True South

Christmas Stream of Consciousness

It’s a wrap

By Susan S. Kelly

Curse people who send early Christmas cards. Go to attic to find Christmas card basket. Create Christmas card list Excel sheet. Begin Shutterfly Christmas card process with family photo with attendant start-overs. Hit “submit.” Hit “submit.” Hit “submit.” Curse Shutterfly and start emailing people to find out new addresses instead. Wrap a present. Begin debating Christmas Eve dinner. Shrimp and grits? But we have grits at breakfast. Ribs? But getting sauce out of linen napkins is impossible. Switch to red napkins instead of white for Christmas Eve dinner. Debate polishing silver. Reflect upon idiocy of having scheduled various doctor appointments in December. Buy Christmas stamps. Create Christmas gift Excel sheet. Ask sister for the hundredth time what our in-law spending limit is. Ask sister what our spouse spending limit is. Ask sister what our niece and nephew spending limit is. Vow for the hundredth time not to do this next year. Wrap a present. While in Lowe’s, debate buying mace spray for daughters-in-laws’ Christmas stocking. Reject idea. Unfold a dozen tablecloths to try to find the ones that fit card table, table for six, and table for eight. Vow to organize linens in January. Debate polishing silver. Make stack for Christmas cards that need a handwritten note along with printed greeting. Make stack of envelopes you didn’t send cards to that you will if you have any left over. Wrap a present. Check cotton twine for tying tenderloin tail. Check Worcestershire bottle level for seasoning tenderloin. Check bourbon and cognac and rum levels for eggnog. See if mini blowtorch gun has enough ammo to make crème brûlée. Create Christmas food Excel sheet. Begin grocery list. Iron leftover usable ribbons. Wish for the hundredth year you had decent to/from gift tags. Wish for the hundredth time you hadn’t bought the cheap wrapping paper at TJ Maxx. Get out empty boxes. Try, for the 33rd year, to figure out lengths of expensive ribbon so that there’s enough to tie a bow at the top of the box. For the 33rd year, fail. Bring Christmas placemats downstairs. Bring all Christmas china downstairs. Take regular china upstairs, stash under beds, and hope you remember where you put it. Empty sugar into Christmas china sugar bowl. Empty salt and pepper shakers into Christmas salt and pepper shakers. Wrap a present. Debate polishing silver. Hand-address Christmas card envelopes, insert card, stamp with return address, affix postage, lick. Repeat 130 times. Feel unattractively smug and superior for hand-addressing all Christmas cards. Begin pile for Christmas cards from people you hadn’t intended to send one. Search stores for candles with Christmassy scent to disguise ongoing terror of old-person-house smell. Discover Christmassy is a word. My computer recognizes it. Who knew? Take off exercise clothes, put on makeup, and hit the stores. Buy more Red Wine Out spray. Buy ZingZang for bloodies before it sells out. Search four different grocery stores for Nabisco Famous Chocolate Wafers. While in Bed, Bath & Beyond, debate buying silver polish and Goof Off for daughter-in-laws’ stocking stuffers. Reject idea. Debate other possibly fun but likely worthless stocking stuffers. Hardboiled egg slicer? Do they still like Big League Chew? Scout possible magnolias in public parks to steal for decorations. Realize the gold-and-black Christmas ornament you bought for a Wake Forest fan is actually an Appalachian State Yosef, not a Demon Deacon. Wrap it anyway and decide to fake surprise on Christmas morning. Wrap a present. Reshape wired wreath bow that’s been dangling from a clothes hanger in the attic. Wonder if this will be the year you finally fall down the attic steps and break your neck getting down the decorations. Put “day to get tree” on husband’s calendar. Move furniture upstairs to make room for tree. Find plastic sheet so overfilling tree stand doesn’t ruin carpet. Again. Go to tree lot for wreath and discover it doesn’t open until 10. Return to tree lot later the same day. Wrap a present. Lay fire. Wrap a present. Undertake too many things in one day and realize there’s nothing for supper. Run out of Christmas stamps and do not care that you’re using flags or the self-stick freebies from the Salvation Army for return addresses because the stamp pad gave up the ghost. Blow dust off crystal goblets. Change white soap in powder room to something vaguely green. Wrap a present. Go to four different grocery stores searching for “superfine sugar” for eggnog recipe. Create what-to-wear-to-which-thing-when Excel sheet. Ignore sister’s suggestion to download some app called “Calm.” Drive around and drive around and drive around hunting for this year’s location of pop-up Dewey’s bakery store for Moravian Sugar Cake. Debate polishing silver. Scrounge around looking for bent, folded nameplates for tables from previous years because you worked so hard on the calligraphy. Reflect on irony of having to save all the homemade gift treats for Christmas Eve and day, knowing there will be leftovers just when you’ve decided to try and not gorge anymore. Schedule manicure. Cancel appontment upon realization that manicure will be ruined polishing silver. On December 21, pitch all Excel lists because you don’t care anymore and what’s going to happen is going to happen. Begin New Year’s resolution list with Learn How to Use Excel.Wrap a present. PS

Susan S. Kelly is a blithe spirit, author of several novels, and a proud grandmother.

The Ornament & the Bell

A lost son, a missing mother and how their wish of finding each other came true

By Jim Moriarty

“Did you look for me at 23andMe?”

Click. That’s all there was. The voice was uncertain, the accent German. John Gessner had just finished a photo assignment. A beautiful house, a farm, some dogs. Pictures of a good life. He sat in his car and listened on his cellphone. Then he listened again. It was the voice of someone he’d been looking for almost from the day he learned she existed. It took 15 minutes to hit a call back button, compressing 55 years into the first words a mother and son ever shared. And they talked. And they talked. And the years melted away.

