A FAVORITE CHRISTMAS GIFT

  The saddle and bridle

 Everyone has a favorite Christmas story and mine is not really any different.  Who am I kidding?  Of course, it is different because it is about an incredibly special lady who loved a little boy so very, very much that she saved her money and bought him the best Christmas present ever.  Better than a chocolate candy bar, better than a puppy dog, even better than being able to play outside until after dark.  It was just THE BEST CHRISTMAS PRESENT EVER!  I'm not kidding.  Really!  All right, all right.  I'm procrastinating because I'm not sure how to start.  Oh, yes, I do.  Every good story begins the same way with Once Upon A Time.  So here goes.

ONCE UPON A TIME there was a little boy who lived on a farm with his mother, father, two sisters and a brother.  The boy and his brother shared lots of chores together, like feeding their father’s hunting dogs, or watering the camellia and rose bushes that made the farm look beautiful or feeding the cows and pigs and horses.  The two boys enjoyed doing the chores together because they were the best friends. Every day, after school they couldn't wait to finish the chores so they could play together...Whoa!   Stop the story.  That isn't right.  That's not how the story really goes.  That's not anywhere at all like the story goes.  Let me begin again. 

ONCE UPON A TIME there was a little boy who lived on a farm with his mother, father, two sisters and a younger brother, (who thought he was an only child). Everyone on the farm had a chore to do, even the little boy's sisters, although their chores were inside the house with their mother, like sweeping and cleaning and dusting the house, or canning fruit or vegetables and reading books.  Girl stuff.  But the little boy and his brother, (who thought he was an only child), had chores to do out on the farm like feeding their father’s hunting dogs and watering the beautiful camellia and rose bushes that made the farm look beautiful or feeding the cows, pigs and horses.  In the summer they would bale the hay and load it in the barn.  Now the brother, (who thought he was an only child), hardly ever helped with the chores on the farm, when their father wasn't around, and although the little boy got angry with the younger brother, (who thought he was an only child), and although the little boy wanted to beat his brother up and say all sorts of nasty things about him, he didn't.  The little boy never even told his parents because he didn't want to seem like a tattletale.  Besides, the quicker the chores were finished, the quicker the little boy could enjoy what he loved to do.  He knew that when he got home from school, if he did his homework AND the chores then he was able to do the one thing he lived for day after day and that was to ride his horse, even after dark if he wanted to if he stopped for supper.  So, the little boy, most of the time, just went and did the chores for both, even if his brother, (who thought he was an only child), ran off to play in the woods or something. 

The little boy didn't mind this because he loved riding his horse.  He loved her better than anything in the world except his dog, Prissy, of course.  The horse was a beautiful palomino mare with a long golden tail and flowing mane.  She was so beautiful she could be a movie horse.  In fact, the little boy wanted to name this horse Trigger after his favorite horse ever, but his horse was a mare and not a stallion like Trigger.  The little boy couldn't name the horse, Buttermilk, like Dale Evans' horse because his horse was not a buckskin quarter horse.  So, the little boy sat down and thought for an exceptionally long time, about what Roy Rogers might name his horse if his horse were a mare.  The little boy thought that if Dale Evans had a palomino mare, she would have named her Trixie.    It sounded like a movie star horses name and it was almost like Trigger.

             So, he named his horse Trixie.

Now, the little boy and Trixie were like best friends.  Every free moment the two of them could be seen riding down the pasture lane while the little boy practiced his rodeo riding tricks.  He loved to bounce off the ground and back into the saddle while Trixie was at full gallop or ride standing up on the saddle while Trixie galloped around the pasture.  Sometimes the little boy would do shoulder stands while Trixie did her thing, but he fell off too much and finally quit that trick.  Why he didn’t have broken bones is a mystery even today.  At bedtime, if his mother weren’t watching, the little boy would sneak out of the house and just go sit on top of his favorite horse and tell her all about everything that went on that day.  The little boy spent hours grooming his beautiful Trixie, carefully brushing her golden mane and tail, making sure there were no tangles.  He took great joy in taking care of his best friend.  

But one thing bothered the little boy.  The bridle and saddle were a dull brown and worn and scratched.  They had been used on other horses before Trixie.   This was fine, he thought, on the other horses because they were sorrels, but his Trixie was a special horse.  She was like movie horses.  She could do tricks like count to ten with her front foot or kneel and lower her head.  She could stand still while the little boy ran from behind and leaped into the saddle like Roy Rogers about to chase the bad guys.  She could even rear up and paw the air with the little boy on her back.  She needed something much better than the brown worn saddle or the fraying bridle.  She needed to look like the beautiful blond animal she was.

The little boy prayed every night that someday he could find a way to buy a saddle or a bridle that would look beautiful on his wonderful Trixie.  He saved all his money and asked for extra chores because he loved his horse so much.  He prayed that he could get a saddle and a yellow bridle for Christmas.  Every night the little boy counted his money and prayed for a miracle.  

One night, the exceedingly kind, sweet lady, who loved the little boy so very much, heard the little boy praying for a saddle and bridle for his horse.  She heard him praying for a miracle.  So, she decided to help the little boy because she knew how hard he worked and how sincere his heart was.  Besides, she too, knew that the little boy’s brother, (who thought he was an only child), didn't do his share of the chores all the time and went and played in the woods instead.    The kind lady planned. She would save her money.  She had been receiving checks in the mail, that no one knew about, not even the father, because she had been writing articles for different magazines using a nom de plume and decided she would surprise the little boy when Christmas came.  

