I was walking down the grocery store aisle, looking for something quick for dinner, when I spotted the sign for frozen pizza.
Having something hot for dinner sounded pretty good, especially if I didn’t have to go to any more trouble than ripping open a cardboard box and sliding a pizza pan into the oven for 18 minutes.

As easy as that sounded, I found myself wishing I was as resourceful as my grandmother. She always made pizza from scratch, including the dough. She’d let me open the Fleischmann’s yellow yeast packet and pour the warm water over it.

She’d add flour and work those ingredients together, gradually sprinkling more flour over the ball to keep the dough from sticking to her fingers.

We’d sit and talk while she kneaded the dough, and it was amazing to watch that ball of gooey dough turn into a beautiful golden globe.

When the dough was smooth, she’d sprinkle flour on a wooden cutting board and, using an old wooden rolling pin, roll out the dough and then use an upside-down small bowl to cut out small circles.

She’d ladle tomato sauce on top of each circle, sprinkle fresh cheese on top and then pop the pies into her gas oven. Our mouths would water as the smell of freshly baking bread and cheese filled the kitchen.

Times change, though, and we went from those home-made pizzas to a brand that became synonymous with my childhood — Chef Boy Ardee. Whenever we saw my mom pull out that tall red box, we knew fresh pizza was on the way.

We had some old Appian Way pizza pans that, over the years, became slightly warped from spending so much time in the oven. That didn’t matter because we loved making our own pizzas.

With a Chef Boy Ardee pizza mix, we could all have what we wanted on a pizza, from pepperoni to extra cheese to hamburger meat to sausage. Many a night we spent watching “Dark Shadows” or “The Smothers Brothers” while waiting for those pizzas to finish baking.

When we were young 20 somethings, price and time mattered, and we discovered Winn Dixie’s frozen dinner aisle, specifically the section with the Totino’s pizzas.

They were cheap, filling and easy. No one cared about trans fats back then. At 10 for a buck, Totino’s fit the bill.

Then marriage and children came along, and it was back to the Chef. My sons loved kneading the dough and then spreading the crust to the edges of the pan. And then smearing the flour on their shirts, their hair and the wall.

Those were great until we discovered people would actually bring pizzas to our front door if we picked up the phone, placed an order and then gave them money when the doorbell rang. When Domino’s came along, our long association with Chef Boy Ardee came to a sad end.

Now that my boys are on their own, I often find myself strolling the frozen food aisle, looking for something quick for dinner. We’ve come a long way from those cardboard Totino’s days. Modern pizzas offer a variety of toppings from artichokes to roasted garlic to Kalamata olives.

Weight Watchers and Lean Cuisine offer low-fat, nutritious pizza choices. There’s also gluten-free and vegetarian pizzas.

Some taste wonderful and others are like eating cardboard. And while it’s a lot easier to pop a frozen pizza in the microwave, nothing beats the smell and taste of a pizza made with fresh bread dough, home-made tomato sauce and freshly grated cheese.

That’s what I call a pizza pie.

This article was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

I saw my daughter-in-law’s vehicle pull into the parking lot as the high school choir began singing the National Anthem. Due to heavy traffic, they were running a bit late for the concert.
Luckily, the concert was a casual and family-friendly affair because the playlist featured songs from classic Disney movies. When I saw my 3-year-old granddaughter come around the corner of the car, a smile broke out on my face.

She was dressed in a classic Disney Snow White costume with a bright red ribbon in her hair and black tap shoes on her feet. The blue sequins on her dress sparkled as mother and daughter dashed into the auditorium, and we hurried to our seats on the front row.

As soon as the choir started with their next song, my granddaughter began rocking in her seat in rhythm to the music, a smile illuminating her face. When the song ended, she was clapping louder than anyone else in the auditorium.

The next song was a lively number, and Kylie was soon on her feet, her arms out by her side, swaying to the music. We tried to get her to sit down, but she didn’t want to sit — she wanted to dance.

She twirled in time to the music, loving the way her yellow skirt billowed out around her. When the choir sang the toe-tapping “Hakuna Matata” from “The Lion King,” the teens were moving with the music.