Gessner was born on the last day of January in 1963 at Misericordia Hospital in the Bronx, New York. After shuttling through a series of families, he was adopted before his second birthday by Fred and Stella Gessner. When he was 10, his adopted mother was diagnosed with cancer. The prognosis was dire.

He learned he was adopted when one of his aunts showed him the family Bible. “I started thinking about her,” he says of his birth mother, “kind of like an escape hatch, almost. Self-preservation. When you’re 10 you need a mother. Well, there’s this other person out there.”

As it turns out, Stella Gessner lived for another 10 years, a few months longer, in fact, than her husband. John’s adopted father was killed in a car accident by a drunk driver when John was 20.

“Back in ’94 after my mother died, I wrote to the adoption agency,” Gessner says. The agency was the Catholic Home Bureau, and the details it supplied about his birth mother were opaque, at best. “In New York all the records are sealed. They gave me this non-identifying information which basically said she was from Germany, here on a work visa, and she had no means to take care of me. I signed up (with the agency) that if she ever contacted them and said she was looking for me, then they’d connect us.”

Gessner consulted lawyers, too. “They said it’s incredibly expensive and there’s no guarantee.” It seemed like a dead end.

Adelheid “Heidi” Koob sailed to America aboard the Berlin, arriving on the 21st of May, 1961. She was coming to visit her own mother, who had left war-ravaged Germany at the end of the Second World War, intent on beginning a new life. “My mother and her three new daughters and her new husband picked me up in New York,” says Heidi, now 80 and married to Arthur Strelick, a retired member of the U.S. diplomatic corps. The “new” family drove south to their home in Fort Lee, Virginia. “After 14 or 15 years, seeing her again was not the same. Something broke away. Where was she when I was sick? Where was she when I went to school? She was not there.”

Heidi, who at 21 was already experienced managing hotels, didn’t want to stay in Virginia with her mother. She wanted to go back to New York. Then, one Saturday night on a date in Fort Lee, “I had a Coca-Cola and then I woke up the next day and I don’t know what happened.” She packed her suitcase and took a bus to New York. “Then I found out I was pregnant.”

The information Gessner obtained from the adoption agency shined as little light on his biological father as it had his mother. “He was in the military and he already had a family,” he says.

In New York, things went from murky to mysterious. Heidi, whose English skills were in the formative stage, got a job working at the Waldorf Astoria. As the time for her delivery approached, a friend at the Swedish embassy told her to go to Misericordia and advised her to pay cash. She delivered a 10-pound, 4-ounce baby at around 1:30 in the morning on Jan. 31. She had him baptized Karl Leo Koob in the hospital chapel on Feb. 2. She wouldn’t see him again for 55 years.

“They said I was sick and had to stay in the hospital,” Gessner says. The young mother left the baby.

“When I came back, they ask me for paper,” says Heidi. “I said, ‘What paper?’ Birth certificate. I don’t have any documents. ‘Did you register?’ I said, ‘No, I paid cash.’ That was it. There was no baby.”

For months, the new mother frantically tried to find her son. Finally, in June of ’63, she went back to Germany and the months of searching turned into years. She was looking for Karl Leo Koob, but Karl Leo Koob was about to become John Gessner.

She met Arthur Strelick, who attended Penn State University and worked for Pittsburgh Steel and NASA before joining the diplomatic corps, when he was a vice consul in Munich. In ’68 Heidi moved to Canada, using it as a base to hunt for her missing son. In 1969, Arthur proposed. As an alien attempting to wed a U.S. diplomat, Heidi was investigated by the FBI and the CIA. She told them everything, but there was no evidence of a child. Arthur was assigned to Sri Lanka, and they were married in ’69. Even he doubted his wife’s story.

Their postings included Vietnam — Gessner’s half-sister, also named Heidi, was born in September of ’74 — then Norway and Egypt. After Cairo, they were in India for two years, then Malta. Heidi, their daughter, was showing great promise as a dancer, eventually having a 14-year career with the ballet company in Ulm, Germany. She now teaches dance at Adelphi University in Garden City, New York.

At every posting, Heidi Strelick, the mother, paid particular attention to the children, to the orphanages. Buddhist. Catholic. It didn’t matter. She gave them food. She gave them clothes. “I think I carried a guilt with me,” she says, “to make me so strong to take care of lost children, adopted children.”

After Malta, the Strelicks were in Brazil. After Brazil it was Bonn, Germany. After Bonn it was Suriname. “We visit the Indians,” says Gessner’s mother. “I took hundreds of pictures of the Indians. I show it to them. They cried. They did like a cat. They turned it around, like a cat looks behind the mirror. I took pictures of their babies. They give me some gifts and I want to pay them. No, they want my flip-flops. The Hollander, they come to Suriname to paint. The color, light, people. It is heaven for artists.”

Next was Athens, Greece. Then back to America and, eventually, retirement. Gessner’s mother became a collector of antique jewelry. Arthur joined her in the pursuit, specializing in Russian watches. Then came 23andMe and its DNA match.

“I get a message around the end of September,” says Heidi. “Really strange. How tall is your father? How tall is your mother? How tall are you? How much do you weigh? What color are your eyes? On the 6th of October, it says you have three messages. I go in there. I fainted. It’s all red, from the top to the bottom. All red. I clicked further. ‘I’m your son. I’ve been looking for you all my life.’ I didn’t answer right away. You get hot and cold.”

