Tour, Pace, & Finish the Race

I recently did another Southeastern tour.  I drove from Edenton, NC to Atlanta, GA to Brookhaven, MS to Moultrie, GA to Vidalia, GA back to Moultrie, GA to Atlanta, GA and then home- to Edenton, NC.  Yes, it did make me dizzy.

The reason for the trip? Ginny.  She got married and a beautiful bride she did make.  That's a funny way of saying she was a beautiful bride.  I have design imprints from events and the imprint from this event was a romantic, shabby-chic, moonlit night with a pop of modern, peach and white, round paper lanterns.  In this night stood a lovely lady in a soft white gown with copper colored waves of hair falling around her shoulders and reflections of light-filled happiness twinkling in her brown eyes.  Virginia Caroline is married.  Happily.

After the weekend of family fun and after a long drive east to Georgia I made another trip.  I went to Vidalia, Georgia, home of a famously sweet onion, to meet with a former English professor.  He looks as I remember and is, in a masculine way, elegant in nature.  He has a proud posture and dresses in a way that is perfect for a man of the English language.  It is exactly as you imagine, easily smart with a quiet formality.  This man is dear to me and I hadn't seen him in quite a while.  I quickly remembered how deep of a pool his mind is and that to jump in is humbling to say the least. When speaking with him I am skimming the surface of that well of knowledge, going under to look around and coming back up to gasp for air.  I realize how dumb I really am.  Being with him is like watching 'Good Will Hunting'.  I beg to be smart.  So, I have five books that he gave me, two of which are collected poems he wrote.  He also gave me This Side of Paradise and The Beautiful and Damned by F. Scott Fitzgerald and A Handbook To Literature that is remarkably helpful and interesting.  I have a list of books to read that he advises will cover everything (in the ways of writing and reading) and another recommended book, The Trivium: The Liberal Arts of Logic, Grammar, and Rhetoric, to purchase.  The good news is that I showed him the first 42 pages of my book and I wasn't slaughtered.  I got a look of puzzlement a time or two and that was expected because I have tried to be different in the writing of this story.  After reaching a certain point he seemed to get excited because my style of writing became clear to him.  Of course, as you could guess, it is Stream of Consciousness.  I won't bore you now with all of his insights and amusements at my writing... I think for a man of his sophisticated intellect I am humorous.  I handed him the Synopsis of my book after he read the pages I handed to him- ill timing, but it seems that's the way I roll.  He looked at me, said it was really good and then it was as if I could read his thoughts as he gave a slight hesitation.  I picked up the slack at that moment of hesitation and said "Why didn't I write the book like that?"  "Yes." He said, "Why didn't you just write it like this?"  What is the answer to this?  It didn't come to my head that way.  And I am being true to the way the story unfolded in my head, even though it may be an obstacle.  At the end of our six hours at his kitchen table he put his hand on the top of my stacked pages and said "Don't change it.  This is you."  So, aside from his insistence on changing the word 'by' to the word 'near' and some other pointers like that... I passed and feel good about it.  He has a Ph.D. in English and Literature and a minor in philosophy... I am proud of anything outside of a trash can.  I could have seen my words slashed and dismembered and my bloody pages could have been as good as a crumpled paper ball in a trash can.  So, I give myself a passing grade.  I hope he agrees.

I did hand these pages to my friend Julie and she, being a positive person in general, gave me the supportive feedback of wanting more pages to read.  That is my goal.  So, I gulped the "Gatorade" needed to finish the race.  I have gotten encouragement from a peer and a "keep it the way it is" from a person possessing far more superior brain cells than mine.  From a new mommy and cake pop queen to an English language purist and professor... I feel I traveled farther than all my routes around the Southern states.  He may never have read this book on his own if he didn't know me.  It is romantic and is probably more appealing to women.  Regardless, I did it.  I showed them both.

My dad had a birthday on the 14th of March, just a couple of days after my cousin's wedding.  Her wedding was like a gift to him- a get-together with all of his family.  He is so easily pleased.  He sets a very good example of how to be happy any time, anywhere, with no requirements.  He is happy.  As simple as the sentence, is his happiness.  He, like his mom was, is very accepting because he listens to me in the back seat as he drives his family to Mississippi or elsewhere.  He'll say "Are you my daughter?" every now and then, although he knows full well, I have many of his tendencies.  I apparently have many character traits of my mother's father too.  I get that a lot.  I never knew him, but can feel him at times.  I can sense his personality.  I missed having a grandfather.  They left before I arrived.  Pictures help.  I cling to them.  Paige's children will never say the same because my father is a wonderful Papa, or Poppy as Madeline would say.  Her kids have two sets of wonderful grandparents.

I have been away so long that I have so much more to say.  I am pacing myself because I want to work on my book and not become sucked into anything else.  I did write a little something that is either amusing or nonsensical but it shouldn't be paired in the same blog entry as that of my cousin's wedding news.  It is of disconnect and the opposite of a happy union.  Happy unions are bountiful lately.  I have two wonderful friends that have become engaged and I have one friend that is expecting her first baby (talk about a union!).  I am gearing up for shower-my-friends mode.  Another cousin is wedding April 30th.  And Nick and I celebrate our own happy union on the 16th, which means all month.  Six years married.  Ten years together.  We have been together like-married almost all of our relationship.  We are the type that live that way.  Which is now another reason to put my SOC on disconnect and separation in another post.

For me, on this day, I am devoted to sitting my bum in this chair.  I'll refresh my coffee, light my candles, pick tunes, and occasionally walk the doggies.  Otherwise, I am sitting.  Typing.  Thinking.  Hoping.  Writing.  Editing the rest of my pages.