May 2009
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Family (8)

Brittain’s blog

Ooh La La!

05 20, 2009 · Filed in: Family

On Mother’s Day morning this year, I felt as if I had gone back in time about 20 years. You may know that feeling. Valerie asked if I could come over before church to put Brittain’s hair in a French braid. It seems as though it was yesterday that I was the on-call hairdresser in my home, and can I just say how fun it was? Then one day I just stood there and thought, “Wait. Where did those little girls go? They don’t need me? Not even to fix their hair?”

I had never even heard of a French braid until I had two daughters taking dance lessons who needed their hair done for recitals. A French braid…..doesn’t that just sound graceful? The ideas, words, wares, and foods that are associated with the French just seem to have an allure.

Even though I have no French ancestors (although my middle name is Cecile—a French name), and even though I don’t speak French, I love French braids, French twists, and French manicures. If a magazine cover features a room decorated in French country, I will flip straight to it. Mademoiselle magazine only ceased publication a few years ago, but it was a magazine with class and one of my favorites. We Americans serve hors d’ouevre to our guests, we talk about that eerie feeling of déjà vu, and we RSVP an invitation. French pastries, French perfumes, and a toile design on anything all capture our attention.

Mademoiselle, 1983 cover

For a French braid to “happen” to a 2-year-old’s hair, there must be orchestration. Taking that thought one step further, I believe it might be easier to write an opera score than to keep a 2-year-old still long enough to braid her hair. It was a lively beginning for an already action-packed Mother’s Day. Dan was there—and that was great because I knew he would help if summoned. I’m actually surprised he understands the whole girly-girl hair thing since his idea of a bad hair day is nicking his scalp.

hair-dan3

Brittain had no clothes on when she opened the door to let me in. After streaking through the house several times, she finally allowed us to put some undies on her. Valerie said, “Mimi is going to fix your hair.” “No.” “Brittain, don’t you want her to fix your hair like a princess?” “No.” “How ‘bout you watch Noggin channel and I’ll give you some little marshmallows while she fixes your hair?” That worked, but I knew I needed to operate fast before the slight sugar high from the marshmallows kicked in.

When I was growing up, I remember Mama and Daddy telling me not to act scared if I was around a strange dog because they could smell your fear. Well, so can a 2-year-old. I suddenly felt like one of those guys who has to dash into a building while the clock is ticking and find the right wires to disconnect before the bomb detonates. Dora the Explorer on Noggin channel started getting on my nerves immediately.

All tools had been assembled: the squirt bottle of water, the comb, the brush, the rubber band. In French braiding, you start with three sections of hair, and that is quite simple. When it becomes fun is when you must grab another section of hair to incorporate into the braid and continue to grab new sections from each side as you go down. You need steady hands that can work on a head that stays still. You also need the 10 fingers you have and you must sprout a couple more in order to grab more hair to braid, keeping all sections taut. If I were really smart, I would add a special trick like picking the comb up with my toes.

As I braided, Brittain would look down at her marshmallows and look back up again quickly. Then, Valerie kept forgetting and would say something to her, and Brittain would turn her entire head which meant I had to hold in place all twelve of my fingers with hair wrapped around them and move in a semi-circle one way or the other when her head moved. The end result was quite nice.

I treated Brittain to a French braid, Valerie treated me to a French twist,

Brittain & Mimi

and then she did her own hair.

Val & Brittain

Now, whether France can really claim this braid known as a French braid is hard to prove. However, we do need to give credit to Madame de Pompadour, a famous/infamous figure during the 18th century. She is known down through history as mistress to King Louis XV. But the hairstyle named after her is what’s unforgettable.

Who can ever forget The Pompadour, France’s gift to America in the 1950’s and 60’s? I believe it was their pièce de résistance. Wouldn’t you agree?

