Our Week of Thanksgiving 2011 Part 2: The Middle

This is Part 2 of my Thanksgiving holiday series.


We arrived in Booneville on Sunday night and made the standard visit to Wal-Mart for supplies. Afterwards, we headed to my family's house for dinner. It's probably a good thing I don't get to enjoy my mom's fantastic home cooking on a regular basis, because I might be as big as a house. It's not that it's unhealthy. It's just so good that I can't stop eating until I can't move.  


I woke up early on Monday morning to pick up a few parts for the Jeep and Volkswagen and headed to my dad's shop for a little mechanic work. I had to put a cooling fan relay on Crystel's Jeep (for the 4th time), but I'm a pro at it by now. If you have a Jeep Grand Cherokee and have problems with the cooling fan, it's probably the relay. For some reason, Jeep decided it was best to mount it on the frame behind the headlight mounting panel, so be prepared to remove the headlight, bumper and headlight panel. It's a pretty easy job though.  


After we finished with the Jeep, we we started working on the Beetle. Over the course of 3 days, we managed to get the brake system rebuilt, replacing the master cylinder, wheel cylinders, brake shoes and surfacing the drums. We also replaced all the fuel hoses, adjusted the valves and got it to run long enough to realize it needs the carbuerator rebuilt. Since this is a restoration, I cleaned and painted everything along the way. Here are a few pictures of the progress.

Brakes Before

Brakes After

See that shiny blue color? That's what it will look like when finished.

One thing is for certain, I didn't go hungry on this trip. For lunch on Monday, we went to one of my favorite places, Weeks' Cafe. It's a Booneville institution. I remember going there when I still lived at home and thinking Willie Weeks was one of the coolest cats on the planet. I pretty much still feel the same way.

My dad, not aware I was taking a picture.

Then on Tuesday, we grilled hamburgers for lunch. On Wednesday, we decided to have a spontaneous fish fry. Here's my dad and grandfather working hard to get the cooker started. It obviously requires intense concentration.

We got to go out to the local Mexican restaurant Mi Toro on Tuesday night, and we went over to my grandparents' house to hang out with them for a while afterwards. Being in their house takes me right back to the time I was 10 years old and spoiled rotten. I'm still pretty spoiled now, I'm just older.

All in all, the trip to Booneville was just what I needed. Here are a few more things I love about being home.

Seeing the two trucks my dad taught me how to drive...





Visiting my dad’s farm in Thrasher…











A Wal-Mart parking lot with nothing but pickups (my former co-workers in the U.K. would get a kick out of this)…



This guy in the building I built with my dad nearly 20 years ago…



Basically, I just enjoy getting to revisit my childhood. I have so many fond memories of my life growing up, and when I’m in Booneville they all come rushing back. I’m obviously able to relax more when I’m there, and I love getting to hang out with my family. Most of my family lives there, and it’s comforting knowing they’re all close by when I’m home.

What sort of memories do holiday visits home conjure up for you?

Memphis to Oxford to Booneville to Oxford to Booneville to Oxford to Memphis, All in One Weekend

So, last weekend in Oxford was hectic to say the least. It was also fun though, so all is good.

We arrived on Friday night, and after unloading our stuff, we headed back to the South Depot Taco Shop on the square for Crystel's birthday dinner. Again, it was excellent. Here are some pictures of the night.

And some more pictures aftter we got back to the house. We had an excellent vegan cake from Muddy's in Memphis. Crystel's sister Lauren did an excellent job picking out the cake this year.

The next morning, I got up early and headed for a run around the lake. I've already mentioned how much I love running around Wells Gate, but it deserves repeating. I even saw a couple of deer on my run.

After I got back to the house and had a shower, Crystel's dad and I hooked up the stereo to the built in speakers in the house. I was a little nervous because I had to cut a hole in the back of Crystel's grandmothers cabinet. I really didn't want to screw that up. After Fred and I made a trip to Home Depot for the appropriate hole saw, the job was fairly easy. Once that was done, we decided to head to Booneville to pick up a load of things from her mom's other house. It's been interesting moving stuff from two houses into one. The trip was good, but I regretted not leaving a little sooner to have a little time to visit my family who live right down the road in Booneville.

