+ Her Barefoot Heart
she sprinkles her conversations
with words and phrases
coined by others,
always
always
always
giving due and proper credit.
“as ruby mcelroy used to say,
‘it just does my heart good.'”
“as willie used to say,
‘it just slud down the hill.'”
“as kipp would say,
‘i didn’t know i be-ed this good.'”
“as alison would say,
‘this is ree-dik’-uh-lus.'”
each one
a tribute
in the vernacular
of those she once knew
and still loves.
today i am thinking that sometimes receiving is itself a gift.
and i wonder why feeling needy
every once in a while
is such a vile thing.
answers are hatching, but
more incubation time is needed.
so many things are
washing up on the beach
during this month with my mother.
some i bring in and ponder.
other things i toss back into the ocean.
to those who took the time to reassure me, thank you.
you are salve to my soul.
i’m feeling too exposed to do a video tonight.
tired, overly vulnerable
from being seen.
today
i think about being transparent.
trans.
parent.
easily seen through.
today i think about how the prefix “trans” means across, over, beyond.
i think about how doing the videos
went over and beyond
writing a travelogue about
how mother and i spend our days.
about how much safer the travelogue would’ve been.
i think about beauty
– i mean all kinds of beauty –
and lack thereof
if there is such a thing.
i think some more about being seen.
i think about how tired i am of thinking.
my children think nothing of posting their photos and videos all over the vast landscape of the internet. but for me to do a video was, well, it sure feels like a big – i mean really big – risk.
do i embarrass my kids?
not the funny-these-are-the-times-you’ll-remember-one-day
embarrassment
but the soul-twisting, i-won’t-be-home-for-thanksgiving-for-the-next-27-years
embarrassment.
i remind myself that it’s time i live
– that i do, in fact, live –
outside the opinions, perspectives, reactions, and comments of others.
i tell myself that other people are interested and intrigued
by their own interests
and how that has nothing to do with me,
but this is one of those days
when it all sounds like
blah blah blah blah blah.
i feel vulnerable.
more than a little exposed
and scared.
downright, flat-out scared.
i am not pretty.
my hair needs to be cut.
i am overweight.
will people still like me?
talk to me?
want to be around me?
i obviously have no studio
no 3-point lighting.
and omg: that breezy beach so-called backdrop.
will people label me as cheesy? an idiot?
i tell stories about my mother
tell them with a southern accent.
will people call me a hick
and dismiss me
as having no depth or intelligence?
i share humorous stories
or maybe not so humorous, depending.
will others think i’m being disrespectful to my mother?
i consider laughter my religion,
finding humor an entertaining and valuable way
to deliver worthwhile messages
and navigate tricky relationship terrain.
i would hike up and down the world
swim in and out of clouds
tromp across oceans
and skip across mountaintops
championing the value of humor
but
is there really anything i
can do or say
to convince people that there humor can
be both sizzle and steak?
and as much as i know the value of humor,
as much as i enjoy cajoling laughter from those around me,
will i be branded worthless
even when and if i write something with my serious ink?
before we begin: if you hear the television in the background, that’s my mother watching the news. if you find it distracting, go close your door.
~~~
i think it’s fairly obvious how well i’ve taken to brene brown’s perfect protest.
except for when i’m really tired, it seems like just yesterday when i first met him.
today is my son’s birthday. kipp is his name; slug is my pet name for him. slug, from the book atlas shrugged by ayn rand – the hottest coal that keeps the fire roaring to keep the train’s engine moving. yep, he is my slug.
he is a true renaissance man – one who loves hiking and skydiving and reading and snowboarding and playing guitar. he’s a wicked good actor and writer, and if you mapped his various areas of intelligence, his brain would light up like our neighbor’s house at christmas.
he makes halloween costumes you just wouldn’t believe and just recently, his idea for a startup company took first place at startup weekend. he’s kind and articulate, and he usually smiles (which is great cause those braces weren’t cheap).
unlike his mama, he’s hardly a picky eater, and unlike his dad, he enjoys post-movie conversations of deconstruction and philosophy. like his dad, he likes fine art and georgia tech, and like his mama, he likes handmade journals and stories. like both of us, laughter is his religion.
he is handy with a camera, and hopefully he’ll pick it up again one day soon and start taking more pictures because he has a way of seeing that stops me dead in my tracks. like the time we rode under telephone wires . . . he looked up at the kudzu creeping and skipping its way across, and said simply “nature’s reclamation.”
wallace stevens was once his favorite poet, now he’s going through a billy collins phase. he’s a good companion to his dog, even letting otto have a pet roomba (the robotic vaccuum cleaner) because he knows border collies just need to herd things.
he is my son, and i frequently wonder what i did in a former life that landed me fortunate enough to be his mother.
happy birthday, kipp.
i love you.
