Alabama Walking

With a cup of coffee under belt and a faint light on the eastern sky, my Dad and I would begin our walks in Uriah, Alabama. My visits home are always marked with this occasion.
In the winter, we would be bundled against the cold and the pace a little quicker. In summer, with a slower pace and bug spray smeared on all exposed skin between our necks and ankles, we would soon be solving the problems of the world.
Parking in front of the Old Blacksher house and heading south, our trek would begin with a silence as we woke up to the day. Going past the small part of town which was as close to urbanized as the town would come, our strides would fall in cadence with each other and by the time we have passed the baseball field and high school, our conversations would begin. We would start to lament about politicians, wondering “how in Sam Hill educated people could make the decisions they do” regarding our national policies. His stout Republican ideals and my more liberal views would always take us to opposing opinions and another side of an issue to be considered and discussed.
In short time our steps would be crunching on the gravel road running behind the Garrett property. It is a ten acre parcel of land with a huge white antebellum home sitting right in the middle. It is a beautiful old house that although having long since lost its luster, still clings proudly to the dignity it once had. On most summer mornings, Ben House would be picking beans or peas, cutting okra or gathering tomatoes in his roadside garden all the while swatting gnats and sweating from the viscous humidity. His work shoes would be muddy and pants wet from the knees down from the early dew coating everything this time of year.
By the time we reach Highway 21, the sky has opened to the day and life is stirring at small town speed. Taking a break in front of the Baptist Church, passers by on their way to work and drivers of logger trucks loaded with paper wood would throw up a hand in greeting. We’d continue across town, with Dad choosing the way he preferred depending on how well he felt that morning. Some folks would be sitting on porches with coffees in hand and sleepy grandbabies in welcoming laps as we strode through town.

“Mornin’, hi’ ya’ll doin’?”
”Doin’ awright. You?”
“Yep – good as can be expected. Goin’ to Mobile on Wednesday for a check up”.
“Let us know if you need anything”.
“Awrigh, see ya later, then”.

These short, common exchanges between folks you just spoke to yesterday are a part of how it’s done there. The communications of a small town don’t need a lot of rhetoric to get the message across that one is thought of, cared about, and missed if out of pocket too long.

Passing the ancient magnolia tree in the yard of Ms. Mary I might ask, “How is Miss Mary?”

Dad might reply, “She’s doing good. She decided to stop driving and seems to be slowing down a bit, but she’s doing good. Me and your Mama went to her 93rd birthday party a week or so back over at the Methodist Church. A lot of her family was there, Laura asked about you”.

Soon we have completed the circle, we have passed the water tower with the town’s name painted on its tank, we have seen flowers and weed brambles along the road, crops growing and yards tended to. There was Hootie’s Barber Shop, not yet open, but with the first early customer waiting patiently in his truck reading The Monroe Journal. School busses have begun pulling into the local school to empty its contents of children who begin running and greeting playmates before classes begin. The cotton gin, in the fall, would be filling the air with its dust and that wonderful, dry smell of cotton so special to the area. By the time we have almost completed our trip, I have caught up on who’s living in Miss Jones old house and who’s building the big new place out by the Nipper’s pecan orchard. Sandra Kilpatrick has moved back from Georgia and is running the café now and the feed mill is closing down if Mr. Reed doesn’t get out of the hospital soon - he’s been in bad shape. The people who have died, divorced and moved on have been discussed. Who has a new baby always brings a smile and a surprise to my spirit.

By the time we return home, another cup of coffee and a simple breakfast of biscuits and Conecuh Sausage hit the spot perfectly. It’s time to relax a little. Dad grabs a morning nap in his recliner while I talk to Mom up in the kitchen. I will spend some time with her later in the day, allowing her to decide where she might like to go, or what she might like to do. I feel better having heard of folks I’ve known all my life and I begin to feel the familiar connection to where my life began and am grateful that my life is good.

The Little Theater Group Road Trip

We had a blast!! This is the group from The Little Theatre Group, who went on the road trip to Playa Hermosa and Hermosa Heights. We were treated great by the staff at Hermosa Heights and the owner, Rich. The food was good, the pool was fantastic and the beach only about 2 blocks away. Anyway, we all got up earlier than early to get on the road for this 4 or 5 hour drive and began the fun. We mostly arrived at about the same time, got our luggage loaded into the rooms, took a quick dip in the pool and then the real fun began. All of our props, techie stuff, and scenery had arrived so we all got busy putting together, organizing, putting our heads together to make it all work and Lo and Behold!

