I am suffering from some seri-ous symptoms that signify a single diagnosis: spring fever. Forget about all the sneezing

and snorting from the pollen.I’m just feeling a need to get

my hands in the dirt and plant some stuff.

In the past few weeks, every time I pass any place that sells plants, I have had to force myself not to stop. It has not been easy.

What has stopped me?It is nigh until impossible to

trust the unpredictable weather patterns that are indicative of this South of my birth.

One day it’s sunny and 70 de-grees; the next it’s freezing again.

I don’t want to spend money on lovely things to plant only to have them freeze to death at some point in the coming days.

I will practice patience for a while longer. Then I’m going to

dig and plant until my heart is content.

•••When I lived in Vicksburg, I

had a huge flower bed in front of my Pepto-Bismol-pink house, and each spring I tried to plant something different.

One year I bought a large package of seeds – A Child’s First Garden. Talk about a mixed bag.

I sowed the seeds and waited to see what would grow.

It was amazing. There were all sorts of flowers – a virtual rain-bow of color.

Then I noticed a tomato plant,

a corn stalk and various other vegetables.

I called it my surprise garden, and it was the talk of my Cherry Street neighborhood.

The next year I chose strawber-ry plants. They are pretty and if my crop was a success, I’d have home-grown berries to eat.

When the plants began to grow, I started noticing slimy trails all around the bed. And the leaves had signs of having been nibbled.

Snails. They were the culprits.A friend told me to put jar lids

of beer at each end of the bed – snails would be attracted to the beer, drink and drown. Who knew snails were sots?

I put out the beer each evening and the next morning the bodies of a band of slugs would be float-ing in the suds. And I was happy.

Each day during my lunch hour, I’d check on the progress

of the strawberries and noted with pride that, surely by the next morning, I’d be able to pick a few for my cereal.

The next morning, the mature berries would be gone.

No snail trails. So I was puz-zled.

Until I walked out my front door one early morning just in time to see my beloved canine Maizie standing in the middle of the strawberry bed.

Licking her lips.That dear low-to-the-ground,

overweight mixed-breed pup was overjoyed to have discovered an endless snack bar in her own front yard.

I couldn’t even fuss at her.That was more than 20 years

ago and the memory remains as sweet as fresh strawberries.

leslie.criss@journalinc.com

Sunday • March 24, 2019 daILy JOurnaL, 1c

LIV

ING

Leslie

Criss

» PETS

» QUOTABLE

Babe is a 2-year-old dog. A spayed female, Babe is a beautiful red-coated dog with a big splotch of white on her chest. A retriever mix, Babe and her big brown eyes would make someone a wonderful best friend. Her adoption number is 031607L.

Paige is a 1 1/2-year-old dog. A spayed female, Paige is a brindle beauty with her coat a mixture of golden, orange and black. She is thought to be a Catahoula Leopard mix. She’d love a forever home and her adoption number is 021005M.

IF YOU’D LIKE TO PROVIDE Babe

and Paige with a good home, call

Tupelo-Lee Humane Society at

(662) 841-6501 or stop by 2795

Cliff Gookin Blvd. Shelter hours are 10 a.m. until 6 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; closed Sunday and

Monday. Adoption fees for dogs and puppies range from $85 to $150. Adoption fees for cats and kittens are $60. This includes one round of shots, worming, spaying/neutering. Please bring the photo of the animal you wish to adopt.

“Spring is nature’s way of saying, ‘Let’s party!’”

– Robin Williams

“In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt.”

– Margaret Atwood

WE ALL LOVE SHARING photos of our adorable pets. Tag us using #DJpets

Springtime delivers desire for digging in dirt

By LESLIE CRISSDaily Journal

TUPELO • Though music’s been a part of her life since she was a little girl, it became her passion only about six years ago.

She can play bass, drums, piano; she played saxophone in grade school; but it’s the guitar that stole her heart.

These days, melodies, lyrics and guitar licks are as neces-sary to Jhia Horn as the air she breathes.

