I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Tag: Thanksgiving

  • Celebrating Love and Marriage Equality: Our Thanksgiving Story

    Celebrating Love and Marriage Equality: Our Thanksgiving Story


    Eleven years ago I published this Thanksgiving post – I am still thankful for Teresa (known now to you as Pretty or Nana), our home, our family that has grown since then and for the recognition our relationship received in time for giving thanks in 2014. Lest we forget…

    My friend Bervin is a retired serviceman who has helped Teresa and me in our assorted yards in the houses we’ve lived in for the fourteen years we’ve been living together.  I’m not sure how old he is…my guess is he’s in his mid to late fifties.  He is divorced and doesn’t have children of his own but has tons of nieces and nephews that he loves dearly.  He took care of his father for a number of years until his dad passed away the same year my mother died.  Bervin and I talk politics and football regularly when he comes to our house to work on one of his days off from his full-time job at Wal-Mart.  He is a tall handsome African-American man with a soothing voice.

    This morning Bervin called me to say he’d seen Teresa and me on the news last night.  He called to tell us congratulations on our marriage license and added “ain’t nothing wrong with that.  No, nothing.”

    From Bervin and our neighbors across the street on Canterbury Road to family and friends in Texas and South Carolina to cyberspace friends in Mexico, South Africa, France, the Netherlands, Australia, Canada… from friends in the USA in California on the west coast  to New York on the east coast and everywhere in between – literally from sea to shining sea… we have received incredible messages of love and support over the past two days as the State of South Carolina became the 35th (or 34th depending on who’s counting!) state to make same-sex marriage legal.  Personal translation: Teresa and I were issued a marriage license by Richland County Probate Judge Amy McCullough late yesterday afternoon in the midst of an avalanche of good wishes.

    We have been touched and overwhelmed by the media and social media response and are beyond grateful for the support.  Teresa refuses to watch the TV interviews on the internet because she was unprepared to actually go into the courthouse yesterday morning.  I was going by to pay the fee ($42.50 for anyone wondering) and she was staying in the car with the engine running to keep warm.  When Judge McCullough informed me she was able to complete our application process, she also told me Teresa had to be there to re-sign the paperwork we had signed in October. I texted T to come in, and the media began filming when she joined me at the desk. Teresa was horrified because she hadn’t washed her hair!

    I, on the other hand, did watch the interviews last night and realized I clearly turned into a pillar of salty tears when the reality of the moment hit me and I was asked about my feelings…my feelings?  I had no words then and not many more now. I wonder how any couple feels when they apply for a marriage license?  Excited, nervous, joyful, proud, like something good is about to happen?  I wonder how the suffragettes in South Carolina felt when they voted for the first time…I wonder what the people of color in South Carolina felt when they saw the “colored” signs coming down…I wonder what the illegal immigrants who have lived in South Carolina for decades will feel when they get a driver’s license…maybe I had those feelings or ones like them.  Regardless, this member of the “older couple” couldn’t have ever imagined a moment like this when she was a little girl who asked another little girl to marry her in the early 1950s. Wow…was what I felt. Jubilation. Unbridled joy.

    One of the interesting comments made in a TV interview I watched was that Teresa and I had been “dating for fourteen years.”  Gosh, was that what we’d been doing for fourteen years?  Maybe that’s what young people call living together these days, and I know this youthful reporter was not intentionally offensive.  Or maybe this was a tiny example of why marriage equality is necessary: to say hey this isn’t dating – this is my family we’re talking about, a family that has been through the same highs and lows your family goes through except we lacked the piece of paper that your parents had to make it legal.  Dating, to me, is a trial run.  Teresa and I are already in the race together and way past the starting gate.

    To the LGBTQ activists we have worked with for the past thirty years in South Carolina and around the country – thank you for each goal we set and each victory we made happen together.  The burdens have been much easier to bear when they are shared, and we’ve had warriors with Great Spirit walking every step with us.  We admire and respect your leadership and bravery over the long haul that is the task of changing a culture and fundamentally altering the political landscape.

