I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Tag: Gamecock women’s basketball

  • leaving moon behind, but you’re still on my mind

    leaving moon behind, but you’re still on my mind


    Well, it’s Old Blue Monday my paternal grandmother Ma began her weekly letters to me while she sat on her little Singer sewing machine stool in front of the large window that gave her a view of her backyard. That phrase was my first thought when I began my walk in the early dawn before the sun rose today. It was old blue Monday, but my walk wasn’t.

    The moon looked almost full like a big circular white cloud against the sky above me when I stopped to watch a lone goose (possibly duck) that had broken ranks with four others to give me a personal “missing man” flyover today. I listened every day on my walks for the sounds of the birds migrating through my neighborhood on their way to wherever they called home. I tried to hear them before they came into view so I would know how many to look for. I guessed the group this morning was small; when the five birds came into sight, they were flying in a triangular formation similar to military aerial special jets like the Blue Angels or Thunderbirds. My goose today left his group, circled back directly over me, and then flew off to rejoin the others. How cool was that?

    I left the moon behind, though, and kept walking as my own jumbled thoughts were keeping pace with my steps: from the war in Ukraine that was always close to the surface, to the Gamecock women’s basketball team on their way to the Sweet 16 in Greensboro Friday, to Rafael Nadal’s loss in the Indian Wells tennis tournament championship yesterday. I also made space in my mind to worry about Pretty who was on a day trip to Georgia in our old Dodge Dakota pickup that would be loaded down when she stopped to deliver her treaures to her antique booths in Little Mountain this afternoon. I could always worry about Pretty and our granddaughters.

    Hm. Macro worry to micro worry. Yep, they call me the worrier for good reason.

    Our driveway was my final hill to climb. Carport Kitty welcomed me home in her usual soft meow. Out of nowhere on the kitchen steps came the memories of a K.T. Oslin song I’ve loved since I first heard her sing it many moons ago.

    You’re still on my mind, still on my mind. I’m still missin’ pieces from this broken heart of mine. Now don’t get me wrong here I don’t do this kind of thing every day. I was just doin’ a little walkin’, doin’ a little talkin’ to myself, and it brought you to my mind again. You’re still on my mind – now I feel like I need to talk to someone from those good ole times.

    All of you are still on my mind today – I’m asking for peace instead of conflict, safety instead of peril, comfort through despair, the power of grace over broken hearts, and the opportunity for every missing person to find the way home.

  • going home

    going home


    As the wheels of our jet plane touched down last Wednesday the 23rd. of February on our runway at the Houston Intercontinental Airport, Pretty shared the news that Texas governor Greg Abbott had sent a letter to the Department of Family and Protective Services, calling on licensed professionals and the general public to report the parents of transgender minors to state authorities if it appeared the minors were receiving gender affirming medical care which would now be considered child abuse. I tried to process that bombshell news as our plane screeched to a halt and taxied to our gate. No time really for deep thought as we disembarked and joined the hordes of passengers trying to find the baggage carousel while throngs of people pushed against us moving in the opposite direction to board flights bound for who knows where. We must have looked like ants that had lost their GPS – going back and forth, to and fro, hurry, hurry.

    Pretty blamed my break up with Texas on the weather. We left temperatures in the sunny 70s in South Carolina only to be met by a ferocious cold wind as soon as we stepped outside the Houston terminal. Jesus Cristus, we were freezing. Our motel for the first two nights of our visit was on Lake Conroe near Montgomery where Pretty and I had a home for four years, and the woman who checked me in that first night punished me for my comment on her not wearing a mask while advertising Covid safety protocols on their website. She put us in a room facing the lake, but it was only accessible by carrying our luggage through a wind tunnel with gusts of hurricane force. I recognized revenge when I felt it; I was chilled to the bone. Pretty was, too. I also recognized the look she gave me when we got to our room, the look that meant why can’t you leave things alone just once, Boomer?

