Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ category
Cherry Tree Carol: Emmylou Harris
December 16, 2012Light One Candle: That Trio I love
December 15, 2012
“My childhood smells like a box of Crayola crayons.”
November 30, 2012I won’t bore you with a description of today’s weather. Ditto ought to be enough.
We all slept in this morning: Gracie, Fern and I. It was really late or early morning depending on how you look at time before I finally went to bed. It was 10 o’clock when I woke up. Gracie and Fern are already back to napping. Maddie is also napping. She is beside me on the couch and right next to the dog. This is monumental. Gracie has been chasing Maddie since Gracie first walked in the door when she was a puppy. Lately, though, Gracie ignores Maddie more than she chases her. They have even sniffed noses, an intimate move in the animal world. I don’t know if its familiarity after 7 years or just boredom which has caused Gracie to give up the chase. Poor Maddie has finally stopped running.
In grammar school, when I was in the first or second grade, we sometimes colored pictures near Christmas. The pictures were always of the manger scene, no Santa and no reindeer. The nun would have us pull out our boxes of crayons and we’d get busy. I remember I always made the straw yellow, a bit bright, but that was as close I could get to the real color of straw as shading colors was way off in my future. The halo over the Baby Jesus was the same color as the straw; a box of Crayola crayons in those days had limitations. The scene also had Mary and Joseph, the manger, always colored brown, a donkey and a shepherd with a lamb across his shoulders. I colored Mary’s dress blue because every statue had Mary in blue, different shades but still always blue. Joseph wore brown. The shepherd wore green and brown. The lamb wore white.
I’d scrawl my name at the top. It usually went all the way across the paper as I hadn’t yet mastered sizing my letters. Most time only Kathleen R. fit, and it was never written in a straight line. It sloped on the right and started going down the page. It didn’t matter. I was always proud of my work. It was perfect for hanging on the refrigerator art gallery.
Shortchanged!!
October 14, 2012I have to get myself in gear so I owe you two more songs when I get home!!
“Sunday is the golden clasp that binds together the volume of the week.”
October 7, 2012It’s a dreary Sunday, a cloudy day with a chill in the air. I followed Gracie outside this morning and noticed red leaves on my oak tree. It was my foliage moment.
My childhood church had an upstairs and a downstairs. The upstairs was the church proper with a main altar and two side altars. The wooden pews were ornate with curly q’s and decorations on the end panels. There was a choir loft with an organ. Only once or twice do I remember a choir singing: at Christmas. Mostly one woman did the singing at weddings and funerals. The sound of the organ filled the church. Above the main altar and along the side walls were stained glass windows. When I’d get bored, I’d look around and read at the bottom of the windows the names of the families who donated them in memory of another member of the family. The only time I saw the side altar used was really early in the darkness of a Christmas morning when I was around ten. Some people used to sit at the ends of the pews. Anyone else looking to sit down in the same pew had to scrunch by them. When it was time to kneel, lots of people perched on the seat, more sitting than kneeling even though their knees were on the padded kneelers. I understood old people doing that but not young people. It just seemed lazy. In those days ushers passed the baskets which were actually woven and had long handles. All the ushers wore suits.
I preferred going downstairs for mass. There was one altar, plain wooden pews, no organ and regular windows. If there was an upstairs and a downstairs mass at the same time, the downstairs one always ended first. That was its draw. When the nuns brought us to church, they always brought us downstairs so it was a familiar place. In the back were racks filled with pamphlets, and I usually took a few. I figured reading them during the mass was okay. It wasn’t as if I’d brought Little Women. I’d do the stand up, sit down and kneel when I was supposed to, but, being a little kid, my mind was often elsewhere. Sometimes I’d go through the hymnal just to have something else to read. I always listened to the sermon though I sometimes didn’t understand all of it. Kids were not the intended audience. I always had a dime for the collection; my father made sure of that.
When the mass was over, I’d run up the stairs and out as fast as I could. My obligation was over, and the rest of the day was mine, except, of course, for Sunday dinner.
“A clever cook can make good meat of a whetstone.”
September 30, 2012The rain continues. It stopped yesterday for most of the day, but the sky never cleared and the dampness never went away. I don’t know when the rain started up again last night, but it was steady when I woke up. I could hear it falling on the roof. I thought my bed perfectly cozy, but I reluctantly got up, dragged myself downstairs, made coffee and went outside to get the papers.
Yesterday I went to pick up a few things at the store, and that was my singular accomplishment for the entire day. I didn’t even make my bed. The animals got fed, and I had hummus for lunch and an egg sandwich for dinner so none of us starved.
When I was growing up, Sunday dinner was always the highlight of the week as it was the one meal when roast beef might just be the main course. The rest of the week was chicken or hamburger and the hot dogs I mentioned yesterday. My mother was a whiz at hamburger. She cooked it so many different ways. Her American chop suey was a favorite as was her hamburger with bean sprouts and soy sauce served over chow mein noodles. I don’t think that dish has a name. We always thought it was Chinese food. My mother made the best meat loaf, and we loved it frosted with mashed potatoes which were then browned in the oven. Other times she’d put ketchup and then bacon on the top. She had to make sure there was enough bacon for all of us or a fight would ensue, one of yelling not punching. We ate a lot of hamburger, a cheap way to feed 4 kids, but we never realized how often. All the meals seemed different and they were our favorites.
