Has It Really Been This Long?

I've been posting directly to Facebook not for over a year, all rants and raves and thoughts on the natural processes of the world, and some not so natural. I decided to take a look at some of my older musings and realized that I hadn't done a blog post for over a year.

A solid year.

It boggles my mind. I write so many posts, some cathartic and some based on random thoughts, that I was a bit thrown off kilter that I hadn't posted here in so long.

I guess that's how life works sometimes. You share and share and share, throwing bits of flotsam into the Universe, that when you stop, it's like the earth slows down to a crawl and you lose actual time itself. At least for me, that's how it feels. Blogs are not as fashionable as they used to be, it's more of a YouTube internet right now, with short snippets of influential goings-on. I will admit, it's one of my favorite pastimes of late, and I watch a lot of the darned things, mostly dogs and gorillas. I have no clue as to why.

This morning, my thoughts crept out of my brain somewhat slower than usual and I was remembering our childhood housekeeper, Willie Mae. This was the 1960s, and we called her our maid. Both Mom and Dad worked full-time, and I needed looking after, and that's just what people did back then. She lived with us part-time, because it was easier and more comfortable for her, because she was already ancient when she showed up like an unleashed Rottweiler, ready to take on demons to keep my little sister and I safe. 

Willie Mae was a force of nature, to use an old cliche. She came to us by some invisible ether, suddenly showing up to iron everything, literally, and to bake us pound cake that has never been equaled to this day. She was stern and you did not cross this woman or all hell would be released. She was there in the morning at some point ( I was already on the school bus) and when I got home, she was there, waiting at the front door like an ominous presence that may or may not have needed an exorcism. Early days with Willie Mae were rough. I was not used to toeing the line, shall we say, but this woman knew how to use a wooden spoon. She had raised her own children, and now she was raising us.

Over the next eight years or so, Willie Mae became such an engrained member of our family that she sat at our kitchen table and ate with us, carrying on in all of the conversations, just like an old family matriarch would do. She slept over some nights, when the day had been too long for her, and going back to her own home, deep in the wilds of Silver Springs, with no running water or electricity, was an inconvenience. She never worked weekends, Dad always diligently gave her a ride home on Friday afternoons. Her stories were fascinating to me, and I have always loved story-tellers. I cannot tell you how old she actually was, but she had stories of what she called the Old South. She told me about hunting for crawfish in little "cricks," how dancing under moonlight would make you crazy and how washing up your hair with rainwater was just the best thing. She made us the most delicious sour orange pie I've ever eaten, and regularly schooled our parents on how to cook up collards, fry up shrimps and lay down biscuits and pie crust the "right" way. She taught me to iron, to do laundry (we used a washing machine, but she sometimes washed up dad's khaki shirts in a tub and used a scrubbing board) and hang it up on the line to dry. She sent me out to feed the chickens and collect the eggs, making sure I spread out some crushed oyster shell so the hen eggs wouldn't be so fragile. She tolerated our dog, but never let her in the house, because dogs didn't belong there. Try telling that to my current brood, who think everything in the house belongs to them.

A couple of things I do remember about Willie Mae the most was that she was a snuff-user. Not the "new" definition of snuff. Real tobacco snuff. She dip those horrible dried leaves in between her bottom lip and her jaw and spit vile juices of mixed saliva and tobacco in the sink, which was white ceramic. Thank goodness for Comet cleanser. Her snuff cans were lined up behind the partition between the cabinet doors above the stove hood, so that they would be out of sight. Willie Mae hated smoking, and Mom and Dad were both chain smokers, but dipping snuff was fine with her. I found those cans years after Willie Mae had left us and this world behind, and I wondered why Mom had never thrown them away.

I had tried smoking once. My friend up the road, Tina Evers, and I sneaked cigarettes into my room and we crawled into my closet to try and smoke one day after school.Now, Tina's parents smoked, in fact, everyone smoked back then, but Tina was as scared of her mother as I was of Willie Mae, so my house was the chosen haven for the cigarette trial. Willie Mae seemed quite busy ironing something or other,   (I believe sheets) and watching television, so we thought we could hide in the closet and get away with it.

