10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1

Countdown to the presidential election as seen from my adopted town of Columbus, Mississippi...

It's unnecessary to try to describe the worldwide perfect storm that 2020 has been, or even to characterize it in the United States.  The world has changed. The United States has changed. Life for all of us has changed this year. Even here in "backward" Mississippi with a Trump-adhering Governor, people in Columbus and surrounding towns that I've visited since the pandemic has settled in, voluntarily wear masks in public venues. And even though most of the restaurants have re-opened after the spring lockdown and quarantine, entrance signs tell customers that mask-wearing is mandatory inside, as is social distancing.

And even though that ability to go into a restaurant or grocery story helps it feel like we're getting "back to normal" the ever present masks and hand-sanitizing stations belie that feeling and this has been with us now for over seven months.

And here we are 10 days from our US election, and it's like we're living in some kind of post-apocalyptic world. We're going through the motions. Creative people have found ways to attend virtual concerts, church, school, and even hold "in-face" meetings through Zoom (?). Live goes on, and the vast majority of Americans are hoping that this election will run smoothly and a new President and Congress will take power on January 20, 2021 and this nightmare of the last year can come to an end. 

Living through this new reality here in Columbus, Mississippi, makes me appreciate the people here all the more. I've yet to see a single argument break out anywhere here by the anti-maskers—those at least who seem to think their Constitutional Freedoms are being trod on. I just ask those people (silently and in my head), do you wear seatbelts? Do you comply with traffic laws? Isn't it treading on your freedoms to buckle yourself into your car seat or to drive on the correct side of the road? Even their answers would have to be, if we didn't comply with seatbelt laws, we would risk much more serious injury in an accident, and if we didn't drive on the correct side of the road, traffic would become unmanageable. So...I ask (silently, in my head) why don't you wear a mask for the same reason? The long answer is that it took almost fifty years for people to come to their senses about wearing seatbelts, and perhaps a little longer for freedom-rebels to get over the idea that they had a Constitutional right to smoke in public places.

The 1918 Spanish Flu took three years to subside—precisely for the same damned reason: some people were stubborn and insisted that they didn't have to wear masks. So we're in for the same result, because many people are pig-headed. 

(Whoa...did I say all that out loud?) 

Listen to the liberal Red Neck...

Across the Mississippi into Arkansas

Neighboring Southern States

When Cliff and I went on our eight-southern-state tour in 2015 I learned that you can actually get around many of the southern states fairly rapidly, except for Texas and Florida, and that each state has something to offer. But perhaps the one thing many of the southern states offers is talent, in both writing and music, and much of it reflects what is uniquely American. One can still hear the Irish influence on much of the music, especially in the fiddle tunes. My own father played the fiddle and it was not a great jump listening to him play than it was listening to some of the Irish music I've listened to as an adult. 

In the South, it is inevitable, when you get a porch full of musicians and they bring out their instruments, you will get banjos, acoustic guitars, fiddles, bases, mandolins, steel guitars, and other uniquely Southern instruments. When they come together in the folk music capital of the world, Mountain View, Arkansas, you can move from porch to porch, to the gazebos in the park, kind of like you can in New Orleans, moving from street to street in the French Quarter and no sooner does the strains of music from one group die away than you begin to hear music from another group...When the weather is fine and it's a Friday night in Mountain View people in this small town of about 3,000 people will play in the late afternoon, into dusk, and on into the night.

It is not clear just what part of the White River this
is, But it runs in the northern part of the state in the
mountainous region.

One my friends who is a Southerner by birth hopes to move back to Mountain View, which was her home for many years. Sherry White and her husband have an expansive and beautiful property on the outskirts of Las Cruces, New Mexico, but she is planning to move back to her roots. I've not talked with Sherry in several years, but she enjoys reading this blog and often comments to Cliff about its content. Sherry is active in Las Cruces, and one of her perennial avocations is the Renaissance ArtsFaire in Las Cruces. 