John Gessner, son, and Heidi Strelick, mother, investigated one another online. “It took me about a month. A lot of sleepless nights,” says Gessner. “I put my website in there. I just wanted her to know that it wasn’t a scam. I wanted her to know that I was a good person. That’s all I really ever expected.”

After Gessner returned that first call from a parking lot, they spoke on the phone every day, often for an hour or two at a time. John went to the Strelicks’ home in Delaware for Christmas and returned in January for his birthday — the second one they’d spent together.

“How does it feel? I cannot describe it,” says his mother. “I cannot write it. It’s in here.” She puts her hand on her chest. “All my life, taking care of babies, taking care of children and I prayed. And I’m still alive and I see the life I’ve given. I got my son. I don’t need much more anymore. I see him alive and healthy.”

Gessner fashioned a Christmas ornament, the gooey kind you bake in an oven, and every year he’d put it on his tree and make a wish that somehow he would find his mother. In far-flung corners of the globe, his mother did the same, hanging a tiny bell given to her by her father, making the same wish, that she would find the son she’d lost. After their first Christmas together, the silver bell fell off the tree and broke. It didn’t need repair. The mending had been done.  PS

Jim Moriarty is the senior editor at PineStraw and can be reached at jjmpinestraw@gmail.com.

Drinking with Writers

The Long Road to Overnight Success

From poet to publisher, Emily Smith makes her mark with Lookout Books

By Wiley Cash   •   Photographs by Mallory Cash

I first met Emily Smith in September 2010 at the annual conference of the Southern Independent Booksellers’ Alliance in Charleston, South Carolina. She was there with a Spartanburg publisher called Hub City Books, which was releasing a poetry collection by Ron Rash. Emily had designed the collection’s cover. A year later, I saw Emily again, but this time I saw her photograph online: She was attending an awards dinner in New York City, where a book she had published was a finalist for the National Book Award in fiction. A lot had happened in the intervening year.

The book Emily had published was Binocular Vision: New and Selected Stories, by Edith Pearlman, a short story writer in her 70s who had long been a favorite of the literati, while never breaking through to a larger, critical audience. Pearlman’s book was the first to be released by Lookout Books, a publishing imprint housed in the Publishing Laboratory inside the University of North Carolina Wilmington’s creative writing department. Emily, along with editor emeritus Ben George, published Pearlman’s book as Lookout’s first release. The book would go on to be nominated for a number of prizes, and it would later win the National Book Critics Circle Award. It was quite the debut for a small press. Publishers Weekly called it a “knockout start,” and Ron Charles of The Washington Post praised Lookout’s release as “one of the most auspicious publishing launches in history.”

There are centuries-old publishing houses in New York City that would kill for a single season’s title to receive the acclaim that Binocular Vision received, but there are simply too many bottles and not enough lightning. Or perhaps there is only one Emily Smith, and her journey from advertising executive to publisher of acclaimed books is perhaps as rare as the aforementioned glass-encased lightning.

In early November, Emily took a break from promoting the most recent Lookout title, This Is My Body: A Memoir of Religious and Romantic Obsession, by Cameron Dezen Hammon, to sit down with me over coffee at Social Coffee and Supply Co. on Wrightsville Avenue in Wilmington. It was a cool fall morning, and Emily and I found seats by the bright windows just inside the front door. Our conversation turned toward the first time we met in Charleston back in the fall of 2010.

“I’d gotten to know the folks at Hub City because I was their inaugural writer-in-residence,” she says. “I went there as a poet, but part of the residency had me working 20 hours per week for the press.”

“What were you doing before that?” I ask.

“I’d been a graduate student at UNC Wilmington,” she says, “and I’d worked in the Publishing Laboratory here, which I now run.”

But her experience in design and marketing, as well as her ability to network and build relationships, predates her time as a graduate student in Wilmington and writer-in-residence in Spartanburg. After finishing her undergraduate degree at Davidson, Emily spent several years in advertising at J. Walter Thompson in Atlanta. “We worked with big clients,” she says. “Ford Motor Company, 20th Century Fox, Domino’s Pizza. But I burned out. I knew it wasn’t what I wanted to do.”

She left Atlanta and returned to Davidson, where she worked in the Advancement office, forging relationships with alumni and the community, and raising money for the university. But something was steering her toward writing, and she enrolled as a poetry student in the MFA program at UNC Wilmington. After finishing her degree and serving as the writer-in-residence at Hub City in Spartanburg, she returned to Wilmington as the interim director of the Publishing Laboratory in 2007.

In her role as interim director, Emily found a distributor to ensure that the Publishing Lab’s titles were sold beyond the campus and outside of Wilmington. When a national search began for the permanent director, Emily decided to apply. “I thought, it would be silly not to try for this after doing this job for a year,” she says. She got the job and forged a dynamic partnership with Ben George, who at the time served as editor of Ecotone, the university’s national literary magazine. The two joined forces to found Lookout Books, which they envisioned as a literary imprint dedicated to publishing women, debut writers, and overlooked work by established authors.

“Ben came to UNCW with a reputation as a meticulous, thoughtful editor,” Emily says. “And I knew the other side of the business. I had an advertising and marketing background. I knew the design part from working at Hub City. I knew how to work as a small press and handle distribution.”

After the success of Edith Pearlman’s Binocular Vision, Lookout Books quickly garnered national attention, and the press has consistently delivered critically acclaimed and award-winning books by both established and debut authors.

I ask Emily about the press’s current release, This Is My Body, by Cameron Dezen Hammon. “It’s the story of someone who grew up culturally Jewish and then converted to evangelical Christianity post-9/11,” she says. “9/11 was a time in which everyone and everything felt spiritual, and Cameron was caught up in it. She converted and moved with her musician boyfriend to Houston, where they performed music at an evangelical church.” The longer she stayed in the church the more she found herself caught up in a misogynistic culture that limited her to a gender role that defined both her faith and spiritual talents. “It’s a story of seeking something and discovering something else,” Emily says.

