Dolly Parton | dual personalities

March 4, 2024

Ponder anew, what the Almighty will do

by chuckofish

A quiet weekend by some standards, but one filled with low key blessings and great weather.

Everything is starting to pop!

At church we had a guest preacher who also played the guitar, accompanied by piano and…harmonica! I have to say I didn’t hate it. The congregation sang with gusto. The twins got an A for non-depraved behavior. They have really crossed a line in general maturity. When I was talking to the head of the Sunday School on Thursday, she said the boy is the friendliest boy there and that Lottie is a real thinker. I concurred. I said that if you asked the twins what they learned in Sunday School, Lottie could tell you in detail and the boy says, “We had fun.”

After church we headed to our house where, after bagels and bacon and handfuls of jelly beans, we indulged in some driveway sittin’ with Mr. Smith.

Meanwhile Ida caught up on reading my article about Alphonse Smith, Kirkwood’s greatest athlete, in the latest edition of the Kirkwood Historical review.

This will be a busy week. Here’s some Dolly to help get us through.

Sit in the sun if you can. Pet a nice dog. Read some history. Rock on.

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September 19, 2023

We ain’t perfect but we try

by chuckofish

I finished the Hillsdale College online course on Genesis and I’m happy to say I passed all the quizzes, the final and the course. It was a worthwhile endeavor and I will probably take another course. And they’re free.

This is an excellent article on a disturbing subject. “In 1939 T. S. Eliot gave a series of lectures at the University of Cambridge in which he described a fork in the road. Western Civilization might continue along the Christian path, he predicted, or it might adopt “modern paganism.” Eliot, a Christian convert, hoped for the former, but he feared that we were already hell-bent on the latter.” The pagans are winning.

And here are two articles about a favorite subject of mine: Puritans–Jonathan Edwards and his long workday and Puritan women debunking Puritan stereotypes.

I try not to get into arguments with people, but I remember one time I did. It was back when daughter #2 was a student at Wash U. and I had lunch with her and her boyfriend, who made the mistake of making a really uninformed remark about Puritans. He was your typical know-it-all, arrogant Wash U. student and I just couldn’t let him get away with his stupid comment. A lecture followed. I’m sure daughter #2 was mortified. Well, let’s just say I was pleased when they broke up at the end of senior year. Thank goodness DN has had the good sense never to knock the Puritans in my presence.

Like I said, I try to get along with people.

We find out when you die the keys to heaven can’t be bought
We still don’t know what love is but we sure know what it’s not
Sometimes you got to

Get along, on down the road
We’ve got a long long way to go
Scared to live, scared to die
We ain’t perfect but we try

—Shane McAnally, Ross Copperman, Josh Osborne

(The artwork at the top is by my talented six-year old granddaughter Lottie. It is her interpretation of the song “Coat of Many Colors” by Dolly Parton. The mean girl on the left is making fun of little Dolly’s dress.)

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January 23, 2023

“I gave you a book, you didn’t read it”*

by chuckofish

Well, I have hardly left the house all week and I am not complaining. Baby Ida is doing well, and how could she not with such a good big sister? I am not sure how much actual “help” I have been besides being another pair of hands to hold the baby and another lap for Katie to sit in, but we have managed quite well.

While here, I have been reacquainting myself with A.A. Milne’s Winnie the Pooh and am newly impressed. “For I am a bear of very little brain, and long words bother me.” But for a bear with very little brain, he has quite a varied and amusing inner monologue.

“Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of his head, behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming downstairs, but sometimes he feels that there really is another way, if only he could stop bumping for a moment and think of it. And then he feels that perhaps there isn’t.”

Anyway, the stories are a pleasure to read, to yourself or out loud to a two-year-old.

I also love stories like this. It is what being an American is all about.

And, oh Dolly, you released a good new song on your 77th birthday last week! The apocalypse is coming…

And speaking of the apocalypse, Anne is on fire here. Yeehaw.

“How on earth can you say that the Bible is “central to our understanding,” though that is a tepid, if not actually fatuous, way of putting it, and then announce that there are many different possible conclusions for what it says about gender, relationships, and marriage?”

(The links in the first paragraph are also excellent.)

