Mama Hattie stood a scant five feet. She never learned to drive. She didn’t go to college. She stuck around the community—a cluster of houses and stores alongside a bend in the road. But she towers in my memory because of the magical summers spent with her in the north Georgia mountains.
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Space Enough for God, Mama Hattie, and a Whale (Part One)
It’s the small things that keep a person alive. Take my grandmother, Mama Hattie. She made it to ninety-five. She was born in a wagon-and-mule era and died the day an astronaut stepped from the space shuttle to test heating devices in the toe caps of his boots.
Her obituary said she was somebody’s wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, sister, and aunt. But she was so much more.
A Mom to Love: Wonder Woman Without the Skimpy Suit
My clearest memory is my mother’s crescent-shaped blue eyes dancing while we taste freshly baked chocolate chip cookies and sip from cool glasses of milk. I feel her gathering me onto her lap because the boy I loved broke up with me. I hear the mellow dinner bell ringing in the backyard and her voice at twilight calling us to come in for supper. Her love did not overlook. Not one of us. Not once.
Lulled by a Late Snowfall: “Iowa Dreams”
A few days ago, snow dusted the southern landscape. Winter’s last blast showed up in a flurry of images on social media. Memory took me back to my time in Iowa. Yards seemed snowbound from November to March. I once stepped outside for a midnight sojourn in a still garden—and walked away with a poem.
Hope Peeps Eternal Thanks to the Persistent Crocus
“Where flowers bloom so does hope.” This quote by Lady Bird Johnson, who championed environmental conservation and wildflower beautification, always stuck with me. Crocuses pushing up from the snow (or bare ground) promises renewal. The spring equinox is almost upon us. The poem “Fauve Crocuses” marks the coming season.