Wendy Hodge

Wendy Hodge

Columnist

Wendy is a writer for The Observer

Wendy Hodge's Latest

Top Hat Tackles Food Insecurity

Top Hat Tackles Food Insecurity

CONTRIBUTED BY WENDY HODGE OPELIKA —“There are people in the world so hungry that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread.” - Mahatma GandhiOpelika and Auburn are blessed. We have restaurants, cafes, delis, bakeries, bistros, coffee...

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The Turkey Is Dead, and Santa Is Too Skinny

The Turkey Is Dead, and Santa Is Too Skinny

By WENDY HODGE My grandmother’s coffee table was a polished walnut, smooth to the touch. It was an antique even then, 50 years ago. And on it sat the inevitable coffee table book. Hers was a collection of Norman Rockwell paintings. From time to...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Oh Christmas Tree!

By WENDY HODGE Forget the midterm elections and the political campaigns. The real question, the one that is truly on everyone’s mind (whether they admit it or not), is this: “When is it too early/late enough to put up my Christmas tree?” Typically,...

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Marigold and Cadillac

Marigold and Cadillac

Times are tough. There’s no denying it. Suffering isn’t hard to find, and if you dwell on it for more than a minute or two it can be hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel. But I have come to lean on these words more and more lately: ...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Today's Headlines

By WENDY HODGE If you’re like me, the news is both a blessing and a curse. Every morning I weigh the desire to know what’s happening in the world against the certain sense of pessimism the news is sure to leave me with. It’s a struggle. Curiosity...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Spectacular: Part 4

By WENDY HODGE When last we met, I was in the midst of a bidding frenzy at Bell’s Daylily Spectacular with a chance to take home the daylily of my dreams.... “Going for $40,” Mr. Bell calls out. I look around. Tim has roused and is grinning at me....

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Spectacular: Part 3

When last we met, I was standing on the hill overlooking the crowd gathered for the Daylily Spectacular at Bell’s Daylily Garden in Sycamore, Georgia. Tim and I had made our purchases in the bargain line and bought our raffle tickets for the...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Spectacular: Part Two

By WENDY HODGE When last we met, Tim and I and his parents (along with a couple hundred other daylily fanatics) were on our feet ready for the annual Spectacular at Bell’s Garden to begin. If you’ve ever been in line for a music legend to perform...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Spectacular: Part One

By WENDY HODGE You’d have to be crazy to do what we do. By “we” I mean Tim and myself and Tim’s parents, Jeff and Jerri. For 364 days a year, we plan and prepare and look forward to the Saturday after Labor Day with a couple hundred other folks,...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

No Excuse

By WENDY HODGE As I write this, we are 48 hours away from what has become a tradition for Tim, Tim’s parents and myself. The Saturday after Labor Day is the annual Daylily Spectacular at Bell’s Daylily Garden in Sycamore, Georgia. I had every...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

It Is Not Just A Table

By WENDY HODGE Fifty years is a long time, and it sure does fly by. In 50 years, you can raise a family, work hard at a job, see your children become adults, become grandparents yourself, retire and then grow old. You can celebrate, and you can...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

My Mother’s Hands

By WENDY HODGE The very first memory I have is of my mother’s hands on my forehead. Her cool fingers, long and thin, were pressed to my skin to gauge how much fever I had. I was 4 years old, and we were packing up to move into a new house. That’s...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Keeping Watch

By WENDY HODGE It’s a torturous thing we humans do, keeping watch over the dying. We gather around a bed, sometimes as a family and sometimes alone, and wait for someone we love to ease into death … like an antique clock winding down, ticking...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

In Flames

By WENDY HODGE It’s been a while since I drove downtown to visit my spot at the fountain in the courthouse square. For a long time, that was where I went to write, and to think and to just breathe. But then life got so busy, as it always seems to...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Bibliophilia

By WENDY HODGE In all of my travels, in this country and overseas, I’ve seen monuments and artwork, natural wonders and famous folks. I’ve listened to symphonies and watched famous plays. I’ve been to concerts and parties. The memories I’ve made...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Headlines

By WENDY HODGE There’s been a shooting at a mall in Indiana. A Nascar driver was stabbed to death while getting gas at a filling station. Someone with a gun interrupted a stand-up comedy show in Philadelphia. A bomb threat cleared out a government...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Sequel

By WENDY HODGE Last weekend, Tim and I went to the movies. “Top Gun — Maverick” was playing on the Big D at the Tiger Town 13, and we had tickets for our date night. We don’t go to the movies very often because we enjoy the theater we have created...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

What A Prince Looks Like

By WENDY HODGE  dreamed the other night that my daughter was a little girl again. In my dream, she sat in front of the TV in the house she grew up in and, on the TV in front her, Disney’s Beauty and the Beast played on the screen. The original...

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Oh Christmas Tree!

Redneck Wanderlust

By WENDY HODGE This time of year, social media is full of vacation pictures … selfies in front of historic landmarks, family group shots at amusement park entrances and ocean views from beach chairs. And I am feeling that familiar pull to travel,...

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The Turkey Is Dead, and Santa Is Too Skinny

To Hear A Voice

By WENDY HODGE Margaret lives in London. She walks a few blocks every day … every single day … just to hear a voice. She walks to the subway station in her neighborhood and perches on the edge of a bench on the platform waiting for her husband’s...

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