Irene & Tex (Part 1?)

Sometime last month, Tex arrived on our porch talking about “this writer, Irene Latham” who visited his school to talk about books.  I couldn’t contain my excitement as I exclaimed that Irene was a friend of mine and that I loved her books more than just about anything!  Tex was grinning and telling me that he knew all about Leaving Gee’s Bend and Don’t Feed the Boy, and was just overflowing with the pride of him knowing me, and me knowing a famous author like Irene, and all of us knowing each other.  Why, he was just pacing the porch with all that pride.  And then, when I asked him which of Irene’s books did he think he would like to read most, he bashfully told me that he’d really like to have Leaving Gee’s Bend, but that he didn’t have the money to get a copy of it.

The very next day, I emailed Irene, who set about making sure that Tex received a copy of Leaving Gee’s Bend with a personal inscription from her to him (Irene has known about Tex for some time, basically since his “one way mirror suit” comments from last summer).

So, after a hand-delivery of the book by Irene to a mutual friend, and then a hand-delivery of said book to me by said mutual friend, I was able to give the gift to Tex a couple of nights ago.  He was beside himself when I handed him the book-shaped package marked TEX, the package that I told him was from Irene.  And rocking from one foot to the other with excitement, he proceeded to try to cut open the wrapping with a knife.  I stopped him as gently as I could and offered to open it for him, lest he cut the book jacket or himself in his glee.   Once unwrapped and in his hands, the book was turned over and over as if he couldn’t believe that Irene had sent him, HIM, a book.  And when he opened the book up to the title page where Irene had penned a personal message to him, he just about lost his Kool Aid.

“But how did she know my real name?!?”  My response was, “Well, I told her your real name.”  Then he laid himself down on our chaise lounge (the one he always acts like he owns) and proceeded to read silently from Leaving Gee’s Bend.  And when he finally decided to get up and go play with the other kids swarming around the neighborhood, he started to take the book with him.  Again, I gently stopped him and suggested that he leave his book on our porch while he played, because the kind of playing he does is probably not good for books.  So, he put the book gently down on the piano bench which serves as our porch table and asked if it was okay that he left it there for awhile.  Of course it was okay.

Tex ran off to play, looking back over his shoulder to make sure the book was still there.  Five minutes later I spied out the window to see that the book and Tex were gone.  I think his mind was too crowded with thoughts of Leaving Gee’s Bend for him to concentrate properly on playing that night.

I'm sure this story is to be continued...

Flat Stanley & Flat Paige at Noccalula Falls, Gadsden, AL

My cousin Michael, whom I've not seen in about nine or ten years, is coming through Gadsden with his family this weekend.  I have not met his family before, and am very much looking forward to this visit.

Now, Michael's youngest daughter Alyssa has been assigned a Flat Stanley project at school, and we were lucky enough to get to help her with her project.  About a week ago, my parents received an envelope at their house with not only Flat Stanley, but his female traveling companion Flat Paige.  I picked the Flat kids up and took them home with me, planning an excursion that, when Alyssa reported back to her school mates, would appeal to both girls and boys.

Here is an account of that excursion:

Flat Stanley & Flat Paige at Noccalula Falls, Gadsden, AL

Although it was cold and rainy, Stanley and Paige decided to visit the beautiful Noccalula Falls Park, located in Gadsden, AL.  They played on the playground (and got very wet!), fed the ducks at the foot bridge (they sure were hungry!), walked through the botanical gardens (which are coming into bloom from the warm spring weather the days before our visit!), and stopped at the statue of Noccalula.

Noccalula Falls Park takes its name from the local legend of the Cherokee Indian maiden Noccalula, who, when commanded by her father to marry an Indian warrior from a neighboring tribe whom she didn’t love, chose to jump from the Falls to her death on the day of her wedding. A statue of the beautiful maiden Noccalula was erected in the late 1960s in her honor.  The bronze used for the 9 foot-tall statue reportedly came from pennies donated by local children. 

The park itself is rather large, comprised of 250 acres of wooded area, campgrounds, and walking trails.  For a fee of $4 per child, $6 per adult, visitors may  enter the park proper which will allow access to many attractions such as a petting zoo, a pioneer village, the gorge trail (which takes visitors down to the bottom of the falls), and a covered bridge.  Visitors may also hop on the replica train to see the park from a different perspective!  And if you enjoy overnight trips, for an additional cost you may stay the night at Noccalula Falls in one of their beautiful cabins, or at their campsite!

For extreme sports fans:  In November of 2011, three kayakers took on the rain-swollen waters of the Black Creek and managed the monstrous 90-foot descent in their kayaks.  All three kayakers survived the drop.  As far as we know, it was the first time ever that a kayaker successfully made the descent.   A videographer captured everything on camera.  Police were waiting for the three drenched athletes when they arrived back at their vehicles.  Luckily, no one was arrested, but only because there were no signs posted at the park prohibiting kayaking over the Falls.  Since this incident, the City of Gadsden has passed an ordinance against such activities.

