By no accident, Southern Appalachia is known for its rich musical heritage. When the Scotch-Irish left Ulster for America there was little room for worldly possessions aboard wooden sailing vessels. When they crossed the mountains into what is now East Tennessee they were limited as to what they could carry in their hands, on their backs, or on the backs of a beast of burden as there were no wagon roads. However, they were able to carry within their hearts and minds songs that told of life in the old country and out at sea as they were a seafaring people.

My mother couldn't make a cake for sour apples, but she made a killer sugar cookie. She never used a recipe, just dumped everything in her dishpan, stirred, rolled it out, cut and baked. I don't have her recipe, but I found one close to it when I was first married in the late forties.

"Even God Must Get the Blues"
Song by: Jo Dee Messina (1998)
Pick up any morning paper
Turn on the 6 o'clock news
The devil's been so busy lately
That even God must get the blues

Good morning my lovely readers!

I know all of you think I am slower than Christmas, and you’re right. I promised you book three in the Smoky Mountain Mist series before the end of 2017. Obviously, I didn’t make that deadline. Sometimes life calls and I chose to do something else instead of writing. For a while. A long while.

I am happy to announce that Dawn’s Gray Light went live on Amazon in Kindle form today. The paperback should be available by the end of next week.

On March 10, Sharps Chapel Book Station finally opened its doors in the restored Historic Oak Grove School, and book station attendant Sherry Medina is loving the new location.

When planning a visit to the home of Union County native Dollie Beeler Merritt, a smart person would arrive at mealtime.

Well known in the area for her chicken and dumplings, along with many other country foods, Merritt says her mother started her in the kitchen at only five years old.

“I would beg her to let me do dishes,” said Merritt. “She’d pull a stool over to the sink and I would climb up and help.”

Most descendants of East Tennessee’s original settler population are also descendants of Union Veterans of the American Civil War. Closer to home, many of us are descendants of original members of Company B of the First Tennessee Infantry, the first federal unit that was formed in Tennessee for service in the American Civil War.

In 1861, our ancestors were facing a war, the most costly in American lives in our history. Four years later the war was over, but the scars would remain for many years. The dispute over the right of secession was ended and the country had to undergo the difficult process of reconciliation. The North and South had to learn to live and work together and to strengthen national unity. The leading group in this process of reconciliation was the veterans themselves.

If you’ve ever had the urge to “get away from it all, a literal way to pull that off is to try backpacking. Think of it as extended hiking where you stay overnight or several days and carry in what you need. Being out in the wild for a few days clears the mind and it’s good for the soul to rough it and be away from the clamor of modern life. The trick to backpacking is to carry only what you really need to be reasonably comfortable and safe. Carry too much and you become a pack mule, which is not fun. What follows is a list of equipment and items usually used on a backpacking venture.

“The Bible Scriptures are like a stream of water that a lamb can wade in and so deep that an elephant may swim in them.”

That saying or some form of it has been attributed to various authors. I think the first time I encountered it was someplace in the Matthew Henry Commentary, possibly in connection with Ezekiel 47. It does not really matter who said it, what matters is that it is true.