The Happy Place - Gail Roughton

           “I need to visit my happy place.” How often we hear that! But what, exactly, is a happy place? And where is it? “Oh, it’s all in our heads!” you say. Well, that’s right. And then again—it’s not. We all carry our permanent happy place with us. See, it’s not limited in location or the space-time continuum. It can be with you any place, any time. All we have to do is remember. Remember the place where magic lived, where memories were made, the memories of things past that shaped us, changed us, molded us, into the person we are. Where was my place? A little beat-up, sun-seared wooden fishing dock on the banks of Stone Creek.

I was born in the Deep South in the 50’s and grew up in the early and mid-60’s. It was a pivotal time in history when the Civil Rights movement, the Vietnam War, and the space program began to drag even the sleepiest little Southern town kicking and screaming into the twenty-first century. Rowan & Martin regularly socked it to the country as Laugh-In looked at the news, and Simon & Garfunkel sang of their brother who had died so his brothers could be free. None of that made much never-mind to me, though. I was busy following my Daddy around like a shadow whenever he was home from work. He was a construction foreman and a master carpenter. On weekends, he’d take me to his building sites, where I walked on the long light poles of Macon’s Henderson Stadium when they still lay on the ground and wrote on the chalkboards of schools-to-be long before students entered their doors. Daddy’s gone, but most of the structures he helped build still stand, strong and functional, still in use. That’s rather a form of immortality, don’t you think?

We lived a few miles outside the mid-sized Middle Georgia city of Macon in a small country neighborhood of only four or five houses, perched on the banks of Stone Creek Swamp. Readers might recognize the name from The Color of Seven. Stone Creek itself ran about half a mile behind the house. I guess I was nine or so when our neighbor “up the hill”, Mr. Emory Scoven, built the dock over the spot where Stone Creek expanded into a small pond.

Mr. Emory was a retired railroad man who lived with his brother, sister, and sister-in-law in the house on the hill next door to us. I ran in and out of that house without knocking, with total impunity. Nobody in our neighborhood knocked back then. I loved the other residents of that house, Mr. Will, Miss Lucille, and Miss Ethel, but Mr. Emory? Mr. Emory was a modern day Pied Piper. Children loved him like lint loves wool. Once upon a time the neighborhood had brimmed with kids who’d dogged his every step, but in my time, the child population was down to one. Me. And on summer days when school was out and Daddy was still at work, I trailed the man unmercifully while he tended the yards and fruit trees he so loved. If he ever grew impatient or tired of my company, he never showed it. His railroad tales were better than the fairy tales of Hans Christian Anderson and the Brothers Grimm.

Late spring and summer evenings were the best times of all. Daddy came home from work, showered and ate. That’s when we headed out the back door to join Mr. Emory at the dock and cast our lines into the leaf-brown waters of the creek. The three of us sat for hours in perfect contentment, talking or not talking, it really didn’t matter either way, while the corks from our fishing lines bobbed on the water. It didn’t matter if we caught anything, either, and in fact, we preferred not to, especially since we always released any fish caught that evening back into the creek when incipient darkness forced us back up the trail toward the house. We caught some of those fish pretty much every day. I learned to recognize them over the course of a summer because all fish don’t look alike, not even fish of the same species. They have individual shadowings of color and irregularities in their gills and fins.

That’s childhood. That’s my happy place. The creek, the dock, Daddy and Mr. Emory. Sitting cross-legged on bare planking, slapping at mosquitoes as they discovered my bare arms and legs. Cane poles only, of course, because rods and reels were useless in the close confines of the creek and its small pool and would only catch uselessly in the brush and undergrowth of the banks.

I remember the sound of the frogs as dusk fell, and birds flying low across the pond’s clearing. Sometimes you could see the head of a water moccasin swimming across the creek further downstream, crossing a safe distance from the intrusion of the dock upon their territory.

Nothing else on God’s green earth feels like late evening in the spring in the Deep South. The air feels like velvet, light trembles off the water, birds fly overhead. The sounds of the frogs and insects make their own symphony. I have no pictures of that creek and dock to post. Digital cameras were far into the future. Children don’t think of such things as recording special moments on film. No matter. There’s no way any camera could have properly recorded those moments, those men, that place, that time. The photographs are in my heart. They always will be. I take them out and look at them frequently, especially when I’m writing. 

I know somewhere out there, they’re still fishing together on the banks of Stone Creek. I love you, Daddy. I love you, Mr. Emory.

Country Justice

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Words of Wisdom to Andrew Lincoln, George Clooney, and Russell Crowe from me...by Jamie Hill

There's been much hullabaloo this week over my favorite 'The Walking Dead' character Rick Grimes, actor Andrew Lincoln, shaving his beard in a recent episode of the hit cable series. The beard furor got me thinking, have I ever written a character with a beard? I write contemporary romance, and while I'm sure many heroes in historical romance had beards, I can't think of many in contemporary settings.