    Texas was the place I’d been born in 1946, the place I had been educated by public schools through high school, the place I had graduated from college, the place where I had my first grown-up job at what was then a Big Eight accounting firm in downtown Houston, and finally the state I left a year later in 1968 to seek my fortune in a city that was as foreign to me as South Carolina was to South Dakota. For the next fifty plus years no matter where I roamed I always flew and/or drove home to Texas for Christmas and usually in the summer time to reconnect with family and friends; to celebrate the mystique of the spirit that defined native Texans as, well, native – to renew the bond I had with the land itself. When my mother became someone else who couldn’t remember how to play the piano and was in a memory care unit in Houston, I stayed for long periods of time in the state with Pretty’s encouragement to be with her.

    This visit, however, was our first trip back since 2017. That would be five years in case anyone is counting. New knees and Covid were the main culprits in my sabbatical from the state. Yet here we were for four nights and days that would be filled with visits to family and friends who had kept in touch over the years: meeting friends at a favorite Mexican restaurant the first night we were there, taking donuts to talk to three little boys who were small when we last saw them but now had grown up and were taking classes online; calling on a cousin who will be 98 this month and still going strong, another cousin who now at 81 is the primary caregiver for her husband she has always adored, two first cousins who met us for lunch and brought pictures from the past that sparked memories, memories.

    The weather was cold and gloomy every day we were there which gave the countryside a harshness I had never associated with the rolling hills that I claimed to be my country. The cattle now grazing needed hay from the ranchers to make it through the unsparing times. Pretty and I drove through my home town the second day of our visit on the way to the little cemetery where most of my family were buried. I felt sadness as I saw what was left of the town and home I loved. Nothing remained but the remnants of wooden houses in severe disrepair and falling down brick buildings. The town was no more.

    Russia invaded Ukraine the second day we were in Texas. When we were in our motel rooms at night, I watched the news on tv. Pretty followed the events on Twitter during the day and kept me up to speed. Regardless of the source, everyone agreed that the not unexpected invasion of a sovereign democracy had begun. Local news in Houston typically focused on murders in the city every day until the devastating international tragedy began and replaced the stories. I was not in a good place when I announced to Pretty and cousins at lunch the next day that this was my last trip to Texas until they brought my ashes in a nicely decorated urn to the little cemetery on one of the rolling hills of Grimes County.

    That was overly dramatic and untrue. Of course I will go back – hopefully not in an urn. The ACLU has filed suit against the state of Texas to protect the rights of transgender minors and their parents. Pretty managed to locate wonderfully warm coats and sweaters for us on Day Two, thank goodness. We ate our comfort Mexican food in a different place every day – even at the Houston airport when we had time for margaritas before the flight home. I loved being with friends and family, and I also loved going to watch the Gamecock women’s basketball team beat the Aggies on their home court in College Station. As a UT grad in rival territory, I was thrilled with the final score 89 – 48. We had an hour’s drive to get back to our motel room on Lake Conroe after the game, but when we walked through the wind tunnel to get to our room, I didn’t even notice the cold.

    the Fabulous Huss Brothers

    l. to r. Dwight (11), George (9) and Oscar (13)

    Thanks to Becky for the photo!

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

    Stay safe, stay sane, get vaccinated, boosted and please stay tuned.

  • famous last words: no need to take my phone

    famous last words: no need to take my phone


    I was lost. Not panicky yet, but on the verge.

    The reality hit me as forcefully as the rain that soaked my clothes, the cold winds that swirled around me. I stopped to remove my fogged glasses which made seeing even more difficult in the dark night, but in that instant when I stopped, the hordes of people who were walking behind me stepped around to unintentionally get between me and my fearless leader: Pretty.

    We were exiting Colonial Life Arena following the hastily scheduled South Carolina women’s basketball game against Mississippi State last night because our original opponent, Ole Miss, couldn’t safely play due to health protocols. Pretty and I had questioned whether we should even go to the game in the first place but decided to take the risk since we knew the people who always sat in our area would be vaccinated and wearing masks.

    Not so fast, my friend. Apparently a family of three had purchased the tickets for the seats in front of us that had been empty during the preseason games – a young couple with a little boy who sat between them. None of them wore a mask. Bummer.