After 44 years, the Renaissance ArtsFaire has perfected the art of this annual event. Set for a weekend beginning at 10 a.m. Saturday and Sunday at Young Park,  whether a repeat customer or a first-time faire goer, here's something to be aware of going into each year's event. Several courts attend the annual Renaissance ArtsFaire, but there is only one official court. Queen Chérie de la Décolletage, played by Sherry White, has been reigning over the Merry Court of the Sherwood Oak for 25 years. Her court of about 25 is made up of ladies in waiting, knights, and the Bawdy Balladeers (who entertain the queen), which now includes a harpist. 

She and Cliff talk about property, and Sherry wants to buy a home in the country around Mountain View, which lies in the Ozark Mountains. It's a beautiful part of Arkansas, and it is near Batesville, Arkansas, and both towns are near the beautiful White River that runs through that part of the state.

And really, Mountain View is just a hop, skip, and a tank of gas from Columbus, MS, about a six-hour drive. You can stop in Holly Springs, Mississippi, and eat a real Southern bowl of gumbo and cornbread in the town square cafe.

Thrilled with My Neighbors

Sometimes I've felt lonely, but then this...

I had become overwhelmed with my yard work, not because I didn't feel I could do it, but that the incessant rains had come and spring sprang and despite the rain (or because of it) the plants and bushes and grass and vines just kept growing.

But little did I know that people in the neighborhood had actually been watching out for me. Yesterday, they came by, one by one, and just started working in my yard. They had talked about it with one another, but only mentioned to me that they would be by yesterday...

Front of House Before the trimming.
Kristie is on the left. Beth is on the right.

This is the front of my house, the front porch, and what you see is the west flowerbed, which is just overgrown. Vines have climbed up through the roof eaves. My neighbor Kristie is on the left and my neighbor Beth (from one street North is on the right. When I got a knock on my front door yesterday morning, I opened it to see Beth down the steps and clipping vines.

Front of House
showing flowerbed on
the right side of the
porch.

And here is the East flowerbed to the right of my porch, before the work was completed. The other flowerbed on the right, while not as overgrown is full of vines and bushes that only hides the house.

While Beth and Kristie were working I got out my lawnmower and mowed the grass in the front yard. I later ran the string trimmer around in places. Their help inspired me to work. It did not feel so overwhelming, and it sure increased my already strong feeling that here in the South neighbors care about their neighbors. But it's more. It's their humanity and kindness. In fact, as we were working the couple from next door came out and talked to us on their way for a walk. Keep in mind this is during the pandemic, and so we all visited with each other from our respective distances. One of my first friends just on the other side of the next-door neighbors also came up for a visit. Sharon and I go all the way back (as friends) to when I first arrived and we encountered each other before dawn, when she would take her dog out for a walk.

Here are two more pictures of the result of the work.

This is Sid who
lives on the other
street across from Beth

Notice how all the large bushes that were obscuring the porch are now gone. Kristie worked for hours to cut the bushes and pulling off the vines, and then Sid, the man in the orange shirt from one street over came back with Beth when she took her dog home and he helped do cutting, down into the depth of the flowerbed. He worked a concrete birdbath disk from the undergrowth and we struggled to get it onto the porch where it sits, waiting to be cleaned. I will need to get down in the flowerbed (which is mostly volunteer trees that grew up in the bed from the roots that slithered underground from the neighbor's street across the driveway. But this is the South; it's wet, warm, and everything grows without having to be coaxed. So I hope that with all the neighbors' help I can take it from here and dig the plant out of the flowerbed, and turn it into just grass, as I did with the flowerbed on the rightsize of the porch under the window.

This is after the East side of the front yard was done In all, I just wanted to show how helpful, kind, and friendly people are in my chosen town in the deep south.

And here we are in the month of memorial celebrations; one origin story for Memorial Day involves Columbus, MS, which was a hospital town during the Civil War, and even when Union soldiers took over the town, the towns people opened their homes and their hospitals to the wounded and Friendship cemetery to the war dead—both Union and Confederate...

