Beneath my suburban soccer mom SUV driving self is a long-haired brown-eyed, often barefoot, girl who grew up on a 100-acre plus farm near the Kentucky line. I had the pet chickens, the cows, and the mama who loved to garden (and still does and who is absolutely amazing at it).

My parents divorced when I was 7 and after living in Nashville and doing the whole country club Cadillac lifestyle, my mom discovered a beautiful old farmhouse to renovate about 45 minutes north of Nashville. It was her therapy and saving grace after she and my dad split. My mom grew up in the city in Detroit and she’d always dreamed of living on a farm. Because my older siblings were all out of the house by the time I was 10 or so, it was pretty much me and my mama in the boonies, along with a few dozen animals and birds. I even named all our chickens. No doubt had blogs been around back then I would have had a blog about my chickens. I was serious about these birds, ya’ll.

I was quite tickled to receive an invite, along with several other Nashville bloggers, from Hallmark to a breakfast get together downtown recently. It was a treat (minus the search for parking) to spend some time with blogger friends, new and old. We gathered around a table for a writing exercise with some of the amazing creative folks from Hallmark.

In a rush to clean out my car I accidentally threw away my scribbled in blue ink thoughts, but I’ve taken another stab at them and it’s a very nice reminder of my roots.

Let me know if you do the same.

The house I grew up in…isn’t it amazing? My mom has built a smaller, simpler home at the edge of our property but no longer owns this house.

I Come From…
8 miles from town
The youngest of five
Dusty gravel roads
Shiny black patent leather shoes on Sunday and Love Lifted Me
Wooden church pews and Wednesday night supper
Porch swings and ceiling fans
Bare feet and braces
Jungle Juice in a carton and Roman Meal bread
Hide and go seek and kickball…tag you’re it
Hee Haw and pin curls on Saturday night
The smell of dark-fired tobacco and smoke curled around red barns like a gray ribbon
Screen doors and open windows
Quilts stitched with love
Milk gravy and biscuits
Saturday morning cartoons
Falling asleep to bull frog serenades
No Internet or iPhones
Vinyl albums and TVs with rabbit ears
Soybeans and winter wheat
Napping dogs in the shade and the thump thump of happy tails in the cool dust
Flannel nightgowns and milk and cookies
Orange Crush in a bottle and Archie comics
Honeysuckle and four-leaf clovers
Trees to climb and barns to explore
4-H and the county fair
Go Tell Aunt Rhodie and Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep
Love

Where do you come from?

p.s. Here’s a link to a great video Hallmark made from our group of Nashville bloggers’ posts. Thanks for the reminder that life is a special occasion.