One day she went to the local Cowboy store and ordered a bridle and a saddle for the little boy.  She made sure that the saddle maker understood exactly how special the little boy's horse was and how beautiful a horse it was with her flowing tail and golden mane.  The kind lady told the saddle maker to use particularly good leather and to dye the leather a golden yellow to match the beautiful horse.  She made sure that the gift would be finished in time for Christmas day. 

Christmas morning that year was so special.  It was a cold day, for once, and the sun was bright and beautiful shining against the bluest of blue skies.  The little boy rushed to the Christmas tree to see what gifts were there.  He searched and searched but couldn't find a single gift except one teeny tiny box with his name on it.  His brother, (who thought he was an only child), had at least three presents and both his sisters had lots of gifts.  He sat down and thought that it wasn't fair.  He worked harder than his selfish brother.  He pouted. 

When his mother came into the room, he got up to leave with a long, sad face.  But the kind lady just asked him to open his present.  He didn't want to, but he did.  Inside was a note that said to look outside the back door. 

When he threw the door open the little boy saw his beautiful Trixie standing there with the most glorious saddle and bridle that he had ever seen.  They were just like he dreamed they should look.  He rushed to Trixie and hugged the saddle and bridle before jumping on to ride.  But then he turned and saw the smile on his mother and father's faces and rushed to give them a huge hug.  “THIS IS THE BEST CHRISTMAS PRESENT EVER!” he shouted as he and Trixie galloped down the pasture lane, shouting “Yippee!  Thank you, Jesus, for answering my prayers.”

 Note to Jonah and Micah my grandsons:   The little boy was of course me, your Papi, Nippy, the kind lady your great grandma Susie Blair and, yes, my brother was looking out only for himself.  

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

 THE DAY MAMA STOLE THE FIREWOOD...

  A FAVORITE THANKSGIVING MEMORY

   I wish there were a photograph, a little instamatic black and white would do, so I could frame it for future generations to enjoy.  But there isn't and memories are all that remain.  

It was a beautiful fall day; the leaves were at their brightest as far as fall trees in Louisiana could be.  The sky couldn't have been any clearer.  You could see your breath in the early morning light.  It was the mid 1950's.  I was 14 and my brother 10.  Thanksgiving morning.  The family had plans to visit some German friends of my parents, in south Louisiana, later in the day, to share the Thanksgiving meal.

My brother and I were waked up early with daddy's shrill whistle.  He had a way of doing that when he wanted something done immediately.  We hopped out of bed and were given orders to hitch up a trailer  to the truck and then go with our mother to pick up a load of firewood. The man, a Mr. Wilson, owed daddy some money and since he was unable to pay, suggested daddy take some firewood in exchange for payment.  We were to do this before we left for south Louisiana.

 He was sending - yes, that is the operative word - the three of us to get the firewood from a place in Buckeye, a small community outside of Alexandria because he had some business to attend to while we were gone.  

After giving directions and some verbal communication from my mother with an attitude, we set off.  She still had not finished cooking the dish we were to bring, and Buckeye was out in the country with lots of winding roads.  She didn't know the area like daddy did. we listened to the tirade most of the way there.  "He always does this to me," she fumed.  "He never thinks I have anything else to do.  I have food to finish.  I have you four kids to round up.  I have to drop everything and go.   But could he go? Oh, no.  He has to send me!" My brother and I were silent, afraid to set her off again if we spoke.  

We wandered the roads in the country, looking for the house daddy described.  It took quite a long time. Mother, in her madness, had forgotten the exact directions.  (This would not be a problem, today, because of cell phones, but we didn't have that luxury in the 1950's.)  The more we drove the more mother thought of things she had to do before leaving for Crowley.  The more she thought of things she had to do before leaving for Crowley, the more upset she became.  The more upset she became, the more she thought of things that she had to do.  The more upset, the more we had to listen.        

Finally, she spotted a huge pile of wood stacked against a pasture fence, newly cut, close to the road.  “That’s the place,” she said.  “He said the woodpile was not near the house. This must be it.”  The house was a good 100 yards away and mother didn't see the need to knock on their door since we were in a hurry.  She backed the trailer up to the pile of wood and ordered us to hurry and load it on the trailer.  

When almost all had been loaded, a woman came out of the house, shouting at us.  

“Who did you think you are?  My husband just cut that wood this morning.  You're stealing our wood,” she shouted.  Mother snapped.  “I am Mrs. Cecil Blair.  We are not stealing your wood.   Your husband owes my husband money, and we are taking this wood for payment.”   Mother told us to keep loading the trailer.  The woman ran into the house.  Mama thought she might be going for a gun and ordered us to hurry and quickly get in the truck.  As the truck started, a man came roaring down the road and into the yard, trying to block us, but mama managed to maneuver around him.  We headed for home as fast as she could drive.  Again, we listened to her tirade all the way home, except this time she added, "Surely daddy called them and told them we were coming today. I bet that rascal forgot.  Now we are going to be accused of stealing."  This was followed by words I shouldn't repeat  She also mentioned those crazy people not wanting to pay.

We arrived home and began unloading the wood while mama hurried into the house, mumbling bad things against my daddy.

