grace grits and gardening - ramblings from an arkansas farm girl

Daylight Saving Time: Let’s Take a Vote!

March 9, 2013 By Talya Tate Boerner

At 2:00 a.m. on Sunday morning, we officially turn our clocks forward one hour. The good thing: more daylight to garden. The bad thing: I lose another hour changing all those clocks around the house. Thankfully the iPhone and computer automagically reset without my assistance. The microwave…not so smart.

I grew up in the 1970s in rural Northeast Arkansas. As far back as I can remember, I attended Brinkley Chapel Church. The church looked as you might imagine with towering pecan trees, a circle gravel driveway and a carpet of clover growing from the back door to the surrounding cotton fields. Inside, a mixture of friends and family filled the pews each time the doors were open.

One year before Sunday school, Uncle Rosie addressed the congregation with important new business. He proposed Brinkley Chapel NOT follow Daylight Savings Time. He felt daylight savings time was unnecessary, and put the issue up for vote.

After much consideration and debate, Brinkley Chapel decided not following daylight savings time would be too confusing for everyone else. So we reluctantly went along with it.

I love that our faithful congregation of forty-five thought such a decision could be made with no regard for the rest of the county, state, nation.

Is it time for another vote?

Grace Grits and Gardening

Musical Pairing:

Walking on Sunshine, Katrina & The Waves

A Beautiful Morning

March 8, 2013 By Talya Tate Boerner

The soil, surprisingly warm, feels of spring.

New ferns, bright green and vigorous, are root bound, holding tight to their plastic containers. Last year’s tired ferns easily pop from the winter dirt. Transplanted to a less conspicuous spot in the back yard, I will nurse them back to health.

Red dianthus and sweet alyssum, how I’ve missed you.

The dogs follow me sniffing the rose food I spoon into the earth.

Vondee iris, tall and strong, will soon bloom.

From my monster rosemary bush, I trim cuttings, poking each into dirt with a splash of root stimulator. As though I need more rosemary…

I drink coffee from the porch swing, savoring this moment, this first day of gardening. By nine a.m. the temperature is already in the mid-fifties—a perfect afternoon awaits. A mourning dove sings. She knows too.

I smile at the potting soil packed underneath my fingernails.

talya

Musical Pairings:

A Beautiful Morning, The Rascals

Magic Carpet Ride

March 7, 2013 By Talya Tate Boerner

Sleep eludes me. No matter when I go to sleep, I wake around 3:00 a.m. then toss and think and write in my head for at least an hour before finally drifting back off.

Tuesday night I slept all night. I slept deep and hard and my mind was filled with bizarre dreams.

At home in Mississippi County, the pages of my book flew from my hands and blew across perfect rows of soybeans. Sheets of white paper, my words, scattered in all directions and settled between furrows. The pages were just beyond my reach and impossible to retrieve, because I was flying over the soybean field on a magic carpet.