A Southern Snow

TODAY'S BIG STORY:  My phone rang around six o'clock...in the morning! My daughter was calling to tell me that her backyard was covered in snow and that her two chocolate labs were going crazy ~ rolling around and jumping up and down!  "Quick!" she insisted.  "Get up and see if it is snowing at your house!"

I replied that it wasn't even daylight at my house, but she persisted with her demands that I must get up!  That is how Southerners behave when we get a southern snow. We get plenty of rain, Spring Break sunshine, and our fair share of storms, but only on rare occasions do we get snow.  And just like those labs, we go crazy!

So...I turned on a light (as it was still dark), put on my housecoat and my big coat (as it was also freezing), grabbed my camera, and proceeded outside.  The southern snow did not disappoint.  In the soft half-light of dawn, the world behind my house seemed almost dreamlike.  I decided to join the frenzy and take pictures of the new-fallen snow...literally at the crack of dawn.  When I turned on my camera, a battery symbol was blinking across the viewfinder. Just my luck...my battery was dead.  I simply wanted to take some quick point and shoot pictures and head back inside my warm house.  Now I would have to dig out the SLR camera, deal with manual lighting and focusing, and hope that the battery was charged.

The first three pictures I took were solid black, which is when I realized that I had not taken off the lens cap.  By this point, my teeth were chattering, and I could hardly hold the camera steady; still, I persevered.  The luminous glow of the snow against the first blush of daylight created a beautifully-tinted quality to the images.

In the 2005 movie adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, my favorite scene is the walk at dawn.  Elizabeth (Keira Knightley) and Darcy (Matthew McFadyen) meet each other in a field just as the sun begins to rise.  The soft glow on her face as she watches him walk towards her is absolutely beguiling.  I can watch that particular scene a thousand times for the cinematography alone.  That same snowy silkiness had fallen from the sky and had surrounded my home.

Despite the chill, I braved the early morning elements to capture the fleeting southern snow.  In a few hours, the beauty would melt away, and the moment of awe would be forgotten.  My daughter knew for sure that a southern snow is not something to be missed.

 

Dianne ; )

My Music Box Mystery

This morning, I was lying in bed and being quiet while my husband enjoyed his Saturday sleep.  I have this weekend wake-up ritual in which I turn on my side, face my bookshelves, and read the titles of all my books.  Sounds strange...I know.  But today, I happened to notice the vintage music box which sits atop three horizontal books: Canterbury Tales, Selected Poems of Byron, Keats & Shelley, and The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin.  The books have a beautiful forest-green and gold binding and are part of The Programmed Series; however, this morning's item of curiosity is the melodic figurine.

The music box was given to me as a Christmas gift when I was a newspaper editor more than twenty years ago.  I think I might have even received it right after I decided to leave the paper and stay home with my three small children.  I do know that my most favorite cousin and dearest friend, Sandy, gave me the music box; and I have cherished it ever since.

One of the most endearing aspects of the vintage collectible (besides the fact that woman is typing, she is Victorian, and she has a vase of flowers on her desk) is the bewitching melody the music box plays.  I have never been able to identify the song.  So...here I go.  I get out of bed and head to my own desk.  I begin an online search for the music box and see if I can find out the name of the mysterious melody.  Only one match appeared on Google.  I find a single picture of my music box on WorthPoint.com ~ an online resource for researching and valuing antiques, art and collectibles.  According to the site, the vintage music box plays "Yesterday Once More" ~ a hit by the Carpenters from the '70's.  Oh, I am beginning to love this little treasure even more!

The description states that music box works, but sounds wobbly.  Oh my gosh! Wobbly is exactly the way the music sounds!  The thesaurus offers suggested synonyms for wobbly ~ precarious, frail, halting, and diaphanous.  Diaphanous is defined by Webster's dictionary as gauzy or gossamer ~ a film of cobwebs floating in air in calm, clear weather.  I just love it when such perfect words appear that so distinctly describe something that seems beyond words.

Next, I have to hear the song "Yesterday Once More" to solve the music box mystery once and for all. After I listen to and recognize the familiar song, I am sure beyond all doubt that the mystery of the  anonymous strain remains unsolved.  Even though the Carpenters' hit is a swell seventies' song, it is not the music box song. The recurring refrain is still a haunting secret, at least to me.

