‘The Powder Room’ Articles

A Minister is as a Minister Does

“Come back to choir with me, Mom,” my middle son said.

I looked at him. I had decided that I would do something special with each of the men in my life, this son, his younger brother, and my husband. Something that would make memories with each of them, something they wanted to do with me. I made this pact once their oldest brother went on to Heaven. Not out of remorse mind you, but more the recognition of just how precious every moment in life is and the ugly truth that you have no idea when they might end.

I really didn’t want to go back to church choir. That was a time past, when three sons were little, I had no career, and well, let’s just say it, I was more innocent about volunteer church work.

“This isn’t what you are used to. You will like Dick,” John said hopefully, describing a bit more the minister who was currently choir director for the mega Baptist church we belonged to. John too, torn in his own way with his oldest brother’s loss, was searching for bigger purpose. He may also have been trying to find a way for me to gain an outlet for my sorrow. There were more than a few nights he held me close this past few months as this unwlecome turn of events placed him in the role of comforter.
I could hardly refuse, given my promise to my own heart.

So Monday nights, in that cold winter of 2006 found me sitting in the back row of the choir room, singing. Well, not really. I cried for most of a year. Music had always been a big part of our family, since the time I started birthing those boys and trying to sing through songs with lyrics the likes of:

“ In this house we’ve built of make believe
Loved ones go long before, seems it’s time to leave
But we will learn how to grieve, to forgive and receive
‘Till we see them there in that city”

Let’s just say, if music is the emotion of the soul, mine had too big a whole to do much more than blink tears through the hymns and listen to the voices of those around me.
That and listen to Dick. I had quit choir just about the time Dick had come to our mega church. Not having been in a frame of mind to want to stay in choir those several years back, I had left. It was easy to say why, I was traveling too much and life had changed. But here I was, a different time and place and a different person and back in choir with my middle son a few rows over.

I don’t know what you think or know or care about worship, that act of religious devotion directed towards a deity, in its simplest, most purest, form to give worth to something bigger than you. There are all kinds of ways you can get to that place. My Dad worshiped when he fished. I knew this the day I heard him say he wouldn’t mind going on to Heaven while he was on the water. So there I was, in choir, on that back row, listening to Dick and finding myself worshiping.

Over the next four years, I healed. Never, in all my time in choirs, had a minister ministered, directed more than notes, to the 200+ people that gathered every Monday, like Dick. Over the next four years, Dick would be called on to continue to minister as his wife, a woman who clearly was the man’s soul mate, went on to Heaven herself, too young, too soon, and suffering. Through it all, Dick fulfilled what I expect God hoped one of His ministers would.

This last Sunday was the last Sunday Dick led my mega church choir. He did it with grace, beauty, and love. He ministered to us once more in song and devotion, worshiping that God in Heaven, who has plans for us all. I hope Dick writes a book. I hope one day I review it here on Pineknot Farm and Lab. But for now, right here on Pineknot Farm and Lab, let me tell you, he’s my Handsome Cowboy for September.

Tags: Handsome Cowboy
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John Wright

For the month of August, announcing, Handsome Cowboy of the month, Mr. John Wright! Just look at those eyes! Look at that smile! Look at that cleft chin! But if that wasn’t enough, he can do this:

1. He can hit a 7-inch bull’s-eye under a mile of water and more than two miles of rock, using a drill bit not much bigger than his two clenched fists.

2. At 56, he is considered the world’s pre-eminent oil well assassin.

3. He is an Aggie, inspired by a lab professor who told him most published technical papers were rubbish “because they did not properly assess the system uncertainties in the variables upon which they draw their conclusions.” He confesses to an obsession with uncertainty.

5. In 83 relief well projects around the world, including the North Sea’s infamous Piper Alpha Platform, which exploded in 1988 and killed 167 men, Wright personally designed and managed 40. Sixteen of them involved blowouts, in places like Brunei and Syria, but also California and Texas. All of his wells were successful.

Any man who has the cool, intelligence and unflappability to become the world’s preeminent specialist in devastating oil well blowouts that threaten my Gulf Coast, HAS to be somebody’s Handsome Cowboy.

Yeah, that’s right.. your mine, John Wright.

PS JW’s phone number: 1.800.BLOWOUT.

