suds in a bucket...and my finger's in the ringer!

When the crowd jumped to its feet at the Shrine Mosque a few nights ago for the third song in her set, I knew it must be a good one. Sara Evans started talking about growing up in New Franklin and doing the chores most Missouri farm girls had to do, and the crowd immediately knew she was leading up to her Suds in the Bucket song.

At first, I thought the song was going to be more about remembering childhood chores and sharing them with your brothers and sisters. But who wants to reminiscense about hanging the laundry and bringing in wood for the fire? Instead, this song is about the growth of a young woman, who, when it's time, leaves her chores behind and heads out when the jet stream blows through town (aka...prince charming in a white pick-up truck.)

But of course, I am a reminiscenser (if there is such a word--and I'm sure there isn't)...and when the song started, I began to think about my own version of suds in a bucket when I was a child growing up in Missouri.

When my parents built their first home in Gainesville, it came with all the bells and whistles, including new appliances in a 1975 shade of green I'm not sure exists today. But while they were loving their up-to-date fancy washer and dryer, I snuck around the corner and down the road to the neighbor's house and learned what an outhouse was and how to make fresh fruit fried pies.

Bonnie and Delbert were always good to let me bother and annoy their everyday life. And when I was around, they never let me get in the way of whatever they were doing.

Bonnie used to play a trick on me. She had an old ringer washer out the back door of the tattered screen porch and inside the run-down smoke house used for a shed. When she first showed me how it worked, she jumped and screamed yelling "my finger's in the ringer!" and I glued my eyes to the rotating ringers waiting for a flattened finger to shoot through with Delbert's underwear. I visualized its flatness to the likes of Wile E. Coyote's mishaps with falling ACME bricks, and I was sure we could pop her finger back into its proper position.

Sadly, her finger never made it through (I'm not sure how grotesque that actually is that I wanted to see her finger come through), but I was mesmerized by this piece of equipment and jealous of its existence at her house. And no matter how much my mom and dad loved their modern Maytags bought brand new from Sears, I wanted that ringer washer. Once she showed me how it worked, Bonnie would often let me send the laundry through the ringers and dump it in the basket to be hung out to dry (which of course, was not my favorite part of laundry day at the Luna's.) But I was willing to help do anything as long as I could work the ringer washer.

Unfortunately, less than a decade later, the ringer washer became a back porch planter when Bonnie and Delbert upgraded, bringing in a pre-fabricated doublewide with all its bells and whistles...and adding brand new appliances to their newly modern home. And although Bonnie couldn't play the "my finger's in the ringer" joke anymore, she found plenty of other amusing ways to scare, shock, and terrify me.

happy birthday caron!

I remember the day you were born....okay, no I don't. Nor will I ever.

But I remember the day you chased a rabbit through the field and couldn't catch it even though you were hopping along behind it mimicking its moves.

Have a good one! :)

so i lied...

When "want dt. coke" comes across my text message on Friday mornings, I know Melanie's waiting at McDonald's drive-thru and is in urgent need of the answer. This morning I text back, "decaf--two splendas."

When my coffee arrives, we head to the lounge to steal Coach Rodgers' News-Leader from his mailbox and read the Weekend Events section. This weekly Friday ritual is an enjoyable time to check out local musicians, see what's on at the Moxie, and find a new place to eat in town. And today was no exception.

While Mel scanned the paper, I was busy at the computer answering e-mails and working on lesson plans, half-heartedly listening to her weekend event chatter. But then a gasp.

"Ohmygosh--Sara Evans is in town!"

I looked up.

"Want to go?" Melanie adds with enthusiasm. "She's at the shrine?"

Now the Shrine Mosque has always been good to me. My mother used to take me there for the Shriner's circus when I was a child, and I'm almost sure that's where I rode my first (and last) elephant. My sister took me there to see my first(but most definitely not my last) Dave Matthews concert with, of all bands, Toad the Wet Sprocket (sheesh...). Brian and I spent a WHOPPING five bucks to see the Wallflowers AND Lisa Loeb (now that was a musical bargain!) More recently, Bob Dylan graced his presence on the shrine stage for one of the most eclectic crowds I've ever seen at a concert. But Sara Evans? Who is she?

"Sure." (I'm always up for a concert--see Rock Star Tour '06)

"Do you listen to her?"

Yikes. Shouldn't I know her? What do I say? Looking back at my work, I reply, "Sure, I've heard of her."

Within seconds she was out the door to find her credit card and cell phone. Later this afternoon a note was left on my computer screen: "Sara Evans...tomorrow night...woohooo!"

Well, yes. Now I know. Sara Evans sings country songs. And if you know me...well...I don't do country very well. I'd rather listen to a piano man who sounds like Kermit the Frog singing Rockin' Robin over showing up decked out in a cowgirl hat and ropers at a Country Western concert.

