“You can’t buy happiness. But you can buy coffee. And that’s pretty close.”

I’d agree with that. I found that truth on a wall canvas at a local coffee shop and I really couldn’t agree more. I’ve grown to like coffee in all forms. I like hot black coffee, iced coffee, artisan blended coffee, café au lait—you name it. I’ve learned that the best iced coffee is cold brewed, and my brother has convinced me that excellent coffee begins with the whole bean. He’s become a bit of a coffee snob in his post-retirement leisure time and I fear I’m not far behind him. I’ve already become super selective, even in the ground variety, preferring Mr. Gene’s Beans Southern Pecan selection for hot brew, while Blueberry Cobbler from Strange Brew is my absolute favorite base for iced coffee. Folgers and Maxwell House are just blasé, and store brand is never on the grocery list, even in a tight. I might make an exception for Eight O’Clock, but that’s just because it’s a sentimental favorite. I can say all that now, because Pampers and private school tuition are also not on the list.

There’s a fine line between being selective and being a coffee snob, or being any sort of snob for that matter, which is why our youngest daughter was mortified when she inadvertently cut off another driver in the Starbucks drive-thru. She was painfully aware of her apparent privileged status as a young, white girl in a late model white Lincoln, in a hurry for her daily latte. She threw off her Ray-Bans and avoided eye contact until the incident passed. I wouldn’t call her a coffee snob. Yet. But I’m working on it.

Being a coffee snob is OK. Being a snob is not. Know the difference. Maybe that should also go on the wall. It covers a lot of territory.

In my infinite coffee shopping wisdom, I also know that a local coffee place trumps a chain setup any time. Dunkin’ and Starbucks chains are predictable stops. They’re consistent, convenient, and color coordinated. Nothing fancy and nothing shabby. Just totally middle-of-the-road to satisfy the greatest number of choosy, but not very creative, coffee connoisseurs. Fourbucks, as my friend Roger calls it, is as non-quirky and personality challenged as coffee places come, as bland on one extreme as it is expensive on the other. Its bare, advice-less walls don’t inspire but don’t offend. It’s a place where nobody knows your name.

On the other hand, my husband and I recently happened upon the Olde Coffee Shoppe in Huntsville, tucked away on a shady side street and nestled beside a low perimeter fence lined with overgrown shrubbery that makes the place seem literally rooted to its surroundings. Fronted by a narrow plank porch, the tiny eatery features all variety of coffee and deli sandwiches, with fresh-baked pastries and artisan chips available at the checkout. A sign above the door advises hippies to use the side entrance, so we came in the front. We may be a lot of things, but hippies we’re not.

I placed my order of a café au lait with almond milk, and chicken salad sandwich, while he predictably stayed in his lane with a plain coffee with cream. He’s such an adventuresome soul. Before vanishing behind the floral curtain-lined doorway to the kitchen to make my sandwich, the proprietor quizzed me on my selection.

“White, wheat, rye, or sourdough? Or maybe a croissant? We have one left.”

“Wheat.”

“Toasted or not?”

“Not.”

“Lettuce and tomato?”

“Just lettuce.”

“Mayo?”

“Well, of course.”

“Classic or baked chips?”

“Classic.”

It might have been easier just to order a plain coffee with cream.

“Be Curious. Not Judgmental” is the first piece of wall-mounted advice I glean from the visit. I like it. It sort of takes the edge off of what would be a negative and gives it a positive spin instead. I’m not judgmental, I’m just curious. I’m already glad we came.

A great coffee shop, one that is connected to place and secure in its quirky character, welcomes you with a heady aroma of fresh coffee beans and old leather and homey disarray as soon as you walk in the door. Worn out club chairs snatched up at the thrift store are grouped in cozy clusters alongside the threadbare couch that was no doubt similarly selected. The girl at the Java Jaay checkout knows my order before I place it because I do the same thing all the time and she remembers me. It’s going to be an iced Milky Way. Always. At Java Jaay, you slow down…relax…exhale. Get swallowed up by the club chair and read the morning paper. It’s a place where maybe not everybody, but at least a few know your name.

“Believe in the power of music, equal rights and opportunity for everybody, chicken fried in a black iron skillet, a free and independent press, the beauty of red dirt and blue skies, a woman’s right to her own body, tomato sandwiches and peach ice cream, the resilience of the human spirit, trap beats and banjo twangs, the power of the ballot box, a more just and humane society, mercy, forgiveness, a better tomorrow & a better South for all.”

That framed piece of wordy sentiment just about covers it, I think—especially the peach ice cream bit. A good credo for a well-lived life. It’s as simple as the coffee shop that promotes it.

Berkeley Bob would definitely agree. He’s the owner of the coffee shop by the same name in Cullman. A former hippie and Berkeley college student, he makes regular solo appearances on the band stage, banjo in hand. He can do that because it’s his place. On the day we were there, he sang his original Colonoscopy Blues number to the coffee crowd, drawing more than a few empathetic nods. That would never happen at Fourbucks. I’m sure it would offend someone. Berkeley Bob doesn’t care.

“I love coffee. That’s all.” Succinct advice from the California hippie turned coffee shop owner. Not bad. That one must have been an epiphany for him on some dark sleepless night. I’m betting he loved more than coffee in his younger years but learned the value of greater simplicity and clean living later on. And then he bought a coffee shop.

Rivertown, in Florence, is a favorite hangout for college kids, hipsters, pastors, free spirits, and downtown professionals. Located on the same block as the historic Shoals Theater and just across the street from Wilson Park, it has a front-row seat to just about every city festival and outdoor concert and theatrical production in town. On a scale of 1-10, with Berkeley Bob’s being a 10 (far out) and Starbucks hanging at a 1 (cookie cutter), Rivertown is about a 6. It’s creative but consistent. Predictable but still fun.

Most days, you’ll find Larry sweeping the sidewalk in front of Rivertown or stocking the coffee shelf. Larry is a semi-homeless middle-aged Florentine who works part-time at Rivertown. You’re just as likely to see him sitting out front eating ravioli out of a can as you are to see him doing anything productive for Rivertown. He needed a job and Rivertown gave him one, although I have a sneaking suspicion that he needed the job more than they needed him. Most great coffee shops are as kind as they are quirky.

“It’s strange how drinking 8 cups of water seems impossible, but 8 cups of coffee go down like a chubby kid on a see-saw.” Another truth. Probably too politically incorrect to make it on Java Jaay’s wall, but Strange Brew or Brewpolo would snatch it up in a hurry, fun-loving places that they are. They’re both about a 7 on the Starbucks to Berkeley Bob scale.

I think that’s really what makes me prefer the offbeat coffee place to anything attached to a bookstore that sells S’mores frappuccino freezes. It’s personality, comfort, and a sense of humor. It’s a coffee bean fix in a world that only does packaged ground. It’s an exhale when you need it the most.

“Black as the devil, hot as hell, pure as an angel, sweet as love.”

Approved by Berkeley Bob. And entirely inappropriate.

