Christmas Short Stories

I got a copy a couple of years ago of A Very Southern Christmas. I pull it out now at Christmas. Though reviews at Amazon only give it three and a half stars, stories (like beauty) are in the eye, or ear of the be-reader. maybe it's just because I love short stories, but in any event it beginning to look a lot like you-know-what.

Revisions

Got some final revisions to work on over the weekend, so I'll try to get any replies off when I can catch up. That's the thing about this blogging. You're(at least I am) afraid somebody'll think I'm ignoring them.

Lenghty AND brief

The following is not a brief post; however , in a concise, relatively few words it covers volumes.

The author is Troy Cauley, born in Comanche, Texas and a contributor to Who Owns America, sequel to I’ll take My Stand both written in the 1930s. This partial essay of Cauley’s appeared in So Good a Cause in 1993.

"...Technological progress in the past half century has been outstanding in the field of transportation. Let’s illustrate it. When I was a small boy in central Texas we lived about nine miles from the county seat, a town of three or four thousand people. In the fall we took a bale of cotton to town in a wagon. With a load of this sort, the team of horses walked about four miles an hour along the dirt road, thus taking over two hours for the trip.

A short time ago I flew from Texas to California in a 747 jet in about the same length of time. That looks like incredible progress. Let’s examine it more closely.

On the flight to California I saw virtually nothing of the country. From an elevation of 36,000 feet, all we saw were some weather-beaten clouds. Our seats were narrow and jammed together, but I visited with no one. Nobody showed any interest in me. I was in a crowd but it was a very lonely crowd.

On the trip to town with the bale of cotton we visited with fellow travelers along the way. We exchanged hearty greetings with neighbors as they sat on their porches. My brother and I had the whole back-end of the wagon in which to roll, tumble, and wrestle. We saw field-larks in the pastures and heard their cheerful calls. Bob-white quail thundered out of the bushes along the fencerows. Jackrabbits raced off for the cover of the post-oaks. The trip was a big success even before we got to town.

In a sense, of course, all of this is trivial. But in a broader sense, it is highly illustrative of a basic human fact: human nature is better adapted to a simple technology than to a highly complex one. People cannot live in a society of bread and circuses, especially when the bread has little or no nutritional value and the circuses consist mainly of endless hours of television depicting violence, vulgarity, and unclassified stupidity..."

Elderly Folks

I spoke with a wonderful Texas lady the other day who was in an assisted living home (she had some information regarding some business interests). When we finished our business discussion we went into a casual conversation. Though I am no spring chicken she has several years on me. As I get older and older I understand more and more what the great value there is in age and its necessarily associated  wisdom.  So much is lost to home, family and society by, so often, relegating older people to the sidelines.

Back

Got them back. A genius named Susan up in Missouri led me through the dark abyss of computer world blogging..
The only reason a tractor is better than a mule is, you can kick a tractor and it won't kick back.

Busted

Somehow I deleted my published links.  Now I've got to redo them. Hmmmm. It was easier the first time.

Small Towns

I was reading an essay by Bill Kauffman, and though a Yankee, also  an agrarian I interpret, and a defender of localism.
The essay comments on some unnamed big city reporter/anthropological writer who knows the small-town-folk, though only through superficial experience.
A quote from the reporter: "It's easy to spot someone who grew up in a small town and got out: they have a breathless air about them, their expressions somehow startled and dreamy."
A quote from Mr. kauffman: "What the hell does that mean?"
Good for Mr. Kauffman. 

Southern Songs

I was thumbing through an old anthology of Southern Literature: The Literature of the South, 1952, Scott, Foresman and Company. I wasn't sure what, if anything, I was going to read, when I passed into a chapter on old folk songs of the South. Some tunes I never heard so they are merely poetry on the page. However, some I recall from childhood and some re-recorded later. Instead of reading, I recalled in my mind,with wonderful nostalgia: Barbara Allen, Casey Jones (my daddy sang it when we went riding when I was a boy), Kennie Wagner and Old Smoky. You don't have to be a poet or a musician to enjoy all of them.

Early on one frosty morn

"...early on one frosty morn..."
It's getting cold in Dixie. I remember in the "old" days having to scrape the ice off of the car windshields after a cold overnight and a frosty morning. Now two-car garages prevent such efforts; unless you've had a garage sale and don't have one.

Poetry

I received a wonderful gift in the mail today. A book of poetry from Don "Scooter" Purvis et ux Bunny Cobb Purvis. Thoughts and memories in Rhyme, written by "Scooter" himself. Full disclosue: "Scooter" is an old high school coach of mine and Bunny was a classmate. Coach Purvis, who played for the 1958 National Champion L.S.U. Fighting Tigers, had put together a beautiful collection of life's memories of family and friends and time and events--wonderfully done in poetic style.  And they reflect  the most important Southern view in life: God and Family.