And for that, I'm Truly Thankful

 So I never hopped on the “Thankful” bandwagon for the month of November, but over the course of the past few days, I feel that there are some aspects of my life for which I am truly thankful and they bear mentioning.

I’m truly thankful for dreams.  I’m thankful for the chance to have a special visit from someone I miss dearly – to have that chance to say what I didn’t in the past.  I’m thankful to have that chance to hear “I’m proud of you” once more and feel that hug I’ve longed to feel. 

I’m thankful for November nights that are reminiscent of a warm June night.  I’m thankful for the fragrances that are on the wind of those nights.  I’m thankful that those winds carry a faint hint of a familiar lotion and a cigarette from Granny’s spot on my porch. 

I’m thankful for the mundane things in my life like raking my own yard, hearing the katydids that fill my trees, the stars that hang overhead, and the promise that my yard will yield new life with spring.

I’m thankful for having a house that was and is a home.  I’m thankful for all the memories that are held in those four walls.  I’m thankful for having a home that is filled with stories begging to be told.  I’m thankful that my grandmother left me a final gift of finding my family history that I long to see but will never get to live.  I’m thankful for the promise that love can happen after forty and three kids, and that even though that marriage might have failed all those letters were worth saving - even if it means your nosy grandson did read them.  I’m thankful for seventy years of music hidden in a closet that it is worth saving, worth playing, and worth hearing again.

I’m thankful for having a life in which I can truly say I’m happy.  I’m happy to live where I do – a place where it is okay to spend all afternoon sitting on a porch if to only watch the cars go by, where friends send flowers to the deceased and food to the family, where strangers will wave to one another as they pass down a two lane road, where prayer is still encouraged and God is still loved, where white is only worn between Easter and Labor Day, and gossip is exchanged just as often as recipes and daylilies.  I’m thankful to be close to such a wonderful family – both in proximity and spirit, to have a life filled with friends that I love like family, to be able to look back and genuinely miss people because their impact on my life was so great, and to be able to look forward and say tomorrow is going to be just as good as yesterday. 

And for that, I’m truly thankful.

Warm Southern Days,

Russ

When you’ve come this far, might as well keep going

When you’ve come this far, might as well keep going

Hey ya’ll!

Sometimes in life there are stories that tell themselves – we are merely the conveyors of the words or a simple scribe to preserve them.  This is one of those stories; I was merely along for the ride.

I awoke to a balmy seventy degrees in Mobile this morning – a reminder that Fall in the South is a constant battle with the remnants of Summer.  I had decided last night that if I’ve gone this far, there is no way I’m going back home without going to the beach first.  And so I did – and the trip was totally worth it.  I chose Dauphin Island for a few reasons – proximity to where I was staying, it’s an island (which is awesome in itself), I’ve never been there, and the drive looked like more fun than actually getting there. 

I was right.

The drive led me along a parkway that was graced by breaking waves of the ocean on one side and khaki colored grass of a marshland on the other side.  Eventually, the land faded away and it was only ocean on both sides of the parkway. There is something to be said about being totally alone with only a cup of coffee, the new day’s sun, and the fragrance of the ocean in the air. 

Dauphin Island is truly a little gem where Southern Pines, oaks covered in Spanish moss, crepe myrtles, and palm trees all live together.  It is the perfect blend of everything I love in a vast plush green and just beyond that a body of blue that laps against the sand.  I drove the full length of the island and somehow found a station playing those old standards I love so much.  You know the kind – Ray Charles and Bobby Darwin - and for a few minutes I felt like that guy who plays the pilot on Pan Am driving with the top down (corny, but if you watch Pan Am you understand).

So now as I type this, I’m sitting at the University of South Alabama staring out a window at a lush palm tree.  And just behind that is a row of crepe myrtles – I’m going to have a tough time staying indoors this morning.

Warm Southern Days,

Russ

Sometimes the Detours are the Best Parts

Hey Ya'll!

