a weekend away

Two years ago I decided to take a teaching position in Tennessee. Three months after the school year started, I became pregnant with Theodore. As it became increasingly evident that very little (if any) of Ryan's work would be in TN, we decided to pack up our baby belly and head home to the heartland. However, my enchantment with the South hasn't faded and I frequently find myself missing life south of the Mason-Dixie. Thanks to a wonderful husband who was willing to do full-time daddy duty last weekend, I snuck away for my first post mommyhood fix of Tennessee.

Summer is my favorite time to visit the South, I adore the heat. A long and feverish season when the air is so heavy and thick, you wear it like a cloak. When the smell of ditch weeds and tobacco fields swirls through open windows with each lethargic sigh of the breeze. When the Osage and Magnolia envelope the landscape, speaking softly to all of nature as if to encourage its survival during the impoverished months. It is a world all its own.....

The nectorious sweet tea, peach produce stands, parched red clay, eternal.

The white craftsmen houses, oversized front porches, firefly performances at dusk, so enduring.

The weeping shadow of catalpas, the drawl, the music....a world without end, amen.

Clearly I had a lovely weekend letting it all soak into my soul. And by the time Monday blew in I was overflowing, and ready to get home to my Ryan and Teddy.