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I know these colors so well. These pale and luminous colors of sand and sea and sky. These colors that melt and morph into each other and back again with the rise and fall of the tide, the climb of the moon, the set of the sun. These creamy whites and silvery grays. These liquid blues. I could drown in the colors and never stop breathing. Today the colors are cool. Thin clouds filter out much of the late afternoon sun and we don’t have to squint to see Adam and Jackson, my boy and his boy, frolicking in the shallow waves. Father lifts son onto a boogie board and they wait for the next wave. Belly to the board, two small hands clutching the front end, he is held steady by two large hands at the rear. The wave comes, building and building and building, and, just as it breaks, just as the rolling blue water cracks into white foam, the two large hands let go. With the slightest push, the board flies across the water, floating over the froth like a magic carpet. We cannot hear the shrieks of delight, but we can see the head thrown back, the mouth wide open in a grin. The wave dies on the beach and Jackson stumbles to his feet, turns around, and heads back to Adam, waiting in the breaking surf. The boogie board is a gift from Jackson’s grandmother. She has come to visit from the part of the world where sheiks live and magic carpets are said to ride on wind currents, not waves. She does not have to tell me what she sees. I see it, too. The son reflects the father. Hair the color of corn silk just sprouted, eyes the color of the bluebird nesting in my mailbox. I know these colors, too. This is a place away from time, away from schedules and clocks and artificial rhythms. The grandmother and I have watched Jackson and his little sister Chambless and have not been able to keep ourselves from seeing Adam and his sister Kate. Fearless Chambless is fearless Kate. Thoughtful Jackson is thoughtful Adam. The one who runs for the deep end; the one who eases in from the steps. It is as though there are four children here with us, not two. It is our last afternoon together. The sun is slipping quickly behind the tops of the live oaks and stucco mansions that lie behind the sand dunes. We move our chairs farther and farther up the beach as the waves inch relentlessly toward our bare feet and wet towels. We are chased by the tide and we are chased by time. One will reverse itself and one never will. We came to make memories. And we did. We walked in the village and played under the big tree where my friends got married. We had cannonball contests and picked up shells and, thank the Lord, got the babies’ mama some barbecue at Southern Soul. We laughed and cuddled and told stories. And, then, in the midst of coming home, finding leftover sand in the floorboard and tan marks on my shoulders, I realized it works the other way around, too. We make memories, but memories also make us. Remembering the sweet times makes me kinder, the hard times less trusting. Remembering the victories makes me stronger, the losses not so much. Remembering that the sun rose yesterday and the full moon will show up again next month and the tide is going to be high sometime today makes me hopeful and optimistic, despite all the reasons not to be. Which is why, all evidence to the contrary, I can see myself some summer day with my feet in the sand watching Jackson lift his own son onto a boogie board and push him out into the waves. Copyright 2015

On the Fourth of July, I walk outside and hoist the flag and drive into town to the Farmer’s Market where I buy three fat tomatoes from a man whose accent I can’t quite place but whose tent smells fresh and green and whose tomatoes have just the right amount of mottling so that I can tell for certain they have been ripened to that perfect red firmness on the vine. Having found my Holy Grail, I wander around a few more minutes and end up buying a canteloupe for $3.00 from a little boy who is learning from his father what it means to grow and tend and share and a package of blueberries that I suspect are going to actually taste like blueberries and a jar of hot sauce for my friend’s daddy’s birthday. And then I go to the grocery store and buy a loaf of white bread, Sunbeam Old-Fashioned with the little girl in the blue dress on the package, the first loaf of white bread I’ve bought since the last time I found perfect tomatoes. I stop on the way home to get gas and a Diet Coke at a station where the young man with a broad smile hands me my change and responds to my wish to him for a Happy Fourth with a “Be safe.” And then I drive home and make a tomato sandwich with lots of mayonnaise and lots of salt and I take it out to the front porch which just the day before was repainted with a shiny latex paint that reflects the sunlight almost like a mirror. I sit down on the top step and, balancing my white china plate on my