And down front, my granddaughter was dancing and clapping right along with them.

Kylie danced the entire performance, skipping and swaying in tune with the piano and those beautiful young voices. She was uninhibited and spellbound in the magic of the music.

The ability to lose one’s self in the moment is sometimes forgotten by adults. We’re concerned with following the rules, coloring inside the lines so to speak, so we keep our emotions in check. We don’t want others to think we’ve lost our senses.

But sometimes throwing caution to an arbitrary, strong wind is just what we need. How often have we sat in traffic with a great song on the radio and only hummed instead of belting that song out like Aretha Franklin or Elvis Presley?

Perhaps we believe we’re not as talented as other or we don’t want to look like we’ve lost our marbles, so we deny ourselves the opportunity to cut loose and lose ourselves in the joy of the moment.

The singers on stage, however, hadn’t forgotten what it was like to belt out a tune and love every minute of the experience. One of the choir members, Ernestine, is in a wheelchair, and I know choir is her favorite class of the day.

Her radiant smile reflected the joy in her heart, just as my granddaughter’s dancing reflected the happiness in her soul.

These two were not afraid for others to know they’d embraced the joy of the moment and were not going to let anything — not social mores, an audience or the thought of being judged by others — stop them from immersing themselves in feeling fabulous.

Toward the end of the show, my granddaughter began trying to sing with the choir. She didn’t know any of the words, but that didn’t stop her.

When I asked her keep her voice down a bit and let the choir sing, she gave me a questioning look.

“But I need to sing,” she said. “I just need to.”

And with that, I sat back, smiled and told her to go ahead and sing.

And dance.

And let the joy in her heart blossom.

Oh how I envy her.

This article was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

Last Sunday, my family came over for dinner and to visit. After we’d eaten, I realized the dishwasher was already filled so we’d have to wash the dishes by hand.
As the sink filled with soap suds, I remembered the days when everybody washed the dishes by hand. When I was a young girl, my mom’s family gathered every Sunday after church for dinner at my grandparents’ house, and everyone chipped in for clean-up duties.

My relatives had the assembly line down pat, and I’m not sure if today’s young people  — reared on paper plates, take-out Styrofoam boxes and cheap plastic cups — know there’s a system for efficiently washing dishes by hand.

When heated debates about politics and football ended, everyone chipped in for kitchen duty. Some cousins were charged with scraping the food into an old milk carton so it could be added to the compost pile, and the uncles put the leftovers in smaller bowls and then in the refrigerator.

My grandfather was always at the head of the line to wash the dishes. He taught me to fill the sink with hot, soapy water and put a tablespoon of household bleach in the water to serve as a disinfectant.

Wash the glasses first, he said, because they needed the cleanest and hottest water possible to stay sparkling clean.

He showed me how to wash the inside of the glass, being careful to swab the bottom of the milk glasses. Next he said to wash the rim and then rinse the glass in clear, running water.

After all the glasses were clean, my grandfather said to refill the sink with hot soapy water, add a bit of bleach again, and then wash the utensils.

“Think about it,” he told me, holding a fork up to the window. “People put this in their mouths. Make sure they’re really clean.”

As the glasses, utensils and plates moved on to the dish drainer, aunts, who talked nonstop, took turns drying them and putting them away in the cabinets.

Last but not least were the pots and pans. Before the invention of rice cookers and microwaves, there was always a stack of heavy-duty cleaning on the drain board.

Washing pots and pans was usually unpleasant if we’d forgotten to fill the pans with water so they could soak. It took a lot of elbow grease and the trusty Chore Girl scrub pad to loosen baked-on rice in the bottom of a pot or on the side of my grandmother’s blue enamel roaster.

As the assembly line moved efficiently in the kitchen, someone made sure the leaf came out of the dining room table and my grandmother’s bowl of plastic fruit was back in the center of the table.

When the last pot was dried and the drainer was empty, my uncles retired to the living room to watch football and my aunts sat around the kitchen table, sharing hot coffee, pie and more talk.

They’d reminisce about the old days, give each other advice about life and relax now that the work was finished. Those days are some of my favorites from my childhood, and I’m glad I was part of a large, extended family that laughed, argued and cried together.

