Living In The Country

Living In The Country…..Or..

The proper way to give directions….

I grew up in the country, you know where you have to “go to town” to buy groceries. Where there is no such thing as pizza delivery or running to the store for a gallon of milk. You stock up when you go to the grocery store; there is no ‘quick run’ to anywhere, unless it is to Uncle Junior’s to borrow a cup of sugar or a pint of buttermilk. I love it out here. It is quiet, most of the time. If someone drives up in your yard and the dog don’t kill them first, they are probably a relative or close neighbor or lost. But more than likely they do not mean you any harm. However, if they are lost and ask me for directions…they are in pretty big trouble. One of the disadvantages of growing up on dirt roads without signs is that we do not give directions like everyone else. If you throw in my handicap of being directionally challenged, that equals instructions like this:

“Well, you go up right up here pass Padgett Farms (well it used to be Padgett Farms, but they sold it and now they are going to plant some grapes there that I hear will be used to make wine, some people think you should not drink wine, but I think it is okay because Jesus did turn the water into wine as His first miracle and if it is good enough for Jesus it is good enough for me) until you come to the fork in the road. It looks like a 3 way stop where one road veers off to the left and one veers off to the right (don’t none of us ever actually “stop”) but we call it a fork in the road. Come to think of it, I don’t know why we call it that because most “forks” have four tines except for those fancy schmancy shrimp forks that only have three so maybe we should call it ‘the shrimp fork in the road”….hey…you know where you can get some really good fresh shrimp? Down at Nick’s on Hwy. 20. But that is the other direction from where you are going so…you go up thata way pass what was once Padgett Farm….let me tell you…they used to grow the best maters you ever tasted and watermelons…. good Lawd them was some good watermelons and maters. Do you like watermelons and maters? Oh well, as I was saying, once you get to the fork, or shrimp fork in the road…you know…we really should call it the Y, because it really is more like a Y…one road veers to the left and the other veers to the right and what you wanna do is veer to the right…(hold on…let me look at which hand my wedding ring is on, that is how I know left from right for sure..oh heck…I took my wedding ring off to wash the dishes…hold on…let me go get it before I forget about it..be right back) …I don’t normally wash dishes by hand much anymore since I got one of those new fancy schmancy dishwashers, but I catch myself washing the dishes before I put them in there, which really makes no sense at all don’t you agree?  Okay, as I was saying you will veer off to the right and go ..oh bout ½ a mile or so. You will pass by where the old dump used to be…. man I wish they had not done away with that dump, now we have to take our garbage off four or five miles away…do you know how inconvenient that is? Anyway you go over that hill just past where the old dump used to be and then a stop sign will just sneak up on you so be very careful. That will bring you to the highway that takes you to Geneva if you turn…hold on…right..and to Defuniak if you go left. Well, it will not take you directly to Geneva or DeFuniak but it will take you close by there and you can stop and ask directions at any of those houses, they are all just the nicest people you will ever want to meet.  What you should really do is turn around the way you came and go back to Hwy 20 and eat some shrimp at Nick’s. Did I tell you they have the best dadgum seafood around? It is right on the bay and they have shrimp and crab and scallops and hush puppies and all kinds of stuff...Hey…where you going…wait…I wasn’t finished giving you directions….”

The moral of this story is this: If you are traveling up my way and think you may get lost. You better get you one of those fancy schmancy GPS/talkin’ smarty pants phones and just go right on past my house.

Signed,

~~Squirrely Girl