Love in Disguise

05 08, 2009 · Filed in: Family

Sarah Ann Sherman Moss

It is hard to believe that fourteen Mother’s Days have come and gone since my own mother died. We grew up with the old tradition of wearing a red rose to church on Mother’s Day to honor our mother on this special day. A white rose was worn to honor the memory of a mother who had passed away. I can still remember walking into church past the ladies who wore a white flower on Mother’s Day and thinking how sad it was that they no longer had a mother. The white rose I now wear on Mother’s Day signifies not that my mother is gone but that she is still with me.

Being a mother to Valerie and Cecilia has allowed me to fully grasp how much my mother loved us. When I was 35, I wrote the following as a Mother’s Day gift to her.

Love in Disguise

Some things are so elusive we simply cannot capture them no matter how hard we try. Throughout history, we have seen magnificent works arise from the hands and minds of humans, but seemingly with some unseen entity helping. Certain words come to mind when we ponder examples: the divine inspiration of Handel’s “Messiah”; the sheer genius of Michelangelo’s creations; the imagination and vision of Frank Lloyd Wright’s designs; the magic in my mother’s fried chicken. What? Had you not considered it a form of art? Its very existence catapults it into this lofty group of talent.

When I was about twelve years old, I remember sitting best-friend to best-friend style, deep in “girl” talk with my best friend. All I can recall from this eye-opening conversation is my friend saying that her mother cooked the best fried chicken around. It took me a moment to comprehend that not only did she believe it, but furthermore, she had never questioned it! I was on the verge of defending the honor of my own mother’s fried chicken when the look in her eyes stopped me from speaking.

It happened again some time later with another friend. I began to notice a strange pattern emerging. The earth didn’t tremble, nor did a thunderous voice speak, but I had a revelation just the same. Every single person I asked responded without a moment’s hesitation and without blinking an eye: their mother’s fried chicken was indeed the best. To a person, they each stated it as if it were a well-known, indisputable, scientific fact. I felt I was moving into sacred territory where no one had dared to tread before. Dare I question a belief so revered—the pride and love a child has for his own mother’s fried chicken?

I crossed into my teens, and boys became my primary interest. The revelation I had had long ago at the childish age of twelve wasn’t really important any more. I just went through years of joyfully eating my mother’s fried chicken whenever it was offered.

To taste it was to love it. Its crust was the thickest–yet lightest–and crunchiest I have ever eaten. It was cooked to perfection every time. Anything served with it tasted wonderful. It melted in my mouth and nourished my soul. In my book, to have a friend over for a fried chicken supper was to extend the ultimate invitation.

Looking back now, I realize it was also the ultimate gift from my mother. A special dish prepared in someone’s kitchen has no equivalent. Time is set aside, loving hands perform the labor, magic is tossed in, and the finished creation is placed before you as a gift needing no elaborate paper or bow.

The years raced by, and I was grown and married. When I tried my hand at frying chicken, I felt betrayed by my own mother. My chicken was a failure, yet she had made it look so easy! My husband chose that moment to tell me his mother’s fried chicken was the best. Oh, really? I said. I never tried it again.

I approached midlife examining and questioning things which before had never bothered me. I asked myself questions that ranged from a little silly to very ridiculous and even threw in a few serious ones. Does God grade sins on a scale of 1 to 10—what’s 1 and what’s 10? Will I still think young when I’m old? Will I leave this life never having learned to fry chicken and have someone say mine was the best?

I began to talk with my now grown-up friends about the sacred subject of Mother’s Fried Chicken once again. That eerie feeling of déjà vu rushed over me as their words echoed my thoughts: I never learned to fry chicken like my mother’s. For a moment, I became amused at the thought of some Margaret Mead personality doing an in-depth study on what could perhaps be evolving as a pattern throughout society—“Is Fried Chicken a Dying Art?”

I wondered if my fleeting feelings of inadequacy could stem from my long-ago failed attempt at frying chicken. Just as “Real Men Don’t Eat Quiche,” I knew deep down that “Real Women Can Fry Chicken.” It didn’t help that I was born in the Deep South, land of “Gone with the Wind,” the Civil War, and home of fried chicken.

