A REAL HISSY-FIT

 

I’ve contemplated defining some Southern terms like “might could” and “come up a cloud,” before going on with adding any more characters to the Paxton census. But recently I read an etiquette question from a young woman who went to her first pitch-in lunch since she moved to the South.

She’d taken a cake as her contribution, and as everyone had been asked to take home whatever food remained on or in the dishes they’d brought, she picked up her plate with a bit of cake left, thanked the hostess graciously, and started for the door.

The hostess called out, in front of all the other guests, “Hey! You’re taking my PLATE!” Guest answered that was indeed her own plate---she’d brought the cake on it. Hostess replied, even more loudly, that it certainly WAS her plate, because it had a Christmas tree on it---going on in that vein, all but calling the guest a liar and a thief.

Embarrassed and chagrined that her first party in her new town had made her the center of such a spectacle in front of ladies she hoped would be her friends, the guest removed the Saran from the bit of cake and showed the hostess the plain white plate. Hostess made no apology beyond a grudging, “Well, it LOOKED like mine.”

The letter-writer asked if that were common behavior (and as my Mammaw would have said, it was VERY COMMON, indeed, but it certainly is not the norm where I come from). I answered her post, saying that it was NOT the usual way of doing things, and that the hostess certainly owed her more in the way of an apology than a four-year-old might be coerced to offer.

Then I explained an almost-entirely-Southern phenomenon---in other regions it might be called a fantod, or a “going off” or just plain RUDE. Down South it’s called a Hissy Fit.

You, My Dear, may have had your first (I hope) and last (more fervent hope) encounter with what is known as a Hissy Fit. And a very amateurish attempt, it was, pitched by someone who has not obtained her proper HF credentials, much like the hangers-on of Rock Stars and Movie Idols.

She THOUGHT she could, but failed miserably. She attained merely Rude, and SHE was the spectacle.

Southern Belles learn the power of the properly-thrown Hissy Fit in their cradles, and use them to good effect and AT THE PROPER TIME---in case of absolute, dyed-in-the-cotton rudeness from someone, or when they see another creature, human or animal, being abused. Gray areas less or more than these are cause for contemplation, reflection and consideration before throwing or refraining. A mistaken dish, no. An overheard bit of gossip, perhaps.

Catching Bobby Ray kissing Sissy Maud---Oh, Yeah.

A REAL Southern Belle KNOWS the difference, and is a model of calm and mannerly decorum, unless dire circumstances require. Some circumstances do require a Dressing Down, a Blessing Out, a taking-to-the-woodshed. Yours, however, did not do Any Such Of A THING.

Your hostess was NOT Raised Right, was probably a THAT CHILD, left to run roughshod over everyone in sight, and was exhibiting TRASHY WAYS.

She is a true blight on Belledom, and would be cut dead at any Garden Club, Debutante Ball, Fishfry, Huntin' Camp or Eastern Star South of the M&D. Her lack of apology is certainly no surprise. I apologize on behalf of Belles everywhere; we do not hold with such nonsense, No Sirree.

I truly trust that you will not have any further truck with such a hussy.   I'll bet she even put dark meat in the chicken salad.

PAST PERFECT

 There’s a dry whisper to all the memories of the Aunts and some of the Uncles of my childhood, for their clothes and shoes and selves seemed crisp, somehow---the fabrics and nubby  linens, the book-edge cuffs and sharp pleats of the men’s pants.   Serge and gabardine and woolens are serious cloth, not like the frivols of today’s miss-matched cottons and all those man-made, unmemorable plasticky garments sported by the young.  

Everything seems so SHINY, now---so plastic, from lips to startled eyebrows to hair, from clothes to shoes and sparkling arrays of color enough to piece a rainbow.   Faces have a greasy texture, somehow, carried on to the glint of the most microscopic glitter in rouge and lipstick---with my Hot South history of life, I cannot fathom how it would feel to be swathed in all that shine.   

It seemed to me that the adults of those earlier times, with their hair, clothes, powdery skin---all seemed to be made of dry fabric, as if they spent their days pinned on a line in the wind.  

Even lively and laughing, they seemed preserved, somehow, with the little dust of powder on the ladies’ faces, the pencil-swoop of eyebrow, and the tissue-blotted lipstick a matte effect, in contrast to today’s glows and shines and all those modern glittery, gleamy cheeks and wetnesses of lip smeared and dabbed on at random moments, morning to night, while driving, in conversation, balancing purse and phone and applicator deftly, not missing a beat as that small wet wand swoops across a tightened lip, between children’s schedules and plans to meet Sherri-with-an-i for  lunch.