Have a good Monday. Read some A.A. Milne. Listen to some Dolly. Hold a baby. Ask yourself:

Do two walk together,
    unless they have agreed to meet?
Does a lion roar in the forest,
    when he has no prey?
Does a young lion cry out from his den,
    if he has taken nothing?
Does a bird fall in a snare on the earth,
    when there is no trap for it?
Does a snare spring up from the ground,
    when it has taken nothing?
Is a trumpet blown in a city,
    and the people are not afraid?
Does disaster come to a city,
    unless the Lord has done it?
–Amos 3:3-8

*Dolly Parton

5 Comments

March 15, 2022

The Ides of March are come

by chuckofish

Today is the Ides of March–famous, as you know, for being the day Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC. “Beware the Ides of March” was a line we knew as children, long before reading the play in ninth grade. Well, I doubt if that is the case with kids anymore. But maybe we were just odd children.

Another famous person who died on March 15 is Benjamin McLane Spock (Dr. Spock). Besides being a world-famous pediatrician, Spock won a gold medal at the 1924 Olympics with his Yale University rowing team. No kidding.

Speaking of the 1924 Olympics, I watched Chariots of Fire (1981) on TCM the other night and was reminded what a really good movie it is. Here is Siskel and Ebert’s review from back in 1981.

I’m with Ebert on this one.

I also recently watched Captains Courageous (1937) on TCM. I had not seen it in a long time and I was impressed.

I am not a big fan of Spencer Tracy, but he is great in this movie as the Portuguese fisherman who saves spoiled rich kid Freddie Bartholomew’s life and then helps him become a better person. And Freddie gives 100%. The film bears the mark of a great director–Victor Fleming–and the cast is a wonderful mix of Hollywood regulars. The sailing scenes, probably filmed in a backlot tank, are very exciting. The first time I saw this movie was around 1966 when my DP and I went to see it at our local movie theater one Saturday afternoon with our neighbor Nancy and her mother. I loved it, but was very shocked by the ending and the way Spencer Tracy’s character dies–(spoiler alert) cut in half and all stove in and sinking out of sight. It was a lot for little kids to handle.

Today is also the birthday of Andrew Jackson (1767-1845), the seventh president of the U.S.A. He is out of favor these days, but he was a man of his time. The son of Ulster Presbyterians who emigrated to America in 1765, his father died just weeks before Andrew was born. Then he watched his two older brothers and his mother die–all at the hands of the British. He had strong feelings about a lot of things. It might be time to dust off The Buccaneer (1958) to watch in his honor. (Charlton Heston played Jackson twice: in The Buccaneer and in The President’s Lady (1953).

By the way, I did make some progress in my office…

…luckily I can close the closet door.

And the Christmas cactus keeps on going…

Woohoo!

And I love that Dolly did this:

4 Comments

April 30, 2021

Tempted and tried with each step we take

by chuckofish

I received some very nice gifts for my birthday from my thoughtful family, including a foot massager that is out of this world. Another favorite is my new book, Dolly Parton Songteller: My Life in Lyrics.

You know how I feel about Dolly–she’s the greatest–so wiling away the hours reading this collection of the lyrics to 175 of her best-loved songs, along with the personal memories and the inspiration behind them, has been a pleasure. Just looking at the pictures of this remarkably beautiful lady from the hills of Tennessee is fun.

In other news, we had a new roof put on our house yesterday and I feel as if I went through the Battle of the Somme. I was exhausted and shell-shocked after 7 hours of incessant hammering and thumping above me while I attempted to work remotely in my upstairs “office.” Boy, do those guys work hard! Anyway, the new roof looks very nice and I am glad to have it done and finished.

Tomorrow is the birthday of Henry Koster, who, though he never won an Oscar, directed some darn good movies: The Bishop’s Wife (1947), Harvey (1950), The Robe (1953), A Man Called Peter (1955), and a host of others. I will toast him and watch one of his films.

And here’s a good thought from another Scotsman. “So we do not panic and we do not vent, and we enjoy a deep confidence even as the tides seem to run against our faith. “

Well, TGIF. Have a good weekend. Mine will be a quiet one with none of the rollicking fun of last weekend, but that’s okay. I need to catch my breath.

