My Week in Roswell

Here I am on Saturday night after eating Take-Out from a Chinese restaurant in Roswell, Georgia. I will miss the different places to eat here. We often find restaurants nearly empty around three o'clock in the afternoon so we can go in and feel safe.

It was a beautiful almost spring-like day with temps near seventy. Lexie and I had a short walk, not long enough for her, but long enough to stir up some pain in my foot. 

By the time this post is published, I will be home in Hayesville. I will get my COVID vaccine on Monday! I am so excited about that. My friends on Facebook are also being vaccinated and showing photos of their doing it. Maybe the more we see it being done, the more people will want to take it. I believe that now we are on the path to putting an end to this chaotic time and bringing some order into our lives. 

Life here at my sister and BIL's house is easy and fun for me. Having lived alone for more than ten years now, having conversations after dinner instead of turning on the TV or going off to bed to listen to Podcasts, is a treat. I interviewed Stu last night about his life before I knew him and, as I was sure it would be, he told of an interesting youth growing up outside Chicago, going to school, running track and he even had his yearbook handy so I could see the teenaged boy who has become such a fine man.

Gay and Stu Christmas 2020

I didn't interview him as if I were going to write an article about him, but I am encouraging him to write about his life. He remembers the names of all the friends he had in high school, the girls he dated until he met my sister years later in Mississippi. 

Every year until the pandemic, he has met with his closest buddies from high school for a reunion. The men and their wives have gone to various cities for several days together. The amazing part of this is the women get along well and have become friends.

After Stu finished high school and four years of college, he joined the United States Navy and became part of the Seabees where he used his Engineering education in various places in the US, but he also spent months in Vietnam. Right after his marriage to Gay, he was sent to Guantanomo in Cuba. He was twenty-three years old and in charge of 150 men. That says something about the leadership he possessed at an early age. At the same time, Gay earned her Masters Degree in Counseling. Stu went on and earned his Masters at Georgia Tech. 

Gay told me she had learned more about her husband in the past week because of me than she learned in the forty-plus years of their marriage. Stu said she had never asked him the right questions. 

We all have stories to tell and nobody can tell them except us. Stu has nieces and nephews who love him and would like to have his life stories to pass down to their kids one day. 

I will begin teaching a new writing class on Tuesday, January 26, on Zoom. I have six students and that is a good number for the two-hour session each week. 

With the help of prompts or ideas given to them to stir up memories, each week everyone will write a true story about their life.  I look forward to the interesting people and their stories.

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Our first prompt is to write about a birthday, yours or another's, and tell us the details, the fun or the bad parts, the people who were there, what happened, where it happened, and ask yourself why do you remember this particular birthday.  

Readers, if you aren't in my class, you can try this prompt at home. It will be fun. Send me your story. I would like to read it.

A tale From Long Ago and Dangers of Today

After a quiet day at home catching up on some work, I had a phone call from my older brother, Max. We talked for two hours. We laughed and reminisced about our childhood, family members and as usual, I heard another new story I had not heard before.

Max is ten years older than I, so he can remember and tell me things I was too young to have known or things that happened before I was born.

Tonight he told me about the time our oldest brother, Ray, was left behind after attending an event with his FFA class. Ray had gone to school that day and, with others, was taken to the agricultural event, a Fat Cattle Show, at Cudahy Packing Company.

When the meeting ended, the teacher went home. Those boys who had no one to come and pick them up had no way to get home. My parents lived on a farm many miles from the packing plant.  The other two boys also lived long distances away.

When the school bus came by that afternoon and Ray did not get off, Mother was alarmed. Our family did not have a telephone, and Daddy had driven the truck to work at the mill.

I can imagine how worried my mother was when her son did not come home. Where could he be? What was he doing? Where would he sleep on this cold winter night? She was stranded with no way to contact the school or anyone who might know where her son was or why he did not come home.

The next afternoon Ray arrived on the bus with his brothers. He told his family that he had spent the night inside the packing house in a warm office. After all the employees left and locked up the building, one of the other boys managed to pick the lock on the outside door. The three forgotten boys went in and found an office door open. The place was warm, and they settled down and slept there all night. Before the workers appeared the next day, the three boys left and walked back to the high school. No one knew they had camped out in the office.

