I scream; you scream; we all scream for ice cream

from Google Images

            After typing in the title of this post, I Googled the phrase, wondering about the punctuation. To some, semicolons are anathema, verboten. But grammar maven Patricia O’Connor says it’s OK to use them. So I shall.

            The reason for this piece was reading that July is National Ice Cream Month. At the same time, I had a vanilla ice-cream cup from Schwan’s—a standing order—in my hands, spoon poised to dig out the first creamy white, sweet bite and allow it to melt in my mouth. One little cup really wasn’t enough to satisfy me, but I usually sacrificed the gratification of another cup. Usually.

            That led me to my office trivia shelf, which led me to . . . well, these ice cream-related tidbits:

The hand-cranked ice cream churn was invented in 1846 by American Nancy Johnson. And now children across the nation get to take their turn at the freezer handle. Her design was patented in 1848 by William G. Young. [reprinted in AR Living, July ’12 with source listed as “WorldOfIceCream.com.”]

The ice cream cone traces its origin to the St. Louis World’s Fair in 1904. Ernest Hamwi opened a concession to sell zalabia, a crisp, waferlike Persian pastry baked on a flat waffle iron and topped with sugar, fruit, or other sweets.

The stand next to Hamwi’s offered ice cream in five- and ten-cent dishes. One busy day, the ice cream vendor ran out of glass cups and the quick-thinking Hamwi rolled one of his wafers into a cornucopia, let it cool, and then scooped the ice cream into its opening. Ta-dah . . . the first ice cream cone. [from David Hoffman’s Who Knew: Things You Didn’t Know About Things You Know Well. A shorter version of this incident was included in this month’s AR Living.]

 Uh-oh! On the blog, “tween us,” by Shannan Younger, is a list of “8 ice cream facts …”: About the origin of the cone, she writes, “Charles E. Minches of St. Louis, Missouri is said to have invented the ice cream cone in 1904 at the World's Fair in St. Louis when he filled a pastry cone with two scoops of ice cream.

“This claim, however, is not without controversy. Italo Marchiony of New York City filed a patent for the ice cream cone months before the fair opened. And, he was selling lemon ice in cones as early as 1896.” (If it makes any difference to you, you can research further to try to find the REAL ice cream cone maker.)

Number 2 on Younger’s list tells us that the exact origins of ice cream are unknown. (Surprise, surprise!) S. J. Arnold wrote in “Everybody Loves Ice Cream: The Whole Scoop on America’s Favorite Treat,” that stories abound.  One is that Marco Polo brought back the recipe for ice cream from China. Another is that Italian Catherine de Medici introduced the treat to France when she married King Henry II. (Again, if it matters, scoop it out. Or crank out your own story.)

I think I’ll reward myself with . . . you guessed it: a cup of vanilla ice cream. (Schwan’s comes tomorrow.)

One value of campmeetings: renewal

 

from www.mtlebanoncampmeeting.org

                   Summer is the season for outdoor revivals. This year, Salem Campmeeting-- near where I live --began in late June. Ben Few and Davidson-- farther south-- have either just finished or are in progress. Salem’s pastor is the evangelist at both of those meetings. Travis Langley, from farther south, preached the Salem revival.

                  Having grown up attending campmeetings, and having been away from the Salem UMC choir for nearly a year, I asked the director if I could sing with them on opening night. Of course, he said yes and even made me a folder with all the music in order. Nice man, Curt.

                 Walking out of the new concrete-instead-of-sawdust-floored arbor afterwards, I was stopped by an older woman. “Are you Pat Laster?” I admitted it. She was the mother of our state representative, and asked me if I knew a Carlene who used to live in Blytheville. I said, yes. Carlene had told her that when this woman moved to Benton to be sure and look me up. Not one of us three can remember how long ago that was.
Afterwards, we exchanged names, telephone numbers and addresses. She lives farther north on the same road I do. Renewal # 1.

Earlier during the service, I’d spotted a man friend who drives from across the river to attend services. During refreshments, we locked eyes and headed toward each other. A hug and “you’re looking good”greetings ensued. We would see each other again during the week. Renewal #2

That was Sunday. The next time I attended was Tuesday. After service, while visiting with a colleague, James, a brightly dressed and coiffed woman came to the row ahead of us. She waited till a break in our conversation, then asked me if I was a music teacher. Again, I admitted it.