Suddenly a Sheriff's car drove up.  The sheriff got out of his car and asked my brother and me some questions. He then asked mama to come outside, but she replied she didn't have time, she had a dish to prepare for Thanksgiving and finish packing.  He asked her about the wood.  She explained that that man, Mr. Wilson owed her husband some money, that she didn't have time for this because we were going to Crowley for Thanksgiving with some friends and she still had to finish the dish she was making, bathe and change clothes and make sure all the four children were getting dressed and ready.  The sheriff tried to interrupt her, but she didn't hear him and shouted for us, boys, to hurry up unloading.  There was too much to do.  Finally, the sheriff said, “Mrs. Blair, I understand your frustration, but what did you say the man's name was where you took the wood?”  She said, Mr. Wilson out in Buckeye.  He looked at his tablet and said, “Mrs. Blair, you were not at Mr. Wilson's house.  You stole that wood. I'm going to have to arrest you.”  Thankfully, daddy arrived home before they took her away and straightened the matter up.  

And, yes, we had to take the wood back before leaving for Crowley.  Two boys did not like that Thanksgiving day.  

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

                   BOUDREAUX’S MOTHER

Proverbs 10:2 Ill-gotten treasures are of no value, but righteousness delivers from death.

  Boudreaux's mother works hard for a living.  She is a roust-a-bout on an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico.  No one messes with her because she has the reputation of being the toughest and meanest of the whole crew and nobody, I mean nobody, is going to find out if there is any truth it.

 When working you can see the tobacco juice streaming down her chin and neck as she works the tobacco around her cheeks and under her tongue, occasionally spitting a large wad over her left shoulder.  The men hate working beside her because frequently they become the target of the wad as it sprays their faces mixed with salt water.

At home she isn’t much different.  She remains the uncouth terror of the area bars, out wrestling, out drinking and certainly out cussing everyone else.

Boudreaux’s mother lives on Bayou Lafourche, the bayou side of Highway One, just past Thibodeaux, on two acres, no wider than 30 feet from bayou to highway, with her half-sister, Lula Mae, and three children, two of them hers, Boudreaux, and Bubba.  Abilene belongs to Lula Mae.

The compound looks like a circus has rolled into town.  On one end is a small garden that supplies all the food for this unusual, dysfunctional family of five.  On the other are the trailers, lined up like a freight train, seven trailers lined in a single row, each connected by a never-ending wide porch.  Boudreaux’s mother has collected the trailers through the years from her seven ex-husbands as part of the divorce settlements.

Each trailer has its own function.  One is the living room, followed by the dining trailer, the kitchen trailer, Boudreaux’s mother’s bedroom. Lula Mae’s quarters, the children’s quarters, and the laundry/bathroom (even though they do not own a washing machine, only a scrub board for washing clothes in the bayou, which isn’t used for its primary purpose.)  When Lula Mae is home alone with the kids the scrub board becomes a musical instrument.  Lula Mae loves leading the motley crew around the train of trailers while keeping time to the loud music with the scrub board and two spoons from Boudreaux’s mother’s best silver collection from the third marriage.  Boudreaux’s mother isn’t bothered by this because she’s never home long enough to know the silver is missing.

If she isn’t on the rig, then she is at the local bars till the sun rises.  Most nights she is so stinking drunk that she never finds her way home.  Lula Mae usually must fetch her from some ditch the next day.

Boudreaux’s mother (no one really knows her real given name) recently stated that she needs a new trailer since seven has not been her lucky number and that eight would be exactly right.  This means that she will be trolling for a new husband.  She believes that eight might even bring her luck in winning the lotto and besides, Boudreaux is getting too old to keep sleeping in the same room with his cousin.

Boudreaux’s mother was recently seen outside Little Joe’s Doghouse, dressed up, fit to kill, out hunting for a man; a real man, a man that has a brand-new trailer.  She is not interested in someone to take care of her.  No one can do that, at least not one in his right mind.  She figures that if she catches one then she only need stay with him long enough to get the paperwork signed over in her name before she gets him too drunk and helps him accidentally fall into the bayou.

 Bless her heart, she is a recreant that needs redemption.

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

MARTHA MAE JOHNSON

 Psalm 44:26   Rise up and help us; Redeem us because of your unfailing love.

 

 

Martha Mae is a true Southern Lady who goes by both Christian names because that is the proper thing to do for ladies of her standing in the South.  She lives on the family plantation that generations of her family have owned in North Louisiana.  Martha Mae has always loved animals and since her papa died and left the estate to her, owns an obedience school for wayward, rebellious animals named “The Martha Mae Redemptive Clinic and Spa for Rebellious Animals”.  Since early childhood, Martha Mae felt a kinship with unruly creatures.  Rumor has it that Martha Mae was quite the “wild one” herself during adolescence.  There was something exciting about the way the animals bullied others and yet she sensed a deep desire, on their part, to be controlled.  She felt she could identify with their rebelliousness. 

 Martha Mae’s Redemptive Clinic and Spa for Rebellious Animals has been in existence for ten years.  Clients from all over the South send their little darlings to Martha Mae.  She has a unique way of communicating with them, unlike anything you have ever witnessed.  For instance, when communicating with birds she flaps her arms and walks with her knees touching, making sounds unlike any bird we know, but it doesn’t bother her.  When getting the attention of a dog she has been known to move about on all fours and sniff inappropriate places. You can imagine how she communicates with pigs.  Some people consider her behavior a bit eccentric, to put it mildly.  Others think she has completely lost her mind and needs to be institutionalized.  It doesn’t bother Martha Mae.  She knows her gift from God is genuine and no one I know can argue with a genuine God given talent.   Bless her heart, she has become a guru to the rich and famous who flock to those who seem a little bit too far left of center. 