We got back to Oxford, unloaded everything, hung some pictures and ate Papa John's. Fred played me a few tracks by some up and coming artists he's been working with, and I especially enjoyed the new songs by one of the acts, Chastity Brown. She's an extraordinary talent. You can check out one of her songs below, and you'll find information about the other her and the other artists Fred is working with as part of the Creative and Dreams Music Network here. The team is developing quite the roster of talent, and one of my favorite aspects is the variety of styles represented by these artists.

And another one of the Creative and Dreams acts, Small Room 9 from Mississippi.

Since we needed to get one more load of stuff from the old house on Sunday, I decided to get up early (4:45) to head to Booneville for breakfast with my family. I figured I'd just go before everyone else and meet them in Booneville later. It worked out perfectly, and I got to see everyone for over 3 hours before Crystel's family got there. Plus, I got to see this awesome Mississippi sunrise.

On the way to Booneville, I saw something else that is uniquely small town. On highway 9 between Oxford and Tupelo, I passed a gas station at roughly 6:00 A.M. It was still dark and the roads were pretty much deserted. However, this random country store had a parking lot full of 4-wheel drive pickups, no doubt headed out for deer hunting. I sometimes miss that whole groups of people can gather in unity over something so simple, with minimal planning. Just get yourself up and go. Everyone else will do the same. I would bet that a similar gathering happened later in the day as everyone was leaving the woods to talk about their success (or lack thereof) for the day and maybe even show off the day's kill.

Anyway, the nice, relazing drive to Booneville was just what I needed that morning. I blasted Eric Church the whole way. Here's my favorite song from his new album.

Heading home for an excellent home cooked meal from my mom was just what the doctor ordered. My sister brought my niece Eliza over, still asleep and wrapped up in a blanket. She's not much of a morning person, but when I went over and talked to her, she opened her eyes and crawled into my arms. She loves her Uncle Jon-Jon, and though I'm not quite ready for kids, she makes me realize that I might have what it takes to be dad someday. After breakfast, I spent some time teaching her how to play tic-tac-toe. We'd played it a few weekends before on my iPad, but she didn't realize you could play it with a pencil and paper, the old fashioned way. She even ended up beating me a few times.

Later on, I spent some time wandering around outside catching up on what my dad and brother have been up to. Their activities consist of a mix of repairing cars, bailing hay, raising cattle, growing a garden, drag racing, buying and fixing wrecked cars and a number of other things I can't keep up with. Variety? It's always interesting to see what the latest project is.

After we got another load of stuff from the house in Booneville, we headed back to Oxford to unload everything. Crystel's dad, Fred had to head back to Nashville, and I cleaned out the garage while Julie and Crystel unpacked boxes in the house. We were able to get the garage cleared out enough to get her cars parked in the garage, which made her very happy. We were also able to get several pictures and other items hung on the walls, but we still have a lot to go.

We stayed in Oxford until Monday morning. Even though we left later than we planned, we still made it to work on time.
I have to say it was a pretty good weekend. We didn't have time to go to the game, and I missed seeing all of my friends that were in town, but it was more important that we help get Julie situated while we were all in town. She's been stuck doing so much of the work by herself, that it's good to pitch in when we can. Plus, we'll have plenty of time in the future to see games and catch up with friends in Oxford once she is settled in. We've missed that a lot over the past couple of years because we haven't really had a place big enough for us all to stay and we don't really like driving there and back in the same day.

We actually stayed home in Memphis this past weekend, so maybe I'll finally have time to post a blog about our summer trip to California. Or maybe something fun will happen in Memphis that I'll write about. Maybe both.

Oxford Town, Oxford Town

This post is a continuation of a series on my travels to my home state of Mississippi.

Picking up where my last post left off, I left Booneville and headed to Oxford to finally see my mother-in-law's new house. The house is great, and everyone is very excited. It's nice to see Crystel getting to spend time with her mom and sister again, and I'm enjoying the time with them and with Lauren's boyfriend Chris. We didn't get to stay around too long, since I didn't get to Oxford until 5:00 in the evening and we still had to get our dog from the kennel back home in Memphis.

