Hanging with our Artsy/Theatrical Family Members

As a child, Jean Claire, our middle daughter, always seemed to have a kitten or a sketch pad in her hands.  Jeannie drew up drawing, and I loved all the pictures she created. Now that she teaches art, I love seeing her students’ work. 

(She had a terrible time learning to ride her little bicycle in the first grade, and a family scrapbook note to her daddy asking him to please help her “roed buy myself” still touches my heart.  Little did we dream that she would be riding all over the Midwest in her adult life.)

Our rural school system had little opportunities for art or speech and theater,, although Jeannie took part in chorus and Junior-Senior plays, and finally the school had an art class when she was a senior.  In addition to her art work, she had a good voice and a talent for acting.  Fortunately, her 4-Club gave her many speaking opportunities, and she was the star at a very young age in their Share-the-Fun skits. 

Fast forward a few years after her marriage to Rick Eiler, and Jeannie dropped out of grad school to became a dedicated  mother. (I declare that her three children are her artistic masterpieces.)  Her first child, Leslie Ellen, set the stage that Jeannie would be required to become a dedicated stage mother. Jeannie has explained that from a toddler on, Leslie would act out anything she wanted to communicate.

Because of her psychology degree, I think Jeannie recognized and was tuned in to her children’s individuality, and  she proceeded to encourage them to develop those strengths. I am afraid I was guilty of offering what opportunities I could to our kids but did so more as a generic thing rather than honing into their individual talents and variations. There were swimming and piano lessons for all and eventually some voice lessons for Katherine and Mary Ellen and a few art lessons for Jeannie.  Gerry and Mary Ellen both loved sports although I was not a very good sports mother.

All four kids participated and profited from school, church, and 4-H activities. I wanted them to have  varied experiences, but failed to provide encouragement for extra effort in any area. I mostly just wanted the kids to have fun, which was not altogether a bad thing.  Having fun is very important. I think I simply assumed the children would have to pick and chose and develop their own interests, and they did, which was similar to the way I was reared.

And Jeannie and Rick did this too, for their kids were all exposed to school and sports activities.  Rick is a runner and a high school tennis and track coach, so he gave them an example of an athlete who found joy in physical activity, and the kids participated. Jeannie, of course, kept them involved in art projects.  But as they excelled in music and theater, by the time they reached high school, that is where their time and energy was used.

Leslie started her acting career at age six in Music Man in Rend Lake College’s summer theater program, and she never stopped until she left home and became a voice major at Belmont in Nashville, TN. Very soon Elijah was old enough to follow in her footsteps and was breaking his leg every opportunity he had.  Both of them often got a lead in their school plays and both of them were involved with singing, piano, and constantly performing.  Just as Gerry and Vickie’s kids gave us many days of happily watching exciting basketball, volleyball, and softball games, Les and Lige brought us great entertainment in the theater.  It was never easy to go over 400 miles to the northern top of the state and we couldn’t go to every performance we wanted to go to, but it was always more than worth it when we managed to make that trip.

When little sister Cecelie came along, she protested being expected to automatically follow her siblings’ activities.  Naturally community friends assumed she would be the star her brother and sister were and were telling her so. But like her parents, I tried to hold my tongue, so she was free to choose her passions.  She chose violin in junior high and made that a priority in her life, and we were proud.  Yet when we drove up for a junior high musical and saw her perform, we knew it would be a waste if she did not continue to use her vocal and drama talents as well.  As a freshman in high school, she is still excelling with her violin, but is not averse to participating on the speech team and is now involved in her first high school musical.  I am very glad.

The reason I am reflecting all this is that finally Leslie is back on stage.  For that too, I am very grateful. She was not able to participate in musical theater at Belmont, and although we certainly appreciated the quality music education she received that landed her a job with a music publishing company and all that she accomplished as a jazz singer, I really wanted her to be able to use her acting and comedienne abilities as well. 

And finally the opportunity came when she discovered the Larry Keeton Theater.  Located in a former school building, this non-profit Senior Center for the Arts has multiple activities going on including this dinner theater in the former gymnasium.  Deciding she needed to become acquainted with this group, Leslie auditioned for their October weekend presentations of Little Women, a new musical based on Louisa May Alcott’s  novel, and she was awarded the role of Jo.

With the Columbus Day holiday available, Jeannie made plans to attend on two weekends and to sandwich in helping her sister Katherine during the days between.  Of course, I wanted to go if at all possible to hear Leslie sing once more on stage. Rick had a conference, but Cecelie would come with her mother on Saturday, and we’d go on to Nashville. Elijah drove down Friday night, and  he could take Cecelie back with him to Bloomington, where Rick would come pick her up on Monday for Tuesday school. Unfortunately, there was van trouble coming down, and  Elijah had to go rescue them while Rick arrived to put the van in the repair shop. Thus, it was Saturday night before Jeannie and Cecelie reached Woodsong.  So seeing the Saturday performance and attending worship the next morning with Leslie and husband Mike was impossible.

