Tomato Plants, Orange Slices and Backroads

 

All I meant to do was buy some tomato plants and flowers for my new flower beds.  But these simple things seem to turn into adventures with me, especially when driving is concerned.

The best place to buy plants around here is down in the Mennonite community, about 15 miles from my house.  It’s a nice drive in the spring, down Highway 50, through the sleepy little Coble community and along a winding road through some of the prettiest woodlands in Hickman County.  I planned to visit a couple of the Mennonite families to get some homemade bread and fresh produce, then stop in at the market to buy a new corn cutter before visiting the greenhouse for tomato, pepper, petunia, squash and okra plants.  I invited my friend Clay to ride down there with me, promising a quick trip.  He said he wouldn’t mind going and buying some orange slice candy at the market.

Imagine my surprise when, just before reaching my first stop, I encountered a road closed/detour sign.  The detour wasn’t even a detour – it was just a parking lot where you could turn around.  There was room to go around the road closed barrier and I thought maybe the actual closure was far enough down the road that I could get to at least one of my destinations so I eased around it.  But just around the next curve was a group of workers with a large piece of equipment.  The road really was closed.  I found out later they were installing a culvert.

There wasn’t room to turn around right there, so I had to back up.   A car had followed me around the barrier, but they had stopped back up the road when I stopped, so I had room to back to an open space to turn around.  The folks in the car pulled up, rolled down the window and asked what was going on.  Turned out it was an acquaintance who was also enroute to the greenhouse.  We parted ways and started back

I knew there was another way to the greenhouse, from the other side of town; I just wasn’t sure where to turn and it would mean going all the way back to town and starting over.  I don’t know what possessed me to decide to try a “shortcut” through the back roads, especially when I didn’t have a full tank of gas.  But when I saw the road that had a sign saying “Nacome Camp 2 miles,” I turned onto it.  “Where are we going?” asked Clay suspiciously. 

“I know there’s another way and I might be able to figure it out,“ I said cheerfully.  Little did I know. 

These were not well traveled roads and there were several other little roads that intersected every few miles.  I was not familiar with any of those little roads.  Pretty soon, I realized that I was loster than last year’s Easter egg.  I had no idea where we were or where we were going, except occasionally we would see a sign that said Nacome 2 miles.  We had been several miles more than two by then, but there wasn’t much choice but to forge ahead.  The road wound along right beside the creek.  Nacome is on the creek, so I figured we would get to it sooner or later and then I would know where we were.  “I’ll bet one of those other little roads would take us over to the greenhouse if I just knew how to do it,” I said at one point.  I won’t tell you what Clay said.  I didn’t blame him – I had promised it would be a short trip and there would be candy.

I don’t think I mentioned before that I am severely directionally challenged.  I don’t know right from left and I certainly don’t know north, south, east and west, unless I am at my house.  I also don’t have any sense of whether my house in north, south, east or west of any other location in my county, or the wider world.  My truck has a compass on the dash, which tells me what direction I am headed, but it doesn’t tell me where home is in relation to those compass points.  I can’t even remember all the times I have stopped somewhere on a trip and gone back in the wrong direction when I left my location.  It used to drive my mother crazy.  “Mary Beth,” she would say, “you know home is to the west!”   Well, no, I didn’t.  One time Daddy was with us on an excursion to Nashville and I was going to drive home.  We were leaving the parking lot and I asked which way to go.  Daddy said promptly, “North.”   My mother spoke up, not exactly yelling, but in a pretty loud voice.  “She doesn’t know which way that is,” she announced and proceeded to tell me to turn that way – pointing to the correct direction.

Every now and then Clay would ask if I knew where we were and mention that he had never been to Nacome Camp.  He also muttered something about orange slice candy every now and then.

We did see some pretty wild flowers, and we finally come out at Nacome Camp, and I don’t think Clay was correct in saying we had driven fifty miles, but I’m also pretty sure it was more than 2 miles.  But the adventure wasn’t over yet.  We came out on the highway and I turned right, which seemed to me to be the way back to town.  “Where are you going?” asked Clay.  “Because Linden is this way and Centerville is that way.”  Now he sees what my mother went through every time we went on a trip.

I could write a book about all the times I got lost with my horse show buddy, Carol.  There was the time in Brownsville, Kentucky, when we ended up at a church at 12:00 on a Sunday morning, just as church was getting out, pulling a horse trailer right through the middle of town.  Then there was the time we ended up in a corn field in Ava, Missouri, in the dark, while trying to find the horse show grounds.  Our last trip together was to Huntsville, Alabama, where we drove around and around and gave Carol’s GPS a nervous breakdown.  I’m serious about the breakdown – the woman telling us where to turn just quit talking to us after we made our second trip into the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant.  We did see some nice Christmas decorations in that little subdivision we drove into though.  At least we weren’t pulling a horse trailer.