Resources:

The legend of Princess Noccalula.

About the statue of Noccalula.

Article about (watch out for the swear word!) and video footage of kayakers at Noccalula Falls.

Some general information about Noccalula Falls, should you ever want to visit (hours and seasons).

As ill luck would have it, the day that Eric and I took Flat Stanley and Flat Paige to Noccalula Falls (just yesterday) proved to be pretty dreary with rain and wind.  Not spring-like at all.  While posing at the statue of Noccalula, the wind and spray from the falls was so intense, it almost whipped my constructed friends from my hands.  Luckily, I was able to keep a hold on Stanley and Paige, who came dangerously close to meeting the same fate as the Indian maiden...

After our photo shoot, we put Stanley and Paige to rest in their traveling envelope and went across the street from the Falls to warm up and dine at one of our favorite restaurants, Kati Thai. Kati Thai is one of the few restaurants in town that is relatively safe for an individual like me, with lots of choices that are naturally free of gluten.  From my Thai dining experience in cities such as NY, Denver, and elsewhere, it holds its own with authentic Thai cuisine.  Eric and I shared an order of Thai Basil Rolls and then each had a plate of the Drunken Noodles. 

Day Care

When I first walked up to the day care, I noticed a large black pickup truck in the pull-through with an older gentleman opening up the passenger door of his truck to, presumably, remove a child from a car seat for drop-off.  From inside the truck came the voice of a child, chattering at his adult handler.  I assumed by the later hour (8:30AM) and the lack of other cars that they were probably late for normal drop-off.   I walked past them on my way into the building to drop off a bag of easy reader books and some information about our upcoming Summer Reading Program.  I stayed inside for a bit, talking with the director of the facility, then headed back to my car. 

Through the windows of the building, I could see the black pickup truck still parked in the bend of the pull-through, the old man gently but firmly holding the hand of a disheveled, crying toddler.  And when I opened the door to walk out, I could hear the sobbing and hiccupping words of the child as he bargained with his adult, “But. I. Don’t. Really. Want. To. Go. In. There…  I. Think. I’ll.  Stay.  Home.  Today…”

That poor sweet child looked as if he had cried himself slick, what with all the snot and tears running down his front.  And the old man was bargaining back as best he could with, “Now, you know you’re going to have a good time when you get in there…and, well, now don’t you try to run away from me like that…” 

I pitied both of them, ‘cause I feel certain that the old man felt just as bad as the child about the whole situation.  So I just put my head down and kept walking, minding my own business.  I don’t know what I would’ve done had I looked back, but I’m pretty sure it would have involved me tossing the keys to my car to the child so that he could make a clean get away…

A Civil Rights field trip.

The backdrop was an over-cast Sunday afternoon last month.  The place was the BirminghamCivil Rights Institute.  Eric and I had been talking about going for months.  We finally made the trip.  It was sobering and set our minds to thinking about a lot of things:  progress, regress, silence, noise, action, inaction.

We arrived about ten minutes before the Institute opened, so we walked into adjacent Kelly Ingram Park.  Almost immediately a man approached us and began talking to us about the history of the park, about 16^th Street Baptist Church and about the Institute.  He wanted us to know the true history of district, the history that we might not hear about in the Institute.  We walked the Freedom Walk with him around the park to the sculptures:  a demonstrator thrown back by the attack of a policeman and his dog, vicious metal hounds rising from steel to tear at desegregation, replicas of high power water hoses that attempted to force back those fighting for equality, three ministers kneeling together in limestone prayer.  And beyond that, a business district clearly still struggling economically, holding on because of the historical significance of what happened along those streets almost fifty years ago.

Our guide, a man who grew up in the neighborhood during the Civil Rights Movement but currently homeless and living in a shelter with his thirteen-year-old daughter, led us out of the park and into the Civil Rights District to show us the Carver Theatre (historic Black African American theatre), the Civil Rights Activist Committee Headquarters, the Eddie Kendrick Memorial Park (Mr. Kendrick of the famous Temptations singing group) and eventually the 16^th Street Baptist Church.  We heard stories of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., of the Children’s March, of Bull Connor with his tactics, and of the bombing of 16^th Street Baptist Church, which killed four young girls.  The daily boycotts, demonstrations, struggles.