I cannot help but think about Emily doing the same, setting out on a search that took her from advertising executive in Atlanta to graduate student in Wilmington to writer-in-residence in Spartanburg and back to Wilmington, where she would publish titles that would make Lookout Books an overnight literary sensation. PS

Wiley Cash lives in Wilmington with his wife and their two daughters. His latest novel, The Last Ballad, is available wherever books are sold.

Pleasures of Life

Great Discoveries

All happen in good time

By Scott Sheffield

It was December of 1956 and I was 9 years old, turning 10 three days after Christmas. My brother, Steve, was 7. My awareness of the world was just beginning to widen, and I asked my parents and my fourth-grade teacher a lot of questions about what I saw and heard. The questions led to revelations about many things, including a recently acquired knowledge about where my Christmas presents really came from. My brother still believed they came down the chimney.

My new knowledge was conferred upon me by my parents out of frustration from my continuous barrage of questions concerning the matter:

How does Santa get down the chimney? I looked up there and there isn’t enough room for someone that fat.

What if there’s a fire in the fireplace? Won’t he get burned?

How can he carry all the toys for everyone on one sleigh? Does he go back to the North Pole for more when he runs out?

How can he deliver all the toys in one night? Et cetera, et cetera.

My parents surrendered this new information reluctantly with the strict prohibition that I not tell my brother anything that might ruin his belief in the story that, only a short time before, I had shared. Of course, after basking in the glow of having my suspicions confirmed, the first thing I wanted to do was tell my brother everything I had just learned. But, it was also cool that I knew something he didn’t, and, that I shared this secret with Mom and Dad. It made me feel grown up.

I weighed the two options and decided not to say anything about it to my brother. The fact that a different decision most certainly would have carried consequences of an unpleasant nature probably also played a part. It was very difficult, though, not telling him something of such seismic impact.

In the latter days of December, after Christmas and my birthday, Dad took us all out to dinner at the local Howard Johnson’s. Next to McDonald’s, HoJo’s was our favorite place to go. The menu listed food that boys our age loved: chicken pot pies, hot dogs — especially hot dogs. We liked the way they called them “frankforts” and because the buns were exotically sliced open from the top, not from the side like the ones we always had at home. It was a treat to order one of those.

We walked into the restaurant and entered the glass-enclosed vestibule where the checkout counter stood. Dad asked the hostess for a table for four. Then, as the hostess left us to check on seating, he moved, suddenly, across the vestibule to stand by the front glass wall. It seemed strange that he would do that, but by the look on his face something must have alarmed him.

Trying hard not to alert anyone else, Dad stood there until the hostess came back to seat us. He motioned for us to go ahead, and once we were all through the door he followed us in.

Curious, I walked back through the door and looked around. I saw nothing unusual. I looked out through the windows on both sides and saw nothing unusual outside either. Then I noticed a magazine stand sitting in the corner where Dad had positioned himself. I walked over to it and saw that it held copies of the latest issue of The Saturday Evening Post. They were standing on end so they were easy to see, which was obviously the supplier’s objective. I leaned in closer.

On the cover of the magazine was a picture of a boy, about my brother’s age, clad in pajamas, standing in front of a chest of drawers. Wide-eyed, mouth agape, his expression was one of total surprise, if not shock. The bottom drawer of the chest was open, and the boy had apparently pulled some things out of it. In his left hand he held a red coat, and in his right, a white beard attached to a red cap trimmed in white fur. Exploring where he shouldn’t have been, this cover boy had made a discovery, and an unsettling one at that.

It all became clear to me. Dad had moved in front of that display to hide it from my brother! He was obviously concerned that Steve would see it and start questioning his belief the way I had but, in his case, much too early in the learning curve.

I hurried to catch up with the family and sat down. Steve and I had our frankforts, as usual, and drank the cream that came in the little glass vials with our parents’ coffee, as usual. When it was time to leave, I walked ahead of everyone and stationed myself in front of the magazine stand. When Dad came through the door, he looked over at me, gave me a smile and turned to pay the bill.

Steve, being only 7, might have noticed The Saturday Evening Post, or maybe he wouldn’t have. He may not have understood what he was seeing even if he had. But I thought at the time that what Dad did was neat. And, just as we shared the secret, I felt that I had shared the experience of sparing Steve from enduring this element of growing up a little too soon. In the fullness of time since that night, as I have become a parent and a grandparent, I appreciate that what Dad did was far beyond neat.

We never spoke about what took place that night, Dad and I, and I never told Steve about it. He probably doesn’t know to this day. He learned the truth about Santa right when he should have.  PS

Scott Sheffield moved to the Sandhills from Northern Virginia in 2004. He feels like a native but understands he can never be one.

Papadaddy’s Mindfield

The Chainsaw Saga

By Clyde Edgerton

I am groggy (after a nap) when, chainsaw in hand, I head for the small, dead tree in the yard adjoining our yard. My neighbor has asked me to cut it down — and I’m always looking for an excuse to use our trusty chainsaw. My youngest son, age 14, is with me. This is a good parent-child bonding opportunity. Had my daughter been around — same.

One thing I can teach my children is that old Boy Scout motto: Be Prepared. Gas and chain oil are nearby, as well as a spare chain. “See, I’m prepared,” I say to my son.

As we walk up to the tree, I set the toggle switch to “choke,” pull the crank cord, reset the toggle switch to normal, pull the cord again. “Wang-wang.” It’s running. Sweet.

