooted and Winged, poems by Luanne Castle, stuck among the host of political asks for financial support which are routine with the mid-term elections looming. Luanne is a blogging friend who shares my interest in personal history mixed with current cats, a love of family, a truth seeker and teller. Hooray, I thought to myself as I put the book down on my chair and returned to Sidney on the still functioning Apple TV+. Regardless of wind and rain, I had a book to read by candlelight. No need for candlelight – my lamp bulbs performed their duties without interruption.

    As the title suggests, this latest collection of poems by award winning poet Luanne Castle vividly portrays her recollections of the people and places that grounded her for life as well as the later forces which led her to observe nature with more than casual acquaintance, confront change in a world spinning out of control, and ultimately gave her wings to the voice she now uses to simultaneously sound alarm while offering comfort.

    Here are excerpts from two poems I found unforgettable.

    Why We Wait for Rain

    We wait for hours watching the dark unfurling

    toward us, unsure

    if it will land here at all

    whether it carries thunderstorm or haboob

    It smells like rain

    bittersweet cocktail of sandstone & blossoms

    still damp and quickening in the air

    over ten thousand years…

    And then this wonderful fantasy When I’m in Charge

    Someday you will realize it was me

    and know what you’ve lost.

    When the cancer cure is announced,

    I will be the anonymous healer.

    I will defeat A.I. before it takes over

    our world, outwit the hackers,

    the scammers and spammers…

    We’re all safe in the future because

    of what I’ve done, outlawing grief

    and its wily predecessor love.

    This book as well as her earlier work is available through Amazon and Luanne’s https://www.luannecastle.com/bookstore.

    Even if you believe you’ve never liked poetry, I encourage you to have a go at this collection. I guarantee you’ll surprise yourself by the emotions the images evoke even as your mind takes flight.

    ***********

    Stay safe, stay sane, and please stay tuned.

  • Carport Kitty and the hurricane

    Carport Kitty and the hurricane


    Carport Kitty settled on a mat at the bottom of our kitchen steps to weather the disastrous Hurricane Ian this week – our home in West Columbia, South Carolina was spared the devastation our neighbors in the low country of the state experienced for the past two days – we are two hours inland from Charleston. We realize we dodged a dangerous bullet by a few twists and turns on the large weather map that showed the destinations Ian reached; for that Pretty and I are immensely grateful.

    This morning CPK shared her space with ?

    Bully Cat who gave me a stare

    The costs of catastrophic weather events like Hurricane Ian are immeasurable today in the losses of lives and property, these costs will linger in the memories of so many people for all their tomorrows. To anyone who struggles to rebuild and restore their dreams for themselves and their children, whether from a blow from nature or a blow from another personal loss or disappointment, I hope you will find your own mat to weather the storm like Carport Kitty did. Maybe you can even comfort someone else.

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

    Stay safe, stay sane and please stay tuned.

  • what’s scarier? Halloween or the MID-TERMS?

    what’s scarier? Halloween or the MID-TERMS?


    Do you have our Boo at the Zoo tickets yet? Pretty called to me from her chair in the den last night while I struggled to catch up on a sea of emails in my office.This past weekend was Laver Cup tennis, one of my favorite tennis events of the year, but the 2022 tournament was in London which meant I was glued to the Telly on British Summer Time for three days with no opportunity for the 3Rs: reading emails, reading blogs and reading bills.

    Boo at the Zoo tickets? I called back to Pretty. It’s not even October, I thought to myself, but I obediently went to the Riverbanks Zoo website to find out about tickets. Last year was our first ever Boo experience because, you guessed it (a) Covid restrictions were lifted for the annual Halloween at the Zoo extravaganza and (b) we had a two year old granddaughter.

    Ella fell in love with her first real Halloween in 2021,

    eyes full of wonder at friendly ghost as we entered

    Boo at the Zoo

    The dates for Boo are October 20th. – 30th., I told Pretty when she walked into my office to make sure I was following up. Luckily, I continued, there are 2,900+ tickets available every night.

    Well, Pretty said, I’d better text Caroline (a/k/a Pretty Too, mother of Ella) to get our date on the calendar right away.

    Exactly, I answered. Game on. Pretty returned to her iPhone in the den.

    ***********

    September flew by this year – such an emotional one with the retirement of Serena Williams the first week of the US Open followed by this past weekend’s farewell to another living legend of the game: Roger Federer. Woe is me, I am undone. I feel like I’ve lost two best friends within a month; I’m feeling sad and angry, as Ella says when she fusses at me for one of my thoughtless outbursts in her direction. The word No should never be in anyone’s vocabulary.

    I’m angry with Time and Tide which wait for no man, according to an ancient proverb, and we can add they seem to speed up for tennis players over the age of 40. If only I could put Time in that bottle Jim Croce sang about…

    However, I will enjoy five more days in September, the first days of autumn, thirty-one days of Halloween excitement with soon to be three year old granddaughter Ella and her eight months old baby sister Molly, trying to avoid the angst of the looming general election on November 8th.

    Stay safe from all hurricanes, stay sane and please stay tuned.

  • who’s (what’s) to blame for microwave disaster?

    who’s (what’s) to blame for microwave disaster?


    Plenty of blame to go around, of course.

