Category Archives: being southern

September 26, 2012 · 1:45 pm

Giveaway Winner & How I’ve Landed

I’ve discovered a hole in the time-space continuum, and it’s in rural North Carolina.

Since arriving at my Mom and Dad’s Friday night, I’ve spent very little time actually aware of what day it is, where I am, or what I’m supposed to be doing.  Five days later, I’m just starting to recover, so first things first: I owe you a giveaway winner.

Thanks to everyone who entered the Along for the Ride Giveaway!  I used the random number generator at random.org to reveal our winner and it is…one Miss Amaris at Beautiful Frolic!

(cue applause)

If you didn’t win this time, you can get a great deal on something lovely from Laura at Along for the Ride. She’s just about to close her shop on October 1 to go on maternity leave, and if you order something before then and use the code herecomesbaby20, you can get 20% off your order.

…

As for me, I’ve been busy hanging out with my parents, eating lots of barbecue and pancakes (not together), and watching country music videos.

This weekend, we’re going to our favorite North Carolina city to spend some time with some of our best friends on the whole entire planet.

Next week, I’m driving to Savannah to hang out with my big sister.

And the week after that, I’m taking my little boy to his very first North Carolina State Fair.

I’m mostly just enjoying life in the Motherland, but I’ll do my best to keep you posted.

5 Comments

Filed under being southern, Giveaways, North Carolina

Tagged as , , ,

August 7, 2012 · 9:38 am

I hate this stupid country.

There are days I hate this stupid country.

Days I hate its five-day forecasts of rain and rain and rain.

Days I hate its houses all stuck together so no one has any privacy and you can’t laugh too loud in the evenings or vacuum your carpets whenevertheheck you want to.

Days I hate its people who don’t say hello in the street, or wave to each other from passing cars on a rural road, or chat to strangers in the grocery store line; its people who close their curtains as soon as the sun sets, who are obsessed with “the property ladder” and “the recession” and “the Conservatives.”

I hate its stupid words for “line” and “diaper” and “bathroom.”  I hate that I have to repeat myself – to translate myself – to be understood.

I hate its rules for roundabouts, and its rules for drivers’ licenses, and its rules for immigration.

I hate that one Krispy Kreme donut costs $2.00.

I hate that there is no trace of maple syrup on its breakfast plates.

I hate its so-called “beaches” covered in painful pebbles, and lapped by freezing cold waves.

Yesterday was one of those days.  I laid on my bed after Adlai went to sleep and cried so hard I shook.  Cried because I hated everything so much.  Cried because this country is stupid.

And then this morning, as is most often the case, I saw last night’s tears for what they really were.

The truth is, the only thing I really hate about this country is that it is 3,000 miles away from my family, my big sister, my best friends.

34 Comments

Filed under being southern, England, home, North Carolina, seasons, writing

Tagged as

August 3, 2010 · 8:32 am

Turns out I’m a Mama’s girl, too.

I’ve never really been a Mama’s girl, that I can remember.

Growing up, I spent countless hours sitting on my Daddy’s lap, riding on the back of my grandpa’s three-wheeler with my Daddy at the wheel, and riding horses with him through woods and cornfields.

In high school, I was his chanteuse daughter, and I sang Ella Fitzgerald numbers at weddings and festivals while he expertly strummed the guitar.  I loved my Mama, too, of course.  But it was different.  She was there when I needed her, but Daddy was the driving force behind most of what I did, and pursued.  I wanted to please him, and quite a lot of what I did and didn’t do revolved around that need in me.

Wedged between my two sisters, they latched onto Mom while Dad and I did our own thing.

I was Daddy’s girl.

Except now, here I am, 3000 miles away from both my parents.

And I love my Daddy.  And I miss him.

But the other day, I was walking through a gardening shop, and I passed by a jug of RoundUp, and I saw my Mama walking down their quarter-mile-long driveway with that RoundUp in her hand, killing the weeds that sprout up between the stones. Her hair was in a ponytail and her sleeves were pushed up so she’d get sun on her arms, and I choked up a little.

And this morning, a girl at work offered me what she called a ‘fig roll.’  When I bit into it, I realized what it was, and I was standing in my Mama’s blue and white kitchen, the tiles cold beneath my bare feet.  I could smell her vanilla candle and feel the breeze from the air-conditioning vents on my face.  I was just in front of her white cupboard, my hand in her box of Fig Newtons.

Never has anything felt so familiar.

Never have I missed my Mama so much.

4 Comments

Filed under being southern, home

Tagged as , , ,

January 7, 2010 · 1:46 pm

It’s flippin’ freezing.

Eight inches of snow and eighteen degrees outside, and this Carolina Girl is freaking right out.  At the last minute, I had to pull the Snuggie my mom gave me for Christmas out of my backpack because it was taking up too much room.  I never thought I’d want that Snuggie so bad…

We’ve been in England two weeks now, (somehow it feels much longer) and, in a way, I find it frustrating that we’re now snowed in can’t go anywhere.  But the good thing is that we can walk just about anywhere – which is what I love about England – and we’ve been trudging around to Starbucks and the supermarket and friends’ houses on foot.  So really, “We can’t go anywhere” isn’t exactly true.  We can go lots of places.  And we do.

Here’s proof.

4 Comments

Filed under being southern, England

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,

September 3, 2009 · 10:48 am

Bake us, this day, our daily bread…

Want to know what I’m doing right now?