It turns out that she was in the 6^th grade when I taught music in all four elementary schools in Benton. Now, folks, that would have been between 1958-1961!

If that wasn’t “renewal” enough, it turns out that sometime between 1986-87, I dated her widowed father! He was an avid dancer and we always went to the VFW.

I invited her to the fellowship hall where homemade hot rolls were “refreshments.” She declined, saying she had enough rolls around her own body. Renewal # 3.

James, a 6^th grade student of mine more recently, enjoyed the dialogue between us. He’s already in his 30s.

On Friday night after service, a beautiful, delicate woman stopped me. She looked familiar. When she told me her name, we embraced—hugged sounds too harsh, though that’s what it was. I taught school with her late mother, and then met her again in divorce court. She was the judge’s secretary. We seemed to hit if off way back then, and I was thrilled to see her again. We connected further on Facebook. Renewal # 4.

Other renewals were the joy of singing the old songs from the Spiritual Life songbook. Plus, using a newer hymn written by a former pastor at Salem, who, coincidentally, married my parents in 1934. The first line is, “Once more, we’ve come to this old Salem Campground/ Where Christ is lifted up to save the lost.”
Another renewal I needed: to be reminded to live as Christ-like as possible as the person I am now—this very day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A bit of nostalgia if you don’t mind

from Google Images

 

 

                 From last Monday till this one, I brainstormed, researched, took notes, wrote possible scenarios and then two chapters of The Sequel to my novel, A Journey of Choice. Was I tired! Spent! But I needed a subject for a different project. Where would I find it? In this mess I call an office? 

                Serendipitously, while going through sheets of old paper looking for some to print on the back—I found. . . I found . . . an orange sheet to which a yellowed newspaper article was clipped. The date was October 8, 2000.

The article was the “Arkansas Traveler” column by Charles Allbright. The headline read, “Last (but not least) names,” and the first words of the article were PAT LASTER TAUGHT SCHOOL 27 years . . . .

Even 13 years ago, I was keeping a log of names. 

Here, without permission from either Mr. Allbright or the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette bigwigs, I’ll reprint it as it was.

“Pat Laster taught school 27 years, then one day found herself running wild-eyed out of her classroom, never to return. The devil helped her do it.

“'I’d endured all the L. and A. I could take.' Lip and Attitude, from parents. A few each semester can engage the world’s most hopeful profession in ongoing dogfight.

“Pat Laster believes that J. Gatling is not catching the same from parents in Morrilton. She loves J.’s autumnal ritual of studying the names of his new students in Morrilton High. Then sharing them, as lyrics for a hopeful tomorrow.

“'I hope Mr. G. can keep it up longer.'

“So. How go Pat Laster’s days?

“'In the quiet of my mornings with only the fan’s whir and the calico’s purr, I take names, too. Mostly from the obituaries in newspapers.' Special names? None can be more special. Names of those who died. Their loved ones. Their pallbearers. Their preachers. Most are at the far end of Mr. Gatling’s life songs.

“And what will Pat Laster do with her houseful of special names? Why, put them in her novel, of course. Maybe employing the begat format. Or Faulkner’s stream of consciousness. Somebody said Requiem for a Nun went 42 pages before encountering its first period. No, no, not your antebellum kind of period. The punctuation mark that ends a sentence. We will be checking this for truth. For one thing, we love the book. For another, true or untrue, where will you find a better example of a mind’s running dolefully amok?

“With deepest respect, Pat Laster enters names from the newspapers in her journal. These are Arkansas names:

“Orbin. Drue. Chane. Dyka. Chelese. Phala. Waldine. Dibrell. Bobara. Destine. Lucchese. Delta. Dakota. Homerleen. Vileras. Duard. Dax. Malderine. Timber. Nela. Delbra. Kendyl. Reck. Lapria. Shanny. Odd.

“It never occurred to B. F. Allbright that his name was, well, unusual. Brice Fount. Get outta here. We once asked his mother, Grandma Allbright, where’d that combination of names come from. Grandma was then in her 97^th year, not in full possession of her communicating skills. She was in absolute possession of a mouthful of Rooster snuff. It could have been three weeks later when she answered:

“'Why’nt you go ask his daddy?'

