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Sisters

April 18, 2012 By Talya Tate Boerner

Every girl needs a sister.

Yesterday was my little sister’s birthday. HOW did she get so old so soon? Staci’s 47 which means Lesa (our sister-cousin) will be 48 next week, and I am holding at 2 Score and 9.75 until July. I’m thinking 5, 6 and 7 years old was waaaay cuter.

Time flies.

Me feeding Staci.

Staci was my first, best friend. Although when the stork brought her, I was a bit skeptical about our future relationship. She stole my thunder. The new cute baby syndrome ran rampant in our house. It was annoying.

Cotton Pageant 1970
We were thrilled.

I think Momma must have always wanted twins? For years, she dressed us like twinkies in handmade outfits. It was SOOOOO embarrassing. Especially when she made us model her home sewn frocks in the Cotton Pageant. We were never meant for the runway. Staci and I were much more comfortable playing with our matchbox cars in the dirt field behind our house.

This picture of our Cotton Pageant experience was in the newspaper, and it speaks volumes. Staci, at 5 years old, is shooting daggers at the cameraman with those expressive eyes. Yet she has her hands sweetly clasped, as if she’s just biding her time before having a total all-out hissy fit. I’m standing uncomfortably like I’m posing for an awkward school picture. My arms and legs are braced as I wait for the perfect opportunity to vault off the stage and run all the way home from Burdette. I prayed NONE of my 2nd grade friends saw this picture in The Osceola Times.

Staci had a Thomas Tate Temper when she was little. She threw tantrums at Big Star on more than one occasion, flinging herself to the nasty sticky floor, flailing her arms and legs. I never knew what triggered these meltdowns – maybe she was protesting our lack of store-bought outfits. Momma, remaining cool and calm, somehow completely ignored these outbursts. She lightly stepped right over her, grabbed a basket and strolled down the grocery aisle shopping for supper. I’m sure inside she wanted to slam a cocktail. I just stared at both of them, completely mortified.

Thankfully Staci outgrew those tantrums pretty quickly. We continue to have hilarious adventures together, and nothing much horrifies either one of us anymore. Except maybe our 1980s big hair photos.

HAIR.

“Big sisters are the crab grass in the lawn of life.” – Peanuts, Linus Van Pelt

Musical Pairings:

Rod Stewart, “Forever Young”
The Beatles, “In My Life”

Where in the World is Barbara Tate?

April 12, 2012 By Talya Tate Boerner

My mother has a love-hate relationship with the navigation system in her candy apple red Cadillac. When she bought the car, she attended 2 training sessions at the dealership to learn to use the fancy features. She may need to register for an entire semester. In her defense, the programming choices are completely nonsensical. Nothing about the system is intuitive.

Each time we drive anywhere unfamiliar, we play the navigation system game, first sitting in her car attempting to program the silly thing. After at least twenty minutes which must be estimated into the overall travel time, we head out. Hope always springs eternal. We are guided by the sultry voiced navigation woman, which Momma named Veronica, who immediately tells us to take the first right and make a u-turn. How can we be lost already? We are still in my neighborhood! Veronica always tries to make us drive north, and she is very big on u-turns. Is she trying to take us back to Arkansas? Maybe she thinks we always need to start at home base before heading somewhere new? Veronica has an evil mind of her own. I prefer to call her Christine.

A few months ago, I drove my mother to her cousin’s ranch near Italy (Texas). In her wicked voice, Veronica focused on u-turns the entire trip. To make the drive even more insane, Momma is convinced Veronica will not work without the radio playing. VeronicaDoesn’tWorkAnyway… She drones on and on providing erroneous directions, speaking concurrently with the satellite radio which is always set to the Elvis station. “Exit at the next right and make a u-turn,” purrs Veronica as Elvis croons In the Ghetto. It’s enough to make you drink and drive and pee your pants.

one of our many trips to the ranch in Italy

Once I am completely unhinged, I whip out my iPhone to navigate, which I should have done in my driveway before leaving. And at the same time, Momma calls her best friends at OnStar for help. She loves loves loves to call her OnStar peeps. I’m pretty sure when I’m not around, she calls them just to chit-chat and check the weather conditions.

“Is it you again, Ms. Tate?” This is how the OnStar people greet my mother now. They have all become buddies – probably Facebook friends. They have directed her all over the country as well as just across Dallas. She definitely gets her money’s worth with OnStar which is good, because Veronica certainly doesn’t earn her keep.

Yesterday, Momma was frustrated as she couldn’t remember how to post a picture on Facebook. I tried to text instructions to her. No go. I called and attempted to walk her through it. At last she told me she thought she had figured it out, so we hung up. I really think she was just tired of talking to me about it. Later I saw the picture successfully posted on Facebook. Yay! I bet she called her friends at OnStar to help her.

talya

Musical Pairings:

Sting, “Message in a Bottle”
The Clash, “Brand New Cadillac”

low in the grave at Easter

April 6, 2012 By Talya Tate Boerner

Brinkley Chapel

The thing I remember most about Easter service when I was a kid at Brinkley Chapel was singing Low in the Grave. It was a horribly slow and depressing hymn, especially the way our small congregation sang it. Even the uplifting chorus of the song “up from the grave he arose!” sounded like something from Night of the Living Dead. I’m pretty sure at least that section should have been happy and full of joy, a celebration of the most important Christian holiday. And maybe expressed with a bit of pep? We sang it like Jesus the zombie clawed his way from the dank dark ground with his fingernails instead of miraculously arising from the tomb into the glorious gates of Heaven.
Although there were some great old hymns in the Baptist Hymnal, we may as well used them as booster seats. Brother Brown was stuck on the same old songs which we knew by heart and sang like funeral dirges.

Brinkley Youth Group 1967
Front: Karen, Monica, Staci, Jamie
Back: Lesa, Talya, Lynn

Momma was the pianist. To no avail, she sometimes tried to speed things up a bit, but sadly we only knew one speed. Snail. From the piano bench, her neck bobbed back and forth like a chicken as she tried to will everyone to pick up the pace. Sometimes she just played ahead of everyone. Singing was clearly not our strong suit.

Staci, Lesa, Talya, Jamie, Karen, Monica
Christmas Brinkley 1971

But those members of the church were strong and faithful. SaltOfTheEarth. This congregation of friends and family who surrounded us growing up, would give their eye teeth and right arms to help anyone. In the moment, spending time there and living life, you don’t realize the influence and importance of a place or people. I wish I could spend one more Easter service at Brinkley Chapel with that same congregation, but the building was sold and is no longer a church and many of the people are gone. I bet if we had one more chance to sing that song it would sound a little better to me now.