grace grits and gardening

ramblings from an arkansas farm girl

Marcia! Marcia! Marcia!

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I wanted to be a cheerleader in the 7th grade. I was skinny and dorky and nervous. BUT, my super cool cousin, Cindy, was the captain. She was a 9th grader. So, maybe I had a chance – nepotism and all. She graciously took me under her wing, and attempted to teach me a cheer for tryouts. We could do any cheer we wanted which was pretty neat. Cindy had a whole repertoire from which to select. I was a cheerleader moron – a blank slate. 
Cindy selected a cheer and helped me master it, paying special attention to my floppy arms and overall gawkiness. We worked on it in the front yard during the summer before tryouts. I remember it very well.

Tic-Toc, It’s Time to Rock
Let’s Have a Vic-to-ry!
Tic-Toc, The Game is Locked,
And the Jackets, (clap-clap) Have the Key.

SERIOUSLY? 
Clearly, she did not want me on the squad. Not the coolest cheer in the ole cheer book. Of course this was the 70s.
Marcia
My sister and I loved to spend the night with Mam-maw Ruby and Papa Homer when Cindy was there. Cindy was our leader. Our inspiration. She wore Cover Girl makeup – lots of it – and removed it with Noxema. We weren’t allowed. She looked like those models on Teen Magazine. She even did some modeling in Memphis. How could we EVER compete with this? For a period of time, she even spelled her name Cindi – with an ‘i’. She was that kind of girl. She could just change her own name, and everyone went right along with it. She knew just how to apply that tanning lotion – QT. I tried to do it one time but my hands turned completely rusted and my legs looked corroded. She was bronze. I couldn’t leave the house for a week. My dad thought she freaking hung the moon. So did we.

Tryouts made me very nervous. I was sure I wouldn’t make the squad – I wore gold wire rim glasses! How can you cheer in glasses? I was Jan Brady. Cindy, of course, was Marcia. Most definitely. She had straight, long, shiny, brown hair that swung across her back as she walked around the Keiser playground. Just like Marcia. AND, her boyfriend was James Parks – ohsweetjesus. If he even looked in my direction I stuttered. He too was in the 9th grade. AND, he was the big brother of my best friend. So, I got to look at him a lot. Marcia had Davy Jones; Cindy had James Parks, and I had glasses. Like Jan.

Jan
Cindy worked and worked with me on the splits – it was part of the tryout test. There was no way I could do the splits. Not even close. How could I possibly be a cheerleader and not do the splits? My legs didn’t work that way. She gave me homework – stretching exercises which I did religiously, on my own time. Staci, my little sister who also was uncool – tried to help. She stood over me and pushed my shoulders down, trying to force me into the splits. Surprisingly, to my knowledge, I didn’t rupture anything. I rubbed vaseline into my knees, trying to limber them up (my own idea). No luck. Cindy was as nimble as Raggedy Ann. She could actually sit on the floor Indian style and put her feet around her head! She invented the flowering lotus pose before yoga was invented. We were first cousins! Why couldn’t I do that? 

When the time came for tryouts, I took my glasses off and handed them to Cindy. a) I didn’t want to be a four-eyes; and b) I didn’t want to be able to see anyone in the stands, especially Mrs. Ashley who selected the team. The team needed a blind cheerleader – I was sure of it. I couldn’t see a thing without my glasses. I squinted the entire time. Attractive.


Amazingly, I did make the squad. Maybe everyone made it? I don’t remember, and I didn’t know because I couldn’t see. I was too cool now for glasses. Thanks to Cindy, I’m certain. 


James Parks
Later, in 1977, the year I turned Sweet 16, I actually had my first date – with James Parks. Still the most handsome boy in Keiser, somehow Becky and I finagled a double date with James and his best friend, Lance. They took us to the Osceola drive-in theatre, across from the graveyard. The movie was Walking Tall, but I couldn’t concentrate on it. I was too aware of James sitting so close to me in that dark back seat of Lance’s dusty car. I had no idea how I had gotten so lucky to be on my first date with James Parks!  I was pretty sure being a cheerleader helped. James played football. Later, we learned Becky’s dad tradedhis best hunting dog to Lance to entice him into this date. Nice. I still have no idea what my daddy promised to James, but I would have given my eye teeth and sold my soul to truly get his attention. Of course, I was just his little sister’s annoying friend and he never gave me a second thought. I don’t even think he knew I was there. I’m sure he was still thinking about Cindy.



