Making A Dash For It

When long hair was hot, the measure of male teenage coolness in the 1970s, was the sound system in your ride.

Your car could burn oil like a cheap lawnmower, but if you had an 8-track under your dash, an equalizer next to it, and 6×9 speakers booming in the rear deck, you had arrived.

But funding such an operation required diversification.

Saturday morning started with a push mower and a can of gasoline. Mowing lawns was the main way I scraped together ...

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Room and Bored

There was always one room in every Southern home that was no man’s land – the parlor. Some called it the sitting room, while others called it the drawing room. It contained the nicest furniture, fresh flowers in the window. And it was the most boring room in the house.

I don’t know why it was called either. We weren’t allowed to sit in it, and drawing was definitely out of the question. If we’d gone near the room with crayons, ...

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When It’s Time To Go Home

I grew up in the far southwest corner of Arkansas. Nature drove the speed of life, and the towns breathed at an unhurried pace. Even now when I return there, the clock seems to slow and things just don’t move as fast.

The countryside in between each community was stitched together by gravel roads and pasture land. You could drive for miles without seeing anyone, but when you did, they weren’t a stranger.

For all who grew up in a similar setting, ...

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Mom Said

Being a kid in the South required being able to speak Mom.

For example: “We’re you raised in a barn?” didn’t actually mean, “We’re you raised in a barn?” (Although, it could mean that for some of my ancestors from Dardanelle.) The phrase was usually uttered when you left a door open.

Letting the heat out (we didn’t have air conditioning) was a major no-no. So, asking if you ...

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