THE RED BRICKS OF MAIN STREET....IN OUR HOME TOWN

Old Main Street in Clovis

    if it could only talk...

O the tales it could tell...

If they could have somehow been

    equipped with recording

devices....how marvelous it

    would be to replay...hearing

from each car!

Cars, dragging Main after a lot of 

     victories in sports, and maybe 

a few defeats....horns honking...

    People waving...laughing...

standing out in front of Standridges...

Times of snow and ice, and I've heard,

     some sledding behind cars...

Car exhaust smells...filling the air!

Hotel Clovis...ever watching o'er its kids!

Lyceum Theater, ever beckoning: "Come

    on in!"

WWII parades, with soldiers marching...

     Pioneer Day parades with the 

Shriners, the Mounted Patrol, and

     the CHS Band, and the twirlers!

The by-gone decades of 

     dragging Main are unforgettable

memories.

Imagine my chagrin a few years ago 

    when Bobby Joe and I were

talking on email...and he said---

    "You won't believe this, but the

kids don't drag Main anymore."

WHAT? Was I reading correctly?

I sat down and read it over. Yes, that's

    what he said.

My mind swept back thru the mists

    of time to a thousand Main draggings---

Week nights,  Saturday nights, 

    Sunday afternoons....anytime...

That's where you went!

A few dozen youthful faces, riding in forties

     autos, flashed across my mind....

Main Street was a big part of our world!

    As were our classmates, many dating

back to 1939.

They would ever be a part of our lives...

    and our memories....

And alas, a good many are dragging the

    Streets of Gold...maybe in chariots...

It seemed something happy and valuable

     had been taken from my town, my life,

my history...and from my old compadres...

By now, on the Long Journey of Life,

     I had begun to learn of---

Change and Loss...and tho' I could never

     quite accept them, I'd learned to live 

with them...

But oh, those faithful old red bricks, so much

     a part of our youth....how about 

them? Do they get lonely?

By 2018, they will be a hundred years old;

     When we first passed over them,

they were in their twenties.

Look at them. They have aged well!

Each one was a friend, even those 

    by the curb.

**********************

BY MIL

1/27/16

A FUNNY THING HAPPENED AT THE DOLLAR STORE

THERE'S BAD NEWS AND THERE'S GOOD NEWS....

There's bad news...it's the oil thing...

I was there, RIGHT THERE, that hot July night in 1950,

(that scary year of the second half of the century)---down

in Dawson County, Texas, when our oil well "came in" as

a gusher.

Yes, I was asleep on Pop's couch in his living room

while he and Dad were out watchin' 'em drill,  at 

two a.m. for black gold!

It was like "BOOMTOWN" without Humphrey Bogart

and James Cagney--- all over again.

It has been nice, eatin' bacon now and then for breakfast,

and having a steak once or twice't a year.

But ah...the bad news. The oil well guys just up and quit

and went off fishing somewhere, maybe over at Tahoka

Lake. The oil pumping has about petered out.

It's easy for you to say: "Oh joy, look at the price of 

gas---I'm driving  to Pt. Barrow this summer!"

If I were a drinker, I'd tell you...I'm off Macallans 1798

and onto Diet Pepsis. 

If I were a smoker, I'd say: Bye, bye $6.00 Macanudo

Churchill cigars.

We are down to two meals a day, these days, and my,

buttermilk-and-cornbread are really not bad for supper.

(It's all that Lee's Confederates, on their long walks home

from Appomattox, had to eat.)

Now good news: B.E. is doing okay from her second 

cataract surgery on January 19. 

She has all manner of visual vicissitudes even yet to deal 

with in the form of ...DISTANCES!  Until the BIG BOYS
at Eye Associates can wield their magic --- for some
six hundred dollar "cuadra-focals", she'll need

different glasses for reading, watching TV, playing the piano,

night driving, day driving,  and I don't know what all.

So several days ago, she headed off to our new-style

shopping venue (since the oil money faded.) ---THE 

DOLLAR STORE ---to pick up some  bargain (and 

well-made) SPECTACLES @ 1.00 per.