“The only thing that makes this old house trailer halfway bearable is the tin roof! At least when it rains, it sounds like home,” I remember my grandmother, Mama Belle, muttering in her most dejected tone, with a healthy dose of guilt thrown in for the benefit of her son who was within earshot. This was the same misguided son who, along with his five siblings, had participated in the plan for her relocation. I was about 9 years old and she was a whole lot older and sadder, having just lost her husband, an event that precipitated her move to a house trailer in her son’s front yard. She didn’t make the move because she thought it was the right thing to do; she moved because it was the only thing to do according to her adult children. She knew they meant well. She shouldn’t and really couldn’t remain in the old farmhouse, but she was miserable. I suppose she had just lost her footing and really didn’t want to also lose her independence. But that was all beside the point. She settled into trailer living and waited for it to rain so she could close her eyes and imagine she was at home.

For most of us, living under a tin roof is the stuff of history. I know the houses I’ve lived in have all been shingled. Yet, I remember the terror of experiencing a storm at Mama Belle’s, made all the more terrifying given the minimal insulation between ceiling and roof. For her, it was the melody of home and comfort. It was security and it made for good sleep. For her. For me, it was the evil chorus of uncaged demons from which there was no escape. It was just about as scarring as when they turned off all the lights in the Cumberland Caverns cave tour and began reciting the Genesis story in a deep male voice that reverberated off every surface of that underground house of horrors. They should never do that to a four-year-old.

It’s not just sound that pulls back memories and takes us home. It’s voices we remember and it’s simple rhythms of nature. Even tastes can do it. The flavor of Doritos chips is precisely that of the Royal Avenue Recreation Center’s chlorine-saturated swimming pool on a 95-degree summer afternoon, while a Bugles chip, on the other hand, is the highly-waxed linoleum-tiled hallway that led to my dad’s office to which I walked each day after school. I apparently spent too much time feeding vending machines, but it all made for good memories.

A mockingbird trills, and I’m ecstatic that school is out for summer vacation. The musical jingle of the popsicle truck gets nearer and nearer, barely giving me time to rush in for the dime that buys the orange pushup. The point is that photographs are not the only way to return home. In fact, they’re probably not even the best way. But when you listen, you can sometimes hear your way back.

“And I go back to watching summer fade to fall,
Growing up too fast and I do recall
Wishing time would stop right in its tracks.
Every time I hear that song, I go back.
I go back.”

Kenny Chesney knows a few things about sound, and how music can take us back mentally to a place or time that looks a whole lot better in retrospect than it most likely was. Mama Belle probably didn’t remember the holes in the roof that required gingerly crawling around on the slick roof to repair—for Papa, not for her—which is most likely why she wouldn’t remember them. What she would have lovingly recalled was the melody of the rain and the comfort the roof provided. The storms were most likely not what she would have cataloged. In retrospect, we do get to pick and choose, and I’m sure she did a lot of that.

Today, as we piddled around with farm chores in an open tin-covered barn, it began to rain a little. And then it rained a lot. Thunder rumbled and lightning flashed, while the metal roof exaggerated and amplified every drop of rain into a deafening crescendo of a spring storm. Finally, the rainfall became so steady that the sound just undulated, much like an air conditioning unit that fades into background white noise. It was familiar and comforting. And my thoughts drifted to Mama Belle’s love of a tin roof, and I know exactly what she meant. It’s the sound of home. Plain and simple. For Mama Belle, it was probably the lullaby she rocked her babies to sleep with on countless rain-soaked nights. She most likely churned butter to the rhythm of rain on the roof and it provided the backdrop to more than a few drizzly Sunday dinners and quilting parties. It grew, I’m sure, into the soundtrack of the family’s life so that in leaving that old tin-roofed farmhouse, she felt the pangs of leaving the family that no longer counted on the roof for protection—or on her. As her family aged, so did the roof, collecting rust like a middle-aged woman collects gray hair, but in the most graceful and inconspicuous way possible. Because aging gracefully is what tin roofs and well-bred women do.

Actually, there’s nothing shabby about a pock-marked, rust-speckled tin roof. It only means it has been on the job for a long while without giving up, just as almost every gray-haired family matriarch like Mama Belle has done. In fact, she had a lot in common with the old tin roof, having relied on its comfort and shelter and predictability for so many years, just as her family had counted on her. Neither one of them ever willingly called it quits.

And yet, she only knew for sure that she would miss the farm, and that the front-yard trailer was a poor substitute. But at least it had a metal roof that reminded her of home. It didn’t talk to her in the same way, but then again it wasn’t always silent. It’s the small things, I suppose. She gave it her best shot but never really settled into the new living arrangement. Soon enough she was residing in another house with a newly widowed daughter, albeit a county away from her much-loved family farmhouse, and under a shingled roof that didn’t sing to her at all in a rainstorm.

Just off the Natchez Trace in Alabama is a winding stone-stacked wall that snakes in and out of a wooded landscape. In understated fashion, it’s just called the Rock Wall, and everybody knows where it is and what it is. It was built piece by piece by a descendant of a Native American girl who was removed from her home during the Trail of Tears era. At the first opportunity, she determinedly made her way back to her native “Singing River” alone and on foot. The rock wall is a testament to her courage and fortitude and love of her native land. Her several-great grandson believes it was the sound that brought her back, as she simply longed to hear the river sing to her again.

Uncle Wayne’s attempt at rehoming his mother a quarter mile away from her beloved farmhouse was undoubtedly nowhere near the disruption felt by the Oklahoma-bound Native American teen on a 600-mile foot journey, so it’s probably a stretch to even compare the two, but where the heart is concerned, it must have been no less a loss of place. And for both women, the sounds of home are what they missed the most.

I also really don’t want to suggest that the ping of rain on a rusty tin roof is anywhere near as sacred as the siren song of a glittering river in Indian lore, but then again, maybe I do. In both cases, home is involved, and home is a pretty sacred thing. It’s just that for pure drama, a river singing a loved one home does sort of trump the creak of an old tin roof on Carolina Road. It would admittedly make a much better movie. Still, the value of home is beyond measure and it’s often the sounds or tastes or even touch that can take us back, no matter how far removed we may be in time or place.

To get positively scholarly about it, I’ve learned that for people removed from home, like international students who come to the U.S. for an education, a high percentage of them define themselves as very homesick. And they also report that for them, home is not just a location. Instead, it’s mostly sensory, with sounds being the most missed. It might be the sound of a morning city commute or maybe even rain on the roof of the pagoda, but it’s the remembered sounds that draw the deepest sense of homesickness while also providing the most solace.

We built a new farmhouse recently, and although we didn’t agree on most things related to the project, the one thing we immediately and collectively concluded was that it would have a tin roof. Not only would it be more durable and maybe require less maintenance, but it was just something that a farmhouse needed for authenticity. And as a bonus, it would sing to us during a rainstorm. And as expected, my most favorite place during a rain shower is in the sleeping loft under the eaves where the melody is the most like what I remember from Mama Belle’s little kitchen when the rain was gentle. It may not be exactly how it was, but the sound is close enough and it’ll do.