lap, pick up the sandwich, square and dense, with both hands. I pause to say the blessing, that thing I’ve done before every meal from the time I could speak. That thing that I did at first because my parents did it and then because I was showing off my memorization skills and then because it was habit and that I do now, today, because I am looking across the yard, then across the road to rows of peanuts trying to gain a foothold before splaying themselves all over each other into long tangled webs and I am reminded of the essential nature of roots. I am doing it today because I am sitting on a porch without splinters and am reminded that even the sturdiest of sanctuaries needs maintenance. And I am doing it today because I am about to eat a perfect tomato sandwich, because the red juice is going to run down my wrist like blood and I will be reminded, strangely, of communion. The Eucharist. Eucharisteo. To give thanks. Elsewhere on this Independence Day there are fireworks and concerts, parades and baseball games and, much to the joy of my little friend Kate, jumping frog contests. There is celebration rowdy and loud and, perhaps, I think, less than reflective of the occasion than it should be. And in the thought I am gifted with another reminder: “It is right and good and a joyful thing,” we intone in preparation for accepting the bread and wine on Sundays, “always and everywhere to give thanks to you Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth.” Always and everywhere. Always – at mealtimes, but also during fireworks and concerts. Everywhere – on quiet front porches, but also at parades and baseball games and, most especially, during jumping frog contests. Always and everywhere, give thanks for freedom. Above my head the flag is fluttering in the warm breeze of midday. Red like the tomato. White like the bread. Blue like the sky. I turn my head to take in pine trees and cotton fields, the nearby houses of people I love, my own strong legs. I lift my hands a little higher. “Thank you,” I say, “for this.” Copyright 2015

The first snake skin of the season appeared about six weeks ago, stretched out in a long line across the concrete of the carport in almost exactly the same spot as the one I found last year, the one I measured and looked up in the Audubon Guide to confirm its non-venomous nature. Upon spying this new one, I congratulated myself (since there was no one else there to congratulate me) on what amounted to a non-reaction, i.e., “Oh, look. A snake skin. The skin of a snake. Lying within a few feet of my back door. What a curiosity.” And it was a curiosity, for this reptilian neighbor had been so delicate in his sloughing, had exercised such finesse in his shedding, had demonstrated such expertise in his casting off that the skin was not the least bit scrunched or wrinkled. The very tip of the tail was smooth and round and the head was perfectly shaped, including the eye caps. I bent low to inspect and it was almost as though he could still see me. After taking a couple of photos, I had to decide what to do with the hand-me-downs. Last year’s snake skin got folded up and mailed to Aden, budding herpetologist and the owner of a western hognose named William Snakespeare. I didn’t think he needed another one. I could take it inside and put it in one of the several bowls sitting around the house containing nests and feathers and acorns and seashells, but it occurred to me that some of the geometric grandeur would be lost if the skin were simply rolled into a coil and left to gather dust. Somewhat reluctantly, I threw it into the trash can. Over the next few weeks several live, non-disrobing snakes made their appearance. The first was driven from the cool spot under the hydrangea bushes by the spray of the water hose dangling over the deck railings. I watched from distance and height, with interest but dispassion, as he undulated with enviable speed across the carport to the patch of ivy that grows along its outside wall. A few days later the second was, apparently, startled by the vibration of the car pulling in and darted from the same cool spot up the back steps to a tiny spot where the brick foundation and HardiePlank are less than perfectly flush and slithered his way into crawlspace. This observation was, admittedly, less disinterested and more passionate, but I managed to convince myself that the darkness under my furniture and feet was what the snake wanted and, even if he could find a way through the subfloor, he would choose to remain in an environment more conducive to his survival. I was, by this time, more than just pleased with myself. I was proud. But if there is one thing I remember from all those years of Sunday School it is that whole business about pride and resultant destruction, a haughty spirit and the inevitable fall. I was, obviously, headed for a fall. It was still daylight when I got home. I gathered up my purse and briefcase and