A challenge. His daddy died when Brice Fount was 7. Took pneumonia, Thomas Finley Allbright did, trying to save his school from being destroyed by fire. But it was gone. So was he. Up in Valley Springs, near Harrison, you’ll find a stone building identified as Allbright Hall. The granddad we never knew.

“Not bragging here. Just pointing out, not everybody with this family name was a lightweight columnist.

“But back to Pat Laster and her collection of names in Arkadelphia.

“The surnames are likewise interesting: Box. Roach. Strain. Kindsfather. Thesaurus. Hum. Peeks. Bear. Sink. Cotton. Fang. Jobs. Said. Smellback. Hamlet. Pouncey. Bottoms. Boatenhammer. Winbush. Carrier. Grooms. Looms. Lawman. Woodring. Battle. France. Johndroe. Whitehouse. Swindle. Hutchcraft.”

Pat, here. I was amazed to re-read this. Charles Allbright—I think—is still around, and reading about him is, well, nostalgic. Well worth the effort to look him up.

A review of our nation’s history on this Independence Day

by Pat Laster

 

                I haven’t written anything to celebrate July 4 since that year a Son of the Confederate Soldiers organization wrote to all church music directors urging us not to use "Battle Hymn of the Republic" in our services.  Not that I “obeyed,” of course. For we had different ideas about the hymn.

                I decided that I needed a refresher course in the nation’s history as regards the celebration of the birth of our country. And perhaps you did, too. And though we now celebrate The Fourth, in 1776, it happened on The Second. Hear John Adams—in a letter to Abigail Adams dated 3 July 1776:

                “The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America.  I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty.

                “It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forevermore.”

                Here’s Mary Antin, an immigrant, writing in The Promised Land, 1912: “So at last I was going to America! Really, really going, at last! The boundaries burst. The arch of heaven soared! A million suns shone out for every star. The winds rushed in from outer space, roaring in my ears, ‘America! America!’”

                And James Baldwin, from Notes of a Native Son, 1955: “The making of an American begins at that point where he himself rejects all other ties, any other history, and adopts the vesture of his adopted land.”

                Louis D. Brandeis, Supreme Court justice, wrote in “Whitney v. California” in 1927, “Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. They did not fear political change. They did not exalt order at the cost of liberty.”

                A Revolutionary leader, Abraham Clark, is supposed to have said in 1781, “We set out to oppose Tyranny in all its Strides, and I hope we shall persevere.”

                George M. Cohan, showman, said this to John McCabe in 1940: “From my earliest days I was profoundly impressed with the fact that I had  been born under the Stars and Stripes, and that has had a great deal to do with everything I have written.

“If it had not been for the glorious symbol of Independence, I might have fallen into the habit of writing problem plays, or romantic drama, or questionable farce. Yes, the American flag is in my heart, and it has done everything for me.”

The poet E. E. Cummings wrote in his “Next to of course God,” these two lines: “next to of course god America i/ Love you land of the pilgrims and so forth oh.”

Charles Dickens, English novelist said in American Notes, 1843: “There is no other country on earth which in so short a time has accomplished so much.”

“I name thee Old Glory,” William Driver said of the American flag as it was hoisted to the masthead of his brig in 1831.

In a Proclamation to the American people, 3 July 1976, President Gerald Ford said, “Break out the flag, strike up the band, light up the sky.”

[These quotations were taken from The Morrow Book of Quotations in American History, by Joseph R. Conlin, published in 1984, and were selected by myself. Since the entire book is available to be read online, I eschewed getting permission to reprint these.]

 Happy Independence Day, 2013.

The more I read, the more I discover what I haven’t read

Hydrangeas and tansy from Couchwood,

photo by C. Hoggard

~ ~ ~ ~

 

 As is my wont, when there’s no bee in my bonnet for a post, I pull down a book from the antique shelf (found in the attic, put back together, refurbished) behind the computer—my resource shelf, I guess one could call it.
 

So I did. I'd picked up “Annable’s Treasury of Literary Teasers” by H. D. Annable for a half-dollar in 1997 at a regional writers’ conference. It became my inspiration du jour.
 

