Memories - grace grits and gardening

Where the heck are my genie powers?

April 15, 2014 By Talya Tate Boerner

DANG IT’S COLD! For one day and one day only (thank goodness) spring has disappeared from the Ozark Mountains and winter has returned. Rude this time of year, don’t you agree?

This morning I am trying to summon the will to unbury myself from my cozy, warm bed. The coffee pot in my Dairy Hollow room is waaaaaaaaay over there. See it sitting on top of that little refrigerator?

Between here and there spreads several feet of icy concrete. And my feet are bare. If only I had genie powers…

As a kid, if someone granted me one wish and I could have been anyone—real, imagined, dead, alive, rich, famous—anyone, I would have chosen Jeannie, from the 1970s sitcom I Dream of Jeannie. I loved everything about her. The way her blonde ponytail bounced when she blinked and performed magic, her dreamy outfit that showed off her curvy body, her super groovy bottle decorated inside like…well, like a genie’s bedroom should be decorated with poofy pillows and sheer fabric and low lighting.

And Major Nelson? ohh la la. He was cute before he became an evil oil baron.

Alas I am not Jeannie, and I must make my own magic. Right now I’m gonna make coffee.

Happy Tuesday everyone!

Grace Grits and Gardening

Musical Pairing:

I Dream of Jeannie

“Magic is believing in yourself, if you can do that, you can make anything happen.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

the Easter BAT

April 10, 2014 By Talya Tate Boerner

Way before parents spent too much time trying to create magical memories for their children, my Momma (the BAT) made holidays special by just being herself and keeping life simple. Halloween involved homemade costumes, birthdays included handmade invitations, and 4th of July meant driving over the tracks to buy Roman candles we set off across the cotton field. Christmas was pure-dee-lightful from the moment the Sears Wish Book arrived in the mailbox to the dreaded morning we returned to school in January.

via morgueFile

And Easter? Easter was fun too. There was the all important Brinkley Chapel part with Brother Brown’s resurrection sermon, and although Daddy never once attended Easter service with us, he seemed to be in an okay mood (except the Easter Sunday our house was robbed but that’s a different story).

During the week leading up to Good Friday, our house smelled of Easter—white vinegar and PAAS dye. Easter egg dyeing was an important part of our tradition.

But my first spring semester in college, for whatever reason, I wasn’t planning to drive home to Arkansas for Easter break. Not enough time? I don’t recall. But I do remember thinking what about Easter eggs? We’d always dyed eggs together. Oh well, things were bound to change eventually…

Not really.

Momma and Aunt Lavern loaded up the Cadillac and brought Easter to Baylor University complete with THREE dozen hard-boiled eggs. My sister, cousin and I dyed those eggs while staying at the Best Western across from campus.

That, my friends, is the definition of a fun Momma.

And yes, I’m wearing a tube top.

Grace Grits and Gardening

Musical Pairing:

The Power of Love, Huey Lewis

Aunt Rena’s Store

March 24, 2014 By Talya Tate Boerner

Beyond the cotton field and over the steep ditch, we could see Aunt Rena’s store from my cousin Lesa’s front yard. On summer afternoons, we walked over for a visit. Aunt Lavern (Lesa’s momma) watched us from their carport to make sure we didn’t get run over on the highway by the big trucks hauling grain. We never did.

Even though Aunt Rena was always busy piddling around the store, she seemed happy to see us and greeted us with big hugs and glasses of sweet tea served in Mason jars. Since her store was dimly lit and crammed packed with stuff, it was our favorite place to play hide-and-go-seek. The creaky wooden floors and musty air that sometimes made us sneeze, added an extra challenge to our game.

I liked to hide behind the large cardboard boxes shoved underneath the dry good shelves.

One day I peeked inside and discovered the boxes were filled with scraps of fabric—different colors and patterns—all folded and stacked in little squares.

Six whole boxes!

“Aunt Rena, what are you planning to do with all this fabric?” I held up a stack of cotton pieces.

“I’m not sure yet,” she said.

I thought she might use the cloth for quilts and blankets. Or maybe she was just a collector of things that were too good to throw away. I never really knew for sure. I never saw any customers in the store either.

Grace Grits and Gardening