Shrubs, plants, and ornamental art

 

Hanging out on my front porch in the mid-1950’s.

Once upon a time in the mid-1950’s, when parents of the Greatest Generation determined to raise their children (Baby Boomers) in suburban neighborhoods or small towns, community life happened in the front yard and on the neighborhood streets. Back yards held carports, workshops, dog runs, quail cages, clotheslines, and store rooms. Common experiences occupied front-and-center: children rode bikes, parents pulled up a lawn chair or perched on a curb and shared the day. Once a night during summer the fogging machine rumbled and whirred through the area spraying pesticides to kill mosquitos and cause future disease.  Some parents lathered their children with an extra layer of stinky protection, guaranteeing a bath before bed. When the street lights came on or when parents gave the signal, it was time to go home for the night.

Everybody lived outside when the weather warranted or permitted. Weekends in small towns were celebrated by downtown walking fests. Children and parents socialized and shopped in complete safety, going in various directions until time to go home.  Television was rare; air conditioning rarer, still.

Grandma and Grandpa cool on the Front Porch, July 4, 1959.

The front porch once was a gathering place for neighbors.  After supper, adults would refresh their tea and sit on the porch.  They’d wave at couples taking their nightly stroll around the block. Sometimes, the walkers would detour and join the porch sitting and visiting.  The quiet of the night was punctuated by clinking ice, laughing children, and in right season, the flash of lightening bugs.

Things change.

The garden hose-filled, tiny,kiddie pool that welcomed everyone along with the lawn sprinkler run-through has given way to the private backyard oasis, complete with barbeque grills, seating, perhaps a pool, and a privacy fence. Events are by invitation, because in bigger cities and these more nervous times, people often don’t know their neighbors very well.  Only shrubs, flowers, and ornamental art enjoy the front yard. Everything else has moved inside or behind the house, behind the fence. Gone are the opportunities to welcome neighbors and connect with the community at large.

Street parties on a designated night act as a substitute for regular neighborhood events. Listed on the city’s social calendar, the big party is orchestrated. Participants drive to a designated cove and unload their grills and lawn chairs from the SUV. The kids play whiffle ball, shoot baskets, fall off skate boards, and play chase. No vehicles are allowed beyond a certain point.  Someone hires a DJ and generic tunes waft through the early evening air until some fuddy-duddy calls the cops:  “Turn it down!” Not long after dusk, everybody goes home to their seclusion to wait for the next annual block party.

Safety has become a major concern. It’s a sad commentary if front yard celebrations become raucous and disrupt neighbors’ quality of life. Drivers-by who speed jeopardize life.  Soda or beer cans pitched onto the front lawn do not contribute anything positive to the quality of life in small towns and neighborhoods. Grills left unattended and children’s toys strewn haphazardly across various properties do not suggest neighborly care. Drive-by shootings are too common and just a thought of that possibility in the news report sends cautious families to safety inside or the back yard.

Celebrating a birthday on the Front Porch, 1954

Some folks, however, celebrate life events of all description with activity spilling over into the front yard and into the street. They propose, argue, fight, cry, kiss, and announce victories in the front yard.  Children’s basketball goals and skateboard ramps are placed in the street next to the front yard because there are no paved driveways or sidewalks.  Families and children congregate in the front yard and hold their cookouts there because the back yard is “otherwise occupied.”

Perhaps front yard living is a custom of a previous time and place, a commentary on economics and customs, remembering when children ran barefoot and dogs followed. Extended families shared a house and the front porch was the coolest place for conversation.

Front porches and front yards once cemented a community.

Times change.

 

