Writer Ellen Morris Prewitt Blog

My New Righting Group Book

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on October 30, 2019. Posted in General, HOMELESSNESS, Writing. Leave a Comment

Y’all, I’ve been so busy getting my new book into the hands of folks who can use it, I haven’t stopped long enough to tell you about it. Most of y’all know for 8 years I was part of a weekly writing group of Memphians who had personally experienced homelessness. We wrote; we held public readings; we hosted full-day...

For Those Who Mother

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on May 8, 2021. Posted in General, LOVE. 13 Comments

An Unexpected Dilemma The flower bins at Claiborne Hills, usually so skimpy in their offerings, were fat with flowers, and I realized the bounty was for tomorrow’s Mother’s Day. I studied the roses and whatever flower it is they falsely color pink so that it looks like when we children stood white spirea in a glass of water with...

Bottling Happiness

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on May 2, 2021. Posted in General, LOVE. 12 Comments

“This, if I could just stop this for a minute and bottle this right here,” my daughter-in-law said Saturday night. We were at the table on the screen porch at the beach house eating Ryan’s boiled shrimp and Tom’s waygu steak. I had cut flowers from the yard to decorate the table, and we were all full of meat and peas and...

So You Love that Racist Movie?

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on April 23, 2021. Posted in General, RACISM. 4 Comments

Scene I Y’all, Gone with the Wind was my first grown-up movie (that means my first movie that wasn’t a Saturday morning matinee where my friends and I ran up and own the aisles acting like fools). We went at night, my mother and two sisters and I. Watching this movie I learned a very important plot point. During the burning of Atlanta,...

Do You Know Your Patterns of Racism?

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on April 7, 2021. Posted in General, RACISM. 18 Comments

All the news about attacks on Asian Americans, I wanted to speak out. So I began writing a blog post, and soon enough, I took a hard turn and found myself re-hashing our national history of white racism toward Black folks, with some scant references to indentured Chinese. I wrote, and I revised, and somehow I couldn’t get it right. Then I realized,...

Beignets, Names, and Future Wins

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on March 28, 2021. Posted in General, LOVE. 2 Comments

Today, we took our grandsons to the cafe au lait and beignets place. Inside the place, I mean. Except for one, two times, I haven’t been inside a restaurant for 12 months. We ordered three plates of beignets and one croissant because it was an after-school snack, and the beignets might not have been sufficient, thus the croissant....

The Gifted Young Professional

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on March 25, 2021. Posted in General, GOD. 4 Comments

In the summer of 1981, when I was clerking at the Wise Carter law firm in Jackson, Mississippi, and living at my grandmother’s house, I walked the five blocks to my job in downtown Jackson. Pedestrian commuting was not the rule in Jackson, but my other option was to drive Bigmama’s 1965 land shark Cadillac, fondly known as “Big Blue.“ At that time,...

Ha, ha! My Own Purple Martin House!

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on February 28, 2021. Posted in General, LOVE. 8 Comments

Generations ago, the Morris family became hosts for Purple Martins. When the ladies and gents of the Purple Martin family would travel through Jackson, Mississippi, on their way from South America to the eastern United States, they always stopped over at the Morris Ice Company. Grandaddy Morris made sure of that. He put up houses for the travelers....

Lent 2021: Update

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on February 24, 2021. Posted in General, GOD, HOMELESSNESS. 2 Comments

It’s really interesting. Most Lents, my disciplines don’t come easy. I have to be very intentional about observing them. After a bit, they will become a new habit, but it takes a while. This Thumb Prayer discipline is different. As I talked about last week, this Lent I’m working on Thumb Prayers each day. Each day,...

No More Giving Up

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on February 19, 2021. Posted in General, GOD, HOMELESSNESS. 12 Comments

This is the way it goes: Christmas, Epiphany, Mardi Gras, Mardi Gras Day, Ash Wednesday, Lent. We are now in the 40 days of Lent. (This is a religious calendar, but life in New Orleans revolves around it; there’s a season of Mardi Gras for a reason). This year, I’ve made a hard shift on Lent, one many of you might disagree with. Traditionally,...

Yay!!!

Written by Ellen Morris Prewitt on February 16, 2021. Posted in General, LOVE. 5 Comments

The temperature dropped to 26 degrees. In New Orleans. But our pipes didn’t burst. The sun came out. Yes, it took its own sweet time, but by 2:00, the sky was blue. The kids came over. They, as a group, were dangerous insects. (Think thorn bug and dung beetle plus two more). I, as David Bowie’s Major Tom, handed out Space...