So I’m fully aware that this post has absolutely nothing to do with remodeling my house, but since most of my postings are more about the simple pleasures in life than remodeling, I thought this followed the same theme. 

This week, I have the great pleasure of recruiting for the University (I like to consider this a perk rather than a requirement of my job).  I’m getting paid to drive my convertible across the state.  How awesome is that? I started my week long “Tour de Alabama” at 5:00 sharp this morning.  There was a crispness to the air that could only be part of the Fall in Alabama.  I decided a long time ago when planning this trip that I would take Highway 43 to Tuscaloosa, my first stop, instead of the interstate.  I know, I could have made better time, I could have driven faster, I could have saved gasoline…there are a lot of perks to taking the interstate – but one perk of taking a rural highway trumps the interstate every time – the personality.  My GPS disagreed whole heartedly and insisted I turn around at every available spot.  So we aren’t on speaking terms since I unplugged it and threw it in the glove box. 

As I traversed further south into the state, farms dotted the two lane highway with faded red barns, glistening silos, and steam covered ponds.  It is a weird and yet complacent feeling to watch the sun rise over the treetops of a mountain.  It’s also nearly impossible to find a convenient bathroom in a pinch – but one has the same problem on the interstate and I digress.  In trying to merge from Highway 74 back to Highway 13, I blew past the junction on into God’s Country (Lady Antebellum was blaring on the radio, don’t judge me).  I found a little half-gravel/half-asphalt road that led back to the highway – and the wrong turn was totally worth the detour.  It was a stellar countryside and an exemplary show of the wonders of Fall in the South.

I think the most profound part of my trip this morning was traveling through Phil Campbell and witnessing the scar over this little Southern town.  But that is exactly what it is, folks – a scar from a prevalent wound that is healing with time.  Ravaged houses still dot the landscape alongside wind twisted trees.  But adjacent to these houses are new dwellings with a light that penetrates the darkness – a reminder of the ingenuity and triumph that builds this South.  The wind ravaged trees are full of leaves again.  It’ll be a scar that stays with each of us forever – a subtle reminder of the awesome wonder of God.  But I’m not talking about the wound that caused the scar; I’m talking about the resilience, the persistence, and faith that has healed that bleeding wound to a scar.  I think it is something that can only be found in the South and understood by those people that give the South its distinct flavor.  Be proud of your neighbors, your heritage, and our success as Southerners.  I know I am.

Warm Southern Days,

Russ

Sometimes, the detours really are the best part.

A Final Gift

Hey Ya’ll!

This isn’t really an update on renovations, but more so a story about the joys of doing so.  Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been trying to decide what I want to do for flooring options (tile in the bathrooms, colors, styles…but mainly price [you all know I’m cheap]).  During the process of measuring the floors tonight, I did a little more cleaning out of my guest bathroom closet.  

After my grandmother had the house to herself, she moved out of the master bedroom into one of the kid’s vacant rooms and used the guest bathroom.  So all of her cosmetics and everyday items were stashed away in this closet.  Any normal person would simply take his or her arm and rake everything into a garbage bag.  Well, I’m not your normal person.  It’s simply amazing what a closet can hold.  It holds more than just stuff – it holds a lifetime of memories.  With each bottle of perfume and each tin of powder comes an overwhelming reminder of the way my grandmother smelled.  Each tube of lipstick and each shade of blush is a subtle hint of the full color of life that she lived.  I found two boxes of sheet music crammed in the bottom of the closet – hidden for the past twenty years.  I sat in the floor, my knees pulled against my chest, and I could hear her piano in the other room.  