Our coughing, and the thin wisps of smoke coming out from under the door alerted her spider senses and she opened the door like the God of Thunder and started chastising us out with a vengeance. Tina ran out, dropping the cigarette, and running out the kitchen screen door to escape the fire-breathing monster that was Angry Willie Mae. She stepped on that cigarette with her house shoes within seconds,  started out of the bedroom, grabbed her corn broom, and began to swat at me relentlessly, yelling at me the whole time about the devil and hell and how I had "better never do that again, you spoilt chile."

And I never did. To this day, I have never smoked a cigarette (of any kind) since.

I had so much respect for the woman. I respected her gruffness, respected her all-enveloping kindness and love, even though she tried to hide it, and respected her moral and ethical rules to live by. She shaped my upbringing as much as my own parents. She taught me respect for all living things, because everything had a purpose "from the ants to the eagles," and there was no difference in people, just skin color. I loved that woman, all of her.

Willie Mae died fairly soon after my little sister was born. She made an excellent wage as our housekeeper, with dad always being fair about paying for all the work she did for us, plus extra. She did not have health insurance, and it was not a requirement for employers to provide that at the time. She had been suffering for years with gall bladder attacks, and having myself suffer from that many moons later, I can not imagine the pain she hid from us. It finally sent her to the hospital, and she did not recover. I don't recall all the details, but I do know that her house and money (yes, kept in cans and buried under the front porch of her home) were all taken by her son, but Dad paid for her medical bills and her subsequent funeral and was happy to do so. I have no clue where Willie Mae is buried, do not know if she has a headstone, and still never knew her last name nor what happened to any of her collected treasures, mostly bird nests and foreign coins from far-off lands.

We got a new housekeeper, but she didn't work out. She was much younger, and had a massive afro, which she spent hours oiling and primping. She smoked cigarettes as much as my parents did, and always had one hanging out of her mouth while she was ironing and fixing after-school snacks. She watched a lot of television, curled up on the couch or on the telephone. We had one phone, a yellow wall model, with  cord that was so stretched out, it made it into the living room. She was pretty much oblivious to my sister and I. When she was let go, it was up to me to govern myself after school, and my little sister was put into day-care for a little while. Those were the best years after Willie Mae, because I could run through the woods at will with my dog Sandy, which I thought was just a mutt until I found out she was, at least mostly, an English Cocker. I managed to get my homework and household chores done, still watch my beloved Dark Shadows on television before Mom got home.

Why she was in my thoughts this morning I haven't a clue. But, she was there, hands on her aproned hips, sluffing along in her well-worn house shoes, with her hair tied up in a bandana. As most things that touch my soul, I had to write a little missive about my memories of her and how she became so important and beloved to me. She is not, and never will be, forgotten. 

Telling the Bees

     Ancestry. com has provided lots of answers, verifying my innate passion for the Low Country, as so many of my father's relatives from Europe settled there, in the coastal wilds of Georgia and South Carolina. I knew that England and Germany (mother's side) were definite origins, and that my Dad always loved England as well as Georgia and South Carolina. At one point, he was thinking of moving the family from Florida to Coastal Georgia. One of the phrases I remembered he used on occasion was "telling the bees," and I swear I thought it was a dismissal to my many questions growing up. As in, "I don't want to listen to you. Go tell the bees." I was quite annoying in that respect. Probably in a lot of other ways, too, and most likely still am. 

    Well, lo and behold, I read an article about "telling the bees," which I happened upon quite by chance. It was in an article written by Bailey Gilliam, in a magazine, Local Life. Here's the explanation of the old, Low Country coastal (and British) tradition:, and some parts are paraphrased:

    "When love is lost or gained, one is supposed to alert the bees of the news. Historically, it is said that if the bees were not told of the important events in their keeper's lives, such as marriages, deaths, departures or returns in the household, a penalty would result on the hive and possibly even the family. If the bees aren't 'put into mourning' or 'invited to celebrate,' they may leave the hive, stop the production of honey or even die."

    "While little is known about the origins of the tradition, it is speculated that it was inspired by the ancient Aegean concept of the bee's ability to bridge the gap between the natural world and the afterlife. The custom of telling the bees is best known to be practiced in England but has also been recorded in most of (Northern Europe). In previous centuries, apiarists would drape black cloths over the hives to put the bees in mourning or bring them cake for weddings or births as a celebratory invitation. When the beekeeper died, the hive would be served (food presented at the funeral), turned to face the burial site and be told that their keeper had passed away."

    "Even today, people still say 'go tell the bees.' For many, even those who aren't superstitious (or have hives as a source of income or personal use), telling the bees of love and loss can be an enormous help in the grieving process. If something is weighing on you, it might be worth a try to find a hive and go tell the bees."

    Infinitely interesting to me, although I haven't carried on the tradition of telling the bees to my own progeny. At one point, I did have plans to install beehives on my four acres in Kentucky, which was purchased along with the building, when the big move to Kentucky was made in the early 2000's. This was a beautiful, hilly pastureland, planted in clover, that my former husband and I had planned to build a house on, or at the very least, revert the existing barn into a place of residence. It was only about two miles from the downtown area, and literally, a perfect place to exist. I buried my two Scotties, Rita and Lucy, on that land, on the highest part, by natural boulders, and never thought that a scant couple of years later, I'd be leaving it all behind to begin again. Divorce not only rids you of your spouse and in my case, best friend, it also evaporates any hopes and dreams you may have had with that marriage. Our plans to go to learn the art of beekeeping at a local Master Gardener's class (which I actually completed later on) so that we could have hives on the property were dissolved. However, even though they were not "our" hives, beehives were indeed placed there by a beekeeper from Maysville, who gifted us with the tastiest clover/lavendar honey I have ever had.

    I like the old phrases like telling the bees. Learning about the Gullah GeeChee and Low Country traditions have always been a big part of my soul in some mysterious way. The fact that I could suddenly remember this little forgotten phrase from childhood from a random paragraph in a magazine decades later is amazing to me.

    

Is She Really Ranting About Toothpaste?

Yes, she is

She most certainly is.

You know, I grew up in a household that there was one toothpaste, and it was Crest. It prevented cavities. To my parents, that was most important, and whether or not any of our teeth were "ten shades whiter" made no difference whatsoever. We drank clean, fresh well water, which came out of the tap practically ice cold. No fluoride, the magic chemical of the 1950s, so of course, since fluoride was touted as the ultimate cavity preventer, we had to use Crest. Now, we kids heard there was a toothpaste on the market called Colgate, but it didn't contain fluoride at the time.

Now, this Crest came in a 8.2 ounce tube, with a tiny little cap which was forever rolling under the toilet or behind the door (our bathroom vanities were built-ins, so that tiny little caps could never roll under them). Twice a day, without fail, our teeth were minty-fresh Crest. The fluoride in Crest was no match for the hundreds of boxes of Snow-Caps, Malted Milk Balls and Milk Duds that were my passion for many years, but it was a noble fight. 

Over the years, of course, toothpaste took on a whole new persona. Now all of a sudden, it became of primary importance to not only prevent cavities, but to make your breath smell like peppermint and whiten your teeth. Toothpaste became a cosmetic product that had to do everything that would make your mouth both healthy and sexually appealing. It was – and is – the new Snake Oil. And, not only this, but it steadily reduced the product in the tubes from 8 ounce to 3.5 ounces. For way, way more money. Reportedly, a tube of Crest cost just under 50-cents in 1956. Now, among the several offshoot brands of Crest, the highest priced one, with a spiffy aluminum-colored top (and not a tiny one, either) costs $6.99 (and it's 3.5 ounces of sparkly blue gel).

I have tried many toothpastes in my lifetime. I begged mom to buy Stripe toothpaste, and she did begrudgingly, but only because it would continue to keep me brushing my teeth, and since I was the kid with all the teeth issues, whatever she could do to keep cavities and the dental visits at bay was worth it. I used Ipana for a while, because it seemed more European to me, although it wasn't. At the tender age of 12, I craved anything exotic. In my hippie stage, I used tooth powder, which was messy and not very effective at preventing cavities, I'm sure. You name it, if it was on the shelves of the local grocery, I used it at one point or another.