For then, just like Mama Belle, I can hear my way back.

 

 

 

I located a treasure recently that I hadn’t even missed. It’s a puzzle of the United States, with all 50 pieces in varying colors and stamped with each state capital. That puzzle was a favorite of mine growing up, made all the more so because it was reversible with the states on one side and a map of the world on the other. The aggravating thing was that in putting the puzzle together after relocating it, I couldn’t find Maryland. Admittedly, the state is small and might not even be missed, especially since it just hangs off the end at the Atlantic Ocean, but I knew it was missing, which made the puzzle incomplete. And that was sad.

I learned my state capitals by working with that puzzle. At one time, I could name all 50 capitals, but now I can’t even name the capital of Montana without cheating. The same goes for New Hampshire and North Dakota. And what about Maryland? I can’t even cheat on that one because Maryland is missing.

If a puzzle is easy, I’m all in, but the piece count has to be minimal. My sister-in-law loved to put together the kind that contained a jillion pieces; she was totally challenged by any with patterns like a piano keyboard or maybe a solid ocean with a few whitecaps. She even had a special table set aside for puzzles in progress and she would shellac the most special projects for hanging later. I’m patient, but only with college freshmen, not inanimate jigsaws. College freshmen are actually a bit easier to figure out. Still, the effort required to complete a repetitive task, like searching for and locating correct links, is very satisfying. I’m just not willing to endure the continued disappointment of finding and trying to force a connection that turns out to be wrong. It makes me mad.

We hosted a family Christmas gathering last year with a prized Dirty Santa gift turning out to be a 200-piece puzzle of the state of Mississippi. As most of the party people were from Mississippi, the puzzle was a hit that required an immediate put-together activity. All went silent as the group of cousins sorted and shared and analyzed patterns, gleefully popping in matching pieces every few seconds. That family is nothing if not focused, and just the slightest bit competitive. Puzzle complete, I posed for a picture with the group, as if I were an active participant, but the truth is that I just hung out to be sociable, intently rearranging a few pieces but finding no matches. None.

I do enjoy word games, like Scrabble, but I’m not wild about crossword puzzles and I just do not understand Sudoku. I want to win at whatever I attempt, and a halfway done crossword puzzle is not winning and would probably keep me up at night. My mom, on the other hand, had no problem leaving an uncompleted newspaper crossword puzzle on the table, done in pencil because she wasn’t sure enough of herself to use a pen. And her widowed mother kept a Commercial Appeal subscription for years, simply for the pleasure of getting a new crossword puzzle with each delivery. Never mind the local or national news. Out on a limb with no Google or online dictionary support, those women were real players who didn’t need to be perfect but took pleasure in the attempt.

Word games like Hangman or Word Ladder or even Find the Words in the Big Square of Letters are very much in my ballpark and excellent preparation for my spin on Wheel of Fortune. Probably not Jeopardy training, but then I know my limits.

About a week after I realized Maryland was missing, I stopped by a little junk store, looking for nothing in particular. And wonder of wonders, there it was. Nestled in among the kids’ sewing cards and old board games and Bingo sets was my little United States pressed board puzzle, just waiting to make my day. I would have recognized the box anywhere, although it was in a lot better shape than mine, with no ripped corners or missing side panel. Apparently, the child who had enjoyed that puzzle hadn’t been quite as intent on learning his state capitals as I had been, but all the better for me. Surely this puzzle would include Maryland.

I gladly handed the shopkeeper a $10 bill and rushed home to find Maryland. And after filtering through the much larger states, there she was. A tiny pink piece, easily overlooked by anyone less OCD than me, with a yellow star beside Annapolis. And I would have sworn that Maryland’s state seat was Baltimore. But no, the capital of Maryland really is Annapolis.

The best part of it all is that I now have a spare for each of the other 49 states. I’m sure I’ll sleep a lot easier now.

BB King and Stevie Ray Vaughn are what’s on the playlist at Little Dooey in Starkville. With blues playing in the background, you’ll choose from boiled crawfish, shrimp, or a plate-sized barbecue sandwich, served by a college student in a neon Dooey t-shirt, and you’ll fix your drink in a side room with a hardwood floor that’s sticky from the spray of sweet tea. Ten-gallon dispensers of the nectar line the wall so that patrons are never without refreshment. On the way from the gravel lot to the main Dooey building, you’ll pass the screened Little Dooey Fellowship Porch, which I suspect bears no resemblance to the similarly named church fellowship hall of your youth, and I’m just betting is a pretty raucous place most Saturday nights. Fellowship can be defined in a lot of ways.

Right across the street is an ages old cemetery, with the once defunct but now revitalized cotton district beyond that. Near enough to MSU, and popular with everybody, the restaurant is swamped on game days so the best time to enjoy it is mid-afternoon on a weekday, which is what we’re doing now. Life’s Lonesome Road takes over the sound system as we leave. I’d totally recommend the pulled chicken sandwich with a side of baked beans.

I have a love/hate relationship with Mississippi. Both of my parents called it home for a good many years and many relatives continue to do so. It’s where my family tree took root and where my grandparents lived and died. It nurtured generations of farmers and land owners in my clan and did a pretty good job of perpetuating our ancestral line. So for that, I’m thankful and indebted. I may not be wild about the lack of some things, like entertainment and smooth roads, but it’s where my story began so I have to sort of claim it.

Actually, I don’t hate Mississippi. In fact, as an Alabama resident, I’m grateful for the state. If not for Mississippi, Alabama would rank last in most critical national measurements instead of only near the bottom. We’d be bringing up the rear in education and poverty and healthcare were it not for our neighbor to the west. About the only thing we can claim ourselves first in, with Mississippi a close second, is the rate of obesity. Apparently, a good number of Alabamians just can’t say no to fried chicken dinners and Sonic chili pies and the ready supply of Twinkies and cheese puffs at the Dollar General checkout. Well, we’re actually first in more than obesity. Alabama is pretty proud of Tuscaloosa’s winning powerhouse football record. We usually lead the pack there.

That’s just ink on paper, though. What no one measures about Mississippi is what can’t really be quantified. It’s a feeling, a flavor, an appreciation for something innate and spicy and alive and totally unexpected. There just must be something in the water that sets it apart from all the other 49. You might look for it in the flaky deliciousness of a fried peach pie from 45 Pantry Café, brought in just that morning from a local kitchen, but you’d be mistaken. Or you could be certain it’s the Blues piano at the Hollywood that the State Tourism Department proudly promotes, but again, that’s not all there is. In truth, you really won’t find it in either place. You also won’t feel the full vibe on the square at Oxford or at a casino in Tunica. You definitely won’t find it in the prepared notes from the guide at the Capitol building in Jackson. Even Waverly Plantation and the Biloxi Lighthouse are far too staged. They hide Mississippi’s crazy much too well for a traveler to get a true sense of the state. You can just about guarantee that anything found in a travel guide is the equivalent of stashing clutter in the bathtub when guests arrive. It’s not the real you and it’s not the real state.

