Author Archives: Jim

A PATCHWORK CHRISTMAS

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Hear Jim’s 3-minute Christmas podcast: https://youtu.be/GGXDS5xV75w

or read his transcript below:

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Life, actually…

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A PATCHWORK CHRISTMAS

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Eighty Christmas Eves ago my four-years-older sister and my infant brother and my early-thirty-ish parents are all I know about Santa and his lively, loveable world.

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All the trappings and traditions of this season glaze themselves into fond memories, fond memories that will remain for handy retrieval all the remaining days of my life.

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As Christmas Eve after Christmas Eve slide past, each fragment of remembrance leaves its trace. Each cameo thought is its own teachable moment, whether it is pleasant or challenging.

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We are a patchwork species, we humans. We possess the ability to dream things that once were, dream things that cannot be, dream things that could possibly happen, dream things that are impossible but still imaginable.

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Each of us is a mixture of rude experience, happy recall, sassy thought, wishes and hopefulness, sadness and regret, incredible enthusiasm, gossamer tiptoeing, bravery and fear, anger and optimism.

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We patchwork people survive by wit and willpower. We slog through the toughest times, dance heartily to the tunes of transcendence and avoidance, caress our companions with full confidence that each good moment will last forever.

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In order to live lives worth living, we tend to use the tools we already have—whatever it takes to get through the next moment safely and securely. We are good at caring, we are skilled at sliding past obstacles, we are adept at holding fast our loved ones, we are clumsy at changing the thoughts and errant ways of other people.

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In other words, we are perfect one moment, imperfect the next, discombobulated at times, assured and sure of ourselves now and then.

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We imagine super heroes who accomplish what we cannot. We find scapegoats to make ourselves more competent by comparison. We feel guilt when we fall short of the lessons our parents and elders and teachers taught us. We are prideful when things turn out the way we planned.

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Santa is one of those dreams we created. In my times Santa stood for generosity, unconditional love, kindness personified, omniscience realized. Santa is still a righteous dude in my heart.

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As long as all the goodness in people remains a possible hope, Santa and his imaginary and real compatriots will stand by me and at the very least gently chide me when I stray

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(c) 2025 A.D. by Jim Reed  

 

OH, BY GOSH, BY GOLLY, IT’S TIME FOR MISTLETOE AND HOLLY

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Listen to Jim: https://youtu.be/sV4LggNwHCc

or read on…

Life, actually…

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OH, BY GOSH, BY GOLLY, IT’S TIME FOR MISTLETOE AND HOLLY

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A dozen or so years ago…

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A pleasant young Russian scientist with pretty wife and fussy baby girl in tow, shows up at Reed Books/The Museum of Fond Memories, this pre-Christmas day. The three stare wide-eyed at the array of books. He’s looking for Birmingham souvenirs they can afford. Frank Sinatra’s voice bounces against the books as other browsers drift the isles, ”Oh, by gosh, by golly, it’s time for mistletoe and holly…”

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A smelly street guy shows up to purchase a HOBBIT DVD for his buddy, who can’t come to the shop “’cause he’s not allowed to leave the shelter.” He was caught with a cellphone and for some ethereal reason that’s forbidden. He’s being punished for not following the Memo. Mel Torme doesn’t notice, he just goes on about “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire…”

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A slender shopper reminds me that she served me breakfast at Dimitri’s one morning and is making good on her promise to visit the store. We chat warmly while an enormous man cruises the isles in a cold sweat, searching for esoterica. Several customers appear escorting visiting family and friends who’ve never before been Downtown. I extoll the wonders of the city while they try to take it all in. The Modern Jazz Quartet dances the musical notes around “England’s Carol,” their version of “God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen…”

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A merry woman spends much of my time trying to fit as many purchases into a twenty-dollar bill as she possibly can. She finally seems happy with three small leatherbound Shakespeare plays and an enormous encyclopedia volume. She leaves behind several 1940′s pulp-fiction novels and a beat-up Purple Heart display case. Now, candyman Sammy Davis, Jr., is soaring about “Christmastime in the city…”

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One departing customer returns to the shop, unable to resist purchasing an old copy of TALES OF UNCLE REMUS by Joel Chandler Harris. Something resonates with her childhood and she has to have it. The Russian couple wants to walk the city, so I send them to their next stops, the Jazz Museum and the Civil Rights Institute. Vince Guaraldi continues interpreting Charlie Brown with his rendition of “Oh Tannenbaum, oh Tannenbaum….”