I am sure my mother was overcome with relief. I can imagine her hugging Ray and him pushing her away as he was not one for affection.

What if? That is the jumping off place for fiction writers. What if starts the wheels in our creative minds working. What if that had happened today?

Mother would have been on the phone the minute her son did not get off that bus. She would be calling the high school and then the police, wouldn't she? There would be hell to pay, and the teacher would be fired. That teacher might even be sued along with the school. The TV news would have it on the six o'clock broadcast. Not my mother, but some mothers, in fact most of today's mothers, would be screaming and demanding blood.

Looking back on that experience, I realize that my parents had complete trust in Ray, at only fifteen, to handle a situation on his own. He was always far more mature than the other brothers, and they looked up to him all of his life. How Mother handled his missing all night and the next day, I can't imagine. I am sure she did not sleep. She adored her first born son. I think she was comforted   knowing he was level-headed and would not do anything that put him in harm's way.

Times were different then, early 1940s, and in our small town in rural Georgia, crime was not an everyday occurrence. But it makes me think about poor people of today who don't have the luxury of cell phones for themselves and their children. Do they have things happen with their children that leave them afraid and wondering where their boys are sleeping -- in jail or in an alley knocked unconscious? Our world today is a far different place and far more dangerous.

My heart goes out to mothers of boys who live in cities where gangs prey on young kids. In countries where criminals recruit young men into their organizations by threatening their families, no wonder those mothers will travel for months to find a safe place to live. Even chain link fences around them bring relief for those mothers. At least inside those fences their children are safer than they were back home. They have food and water. I can't imagine fear of such danger that even the most menial aid is life-saving.

But I can imagine the worry and stress of a mother having her children taken away to some place she can't go and where she doesn't know if she will ever see them again. That is heart breaking.

Charlie, the big white work horse

Recently my brother Max, in photo on left with sister, June, and I had a long conversation on the telephone. We don't see each other often these days. I wish someone had time to bring him to see me or just bring him up to where I can meet them.

He tells me these wonderful tidbits of family history that I can't wait to write as soon as I hang up.

The most recent story involved a big white horse named Charlie. Charlie was a popular name in our family. My grandfather's name was Thomas Charles and my father's brother was named Charlie.

But back to the horse. Daddy owned Charlie, the huge work horse, when he moved the family to the farm on Fleming Road in Dougherty County, Georgia. Charlie is part of my earliest memories. 

Charlie had the good life in winter when he didn't have to work in the fields, but in the spring when it was time for the plowing to begin, his vacation was done. Daddy harnessed Charlie to a big turning plow to start breaking land for planting and headed to the field. Charlie's energy level was up to the clouds and he almost trotted while pulling the heavy piece of equipment. Daddy said he could hardly keep up with the big horse. But by day's end, Charlie had slowed to a normal walk, his massive neck bowed under the strain of the load. 

An example of the harness used for plowing a horse or mule.  

Charlie worked the land for many years until he developed a fistula on his withers. Although it could be lanced and drained, it came back again and again. The veterinarian told my father there was no cure. Charlie could no longer be depended on for plowing. The harness rubbed where the fistula swelled. He was turned out to pasture and would have lived out his days there except for a man named Mr. Buntin who made his living buying and selling and trading livestock. One day he approached my brother Ray at work and asked if there were any animals on the farm for sale. Ray said no, and then he remembered Charlie. Charlie was no longer any good as a farm horse, and it costs to feed a big animal like that. 

Mr. Buntin made the decision not to buy Charlie, but offered to swap a green two-year-old mare for the older horse. I don't remember any of this as I was very young, but Max and his brothers were in their teens and they loved the idea of a pony to ride. So Charlie was taken away. I imagine if I had known, I would have been crying.

 A man was hired by Mr. Buntin, to get the horse into town. Charlie would not load on a truck or trailer and he would not let anyone ride him. The hired man led Charlie about a mile and decided he would ride him instead. He managed to climb aboard the broad-backed horse, but it was said that Charlie bucked him off, and he sailed as high as the top of the nearest pecan tree. When he came down, and picked himself up, he took Charlie's lead rope and walked him the ten miles into Albany.