As I washed the dishes and my daughter-in-law dried them, our sons, granddaughter and my husband cleared the table and took care of the chores that accompany a family dinner. All the while, we laughed and talked.

There’s a rhythm in a kitchen, the give and take of seemingly mundane talk of family and friends that accompanies worthwhile tasks and puts a finishing touch on a slow Sunday afternoon.

This article originally appeared in the Fort Bend Herald.

As usual, I was running late on a Sunday morning and found myself too far away from town to attend church services at my home parish. Luckily, I was crossing Wallis’ city limits and pulled into the parking lot at Guardian Angel Catholic Church two minutes before Mass started.

A few years ago, Fort Bend Herald Photographer Russell Autrey and I collaborated on a story about the historic church, and that outing was one of our favorites. Russell captured the majesty of the church in his photographs as well as the intricate workmanship evident in the interior’s every arch and graceful curve.

Founded in 1892, the church is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and, according to the city’s Website, the chapel was one of the last painted churches built in Texas.

The current building is the third one erected on the site — a tornado destroyed the first one and the congregation outgrew the second. Construction started on the current church building in 1913 and was completed in 1915.

Seventy-five families contributed toward the wooden building, and the Gothic style church was mostly built by volunteers. The generous townspeople who gave of their time also donated incredible talents, as the church is gorgeous from ceiling to floor.

First and foremost is the altar. Catholic churches built before the 1960’s often contain elaborate back altars, and Guardian Angel’s is no exception. The altar resembles a cathedral with scaled-down yet delicate arches and spires. Statues of humble angels adorn the altar, and painstaking workmanship is evident in their expressions, hands and robes.

The leaded, stained glass windows were created in Italy, and each window contains the names of parishioners, written in Czech, as well as emblems that reflect a Catholic belief. These gorgeous windows allow the sun to illuminate the church in a soft, amber glow, and electric lights are almost unnecessary.

In newer construction, ceilings are acoustically sound, but they’re often a boring, institutional white. Not at Guardian Angel.

The tall, domed ceiling is decorated with intricately painted medallions featuring saints. For this mostly farming community, the saints are those farmers hold dear, and the names are written in Czech and English.

Although the parish has a long history, the service was filled with young families, grandparents, young adults and teens, and it seemed everyone knew everyone.

After the Mass was finished, I spoke with people who were life-long parishioners. They said they treasure the church building, even though they sometimes take for granted the beauty of the interior.

The current pastor, the Rev. Twee Nguyen asked if I knew about the hidden statue of Christ inside a side altar, and I remembered that little known fact from my last visit. The statue is only revealed on Good Friday, and it’s a replica of Michelangelo’s “Pieta” sculpture.

So many other details hide themselves from those visiting the church on a quick visit. But in the quiet of the church, after the congregation had gone home, there was a definite feeling of warmth and home inside those old, wooden walls.

For once, I was glad I was running late for it gave me a chance to catch my breath and refresh my soul. From the worn spots on the wooden pews, I figure I’m not the first wandering soul to seek refuge from the storms of life.

I unexpectedly found that serenity at a quaint, wooden church in a small, country town.

This article was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. Note that Guardian Angel Catholic Church is open daily for tours. Call 979-478-6532.

The laughter coming from our table was almost embarrassing. Four of us were having dinner at a local restaurant, and we were reminiscing as only friends who’ve grown older together can do.

We’ve known Mike and Carolyn for over 20 years. Our boys were in Boy Scouts together, and the guys spent many weekends camping or canoeing.

We chuckled remembering how our boys survived their summer Scout camp in Texas and the times we’d sat down together at pot-luck dinners and evening campfires.

After our children were grown, though, we gradually grew apart, keeping up through Christmas cards or chance encounters in the grocery store.

Three years ago, Carolyn called me when she heard our son was getting married. She extended a gracious offer — she volunteered to help at the rehearsal dinner at our house.

For hours, Carolyn refilled glasses, threw away paper goods, kept the food hot and handled all the hostess jobs, freeing me to visit with my family.