Thunder, Gunshots, and a Pick-up Truck

Sometimes, the weirdest things come to my mind. Take this one for instance: The Sister Wives. Maybe it’s because the Mormon Tabernacle Choir raised my roof yesterday or because a couple of us girls were talking about the TV show the other day, and I wondered aloud if it were still on TV? Oh, yes, was the reply.
I thought the A&E program had gone to the garbage dump since one sister-wife had declared herself OUT of the madness. Add to that the multiple lawsuits, and you’d think the desire to display that really weird life-style would have come to an end. But no! It continues; even if I watch Duck Dynasty instead! (heehe)
BTW, the Hubby-Buddy must be an outstanding man to pour happiness over so many women. Most men can’t figure out the workings of one woman. And, while each wife is of child-bearing age, living under the same roof, all will ultimately share the same cycle of life. Imagine several wives being pregnant, having the “blues,” or toting a loaded gun at the same time! He deserves whatever witchery lands on his head.
Let it go on the record: NO!!! Not only NO, but Hell No: I will not share. I refuse to play well with others. It is NOT something I learned in Kindergarten. What I learned before I ever went to Kindergarten was “Take care of your own stuff. You don’t share your very best toy, because others won’t take care of it like you will.”
“Hey, Honey(s)! I was down at the coffee shop and saw this really beautiful 25-something, dark haired, long-legged, shapely beauty. We shared a muffin, and I realized that she’d make a good addition to our family.” His remark is not about adopting her; he proposes her to be “the next, additional wife.” Only HE gets to play across the street, however. Somehow, on MANY levels, this is not right. Not in my world, not ever. I don’t even think a good country song could be written about this situation unless there would be lyrics about thunder, gunshots, and someone being run over by a pick-up truck!
I have a hard enough time reconciling previous wives in the legal sense, the one still walking, and the one who has died. These women, relegated to a previous life in a land long forgotten by time, once drew a breath beside my husband. Divorce does not erase these women from history. If I could Clear the Cache, Erase the History, I would! But, don’t come looking for me to explain any mysterious events, for I don’t look cute in horizontal stripes. And, I don’t own a pick-up truck!

Mixed Metaphors and, oh, yeah: “World Peace”

Do you remember a particularly stressful job interview?  Remember your sweating palms, the hope that your teeth would not chatter while you spoke?  And, you went into the interview prepared for the hypothetical questions you thought they’d ask …and they didn’t ask any of those?

Do you remember the final exam question for World Civ?  You know, the one requiring you to outline the semester in order to respond thoroughly:  Trace the Rise and Fall of Western Civilization.

I interviewed for a job one interesting spring morning; the job was one I had desired for quite some time, one for which I was particularly well-suited and for which I was highly recommended.  It was an experience I won’t ever forget.

I vaguely remember the questions, some of them, and generally know my answers.  Overall, however, what I said in the interview came from years of Family Training and refining my own skills at the feet of YODA, HOMER SIMPSON, and the GREAT BUZZARD BAIT, otherwise known as “The Rubbed Sage.”

The ultimate result was this:  my answers to whatever questions were asked made no difference, whatsoever.  The decision to choose another person for the job was made prior to the interviews, and without anyone’s knowledge, and to most people’s dismay.  The decision was made by Cruella and Drucilla, puppet masters of Chuckie.  The sinister two took it upon themselves to even the score with me concerning a very public instance wherein I had thrown them, deservedly so I must assert, under the bus.  As a side note, neither of these ladies is employed in the system today. Neither am I; I retired, several years after their conjoined departures.

Let me take you through my living nightmare of an interview.  I share this experience with jaded breath.

First things first: “wait”  ….over on the “blue chairs.”  I felt like a bad little girl at the principal’s office.  I’d had some experience in that realm, so I know whereof I speak.

From out of nowhere, the prune-faced, steel-cold woman who is director of Human Resources and the inspiration to the composer of the Jaws theme, appeared and told me to “complete this writing prompt.”  Let’s see: Trace the rise and fall of Public Education in America.  Ok, maybe not that broad, but “what two challenges…and how would you address….”   bla..bla..bla.  I decided NOT to write about “Beating the Zoning Requirements with Lease Agreements purchased at Wal-Mart,” nor about “Crack Babies and their Sexting Baby-Mommas,” as I felt neither of those subjects would be received well.

So after about 15 minutes, an emissary came to escort me to the holding cell outside the doors of the interview chamber.

I heard laughter, or perhaps it was incantations for an evil spell, coming from within the chamber…and then the door was opened and I was greeted by Darth Vader’s Twin Sister.

Escorted into the sanctum, I saw what I supposed to be 6 storm troopers, all of whom I had known as decent human beings, albeit in a former life.  We shook hands, cordially and professionally. I was seated at the foot of the table, 3 to my right, 3 to my left: “cannons to the right of me…cannons to the left of me…” and the games began.

As these storm troopers morphed into various villans such as female versions of Joker and Penguin seated in their customary fashion, I wondered if I were about to hear Gotham City’s take on “I’ll Get You, My Pretty….”

The first question was the one that must be answered:  that you know you are lucky to have a job and that if you are employed you know you are one lucky duck and that your employment is at the pleasure of the king.  If you don’t answer, “I who am about to die, salute you,” the interview does not turn out well.