My son points to the chainsaw. Covering the chainsaw bar and chain is a lightweight orange plastic sleeve — a safety cover. I’ve forgotten to remove it. I haven’t even seen it. The sleeve is there for a reason: The bare chain, with the engine off, is sharp enough cut you.

You are, of course, supposed to take that plastic cover off before cranking the engine, but being groggy from my nap, I’d been . . . well, groggy from my nap. I’d forgotten.

When I grab the sleeve to remove it, I do not realize that the engine is idling at a good clip and thus the chain is rotating rapidly. In less than a second, I pinch the plastic just enough for the rotating chain to 1) engage the sleeve; 2) cut through it and into my middle finger; and 3) shoot the plastic sleeve off the chain. It lands about 20 feet away.

I look at my finger, look away, and manage to quickly cut off the chainsaw and place it on the ground. I look at my finger again. The cut, just above that first joint, is deep, and jagged, and I see something white. The skin is kind of like a large flap, if you know what I mean. I am not prepared for this.

But while in pain — during this emergency — I’ll be a role model for my son. Isn’t there another part of the Boy Scout motto somewhere that says Be Brave or Be Calm or something like that?

My son walks over and I show him. Blood is flowing. Normally, I would be able to deliver a lecture: “Be prepared: thick gloves, removal of chain sleeve.”

But now that’s out the window, I’ll Be Brave and Calm. I’ll be a role model.

My wife is not at home, so my oldest son, 16, with a driver’s permit, will have to take me to Urgent Care or the Emergency Room. He calls Urgent Care. They are open. We will go there — and avoid a long wait, perhaps.

I’m in the car and my oldest son is driving. The youngest decided to sit out this next part. I’m holding my right hand up, my left providing towel pressure on that middle finger to stanch the bleeding.

“What happened?” he says.

I tell him.

He says, “Aren’t you supposed to . . . ”

“Yes,” I say.

We are at an intersection. “Which way?” he asks. I tell him.

We are at another intersection. “Which way?” he asks. I tell him.

This happens a few times.

We finally park and walk into the large Urgent Care waiting room. Ah! It’s empty! What luck. We walk over to the little window. The receptionist smiles, then sees blood. “Oh, my goodness,” she says. “Can I get your insurance card and an ID?”

With my good hand I reach for my billfold. Back
left pocket.

The pocket is empty.

“Forgot my billfold,” I say. I’m sure my smile doesn’t mask the deep pain in my eyes.  “Can I go get it after my finger is sewed up?” I ask. “My son has a permit only, and I’d have to ride back with him home to get my billfold. And then back here.”

“I’m sorry sir. We can’t treat you if we don’t have an ID and insurance information.”

We are at an intersection. “Which way?” he asks. I tell him.

“How could you forget your wallet?” he asks.

I don’t answer. Then I say, “It’s a billfold.”

“Not these days, Dad.” We are at an intersection. “Which way?” he asks.

“Straight ahead. Then right at the stop light.”

“I can’t believe you forgot your wallet,” he says.

Not only will I stay calm and brave, I will be humble.

I retrieve the billfold. When we get back to Urgent Care, six people sit in the waiting area — honest — with two standing at the window.

About a half-hour later, I’m in a room waiting for the doctor. My son is with me. I want him to see my calmness. The doctor comes and explains that getting stitches means you must lie down on the patient table, so that you can’t watch and faint. So OK. To deaden my finger before the stitches go in, the doctor will give me a couple of shots. It’s a very long needle. The very long needle will be inserted all the way into the joint on one side of my middle knuckle. I tell myself to stay calm. The needle goes in.

I scream. Then, “What the hell,” I say. That kind of pain has to be rare.

The needle is then inserted into the joint on the other side of my middle knuckle. I scream again.

In about 10 minutes six stitches go in. No pain.

As I prepare to return a couple of weeks later for stitches removal, I don’t ask my sons or daughter to go with me to the doctor for any role model stuff.

They’ve learned enough from Papadaddy.

Be prepared. Be brave. Be calm. PS

Clyde Edgerton is the author of 10 novels, a memoir and most recently, Papadaddy’s Book for New Fathers. He is the Thomas S. Kenan III Distinguished Professor of Creative Writing at UNCW.

Bookshelf December 2019

GREAT GIFT BOOKS

Biblio-Style: How We Live at Home with Books, by Nina Freudenberger

This is the book you might actually buy for yourself at Christmas. Freudenberger is an interior designer whose first coffee table book, Surf Shack, was a great success. She brings us fantastic homes of people surrounded by what they love, and this time it’s their books. The people and homes are an eclectic mix of booklovers — from writers, to a prince, to a fashion designer and everything in-between. She features bookstores, libraries and collections periodically throughout like little gifts. It’s a wonderful present for anyone who loves to read. 

On Flowers, by Amy Merrick

This lovely coffee table book is a treasure. Beautifully designed, it’s as fun to read for its transformative ability and its flower arranging tips as it is to look at. Written with a sense of whimsy and a slightly ’50s lilt, the book is peppered with cleverly titled lists, coupled with sweet paintings of flowers and beauty shots of arrangements. It’s the perfect gift for Southerners who love flowers and nature and find themselves living in the city, or anyone who enjoys flower arranging.

Half Baked Harvest Super Simple: More Than 125 Recipes for Instant, Overnight, Meal-Prepped, and Easy Comfort Foods, by Tieghan Gerard

This is a great cookbook. There are loads of pictures, and easily accessible recipes that are familiar, yet, somehow slightly new. Some recipes come with three different ways to cook it (slow cooker, pressure cooker or stovetop). Inventive dinners like browned sage butter chicken potpie or spiced lamb hummus (it can exist as an appetizer, too) accompany delightful breakfasts, side dishes and dessert options. A great gift for anyone who is cooking for a family, especially someone working on integrating pressure cooking into a busy lifestyle. 

