Truly a Winter of Discontent

2020 and the final days of winter...

 

Your Blogger Ronald Donaghe
Mississippi Transplant in 2016

Not to put too fine a point on the misery that the entire country felt with the pandemic, the election in November, the long drawn out sore loser "stolen election" rabble rousing, the seditious attempt to overthrow the US Government by wildly confused people who thought they were the ones who were the patriots—all of this stacking up at the end of 2020 continuing into 2021 made me extremely damned glad the country came out on the other side of everything with hope for a return to normal, and vaccine shots rapidly becoming available for everyone. Maybe being closed in for several months before things began to open up a bit made people a little stir crazy. I live alone and stay at home anyway now that I'm retired and have a life that doesn't depend on parties and bars and crowds, but I am also glad that I can go spend a delightful morning here in Columbus and listen to the other patrons talk and visit and be polite to one another. Southern charm and hospitality and politeness have yet to disappoint me. Oh, I know the other reality is that unspoken thing about Southern inhospitality for Yankees (very old term I think) and racism and whatever.

Half my extended family are Southerners, anyway, and the other half are Irish, and the third half are down-to-earth, honest, hard-working people—just like my neighbors in my part of town, here in Columbus. We're not all Southerners by birth in my neighborhood, but we moved here by choice. It's a delightful old town full of architectural variety from antebellum to Victorian to Craftsman to mid-century modern. 

And last week I attended one of the first traditional activities to re-open during the pandemic: Tennessee Williams's Birthday celebration. He was born in March 1911 and this year would have been 110 years old.

Two of Columbus's entertainers played Tennessee Williams's Mother and the young Tennessee Williams, who returns to Columbus every year to celebrate his birthday.  It takes place in the house where Williams was actually born, here in Columbus, and which is now used as the city visitor's center. The play we watched was performed in the house's parlor, and most of the rooms are restored to what the house would have looked like when Tennessee Williams lived there.

Later on in the year, another Tennessee Williams's inspired activity will be the Stella Shouting Contest. More on that when the time arrives.

But back to the winter of our discontent, Spring is now here and the weather is slowly accommodating our renewed feelings of hope that things will get better as we get further from the ravages of 2020. My backyard has volunteer crocuses and one species of tree has already filled with white blossoms and another with pink blossoms; oh, and dang, I have to hop on my yard tractor and mow that large yard...now where did I put my work boots and pants and gloves? Time's a wastin'.