Toothpaste now comes in plastic tubes, not metal, and it's hard to actually use all of the product. The caps have changed to the more convenient ones which allow you to just flip open the cap (thus eliminating the lost cap and the ensuing verbal thrashing for losing it yet again) as well as standing it on the counter. Great changes, yes. Paying a whole bunch more for half the product, no. 

After all, it is just toothpaste. A specific product for a specific use. I think it's become way too diversified. Whatever happened to keeping things simple?

Gratefulness Without Measure

     I know, I know. It's a subject that plays in my brain and heart over and over again in droves. I pass off the constant feelings of gratefulness to advancing age, but you know, when I think back, I have always had an overwhelming feeling of gratefulness, both for large and small things.

    What is gratefulness? Is it love unbridled, like a runaway horse? Is it guilt in small, tiny vials marked poison, which we drink and then, right before we close our eyes, we feel? Is it faith in something larger, universal, which grabs our gut and clenches it tight, wrenching out tears from the eyes and piety from the soul?

    I have no answers as to why some people are more prone to gratefulness than others. There are those who go about their daily lives, working and striving to create comfortable places to exist and purchase objects to improve their status or lifestyle, who appear to have a very low percentage of gratefulness. They use life to their advantage, and only to their advantage, and never take precious seconds out of their 24-hour time slots to be truly grateful for their sheer ability to be where they are in life. I've met those who are down on their luck, always complaining, always envious of the people mentioned above, who carry rot in their soul for not being in the upper echelon, as if life threw them dark clouds from birth,

    I have also met those who attribute their good fortunes to religious faith, faith in a creator-being who pats them on the head like little lap-dogs when they attend churches or prayer meetings, and who believe that the only reason they are blessed is because they follow their master without question. Don't get me wrong: I attended church (Episcopal) since I was a small child, and I've read the King James bible from cover to cover. I'm not writing this to diminish the power of faith. I'm writing this to ask you, in short, to examine your own gratefulness, or lack thereof.

    I have never felt, personally, that I have created my life alone. Every step along the way, from a mother and father who believed in my talent so much that they were willing to mortgage their home to send me to Parsons in New York City so that I could further my art. A mother and father who, for whatever reason, let me run wild for most of my youth, to explore my own boundaries and to forge my own belief system in all things. Both of my sisters have been supportive of me in their own ways throughout the years, both emotionally and financially, and I have had partners in life and marriage that have taught me lessons, schooling me in the emotional realms of love, pain, loss and grief.

    Through it all, I have felt grateful. I express it in countless spoken and written words, and mean it sincerely. I have been given so much, and feel as though I have not returned it to those who have offered it. My life bloomed rapidly, like a flower with countless petals, and now, as the petals are starting to fall away, I feel even more gratefulness than ever. We are not meant to constantly bow our heads, to meekly retort our thank you's over and over again, to attribute all of our life's achievements to others. But, we are meant to step outside of our own egos and realize, in no uncertain terms, that we are not the sole creators of our lives. We are meant to recognize that we have helped to build our lives with the stones and pebbles others have given us. We are meant to be introspective of how we became ourselves.

    Some of the physical objects or financial gains we have acquired, the emotional pain or pleasure we have received, the places we have traveled to or lived in – all of these are those stones and pebbles that have made up our foundations. Be grateful.

In the Still of the Morning

     I've been so busy trying to produce enough art for another show, I've been keeping my mind locked up behind a very large and formidable locked door.

    But, this morning, when I swore to myself I would stay in bed until at least 5:30 a.m. every day, I was up again at 3 a.m., like a frantic mouse, scurrying to and fro looking for that last morsel to take back to the nest before I settled in for a nap. No matter what I tell myself: "You need to heal, Brenda. You need to rest, Brenda"...nothing seems to work when the brain kicks in.