With all this publicity she has begun to write books.  Recently Martha Mae completed her third book titled “Raising Christian Animals.  How to be assured your pet will go to Heaven.”  Her first publication was “Baby Signs for Cats” dealing with the vast vocabulary infant kittens learn to recognize and respond to as they communicate with humans.  Its success brought on her second book titled “Warning Signs” which dealt with the subject of pets on drugs.  Martha Mae explored in detail how to recognize the many warning signals animals give when doing drugs.  It sold very well among celebrities causing it to be number one for ten weeks on the bestseller list.  She is currently working on a new book that will deal with recognizing the artistic creativity in chickens.

Martha Mae is currently touring the country promoting her expertise as an Animal Behaviorist.  Recently she was on Jimmy Kimmel and just last week visited Jenna’s Book Club.  She once appeared on America’s Got Talent, where she was to interpret the body language of caged lions but then the audience decided she herself should be caged. 

You may purchase her books at $29.95 each from her website: marthamaewild.com or in Christian bookstores located only in malls.

 

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

 Almond Sugar

  Psalm 150:4     …praise him with the strings and flute.  

 Almond Sugar is not like the rest of her family who should be medicated and placed in a padded room.  She is normal. 

 There are 27 dogs and 15 cats that live in the house with them, in the backwoods of North Louisiana, and occasionally a pig or two.  There are holes in the walls covered by cardboard and broken windows which the brothers destroyed from their constant wrestling over who drinks the most.  The screen door leans against the wall hanging only on one hinge.   In the summer they crank up the generator and turn on several fans to keep the animals comfortable.  In the winter, they all gather in the “big room” and huddle around the fireplace sleeping on pallets with the animals acting as blankets sharing chews of tobacco with each other, and fleas.  Some of the cats have become addicted to the juice after licking it up from the floor.  It is a pathetic family.  They are not cultured except for Almond.

  Her real name is just Almond, but when she’s home, everyone keeps saying, “Almond, sugar, will you open the window?  Almond, sugar, will you feed the dogs?  Almond, sugar, your daddy needs his beer.  Will you get it for him?  Almond, sugar, whatcha cookin’? We’re hungry.  Almond, sugar, can you fix the porch rail, Bugger, Jr. broke it tryin’ to catch a possum.”

 Almond Sugar is gifted in music and plays first chair violin for the Shreveport Symphony Orchestra.  Her family cannot understand this strange girl for they are musically challenged.  Her daddy. “Bugger” and her brother, “Bugger, Jr.” barely know how to play the radio, much less a musical instrument.  In fact, the closest they ever came to making music was when they came home drunk, trying to sneak in the house, knocking over pots and pans in the kitchen that were all over the floor to feed the animals.  Two of her brothers, after eating the entire pot of their ma's bean soup often gave a musical concert, but that is as close as they ever came to making music.

 When Almond was in school, her ma was overheard one night talking to a drinking buddy at a bar, saying, “Almond Sugar’s teacher said she is gifted and above normal.  Hell, normal people make me nervous, and I got me one with a gift.  Don’t know where that child keeps it, I’ve looked all over that room of hers and ain’t found no gift yet. I think that teacher’s lyin’.  If that child got a gift from her teacher, she ain’t never brought it home.  Gift, hell.  There ain’t one, I’m tellin’ ya.”

 Almond seldom comes home but when she does it seems all her time is cleaning or mending or fixing broken windows or things around the house.  Her family never lifts a finger to help.  She would send money home, but she knows where the money would go.

 Still, her parents are getting old, so she makes the effort to visit every other month even though she would prefer remaining in the city.  When not in Shreveport playing with the symphony, Almond loves to sit on the front porch in a cow hide chair, resting her feet on the porch rail, with a hound dog under her feet or a pig. If she isn’t reading, then she will pick up her instrument and play Mozart or Bach.   But sometimes, you can catch her with a big smile on her face, tapping her foot and playing some good old Blue Grass Country.

 I guess you can take the girl out of the country, but you can’t completely take the country out of the girl.

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

 MY FAMILY

 Proverbs 1:8 Hear, my son, your father’s instructions, and forsake not your mother’s teachings.

It has been said that Southern families are known for being a colorful sort of people.  Southern politician's families even more so.  Then why should anyone be surprised if my family looked like an 8 box of Crayola Crayons (that's counting the dogs).  We were different, brilliant, and nontoxic, and oh, so much fun.

 My dad held the trump card of the raconteur, feeling most at home with an audience around him, telling homespun tale after tale.  Never mind if the tale grew in proportion each time it was repeated.  If it caused attention being brought to him then the better the tale.  Daddy loved an audience.  He rose from the ranks of the poorest sharecropper’s son to work for the common good.  He honed his skills of honesty and hard work, meshed with a clear understanding of all man’s problems and dreams.  He had a big generous heart and a fair dealing hand which characterized his efforts in the strange world of Louisiana politics.  The most important person was the person he was currently talking to.  He loved having people around him.  He loved a good joke, and no one was immune.  Not even the governor.

 

         


  My mother was articulate, literary, and well trained for public life.  She was a scholar, loved reading,  writing and entertaining.  She loved the arts.  She, also, required lots of alone time.  Being a Methodist minister's daughter, she had lived her entire life “in a fishbowl” and was well suited for being scrutinized by everyone, relishing the idea of surprise as to their evaluations.  She too loved jokes and loved telling stories.  Mother felt drawn to the man who had never known the genteel ways she had been taught, perhaps exercising her independence by rebelling against the tight reins her parents had kept on her and perhaps due to her idealistic hope of refining the rough edges of this common man.

