grace grits and gardening

ramblings from an arkansas farm girl

Storybook Journal

By

jour·nal a record of experiences, ideas, or reflections kept regularly for private use. (Merriam-Webster definition 1c)


On the afternoon of my last full day at Dairy Hollow, I opened the middle section of an antique bookcase to reveal a drop-down desk. Inside, I found journals provided to guests when the property was a bed-and-breakfast. For an hour (or more) I became lost in the entries dated 1988-1995. Hundreds of thoughts and reflections, along with detailed sketches and poems.

The stories were similar. This peaceful spot in the Ozarks affected each guest in the same manner. People were drawn from across the country, all with different circumstances–newlyweds, lost souls, stressed out families. Some folks were simply passing through. Each with different issues and lives, all leaving with a common bond.

Connecting randomly selected sentences from five journals–a letter to Dairy Hollow…

Dear Dairy Hollow— 

My bride and I arrived late on January 4 all decked out in glorious wedding attire. She was beautiful… I didn’t know a woman could change so much from one night to the next morning! Just kidding! (1992). This can’t be real life…we have stepped into the pages of a storybook and like Goldilocks, everything was “just right.” (1988) 
I have traveled many miles visiting hundreds of inns…fine, stately mansions with exquisite furnishings….others are cute little places. Each is a reflection of the innkeeper’s soul. Some have no soul…Dairy Hollow stands out…there is a mystical quality.  (1990) Our last night in particular I felt and understood the power of this place. (1993)

This has been a pleasant way to start a life together. (1991)  No phones, no television. It is so sweet to remember how less is always more. (1988) We love this place. (1995)

Home Sweet Home (1988)

Love… 

talya

More than a Feeling, Boston

“And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.” 
― Roald Dahl

Demented Dairy Hollow?

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For four nights in a row I have slept like the dead. My Dairy Hollow cabin is chilly, yet I nest comfortably underneath quilts and blankets snuggling with my feather pillow from home. Good sleeping weather.
Dairy Hollow, Eureka Springs, Ar
Above my rooftop, a canopy of trees, a forest dense and dark. The branches are woven and twisted together, growing as one. The stars twinkle beyond the treetops, but from my spot they are concealed. I am concealed.
The hunter’s moon glows, a giant orb in the autumn sky. By day, the mountainside boasts brilliant fall foliage. By night, the forest mutates into a haven for predators and a hiding place for prey.Especially on Halloween.

On Halloween night I went to bed early, exhausted from the day’s activities. Drifting off easily, I slept  until something stirred me, waking me with a cold chill. A noise outside my door. A scratching sound. Maybe a limb against my window?

Dairy Hollow, Eureka Springs, Ar

A glance to the bedside clock showed 11:57 p.m. Almost midnight.

Thinking it my imagination, I dismissed the noise, but sleep would not return. My nerve endings were on full alert. With blankets pulled to my nose, I watched without blinking, listened to hear what wasn’t there.

Another unfamiliar sound. It was not my imagination, I was certain.

My heart raced as my mind conjured images of ghouls prowling outside my cabin.

In the distance I heard the shriek of a bird, maybe an owl. Haunting. Eerie. And I sensed something, someone, footsteps? The rustle of leaves?

Outside my kitchen window, a slight change in the darkness, a shifting shadow. Was my mind playing tricks?
Weary and empty, I felt devoid of hope and happiness. Devoid of myself. Morning would never come.
I summoned the courage to tiptoe to the front door, my heart pounding in my throat. Through a corner of the blinds I saw darkness. Nothing. Coldness. A reflection of my own frightened face. Flipping on the outside light and shoving open the door, something moved away. Or floated away. Disappearing. Restoring my sanity.
And then I slept. A deep silent sleep. I dreamed of Dementors.

talya

Grace Grits and Gardening
Farm. Food. Garden. Life.



Musical Pairing:

Harry Potter & the Prisoner of Azkaban, Dementor Test

“Believe only half of what you see and nothing that you hear.” 
― Edgar Allan Poe

What Happens at Dairy Hollow…

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The following is a guest blog by my new writer friend Tom Sweeney. Tom is from New Hampshire and writes mystery, science fiction and even a bit of romance. He is working on a series of three mystery/crime novels.


It was wine-thirty at the Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow--time for our daily afternoon get-together, and we residents were gathered on the deck. Writing is a solitary endeavor, hours spent cooped up in a small room, attempting with varying success to wrest that one telling detail from our resistant brains, the single apt metaphor, the bon mot that will bring our prose off the page and into life.

These gab sessions interacting with other writers are a major reason why the Writers’ Colony works so well for me.

Someone mentioned my roomie, and we all laughed. We don’t have roommates, particularly not roommates of the opposite sex as neither spouses nor visitors are allowed here at the Colony.

Then again, as I retorted, “That’s what they say, but you notice that each studio has a big double bed.” 


Everyone laughed. Someone joked, what happens at Dairy Hollow, stays at Dairy Hollow…

Half a carton of wine later (and only a Diet Dr. Pepper for me), we headed back to our rooms to write. Four hours after that, following a post-dinner impromptu critique session, the two walkers among us decided to see Eureka Springs at night, so we headed downtown.

A half mile from the Colony, we turned a corner of winding Spring Street and saw the gorgeous neon sign of the Palace Hotel and Bath House. The hotel itself was an impressive granite building. We peeked in the window of the lobby and tried to open the door. It was locked, but as we turned to leave a woman appeared from behind the desk to welcome us in.

Her name was Lucretia (perfect Halloween name…) and she was the great-niece of Allen Parmer, who rode with Jesse James. Providing a tour of the hotel, she explained it was the last of many bath houses one time lining Spring Street. The hotel has its original structure and architecture intact, including magnificent woodwork and a finely detailed tile floor.

Tom Sweeney
Writers, both of us, we could not help fall under its spell. Imaging what it must have been like as a Victorian resort, we each drafted a short story in our minds, stories set here at the hotel.

Writers sometimes get lost in their own reveries, though. 

As Lucretia gave us a tour of one of the rooms, complete with king bed and two-person Jacuzzi, my friend turned to me and said, “Honey, we should get this room.”

I was taken by surprise but quickly realized…ah, she’s a fiction writer too…

Food. Farm. Garden. Life.

THANKS FOR READING!