    This morning, my thoughts were on the lost. Not those orange-handled scissors that you swore up and down were in the basket on your desk, and now are nowhere to be seen. Not the brand-new jar of Skippy you bought just last week that has disappeared into the Twilight Zone of your kitchen. No, neither of those things, but the loss of long-known establishments and people that defined your youth.

    Everyone has loss as a part of their lifespan. We lose people that have been close to us, we lose people that we watched on television, we lose people that spanned generations of music and art. We got comfortable knowing they were always there, and now they are not, never to return. Places are the same way. Roadside gift shops with big shark heads and billboards touting "live alligators," at least here in Florida, were always my triggers for comfort in my state, silly as that seems. Seeing them on my day journeys throughout the state, knowing that inside them was the smell of orange-scented pottery and imported Philippine shells, pirate flags and ceramic flamingos, plastic oranges, bamboo wind chimes and tacky decals for your glass sliding doors. All of them were the same for the most part, and every single one of them meant home to me. I grew up in Silver Springs, a huge tourist destination since the early 1800s, and there was one particular shop I rode my little pink Schwinn bicycle (with streamers, folks) every single Saturday afternoon (after the obligatory chores, a Tarzan movie and the following Creature-Feature on television) that was in a little corner niche on SR 40, which has now become a boring highway median. I took my weekly allowance ($2.00) and rode off into the sun to purchase a shell or two, sometimes "lavender toilet water from France," leaving enough for a slaw-dog from the nearby Dairy Queen. Don't tell Mom...she hated it when I ate before my dinner (but how I dearly loved slaw-dogs, and ONLY from Dairy Queen). The Shell Shop was torn down many, many years ago. As were the Cloister Courts, built from coquina rock, that was the favorite motel for many travelers, and Yancy's Blueberry Farm.

    Just recently, I read a post on Facebook that Tom's, also a well-known Florida gift shop, has drifted off into the sunset. It had been going downhill for years, but these last two years of minimal tourism and disinterest in the old Florida pit-stops finally made the final slice, and it has closed as well. This shop was on the road to St. Augustine, a route I still travel as often as I can, now that I'm closer. Nothing gives me a thrill as much as seeing a lighthouse as I come around the bend on A1A to Anastasia Island. I would often pop into Tom's. Just to remember.

    In the mid-70s, I was a dancing fool to David Bowie (cancer), wearing padded-shoulder jackets and high heels with my jeans. I had all of his albums, and think I still do, buried in a bin somewhere in the shed. In the late 70s, I took a job at ABC liquors as a bartender, wearing a little red "elf" dress, mixing drinks to the tunes of Donna Summers (lung cancer) and Glenn Frey (pneumonia) and shot a mean game of pool to the tunes of Stevie Ray Vaughn (helicopter crash). I adored Jim Croce (plane crash), especially "Time in a Bottle," and am dreading the day when Jimmy Buffett is no longer pumping out his tunes of tropical living. They all left their music behind to bring us back to earlier days, and when the tunes I remember pop up on my car radio (yes, I listen to 70s and 80s music), I get a little misty.

    Yes, I know, ch-ch-ch-changes are inevitable. Nothing stops change. But I am getting to the age where I reminisce about the long-gone. Riding my little bike miles to downtown Ocala, which still had brick streets, huge, ancient buildings and a Woolworth store complete with a lunch counter, and board sidewalks in some parts of town, just so I could buy a little gift for my Mom or go to a movie at the Marion Theatre (I could get in with RC bottle-caps, which I picked up from the Jiffy Store parking lot). Music will always take me back, and I still watch the old movies and television series from time to time because I just plain like them. The past is a funny place. Not good to live there, but nice to visit.

    

All In Favor of Hummingbirds, say Aye

 I’ve decided that, in part of my new attitude towards an overall health change –which does not include a strict diet with cardboard as the main staple, much to the chagrin of my new physician, who gives drill sergeants the demeanor of bunny rabbits compared to him– am going to take some time each day to reflect, to write, to go through my mental file cabinet and clear some debris.

