I was scrolling through my photo gallery on my phone the other day looking for a picture.  I ended up scrolling all the way back to February of this year.  And got quite a shock.  I gasped and clutched my pearls.  Fitz, my cat, looked up from his napping perch on the couch to see what was going on.  Y’all…. The picture was taken the week after Uncle Chauncey died.  A nice snow front had settled into Central Arkansas.  No one was going anywhere.  Well, I was not in the right mental space to go anywhere anyway.  An on-time winter wonderland.  You might be imagining that this was a picture…

I recently realized how important my different church families have been in my life.  I grew up in church.  If the doors of the church were open, Bible Study Mama made sure that we were there.  When you spend that much time with people, you inevitably create bonds.  Now, let’s be real for a second.  Many of us present a nicer version of ourselves at church.  We want to appear to be super saved.  Not in need of help ourselves but beacons of light for the heathens of the world.  But given enough time and being placed in the right circumstances, you can see through the façade.  You get to…

A clean slate.  A new page.  A fresh start.  New beginnings.  After an ending, we get the chance to begin again.  An opportunity to seize the day.  Maybe you are sending your kid off to their first day of school.  Maybe you are trying to cook macaroni and cheese like your mom does for this year’s Thanksgiving feast.  Whatever it is, we all have to face new journeys.  As thrilling as new beginnings can be, they can also be a little scary.  Well, let me speak for myself.  New beginnings are a little scary for ME.  Even when they are totally positive.  I think it is the fear of the…

I can be a bit weird.  I fully own it and am not ashamed of it.  After all, Deuteronomy says that we are a peculiar people.  So, I am totally prepared for the judgment that may come after I tell you this.  See, I have an appreciation for endings.  Do not get me wrong.  Some endings are totally sad.  Totally unexpected and absolutely unwelcome.  But even those endings have a greater purpose.  Of course, this has not always been my mindset. Want to hear something else weird about my admiration for endings?  I am an avid book reader.  In order to challenge my brain, I began to read the very…

Why oh why would I be thankful for grief?  I am so glad you asked.  Initially, I was anything but grateful for my grief.  It was a dark, dark, cloud that hung over my head.  It was an unbelievably heavy load that I had to carry.  It made me irritable.  It made me numb.  It ruled my life. When you lose people you love, folks always feel pressure to say the right thing.  To offer the right advice.  Sometimes even to share their own stories of loss.  It can be helpful but many times it was not for me.  I just was not in a place to receive it.  Parts…

Since I have been on a roll with showing my appreciation for people in my life, I figured I would keep that train moving.  I love all my family.  I do not want to imagine life without any of them.  Everyone brings something different to the table that just cannot be replicated.  Especially my Cuzzo Crew.  (Cuzzo means cousin…just realized that I probably needed to explain that.) To be fair, I literally have hundreds of cousins.  When I look at both sides of my family, the cousin count gets ridiculous.  My people BELIEVE in having babies.  They want to make sure that they help repopulate the earth.  Now let’s be…

I NEEDED this gratitude series.  I had to have a way to keep my head above water.  And when I think of keeping my head above water, I think of my mama.  In case you cannot tell, we are very close.  Even though I am not her favorite kid, I know she loves me…lol.  I usually shout my love for her from the rooftops on her birthday.  This year we were attending Aunt Linda’s wake on ma’s actual birthday.  I did not have it in me to write.  I was just trying to survive.  And I was also attempting to shove birthday cake down my ma’s throat, but she was…

Although I have struggled to do it consistently this year, I am grateful for the gift of writing.  Quiet as it’s kept, I was a very emotional pre-teen and teenager.  Honestly, it is not my fault.  I grew up watching hours and hours of All My Children with my great-grandmother.  The characters had NO problem expressing their emotions loudly and proudly.  I guess I internalized their behaviors.  When my parents made me mad, I would stomp to my room, slam the door, and throw myself onto the bed. Those frequent scenes had repercussions.  Not whoopings.  We have already discussed that.  I am a precious angel and nobody should be whooping…

I have a deep love and appreciation for quilts.  Mainly, the quilts that my great-grandmother made.  Ma Patra would sit and sew regularly.  This has become a part of my life that is really a background memory.  I do not recall ever helping much with the quilting progress.  But I know that she was diligent about completing the quilts. Fun fact:  My family is very territorial about their Ma Patra quilts.  We all have more than one that was hand-stitched by her.  As I was growing up, she would give me a quilt on special occasions.  I would also get them just because, but I looked forward to receiving a…