I don't have a picture of Charlie, but this looks much like him. 

I won't tell you the fate of old Charlie as I am not absolutely sure of what happened to him. 

Click on the link below and read my poem about Charlie the big white horse who was responsible for my ongoing love of horses.

My Love for Horses Started Early

Old Age is a treasure-house of history - share it.

While reading The Gift of Years by Joan Chittister, I found a section I want to share with you.

“Old age is a  treasure-house of history – personal history, family history, national history, world history. But what do we do with everything an older generation knows in a culture that does not seek answers from that generation? Every elder in every community is a living story for the people to whom he or she will someday leave the Earth to guide as good, as better, than they did in their own time.

Family tales have always been the parables one generation handed down to the next to tell us who we are and where we came from. Funeral rituals, the interment of ancestors, became the art form that preserved the values and ideals of the past in special ways. Meant to remind the clan of their connections in both life and death, funerals were a tribal event. Telling the stories of those who passed away made the family the bridge to both past and future.

Even in our own times, in the not so distant past, the deceased were laid out in the family homes. But while it was prayer time for the soul of the dead in the parlor, in the rest of the house it was story- telling time for the living….In those moments children learned the history of their parents’ own childhood. Most of all, the young came to realize what stood to be lost forever in one last breath if the next generation did not take responsibility for maintaining it.”

 I encourage people to  write or record their living history, their story, even though the younger generation is not now interested in our stories. One day they will realize that our stories are their stories and they will wish they had listened. They will read our stories.

Recently a man told me he wants to write his parents’ story, but they are both gone and so were others who knew them.  He has no oral history or written history of his mother and father.

I spent ten years researching and writing a family history book. I published the book in 1998. Some of my siblings never read the book. Some of their children did read the book and found it interesting. After all these years my last living brother has been reading the book. 

I am happy I was able to record the stories of my grandparents on my father’s line and the lives of his ten children. Often it is not until a parent or loved one dies that the children begin to long for more knowledge about that person’s life. I can’t begin to count how many times I've heard the words, “I wish I had asked my mother or my father about what their lives were like when they were growing up.”

One man told me he doesn't have family and is not sure for whom he would write his life story. I responded that he has friends and extended family he is not close to now that would like to read his story someday. Our stories have value to future generations. As elders we pass on the family history to  those who will carry on where we leave off. 

As a genealogist, I know the thrill of finding written information about an ancestor or distant relative when searching my family tree. To find a book written by one of them would be like discovering a gold mine. I have no children, but I have a family with many, many stories that I hope to record for those who will want to read them one day.

Here are a few titles: The Day My Father was a Hero, Frog Gigging with my Brothers, The Council Brothers go to Dallas,  Pop-up Camping across the USA, and others. 

Do you have some unusual family stories you can share with others? Give us some titles to  ponder.

How to write about your family - WD article

This is a question I hear every time I teach a workshop or course on Writing About Your Life.

Often when we begin to write about family, we want to tell all the negative things about some of them. Once a student said she had been waiting a long time to tell about her awful mother.

In the article in Writers Digest, the online editor, Brian Klem, has excellent advice about how we might handle the awful mother or others who have hurt us or let us down.

At one time, I wanted to write about my distant father who seldom seemed to know I was in the room. Now, after years of writing I see that my father had another side to him that I didn't know. I learned he was similar to most men of his generation, afraid to show his soft side. Afraid he might show tears that would embarrass him. I know that is why he didn't give me away at my wedding.

Brian Klem, in this article touches on many of the things that we must take into account when we write about family. Read more here.

Write Your Life Stories at Tri County Community College in Murphy, NC with Glenda Beall, instructor.
Classes begin Tuesdays, 6 - 8 p.m. March 24 for four weeks. Contact Lisa Thompson, lthompson@tricountycc.edu   for registration.

A Family Story from my collection

I am compiling a manuscript of family stories. Madness is one of them. Let me know what you think of it. 

