A half hour later I’m washed, dressed and ready to meet Jesus, but nothin’ happens, so I go to the kitchen to find me a snack.
Clara looks cross as I enter the kitchen on my walker with the two green tennis balls attached to the bottom. I love those darned things. Cousin Chicken and me used to have fun stealing them from the woods behind the high school. The old-timey tennis balls were wonderful toys but great missiles at the head of anyone who tried to hurt us. Those were the days. I sigh.
“What’s this idea about you volunteering, Grandmama?” Clara says to me. “It’s foolhardy. You simply cannot do it.”
Now Clara is the hoity-toity one of our family. She wasn’t raised in Mossy Creek like the other five generations of Whits. She was born here, but dragged up North when her mother found a teaching job in the capital of H-E-double-hockey-sticks, New Jersey.
Clara has a warped sense of the South and our lovely town, and everyday she’s been here, I’ve tried to change that perception.
“Since when am I too old to help somebody?” I ask. “I suppose a life should only be fulfilling if you’re eighty and under?”
Sometimes she gets on my nerves with her two-inch heels and sixty-six year old legs. I’d kill for those darned things. She’s got all her real teeth, too. It’s downright sickening that she doesn’t show them off more instead of that salty look she always has on her face.
“No, Grandmama. That’s not what I’m saying,” Clara says with exaggerated patience. “You’re old.” She gags on the word, and I don’t even try to stop her. “I just meant, what would you do?”
“There’s lots of things,” Estelle chimes in, sitting some cookies in front of me. “Great Gran could work at the Wal-Mart down in Bigelow.”
“I’ve been there,” I say, getting excited until I remember something. “‘Cept, sometimes they play their announcements too loud, and when I complained to the manager, he told me to turn down my hearing aid. I should have caned him, but I didn’t have my cane. And I don’t have a hearing aid. ‘Sides that, I didn’t like that the senior center thinks it’s funny to take us seniors to the Wal-Mart on a field trip on the first Tuesday of the month and leave us there. The last time I went, we were stuck there for an hour listenin’ to some boogaloo music. ‘Bout drove me crazy. I ain’t never been so happy to leave a place. And I’m not going back.”
“There’s nothing for seniors to do in Mossy Creek on a regular basis,” Clara points out. “So, I guess you’re stuck with us.”
That’s a scary thought, considering I don’t much care for her company. “I’ll make you a bet, Clara.”
“What is it?”
“I’ll get a job if you get a job.”
“What kind of bet is that?”
“One you’ll lose if you don’t find something to do besides make an old woman’s life miserable with your boring self.”
Clara flinches, but sometimes the truth hurts.
“You can’t work,” she says, “End of subject.”
She ain’t that hurt, I think as she walks outside. Frankly, I’m relieved. Estelle and I have more like minds than my Clara and me.
Estelle looks at me with her serious eyes. “I think we should get her a boyfriend. She’s bored, that’s all. I’ll go get her.”
“No. Let her find her own way, Estelle. She’s searching for something and it has nothing to do with us. But that won’t stop me from finding my own gig.”
For the first time in a long time, I’m energized. Getting old in Mossy Creek has meant the world to me. I know this place like the back of my hand, and I’ve loved every second of being here. “Bring me a pen and paper,” I say.
Estelle grabs them and sits across from me.
“Number the paper one through three.”
“I thought you were going to do the writing,” she says, a sly look on her face.
“Why should I when you’re here and not at the coffee shop working?” Estelle works at the Naked Bean.
“Jayne gave me the day off. So, if you could pick a job, what would you like to do?”
“I’d be a cop like Amos. That’s the number one job on my list. Put that down.”
“Are you kidding?” Estelle asks, her eyes wide.
Now she sounds like Clara. I think over what I just said and give her a definitive nod. “Yes, I want to be a cop in Mossy Creek. In fact, after we make the list, I think I’ll give Amos a call and have a chat with that man about some changes that need to be made around here. Number two, I’d be a street-sign maker.” The pen teeters in Estelle’s hand and I point. “That’s an important job. Yes, suh!”
“Great Gran, I don’t know about that. You have to have some experience in the area you’re trying to work in.”
I lick my last real tooth and smile. “The only people that need to have experience are doctors and people who pave roads. The rest is up for grabs.”
I think of all the signs I’d make. “I’d make a sign for the boys that were smokin’ behind the Piggly Wiggly last month. I was coming from JoRay Cummings’ funeral in Bigelow, and Clara had to stop at the store. I told her we didn’t need to park in the handicap parking space, but she pulled in anyway. I guess it was divine intervention, because I see these boys behind the store smokin’.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothin’ ‘cept they was sharing a cigarette. Passin’ it back and forth. I just shook my head. If you can’t afford to kill yourself by buying your own pack of cigarettes, you can’t afford to smoke. Don’t share with your friends. That’s just plain unsanitary. Besides, the only decent tobacco is peach snuff. I don’t care what I said at New Year’s, I’m not giving up my snuff. And the next time Katie Bell writes something about my snuff, I’m gonna spit on her. Spit peach snuff.”
