Chapel of Hope Stories

Dear Reader:

While pulling information on the latest mural about “sweet tea” that has gone up on the side of the Visitor’s Center (artist-Kevin Morrisey)… another link to an old mural in an historic building in Summerville popped up.

It is a mural that has come up for discussion when the CPW (or as we called it the ‘water works’ building) moved this past summer from what had originally been the ‘Old Post Office. It was there when I first arrived (fresh out of college) to teach in the small “hamlet” of Summerville in the early 70’s.

The mural – a four and half foot by 12 foot oil on canvas – is entitled “Train Time” and depicts the “Best Friend of Charleston,” a locomotive that exploded in 1831. It was created by Bernadine Custer. A plaque underneath the mural reports that Custer was commissioned in 1939 by the Works Progress Administration in support of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal Program in the midst of the Great Depression.

While re-examining the original deed (when CPW bought it in 1985)….it has been discovered by Patty Walton, executive assistant to the general manager at CPW, that the mural is protected by a deed and cannot be moved. This is great news for the old historical building and all of us Summerville residents who want to keep as much of our past alive for future generations.

Now…as far as the building itself…there is hope that the town might buy it and use it as a public community center for so many talented artists of every design to use. Charlie Cuzzell, former manager of the CPW, took interested residents on a tour of the property which prompted some great ideas.

Cuzzell  liked the ideas so much he took Dianne Frankenberger (owner of People, Places, and Quilts/neighbor to the building) and a few others on a walk through the building to stretch their imaginations.

“We all looked it and said this is the greatest thing in the whole wide world,” Frankenberger said. “We just could see it, we all could see what it could be.”

Her friends-including Dennis Ashley, Will and Dottie Rizzo, Kevin Morrissey, Nancy Jean Nettles and others want to call the space “Public Works.” The organization would promote cultural activities and provide opportunities for broad community involvement.

The “Public Works” building would provide space for aspiring artists, classes on painting, dancing, sculpting, printmaking and host shows, performances and black-tie galas.

“There are just all kinds of things that we could do there,” Frankenberger said.

The back loading dock could serve as a venue for performances, there are plenty of areas in the basement — rare for buildings in the area — that would be ideal for children’s art programs.

If the town is not interested in purchasing the building, Frankenberger will write grants and hold fundraisers to see that the “Public Works” idea comes to fruition.

( Summerville Journal-Scene- “Community Member Wonder Will Become of the Old CPW Building“- Joy Bonala)

One of the little unknown fun facts about the CPW building is that (none-other) than Frosty the Snowman looks out the top cupola windows at the town below. How long has he done this…I don’t know…but when I read about it…I just had to stop and check it out myself yesterday….(I almost stepped out on the busy town street trying to get the picture…if it had happened Frosty would have been the last smiling face I saw…it could be worse!)

Sure enough there was Frosty…smiling down at the townspeople walking up and down the sidewalks completely oblivious to his smiling face… how many decades have I ridden by the Old Post Office (and later the CPW building) and never noticed Frosty? What a marvelous discovery!!! The obscure secrets and oddities of historical buildings that make up my hometown…hidden treasures.

One local news article even mentioned a long-time ghost that apparently has been around this archaic building… dating back to its completion during the Great Depression. To date I haven’t been able to locate a specific story to connect with this ghost….Could he be a letter reading ghost…or a letter writing ghost when the building was the Old Post Office…Or perhaps he even emits an eerie sound…made by gulping water (a ‘ water fountain ghost’ who stays eternally thirsty?) – while the building was the Commissioner of Public Works – the search continues.

What fun it is to discover the wonderful idiosyncrasies that make life so much fun and allow us curious “folk” to widen our imaginations.

So until tomorrow…

America is my country and Summerville is my “home town”….a quaint refuge in a busy world.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

I broke out into song last evening before it got dark (“Anticipation” by Carly Simon)… because while walking through the garden  I saw buds on my Confederate Rose! You might remember back in early summer the stems/leaves atrophied for some inexplicable reason and the whole top of the giant bush had to be removed to stop the disease.

Now it is back to its original height and the buds are starting to pop out…I am so excited! I can hardly wait for the white, pink, and dark pink shades to take over the bush. It made it after all!

Dear Reader:

Everywhere you turn these days there are pumpkins, more pumpkins, and even more pumpkins for sale. Boone Hall has the largest “pumpkin patch” in the Charleston area (filled with food, drinks, mazes, and all kinds of games and hay rides.) I feel sure the grandchildren all will hitting it soon….if it ever cools down enough to enjoy it.