I actually saw James Parks a few weeks ago on his way to a funeral, and he asked me about Cindy. I KNEW he was still thinking about her. 


jan


Musical Pairings:
Ella Fitzgerald, “Blue Moon”
Johnny Rodriguez, “Ridin’ My Thumb to Mexico”
Keiser Jr. High Cheerleaders
Yellow Jackets!
I’m on the far left standing on one leg like a flamingo?

A long, long time ago, I can still remember…

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Buddy Holly

February 3, 1959. Every year at this time, we pause to reflect and remember the sad, cold, day the music suddenly died.

Buddy Holly, only a year and a half into his promising career (he opened for Elvis in 1955!), was top billing on a 24 day tour through the Midwest with the Big Bopper and Ritchie Valens. On an early morning flight flown by a very young pilot, the music died in an Iowa cornfield in a blizzard. Holly was 22 years old. His bass player, Waylon Jennings, was scheduled to fly on that plane, but he gave his seat up to the Big Bopper who was under the weather. His guitarist, Tommy Allsup, flipped a coin with Valens for the last seat. Valens ‘won’.  This turn of events and the short musical career of Holly impacted music worldwide. In ways we can’t imagine.

Buddy Holly’s records influenced both John Lennon and George Harrison. The cover of the first Rollin Stones’ single released in the United States was the cover of Buddy Holly’s “Not Fade Away”.  And if Waylon Jennings had been on that plane??? My life would have been decidedly different. I was raised on Willie and Waylon…

In the early seventies, my sister and I practiced cheers and cartwheels for hours at a time in the front yard with the radio blaring. American Pie was our favorite cartwheel and herkie practicing song.  We sang it off key and loudly as we ran from one end of the yard to the other trying to get up the speed and nerve to flip. We didn’t really understand the song’s meaning —most of the phrases were mysterious, almost like a riddle. And back then we couldn’t google the lyrics or press the back button on the iPod, we had to wait until the next time it played on the radio. Fortunately it was regularly played.

Bye-Bye Miss American Pie. We liked pie. Papa Homer made the best fried peach pies! And, we loved the Miss America pageant, so therefore it was a good song. One of the highlights of the year was watching the Miss America pageant with Nana. We stayed up late, each picked our favorite contestant, cheered like crazy for Miss Arkansas even though she rarely won, and fell asleep on the floor right before it was over.

Drove My Chevy to the Levee. We knew all about driving ‘chevys to the levees’. Daddy drove a chevy. It always smelled dusty inside, from driving up and down the turnrows. And we lived only a couple of miles from the Mississippi River. A huge levee kept our mighty river in check. We often drove over the levee in Osceola or Wilson just to make sure the river was still there.

Drinking Whiskey and Rye. My sister and I knew what  ‘drinking whiskey’ was. Daddy had a whole liquor cabinet full of the stuff.  I wasn’t so sure about what rye was though…

And While the King was Looking Down. Obviously the King was Elvis. Everyone knew that. We drove by Graceland all the time. We practically knew Elvis.

Helter Skelter in a Summer Swelter. – Okay this was where the song started to get a little freaky. Charles Manson had murdered that poor Sharon Tate.  SameLastNameAsUs!!  That was a little too close to home for me. The song was reeeaaalllly long, and I thought Mr. McLean could have left this part out altogether.

A Generation Lost in Space. Easy peesy. We saw the moon landing at school. In first grade. Plus, my mother nearly got us kicked out of the Pink Palace Museum in Memphis for taking a picture of the moon rock. They tried to take her camera but she wasn’t about to let that happen. It was embarrassing, and on my birthday…  Just this once, couldn’t she not draw attention to us?

No Angel Born in Hell Could Break that Satan’s Spell. Well that was scary. I was a good little Baptist girl. No one had to explain the devil to me.

The last verse was just plain sad. The tempo was slower, and I wanted to cry when I thought about how the music wouldn’t play. But overall, it was the best song I’d ever heard. It gave me much to think about while practicing my cartwheels.

Grace Grits and Gardening
Musical Pairing:
Don McLean, American Pie

 

I’ll have what IOWA’s having!