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Garrett

This guy has stolen my heart. Really. I first met him about 6 months ago. He came riding up to the fence on his bicycle, that separates his Grandaddy’s property from our farm. I am a sucker for a long-sleeved cowboyshirt tucked into jeans. His collar was buttoned up, it was a quite warm day, and I still don’t know how an 8 year old could keep a shirt tucked in as he climbed the fence to give me a hand.

Garrett is what he told me his name was, not a boistrous kid, and he sat with me in the dirt while we fixed the weedeater I was working on.

He’s smart, I thought to myself, as without much talking, he watched what I was doing. A fine bead of sweat glistened above his thin upper lip and I watched him as he tried coiling the new string into the weedeater.

“Garrett”, Grandaddy Gene called. “Come on back over here. Your momma is ready to go.”

“Can I come back?” he asked me.

“Year, Garret, you’re a good helper”.

“I like you,” he said.

“I like you too,” I said with a smile.

Gene later told me about his grandson. How they almost lost him. Deep inside every cell of that cowboy’s body are little factories that make energy, and his are messed up. “He’s got what they call a metabolic disease,” his Grandfather stated.

Garrett and I have spent a few afternoons together. He always politely asks if he can help me. He tells me about school and likes to help me get the chickens and turkeys in the pen. He watches and learns in everything he does and when we are done, we have a coke out of the little fridge in the tack room. He usually stands, shirt all tucked into his belted genes, pushes his hat back, booted feet crossed at the ankles, and swigs his drink happily.

“Can I come back next time I am here?” He always asks.

“Yep”, I say.

I watch as his little thin shoulders grab the fence and he hooks his boots into the hogwire and over he goes.

Garrett is the resiliency, innocence, and beauty that is a child. He takes each day the way it comes and hopes for the next.

He’s my handsome cowboy this month.

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Look Before You Lock

As temperatures start to rise this summer, I see constant reminders of how dangerous it is to leave your child inside a car unattended.  Article after gut wrenching article of the most devoted and doting parents get distracted and forget their baby is with them until they realize too late…I shudder when I think about how easy it would be for me, a sleep deprived new parent with a million and one things running through my head could forget my pride and joy is sleeping peacefully in the back seat of my car.  I’m now taking precautions and am passing these tips on to you in hopes of avoiding this fatal tragedy:

• Put something you need on the floorboard in the back near the car seat, such as your purse, wallet, or cell phone.  This forces you to open the back door and see the child in the car seat.
• “Look then Lock.”  Get in the habit of opening the back door before you lock the doors to make sure there isn’t a child back there.
• Keep a large stuffed animal in the car seat when it’s not occupied.  When the car seat is in use, move the stuffed animal to the front passenger seat as a visual reminder that your child is with you.
• Make arrangements with your babysitter or daycare provider to call you if your child does not show up as scheduled.
• If you see a child left unattended in a vehicle, get involved.  If it is hot or the child seems sick, call 911 immediately.

For more tips or facts on hypothermia check out http://www.kidsandcars.org/

Tags: Mi Madre, Mon Ami
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Armando Galarraga

I must have looked through a thousand photos of Armando, trying to find the right one for his installation into the PFandL Handsome Cowboy Hall of Fame. There’ s approximately 1,520,000 of them to go through, most of them showing what a pitchers body does in the middle of the execution of a 90 mph fast ball.

But what I wanted was something else entirely. I wanted that very fine moment when the camera caught Armando’s reaction to the fact that the Ump, Joyce, had just blown his perfectly pitched game.

He smiled. Nothing big and toothy, fringed subtly with  sarcasm or mockery. Clearly, he was surprised but not extremely incredulously so, the kind of incredulity that some might have wanted to demonstrate when  a mistake of that baseball-magnitude occurred from a fellow baseball professional.   He certainly knew in that precise instant that Joyce had made a mistake. There wasn’t a hint of anger or enmity and none followed.

Thinking about it as I put him into the PFandL Handsome Cowyboy Hall of Fame, Armondo’s smile, seemed, well almost as if it has a secret behind it. Something, that the millions of people who have now seen that footage, recognized but certainly found exceptional, and maybe don’t even get.

Almost like he has the game of baseball and his place in it, in the best possible perspective a pitcher-for-a-living could have.

I bet if you could find that picture, and someone painted it and then someone looked at it 100 years from now, they would wonder, “what makes that guy smile like that?”

Sort of like the Mona Lisa.

