March 6, 2006

  • Michael hanging on here in Stephenville.  Lya did not go to school today because she is sick.  She seems to have some sort of virus, so I have been feeding her Tylenol for the fever and chills.  She has thrown up a couple of times but only because she gets to coughing so that she gags herself.  Hopefully, we will be able to get some sleep tonight, and she will be able to go to school tomorrow.  I know that she is ready for a change in scenery and some excitement in her life -- and to feel better.  I am exhausted.


    We will try to call Lorena later to see how she is doing.  Since we have not heard anything, I am sure her father is still okay.  I find myself thinking so much of her and hurting for her.  Yesterday, though, the good thing was that she was more animated and "talkative" than she has probably ever been at any other time since the stroke.  It was the first time that she has ever spelled during one of our phone calls, so that is fantastic!!!'


    My cousin Jean Gilliam made the following comment on my "Southernisms" post, and I have to post it here because it is such a perfect illustration of what the post was all about.  The "Aunt Flossie" referred to was my paternal grandmother, Flossie Jane Jones Thomas.  [Her mother died when she was three, and she could still remember the cold winter day she watched the wagon bearing her mother's coffin bouncing down the old rocky road to Lost Creek then up the other side with the team straining and the iron wagon wheels bouncing up the rough road up the incline to Lost Creek Cemetery.  The coffin was cushioned on a bed of wood shavings, and as the wagon bumped and banged it way up the steep slope out of Lost Creek, the coffin began bouncing out of the wagon and quickly had to be rescued and secured by some of the men before it literally dumped my great grandmother's body out into the road.]  Anyway, here is Jean's comment: 


    "Just down the road"..Michael --one time we went to the Jones family reunion in Brownwood with my mom and dad.  We stopped at Aunt Flossie's and visited some and she told us she would take us "Just down the road a piece" to Lost Creek, May, Uncle Jim Jones old home place, by Captain Jenkins property....Granny Palmer's old home place, her daddy's old farm house out in the country and the rock house that George and she lived in.  My husband was driving my dad's Suburban, and said he bet he drove "Just down the road a piece" for fifty miles.  We laugh about  that drive through Brown County with Aunt Flossie.  I am so glad that I knew her.  [Actually, the ride "just down the road a piece" that Jean describes would probably have been closer to 60 miles.]