That night, I realized how fortunate I was to have someone like Carolyn in my life. But I’m not the only one who’s benefitted from Carolyn’s generosity. A family in need will always find Carolyn there with groceries, home repair supplies or clothes in hand.

Mike is just as gracious, and if we ever needed someone to help us with a tough chore, Mike was there, his dry wit and hearty laugh accompanying every adventure.

Recently, we were drawn together under sad circumstances, and I realized once again the strength of Mike and Carolyn’s commitment to friendship.

Friends from the Boy Scout troop lost their son unexpectedly, and we were all devastated. Just as she did for my son’s rehearsal dinner, Carolyn worked behind the scenes, coordinating the food for the wake and quietly overseeing details, from packing up food boxes for out-of-town visitors to gathering the information for the funeral program, typesetting it and then making copies for everyone.

When we saw Mike and Carolyn at the funeral home, we spent time catching up with each other — where our children were living and the unexpected joys of being grandparents. But that short conversation left us wanting more, so we met up later at a local restaurant.

We reminisced about the old times and added more stories to our collective memories. We laughed loud and we laughed often.

Maybe it was with relief from the stress we’d all been under at the funeral. Perhaps we’d been reminded that life spins on a dime, and we’d better reach out and embrace happiness when it comes our way.

As we drove away from the restaurant, my face sore from laughing so much, I thought about all the people I’ve let drift away over the years, whether it’s because we’ve moved, our children grew apart or we just got too busy.

I realized how much I missed having long-time friends in my life for they are irreplaceable. They remember our true hair color and the cars we drove when we were toting around lawn chairs and baseball bats.

When they come to visit, they never say a word about the dog hair on the couch, the pile of backpacks and wet tennis shoes by the back door or the big dent in the fender, courtesy of a teen-age driver.

If we’re lucky and we live long enough, we have old friends in our lives. Because of them, we realize the world’s not coming to an end of we linger a bit over a plate of beef stew, laugh until our sides hurt and remember bygone days.

And remember to give thanks for having long-time friends of the heart.

This article was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

The old wives’ tale is that bad things happen in threes, and such is the case in my life recently. Two out of the three had happy endings. One is a “to be continued.”

A few weeks ago, I purchased a four-gig flash drive to easily transport cumbersome documents. What I love about this flash drive is it fits easily in my wallet or pocket. What I dislike is the same thing — it’s so small, I forget where I put it most of the time.

The last time I used the flash drive, I was in a hurry. I slipped the device in my pocket and forgot it was there. Days went by, and I kept wondering where I’d left it.

The mystery was solved when I threw a load of clothes in the washer and found that brand new flash drive in the bottom of my washing machine.

After the washer had finished its extra-rinse power cycle.

No way that flash drive was going to work, I thought, but I put it underneath a fan, crossed my fingers and let it sit there for a few hours.

I wasn’t hopeful because I’d tried the same thing when I found my iPod in the bottom of the washing machine after the rinse cycle. I put the iPod underneath a fan overnight, tried drying it with my hair dryer and even waved my granddaughter’s magic wand over it, but the device refused to return to life.

A friend suggested I put the iPod in a bowl of dry rice. Apparently the rice will magically suck the water out of a device.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained, so that iPod’s currently buried under three inches of Uncle Ben’s rice, and I’ve got my fingers crossed.

When it comes to technology, luck plays a huge part in my success because I have to see how things fit together to understand how they work.

I understand a needle and thread. After vacuuming up a sock, I understand how dust and dirt will accumulate inside a hose behind an obstruction, thus create a huge mess when the hose is disconnected from the vacuum cleaner.

But the Internet? That’s an magical universe of atoms that can infect a computer without ever sneezing on it.

On the Internet, I can instantly see the beach conditions in Gulf Shores, Ala. With two clicks of the mouse, I can talk to my son in Taiwan for free — that’s just amazing.

So when my computer refused to log onto the Internet last night, I was stumped. I hadn’t washed it like my iPod or flash drive, and everything looked in place from the outside.

I ended up dragging the tower into the computer store, waiting in line and then listening to the pleasant technician tell me it was the connection at home, not my computer.

As I pushed the heavy cart back to my car, I gave that tower a stern warning.