    (1) no alarm clock in our house that we can figure out how to work except microwave timer

    (2) the Covid test kit with exactly 15 second nose swabs and then

    (3) exactly 30 seconds swirling in tube and then

    (4) exactly 15 minutes to wait for valid test

    (5) the unsuspecting Lizard’s Thicket dinner roll placed two days ago in microwave to be eaten by someone for breakfast yesterday

    (6) Lizard’s Thicket for giving Pretty one dinner roll and one cornbread with her vegetable plate day before yesterday instead of the two cornbreads she always orders with the vegetable plate she gets at least once a week

    (7) whoever was supposed to eat unwanted dinner roll for breakfast yesterday but chose cinnamon raisin bread toast because she totally forgot the dinner roll was in the microwave

    (8) whoever decided to take yet another Covid test early this morning because she can’t believe her laryngitis and sore throat aren’t due to Omicron variant of the coronavirus

    (9) Pretty for staying with Molly for five nights at Drew and Caroline’s house across town while they were gone with Ella, leaving Pretty’s hypochondiac wife alone with Covid testing kits in kitchen

    Note to self: never leave dinner roll in microwave for 15 minutes. The dinner roll will catch fire, the microwave will never be the same, and the house will be filled with smoke.

    Could I possibly blame Carport Kitty when Pretty comes home today?

    Hm. I doubt it. Sigh. What’s one microwave more or less among friends, right, Pretty?

  • changing of the guard in Queens (New York, that is)

    changing of the guard in Queens (New York, that is)


    As Serena Williams said in her farewell on-court interview following her loss this year in the US Open, there would be no Serena if it weren’t for her sister Venus. Tennis fans who have followed the professional tennis world for the past twenty-five years echo this sentiment. The two sisters have been prominent figures who not only set new records in the sport but also contributed to changing the evolution of women’s tennis players toward a more powerful game.

    Selected Women’s Singles Champions at the US Open:

    1999 – Serena Williams (17 years old)*

    2000 – Venus Williams

    2001 – Venus Williams, Serena Williams Runner-up

    2002 – Serena Williams, Venus Williams Runner-up

    2008 – Serena Williams

    2011 – Samantha Stosur, Serena Williams Runner-up

    2012 – Serena Williams

    2013 – Serena Williams

    2014 – Serena Williams

    2017 – Sloane Stephens, Madison Keys Runner-up

    2018 – Naomi Osaka, Serena Williams Runner-up

    2019 – Bianca Andreescu, Serena Williams Runner-up

    2022 – Iga Swiatek, Ons Jabeur Runner-up

    *Serena Williams was eliminated in the third round of the 2022 US Open on Arthur Ashe Stadium in the Billie Jean King Tennis Center, Flushing Meadows, Queens, New York. Williams was 24 days shy of her 41st birthday. She holds the most combined major titles with thirty-nine: 23 singles, 14 women’s doubles and 2 in mixed doubles plus four Olympic gold medals representing the United States.

    Venus (l.) and Serena Williams win 1st Major Doubles

    together at US Open in 1999

    Carol Newsome/AFP/Getty Images

    2022 US Open Women’s Doubles Runner-up Team

    Caty McNally (l.) and Taylor Townsend

    photo by Pete Staples/ USA

    The Open this year marks, in my opinion as a tennis fan for more than fifty years, the beginning of a changing of the guard in both women and men’s tennis. New names emerged this year – names unfamiliar to the television viewers perhaps but nonetheless those we will need to learn how to pronounce, to watch for, and to embrace as they make their own places in history.

    Iga Swiatek won 2022 Women’s Singles at US Open

    from Poland – also won French Open in 2020 and 2022

    19-year-old Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz won 2022 US Open (l.)

    while runner-up was 23 year old Norwegian Casper Ruud

    Getty Images

    The US Open win for Alcaraz meant he was the youngest man ever to become #1 in the world in the ATP rankings. The year 2022 has not been a total changing of the guard in men’s tennis; Rafa Nadal won the Australian Open and the French Open, Novak Djokovic took the Wimbledon Championships. However, Roger Federer didn’t play at all in 2022, Nadal has many physical issues as well as becoming a father for the first time this fall, and Novak Djokovic has Covid vaccination problems. I do sense a shift in the winds away from the Big Three and their stranglehold on the majors in the Golden Era of men’s tennis for the first two decades of the 21st century. Fasten your seat belts, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

    Carlos said one of the greatest inspirations for him was Serena Williams. He grew up in the generation that watched the magical play of Serena. “She inspired me and a lot of players, you know,” he answered when asked what player on the WTA had inspired him.

    “It’s passion, it’s power, it’s everything; she is the GOAT for me, plain and simple,” said Casper Ruud on Serena Williams.

    photo of Iga in selfie with Serena at US Open

    posted by Dzevad Mesic in Tennis World

    “Her legacy is so big. She has shown us that it’s possible to play so good consistently for all these years and also play, and have a great business, and be a mother. She has shown us that there’s hope for that and for us.And with hard work, you can achieve really great things. So Serena is a legend of our sport for sure,” Swiatek said about Williams in a video for the WTA.

    The final word belongs to Pretty, of course, who has allowed me to quote her on Serena. “Coco Gauff, Naomi Osaka, and every other kid in America who picks up a racket – male or female – will do it because of Serena Williams.”

    There you have it. End of story except to say Serena will always be my Queen of Queens, and it’s hard to say goodbye.