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The day is filled with auld acquaintances materializing, new friends made, adventuresome explorers sated, bookmongers always looking for the next fix, children grabbing stacks of tales for their dad to read aloud, and one man spending two hours to find just the right volume to adopt. Dean Martin trills, “Rudoph, with your nose so bright, won’t you guide mein sleigh tonight…”

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And by gosh and by golly, a good day was had by almost all, and isn’t that about as much as you could possibly hope for in this erratic, terror-filled, joy-soaked world? “I’ll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams…”

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(c) 2025 A.D. by Jim Reed

 

SOONER OR LATER SOMETHING SUPER COULD HAPPEN

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Listen to Jim Reed’s Red Clay Diary podcast https://youtu.be/dFVNuGPwONw

or read the transcript below:

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Life, actually…

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SOONER OR LATER SOMETHING SUPER COULD HAPPEN

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“Maybe I am just not doing everything right.”
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Jimmy Three is standing in place in the back yard of summer, muttering quietly to himself. He knows better than to mutter loudly, since his disjointed thoughts might bring laughter or shame from others.
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Anyhow, this is Jimmy Three, some seventy-plus years ago, attempting to work out the differences between reality and child’s play.
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“I have my cape (ragtag towel), my lightning chest patch (carefully cut from yellow construction paper), my cool boots (old sock tops over floppy summer sandals).”
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Jimmy Three is certain that if he gets all the costumery in place, he is a mere step away from becoming Captain Marvel.
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Jimmy knows everything worth knowing about his comic book hero. He knows that a somewhat scrawny young boy can rise about his station if he can only transfigure himself into superherodom.
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Decades later, Jimmy Three is both amused and bemused by the unfiltered desires of the little kid he once was and maybe still is, deep down.
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But right now, all these eons ago, Jimmy Three is still dreaming of power and glory.
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“SHAZAM!” he hollers at the startled shrubbery cat so busy napping nearby.
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“SHAZAM!” he screams at no-one in particular in his tiny neighborhood. Only a bullfrog and bustling ant are within voice distance, and they don’t seem to care.
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Jimmy gazes at the fluffy storytelling clouds above and wonders whether Zeus and his ilk can only hear certain boys here and there. Maybe it’s like a lottery where not everybody wins.
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“SHAZAM!” once more with all his might and main.
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The silence is filled only with whatever is already on hand. No gods to the rescue. Only redbugs and tall grass and baking sun and loose shingles and red clay dust. They were there before, they remain.
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Jimmy Three is philosophical about all. After all, maybe Captain Marveldom is not his destiny.
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Maybe he’d do better as Bat Man, even Robin.
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He gets busy finding black felt and scissors. A utility belt just might do the trick
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© 2025 A.D. by Jim Reed

RUMINATIONS OF A DOWN SOUTH RUMINATOR

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Hear Jim’s podcast at https://youtu.be/LtczGvPRDw0

or read the transcript below:

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Life, actually…

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RUMINATIONS OF A DOWN SOUTH RUMINATOR

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Whenever I begin writing a love letter to my people—the Down Southers who surround me—I go kind of blank.

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This could be because I’m trying too hard to be understandable.

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In this love letter to my people I want to be both specific and eloquent at the same time, so that my words will stay around for a while.  We writers live with this impossible hope, the hope that something profound will issue forth from our innards as we ply our trade.

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Of course, this does not happen frequently.

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So, why is writing a love letter so difficult?

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As inwardly-focused as we authors are, it is amazing we ever see anything objectively. The poetry of life, the adventure of life, can get in the way of specificity. We are stuck in our own dreams.

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So how do I get this letter written?

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An answer hurls itself at me in a rumpled note I just retrieved from the floor of my writing room. This note contains a quote by one of those long ago thinkers we might have heard of but of course never voluntarily study, Jean Jacques Rousseau.

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Now what in the world would someone like Rousseau, who lived several hundred years ago, have to say that in any way would apply to an obscure writer ensconced in the Deep South?

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Well, here is this guy’s quote that stays with me and propels me forward:

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“To write a love letter we must begin without knowing what we intend to say, and end without knowing what we have written.”

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That’s it. That’s the thought that taunts and instructs me.

