The first time I saw the Pointer Sisters on television, I thought, “What an unfortunate choice of clothing!”

Those gals were dressed in 1940s garb, which wasn’t very stylish back in the 1970s. Heck, it probably wasn’t “stylish” in the 1940s! It looked like something out of my Aunt LaVerta’s closet that she donated to a thrift shop. In fact, it very well could have been.

The ladies were singing, I think, “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B,” which the Andrews Sisters had popularized decades before. If I closed my eyes, I could get past the way they were dressed. Those women have voices that will knock your socks off! I’ve always enjoyed their music full of jazz, scat, and be-bop. It’s definitely a joyful noise.

The fact that they succeeded in the music world is an interesting story, because they grew up in a household of “can’t.” Their daddy wanted to protect them from “the devil’s work,” so there was “no jewelry, no makeup, no dancing, no movies, and certainly no rock music.” They didn’t have a lot of money, and their clothing most often came from Salvation Army thrift stores. Though they weren’t fond of dressing that way as children, that look worked well for the music they would later sing on stage.

When I saw that Mo at Manic Monday had the word “can” as a prompt, the Pointer Sisters came to mind immediately. One of their songs is almost a “theme song” for me. Go ahead and play it in the background while you read some other blog posts for Manic Monday. I won’t be offended. Y’all make it a good day.

Remember we are in this together!

Yes We Can Can, by the Pointer Sisters

TubeCodes.com

Now’s the time for all good men
to get together with one another.
We got to iron out our problems
and iron out our quarrels
and try to live as brothers.
And try to find a piece of land
without stepping on one another.
And do respect the women of the world.
Remember you all have mothers.
We got to make this land a better land
than the world in which we live.
And we got to help each man be a better man
with the kindness that we give.
I know we can make it.
I know darn well we can work it out.
Oh yes we can, I know we can can
Yes we can can, why can’t we?
If we wanna get together we can work it out.

And we gotta take care of all the children,
the little children of the world.
’cause they’re our strongest hope for the future,
the little bitty boys and girls.

We got to make this land a better land
than the world in which we live.
And we got to help each man be a better man
with the kindness that we give.
I know we can make it.
I know darn well we can work it out.
Oh yes we can, I know we can can
yes we can can, why can’t we?
If we wanna, yes we can can.

“What do you want?” my husband asks, as my birthday looms on the horizon.

“Oh, nothing,” I reply sweetly.

My husband is a smart man. He knows that if you ask a woman what she wants and she says, “nothing,” that’s not what she really means. She means, “Think it up yourself, buddy, and it better be darned good!”

I think I intimidated him early in our relationship by telling him, “NEVER give a woman a gift that requires a warranty, unless she specifically asks for it.” So, I know I’m not going to get a blender, thank goodness.

What do I want?

• World Peace would be a good start.
• An end to global warming would be a hot item on the list.
• A cure for cancer would be grand.
• A stable economy wouldn’t be too bad.
• I really wish I had some little elves, like that shoemaker guy in the fairy tales. Only forget the shoes; I have too many of those anyway! I want them making the Share A Square afghans! We have 87 of the 140 afghan goal at my house now! See most of them in the Afghan Gallery.
• How about a lottery win? I don’t need millions (that’s obscene)…a hundred thousand would be good.
• Maybe a maid and a secretary for a few days so I can get caught up?

Hmmm….

Ok, I know I’m not going to get any of those things for my birthday. It was just a little fantasy for a few moments. Now and then I get to indulge in them. But, I don’t really know what I want…I have everything I need.

How about you? What do YOU want? Tell me in a comment, because I want to know. Maybe you can give me some ideas. If you are a blogger, I just installed the CommentLuv plugin, which will show a link to your most recent post. And, if you are a blogger, write a post of your own about “want” and join Mo and friends for Manic Monday.

Oh, and Honey, if you are still trying to think of something to give me….that spa certificate you gave me a few years ago wasn’t a bad idea! But, I don’t really care if you get me anything for my birthday, because..