You’ll get a glimpse of Mississippi’s crazy in the lineup of local hard workers who dust off the flannel shirts and cowboy hats to line dance to Rockin’ Robin at the Dennis Community Center on the Saturday morning of the local historical society’s kickoff. You might find a bit of the crazy in the Wyoming transplant of a college professor who offers to take students on a guided, if not university sanctioned, midnight coon hunt, giving any of the night’s catch to locals at the corner gas station who make sure it doesn’t go to waste. I’m sure he would call that experiential learning if pressed. You might pass the same university’s experimental car on Highway 25, out for a test run of the totally electric driverless supercar’s flexibility at both on and off-road travel. The Ivy League Northeast might lay claim to top honors in biomedical research, but if you’re ever in need of a driverless electric off-road supercar, you know where to go. Take that, Harvard.

Mississippi is not just crazy; it’s creative with a side of humor. It shows up in town names that are adjectives like Strong and Chunky. I’m imagining my return address label listing Chunky, Mississippi. I’d much rather meet the mail carrier at the end of my shaded tree-lined drive fronting the manor house in Hickory Grove or Holly Springs, or Magnolia. Egypt and Prairie, Mississippi have to be sturdy and farm proud, while Pontotoc and Tishomingo and Mantachie and Oktibbeha suggest old and native and deep-rooted places–those populated by people of the earth. If there’s one thing Mississippi must be first at, it’s pride in place. But then, that can’t be measured.

It can be painted, though, in the eerie ghost stories of Kathryn Wyndham Tucker and the short stories of Eudora Welty. William Faulkner was pretty good with words and John Grisham is still powering through legal thrillers when he’s not dining at the Graduate in Oxford. Who knew Mississippi could be literary?

The Magnolia State is not always counted last. It does have its firsts. It is first in catfish and it’s first in sweet potatoes. I’m sure there’s some other first that’s just not on the nation’s radar, like the most heat generated in a single day or the most miles of lonely interstate between exits, but who really cares about that. The state is definitely not first in revenue, thanks in part to the location of Mobile just over the line in Alabama and New Orleans just over the line in Louisiana and Memphis just over the line in Tennessee. In the game of city musical chairs, Mississippi was left standing, wondering what on earth just happened.

But that’s OK. Being first is tiring. My Ole Miss cousin, who is wise in the ways of SEC football, pities the rabid Alabama fans whose mood is governed by the outcome of a Saturday ball game. “We don’t have to always win,” he comments. “We just set up in the Grove and have a good time before the game. We know we’ll likely lose but that makes the days we win that much better. We’re going home, win or lose, and there’s always tomorrow.”
As luck would have it, MSU was set to play Alabama on the first Saturday after Alabama’s devastating loss to LSU, marring a perfect season. Alabama fans were none too happy about that and bent on revenge, but a very creative local coffee shop found a bit of humor even in that dour situation. “We had nothing to do with last Saturday, Nick” read the large black letters at Strange Brew.

Because win or lose, Mississippi people just go back home and don’t count the numbers that suggest they are less than OK. For in the things that really count, they are more than OK. And anyway, much as we’d all like to, we can’t all be Alabama.

Roll Tide.

“I cannot tell a lie. I cut down the cherry tree,” is a lie. That anecdote was fictionalized by Mason Locke Weems, who wrote a best-selling biography of Washington shortly after the former president’s death. It makes for a good story, though, and I suppose it could be true, especially given Washington’s propensity for being forthright and honorable and all those good things we expect from the father of our country. I’m sure that’s what Mr. Weems had in mind as he got a little carried away with memorializing the great man. I know it’s a lie, though, because I saw it disputed on Wikipedia and I also just finished Ron Chernow’s huge Washington biography. I even know that he had only one tooth in his mouth for his inauguration and that he spoke very little because he feared spitting out his ivory—not wood—dentures. I suspect he didn’t laugh very much for the same reason. And if dentures keep a president from saying too many stupid things, perhaps we should wish only one tooth for them all.

I realize I’m an anomaly, but as we’re all weird in some ways, I’ll confess my oddity. I’m a presidential trivia fan. This year, I committed to reading a biography of every American president, but as it’s February already and I’ve only finished one book, I think that resolution will have to span a few years if not a decade. I seriously doubt that I’ll find a biography of Chester Arthur or Millard Fillmore anyway, but you never know. They might be more inspiring than I suspect.

My family enables my passion, or peculiarity, by picking up interesting presidential-themed books as they crop up. Some people collect salt and pepper shakers. I collect presidents.

One of my favorites is Dead Presidents, a book I became so engrossed in that I just about missed my flight from Reagan International once. It turns out I was also in the wrong terminal which further complicated the matter. Take my word for it. The book is a whole lot more intriguing than its title. Who wouldn’t want to know that Grant’s Tomb in NYC is the second largest mausoleum in the Western Hemisphere and is the centerpiece for one of the most repeated corny presidential jokes ever–“Who’s buried in Grant’s tomb?” I really don’t want to know how many people might struggle with that one.

Speaking of not judging a book by its cover, Mary Todd’s family should have taken that tack instead of deeming Abraham Lincoln unworthy of her. They were certain that the gangly, awkward, tongue-tied suitor would never amount to anything. His political prospects were dim and his income was even more limited. She married him though, and the slow-to-launch politician made a pretty good name for himself. He didn’t struggle at all for words with the Gettysburg Address, but probably should have taken less interest in the theater.

Words came easy for Franklin Roosevelt, too. Without access to a speechwriter on Pearl Harbor day, he dictated verbatim in one sitting his 6-minute declaration of war against Japan. His first draft, though, read “Yesterday, December 7, 1941—a date that will live in world history…” I’m nodding off already. Replace “world history” with “infamy,” though, and we’re ready to rumble. Words.

I’ve always felt sorry for mathematicians who can’t make a sentence. Brilliance must be boring and nobody is impressed.

Well, actually they were probably pretty impressed with Woodrow Wilson’s Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins, making him the most well-educated president so far, but it wasn’t a math degree, so I rest my case. Brilliance doesn’t have to revolve around science and math. That’s what I keep telling myself.

So this month hosts Presidents Day, a holiday set aside because both Lincoln’s and Washington’s birthdays occur in February. Trivia aficionado that I am, I know that Washington was actually born on February 11, not the 22^nd, because the Julian calendar was in place then. But it’s still in February so no harm done.

George Washington liked the ladies, but he seems to have kept it all within bounds, as you would expect a father figure to do. Warren Harding, though, just couldn’t say no. Of his most infamous affairs was a 15-year relationship that the Republican party swept under the rug by sending the consort and her husband off on an incredibly slow boat to Japan during Harding’s election year. Literally. They made sure she had plenty of spending money, though.

Grover Cleveland had a child out of wedlock, James Garfield confessed to multiple dalliances, and we all remember the Clinton years. JFK probably topped them all but died a martyr so nobody much goes there.

Including Kennedy, eight presidents have died in office. Four were assassinated and four died of natural causes. Some suspected that Zachary Taylor had been poisoned instead of suffering gastroenteritis from eating cherries that were too cold—who knew?—but a recent exhumation proved otherwise. The only president to survive an assassination attempt by a woman was Gerald Ford. In fact, two women tried to kill him on two different occasions. I remember him, and don’t know why he would have made women angry, but he ticked off at least two.