Madness

By

Glenda Beall

It was summer and the hot August sun beat down on the fields and pastures surrounding our white frame farmhouse in southwest Georgia.  My sister Gay and I played with our dolls on the covered front porch while Fluffy, a black curly dog near the front screen-door, slept. She had been given to us when she was a puppy, and we loved her. I often buried my face in her soft fur and squeezed her in a tight hug. She licked my face to show me she loved me as well. Wherever Gay and I played, under the huge oak tree beside the house or on the porch, Fluffy was always close by as if she had appointed herself babysitter.

Our playtime was interrupted when Mother rushed out on the porch, grabbed each of us by the arm and hurried us inside.  We were forced to leave our dolls and Fluffy behind.

Being grabbed so quickly and seeing my usually calm mother in such a dither, I cried, “Mother, what’s wrong?”

“There’s a strange dog in the yard.  He looks dangerous. Stay inside until he’s gone," she said. 

It was then we saw through the screen door, the large brown dog coming from behind the house.  Mother had noticed him from the kitchen window, his muzzle white with foam, slobber dripping down in long streams. He seemed intent on a mission, looking for a victim.

Mother called to Fluffy, "Come here, come inside, Fluffy."

But Fluffy would not come. Mother did not believe in having pets in the house. Fluffy had never been inside. She ran down the steps heading for the place where she felt secure, her bed under the porch. It was the only refuge she knew.

The strange dog saw her and followed. In minutes we heard Fluffy’s pitiful yelps. I wanted to go to her. I pushed on the screen door, but Mother would not let me open it. I stood safely inside and called Fluffy until she finally came up on the porch. I let out a sigh of relief. I saw no blood. She looked fine to me. I wanted to run out to her and give her a big hug. There was no sign of another dog in the yard. 

“He didn’t hurt her, Mother,” I said. “She’s not bleeding or anything.”

Still, Mother insisted we stay inside away from Fluffy who was back on the porch, licking her fur, cleaning herself of the terrible ordeal she had experienced.

My father and brothers came home for the noonday meal, and Daddy examined our friendly pet. He found bite wounds we had not seen. The rabid dog had done the damage. Daddy locked Fluffy in a cage beside the barn. She would be fed and given fresh water as he watched for signs of illness. She was quarantined, a word my sister and I did not know.

 Her sad brown eyes begged for our pats and hugs, and when we approached she wagged her bushy tail. But we could only talk to her from a distance and tell her how sorry we were that she had to stay in the cage.  We missed her and every day we asked, “How much longer does she have to stay shut up?”

One day Gay and I went out to visit Fluffy and found the cage shut tight, but our beloved dog was not there.

“Mother, Fluffy’s gone. What happened to her?” I ran inside to the person who always made things right. Tears ran down my cheeks. Somehow I knew she couldn't fix this problem. She seemed as sad as I was, but I couldn't help my anger toward her. If only Fluffy had been an inside pet.

We were little girls and no one wanted to tell us Fluffy had to be euthanized. Daddy said she must have gotten out of the cage somehow. He evidently wanted us to believe she escaped and wondered away. Even today my older brother tells me he doesn't know what happened to our pet.

I knew Fluffy would never have left us. No matter what we were told, Gay and I believed she had been destroyed. I vowed then and there, at the age of six, that when I was grown up and had my own house, I’d have my own dog, and he would sleep in the house and even sleep in my bed so that I could protect him.

We had other dogs as I grew up. They were family pets. Brit was an English Shepherd that was killed when she was run over in our yard by a neighbor kid.  Turbo, a purebred Cocker Spaniel, was given to us by an Air Force officer who was going overseas. That was a big mistake. That fine animal deserved a home where he was groomed daily and fed treats, curled up by the fireplace. Instead he ran out and collected sand-spurs and burrs in his lush coat. He went to the field with my brothers and my father. Turbo rode in the pickup and acted like a hound dog. He disappeared one day, and we never saw him again. I always hoped he had found a better place to live.

One week after my wedding day, I was finally able to fulfill the promise I had made to myself. My husband Barry, who also loved dogs, gave me a puppy, a miniature black poodle, that we named Brandy.  This lovable little animal quickly owned our house and both of us. In many ways he looked like Fluffy with his dark curly coat, his deep expressive eyes that could read my mind. For nineteen years I kept him safe in spite of his mischievous ways, his daredevil personality, and his stubbornness. But one afternoon, his old body gave out as he slept in our bedroom. It was raining. Barry was out of town. Alone, I buried him under the trees behind our back yard.