The figurine is described as a pretty blonde woman who may be a teacher or librarian, seated at her desk typing.  She is wearing glasses and a long Victorian dress.  I imagine that she is a writer who has just purchased her first typewriter.  The look on her face is one of sublime contentment.  She listens to the clicking sound of each key as the first page of her literary work materializes before her eyes.

I love the delicacy of her hands and the confidence of her posture.  I may never be able to name that tune, but I can positively identify a writer when I see one.

Dianne ; )

Just Right

I have places where all my stories begin.

That is the first line of an essay entitled "Knowing Our Place" written by Barbara Kingsolver.  The essay is taken from a compilation written by various Southern women – a book called All Out of Faith edited by Wendy Reed and Jennifer Horne.  I want to be sure that my works cited is out of the way, because if there has ever been one ounce of plagiarism in my heart, it is for this sentence.  

I have places where all my stories begin.

I do have places where all my stories begin.  I have such an appreciative sense of place when it comes to telling stories; I just want to soak it all in.  As a young child, my first impressions of place were always linked to permanence.  My grandparents’ home, my parents’ home, all of my aunts and uncles and neighbors’ homes – these places represented permanence to me.   Everyone I knew lived in the same houses and owned the same land until they died, so much so that the houses were actually named for their owners.   

But for me, finding that permanent place has been more like the children's tale of Goldilocks and the three bears.  I first thought about how I identify with that story when I read an article in Cottage Living April 2008.  The article was focused on a trend called 'pocket neighborhoods' and one of the architects – Ross Chapin – made this statement about finding 'the sweet spot' of home design: When it’s just right, there is a resonance.  It’s what Goldilocks was searching for.

So…I decided to read the original children’s story again. As I perused various internet articles, I learned that the original nursery tale dates back to the early 1800’s.  In the earliest version, the intruder was a she-fox, who was later replaced by a hag-like woman.  Over the years, the silver hair of the ugly old woman was transferred to a younger protagonist, and finally changed to golden hair – thus, Goldilocks.  While versions vary, we do know that Goldilocks was in search of the comforts of home and these comforts had to be just right.

On a literary level, the story uses the rule of three.  In his book, The Seven Basic Plots: Why We Tell Stories, author Christopher Booker calls it the "dialectical three...where the first is wrong in one way, the second in another or opposite way, and only in the third, in the middle, is just right.  This idea that the way forward lies in finding an exact middle path between opposites is of extraordinary importance in storytelling."

Unlike most fairy tales, the uniqueness of this story is that it offers no resolution.  Goldilocks runs back into the forest (the wild place) and never returns to the bears’ house (the civilized place) again, which is an ironic contradiction in itself.  No matter the outcome, we still have a place where the story begins.

My own search for just right has led me to homes that were too big, too small, too hot, too cold, too old, and too new.  And yet, I found something just right in every single place; I found story.  To date, we have yet to find that just right perfect ending, but we have found places where all our stories begin.  Some of today’s big stories are so simple, but when they are examined years later for their hidden lessons, they are profound.

Back to the beginning…In her essay, Barbara Kingsolver writes the following: Whether we are leaving it or coming into it, it’s here that matters, it is place.  Whether we understand where we are or don’t, that is the story: To be here or not to be.

In the earlier version of The Three Bears, the old woman took three actions: She looked in at the window, then she peeped in at the keyhole, and seeing nobody at home, she lifted the latch. At that point, I’m in for the rest of the story, no matter where it leads or how it ends. Once I am here (place), I have to be here (story).  If the process is too hard, too soft or just right…it’s all part of knowing my place.

When I was little girl and my grandma read me stories, I never closed my eyes or fell asleep; I didn’t want to miss a single thing.  I would ask her to read the same story over and over again, but I never understood why.  Now, I do.  At some point during the narrative, I knew the story so well that I lifted the latch.  No more looking in or peeping in, I walked inside the place where the story began.  

Sometimes, I think we are so busy trying to find the place that is just right that we live outside our own stories as they are being told.  We may catch an occasional glimpse or peep into the narrative of who we are, but we never know the place where our stories begin. 

Thank you, Ms. Kingsolver, for your fourteen published books, and for one completely coveted first line that's just right. 

Dianne ; )