Tip of the Month

                My First New Year Resolution                                                                                  

New Year’s Eve, a busy time at my Grandma, Mamie’s house. We were having a “Hootnanny”. Mamie and Papa’s house had always been the gathering place for family Hootnannies.  Their friends would come and we would sing and eat and gossip about the people who weren’t there.  Mamie played the old upright piano, Daddy played the fiddle, my uncles played guitar and fiddle. Others from church played various instruments. Papa led the singing and my sister, Bobbie, and I joined in. I loved Hootnannies because we got to sing something beside church songs….the old, lively post war songs; “Don’t sit under the Apple Tree”, “Three Little Sisters”, “When Johnny comes Marching Home ”. How I loved those upbeat songs.

Mamie was busy at the sink, her hair up in rollers, washing collard greens for tomorrows dinner. A pot of black eyed peas sat soaking on the counter and a fat hen was already in the oven. As she cooked, she instructed me in housecleaning. “If your house is dirty on New Year’s Day, it will be dirty all year”.  Her clap-board house was old and drafty, a simple unpainted house with worn out furniture and bare floors. The house was tiny, bedrooms were sealed with cardboard from old boxes. Feather beds were piled high, stuffed with feathers from our own chickens and clothes hung from nails on the wall. Water came from a pitcher pump on the back porch. As the cold wind whipped up through the cracks of the old wooden floor. A fire blazed in the fireplace and the sweet smell of apple pie wafted from the kitchen.

“Mamie, what is a New Year’s Resolution?” I asked. Putting down her greens, she put her hands on her hips, “It’s a promise you make to yourself, honey-dear”, she said. “You know how you make promises to God in church and you make promises to your Mother when you’re being punished?...Well this one’s for you. You make it to yourself...and you write it down.”

I thought about it for a few minutes. I really didn’t know what to promise myself. Everything I did was because someone else told me to….God, Mama, my teacher. “Why do we do it on New Year’s Eve?” I asked.                                                                                        

“What better time for a new beginning. It’s a brand new year and you have twelve months to get it right. If you don’t, you just make new ones and try again next year”.

I thought about it some more. I always promised God I would “be good”. Come to think of it, that’s what I promised Mama too. I knew what they considered being good; doing  what I was told, studying hard, praying, not talking back, washing behind my ears, caring for my pets, saying “Yes Ma’am and No Ma’am, getting up early, not slamming the screen door,  never using cuss words, and a whole lot of lesser do’s and don’ts. What else was there to promise? I supposed I could just make myself the same promise I made to God and Mama….a promise to be good.  But somehow, that just didn’t seem good enough for a New Years Resolution.

People began to arrive. Church members, all of them. Mamie brought out the plate of fried fat back.  Next came strawberries from our farm, then honey from Papa’s hives... still in the comb, which she placed next to a bowl of heavy cow cream. Then came the platter  of steaming hot biscuits. Last was the apple pies. People hungrily reached for the plates, never noticing that they were all mismatched, chipped and cracked.

After everyone ate, we migrated to the tiny living room, sitting wherever we could...most of us on the floor. Mamie sat at her piano and stretched her long, freckled arms as if she were a concert pianist. Then the music began; “Amazing Grace”, “Old Time Religion”, “When they ring those Golden Bells””. One by one they sang all the church songs. When there was no more church songs, they got to the part I loved...the old war songs. Bobbie and I knew every word and gleefully joined in, singing at the top of our lungs. The old house shook from the clapping, and foot-tapping of  musicians. Winter winds howled outside, but the old house was warmed with the love of family and friends. I was blessed to be a part of  it. 

As the night progressed, the music got slower and the singing fainter, until at last it was midnight. It was then I realized I hadn’t made my New Year’s resolution. I panicked, I only had a few minutes left. If I didn’t hurry, it would be too late and I really wanted to make my resolutions.

It took me a moment to figure it out, but just in the nick of time I knew what I would promise.  Mama and God had worked out the “being good” thing. They had that part under control. Everything and everybody seemed to be covered. All required of me was to listen and learn the lessons they were trying to teach me.... If that part was good enough for God and my Mama...it was good enough for me. I would just promise to be good.

I started to write but, thinking about it, that promise just didn’t seem good enough. Something was missing. I was making a promise for everyone else, but what about me? If I was to be good to everyone else, shouldn’t I fit in there somewhere?  Shouldn’t I be important to me too?  Right then and there, I made a decision and a promise to “be good to me”. It took me many years and many resolutions to learn what “being good to me” meant. But, like Mamie said, “If you don't get it right, you always have next year.”

So this year, consider a promise to be good to you. This  includes being kind, having fun, taking care of yourself, enjoying your family, realizing your value, your uniqueness and using your life’s lessons to make your little world a better place. It may take you a while, but you’ll get it right. Just remember, if you aren't  good to yourself, you may find it difficult to be good to others.                                                                                        

  Happy New Year everyone!                                                            Kay 

Kay and James Minshew

What fun it has been traveling with Kay and James over the years. What adventures we had! James was such a riot...never a dull moment when he was along. James has passed away and everyone who was privileged to travel with him really misses him. Kay bravely carries on, visiting those places she knows he would want her to see. She recently joined our group to New York and Canada, then it was Ireland and later the Caribbean. Kay is a good  traveler and is doing well traveling “on her own”. We always look forward to our trips with her.