Since that time I've opened my heart to other dogs – Nicki and Kodi, the Samoyeds, so pristine white, always smiling and loving – Rocky, the rescued mix, who was Barry’s dog, but won my heart even as I grieved for Kodi. We protected them well, loved them and they loved us. Each one had his own personality, his peculiar traits just the way humans do. They all lived long and good lives except for Nicki who died at the age of two from a mysterious malady no one understood. All of them lived in our house and Brandy slept in our bed. The bigger dogs had their own beds or slept wherever they wanted. 

Rabies is a terrible disease, and found in wild animals in our area even today. I am grateful that my mother was vigilant enough to protect my sister and me, even if she couldn't save sweet Fluffy. 

A Post from Florida Last Winter

I spent time in St. Petersburg, Florida last winter and visited cousins and friends throughout the area. I hope to go back this winter and visit more places I've not been before.
I wrote this post while there.
Friday, January 20, 2013

My father, long before I knew him, lived in Palmetto, FL with his brother Charlie and worked on Charlie’s farm. In fact, that was when my daddy fell in love with growing crops. Those days produced in him a dream of someday owning his own land.

Sitting around our large dining table, my brothers and sisters and I heard the tales of life in Palmetto, Florida with Charlie, Verta and their family. In his letters to my mother before they were married, my father described the work he did and also the fun he had on weekends. He mentioned going to the beach with other young people.

Uncle Charlie's daughter, Monteen, in her nineties on the right in white.

In my father’s time, the beaches were open to the public.
Weekends meant fish fries on the sand, and young people gathered to dance and flirt with each other. Daddy pretended to Mother, in his letters, that he never had fun and just went along because his sister and his friends were there. With little to do for entertainment, a night in summer on a warm beach with good food and lively young people must have been enjoyable. Today one would be hard-pressed to find a public beach. The high rise hotels own the waterfront.

I try to imagine what it was like in the nineteen-twenties here in this now metropolis with tall buildings and  traffic. I understand that St. Pete has quite a few millionaires and some billionaires living in mansions around this town. I remember hearing about traveling on the Tamiami Trail. In my childish mind I pictured it as a path through woodland. Today I saw a sign for the Tamiami Trail, a wide highway not far from my cousin’s house

For years I heard about Pinellas County where my aunt Oleo and her family lived and also Manatee County. Driving into Tampa and seeing the signs with those familiar names, bring back to me the voices of my aunts and cousins. Because of them, I feel a kinship with this area.

My father finally brought my mother to Palmetto to live and their second child was born there, but she never liked Florida. After a few years she persuaded him to take her home to Pelham, Georgia where she would be near her family.

Today we drove to Clearwater where both my parents once had kin.
We went to the Marine Aquarium to see Winter, the dolphin that was injured and rescued. She had to have her tail amputated and a prosthesis made for her. That is some story. A movie has been made about Winter. I had the chance to see her up close and fell in love with her as everyone does.

On a visit to Palmetto, we saw this giant whooping crane walking on the road.

One day I met one of my cousins for lunch in Tarpon Springs. We ate outside overlooking the water and the boats. A beautiful day with a beautiful soul, my cousin, Pam.

My pretty cousin, Pam, talking 

Those times when Daddy was a young man and lived here seem like light years ago. But those were some of his happiest times. He never tired of talking about his older brother and the other people he knew back then. One of his friends, a relative, was John Council who would eventually become publisher of one of the  newspapers in this area. Daddy said John was one of the handsomest fellows he had ever seen and was a “dandy” with the women. They were "running buddies" for a short time, I think.

I'll always remember, after Aunt Judy moved back to Florida in her later years, she would say, "Florida tomatoes just aren't as good as Georgia tomatoes." I think she had to buy her tomatoes in Florida from the grocery store, but in Georgia, she ate the ones grown by my father in his garden. Fresh beats cold storage any day of the week.

So many things seem familiar to me here, but in truth, I've only heard about them in stories passed down from older generations.That is what we do. Like most families, we tell stories in one way or another, and have been doing this since the beginning of time.

Florida holds some of my history.