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If I’m to write a love letter to the Down South people I’ve lived among these many decades, I have to stop ruminating, stop over-thinking, stop examining…I have to plunge into the task like any young’un who is confused and motivated by the passion of the moment.

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I have to write that letter full-blast, straight-forwardly, unapologetically, forgetting the rules of etiquette and grammar. What good is love if it has to be fussed over, gussied up, lipsticked beyond recognition, self-consciously faked?

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So, I’ll get started. I will write my love letter in a burst of passion and joy. I will put it aside unread until I can catch my breath.

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Then, as Miles Davis once said about his music, I’ll play it first and tell you what it is later

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© 2025 A.D. by Jim Reed


THE VACANT THANKSGIVING CHAIR

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 Life, actually…

THE  VACANT THANKSGIVING DAY CHAIR

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Listen to Jim’s podcast:
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http://jimreedbooks.com/mp3/thanksgivinghappiestsaddest.mp3

or

https://youtu.be/VcCpkjC-DyA

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or read on…

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Here is a true story I re-tell every Thanksgiving, just

to remind myself and you that everything that really

matters is right before us, all the time. Here ‘tis:

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THE VACANT THANKSGIVING CHAIR

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The saddest thing I ever saw: a small, well-dressed elderly woman dining alone at Morrison’s Cafeteria, on Thanksgiving Day.

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Oh there are many other sadnesses you can find if you look hard enough, in this variegated world of ours, but a diner alone on Thanksgiving Day makes you feel really fortunate, guilty, smug, relieved, tearful, grateful…it brings you up short and makes you time-travel to the pockets of joy and cheer you experienced in earlier days…

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Crepe paper. Lots of crepe paper. And construction paper. Bunches of different-colored construction paper.

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In my childhood home in Tuscaloosa, my Thanksgiving Mother always made sure we creative and restless kids had all the cardboard, scratch paper, partly-used tablets, corrugated surfaces, unused napkins, backs of cancelled checks, rough brown paper from disassembled grocery bags, backs of advertising letters and flyers…anything at all that we could use to make things. Yes, dear 21st-Century young’uns, we kids back then made things from scraps.

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We could cut up all we wanted, and cut up we did.

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We cut out rough rectangular sheets from stiff black wrapping paper and glued the edges together to make Pilgrim hats. Old belt buckles were tied to our shoelaces—we never could get it straight, whether the Pilgrims were Quakers, or vice versa, or neither. But it always seemed important to put buckles on our shoes and sandals, wear tubular hats and funny white paper collars, and craft weird-looking guns that flared out like trombones at one end.

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More fun than being a Pilgrim/Quaker was being an Indian—a true blue Native American, replete with bare chest, feathers shed by neighborhood doves, bows made of crooked twigs and kite string, arrows dulled at the tip by rubber stoppers and corks, and loads of Mother’s discarded rouge and powder and lipstick and mashed cranberries smeared here and there on face and body, to make us feel like the Indians we momentarily were.

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Sister Barbara and Mother would find some long autumnal-hued dresses for the occasion, but they were seldom seen outside the kitchen for hours on end, while the eight-course dinner was under construction.

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There was always an accordion-fold crepe paper turkey centerpiece on display, hastily bought on sale at S.H. Kress, just after last year’s Thanksgiving season. It looked nothing like my Aunt Mattie’s turkeys in her West Blocton front yard.

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And for some reason, we ate cranberry products on that day and that day only. Nobody ever thought about cranberries the other 364 days! And those lucky turkeys were lucky because nobody ever thought of eating them except at Thanksgiving and Christmas. They were home free the rest of the year!

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Now, back into the time machine of just a few years ago.

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It is Thanksgiving Day. My wife and son and granddaughter are all out of the country. Other family and relatives are either dead or gone, or just plain tied up with their own lives elsewhere, doing things other than having Thanksgiving Dinner with me.

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My brother, Tim, my friends Tim Baer and Don Henderson and I decide that we will have to spend Thanksgiving Dinner together, since each of us is bereft of wife or playmate or relative, this particular holiday this particular year.

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So, we wind up at Morrison’s Cafeteria, eating alone together, going through the line and picking out steamed-particle-board turkey, canned cranberries, thin gravy, boxed mashed potatoes and some bakery goods whose source cannot easily be determined.