Lush: A Season-by-Season Celebration of Craft Beer and Produce, by Jacquelyn Dodd

A celebration of fruit, vegetables and craft beer, this latest book from the author of The Craft Beer Cookbook features 80 produce-forward recipes, all made with seasonal craft beer. Ciara hop and basil pesto, Mexican street corn beer cakes with chipotle crema, and roasted cabbage wedges with feta-mustard beer vinaigrette are just three of the dazzling dishes. Recipes are measured both by cup and weight. A holiday favorite might be mushroom- and Gouda-stuffed barley wine onions. It is true that this book has no meat recipes. It is also true that you will be so captivated you might not notice. A gift for anyone who likes to be in the kitchen and is looking for new ideas, you might even include a pint or two.

Close to Birds: An Intimate Look at Our Feathered Friends, by Mats and Asa Ottosson, photographs by Roine Magnusson

Intimate photographs by Magnusson, an award-winning photographer and National Geographic contributor, capture the beauty and detail of each bird’s form, as well as their unique character and personality. The accompanying essays by the Ottossons share charming and often hidden details from birds’ lives. Discover why robins sing so early in the morning, and learn the science behind the magical iridescence of mallard feathers. A wonderful gift for your bird-watching aunt. 

The Envious Siblings and Other Morbid Nursery Rhymes, by Landis Blair

Heralding a brilliant new cartooning talent, Envious Siblings will captivate readers who have thrilled to the lurid fantasies of Roald Dahl, Quentin Blake, Charles Addams, Shel Silverstein and Tim Burton. Blair interweaves absurdist horror and humor into brief, rhyming vignettes at once transgressive and hilarious. In Blair’s surreal universe, a lost child watches as bewhiskered monsters gobble up her fellow train passengers; a band of kids merrily plays a gut-churning game with playground toys; and two sisters, grinning madly, tear each other apart. These charmingly perverse creations take ordinary settings — a living room, a subway car, a playground — and spin them in a nightmarish direction. For the brother or sister you never buy a present for.

50 Things that Aren’t My Fault: Essays from the Grown-up Years, by Cathy Guisewite

From the creator of the iconic “Cathy” comic strip comes her first collection of funny, wise, poignant, and incredibly honest essays about being a woman in what she lovingly calls “the panini generation.” Guisewite found her way into the hearts of readers more than 40 years ago, and has been there ever since. Her hilarious and deeply relatable look at the challenges of womanhood in a changing world became a cultural touchstone for women everywhere. Now Guisewite returns with her signature wit and warmth in this debut essay collection about another time of big transition, when everything starts changing and disappearing without permission — aging parents, aging children, aging self stuck in the middle. For the woman who read Cathy aloud every morning from the paper or has cut at least one of her comics out. 

Why Don’t You Write My Eulogy Now So I Can Correct It, by Patricia Marx

Marx, a New Yorker writer, has never been able to get her mother’s one-line witticisms out of her brain, so she’s collected them in a book, accompanied by full color illustrations by New Yorker staff cartoonist Roz Chast. These snappy maternal cautions include: If you feel guilty about throwing away leftovers, put them in the back of your refrigerator for five days and then throw them out; if you run out of food at your dinner party, the world will end; when traveling, call the hotel from the airport to say there aren’t enough towels in your room and, by the way, you’d like a room with a better view. Why Don’t You Write My Eulogy Now is a perfect gift for Mom! 

Surf Like a Girl, by Carolina Amell

This coffee table book is a collection of photographs and interviews with 30 girl surfers from all over the world. Perfect for surfing enthusiasts, this unique compilation of stunning pictures and hard-won wisdom proves that the thrill of catching a wave, riding it, and kicking out belongs to everyone.

CHILDREN’S BOOKS

Ho Ho Homework, by Mylisa Larsen

Everyone wonders just what Santa does the 364 days a year he isn’t in the spotlight, and Jack wonders if he just might have found out when the substitute teacher eats reindeer cookies, knits stockings and teaches the class how to make snowflakes. A fun new look at Old Saint Nick, Ho Ho Homework is sure to be a hit this holiday season. (Ages 3-6.)

If I Could Give You Christmas, by Lynn Plourde

Pops of red on green, the taste of the very first snowflake, choruses of chirping carolers . . . the gifts of Christmas that mean the very most are the things that just can’t be wrapped up in a box. This fun read-together title features delightful illustrations of animals found in the author’s home state of Maine and is a wonderful celebration of the natural world at Christmastime. (Ages 3-6.)

Bear is Awake: An Alphabet Story, by Hannah Harrison

Absolutely adorable, this unique alphabet book tells a beautiful story of friendship, kindness and the value of research with a text simple enough for the youngest reader yet rich enough for a family read-together. An absolute must-have for holiday giving. (Ages 3-6.)

Saving Fable, by Scott Reintgen

Indira has been a character-in-waiting all her life when she’s finally chosen to attend the great Protagonist Preparatory in Fable, a school known for producing heroes. Or at least that is the way it is suppose to go. But after a failed audition, Indira discovers an evil protagonist might be to blame. Fable is under siege and everything she believes in is under threat. Can a side character save the day? Readers of The Land of Stories and the Inkheart Trilogy will find themselves drawn in to this exciting new series. (Ages 9-13.)