Isolating in Place in Columbus, Mississippi

Lowndes County and the City of Columbus Lockdown

Early on, some time in March (maybe) both Lowndes County and the City of Columbus closed down all but essential businesses, put in place social distancing guidelines and did so without guidance from our new governor. I was very glad to see that people in this community had apparently been paying attention to the medical experts and were not going the way of the wild wild red states—at least those that were as slow to act as the President. Sorry my Trump-supporting friends here in the Friendly City...this is not a diatribe about Trump, because he's mainly absent from life here in Columbus. Polite Southern society generally stays silent about him. If pushed (by accident) they will say, "He's done some wonderful things." Ok. Enough on that issue.

Sheltering in Place BEFORE Covid-19

Because I am "sheltering in place" or "self-quarantined" I just have to mention my twin calicoes, which you can see to the left. Like all of us self-quarantining, they seek out comfort in their food, or sleep. The girl on the left is Ellie. The girl on the right is Mae. Over the last four years however, their names have grown as their personalities have emerged. Most of the time Ellie is now Ellie Girl or Miss Ellie, and if she could talk, she would say, "I'm Miss Ellie. I'm the pretty one, and I like to bite!" All said with enthusiasm and clarity. Mae has become Mayberry or Miss Mayberry, and if she could talk she would say, "I'm Mih-maybewy," in a kind of breathless voice, kind of subdued, and with equal taciternity, she would admit to her middle name being "needwant" and say, "Can I have a treat?"

Actually sheltering in place During
Lockdown

And here they are continuing to self-quarantine. This time sharing a chair in the living room and allowing me to sit in the other one during TV time, which self-quarantined creatures, human and feline, must do to stay sane....or...uh...catch up on sleep. Mae is the girl on the left and Ellie is the girl on the right.

That's our basic day while the virus rages and the world is hunkered down. Eat, sleep, watch TV and take naps. Just not that different for us anyway.

With the stimulus check received this month of April, on the 15th, I was able to buy a bigger bill of groceries, which means I don't have to venture out every three or four days to buy a few groceries. I will still have to keep bread and milk on hand. I even bought the rest of the ingredients I need to bake a chocolate cake from the recipe that has been on the Hershey's Cocoa container for decades. I'll add Southern Pecans to the icing! I will attempt to make it last, but I suspect I just might have a piece for breakfast.

One of Cliff's friends from when he lived here (her name is Beth and she lives just one street farther north) has been bringing me cooked food during the several weeks that we have been isolated, and my neighbor down the street and her friend have also given me prepared food. What I appreciate more than the food is that this just has to be their way of telling me they're fond of me, want me to be safe, and are watching out for me. I feel the same way about them. And so it is with many of the others I have met and become friends with here in Columbus during the past four years. It is hard to believe that I have already lived here four years! And next month will be my second-year anniversary to have quit smoking! The odometer has also turned over into a new decade of my life, from my sixties to my seventies, but like my father, I still don't think of myself as one of the old people. If I was ever right about anything, the last four years living here in Mississippi, which has a really bad reputation for being backward and uneducated, has proven that this stereotype is just not true—at least not here in Columbus. During this pandemic, people who still work in public to keep open the grocery stores, gas stations, building supply stores, etc., are risking exposure to the virus to keep the rest of us feeling like life is still going on. They wear face masks, they clean and re-clean surfaces in the stores, they use hand sanitizer, and otherwise have made logical and safe choices—just so that the rest of us can continue to thrive.

No doubt, people everywhere during this time of anxiety and fear are taking precautions. Not that many people are being reckless and stupid, as far as I can see. But especially here in Old Dixie, where outsiders still think that Mississippians are backward, nothing could be further from the truth. There are backward and stupid people in ample supply elsewhere too. But given a place to live in times of trouble, I'm glad to be here among these people. I get an extra-strong feeling that they care about their neighbors and each other.

Columbus is a small city of only 24,000 residents, but it does have its own TV station, and local businesses often have the television turned to WCBI in Columbus. And here is a relevant sample of the station programming during Coronavirus: