If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.

Thursday, January 31, 2019

Oldies - Number 2

Last week I started a new series that I hope I can keep up or at least contribute to from time to time.  While cleaning out, we have run across some old photographs that really bring a smile to my face - and sometimes side-aching laughter as well.  I'm starting out with photos of myself, not because I am ultra-self-centered, but because I feel like I am the one who should be humbled first!

Today's photo is one that I fondly recall.  I grew up when Franklin was a small, rural town in Tennessee where not much happened.  One big event each spring was the Franklin Rodeo.  The Rodeo was started in 1949 by the Franklin Rotary Club.  It is known as one of the longest-running family events in Middle Tennessee and one of the largest rodeos east of the Mississippi River.  When I was a little girl, the rodeo was a BIG deal!  We never missed the parade if at all possible.  There were local civic clubs represented with floats made on wooden hay wagons and pickup trucks with scout troops riding in the back and beauty queens sitting on the back of a convertible.  One of my aunts was even selected as Rodeo Queen in her day.  The Rodeo was HUGE!

When it was Rodeo Week at school, we all became cowboys.  I don't mean the kind I really was that took a stick out into the pasture and drove the cows up to the barn at milking time, either.  I mean the kind that wore leather cowboy boots, bandannas, and cowboy hats and rode the range.  At the end of the week, we all were allowed to dress like the cowboys we dreamed of being.  Well, sort of.  You see, there was a dress code at my school and girls had to wear skirts or dresses - no pants.  So, jeans and chaps were out altogether for this old gal, no matter how rugged you were out on your fantasy range.

I well remember that Mama made me a new outfit just for Rodeo Day.  I believe that it was hand-crafted of chambray or twill of some sort and accessorized with a bandanna.  My boots that I tromped around on the farm in were cleaned up and I was allowed to wear them instead of my normal 'school-shoes' which were probably Mary-Janes or, maybe, some sort of Keds.  Best of all, I got to wear a cowboy hat as well.

When I look at this photo today, I see the scraggly barbed-wire fence built with cedar posts that Daddy cut himself which surrounded our rocky yard and the old tool shed in the background.  I see the old second-hand car that Mama took me to school in that sent us careening into a neighbor's yard one morning (another story for another day).  I see the cedar pole that was used to hold the power line that Daddy and Granddaddy ran from the house to the milk barn leaning off 'toward Aunt Sally's' as my parents' used to say.  I see the date when the photo was developed and remember that scalloped-edge the picture had and sort of long for the old days when that is the only way we could get photos developed from an old Brownie camera at the local drug store.  I see my seven-year-old, second-grade, spindly arms and knobby knees and wish I was half that skinny now.  Gracious! We were poor country folk but I was smiling just as happy as can be to be dressed in my Rodeo Day finery.

As a teacher, looking back, I probably would have dreaded Rodeo Day like the plague because it would have been such a disruption.  All those kids in hats and boots and hyped up about the next day's parade and big rodeo would have been rowdy and certainly not interested in doing anything school-like!  Looking back as a kid, though, I recall just how fancy I thought I looked and how lucky I felt to get to go to school looking so decked-out.  Good times!
Giddy-up, Cowgirl!

Thursday, January 24, 2019

Oldies

Old photos rake up old memories.  Most of the time, I think we find that old photos make us chuckle.  Other times, I think they make us question past thinking.  I'll never forget years ago when I was moving and some of my son's old photos surfaced.  He paused and looked at a school picture of himself and asked, "Mom, why did you let me wear my hair like that?"  I couldn't help myself, I just laughed out loud.  The main reason is because my memory of that stage of his life was of me thinking, why does he want to wear his hair like that?

Some old photos were found recently when my mother was packing up to move.  Some of them fell into my hands, somehow.  I was ever grateful to get most of them and was also glad to share some with cousins and aunts.  Of course, again, I chuckled. 

There was one incredibly horrible photo of one of my cousins.  She was always a really cute girl.  Oh, she went through a gangly stage at one point in her life, but she still was a cutie to my recollection and turned out to be a beautiful woman.  However, this particular photo was probably taken sometime around her first through third grade years.  I won't post it here because that would just be cruel.  However, her hair was chopped off right about at the bottom of her ears and was sticking out around her ears.  Her bangs were chopped off about an inch above her eyebrows and she had a really snarly look on her face.  To give her mother credit, my cousin, Janice, had on a really cute jumper and blouse with beautiful cotton lace around the Peter Pan collar and puffed-sleeve cuffs - a classic ensemble for a little southern girl.  Her outfit was hand-made and not home-made looking.  However, the remainder of the picture just really was unflattering.

Not having her mobile number, I texted it and a few other photos to Janice's sister, Joyce.  She and I spent about an hour laughing till our sides ached texting back and forth about this and several other photos I sent her.  Then, we also had a phone conversation that was at least a half-hour long talking and laughing about those photos and wondering where our mind was at the time to think all that was attractive.

I love photos and I really love looking back and reminiscing about days gone by.  Having somebody to contribute to the memories makes it even better and I am ever grateful to have photos and relatives with whom to share them.  I am constantly telling myself that I should take more photos and even after taking a pot-load of them, I always wish I had more. 

My plan is to take some time here to share some of those old photos from time to time so that they are not lost sitting in a box or stored in an online album somewhere.  I hope they bring a smile to others like they do to me.

Today's photo is one of me.  I am almost six years older than my sister.  I think my parents worried that I needed playmates.  I also know that my parents wanted me to be school-ready and socially aware when I began school.  So, I was enrolled in the local Head-Start program.  The best that my memory serves me is that I went to Franklin High School for these interactions and at some point, I must have been told that I was going so that I "would learn to play with other kids."  That really is about all I recall.  Goodness!  I wasn't even five years old, yet! 

At the end of my time in the Head-Start program. I do recall a graduation ceremony of some sort and getting a rolled-up piece of paper, tied with a ribbon, while wearing a mortarboard hat made of stiff, white paper.  The photo of me shows my snaggle-toothed self standing, wearing that hat, and holding my rolled-up paper.  Like my cousin, Janice, was in her picture, my hair is the style of the day, chopped off and straight bangs across my forehead. 

My snaggle-toothed smile is one I wore for several years, because aforementioned cousin, Joyce had kicked me to get back away from her when I was taunting her for something and she was sitting atop the washing machine, to the best of my recollection.  I was four and she was three and I lost my two front teeth that didn't grow back in till I was aged six or so. 

My dress was a cute one that was probably hand-made by my mother because I don't think I owned a store-bought dress till I was in the fifth grade.  I was really dressed up because I was also wearing lacy, white socks and white shoes.  I well-remember that white shoes were reserved for Sunday-wearing and special occasions! 
I'm sure there are many other photos of me over the years wearing a mortarboard hat and dressed in my finest because, after all, I went on to graduate from high school, as an undergraduate from college, and with a graduate degree from college.  However, this will probably always be my favorite photo of me as a graduate.  Good times!

Monday, January 21, 2019

In Honor

Today we honor one of the most inspirational and strongest leaders our country has ever produced.  I am honored to share an image and quote.  The hard part was deciding which quote to share because he was so eloquent.
"Life's most persistent and urgent question is, 'What are you doing for others?'" 
_Martin Luther King, Jr.

Dr. King included these words when speaking to an audience in Montgomery, Alabama in 1957, two years before I was even born.  Wise words from a wise man who tried to lead us toward a better country and world.  In my humble opinion, we need more like him today.