As far back as I can remember
Ive esteemed class rings, whether they were high school rings or college
rings. Perhaps, it was the influence of my uncles, Earl Carter and Lamar
Carter, who each held college degrees at a time when symbols of educational
achievement in the Carter family were rare, that birthed my admiration for
class rings.
Neither of my Carter grandparents finished high school. Hayden Carters
father died when Hayden was perhaps seven or eight, so he was needed to help
with the familys livelihood, farming. Haydens formal education
probably ended before the fifth grade. My grandmothers father died
at age fifty. Becky may have completed the seventh or eighth grade before
she also had to drop out of school to help work the family farm.
My dad didnt graduate high school, though he doubtless would have had
he not, in his senior year, had a falling out with a teacher, who wouldnt
accept a paper hed written as his work. My grandfather thought he could
convince Dad to return to school by working him extra hard on the family
farm. Dad admitted the next several weeks were the hardest of his life, but
his determination to spite the teacher prevailed. If Dad ever regretted his
decision to drop out of school, he never shared it with me.
Mom had dropped out of school even earlier than Dad and didnt finish
the eighth grade. Instead at sixteen, she and Dad married. The following
year, my older brother was born and over the next twenty years three more
children arrived, with each of us finding slightly better living conditions
than our sibling predecessor. None of us experienced anything like a childhood
lived in affluence, but we were loved and cared for and given the best our
parents could afford.
In my youth, there were more opportunities for me to be around my Uncle Earl
than Dads younger brother, Lamar. Uncle Earl had settled in Senatobia,
MS, but Uncle Lamar found work in Venezuela more to his liking. Since leaving
Venezuela, Uncle Lamar has made New York City his home, where consulting
has provided him opportunities to "see the world." So, when it came to seeing
class rings in my family, I saw Uncle Earls more than Uncle Lamars
Having so few family members with class rings made the arrival of my high
school ring a memorable occasion. How I talked my Dad out of the thirty-five
dollars that was needed to purchase the ring, I no longer remember, but in
1959, thirty-five dollars was a lot of money.
Traditionally, Pontotoc High School had used the Balfour Co. as the chosen
provider of its graduation rings and jewelry. And, traditionally, the letter
P was set into the stone or stone-like material atop the ring. The year of
my graduating class, we chose the then unique feature of placing the
P inside the material after a "shadow-box" fashion.
Approximately five years
later, I ordered my college ring from the same company. I dont remember
if I was a college senior or junior, though I suspect I was a senior and
probably needed the assurance I would graduate in 1965 before plopping down
the sixty-three dollars required to buy the ring.
College rings, I discovered, were customizable; one could choose the color
of the "stone." I chose red, but over the years a lot of folks have confused
the deep red with maroon and asked if I were a Mississippi State graduate,
giving me reason to second guess my choice of colors. Additional customization
came in the letters representing ones degree. In my case, BS represents my
Bachelor of Science degree.
As viewed by an observer, BS is on the left side of the ring and 65, the
year I graduated, is on the right side. Ive always worn my college
ring on my right hand. Whether tradition still holds or not, I dont
know, but I was told that I should wear my ring backwards as an undergraduate
in order to see the degree I was striving to attain. After graduation, the
ring was reversed to "right-side up," in order for me to see the year of
graduation.
As a math teacher, I wore my college ring daily. I am proud of my alma mater,
The University of Mississippi, and I was always happy to recommend Ole Miss
to students interested in attending a university after high school.
Early in my teaching career, I jammed the knuckle of my ring finger on my
right hand. While the swelling eventually receded, my knuckle was permanently
enlarged. I had to have my ring enlarged to slip it past the knuckle. The
resizing was done by a jeweler in Ripley, MS. While the ring fit well enough
and looked fine on my finger, I regretted the work had obliterated a part
of the engraving of my name inside the band. Wayne L. was still legible,
as was Car, but the rest was gone.
When I worked in the meat department of a supermarket, I was unable to wear
my college ring because it had a tendency to cling to the meat film used
in wrapping meats packaged in the store. The places I worked usually had
a designated meat wrapper, but there were times throughout the day that I
also performed this function. I found it easier to not wear my college ring
while working with meat than to have to remove it multiple times during the
typical day.
After becoming a Meat Field Specialist in 1982, I had greater opportunity
to wear my college ring on a daily basis. More wearing meant more wear and
tear. In time, the resizing weld showed signs of fissure. Miraculously, the
ring held together a good ten years or more after I first noticed the break
in the weld.
In the early nineties, I received an
advertisement for an Alumni Signet Ring. The allure proved too much for my
threshold of resistance, and I soon ordered it. I wear it on the ring finger
of my left hand. So, if we ever go back to the days of letter writing and
sealing envelopes with wax, Ill get full utilization from my signet
ring. Meanwhile it serves as a conversation piece for keen eyed observers.
Last year, after Barbaras journey necklace was lost for a brief period,
she had a local jeweler add a larger link so the pendant and chain could
not slip apart. She asked me to pick it up when it was repaired. In doing
so, I asked the proprietor about repairing my college ring. He looked at
it and said hed be glad to repair it, but that I should first check
with Balfour as the ring had a lifetime warranty. I went online and found
I could return the ring for repair as cheaply as $14.95, provided I had not
violated the conditions of the warranty. I printed off a form to use in returning
the ring but didnt act right away.