The Civil Rights Movement was something that I learned about early in my public education in Alabama, so it is something that has been a part of my consciousness since I was a youngster.  It wasn’t until I was older, maybe a senior in high school and then a student in college that I really began to see the extent and the frightening brutality of racial hatred in my home state.  I discovered that the 1961Freedom Riders whose bus was firebombed in near-by Anniston, AL, were beaten by Klan members after they managed to escape being burned to death only because providentially the mob was unable to hold the doors of the bus closed.   It was then that I also read about how in 1963, Birmingham’s commissioner of public safety Theophilis Eugene Conner, known to all as Bull Connor, turned high-powered water hoses and dogs on crowds of men, women and children to dissuade them from their peaceful demonstrations.  That Birmingham was known as Bombingham and that a section of town was so war-torn with violence during the 50s and 60s it was referred to as Dynamite Hill.  That justice for the deaths of Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson and Denise McNair, the four little girls killed in the 1963 16^th Street Church bombing, took decades to be dealt (Chambliss was convicted in 1977, Blanton in 2001, and most recently, Cherry in 2002).  

Later I would learn of even more localized hatred in the form of incidents here in Etowah County (in some cases, just blocks from where we live and work), the 1906 lynching from the railroad bridge of Bunk Richardson (a black man wrongfully associated with the rape and murder of a white woman), the 1960 firebombing of Temple Beth Israel by Jerry Hunt (who also shot two fleeing congregants, Alan Cohn and Alvin Lowi), the 1963 shooting death in Attalla of Baltimore postman William Lewis Moore who was walking from Maryland to Jackson, MS to deliver a letter of desegregation  to Governor Ross Barnett.   These things.  Here.  In our community, and not so long ago.  

16th Street Baptist Church

16th Street Baptist Church

 

Religion & Dietary Restrictions

On Christmas Eve, Eric and I attended services at his church, First United Methodist.  The sermon was a touching story that brought tears to my eyes (all I can say is that the story involved an orphan child and his homemade nativity, which happened to have two babies in the manger instead of one…because he didn’t have a gift to give the Baby Jesus, so he thought that maybe it was okay for him and Baby Jesus to be together in that manger so he could keep Baby Jesus warm).  It was perfect.  Until we went up for communion.

Now, I’m a religious free-agent.  I was raised Southern Baptist as a child, adopted the Episcopal church as an adult because of personal and spiritual beliefs, but currently attend the local Methodist church with my partner because of their community-giving tenets aligning with mine.  So, by virtue of my Episcopal and Methodist leanings, I’ve taken communion many times.  And communion has come to mean a lot to me as it is one of the most intimate and beautiful and holy things that a congregation, that any group of people, can do together, whether it is at a church alter or at the dinner table.  I love communion.  And still do, despite what happened on Christmas Eve…

Everything started off as it normally would during communion, the walk down the isle, the taking of our places along the prayer bench.  Palms up to receive the Host, which is smallish square pillow of a cracker.  As the body of Christ was blessed and placed in my palm, I realized that I had not received communion since my gluten allergy diagnosis, therefore I had not thought about the digestive consequences of ingesting a non-gluten-free Host. 

Instead of all the prayers I had planned on praying, other thoughts began racing through my mind as I placed the Host on my tongue.  I had not consumed any gluten in the past two years other than that from cross contamination.  What was going to happen?  It could be bad, and I could be sick for the next three days.  Surely God would protect my digestive tract from the inevitable GI distress and the full-body rash…it was the body of Christ, after all!  I thought of faking a cough and palming/pocketing the Host, but not remembering what level of sin that might be, I decided it would be best to take my chances…And while I ticked through these panicky thoughts, I accidentally swallowed the Host whole.  And on Its way down my esophagus, It turned sideways.  And lodged there.

I won’t go into the uninteresting details of me trying to work the Host down my throat as silently as possible so as to not disrupt the service (picture large heartworm pill and dog).  Nor will I go into detail about the itchy thick feeling that quickly developed in my throat, an allergic reaction to the gluten.  And I won’t bore you with details of the painful squeezing of my esophageal muscles as they automatically worked the Host down on its righteous pathway to nourish my body and soul and how Eric thought he might have to cart me out of the service before we shared the flame of the Christ candle…

My alternate title for this post was Choking on Jesus, but I thought that too irreverent and/or blasphemous.  I have faith that with God knowing what is in my heart, he knew that I meant no offense when I thought and wrote those words just now.

New Year's Eve 2012

2012 was a good year.  Yes, sadly, there were losses (some I've blogged about, others, I've not yet found the words to blog about.  Maybe one day.).  But it was a beautiful year for figuring out what is important (mostly people and the simple things) and to begin New Year's resolutions early (again, pertaining to people and simple things).

Eric and I closed things out on New Year's Eve with a gathering of friends.  The Bungalow is small, and parking is never easy on our street, so the number of folks we can comfortably accommodate is limited.  Those who came were brave merry souls...

NYE 2012 at The Bungalow.  With permission, by Laura Catoe.

What may be my favorite photo of the evening is the one below, again by Laura Catoe.  I am wearing a vintage set of jewelry given to me last year by my mother.  The earrings and necklace were hers when she was a girl.  The painting is of her as a teenager.  She is wearing the necklace in the portrait.  I love the jewelry.  But more importantly, I love my mom.  I was more than happy to pose for this shot.  I may have even been giggling when Laura snapped it...