It did!!

We did a run through, grabbed a bite to eat, went over lines and discussed entries and bows a little further and before you knew it, SHOW TIME!!

Our first night went very well and we all were pleased. The second night, we played to a full house and we hit the mark!! Everyone did an outstanding job! The hob-nobbing afterwards and the pool party after that was such a great time. Lots of stress was relieved as we swam, talked about the play, had wines and bocas, and best of all - laughed! Threw our heads back at stories current and past and laughed!! Good for the soul!

Ann, Vicki and Mary. Ann is my fellow actor and director. Quite a talent, I may add! And a heck of a lot of fun to hang around with, as well!!

Vicki is my director and fab-u-lous to work with. Ann, Wayne and I are doing, "Twilight Zone". Thank you for all you did, by the way.

Mary was our techie with 3 plays in one, DVD's, CD's, and sound for each - well she had her hands full!!

I missed getting pics of Wayne, my fellow actor as well and Tom, who is with David in "Death Knocks".

Susan, our actor for "Sorry, Wrong Number".

Randy, producer and active member of the group.

Starting to unload the show!!

David, setting up the props

Lisa, President of LTG and fearless leader of this gang!

What a hamm!!

Speaking of hamms!!!

Beautiful Playa Hermosa

Hermosa Heights, where we stayed and staged our play!

Very, very nice pool and cabana

The countryside in Guanacaste.

Driving....and then some!

I have discovered that my happiness is very dependent on traffic. The less I am in traffic, the happier I am. You can hang your hat on that.

I am pretty well traveled I have experienced many different driving styles from Alabama to Boston; I have driven and been driven all over the United States, Europe, and some Central and South American counties.
There is one thing in common with all traffic – everybody just wants to get there in their own way - with their own methods in mind. That’s just a universal fact since we started moving around eons ago.

Driving in the U.S.A. is boring for the most part. I’m not talking about scenery and majestic cities; I’m talking about the actual act of driving. The roads are in good repair and generally well marked. We are Google Earthed, GPS’ed, and mapped out the ying-yang. Well, it’s just almost too easy. Traffic congestion, removed, of course-that is its own monster. I still get a little shocky when I think about the Belt Parkway in New York and those long, long backups on Rockville Pike in Bethesda, Maryland.

There are however, some minor irritants in the midst of American Drivers and one I will mention here is the left lane driver. You know, you gotta get somewhere, times a ticking, and you’re driving along on a nice four laned highway fully equipped with a middle turn lane, it’s well marked and traffic moves along at a good speed. UNTIL….the 60 mph has suddenly dropped to about 37 mph because some driver in the left lane, who is looking straight ahead, sipping on a Big Gulp and munching Slim Jims, is so totally unaware of the bottleneck he is creating. The guy on your right, who is rightfully going slowly in the slow lane, is riding right along with Mr. Left Lane’s rear bumper and so now you’re trapped. Nowhere to go, no way around….aaarrgggh!!!! It can suck the serenity right out of my best day. Now, I do know a woman who used to get so upset about this, that at the first available chance she got, she would cut around, cut back in front of the offending Mr. Left Lane and make sure they got the signal of her pointing to the right lane in an attempt to “make them aware” and then speed off. In my opinion, if they cared in the first place, they would already be in the right lane so the lesson is mute, plus, aggravating though it may be; it just isn’t worth making an ass of yourself just to prove a point to those who don’t care in the first place.

I lived in Sicily for almost 3 years. That was the most impressively disorganized driving I had ever seen. It is like Santa Claus brought everyone a car for Christmas and they all started driving at once. Another way to describe it is to go outside, kick open an ant hill and watch them run around like crazy. That is driving in Italy for the most part. If I remember correctly, the rules of the road are: 1) if one is going down hill then one has the right of way. After all, the car one is driving may not have brakes, don’t forget to blow your horn as you approach intersections just to let them know you’re coming through and may not have brakes 2) if you flash your lights or blow your horn first, then you have the right of way, (How in the hell would you know who blew a horn first! They all do it all the time!) 3) if your bumper is ahead of the person’s bumper who is ahead of you, then it is NOT your fault….and finally, but not in the least, is rule number 4) if you are going down the road and a goat herd happens to be in the way, and you hit and kill an animal (hope it is an obviously old animal) then you must pay for the animal itself as well as any offspring it may have produced. My question to the court is: How does one calculate how many offspring an animal may produce? What if the goat is gay? Or it happens to "‘ho itself out" just to make a good profit for the herder? How do you make a defense on that?