    I often say the battles are for those who will come after us and that the next generation will benefit from our efforts in the state, and there is truth in that.  But I also want to remember my sisters and brothers who did not live to share these celebrations with us.  Last night we went to dinner with one of my oldest friends Millie who took Teresa and me and another good friend Patti to an Italian restaurant.  Millie had made the plans a week ago so we weren’t there to celebrate the excitement of yesterday but I confess I did carry the license with me.  I wasn’t leaving home without it.

    pasta fresca pic

    The waitresses were fabulous and came to our booth to congratulate us when they realized why we were ordering champagne and snapping pictures and brought our desserts with candles to end the dinner with a bang.  Our server was a young woman with a great smile, and she drew “hearts” on our to- go box.  Really sweet.

    But Millie’s partner of fifteen years, Cindy, wasn’t with us because she had died earlier this year.  Millie said Cindy would have wanted them to be next in line to apply for the marriage license.  This was not to be for her and many of our brothers and sisters who have gone before us.  We will always honor their memories.

    One week from today we will observe my favorite holiday of the year, Thanksgiving Day.  Teresa and I will make our usual trip to the upstate to have a late evening family meal with her mother’s people in the fellowship hall of the First Baptist Church of Fingerville, South Carolina.  I always love being with her family because they are good people and because nothing is more important to me than family.

    This year I’m getting a head start on the holiday and giving thanks for the woman who loved me enough to say yes, I want to marry you.  That’s the Good News tonight.  Tell it.

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

    I have to say our marriage license doesn’t usually affect the quality of our everyday lives eleven years after 2014, but this year we were threatened again by evil forces set against marriage equality for the LGBTQ+ community – forces that took their fight to the Supreme Court of the United States. I am thankful for the Court’s refusal to become involved in a matter already settled, but I also have learned laws protecting a woman’s right to have control over her own body can be overturned after fifty years by that same group of justices.

    For the love of family, however you experience it, please join Pretty and me in celebrating this season of giving thanks.

     

  • around our world in 30 days

    around our world in 30 days


    November was a bit of a blur for me after our election in the USA on the 5th. followed by Pretty’s knee replacement on the 11th. I’ve been struggling to regain my thoughts, much less my words. Luckily, I do have a few pictures to share on a cold morning in early December – the first one is a full page ad in the December, 2024 issue of The Atlantic which I had time to read since I no longer watch TV except for Netflix, sports, and the local weather. Wow. Take a gander at this, will you? Maybe I need to go back to TV.

    strategic dating?? like a CEO?? (surely, you jest)

    colors on a morning walk in November

    five-year-old granddaughter Ella creates another persona with a hat

    Ella as Ella leaving for school in November

    Ella and her younger sister Molly who will be 3 years old next month came to visit Nana who was icing her new bionic knee after her surgery – Molly wasn’t sure about the incision, but she leaned over to kiss it anyway because that’s what you do for boo-boos. Then she ran off with a look of horror on her little face. Maybe she needed to ask Naynay for a cookie.

    Pretty walking with a cane for her two-week follow up appointment

    (following week taking short strolls around the house without cane!)

    sisters relaxing on our screen porch in their “Baby” pack and play

    (our friend Curtis made the blanket as a baby gift for Ella in 2019)

    Molly and Ella with cousin Caleb at Thanksgiving

    (Caleb was two years old in August)

    Ella and Molly decorating beautiful tree at their house

    Thanksgiving and the month of November are now in our rear view mirror – the holiday season has officially begun as we race toward the finish of 2024.

    Regardless, our terrier Carl and I are thankful for the colors that hang over us in our backyard every morning in every season.

    Onward.

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

    Slava Ukraini. For the children.

  • ‘Tis The Season

    ‘Tis The Season


    November 10, 2011, seems like a lifetime ago, but on that day I published this piece about Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday. I hope you enjoy reading again – or for the first time.