Legacy, by Shannon Messenger

It has been a long time since a series has come along with such a rapidly growing dedicated fan base as the Keepers of Lost Cities series. Messenger’s unique blend of fun and fantasy have young readers literally jumping up and down and hugging each new book. Readers will be waiting at the door the day Legacy arrives. (Ages 10-14.)  PS

Compiled by Kimberly Daniels Taws and Angie Tally

The Omnivorous Reader

Fight the Good Fight and Keep the Faith

The political saga of a father and son

By D.G. Martin

Anyone who wants to master North Carolina political history must try to understand how Kerr Scott, elected North Carolina’s governor in 1948, could be both a liberal and a segregationist. Two books that can help are The Political Career of W. Kerr Scott: The Squire from Haw River, by retired University of Florida professor Julian Pleasants; and The Rise and Fall of the Branchhead Boys, by former News & Observer political reporter and columnist Rob Christensen.

Pleasants chronicles the exceptional life of Kerr Scott, who was governor from 1949 until 1953 and U.S. senator from 1954 until his death in 1958. 

Scott, a dairy farmer from Alamance County, won election as commissioner of agriculture in 1936. In 1948, after using that office as a launching pad, he resigned and mounted a campaign for governor. He beat the favored candidate of the conservative wing of the party in the Democratic primary, which in those days was tantamount to election.

Once in office, Scott pushed programs of road paving, public school improvement and expansion of government services. Hard-working and hard-headed, plain and direct spoken, he appointed women and African-Americans to government positions.

Future governors Terry Sanford and Jim Hunt were inspired by his success. Hunt said, “If not for Kerr Scott I would never have run for governor. My family viewed Scott as our political savior . . . He improved our roads, our schools, and our health care.”

Scott’s commitment to common people, fair treatment for African-Americans, skepticism and antagonism toward banks, utilities and big business, and a pro-labor platform earned him a liberal reputation that was praised in the national media. In 1949, he appointed Frank Porter Graham, the popular and liberal president of the University of North Carolina, to fill a vacant seat in U.S. Senate. When Graham lost to conservative Willis Smith in the next election, Scott resolved to run against Smith in 1954 to avenge Graham’s loss and reassert the power of the liberal wing of the party. When Smith died in office and Governor William Umstead appointed Alton Lennon, a conservative, to the seat, Scott ran against him in 1954 and won.

In the Senate, his liberalism did not extend to racial desegregation. He joined with other Southerners in Congress to fight against civil rights legislation. He signed the infamous 1956 Southern Manifesto, which urged resistance to the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education decision requiring the elimination of school segregation. 

Scott died in office in 1958, leaving open the question of whether he would have won re-election in 1960.

Missing from Pleasants’ excellent book is the story of the entire Scott family and its role in North Carolina political life. Christensen takes up that task. He follows the Alamance County farm family beginning with Kerr Scott’s grandfather, Henderson, and his father, “Farmer Bob.” Both were active in statewide farmers’ organizations.

Christensen’s important contribution to the Scott family saga is his account of the political career of Kerr’s son, Bob. Born in 1929, Bob grew up on Kerr’s dairy farm. Like his father, he became active in farm organizations and worked in political campaigns, including Terry Sanford’s 1960 successful race for governor. By 1964, at age 35, he was ready to mount a statewide campaign for lieutenant governor. But two senior Democrats, state Sen. John Jordan and House Speaker Clifton Blue, were already running. Christensen writes, “In some ways Scott had broken into the line.”

Nevertheless, with the help of powerful county political machines, he won a squeaker victory in a primary runoff over Blue. 

Bob Scott used his new office to run for the next one, giving hundreds of speeches each year, and he won the 1968 Democratic nomination over conservative Mel Broughton and African-American dentist Reginald Hawkins.

The results of the 1968 presidential contest in North Carolina marked what Christensen calls “the breakup of the Democratic Party.” Richard Nixon won; George Wallace was second; and Hubert Humphrey was third. Nevertheless, in the governor’s race, Scott faced and beat Republican Jim Gardner. 

Mountains of bitter controversies in the areas of race, labor, student unrest and higher education administration were to confront Bob Scott after he became governor of North Carolina in 1969. As governor, Scott followed his father’s tradition of inviting friends to “possum dinners” with the main possum course accompanied with “barbecued spareribs, black-eyed peas, collard greens, bean soup with pig tails, corn bread, and persimmon pudding.”

Christensen writes, “Scott may not have been the populist of his father, but he brought a common-man approach to Raleigh.”

But times had changed. College campuses were erupting. Black anger was spilling into the streets. Historian Martha Blondi wrote that 1969 marked the “high water mark of the black student movement.” Christensen writes, “During his first six months in office, Scott called out the National Guard nine times to deal with civil unrest.”

In March, he sent more than 100 highway patrolmen to Chapel Hill to break a food worker strike and force the reopening of the student cafeteria, overruling the actions of UNC’s president, William Friday, and the chancellor, Carlyle Sitterson. This action and similar strong measures against student-led disorders earned Scott praise by television commentator Jesse Helms and many others in the white community, “but he got different reviews from the black community.” 

Although he appointed the first black District and Superior Court judges, his pace of minority hiring and appointments was roundly criticized.

Increased desegregation of public schools resulted in more disruption. Speaking about the 1971–72 school year, Scott said, “Many schools were plagued by unrest, tension, hostility, fear, disturbances, disruptions, hooliganisms, violence and destruction.”

In response to disturbances relating to school desegregation in 1971, Scott sent highway patrolmen and National Guard troops to Wilmington. Conflict there led to arrests, trials and prison sentences for the group of protesters who became known as the Wilmington Ten.