OUR ladies sat at Vanity Tables, carrying their taste for tulle-and-net-covered dressers way past their teens and into their married bedrooms, and the poufy effect was enhanced by all the powder puffs and atomizer bottles and dresser sets of comb, brush and mirror, all laid out as part of the room’s décor---all with their own perpetual haze of sifted-down face-and-body powder lending a soft focus to the entire scene.  A matching ashtray was quite a part of the arrangement, as well, holding a few lipstick-tipped butts as casually as the little china box held bobby pins, and the smoke-drifts added their own oddly inoffensive-then note to the perfume's bergamot and rose.  There was such an aura of forceful feminity to those dressing areas---an almost overwhelming sweetness to the smoke and the scents, like opening a long-ago perfume bottle with but a dried golden film in the bottom.

 They sat down and tended to things, those ladies in their boo-dwars, with everything to hand right on the countertop, and every gesture and application a serious business.

 The foundation swooped and smoothed just so, the powder, the tiny round rouge puff maneuvered delicately over contour of cheek, and the practiced touches of the lipstick, with the final lip-clench over a bit of Kleenex to avoid smears on glass or cigarette.   

   All the younger Aunts but one---my dear Aint May-ry-on-the-other-side, she of the soft  smooth skin and fine blonde hair, contagious laugh and forward-tilt in her pretty white pumps, a dry rustle to her own crisply-ironed cotton blouses and skirts---all those other Aunts smoked, as did my Mother and Daddy. And since I saw these relatives so seldom, and then always with all of us in our Sunday Clothes--“dressed-up” to me naturally meant a nice spray from the Chanel or White Shoulders bottle, the smooth hang of their luxurious fabrics in unfamiliar greens and browns and taupes, or some soft-toned mustards and yellows, and the ethereal suggestion of just the faintest wisp of Chesterfield or Kool.   It was simply a fact of life, that scent-addition encircling almost every adult in the family---either the honest sweat-and-khakis of a hard work-day, or Sunday clothes with their own dry-goods-store aroma mingling into the Old Spice/Coty/Shalimar/My Sin and smoke.

I loved to watch my visiting Aunts get dressed for the day, especially Aunt Cilla.   She had the most wonderful wardrobe of them all, from Goldsmith’s and Lowenstein’s in Memphis, all cut to fit her tiny frame.   She’d hang her things in the closet as soon as they arrived, in hanging bags-to-match-her-Samsonite.   Those smooth tobacco-brown cases held wonders never imagined by Aladdin in that cave---pale stockings-with-seams, all in a pink satin bag to keep them safe from runs, and stacks of pastel undies and gowns and dusters and the tiniest bedroom shoes of velvet and and beadwork and lace, cuddled into the Overnight Case with tiny satin sachet poufs tucked in.   Her real shoe-case was a square puzzle-box thing that folded out in several directions to display a half-dozen pairs of beautifully polished leather shoes---mostly peep-toes or sling-backs with heels which raised her height to at least 5’2”.

And the dresses and pants and little jackets with peplums, or that one darling “military-style” one which was a deep blue, cut off sharply at the waist, with gold buttons and the smallest hint of little epaulettes.  I remember she wore that one occasionally just around her shoulders, striding down our little main street in her perfectly fitted slacks and fabulous shining shoes. 

She was FROM there, but no longer OF there.   Being “from OFF” separated her and Uncle Jed from the rest of us, into a cool, sanctified place, of wide streets and hedged lawns, of brocaded spindly chairs and sofa (as opposed to our chunky, wide-armed prickly-covered COUCH and chair-to-match.  I remember that Daddy complained from Day 1 that you couldn't balance a glass or plate on the slopy arms of those things.

 Even having been ordered from Sears in Memphis and delivered on the TRAIN did not imbue ours with such cachet as the stately, delicate furniture in the still, sea-green living room in her House on Parkway).   It was, and still is, the absolute in décor and gracious living.

And if I could replicate it, I’d go there and simply DWELL, swinging along on my own two merry little clothespins.

SUMPTUOUS SUNDAY SUPPERS

 

I’ve always wondered about the people who had Sunday Night Suppers.   When I was a child and teen, those were portrayed in magazines and TV commercials and cookbooks as a meal apart from any other, with chafing dishes and pale trays of Welsh Rarebit and Chicken Veronique cooked and served right there on the coffee-table by chic women in Hostess Gowns.