“Listen here, buddy, you’re too heavy for me to carry in and out of the repair shop, so I suggest you find some kind of way to get along with what’s coming out of the wall.”

Apparently, that mom talk did some good as I reconnected everything when I got home, tightened up the wires and I could connect to the Internet.

I have no idea why my computer now works.

I have no idea what I did differently than what I did yesterday to make it work.

All I know is my computer is working. My flash drive works. My iPod’s drying out in a bowl of Uncle Ben’s rice. And I’m reconnected to the world.

Two out of three ain’t bad.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

(My brother, Jeff, is a wonderful cook who’s not afraid to try new dishes. Thanks, younger brother, for the culinary tip!)

On a recent visit to my brother’s house, he whipped up a fabulous dinner of chicken simmered in raspberry chipotle sauce. I’m not exactly sure what a chipotle is, exactly, but it’s delicious.
So now I’m on a new kick — if it can be grilled, fried or sautéed, I’m smothering it in chipotle sauce.

In a few weeks, my husband will mutiny, and I’ll have to find some new cooking binge.

That’s the way it goes in my kitchen, and it all started with ketchup.

My dad loved ketchup with everything — scrambled eggs, fish, potatoes — almost everything was covered in Heinz 57.

As a result, I’m a ketchup fan. I don’t have fries and a burger — I have ketchup with a few fries thrown in and two layers of ketchup with a hamburger patty in the middle.

I also love ketchup and mustard on a hot dog, which brings to mind my love affair with mustard. We grew up on plain, yellow mustard. In my 30’s, I discovered two words that would change the way I looked at a bottle of mustard — Grey Poupon.

Once hooked, I branched out and discovered honey mustard. For years, I was on a honey mustard kick, ordering a bit of lettuce with four containers of honey mustard dressing.

Then I read the calorie count.

No wonder that dressing tasted so good.

Then I discovered lemon pepper. I first tasted lemon pepper on broiled catfish. Growing up in Louisiana, we had catfish fried, baked and in gumbo.

But eating that lowly fish with lemon pepper took the dish to a new level. I was hooked and bought a huge bottle of lemon pepper seasoning from one of the wholesale clubs.

I proceeded to put lemon pepper on everything — chicken, steak, hamburgers, roasts — everything off the stove and from the oven was a shade of black and yellow.

After a while, my family hid the bottle, but I’d already moved on to Old Bay Seasoning. Created from 12 herbs and spices, Old Bay actually pushed the hallowed, giant bottle of Tony Chachere’s seasoning out of the forefront of my cabinet for a while.

Old Bay was my new passion. I’d seen that rectangular can in the store for years, but I thought it was for chowder, not southern cooking. I was wrong.

Everything that came out of the oven was covered with Old Bay. Someone hid the can after an extra heavy dosing on a chicken one night. So I resurrected Tony from the back of the cabinet, and proceeded to fall in love with that Cajun staple once again.

Then I read the sodium content on the side of the bottle.

Hello Mrs. Dash. After one use, it was Goodbye, Mrs. Dash.

I’ve only skimmed the surface when it comes to sauces and seasonings. There’s the whole world of allemande and Bechamel sauces and habanero and white pepper spices.

There’s even an chipotle chile seasoning. I could probably prepare a chicken with the chipotle chile seasoning and then cover it in chipotle raspberry sauce. My mouth’s already watering.

As with all culinary crazes, this one will run its course, sooner rather than later, because while I was shopping this evening, I wandered down the spice aisle and saw an intriguing bottle, “Chinese Five Spice.”

Something tells me a new adventure awaits my family.

Pass the Alka-Seltzer.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

It was the end of a long day. My fingernails were chipped, my left toe was aching because I’d taken a corner too sharp and there was a coffee stain on the front of my shirt.
The last thing I wanted to do was stop at the grocery store, but we’d eaten out a few times this week and the only foods the fridge was keeping cold were sodas, cheese slices and mustard.

After throwing a few frozen dinners, fruit and a bag of lettuce in my cart, I made my way to the check-out line and took my place behind an elderly woman and a young man as they painstakingly unloaded their grocery cart.