On a miserably hot July afternoon at an Arkansas softball tournament in 1989, my high school girlfriends begged me to see Alan Jackson with them that night. At that time, the only country singers I knew were Waylon Jennings and Conway Twitty--and I'd only heard their names. I agreed, and fake sang my way through "Way down yonder on the Chattahoochie," and "Don't Rock the Jukebox," (which I highly disagreed with being a Rolling Stones fan) and it was here I learned it didn't take long to pick up on the melody and the lyrics of a country song. Once I collected the verses in my short term memory, I belted them out just like the rest of the 10,000 people wearing ropers and pancake-sized belt buckles, which are mighty uncomfortable for those of us with an extra roll around the waist.

Last summer at Sheryl Crow's concert, her opening act was a country singer...and gee, I can't remember his name. According to the people next to me, he had a top country hit the week before...and most everyone was singing to his songs. I knew none of them, but I do remember one he sang, a ballad, about his daughter Ava. It was a beautiful song that didn't place him on the charts, but did make an impression on me--although not enough for me to buy his album.

I finally confessed to Melanie. She giggled with delight and cannot wait to introduce me to Sara's beloved songs..."And," she assures me, "you'll be an instant fan!" She's bringing the CD's "so you can get a feel for her music" on the drive to Springfield. So not only will I get two hours of country music, I'll get another dose on the drive there.

But afterwards, I'm in charge...and we just might end up at Ernie Biggs, where the piano man will sound like Kermit the Frog and pull us onstage for a nice round of Bobby Day's Rockin' Robin (Tweet! Tweet! Tweet!).

who is in your circle of the wise . . .

"The next best thing to be wise oneself is to live in a circle of those who are." C.S. Lewis

Of course you can't be a Willow teacher without being Coveyized. And Stephen Covey writes a great deal about your Circle of Influence. But when I came across this C.S. Lewis quote a few days ago, I flipped my thoughts to who is in my "circle of the wise." Rather than influencing, who am I gleaning information from? Who is influencing me? Who is in my circle of the wise where I can find understanding, knowledge, even acceptance of my intellect and desires?

My friend Joe in my writer's group told me a story the other day about legendary rocker Jerry Garcia. As the Dead were touring in the 70's throughout America's southwest, Jerry would often, after numerous shows, find the local hangout where local bands were finishing up their gigs. Interrupting a set, Jerry would ask to join in, following the lead guitarist and vocalist rather than taking center stage. A talented musician, Jerry could play just about any stringed instrument. His new friends stayed up all night performing impromptu jam sessions with him and when asked about this, Jerry said, "I want to be surrounded by people who love music and who make me a better musician...and this is where I find them."

Connecting with and to those who have positive influences on you can enrich your life and engage you toward leading a more productive lifestyle, no matter what path you choose.

Jerry Garcia's circle of the wise encouraged creativity and the pursuit of pleasure in doing what you love. And that does make a difference!

i see her in my hands...

but I lose her in my green eyes. My family says I act like her rather than look like her.

Today she would be 59 and I wonder what her online identity would have been? What cellular service she would have chosen; what tv programs she would watch.

She never used a microwave or even a VCR. Her car ran without GPS and seatbelts.

She posted on her "blog" daily: what we ate, what we said, what we felt. Why the pancakes burnt and how the syrup spilt. Ten years of my childhood laid out for my memory in a daily record book after Noxema cleansed her face at night and Oil of Olay replinished the shine. She lotioned her hands and watched Johnny Carson and waited for my father's 4:00 p.m. shift to end. When she finished writing, she'd pick up a crossword, much like my sister does today at the beach, in the bedroom, at the airport.

She never had time to mess me up. Only a decade to nurture. Only a decade to laugh. Only a decade to wipe away tears and apply a kiss and a band aid when a rock stuck in my roller skates on the rough edge of the concrete and stung my shins and blistered my palms when I fell hard.

I don't cringe when someone says, "You act just like your mother." I don't need counseling because she made me feel inadequate. I don't need therapy because she lowered my self-esteem through my teenage years. I don't need a psychologist to tell me it's not my fault and that I am the way I am because of my condescending mother with disapproving looks when I left home in a too short skirt in my boyfriend's convertible.

It's been 24 years and I do miss her. I wish for what I didn't have with her and what my friends don't have with their mothers, because of course, if she were alive today, we'd have the perfect mother/daughter relationship. We'd share stories about our day and then meet for coffee to talk some more, although I never saw her drink a cup in her life. We'd eat lunch at teahouses and swap our most recent essays. She'd complain about dad and I'd laugh and say, "Mom this is too much information!" She'd tell me secrets about life and secrets about love. She'd listen intently, and quietly, to my complaints that the weight of the world seems to be on my shoulders, and she'd know that I really wasn't complaining, but venting in the moment. And she would agree with me, but artfully slip in a word or two of advice . . . and then . . . transcending . . . we would find cotton candy, buy the pink one, and rest on a park bench eating until our fingers were sticky and our tongues were liquid sugar. We would shop for baby dolls and Barbies and stop by the supermarket to buy the necessary ingredients for homemade sugar cookies shaped like stars and Santas. And then we would go for ice cream, and outside the Tastee Freeze we would look up to remind ourselves and whisper outloud: "Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight. Wish I may, wish I might, have this wish I wish tonight?"