    The game was fun, the #1 team in the nation rebounded from our loss at Mizzou on Thursday night; Pretty and I were in a celebratory mood by the time the game reached its 80 – 68 conclusion only to be greeted by a monsoon when we stepped outside to start the trek for our car. The weatherman had predicted inclement weather, and I had worn my lucky Gamecock baseball cap along with a lightweight windbreaker in the unlikely event he was right, but Pretty doubted his track record for forecasts and opted to come bareheaded without a raincoat.

    Parking for our game had also been a bit tricky. Our assigned parking lot which was in a garage directly across from CLA was closed so we had parked much farther away in an open lot that was a hike from the arena. Pretty, who always drove us everywhere, had taken great care to park our new (to us) family car toward the back of the lot when we arrived.

    I had hollered to Pretty when we began walking toward the car after the game for her to go on ahead of me, that I would follow her, not a problem. I sincerely believed it. (A) I walk for 45 minutes every morning so the 10 minute walk to our car should be easy (B) Pretty was getting drenched and hated getting wet with a passion (C) I never walked as fast as she did and didn’t want to slow her down. It seemed like such a great plan.

    Everyone knows the best laid plans of mice and men oft go astray.

    Clearly our plan and I both went astray in that parking lot. I was sure I remembered where we parked two daylight hours earlier, but that didn’t help when I walked to where I thought we were – and we weren’t there. But a biting cold wind was there along with a deluge of rain on a dark night illuminated only by the headlights of car after car driving around me while I wandered in a wilderness of disorientation looking for Pretty.

    At one point I thought I saw our new car pulling around and slowing down for me. Such a relief – Pretty on the move to get me. But alas, as I approached the passenger door of the front seat, the man who was driving waved me away. I scared him almost as much as I scared myself.

    Finally I stopped for shelter under a large tree in the middle of the lot. I’ll just give Pretty a call, I thought, and fumbled in my pocket for my phone when that nasty know-it-all sarcastic voice in my head that I knew only too well reminded me of those famous last words I uttered before we left home for the game. No need to take my phone – no one ever calls me except you, I had told Pretty, and I’ll be with you. Okay, time to panic.

    My one comfort was I knew Pretty wouldn’t leave without me.

    “Sheila, SHEILA, SHEILA!” I heard Pretty yelling for me and finally saw her standing in the wind and rain, waving frantically from a short distance across an exit lane in the parking lot. I was found.

    Pretty laughed at my story of the man who wasn’t her. We were both happy the Gamecocks won – and I promised to bring my cell phone to every game.

    ***********

    Stay safer, stay saner, please get vaccinated and please stay tuned.

  • train up a child in the way she should go…

    train up a child in the way she should go…


    and when she is old, she will not depart from it. (Proverbs 22:6 or something like that)

    Or in our house, it’s more like bring up the little girl as a University of South Carolina Gamecock fan and, hopefully, she’s a fan for life. Not that it will be an easy life. Haha. But she comes from a long line of Gamecocks who have endured the good and lean years in athletics and remained loyal forever to thee, Carolina.

    Teesa, will I meet Cocky

    I love a basketball gym, but where is Cocky

    Nay Nay, did someone say something about my bow

    Teesa, I love the Gamecocks –

    even if I didn’t meet Cocky this time

    Alas, Cocky was spotted below where we sat several times and of course often in the spotlight in the middle of the arena performing his Mascot duties, but by the time Teesa maneuvered her way with Ella to the floor, Cocky had walked out through a different exit. Bummer. Next time.

    The Gamecock women’s basketball team continues to be ranked #1 in the nation in the Associated Press poll of the top 25 NCAA programs. We have a large target on our backs now, but team veterans as well as newcomers are stepping up. And yesterday in their victory over Elon they had another newcomer waving her white towel during sand storm at Colonial Life Arena.

    Go Gamecocks!

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

    Stay safe, stay sane, get vaccinated and please stay tuned.

