::About Jean::

I’ve been ruminating the past few days, over friends and family members. Some who are still here on earth, and others – too many for my liking – who have passed on.

Today this is about Jean.

Jean’s funeral was last week. I drove in to Fisk Chapel from Franklin, where I was shepherding my grandkids while their parents were away.

I parked and went into the beautiful little chapel at Fisk University. I hugged a dear friend in the vestibule, and signed the guest book.

I found my seat, and held the silence for a moment. Then I looked up to the front, and realized the casket was open. Jean was lying there. Not Jean. The body Jean inhabited during her time on earth. I lowered my eyes, and the tears came as memories of our times together flooded my mind.

A few years back, Jean and “Sheila the Wonder Dog” lived with me. We’d been talking on the phone, and she casually mentioned that she had no place to live. I stopped her:
“What?! Yes you do. Come live with me.” And she did. They did. For about six months or so, Jean and Sheila were here in my house. Slept in the guest room. Cooked, ate, did laundry, took showers … those were some of the best “friend-and-roommate” months of my life.

Robert Wynn had introduced us, back during the days when I was studying under Ruth Sweet.

“Celia, dahling, you and Jean are sisters. You just don’t know it yet!” Robert was right.

From moment one, we were sisters. Spiritual, musical, comical, creative, philosophical sisters.

Lord, how we laughed.

The last time I saw Jean, it was at S.I.R. She was staging a listening party for an artist from Texas. She’d called me to see if I could watch the door, welcome the attendees. I said yes. I always said yes to Jean.

When I got news of her passing, I cried. I didn’t shed one tear when my mother died. But I cried over Jean. I still have moments when I tear up. Her absence is felt as profoundly as her presence was, maybe more so. Because that hole is huge. She was a light. An encourager. Jean was one of the few in my life who poured into me the truth of who I am, and what my talents are.

She believed in me, and it always humbled me that she did. Because in my life there was too much time, and there were too many people, who did not. People who claimed to love me and who declared me untalented, marginally smart, and more trouble than I’m worth.

Jean saw me. She “got” me. And God knows, I loved her for that.

Life goes on, Jean is now at peace, and I’m still here on this planet waiting for my number to be called.

Until then, I’ll strive to remember what Jean saw in me, and to live each day with all of it exposed to the world. That’s the best thing I can do, for both of us.

Love you, Jeannie. See you when I get there.

February 27, 2023 5

::Higher Ground::

Common new phrases: ‘shelter in place’; ‘isolate together’; ‘curbside dining room’; ‘together separately’ … and the list will, no doubt, grow as days go by. I’m always happy to expand my vocabulary. Now is no exception.

It’s interesting, the way people are responding to the current unrest. On the one hand, there are guys who bought up all the TP with plans to sell it at premium prices.

I can’t knock free enterprise, but in the midst of a declared national disaster, ‘this’ is not ‘that’. It’s called price gouging, and it’s illegal.

On the other hand, there are those who – when they get an inkling that you might have a need, will throw open their trunk and ask, “How many can I give you? No problem, ma’am, I’m on my way to the church with this stuff and if you need any, I”m happy to share.”
These people … angels on earth. The hands, feet and heart of Jesus. That’s what they are.

They are the ones who help lift our gaze to the road before us, and the higher ground ahead.

I’m a grown woman. Really grown. I mean, I’ve been here awhile. I rarely remember that, and when I get the message to “check on the elderly in your neighborhood,” I start thinking of the ladies down the street. Then I start laughing, when I realize: I’m older than they are. WHAT?! Yes. Yes, I am. But I’ll check on them anyway. Because that’s what neighbors do.

In the main, I’m a hermit. I love being, living, creating alone. I cowrite weekly, via Skype. But I rarely come face to face in person. Rarely in the energy field of other people, rarely experience their scent or the texture of their sweater when I hug them.

Those things I do miss from time to time. But what I realize is, my lifestyle has prepared me for *this*. The need-and-the-call for everyone to, basically, live as I have lived for the past twenty years.

But we are a creative people. We Skype, and Zoom, and Facetime, and text, and call … we will always find a way.

The connective tissue between those who love each other cannot be destroyed.

March 21, 2020 0

::Birth Day::

Another year has come … and gone. I’m on the fifth day of “next year;” it feels good to have a full tank of gas.