The Tupelo-born daugh-ter of Joe Horn and Lacreshia Beene Horn, who’ll turn 26 on Wednesday, loves her family and her name, but she prefers to be called Jhia – “just Jhia.”

She left Tupelo with her fam-ily when she was 5, spending time in Missouri, Louisiana, Texas – thanks to a hurricane named Katrina – and Georgia before returning to Mississip-pi in 2011 to attend Ole Miss, where she studied computer science engineering.

“I’m a nerd,” she said, dim-ples deepening as she smiled. “My mom pushed me into it so I’d make a little money, and I’m good at it, but I can’t just sit behind a desk all day where I don’t get to talk to people. The closest I’ve come to work-ing with computers is a job at Best Buy for a while.”

The self-professed nerd is a people person who rarely meets a stranger. She’s worked as a barista, as a program di-rector for Boys and Girls Club and since last week, she’s ac-tually doing something with computers at FedEx – and she likes it.

Jhia loves to spend time with her cat, Maxx. When she’s not working, she likes to play Mo-nopoly and she proudly pro-claims she’s just gotten really good at jumping rope.

But at the top of her list? Mu-sic.

When Jhia was 7, she’d watch her grandfather, JC Beene, play guitar in church.

“I’d sit in his lap and he’d let me help him play,” she said. “I learned a lot from him. We had one guitar and so we’d pass it back and forth. But I didn’t play consistently at all.”

Not until she was involved in a car accident that “tore my arm up.”

“I stopped going to school and had a bunch of time to sit around and think,” she said. “I spent time reflecting on life and God. That’s when I got really music heavy. I picked up a guitar again and haven’t put it down since.”

These days, Jhia plays a Taylor acoustic guitar that was given to her by a former co-worker.

Just as she grew up watch-ing her grandfather play guitar, Jhia’s spent her life in a family of

singers, but until she was 19, she would not sing in public.

Her grandmother, Betty Beene – affectionately called “Bud” by her oldest grandchild – changed that.

“She’s the director of Tupelo Unity Choir,” Jhia said. “They were singing at the Sunday gos-pel event of that year’s Elvis Fes-tival and two of the lead singers didn’t show up. My grandmother asked if I would do it. So, I did.”

Since then Jhia’s become a nat-ural at singing for an audience, though she positively professes a persistent case of nerves.

“Once I got over my fear of putting stuff out there, I love the interaction with people,” she said. “The coolest thing is hear-ing people sing along. I played recently at The Thirsty Devil and someone was singing along and I thought, ‘I don’t even know you

and you are singing along to one of my songs.’”

In her own wordsTwo years ago, Jhia added

songwriting to her resume but humbly downplays this gift.

“I don’t consider myself a songwriter,” she said. “I just sing and write songs. I can’t even tell you what genre my songs might fit. I don’t have a clue.”

Singer/songwriter Mersaidee Soules of Tupelo disagrees with Jhia’s self-assessment.

“Jhia is very unique, very in-dividual,” she said. “You can’t categorize her. And she doesn’t realize her gift.”

But Soules does. And she’s en-couraging Jhia as only someone who worked as a songwriter 17 years in Nashville could do.

Tupelo singer/songwriter finds joy in making music

THOMAS WELLS | BUY AT PHOTOS.DJOURNAL.COM

Jhia Horn loves a good game of Monopoly, but she’s happiest when she’s playing guitar or writing a new song. Check out Jhia singing “Ballerina Girls” online at djournal.com.

COURTESY

Jhia comes from a musical family. The Beene sisters, made up of Jhia’s mom and three aunts, have been singing gospel together for 40 years. Sometimes their parents and Jhia sing along. Seated in center are JC and Betty Beene of Tupelo. In semi-circle around them are Jhia’s mom, Lacreshia Beene Horn of Atlanta, left, Jeniquez Beene Long of Tupelo, Jhia, Trenessa Beene Pearson of Atlanta, and Walidah Beene White of Connecticut.

TURN TO JHIA, 2C