Speaking of a trip to the kennel, here is Porter's "Pawgress Report" from the visit.

The following weekend, we really got to discover the new house. We drove down on Friday after work, and stayed until Sunday, when we left kicking and screaming to head back to Memphis and reality. While we were there, we got to go to the South Depot Taco Shop on the square for dinner (always a good choice if you're looking for a fun casual meal in Oxford). After dinner on Friday night, we headed to our old watering hole The Rib Cage to see if we could spot any old friends. We ran into several people we knew, and I was reminded of how much I miss my friends. I made the best friends of my life while I was in college, and I'm hope I get the opportunity to see them more often. Here's a picture of most of our college friends at our wedding in 2007. Just looking at this picture makes me miss everyone.

On Saturday morning I went for a run around the new neighborhood, and I can't think of a more perfect place to run than Oxford in the fall. The new neighborhood has a lake, and the path around it is approximately 3 miles; perfect for 5k training. We managed help out with a couple of things with the house before we had to head back to Collierville on Saturday afternoon so Crystel could work at an event for her Youth United group at Habitat for Humanity.

When we got back into town around 6:30, the Rebels were already getting thumped soundly by the Tide, and we decided we'd better get our running around done before the game crowds hit the streets. We stopped by Home Depot, where we ran into our old friend Neal Patel. Neal was part of our group of friends in Oxford from the very first semester when he owned a bar called Duffy's where we'd go for Leo's Karaoke. It was great catching up with Neal, and a nice surprise to run into him while shopping for toilet flappers and picture hooks.

Speaking of Duffy's, it will always hold a special place in my heart. It's really where Crystel and I were able to spend time together early on, without the pressure of formal "dates." We were just hanging out with friends, and it became what it is today. We would go and listen to the same people sing the same songs week after week, but it never got old. Burt would sing Bottle of Wine, a group would always sing Love Shack, a few fraternity brothers would always ironically sing I Want It That Way, I would usually join our friend Chambers and a few other friends near the end of the night for a Top Gun-style rendition of You've Lost That Loving Feeling or a group rendition of Lean on Me, I'd usually sing a few solo songs, and I'll never forget the Coopers singing Elvira (with Little Cooper gracefully filling in the Oom PaPa Oom PaPa Oom PaPa MowMow...). I seem to recall Big Al singing the Jason Boland masterpiece Rich Young Dumb Nymphomaniac, but I can't remember if that was Karaoke or just sitting in with the bands that sometimes came through. Duffy's closed during our second semester in town, but it definitely left a mark, and things were never quite the same afterwards.

We spent the rest of Saturday night and Sunday helping out around the house, and as we headed home we vowed to try and spend more time visiting our family and friends. I always really enjoy visiting both of our homes in Mississippi, so we really have no reason not to make more of an effort to go. It's an easy trip,and a fun, cheap way to have an enjoyable weekend away from our day to day lives.

We rolled into Memphis, happier and more relaxed than we've been in months, even though I had an 8:00 flight the next morning to Harrison, AR. I had to unpack, wash clothes and repack in a short few hours, then spend four days on the road, but I was very calm. Crystel can attest that I'm not normally so calm on days before I travel. If we've felt like something is missing from our lives, I think we've been pinpointing it lately. We've started regularly going to church (and actually being involved with the church), and that has helped a lot. I think the other missing element is quality family time. Sure, we see our families occasionally, but I don't feel like we've been really involved enough in each other's lives. We hope to change that.

I'm going to try and continue the series of posts about time spent in Mississippi. Hopefully, the posts will become more entertaining (and maybe even humorous) as I'm able to write more real-time about what's going on as it happens (as opposed to playing catch-up with 4-5 posts in a week).

Welcome to Booneville

This post is a continuation of a series on my travels through my home state of Mississippi, in which I'm trying to spend more time in my home state than the 5 or 6 days we've averaged over the past few years.