Little do the children (or adults) know that they have the lowly turnip to think for the evolution of pumpkins, jack o’lanterns, Halloween and all other fall celebrations. Yes…that little turnip most children turn their noses up to…is the catalyst to our love of pumpkins and carving them.

We also have to think a diverse group of our population for contributing to this festive time of the year….from the Irish, to the Scots, and even the French.

It was the English translation from the french explorer Jacques Cartier’s name for some big melons he discovered…that brought about the pumpkin’s name.

• In 1584, after French explorer Jacques Cartier explored the St. Lawrence region of North America, he reported finding “gros melons.” The name was translated into English as “pompions,” which has since evolved into the modern “pumpkin.”

The History Channel tells how the lowly turnip was first used to ward off mischievous fairies and goblins on the last day of October.

We have pumpkins at morning and pumpkins at noon,
If it were not for pumpkins we should be undoon.”

Those lines, from a poem written by a Massachusetts settler in the 1630s, seem particularly appropriate at this time of year. Halloween is nearly here, so grocery stores, coffee shops and bakeries fill with pumpkin-flavored treats, from muffins to lattes to ravioli.

Modern Halloween comes from the Irish festival Samhain, an occasion that marked the passage from the summer harvest season to the dark of winter. Tradition dictated huge bonfires be built in fields, and it was believed that fairy spirits lurked in the shadows.

To distract these spirits from settling into houses and farms, people would carve rudimentary faces into large turnips, and set candles inside. The turnip lanterns would rest along roadways and next to gates, to both light the way for travelers and caution any passing fairies against invading.

Turnips are often far more grotesque than pumpkins, which is quite right as they are fundamentally about warding people off.

Children in Ireland and Scotland also used them, supposedly, as a lantern to help guide ancestral spirits home; they would walk door to door and offer a prayer for a dead relative in return for food.

The celebration of Halloween in America didn’t take off until waves of immigrants from Ireland and Scotland arrived in the mid-1800s. Pumpkins are native to North America, so while it’s not known exactly when the first pumpkin was carved and lit, the first mention of pumpkins jack o’lanterns comes at around the same time. In 1866, the children’s magazine “Harper’s Young People” reported that “a great sacrifice of pumpkins” had been made for that year’s Halloween celebrations.

Pumpkin carving grew more and more popular as the years went on. By the 1920s, Halloween had been embraced throughout the United States. Parties and costumes became the norm, and “trick or treating” soon followed in the mid-1930s.

Vintage Postcard from the 1920’s:

By the Great Depression….the addition of trick or treating came into existence as a way to give children a small treat when sugar was an expense most families couldn’t afford…but for one night they saved up to help put a smile on children’s face….

This held true through the WWII years of the 1940’s when families saved their ration stamps for this one night each year…to give the children a happy night.

Vintage 1930’s postcard:

From the 1950’s on Halloween and Fall celebrations became more commercialized as television entered the average American home and today pumpkin carving has become an art form of its own.

I am bias….but this fun garden pumpkin (who guards the flowers from strange things that go bump in the night) is my favorite.

*For all of you creative pumpkin decorators or carvers….please share photos of your artworks with us….would love to include them on the blog this month!

So until tomorrow….Let us enjoy this season of beauty, fun, and creativity….and pray it doesn’t pass too fast! Also, don’t forget to eat your turnips…they can protect your health as well as your being.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Dear Reader:

You might be guessing that the “old story” (in the title) refers to the ‘Old woman who lived in the shoe… who had so many children she didn’t know what to do’…. but if you assumed this…you would be wrong. However there is a connection between Mother Goose’s story and today’s story….a story about perspective and life.

“Perspective” (Awakin.Org)

Aaron Zehah

A poor man lived with his wife and six children in a very small one-room house. They were always getting in each other’s way and there was so little space they could hardly breathe!Finally the man could stand it no more. He talked to his wife and asked her what to do. “Go see the rabbi,” she told him, and after arguing a while, he went.

The rabbi greeted him and said, “I see something is troubling you. Whatever it is, you can tell me.”

And so the poor man told the rabbi how miserable things were at home with him, his wife, and the six children all eating and living and sleeping in one room. The poor man told the rabbi, “We’re even starting to yell and fight with each other. Life couldn’t be worse.”

The rabbi thought very deeply about the poor man’s problem. Then he said, “Do exactly as I tell you and things will get better. Do you promise?”

“I promise,” the poor man said.

The rabbi then asked the poor man a strange question. “Do you own any animals?”

“Yes,” he said. “I have one cow, one goat, and some chickens.”