Tempted and tried with each step we take.
We stumble and slide and make our mistakes,
Ask God to forgive us for all of our sins,
Then we take off our horns and wear halos again.
–Dolly Parton

(Only Dolly can rhyme sins with again.)

3 Comments

September 6, 2019

A broken record

by chuckofish

I know I sound like a broken record, but it has been a hard week and I am glad it is Friday again!

If you are looking for something to celebrate this weekend, Sunday is the 53rd anniversary of the television debut of Star Trek in 1966. In “The Man Trap” episode, the crew visit an outpost to conduct medical exams on the residents, only to be attacked by a shapeshifting alien creature seeking to extract salt from their bodies.

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Well, I’m always ready to toast these guys.

“The Man Trap” placed first in its timeslot, with Nielsen ratings of 25.2 during the first half-hour; some 46.7 percent of all televisions in use at the time were tuned in to the episode. I was in the fifth grade and I remember watching with my older brother who was in the 10th grade. I’m sure we thought it was pretty hokey (because it was), but we kept tuning in, didn’t we?

Please note that there is a big celebration planned for Dolly Parton’s 50th Anniversary of being an Opry Member. There’s going to be a week-long celebration of Dolly’s “impact on music and the Opry,” all leading up to her 50th anniversary performance on the Opry stage on Saturday, October 12, 2019. Unfortunately, I will have to pass on this, but it sounds like a real good time to me!

I have been readings essays by E.B. White this week and he was a big one for noticing the little things…the changing of seasons and the goings on of the flora and fauna around him. It is a good reminder of the old lesson to pay attention. Summer is coming to an end here in flyover country, although the temperatures are still pretty balmy. It’s getting dark earlier, but still the cacophony of lawnmowers and weed-whackers fills the air on a constant basis. Whenever I lay my head down for one of my frequent naps, the sound of a lawnmower revving up is sure to follow. It never fails.

Have a good weekend! Celebrate something!

3 Comments

February 11, 2019

“Lookin’ out my back door”*

by chuckofish

Doo doo doo…How was your weekend? Mine was quite pleasant, despite some bad weather. Sometimes bad weather causes us to slow down and settle in at home for some quiet time, and that is not a bad thing.

I took daughter #1 to the airport early on Saturday morning and she headed off to the east coast.

She and daughter #2 and DN had so much fun, but I wasn’t jealous or anything.

Screen Shot 2019-02-10 at 12.16.50 PM.png

Indeed, the OM and I had our own good time at the Elegant Italian Dinner–so good, in fact, that we all forgot to take any pictures. Just one:

The wee babes, despite being tired and a bit cranky when they arrived, took right to the nursery and had a fine time playing and eating pizza with the other kids.

I read a lot of A Light in August by William Faulkner. Besides learning some new words (morganatic: “relating to or denoting a marriage in which neither the spouse of lower rank, nor any children, have any claim to the possessions or title of the spouse of higher rank”), I can see how this book published in 1932, added several stereotypes to our culture, evidenced profusely in other people’s books and movies ever after.

I worked on organizing our CDs and DVDs. I hemmed some pants.

I cleaned and puttered and tidied.

All in all, not an unproductive weekend.

I must also add my high fives for our she-ro Dolly Parton, who was honored as 2019 MusiCares Person Of The Year. The eight-time Grammy winner is the first artist from “the Nashville music community” (please) to be honored at the annual Grammy Week gala benefiting music people in need. Well, it’s about time those snobs did so, I’d say.

Have a great week!

*John Fogerty

4 Comments

January 19, 2018

Birthday girls

by chuckofish

Today is our mother’s birthday. She would have been 92! It seems impossible that she has been gone thirty years. Well, gone, but certainly not forgotten.

MCC and siblings.jpeg

“There is so little to remember of anyone – an anecdote, a conversation at a table. But every memory is turned over and over again, every word, however chance, written in the heart in the hope that memory will fulfill itself, and become flesh, and that the wanderers will find a way home, and the perished, whose lack we always feel, will step through the door finally and stroke our hair with dreaming habitual fondness not having meant to keep us waiting long.”

–Marilynne Robinson, Housekeeping

This year I will turn the age our mother was when she died. It is a strange feeling.

