Every January I study on what I’d like to accomplish on the Blind Pig and The Acorn in the coming year. First and foremost I’d like to continue to celebrate and preserve my rich Appalachian culture and heritage. Come March I will have been blogging about Appalachia for 11 years.
Other plans I have for 2019
- I’d like to get the girls and maybe even The Deer Hunter to contribute to the blog with their own posts as Paul has done in the past year.
- I hope to share more stories from Granny.
- I enjoy talking about the language of Appalachia. In the coming year I hope to do more talking about it on the blog as well as on Facebook and Instagram.
- I’m still kicking around the idea of offering more content here on the Blind Pig. I’ve been studying on adding a premium feature to the blog for a few years now, I’m hoping to make real progress on the idea in the coming year.
- I hope to meet more of you in person this year. I had the pleasure of meeting several Blind Pig readers in 2018 and it was so much fun to put a face with a name.
- Sow True Seed has signed on to sponsor the Blind Pig and The Acorn again, so be on the lookout for this year’s reporting @ large project.
I’m hope each of you will continue to visit Blind Pig and The Acorn during 2019. And if you know someone who might enjoy the blog, please send them my way.
Tipper
*Ruling day 11: Low 46 High 54 Rainy, Cloudy
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I like all your ideas, Tipper! Happy 2019!
I’m in the market for an ark if anyone know of one for sale!
I have been behind you for quite a few of those 11 years. I hope to follow you into the foreseeable future. The only way I won’t be here is if I’m not here, if you get my drift.
I am fascinated by the personal stories and takes on life so look forward to reading what the girls, the Deer Hunter, Granny, and others in your neck of the woods have to say. Maybe even stories from those who’ve moved away and what mountain skills have helped them and what totally surprised them (compared to Appalachian life) about their new homes.
What about a series focused on “making do” – the Appalachian way? ie: if you don’t have _____, you make do with/by ______.
Also a “use it up, wear it out” series. You’ve touched on this before and a number of readers as well as me mentioned fabric transitions such as feed sacks to school clothes to aprons to rag rugs and patchwork. I imagine we could find other items of common use that go through a series of transitions before they are no longer useful.
. . . just a few more ideas for you to mull over . . .
Yes Tipper, and that would be even more for us to get to read. Live the ideal. God Bless! Can’t wait.
Tipper–I urge you, in part on the basis of personal experience, to spend a lot of time probing your mother’s memory, recording her experiences, and in general delving into a lifetime of accumulated wisdom. My siblings and I did a somewhat decent job of listening to Daddy reminisce and there is even some recorded material. Nonetheless, there isn’t a week goes by when I don’t catch myself thinking: “I wish Daddy was here. He could answer than question.”
As for Momma, we did far less, and that’s a source for enduring regret. Then there’s my Grandpa Joe, who was quare in the finest mountain fashion, a gifted storyteller, and an absolute flowing font of tales and experience. While I listened to him for endless hours and derived a world of material for my own storytelling from him, in retrospect there was so much more gold to be mined.
As the lyrics in a song about Western artist and writer Charlie Russell suggest, “get it all down before it’s all gone.” I know you are striving mightily in that regard, and I urge you to keep it up.
Finally, don’t forget that there’s a book, and probably a bunch of them, just floating around in the recesses of your mind waiting to be organized, completed, and brought to printed fruition.
Jim Casada
I think it would all be good, but your shinning star is your Mother. You may think you have heard every story and perhaps asked every question but when they are gone you will find you have a question and she is not there to answer. You probably have written down all the stories and questions answered and that will be a treasure for your children. The more information your Mother can tell you about her mother and father and anything about her grandparents, and great-grandparents; like I said, a treasure for you and your children. You can tell I am a true history buff. As I remember some of mine, they are fall over laughing and some are sort of sad but the majority show the strong faith, strength, independence, and perseverance of my people in the face of sickness, death and hard times. I’m sure yours runs the same way.
Sounds like good ideas to me. I’d like to read posts from Chitter, Chatter and the Deer Hunter. And ‘the way we talk’ is a favorite. As a gardener I like to hear other’s experiences. They are all helps to investing my rime and effort better. It was a treat to run across you all up at Helen to. I am looking forward to reading BP&A throughout 2019.
Tip, those are all great ideas. I especially like the idea of the girls and the Deer Hunter contributing. If the Deer Hunter would just share some of the things he’s made it would be great fun! But he’s a little on the quiet, shy side so I don’t know how you would talk him in to it.
Happy New Year, Tipper.
Keep on keepin’ on!