“Good,” the rabbi said. “When you get home, take all the animals into your house to live with you.”

The poor man was astonished to hear this advice from the rabbi, but he had promised to do exactly what the rabbi said. So he went home and took all the farm animals into the tiny one-room house.

The next day the poor man ran back to see the rabbi. “What have you done to me, Rabbi?” he cried. “It’s awful. I did what you told me and the animals are all over the house! Rabbi, help me!” The rabbi listened and said calmly, “Now go home and take the chickens back outside.”

The poor man did as the rabbi said, but hurried back again the next day. “The chickens are gone, but Rabbi, the goat!” he moaned. “The goat is smashing up all the furniture and eating everything in sight!” The good rabbi said, “Go home and remove the goat and may God bless you.”

So the poor man went home and took the goat outside. But he ran back again to see the rabbi, crying and wailing. “What a nightmare you have brought to my house, Rabbi! With the cow it’s like living in a stable! Can human beings live with an animal like this?”

The rabbi said sweetly, “My friend, you are right. May God bless you. Go home now and take the cow out of your house.” And the poor man went quickly home and took the cow out of the house.

The next day he came running back to the rabbi again. “O Rabbi,” he said with a big smile on his face, “We have such a good life now. The animals are all out of the house. The house is so quiet and we’ve got room to spare! What a joy!”

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Isn’t it wonderful when we open ourselves up to new possibilities and particularly new perspectives? In a nutshell isn’t this the basic problem in our country today….two divided perspectives….and little tolerance or patience to try to understand the other’s way of looking at things and why. (More importantly being willing to look for commonalities instead of differences. This means looking for core values that we all can agree upon.)

We have been given guidelines through scripture and human experiences to know when we see wrongdoings going on in front of us…we all know the values Christ showed us while here on earth…and I seriously doubt if any of us can honestly look in the mirror and justify the travesties in our daily lives, not only in our country, but around the world.

Poor God…I think He must be appalled to have His Name linked with so many ambiguous decisions that still leave out all His children and their needs on this planet. If united, we could spend our lives helping to bring a better balance to the lives of others in desperate need whose gift of life is just as sacred as ours…then maybe all this other squabbling would de-prioritized; instead we could spend our time improving and even saving other human lives. That is what I would like to see greet me on the front pages of our newspapers.

No more finger pointing, ranting, and raving over “more” …instead we could hold hands and promote sharing the resources we have been so blessed to receive. God keeps giving us so many chances to do just this…I believe “Patience” and “God” must be Synonyms.

In fact I doubt with each child that the ‘old woman in the shoe’ felt more crowded…she just felt more needed. And if you have gone through or are about to go through the “empty nest” phase of life…you soon realize that all the chaos and loudness of children and teenagers in the home is sorely missed.

Now you can have the clean, organized home you always wanted…at the expense of silence. Like the lesson in  the Monkey Paw story…”Be careful what you wish for…it might come true.”

So until tomorrow as Oscar Wilde once said, “Nothing worth knowing can be taught.” It is the experiences we weather in life that become the true teacher…that helps to define us.

Each stage of our lives brings new knowledge and wisdom….and if we learn from our mistakes and and are open to new perspectives…then our blessings abound amid our growing gratitude for the most sacred experience called life.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

My morning glories have finally started growing along the string to the other section of the fence…it only took all summer to do this but again…the garden is teaching me patience.

A variety of gorgeous birds keep coming to the “Little Bird Chapel” but I keep missing my opportunity to catch one on top of the chapel or eating inside…again…patience…I will get one when the time is right.

The cute little “crab” dress of Eloise’s and the boys’ “crab” swimming trunks looked adorable this past weekend when Sarah took pictures of the family…

Dear Reader:

I never checked my mail Sunday since I wasn’t expecting anything from Amazon.com….so it was Monday morning when I dropped some note cards in the mail to go off. There was a small package in the box and when I took it out I recognized Beverly Parkinson’s Mississippi address. What in the world?

When I first opened the package… a clear box containing the originally designed creative birthday card was sitting inside. It took a minute for me to put two and two together and realize, knowing Beverly’s artistic background, that she had re-created “Big Red” sitting on a three-dimensional, delicately cut cardboard white bench alongside a large pop-out red-papered “bloom”… back-dropped by the exact color of the bricks on the front porch behind the white bench. Absolutely amazing! I now have a personally created card from Beverly! What a treasure!

I am going to find a small shadowbox to preserve it and place it on the central coffee table  so I will never forget the plant that guided me through a decade of cancer treatments…encouraging me with its own acts of courage and perseverance…a ‘floral mentor’ for me during tough times.