Yeah, Armando, your smile. It’s like that. Potentially famous and one that could make generations shake their heads at.

Mr. Galarraga, we offer our gratitude, for showing a generation of future young cowboys and cowgirls what you have to have inside to make a smile like that come out on the outside.

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Start a Baby Blog!

Baby books are out, blogging is in! Blog about every single event in your child’s life, no matter how big or small. There are many benefits to blogging:

1. All your memories are housed in one location
2. It is so much easier than scrapbooking
3. You can instantly share photos and milestones with your friends and family
4. You can upload videos
5. Your friends and family that don’t live nearby feel like they are a part of your little ones life
6. It is easy, fun and free

To start a blog pick a platform (such as www.blogger.com), sign up, pick a pre-design template (or for the more savvy create one of your own), share the address with family and friends (you may want to make the site private) and blog, blog, blog! Don’t worry if your child is no longer a newborn, you can start at anytime, or you can even back date entries if you like. Once you start, there is no looking back, you will begin writing more than you ever thought possible…and  you will be so happy you did!

Tags: Mi Madre, Mon Ami
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Mike Rowe

It’s that time again… the one where we get to pick the Handsome Cowboy of the month (whatever… inspiration is not constrained by time… where handsome men are concerned.)

This month’s winner is none other than the melodious voiced, Mike Rowe, famous of among other things, his work as chief dirty jobber on Dirty Jobs.

You know him. He’s the one with the not quite handsome face who works in all kinds of poo and makes you laugh at it.

I want to be on Dirty Jobs.. with Mike Rowe.

Why, you ask is he Handsome Cowboy of the month.

It doesn’t hurt that below that not quite movie star handsome face, are these chest muscles…

But mostly we like him for this

You’re the man, Mike. This month at least…

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Silent Bob

Since its Valentine’s Day, at least it’s the aftermath…

I am proposing to induct a Handsome Cowboy in my own Hall of Fame, whenever the notion hits me. I do believe I am obliged to set you straight on why this is an okay activity for me to do and for you to read because you might think that for a married woman this whole activity might be unseemly or downright  improper.

First, Mrs. G does it and she’s happily married and for gosh sakes, SHE calls them ‘Cabana Boys’. I mean, how humiliating is that. Those men KNOW she and the Women’s Colony consider them sex objects. (Or they can assume that, which is interesting, because I think its the case that when you speak of  ‘sex object’ and it’s a woman speaking of it… compared to the images conjured when a man hears a woman thinking about it… there is generally a way-different thought process and end result…to, you know, where the thoughts take said man versus woman…)

hmmm…

We can probably let it rest that ‘Cabana Boys’ are, at a minimum, ALWAYS  pleasing to gaze upon. Handsome Cowboys are going to consider, well, deeper attributes. Yeah. Okay, maybe. Hopefully. Sometimes. Ugh. I’ll try.

Second, it’s not like when you get married you die.

Third: It’s not like I haven’t talked about them before.

Fourth: you, yes you, my girlfriends, can nominate a candidate and if his portfolio or your defense of his handsome cowboy status stands up to the  criteria, well, we can take a vote and who knows what might happen.

Fifth:  Men read with alacrity, there is way better info here than from Men’s Heath or Maxim.. plus it’s free.

SO having convinced you thoroughly, here goes….the first installment of PFandL’s Cowboy Hall of Fame is officially started and the very first honoree or inductee or infamous-tee, will be none other than Silent Bob.

Silent Bob has been nominated and chosen because he has taught me that golf is a passion, his passion, and it is worth me walking around carrying his bag to share it with him. He has stood with me, through things I couldn’t have been left standing had I been alone. He makes me cinnamon pecan pancakes for breakfast …in bed and he has supported me like few, no… like no other husband could have done, when luck or God sent me down a road of my own profession.  Upon which, when it is all said and done, I don’t care nearly so much about (the profession, not his support) then the fact that he made me a mother and I love the three sons that are ours.

Oh yeah, he also is very smart, well aware that it would likely be ill-advised, however enjoyable, should he have the idea to start something like a beautiful cowgirl page. I love smart men.

It’s a double  standard. What can I say. It’s not like there haven’t ever been any of those before.

So, my Robert ‘Silent Bob’ Siefert

Welcome to the PFandL Handsome Cowboy Hall of Fame

Tags: girlsonly, Handsome Cowboy, LadiesOnly
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