Book Spine Poetry and April Flowers

April is Poetry Month, and one of the women in my writing group was talking about the public library promoting book spine poetry this month as a fun activity.  I have a decent-sized library so I decided to see what I could do with books from my shelves. 

Without spending a great amount of time on the activity, I entertained myself creating these poems.  A side benefit was the necessity to dig through my library and discover books I had forgotten. 

Have you tried book spine poetry, or is it too silly for you?  It's kind of addicting, looking for interconnections between titles.  I have a picture or a story in my mind for each of these.  Perhaps it's just word play, but fun nonetheless.

In other Highland Cottage news, most of our plants survived our Deep South February "snowmageddon" and cold temperatures that I wrote about in my last post.  Actually plants may have had an easier time dealing with the unprecedented events of the cold spell than people did. 

Below are a few photos from our front yard today.  We appreciate spring beauty more than ever this year. 

 Rosa Shreveport (Grandiflora Rose)
 Shreveport roses display their vibrant color & hardiness

Lenten Rose and violas with old toy tractor
we dragged from someone's trash heap

Native gladiolus 

Thanks for the stopping to visit my Highland Cottage.  It's spring in southern tornado alley, so we are watching storms heading our way tonight....April showers!

February and March 2021 Happenings: Snowmageddon and the Great Pyrenees

It has been a couple of months since I’ve written a blog post, and I always must write a catch-up post, as if everyone were on the edge of their seats wondering, “What has Teresa been doing since she last wrote?”  My Facebook friends already know, but maybe some of you do not.  

The end of February brought snow and cold to Shreveport, which almost shut our city down.  We didn’t have a snow day; we had a snow week.  It’s hard to say how much snow we got—about six inches in all—interspersed with freezing rain and sleet over the course of several days, and the temperatures didn’t climb above freezing.  There were no snowplows.  Roads became treacherous.  People were urged to stay home.  Employees couldn’t get to work.  One Brookshires grocery store operated all day with four employees.  Hospital employees slept over to insure someone would be there to care for the patients, including many with COVID. 

Front of our house with snow, dog, and Mardi Gras decorations

Walking Treble on a cold snowy day

Ricky and Treble walking in the neighborhood

Shreveport’s water system failed, unable to get water to most of the city’s neighborhoods. Volunteers began addressing the mounting crises while city, state, or federal entities struggled to respond.  Oil field tanker trucks hauled water to area hospitals to fill their boilers so the hospitals would have heat.  A local bottled water company, Music Mountain, donated potable water to hospitals and other essential facilities.  Our city council woman arranged for the bottled water company to donate water that first responders distributed to the elderly.  Volunteer groups raised money and began distributing water to high need individuals.  People melted snow for water to flush toilets. 

Collecting snow for melting

Melting snow on the stove

The frigid temperatures, which one night was five degrees above zero, added to the misery.  Shreveport's older homes are built with pier and beam construction, which meant that pipes froze in many older homes despite efforts to insulate them.  Once the water system failed, no one could leave faucets dripping, so this added to the number of frozen pipes.  When the weather finally warmed up and the city got water back into all the neighborhoods, citizens discovered burst pipes everywhere.

We had so many broken pipes at our house that Ricky turned the water off at the street.  Ricky repaired one broken pipe for an outside faucet, but when we turned the water back on, we still had water running down outside from behind an exterior wall next to a bathroom.  We turned the water off again before the leak could damage an inside wall.  We needed a plumber to repair the broken pipes under the house, and plumbing companies were booked for weeks into the future.  We had no running water for 12 days while we waited on the plumbers. 

Brookshires Grocery sent an 18-wheeler to Shreveport filled with pallets of water, which our neighborhood group helped distribute in the store parking lot.  One Shreveport brewery, Great Raft Brewing Company, let individuals fill up containers with clean water that they would ordinarily be using to make beer.  We picked up water at both locations, and Ricky bought lots of water at near-by Music Mountain Bottling Plant, which we shared with others.  Once our neighbors’ water pipes were repaired, they let us fill up buckets of water from their outside faucet to use for flushing, but the city remained under a boil order for days, so we drank and cooked with bottled water.