Most all of my heroes have what I like to call a 'three-day beard growth'.  This works great in fiction, but in real life it's impossible to maintain for longer than a couple of days (depending on the rate of beard growth of course.) Some mens' beards grow quickly and they end up looking like Gandalf or Santa Claus.

 

 

This was the fate of Andrew Lincoln's beard in The Walking Dead, I'm afraid. A touch too long there at the end. A clean-shaven Rick was a shock, though that shower scene was pretty hot for regular TV.

 

Which do you prefer of the many stages of Rick?

 

 

I have to admit, I still prefer the three-day growth look. But I like beards! I think George Clooney and Russell Crowe can also rock the beard and to me, they look better as they age.

I might consider giving my hero a beard in an upcoming novel. It'll have to be a fairly closely cropped, neat looking thing. No Duck Dynasty crumb catchers, just enough hair there to tickle.

What's your opinion? Barely there or totally bare? Do you dig beards? I have to admit I do. And if I could offer some words of advice to the actors above I'd say totally keep the beards. These guys know how to rock them.

Jamie Hill ~ Romantic Thrills ~ Suspenseful Chills

Find my beard-free titles at Books We Love: http://bookswelove.net/authors/hill-jamie/

or on my clean-shaven website: http://www.jamiehill.biz/

 

Follow my 'possibility of a beard in a book' writing progress on Facebook: 

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Jamie-Hill/135137799867321

Henry Hudson, an Englishman, by Katherine Pym

In the first decade of 17th century, Henry Hudson worked for several merchantmen companies, both in England and in Holland. His goal was to find the northern route to the Spice Islands in the South Pacific. 

He worked for the Moscuvy Company, England's East India Company, and the Dutch East India Company. These individual companies pooled their resources, made their captains sign extensive contracts, gave them long lists of rules and regulations, then sent them on their way to find the easiest, fastest passage to East Indie ports of call.

The route south through the Cape of Good Hope was fraught with danger, i.e., weeks of calm, scurvy, the bloody flux, pirates. Once into the Cape, there were added dangers of rogue waves that came from nowhere, swamping and sinking a ship to the depths of the sea. 

If it weren't for the ice that filled the northern regions, that route would be far easier to navigate. When men sailed north toward Greenland or west to Newfoundland, these intrepid explorers found a vast ocean so crowded with fish, they leaped into their boats rather than be netted. They brought home stories of ling cod, and whale meat/lard. Fishermen sent their ships to these waters, and the English dinner table began to find new foods that delighted the palate. 

Whaling

When Hudson worked for the Moscuvy Company, he did not find a Northwest Passage, but alerted his employers of a place where one could catch many whales. Hudson made a splash amongst these merchant companies. After the Dutch East India Company (VOC) had so many failures, when they heard of Hudson, they enlisted his services. 

Hudson promised better things. He was certain the passage could be found. All VOC's previous captains could not find the passage, and the directors wanted to know how he would go about it. 

Henry replied that he followed Petrus Plancius' theory. Plancius was one of the founders and cartographer of the VOC, so the directors nodded their approval. When Hudson offered this theory, Plancius was still alive. He could be consulted for authenticity. 

The theory was of a temperate, open sea in the North Pole not covered with ice. What Hudson professed was a mild climate above '74 degrees latitude - the point at which the Dutch ships had always found their path blocked by ice'. Hudson not only affirmed to have seen this, he raised the stakes higher by adding the depth of the sea was so great at this point, the swells could never freeze. In this temperate area, Hudson declared to have seen a new land with many animals, sweet grasses wherein the animals grazed. It was a veritable paradise. 

Hudson's Route & Final Destination

Hudson further added if he could go above '83 degrees latitude', he would sail west to the Pacific then south into the warmer seas of the East Indies. VOC demanded more proof, so Hudson sent for Petrus Plancius. The gentleman, an astronomer and clergyman, nodded his concurrence on Hudson's every point. He added the sun's long days and white nights during the summer kept the waters warm enough so that ice would not form. As a result, Henry was given the opportunity to seek a northern route to the South Seas.

Once aboard ship, Hudson disregarded all instructions by the VOC. He used his own maps and went northwest through bad weather. Finding the way too difficult, Hudson tootled south. He expected to find a waterway along the American coast he could travel to the Pacific. He did not find it, but did find a land rich in fisheries and game, trees so big they would make excellent ships. 

Hudson Arriving at Manhattan Island

Hudson had found Manhattan Island. The VOC was not impressed but other merchants were, which started the colonization of that area. 

In 1610, this time financed by the English merchants, Hudson tried again. He found his way into what is now the Hudson Bay. The seas were filled with ice. His crew turned surly, and one night mutinied. They grabbed hold of Henry Hudson and a few faithful crewmen, put them in a small boat without food, water, or warm clothing, and sent them adrift. 


Henry Hudson disappeared into the night, never to be seen again.

Hudson, Set Adrift

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Many thanks to the following bibliography:

Nathaniel's Nutmeg by Giles Milton, and Wikipedia (Hudson, Petrus Plancius)

Map of Hudson Bay is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.

The Barbers, a story of science & medicine in the 17th century. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00I6KOKL6