No meal, according to my father, was complete without potatoes, usually mashed potatoes, though once in a while my mother would bake them, but because we didn’t like the skins, we only dug a little so most times we left a lot of potato behind. My favorite was the mashed potatoes with peas as the vegetable. I tolerated wax and yellow beans, French green beans and carrots.
When I was leaving for Peace Corps training, my mother asked me what I’d like for our last meal together for a long while. I asked for roast beef, gravy, mashed potatoes and peas, a Sunday dinner, a family dinner.
What About All Those Bananas?
September 15, 2012Sorry, but this will have to be quick as my time is running down. I am back in Accra as I will be leaving tomorrow. I won’t be able to fill you in on all that has happened since I left the monkeys, but I figured just the monkeys will do for today!
The Monkey Sanctuary is off of a long, dusty dirt road filled with ruts. We’d see nothing then a village would appear then we’d leave it quickly behind us. The village nearest the monkeys was large, bigger than the others we had passed. We were driving to park the car when I saw one of the monkeys running behind the house. It was a Mona monkey, and they seem to come and go into the village at will. The monkeys come usually in the morning and early evening to eat but are more than happy when new bunches of gawkers appear with bananas in hand. The monkeys are not at all shy, and they stand up and spread out their arms to beg. We bought bananas and one of the critters grabbed it out of my hand. Grace, my student, offered to show me how to do it and the monkey grabbed her banana as well even before she was ready. With the second banana I held on and the monkey had to be satisfied with half and then half again. There were several around us by the time we started into the forest.
The woods were thick and so humid every pore in my body sweated. The guide stopped several times to show us trees and plants which were historically significant. including one called the giraffe tree. We kept going deeper into the forest to see the Colobus monkey, a larger shyer monkey than the Mona. We walk a long way until the guide noticed the long white tail of a Colobus.The monkey was sitting on a limb watching us. We kept walking but saw only four of these amazingly beautiful animals.
From there we walked to the monkey graveyard where there are several graves marked with the sexes of the monkeys and their death dates. Two humans are buried there also, both fetish priests to the monkeys.
According to the guide, the Colobus monkeys will make a huge racket late at night if there is something going to happen. He said the fetish priests could understand what the monkeys meant and would interpret. The monkeys still make the racket but no one can understand anymore.
When we left, I was soaked as if it had been raining. The air conditioning in the car was wonderful.
I have so many more things to tell you about the last few days but it will have to wait until I am home. I leave tomorrow night at 10:10 on the Delta flight.
I’ll see you on Tuesday!
Greetings from Accra
September 12, 2012Sunday morning I was awakened at 4 when the air-conditioner went back on with all its rumbles. I hadn’t heard it go off, but the sound of its return was loud enough to roust me. During the night, the electricity in Bolga and the surrounding villages was turned off at different times for two hours. I suppose it was to conserve electricity but no one knew for certain. “It is what they do,” was the answer to why. Later, around 11, the electricity for the whole country went off. It came back slowly with Bolga being the last around 8 that night.
Well, after I was up so early, I finally stopped reading and got dressed around 6, made my disgusting coffee and went to the roof which is begging to be a patio. All it needs is a table, chairs, an umbrella and mosquito netting. From my perch on high, I watched the morning. I could see and smell the smoke from morning fires. From the compound beside the house I heard a baby cry. Roosters were greeting the day, one to each side of the house, but I couldn’t see them. On the road I could see a man carrying a table on his head. I wondered about that table. A woman came out of the house, walked into the tall grass and returned in a bit with some eggs. Small girls carried empty then full buckets to and from the bore hole. The air was clear and there was a morning breeze. It was too early yet for the sun to grab the day. Mornings in the village are a joy to watch.
Part II Meet the Mother of Chiefs
Sunday afternoon I was told to be at the chief’s house at 1:30. As I had met him before, I didn’t know why. When I arrived, four of my students were there. The chief was waiting and explained to me that I would be thanked for teaching these women and for returning to Ghana by a traditional ceremony. I was to become the mother of chiefs and I would be given a new Ghanaian name. I sat in a chair in the middle of the room then was told to stand up and raise my hands over my head. Lillian, a student and one of the wives of the chief, then took a fan on which was cloth, sandals and jewelery. She passed it around me 4 times then took it and moved it back and forth in front of me 4 times as well. Then she and one of the elders started dressing me in Ghanaian cloth, 3 pieces. First came the skirt, then the top and finally a headpiece of cloth. All of my clothes were now covered by the Ghanaian cloth, the same cloth from which fugus or smocks are made. The chief announced my new name was (phonetically) an a Mah, mother of chiefs. During all of this, a photographer had been taking his own pictures and some with my camera. My students were going to order copies. After all of the festivities were finished, the elders accompanied me to my house (substitute car here as the village is too far). They took pictures of me walking to the car and getting in with the help of the elders. The ceremony was finished.
It was amazing. My students had planned it with Lillian and the chief. They had bought the cloth and all the accessories. I was told that I would always be called by my new name by any FraFras. I couldn’t have been more honored.
On Monday we left late and made it only to Tamale (tam, as in rhymes with arm, a lay). On Tuesday we made it to all the way Accra with only one stop- to see the monkeys. Today we are traveling to Cape Coast and Elimina.
Next journal entry: the monkeys!
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