I went back to the Mennonites yesterday.  I was telling the gentleman who sold me some vegetables that I tried to get down there the other day and the road was closed.  He said there is a way to wind around and get to them but it was a confusing route and I probably would have got lost.  I nodded and agreed.  I did get my tomato and pepper plants, flowers, homemade bread and Clay’s orange slice candy.  The market didn’t have a corn cutter so that will be an adventure for another time.  Strawberries will be in season next week.  I hope the main road is not closed then.  

 

The Porch Swing

 

I would get a lot more done, I think, if I didn’t have a porch swing.

My first memories of this swing were of my grandmother.  I grew up in a multi generation household, with my grandparents, an uncle and my mother and daddy.  My mother worked in a local department store from the time I could first remember, so I was at home with my grandmother, who I called Nanny, during the day.  We spent a lot of time outside and on the front porch.  Like most southern farmhouse porches, it extended almost the width of the house, the ceiling was painted haint blue and the swing was painted to match.  Nanny would sit in the swing and we would play.  From an early age, I loved to make up stories, which I would act out with cooperation from Nanny.  My favorite, or at least the one I remember best, was about a little girl named Josie, who loved to ride horses.  I don’t remember a lot about Josie, except she rode in a lot of horse shows.  (I had a stable full of stick horses that lived on the front porch.) There was also a snooty neighbor woman, whose name I have forgotten, who didn’t approve of little girls who rode horses and Nanny and I used to have quite a time dealing with her.  That’s all I recall of our play acting, but it’s enough to give me a wonderful memory of our time together.  We sang, told stories and dreamed dreams.  Nanny probably didn’t get much work done either.

My mom started babysitting after she “retired” from public work.  She and her young charges spent a lot of time in the porch swing too.  I have vivid memories of her sitting in the swing with the first of many children, who actually was more like part of the family than a paying customer.   They would sing hymns like Lily of the Valley, In the Garden and Swing Low Sweet Cheerio (Julie’s pronunciation for Chariot).  As time went on and Mom’s baby-sitting subjects increased, other small children sat and sang with her in that swing and became part of the family.  Sometimes the swing got pretty crowded, but they always made room for one more.  She cooked lunch every day for all those children, worked in the garden, kept the house reasonably clean, yet seemed to have a lot of time for the porch swing.  To be fair, work took place there too – green beans to snap, corn to shuck, and peas to shell, with a pan for everyone.

So now I have moved back into my childhood home and I spend way too much time sitting in that old swing, now painted white, with the dogs at my feet and the breeze sweeping across the porch that extends almost the full width of this old farmhouse.  Early mornings, I watch the sun come up and the birds come to the feeders.  In the evening the owls and whippoorwills call and the sunset reflects orange and pink on the eastern sky.  At night I watch the stars sing, the fireflies flash, and the moon shed its cool light over the grass.  It’s a great place to watch a thunderstorm and listen to drum of rain on the tin roof.  And on summer evenings, I break my beans, shuck my corn and hum Swing Low, Sweet Cheerio as memories wash over me.  I still tell stories, dream dreams and think about past dreams that came true.

 I need to repaint the swing this summer.  I noticed a chip last week of the original color showing through.  I’m going to try to find some haint blue paint.  I think Nanny would be pleased.  Several of my mom’s “children” now have young children of their own.  Maybe I can teach some of them to break beans and shuck corn in that old porch swing.  We might even sing a verse or two of “Swing Low, Sweet Cheerio.”

 

Who Needs a Church?

This past year has been a strange one, in so many ways. Our little congregation didn’t have church for about 12 weeks, except online and on the local radio. It was an interesting time, going to church in my pajamas while eating breakfast, or catching the service during the mid afternoon.

 Listening to some people lament not being “allowed” to attend church, I couldn’t help feeling pity for such a limited vision of where one can meet God. I guess I just can’t understand how people think they can keep God in a box, or a building. I’ve visited with Him in many places and circumstances through the years, riding a horse along a country road, enjoying puppy kisses on a summer lawn, listening to the laughter of a child, gathering sun-kissed sheets from a clothes line, tasting the first sweetness of strawberries off the vine. And I can always find God through music, which plays almost continually in my house these days. (Who needs a sermon when you can listen to “Why Me, Lord?”) 

But on many mornings, I make my way down the steep and rocky hillside to my little piece of paradise, where wildflowers bloom and God reaches through the trees to take my hand. Some of my most special times take place on that hillside. In my peace of paradise, I know that heaven is not so far away. 

 

Who needs a church? 

The hill folds its arms around me

 Arching branches form an altar,

 And the breeze is a brush of angel wings.

 A mossy stone to sit on, dry leaves that cushion my steps.

 A loyal dog at my feet,

 And music in the air. 

A wood thrush sings a sermon 

The rushing stream plays a melody, 

While a choir of sparrows celebrates. 

The sun through the trees paints mosaics on the ground, 

And a sea of wildflowers lifts my heart. 

My heart is warmed, my soul sings 

In the golden hour, when the veil is thin 

That separates heaven from here.