  As a young couple, they were perfectly suited or so one thought.  On the one hand, there was the idealistic country boy out to conquer the world, who had never used a telephone until the day he arrived at college.  On the other hand, there was the young lady who was used to Sunday socials, attending plays and concerts and teas in the warm summer afternoons, or sneaking off to swim on a Sunday afternoon, a known sin for a preacher's daughter.   My daddy was a home body, he had never traveled outside of central Louisiana, except during the war when he was sent to China, and really didn't care much for it.  Mother loved to travel. She was used to it since Methodist preachers moved every three years back then.  No two backgrounds could ever have been more different.  Yet, there was a commonality between these two.  Both had a keen sense of humor and playfulness; both were strong willed, though mother had been trained to acquiesce to the male in the family.  Both loved to talk at the same time.  One never really listened to the other, but continued to talk over and above the other, succeeding to communicate his or her wishes only by endless repetitions.  To this competing conversation at the dinner table, we four children added our voices creating a cacophony intolerable for most, but the norm for us. 

 My parents believed in entertainment and creativity.  There were large gatherings on election eve.  There were small groups over for meals.  Sunday School parties, party parties. People were always coming to visit us to talk politics, or ask for help.  Our house seemed like a revolving door.  Everyone was treated as a dear friend, although, privately Mama grumbled behind closed doors.

 Our life was one adventure after another. For instance, when I was around nine or ten my mother decided I should experience a train ride and a plane ride.  I thought she did this with all of us, but found later that I was the lone lucky one, probably she saw us as kindred souls.  So, the two of us went down to the train station on lower Third and boarded a train to New Orleans where we spent hours exploring Magazine Street and the antique stores.

 We went to Brennan's for a meal, white tablecloths and napkins, jazz music in the background, and fine silverware.  I even wore a tie.

  
A sharp contrast to the rowdy meals we had at home.  We spent the night at a hotel on Canal Street.  The next day was spent at the Audubon Zoo after some beignets at Cafe du Monde.     

 

She even took me to Preservation Hall.  We traveled Bourbon Street while I had a lesson about the evils that lurked behind those doors while laughing at the drunken characters we met.  She told me that someday I might want to attend Mardi Gras in New Orleans, but I should wait until college which I did.   The next day we boarded a plane and flew home.  I was now a man of the world, I thought.  

 

 

  
A few years later, when I was twelve, while staying with daddy in Baton Rouge, he took me to a bar/restaurant downtown just a block from the Heidelberg Hotel.   He said I should learn about Beatniks.   These were young people who were part of a social group in the 1950s and early 1960s that rejected the traditional rules of society and encouraged people to express themselves through art.  We sat at a back-corner table, wine for daddy and a coke for me, listening to the young people.  Some played their guitar, others read a poem.  One sang a song of rebellion.  After each performance, the fingers would snap in approval.  The room was dark with wine bottles as candle holders and black lights around the black walls.  Everyone there wore black clothing with berets or scarves. Most everyone was smoking.  I, being naïve, thought, they were only cigarettes.  Daddy didn't think the smoke would be a problem since we wouldn't be staying for long, and it was important to have this experience.  I was fascinated by these people that I had heard of but never seen.    

  I might have even dressed the same except that I owned no black clothing.  Blue jeans and cowboy boots with a western shirt was my attire those days. 

 When we were in early elementary school, mama caught some of us using crayons on the walls in the hall, guess who?  Yea, me. I tried to blame my younger brother, but she saw through my lie.  There was some fussing, not too loud, while she complimented my artwork.  I did have to clean up after myself.   A few days later, Mama cleared out a closet in the middle of that hall and declared that it would be everyone’s place to be creative.  The closet had a space where the clothes should be where we could play. Overhead were two large, deep shelves that used to house suitcases.  We could climb up and lie down in those cubbyholes.  We wrote all sorts of things on those walls as well as colored and drew to our hearts content.

At the barn, we made hideouts and tunnels in the hay loft, and read books away from prying eyes.   My brother hid in the loft and skipped school and discovered smoking. We climbed trees and hung by our knees on the topmost branches, well, I did anyway.

  We used slingshots, shooting China berries, and had wars with each other or just tormented our sisters.

We were free range children.  We made rafts in newly created drainage ditches and floated around the ditches.  We laughed at the table and walked around the rooms like Groucho.  I was frequently on my horse galloping around the lane that circled our cotton and corn fields, pretending I was in the Kentucky Derby. Our only rule was to be home for supper and before dark.  I’m glad I grew up in a family that was different, brilliant, nontoxic, and fun.

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

Madame Zulu Voodoo Jones 

Luke 6: 18 who had come to hear him and to be healed of their diseases.  Those troubled by impure spirits were cured.

I was travelling down highway One from Mansura to Marksville in Avoyelles Parish when a sign on the roadside caught my eye.  So, I pulled over.  I had passed this forlorn place many times while traveling down highway One only to laugh at the ignorance of others who might have stopped there.  This time, curiosity got the better of me and I stopped, laughing to myself. 

The yard was bare of any grass.  There were chickens scratching about on the hard, dry earth enclosed by a fence that long ago had lost its usefulness. The house was an unpainted dogtrot that had seen better days but still had a little life left in it, maybe.   The sign, crudely painted on an old sheet of plywood in the front yard said: Madame Zulu Voodoo Jones, Faith healer, Palm Reader, Treater of all illnesses, Remover of the Devil, Reader of the stars.

The old hound dogs greeted me at what used to be a gate before I could get out of the car.  One obviously had recently given birth to a litter from the looks of her and the other looked as if he could tear the tires right off the vehicle if so inclined.  He began making his rounds, barking, growling, and relieving himself on my right rear tire while the female sat scratching and trying to make the puppies leave her alone.  