eating grapes
eating mudpies
cords on blinds
eating hot dogs
a wooden playpen
swimming in a pond with cows
cabinet doors without latches
summers without air conditioning
hanging wallpaper with my husband
eating peaches right off the tree
my high school guidance counselor
a mugging on the sidewalks of new york
roller skating without protective armor
riding in cars without carseats or seatbelts
telephones with no voicemail or answering machine or call waiting
bike riding before helmets, gloves, kneepads, and gears
an F on an undergraduate biology test (i was in love – i’ll tell you about it one day.)
and now: my brother going to afghanistan.
he leaves tomorrow night, and i’ve tried hard not to waste our time by missing him while we are together. but every now and then i kinda’ practiced, kinda’ opened that door to my heart just a teensy little bit to see if i could survive him being a world away.
why will i miss him?
oh, just let me tell you (some of) the ways:
he can keep secrets.
he always – and i mean always – has my back.
his soft spot for animals is about the size of the milky way. maybe bigger.
he’s so damn good on the golf course, i had to learn how to strut.
he has a deep insightfulness that sometimes takes my breath away and always keeps me thinking.
he tells the truth.
he is funny – i’m talking knee-slapping, side-hugging funny.
he wouldn’t know pretentious if it up and bit him on the nose.
he loves me just the way i am, bossiness and all.
my brother, of course
a.k.a. j3
some days the galaxy conspires with me.
either that, or i’m so self-absorbed i see whatever i’m looking for.
whichever way it is, i’ll enjoy it, appreciate it, and tell you about it . . .
to sneak up on the day, i opened the book An Altar in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor who captured my attention and affection with just the title of her first book, Leaving Church. anyway, the book fell open to page xvii where barbara writes about being asked to go speak to a church in alabama. when she asked the priest what he wanted her to preach about, he said “come tell us what is saving your life now.” well, that must’ve ignited something cause when i sat down to write in my journal about 30 minutes later, i pitched a written hissy fit. a good, old-fashioned out-and-out hissy fit. then i tweeted about it, and wound up twalking to some gals i’ve either never twalked to before or don’t get to talk to that much. @happinessinside twasked what my plans were for the day, and when i told her i did have plans for the day, but i just didn’t know what they were, she asked if i was perhaps on the cusp of writing my story today. which tells me she was lurking closeby.
~|~
@efloraross, asked if i felt better to which i said that starting the day off with a hissy fit gives a whole new meaning to the term morning constitutional. then later i gave her advce on dressing for preschool interviews:
@efloraross: Taking DD to tour another preschool today. Guess I’d better brush my teeth and put on some makeup, huh?
@whollyjeanne: for preschool: yes. for high school: no.
@efloraross: A bra would probably be in order, too.
@whollyjeanne: ditto for what i said about makeup.
she’ll no doubt be consulting me daily about what to wear.
~|~
@mrsmediocrity said she has volumes filled with her hissy fits. (she’s usually much pithier, but she had trouble waking up this morning.)
~|~
@nicholebernier said: “Venting 301. The FDA recommends it.” now i want you to click on and visit her web site. go ahead. i’ll wait. did you see that she’s working on a book about a woman who leaves behind a diary? well, naturally, i couldn’t let that slip by, so i asked her if elizabeth d ever had hissy fits in her journals to which she replied: “There’s nothing good about a journal unless you can pitch a few fits & tell where the bodies are buried. Probably early 2012.” (you’ll note that she didn’t answer my question about elizabeth d recording her hissy fits, but in answer to my question about when her book would be out, she did tell me that i’m gonna’ have to wait over a year on her book. which is okay cause i’m sure it’ll be worth the wait. i mean go back and read about it. and look at those pictures while you’re there.
~|~
@abccreativity told me: “i love starting my days like that! those hissy fits sparked big life changes for me.” and that got me remembering a tweet from my friend @angelakelsey the other day when i showed a picture of my still-new zafu made of brocade with dragons spitting fire and said i got it on account of wanting to sit on my dragons. “@wholllyjeanne,” she said, “the best part about dragons is the fire.” then she said, “write, speak, paint, photograph, quilt, sing the fire.”
now that made good sense then, and it made good sense to remember it today cause we all know that throwing a hissy fit is a lot like exhaling fire.
~|~
before long, i spied a tweet from @Wendy_Tokunaga mentioning a new lit review called The Sharp-Tongued Woman’s Review, and since i seem well on my way to becoming a class-a sharp-tongued woman, i visited the site and helped spread the word a bit cause i sure liked what i found there. (you oughta’ take about 5 minutes and read meg’s schneewittchen.)