    SEASONS GREETINGS FROM FINGERVILLE, SOUTH CAROLINA 

                Today is a day of giving thanks.  We cleverly named it Thanksgiving Day and have celebrated it for more than four hundred years in the United States.  I was surprised to learn that this tradition was actually introduced to the U.S. in 1565 by Spaniards in St. Augustine, Florida.  This newsflash made me feel a little better about the Texas Thanksgiving Day weather of my youth.  My elementary school textbooks portrayed pouty Pilgrims wearing ridiculously tall hats, oversized belt buckles, and heavy coats—all in black.  They invariably stood in deep white snow and appeared to be near freezing.  I recall being embarrassed at our lack of proper cold temperatures for Thanksgiving in rural east Texas.  If snow was good enough for the Pilgrims, it should have been good enough for us.  It makes me happy, then, to think that this holiday really began as a fiesta in Florida with lots of warmth and sunshine and people who knew how to party.  I have visions of tortilla soup, cheese enchiladas, and key lime pie.  (I’m not sure how we made the leap to turkey from tortillas or pumpkin pie from key lime, but that’s a question for another day.)

                Thanksgiving is still my favorite holiday because it is the most resistant to crass commercialism.  Halloween and Christmas have become impostors that pave the path to New Year’s Eve, but Thanksgiving remains the holiday for celebrating family and friends.  It is the lull between two storms that blow powerful winds of spending and of buying more of what we don’t need in larger quantities.

                When I was a child, Halloween was a night for wearing a costume made by my grandmother and walking with my friends to trick-or-treat in our little town.  We each carried small paper sacks to collect the few pieces of candy offered by our neighbors.  The highlight of the evening was the home that gave away homemade popcorn balls that were the size of tennis balls and had the rich aroma of freshly popped corn mixed with the white Karo syrup that held it together.  They tasted as good as they smelled.

    Sixty years later, I am astonished to see bags and more bags of Halloween candy in grocery stores.  I’m talking about bags.  I’m talking about the biggest bags you can imagine.  I’m talking about bags of every color with every kind of candy known to the human species.  Some of the bags are so big that they are difficult to carry.  Enormous bags.  Enough candy to last for years.  Take several, will you?  I’m drowning in Halloween candy.

    And I’m talking about decorations, too.  When did Halloween require stringing orange lights and black bats outside your house?  When did it get out of control?  Last year I stood with a large group of my neighbors who were mesmerized by the elaborate decorations of a house in our neighborhood.  The entire front yard was filled with ghosts in an array of positions and the ability to become animated when activated.  Our neighbor started the display regularly every night for two hours and did this for several weeks.  On his cue, the ghosts in the bluegrass band played country music and hymns as the other figures performed by popping up from behind bushes to frighten the children.  Seriously, hymns.  Hymns for Halloween.  Oh, yes, and yet another ghost repeatedly beat the head of one that tried to rise from a coffin.  People came from far and near to watch.  Halloween is officially an Event.  Put a special note on your calendar that October 31 is an important day in our lives.  We party.

    But, on November 1, watch out.  Clear the aisles.  Christmas candy—bags galore—has miraculously supplanted the Halloween candy, which is now half price.  Christmas decorations appear out of nowhere to signal the retail onslaught of the season.  If you think you’re seeing red, you’re probably right, because red is the signature color for this time of the year.  Red Santas, red stockings, red wrapping paper, red cards, red candy canes, red ribbons, red blinking lights—everywhere you look, you’re seeing red with a splash of green or gold or white for emphasis.  It’s time to buy.  A gong has sounded, and no payments will be due on anything until next year.  Thank goodness.  Because we won’t be able to afford them this year.  We must decorate.  We need to get out our trimmings to make sure they’re blinking properly, and, of course, we’ll need to buy some new ones, too.  The season demands it.  Something old.  Something new, nothing borrowed, nothing blue.  Mostly something new.  Definitely something red.

    The march is on, and good cheer has a price.  Merry gentlemen, God doesn’t rest ye.  O Holy Night, you’re not really silent.  As a matter of fact, you’re all about the noise of cars and planes and people in a hurry to get somewhere.  It’s time to travel, and the highways and airports are hubbubs of activity.  We are rocking around the Christmas tree.  Every creature is stirring on the night before, during, and after Christmas.  Hallelujah.  Let’s make it a chorus.

    Sandwiched between Halloween and Christmas is the poor relation, Thanksgiving.  On this lesser holiday, I am thankful for the memories of my family and our life before cell phones interrupted us while we feasted at the tables of my grandmothers.  I am thankful for a grandmother who got up in the wee hours of the morning to put a turkey in a large cooker that was used only twice a year.  I can still smell the aroma that permeated our whole house by the time we got up on Thanksgiving morning.  The turkey was on its way to perfection.  I am grateful to that grandmother for working ten hours a day, six days a week so that we would have a roof over our heads and food to eat.  I feel her love today as I felt it then, but now I know how fortunate I was to have her in my life—and I also know that not everyone is so lucky.

