My face hurts from grinning...

I have done my first interview and I couldn't be prouder. The piece appeared in the local paper, the Douglas County Sentinel. The picture associated with the print article was taken by my dear daughter.

I am so proud to have this interview published where my friends, my family and probably more than one  enemy resides. I welcome any new readers to this blog that may have learned about it through the article. If you are living somewhere else and simply must read it (come on, you know you want to!) here is the link to the article that appeared on line, I hope you enjoy it!

Local Author Publishes First Book

The South, Where Elvis and Jesus Live Side By Side

Headlines are a mystery to me. I have decided that unless war is declared somewhere or a crazy person lets loose with gunfire in a populated place there are no real news stories. Instead a group of men and women wrap post its with ideas jotted on them around darts and start throwing them at a board. If it sticks, it becomes news. Maybe a bulls eye gets to be front page news and if you hit the wall but the dart still sticks then your story gets to be filler in the classified ad pages.

On the front page of our local paper headlines scream about one real story, a murdering kidnapper shoots himself after being confronted by the police. The two little girls he abducted after murdering their mother and sister appear to be dehydrated and covered in poison ivy but otherwise okay.

A slightly smaller headline declares the titillating (but not necessarily news)  information that  4 of the 11 members of a marching band indicted for the hazing death of a fellow band member participated in his funeral procession. This is a horrible reflection on them as human beings but not news.  Anyone who would murder and try to hide it has no character. Why would we expect them to be gentlemen and women and decline to march on that day?

In smaller font still are two stories, given equal weight. One is that three police officers are indicted for beating teenagers while they were handcuffed and in their custody. NEWS!! The other is that pictures of Rihanna wearing a daring dress can be found inside! Really? This is on the front page? Have you people lost your minds?

First, I am pretty sure that Rihanna in a daring dress is about as uncommon as the sun rising and setting. I don’t fault her, she looks great, but it is hardly  news. Mother Theresa in a daring dress would have been news and photo worthy! Bill Clinton even more so, but Rihanna? No, not even close.

The last bit of so called news above the fold on the front page was a study declaring that the South as a whole has less upward mobility and more downward mobility than most other states with the top seven (New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Utah and Connecticut ) nearly all being Mid Atlantic or Midwestern. First off, this might be news to people in states that are doing well but it is certainly not news for people who do indeed live in the slow moving south.

I do believe most of the states listed have strong labor unions. It is a matter of Southern Pride to hate unions for no good reason that I could ever fathom except maybe we like being less upwardly mobile. We also do not house thousands and thousands of overpaid (by our standards, but then again our motto is any pay is good pay, shut the eff up, eat your banana and thank God you have a job) federal workers . Unless I am mistaken, which would certainly not be the first or the last time THAT happened, we are a more agrarian group than the others and farming traditionally pays less than manufacturing. Some of these same discrepancies were around 150 years ago and in fact were reasons behind the Civil War. Seriously, look it up.

So why do we stay in this ‘backward’ or downwardly mobile place? Well, because we can have a pink trailer with statues of Elvis and Jesus out in the yard next to a Corporate mogul’s mansion and people on both side of the tracks just say bless their hearts and pass the moonshine. And our weather is so much better it barely even needs to be mentioned! 75 degree days are not abnormal even in the harshest of winters here and nobody loves forsythia in February more than a true southerner. 

Our bosses pay us squat but we can tell them to stick that squat where the sun don’t shine and walk out without it being held against us. As a person who has found themselves as often on the telling as the being told side I appreciate that immensely.  Lastly the food. Oh my God, the food! Fresh grown produce picked out of the yard seven months out of the year. Iced tea and cold beer going down oh so smooth while the grill heats up and the ribs go on. Short cake and lemon pound cake and Key Lime Pie, oh my, I get gassy just thinking about it but my mouth is watering at the thought of what a joy that is.

There are enclaves of ‘civilization’ here and there. Fenced communities are slowly making an inroad. All these years of the south fighting being known as a racist and brutal society  and then other folks move in and wall us all apart again while deriding our ‘backward’ lifestyle. Money is becoming more important than character, which is a crying shame and is happening all over from what I can see. In an effort to appease our more forward and upwardly mobile brethren we appear to be losing our social identity and the indomitable spirit and character portrayed by writers as diverse as Faulkner,  Poe and Douglass. 

Reading the newspaper we could be anywhere, any city USA. Take a drive through the country though, turn down that windy lane or onto those dirt roads and you can still find the pink trailers on lots next to huge mansions with Elvis and Jesus looking on with pride and love.

FINALLY... Published and Proud

I wanted to say something poignant, worth remembering but nothing comes to mind except OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD!!! I did it, woohoo!!

Enjoy Raod Trip-- my first endeavor (hopefully not the last).

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007VJHSD0/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=wooly02-%3C/a%3E

So this is what they think about the author ...

I have a book coming out in a few weeks (Road Trip). Since the majority of the book is autobiographical I wanted to do something differant with the 'About the Author' section. I asked friends and family to send me a sentence, any sentence they wanted for this section. Here are the end results! Feel free to send your own, but make it snappy! Times a' wastin'!

Whether in Europe or the states I always looked forward to lying awake & listening to my cousin Jean tell stories – Julie Sorbet, Nevada

(Authors note -- The only cousin I ever made cry… I still feel guilty about that. Go Donny Osmond!)

10 years ago, was mistaken for her 32 year old niece, by her niece's husband. David Etter, Michigan
 (Author's note -- David is my new best friend!)

My Aunt Jean is wise, comical, tough as nails,the first to laugh at herself and the last to laugh at someone else. An indomitable spirit to be sure!-- Teri Smith Kupchunos, Georgia
(Authors note -- Paid for (with cookies and chicken wings) by the committee to promote this book!)

My sister Jean is witty, loving, smart, practical, creative, quirky and a really good cook. The ‘Cookie Queen’.—Mary Sorbet, Georgia

(Authors note – Mary is living with my husband and I now, so take this with a grain of salt, a half pound of butter, a cup of sugar, a cup of flour and two eggs, lightly beaten!)

A book written by my aunt who quit Belgium for USA after I was born, I hope there is no link – Vincent Vanpee, Belgium
(Authors note—Those rosy, cherubic cheeks were a definite sign of trouble to come…)

DO NOT SELL THIS BOOK ILLEGALLY – Mark Funk, Virginia
(Authors note – He is rather obviously vying for the role of enforcer just in case I ever need one. I hope he doesn’t think it would be a paying gig…)

A book bringing back fun memories of early childhood when family visited. – Dale DeMarcy Touchet, Louisiana
(Authors note – Dale must be one of the few cousins I didn’t irritate by talking to invisible friends and trying to hog all the crawfish)

Written by a dear friend who really knows how to brighten your day. This is a must..—Susan Rannestad Frantzen, Norway
(Authors note—She loves me because she sees me once every 30 years and lives far, far away! Evidently I am pretty cool in small doses.)

Tales From The Back Side

I apologize in advance to any of my readers who might be sensitive. You may as well know up front that this story is about a bodily function, passing gas, breaking wind, farting, pooting, tooting, letting one rip, cutting the cheese or dropping a bomb. These are all common colloquiums for expelling noxious fumes into the atmosphere from our ‘derriere’ (excuse my French). Members of delicate society do not discuss it, but since I have NEVER been described as delicate I feel I can go ahead and tell my tale.

Someone I love dearly recently had to endure a colonoscopy. This is basically a procedure where they clean out your bowel by having you consume hideous concoctions by the quart for several days in advance, not an easy or pleasant feat, blow your body full of air, expanding your bowels like a 2 dollar carnival balloon, and then shove a camera up there and have a looky-see. This is a valuable and necessary test. This is also, as my loved one put it, a violation of the most personal kind.

Thankfully people are usually sound asleep during this humiliating violation. They are wheeled back into a recovery room where they are held hostage until they manage to expel the majority of the air that had been pumped into them. This would be horrifying if you were the only person with a gut full of gas in a room full of people recovering from, say, giving birth to a precious child, or a life saving cardiac procedure which left giant scars down the middle of their torso and grateful, tearstained family hovering over their beds. Instead you are wheeled into a beehive of a space, many small rooms separated only by too short fabric swaths which do absolutely nothing to contain sound, each space holding a recovering patient who has had the same procedure as you.

I sat with another family member who had had this same procedure during his stint in the recovery room and it was an amazing, amusing, musical experience let me tell you!

While my relative was still snoozing deeply a sound akin to a whistling bottle rocket taking off came from the curtained cubicle next door. This was quickly followed by a series of staccato burst, say, from a string of little firecrackers tied together by their fuses. I had to grin. I am human. I maintained my composure and sat through about two minutes of silence. Another bottle rocket! More little explosions! A giant burst followed by a million little pops and whistles! I was having a hard time being respectfully silent at this point.

Suddenly, from my other side I heard a deep rumbling which seemed to last for-ev-errrrrrr. This roll of sound surprised me so that I wondered for a split second if the sunny day had turned violent and a thunderstorm was raging outside! Across the hall geese started honking repeatedly, quickly, while an elephant trumpeted from two curtained cubes down.

I admit it. I lost it. The menagerie, the fireworks and the thunderstorm in concert just did me in. I was feeling like a horrible person but apparently I was not the only one who had been struggling to contain their inappropriate mirth. As soon I started laughing the dam broke. Caregivers, nurses, loved ones, janitors… we all laughed like idiots. One of the orderlies let one rip while he was bent over laughing and the crowd went wild, crying and holding our stomachs and wheezing with the exertion of it all.

By the time my charge was waking up a full on orchestrated version of the 1812 Overture was in play along with the sounds of Noah’s Ark and nature’s mightiest tempests. My face was soaked with tears, my stomach hurt from laughing and I was so out of breath I couldn’t even answer his groggy questions.  The horde of ‘expellers’ were coming to life and we slowly got a grip on our mass hysteria and tried our bests to ease their awakening and help them begin their recovery.

Every now and then a manic giggle would escape one of us, those that had enjoyed the show and retreated to the land of four year olds for a brief and wonderful moment. I hated to admit it but the violation of my charge had given me the first opportunity for a gut busting laugh in a year and I loved it. I guess the moral of this story is do the test if the doctors order it but make damn sure your loved ones wait outside, unless they have had a really, really bad week. Then swallow your pride, invite them back and make them promise they won’t record it. They will thank you later.

Get to know Peter Williams!

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