The woman gave the cashier three plastic cards, telling her there was $17 on the first gift card, $12.71 on the second and to put the remainder on the credit card.

It took a few minutes for the cashier to figure out what she was saying, and I found myself growing crankier every time the cashier squinted her eyes and said she didn’t get it.

As I waited for some type of understanding to take place, I looked around at my fellow shoppers. The woman standing behind me was on her cell, complaining about her boss.

One line over, a frazzled young mother was trying unsuccessfully to convince her 3-year-old he did not need four candy bars.

There was the quiet elderly couple two lines over, their small cart filled with low-fat cheese, reduced-calorie bread and a day-old cherry pie.

A man in a rumpled business suit was holding a bouquet of roses in one hand and was busily tapping away on his Blackberry with his thumb.

The woman in front of me was still trying to explain what she needed the cashier to do, and I found my patience dangerously close to the “empty” mark. I kicked myself for, once again, choosing the slow line.

I have the worst luck choosing lines, especially when I’m tired and in a hurry. The last time I was in the grocery store, the lady in front of me disagreed with the discount the computer dispensed.

Instead of the dollar she felt she was entitled to receive, the register only rang up 50 cents. She asked the cashier to have someone physically go look at the display so she could get her discount.

I wanted to give her the two quarters so I could be on my way, but something in the way she looked prevented me from sounding off.

Perhaps it was those worry lines around her eyes or the worn edges on her sleeve that told me the 50 cents many of us take for granted meant a great deal to her.

Thinking about that lady, I looked again at the people in front of me. A cane was hanging over the young man’s arm, his beard was shaggy, and his pants were a bit too tight.

The older woman appeared to be his mother, and the two of them watched every penny the cashier rang up, and their purchases were the essentials — no junk food or name brands.

I was buying convenience groceries. They were buying what they needed, using a variety of resources just to make ends meet.

Gratitude is something we often feel when circumstances remind us to be thankful — narrowly avoiding a fender bender, a friend helps us out of a jam or we make it home safely on a rainy night.

I didn’t need a close call to remind me how fortunate I am. That opportunity was as close as the grocery store check-out line.

This article was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

In less than a month, my niece and her husband will be welcoming home a third son. Chrisy and Blair are the parents of two wonderfully behaved 3-year-old twin boys, and they’re looking at their expected third boy as a genuine blessing.

Chrisy smiles when people say “three boys, oh my” and claims she’s happy as long as the baby’s healthy. But Chrisy loved dressing up in gowns for Mardi Gras balls, has a beautiful collection of Barbie dolls and taught dance classes for years. She was probably hoping to pass those loves on to a daughter.

I know how she feels. Many years ago, before parents could find out the sex of their unborn baby, I assumed my babies would be girls because I wanted a daughter so badly.

When I found out I was expecting, I made a soft pink blanket to wrap around my baby when she finally arrived. Just to be on the safe side, I stopped in a baby boutique and bought a beautiful lacy white newborn bonnet and carefully tucked it in my suitcase.

Surprise. My first-born was a boy, and I reluctantly returned the bonnet and traded it for a kid’s LSU baseball cap.

I was thankful I had a healthy baby, but secretly, I wanted a daughter who would share her hopes about becoming a woman with me, a daughter who would grow into my friend, just as I have with my mother.

When I found out I was expecting a second child, I instinctively knew he was a boy. Still, there was a 50/50 chance for a girl, so I quietly crept back to the baby section in a department store, bought another white, frilly bonnet and tucked it into my suitcase.

And, a few months later, I traded the bonnet for a baseball cap.

With my third pregnancy, my mom said she was hoping I’d finally get that girl, but I knew better than to think pink.

Still, I went back to the same store, a 2-year-old toddler and squirmy 7-year-old in tow, and nonchalantly bought another white, lacy bonnet.

Once again, I tucked that bonnet in the back part of my suitcase.

And, once again, traded the lace for sturdy denim.

Thankfully, my three boys are healthy, intelligent young men, and they’ve brought us great happiness. Chrisy’s third boy will bring her the same amount of joy. However, the joy that comes from rambunctious young sons is served up a bit differently.