It's true---barely comprehensible--- people can produce

excellent frames, lenses, ear pieces...even put little

eagles on the right and left,  package them, ship them,

market them @ $1.00 each...and make money.

I must write Trump  about THIS!

Well sir, while she was there she picked out four 

magnifications---1.50, 1.75, 2.00, 2.25---

and she bought 'em all for four dollars !

Ah, but while there, she also spotted and bought 

herself a new set of dishes....Mexican dinner-

style-looking-dishes...to have people over for 

tacos, tamales, enchiladas, carne adovada, 

rellenos, guacamole dip, nachos...and on...

Just check that plate---don't you want a taco...

just seeing it  ?

Yes, the bad news, I guess, was we had a new set

of dishes...and nowhere to put them. And I thought
probably she'd spent $300 on them! 

But there is good news...comes in TWO PARTS---

(1)  "A happy wife means a happy husband," as Ben

Franklin probably once said.

2)  And check this! Oh joy! The dishes were one 

dollar each! Ah, what a store--- the "DOLLAR

STORE!" We were out less than forty bucks!

Definitely my kind of store!

Now if lead poisoning doesn't get us, we'll LIVE

long and happy.

*************

BY MIL

1-28/16

(Writer's note: Well, OK, I may have exaggerated
the poverty-thing JUST a  bit, "Literary License", you know!

GENUINE HOMEMADE ENGLISH ORANGE MARMALADE

GENUINE HOMEMADE ENGLISH  ORANGE MARMALADE

There may be nothing better on a cold winter night, 

if there is no soup to be found on the stove, in the fridge

or freezer...than to settle down to watch a "LONGMIRE"

re-run with a steaming cup of decaf and couple of

those frozen homemade biscuits...that come in a sack.

With a veggie sausage on each one. Jimmy Dean's are

better sausages but "Oh the guilt trip..." they are so 

fatty!

But here's the "Biggie!" B.E. will always say: "Want ''em

buttered...WITH SOME ORANGE MARMALADE ON 'EM?"

How utterly tempting...for has anything ever been invented

that is more delicious than ORANGE MARMALADE??

(Never tasted it 'til I was grown!. Didn't have up it down 

in West Texas. "No oranges" ergo---no marmalade. Simple

as that!) Of course they did have oranges down in Florida---

"Look away...look away...Dixie Land..."

Yes! I wanted it on my sausage biscuits, but remembered 

"SMUCKER'S LAW OF STICKY"----"one drop of orange

marmalade will make everything within a square yard---

STICKY!"

Yes, you guessed it---if I put  any  o' that imitation honey on my

sopaipilla  down at the Mexican restaurant, soon I am  covered

all over with the stuff...and can't even pay up...my Washingtons

are stuck together, and all...

Being quite a bit fascinated by the "whole marmalade thing..."

I recently did some research.

Wikipedia---"Marmalade is a fruit preserve made from the juice

and peel of citrus fruits, boiled with sugar and water."

"It can be produced from kumquats, lemons, limes, grapefruit,

mandarins, sweet oranges, bergamots, or other citrus fruits or

any combination thereof."

"The benchmark citrus fruit for marmalade in Britain is the 

Spanish Saville orange---"citrus aurantium." (I threw this 

in just to impress Wally. He knows those Latin terms!) It is

much prized for its pectin content, which gives a good set.

Back to me in my Lazy Boy, getting set to watch 

"LONGMIRE"---"No," I said to B.E., "I'll skip it or it"ll be all

over my TV control (and me)...and you know how STICKY

Comcast is about everything (no pun intended)--- they'll 

go up five bucks a month! Any excuse---you know!"

In my musings today about marmalade I thought of the

angel on the Earth Planning Committee, back in the 

beginning of time, who probably is a High-Ranking

Angel today for "Lord, here's my plan to have a jam

using every bit of the fruit---EVEN THE PEELS!"

And then I mused---what if in my little college cafe,

'crost the street from HSU--- the Chatterbox---if

I'd said, "I'll have toast and coffee (you know---on

the run to class) with some pergamots marmalade,"

they'd have thrown me out.