 On the last page of the chapter called AUTHOR! AUTHOR! were eight questions about poets and famous authors. I guessed at this one: “Can you name the Italian author of “La Vita Nuova,” “De Vulgari Eloquentia” and “De Monarchia”? Then where was a hint: “He wrote a very long, very famous poem, too.” Aha! Could it be Dante?  YES! Thank goodness for hints.

 

 The next section, was STAGE AND SCREEN. I doubted I’d know even one of these, but, because I’d just re-read the first chapter, I knew the answer to this: “George Kaufman did two very successful musicals with a collaborator other than Moss Hart. Despite ‘The Royal Family’ and ‘Stage Door, she is known primarily as a novelist (one of her books was set on a showboat, another in the oil fields). Who was she?” Edna Ferber.

 

Now, I know friend Dot H., being an actress and a collector of plays, would know the answers. I knew only one: “Who created the character who sang: ‘I’m called Little Buttercup—dear little Buttercup /Though I could never tell why’ in ‘H.M.S. Pinafore’”? I wrote in pencil, Gilbert & Sullivan. Gilbert was correct.
 

I knew none of the next page of questions. So I called Dot. She knew this one: “What three Shakespearean characters open a play with these lines: ‘When shall we three meet again/ In thunder, lightning, or in rain?’ and what do actors call it instead of its title?” Answer: The 3 witches, The Scots Play (Macbeth).
 

The other teaser—there were eight in all—that Dot knew was this: “Name the sophisticated British actor and playwright of ‘Bitter Sweet,’  ‘Private Lives,’ ‘Cavalcade,’ and ‘Pomp and Circumstance.’” Noel Coward.
 

So much for stage and screen. Let’s see what’s next. FIRST AND LAST. First question: “Name the author who began a poem, ‘Tiger! Tiger! Burning bright.’ Oh, I know! I know! Robert Blake. Grandson Billy has a book of that poem, only Tiger is spelled Tyger.
 

One down, seven more to go: “The first line of the poem is ‘Oh my luve’s like a red, red rose.’ Who wrote it?” Robert Burns!
 

The only other one I knew on that page was: “The first line is ‘The sun shines bright in my old Kentucky home.’ Give the author and the title.” Stephen Foster, “My Old Kentucky Home.”
 

On the next page of 8 questions, I knew only two: “Who wrote, ‘When I wrote the following pages, or rather the bulk of them, I lived alone, in the woods, a mile from any neighbor, in a house which I had built myself.’” Thoreau, Henry David, from Walden.
 

Finally, the other one you’ll know from the get-go: “Who’s the author of the long poem that begins with the words, ‘I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear’”? Walt Whitman. Ah, yes.
 

 

So much to read, so little time. Sigh.



Seven years ago, I moved for the final time—during this life

A lone dutch iris amid the shrubs

-view from the front porch

                   Seven years this month, Kid Billy and I moved into the family home upon the demise of his grandmother and my mother in late March of that year.

                  Dad and his dad, Noah David Couch, built this rock and brick abode in 1932 sometime after their other house, which sat a little west and a little north on this hill, burned. “N. D. Couch, 1932” is scratched on the concrete sill of the (now) bathroom window.

                When Dad and Mom moved from “the Little House”—a smaller rock-and-brick abode farther north and within walking distance—with five children, the youngest not a year old—the family moved in with Dad’s mother. Granddaddy had betaken himself to Houston for construction work and Grandmother refused to go.

              Soon, we kids learned the names of the various areas in this “huge” house. The concrete front porch—facing east, stretched the width of the house. Two-thirds of it was roofed. Then there was the living room, the sun room, the dining room, kitchen, and beyond that, the breakfast room and a dark hall leading to the large, partially-roofless back porch--this one extending only from the back door to one of the back bedrooms.

             Three bedrooms opened from a squarish hall: the back room whose two west windows look out on the porch, called “the boys’ room;” the northwest room with two windows on each wall, called “the girls’ room,” a space for an as-yet non-existent bathroom, and Mom and Dad’s room, also on the north, with two windows, plus a door opening into the living room.

             Above was “the attic,” below was “the basement.”

             I lived here until I married in 1960, then after 46 years that saw many changes--both in my life and in this house-- I moved back “home.” 