That’s what I call it when a Birthday arrives. The month sliding into my natal day typically finds me “running on fumes.” Through the years I’ve observed that I’m usually a little scatterbrained during that time, forget where I put things or what I’m talking about. Yeah, that can happen any time of year, but it becomes a several-times-daily occurrence during February and most of March. My wheels get loose and jangly, and I careen a bit from side to side. Until March twenty-one.

Somehow I picture myself on that auspicious day, jumping out of bed, backlit. Looking good in spandex. Doesn’t happen quite that way.

This year I spent the entire day in my robe and slippers. It’s a fairly new robe, quite cozy, and the weather was spitting snow in the morning, freezing cold, so … it seemed a good choice. And I thought a lot that day about life, and Birthdays, and what they are. What they mean.

I know some people don’t think Birthdays are a big deal. But I love celebrating other people’s Birthdays. I’m responding to the day they arrived on the planet. I’m saying, “I am cheering that you were born, and that you’re in my life. And every year, on this day, I get to say ‘YAY’ to you!” In this world of automated distance between us all, to me that’s more important than ever.

I saw a story the other day about a man who was celebrating his 105th Birthday. There were people crowded around him as he sat in his chair, wearing his military cap. He was staring at the inferno of a Birthday cake on the table in front of him, and grinning from ear to ear. That man has experienced things I can’t even imagine. He has a lifetime of stories to tell, and I hope there are people he can tell them to. They will be richer for it.

We bear a growing wealth of knowledge, the longer we’re here. None of us know everything. But those of us who pay attention, we know a lot. And much of what we know won’t launch a rocket … but it will settle a fussy child, comfort an old dog, feed a family of eight on one potato and one onion. Plant and tend a garden; use a remedy from that garden to heal a sick one.

It feels good to become “one of those” to whom some turn, seeking comfort, or knowledge, or aid. I have more to give than ever, because I’ve never been here longer than I have today. And with each day that comes, I pray I am open to know more, that I learn new things, and that I have opportunities to share what I know and who I am with any and all who seek it out.

For through wisdom your days will be many, and years will be added to your life. [Proverbs 9:11]

March 26, 2018 1

:: MISS HONEY ::

Miss Honey seemed to love everyone. Her little house was surrounded by a picket fence, and the kitchen window faced the front. Perhaps that’s why the air around Miss Honey’s always smelled like fresh bread, sugar cookies, or apple pie.

Through the window at night, and in the early morning, you could see the kitchen light burning bright. And you could hear Miss Honey singing along with her Frank Sinatra records.

When the children walked home from school, they went out of their way to pass by Miss Honey’s. There were always tasty baked treats waiting for them in the wicker basket that hung on Miss Honey’s front gate.

During the Christmas Holidays, Miss Honey hung a fresh evergreen wreath on the front door, tied with a big red bow. Colored lights were swagged along the pickets, and a candle shined in the kitchen window. The basket on the front gate filled up with decorated cookies: Santas, Christmas trees, bells, stockings, and gingerbread men.

Though everyone in town felt they knew her, people rarely saw Miss Honey. She was always calling “Heeelloooooo!” out the window or “Merry Christmaaaas!” as she swooped around the corner to the market or to church.

Miss Honey’s only child – if you could call him that – was a big orange cat named Carl. Carl was the size of a small dog, and acted like one some of the time.

When Carl wasn’t playing fetch with the school kids, he was parked on the welcome mat on Miss Honey’s front stoop. In the winter when it was snowy, Carl watched the lacy flakes come down from inside the kitchen window.

Miss Honey’s birthday was the first day of Spring. Every year, on her birthday, she baked cupcakes and used colorful frosting to create flowers on top of each one. She arranged them on a platter, and placed it on a little table underneath the basket on the gate. She watched through the kitchen window with a twinkle as the school children ooh’d, aaah’d, and tore in to the delicious treats. “Happy Birthday to me,” she whispered happily.

One year, on the night before her birthday, the school children and the townspeople all visited Miss Honey’s gate. They quietly placed hundreds of bouquets of Spring flowers in the wicker basket, and on the ground in front.

On her birthday, when Miss Honey came out with the cupcakes, she saw the flowers. She sat the tray down, swatted Carl away, and opened the card peaking up out of the wicker basket. Inside it read,

“We love you too, Miss Honey. Signed, everyone.”

August 17, 2017 1

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