*I have decided ‘Wendy the Witch” (who reigns over my mailbox each fall) is definitely a good witch…bringing me wonderful surprises inside my box each day.

How lucky am I to have such artistically talented friends like Beverly, Anne, Honey, Joan, and Kaitlyn (who made me key chains from some of mother’s costume jewelry I gave her years ago.) Painters, sculptors, and jewelry artisans….WOW!

*I hit a wrong button while editing the new ‘little bird chapel’ photo and it came out …really psychedelic…different but kinda “cool.”

And then there is Michele who contributed to artisans in third world nations (providing employment for them) and finding a bird house chapel…exact replica of St. Jude’s Chapel of Hope. Life is filled with surprises if we just take time to pause and look around.

In the midst of all the craziness of the month I went to my mailbox after I got back from the mountains and there was a large envelope from Joan Turner….When I opened it…I squealed with delight!

One of her wonderful whimsical animal paintings (I had admired and coveted) was in the bag, along with what else….note cards of the same artwork. My goodness…my life is surrounded with creative friends and family! I love the painting and note cards Joan…talent galore!!!!! Thank you beyond words! Isn’t it precious…every baby’s room should have one on the wall!

It wasn’t until I got home that I realized how fast I had flown through opening the birthday gifts at the mountain cabin before we left for Columbia. Honey had given me two exquisite fall-colored acrylic finger-paintings from a colleague of her…Amy Perrier Paintings.com of Hendersonville, North Carolina. Amazingly creative…I never was good at finger painting in kindergarten!

*God Wink: Another interesting little tidbit from the stolen car incident. (one week ago today) When I saw how trashed the car was inside I immediately began hunting for important papers that I needed in order to drive the car.

Two documents I really wanted to retrieve were my updated insurance card on the ‘Vue’ and even more importantly…my registration card from the DMV. It was safe because instead of putting these cards in the glove compartment, I hid them under the driver’s  sun visor….held firmly in place by an “angel” pewter clamp that Terry, a friend of Brooke’s, gave me as a former breast cancer survivor. That little angel spared me a “long” visit to the DMV. Thanks Terry!

Another fun coincidence happened yesterday when I had to detour off 17-A (cutting tree limbs) and pull into the neighborhood next to mine to get home. At first I saw the beautiful entrance to the Tea Farm neighborhood….the families living there really keep the entrance looking pretty throughout every season…and then saw the historical marker about the original tea farm founded by Dr. Charles Shepard.

Just think…here I was dreaming of sweet tea and loving its history associated with Summerville while I am living less than a mile from where it all began….the first successful tea farm in the United States. Connections, connections, connections…the universe must love to laugh out loud at its own tricks on us.

So until tomorrow…Zola says that being an artist is “living out loud“…and look at all my friends/family who are doing just that…and then sharing their dreams on canvas with us! Thank you one and all. Quite a memorable birthday!

And don’t get me started on all the other cards…When I got back last Friday I spent the night re-reading them, laughing, crying, and just hugging myself in gratitude for such wonderful friends!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

My roses are trying to bloom again…their third showing this season!

For the first time…there was just a slight tell-tale sign last evening that fall is only a few steps behind…slowly catching up….a beautiful evening. It is certainly getting darker earlier and earlier.

Dear Reader:

It suddenly hit me when I had time to slow down and relax this weekend (except during the Clemson-Syracuse game) that I had missed a lot of “going-on’s” in Summerville while I had been gone most of September… in the mountains, Columbia,  Walterboro, and Mt. Pleasant.

I know this sounds rather narcissist but don’t we all (at least sometimes) still think like children ..that the world is supposed to rotate around our schedules and not it’s schedule? How could the Sweet Tea Festival have scheduled its annual event the same time as Jake’s and my ensuing birthday celebrations? Bummer!

You might remember from the Azalea Magazine (local magazine) excerpts in my blog post last week that contained one article on Kevin Morrissey. He is a hometown boy, who is making a name for himself…not only as a teacher, but as an artist who creates artistic/spiritual designs on carpentry tools like saws and hammers.

He was asked to paint a mural on the side of the Visitor’s Center/Chamber of Commerce for the Sweet Tea Festival this year.. No doubt there is quite a story behind this daunting endeavor. I can only imagine the challenges of volatile weather…especially rain. But it turned out beautifully!

And speaking of tea…for whatever reason I have craved cold, iced sweet tea all summer. However, I have made one ‘health’ concession…I ask for half and half tea…(but then I never fail to ask the waitress or waiter to wait and add the sweet tea half on top.) 🙂 *There are only so many compromises a southern gal can make with the ancient  ‘moderation in all things’ philosophy…especially when it comes to sweet tea….not even Aristotle is allowed to play around with southern tradition!

