I get really saddened when I read about lack of funding for schools and especially lack of funding for libraries.

We have money to send our children off to fight and die in foreign countries, but we don’t have the money to educate them in modern fashion. We’ve chosen between guns and butter to our detriment.

That’s not what saddens me most, though. What bothers me most of all is the emphasis schools place on grades and test scores. We expect our students to come to school ready to learn and be all attentive when, in fact, a whole lot of them don’t know where their next meal is coming from or where they will lay their heads tonight. I remember getting to school at 6:45 AM and sneak kids into the library against school policy because they had been running the streets all night. Some do it by choice and others by necessity but in any case, they aren’t ready to learn.

The problems children face today are beyond anything most of us older folks ever saw. All the baggage, all the issues that they carry to school with them in their lunch boxes and book bags take up too much space on their desks and in their minds to allow the knowledge and skills we are supposed to teach them to seep in. I submit as proof that the world has tilted from its axis this story from a Dallas suburb about a FOURTH GRADER who committed suicide by hanging himself in the school restroom.

What have we come to as a society when a nine year old child no longer can find a reason to go on living? We are worried about test scores in the face of this blasphemy? Yes, I said blasphemy because the suicide of such an innocent can be described accurately by no other word that I know.

If a story like that cannot move the politicians, what about the “diligent mother” in Georgia who insisted her son do better on his report card and reinforced the lesson by having him bludgeon his beloved pet hamster to death with a hammer. Some neighbors are claiming the boy made the whole thing up because he has “emotional problems.” Well, if he didn’t, you can bet your sweet bottom he does now. I have long maintained that it is ludicrous in the extreme that one must pass a battery of test just to earn the right to drive a car but any two fools with active gametes can conceive a baby.

I don’t have any easy answers. To be honest, I don’t even know if our broken educational system and our wrecked social system can BE fixed. We may find out that nothing short of a revolution will change what needs changing in our country. If that were to happen, let me ask you: would you be stood against the wall or would you be one holding the gun? It may be a far fetched idea, but I don’t think it’s any secret that something, somewhere, somehow is going to have to give. God only knows where it will be.

Until we take to the streets in bare feet, my lovelies, keep those tootsies clean and remember that GS Feet loves y’all and just wants everyone to “do right.”

Take care, y’all.

I have a question for the masses, which means the four or five of you that check to see if I’ve written anything lately. Feel free to email me your idea or post it in the comments.

Is it ironic for a father to tell his son he loves him directly before AND immediately after calling him a “fat, lazy a$$ed self-pitying m*****f*****?”

Just wondering if I’m using the correct term or if I’m just being overly sensitive.

Keep those feet washed, y’all.

Love each of you.

My guitar cake and I on my third birthday, January 6, 1974.

Okay, so I’m 39 today. As birthdays go, it’s been a pretty dull one. I pretty much stayed at home sending out the usual daily resume’ that will go unanswered and cleaning house. I did take a birthday trip to McDonalds and treated myself to $12.50 worth of heart attack on a bun just because I could. I mean, it’s my birthday, right?

It’s my birthday. I don’t know how many of y’all listen to the rock group Nickelback, but they have a song that pretty much sums up my thoughts on having reached 39. It goes, “I’m tired of standing in line at clubs I’ll never get in. It’s like the bottom of the ninth and I’m never gonna win. This life hasn’t turned out quite the way I thought it would be.” Nope. It sure hasn’t.

By the time Alexander was 30, he had conquered the known world. Augustus was first emperor of Rome by my age. Jesus had already come the first time, preached three years, redeemed the world, and gone back to Heaven by 33. I could go on. Believe me, I could go on and on. It’s never good to be a history buff and suffer from borderline personality disorder at the same time. You find all kinds of people to compare yourself to who make your paltry accomplishments look ever more sadder than you already know them to be.

No. Things haven’t gone according to plan — any plan, A, B, or Q — at all. Didn’t get in the Naval Academy. Didn’t go to an Ivy League school (BUT I did get accepted). I’m not even a teacher anymore and that was pretty much all I had going for me. I don’t care much about not having as much money as other people just because I’ve never used money to keep score. I’ve got a roof over my head and food on my table, thanks to The Reason I Get Up In The Morning, and that is enough as far as material possessions go. I was just hoping I would have accomplished a little more.

In any event, this is my last birthday. I went batcrap crazy into a serious depressive funk when I turned 30. I have no intentions of doing the same next year. So, since I can’t stop time, I intend to begin celebrating anniversaries next year. Therefore, next January 6th, I will mark the first anniversary of my 39th Birthday. It’s semantics I know, but when you’re fighting a black dog, you do what you can.

So, for all the members of the Class of ’89 at LDHS who voted me “Most Likely to Succeed,” I apologize. I pretty much let y’all down, but don’t worry, I let myself down even more. I hope you’ll all pardon the maudlin self-pity party. I try to limit myself to publishing only one per year . . . usually on my birthday. I appreciate all y’all bearing with me.

Love y’all.

Don’t forget to wash your feet.

Me and Mama when I was in 5th Grade.

