Okay, am I the only one who occasionally wakes up with a feeling that something isn’t right, but you don’t know what it is? That’s me today. I woke up with some kind of dread in the pit of my stomach, like something had gone wrong, somewhere, with someone I care about. My innards are just fine. I just have vague worries and concerns that I can’t pinpoint. Oy.
But, WHY do I have a bad feeling?
I asked a bunch of people if they were all right, then I got to worrying that it was my step-mother, so I ordered her Christmas flowers. Interesting path to guilthood there! Who knows, maybe I should call (except that phoning is this introvert’s biggest nightmare).
There’s no reason to feel this way, at least no conscious reason. I got good news today at work, got some things done, and supported a friend. Nothing bad there! But still, there the feeling is. Sitting on my psyche and squishing it.
The bright side: I checked in on people! People like that. If something’s going on with YOU, let me know. Until them I will keep randomly messaging people to be sure they’re okay.
This got long, so it’s going to be a two-parter. Here, I explain why classism offends me so much.
I think I’ve dealt with as much classism in my life as racism. Both of those practices get me all riled up. It has occurred to me (this morning!) that classism in the US, especially in small towns, is incredibly insidious – because it’s harder to see. The signs of who is in what class are often subtle. However, it’s easy to feel.
Child me, with Mom in her characteristic cigarette wielding pose in the background. Sarasota, Florida.
As a wee lass, I lived on a quiet street in a working-class neighborhood in a north-Florida college town. My dad had come up from extreme poverty in north Georgia/Chattanoga and was in his first job that would let him afford to buy a little concrete-block house on two lots (which he turned into a botanical garden, but that’s another story). My mother was from a family with deep roots in the area that had always aspired to be “classy,” I guess. They came from merchants, musicians, journalists, etc. They had maids who raised their kids,just like in The Help. She HATED that her surveyor father had made her live in Dixie County, Florida as a child, around all that “trash.” No wonder her parents didn’t like her marrying my dad; it took her down a notch in class. (Mom had many great qualities; I’m just not focusing on those right now.)
Trash, the People Kind
I heard a lot about “white trash” as a kid in the Deep South, as much as I heard pejorative terms for black people. (I normally don’t use those terms.) Apparently, thanks to Mom’s side of the family, we were not “trash.” Our neighborhood consisted of people who were not all that well off, but of some other, slightly higher, class. Well, except the Purvis family, whose women all had babies at 15, whose men wore overalls and sleeveless t-shirts, and who never took their Christmas tree lights down so that the tree grew around it (it may be noted that I liked them, played with their daughter, and loved their kumquat tree). The classes didn’t have formal names, but apparently everyone knew what they were.
Lee as the cover of a romance novel for middle-aged women.
Lee is my spouse! I’ve mentioned him before, I just know it. Oh, I can be funny.
We will have been married 11 years on Friday. He’s a hermit. But he does right a lot. You’ve perhaps seen some of his posts on our Hermit Haus Redevelopment blog or the new Hearts, Homes and Hands blog. Still, he told me he wondered why no one seems to come across his personal blog, while I get a reasonable number of hits.
I told him no one’s going to just stumble over it; they have to know it’s there. I share.
Now I will share Lee!
If you’d like to learn a little bit about him, head over to The Hermitage, a blog he’s been keeping since I met him. There he gets to control all his HTML and format all his pictures exactly how he likes it, and that makes him happy.
None of this WordPress hand-holding for him! Right now, he’s sharing what he’s grateful for, and I’m happy to be one of those things.
I’m grateful for my spousal unit, too. He’s really kind, generous, stubborn, and occasionally grumpy. Other times, he’s funny and sweet. In other words, he’s human!
One thing that makes us a fun couple is how different we are. Go see him and find out for yourself! Give him a comment or follow him on Blogger.
I said I wouldn’t do anything strenuous today. I think I succeeded. We just had a nice family day followed by an equally nice Sunday dinner for 7.
Autumnal bovine
The weather was so nice that we started outside a lot. I put up some fall decorations I’d found, walked with various dogs, and tried to catch up with writing. That’s why this is so late. Lots to write.
Unnatural spider
We even had a visit from Mandi, who brought her son by to talk to Chris about welding. Chris got to show him all the stuff on his truck, which is interesting to welders.
Walks are fun. Kathleen found a snakeskin. Nature.
Dinners
Our Sunday night dinners have taken on a life of their own. Whoever is in town and not sick shows up. Actually a sick lesson even sent their food. That was sweet.
I had to get this beautiful sky. It seems so big out here.
Tonight Kathleen wanted me to take pictures of her with Martha and Mike, while we were out walking, since we are all dinner buddies. Then we sat on the porch. My sister made lovely home-made lasagna, Kathleen made dessert, and we all laughed as usual.
Wine makes a walk fun.
Oh yes. We spent much time looking at the moon. Group activities for the nature living set!
The moon behind clouds. The two white dots are Mandi’s house.
This is one of the most interesting times in my life, at least as far as my mental state goes. Why so interesting? Oddly enough, it’s because I’m not in a tizzy about anything. It’s not because my life has suddenly turned out to be like I imagined adulthood would be as a child, where you go to work, come home and do hobbies, enjoy a meal with your loving spouse, and sleep soundly, knowing you have the money to pay all your bills. Nope, that’s not it.
Little things just make me happy these days, like my peace and trees corner (shh, they are not Christmas decorations).
Rather, as I’ve mentioned in other blog posts, it seems as if all the things I have been working on to become my best self have taken effect, at least for the most part. Like what, you ask?
First, I had to accept myself the way I am. I’m human, with some issues that led me to develop some habits and tendencies that might bug people (let’s see, over-reacting to perceived criticism, crying when confronted angrily, problems with being “yelled at” or picked on, sarcasm, coming across as “looking down” at people…whatever). It’s weird, once I convinced myself that it was okay to be who I am, so many of those behaviors lessened. I haven’t cried in AGES other than when totally appropriate (death of people and dogs I love, mainly).
Things just hit you sometimes. Yesterday I was walking toward Rowdy the Rental Audi in the work parking garage, and I got a flashback of being a kid. I’d talked about missing my parents earlier in the day, which probably prompted the experience.
I suddenly felt the heavy weight of the humidity at my house in Gainesville, Florida, smelled the dark black earth, and heard the thump-thump of my dad, doing his favorite activity, known as “digging a hole.” If Dad was upset, frustrated, or just needed to get away from Mom’s antics for a while, he’d go out in the yard and dig. He used to joke that some of the camellias had been moved five or six times, for no good reason.
The Hermits' Rest 