Do you recall Goldfinger’s arena of investigation and what happened to the unfortunate people questioned prior to James Bond’s escorted entrance? The sad individuals who did not give the right answer while seated in “the chair” felt the floor open beneath them and saw ripples in the water wherein they were about to take a little dip. There was no long-haired cat seated on the lap of any of the individuals commanding the space, but the result could be just as deadly.

The interrogation would continue if you answered Question #1 correctly. If you were stupid and answered otherwise, you would be asked the follow-up questions, but a big red X would be put on your paper, and you would get an F: disaster!

It all centers on the fact that HE WHO THINKS HE IS IN CHARGE makes the decision and not the committee. “I SAYS when it’s Quittin’ Time.”  The committee recommends, but it is the King who makes the appointment.  And you have to say you know that.  And that you understand and yield to the Power of the Force or the Dark Side, whichever happens to be in command at the time.

One or two questions dealt specifically with the job description and I conjured up some decent answers there.  Another dealt with parent conferences and I had several really good answers for that. “Don’t have them!” and “Get a lawyer and get in line.” Really.  Just blather.  Everybody knows how those questions are to be answered.

The final question is a standard question, one I had been asked in other education-related interviews, but was not anticipating at all in this interview. It was, however, really an opportunity for me to clear the air with Cruella and Drucilla, the women who did not appreciate my take on lack of investment in Community Rezoning Issues and proceeded to stab me in the back under the guise of a smile. I took the opportunity to clearly and with deference to correct politics say that I recognized that there were those who know more than I do….” I do not see them around this table, but surely there are. hahahaha.

Then, finally, the last question.  I awaited the Applause-o-Meter to come to rest over my head while the Mistress of Ceremonies said they appreciated my answers, my service to the system.  Further, she said that I had answered well all they had to ask me.  Further, she asked me to respond if I had anything further to say or any questions.

I had no questions, but I ended the interview with something along the line that, “I really need a new washing machine and if I am selected as Queen for a Day, I’d really be a happy girl.  And, oh, yeah, “…World Peace.”

The Last Kiss

Once upon a time there was an attractive, divorced woman who had longed for romance her whole life.  As a child, she had dreamed of someone who would be her own prince charming, had sung along with on the chorus of “Someday, My Prince Will Come.”  She had been safely married, had 2 children, had been the supportive wife and mother, patterned after the good in her parents’ 50 year + marriage.  Anyway, she was divorced.  She was dating a few really nice gentlemen.  None of them could kiss and kissing was her pleasure, her passion.  If she was to find someone to love, he’d have to know how to kiss.

Let me tell you her story, for it is mine.

There was one man…he had been the first one in a long time and in hindsight, I went out with him because he was fairly attractive and attentive.  After a couple of dates, I actually allowed him to kiss me.  We were standing on my front porch, stopped to say “enjoyed the evening, bla, bla, bla”.  He surprised me by planting a full kiss on my lips. I felt that kiss, indeed, and it let me know that my libido was not in permanent retirement. For it had, indeed, been years since I had been kissed by a man who wanted to kiss me.  That was good news.  The bad news was that when he kissed me the next time, I was repulsed by his aggressiveness and left him immediately thereafter with no intention of ever kissing him again.  He was history.

What is it about some men who have to be “cave man” once they think that you will respond to them.  He turned me off fast with that kind of aggressiveness.  The kiss was hard, rough, invasive, and I was grateful to be inside my car, behind the wheel, but leaning inside my window, he did try to bend me double, I think.  Maybe he wanted me to get out of the car.  All I could think of was, “get out of my way, before I run you over.”  When I left, that was it.  I told him face to face the next day that I was not interested in continuing to see him.

Then, one fine day, I met a really nice looking man who was attractive to me in every way.  He was not only handsome, but he loved to talk and could talk about anything. The interest was in seeing him, being with him, talking to him, joking with him.  The intellectual, quick-witted play was stimulating.  He was unlike anyone I had ever known, and yet, like the one I had always wanted to know, the one I had wondered about. Did those men in my “lust in the dust” novels actually exist?  And, if they did, did they have a job?

He was a combination “bad boy/good boy.”  He was very attentive, respectful, but had a rough edge that was undoubtedly sexy.  While his hands were calloused from years of labor, he cared for them.  His nails were clean and his hands were well kept and he made sure they were not rough; his neck and face clean-shaven, his ears free of “old man hair.”  Funny, but women do look for those things.