Even the attire was special---long robish Auntie Mame dresses  sweeping  the floor as the ladies daintily stirred and arranged the food, floating past their smiling, well-groomed children in a cloud of Chesterfield smoke, while they all conversed or sat neatly awaiting Disneyland on their pale-ivory Jetson TVs. 

My Mother had a robe kinda like that, a long pale pink quilted one, a gift from Aunt Cilla, and I longed with my heart that she’d wear that some Sunday night and we’d cook in the living room, all fresh food for special, instead of the perfectly wonderful leftovers from the good Sunday Dinner we’d had right after church.   

Never happened.  Though the books and magazine were couched in terms of "taking the trouble out of all the planning," for those special weekly evenings, our own leftovers WERE certainly perfectly good.  Even a Day of Rest could leave you too tired to cook again, and Mother would no more have worn that robe to cook in than she’d fly. 

 I loved those pictures, and coffee-table cooking or serving, in those rooms of stick-legged furniture amongst the knotty-pine walls and pyramid lampshades and drifts of Arpege seemed an exotic thing to me, like people sitting cross-legged on carpets in India or Arabia, around an ornate communal dish.  And of course, Sunday Night Suppers were even more elegant.

 Instead of being in Church for the fifth hour that day like me, in the same clothes and with the same folks---neither of which were as fresh or bright as their first appearance at Ten O-clock Sunday School, I imagine.

And that all the classy folks were home on Sunday nights, freshly dressed for Supper and graciously anticipating that gentle, rich fare.   And it always happened at Six O’Clock.   Nobody told me that, and I didn’t read it.   It just WAS, somehow, the Right Time.

All the magazines listed small, easy-to-prepare egg or chicken or cheese dishes, some with their own specific bread or biscuits, and sometimes the almighty TOAST POINTS to serve as cushion beneath those lovely concoctions.    Things with sauces were lavishly portrayed, as were NESTS of things---rice or grated potatoes or mashed potatoes or chow mein noodles, to cuddle all those splendid sauced things in.

After all, chafing dishes were invented especially so you could put a can of mushroom pieces and a jar of paminna in most any chicken dish, and call it a la King.

There were often crepes, one time savory and another, sweet.  And THAT one I had a hard time getting.  I’d MADE crepes, and you certainly didn’t rely on the iffy Fahrenheit of a Sterno can, not if you had a dozen crepes to turn out, and then the sauce besides.

Anything in a casserole dish that you could nap with white sauce and brown was perfect for a Sunday Supper.  Extra points for a little Colman’s in the sauce.

And always, always, the green peas.  Everything required peas.  And never had I ever seen such a green pea in my life---the bright fresh color in the pages was tiers above the gray-green softness in the School Day can, and even the short-term crop of English Peas we grew in the Spring were shelled and boiled and creamed into canned-pea gray.   I guess if I’d peeked into the pot, somewhere between TWO MINUTES and BABY FOOD, that heavenly color might have shone for an instant.

Things in Rings were immensely popular, and that's all I have to say about that.

There was usually a light, colorful dessert of daintily cut fruit or fancifully-molded sherbets or Jello.   Both salads AND desserts were of the fiddly-poo sort, with nary a normal cake or pie in sight.   And they had NAMES.   The above is called "Cut Glass Salad," and it's usually made with several different colors of Jello, made separately, cut into cubes, and then folded into whipped cream or Kool Whip with more Jello to make it set.  And all cooks know that that lady above had to go around and wash the face of every pee-diddly cube of that Jello up there to get it to show through.

Perfection salad also comes to mind (though seldom voluntarily), and though I like every one of the ingredients, together it seems a misbegotten match, too much like putting Italian dressing over marshmallows and beets.  This one, like most of the others of my childhood, reminds me of a mother Horta and her babies.  

There always seemed to be a plate somewhere of tiny weenies on picks, or crab puffs and exotic-sounding devils-on–horseback in the timer-set Tappan as you took your ease, awaiting a mere TING and a graceful bend and sweep to waft them to the living room.  

Good Luck on that, with the folks that I knew.   Knew personally, that is, for I never doubted that there must have been people named Carstairs or Langdon or Van Something who surely enjoyed such sumptuous evenings. 

And of What They Were Watching:  Moire non.

THE POPPIES BLOW

White poppies on a friend’s blog just now set me on one of my little hunts for histories of interesting people—it had me running over the verses of Flanders Field in my head, and looking up some of the last words, I found the poem inscribed in a young woman’s handwriting in her Nurse’s Daybook, and that just captured my heart.