Just looking at some of the posters publicizing the event makes me thirsty!

As a retired history teacher I do get tickled over the controversy surrounding the claim that our little town of Summerville, SC created and served the first sweet tea. We certainly have a few excerpts dating back to the Civil War and post-Civil War period that (perhaps) points in that direction but we have also been challenged by other towns claiming they served the first sweet tea.

You know what? In the end it doesn’t matter…because, with time, the story behind the claim will begin with “Legend says that...” (ambiguity at its best) and the story will just become even more enticing. As far as we Summervillians are concerned…our town is certainly sweet enough to be the original home to sweet tea and if you don’t believe us…come sit down and order some of this delicious drink…it will make a believer out of you too!

*If nothing else Summerville did build the largest glass of tea in the world according to the Guinness Book of World Records. In June of 2015 the container held over 1,400 gallons of brew made from 116 pounds of tea leaves from the Charleston Tea Plantation. Named “Mason” it went on display downtown celebrating National and World Tea Celebration Day.

AND…if you want something to go along with that glass of tea…how about some pasta because yesterday was Summerville Italian “Feast” Festival Day in downtown Summerville. No one really has to leave Summerville any more to travel to Charleston for entertainment…we have enough going on here to keep one hopping, eating, and drinking as much as you wish. Go Summerville!

So until tomorrow…There are so many stories surrounding us in our daily lives in our hometowns…take the back roads and learn more about the history of your town and its diversities that make us special!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

*Oops! I was just about to forget…Today is the first day of October…so remember to say “rabbit” first thing when you get up and then have a wonderful month…not hard to do since October is pretty wonderful all on its own!

Dear Reader:

I took this picture last Wednesday when I returned to Mandy and John’s house to help with the grandchildren while John was gone to an out-of-state meeting. The beautiful diverse orange flowers’ arrangement was still glowing in the aftermath of  Jake’s and my birthday party four days earlier. (Last Saturday)

There were a few tell-tale signs that some slight wilting was beginning to transpire but over all, at first glance, it looked as radiant as it did at the party.

By the time I left though (Friday) all the flowers had dropped their blooms and the leaves were turning dark. The arrangement’s time had come to an end. But still…what impressed me was that….knowing the ending was near…the flowers fearlessly kept living life to the fullest for as long as they possibly good.

Don’t we sometimes get down on ourselves and equate fearfulness with lack of faith? Yet when we study the men and women from scripture who God called to perform certain tasks, we realize they were just like us. “Who am I that I could pull something off like what You asked?” (We ask ourselves this still today when we sense God’s tugging at our sleeve to do something for Him in our daily lives. We think to ourselves… ‘I am fearful and find my self-confidence and faith waning when I need it the most.’ 

That was why I wrote that note to myself while waiting on my CAT-Scan results. My mouth was dry, my heart pounding, and my hands shaking while I wrote the note but I needed to see my inner thoughts written down. I was anxious but I still had faith that God was with me and whatever unveiled was with His knowledge… He would be there regardless of the outcome.

When this same thought was orally re-iterated by my oncologist (when I told her about the message)…I felt God’s presence in that tiny cubicle… it suddenly loomed larger with more space to breathe.

Yesterday I woke up to the beautiful sounds of thunder rolling off in the distance and lightning streaks across the bedroom…oh the perfect day to roll back over and think how glorious it is that the garden is being watered by God on this particular morning. He does a much better job than me!

After one of the showers I walked around to ‘see how my garden grew.’ Each photo once again told the story of how life fights to the finish each day to stay in the light just a little bit longer….Plants are no different than humans in that regard….life is too precious to easily let go. Hope is eternal.

I really thought I lost my bottlebrush to the ice storm last January….only sticks jutting out of the ground showed where it once was…it was late spring before the first green leaf appeared and then slowly but surely it started climbing back up along the branches. Yesterday the first sighting of a red and soon-to-be-seen formation of a bottlebrush was evident it had survived. This plant never gave up hope.

We expect to see mums as fall arrives but this container (filled to the brim with little mum blooms) survived an extremely hot summer without burning up and wilting away like many of the other mum planters. It survived when others didn’t….it knew rain and cooler weather was coming…it just had to keep on keeping on. Hope survived.

 Spider lily….this delicate bloom had not been seen for two years and was feared killed by the lawn mower. But three days ago it popped back up looking more beautiful than I remembered it…deep inside the earth for such a long time it never forgot the light of life and left the darkness to be reborn again. It never gave up hope.