But perhaps the greatest treasure I found was an old box of loose papers.  These are papers that wouldn’t mean a thing to anyone else but my grandmother.  It was a collection of history of her children.  I found handwriting lessons my aunt and uncle completed when they were in the first and second grades.  With each piece was my grandmother’s handwriting across the top telling the date and the little hand that wrote it.  I found handmade Christmas cards, pictures drawn by her children, and ribbons that were worn in my mother’s hair.  And then I found the note that spoke to my heart.  I found a note written by my mother when she was just fifteen years old.  It was folded four times and ‘To Daddy’ was written on the outside.  As I opened the crisped paper, it revealed a note in which my mother was begging her father – my grandfather – to let her go out with a boy.  What’s more to know is that she was interested in a boy before my dad.  As a youth involved so much in his own life (and typically fully believing that his parents’ lives revolve only around him), one tends to forget that his parents had a life before he existed.  But it spoke to me.  My mom has a history…she has loved and she has lost.  She was a teenager once who lived through puppy love, and had friends that could date when she couldn’t.  She lived a life – and a grand one.  She negotiated and begged – offering to get up on Saturday mornings to clean house and only watch T.V. when my grandfather told her she could – all in exchange for one date.  She closed by telling him she was older than he thought and she wasn’t so little anymore.  (I hope I don't embarrass my mother too much by telling this - it was too charming to me not to share).

I think this is one final gift from my grandmother – a chance to live a past I never got to see – a chance to see my family grow up; maybe not with my own eyes, but with pieces of their history.  There is a memory attached to everything, and each one is worth hearing and worth being told. They may not mean anything to anyone else, but they mean everything to me.  I guess the best part is I didn’t just buy a house, I bought a home.  

Warm Southern Days,

Russ

The Beginning of the Stories

Hey Ya’ll!

               

As I haven’t updated this since I’ve begun renovations, decided that it was past due time to update on the current progress of the house.  As of right now, there are no substantial changes that anyone would notice.  We’ve added a coat of primer to the hallway and a coat of primer to the master bedroom.  After cleaning out the closets in my master, I found twelve suitcases (three of which are pre-packed), two boxes of toys (one of which contained a creepy dummy head…that can’t stay in the same house as me, and since I’m paying the mortgage – it goes), seventy years of clothes, three bedding sets, and if I keep digging perhaps a partridge in a pear tree.  So right now I’m (along with the help of Mother) sorting through the overwhelming pile of 70 years of memorabilia that has been stashed away in these closets.  There is nothing hard about renovating a house when it comes down to the actual work – it is the details leading up to the work.  Each piece of clothing, each toy, each knick knack – they all have a story.  I’m so proud to hear them – to know they exist and the stories of the people that had them.  

So alas, that is the challenge I face. Moving past the stories. But they are worth hearing, and they are worth the additional time. 

I have, however, managed to begin the monotonous chore of pressure washing the driveway.  I have a feeling I’m going to drain Wilson Lake dry in the process.  I also found out it is indeed a good idea to move one’s foot from the path of the pressure washing, but I digress. 

My other task at hand is removing all the unwelcome non-rent paying tenants from the house.  I’ve got a family of furry little friends living somewhere in my basement.  I caught one of the baby boys with a plunger and a plastic bag.  Dad took the liberty of sending it on to glory.  Mice typically don’t bother me that much – spiders are where I take issue.  So when I saw the black spider the size of my head crawl down the louver door of the closet I was cleaning only to dart across my shoes and under the door into the abyss of the closet did I decide to take action.  I calmly shut the closet door, walked to the kitchen, phoned Terminix, and told them I want their “Kill Everything that Moves in My House” plan.  So for a nominal fee of $162.50, they are going to spray my house, yard, granulate my yard, remove all spider webs, cobwebs, wasp nests, and bees nests from the premises.  After that, they will service the house every quarter for $82.50.  Now, I’m sure some of you are thinking this is a price to be bargained.  Well, I would have given them $1,000 if they can get rid of the spiders and the mice. I’ll gladly pay the quarterly fee in return of having a house where I am the only occupant. 

Now, if I can only catch that God-forsaken armadillo that relentlessly digs in my yard.  However, all good things must come to an end. His time is drawing near...I have no shame in sitting on my front porch wielding a shotgun and having a go with this creature of the night. But that rendezvous is for another story. 

 

Warm Southern Days,

Russ

Irises circling my driveway during this Spring