Hey y'all -
There's an unwritten rule in the South that you can talk about your family like they're a bunch of mangy no-good dogs, but God forbid someone outside the family says something ugly... then, you have to defend those same no-good morons as if they should be in the mix as the Vatican chooses the new Pope. My favorite example of people talking ugly about their relations happened a few years ago, when I was watching a "Behind the Music" special on CMT about the country music duo, Montgomery Gentry. The narrator, in his professional baritone, was talking about how Eddie Montgomery had fathered some children in a previous marriage. Then, they cut to Eddie's mama, who looked straight into the camera and said, "You know he wadn't no kind of daddy to them children." I mean, who does that on national television? But I'm sure if anyone from outside the family said the same thing to her about Eddie, she'd'a shoved one of her pink curlers up their nose.
Lately, we've been getting a lot of calls to show our house. I know it's a necessary evil, but it's really the worst, because I first have to find a way to get you two out of the house.
Then, I clean until the very moment the realtor and his clients get here. Since I work from home, I typically take a walk as they're looking at the house and sometimes from the other side of our densely-wooded circular driveway, I can hear what they're saying.
I know everything that's wrong with this house. I could make you an itemized list that would barely fit in a big-ass binder. But that doesn't mean I want a bunch of strangers standing in my driveway sharing their opinions on its relative weaknesses. When I hear them complain about how our well doesn't get enough gallons per minute, or the road is too bumpy, or they laugh about how small it is, I want to get Thor's rifle and tell them to get the hell of my property. Because this house, just like my family, might be screwed up ten ways to Sunday, but it's mine, so hush your mouth.
The moral here is that I should probably drive somewhere far away when people come to look at my house.
But today, when someone wanted to show the house, Dad took you guys to town while I finished cleaning, and then I took a walk down the road with my camera and practiced shooting things in manual focus:
Shooting pictures of the neighborhood is way more productive and legal than shooting screechy Yankees with your daddy's gun.
Love,
Mom
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