            Brother Bill (sibling, not preacher) knew an electrician and that’s where we started in 2006: Terry took out all the original black-encased, knob-and-tube wiring, added new outlets, and increased the amperage, added one ceiling fan inside and another on the shed porch. Now, it would be safer, at least.
           I took down all the drapes and curtains in the main living areas. The sunroom became my “office,” sometimes called “the blue room.” The walls and ceiling still are the original plaster, though cracks abound in the ceiling. And I read last Saturday that in older houses, cracked plaster ceilings should be replaced with drywall. Not under my watch!

           Eventually, both the gas and water lines had to be replaced. The water heater in the basement, which very often had to be re-lit because of high water after a rain, was replaced with an electric one, so that nothing is down there now except iron braces, floor joists, wires, old fruit jars and milk jugs. Oh, I did buy a sump pump, and later, a water vacuum.

           Three air-conditioners were in the house when Kid Billy and I moved in, and we quickly added one in each of our bedrooms. Soon, two of the old units had to be replaced and while we were at it, I added one in the office. My electric bill during the summers is way up there, but so be it.

            I’ve had several trees cut, and now it looks like two of the three large red oaks must go soon. I may also take down the giant hackberry whose large limb split off and fell earlier this year.

            And I’ve enlarged Mom’s front flower beds by twice or more. As I write, the gardenias are blooming as well as the Easter lilies and the daisies.

            I think we’ll stay.

Two Junes ago - a perfect combination and setting

                “Writers, like other dangerous criminals, should come to know solitary confinement.” – Paul Greenberg, Arkansas Democrat Gazette.

 I had been in Florida when he delivered his speech to the Arkansas Writer’s Conference, but  caught it in his next Sunday’s column. (Which saw double duty.)

Greenberg’s sentence hit me like a dirt clod. For each of eight mornings, some days as early as 6:15, I sat in solitude (not solitary confinement, but still...) and read and wrote. It was like being at a writers’ colony with Gulf breezes and doves as a background for creativity. What better place could I find myself?

Never mind that I had to look out over a parking lot as large as a football field. I tried to look up and beyond to the little patch of Gulf across the street and behind a row of ubiquitous condos fenced in against any but the owners/ guests. 

Our arrival at the condo turned out to be not-so-pleasant. The air conditioning labored, but got no cooler than 74 degrees. Billy couldn’t stand the heat so all the others in our party--Billy, his mother, his sister and a friend—“jumped ship” and stayed at J.’s place. “An emergency,” Daughter said, until a definite complaint to the lessors could be made the next day.

I found myself alone in room 2C of Tristan Towers, which touted three queen-sized beds but held only one-- they must have meant a blow-up mattress (in the closet) and a pull-out sofa for the other two. I had an oscillating fan that Billy traded for my smaller “face” fan.     

The AC was repaired later the next day, but by 6:15 Friday morning, I was outside on the deck.

Myriad doves with a different sound than those at home—a 3-pulse motif: coo-coooooo-cuk ––called over and over.

Sights included the horizon––the curved edge of the earth––a cloudless sky, dog walkers, joggers, swallows, palms, oleanders, river gravel, ornamental grasses and CARS! 

A business man, satchel in one hand, lunch in the other, purple shirt, taupe trousers, walked to the farthest vehicle in the parking lot––a slate gray hatchback. Before exiting, he pulled over to the concrete barrier/fence and hosed off the car and then headed into the gate’s security eye and disappeared. He must have been one of the 90 families who lived in the Towers. (I counted the mailboxes in the lobby!)

A dove settled on the top of a nearby light standard. Before I could get a good look through my binoculars, it flew. Another--or perhaps the one that flew—a gray blob fluffing its feathers--perched on the clubhouse chimney.

A cool breeze barely moved; a school bus passed silently––the merging of nature versus man, an attempt to meld them into a mecca where inlanders like us long to go on vacation.

If folks needed and enjoyed solitude as much as I did, they’d escape to a deserted place where only the water, birds, and fish were companionable. And the breeze.

My family didn’t know what a gift they gave me when they—for want of a cooler abode—fled to J.’s place for the night.

And they left me in a $1680-for-ten-days, Gulf-area condo—spacious, q-u-i-e-t, orderly.

For a day or so, at least.