The Days We Never Forget

March 30, 2025March 30, 2025 / Pam Goode / 12 Comments

“It’s not bad — we think you’ll be fine” and suddenly the words leap from “We’re just not sure why this isn’t working” to “I’m so very sorry, but this is all we can do,” and before we knew it, she was gone.

Today is the day my Mom died. It was 5:30, March 30th, 2006.

I remember every moment of that day, as do my sister and brother. Still. And Forever.

Death is so surreal — and often, so unexpected. Even when you know it’s coming, it jumps at you like a growling hyena, and you wonder if you’ll every understand.

If you’ll ever get past it.

My mother’s death was one of those “wait, WHAT HAPPENED??? sequences that spilled suddenly from “It’s not bad — we think you’ll be fine”, then morphed strangely to “Unfortunately we’re just not sure why this isn’t working” to tears and more tears right up to “I’m so very sorry, but this is all we can do.”

We stayed with her night and day, and still before we knew it, she was gone.

Mom was one of those women who could (and would) do everything. She loved us, fed us, had a fabulously and almost childish laugh, danced, taught us how to sew and create and curtsy, get along with Dad, AND be a bad ass??????

My sister, who gardens like a similar first-class badass in addition to raising sheep (LOTS of them) and growing food for the family, pretty much took on Mom’s role and keeps us together.

Three children — each forging their own path and as different as night and day. It didn’t matter a wink how different we were (and still are). I’m so deeply grateful that we’re all still together and helping each other along the path. Life isn’t always easy, and that’s an understatement, but we love each other.

Thank You Mom
Love Always

September Sand

September 17, 2023 / Pam Goode / 7 Comments

I wasn’t a huge September fan until I became a hardcore beach girl. As children, we always headed out smack in the middle of the heat and loved every minute. Of course now July summers are hotter than hades and a bit less attractive. I might still be willing to go … my mom did it … but I don’t. Instead I dig my toes into sweet September sand and let the softer sun have at me. She loves me, and boy do I love her.

And here’s a secret about September — the beach is almost completely empty. And that is surefire motivation.

The best fun is hanging out with our gaggle of girls, a stash of every kind of art supply, and burying ourselves in all-day creativity (and sometimes all night), conversation, and laughter each week.

And so we come, and we cook, and we eat, and we create, and we walk the empty beach and smile at the wiggly periwinkles trying to dig back into the sand after being disrupted by a wave, and ogle the starfish. But mostly, we laugh. Indeed laughter is so very good for the soul, but it’s also so much more than that — it’s healing and renewal.

Photo: My Mom and Dad on the beach when I was just a tiny thing.

The Lives We Live

August 11, 2023 / Pam Goode / 11 Comments

My Dad wrote: “I’ve spent the afternoon sanding Uncle Alvin Howard’s workbench. My great aunt, Laura Hayward Howard, bought the bench in 1936 from Hammacher Schlemmer in New York, and then gave it to Uncle Alvin for Christmas.

Uncle Alvin quickly let on as how he wasn’t about to take up woodworking, and planned to give the workbench promptly to the local boys’ home.

Then Nana caught wind and talked him out of giving it away, saying that she had three rambunctious boys at home who could make good use of it. Both the three boys and their mother did, indeed, use it like crazy. Fifteen years ago, Dad wrote “whatever I know about woodworking tools, I learned at that workbench, sixty and more years ago. Mother is gone now, and I’ve always wanted to repair and restore it. Jeanne and Adam will be coming with a pickup truck in the morning. I’m flying out of Pass Christian on Tuesday afternoon to Atlanta, and then driving to Charlotte Wednesday morning.”

And so he did.

I can’t quite tell whether or not he ever got around to restoring it (the Pardue family wasn’t the hoity toity type), but I can definitely say that he used the workbench handily in his architecture office for quite a few years until he died in 2013. It’s now mine, and though I’m nothing close to a woodworker, I love it like crazy. Many thanks to Alvin, Laura, Nana, and Dad for always sharing their stories, and Jeanne and Adam, who I don’t think I knew, for making it happen.

We need more family stories, don’t we?

Home from Ireland

May 3, 2023 / Pam Goode / 1 Comment

And then she was home, happily laden with:

three new (heavy) sweaters that I’ll surely need again next time,
the thick gloves and ear muffs that were a godsend,
not quite enough leggings,
a new pair of shoes to replace the two pair that fell apart as soon as I got to Ireland,
a baggie full of beautiful stripey rocks (WAY fewer than I wanted to bring home),
several sets of broken pottery that I haven’t yet had time to reassemble into something fabulous,
notes for my next trip to Ireland,
215 emails that need responses,
the joy of laughing with favorite old and new friends,
the opportunity to try new things: new art, new hikes, new food,
a brand new grandson who sleeps like clouds from heaven,
beautiful gardens all gloriously blooming and a sweet husband who keeps them that way,
and several handfuls of notes for my next trip (to Barcelona in June!)

Because we’re not getting any younger.

Love to All!

Book Release Coming Right Up!

July 10, 2020May 11, 2022 / Pam Goode / 1 Comment

It seems easy enough, right? Many claim to have penned this truth: “Writing is easy. Just open a vein and bleed” — and no doubt we’ve all felt it, whether during middle school exams or penning a verse to a would-be lover.

But the truth is, writing is sometimes hard and sometimes easy, but editing and publishing can extinguish god’s own holy spark in the best of us. Not that I’ve ever been particularly holy.

Regardless, I believe I’ve just pulled myself through the last hoop atop the last hill (and yes I CAN hear you laughing in the background) and have pushed the appropriate buttons to make the July 24 release date.

Can you hear my wild self-applause????

Touch of Fire by Pam Goode, available as e-book or paperback July 24, available for e-book pre-order July 10, aka, NOW.

Pre-Order Link here. Let’s roll!

Bowling Lady Watering Can

10 Things I Learned Antiquing in Virginia

November 27, 2012 / Pam Goode / 11 Comments

Sisters spontaneously dress alike, no matter how many years intervene.

Prosecco goes with everything.

Run while you can.

Design your own path, and make it sing.

Reflect your true self.

When you hear yourself mention back pain, nausea, headaches and a cramped jaw all in the same sentence, and your sister hands you a doggie Xanax, take it.