YES, I AM STILL HERE looking out my window on Main Street, and I must tell you I witnessed the most amazing thing, last week.
I still can’t believe it and I am hoping that someone will verify that this actually happened. Maybe the company’s internal security cameras caught it.
I think I saw a shopper in Walmart going the right way on the canned vegetables aisle.
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OF COURSE I couldn’t finish this column last week because of the death of my mother, Wilton Clements Graves, 99.
I had time to write, but could not concentrate for long. So, JR looked back and found a suitable column to repeat.
So, I appreciate your benevolence — I am still laboring to concentrate.
My brothers and sisters and I all knew Wilton’s death was coming, and we managed to visit her in the hospital when she could still recognize and talk to us. She was sharp until near the very end.
Something I noticed after she was gone, was that I was sooooo sleepy. I’ve been told that being sleepy is one of the natural reactions to grief.
See her obituary and our Card of Thanks in this newspaper issue. Thanks to the Almighty for giving us such mothers, and peace to all of us who have Wilton’s blood running in our veins.
Another natural reaction to grief is the expansion of the waistline. Many people brought foodstuffs to places where Wilton’s kids were gathered. I tried to only eat sparingly of the raw vegetable platters, but may have slipped once or twice.
Lying about eating is another natural reaction to grief.
One thing Wilton Graves had was a vast sense of humor.
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SPEAKING OF EATING. We tend to eat more when working from home due to the virus. That’s because the chips in the pantry are so near, says an expert in the weekly emailout from Dollar Shave Club, of which I am a member.
She says that grazing is just a habitual action, like how a baby learns to stand up and walk by doing it over-and-over again.
There are ways to combat competitive grazing, the club advises. And I quote:
•“When you notice yourself wanting a snack, immediately step away from your work area.”
•“Stand up straight, as if a string is pulling you up from the top of your head and allowing the rest of your body to relax, especially your shoulders.”
•“Take a sharp double-inhale, and release it with a long sigh.”
•“Tell yourself, ‘I can handle this!’ The words you say to yourself are the most powerful words in the world.”
When that doesn’t work, just go back to the pantry and get another bag of M&M Peanuts. Over and over again, just like a baby learning how to stand and take steps. Tell yourself: “One more 3-lb. bag of M&Ms won’t make a difference.”
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ANIMAL CRACKERS. A week ago when my brothers and sisters were gathering in the wake of our mother’s death, I stoopidly stood on top of a fire ant mound.
The ants got into my webbed shoes and I almost couldn’t brush them off of my foot. Everyone was concerned when without any notice I suddenly began hopping on one foot and shouting.
At the time I got some relief by slathering some Neosporin ointment on the bites. But they’ve continued to itch and burn. So much so, that I’ve become a Neosporin junkie. I’ve gone through two jumbo tubes. Nothing gives lasting relief from fire ant bites. Nothing. Scratching doesn’t help. I may try radioactive heroin, next.
At the drug store they made me sign up for an anti-itch substance registry. “It’s the fastest growing addiction,” Saundra said sweetly.
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LET ME CATCH YOU UP on my distant kin, Uncle Parry Normal.
Although he wasn’t the first to run, Uncle Parry is the actual person who invented the term ‘streaker.’
For some reason he enjoyed running nekkid through large crowds and avoiding capture. He told someone that the reason he ran nekkid was that police were reluctant to touch him and also that he didn’t have any identification on his person if he happened to be captured. We never did learn where he stashed his clothes before he took off running. He wouldn’t even tell his parole officer.
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PAYING TAXES. Really? Our billionaire president paid less taxes than me last year? I personally like that presidential candidates over the last four decades — Republican and Democrats — have released their tax returns. At least the public can see who they’re beholden to.
During the campaign the president promised he’d release his, too. But then he backtracked. More than that, he fought like a champion to keep his secret. Was he hiding anything? I hope not.
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HE SAID: “How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in your life you will have been all of these.” George Washington Carver, agriculture scientist and inventor
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SHE SAID: “We think sometimes that poverty is only being hungry, naked and homeless. The poverty of being unwanted, unloved and uncared for is the greatest poverty. We must start in our own homes to remedy this kind of poverty.” St. Teresa of Calcutta (Mother Teresa)
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SWEET DREAMS, Baby
