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How I Kept My Sanity while Staying at Home with Very Young Children
Written by: Cynda Pierce
When I first left the work force to stay at home with my infant daughter, I desperately missed conversation that didn’t involve what the baby was eating or not eating and how many diapers had to be changed. Don’t miss understand me, I loved being at home with her immensely and considered it a privilege, but I craved intelligent conversation. Not intellectual, but intelligent. That’s when I discovered the Ludlow Porch Show.
Ludlow Porch had been an Atlanta radio personality for years. He started his radio career at WRNG, but I found him at 9:00 am on WSB 750. Every morning, I’d be greeted by a genteel Southern gentleman that genuinely cared if I knew a song title that had the word “blue” in it, or what my current pet peeve was, or if food should be passed to the left or to the right at the supper table. We talked for three hours about absolutely nothing, but we talked and, more importantly to me at the time, we listened to one another. Read the rest of this entry »
Reunions
Written by: Cynda Pierce
Reunions? Are they typically a southern phenomenon? I’m not sure. My mother’s family is from the mid-west and while we did get together with her immediate family, events rarely encompassed the second and third cousins that routinely gather for my dad’s family.
My dad’s mother was from Chester, Georgia, a small town in Dodge County. When she was born, Chester wasn’t officially a town yet since it wasn’t incorporated until 1912. She was the oldest of six, though on my recent pilgrimage, I discovered two gravesites of her younger brothers that I never knew of. Her dad died in 1924 and her mom in 1957, both well before I was a twinkle in my daddy’s eye. Yet here we are on a fabulous fall afternoon, gathered in Cochran, Georgia to celebrate the family that shares her Lister heritage.
We meet at the farm of a first cousin, once removed. This farm is not family land for the Listers. Instead, it is the ancestral home of my cousin’s wife’s family. We were not born of landed gentry. We gather from Gainesville, Newnan, Atlanta, Social Circle, Calhoun, Fayetteville and talk about the missing cousins from Covington, Valdosta, Lawrenceville, Brunswick and Hinesville. A few of the cousins ventured as far as Texas, Virginia, Nevada, Florida and even Canada, but representatives of those families routinely make the pilgrimage to Middle Georgia. Of my grandmother’s generation there is one sister left and she celebrated her 92 or 93 birthday the day after the reunion. No one is really sure how old any of that generation is. They were all born at home and their births were accounted for in the family Bible, but coincidently, the sisters all claim to be younger than the Bible records.
Food is plentiful and varied. There is ham, roast beef, fried chicken and in years past we’ve had venison and duck. The vegetables are fried or cooked in seasoning – fat back, bacon drippings, or ham. The salads are made of mayonnaise and sour cream bases, with “healthy” vegetables thrown in. After dinner (not lunch), we walk around the lake and through the cotton fields to make room for dessert. Chocolate cake, which isn’t chocolate at all, but yellow cake with chocolate icing, caramel cake, banana pudding, chocolate pudding, red velvet cake, coconut cake, chess pie, lemon meringue pie, lemon cheese cake, peach cobbler – all have graced our table over the years. Read the rest of this entry »
Vacation Memories
Written by: Cynda Pierce
When I was little girl, a vacation did not mean a trip to the beach or the mountains. My dad was an enlisted man in the Air Force and we were stationed in West Texas. We were too far from the beach; and the mountains that surrounded El Paso were not an inviting vacation opportunity. For us, vacation meant we were going to visit family, either my mom’s family in Oklahoma or my dad’s family in Georgia. Vacation meant a long trip in the station wagon.
We always left early in the morning. Dad would carry us to the loaded car in our pajamas and we would try to go back to sleep, but four children in two seats (the back seat and the way back, as we called it) meant that there were soon cries of, “He touched me!” or “I’m tired of being in the floor.” Those were the days before mandatory seat belts; in fact, I don’t think our station wagon even had seat belts. We would take turns sleeping in the floor or in the space between the two seats. Since the way back faced backwards there was a space between it and the back seat where one of my three brothers could fit and actually lie down. The luggage was always in a luggage container that was strapped to the top of the car so we had “lots” of room inside. Read the rest of this entry »
Too Late for Resolutions
Written By: Cynda Pierce
Is it too late to make New Year’s resolutions? I’ve never been good at keeping them, though I make them all the time. I’m not really creative, the same ones keep popping up year after year: loose weight (I’ve lost the same ten pounds for the last five years), get in shape (any shape but round), read more (not IRS Revenue Rulings), spend less time on the computer (does blogging count as computing time or writing time?), stay in touch with old friends (FACEBOOK does make that easier but that counts against my less computing time resolution) and eat healthier (does guacamole count as a vegetable?). Last year I didn’t even try to make any resolutions until after tax season. It’s too hard to eat well and exercise when you’re working 60+ hours a week. (I must say I am really intimidated by Jody Lappi the blogger who’s training for a marathon). I did read the Bible through in a new translation last year, but to be honest I started in 2008 and finished in 2009 so I don’t think that counts as a New Year’s resolution. Read the rest of this entry »
Introducing Cynda Pierce, CPA
Written by: Cynda Pierce, CPA
Good morning, afternoon or evening! Thanks for taking time out of your busy day to read this blog. Read the rest of this entry »