Today is Mama’s birthday. For years, I’d take whatever money I got for Christmas and beg a ride to the store from someone, until I could drive myself, and get Mama a birthday present and a card. One year when I didn’t get any money, I sold my collection of Harbinger comics to buy her a CD organizer and case. Today, per her wishes, I had to bake her a homemade New York cheesecake to go with the card. No card and I could get her a Cadillac and it wouldn’t matter. She’s always been a card fanatic.

I won’t go into her age because even though she doesn’t read my blog because she doesn’t fool with computers much, she would sense through the Mama Force that I had posted her age online where God and everyone else could see it. She would not be pleased. I’m sure y’all know about the Mama Force. It is the supernatural ability to tell just where your child is, who they are with, and what they are doing. It is especially strong and accurate when they are somewhere they are not supposed to be, with someone they are forbidden to see, and doing something they’ve no business doing. The Mama Force is a fearsome thing and it kept me more or less in line.

Not wanting to worry Mama picked up where the Mama Force left off. As long as I can remember, Mama worked hard, crappy jobs to put a roof over my head and food on the table. As you can tell by this picture, Mama was an extraordinarily beautiful woman in her prime. That prime was spent largely raising me. Mama had me at 18 and she and Daddy divorced when Mama was 26.

She had a lot of offers from other men over the years, but once she made it perfectly clear that I was an unquestionable part of the deal, they all pretty much hit the road. It’s because of all the lonely years Mama spent taking care of me when she could have been out having her own fun that I have no patience with young mothers, single or otherwise, who pawn their children off on grandparents or relatives so they can “do their own thing.” I hear them say, “I’m young, I shouldn’t have to settle down.” To which I’ve always wanted to reply, and actually have on more than one occasion, “You should have thought about that while you were on your back with your legs spread.” Mama always told me I hadn’t asked to be brought into this world and since she had drug me here, she has a responsibility.

Mama and me when she finished eye school.

Mama always took care of me, watched over me, looked out for me. She was always there for me. These days, she doesn’t get around as easily as she used to. She’s not elderly by any stretch, but a lifetime of hard work, heartbreak, and hard times has taken it’s toll. The once shiny blonde hair is a respectable iron-grey now, for the most part. It pains me to admit it, but I put more than one of those grey hairs in that head. Truth be told, I put most all of those grey hairs in that head.

Right from the start, I was trouble. She almost died bringing me into the world because her idiotic doctor let her stay in labor for 36 hours before it finally dawned on the doofus that there was no way in Hell a 5’2″ 89 lbs woman was going to bring a 10 lbs baby into the world without some help. The scar she carries from that Cesarean Section has always reminded me of what I cost her. She nearly died having me then gave up her life to raise me.  As a result, Mama has always been perfect in my eyes — the eyes of a child. Even older and wiser as I am now, I cut Mama more slack than anyone else on the planet, including myself. She’s my hero in a lot of different ways and if you haven’t guessed by now, I am 100% a Mama’s Boy. I take little to nothing from Mama in looks or personality. In both respects, I am a close clone of Daddy and the good Lord knows I love him too, but Mama has always been here when everyone else has been gone. Children, even grown children, don’t forget things like that.

Happy Birthday, Mama. I love you.

These things had a LOT of decals!

Christmas Eve has been a favorite day of mine for a long, long time. When I was a child, it meant getting up early and driving to Granny Hughes and her jerk second husband’s house in Columbia for a day of food and presents. That was as far as we ever went when I was a kid and driving with Mama for an hour seemed like an adventure.

I remember one time, we were coming back in a driving rainstorm and Mama couldn’t see plus she was dead tired and nodding off. I kept putting my hand out the window to collect rainwater and rub on her face to keep her awake. Good times. Good times.

By the time I was a car driving teenager, we didn’t have to go to Columbia anymore because Granny had moved in with us. Instead, I’d go hang out with my Aunt Cathy and Uncle Larry and their two sons, Zach and Blake. This particular Christmas Eve, Zach was maybe six years old. Blake was a toddler. The must have toy for that year was the DinoRider Action Figure collection. Zach was in love with all things DinoRider, so Cathy, like any good mother, had gone out and purchased a tandem axle dump-truck load of DinoRider Action Figures for her tow headed eldest boy.

I got to her house about ten on this particular Christmas Eve and the boys were asleep, finally. That was the cue for Cathy, Uncle Larry, and I to put together the “Santa Tableau”.  Most of the toys went together easily enough as I recall, but around midnight, we got to the DinoRiders. The box said “some assembly required.” Yeah, right.

The figures were all put together, BUT none of them had the correct decals stuck on yet. Those were in a sheet PER BOX about the size of the Webster’s Third Edition International Unabridged Dictionary. I started sticking decals on. To make matters worse, the figures had a molded place EXACTLY where the decals were supposed to go, so if you were the tiniest bit out of line, it stuck out like a sore thumb. I didn’t know I had OCD at that time. I just knew I had to get the stickers on perfectly or it would drive me crazy. If you made a mislick and put a sticker in the wrong place, God help you. I’m convinced that had the Titanic been wrapped with DinoRider decals, she would have split the iceberg and made New York in record time. Those things would stick your eyeballs together just looking at them.

