Phyllis Maclay

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Hold Your Horses!

Quit horsin’ around and use your horse sense to read all about horse idioms and sayings He said I had to choose him or my horse. I miss him sometimes. Cowgirl Spirit “Does anyone know where I can find some road apples?” Everyone else kept playing Bunco but I froze in my seat. I grew up in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, where Amish and Mennonites mingled their horse and buggies in traffic. If you just washed your car you tried to avoid road apples dumped on the street by uncaring horses plodding along to get to the next stop. You were careful to walk around piles where the horses had been

The Color of Cowboys | What History Didn’t Tell You

Don’t squat with your spurs on. Will Rogers U.S. Marshal Bass Reeves was good with his guns but he knew the danger of his job; death came to 130 of his 200 fellow marshals in Oklahoma. Once he took the job in 1875, he and his American Indian sidekick tracked down thousands of outlaws, including his own son, who was wanted for murder. Reeves used disguises to get close to his targets. After serving in the Indian Territory 32 years, he had killed 14 criminals and delivered more than 3000 warrants. Because he kept his identity secret and traveled with his American Indian companion, Reeves is thought to be the

So I Sang | The women and songs in the life of country singer Darius Rucker aka “Hootie”

Music is what feelings sound like. Unknown His brothers never seemed to grow tired of tormenting him about his taste in music. Tired of hearing him defend himself, his mother came through the door in time to pick up where he left off. She scolded the siblings to leave him alone as she slumped into her chair — she was lucky no one was in it. With 18 people living in the three bedroom house at times, there was little space to claim as your own. His mom looked tired from working extra hours as a nurse at Medical University of South Carolina. The boy knew they were far from

In the Arms of a Dream

Sleep: A Life Sustaining Activity Dear Sleep, I know we had problems when I was younger, but I love you now. I could see my arm resting on my bed sheets. I saw the morning sunlight sneaking through the blinds landing in parallel stripes on my blanket. Trying to remember whether it was a school day or not, I tried to move my hand to sit up and peek at my clock. It would not move. I tried to move my arm. I commanded it to budge. Nothing! My head felt like stone — a heavy-not-moving-rock. I looked around my small bed; saw my bedspread at the bottom, saw my

A Southern Story | More Than a Horse Store

Aiken’s Equine Divine Was Named One of the “South’s Best Shops” in Southern Living Magazine Dini Jones smiled as the customer strolled into her store in downtown Aiken. “Welcome to Equine Divine,” she said as the woman searched through the dresses, eyeing the one Dini was wearing. “Do you have any more dresses like the one you have on?” It was one of the dresses from Equine Divine, but there were no others just like it in the shop. Dini showed the customer other dresses similar in style and color, but she had her heart set on Dini’s. “Well, you are welcome to try this one on if you’d like

A Joyful Tradition | Crafting a Community

Aiken Crafters have formed a community of supportive people with a passion to create and socialize with one another. ~ Kathy Klein Amy Moore was going through the motions of dealing with the grief that followed her like a dark shadow after the death of her husband in 2016. Never forming any close friendships, she felt loneliness envelope her even as she drove to her son’s soccer tryouts at the church in Midland Valley. She decided to talk to a couple of moms about making crafts and sensed a strange lifting of her sadness. Amy felt a glimmer of joy in that moment. It was August of 2019, and it

A National Tradition | Soaring Turkeys | WHAT IF ONE OF OUR FOREFATHERS HAD GOTTEN HIS WAY?

It took an act of Congress and six years to make the bald eagle our national bird. In a letter to his daughter in 1784, Benjamin Franklin complaint was not that it took so long to accomplish this feat (some things about Congress haven’t changed much), but that the turkey was a more deserving creature to earn that honor. “For in Truth the Turkey is in Comparison a much more respectable Bird and withal a true original Native of America… He is besides, though a little vain & silly, a Bird of Courage, and would not hesitate to attack a Grenadier of the British Guards who should presume to invade

A Tradition of Inspiration | Bella’s Featured Artist: Julie Adams

Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time. ~ Thomas Merton In her second story studio, Julie Adams was energized as the portrait of her son came to life on canvas. It was a new style for her; an oil finished in pencil. It gave the impression that the painting was not quite completed, “like my son,” she mused. “He’s not finished yet, as a person. None of us are.” Then she learned that English artist Mark Demsteader was gaining fame and popularity in his country for the using same technique; her enthusiasm grew. “That’s what I was doing, too. When I saw his work

A Tradition of Community | Aiken’s One Table Food for the Body and Soul

Until you see the smiling faces hovering over steaming plates of food, until you hear the laughter and music drifting through the Alley, until you brush your arm against a friend you’ve met for the first time as you reach for your fork, you cannot understand what happens at Aiken’s One Table on Thanksgiving Day. More than just eating mashed potatoes and turkey dripping with gravy, more than splurging on spicy pumpkin pie and chocolate cupcakes, Aiken’s One Table is a feast of fellowship, friends, and fun. When sliding your chair forward to the table, people leave their worries and differences behind to celebrate the holiday of gratefulness and thanksgiving.

Creating Flavor | The Art of American Craft Beer: The sure cure for cenosillicaphobia

I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts, and beer. Abraham Lincoln Two months at sea and hopelessly north of their course to the Virginia colony, the desperate passengers and crew of the Mayflower were running out of beer. As in Europe, beer was a trusted drink instead of the perpetually contaminated water. Besides that, Captain Jones worried about sustaining his crew with beer on the trip back across the Atlantic Ocean. In 1620 the ship docked in Cape Cod; but the passengers balked at leaving