When I spotted this brown and white striped moth (or butterfly) on a brown, dead looking flower bloom I wondered what possible nutrition it could get from a dead bloom. Obviously a lot…what I have learned from gardening…is to give seeds and plants a second or third chance at life because things that appear dead to us are only resting to return again.

A terrible aroma lead me to this discovery Friday night…my Race for the Cure pumpkin, after two years of sitting prettily on a book shelf succumbed and it was not a pleasant smell…however the pink breast cancer sign, along with the letters HOPE, remained until I threw it all in the trash bag….and chlorox’ed the whole shelf.

Which brings me back to the letter H on the cloth letters HOPE hanging on the back deck….I already mentioned the O letter had holes in it and now the H is tattered with a hole in it….but tattered and torn HOPE never gives up and that is all we need to remember….fearful or faithful or fearless and faithless…we just never can give up hope and must always keep the faith. We are not alone.

*God Wink….Yesterday Honey and seven friends traveled to St. Jude’s Chapel of Hope in Trust, NC and there she found “the” picture of me, Mandy, and baby Eva Cate front center on the altar table. She placed a little stone in front of the picture…on it was written the word H O P E. Unbelievable….something special  happens when Honey makes her pilgrimage to the little chapel in the woods. There is always a mystical connection.

So until tomorrow….

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

*When you are four and your whole world exists around toy cars and trucks…”Happiness is”…. Jake displaying all his ‘hot wheels’…too cute!

I am sure Mollie must think….”I don’t remember anything in the baby books about having to take three children to a school fundraiser on a rainy Saturday morning”.…it was Rutledge’s school but Lachlan heard ‘paint race’ and he was all in.

*This is how I felt at halftime yesterday (Clemson and Syracuse- 10 pts behind…we lost our second (now first-string) quarterback and were looking to put in the third string quarterback. Deflated.

I have to admit a little Eeyore was beginning to settle inside me….but miraculously the team pulled together and got by with a victory….it looked like something out of a movie…with a good ending! It will definitely be a testing time of character and perseverance for the Clemson team….”Keep the faith boys!”

*I will keep the “home fires” burning! 🙂

Happy “Official” Birthday to my only and most favorite son-in-law John! I am so happy you came into our family…what an asset!

 id!

Dear Reader:

What in the world happened this year? Normally by now all my pumpkins and “Boo’s” would have been decorating my house for at least a couple of weeks? Fall has officially come and my house is still summer. (And it still feels like it outside unfortunately…)

Hum….let’s see…what could have caused the delay? Could it have been Hurricane Florence, an upside down mountain trip, a series of weekend family birthdays, medical test appointments and office visits, and Boo Boo grandmother stay-overs and help-outs? Yes…I think I can forgive myself for lack of time and even remembrance of pumpkin decorating.

When I returned home yesterday I immediately fell asleep….poor Eva Cate came down with a stomach virus and Mandy, Tigger, and I were all up most of the night with her Thursday night. When I woke up mid-afternoon I fixed something to eat and felt like I had re-entered the world of the living. It was time to start pumpkin and “boo boo” decorating.

I just got a few spots completed…but at least the process has started and I now have the weekend to keep working on it along and along…which these days works best for me. Here is my first fall decor to appear this year. (Some of these are new…thanks to birthdays presents from many of you!)

Thursday night, while Mandy was attending a parent night at Eva Cate’s school…Aunt Kaitlyn came over to start  Eva Cate on yoga lessons….she soon found out that Jakie was not about to be left out. (By the way keep washing your hands Kaitlyn….I don’t want you coming down with a stomach bug!)

Wednesday Gin-g (Bless you!) took me to my Lab Work appointment and Cat-Scan where you might have seen the three of us doing a “selfie” with Sheila, our favorite CT-Cat Scanner on yesterday’s post. We then ate lunch (thanks for my beautiful necklace Gin-g!) and I headed over to Mt. Pleasant.

Thursday morning, after dropping Eva Cate off at her school (at 7 a.m.) I watched the sun coming up on the canal while the moon said good-bye…a beautiful sight. I said a special prayer that the Cat-Scan showed no mestastatization at my appointment that afternoon.

I know I had lots of other prayers from family and friends and you just don’t know how much  it meant to me. It had been eight months since my first Cat-Scan. It is the scariest part of living with cancer…kind of like waiting for the other shoe to drop….is it still dormant or active again…has it move internally this time or re-surfaced …present but perhaps unaccounted for?…

Being human these are the questions that plague us cancer patients while sitting in the office waiting for the oncologist to bring back any report. I took out a piece of paper and wrote a quick message….thanking God for being with me this far and praying that all was well.