Tampa Bay

I spent time in St. Petersburg, Florida this winter and visited cousins and friends throughout the area. I wrote this post while there.


Friday, January 20, Everything is Familiar because I’ve heard the Stories.

My father, long before I knew him, lived in Palmetto, FL with his brother Charlie and worked on Charlie’s farm. In fact, that was when my daddy fell in love with farming. Those days produced in him a dream of someday owning a farm.

Sitting around our large dining table, my brothers and sisters and I heard the tales of life in Palmetto with Charlie and his family. In his letters to my mother, my father described the work he did and also the fun he had on weekends. He mentioned going to the beach with other young people. I remember him speaking of the Tamiami Trail. In my childish mind I pictured it as a path through woodland. Today I saw a sign for the Tamiami Trail, a wide highway not far from my cousin’s house.

In my father’s time, the beaches were open to the public. On weekends the young people gathered on the sand for fish frys. They danced and flirted with each other. Daddy pretended to Mother, in his letters, that he never had fun and just went along because all the others were there. Today one would be hard-pressed to find a public beach. The high rise hotels own the waterfront.

I try to imagine what it was like in the early twenties here in this now metropolis with tall buildings and  traffic. I understand that St. Pete has quite a few millionaires and some billionaires living in mansions.

For years I heard Mother and Daddy talk about Pinellas County where my aunt Oleo and her family lived and also Manatee County. When I see those names on signs I can hear my aunts talking about this land, and my father knew the names and landmarks mentioned. Although he lived in the area off and on only a few years, I could tell he had fond memories.

Today we drove to Clearwater where I  had kin on both sides of my family. I don't know any of them well enough now to find them. We went to see Winter, the dolphin who had to have her tail amputated and a prosthesis made for her. That is some story. A movie has been made about Winter. I had the chance to see her up close and fell in love with her as everyone does.
 
When Daddy was a young man and lived here seems like light years ago. But those were some of his happiest times. He never tired of talking about his older brother, his sister, Annie and her beau, and the other people he knew back then. One of his buddies was John Council who would eventually own one of the big newspapers in this area. Daddy said John was one of the handsomest fellows he had ever seen and was a “dandy” with the women. Could my father have been a little jealous of John? He never sad he was, and he enjoyed hanging out with John.

So many things seem familiar to me, but in truth, I’ve only heard about them in stories passed down from generations. That is what we do. We tell stories in one way or another and have been doing this since the beginning of time.

FAMILY PHOTOS AND THE STORIES THEY TELL

This photo of my parents and their grandchildren was taken at my parents' 50th wedding anniversary in the early seventies. Soon after, my mother had a stroke that left her somewhat damaged for the rest of her life.

All of these children were so dear to me at the time. I babysat for most of them. Now they all have families and cute kids of their own. They are responsible adults and working in their own businesses or with companies or teaching school. Below, see some of them as adults. Can you place them with the photo above?

If you are like me, the time seems to fly faster and faster as we grow older. I remember when these handsome adults were little kids playing all over the farm riding horses, swimming, free as young animals frollicking through life.

The beautiful girl in the above photo earned her PhD,  and she is named for my father. The middle picture is of a young man who turned out to be a competent business man running a profitable business even in difficult times, The last picture is a charming, handsome father of five beautiful children.

My family stories don't often include them, but I feel that future stories should and will.

"Sisters, Sisters, There's Never Been More Devoted Sisters"

SISTERS Photo by: Barry Beall

June, sitting in the chair, and Gay behind her on her left are my sisters. I am the middle child, but only two years older than Gay.

How lucky I am to have these two always on my side. June recently moved with her husband Charlie to a Retirement "Resort" in Alpharetta. That was a turning point in her life and now she stays extremely busy. In fact, I have to call and find out when she will be available for us to visit. I am delighted to see June happier and healthier than she has been in years.


Gay, who practices her Reiki and EFT on all of us when we need it, is like a part of me. I call her when I am sad, when I want to celebrate, when I want to vent, or when I just need to hear her voice. How lonely and sad my life would have been without her. I wrote a story about how we almost lost her when she was a baby. It was published in an anthology.

I'll post a photo of us as kids. Together we can't be beat!