I believe in life, which one day each of us shall lose. When we are young we think we won’t, that we are different. As a child I thought that I would never grow up, that I could will it so. And then I realized, quite recently, that I had crossed some line, unconsciously cloaked in the truth of my chronology. How did we get so damn old?

–Patti Smith, M Train

Yes, indeed, how did we get so damn old?

I leaned forward with my elbows on my knees and her book in my hands. Like a lot of things in my life, I’d just about worn it out, but it was worn out with love, and that’s the best kind of worn-out there is. Maybe we’re like all those used cars, broken hand tools, articles of old clothing, scratched record albums, and dog-eared books. Maybe there really isn’t any such thing as mortality; that life simply wears us out with love.

–Craig Johnson, Kindness Goes Unpunished

Well, I didn’t mean to get all serious, but, you know, sometimes we do.

P.S. Big congratulations to our other birthday girl Dolly Parton,
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who was recognized in the Guinness World Records 2018 edition for earning the records for most decades with a Top 20 hit on the US Country Songs chart as well as most hits on the U.S. Hot Country Songs chart by a female artist. You go, girl!

Hey, it’s Friday! Have a good weekend!

5 Comments

April 25, 2017

“Tell them I came, and no one answered, That I kept my word”

by chuckofish

The Listeners

by Walter de la Mare

“Is there anybody there?” said the Traveller,
Knocking on the moonlit door;
And his horse in the silence champed the grass
Of the forest’s ferny floor;
And a bird flew up out of the turret,
Above the Traveller’s head:
And he smote upon the door again a second time;
“Is there anybody there?” he said.
But no one descended to the Traveller;
No head from the leaf-fringed sill
Leaned over and looked into his grey eyes,
Where he stood perplexed and still.
But only a host of phantom listeners
That dwelt in the lone house then
Stood listening in the quiet of the moonlight
To that voice from the world of men:
Stood thronging the faint moonbeams on the dark stair,
That goes down to the empty hall,
Hearkening in an air stirred and shaken
By the lonely Traveller’s call.
And he felt in his heart their strangeness,
Their stillness answering his cry,
While his horse moved, cropping the dark turf,
‘Neath the starred and leafy sky;
For he suddenly smote on the door, even
Louder, and lifted his head:—
“Tell them I came, and no one answered,
That I kept my word,” he said.
Never the least stir made the listeners,
Though every word he spake
Fell echoing through the shadowiness of the still house
From the one man left awake:
Ay, they heard his foot upon the stirrup,
And the sound of iron on stone,
And how the silence surged softly backward,
When the plunging hoofs were gone.

Remember this poem? It was written by Walter de la Mare (April 25, 1873 – June 22, 1956), English poet, short story writer and novelist, and today is his birthday.

Let’s toast him tonight, along with Sandy Gallin who died over the weekend. He was one of those wildly successful agents/managers in Hollywood, but one who never seemed to have cheated or stolen from anyone. The fact that he was a great friend and partner of Dolly Parton–who does not suffer fools gladly–says a lot.

They co-produced Buffy the Vampire Slayer you know. Anyway, his obit in the New York Times is pretty interesting, albeit terribly written. Into paradise may the angels lead thee, Sandy.

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December 6, 2016

An honor just to have them on your shelves

by chuckofish

Books are to read, but that is by no means the end of it.

The way they are bound, the paper they are printed on, the smell of them (especially if they are either very new or very old), the way the words are fitted to the page, the look of them in the bookcase — sometimes lined up straight as West Point cadets, sometimes leaning against each other for support or lying flat so you have to tip your head sideways to see them properly. Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation, the plays of Beaumont and Fletcher, the Pleiade edition of Saint Simon, Chesterfield’s letters, the Qur’an. Even though you suspect you will probably never get around to them, it is an honor just to have them on your shelves.

Something of what they contains gets into the air you breathe. They are like money in the bank, which is a comfort even though you never spend it. They are prepared to give you all they’ve got at a moment’s notice, but are in no special hurry about it. In the meanwhile they are holding their tongues, even the most loquacious of them, even the most passionate.

They are giving you their eloquent and inexhaustible silence. They are giving you time to find your way to them. Maybe they are giving you time, with or without them, just to find your way.

–Frederick Buechner