SMALL TOWN LIFE

The small town where I live is changing. Those who have grown up here are sad to see some of the changes - the big city encroaches on the things natives love about the place - WalMart -- make that a super Walmart -- paved the way for the usual strip shopping. And those city folk are coming up in droves from Atlanta. I grew up in a small town in Pennsylvania and never looked back as I left it. However now I find that I am jealous of the families living here in Ellijay - a pyramid of four generations offering love, support and familiarity for all. The great -grandmothers and grandmothers and mothers and kids all have access to the family fountain.
In my case, my four "kids" and two step-daughters and grandkids live too far away to have the blessings of life-sharing. Cell phones only do so much. I have lived in big cities where it's much harder to find four generations within "come over for dinner" distance. As the commercial says: "priceless".

HOT & HOTTER

I know, why bother complaining about it! Can you imagine what it must have been like at the turn of the century - women wearing petticoats, and cinched-up dresses? And men wore WOOL? And there was no a/c, no icemaker-in-the-door access to a cool drink. I read today that you could hear the thud of horses falling down in the heat in those days. I don't buy into Algore's global warming disaster prediction. Seems like just a normal weather cycle from my point of view - even if it is nasty! Hard to believe that just over 20 years ago there were magazine covers bemoaning the coming of a nuclear freeze.