No?

Well, I’ll tell you anyway: I’m eating my breakfast, which consists of coffee and sourdough bread made by none other than…ME.

IMG_0957

Yesterday was my day off from teaching, and my friend Emily let me come over to her house and soak up her breadmaking knowledge – not to mention that she gave me a cup of the bread starter that’s been in her family for decades.

Really.  

Sourdough bread starter is just a mixture – a living mixture – of flour and water, and yeast and bacteria.  Yummy.  Once you get a good starter going, you can feed it every week or so, and keep it living for years.  Emily remembers her mom making sourdough bread when she was a child from the same batch of starter she uses now.  When Emily got married, her mom gave her some of her famous starter, and now Emily feeds her little starter pet and keeps it in her fridge.  A few years ago, Emily’s mom’s house burned down, and Emily was able to give her back some of her original starter.  And now, she has kindly shared it with me.  I feel honored to be a part of such a rich breadmaking heritage…lovely…

Anyway, in addition to being a great breadmaker, Emily is also a great mom to her three-month-old, Evan.  So, as you can imagine, I was in heaven yesterday: holding babies, talking books with Emily, who has an MA in Literature, and baking bread.  Oh – and did I mention the coffee drinking?  

My first bread loaves turned out tasting fabulous, but only looking semi-fabulous.  You see, bread dough usually takes hours – and hours – to rise before you bake it, and we were on a bit of a tight schedule, so…

IMG_0952

 

Next time, they’ll be a bit fatter.  And that’ll make two of us.

6 Comments

Filed under being southern, cooking, home, learning

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,

May 29, 2009 · 11:37 am

Goin’ to the chapel…

Things are pretty crazy around here with our move this weekend, but I just found some videos my brother-in-law made the week of our wedding two years ago.  This one’s fun: the Brits take over America.  Enjoy!

1 Comment

Filed under being southern, England, family, home, marriage

Tagged as , , , , ,

October 3, 2008 · 11:36 pm

In my dreams

 

Last night, I had this dream that Simon was cheating on me, so, of course I am mad at him today.  I’ve been trying to tell him about the dream all day, because it was the first really vivid one I’ve had in a long time, and I actually think it was pretty interesting.  But he keeps telling me he doesn’t want to hear about it because it’s nasty (that’s pronounced “nAH-stee” instead of the normal “nasty”, on account of his British accent.  it also means “horrible” and not “gross.”)*

So, I thought I would tell y’all about it, because I think it’s pretty entertaining, and the more I tell it and realize how funny the whole thing was, the less I will be mad at him for crimes he did not commit.

It started out with me sitting in a restaurant, or, like, a Dairy Queen, in a booth with Simon and some other people, and then this very petite, brown-haired girl** in jeans and a pink t-shirt came and sat by Simon on the other side, and then I was like, “Wa-..are y’all holding hands?”  And they were.  

And I was like, “Simon!?  What the heck?”  

And he was like, “What?  She moved to Smithfield and she doesn’t know anyone.”  As if that was a perfectly good excuse to start dating someone when you’re already in a relationship.  I’m not sure if we were married yet, but I kept yelling, “I saved myself for you!”

Apparently we were in the food court of some mall, because then I went upstairs and was leaning over the railing watching them come up the escalator, feeling sick and yelling at them.  Then, I said, “How old are you?” to the very petite girl, and she was like, “17.”  

When I woke up, I was pissed.  But also very relieved that my husband was not having an extramarital affair with a child.

*nAH-stee is like a secret code word we use in arguments.  I guess, technically, it is neither secret nor code, but what I mean is that, if we’re arguing, and Simon says, “Stop being so nAH-stee,” I always say “I’m not being nAH-stee,” and then we’re done arguing because I’m overwhelmed with how cute it is that Simon talks like that and he’s overwhelmed with how cute I am because I’m Southern and try to do a British accent.  Basically, we’re pretty sick. 

**i.e., my complete opposite.

1 Comment

Filed under being southern, eww, forgiveness, marriage

Tagged as ,

March 30, 2008 · 3:16 pm

Hush, puppies.

hushpuppies.jpg

Yesterday, I was standing in line at Smithfield’s Barbecue, just about to order my Val-U-Pack (barbecue sandwich w/ cole slaw, french fries, and a sweet tea), when a small lady in a mini skirt scurried up to the counter and cut in front of me.  She was holding a tray of hushpuppies in her hand.

“Excuse me,” she said to the teen-aged boy at the cash register, who was wearing a Smithfield’s baseball cap and a t-shirt that said, I serve fresh food. “We didn’t order these.  We ordered a banana pudding.”

“Oh…ok,” said the boy.  “Can I see your receipt?”

The lady handed it over.

“Ah, you got the 4-piece plate.  That comes with hushpuppies.”

And then she said this: “Well, what do I do with them?“

She looked at the boy.  The boy looked at me.  I looked at the woman.  The boy looked at the woman.

“Well, ma’am…you eat them.”

“Hm,” she said, looking at the hushpuppies.  “Do I put something on them?”

“I guess you could put butter on them,” he said.

She looked at him, then at the hushpuppies.  She took her banana pudding, and walked back to her table.

I stepped up to order my Val-u-Pack, smiling at the boy.

“That’s never happened before,” he said.

3 Comments

Filed under being southern, random