 

From my perch in my favorite patio chair by the pool, I looked around and gave some thought to all the pruning that needed to be done, and as I looked to the left, I saw how high my neighbor’s Cape Honeysuckle had grown, overtaking my fence and dropping dead leaves and flowers in my once fastidiously groomed pathway. There is no reasoning with him about trimming it into a nice, manageable hedge, as I have never met anyone who despised doing anything in the yard more, other than the man I married. 

 

And then I saw them.

 

Three, perhaps four, hummingbirds, dancing a frenzied waltz around from bloom to bloom. My heart lept in sheer amazement. When I moved in my house, the former owners had left two hummingbird feeders, hanging from a tree limb that draped over my other garden pathway. I was determined not to be a slave to hummingbird feeders, as I had tirelessly cleaned and filled them for years in my former rental home, and had never seen a single bird. So, I took them down, and not a month later, I saw hummingbirds, frantically searching for their former food source. I felt bad for years, and went through feeding birds, squirrels and when that became a problem, drawing beach rats and raccoons, I just eliminated all feeders entirely, focusing on planting native plants for bees and butterflies. 

 

But now, the elusive hummingbirds were once again making an appearance. So, sitting here in the balmy breezes of a Florida winter, I have become resolute that I will concede to the natural order of things, and let the bright orange blooms of the messy, invasive honeysuckle to continue to thrive, even if it does drive my deep-seated need to have everything somewhat tidy into overdrive. The hummingbirds did it. Clever little creatures.

From The Rabbit Hole of Pemphigus To A Whole New Journey With Medicare

 What is it about turning 65 and going on Medicare screams "profit margin" to health care providers? 

Before, I had the very least minimal health insurance I could get. Think of your car insurance and just keeping enough to get a new tag every year. That was me.

Far from complaining, but when I had my first, and now continuing, series of eye test, medical tests and dental tests when I turned 65, I went from being a healthy, active 65-year-old to being on pills that, if lined up in pill bottles on a countertop, it would look like an art installation. I'm on Cellcept (for the autoimmune disease), Prednisone (inflammation for the autoimmune disease), Lisonpril (blood pressure, probably from anxiety about taking all the pills), Metformin (Ben & Jerry's makes a wonderful ice cream called Salted Caramel Core, and it's double the amount of sugar any normal person should have in a day, much less a person battling impending diabetes), Berberine (anything to reduce blood sugar), Rosuvastatin (What? I have to manage cholesterol, too?), several "old person" supplements like Vitamin D, COQ10, and Folic Acid. There are a couple of other pills in there, too, that I am unsure of what they actually do – oh, and a once weekly pill for osteoporosis, which apparently I have in my lower back. Let's not leave out gingivitis, for which I had to have all my "quadrants"scraped and fumigated and medicated or whatever they do, and my eye tests which determined I have higher pressure than normal, and less than 20% of my optic nerves left.

Having said all this, you must remember that at the end of 2020, I was in great health. My weight was good, range of mobility perfect, eyes tested out same as the last four years and regular teeth cleaning could commence. I had my vaccinations, including flu, and all was good.

So, I ask you, why am I suddenly a member of the walking dead? Why am I popping pills like an out of control hypochondriac, and on doctor's orders no less? And, why are my blood tests that I have every three months getting progressively worse, which determines my apparent need to have even more pills to cram down my throat, at specified times during the day. 

The side effects of medications are headaches, nausea and skin so thin that I put a band-aid on the other day (new puppy=necessity for band-aids) and tried to remove it, at which point my skin literally peeled off my arm with it. I'll show you the scar. I still have an open lip ulcer, currently being treated by Betamethasone Dipropionate, which apparently doesn't work, and three separate other topicals for skin and scalp sores. All of these gleefully dispensed by the elves at the pharmacy.

I want to go off all this crap for a year and see if my body returns to normal, or at least 65-year-old normal. But, I'm afraid I'll disintegrate into a pool of jelly. So, I faithfully trudge along, taking a specified regimen of pills at morning, noon, evening and bedtime. I just somehow think the system of prescribing medications to make you well....makes you sick.