![\"\"](\"http:\/\/blog.pelicanbookgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/gail2-225x300.jpg\")
\n<\/p>\n\n\tDuring the Christmas season hair flew fast and furious in the beauty shop my mother ran. Situated in a small town at the foothills of the North Carolina Mountains, the place overflowed with chatter. On Christmas Eve, until I started working in a department store during the holidays, I put the finishing touches on our dinner while she continued to work in the salon. I also received Mother’s gifts, which her customers placed on the back porch. \n<\/p>\n
\n\t\n<\/p>\n
\n\tAll day long they stuck their heads in the kitchen and called out, “I brought your mother a set of embroidered pillow cases. I’m putting them here,” or “I’m leaving your mother a bag of potatoes,” or “I’m putting a pie on the porch.” The presents ran the gamut.\n<\/p>\n
\n\tOne year I’d placed the casseroles Mother had pre-mixed in the oven and started to prepare Heavenly Hash, a fruit delicacy. I’d never made the recipe before, so I studied Mother’s directions carefully.\n<\/p>\n
\n\t“There’s a mess of green beans out here.”\n<\/p>\n
\n\tI flinched. “Thank you,” I said without turning around as I added a jar of sweet cherries to a can of mixed fruit. I needed to cut up two oranges and a fresh pineapple, cook and chill a dressing for the salad, and then chill the entire dish before dinner. My nerves stood on edge.\n<\/p>\n
\n\t“I brought your mother chicken.”\n<\/p>\n
\n\tStaying focused on my task, I automatically replied, “Thank you” as I picked up the pineapple.\n<\/p>\n
\n\tA few seconds later a “Baak, baaak, baaaaak” sound wafted to the sink.\n<\/p>\n
\n\tA live chicken?<\/em> My backbone stiffened, and I bounded to the porch where a pretty, white-feathered chicken scratched and pecked uncontrollably at pies, potatoes, pillow cases and an assortment of other gifts including apples, calendars and cross-stitch pictures. Not knowing what to do, I shook inside. The fruit salad created only minimal stress compared to this.\n<\/p>\n \n\tBut all’s well that ends well. I summoned Mother, and we put the gifts in the kitchen and closed the door to that room and the porch. \n<\/p>\n \n\t \n\tI’ve carried the love from those caring, Christian people in that small town with me my entire life. I wanted to bring back that spirit of community in Hair Calamities and Hot Cash<\/em>, which has its roots (no pun intended) in my mother’s shop.\n<\/p>\n \n\t \n\t \n<\/p>\n \n\t <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" During the Christmas season hair flew fast and furious in the beauty shop my mother ran. Situated in a small town at the foothills of the North Carolina Mountains, the place overflowed with chatter. On Christmas Eve, until I started working in a department store during the holidays, I put the finishing touches on our […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[746],"tags":[776],"class_list":["post-2953","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-holidays","tag-holiday"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2953"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2953\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/blog.pelicanbookgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/gail3-300x225.jpg\")
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