My neighbor, in foreground, and I
giving out water at Brookshires

Once the weather drama was behind us, Ricky and I continued to be involved in our Highland neighborhood, a national historic district in Shreveport.  Our neighborhood needs some love and not just when the pipes break.  Highland is suffering from blight and neglect from property owners and often city officials. The large houses in Highland were subdivided into small, inexpensive apartments in the past, and many renters of these poorly maintained apartments are low-income and transient, contributing to the piles of furniture and rubble that often line our sidewalks.  Fortunately, Highland is also home to young investors who are trying to save the historic housing stock and restore the neighborhood.

Boarded up apartments, allowed to decay

Duplex open to transients, being allowed to decay

Recently restored bungalow next to duplex shown above

In the last couple months, I’ve worked with our neighborhood association on various projects including zoning issues involving historic preservation, plus I continue my daily litter abatement efforts, i.e., picking up trash daily when we walk our dog.

Litter from neighborhood sidewalks 

Ricky picking up trash along the creek in 
neighborhood park

Speaking of dogs, somehow, I got enmeshed in the plight of our neighbors’ two Great Pyrenees dogs, Coco and Grayson, who broke out of their fenced compound multiple times a day.  They loved to roam at night, but they would also take early morning walkabouts.  Everyone in the neighborhood began to recognize them.  Some residents would walk the huge dogs back to their yard, but the fence couldn’t hold them.  One sweet family kept the Great Pyrenees inside their house for the entire day, along with 5 children and their own pets until the dog owners could claim them.  Photos showed the Great Pyrenees looking relaxed laying in the middle of the living room floor, or one even sprawled on a spare bed at one point.  One local veterinarian let Coco and Grayson spend the weekend at her clinic when they followed a man and his dog inside the vet office one Friday. 

Great Pyrenees escaping through their fence

Coco and Grayson with Treble in our yard,
 These two Great Pyrenees later squeezed through 5" space
 between wrought iron fence rails seen at end of the drive-way

Because my husband and I are retired, I was immediately aware when the dogs escaped, and I began to feel responsible for keeping Coco and Grayson safe until their owners could figure out a solution. 

Finally, our neighbors decided that Coco and Grayson needed more space to roam and jobs to do.  After all, Great Pyrenees were bred to herd sheep in Spain.  I worked for hours trying to find them the perfect new home.  We were eventually able to rehome them to a ranch in East Texas.  The new owner even drove her horse trailer to Shreveport to transport them safely back to Texas.  

Coco and Grayson at their new home on Texas ranch

These dogs were like two 100-pound toddlers when you tried to get them to do something they didn’t want to do.  Their last escape was in the hour before the woman from Texas was coming to get them.  My husband and I drove around our neighborhood, while I looked on Facebook to see where people had reported seeing them.  Finally, we found them following a man who was walking down the sidewalk pulling a suitcase with two Great Pyrenees following behind him.  We had leashes with us, so Ricky walked them blocks across the neighborhood to our house, while I called our neighbor to say we had found them, then called the woman in Texas to say we had them in custody and to come on to pick them up.

In my next blog post, I'm going to share my efforts at book spine poetry in honor of National Poetry Month.

 

 

Mardi Gras 101

“No one in Virginia will understand this unless they see it”

--quote from my sister, Susan Brooks, during her 2019 Mardi Gras visit

I’m originally from Virginia, and I moved to Louisiana without knowing any details about Mardi Gras.  I’d heard about New Orleans Mardi Gras debauchery on Bourbon Street, and that was my only mental picture.  I’ve lived in Shreveport for over 35 years now, and I’ve learned a bit about Mardi Gras in Northwest Louisiana. 

 Mardi Gras Queen
(banner Ricky ordered and hung at our house)

As my reign as Mardi Gras queen of the Krewe of Highland ends on October 18, I’m going to share some of my Mardi Gras experiences.  

Parade Day

Krewe of Highland XXIV on float
(Copyright, Henrietta Wildsmith, photographer)

What is a krewe?