There was someone sitting in a rocking chair in the open space between rooms, a box fan in one corner and a TV balanced in an open window.  An extension cord was dangling precariously out the window and across the porch to the fan.

I rolled down my window enough to speak.   “Is Madame Zulu in,” I shouted, “I would like….”

The woman jumped, startled by my intrusion. “Yes, yes, don’t leave.  I will get her,” interrupted the animated woman as she spat upon the ground.  “Get out of the way, dogs, we got company,” she hissed.  Tripping across the extension cord she hurriedly rushed into the house.  I waited while the guards continued manning their post. 

About ten minutes later, the same woman, (or her twin sister) returned dressed in a garish dress, wrapping a bandana around her head.  She tugged at the skirt and rolled it up enough to walk barefoot around the chicken droppings while fastening a metal belt made from beer tabs around her waist.  In her best “Haitian” accent she began a singsong monologue as she ushered me upon the porch.   “Welcome, welcome, mon amis.  Yes, I am the Madame.  Welcome, welcome.  Yes, I can read your palm.  I can tell you do not need a healing for you have no major illness.  $20.00 before we gaze into the crystal ball.  Come, come in mon.” 

I hesitated, “No.  You must pay first,” she smiled  toothlessly while grasping my arm tighter.

 I hunched my shoulders, my empty palms facing up trying to explain that I did not wish a reading today and did not have $20.00.  I mainly wanted to know her prices for future references.

She turned on me with a vengeance that would make the devil himself take notice and forgetting her Haitian accent cursed me for interrupting her soap opera while calling the dogs and reaching for a broom. 

I twisted my ankle as I stumbled down the steps, landing right in the middle of the fresh chicken droppings.  The dogs surrounded me, barking madly, while she swung wildly with a broom barely missing my head several times.  She continued swinging and cursing as I stumbled over the chickens, causing them to cackle and flutter over my head, scratching my neck.  I crawled over the bare ground, the dogs barking and growling ferociously.  The male grabbed my pants leg and tore off a piece.  He stood there shaking the cloth as if it were a dead animal.  This is when I took flight, past what was left of the gate, barely making it to the car before the dogs were on me again.

I sat stunned in the car watching her remove her wig and bandana while tugging at the skirt.  Giving me the evil eye, she slammed what was left of the screen door, cursing at the top of her voice.  From the open window she shouted, “Nosy old white trash, interrupting my program.  Hope the dogs’ bit you good, yes sir, interrupting my program.  Dirty white trash.  How can a decent woman make money with people like you?  Git, I said, git before I send the Gris Gris.”

*Note:  Gris Gris is a Cajun term that usually means to put a curse on someone.  Usually in jest, but I'm positive not in this case.

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

LADIES OF THE ORDER OF 

THE MEMPHIS EASTERN STAR

PSALM 4:2   How long, O men, will you turn my glory into shame?  How long will you love delusions and seek false gods?

Holly, Amanda, Grace, and Eunice have been best friends since they were in Mrs. Wilson’s preschool in Grant Parish, Louisiana.  Growing up in the fifties, life was tranquil, a time of freedom.  Everyone knew his or her neighbor; doors left unlocked; children rode bicycles with abandon anywhere in town.  Neighbors cared. The girls did everything together and kept no secrets from each other.  Their bonds ran deep; loyalty was their motto. 

This was the life that Holly, Amanda, Grace, and Eunice enjoyed.  There were trees to climb, horses to ride, creeks to explore, secret places to hide under the canopy of pines where they would sit for hours telling secrets or gossip about the boys or nosy old busy body “redneck” neighbors.  They had the pure freedom to be girls, Southern girls, “raised properly”, if you talked with their mamas.  They had deep bonds.

Holly is not as sharp as the rest of her peers due to an accident at birth, her intellect not progressing past the first grade but that doesn’t matter to the girls.  It didn’t matter then, and it just doesn’t matter now.  They are friends, for their friendship knows no boundaries nor has room for prejudice.

When the girls turned 13, they spent forever locked in Amanda’s room with the music of Rock and Roll bouncing off the walls from the record player as they practiced the jitterbug, the Mashed Potato, the Swim, the Twist, the Pony or the Stroll.  The fear of boys asking them to dance and being all left feet was forever on their minds.  They would be horrified not being prepared.   Elvis was their preferred musician.  He was young and gorgeous; they were young and madly in love with the King.

In the tenth grade they became Rainbow Girls making sure that Holly was included because it would have been rude otherwise.  “Friendship is not cruel,” they would tell others.  The rituals appealed to them and were easy for Holly to follow since she thrived on repetition.  And the dances, oh, the dances were divine.  They danced all the latest. 

Life was full of boys and music and music and boys and ELVIS, mostly ELVIS.  There were lots of Elvis themed birthday parties like Pin the Guitar on Elvis, Elvis musical chairs, Elvis impersonator costume events, Elvis decorated cakes, Elvis anything.  Their parents went along even though they feared this new Rock and Roll and especially this Pied Piper called Elvis.  “He is dangerous” was the topic of conversation behind locked bedroom doors.  Yet they went along although they were afraid of what this music was doing to their girls.  They went along afraid of losing their girls, not realizing it was too late because the King had already taken over their children’s very souls.