JFK, LBJ, FDR, W. Some presidential names are just more fun abbreviated. And until yesterday, I didn’t know that the S in Harry S Truman stands for nothing. It’s just S.

Enough already. You really don’t need to know that FDR spoke German fluently, so he probably understood a lot more WWII rhetoric than he would have liked, or that the commander of the Allied forces in that same war, Dwight Eisenhower, was an accomplished chef who specialized in vegetable soup. And yet, that’s what makes trivia so spellbinding. You really do want to know that.

They’re just people. Just like us. Good and bad, honest and not so much, wordy and not so wordy (I’m thinking Calvin Coolidge). Most have shown up when we needed them, though, and have done the right thing more often than not. Winston Churchill gets credit for a quote that he might or might not have said, “Americans will ultimately do the right thing, but only after trying everything else.” So it has been with many of our presidents. They ultimately seem to do the right thing which is at least a bit comforting. They haven’t wrecked it yet.

Winston Churchill also concluded that “Democracy is the worst form of government except for all those other forms.” That’s true. Woodrow Wilson wanted to make the world safe for democracy…

Somebody, please stop me.

Charlie had a really good day about four years ago. Charlie is our little rescue dog that is no particular breed and is as ugly as the day is long. If he were in the animal shelter, I have no doubt that many potential adopters would pass him by, having no idea of the treasure he really is. We didn’t ask for Charlie on that day four years ago, but when his owner decided he no longer wanted him and unceremoniously dumped the puppy in a ditch, Charlie’s worst day quickly evolved into his best day ever. Within five minutes of his abandonment, he was riding to a new home in the floorboard of my tenderhearted daughter’s car, shivering with fear before tentatively making his way up to the console to be near his trusted rescuer. He was completely oblivious to the life shift that had just occurred, but he was living out his “one day,” that unexpected day when a downward spiral suddenly rights itself and all is well with the world. In fact, all is much better with the world.

I’m thinking that my one best day might be when the Publisher’s Clearinghouse van pulls into the driveway. Or it could be when the next billion-dollar lottery numbers are announced and I have every single one. My best day wouldn’t even have to involve money, although that would definitely make it a good day.

Charlie came home to backyard playmates and a private kennel that quickly evolved into shared space in a doghouse the size of an outdoor storage unit, lit by a heat lamp during the winter and cooled by deep shade in the summer. He plays all day, never misses a meal, and sleeps well. I imagine him and his friends sharing a game of cards in the lighted house on long winter nights and wandering out onto the covered porch with a cup of coffee each morning. He is definitely loved and appreciated and pampered now, although he was never that in his former life. And it all started on that one day when all was lost.

Joseph probably thought his day was going badly when he woke up in the dungeon prison yet again. He didn’t own anything and he had no family. His brothers had sold him into slavery and watched without remorse as he trudged away with the desert caravan to who knows where. But on this day, on this one day, he was called to interpret Pharaoh’s dream and ended up moving from the dungeon to a high-rise penthouse of the ancient world. In fact, he ended up controlling much of the ancient world, including his destitute brothers who were reduced to begging him for food. I’d have to say that was a good day. In fact, it was Joseph’s “one day.”

Things change for the worse too, of course, with unwelcome early morning or late night phone calls that change your life forever. Unexpected diagnoses and unimaginable losses can, and often do, cause good days to go gray in an instant. But that happens so often that it’s incredibly important to look for those fewer days when wrong is righted, when gray becomes multi-colored.

Charlie’s worst day was turned around in just a few minutes. But most of those “one days” are only recognizable in hindsight and some don’t really change a life much but are well worth remembering. Waiting behind an incredibly slow minivan in the Jack’s drive-thru one day, I was stewing about the wasted time and muttering to myself about the untold numbers of hungry little people in the van that the driver was probably feeding. I ate crow instead of fries though, when I got to the window to find that the driver of the minivan had bought my meal as well as theirs. The time she spent at the drive-thru window was in part spent paying for my meal.  She changed my attitude that day and I’ll always remember that. It might not have changed my life, but it definitely gave me the nudge I needed on that one day. I know it at least temporarily made me a better person.

It’s not always what you get, but it’s often what you don’t get that changes the color of a day. When you don’t get the call with possible bad news, when the diagnosis is not what was expected, when you actually didn’t leave the stove eye on and burn down the house. I suspect a really good day would be if a jury didn’t find you guilty of something you didn’t do or if you were one of the few who was sorely tempted but didn’t buy a Titanic ticket before the unsinkable liner left port.

Patience is often involved if you expect to encounter the one day that changes your life. Waiting for the right spouse candidate. Waiting for the job that fulfills you. Maybe even taking charge of your future and making a plan that you just know is best for you, only to live through the dashing of those plans. Perhaps you’re limping along on the path you carved out for yourself when you’re redirected by a chance encounter that promises an even better future than the one you so meagerly envisioned. Patiently waiting for and asking for divine guidance is seriously underrated.

Count your blessings. Thank your lucky stars. Whatever your mantra, it’s clear that when left in charge we dream too small and expect too little and prepare not nearly enough, so we’re usually surprised when we get a windfall of good. One day can change everything. Just one day. One phone call, one encounter, one suggestion, one Publisher’s Clearinghouse van.

Personally, I’m waiting on the van.

“When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one child to move beyond the geographical bands that have connected her with her beloved home and family, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Education and of an Awarded Scholarship entitle her, a decent respect to the opinions of her mother requires that she should fully understand that the causes which impel her to the separation are temporary, with a definite beginning and an immovable ending.”

That Declaration of Dependence accompanied our youngest as she set sail for George Mason University about a year ago, scholarship and suitcase in hand. At first, I wasn’t wild about Arlington. I was even respectfully wary of its proximity to the dreaded scourge of Washington, D.C. But a mother/daughter weekend adventure to finalize her living arrangements there convinced me otherwise. It only took one stop along the Appalachian Trail at an overlook near Charlottesville, during which we were privy to a stunning vista of watercolor blues and lavenders melding sky and mountain together in one vast panorama, to make me rethink my rock solid resistance to having her stationed so far away.

Of course, the month was August, and there was very little traffic, and the weather was beautiful. A rainbow even arced over the highway ahead, leading us like Dorothy through the field of yellow poppies to the Emerald City. It was an omen, we were both sure. And when we found the Red Truck Bakery in Marshall the next morning, the whole thing was just capped off. It would be OK. Not great, but OK. I might even visit occasionally.

But I remembered. I remembered a Washington trip the previous March, during which my cousin and her kids shared a weekend rental with Alli and me. We only ended up in Washington when our planned Boston adventure was scrapped for a blizzard. The city was already a consolation prize but we were determined to have family time, darn it, even if it meant flying from Nashville to Fort Lauderdale to Baltimore first.

