In Memory of Alex

This is from a greeting card that I bought for my husband -

Yours is the smile
I look forward to each morning,
and yours is the voice
I love to hear throughout the day.
Yours is the touch
that can reach my heart and soul,
and it is your understanding
that so often calms
my doubts and fears. . .
Yours are the plans
and dreams
that blend with mine,
becoming ours,
and yours is the love
that means the world to me.
My life would be so different
if you weren't a part of it,
and that is why no one
has more to celebrate today
than I do. . .
my husband, my soul mate,
my very best friend.

In memory of Alex
May 8, 1942 - October 22, 2004

The Girl in the Photo

I sit at my daughter’s dining room table, on the far side, against the wall with the sunlight coming through the window. Everyone has left the table and as I sit there I am looking at the different framed photos that she has sitting on the pine sideboard and I realize that I am looking at a black and white photo of myself staring back at me.

I know exactly when the photo was taken and I feel as though I can remember exactly what I was thinking. It is a photo of me taken in our backyard before we left for my graduation ceremony from 8th grade. I am wearing a white dress with cap sleeves and a wide skirt with crinolines (I think two) underneath and my mother had taken me to get my hair done at Robert Manning’s Hair Salon (where she always went). I remember I didn’t like the way the woman did my hair but couldn’t speak up to tell her to stop. I am a tall skinny girl and not feeling very pretty because I didn’t like my hair.

The girl in the photo looks back at me and I sit there, frozen for a moment in time, wishing this could be a movie with some kind of time travel and I could fly into the photo and whisper words of wisdom in her ear.

And so I sit there a few more moments knowing the decisions I made and thankful for the blessings that came from the good ones and thankful for God’s protection through all the wrong ones. And there were a lot of wrong ones.

“This I recall to my mind,
Therefore I have hope
The Lord’s loving kindnesses indeed never cease,
For His compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
Great is Your faithfulness.”

Lamentations 3:21-23

Five Things That Will Never Get Better On Their Own

Over the years and from many hard earned lessons I have learned that there are some things that will never get better on their own:

1. Plumbing
2. Teeth
3. Cars
4. Problems with the IRS
5. Unruly Children

Does anyone have any other suggestions?

A Summer Evening

Today was Monday - at work - all day. They announced furloughs for all of us of five days - to be taken anyway we choose or can arrange with our manager. We knew it was coming. Two more people were offered "packages" so they will be leaving. Three left last week.

So what did I do tonight? I had a coupon for a book I wanted to buy, "The Guernsey Literary and Potatoe Peel Pie Society," at Barnes and Noble. I drove to the area where the store is - it is called Market Common - a really pretty "Truman Show" type place - with fountains and rocking chairs and places for kids to play and really good stores like William Sonoma, Pottery Barn, Banana Republic and more. I walked around at Barnes and then went and got a personal pizza and a soda and went back to to Barnes and sat at one of the tables they have in front of the store and ate and listened to the sounds of a summer evening - feeling the wonderful balmy breezes - and just really enjoying myself. I thought I would read while I ate but instead I just ended up "people watching." The sky was beginning to turn into a sunset and the clouds were beautiful in the distance and I was happy.

I love this quote by Henry James, "Summer afternoon - summer afternoon...the two most beautiful words in the English language." I could add "a summer evening- a summer evening" to the quote.

What Have I Been Doing?

This has been a kind of crazy summer so far - thought I would try and list it:

1. Family came to visit - not enough time because I had to leave and go to DC
2. Went to DC for Centurion weekend - great time of learning and getting to know other participants
3. Went back to DC daughter's home for a week of being with 3 yr. old grandson and 3 month old twin grandsons and youngest daughter (who also lives in DC) - loved being with them and cried like a baby when I had to drive away
4. Drove home by myself - took 4 hrs to go from DC to Richmond - bumper to bumper traffic and then when that cleared there was a tractor trailer/passenger/van/plus two cars accident
5. Started back to work on Monday - 3 more people are no longer working at the newspaper.
6. Major project due on Friday has been postponed until next Friday - God is in control!!!

Bathing Suit Debacle

I'm overweight - I know it - today June 1st I have started again - seriously - no - don't roll your eyes - I AM SERIOUS!!!!

anyway. . .

I went to the store on Saturday and while my sister was buying sheets I decided to try on bathing suits. The one I have been wearing is seven years old - I know this because I bought it to go to my oldest daughter's bridal shower in Houston. It is awful - but I really know what it is like to shop for a bathing suit when you look the way I do - but - I thought - foolishly - how bad could it really be????

A friend told me to try a tankini - I even went up a size just to make sure it would fit - and perhaps have the small pleasure of having to go to a smaller size - (cue hysterical laughter) so I picked out a nice chocoate brown outfit - and went in to try it on. Am I the only one that worries about hidden cameras ? I put the suit on - looked in the mirror and what do I see??? A stack of donuts stacked on top of each other with a head and arms --- aughhhhhhh!!!! I got out of the thing and got dressed - my sister called me and asked me where I was - I told her I was in the "fitting" room and I had just finished trying on a bathing suit and was trying to commit suicide with my nail clipper.

I decided to go to the jewelry department immediately - I needed something gold and something that would be my size!!! I told the saleslady I was depressed because I had just been trying on bathing suits and needed something to cheer me up. I talked myself down from buying the $150 gold earrings and then my phone rang - it was my sister looking for me again.

Today I planned out what I would eat - and wrote everything down - the journey begins again...

Strange Verses

I try to read through the Bible every other year - on the other year I read through the New Testament. The only way I can do it is by using a program called Daily Walk (for the whole Bible) and Closer Walk (for the New Testament) - helps me get through books like Numbers!

Anyway - in my journey I have come across some "funny" verses - and I started writing them down in the back of my Bible - like verses about whistling:

Isaiah 5:26 He will lift up a standard to the distant nation, and will whistle for it from the ends of the earth; and behold, it will come with speed swiftly.

Isaiah 7:18 In that day the Lord will whistle for the fly that is in the remotest part of the rivers of Egypt and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria.

Zechariah 10:8 I will whistle for them to gather them together, for I have redeemed them; and they will be as numerous as they were before.

and then there are verses about clapping:

Lamentations 2:15 All who pass along the way clap their hands in derision at you;...

Ezekiel 6:11 Thus says the Lord God, "Clap your hand, stamp your foot...

Ezekiel 25:6 For thus says the Lord God, "Because you have clapped your hands and stamped your feet...

Ezekiel 21:17 I will also clap My hands together ...

And then I always get a picture of a pitcher on a baseball field with this one:

Isaia 22:17 Behold, the Lord is about to hurl you headlong, O man. And He is about to grasp you firmly and roll you tightly like a ball, to be cast into a vast country...

Just thought I would share some stuff that I find unusual.