The girls, living together now, are middle aged and divorced and living near Graceland. The men could not compete with the King, not even the best of them.  Holly never married.  The four are members of the Eastern Star and still carry a love for Elvis.  Their house is filled with Elvis memorabilia, Elvis scarves, Elvis albums, photos of them being kissed by Elvis, or of places where he might have stood.  They have throws, comforters, decanters, and Elvis plates to eat on, Elvis place mats with Elvis glasses.  There is even a fat Elvis cookie jar from his later years.  Holly even painted a nude Elvis on the bathroom wall with his legs in that seductive pose.

 Bless their little southern girl hearts.   They are on a life-long pilgrimage.

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

       CECIL BLAIR a memory of my daddy.

                   
At his funeral, our pastor at Emmanuel Baptist Church, Dr. Larry Taylor said that the first time he met Cecil Blair he thought that he had seen “a figure who had stepped out of the pages of southern literature.  That even someone with a heart as big as Cecil Blair’s couldn’t keep going forever.  He had a big heart that finally gave out.”  This was an accurate description of my father. One could imagine seeing him in a white suit, a huge cigar stuck in his thick mustached mouth, his southern drawl holding court in the legislative houses of Louisiana. Instead, he was a down to earth person who felt comfortable next to poor farmers or governors. He treated everyone the same and seldom forgot a name.

Most Sunday mornings you could see him standing in his suit wearing a colorful necktie featuring a hand-painted horse’s head, cigar, unlit, carefully placed between his middle and index finger on his left hand, or stuffed in the top, coat pocket, as he greeted people at the front door of church, telling tales of events, laughing, and enjoying everyone as he handed them a program.   Any time anyone complimented him on his tie he would say, “You like it?  Here, you can have it.  I have plenty.”  Then he removed the tie and handed it to the surprised person.  “Now you have to wear it next Sunday,” he’d chuckle.   This man loved sharing and he didn’t really mind losing the tie because he did have plenty.  Our former minister, Dr. Glenn Bryant, took up painting after retirement and began painting a horse’s head on neckties.  Since he and daddy were close friends and traveled to Shetland pony shows together, daddy received a lot of neckties.  These became a regular part of Cecil Blair’s business wardrobe.  

Cecil Blair was a farmer, businessman, state Senator, and a raconteur.  He embodied the character in a Hemingway novel. This man was always looking for a new adventure and when conquering it, would quit and move on.  Through the years he learned golf, played for years, and then moved on to a new adventure. He grafted camellias and entered flower shows, judging on occasion, he grew roses and gave new rosebuds to every patient in hospitals for several years, he fell in love with Shetland ponies and raised them to show across the United States winning blue ribbons, he became the National President of the Shetland pony association, then quit.  We had a pony ride for a while before raising goats -descendants of Carl Sandburg’s floppy eared goats, no less.  The list goes on and on.

 When not taking care of business at his pest control, or in Baton Rouge, taking care of state business, then he was on his farm unwinding.  He wore old, faded shirts, sometimes with tobacco juice stains, old, faded jeans and boots on the farm.  There are no words to describe the torn, bedraggled hat on his head.

Daddy had friends on the state and national level.  To see him in his element you would never think that he had grown up a sharecropper’s son and was called “white trash”.  He was the third of eight children, growing up in Sicily Island, a small community in Catahoula Parish, in northeast Louisiana.  His school principal often talked to my grandfather about why he was keeping daddy out of school to work crops.  “He’s too smart, Mr. Blair, that boy could go somewhere, be somebody,” he told him.

After graduating from Sicily Island high school in 1934, Cecil Blair wanted to go to college, be the first in his family to do so, yet he had no idea how.   At eighteen years old and with virtually no money, he hitchhiked to Ruston, Louisiana hoping to attend Louisiana Tech University.  He knocked on the university president’s door, tired and hungry.   He told the president that he wanted to attend college but didn’t know what to do.  The president was impressed and found him a job on campus.  He moved into the athletic dorm under the stadium with the football players who were always sending him on errands and such.   He knew little about modern technology.  He had never been to a restaurant and wasn’t sure how to order food.  He had never used a phone before in his life and when asked to do so was dumbfounded how to operate it.  He was thrilled to have an indoor toilet and a shower.

 He worked his way through college earning a Bachelor of Science degree in Biology in 1938.  While at Louisiana Tech he met Virginia Susan Ruth “Susie” George.  After graduation he enrolled in graduate school at Louisiana State University where he earned a Master of Science degree in entomology.  Susie followed him to complete her studies.

When they were getting the marriage certificate and he was asked her name, he turned to her and said, “What’s your name?”  He had only known her as Susie.  They got married in 1939 and went back to their dorms.  They moved to Alexandria in 1940. 

In 1944, although he had two small children (my sister Becky and I), he enlisted in the United States Navy and served in the Pacific Theater of Operations until the end of World War II using his entomology degree by spraying mosquitos for malaria in China.  He was never on a ship.

In 1952 he became a member of the Louisiana house of Representatives for Rapides Parish.  During this time, he supported farmers in need of open range lands.  He authored a bill to fence the highways to keep roaming cattle off the roads. He worked to obtain the relocation to Alexandria of St. Mary’s Training School for the handicapped.   In the Senate (1960-1976) he pushed for the creation of Buhlow Lake from the unused pasture of the cows that once supplied milk to Central Louisiana Mental Hospital in Pineville, Louisiana. Boat races are held there.   He also worked for the establishment of LSU-A, located between Alexandria and Lecompte, Louisiana.  Years later, the school was given four-year status which came through just weeks before his death.