I didn’t think wind could be that strong or that fierce or that cold. Scarves on and coats buttoned to the ears, we braved it all over those streets, skirting a protest at the Capitol that we probably should have stopped to understand but were a bit too fearful to become involved with, and literally sailing down the National Mall in our quest to locate the Declaration of Independence. Which we finally did, flanked by burly guards in a dimly lit room that made actually seeing the document impossible. I suppose I can say, though, that I’ve seen it. Not read it, but seen it. I think.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all Children are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Higher Education. That to secure these rights, Parents and Universities are instituted among them, providing tuition and granting sought after certificates of completion after a set amount of time, which in this case can be no more than three years.”

Arlington National Cemetery in the snow, stark white crosses in rows of unbending military precision, was well worth the Uber fare. I counted all 21 steps the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier took before he clicked his heels and did it again, causing me to start the count over. Never blinking. That was topped only by the raw emotion and determination carved into the stone faces of the Korean War Memorial soldiers, forming a ragged line of trench-coated beleaguered warriors slogging through slushy snow toward the Washington Monument.

So much to see. And then we happened upon my diamond in the rough, the one thing that I thought might make one or more return trips possible, even probable. The National Portrait Gallery. With Alli safely ensconced at GMU, I imagined catching the train into the city, dropping off at F Street, and spending an entire day just browsing among what the museum bills as “American Portraiture.”

The place is three stories of treasure for a history nerd who is a bit culture starved. I’d marvel at the collection of women writers and then move on to British nobility and Grandma Moses. There’s the Will Rogers collection and Washington Crossing the Delaware and a full wing of simply presidential portraits. I’m not wild about Obama among the kudzu and question the lucidity of the artist responsible for Bill Clinton’s image comprised of a million individual mirrored tiles that give him a snaggle-toothed wild-eyed, totally disconnected look. But overall, I know I could easily spend a day there in bliss. And I was looking forward to it.

“We, therefore, the Representatives of your Family, do in the Name and by the Authority of the good people of Home, solemnly publish and declare that you are Free and Independent, that you are absolved from all allegiance to us, unless you expect any monetary or emotional support. If that be the case, you are advised to maintain all familial connections in good order, adhere to frequent calls and visits home, and resolve to remain in the dreaded North only so long as required by the Institution of Higher Study. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortune, and our sacred Connection forevermore.”

Her little studio apartment was adorable, if incredibly overpriced. At least that’s what I thought. I didn’t live in the Emerald City though. She did. And she hated it. She hated the stop and go traffic that contributed to a 45-minute 5-mile commute. She hated the gray blustery days and the single apartment window providing a view of the concrete pad that Yankees call a courtyard. I can’t name one thing she was really fond of. August had definitely given way to November and before I knew it, she was headed home. For good. Sort of.

And I hadn’t even made one trip to the National Portrait Gallery.

But then Oklahoma called and she answered. OSU had a place available in January that would precisely dovetail with her Arlington departure so she subleased the studio apartment, furniture and all, and hightailed it south. Or west. During that year, taillights were about all I saw, in one direction or another.

I really wish I could get excited about Oklahoma; as excited as I was about the National Portrait Gallery. She says there’s plenty to do. We could visit Pawnee, maybe take in an Indian reservation or two, and then there’s the intriguing Salt Flats, which is a flat bare 11-thousand-acre slab of land northwest of Tulsa. High on a windswept plain. To get to that dream destination, I get to bounce across Arkansas, perhaps stopping off at Toad Lick or maybe detouring to Petit Jean for a sweeping vista that I’m sure approximates that of the Appalachian Trail. I even get to traverse the Mississippi Delta and downtown Memphis.

I hear the Walmart heiress has a jam up art gallery in Bentonville, which isn’t all that far from Oklahoma, that I bet I could get to in the same amount of time it took Alli to get to class from her apartment in Arlington, so there’s that. It may not be the National Portrait Gallery, but surely I could find enough there to occupy a morning.

In the meantime, I’ve reworded the Declaration slightly to fit Oklahoma, although I’m still working out the kinks. This is definitely her last stop before she comes back South, so here goes:

“Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Families long established should not be departed from for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that children are more disposed to suffer in the arid wastelands of the West than even the frigid avenues of the North. Therefore, at the earliest possible time, all attempts should be made to right themselves by abolishing the forms of Education to which they are accustomed and return to the comforting arms of the Homeland, diploma in hand. We must, therefore, at the present acquiesce in the necessity of temporary separation but total dependence on those from which we took our leave…”

I do have one consolation. She graduates in a little over a year and we’ve made a pact at that time to head directly to the National Portrait Gallery. She’ll drop me off and will not return until the day is done. Maybe that’ll be enough time.

If your mom is still with you, do me a favor. Sit on the pew with her next Sunday. You can bet if it were possible, I’d be sitting with mine. Especially on Mother’s Day. I’d go so far as to insist on wearing a red rose corsage and I’d make sure she had a rose of the appropriate color, too. It goes without saying that if your family is not a churchgoing lot, you’re not excused. Sit with her for Sunday dinner, whether at a crowded restaurant or a simple dining table. You might skip the corsage, but not the time with her. In fact, don’t even worry about whether it’s a Sunday. Just sit with her somewhere sometime. But do it sooner than later.

A phone call will work in a pinch but make it sincere and make it often. As a mom of two grown daughters, I’m absolutely qualified to make the rules, and I’m telling you, it is in your best interest to remember who gave you life and it’s advisable to honor that selfless sacrifice with your presence and time as often as possible. I don’t care if you’re three states away or three doors down, call your mom. If she’s busy, she’ll call you back.

It’s more than just the sacrifice of bringing you home as a baby that merits your mom’s admiration. She actually lived with you day in and day out. Never mind changing smelly diapers, the real mettle test was leaving you crying in the school door as you begged her not to leave. You have no idea how much longer those days were for her than for you. She earned her stars scouting out cow killer ants for your insect collection and relearning long division so she could help with homework assignments. Cow killer ants are terrifying, I can tell you. I seem to recall only collecting butterflies when I was the same age but maybe that’s because my mom was behind the scenes with the cow killers, as well.

A lot of behind the scenes work goes on in a mom’s life, which you would be well advised to remember. My mom chose to stay at home with us, which is what most 1960’s moms did, preparing home-cooked meals and ensuring a spotless existence for us. She packed a peanut butter sandwich and Cheetos in my Barbie lunchbox each day and sent me off to school worry free. That was then. I worked full-time during my young mom years, which didn’t ensure home-cooked meals or a spotless existence. My girls enjoyed plastic wrapped Lunchables containing ingredients and a fat content I will not read to this day. And they will not eat them to this day.

For my early school years, my mom kept a “School Years” scrapbook that was designed with places to list best friends, activities, achievements, and school pictures from each year. At the bottom of the page for each school grade was a place for the child to check what he or she hoped to “be” eventually. Girls stayed in one column—the one listing Nurse, Teacher, Airline Stewardess, or Mother—while the boys could choose from Policeman, Fireman, Doctor, or Lawyer. Father was not an option. I was always sorely tempted to choose airline stewardess, but my heart led me to select mother. At that time, the option to be both a mother and an airline stewardess violated a rule of nature, so it never crossed my mind to check both. And perish the thought that I might be a lawyer or doctor. Another rule of nature.