Have YOU done any musing about IT?

**************************

You may want to google MIL'S PLACE:

"DON'T GET ORANGE MARMALADE ON YOUR

APPLE."

***************************

BY MIL

1/27/16

(If you like this one, wait 'til

you read "MUSINGS ON 

CHOW-CHOW!")

"THE KING OF LOVE MY SHEPHERD IS"

(I saw this photo...and began singing this old hymn...in my heart...)

1. The King of love my shepherd is

whose goodness faileth never,

I nothing lack if I am his

and he is mine forever.

2. Where streams of living waters flow,

my ransomed soul he leadeth,

and where the verdant pastures grow,

with food celestial feedeth.

3. Perverse and foolish oft I strayed,

but yet in love he sought me,

and on his shoulder gently laid,

and home rejoicing brought me..

4. In death's dark vale I fear no ill

with thee, dear Lord beside me;

thy rod and staff my comfort still,

thy cross before to guide me..

5. Thou spreadst a table in my sight;

thy unction grave bestoweth;

and oh, what transport of delight

from my poor chalice floweth.

6. And so through all the length of days

thy goodness faileth never,

Good shepherd may I sing thy praise

within thy house forever.

------------------

THE TWENTY-THIRD PSALM

THE CROCUS....A MIRACLE....

Roses and daisies rank high

    But I can study a crocus for hours

and be totally awed.

I just look... and a thousand reverent thoughts

    arise in my mind....most of 

them as yet...unworded.

It's a mesmerizing flower---

      admiration....and questions abound...

Is it a promise ....a harbinger...of spring?

    Why is it such a brave and hardy flower,

preferring to make its debut... in the cold---

     thru snow and ice?

Could it be a reminder from the Creator---

     "Bloom and beautify the world

with your lives

      no matter how cold, icy, and sinful

you may find it..." 

      as does the flower...

and showing us, as the crocus does...

    That there is a Creator...of love,

beauty, color, and miracles....who cares

      about human life on this earth.

****************

BY MIL

HARVEY WALLBANGER...BIG ROOSTER

YUKON POEM--"THERE ARE STRANGE THINGS DONE IN THE MIDNIGHT SUN..."  R. SERVICE

TEXAS POEM---"BUT WAIT 'TIL YOU HEAR THIS STORY..."

HARVEY WALLBANGER

Now here's a story...a reg'lar cliff-hanger

'Bout a rooster named Harvey Wallbanger.

And this didn't happen under "the 

    midnight sun" (as the old poem goes).

There are strange things happening

                              down Texas way.

in broad daylight, ev'ry day.

It's about Harvey Wallbanger, who took 

     his name...from...

His favorite beverage, of the same name.

As tales oft are, this one is a bit murky,

     and some say a lot quirky---

Now Harvey met this unnamed lonely lady,

     in a bar...they both liked to drink

after work....and she...according to the tale

    needed a drinking companion.

She struck a deal for him and took him home

to her little farm cottage.

A nice place, with cool elms and clover spread

    around the place....and he dozed his

days away, waiting for his drinking buddy lady

    to get home from work.

Harvey could "hold his" booze, one drink,

    anyway....and would sit "big as Ike"

right up on the nice wood fence...and she'd

     sit in the clover, next to the daisies.

Things were fine, but alas one day, she lost

     track of Harvey's drinks, and served

him TWO. Being a gentle-rooster and not

     wanting to offend her...drank it.

He got dizzy, toppled off the fence and broke

    his neck, so the vet said,

and pronounced him dead.

He was wrapped up in a favorite old Indian

    blanket and carried to the animal

mortuary to lie in state....

But the story, if it can be trusted, from the 

     Texas Old Timers is:

Harvey Wallbanger arose...yea...and was seen

     walking the streets of Buffalo Gap,

In fact all over town, looking----"LOST and 

ADDLED."

They say, to this day---

     "Why he looked awful scruffy and needed 

a bath..." and one said---"And maybe some hair-

     of-the-dog."

As drunks often do.

**********

BY MIL

1/14/16