Estelle’s eyes tear and she starts gasping, then coughing uncontrollably.
“Chil’, let me get you some water. It wouldn’t be fair if you died before me.”
She sips the water I give her, and that’s when I notice there’s nothing on the paper. Although my body is fragile, my mind is sharp as a shark fin. But sometimes I forget. I guess it’s a by-product of being on earth long enough to know everybody’s business.
“Estelle, write this down. Cop, sign-maker and last but not least, mayor.”
This time she spits water all over the table. I give her the evil eye. “You’re too old for that nonsense. Spitting your water out like you’re a child.”
“Great Gran.” She mops the table, not looking at me. “None of these jobs are suited for you.”
“And why in the Sam Hill not?”
“Who’s Sam Hill?” Estelle asks.
This girl has the attention span of a gnat. I need to get her ginkgo biloba.
“A man with a job, I’m sure. Explain yourself, young lady.”
“Great Gran, these jobs are very physical. Very demanding. And they require you to meet certain standards.”
“You were the one with the big idea that I needed a job. Now I’m excited, and I thought you’d be excited, too. But if you’re not, you can join Clara down the road. I’ve got to get dressed for work.”
“I’m with you, Great Gran,” she assures me. “All the way.”
“Good. Now get dressed, we’re headin’ to town.”
IN MY ROOM, I DIAL the phone, hoping Amos will pick up over at the police station. Ever since my granddaughter moved in here with me, she’s modernized things. We now have a computer and a printer. Between the loud motor on the printer and Clara’s snoring, you get the impression that she has to get oxygen from New Mexico.
But worse than that is the confounded phone. When I’m mayor, I’m going to pass a law that says everybody in Mossy Creek has to have at least one rotary phone in the home. That way, senior citizens are covered. Clara insisted on a pu
sh-button thing, but I don’t like it. My fingers always press the wrong button and I end up calling someone I don’t know. After I talk to them for a half hour, I can’t ever remember who I was calling and why.
I finally had Estelle dig up my old rotary phone, and it’s in my room with old me. We’re perfect together. I dial and get it right the first time.
“Mossy Creek Police Department, how can I assist you?”
“Amos?”
“No, Miz Whit. This is Sandy.”
“I don’t want to talk to you, I want to talk to Amos.”
“He’s on his way back from Atlanta. He had to go down there to . . . hmmm . . . never mind. He’s not here right now, Miz Whit.”
“Get him on the phone. I know he’s got one of them cell phones. I called him in his car once, by accident.”
“All right, Miz Whit. Hold on. I’ll transfer you.”
I smile. When you get to be over a hundred years old, the police don’t even try to argue with you. They just give you what you want. I hear a beep. Amos says, real polite, “Hello, Miz Eula.” I hear road sounds in the background. He’s driving.
“Hello, Amos. How you today?”
“I’m having an . . . interesting day, Miz Eula. How are you?”
“I’m not dead yet, so I guess I’m fair to middlin”.
I don’t hear him for a moment, then he says, “Good. What can I do for you?”
“Amos, I need a job. And I decided that being a police officer is right up my alley. When can I start?”
Amos must have swallowed down the wrong pipe, just like Estelle, because he starts coughing like a hound dog during huntin’ season. He manages to grouse, “Just a minute,” and the phone hits something. Poor young folk. They eat too fast and the food gets stuck. Old people know better.
Finally Amos comes back. “Hello?”
“Are you all right? You shouldn’t eat while you drive.”
“Yes, ma’am. Now, about—”
“Estelle had the same coughing fit a while ago too. I hope you two don’t have an adult version of the whooping cough. That would be terrible.”
“Miz Eula, why do you want to work?”
I figure this is the interview phase of the job. “I been sittin’ around in retirement for twenty-one years waiting for Jesus to call me home, but so far, nothin’. So I’m thinkin’ maybe He has something else for me to do. I’m especially excited about carrying a gun.”
Another round of coughing hits the police chief, and he finally regains his composure. “Miz Eula, I hate to tell you this, but there are certain requirements to being a police officer. And I’m afraid you exceed those requirements in so many areas, we wouldn’t be able to afford your services.”
My hopes deflate like a three-day-old birthday balloon.
“I’m too old?”
“Yes,” Amos says honestly, “But you’re smart and wise, Miz Eula, and that’s what every police department needs. The other thing is, we have to apprehend criminals. Those criminals want to get away, and they’ll do anything to escape arrest, including hurt officers. Nobody wants to see you hurt.”
The idea of getting hurt didn’t occur to me. Frankly, I just don’t think about crime in Mossy Creek as being serious.
“Amos, when was the last time you had to use your gun?”
“Well, that’s not the point—”
“And when was the last time you were in a fist fight?”
“Does throwing an angry woman over my shoulder count?”
“When? What’d I miss? Do tell!”
“Forget I mentioned that. You win, Miz Eula. I admit it: I haven’t ever had a fist fight on the job in Mossy Creek.”
“So what do you do all day?” I say, so far unimpressed with his ability to protect and serve.
