Life in Cayuga

 Today is Halloween. Witches, ghosts, goblins, and pumpkins everywhere.  Kids dressed up as cartoon characters, scary creatures, princesses, and cowboys, roaming the streets.  Tons of candy given out tonight, and tons of stomach aches tomorrow.   Once again, it made me think of Halloween when I was a kid. We always went as a group with my Yates cousins. We’d go up and down Old Port Gibson Road to all the neighbors and relatives.  We always knew what we’d get at each house.  They gave the same things every year!  Mrs. Peyton always had parched peanuts. Mrs. Brown always had the best popcorn balls. Aunt Jane had cupcakes, and Aunt Helen had brownies.  Grandmother had chips from the store. And Mr. Womack, who was a widower, always had us a cold Coke! Other than Granny’s chips and Mr. Clyde’s coke, all our treats were homemade.  They were much better!   One time Daddy had bought an old airport shuttle bus and we all piled in it and went as a...

 I don’t know if it’s a product of getting older, or what, but lately, I’ve been resurrecting a lot of good memories that I’d forgotten.  Today, for example, I was putting up some fresh shrimp I’d gotten from a friend who went to the beach this weekend.  While I was working it brought back memories of doing the same thing on Sunday afternoons with my parents as a child (and hating every minute of it!). We rarely took long vacations, but usually went to the Mississippi Gulf Coast several times a summer for a long weekend.  Every time we’d go, my parents would save the room in the ice chest for fresh shrimp to bring home for the freezer.  That led me to think about the little “mom and pop” motel where we always stayed before it was flattened by Hurricane Camille in 1969.  And the 3 other families, friends of my parents’, who often went with us.  They all had kids around the same age as my sister and me and we always had fun. Good memories   Then I r...

 I’ve told you about my oldest son and his wife and baby.  (See “Love At First Sight”). My younger son is a whole different story.   Lee is 38 years old.  His identical twin was killed in a car accident when they were 15.  He has never gotten over it, and he never will. We were afraid we would lose him to suicide because all he wanted was to be with his brother.  It has taken years, but he has finally found happiness.  He’s never married and runs from commitment because, as he told me once, “If I love somebody I’m afraid they’ll die.” He has had a succession of girlfriends over the years, but when they start getting serious, he runs!  He did live with one for a couple of years, and that’s where this story begins.  When they met, she had 4 children by two fathers.  My first thought was that this ain’t good.  But I was wrong. She’s a really good mother. The older two have a good dad. He sees them regularly, pays his support, everythin...

For some reason, I thought about angels today.  Angels on Earth   Yes there really are angels on Earth.  Some days I question my religious faith but I know there are angels here among us.  Most of them wear scrubs, check vital signs, and take care of us when we’re sick. Nurses are the true angels on earth.  They work long hours doing some of the worst, nastiest jobs in the world.  They may be tired to the point of exhaustion, but they still comfort and care for us.   I was hospitalized with pneumonia during the worst of the COVID pandemic.  I was on the “COVID floor”but thank goodness I didn’t have COVID, just plain old double pneumonia that almost killed me!  One of my nurses was a sweet girl in her early 30’s with the cutest bubbly personality.  I just loved her. She always came in my room smiling and cracking jokes with me. She brightened my day when no one could visit me because of the pandemic. The day before I was discharged, she c...

 My friend Brian, who got me into barbecue judging, has a big Holiday party every year where he cooks a whole hog. Since the hog has to cook for about 24 hours, they put it on to cook the night before.  This is called the “Pre-Party”!  It’s more informal (read redneck shenanigans!) than the main party   He always invited Bob and me to cook egg rolls for the Pre Party.  In 2006, Bob had to be at an out of town wedding the weekend of the party so he asked me and my son Stephen to cook the egg rolls.  Stephen had helped us roll before and was almost as good as me!  Several members of Brian’s family were there.  His brothers, parents, and some cousins.  I noticed one cousin, Sara, who was a pretty brunette girl about Stephen’s age (early 20’s). A few minutes later, he noticed her!  And then she noticed him!   Folks, I’ve heard of love at first sight all my life but that night I saw it!  There were almost literal sparks flying betwe...

 About 35 years ago I met a man who would become the best friend I have in the world.  Bob and I met at church and we hit it off immediately.  We both love Mississippi State, bourbon, cigars, and cooking.  (I had to give up the cigars a few years ago for health reasons!) We’ve shared the good times and the bad, happy and sad   We’ve leaned on each other through the deaths of our parents and the loss of my son.  We’ve celebrated our children’s weddings and the births of our grandchildren. Bob is the closest thing I have to a brother.  Before I met Bob, he came up with a recipe for homemade egg rolls. These aren’t typical Asian egg rolls.  They have smoked pork, pork sausage, venison, and the usual vegetables. Lots of garlic and Cajun crab boil are the primary seasonings.  We make the filling in huge batches, over 200 pounds at a time, and bag it in gallon zipper bags for the freezer.  One bag makes 50-60 rolls. We have to cool it down bef...

It’s gone now, torn down when my cousin and her family bought my grandparents’ house.  It sat behind Popdaddy and Grandmother’s house, just up the hill from their store.  My grandfather built it in the 1940’s. My father used it when he started farming as a young man in the 1950’s and used it until he built his own shed years later.  But it was much more than just a shed or pole barn.  It was a classroom, a university for me.  I got my most important education in that old shed.  It was my father’s office, headquarters, and refuge.  It was where he worked on equipment, stored seed, chemicals, and fertilizer, weighed the cotton the field workers had picked (before he had a mechanical cotton picker).  It was where he met bankers, salesmen, and anyone who had business with him. It’s where he went when he needed to let off steam.  He’d find something to beat on or work on, or build and get rid of his stress.   It’s where I learned the most imp...

My name is Dale. I’ve hated my name for as long as I can remember.  But, my father loved it, so here I am.  I’m 68 years old and have lived in the small, unincorporated village of Cayuga, Mississippi my whole life.  That doesn’t mean I’ve never left.   I traveled pretty extensively throughout the United States in my work as a heavy truck dealer. I have been a certified professional barbecue judge for the past 15 years and have traveled all over doing that.  And I’ve had some other pretty interesting experiences along the way as well.  I’ve seen many beautiful places and have met some of the most interesting people in the world. As the late Jimmy Buffet wrote, some of it’s magic and some of it’s tragic, but I’ve had a good life all the way. These are the things that I’ll write about in later posts. My family consisted of me, my parents and my sister. I was married for 30 years but because of some really poor decisions on my part, I’ve been divorced for 12. I...