I got you, Babe.

TubeCodes.com

Y’all, I would like to think that I’m a smart woman. I am a smart woman in my own way, but my Daddy was right. He said that words go in one ear and out the other for me. My little pea brain only processes the information that I need right now. I have a hard time keeping my mind on track, and I am often oblivious to niggling little details–ones that just might make a difference later.

A case in point was when my Future Husband Now Ex (I’ll just call him Mr. X) and I were hunting for our very first house. I was only eighteen years old and had always lived in my Daddy’s house, so I didn’t have any idea what to seek. If I had watched HGTV back then, I would have known that the main thing to look for was “Location, Location, Location.” But, this was back in the Stone Age and there was no HGTV.

We found a lovely little two-bedroom, one bath house on a corner lot. It needed paint, but it was pretty. The cost was a whopping $7,000. This was in 1973. Today a house like that would cost $60,000 or more, but back then $7,000 was a small fortune. We wanted it, but had no idea if we would be able to make the $70/month house payments (I would kill for a house payment that was only $70 now…wait, no I wouldn’t. I’m kind.).

It burns me that these days you can’t buy a decent new car for that price. And, the car doesn’t have indoor plumbing! But, I guess you could sleep in it if you had to do so.

Anyway, we bought that house, and Mr. X moved in. I came over in the daytime and helped clean, paint and “decorate.” My idea of decorating back then was odd in retrospect. I can’t even bear to think about it. I never spent any time outside while I was there, because I was concentrating on making my nest livable. If I had gone outside, I might have noticed something that would later annoy me.

Fast forward to the night we returned from our honeymoon in Colorado. We had been driving all day, and it was late at night when we arrived. The long drive had made for frazzled nerves. When we carried our bags up on the porch and opened the door, the porch light wouldn’t come on. In fact, none of the lights in the house would come on.

Further inspection showed that all the light bulbs had been unscrewed in the house. On top of that, there were streamers, balloons, and rice all over the place. The bathroom mirror had “Just Married” written all over it in soap. This is what we got for hiding the car so it wouldn’t get decorated. Mr. X’s mother, who was the only person with a key to the house, had let his friends in to play their practical jokes.

I was even less amused when I tried to crawl into bed to discover that Mr. X’s friends had short-sheeted the bed and spread rice all over that, too. I was not in a pretty mood by the time I got to bed. We both were fast asleep immediately.

During the middle of the night, there was a jarring sound that jolted me upright in the bed.

“WHOO WHOOOOOOOO chug a chug a WHOO WHOOOOO”

I wondered, “Oh Heck! What are his ‘friend’s’ doing now?”

I threw back the curtains, and screamed,
“Oh My Lord, there’s a TRAIN outside our window!”

Mr. X rolled over and pulled the covers over his head muttering at me as if I were an idiot, “Of course there is. It goes past every night.”

I had no clue there was a track out there! I tried to go back to sleep, but about the time I drifted off, here came the train the other direction.

“WHOO WHOOOOOOOO chug a chug a WHOO WHOOOOO”

The next morning, I went outside and walked across the side street. Sure enough, there was a train track. It was a spur that went from downtown Gainesville to a paint factory on the other side of the highway. I had never noticed it, because the trains only traveled it at night. Of course.

For the seven years that we lived there, that train went down the track each night. It’s whistle split the air as it crossed the street on which we lived. To tell you the truth, I got used to the sound, and learned to sleep right through it.

When we later moved to Lindsay, Texas, I missed the sound of the train. I much preferred it to the recorded chimes that the Catholic Church broadcast at full blast from it’s steeple every hour.

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥
The theme for Manic Monday is “track.” Mo at It’s A Blog Eat Blog World gives us words to use as a prompt for writing. I worked on the theme, trying to come up with other ideas, but couldn’t keep my mind on track.

Technorati Tags: train track, Manic Monday