And honestly, if I could be even a portion of the mother my mom was to me, that was a pretty lofty goal. I also liked the staying at home part while everybody else went to work or school. I could just imagine watching Captain Kangaroo from start to finish each day, followed by the Beverly Hillbillies, and then a nap.

Some people lose their moms far too early. Some have mothers who are just not there even when they are. I’m painfully aware that my chance for a charmed childhood and saint of a mother can only occur in the dreams of some, which makes me incredibly thankful for all that I’ve been given and very sad for those who can’t enjoy that.

When my brother and I met with the pastor who was to officiate my mother’s funeral, he asked a pretty blunt question. “Tell me what your mother was to you.” My brother was the first to respond. “Home.” How very simple. Home. A simple word for a simple woman who was our world. For us, home was not a place. It was a person. And I couldn’t add to that, so I just agreed. I love words, but that one word says it all for us.

The dictionary defines a mother as “a female parent,” and also “a woman in authority.” Yes to both. I’ve probably set a pretty poor example in some ways in that I just may be too determined. The mom in the Big Fat Greek Wedding movie advises her daughter that the man may be the head of the house, but the woman is the neck. She turns the head any way she wants it to go. That’s probably a bit too far along the relationship pendulum, as moms and dads really should parent jointly, with unique roles for both. And I’m absolutely in awe of those who handle that job singlehandedly. The point is that most moms are definitely in authority so it’s best if you respect yours.

On the last day I saw my mom, she had been placed in rehab for what should have been just a few days, after a hip fracture. I bought her some brand new navy blue Keds for her therapy and supplied her drawer with nightgowns and magazines. As I turned to leave, I asked her what else she might need, and sitting on the side of that hospital bed, she gestured around at what I had brought and said, “Nothing. You just go on. You’ve done enough.”

I know what she meant, and I truly hope I had done enough to make her life pleasant, not only on that day but on all her days, but what I thought a while later was that it was she who had actually done enough. She had given us a home in every way. We still needed her, but she had already passed the excellent mom test.

The next night we talked on the phone about her upcoming therapy and my plans to join her for lunch. At the end of the conversation, she said “I’ll see you tomorrow.” And I know that I will.

So, wherever you are, take time to sit on the pew with your mom. Or just join her anywhere. And don’t even worry about the corsage.

Hobby Lobby is definitely not my favorite place. In fact, it makes me almost as unhappy as Wal Mart. Not quite, but almost. To be perfectly honest, a high degree of stress, and yes, even anger is usually involved before I get through the checkout line. I’m really not proud of that, but it seems inevitable and is what I’ve come to expect. I do visit the store often, though, and am working hard to adopt the carefree mental state of those artsy crafty people who frequent the Lobby. I appreciate the principles that the founder espouses and applaud the Sunday time off he ensures for his employees. That is, until the Sunday I’m inspired to resin coat a few four-leaf clovers, only to be reminded that the necessary resin is perfectly unavailable behind the store’s locked doors. It’s usually the same Sunday I’m craving Chick Fil A nuggets.

My frequent visits to the crafting mecca this Christmas season have led me to conclude that truly creative people must possess a high level of patience that I wish I could conjure up. I just don’t see on their faces the same angst I feel at watching the checkout clerk peruse the store flyer to ascertain whether an item is on sale before she carefully and methodically wraps every single breakable piece in several layers of protective packaging, with each corner creased and bent at precise angles. In slow motion. And invariably, the person ahead of me in line is purchasing more than a few possibly breakable treasures. That, or they’re returning something without a receipt, prompting the checkout person to call for a runner to do a price check. At that point, I begin the hopeless visual scan for a faster horse of a checkout line, and so the game begins. What Hobby Lobby has against bar code scanners, I just don’t understand.

And as my mood darkens, with little else to occupy the time spent waiting for the price check runner to return, I scan the rack of inspirational and self-help books conveniently positioned by the checkout. There’s plenty of time to read the cover of each, and so I do. The Power of I Am by Joel Osteen promises that those two little words will change your life. But I know precisely where I am and it’s apparently going nowhere. Just like Hotel California, you can apparently check in but you can never leave. I know this.

If you need batteries or tweezers or Scripture mints or refrigerator magnets, Hobby Lobby checkout line is the place to be.

This year, I determined to decorate the farmhouse in the style touted by the Farmhouse Christmas magazine I picked up in the grocery store checkout line. Checkouts are truly a racket. I know this, too. The adorable design involved a large vertically-positioned “JOY” by the front door. The letters J and Y were large metal letters, with the O in the middle comprised of a bow-festooned wreath. Off to Hobby Lobby I sprinted to find the expected cache of large metal letters. Of course, I located a J but no Y. Really? They carry a large metal ampersand but no Y? And they have an X in stock. For the life of me, I can think of no word I’d want to spell that includes an X, which is probably why the X was still available. I briefly considered spelling Ho Ho with two H’s and two wreaths but decided that the design would be too busy. Artist that I am.

Surely I can find a Y at another Hobby Lobby so I stood in line to buy my J.

That turned out to be a mistake. There had apparently been a run on Y’s, as I couldn’t find a single large metal Y at any store in North Alabama. And I think I visited them all. I briefly considered calling it quits and just spelling Jo instead of Joy but decided that would be weird. If only I’d gone with Ho Ho or Noel, but it’s too late now.

I’m actually looking forward to returning the big metal J at a more convenient time, although I’m quite sure there is no convenient time at Hobby Lobby. And since the store is full of patient people with oodles of time to visit and craft, I’m sure they won’t mind waiting in line as the price check runner locates the price of the item for which I have no receipt. That’s the way the game is played. I’m learning the rules.

I’m also learning that crafters are not only patient, they’re flush with free time and they don’t watch football. Living in an SEC state from which champions usually emerge, I know that the best time to shop or dine out is during a Saturday afternoon televised football game. Although that is definitely the time to browse the desolate aisles of Target, not so for any store frequented by artsy people. My fellow crafters and I are happily oblivious to goings on at Bryant-Denny. We have far more important projects to occupy ourselves with, as I was disappointed to learn in yet another long checkout line one hopeful fall Saturday afternoon.

As I waited, I read every single quote plastered on the wall above the EXIT door. The quotes were artfully arranged on planks of barn wood or lettered in fancy script and framed.  “New Day, New Start,” “Blessed,” “Do What You Love,” and my favorite “Today is the Day You Never Want to Forget,” reminded me that no matter the frustrations of slow people with full carts ahead of you, or the inevitability of a blocked aisle as people chat or browse the shelves, it’s OK to slow the pace and give others a break.

“Just Breathe,” I’m advised by the framed quote at the far right.

And so I do.