made sure I’d picked up my phone from the console of the car. I got to the bottom of the steps and stopped. Frozen still. Dead still. Catatonic still. There on the steps was another snake skin – actually half a snake skin – hanging out of the secret entry into the crawlspace. I couldn’t tell at first if the shedding had been completed, if there might be, in fact, a snake still inside, still wiggling and squirming and rubbing himself against the other side of the brick trying to free himself from the old skin. I couldn’t tell if I was standing within inches of something alive or something dead. It took probably three minutes of absolute stillness to convince me that the creature that had once inhabited the skin was long gone. It took three days before I could make myself get back out there and pull the skin out of the crack. It took three days to figure out what had happened: I’d been perfectly fine with the live snakes that I knew were alive, perfectly fine with the dead skins that I knew were just dead skins. What I had not been perfectly fine with was the uncertainty. Uncertainty had left me paralyzed. It was in the middle place of neither alive nor dead that I found myself powerless. I wish I could say that I’d never been to the middle place, but the truth is that I have. I’ve even set up camp a time or two. But it’s never been so much fun that I wanted to stay. Sooner or later I always figure out whether the snake/relationship/opportunity has a pulse or that what I’m seeing is just a souvenir of what the snake/relationship/opportunity used to be. Sooner or later. And I get to choose. Copyright 2015

Across the field I could hear it coming, like the rustling of a thousand pages, the whispers of a thousand lovers, the lifting of a thousand wings. The rain moved toward me across the broad, flat field, a row at a time. I’d been doubtful, when I left the house, based upon the general dryness and the dust that rose when a single car passed me, that any significant moisture would materialize. Doubtful that the clouds, the color of pewter and thick like cotton batting, held the rain that the rows of short green stems craved. Doubtful that the sky would yield anything other than disappointment. So I had headed out. A drop fell on my bare shoulder, another on my cheek. I watched as three tiny pools collected on the open magazine I was holding just steady enough to read. Then three more. The slick stock puckered and the ink smeared. I kept walking as I measured the time between plops. It was, it occurred to me, the exact reverse of staring at the microwave while the popcorn pops, waiting for the rapid-fire explosions to slow. About halfway up the hill, the pine trees on either side of the road started singing. The wind was sweeping through them like breaths through an oboe, deep notes that somehow float and circle and find resonance in a heartbeat. This was no ruse, no prank. The rain is coming, the trees were telling me. I kept walking. Eventually, though, I tired of trying to turn pages that had stuck together and were curling at the edges. I tired of fighting the wind that snatched at my hair and tried to stuff it in my mouth. I tired of doubting. I closed the magazine and stuck it under my arm. I made sure that my phone was as deep in my pocket as it could be. I sighed and turned around. The thing about getting caught in the rain is that once you’re wet, once your clothes are stuck to your skin, once the tread on your shoes has filled with mud so that any one step could be the one that sends you sliding to the ground, there really isn’t much need to hurry. So I didn’t. I walked slowly, if not carefully, and wondered how I could have so easily presumed that the clouds were empty or, worse, fickle. How I could have been so willing to assume the sky’s offer of rain was nothing more than a meteorological bait-and-switch. Why I didn’t trust the sky. Somewhere in my brain lies the place where lives the strange notion that if I want anything too much I am certain to not get it, the strange notion that equates desire with presumption and presumption with unworthiness. It is a notion that resists the words of great teachers and the comfort of great friends. It is an idea that has no support in science or religion and, yet, it remains, so that on this day, standing on the front porch and considering the sky, I did not dare admit that I wanted very much for the pewter clouds to relieve themselves over the dry and dusty fields. The deepest truths, however, lie not in the brain, but in the heart. And the truth is that I do trust the sky. I trust it far more than I trust myself. I trust it to know far more than I ever will. The struggle is to remember. Back at home, I wipe my feet, I change my clothes, I unroll the magazine so that it can dry. On the kitchen table, I spread it open. Open like my hands at communion, open like the leaves on the short green stems trembling beneath the steady fall of rain, open like a heart that can be trusted and is filled with desire. Copyright 2015