“I’m busy day and night stopping people from committing crimes. As a matter-of-fact, I’d better get back to work. I have a criminal in the back seat of my patrol car, right now.”
I hear a high-pitched voice in the background. Sounds like somebody saying bad words.
“That a woman?” I ask Amos. “Did you arrest her for talkin’ that way?”
“I have to go. Bye, Miz Eula.”
“Bye, Amos.”
I get up off my bed, change clothes and go to the living room where Estelle is reading the paper.
“You ready?”
“What did Amos say?” Estelle asks me.
“Not what I hoped, but there’s another good job out there for me. Let’s go to the bank. I drop in occasionally to make sure they still have all my money safe and sound.”
“Great Gran, it’s a bank, that’s what they do.”
“You obviously don’t watch Cops. Sometimes, bad guys can be very sneaky.”
AS ESTELLE AND I drive through Mossy Creek, I love the pretty browns and grays of wintertime.
Even though a hundred years has passed since I first laid eyes on this town, it’s still beautiful to me.
People stop and wave as we drive by the courthouse, the center of town and the square, where the Methodists are selling food and knickknacks to heathens. Even there, everybody stops long enough to wave.
I’m the oldest soul in Mossy Creek. I feel honored by the tradition and the show of respect.
“Drive over to the bank, and afterwards, we’ll go to the sign store. They make copies there, too,” I tell Estelle, who’s been unusually quiet since we left home. “I could run a copy machine.”
We park next to the blue-lined handicap space at Mossy Creek Savings and Loan, which is appropriate since I’m feeling quite spry for an old gal. I get my seat belt unbuckled, and try to untangle myself from the contraption. “I should work for the car builders. This thing is like a prison.”
“Great Gran, don’t get your hopes up about a bank job.”
I regard my great granddaughter. “Would you recommend I get my hopes down or have no hope at all?”
“I just don’t want you to be disappointed or sad.”
“Estelle, you use those words about things that have so little significance. Sad is when your children die before you and you have to live on without them. Disappointed is when you live a life and don’t find joy in the precious moments it gives you. If I don’t get a job, then so be it, but I’ll never feel sad about it. Now, let’s go check on my money. Get my cane. I might have to stand in line.”
Estelle and I make our way to the door of the bank, when a young man hurries toward us from the inside. He opens the door and as we start to pass through, so does he. Doesn’t even take down the hood on his jacket. After having people be respectful during my drive to the bank, I’m not about to let him ruin that record.
“Excuse me, son,” I say to the hooded fella. “You can be on your way as soon as you open that other door for me. I’m not as strong as I used to be, and I can’t manage the cane and the door at the same time.”
I look him in the eye and wait for an answer. He hops from foot to foot like he’s considering my request or has to go to the bathroom.
“Great Gran,” Estelle says from behind me, “I’ll get it.”
Just as I’m about to launch into my being a good steward speech, he reaches for the door handle.
I smile at him, victorious. I knew there was good in this young man. “No, thank you, Estelle, this young man has proven there is community service in every person alive. Thank you very kindly.”
It takes a few minutes, as I’m not as fast as I used to be. When we finally get inside, every eye is on us. Nobody in the bank is moving. I nod hello to the tellers and the head finance man, Rick Ramsey.
The young man hurries down the sidewalk outside, and I go sit down to wait my turn.
Rick rushes to the door and locks it.
Suddenly Mutt Botto
ms is outside and he has the young man with his face smashed against the glass, putting handcuffs on him!
“What happened?” I ask, mortified.
Estelle grips my hand as the president comes over and sits down. “You just caught a criminal, Ms. Eula. That man had just robbed the bank. You slowed him down until Officer Bottoms could catch him. You’re a hero.”
Estelle applauds. “Great Gran! I can’t believe it.”
I’m so shocked, I don’t know what to say. Suddenly there’s clapping and lots of it. I begin to clap myself, I’m so excited. This was better than watching Cops, because I was a real, live, criminal catcher.
That’s just dandy, in my eyes.
“So I guess this means you’re giving me a job,” I tell Rick.
After a wide-eyed second, he gives up and smiles. “I’m making you an honorary bank guard,” he says.
I look at Estelle. And stick out my tongue.
I got me a job.
Mossy Creek Gazette
Volume V, No. 6 • Mossy Creek, Georgia
Meetings & Announcements
The Mossy Creek Garden Club invites everyone to a winter gardening seminar at the Hamilton Inn. Main speaker: Peggy Caldwell, retired English professor, fan of murder mysteries, and creator of an award-winning specialty garden.
Topic: Plants To Die For. Beautiful But Deadly Perennials.
Tickets still available. Open bar. Non-toxic buffet courtesy of Bubba Rice Catering.
Chapter 11
You can always count on cats and grandchildren to surprise you.
Peggy and the Wildflowers
MY GARDEN PROBLEM started in October, but I wasn’t aware of the ramifications until January.
I was stretched out in my outside lounger under the big tree halfway down my backyard, when I caught sight of my granddaughter headed for trouble.
A Day in Mossy Creek Page 16