In January, this year, I dropped my college ring and in picking it off the
floor observed the 3 millimeter section of gold comprising the expansion
joint was loose and being held in place by friction. I put it in a Ziploc
bag for safe keeping and decided it was time to fill out the Balfour repair
form.
To be continued
Blue House Carter Family
Memory
Theres a housing project underway on acreage near the stomping grounds
of my childhood friends Tony Austin, Jimmy Rackley, and myself. A portion
of the dirt work is visible at the corner of Reynolds and Dowdy (Railroad
Ave.). Much of the area has been covered with small trees and vines and provided
something of a privacy screen for the backyards of homes on the west side
of North Columbia Street.
I dont mind seeing the landscape being molded into lots for small-footprint
housing as I had no sentimental attachment to the land. However, Im
sure to miss a house that was demolished in the process.
Im not sure the demolished house was originally constructed as a house
or if it may have started its life as an office. I remember it went up rather
hastily, and esthetically it never rated much above shabby. It wasnt
even a bricked house. The builder had covered the exterior walls with something
having the appearance of 4x8 plywood sheets with vertical strips hiding the
seams. The last time it was painted, someone chose country blue for the outside
color.
Theres little left of the house in the picture I took recently, but
I made sure the photo had a bit of blue siding in it. The pile of rubble
will probably be hauled away pretty soon, and the current remnants of the
blue house will become fodder for a landfill or possibly fill for a future
building site.
My regret in the loss of the blue house is I wont be able to show it
to my grandchildren and recall the time Rayanne and I walked in on a family
having supper in the blue house. I believe Ive related the following
in a previous newsletter, but Ive been unable to locate it.
One Christmas season after Rayanne and Ashley Butler married, Rayanne asked
me to go with her to select a recliner for Ashley. Our destination was the
blue house, but it wasnt blue then.
It was almost dark, and there were no recliners out front, but there had
been several on display a week or so earlier. Rayanne had seen them, as had
I. Confident we were at a retail business, I opened the front door without
knocking, and we walked in together.
Something didnt look right. There were no recliners in the room, but
there was a couch and chair and a TV. At first we didnt see anyone,
but as we moved toward the middle of the room, we saw three or four people
eating around a kitchen table.
They looked a little startled when we asked if they had any recliners left
to sell. By the time they figured out we werent there to do them any
harm, we figured out we were inside somebodys home, not a business.
We apologized for our intrusion and hurriedly left.
Each year as Christmas nears, Im reminded of our recliner
story, and as the story is retold in our family midst boisterous laughter,
Id like to believe that theres another family living somewhere
that also pauses at Christmastime to remember the night a man and his daughter
burst into their living room asking to buy a recliner.
Bodock Beau Political
Respite...Mostly
In an election year, a little humor is a refreshing respite from the liberal
medias love affair with the Democrat candidates for President.
Concerning Children
1. You spend the first two years of their life teaching them to walk and
talk. Then you spend the next sixteen telling them to sit down and shut up.
2. Grandchildren are God's reward for not killing your own children.
3. Mothers of teens now know why some animals eat their young.
4. Children seldom misquote you. In fact, they usually repeat word for word
what you shouldn't have said.
5. The main purpose of holding children's parties is to remind yourself that
there are children more awful than your own.
6. We childproofed our homes, but they are still getting in.
7. If you have a lot of tension and you get a headache, do what it says on
the aspirin bottle: "Take two aspirin" and "keep away from children!"
Received from Kim Goslin
Boudreauxs Conversion
Each Friday night after work, Boudreaux would fire up his outdoor grill and
cook a venison steak. But, all of Boudreaux's neighbors were Catholic, and
since it was Lent, they were forbidden from eating meat on
Friday.
The delicious aroma from the grilled venison steaks was causing such a problem
for the Catholic faithful that they finally talked to their priest.
The Priest came to visit Boudreaux, and suggested that he become a Catholic.
After several classes and much study, Boudreaux attended Mass, and as the
priest sprinkled holy water
over him, he said, "You were born a Baptist,
and raised a Baptist, but now you are a Catholic."
Boudreaux's neighbors were greatly relieved, until Friday night arrived,
and the wonderful aroma of grilled venison filled the neighborhood.
The Priest was called immediately by the neighbors, and, as he rushed into
Boudreaux's yard, clutching a rosary and prepared to scold him, he stopped
and watched in amazement.
There stood Boudreaux, clutching a small bottle of holy water which he carefully
sprinkled over thegrilling meat and chanted: "You wuz born a deer, you wuz
raised a deer, but now you is a catfish."
Contributed by Ed Dandridge
How To Train A Cat
Our young daughter had adopted a stray cat. To my distress, he began to use
the back of our new sofa as a scratching post. "Don't worry," my husband
reassured me. "I'll have him trained in no time."
I watched for several days as my husband patiently "trained" our new pet.
Whenever the cat scratched, my husband deposited him outdoors to teach him
a lesson.
The cat learned quickly. For the next 16 years, whenever he wanted to go
outside, he scratched the back of the sofa.
Shared by Larry Young
"These Clintons are like cockroaches. Theyll be the last thing left
after a nuclear blast." Rush Limbaugh
"Change is the seasons mantra for the star-struck masses.
Obamas latest slogan is Change to believe in. But how do
you believe in change? Change, after all, is process.
Change to what? Barack Obama does not say, the genius of the
promise. Everyone gets to fill in the blank now, and be disappointed later."
Wesley Pruden
It looks like John McCain has clinched the Republican nomination. He was
very excited when they woke him up to tell him." Craig Ferguson