For readers who don’t live in Mardi Gras land, in Louisiana a krewe is a group of people, usually a non-profit organization, that stages events or hosts a parade during carnival season.  Carnival, or Mardi Gras, season is pre-Lent and begins on Twelfth Night, January 6.  In the Christian tradition, January 6 marks the Feast of the Epiphany when the Three Wise Men visited the Christ Child.  Mardi Gras culminates on Mardi Gras day, or Fat Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday in the Advent calendar.

Sometimes krewe members share common interests or vocations, e.g. in Shreveport, the Krewe of Justinian is comprised of lawyers.  The Krewe of Highland is a neighborhood krewe, associated with the historic neighborhoods of Highland and South Highlands. Our parade rolls on the Sunday afternoon before Fat Tuesday and traverses neighborhood streets.  The parade lasts about two hours from start to finish and passes close to my house, so every year we have a large party and invite all our friends and family who aren’t fortunate enough to live on the parade route.  Last year, the party went on without me because I rode in the parade.

My beads are loaded on the float,
the rain has stopped, we are ready to roll

Crowd waiting on the parade at our street in previous years

 Twelfth Night is the sixth-- the first big event

January 6^th is a busy day for Shreveport Mardi Gras royalty.  It begins with a Mardi Gras mass at St. Pius Catholic Church.  At mid-day, there’s a luncheon sponsored by Loblolly, a social service group associated with Mardi Gras.  Food, music, and an auction raise money for Loblolly to continue their work in area schools.  Later, the evening of 12^th Night, a big party with all the Mardi Gras krewes kicks off the Mardi Gras social season.  Each krewe decorates their tables, brings food, and socializes with one another or dances to the music of a band.  The krewes take turns organizing this annual event.

Royals at Twelfth Night

Medallion from 2019 Mardi Gras mass

Twelfth Night party

12th Night Decoration

“Throw me something, mister!”

Many krewes serve a social purpose, while also performing social service.  During the season, krewe members are frequent guests at schools and senior citizen facilities, where they lead mini-parades complete with Mardi Gras music and inexpensive beads that are thrown or passed out to viewers whose shouts of “Throw Me Something, Mister” are synonymous with Mardi Gras. 

Visit to elementary school Loblolly event

Child at Early Head Start center parade

Mardi Gras colors are purple, green, and gold, but beads come in every color of the rainbow, often featuring some sort of cheap medallion.  Each krewe, or individual member of the royal court, also has a specialty bead with a medallion that depicts that year’s theme for the krewe’s coronation and bal.  Some royalty have an individual specialty bead.

One older woman at a nursing home where the nursing administrator invited our Krewe of Highland to parade through the halls and visit residents in their rooms was not exactly welcoming.  When the other “royals” and I entered the woman’s room, she told us, “Get out, you’re crazy,” and she kept repeating this.  I was the last person to leave and I turned and said to her, “We may be crazy, but it’s in a good way.”  She laughed.

What the heck is a trash jacket and why would you want to wear one?

When krewes attend public events, they wear “trash” jackets.  These are usually tuxedo jackets, embellished with the krewe’s logo embroidered on the back and festooned with inexpensive costume jewelry brooches and sewn-on patches that have meaning for the individual.  Each “trash” jacket is unique and a little bit crazy.

Front of Queenie's trash jacket

Back of trash jacket

Trash jacket detail

Queen Teresa & Duchess Sheila visit Early Head Start

Trash jackets at Women's Department Club luncheon

During this year’s Mardi Gras mass, the priest said it made him happy to look out into the congregation at the sea of individuals wearing trash jackets representing all the different krewes.  It’s fair to point out that the Roman Catholic traditions of Mardi Gras practiced in South Louisiana are often lost on the staunch Baptists prevalent in Northwest Louisiana.  I’m not Catholic (nor Baptist), but I found the Mardi Gras mass to be moving and uplifting.  After mass, a family in the church treated everyone to king cake and coffee in the rectory hall. 

Where’s the baby?