Let's back up to a few weeks ago. I took a Friday off of work, and left Memphis at around 7:00 in the morning headed for my hometown of Booneville. After dropping off a few things and seeing my mom, headed to the city park for a cookout my dad was helping put together for several of the students in the various technical programs at Northeast Mississippi Community College, my dad's employer. Just getting to spend some relaxing time with my dad and brother was worth the drive down. The food wasn't bad either. My grandparents even stopped by for a quick bite on their way to Miami (now you see where I get my traveling tendencies).

Every Friday and Saturday night of my high school years was spent hanging out at that same park, sitting on the tailgate of my '85 red long-wheelbase Silverado listening to cheesy music and learning the lessons of life. For a short time in my life, it seemed like everything that mattered in the world was right there on that 2 mile stretch of road between the city park and Hardee's. I'd wash my truck nearly every Friday night after work. If I didn't have the newest truck on the strip, I could sure have the cleanest. I still wonder where that truck is now.

On the way to my family home, I stopped by Courtesy Automotive (formerly Davidson Chevrolet), my employer during my high school and community college days. This is where I learned to wash a car with the best of them, from the best of them. This is also where I'd wash my truck on Friday nights (and sometimes on Saturdays too). It was good to catch up with old friends and reminisce about the "good old days" when I had a tendency to be kind of a brat.

When I finally got home, I worked on my truck with my dad and brother for a little while, and then visited the family farm with my dad later that evening. I even got to go pick up my niece (at her request) with my brother in his classic Corvette convertible. She attends Thrasher School, the same school that me, my sister and brother attended (my sister teaches there now). Just sticking my head inside the door filled my nose with the smells of my youth. It's funny how smells seem to be the best way to bring back a memory. For me, it's even stronger than sight. Later that night, we spent time with my mom and dad eating Pizza Factory pizza. Here's a picture of my niece, Eliza in the aforementioned Corvette. Ain't she purty?

The next day, I visited two more landmarks of my youth. I had breakfast at the Thrasher Store with my family, then had lunch at Weeks' Cafe with my brother. I used to stop by the Thrasher Store every morning for a 20 oz. Mountain Dew on the way to school. I remember the funny looks I'd get sometimes from the older folks hanging around when I'd drive out of the parking lot blasting Nirvana's In Utero, Pearl Jam's Ten, Outkast's Southerplayalisticcadillacfunkymusic, Tool's Anemia, Phish's A Live One, Offspring's Smash, or what ever my latest discovery was at the time. Here's one of the songs that got the stangest looks.

As a side note: I know it's hard for most people to imagine now, but living in a small town prior to the internet age made it both a task and a joy to discover new music. We never had a real "Rock" station, and we didn't even have cable at my house until later in my high school years. Discovering new music meant reading magazines, visiting record strores (for you kids, that's a store, mostly extinct now, where you'd go to buy music; ususally on 8-track, vinyl, cassette or CD, depending on your generation). These days everyone is pretty much on a level playing field when it comes to discovering music, which is mostly great, but a little sad. Sad because most younger people now days may never feel the excitement of driving 30-45 minutes into the next town over to buy an album, ripping the plastic off and rocking out all the way home. Now it's all too easy.

Back to the story: between breakfast and lunch, I had the privilege of watching Eliza play soccer. If you haven't seen 5 year olds play soccer, it's a sight to behold. Here's a picture of Eliza warming up.

And a picture of what most of the game looked like. Notice the coach pointing in the direction of the goal.

That Saturday afternoon, I officially started the project of restoring our 1972 Volkswagen SuperBeetle. My brother and I used the 4-wheeler to drag it to the shop and tear the brakes down. To be honest, my brother did the bulk of the work (as evidenced below). At any rate, here are a few progress pictures. Don't worry, the funky paint job will have to go. Hopefully, I'll drive it sometime before the end of the year.

 Here's what I hope it looks like when finished

Stopping by my mom's daycare in the middle of the day and closing the door gently to keep from waking up the kids at naptime, running into old friends around every corner, seeing my little sister all grown up and teaching at our old school, noticing even the slightest change to the landscape in the middle of the country that is ingrained in your mind like a painting you see every day, standing in my dad's shop where I learned most everything I know about cars and putting one more mile on a few old forgotten roads can only mean one thing, I'm home. It's funny when I notice that this town not only shaped me, but I left my mark on it as well. I see the beams I helped hang (and sandblast, and paint, in July, with a protective leather hood for the sandblasting) in my dad's shop, I see the floors and walls I helped paint a time or two and the shelves in the parts warehouse I helped move and assemble at the dealership where I worked, I see various cars I've worked on or helped build and I see my siblings who for better or worse, I've had a huge influence on.

