The Tale of Two Cities

Our tiny temp home seems better and better the closer we get to the end of our lease which is up at the end of September. It's been an okay place to stay for twelve months, unless you ask our three huge dogs who have been in dog prison in a tiny back yard after roaming free in the huge back yard spa we previously had with a four bedroom, tri level house to lounge around in.

I think they're still mad about it. Now they are imprisoned in a pen and forced to watch ducks and cranes in the retention pond thirty feet away over the fence.

Our life has suddenly turned into my very own "Tale of Two Cities."  One I still one dearly and one I'm trying to love.

This past Mother's Day weekend I treated myself to the present of spending three days and nights in the one I love dearly. Massey and I drove up Friday and arrived around six.

It was hands down, one Mother of a Day!

It started with spending the first night with my sister at her house in Senoia. It's the most beautiful place ever.

She cooked a Low Country Boil with fresh shrimp we brought from Florida. It was a wonderful night filled with much love and laughter.

My sister lives in a well over century old farmhouse, complete with a smoke house, block house, barn with a hay loft, Koi pond, huge vegetable garden and flowers every where you look.

Bonus points, my Lost Boy came by after work to join us.

I never knew you could miss someone so much who used to get on your nerves so bad...but I surely do.



Massey and I went the next day to her best friend's graduation party, and spent a few hours there.

I know this move has been hard on me but has been extremely hard for Massey. She has no friends here. She's finishing her last semester of college online so doesn't have the advantage of socializing with other students or any way of making friends.

Here's how lucky I am.

She hasn't complained even once but instead, has helped me when I complained. I would have never made it down here without her and will be eternally grateful for her love and constant support.

After the graduation party, we packed up and headed to my old favorite (airport) manager's house to spend the night with him and his partner to meet the two pups (Boxer/Hound mix) they recently rescued.

I'm thinking the first wine cork popped about five minutes after we got there. The popping rarely stopped the entire visit.

It was an awesome visit with an over abundance of hospitality.

Massey and I loaded up late Sunday afternoon and headed back to my sister's house. We spent another night there, chatting late into the night with my sister and her husband.

Massey got up early, had breakfast with her graduated bestie and hung out together for a few hours.

At noon, we all met up at Mother's Kitchen for one last meal together before heading back to the city I'm trying to love.

It's my absolute favorite restaurant. It's down an alley, with no sign or marked entrance. You walk through the two screen doors and are immediately greeted by everyone.

She even made the cover of the county magazine.

The menu changes every day but is always fresh, homemade and served up by Mama herself. She is in the kitchen at the stove and hollers out from the back, "Who's next" then you verbally place your order back to her.

Then you go sit down and quickly your plate is delivered, piping hot from her stove top.

My sister was there, with her son. Massey met us there with her graduated bestie. My Lost Boy was there (Mother absolutely loves Zachary) and my former manager even drove down from Kennesaw to have lunch with us.

There is nothing better than sitting down to a meal prepared with love.

Massey's art teacher from high school did this portrait of Mother which is in the tiny dining room.

We got our Eat On.

Since my former manager had driven all the way from Kennesaw to eat with us, decided to take him to the stomping grounds of The Walking Dead set... aka Senoia. He's a huge fan, just like me and thought he may like seeing the actual set of "Alexandria" from a pretty short distance.

It was so much fun. It was hot as a firecracker that day but well worth the sweating. If you're a TWD fan, is an awesome experience.

After the TWD creeping we all split ways. He headed back to Kennesaw and we headed back to my sister's to pack up and leave for Orlando.

My Lost Boy went with us to creep on the Zombies and dropped him off on our way back to O Town after packing up.

That was a hard  to take goodbye.

But I'm happy he has survived on his own, never thought he would... but did.

I miss him, I miss my sister and I miss my home.

It was an awesome weekend with so many people who I love, and always will.

I guess, suppose and hope they all feel the same way about me.

We're In Florida to stay. It's a fact.

I love the weather and sun; it's where I've always wanted to live. I just never knew how much I would miss home.

Truly a Tale of Two Cities.

 

Bam!!!


Til next time..COTTON

Unimaginable

Back in the day, I worked for Western Sizzler. It was really LongHorn but after they fired me for giving my daughter a cup of ice cream (without ringing it up) when she and friends had spent over fifty bucks on lunch and they knew my husband was out of work as well, swore to never mention or go their establishment again.

I haven't eaten there since and most probably never will, but met some pretty awesome peeps in the thirteen years I was employed there.

There were two young girls, who were servers that I especially felt close to. The girl on the right in the above photo had lost her mom to cancer around the same age I was when my own mother died. She's smarter than smart and sweeter than sweet. All these years later are still friends. She put herself through Georgia Tech and currently is employed with them, while also working on her Doctorate.

The girl on the left was originally good friends with my oldest son, TJ first (who worked there as well) but quickly also became my friend.

She is also smart as a whip but totally whimsical as well. I'll never forget the time she told me about the unicorn in her back yard...and was drop dead serious.

You have to love someone who believes in unicorns.

She's also done very well for herself, working for CSX. Last year her father was diagnosed with brain cancer and the battle has been fast and furious, for him and his family.

I know all too well about losing a parent; I've lost both of mine.

In hindsight was extremely blessed when they passed. My mother went from shopping with me and my sister for school clothes one second to being dead in thirty more.

My father lived to the ripe old age of seventy seven and went from feeling kind of "Yucky" one day with seemingly some cold or virus to being taken off life support ten days later from what we found out was West Nile Virus.

Those ten days with our Diddy in the hospital felt like a decade to us, but it wasn't.

It was ten days for me and my two sibs to bond, remember, laugh and sometimes cry.


It was all God's Plan...it always is.


We were lucky in the respect that God took our parents quickly.

My heart is breaking for Frazier. Am hoping for the best for her dad, and her family. If Jimmy Carter beat it, so can he.

So I was finishing up this blog in our bedroom as Ole Jed (Tim) was going to bed. I turned around and asked him what song most conveyed the message of hope and love?

Can you believe it?

He nailed  it.

I know Frazier's dad has quite the uphill battle. That's why am asking for furious prayer warriors.

People did it for me when I needed it and people should do it now for my friend as well.

"There but by The Grace Of God go any one of us."

Help a sister out.

Prayer is a mighty tool and think is stronger than the Internet.

Til next time...a praying COTTON