     My daddy used to tell me it was pointless to compare my life to someone else’s.  He said  I could always find someone who had more than I did, or look in another direction to discover someone who had less.  My daddy was a wise man.  Today, I count my many blessings, and, as the hymn says, I name them one by one.  For the father who insisted the whole earth was my territory and who tried to show me as much of that world as he could, I am thankful.  For the mother who wrestled her own demons as she tried to accept her daughter’s differences but never quit loving that daughter, I am thankful. For the partner who knows me inside and out and loves me for who I am, I am thankful.

    I celebrated last Thanksgiving with my partner Teresa’s family.  We drove from our home in Columbia to the First Baptist Church of Fingerville in the upstate of South Carolina where she is from.  (No kidding.  The town’s real name is Fingerville.)  This wonderful extended family from her mother’s side gathers in the fellowship hall of the church every year to eat an evening meal and to remind each other that family differences don’t necessarily mean family disconnections.  Although politics and religion are divisive issues and shelved as topics of conversation during the gathering, the gossip surrounding the activities of children and grandchildren are fair game.  The aunts and uncles who are older now speak volumes without words, and the simplicity and sameness of the party suggest a time long ago and far away.  In the midst of a truly southern meal, our souls were nourished.

    Three different kinds of cornbread dressing went well with either the turkey or ham.  Several dishes of creamed corn, sweet potato casseroles, green beans, black-eyed peas, fruit salads, and green salads completely filled the main tables in the fellowship hall of the church.  A second large table was reserved for the desserts that included pumpkin and pecan pies, coconut cake, lemon pound cake, and an assortment of Krispy Kreme donuts.  Drinks were available in the kitchen that was adjacent to the dining area of the fellowship hall.  Sweet and unsweet iced tea and coffee provided the right amount of caffeine to make sure everyone stayed awake during the ride home.  It was a feast, and an exact replica of the meals I had in Texas for Thanksgiving.  No wonder Teresa and I were happy—our families shared the same recipes!  I miss the ones in my family who are gone, but I’m fortunate to have another one that welcomes me to their table.

    Whether it was the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock or the Spaniards in Florida or some other group yet to be recognized, I salute this day of giving thanks.  It’s a meaningful one for me and suits my tendency to ponder.  For those of you who prefer the orange lights of Halloween and the white lights of Christmas, I wish you joy and strands that are easy to untangle.  I also fervently pray to the Gods of All Holidays that Thanksgiving candy and Thanksgiving outdoor decorations are hereby permanently prohibited.  Amen.

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

    Alas, Thanksgivings with Pretty’s extended family in Fingerville are no more because the Alverson family matriarchs who inspired the tradition were lost in recent years during the Covid pandemic. New Thanksgiving family traditions for future generations will be made, and that’s as it should be. 

    At our five year old granddaughter Ella’s school Thanksgiving program Friday, she was asked what she was thankful for, and without hesitation she said she was thankful for her grandmother (singular). The four grandmothers who were there with cameras capturing the moment knew without a doubt who she meant.

    From our family to yours wherever you are, whether Thanksgiving is a holiday for you or not, we are thankful for your sharing our life’s journey through the years. We wish you a joyous holiday season!

     

     

  • the man in the moon

    the man in the moon


    One of my paternal grandmother’s favorite euphemisms when she became exasperated by the ignorance of someone who had trampled on her last nerve was “he didn’t have any more sense than the man in the moon.” Ma’s euphemisms were more like proclamations that I took to be absolute truth, which meant I had little regard for the man in the moon of my childhood. Yesterday I saw him through different eyes.