He was not the one to put his hands all over me and he kept a very respectful distance.  Almost too much of a distance, I was thinking.  His eyes were friendly and kind, dancing and laughing.  His smile was simply great. I reached out, one time as we walked along, since our hands were almost touching, and slipped mine into his.  So, what was missing?  A kiss.

I remember the evening well.  As our time together was coming to a respectful end, standing outside my car, he, about to go to his vehicle and I to my pumpkin-coach, he leaned down to place a sweet goodnight kiss gently on my lips.  His lips were soft, just the right size, not mushy and not thick, manly, but not rough.  The pressure of the kiss was light, sweet, promising.  Not too much, saying “let’s see about this.”  Once. That was that.

I felt some familiarity in his lips, like a place I would want to return. In his call immediately after I drove away and turned toward home, I heard a different quality in his voice.  He said he was going to get more than a little peck – “next time.” That made me smile.

That next week, he invited me to come to a late supper.  After work, an evening event, I drove to his neighborhood grill and we had supper and conversation.  He was about to leave and he had kissed me, again very sweetly. This is one of those defining moments I will never forget when he said he had told a friend that in his past relationships, he had always felt a quick chemistry.  He did not feel that with me.  The friend had advised him to “give it time.”  He just didn’t know, he said.

All girls know what they have and what they do not have.  I am not overtly sexy.  I am not model beautiful.  I am not “hot.”  So, if a man wants those things, he does not want me.  We all know that there is no way to fake being “hotsy-totsy” when you obviously are not. At a younger age, in a different life, we might have tried it.  But as we age, there is no reason to play any games, be anything other than absolutely honest and clear about self.  He told me he was worried that we might not have the chemistry he was accustomed to feeling.  I reached up and kissed him softly and said, “That is your call…one you will have to make on your own.”

I turned and got into my car, started the engine and pulled away.  I thought that I’d never hear from him again, and I was disappointed, and admittedly, my feelings were bruised.  But, when you are over 50, you know your competition and you know what is worth it and what is not.  If someone is not interested, why in the name of all that is right would you want to be someone you are not in order to continue a relationship. The relationship would be based on a lie.

Whatever it was, it was.  But, he called again and again, and we went out again, and again. He had asked me to go to his class reunion.  I had accepted, when I learned that, indeed, we would be driving back and forth, not spending the night in some “hot sheet NoTell MoTel.”  He asked me to go with him to select a shirt or two for the event and to dinner with him after that. It was that evening that put us on the road to our future, together.  It was, indeed, the turning point.

I remember it clearly.  The time had come to say goodnight and he leaned into me for that goodnight kiss.  I had longed for this kiss.  We were in the car with the gearshift and console between us.  Nonetheless, his hands reached for me and he placed them on my shoulders to pull me toward him.  I moved toward him with gently open lips and he matched the pressure, a bit reserved, very sweet, very soft and gentle; did I read “meaningful” in that few seconds?  I must have because I did not pull back, did not want to stop, and neither did he.  In fact, I can still feel how his hands pulled me forward with just enough insistence to say, “I want to really kiss you and have you kiss me back.” My hand reached up and encircled his neck, placing my hand on his neckline and putting a bit of pressure there, fingers gently combing through his hair. I knew what this kiss meant to us.  I could feel his hands tighten and move across my back to bring me toward him more.  That experience was incredible.  That kiss was like being jump started, kick-started into the grand experiment of just how much can be said with one kiss.  We kissed, came up for air, turned another way, and kissed some more.  We could not get enough of one another.  We acted like a couple of teenagers parking on a dirt road under only a starlit canopy.  Someone has got to clear his head and say “uncle,” or at least shake off the cobwebs and say “good night.”

The kisses I have come to know and expect from my husband comprise the dearest part of my day.  They travel the full range from playful to passionate, from pecks to love-pats.  The beating of my heart, the rapid pulse rate, the flutters in my stomach, I hope never go away.  He is a passionate lover, passionate about feelings, what he wants, what he feels, what he hopes for.  He is passionate about me as I am about him.

Strange how I could be married for thirty years and not experience the intensity of passion I feel with this man. A man knows a woman and is made for her.  Confounding as it is to know that he is a man of “previous experience,” it is that experience that makes him in tune with me and my desires. This man ignites fires I never knew existed.  He curls my toes, enflames my inner core.  My body heats from the inside out and I have longings finally fulfilled. He told me at one point that he kissed me long and hard, just to see how much I could take and how much I could return.  He did, indeed, meet his match in that department.  And just so you’ll know, those “lust in the dust” fantasy novels offer nothing when compared to the “real thing.”