 Dr. Jeter walked in and said “All is clear.” There was no evidence of it mestastatizing. I felt myself sinking back in the chair with relief and letting out a big breath….unknowingly I had been holding my breath from the time the door knob turned. I suddenly felt lighter than I had in quite awhile.

(This, by far, was my best birthday present!) My white cell blood count remains very low however, so she will check it monthly with flu season approaching and we will pray I don’t catch it or any other serious infection since my immune system is compromised under the daily oral regiment I am on. Still, right now, today, this moment I am well and living my life to the best of my ability!

One thing was so sweet, that Dr. Jeter said when I showed her my writing pad and the quick message to God on it…she looked at me and said “You do know even if the report had turned out differently…it was still okay…God always has a Plan B…which I knew…if needed.” 

When I got in yesterday there was a package on the porch from Michele Jones, a wonderful friend from church. I could not believe my eyes when I opened it…a birdhouse made completely out of wood called the “Little Chapel Birdhouse.” It so closely resembles St. Jude’s that tears  sprang to my eyes.

It had been made from an organization called Ten Thousand Villages…a world-wide organization to change lives around the world selling homemade gifts from talented villagers living in third world countries. This fact just makes it even more special. I can’t begin to thank you Michele for such a thoughtful gift!!!

So until tomorrow….Father….Place Your light in us as we do a pumpkin so we can share it with others while blessing our bountiful gifts of life.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Dear Reader:

Eva Cate’s art class had to do a self-portrait drawing recently, and this is how Eva Cate perceives herself at age eight. I love to compare these drawings with earlier years and see her self-image evolving as her perspective on the world and her place in it changes also.

I thought what an interesting life-size abstract could be created of all of us…showing the changing faces of ourselves as we go through life….Are our expressions becoming more open or  closed? Are our eyes growing wider or smaller with the wonders of the world around us? Are our limbs growing longer to embrace the world or are we slowly shriveling up as we hide from new experiences?

Each of our life abstracts would be different….some stay primary-bright colored to the end while others become more subtle until finally all color has faded into white and then disappeared leaving no image behind.

When I discovered the following thought…it spoke to me today…I hope it does to you too.

When we look in the mirror these days do we still see the child within us who wants to play, the self-conscious adolescent who wants to be beautiful, the young teacher who wants to make a difference, the harried mother who wants her children to turn out prepared for life’s challenges, and the aging self who finally has time to reflect back on her life and see it for what it was …glorious!

So until tomorrow…Take time to reflect on the “thousand versions of you”….you will be surprised how strong your “oak tree” grew!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Some days while working on my blog I feel like I in a scene from Snow White …the one where all the birds and animals of the forest gather around her in the woods…the little chickadees are doing this to me.

They eat from my bird feeder and then fly over to the outside window sill by my computer desk and play up and down the window. They are so close I could touch them if the pane wasn’t there. They make me laugh out loud with their funny antics.

Dear Reader:

This is where the “Green Vue” was discovered….on the other side of Old Orangeburg road…a location we local folks call the “boonies.”

The car ended up less than 10 miles from my house. It was trashed but remarkably not permanently damaged. A true miracle the (last) officer told me….most stolen cars are never found or if they are they have been wrecked in the process. I was in the small percentage of the population that got their car back in fairly stable condition.

In other words…the juvenile delinquent car thief didn’t want my car. All the idiosyncrasies I have complained about on my old car proved to be the catalyst to its discovery & recovery. I have an engine light that comes on (computer light switch problem) but nothing to do with engine problems and an oil light that comes on….when there is plenty of oil.

Any of you with old cars know this to be true…we just get so used to these “blurbs” that we visually tune them out….and just keep on keeping on.

I think the “Green Vue” went on a short “joy ride” which turned out not to be very joyful and the culprit decided this car was going to stop and leave him stranded. So he picked a remote neighborhood far out with just trailers, woods, and fields…one of which had a huge trailer and parked the car between the trailer and the woods.

A neighbor cutting his lawn saw it, looked inside and saw it was trashed…the thief had taken the baby seat out and thrown it and lots of papers from the consoles and drawers out into the woods. He called the police and the report had just gone in…bingo! Car found!

And the thief didn’t throw the birthday bag with Anne’s watercolor in it out in the woods…the bags of zinnia seeds were scattered on the floorboard but still there. Maybe my juvenile delinquent car thief had a heart after all.

