Throwback Thursday: Family Vacation Photograph from A July Summer of 1984 Trip to Destin, Florida

My Brother (to the right) and I in Destin, Florida circa July 1984

Somewhere in the 1980s, my parents made me wear floaties as I learned to swim. Read more about it right here, on my writer's blog Stones of Erasmus!

It's funny how memory works. You think you remember it just as it happened. It ain't so. For example, I remember sitting on a hotel bed in Florida eating Pringles with my younger brother - wearing floaties.

That's pretty much how it went down for the "Roselli - July 1984" beach vacation. Except I was eating Planters brand cocktail peanuts - and that's my older brother in the photograph, not my younger sibling. And look. He's attempting to give me bunny ears. I'm clueless.

Mom says we jumped on the bed. But there's no photograph of that.

And no one can confirm it's Destin. But I don't care. I'd like to think that there's a six-year old me floating in some beachside pool in Destin - the State-of-everlasting-beach-vacations, Florida.

And ohhhh. I found the floaties. And look at me chomping on those Sour Cream and Onion Ruffles brand potato chips.

Wear Your Floaties!

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Transcript of a Dream (from Beijing)

In my dreams, I heard the thumping of feet and I thought it was the sound of my feckless roommate thumping towards the bathroom to puke but it wasn't my roommate thumping.

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"On Evil" - A Brief Reflection on Theodicy

I am not sure how I first became interested in evil. Maybe it was the repetition of the line in grade school from the Lord's Prayer, "deliver us from evil," that first alerted me to the concept. Evil - at least how I conceived the concept then - was something akin to supernatural power. Like a demon with wings. Or a nebulous force á la Freddy Krueger tearing away carpet and bedding (cum bodies) in horror movies. Certainly evil is akin to horror. However, I probably was propping up evil with dramatic flair by honing my focus on demons —  and by contrast, the good on angels. If there are demons, or so my logic foretold - there must be angels.

Family Photograph: Throwback to A New Orleans Mardi Gras from the 1990s

I really like Mardi Gras. Even when I was thirteen. Throwback post to that time I went to "all dem parades" for Mardi Gras back in 1993.

For many years as a kid, I would go with my family 

to the "truck parade" on Mardi Gras day on Veterans

Highway in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana. 

I wanted to save this post for actual Mardi Gras - but, heck, it's kinda too funny to wait - and I'm impatient.

For me, New Orleans Mardi Gras wasn't really celebrated in New Orleans. We went to Jefferson Parish, secured a spot on Veterans Highway in Metairie, a few miles west of the Orleans Parish line.

On this strip of highway, folks set up ladders on the neutral ground (the grassy median). We got there early, lugged ice chests filled with sandwiches, cola, and liquor (for the adults).

In the Metairie version of Mardi Gras, the first parade is run by the Krewe of Argus (compared to the Krewe of Rex which runs on Saint Charles in New Orleans). Argus is an interesting choice for a Mardi Gras pleasure krewe. Argus is the mythological creature with a thousand eyes - so he can sleep but keeps several eyes open. The signature Argus float is spectacular in my memory - a bust of the many-eyed giant flanked by papier-maché peacocks.

Maybe I caught the undies and bra at Argus? I don't remember.

In the photo, we're waiting for the truck parade. It rolls immediately after the Krewe of Argus. The trucks number in the low hundreds. They're eighteen-wheeler cabs affixed to a flatbed converted into a Mardi Gras float.

Maybe I got the wig from home? I'm not sure - but judging from this picture it was one helluva Mardi Gras in Metairie, Louisiana.

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Throwback Thursday: Flour Babies

Back in the mid-nineties - hell, it probably still happens - our public middle school in Saint Tammany Parish Louisiana conducted a program meant to curb teenage pregnancy.

The program was called Flour Babies. Every kid in our Seventh Grade class bought a six-pound bag of flour from the grocery store, we dressed it up to look like a boy or a girl and propped a head on it. I guess we gave it a name.

We carried the flour baby with us everywhere we went. We took it to class, brought it home with us, and made sure we didn't leave it behind.

Leaving behind your flour baby was tantamount to committing childhood neglect - I think kids who left it on the bus or in homeroom had to endure after school suspension. Or maybe they were told, "Don't have kids."

Here are two photos from my flour baby days:

I hold onto my flour baby like it's my own dear baby, baby.

Younger brother and Mom pose with the flour baby.

Did you have a flour baby growing up? I'd love to hear about it.

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Video Post: Feeding Ducks in Robertsdale, Alabama

Ducks hang out in a parking lot in Robertsdale, Alabama

Off of US Highway 90, my mother Pamela, my older brother Bradford, and I stopped at an old, dilapidated building with a sign out front that read "Interdenominational Church." We fed the ducks. Greig (that's me) conducted an interview.

- Posted on BlogPress

Location:Robertsdale, Alabama

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Family Photograph: "Mamaw"

There's a photo in my mother's album of my paternal Grandmother, Veronica Greig sipping a cup of coffee.

In 1992, my family moved to a new house in Mandeville, Louisiana.

Mamaw and Pawaw came to visit us very soon after we moved. Mom made sure the house was spotless. My brothers and I were more or less happy because we liked our new neighborhood. And we had a new dog - Maggie.

I must have been in the Sixth or Seventh grade.

Veronica Greig Roselli is my paternal grandmother - from whence I get my name, "Greig"!

There's a photo I found in mom's album. I like how Mamaw is holding her cup of coffee gingerly. I love her glasses. She used to get dressed up on Sunday to go play BINGO. She'd put powder on her face, and it would smudge her glasses but she wouldn't notice.

Mamaw was very sweet. Pawpaw wasn't so nice. He was gruff and vindictive. I'm not sure why - probably a fight between my father and Papaw - but I don't think my grandparents ever visited us again in our house on Live Oak after the day this picture was taken.

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