Bob Scott’s stormy relations with President Friday continued as Scott “decided to undertake the reorganization of higher education as his political swansong.” His proposal to bring all 16 four-year institutions under one 32-person board was adopted by the legislature. Scott expected the new organization would eliminate or minimize Friday’s role. But Friday became president of the reorganized 16-campus system and led it until 1986.

Summing up Bob Scott’s time in office, Christensen writes that his legacy is “far murkier” than his father’s, in part because the state was “less rural, less poor, more Republican, and more torn by societal dissent, whether civil rights, Vietnam, or the counterculture.”

Both Terry Sanford and Jim Hunt acknowledged their connection to Kerr Scott. But Bob Scott never bonded with either of them. The breach with Hunt became a public battle when Bob Scott challenged the incumbent Gov. Hunt in the 1980 Democratic primary. Scott was angry because Hunt had not supported his ambition to be appointed president of the community college system. Scott lost the primary to Hunt by a humiliating 70–29 percent margin.

Ironically, in 1983, when the community college presidency opened up again, Bob Scott won the job and served with distinction until his retirement in 1995.

Bob Scott died in 2009 and was buried at the Hawfields Presbyterian Church near the graves of his father and grandfather. Kerr Scott’s tombstone reads, “I Have Fought a Good Fight . . . I Have Kept the Faith.” Bob’s reads, “He Also Fought a Good Fight and Kept the Faith.” PS

D.G. Martin hosts North Carolina Bookwatch Sunday at 11 a.m. and Tuesday at 5 p.m. on UNC-TV. The program also airs on the North Carolina Channel Tuesday at 8 p.m. To view prior programs go to http://video.unctv.org/show/nc-bookwatch/episodes/.

In the Spirit

That’s What She Said

Small but enjoyable gifts for the holiday season

By Tony Cross

I’m a huge procrastinator this time of the year. Don’t get me wrong, I do pretty well in the gift-giving department. I try to be thoughtful, and probably spend a little beyond my means. But my gifts are dope. At least that’s what my ego says. My family and friends — you’ll have to ask them. Those who are at the bottom of the totem pole on my list of recipients (they actually appear in the “Should I?” column) are the ones that usually end up getting shafted.

Honest to goodness, it’s not because I shrug my shoulders and say, “Oh, well . . . ” but because I’ve always felt kind of silly giving gifts that have zero significance — you know, the stuff you grab in the aisle at any department/grocery store while you’re waiting in line to cash out. So, without further ado, here are a few ideas that I, personally, will be putting into practice this Christmas season, written down so I won’t forget what to buy. Yes, I am that lazy.

InStill Distilling Co. White Rum

I first met Leigh and Eric over the summer when we collaborated at an event in Pinehurst. I was pouring draft mojitos, and they donated their rum. Let’s just say that the keg blew fast, and people were upset that I didn’t bring more. Clayton, North Carolina’s first distillery (legal distillery, that is), is showcasing its rum. There’s a general misconception about rum — most folks think of Captain Morgan or Malibu when the spirit is mentioned. Nonsense. Local, and veteran owned, this white rum is fantastic for daiquiris and my carbonated mojitos. Trust me, I threw back five — I mean, ahem, two — daiquiris made with their rum while blasting the new Tool album back in August.

Why it’s personable: It’s a veteran owned company. OK, I already covered that. But did you know that Eric, who joined the police force after serving in the Army, was fired after seven years by his police chief after she found out that he owned a distillery? Google it. Here’s a daiquiri recipe that you’re going to jot down on a little gift tag and tie around the bottle.

Daiquiri

2 ounces InStill rum

3/4 ounce fresh lime juice

Slightly less than 1/2 ounce rich cane sugar syrup

Smidgen of salt

Combine all ingredients into shaker, add ice, and shake hard for 10 seconds. Strain into a chilled cocktail coupe. No garnish.

Sutler’s Spirit Co. Gin

I’ve written a few times in the past about my man Scot Sanborn and his incredibly versatile gin. It’s so damn good that I’m telling you about it again. I do a lot of events and meet new people on a weekly basis. I get asked a lot about my opinion on certain spirits, and I’m kind of surprised that I’m still turning folks on to Sutler’s. It’s not juniper-forward like most gins that you probably drank out of your parents’ liquor cabinet; it’s got a lot going on, with coriander, orange and lemon peel, and yes, a little bit of juniper. That means that even if the friend or family member that you have in mind isn’t too keen on gin, this is the bottle that can change their mind.

Why it’s personable: It’s Winston-Salem’s first legal distillery, and Sutler’s probably has the sexiest packaging in the game. I guarantee that a majority of people wouldn’t give a flip even if they hated gin because the bottle looks that good.

Reverie Cocktails Bottle/Growler Delivery

Did you really think that I was going to skip over my baby girl? Actually, Reverie is my little brother’s baby girl. If you’re as lazy as I am, you might enjoy our pre-bottled Old Fashioneds or Sazeracs. Just pour over ice and enjoy. No, you don’t have to stir it with ice; we’ve already factored that in. Just pour and enjoy. Or pretend that you made it and wow your family and friends.

If you’d like something more bubbly and refreshing, then definitely check out our carbonated growlers. Drink options change weekly, but the quality remains the same (or so we’d like to think). We deliver and bring food, too. We kind of have to — it’s the law. Pre-bottled cocktails yield nine drinks, and our growlers can pour up to 10.

Why it’s personable: Because I just told you that Reverie is my niece, and we deliver to your door. C’mon.  PS

Tony Cross is a bartender (well, ex-bartender) who runs cocktail catering company Reverie Cocktails in Southern Pines.