My absolute favorite ornament is the white poster board star with irregular strips of silver glitter fanning out to the edge of each star point. In the very center is a glued-on picture of our oldest daughter at about the age of 6, dressed in a red plaid dress with a wide white collar. Her tenuous half-smile barely conceals her self-consciousness at having her picture made, but I would know that smile anywhere. That angelic face, framed by brown ringlets of untamed hair, stares back at me each year as I carefully place it near the top center of the family Christmas tree. It means nothing to anyone except us, but if the house were on fire and I could get to it, I would definitely carry it out.

When we married, we moved into this house. At a much younger age, I would never have dreamed that a house could breathe; that it could take on a personality and reflect the lives and characteristics of those who call it home. Maybe it’s my warped personality and soft heart that personalizes everything, but this house is rooted in my soul. Our family has grown up and grown a bit older here but we’ve never really outgrown the little three-bedroom, narrow-hallway, galley-kitchen structure with the completely overstuffed garage and too many pets to mention. I’m reminded of that fact each year when we—or actually when I and any stragglers who have nothing else to do or just didn’t see it coming—fend off the cats and put up the family Christmas tree. And somehow this year, that little slightly wopsided, a bit loose in the branches, not fully lit pre-lit tree has touched my heart in a way that it never did before.

The difference is that we finally bit the bullet and built our dream house at the farm, a mere 10 miles from our little starter house. The farm has been in my husband’s family for generations. It’s where his dad was raised and where his grandparents lived and died. When the last renters finally vacated the place, we razed the old original house and built our own. And it’s beautiful. Right down to the elegant, perfectly straight, pre-lit Christmas tree that can be operated with the touch of a button. If you’re feeling low key, set the tree for the muted ambience of clear lights. Some days might call for the lively LED multi-color selection or you can go wild with any combination of flashing rotation. The color-coordinated, no-personality, collection of store-bought ornaments glistens in the glow of showroom light fixtures that illuminate the 28-foot ceilings in the great room. That farmhouse is everything we always wanted and everything our little home house couldn’t offer, and we’re incredibly fortunate to be able to put it together but it’s not yet my best friend. Nothing underscores that more than Christmas.

One thing we determined during the farmhouse building process was just how woefully in need of improvement the home house was. So we invested heavily in new flooring and tile showers and quartz countertops, and complete repainting, ostensibly under the guise of preparing it to sell. But I know my heart is not ready and probably never will be. I’ve even convinced myself that it’s not at all weird to own two houses within a 10-mile radius and that at some point one or both daughters might need a soft place to land. It’s not odd. It’s just being prepared. And it’s definitely not being a helicopter parent. It’s maintaining a guest house or waiting for the housing market to improve or hedging against an economic downturn or speculating in land or planning for a rainy day—or maybe it’s just that darned Christmas tree.

I hang the Waterford “Baby’s First Christmas” ornament carefully, placing it far enough back on an artificial limb to prevent accidental toppling, while also discouraging any disastrous cat intervention, which is entirely possible. Jenn made her entrance into the world unexpectedly 28 years ago on December 20, so some thoughtful friends showed up at the hospital with the precious timely ornament that has graced the tree’s branches ever since, reminding me of both the baby and the givers. Again this year, it shares proximity with the laminated cone of an ornament fashioned by a much younger Alli. Circling the cone is a hand-drawn panorama of a stick figure Mary and Joseph and oversized Jesus in a manger, bordered by crisscross candy canes and a green snowman, I think. Or maybe that’s the Grinch. Nearby dangle several varied angel ornaments from the days I fantasized about an angel tree but lost interest too soon, and I’m reminded of trips made to the Opryland Hotel and the beach and Gatlinburg by the personalized ornaments that return each year. The Mountain Memories ornament frame is there, but without the souvenir picture I must have intended to include. Instead, the incredibly happy sample family on horseback remains in the frame until I find time to replace it, if ever. It’s pretty special as is and at this point I think I’d actually miss them. They’ve become part of our family, too.

The little plastic doll ornament with the floppy hat and open hand that at one time held a bouquet of plastic balloons makes her entrance each year. The balloons are long gone but the ornament girl remains in place. She was a gift from my best friend in college and I think of Mary each year when I hang her gift. A green wooden heart ornament emblazoned with a “Gone Fishin” sticker is a mystery to me. I dutifully place it on the tree each year but I’m not sure where it came from or what its significance is. Even so, it must have meant something to someone at some time, so up it goes. That’s the way it is with a family Christmas tree. Meaning is everything, even if the only family it means anything to is yours. And even if you’re not really sure what the meaning is. At that point, it’s just tradition, which is enough.

The not-so-special commercial ornaments are relegated to the back of the tree, facing the wall, while the priceless handmade one-of-a-kind mementoes are in full view. Each one is a memory of a year or an age or a trip or a giver. I realized this year that not a single ornament on our Charlie Brown tree is round or orb shaped. Nothing matches and yet everything does, giving seamless retelling of the story of a family in motion. The theme is not angels or plaid or shabby chic—although I suppose it’s closer to shabby than anything else—but instead, the theme is family. The theme is this family.

Just like my little home house, the tree is a comforting reminder that not everything has to change and that memories come in all sorts of packages, including ornaments pulled out once each year or in houses that you think you’ve outgrown.

Growing up, we always bought a real tree, usually from the Lions Club at their downtown lot. After stopping by the fire department for a dip in their fire-retardant vat, the tree was hauled home on the top of our Galaxy 500 and placed in the living room. Lit by glowing multi-color bulb lights, the prize reflected beautifully through the picture window to the street outside. Depending on how art class went that year, the tree’s decorations varied but the standbys included an aluminum foil chain that was never quite long enough to make all the necessary rounds, a Styrofoam ball snowman with pipe cleaner arms and button eyes, and red gingham bows tied by my mother and me. One year, we must have had way too much time, as we sewed a bunch of calico stuffed ornaments bordered with white rick rack. The coup de resistance was always the silver aluminum collection of icicles, draped carefully on each limb to simplify the task of removing them after the season so they could be reused next year. Tradition and memories were hopelessly intertwined in the beauty of that living room tree for a lot of years. It was the anchor of the season for us.

This year, we located the Avon angel tree topper that my mom used for so many years on the little living room tree at home. We spruced her up a bit with a red sash and gold filigree for her wings, and got her, for the most part, centered on the topmost limb of the shabby chic tree. And there she totters, bridging the generation of my youth and that of my girls. Throughout the season, she reminds me that even if things do change, some memories are worth preserving and celebrating. Tradition and place are Christmas anchors, best personified by a family tree full of memory ornaments and maybe topped by a plastic Avon angel.

Actually, there’s one more ornament that makes the season complete for me, and it isn’t homemade. I’ve always known of it, but I don’t know where it came from. It’s a round, glittered, mural of a country church in a snowy field. Across the front are scripted the words “Silent Night.” Each year, it graced the living room tree at home, and I’m committed to locating it this year so that the tradition can continue on our family tree.

Or maybe I’ll take it to the farm and begin a new tradition there. If the evergreen tree represents new life and hope for the future, then I can think of no better place to start than a new house. But that doesn’t mean I’m giving up on the old. Not yet. That tree is just a bit too special.