Weather Blogfest

Nick over at A Little Slice of Nothing is having a Weather Blogfest today and in his honor, I am posting an excerpt from my work in progress, "Churches, Chickens and ChiChi's".

Sammy, the main character, just rode to the emergency room in the ambulance with her mother who had a heart attack. I hope you enjoy.

http://www.weatherpicturesweatherphotos.net/

Sammy wished she had her earphones so she could listen to some music on her iPhone. And she really wished she could have a beer.

She wasn’t in the mood for a magazine full of yesterday’s news, so she tried watching television. That held no interest, either.

Restless, she wandered to the emergency room door. The sky was darkening. A storm was brewing. Stepping outside, she leaned against the sturdy brick and watched the thunderheads sweep in from the east. It would rain soon.

The wind rose, thrashing the trees and their tender leaf buds. It was going to be a good one. Sammy’s heart thrilled in anticipation and she pulled her coat tighter around her. She was glad she had grabbed it before leaving the house. The temperature had dropped and the wind was bitter.

A jagged streak of lightning split the sky. One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand, she counted before the boom and the rumble of thunder. The storm was close. A grin split her wind-whipped face. God, she’d missed this.

Another streak followed the first. One one thousand, two one thousand, boom crash roll. Sammy chuckled and opened her arms to the black clouded sky. Her cares fell away as the storm raced toward her. Its first raindrops, big and fat, splattered her face as the wind delivered the storm to her. Soon the sky would let loose in a deluge. She inhaled the bitter sweetness of lightning-induced ozone.

A purple streak of lightning cracked nearby, followed by an immediate boom and several rolls. Sammy ran back in to the hospital, wet and grinning, barely escaping the pelting raindrops. She leaned her forehead on the door to watch the fury of the storm break against the glass.

Feeling someone beside her she glanced over to see Barry Rakestraw. He stood looking at the storm, dressed in eggplant scrubs, his face as brooding as the sky.

She pounced on him. “Thank God you’re here. How’s Mama?”

“Come on, I will tell you both at the same time,” he said and reached for her hand.

Her hands fluttered to her mouth. Whatever it was, it wasn’t good. For an instant Barry’s solemn face was lit by a flash of lightning. Then a deafening clap of thunder rattled the door, startling them both. What if Mama was dead?

Her knees wobbled and she almost went in to the shelter of Barry's arms. The thunder rolled, deep and long. Instead she settled for warm fingers around hers, leading her across the hall to her father.

Be an angel and leave a comment to let me know what you think of my snippet, then click on over to Nick's and read the other entries. If you haven't already, maybe you could join us with a weather scene of your own.

~Olivia J. Herrell

Strawberry Jam and Free Online Books

Yesterday I had a hankering for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I slathered the bread with peanut butter then dipped a knife in to the jar of Smucker's strawberry jam. As it jellied itself out on to my peanut-buttered slice, a lifetime of memories slid out with it.

Image courtesy of Never Enough Thyme

We lived on a dirt road in rural Georgia. In the early summer it was our (the kids) job to pick the wild strawberries growing across the road. When we had enough, Mama got out the jars, the pectin and the pressure cooker and made strawberry jam.

I lurked in the kitchen most of my growing up years, learning to cook. You can better believe I was underfoot when it was strawberry canning time. My favorite part of the jam was the frothy pink foam that Mama skimmed off the top. She let us gobble this down as soon as it cooled. I would watch as she scooped that steaming syrup full of strawberry chunks in to scalded mason jars. These were arranged in neat rows on a folded white towel.

Image courtesy of Never Enough Thyme

Next came the lids, screwed down tightly, the heat sucking them in. I would count them, then come by later and count them again. Within a day or two I would hear a 'pop' and know that one of the jars had sealed, and the lid had popped back out.

As these memories washed over me in the midst of making that sandwich, my upcoming trip to NY flashed in my head. Ahhh. The family reunion. Mama won't be making the trip. For the first time ever, we'll be going without her. My aunts and uncles won't be there, either. The generation that made us has passed.

The good news is that the newest generation is growing in leaps and bounds. At least three of my second cousins have new babies. And we'll 'get to' be the elders.

The other good news? By the time I finished eating that peanut butter and jelly sandwich, I felt lighter than I had felt all week. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thank you for hanging in here with me as I trudged that heavy road. Now for your reward! Noah Lukeman, President of Lukeman Literary Management and author of "The First Five Pages", is generously offering a free ebook on his blog, Ask a Literary Agent. Click on the excerpt from his latest post to read and follow his blog and to download his new ebook.

"This blog has now reached its one year mark, and I thought it would be convenient for readers to have all the information from year one easily at their fingertips. I have thus assembled all of the questions and answers from year one into a PDF file, so you can conveniently have all of this information in one place, and can read it at your leisure, whether it's on your computer, or on your favorite e-reader..."

AND, as if this weren't enough, at the bottom of his download page there is a link for The Gutenburg Project. Here you can download over 33,000 ebooks (in the U.S.), exciting news to me. These classics have expired copyrights. They're digitized with the help of volunteers and made available to the reading public. Meaning you and me!

So drop me a quick hello, then click on over to Noah Lukeman's blog. Follow him for his current articles and then download his free ebook. By the way, Noah invites us to ask questions of him in the comments section (but asks not to query him).

Happy reading!

~Olivia J Herrell

Call Me Trahlyta

"May you always have a smile on your face and a song in your heart." ~ any body know?

Today I realized I am depressed. I looked at myself in the mirror, our eyes locked, and I said, "You're depressed."

My reaction? Tears of relief. This explains my inability to write. It also explains my recent hesitation to have interaction with other human beings.

Just naming the source of my malaise allowed me to answer the phone when it rang. And talk to my friend who declared that she and three others were coming to roust me. I assured her it wasn't necessary and that I would come to them.

It was no coincidence that the last address of my afternoon census run put me smack dab at the intersection of Highways 19 and 60. Here sits Trahlyta's grave. I had heard of it.

Last week Kimber, Funky Writer Girl, told me that when she lived in Dahlonega she put a stone on Trahlyta's grave every Sunday. It is tradition.

It turns out that I was passing this monument every time I drove to Walasi-Yi.

And back.

I saw it, but didn't 'see' it. Trahlyta's grave sits in the middle of the Y and is a classic example of something that is hidden right under your nose.

The inscription on the marker says:

This pile of stones marks the grave of a Cherokee princess, Trahlyta. According to legend her tribe, living on Cedar Mountain north of here, knew the secret of the magic springs of eternal youth from the Witch of Cedar Mountain.

Trahlyta, kidnapped by a rejected suitor, Wahsega, was taken far away and lost her beauty. As she was dying, Wahsega promised to bury her here near her home and the magic springs. Custom arose among the Indians and later the Whites to drop stones, one for each passerby, on her grave for good fortune.

The magic springs, now known as Porter Springs, lie 3/4 miles northeast of here.

I left two stones. One for Kimber and one for me.

And Kimber, you're right. I felt different when I left.

This, my friends, is the beginning of the Appalachian Mountains, aka (down here) the Blue Ridge Mountains. See those blue ridges?

The resident German Shepherd was being protective of his territory, so I took this picture through my windshield from the top of Porter Springs Drive.

Beautiful.

What do Trahlyta's grave and the Blue Ridge Mountains have to do with me being depressed and unable to write?

I feel Trahlyta's suffering.

No one kidnapped me and threw me on the back of a horse. No one made me leave my home.

But as beautiful as it is here in the North Georgia Mountains, my soul cries for California. The depression is her reminder.

~ Olivia J. Herrell