Golden Tinsel

Hey y’all,

Somehow this letter (I hate the term blog – it feels so technical – I feel like these are more a personal series of letters to each of you instead of communicating en masse) feels like it should be the close of a book, or at a minimum, a chapter. I suppose it in a way it may be. In that result, it is just a precursor to a new chapter or even a new book in a series.

Four nights ago, I nailed the final piece of trim in place in my house – well, now my home. It wasn’t some monumental occasion – it was a simple piece of trim on one of the beams in my living room. The trim snapped in place, the nails went in just like all the others, and it blended perfectly with the rest of the stained wood. But somehow, it was different. There was nothing left to nail. Nothing left to glue, to paint, to sand, to stain…to anything.

Almost two years to the day later, it was complete. Don’t get me wrong, there is still a punch list of tiny things to do. Clean the house from top to bottom (I’ll more than likely be adding a line item to my budget for “help” in the near future), landscaping, and polishing all the furniture. But essentially, the project in which I’ve been totally engulfed for the past two years was finished. I stood in my kitchen, hammer in hand, searching – yearning – for something else to nail, to paint, to glue, to sand, to stain…to anything. But found nothing. Suddenly, I found myself asking what next? And I’m still trying to figure that one out.

But I told you that story to tell you this story. I began cleaning my house shortly thereafter. Boxing up all of Dad’s tools, moving paint buckets into storage, and vacuuming up the three inches of dirt and sawdust that coated everything. In the process of cleaning my hearth, something shiny caught my eye - a single strand of golden tinsel – a tiny reminder from a Christmas that occurred at least four years ago hidden beneath a firewood rack. Through all the chaos, debris, and demolition, it stayed. I sat on the edge of the hearth and ran it through my fingertips.

And I cried like a damned fool.

Every Christmas in that room came flooding back. From the old C7 lights and homemade ornaments on the tree, to the green carpet, to the smell of the pecan pies in the kitchen, to the laughter of my family and my grandmother’s smile – all of it. Each year, it was my job each year to help my grandmother drape that golden tinsel across the fireplace. I miss it. But it was yet another subtle reminder – a reminder as to why I ever began this endeavor. As much as some of the memories sting, they are still mine. And the sting is shortly followed by an overwhelming warmth, and the reminder that this house isn’t just a house, it is and was and forevermore will be a home to my family and me.

Two years ago when I started this writing I had this grandiose idea that I would tell all about remodeling and the perils within, how to stretch a dollar, and repurpose as many things as possible and somehow get this massive list of followers (and perhaps a spread in Southern Living – which is still a goal but now with a different story, but I digress). Ha! Foolishness. No, this turned out to be a written documentary of my family history – and if I had to do it all over again, I wouldn’t change a bit. Watching my family grow up – holding their history in my hands – with all the pieces my grandmother left behind is worth more than any extravagant list of followers one could gain. Finding just a quarter of the many precious pieces I have would have made the journey worthwhile.

It’s been nothing less than an epic journey. I (along with my family) have spent many drops of tears, sweat, and blood on this house. And somehow, through it all, I feel like my grandmother has been right there guiding me every step of the way. I hope she’s smiling. I hope she likes it. I did this as much – if not more – for her as me.

So I want to say thank you – thank you for taking this journey with me. And to those of you who have contributed to seeing this house be a home – from the bottom of my heart, thank you. A lifelong goal of mine was to have a house furnished solely with antiques. Never in my wildest imagination would I have dreamt it would be with family heirlooms. From photographs to my maternal grandmother’s Christmas china to my paternal grandmother’s dining suite – every piece tells a story – a story of my family of and of my history. I’ve held a lot of titles, but none bring such high esteem and honor as being considered the “Curator of My Family History.” And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Warm Southern Days,
Russ

It Goes On

Hey Y’all, 

I’ve always considered myself a lucky man.  However, in recent times I’ve found out nothing could be further from the truth.  Luck is a misnomer in every sense of the word.  It implies coincidence. It implies chance.  It implies that I have somehow managed to manipulate my own fate.  