The clouds that teased rain have drifted away to empty themselves elsewhere and I am left to do the watering myself. I have planted strategically so that the hose does not have to be dragged all over the yard. I can, for the most part, stand on the deck and reach every thirsty green thing. The hydrangeas are thriving in the low, shaded spot between the deck and the carport, pale blue heads pushing their way out through the dark leaves on thick stems. Down by the steps the coreopsis is fading as the lantana comes to life and the Mexican petunias are just beginning to bud. The Russian heather is already tall and gangly, moving in the breeze like teen-aged boys shuffling their feet on the edge of the dance floor. On the other side in the corner, the rosemary has been cut back and hasn’t quite recovered from the shock, but the lemon balm and verbena and mint are happily rushing over and around each other. I can’t help pinching a leaf and crushing it between my fingers. The scent is sweet. The three pots on the deck contain a single bright pink Gerbera daisy, a good crop of basil, and a citronella plant. Eventually, I tell myself, I will find the time to come outside after dark, sit back in the reclining chair, and test its powers at repelling mosquitoes. Eventually, but not tonight. Tonight I’m just watering. The dial at the end has somehow been moved to a position between two of the settings. I don’t notice and turn on the water expecting a steady stream in one direction. What I get is an erratic shooting and significant drip. It takes only a couple of seconds to adjust the nozzle, but in that time I can’t help noticing how many choices I have. Jet. Mist. Flat. Cone. Shower. Angle. Center. Plus something called “½ Vert.” A true gardener, someone like my Grandmama Anderson, could probably tell me which one is best for each of my green things. A true gardener, however, I am not. I settle for center which shoots forth water at a rate slower than jet, but faster than shower. Watering, I have found, puts me into a rather meditative state. There’s nothing for me to do except stand there and hold the nozzle steady while water and gravity do the hard work of reaching the invisible and indispensable roots. So I find myself thinking about those settings – jet and mist and flat, cone and shower and angle – and how, at various times and through various experiences, I’ve been watered by every single one. Getting fired from my first job as a lawyer was a jet, a hard fast blast that tore at the ground around my trunk and left me standing in a puddle of mud. The years I spent at Wesleyan were a fine mist, gentle and consistent. The loss of people I’ve loved were hard angles, leaving me off kilter, and realizing my dream of being an author was a shower, a baptism of satisfaction and joy. I push the lever that closes the nozzle. By the time I get to the spigot to turn it off, the water – all of it – has soaked into the ground. I hope that I have been that receptive. I hope that I have absorbed the jet and the mist with identical enthusiasm. I hope that I have allowed the angles and the showers to nourish me equally. I hope that with each watering, whatever its force, my roots have dug deeper into the soil. Copyright 2015

Back in 2004 three hurricanes brought a LOT of water to southeast Georgia in quick succession and, as a result, Sandhill was left with a very leaky roof. I took that opportunity to give her a facelift. Once it was all done, she was still the same girl, just wearing a new dress. That's what a completely redesigned webpage is like. Most of what was here before still is, but the visual presentation is brighter and more interesting. And there are some new things. For a number of years I've hosted a blog on which I've posted my newspaper columns. It finally occurred to me that it made much more sense to combine the blog with the website, so this is where you'll find the columns from now on. The old blog will still be around, but there will be no new posts after June 30. They will be right here. Also right here you'll find occasional posts on topics I don't usually write about in the column. Please take a look at the Community page and, if you like, subscribe to the new quarterly newsletter, The Museflash. That's just one more way to keep in touch and share stories. The Community page also includes an email link. Use it to inquire about appearances at your civic group, book club, church, or other event. And let me know what you're thinking -- about the website or anything else. I love talking to people about books and writing and finding magic in the world and I want this website to be a place to do that with the people who have embraced me and my words, a place where there is a lot of "I feel the same way" and "I know exactly what you mean." I hope you'll join the conversation.