It all started when we sealed our fates together that one night, with that one kiss.  That’s all it took…Just one kiss…his kiss.

And, his is the Last Kiss, the Only Kiss, I ever want to have in my life.

A Magnifying Glass and Barbie’s Butt

A Magnifying Glass and Barbie’s Butt

Yes, I am guilty.  But – (no pun intended), so is my girlfriend, who mentioned that she still had her Barbie <a href= http://vintagebarbie.com > </a> from childhood.

How that conversation came up, I do not know, except that several of my compatriots were into collecting Blue Ridge China <a href= http://www.blueridgechina.com > </a>, Fiesta Dinnerware <a href= http://www.fiesta.com > </a> , Beatrix Potter figurines, and everything else under the sun.  I did not have anything to collect, so felt a bit out of the group.

I began to collect the ugliest pottery on the face of the earth – Camark Pottery <a href= http://www.camarkpottery.com” > </a>, because of its manufacturing spot in the low-country of Arkansas, the region of my birth.  I also noted in the Antiques and Collectible section of the local bookstores, there were collecting books on none other than Barbie.

Note the singular form of the noun Barbie.  Girls did not have multiple ‘Barbies’ but one and only one Barbie, the star of the show.

I digress in my story of discovery.

I called my mother and asked if my Barbie and all the clothes were still packed away in her attic.  Indeed they were, so on my next trip to visit the parents, I picked up Barbie.  She had to ride with me because there was no Barbie car or Barbie plane or other Barbie transportation.  Also, there is no Ken or Midge or Skipper or Alan, no one else – just Barbie.

Upon my return home, I called the aforementioned friend and she rushed over that Sunday night (yes, she did) with her Barbie. She was young enough to also have a Midge and Skipper; she still, though, had in her hand, her original Barbie as she came through the back door.  She also brought along a Barbie Collectible book.  Not the one with all the reproductions, but the one for Vintage Barbie. Snobs that we are – it’s Vintage or nothing.

We read and read, looked at pictures with critical discernment and got more thrilled and excited by the paragraph.

That explains why when my high school age son came home and walked into the kitchen, he beheld two grown women standing under the kitchen light head to head with a magnifying glass, peering closely with furrowed brow, examining in close detail Barbie’s butt.

“Let me go out and come in again,” he said in disbelief.  “What are you doing?” – emphasis on “Are.” 

Explaining that the markings on the but-tocks (ala Forrest Gump) could get him a sizeable inheritance or a nice trip somewhere changed his disrespect to awe.

“Really????  Let me see!”  Now, I do so wish I was the one with the camera.

We all were astounded.  Barbie #2 is what I have.  My friend has Barbie #4 or #5…more current than mine.  It seems that #1 lasted a while and then #2 came out.  Dear Barbie #2 did not last long and was replaced almost immediately with #3; thus, #2 is quite rare.  Hmmmm.  Do I hear a drum roll?  I have #2.  I don’t think my hometown got #1 of anything, actually.

I also have her outfits:  the classics and the TM label (which makes them worth more.)

I will write more on this adventure later, but want to tell you this:  the quest for Vintage Barbie saved my sanity while I was enduring chemotherapy for ovarian cancer.  The trip to a Barbie Show in St. Louis was like nothing I’ll ever experience again.  And, my travel buddies and I returned to Pensacola, FL, because we had seen Fluff.  I did not know at the time, but soon discovered, that Fluff is one of the later Barbie’s animals.  Remember when she had a Pony and a Dog?  She also had a Cat – Fluff which also came with a kennel/”cat house!”           

When we got back to the condo in Gulf Shores, AL, I continued pouring over the collector’s Bible of Barbie and found that, “Oh, My Stars!!! Fluff is RARE!  We have to go back and get Fluff.  We can’t leave Fluff in Pensacola!  He’s rare!”  So, the next morning, before any other adventure could take place, we drove back to Pensacola for Fluff.  Yes, I still have him.

 I also have all my dear friends who would do anything to create for me a diversion from the horrors surrounding chemotherapy, and years of it.

So, hats off to Barbie.

I’ll tell you more Barbie stories later….but speaking of Cats – I also have a Camark Cat, also valuable and rare.  And a story to go along with it.

EBay or Craig’s List, here I come!