From a porn tape and the music blaring…everything pointed to a young person…probably teenager. We will never know why he chose my car…but I have a feeling he realized quickly he had chosen wrong. They couldn’t get a good finger print because there had been a rain shower where the car was parked.

But all is good….what is the name of that song…”If You Want to Be Happy” by Jimmy Soul (1963) with the lyrics….

If you wanna be happy for the rest of your life. Never make a pretty woman your wife. So for my personal point of view. Get an ugly girl to marry you…. the same philosophy must work with an ugly car…no one else wants it….even a car thief! 🙂

And now for the story behind Anne’s original watercolor of orange zinnias she gave me….she kept telling me at Oscars that she knew I liked bright orange flowers…especially zinnias…but when she finished the watercolor…she thought it was too serious…it should look happier.

I told her I saw “happy” and then, suddenly, three little packets of sunflower, zinnia, and Black-eyed Susan seeds fell out of the bag.

Now I knew  the symbolism was that next March or early spring when I plant the seeds… the happiness will come with the re-birth of a beautiful bed of bright colorful flowers to start a new season. In the painting two of the orange zinnias are starting to bow their heads, no longer in full bloom…ready to make seeds for the next generation…but they aren’t sad…they are happy for the ones who come after them!

So until tomorrow…There are “perks” at every age…and sometimes the best perks come as we age…because we know the secrets to what is really important and how not to believe everything we see!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Dear Reader:

Beauty and Truth…they are synonymous. John Keats has had it right all along. When I unloaded my car Monday morning and took all the plants out I had gotten for my birthday…along with more plants waiting for me from my neighbor Vickie…I stood there breathless watching the multitude of beauty evolve before my very eyes on the front porch. Fall suddenly descended right then and there.

And in the middle of it all…sat “Little Red”…so happy to be home again…but, also, so grateful for the tender care he had received from Tommy and Kaitlyn…he had added leaves and looked even more handsome than I remembered.

Soon I will begin planting all the flowers in the garden but for now I just want to line them up on the porch and smile every time I go in and out the door. My own private fall garden on the porch!

Lori, Mandy’s adorable neighbor, gave me a diet coke since she knows I love them….a vice for sure but there could be worse ones…a cute Boo glass (“More Boo’s Please”)  and a notepad that reads:

“I don’t know how to act my age…I’ve never been this age before.”

I love this statement because it is so true. Didn’t we all think as children growing up (wishing to be adults and independent) that one birthday…one age…(perhaps 18 or 21 or 30) ….would suddenly, magically transform us into being all “grown up?” I sure did.

Now I know differently. I think we get to a certain stage (more than age) in life and remain there…if we are lucky. Like Peter Pan I don’t ever want to grow up…instead I always want to be surprised by life and do silly things just because I can. I always want to take a risk when the opportunity arises and welcome adventures into my life.

It is a shock some days to look in the mirror and see a face that looks familiar but different at the same time…a face that is growing older…along side a body that doesn’t cooperate as well as it once did…Yet inside I feel alive and ready to go where the ‘action is.’

There is no chronological number I can place on myself  any more…I am simply “deliciously” alive and still going. That is good enough for me.

I still find life mysterious and amazing. It opens up teachable moments for me each and every day. I am no longer the teacher but the student who keeps on learning from each year of life.

Which brings me to an underlying lesson in Anne’s beautiful orange zinnias watercolor she made for me for my birthday.

………………………………………………………………………………………….

It has been two hours since I typed the last line…. I was going to take a close-up picture of the zinnia painting and remembered the bag with the painting was still in the back seat of the car…I went to get it and discovered there was no car in my driveway. My car had been stolen.

The police have been here…been on the phone with my insurance….done everything I can do until all the reports are in.

I have lived in this neighborhood since 1982…and early Tuesday morning my car was stolen….so sadly Anne…the painting was too…the story lives on…and I will tell it another day. Kinda sad and mad right now.

So until tomorrow…Thank you God for the gift of not having the ability to see around the bend…because Monday, my birthday, was such a wonderful day…that I can hold on to those memories today.

“Today is my favorite day” Winnie the Pooh (it still is…possessions are just that…possessions.) Inconvenient yes…but still just an annoyance.

*** I couldn’t write a script like this….Yesterday after a long strange bizarre day I got a call from the police that they had found my car. It is dirty inside with papers and stuff thrown all around but no major damage to the car. He threw the baby seat and console papers in the woods…but guess what Anne…he didn’t throw out your painting. He must have liked the orange zinnias too! My head is still whirling so I will wait until tomorrow….to update you…just know God is good!