No, I’m not a lucky man – I’m a blessed man.  I think back to every single door God has slammed in my face leading to where I am today – what a fool! To think that is what I wanted instead of where I am today.  Idiocy.   And there are so many blessings around me.  My precious family, my home, my career and those that make it worthwhile, and my friends – my dear, precious friends - they are my blessings. 

One of my best friends asked to be a guest writer for my blog.  I had no idea what she planned to say – all I knew was deep honor and humility that she asked to do such.  Jessica has seen me through more than a body has a right.  She has seen me at my best, and she has seen me at my worst.  She listened to me ramble for two hours straight as I told the story of a Southern Widow who had everything but lost her family in the process.  And after much encouragement and being my editor-in-chief, she was my driving force behind writing my first book. She knows how much I love to write – evident in how I tend to be a little (or a lot) wordy and get lost in details.  She asked me to take her words and proof them  - fine tune them, if you will. I read her words. I cried over them.  Sometimes the best stories are in their purest form – unadulterated and straight from the heart: 

“One of my best friends is remodeling his house. It was his grandmother’s house and the place where his mother was raised. His grandmother and grandfather built the house and filled it with three kids and lots of memories.....and never threw anything away! Since the death of his grandmother and his acquisition of the house my friend has spent a lot of time going through all the memories and documenting the process of remodeling it on a blog and Facebook. He has focused on the memories he found tucked away in closets and what those walls have seen. Russ has an affinity for personifying this house, breathing life into its walls, and bringing all the memories that have been made there come to the forefront. I must say, however, that he has overlooked a big part of this house’s personality over the last two years. He has focused on the past, on the memories of days gone by, and in the process he has (we have) made a few memories of our own. As his remodeling process comes to an end, I can’t help but look back over all that has already happened in his house before he has even spent one night there. 

From day one I have had an open invitation at this house. I have seen it from its pristine, timeless beginning to it’s gutted hollow mess, and now I’m seeing him fill it back up again. I’ve spent many nights over there watching him work and talking. I’ve also gone through every closet, drawer, and cabinet (even the ones in the basement). I’ve tried on every prom dress I could find. It was sooo much fun to play dress up like a life-sized Barbie. I’ve also cried in 6 of the 10 rooms upstairs, we have had deeep discussions in every room except 2, and we have spent several evenings enjoying the wonderful front porch. This house has been a huge remodeling project for Russ. He has spent more money and time than I am willing to calculate changing the inside of this house and in the process it has changed us. It has been a place for us to go where prying parents can’t hear our rants and raves. It was where I felt safe when a boy broke my heart. It has been the project that kept Russ’s sanity when he felt he was gonna lose it. I think we have worked out the problems of the world between those walls if people would just listen to us! As his remodeling process comes to an end, I can’t help but look back over all that has already happened in his house before he has even spent one night there. I can’t even guess what the next few years will bring and what memories will be made when he starts having real guests!!”

Jessica, I can't tell you what these words mean to me - there simply aren't enough words in the English language.  I'll treasure them always. 

Seven years ago (God, does that leave a bitter taste in my mouth) I wrote a note on Facebook about a funeral.  It was funeral for my parents’ best friend’s mother.  It had been a number of years since my parents’ had seen their nearest and dearest friends.  I remember seeing my mother hug this woman – this woman she had shared her secrets with - intimate parts of her life which I’ll never understand and a past that began long before I was ever thought about.  And for a brief moment, I saw the twenty-something girl inside my mother and the twenty-something boy inside my father surface in their eyes.  They were with friends again.  

At a funeral. 

Frankly, it scared the hell out of me.  I was next in line for this.  I was next in line for college degrees and relationships and weddings and children and funerals.  And through all of that, life would progress.  Friends would be made.  Friends would be lost. Would I only see my best friends because of a funeral?  Seven years ago, I had five best friends: Jessica, Julia, Courtney, Josh, and Tara. Seven years later, with college degrees earned and relationships made and relationships lost and weddings and children and houses and cars and moves - I still have five best friends holding my hands: Jessica, Julia, Courtney, Josh, and Tara.  I’ve never been one to keep my emotions hidden.  When I’m happy, it is jubilation.  When I’m anything but, it is written all over my face like a flashing neon sign.  And these five people have seen me through every bit of it.  I’m not sure how or why I have each of you in my life, but you are my family.  And I would be remiss if I didn’t say I love each of you dearly. 

I’m reminded of Robert Frost and his philosophy: “I can sum up life in three words – it goes on.” 

Yes, Mr. Frost, it does.  It certainly does. But it sure is a lot better when you have friends that are more like family than anything else.  Thank you for helping me make my house a home.  And thank you for making this a life that isn’t just another walk down the road, but a path that has made all the difference. 

Lucky? No.  Blessed?  Absolutely. 

Warm Southern Days,
Russ

Four Paneled Walls

Hey Y'all,

My intentions were never to actually paint the paneling in my kitchen.  My original idea was to tear it out and replace it with drywall.  But then several things happened.  Time happened.  Money (or lack thereof) happened. Life happened.  I could rip out the paneling in my kitchen and replace it with drywall for roughly five hundred dollars and two to three weeks’ worth of work.  Or, for fifty bucks, I could buy a few gallons of primer, some paint, and a little caulk and spend three or four nights working and it would be done. 

Obviously I’m cheap and I want to live in this house before I retire – so the latter won.

But something more than that happened.  Any of you who may have read any of my postings in the past understand that renovating my grandmother’s house hasn’t been just slapping up some paint and laying down fresh flooring.  This is so much more than that.  It has been a journey through my past and through my family’s past.  So why should this be any different?

I stood in my kitchen with a crowbar in one hand and a hammer in the other ready to rip out this paneling.  The longer I stood there, the more I stared at it.  And I realized it would be like killing a member of my own family. I thought about everything these four walls have seen. 

You see, my grandmother’s kitchen wasn’t just a kitchen – it was her living room.  Like any true Southern family, my grandmother’s kitchen wasn’t where we simply cooked.  No, it was where life happened.  It was where we laughed over countless jokes, hugged family members that were passing through, and cried over more than chopped onions.  It was where there was enough space on the counter to set a couple of grandchildren and still have room to make peanut brittle or a pecan pie.  It was where eighty people gathered to hear my Uncle Drew pray over a meal big enough to feed a third world country each Fourth of July.

And I want to talk to these walls.  I want to ask them so many questions – what they’ve seen, what they’ve felt, what they’ve heard, and who they’ve loved.  What was it like when my grandfather hammered you to the bones of this house? What was it like when my grandparents moved inside with their three children?

And I want to ask them did you smile when my grandmother played her piano? Did you wrinkle your nose at the smell of the perm kits in her beauty shop? Did you cry at her loneliness when two husbands walked out on her? Did you smile when my grandmother’s first grandchild was brought in her kitchen? Did you smile when we came to play in her floor? Do you recall her jokes, her wisdom, and the countless stories told by so many family members from days gone by?  Did you scream out in agony like the rest of us when your owner passed from this life to the next?

No. You did none of these.  But you were there.  For her.  For all of us.  You were there for comfort when she had no one else. You were there to provide comfort and shelter and refuge for five grandchildren. You were there when my parents were told their marriage would never last.  And you were there to welcome their family at their 25^th anniversary celebration. You were there for all those Christmas breakfasts, Fourth of Julys, and birthdays.  You were there to hold in the aroma of toasted pecans baking in a pie. You were there to wrap around us when the world felt like it was falling apart.  And when the end was near and my grandmother asked my mother to take her home – you were there.

And you were there when I needed you most.  You were there when I needed a place to rest my back.  You were there when I needed to slam my fist against something instead of someone when I asked why to a question for which I already knew the answer.  You were there to remind me that life is just a short glimpse of time’s progression. 

And I want to thank these four paneled walls.  I want to thank them for always providing a place of refuge – for providing a place of comfort when I felt like there was no other place in the world where I was welcome.  I want to thank them for standing firm for these past forty years – for loving my family and me and providing shelter to us.  I want to thank them for the warmth and the laughter and the support. 

These people that say a house is just four walls with some paint and carpet – I don’t believe them.  A house is so much more.  It is a person’s roots.  It may not breathe and feel and live the same way we do, but it is alive.  It is alive with thousands of memories and warmth and love that only a home can provide.

And someday, if I find someone who takes leap of all senses and foolishly agrees to marry me, I hope that one day these walls will see me through my own children and grandchildren.  I hope they see me through heartache and laughter and joy and sadness. I look forward to eighty years of Christmases and birthdays and Fourth of Julys with these four paneled walls. I look forward to this very small glimpse of time’s progression that I get to share with these walls.

I hope that they’ll be filled with light and laughter and love just like all the years that have passed.  I hope that my family and my friends will feel more welcome here than anywhere else on earth.   And I hope someday they are once more filled with the aroma of toasted pecans in a pie with grandchildren sitting on the countertops and aluminum foil stretched out ready for peanut brittle.  And I hope that somehow I’ll be reminded my grandmother is here – just like these four paneled walls.  

Warm Southern Days,

Russ

My four paneled walls before a coat of primer

After a coat of primer and ready to paint

A Sacred Place

Hey Y’all,

This note has been a bit tougher for me to find the words to compose.  I’m not sure why I’ve waited so long to write this, but finding the words has truly been a challenge. 

I have little gnomes living in my house.  They take the following things and hide them in the night: my hammer, my pliers, my paint lid opener, and my knife.  I hate them.

So it all started with a quest to find a pair of needle nose pliers.  

I’m not sure how such a simple task can make a grown man cry, but it did.  You see, there is one room in my house I haven’t touched yet.  I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.  And yet, it is the room I want to demolish in its entirety.  Not because it holds bad memories – no, just the contrary, some of my happiest memories were made in that room – but because it just doesn’t work for me. 

It was my grandmother’s music room.  It was a small white room sandwiched between her kitchen and formal living room closed off by two white French doors and lighted with a magnificent crystal chandelier.  All my life it held her organ, piano, and a small wicker desk. The organ has been long gone, bequeathed to my uncle – but the piano remains, promised to my mother.  And since she doesn’t have room in her house for it (yet anyway) I get it. 

And I’m so lucky I do.  You see, this piano is the only inkling of any type of musical instrument that I can play.  And at that, and after two years of lessons, I’m still horrible at it.  Maybe it was because I didn’t practice enough.  Maybe it was because these fat fingers are incapable of learning such a gift.  Maybe it was because I could never compare to my grandmother.  It is indescribable what a divine melody was created by that piano when my grandmother sat down at its keys.  I remember occasionally walking to her house and finding myself lucky enough to be a secret guest to a concert for only her and God to hear.  I could never bring myself to ring the doorbell when she was playing…only stop and listen. 

And I miss them.  God, do I miss those days. That piano deserves to have life again.  It deserves to be played only the way she could.  I hope one day that I can.  That somewhere I can find the strength and the courage to take up lessons again.  I’ll always regret she wasn’t the one to give me that gift – but she started me on that path.  And I did learn much of it from her. 

I told you that story to tell you this story.  On top of her piano was a stack of cards roughly a foot to a foot and a half in height that she never got around to putting away (she kept every card she ever got…a gift and a feat in itself).  They were all cards sent to her when she found out she had cancer.  Get well cards, thinking of you cards, birthday cards.  Cards that she didn’t put away because she either never found the time or simply didn’t want to.  Often times, she would read those cards when she was feeling rather low.   These cards have been untouched since she died.  I’ve owned her house for almost two years and it is the first time I’ve really looked at them.  I don’t know why.  Maybe it is because part of that house was still hers and sacred to me. So I sat and I read them. 

All of them. 

I read them all through blurred eyes and a God awful ugly cry.  Cards from my church family, cards from ladies I had never met, cards from family.  Cards from people that knew and loved my grandmother as much as I did and still do.  I want to thank each person who wrote those cards – hug them and let them know they mean as much to this grandson as it did the recipient of those cards.  But the gut wrenching part is I can’t thank all of them. Aunt Thelma – you were my grandmother when I lost mine, Mrs. Stockard – you treated me like one of your own when I saw you every Sunday – I can’t thank them anymore.  And that tears at my soul. I hope they know how much they meant to my grandmother – and I hope they know how much they mean to me.  But the ladies that I know and I can still see – expect a bear hug from me and expect it soon. 

The cards have been packed away, the piano has been moved, the chandelier taken down, and the walls ripped out.  But my memories of that tiny room remain.  And take heart, the piano will be a focal point in my living room, the chandelier proudly lighting my dining table, and I’ll cherish those cards for the rest of my days.

And I still haven’t found my pliers.

Warm Southern Days,

Russ

Dallas: an In-Depth Review Mid-Season of the Best Prime-Time Soap and Also Still the Reason Why I Wish My Last Name was Ewing

Hey Y’all!

Again, this has nothing to do with my house, but it is my blog so I’ll post what I want. Yay me! Anyhoo, I felt it was due time for another recap of Dallas mid-season.  And I do dare say last night was quite a doozy (oh and just for future reference, that statement comes from the 1929 Duesenberg Model J car.  $29,000 of 1929 money [$1.2 million today] got you a chassis and an engine.  Then the car went to the carriage builder of your choice where it was custom built to owner specifications.  No two of these cars are the same and therefore the birth of the phrase “it’s a doozy.” It’s my blog and I’ll post random crap if I want to.).

So congratulations TNT!  It still doesn’t suck!  I’m so impressed! You have stuck with the original music, the story lines are intriguing and actually have substance, and the characters are genuine (except Christopher…more on that later).  Now then, lets break down each of the characters.  

Let us begin with the easiest – John Ross.  You are quite a gem, good sir.  And an idiot. I mean seriously? You had to ask the question what does a deed to mineral rights mean? You are in the oil business.  I knew what that meant when your whiny baby of a cousin Christopher (I’ll plunge into that later) handed it to you.  But I still do think you are best friend material.  If nothing else, you know how to have a good time and have some delightful cars (I’m particularly partial to that black Corvette) and spending cash to boot. I don’t get your fascination with Elena other than the fact she is Genius Level 102 and you need someone like that.  God knows you are Moron Level -12 and aren’t improving with each episode.  But I still cheer for you. Oh and by the way, sucks for you they are going to pin Marta del Sol’s murder on you.  Cause you ain’t gonna make it in prison.  I’ll refrain from quoting Deliverance here and let you draw your own conclusions. 

Christopher oh Christopher, you still suck. I mean seriously, what were trying to do last night? Cry? Because you failed.  I spent more time screaming at the TV “for the love of God and all things holy if you are going to cry just do it!” Every time someone dropped a bombshell on you all I could think was dear God here come the pouty lips.  I swear I thought you were trying to perfect the teen girl Facebook photo. Quit it.  I want to like you Jesse Metcalfe, really I do.  I don’t know if it is the writing, the fact your character is a three year old in a thirty year old body, or you just suck as an actor. But you suck...I have no better word for it. And for the love of all things holy do we have to bring up the my-mommy-couldn’t-have-babies-so-daddy-bought-me-and-I’ll-never-be-a-Ewing-ever-oh-woe-is-me! in every freaking episode? 

Let. It. Go.

It really makes me want to punch you in the face.  Really, it does.  And the sad part of that is it seems you have much more time to dedicate to the gym than I do (actually if anyone spends more than five minutes in the gym, then that is five minutes longer than I do…I think a gym is hell on Earth) and for that reason I’m pretty sure you could kick my butt. I don’t like to think that a whiner like you could take me, but I know a fact when I see it.  If Rebecca had a brain in her skull she would dump your tail and find someone who has a pair. 

Bobby – your wife is a delightful person and a wonderful character…but she a fruit basket full of nuts. Girl got some psycho issues.  And I think you would be wise to get that checked out.  No one wants to wake up in the middle of the night with his wife standing over him with a butcher knife or a few gallons of gasoline while singing Hotel California and waving a lighter in the air. I truly feel life is going to suck a lot more for you before it gets better. 

J.R. – you’re still my hero. 

Sue Ellen – I still want to marry you. Call me maybe? 

Christopher – you suck. 

Warm Southern Days,

Russ