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But we laugh at our situation and each other, tell jokes, cut up a bit, and thank our lucky stars that this one Thanksgiving Dinner is surely just a fluke.

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We’ll be trying that much harder, next year, to not get blind-sided by the best holiday of the year, Thanksgiving being the only holiday you don’t have to give gifts or reciprocate gifts or strain to find the correct gifts.

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 Left to right: Tim Reed, Tim Baer, Jim Reed lining up for Thanksgiving.

Don Henderson is behind the camera.

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On Thanksgiving holidays ever since, I make sure I’m with family and friends, and now and then I try to set a place at the table of my mind, for any elderly lady or lone friend who might want to join us…for the second saddest thing I’ve ever seen is a happy family lustily enjoying a Thanksgiving feast together and forgetting for a moment about all those lone diners in all the cafeterias of the world who could use a kind glance and a smile

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© 2025 A.D. by Jim Reed

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https://youtu.be/xDLnyTrOchc

SOMEWHERE BEYOND THE WILD BLUE YONDER

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Life, actually…

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SOMEWHERE BEYOND THE WILD BLUE YONDER

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The planet-sized eyedrop is on its way from squeezed-rubber tube to human eyeball (mine).

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It isn’t always the size of my field of vision. It starts out as a small droplet, then gravity drops it through six inches of humid space all the way into my in-between blinks. By the time it splashes, by the time I involuntarily blink, this space traveler has done its duty. It is bigger than the universe, then disappears into my innards, then helps heal my momentary affliction. Then is no more.

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During the time I am this little kid lying abed, I receive many nurturing gifts not of my own choosing. These many years ago I simply go with the flow. Grownups manage my well-being, my health, my energy. From all this attention comes the free time needed to grow and develop, to become who I am, to become who I will be should all go well.

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Now, at the over-ripened age of eight score-plus, I feel the effect of those eyedropper years. I see how a thousand fold acts of kindness thrust me gently into the future I now inhabit.

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All those implements my elders employed to keep me viable were important, more instrumental in enabling my good and future life than I ever realized.

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The objects that kept me going were all larger than life when I was a tad: planet-sized wash cloths, diapers, syringes, thermometers, towels, bandages, ointments, unguents, sanitizers, protective clothing, clippers, shampoos, soaps, braces, crutches, supports, vitamins, polishes, buffers, tweezers, magnifiers…

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And, most importantly, planet-sized loving hands were always present to administer these tools.

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I think about all the dedication and drive it took for parents and family and friends and professionals to keep me going. They patched me up, encouraged me, pointed out the good opportunities, warned me of the bad, took me in when I became disoriented or sad. Cared for me without condition.

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Did I thank them enough? Did I fail to thank many others? Will I ever be able to reward these interplanetary-sized good-hearted Good Samaritans? No way.

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All I can do is become the Samaritan of Right Now. I can pay it forward by closely attending to those who need me, even to those who don’t know they need me.

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The kindest thing I can do is silently and invisibly lend a giant hand where needed. The most unselfish thing I can do is quietly help someone, then quietly fade away.

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Only then can I breathe easily, smile at life, watch out for potholes

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Jim Reed © 2025 A.D.

MY ANTEBELLUM CHRISTMAS PRESENT

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Life, actually…

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 MY ANTEBELLUM CHRISTMAS PRESENT

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https://youtu.be/TamF9KovbqI

(Read text below and/or listen by clicking above.)

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Every trip to the old antebellum house was like Christmas Morning.

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Whenever I could get there, by way of bus or foot or bicycle or ride-hitching, I felt like Christmas had just gotten jump-started.

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The antebellum home in Downtown Tuscaloosa, back in the 1950’s, had expelled its original dwellers and converted itself into the County Library.

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It seemed to exist solely for my pleasure.

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Up the stairs, not racing, in slow motion—don’t want to incur the wrath of a shushing librarian—I head for bookcases containing the knowledge of the known world and the imagined knowledge of undiscovered worlds.

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Opening each book was like unwrapping a Christmas gift.

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Each volume contained its own peculiarities. In addition to the printed words within, there were always imagination-laden surprises:

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A pressed flower might drop spinning to the floor.

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A scrap of paper complete with cryptic message would unfold itself and read its contents to me.

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A margin scribble or an underline would challenge me to guess what a previous reader’s life was like.

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Mustard stains might tattle-tale whether the patron read at night or on the run at a hot dog stand.