 

Her name was Ella Osborn, and she worked at Mt. Sinai in New York, I believe, before she took  up the flag and volunteered for work right on the front lines in France---they were right under the bombers and felt the wounds and damages of the ordnance, the searing sting of the floating mustard gas, as they stood in their operating rooms or repairing rooms, hands deep in the wounds of soldiers, til sleep almost swept them off their feet.

She copied the poem on pages in and amongst numbers of lost patients, hours at the operating table, and recounting the small simple joys of an outing away from the melee into a town for a bowl of soup.  Her fieldbook/daybook/nurse’s notes held the diary of her days, from her term of service there, January 1918 to April 1919.  A year and some-odd of a Hell no one could imagine.    She wrote once of an unthinkable reprimand:  “I went for a walk but had to come back early to a lecture given by the colonel who gave us quite a raking over, and said in a nice way we would have to come under Army Discipline.”   (I’m trying to imagine what kind of rank and courage and confidence it would take to dare bring reproof to such a group of heroic, dedicated young women as those battlefield nurses).

 

And I just held her to my heart, with the absolute kinship of family tragedy, with my Dad’s two oldest brothers, 5 and 7, dying within a week of each other in the Flu Epidemic of 1918, before Daddy was born.  The thought that she might have been standing there, energy spent, in bloodied clothes from several soldiers she had helped repair or comforted as they whispered away, when our little boys breathed their last on their bed in that faraway little tenant house, it's beyond imagining the two scenes of such hope, pain and sorrow rising to Heaven.   

I spent lots of hours scribing my finger along the grooves of the lettering on their fading small stones, oldest in our family section of the cemetery,  and then such searing pangs as a Mother later, of how in the world my Mammaw made it through that, pregnant with Daddy’s sister born two months after their deaths, and then Daddy’s birth a year later.  Finding her words was a sort of "she was there doing THAT and my family was here in grief over THIS" in a time frame of mutual hardship.

 

Mammaw also lived through a rattlesnake bite in the pea patch when Daddy was a teen---he drove her in their old Ford five miles on dirt roads to the doctor, as his sister held onto her in the back seat.    She “swoll up fit to pop,” but she made it, circling the century and living another fifty-five years until 1987, within months of her 100^th birthday.   

 

 I’m delaying lunch to ferret out more on such a hero as Ella Osborn.    I pray her life was a sweet reward for all the sacrifices she made and good she did in those months of unspeakable trials.   And I hope there are poppies where she rests. 

Another reference that came up just now:  Her trip to France and her service there.

https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/847fad150ae74ff2a8e8e2df09d4a891

To Soothe the Savage Breast

 For anyone who hasn't seen The Shawshank Redemption, I can from my heart recommend this movie from WAY BACK---I can remember my own modest Mother, whose work ethic was strict and of high resolve, one day when she had gone to lunch and failed to return at her usual five-minutes-to-One to take over so I could go home. She called to say that she had settled in the den at noon with a sandwich and glass of tea, happened upon the first few moments of the movie, and just HAD to see "how it came out."

If you have not experienced this wonderful movie with its perfect cast and gifted actors, plus the absolutely sublime Stephen King writing---DO look it up.

In one of the brightest spots in a grim-spotted movie, of prison and of gray and of the beating-down of the humanity within, there are incandescent moments of LIGHT so bright they feed your soul. My favorite is when Andy Dufresne, convicted of murders he did not commit, had been given the task of administering the prison library.

He took on the small, dim space, with its creaky book-cart of handworn, many-times-read books and its dusty corners, and by writing to organizations and pestering the state legislature with something like a letter-a-week requesting funding, he was finally sent a few boxes of used books and records.

On one particular day, the guard stepped out for a moment, and Andy took out a big old slick black record from its worn sleeve, set it on the turntable, started it playing, and turned on the intercom/public address system for the whole prison---house and yard.

The men elbow-deep in hot laundry suds stopped their labor; the kitchen cooks and the machine shop grease-monkeys and the floor-moppers and the guards all looked up in wonderment as those silvery notes floated out over the gray walls and bare-trodden yard, as if they were seeing the very angels in the air who voiced the melody.

And Red, who was Andy's best friend---a pragmatic old lifer played by Morgan Freeman (imagine that rich, honey-syrup voice narrating the words), says:

"I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. Truth is, I don't want to know. Some things are better left unsaid. I'd like to think they were singing about something so beautiful it can't be expressed in words, and it makes your heart ache because of it.

I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a grey place dares to dream. It was as if some beautiful bird had flapped into our drab little cage and made these walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQ8ZHilxdm8