I refused to believe that home-cooked Southern fried chicken is a dying art. It has too many reasons to live. No fried chicken? No picnics. It has also been decreed that there always be five or six different versions of it at any church dinner. Last, but not least, future generations must experience the joy of it.

I’ll wager that if I really tried again, I could learn from my mother how to fry chicken like hers. I could probably place it before my children and see the same delight in their eyes and have them tell me mine is the best.

Does this mean then that I do not believe any more that my own mother’s fried chicken stands unparalleled? No. In my eyes, my fried chicken couldn’t begin to equal my mother’s. Her magic would be the lacking ingredient.

In my curiosity about “The Magic of a Mother’s Fried Chicken,” I have learned many things. Our mothers’ fried chicken is only a tangible manifestation of their love for us, their children. Our adoration and praise of it as the best is actually our feeble attempt at placing our mothers on the pedestal where they deserve to be. We must learn to recognize demonstrations of love, however they may be disguised. I know now that her fried chicken caressed me just as much as her arms ever have.

What more beautiful work of art can we behold than the essence of a mother’s love and her child’s appreciation of it?

But, I leave you with one parting thought. My mother’s fried chicken is the best. It always was, it still is, and always shall be. Amen.

This article was written for Mother’s Day 1987.

Mama’s fried chicken graced our table for seven more years.

The Pink Hiney–a Great Atlanta Tradition

05 04, 2009 · Filed in: Family

Who would have ever dreamed they would be forced to launch “damage control” from a high level in the name of pigs? Are you kidding me? Wipe everything you have heard from your mind and say, “H1N1.” And forget about The Flu Formerly Known as Swine.

H1N1. Sort of looks like hiney to me. You know that little tune: “I see your hiney, All bright and shiny. It makes me giggle, to see it wiggle.” I’m sorry, every time I see H1N1 from now on, that’s what I’ll think.

After the entire world has been promoted to Pandemic Level 5, and after WHO—not to be confused with THE Who (great music but glad they’re not in charge of the pandemic)–has spoken and said, “All of humanity is under threat,” they decided to rename this disease because it gives pigs a bad image, and people are not eating pork.

The pigs ARE at fault. As the President himself said about closing the borders to contain it, “It would be like closing the barn door after the horses are out.” Apply the same logic to the whole name change. The CDC can’t unring that bell. At least they called it Swine Flu. They really could have named it Pig Flu. Or, maybe it would have been okay to disguise it as in “Ig-pay Oo-flay.” When they named Mad Cow Disease, they didn’t beat around the bush. We knew where that came from. Plus they added a descriptive adjective in front of it to make it even worse. Cow Disease must not have carried the right amount of terror. The pork industry ought to get over it. The whole world could have been calling it Filthy Swine Flu.

There’s one thing that really makes me sad: even if everybody really does start calling it by its new name (the Hiney Flu), nobody is gonna forget where it all started. That cute little pink guy with the curly tail won’t ever be thought of the same way again. “This little piggy” has to get with the program. “This little hiney went to market, this little hiney stayed home”—I could go with that. And one of Atlanta’s best-loved traditions for the past 50 years, The Pink Pig, could stand another makeover:

the-pink-hiney

I think it has a nice ring to it. What do you think? : )

No More Flying Trapeze for Me

05 03, 2009 · Filed in: Family

Dear Diary: While walking through my kitchen, I thought I was a goner when one of my treasured fake shutters fell onto my back. My ridiculous half-scream followed by, “OMG, the shutter fell on me!” failed to even budge Danny from his chair where he sat playing Adventure Quest on his laptop. I wanted to stretch out on the floor and place the shutter on top of me until he walked in and noticed, but I might have been there for a couple of hours. When it fell, the wood frame hit me right in the trapezius, probably ending my circus act forever.

trapeze-artists3

I guess you could say it was a freak accident.

Love, Jackie