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Unmistakable tobacco fragrances absorbed by the paper would be identified by brand-name (Cherry Blend was popular).

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Little crayoned bookmarks and turned-down corners made certain pages more intriguing.

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Coffee rings exposed the previous reader’s carelessness.

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Librarian mutilations included penciled numbers and rubber stamps and glued pockets and dog eared dated cards and taped-down dust jackets and intrusive binding materials and repaired/reinforced spines.

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The heft and texture and color and fragrance and flaws of the physical book were more fascinating than the book itself, at times.

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The powerful shower of Holmesian clues would almost make reading the book an anticlimactic exercise.

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To this day, I prefer the flawed personality of a well-used book to the pristine untouched edition that nobody ever opened.

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Every book has its own history, my dear Watson. I can tell you a lot about what that book has been through just from all the clues and hints of clues that warp it and give it character.

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Visit my antebellum shop in the Center of the Universe, Birmingham, Alabama and commence your sleuthing

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Jim Reed © 2025 A.D.

GRANDMOTHERLY ADVICE TO A FORLORN MEMORY RETRIEVER

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Hear Jim’s Red Clay Diary 4-minute podcast: https://youtu.be/_JuTgDw1GDg

or read the manuscript below:

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Life, actually…

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GRANDMOTHERLY ADVICE TO A FORLORN MEMORY RETRIEVER 

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“Be a good boy. Always do the right thing. Do not waiver from the true path.”

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This is the kind of advice my grandmother gladly and generously dispensed whenever I would listen. It was good advice. Commonsense advice. Grand Vizier-level advice.

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It was the kind of advice that any wise village elder possesses, even to this day.

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The only problem is, my grandmother and her generation seldom got to lay out their truths and wisdoms to upcoming generations. Nobody got to converse one-on-one with elders. Life is distracting and noisy. Distractions and noise gain much more attention than quietly spoken tutorials about love and generosity and behavior and kindness.

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My grandmother was venerated. We loved her. We simply did know that our inexperienced language and her seasoned language could get together and share things, things that might make life more understandable, more tolerable.

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She was of her generation, we were of ours. We did not know the language of acceptance and diplomacy.

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I wish I had known all this as a child. Maybe I could have skipped some of the more difficult episodes that deflected my growth as a mature adult.

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I am now ready to listen, Granny. But you are not here to share time with me.

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But wait—there’s more.

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Truth be known, I can share wisdoms with my grandmother. All it takes is a deep breath or two, a few furlongs of memory retrieval, the willingness to pay close attention to every single memory and impression of Granny that I ever had.

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Granny can talk with me because I know what she would say in so many words if she were here, today.

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Having birthed eight kids, she would help me understand how to navigate childrearing. She would point out the potholes and show me how to heal or correct a boo-boo. “Here’s an example of how I did this,” she would say. I would listen and observe.

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“Here’s how I dealt with a bully in my day. Listen and learn.”

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Yes, children of the Down South soil, there have always been bullies about, and there have always been people who knew how to quell the behavior of bullies. I know how Granny’s generation did it. I just had not realized that she, being of that generation, knew the knowable—the things more people of solid upbringing learn from experience, learn from observing their own elders.

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To spank or not to spank? Granny knew what grannies know, that setting solid and loving boundaries—and enforcing them—gets you through hard moments, no spanking necessary.

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Got it?

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You can list your own wisdoms and observations, things that your elders have outlined and demonstrated to you silently, no one-on-one deep chats needed.

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Go back and examine your memories. Pay attention to lessons that were clearly on display, lessons you and I ignored at the time because we thought we knew better.

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Now, at our present age, we at last know that we did not know what we needed to know. Our wild inexperienced ideas and notions were simply that. We guessed at things based on gut and fear and unfiltered reaction, but we did not yet have experience on our side.

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We now know that we never did know everything we needed to know. We now know that in order to know that which is worth knowing, we actually need to admit we don’t know, we have to admit that it is time to tune in to those who loved us and are still waiting patiently to help us out

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© Jim Reed 2025 A.D.

 

THE HALLOWEEN THAT ALMOST NEVER WAS BUT COULD HAVE BEEN

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Hear Jim’s 3-minute podcast on Youtube: https://youtu.be/pfrq9Xzkn2o

or read the transcript below:

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Life, actually…

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THE HALLOWEEN THAT ALMOST NEVER WAS BUT COULD HAVE BEEN

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     I’m meandering the ever-changing aisles of a bargain chain store after work, trolling for Halloween candy with which to bribe any would-be evildoers who appear on our porch on The Night.