We want pink ballerina shoes. We get muddy boots.

We hope for pink bubble baths. We get rings of brown dirt in the bathtub.

We want lacy nightgowns. We settle for camouflage underwear.

The mothers of girls will say they get the same mud, sass and sweat as the boys, but as I watch my granddaughter, I’m amazed at the different way she approaches life as compared to my sons.

My granddaughter snuggles with her favorite baby doll, cooing and singing her to sleep.

My boys slept with their Ninja Turtles and He-Man swords, but they beheaded Michelangelo and Splinter before dawn.

My granddaughter says “excuse me” when she burps. My sons belched as loud as possible and believed putting their cupped hands underneath their armpits and pumping their elbows up and down like greased lightning was great fun.

But my sons are my friends and they’ve brought wonderful women into my life who’ve become the daughters I didn’t have.

So, my dear niece, you might not get the pink perks that go along with rearing a daughter, but the joys of being the mother of boys are just as rewarding.

They’re simply buried underneath a mountain of smelly socks, bright red Matchbook cars and dried-out pizza crusts.

This article was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

The set was minimal — a plain Formica kitchen table in center stage, two matching chairs and an old Frigidaire in the back corner next to a kitchen sink.
When Traci Lyn Thomas stepped out from the wings, dressed in a cowgirl outfit, complete with fringe, sequins and cowboy boots, and began to sing, it was as if the legendary country singer Patsy Cline had come to life.

The event was the stage production of “Always, Patsy Cline” at the Durango Arts Center in Colorado. The play is based on a true story regarding Patsy, as she was called, and a friendship she had with a sassy Houston hairdresser, Louise Seger.

According to legend, Louise and Patsy enjoyed a friendship that lasted from the beginning of Cline’s career until a plane crash in 1963 took her life.

The play is told from Louise’s point of view and opens with a bodacious performance by Mary Ellen Cerroni who brings the spunky Louise to life.

When Patsy came to Houston to perform, Louise happened to arrive early, befriended the singer and then invited Patsy to spend the night at her house. The singer accepted, and it seems odd that a performer would go home with a fan.

But back in the early days of country music, singers and musicians didn’t allow self-indulgent egos to alienate them from their fans, unlike modern singers who stay in expensive hotels and use stretch limousines and private jets to avoid their fans.

Patsy and Louise found they were more alike than different. Through letters over the years, these two women from different walks of life found they shared quite a bit — loneliness, struggles with money, a love of music and the bonds that only women forge.

Numerous songs were featured in the play, which delighted me as Patsy Cline’s one of my favorite singers. It’s impossible to stay dry eyed through “Crazy” and “Sweet Dreams,” and I found myself tapping my foot in rhythm when Thomas sang “Lovesick Blues” and “Walkin’ After Midnight.”

The audience loved the show, perhaps because Patsy’s life reflects struggles many experience — a hard-scrabble life, a rocky marriage and poverty.

My brother, sister-in-law and I loved the show, and we talked all the way home about the singers we admire and the ones whose songs have touched our lives.

The next day, I found myself humming some of Patsy’s songs, reflecting on beauty and true talent. It’s not in the movie star packaging of today’s entertainers, and beauty’s not necessarily in the skyscrapers of a bustling downtown.

Beauty is simple — a freshly picked bunch of bright red radishes, a yellow daisy growing tall in a field of green grass, a crystal-clear stream bubbling over rocks and boulders and a strong, simple voice reminding us of love, cheatin’ hearts and the blues.

And make no mistake — Colorado is a gorgeous state. The Rocky Mountains are faithful sentries on the horizon, the humidity is low and there’s a gorgeous surprise around every corner. The people are friendly, there are four distinct seasons and it seems there’s a stunning site around every corner.

That beauty’s also evident in a field of bluebonnets, the sun setting over the Comal River and days when country music’s playing on the jukebox and you’re dancing cheek to cheek with a special someone.

Like Patsy sang and Willie Nelson penned, we’re crazy about lots of things, and living in Texas — enduring the heat, humidity and more heat — might be hard to understand from time to time, but because it’s home, it’s wonderful.

This article was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.