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So the Iowa Caucus is over. After all the coffee drinking and hand shaking and slobbering on cutie patootie babies, seems like it was a wasted effort. First Mitt Romney was declared the winner – wait just a minute! NotSoFastMittens. Someone in the back room recounted, or found some more ballots on the floor, or forgot some ballots were left on the copier and suddenly Rick Santorum was ahead by 34 whopping votes. Then, the party confessed that maybe some votes went missing. Left in the bathroom and accidentally thrown out? Hmmmm.


So now it’s being touted as a three way tie – everyone won! – yippee! – trophies and pizza all around! – a triple header – sounds as American as apple pie if you use baseball lingo to describe the confusion. Triple losers. What’s a nation to do?

Iowa sets the tone for the entire election. Iowa goes first. Apparently no one can decide who to vote for until the normal regular people in Iowa decide for us. Kinda like ordering dinner at a restaurant. Sometimes you just can’t pick something off the menu until you hear what your best friend is having. Sometimes you don’t understand the menu – it’s written in Spanish or very fancy words – so you need someone to translate or even order for you. Sometimes you order something that you saw advertised – it sounded really good at the time but later it gave you serious indigestion. Or diarrhea. Sometimes you just can’t see the menu because you forgot your cute Kate Spade readers – you accidentally left them in your other purse. Or, maybe you think you want the Chicken Caesar Salad, hold the croutons, with the dressing on the side (you have been going to yoga and really trying to shrink the burrito that has formed around your waistline), BUT then your husband orders sour cream chicken enchiladas with chopped onions and a side of white queso. Suddenly you change your order. And you order iced tea with lime until you realize everyone else at the table is ordering a top shelf margarita. So you change your order. You don’t want to be different. Sometimes you aren’t even hungry.

Everyone, across the nation, is hoping and praying that someone – anyone – just a normal regular girl with business sense and common sense will throw her hat into the ring. Someone who would never ever tie her Schnauzers to the roof to drive to the dog park, much less to Canada. Someone who doesn’t need an exploratory committee to know we can’t afford a 51st state on the moon – we can’t take care of the 50 states we have. Someone who knows that people will be bored to tears by a man in a Mr. Rogers sweater vest. 

I don’t know that much about caucusing. I’ve never caucused – I just go vote when the polls are open. But, just to satisfy my own curiosity, I did conduct my own exit poll after the last democratic caucus in 2008 –  among my co-workers. As I suspected, no one who participated knew the first thing about what they were doing. I admit, my poll was in no way scientific – more of an SNL kind of thing. The answers confirmed to me that Iowa should decide for us – at least for my co-workers. Iowa’s been doing it a long time. They seem really into it. And, they probably don’t have much going on in the wintertime, so they can adequately prepare. The question posed was: “Did anyone at the bank participate in the caucus yesterday? If so, how was it?” 

Results: (direct quotes – some names changed):

  • I tried to caucus in Grand Prairie, but it was too crowded, so I went home;
  • My momma did. She didn’t get home til 11 pm;
  • I bet Johnny likes him a big ole caucus;
  • No, I didn’t know anything about the candidates. But I know it’s a secret ballot.
  • Yes, Laurie made me do it. I voted early and Laurie told me if I didn’t caucus, my early vote wouldn’t count. I just followed the instructions of some lady. I was confused. I just voted on who I wanted on the ballot… unless they gave me something else, because I had to tell them I was already in for the early voting…so I hope I did it right.     (omg)
  • Well, I can tell you one thing, you don’t get home til midnight. I caucused in Mesquite. We didn’t start until 9:30 and had to stand in a line outside in the dark and in the cold. We got in two lines, one for McCain and one for Huckabee. You had to print legibly your name, phone, and address so they could verify you were legal. You put your hat in the ring if you wanted to be a delegate – I didn’t want to do that so I just stayed in the back. Then later you go to state to the big thing. They didn’t start this caucusing thing until the John Kerry thing because they didn’t count right or do right. I wanted to vote for McCain but couldn’t because it was only between Hillary and Obama.
  • No, is it too late? 
Seriously OMG. 

Sometimes you just lose your appetite altogether. 
Oops….

talya

Musical Pairings:
Gnarls Barkley, “Crazy”

Food. Farm. Garden. Life.

THANKS FOR READING!