Now I live in Costa Rica. Driving here is its own monster. There are many cars here in the Central Valley. SUV’s abound, small cars are very, very well used here. Produce trucks, semis, busses and motorcycles of all sizes crowd the two lane streets. There are no multi-laned freeways, the best is a four lane and that is not the norm for most of the highways here. Most streets are mostly marked with lanes and turn signals, sometimes not, and there are potholes galore. As soon as they get it patched it comes right back. Reminds me of when we used to pull weeds out of the farmer’s fields in Alabama- for every pig weed you pulled there were two more waiting to show up overnight!

Driving in Costa is the ugly step sister to an otherwise calm, quiet, reserved culture. I mean Costa Ricans will stand in line at the bank for forty-five minutes to conduct a 3 minute transaction and never make a face or show any sign of impatience. That would be considered rude. But they will run over you in the parking lot, believe-you-me. It is said, that the pedestrian is the most endangered species here. It’s true! People run, I mean even the elderly, will break a trot to get across a street. Cars go so fast and whip around corners like nothing ever could or would happen to be in the way. Just yesterday a little old lady was crossing the street when halfway across, a car whipped by her so fast and close it blew her skirt up. The driver was probably a young man and gave no thought to it what-so-ever. She shook her fist at him - but I can think of another part of her hand she could shake at him!

Another driving habit they have is putting on the flashers and just stopping in an active lane of traffic-maybe to buy produce, maybe to chat on the phone, maybe just because. It makes no sense to me. It causes a lot of inconvenience for the rush hour commuters. It seems dangerous, too especially when a passenger is getting out of a car. But they seem to accept it among themselves. You have to expect some of this type stuff in a city and especially a city with a different cultural environment. Acceptance is the key to serenity......

We all have driving stories to share and when I think of all the close calls that occur each and every day, well it amazes me how me made it this far. Sometimes you just have to wonder. We keep complaining about the other guy and what an idiot he/she is and we shake our heads and wonder how the law can let some of these yahoos run around loose. But we keep moving around and always will. Be safe!

Mrs. Haverson

Mrs. Haverson was a woman of bulk. But that is not what you noticed about her at first. Her eyes did not twinkle; her hair was neither shiny nor styled. Her skin had no luster. What you did notice about her was a sadness, not a self-pity sadness, but a tiredness as heavy as she was.
I met her on a hot, sticky Alabama morning. One of those mornings that begins almost as hot as it left off yesterday. The evening had lost the battle to cool things down. I do remember this well. She was in Bed Number 8 of the ICU at Southern Alabama Regional Hospital. I took her breakfast to her. After we exchanged the usual pleasantries and I got her all set up, I left her room and she to herself with her breakfast. I had work to do: Doctor’s orders to transcribe, labs reports to post, seven other patients who demanded some sort of attention, and my own breakfast to tend to. It would be a long, busy day.

Mrs. Haverson was admitted to the ICU with a number of problems, mostly metabolic in nature. Her feet and legs had just enough circulation to prevent a total mummification, her hygiene, at best, had been an attempt, her diet was whatever she could get with government subsidy. Probably cheap sweets, peanut butter, canned foods which could be heated or not, and most likely purchased at the local dollar store where fresh fruits or vegetables were lacking. She was an obviously poor woman, and had been for years.

As I worked with Mrs. Haverson, I began to like her, but still there was no actual communication between us other than on a professional level. I washed her face, helped the nurse assigned to turn and clean this lady who had gradually lost most of that ability a few years earlier. Time spent with her, at this point, was totally in the line of duty. I shared a couple of laughs with Mrs. Haverson as we began to get to know each other. The short discussions when I took in a meal tray, the quick “How do you do’s” as I checked her blood sugar levels, the vital signs check at least TID (three times a day) added up to a comfortable rapport. She never complained. She never asked for more. And she had the sweetest voice.

Eventually she was moved out to the step-down unit. She was getting better, but still not able to take care of herself. The social service workers- the home health care folks were summoned to start the routine process of “taking care of someone”. I was off the day they moved Mrs. Haverson into the step-down unit and immediately missed her when I walked into the ICU after having been off for 3 days. Our shifts were 12 hours long, so we did get 3 day weekends every week and a half. It just so happens that I did get to visit with Mrs. Haverson before she was completely discharged. I got assigned to the step-down unit for a couple of days; a bit less intense than the ICU, but a busy place nonetheless.