I've been having a blast spending time in my home state, and it's a shame I've been away for so long. I might have to keep this up.

Here's a great song by one of my fellow Boonevillians (is that a word?), Mississippi Moonshine by Jamie Davis and Soul Gravy. While I guess this song is technically a song about a night out with a girl, I like it because Jamie does such a good job of painting a picture of a quiet Northeast Mississippi night.

What about you? Do you feel a strong pull from your hometown or home state? What sort of memories are stirred for you when you go home?

Home Sweet Home Mississippi

Why am I here? Am I doing what I was put here for? Should I be living somewhere else, living a different life? It's not that I'm unhappy. I consider myself a really happy person. I just don't always know if I'm living life to the fullest.

For the last 5 years, Crystel and I have been living in Memphis. While Memphis isn't the biggest city, it's a far cry from my hometown of Booneville, MS, population approximately 10,000. I've been exposed to a lot of things in the past 5 years that I would have never dreamed of growing up. Memphis has been, and continues to be good to me. For that matter, the South has been good to me.

In my many travels all over the world, my constantly questioning nature leads me into thoughts of living elsewhere. Los Angeles was my most recent obsession, but Nashville, Atlanta, Savannah, Charleston, Austin and many other destinations, both foreign and domestic have all been in play in the past 5 years. The funny thing is, I'm always drawn to Mississippi. It's not the most exciting place, and it can sometimes limit opportunities, but it's always been home.
Early in my career, I worked for the public accounting firm Deloitte. One of my clients was Viking Range, the high-end appliance company based in Greenwood, MS. I would routinely spend 4-6 consecutive weeks at a time traveling to Mississippi to work. Driving down on Monday morning always had a therapeutic effect that I don't get in the city. I found myself reading Mississippi magazines and feeling a strong urge to move back to my home state. I always missed Crystel when I was gone, but I loved being in Mississippi.

After I left Deloitte, I stopped traveling to Mississippi as often (though I did still travel periodically to Fulton, MS to my company's plant...feeling that same pull then as well). I slowly became more removed from my home state. We moved further into Memphis (we previously lived in the suburbs of Shelby Country), got more caught up in young married life with a new (old) house, a new dog and our cat. Crystel took a non-profit job that immersed her more in the Memphis life and we traveled more together.

Speaking of the dog and cat...

All along, we both dearly loved our family, but we couldn't seem find a spare moment to spend quality time with them. A lot of other factors have been at play, but I feel like we missed out on a lot of time with family and friends while living just a short drive up the road. Recent developments have made it a little easier to see our loved ones. My mother-in-law, Julie, moved to Oxford, MS, and that's been a tremendous help. Before, she was always bouncing around between Booneville, Oxford, Memphis and her late mother's house in Cerritos, CA.

This past weekend, we went down to help Julie settle in. The weekend before, we spent one night in my hometown and got to visit Oxford on the way back to Memphis. All of this time in Mississippi has made me realize how much I miss home. I don't mean that I miss home in the sense of needing to move back. I just want to spend more time at home, more time with our family. Mississippi is home. From Booneville to Tupelo to Oxford and all points in between and everywhere else I've been in Mississippi, it feels like home. It's where our families are, it's where most of my best friends are, it's where I grew up and it's always going to be home to me. It's what made me who I am. I don't have to live there for it to be home.

I thought I'd write a few blog posts about our travels home. The posts will be chronological to document the past two weekends, with future posts likely to follow as we continue helping my mother-in-law move into her new house, restoring the Beetle (more on that later...before picture below) and visiting our families for the upcoming holiday season.

One more thing I confirmed last weekend: Oxford, MS is my favorite place on earth. Nothing can compare to it.

So, where is home for you? Do you have that certain place that always immediately feels like home no matter how long you've been gone?