King cakes are also a Mardi Gras tradition.  They are most often made from sweet yeast dough, rolled out to make a long piece of dough.  A filling is spread on the dough and the dough is rolled up, with the filling inside the elongated piece of dough.  Next, the dough is shaped into a round ring, leaving a hole in the middle.  Then the cake is baked and iced, usually with a simple confectionery sugar icing, and sprinkled with purple, green and yellow sugar.  There are dozens of types of King Cakes, and not all of them are sweet, but common King Cake flavors include apple, cream cheese, praline, chocolate, cinnamon, strawberry and cream, blueberry and cream, and Bavarian cream. 

King Cake party--Vote for your favorite king cake!!

King cakes get their name from the small plastic baby, which is hidden inside each cake.  The baby represents the Christ child.  The person who finds the baby in the king cake is responsible for bringing the king cake next Mardi Gras.  These small plastic babies are definitely a choking hazard, so the uninitiated must be warned about the babies.  Some bakeries place the baby on top, leaving it up to the buyer whether to place the baby inside the cake.

What’s in a name?

Every krewe has a king and queen and a royal court.  The court members have imaginative names.  For most of the krewes, the titles associated with their royal court remain the same from year to year, e.g.-- Duke and Duchess of Merriment, Duke and Duchess of Mystery, Duke and Duchess of Food, Duke and Duchess of Frolic, Duke and Duchess of Delight, Duke and Duchess of Deliciousness, Duke and Duchess of Harvest, Duke and Duchess of Spring, Duke and Duchess of Hospitality, Duke and Duchess of Mayhem.  The Krewe of Sobek has the Keeper of Earth, Keeper of Water, Keeper of Fire, and Keeper of Wind. 

Presenting the 2020 Queen of Krewe of Sobek!

Some krewes have a theme.  The Krewe of Excellence has the Duke and Duchess of Perfection and the Duke and Duchess of Superiority, while the Krewe of Elders has the Duke and Duchess of Wisdom and the Duke and Duchess of Longevity.  The Krewe of Gemini, the first krewe formed during the modern Mardi Gras era in northwest Louisiana, focuses on Shreveport’s geographic location in the Arklatex.  They have the Duke and Duchess of Texas, Duke and Duchess of Arkansas, and a Duke and Duchess of Louisiana.  There’s also a Duke and Duchess of Furry Friends, a Duke and Duchess of Rescue, and the Duke and Duchess of Pet Education—guess what krewe this is? Barkus and Meoux, of course.

Royalty, Krewe of Highland XXIV
Copyright Lara Leroux Photography
(Amanda Nicole Lara, photographer)

In the Krewe of Highland, you get to choose your own name.  I’m Queen of the Wild Things.  My court includes: King Dennis Beckman as King of Fantasy; Captain Sydni Smith is Keeper of Magical Things & Beautiful Beings, and our Co-Captain Michele Marcotte is Mystic Madam of Merriment.  We have a Duke of Pandemonium and a Duchess of Persuasion; a Duke of Division and his Duchess of Enchantment; and a Duchess of the Freak Show and a Duke of Hospitality.  And the list goes on. 

 

You can’t have royalty without a coronation

Every krewe has an annual coronation during which their king, queen, and royal court are announced.  These are usually themed parties held on a weekend night, and the attire ranges from Mardi Gras casual--wear Mardi Gras colors and trash jackets unless it’s 100 degrees outside.  This is when you can bring those light-up shoes and rhinestone shirts out of the closet.  Other coronations may suggest cocktail or formal attire.  I now own five long formals, two pair of piazza pants, and two cocktail dresses—not to mention the costumes required by the Krewe of Highland!  You can see some of the gowns of the queens below:

The Krewe of Highland coronations and bals are always costumed events that match the theme.  Our 2018 coronation theme was “Under the Big Top: Amazing Highland Oddities & Attractions.”  To see more about the Krewe of Highland coronation and events happening about this same time last year, click here and scroll toward the end of the post.  When you see several pictures of a woman wearing more leopard print than seems possible, you’ve found it.

In order to enjoy Mardi Gras, you can't take yourself too seriously.  If it's not fun, don't do it!

Stay tuned for more retrospective posts about my reign as Queen XXIV, Krewe of Highland, and the upcoming coronation of the next queen and events marking the 25-year anniversary of our neighborhood krewe.