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Since we live in Norman Bates’ mother’s house, a beautiful 120-year-old carpenter gothic dwelling that fits us like an old shoe, I am constantly aware that we may or may not see trick-or-treaters this week.

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Some years, the ‘hood is too bereft of children and too daunting to parents who are afraid to drive down an unfamiliar street situated in the heart of the far past.

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Other years, parents are brave and adventuresome and bring their kids to see what’s what, in a community that just might nourish ghosts and notions about ghosts.

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    This makes my discount store task easy. Just in case nobody rings the bell this year, I stock up on goodies that Liz and I won’t mind having around—stuff we ourselves like.

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I pick up a bag of candy corn, but it tastes of Clorox and a bit of staleness, so I’ll have to find another brand in another place on another day.

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I get Reese’s Cups for Liz so that I can always tell from her peanut butter breath when she’s been into the stash. I buy a dark chocolate goodie because she loves that stuff. I pick up some small candy bars mixed together in a variety pack and try not to eat all the Mounds Bars on the way home.

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    By Halloween, we’ll be all set for the kids. I’m dressed as the weird-looking bearded geezer I am, just to play along—for me, it’s a come-as-you-are Halloween event. Liz dresses like the smiling and sweet and always-interested-in-kids person she is—she’s ready to play all year long.

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    Will the Munchkins come and will we see our fair share of Star Wars characters and princesses and zombie dudes and Bat Man midgets, or will we be sick to our stomachs by trick time, having eaten all that candy ourselves?

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Even wizards and dragons and bump-in-the-night creatures don’t know for sure.

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Stay tuned

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      © Jim Reed 2025

COWLICK BLUES

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Hear Jim’s 4-minute audio podcast:

https://youtu.be/Z_SMHqWgBKg

or read his transcript below:

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Life, actually…

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COWLICK BLUES

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Seeing as how long-buried childhood memories linger and magnify as the seasons speed past, my red clay diary is once again victim of the words that tumble out…

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Just as the 1950s rise and capture the world, I am barely a decade old today. I am gazing into the fogged bathroom lavatory mirror, attempting to tame a forehead cowlick.

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I still have hair back then.

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During this era of growth spurts, cowlicks take on an enormous importance. The idea of good grooming looms over me. Even though I am not quite sure what good grooming is.

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I do not actually know how I look to other people at age ten. Each passing reflection reveals a different version of yours truly. I don’t know which version depicts the real thing to onlookers.

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Since I cannot view the back of my head, l concentrate on what is visible. Forehead (yikes! a looming pimple!), eyes (I can only see my direct gaze, no idea how eyes look from a sideview.), mouth (chapped lips I understand), chinny chin chin (Where’s that dimple that’s supposed to make me look like a movie star?), teeth (gaps and enamel, gums and tongue), eyebrows (Do I look cooler if I raise one slightly?), runny nose (too big? too small? too wimpy?).

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And so on.

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When you’re ten with no duties and appointments and responsibilities eating up your schedule, this is one of the last years you can laze about and ponder such silly things as whether that stubborn cowlick will ever be tamed.

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I re-gaze into the mirror.

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The cowlick seems large and obvious to the world. Will people stare? Will they laugh? Will they feel sorry for me? Do they already shun me?

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“There goes that neighborhood boy with that grotesque cowlick.”

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I comb my hair, add a dab of Wildroot Cream-Oil Hair Tonic (“It’s made with soothin’ lanolin.”). I wonder whether I look more like Fearless Fosdick than Jim Reed.

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I wonder for a moment whether the hair tonic will divert attention from the cowlick.

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Being ten years of age, these enormous ideas and ruminations disappear in a jiffy as soon as I exit the bathroom, grab a piece of buttered toast and issue forth into the small front-yard world of whoever I wish to pretend to be this beautiful sunshined morning.

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Playmates await, redbugs pounce, the milk delivery truck revs up from the next block over, and my imaginary world once more garners all remaining attention.

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In the rush of oncoming playground projects, cowlicks and pimples and raised eyebrows mean nothing.

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Now I can just be a kid who never once noticed a mirror

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© 2025 A.D. by Jim Reed