Midnight became 2 A.M. which turned into 4 A.M. Finally, at around 5:45 AM, the three of us got the last of the toys ready and set up properly for maximum “Wow Factor” when the boys came in to see them. I stumbled into Zach’s room and collapsed in the bottom bunk of his bunk beds and promptly passed out from exhaustion. I slept like the dead until around 6:15 A.M. when, with the barest hint of dawn just breaking in the window, I was awakened by two pudgy little hands beating me about the head and shoulders with cries of “Shannon, come see! Come see! Santa came!”

Somehow, I managed to stumble into the living room as Zach ran into the midst of half the stockpile of Toys R’ Us arrayed underneath the well decorated tree. Cathy was snapping still pictures and Larry was filming the event with one of the first practical VHS self contained camcorders. Zach, joined a few minutes later by Blake, was so happy and so bouncy that I felt less and less tired. I may even have drank a cup of coffee even though I hated the stuff.

It never ceases to amaze me how time gets away from us. That was twenty years ago at least now. Zach is a grown man and the associate pastor of a church in Gainesville, Florida, but he just posted on FaceBook that he’s home safe. I’ll see him tomorrow at Daddy’s house for Christmas supper and I’m thinking it won’t be long until I have to put together a second generation of toys. You see, the little pudgy, tow headed boy of all those years ago gave one of the most beautiful diamond rings I’ve ever seen to one of the sweetest girls I’ve ever met just this past Thanksgiving. Just yesterday, he was beating me awake to come see him play with his toys. This coming Easter, I get to see him marry the girl of his dreams.

Don’t forget to wash your feet, y’all, and most of all Merry Christmas!

Love y’all a lot!

Granny and Papa Wham on their wedding day, December 22, 1945.

I won’t get to the end of this post with dry eyes.

Had they both lived, today would be my Granny and Papa Wham’s 64th wedding anniversary. Unfortunately for the world in general and me in particular, they have both gone to their reward — I hope the reward which Granny taught about many times in 51 years to the women of the Martha Wham Bible Class at Dials Methodist Church and then at Beulah Baptist Church.

To say they were an incredible couple would be like saying Hurricane Andrew was a strong breeze. Papa returned from The War in Europe in September of 1945 and they were married in December. Papa was 26 and Granny was 24. Papa worked and Granny made a home. In the 45 years they were together they weathered, among many other things, the tragic death of a newborn daughter, a handsome son who was at once the apple of their eye and the bane of their existence, that son’s 13 month tour of duty in the bowels of the Central Highlands of Vietnam, a beautiful and beloved daughter with somewhat expensive tastes, building a house, grandchildren, the son’s divorce, a few hospitalizations, the deaths of many, many family members, sickness, health, riches, poverty, Granny’s stroke, and Papa’s emphysema . Their secret? A deep and abiding love the likes of which I have never, NEVER seen in any other couple I’ve ever watched.

It may be a cliche’ but they never fought. Papa was the undisputed king of the household and Granny was his seneschal. In thirty years, I heard Papa’s voice raised in anger twice. Both times, I was terrified because I had no experience with anything other than his kindness. He watched the Braves play ball while she baked pound cake. He napped on the couch while she read her Sunday School lesson. I wish I could describe their love for each other in proper terms, but I cannot because adjectives don’t exist on this lowly plane to adequately capture their feelings for each other. You couldn’t describe it, but my God how you could feel it!

I remember the last time they parted. Papa was in failing health and the effects of nursing him had begun to tell on Granny. She had a stroke in July of 1995. Papa died two days later. Daddy, Aunt Cathy, and I all believe Papa died of a broken heart. Cathy saw his face as he watched the EMTs place his blushing bride into the ambulance and she said it looked to her like he died right then. He simply could not live without knowing she would be at his side watching his back anymore. He could face German bullets and shells at Anzio and on Omaha Beach, but he couldn’t face life without Granny.

I was with Daddy when we told Granny in her hospital room that Papa was gone. One tear rolled down each cheek and she lowered her head. She never broke down and sobbed like some thought she would. She was too strong for that, but she was never the same. Granny entered a steady decline after Papa died even though she soldiered on in her role as matriarch for our sake. I always told everyone that Granny took care of the family and Papa took care of Granny. I also said that the day would come when she missed Papa and wanted to go find him more than she wanted to stay here and take care of us. That day came in February of 2008. With Aunt Cathy holding her hand and telling her we loved her and to tell Papa we all said hello, Granny left us to rejoin him.

Granny was famous for making Papa wait on her to get ready and check over the house. Despite his unbelievably good nature about everything else, Papa didn’t wait on anything or anyone patiently. In my mind’s eye, I could just see him the moment she arrived at the Pearly Gates, rising from the seat where he’d been waiting with Aunt Judy to say, “Mama, I’ve been waiting. What took you so long?” and her replying as she reached out to take his hand, “Daddy, I had to watch the children a while longer; I came as soon as I could.” Finally, after more than ten years, harmony returned to the Universe; Mot and Frank were together again.

Love y’all. Don’t forget to wash your feet.