~|~
the morning was capped off with a tweet from @elizabeth_stark with a link here. i once again copied my friend @angelakelsey and took down the sticky note on my computer saying “comma” and replaced it with one saying “write like a mf.” which is what i really want to do anyway, you know.
what i saw:
this picture of my mother taken last summer. i was driving the boat. i think it’s easy to see why i ran into that dock.
what i tasted:
crispy, crispy, crispy bacon done just right. wasn’t burnt, didn’t move when i picked it up.
what i heard:
laughter.
lots and lots and lots of laughter – my sides required ben gay – as my brother and i visited our own special planet and conjured up images and tales of a gang of 3 geese who are bad to the bone . . . i mean, feather.
i guess you had to be there.
what i felt:
the cool, smooth silk hand-dyed by my talented friend glennis.
what i smelled:
my leftover christmas candle burning. who says sugar cookie scent is seasonal?
when you wrestle with a pig, you both get dirty and the pig likes it.
she’s just jealous.
turn the other cheek.
play nice.
be good.
behave.
rise above.
i’ve dealt with enough bullies in my lifetime to be absolutely certain that there is no one single right way to deal with a bully. there are bullies who will push you into a wall, backing down only when you stand straighter than ever before, look them square in the eye, and say “enough.” there are bullies who will back off only when you scream and shine a light on them for all to see. there are bullies who will wrestle you to the ground, twisting your extremities into unnatural and painful positions and holding you there until you cry “uncle, already.” there are bullies who never get tired and never run out of tactics. there are bullies who will never backdown. ever.
when it comes to guidelines for conduct becoming a female when dealing with bullies, i’ve heard it all. most of them sound real pretty – noble even. but my best how-to-deal-with-a-bully advice came from a kenny rogers song about playing poker: you’ve gotta know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em.
i dealt with a bully last week. a man who’s old enough to know how to behave himself. a man who has enough letters before his name indicating rank that’s impressive enough to make me think he was out the day they taught the Army Core Value of respect. all that talk of wrestling with pigs and turning the other cheek and rising above flew right out the window as i dealt with this guy in what sure felt like my native language. i wasn’t rude, wasn’t aggressive, didn’t bully him, but i didn’t let him wipe his feet on me, either.
and it was exhilarating. it felt good.
afterwards, two men who overheard the conversation commented on how i’d conducted myself with “civility, discipline, and showed great restraint.” those were conversations i played in my head the rest of the day – to the point that i felt silly that i even remembered it, let alone put that one 15 minute period on such a lofty marble, diamond-encrusted pedestal. why did it feel so good? why were these 2 incidents of validation so incredibly important to me?
[insert lightbulb]
years ago, as a teenager still learning how to navigate my way through life with non-related others, i was in an abusive relationship. every minute of every day was a huge eraser as i made myself invisible to others because for something as simple as talking to another person in the hallway between classes, there was hell to pay. the confident, carefrree, kickass girl i had been up to that point had to go.
it was the ultimate ambush makeover, and vestiges die hard.
so last week when the bully started into me with his condescending tone and his berating, belittling words, my spirit said “never again a doormat” and balanced all those admonitions about pig wrestling with what i learned – what i still carry: visceral memories of from that one abusive relationship.
when the bully on the phone interrupted me, i called him on it, then finished my sentence. when he smartassed me, i asked him to choose different words and use a different tone. when he asked, “are you finished?”, i answered “for now.” and i did it from my core so there was no hysteria (even though he resorted to the dominating eraser phrase “calm down” more than once.) i never raised my voice, i never cried, i never wrung my hands. though i had never spoken with this man before and had no idea what he was like, i intuitively stood up at the beginning of the phone call when he uttered his first words.
one thing that abusive relationship taught me is keen sensitivity as a means of self-defense and survival.
though it seemed endless, the phone call actually lasted only about 15 minutes, and when i hung up, i smiled. big.
okay, self, i said later that day, i get why you feel such a rush having dealt so efficiently and effectively with this man. but why do you continue to shamelessly replay the comments from the two men who were impressed enough with the way you handled conducted yourself on this phone call to say something?
[insert another lightbulb right about here]
when i look back on that abusive relationship, i realize that he was one of the most congenial, affable, friendly guys you’d ever want to meet . . . publicly. but in reality, that friendly, affable persona was methodical, designed to make me a liar before i even thought about talking to anybody. with his public image of mr. congeniality, he made quite sure that nobody would ever believe anything i said about the way he behaved privately.
but last week, two men whose opinions i happen to value saw this man through my eyes. with no convincing from me and without hearing his side of the conversation, they recognized him as a bully – their positive remarks about my side of the conversation proved it. they didn’t dismiss me or erase me, they validated me.
with their words of support and validation, i’ve turned a page in my life story. it’s big, i tell you: big. that validation is so big, it’s all i can do to resist the urge to embroider their words on a pillowcase marking the day i was a pencil with no eraser.
This work by Jeanne Hewell-Chambers is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at http://www.TheBarefootHeart.com.
© 2026 Jeanne Hewell-Chambers
Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑
here ‘n there