  • the race is on


    GP: James Clyburn and Joe Biden, 190621

    Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) with former Vice President Biden

    at annual fish fry in Columbia June 19, 2019

    Al Drago/Bloomberg/Getty Images

    True political confession time. I voted for Pete Buttigieg in the South Carolina presidential primary this past Saturday, leap day in 2020. I hope my friend Linda Ketner (who was the first openly gay candidate to run for the House of Representatives in South Carolina in 2008 and whose political acumen I seriously admire) isn’t reading along since she made a great effort to change my mind to vote for Joe Biden, the person she truly believed was our best hope to beat the current White House occupant this November in the general election. I told her I would wholeheartedly support whomever our nominee was, and I intend to keep that promise.

    I am inclined to vote my heart in the primaries, though, like Al Sharpton in the 2004 primary which John Edwards won in South Carolina. Although Edwards was born in Seneca, SC, which made him a kind of home boy in our state and many people I knew supported him, I remember I struggled even back then about my primary vote. Edwards had good experience, was a successful attorney in North Carolina; he looked good on television which was apparently a huge plus. Eventually John Kerry got the presidential nomination, chose Edwards as his running mate, and promptly lost to Republican Dubya (George W. Bush) in the general. I voted for Reverend Al in the end because of his passion for the poor and those who had been disenfranchised in the political process. The fall of Edwards that followed him in his life afterwards was like a Shakespearean tragedy of epic Hollywood proportions that continued to astound me. I am stunned to discover  Reverend Al still owes almost a million dollars for that 2004 presidential run. Can anybody help him? Mike? Tom?

    The South Carolina primary is over, Super Tuesday is behind us, and the race is on…here comes pride up the back stretch, and heartaches going to the inside…my heart’s out of the runnin’…true love’s scratched for another’s sake. Thank you, George Jones, I couldn’t put it better myself. My guy Pete dropped out after his inability to score support among African Americans in South Carolina, and he knew he wouldn’t win against the presidential incumbent without that support. He and another candidate Senator Amy Klobuchar withdrew Sunday and pledged their support to Joe Biden whose South Carolina victory may be an historical turning point in the 2020 election. Joe needed a big win here, and he got it.

    I thought the media attention given to our state last week was fun and fabulous. For me, watching my favorite MSNBC commentators like AM Joy Reid hosting their programs from a locally owned meat and three restaurant called Lizard’s Thicket in Columbia was as thrilling as spotting Texas A&M’s women’s basketball head coach Gary Blair and his wife strolling around the Colonial Life Arena Sunday afternoon taking in the sights before the game with our Gamecock women’s basketball team. Honestly, presidential politicking at  Lizard’s Thicket and the Aggies in town at Colonial Life Arena for the final home game of the regular women’s basketball season – well, how good does it get for an old sports loving political activist dyke? Not much better than this.

    To me, as my mother Selma used to say when she had her right mind, the person who changed the course of the SC presidential primary in his endorsement of Joe Biden was our House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn who is the highest ranking African American member of the House,  a man who gave a passionate speech for Biden on Wednesday before the Saturday primary. In an interview with NPR host Mary Louise Kelly after his speech, Rep. Clyburn addressed one of my personal questions in this primary process. Why should I vote for another old white man.

    “What I’ve said to people when they say that to me, I say, well, it’s a little bit like saying would you rather have an old Thurgood Marshall or a young Clarence Thomas. You don’t define that by age. You define that by people’s philosophy, so the age ought not to be a factor unless there are other things at play.” I would take Marshall over Thomas every day of the week and twice on Sunday.

    Finally, let me thank the people who have voted in the primaries thus far. I say Bravo to all of you who stood in lines for hours in your states to cast your votes for your favorites. The amazing turnout in the primaries bodes well for the general election in November. I believe the sights of the citizens in long lines indicate the level of dissatisfaction with a divisive president who doesn’t deserve a second term.  My hope is that new leadership in the Senate and White House will allow the American people to participate in moving our country forward in a direction that will lift all boats to steer toward the highest ports of true equality and justice for everyone.

    In the meantime, I am excited to go to the SEC tournament in Greenville, SC this weekend to see our Gamecock women play. We finished the regular season with a 16 – 0 record, but of course we want more. That’s what fans expect. Go Gamecocks!

    Stay tuned.