Day: May 5, 2024

5 May 2024

Cinco de Mayo! Today has certainly been a better day family health wise. One of the things I’ve forgotten in Mississippi is how far away everything is. In Florida, I’m 4 miles from the Atlantic Ocean. At Roosevelt State Park, I’m 17 miles from my brother’s house in Brandon. That doesn’t seem like much but if you travel it back and forth twice, that’s 68 miles.

I picked my brother up around 10:30 (Tanis wanted us to have some time together) and we traveled to Morton via US 80, at one time, the only coast to coast road in the United States.

We pointed out old bootlegger places, old friends’ homes, old businesses, and told stories about all of them.

We visited the cemetery in Morton where most of our relatives are buried and then back tracked to have lunch.

We stopped at Asadores Mexican restaurant and the service and food were a delight. I had fajitas and strangely, on the menu was liver and onions which my brother loves.

From there we went to Pulaski and the Searcy cemetery and I tried to clean pine sap off the head stones of Mom and Dad and Grandaddy and Grandmama. I got them scrubbed enough you could see the names and dates.

I then gave Archie a tour of Roosevelt. It had been years since he has been there. One of the things I showed him was the remains of the old diving platform we used to jump off as kids. It had a high dive and a low diving board.

Our cousin Joe Lee was showing out one day and decided to spring off the high board and land on the low board and then spring into the water. He missed. He hit his head on the way into the water on the low board. I decided not to try that particular maneuver.

On our way back to Brandon, we took, not US 80 but old US 80. It was a fun trip.

Yesterday, I had some visitors at the motel.

Tomorrow, I take the Jeep in to see what’s what. Archie and Tanis will pick me up at the Jeep dealership and we’ll go to lunch and then go to Tanis’ doctor’s appointment. If I can drive the Jeep with the check engine light on (which I’ve been doing) I’ll head home on Tuesday. If not, I may be staying a while longer. Hopefully not 31 days like last time.

Stay tuned!

4 May 2024

I didn’t make yesterday’s post.  It turned out to be quite the day. I reunited with Jean, Roger, Jimmie and Stephen and later met Jean and Roger’s son Kevin and his son Liam.  Stephen treated us to lunch at Ichiban in Flowood.  After a tour of Kevin’s home, I headed to Archie and Tanis’ house in Brandon.  

There was a family emergency there and Tanis’ son, David, and I tried to help as best we could.  The next day, the emergency situation got worse.  Tanis ended up in the emergency room at St. Dominix and it was around 10 pm when we got her back home.  

Today I found her to be much better and I treated them to lunch at a local restaurant in the square in Brandon.  It’s been an emotional experience and isn’t over yet.  Let’s just say aging is not an easy process: for me, my brother, and my sister-in-law.  

After our lunch, I headed to the cemetery in Morton to take some photos of family gravestones and then headed to the park where I went back to bed.  Tanis has a doctor’s appointment on Monday and I need to take my jeep into the Jeep dealership in Flowood and get it checked for the “check engine” light.  

I’m not sure how many days I’ll stay in Mississippi to try to help David with Archie and Tanis.  As soon as I know, I’ll post the info.  The next few post may be very brief.