My daddy loved life and a good joke.   During his political years, people would come to the farmhouse on highway 71S to see “the senator”, and mama would say, “Drive down the pasture lane and keep going toward the back and you’ll find him. Don’t forget to shut gates or the animals will get out.”  They’d drive down the lane slowly, see a man on a tractor. Stop. Get out and walk toward the man, while waving their arms above their head as if trying to stop someone in a crowd.   When he stopped and looked at them with his faded tobacco-stained shirt, they’d ask if he’d seen the senator.  Daddy, knowing they had not recognized him would occasionally say, “Naw, sir, I ain’t seen him.  I just work back here plowing for him. Ask that woman up in the house by the road where he might be.  Don’t forget to shut gates, there’s a lotta bull back here.”

The person would then quickly walk back to their car, drive very slowly down the lane, shutting gates carefully keeping an eye out for some bull, and return to the house.  When mama answered the door, they’d tell her that that man on the tractor said that he wasn’t back there and to ask her.  This usually flustered Ms. Susie but she would take what information they had while promising to let him know when he came in.  If she were extremely agitated, she would send them back down the lane with a folded note saying, “Quit giving these people bull, dammit.  I’m busy.”

Daddy raised sweet corn and sold a lot of it from his vegetable stand by the highway. He held court with anyone that stopped by.  Since we were in the center of the state, politicians traveling back and forth frequently stopped.  Friends or strangers would stop and talk politics or listen to him tell stories.  He lived on the honor system when not sitting in the shade in his rocking chair under a box fan.  There was always a jar to place the money in with a note next to it, written on cardboard with the prices.   The jar was always full at the end of the day. 

When the sweet corn season was over, Cecil Blair always held a corn boil.  Hay bales would be placed around the vegetable stand by the highway.  People would gather, corn would be boiled, brisket cooked, dishes brought by friends and the party would go for hours.  There would be preachers of all religions, politicians, friends, and strangers. Cars would line the service road as far as you could see.  Sometimes the rabbi or the catholic priest would say the blessing, or the Baptist, or Methodist.  Sometimes even the governor or a politician would be put on the spot.  It was always a good time, people sitting on hay bales, conversation and laughter filling the air, paper plates balanced in their laps, drinks on the ground with cautions to the many children as to not spill them accidently.  Everyone had all the corn they could eat, leaving barrels of cobs for the neighbor’s pigs. Occasionally there’d be contests to see who could eat the most, and most times people would pile their finished cobs on an unsuspecting preacher’s plate for a photo shoot.  

Daddy also held corn boils on the grounds of the state capitol in Baton Rouge, for the governor, the legislators, and the staff that worked there.  I can imagine the conversations that went on during those gatherings.

   Cecil on the grounds of the governor's mansion.

Cecil Blair was a democrat of the anti-Long faction, mostly because he loathed corruption and favoritism in government which sometimes agitated other legislators.  When he retired in 1976, after twenty something years, he was given a washing machine agitator as one of his departing gifts.  Very appropriate. 

My daddy loved flowers.  Especially camellias and roses.  We had over three-hundred camellia bushes and around three thousand rose bushes around the house.  One year, he planted wildflowers on the highway right of way in front of the farm property, beautiful red clover. When the highway department came to mow the highway, they mowed the clover down.  Daddy fussed. The head of the department said it was illegal.    Cecil Blair called the governor, explained the situation, and the matter was settled with an apology. He replanted clover all the way to town after that, even received a letter from Lady Bird Johnson for his efforts to beautify the highways.  The highway department never mowed that section again.  Today, wildflowers still grace that part of highway 71 South.

One day he was out weeding the thistles around the red clover on the highway, and stopped to rest on a culvert, his hoe by his side.  A car drove by, slowed down, looked at this man with his disheveled gray hair, and overgrown mustache, fanning himself with a beat-up straw hat, tobacco juice running down his chin, looking pitiful on the side of the road.  They thought he was homeless and rolled down their window asking if he was okay. He replied that he was hoeing weeds so the flowers would be pretty.  Thinking he had lost some of his marbles, they asked if they could take him somewhere, for food or water.   “Nope,” he said, my children take care of me.”  They then asked if his children knew where he was.  “Hope not,” he replied, “they’ll find me eventually,” and kept fanning. “Ya’ll go on now, I’m fine.  Trucks right up there,” he pointed. 

This man was a colorful raconteur.

Another time, daddy was working in a flower bed next to their house in LeCompte, La. and a woman admiring his flower bed wanted to hire him.  He replied, “No, ma’am.  I only work for that woman in this house because she lets me sleep with her.”  The woman couldn’t leave fast enough.

Cecil Blair died at St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital in Houston of heart failure.  While at the hospital we read a quote by Barry Lopez from the book Crow and Wheel.  It was printed at the top of a newsletter the hospital put in the rooms.   It was quite appropriate, and we had it engraved on the back of his headstone.

“The stories people tell have a way of taking care of them.  If stories come to you, care for them, and learn to give them away where they are needed.  Sometimes a person needs a story more that food to stay alive.  That is why we put these stories in each other’s memory.  This is how people care for themselves.” Barry Lopez, the Crow and Wheel.

Daddy spent his life trying to prove he was somebody other than a “white trash sharecropper’s son”.  He once told me that a person was really somebody if their obituary was on the first page of the newspaper, above the fold.  Well, he was somebody.  His death was announced on the first page above the fold on several newspapers.

There are so many more stories about this colorful man I called father, but one must stop somewhere.

Cecil Blair was a living sitcom full of stories.  I’m thankful he passed this gift on to some of his children.

  Sine die, Cecil Blair.  Your family and friends miss you. 

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.