“Good morning, Mrs. Haverson! So good to see you again. Nice to see you are improving and have been moved out of ICU. That means you’ll be going home soon!”
Mrs. Haverson, returned the greeting, but did not seem particularly proud of this upcoming fact. While her health was stabilizing, her tiredness was still very apparent.
Finally, the day before she was to be discharged, at the end of a busy shift, I stopped by her room. I don’t remember exactly why, but I did. I guess I consciously made the decision to chat for a moment with Mrs. Haverson. After all, it had been almost three weeks since I had met her and I loved that sweetness she still had in her voice.

I asked her was there anything I could get her before I go, and then I said, “Where are you from, Mrs., Haverson?”

“Mississippi” she says, and mentions a small town I had never heard of, but she tells me “it’s in Central Mississippi”. She goes on to say, she had been very poor as a young girl, “But everybody was”, she added.
Mrs. Haverson goes on with stories of picking cotton, milling sugar cane, hard winters and life on life’s terms. Many of the same stories I witnessed and heard from my parents and their parents, she retold as her own. I sat on the arm of the side chair and just listened. She had never spoken to me so much.

“Do you have any children?” I asked.

“Yes, a daughter”. Her face became a little longer, her eyes a bit distant as she pulled up memories. And all at once…
“I haven’t seen her in twenty years, and I’m not sure why”.
She finally said.
“She had a little girl, too. I have never seen my grandchild. I tried so hard to be good to her and give her the things I never had. She had her Daddy’s hard-headedness and after he died, I couldn’t do anything right by her. She took off when she was about seventeen, didn’t even finish high school. I heard she headed to New Orleans. I went down there and looked and looked, but I could never find hide nor hair of her. The police weren’t much help back then. I was never much on church, but I prayed to God to please take care of my Baby, if at least He couldn’t bring her back home”. She paused for a moment and with an even softer tone, she said,

“I heard through some distant cousins I had in Metairie that they had seen her a couple of years later and she had a little girl with her. That’s how I know about my grandbaby. They said the little girl looked like me in the one few pictures of me I do have. She might’ve been pregnant when she took off…but she had no reason to be ashamed. Things were different then”.

I just sat there listening.

“I didn’t get a good start with life and Lord knows I made my mistakes”, she started again.

The late afternoon sun slanted in through the blinds.

“I know I can’t do nothing about it now, but if I could go back, I would’a got both of us outta that town and away from that man I took up with after my husband died. There wasn’t much choice. I had to feed us. He was pure meanness, he drank a lot and no tellin' what else. I’m sure he’s why she took off like that. I was suspicious of other things happening…I guess she had every right. I should have done better by her".

And with that, and a heavy sigh, Mrs. Haverson had finally got it said and done. She seemed lighter. I guess those words had weighted a ton.

She just kept looking at her hand resting on the table pulled across her lap. Then she slowly looked toward the window. She was silently crying. She was sorry for things, for memories, long since pushed into the past. I would never know, nor anyone else for that matter, what all had happened in this ladies life. I didn’t need to know more.

My shift had ended. I got up, patted her hand and said, “Mrs. Haverson, I need to go. I want you to have a good night, now. I’m off tomorrow and the next day, but I will see you soon as I get back to work.”
She said ok and with that, I went home. I thought about Mrs. Haverson over the next couple of days. I just did. When I got back to work, Mrs. Haverson was totally discharged from the hospital. I guess the Medicare and home healthcare had been approved. I gave her a couple more thoughts and went on with routine days.

About three months later, Mrs. Haverson was readmitted to our little hospital. This time she was in a coma, the breathing tube prevented her speaking if she had wanted to. She looked, to me beyond just sick. There was some suspicion as to why she was here this time. Rumor had it she had been poisoned – with rat poison. The “companion” she lived with, a skinny, greasy haired man who used one of those electric chairs, would come by and see her once in a great while when she had been admitted before, was now just sitting there looking at her. No expression - didn’t seem to care. Just looking at her.

I just couldn’t help but wonder...

Mrs. Haverson finally passed away. It seemed a lonely passing and obviously I have thought of her over the years. The day she told me about her struggle is one of those times I will always hold special. I am glad I was somewhere I needed to be and especially so for those few minutes, on that hot Alabama afternoon, that I got out of my way and sat and listened to someone. It made all the difference for both of us.