    Nana and I took care of our two young granddaughters, four year old Ella and twenty-two month old Molly, while their parents enjoyed a day of food, friends and college football. Activities had been fast and furious for the girls – Nana and I had struggled to keep pace, but late in the afternoon they settled outside playing together in the sandbox where unfortunately an argument over a pink shovel caused a meltdown by Molly which sent Ella scrambling to a small hammock swing nearby. The next thing I knew Molly had climbed in the hammock with Ella (Nana gave her a leg up), and both of them were laughing while Nana pushed them, twirling them around like a ride at the state fair.

    As twilight came too soon for the girls who cried Nana, go higher, go higher I had a Thanksgiving moment for these three: my wife who shared the past twenty-two years with me and the two little girls whose lives added another dimension for our family.

    Finally, Nana stopped swinging the small hammock, and Ella jumped out of the swing. Hey, everybody, I see the moon, she exclaimed with delight. Naynay, come see the moon, she insisted. I left my chair on the deck to do as she told me because that’s how I roll with this four year old. Nana picked up Molly to stand next to Ella who pointed to the moon for her younger sister. Molly said moon, moon while her face beamed brighter than the moonlight.

    I told the girls a story about a man in the moon, but the man I saw with them through their eyes was a kind man – very smart – who simply stayed in the sky to watch over us. Why? Ella asked. Good question, I replied.

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

    “The oak trees were alive with color in the midst of the evergreens. Bright red and yellow leaves catching the sunlight as Daddy and I walked through the brush early that Thanksgiving morning. The smell of the pines was fresh and all around us. We didn’t speak, but this was when I felt most connected to my father. Nature was a bond that united us and the gift that he gave me. And not just in those East Texas woods. He envisioned the whole earth as my territory and set me on my path to discovery. In 1958, this was remarkable for a girl’s father…Perhaps, though, it is the love and closeness of those family ties that leave the sights and sounds that last a lifetime.” (from Deep in the Heart: A Memoir of Love and Longing)

    Thanksgiving blessings to you and your family from ours in South Carolina

  • ’tis the season – too harsh?

    ’tis the season – too harsh?


    Thanksgiving is still my favorite holiday because it is the most resistant to crass commercialism.  Halloween and Christmas have become impostors that pave the path to New Year’s Eve, but Thanksgiving remains the holiday for celebrating family and friends.  It is the lull between two storms that blow powerful winds of spending, of buying more of what we don’t need in larger quantities.

    Ouch. Someone just stomped on Halloween and Christmas with both feet – who could that negative naysayer be, and what did she say next?

    The march is on, and good cheer has a price.  Merry gentlemen, God doesn’t rest ye.  O Holy Night, you’re not really silent.  As a matter of fact, you’re all about the noise of cars, planes and people in a hurry to get somewhere.  It’s time to travel; the highways and airports are hubbubs of activity.  We are rocking around the Christmas tree.  Every creature is stirring on the night before, during, and after Christmas.  Hallelujah.  Let’s make it a chorus.

    Oh my goodness. Someone swallowed a Bah Humbug pill that turned her into an old “Eleanor-eezer” Scrooge type with too many tunes swirling through the memory banks in her brain. What kind of person would write this, and when did she write it?

    To no one’s surprise I am the guilty writer, and I published this piece on November 10, 2011 – exactly twelve years ago today. This is neither a retraction nor an aha moment with a total change in my annual holiday philosophies, but hopefully I can admit when softer, less judgmental tones are more appropriate.  

    Sandwiched between Halloween and Christmas is the poor relation, Thanksgiving.  On this lesser holiday, I am thankful for the memories of my family and our life before cell phones interrupted us while we feasted at the tables of my grandmothers.  I am thankful for a grandmother who got up in the wee hours of Thursday mornings to put a turkey in a large cooker that was used only twice a year.  I can still smell the aroma that permeated our whole house by the time we got up on Thanksgiving morning.  The turkey was on its way to perfection.  I am grateful to that grandmother for working ten hours a day, six days a week so that we would have a roof over our heads and food to eat.  I feel her love today as I felt it then, but now I know how fortunate I was to have her in my life—and I also know that not everyone is so lucky.

    Yes, this was also in the post twelve years ago today, and I am thankful for the softer tones, warmer images, more understanding of the challenges families face during holiday seasons when not everyone shares the abundance of love I remember or even the luxury to ponder the memories. Not all those who ponder are lost, but we need one holiday to call our own. I choose Thanksgiving.