In the meantime, Gerald’s only sister Ernestine and her husband Don also arrived Saturday evening in their camper from Rock Springs, WY,  along with their beautiful dog Lacy.  So as it turned out, Jeannie, Cecelie, and Elijah were able to all have supper at Woodsong with their Uncle Don and Aunt Ernie, and Jeannie could spend the evening visiting with them. Brianna and Trent soon came over with Trent’s weekend friends Tim Marten and Brock from back in Waggoner country. They picked up Lige and Cecelie to join Sam in Marion for whatever mischief they could cook up. (I never heard a report on that except I know they visited a spook house.)  Mary Ellen was over for coffee early Sunday morning to visit Don and Ernestine before the Eilers and I left for our delayed trip to Nashville.

I consider Don and Ernestine among the “artsy” relatives. Ernestine has great appreciation for native American art and culture, and as a seamstress, her mother’s artistic talent is duplicated.  A favorite sewn Christmas ornament that she created pleases me each year as it captures her and Don’s essence.  Their backyard is a work of art with rock and fossil artifacts they have collected as they have explored the mountains and wilds of Wyoming. Don, a retired English teacher, is a writer, and Ernestine, a retired librarian, is a prodigious reader. I was disappointed I was unable to be there Sunday afternoon when Gerald’s brother Keith and wife Barbara and our niece Vicki Escue came to the farm.  I also had to miss the Tuesday morning family breakfast at Jonesboro, but I enjoyed every minute I had with them until they went on down to visit the Union County relatives Monday night.  I had assumed they spend at least a week here, but they had some other places they needed to go on their way home to a cat that was missing them.

Jeannie, Lige, Cecelie, and I arrived at 108 Donelson Pike in time for the excellent Sunday dinner before the afternoon musical and enjoyed visiting with the other seatmates at our table.  I was eager for that curtain to go up, and I was not disappointed when it did.  Leslie was a perfect outspoken determined Jo, and I loved her every line and every song.  With all the musical talent available in Nashville, the cast was excellent, the multi-height set  effective, and the March sisters—Jo, Meg, Beth, and Amy--and their cohorts made us laugh and cry as well as reviewing some Civil War history for us. Finally we were hugging and congratulating Jo, who joined the other cast and their directors Ginger Newman and Jamie London for an after-session with some high schoolers, who had been invited. They each told a bit about themselves and answered the students’ questions.  Afterward with her GPS to guide her, Jeannie treated us to for dinner with Leslie and Mike, who met us at the restaurant.

Like Leslie, Mike is a musician and he started to Belmont as a guitar major when the intensive use of his arm prevented him from playing for a year.  Graduating Magna Cum Laude in Biblical studies, he had also become a personal trainer and is employed full time in that now. He has written his own e-book and participates in various Strongman events with Leslie cheering him on.  If you want to read more about this grandson-in-law, check out this link:   http://friendslife.org/uncategorized/volunteer-spotlight-michael-thompson/

We did not want to say goodbye to Les and Mike, but it was a long trip home ahead of us made even longer by road construction closing our entry onto 24West to one lane.  Almost an hour we crawled and stopped and started allowing cars to merge when necessary, but Jeannie handled it all with skill.  When we stopped for gas, Elijah took over and she got some deserved rest. We arrived back at Woodsong by 11 and went to bed promptly as Elijah and Cecelie had to leave at 5 a.m. to meet Rick in Urbana.  Jeannie and I didn’t have to get up that early, and we enjoyed another morning visit with Don and Ernestine before we started on our goal of helping Katherine with some projects.

August Filling Up and Rushing By

I woke up this morning to a gentle rain. I need to go out on the deck and see how much we received so I can tell Gerald when we talk on the phone. He is in Texas.
Less than six weeks ago, Gerald helped granddaughter Erin move her huge sectional couch from the little house in Cambria to her new quarters nearer Southern Illinois University Carbondale, where she worked. I was emotionally prepared to be involved with her 2012-13 softball games there, and I liked thinking about the lovely new duplex she would share with another young woman professional. And I knew I would continue to enjoy her drop-in visits to Woodsong.

But life has a way of jarring us from what we expect. Erin had an offer from Denton, Texas, to become an assistant softball coach at North Texas University and she could not refuse this advancement. Suddenly she had to make a great many changes in a very short time. Her SIUC coach was wonderful and very supportive, and Erin quickly found another young woman to take her place sub-leasing the duplex. That did involve quickly moving her stuff to a storage building behind so this person could move in immediately and also putting that huge couch out on the sidewalk in hopes someone else might use it. Because the new renter had a pit bull and Sadie does not like pit bulls since she had been attacked by one, Sadie came to visit us this past week. And Erin stayed here when she returned from finding an apartment at Denton. Now she and Sadie must adjust once again to new quarters.

Because we have friends in the Denton area that Gerald has been wanting to visit, he could not refrain from saying he wished he could help Erin move and visit with his buddies down there. I am not sure he meant it, but that is how he became involved helping her load the U-Haul and taking it down to Denton behind his pickup. They made the trip in one long day and had her moved in so she spent the first night in her new apartment. The next day Gerald was breakfasting with his good friend Bobby Sanders and that afternoon he and Erin were able to attend Bobby’s birthday party. This afternoon he is visiting at a nearby town with Don and Helen Ruth Dillow. I can tell he is having a good time, and I was relieved that Erin had help moving in. I wonder if anyone ever picked up the couch from the sidewalk.

I was thrilled to have Leslie and Mike stop in Friday night on their way up to Freeport for a reception for friends in Leslie’s hometown. They had to be back at work this morning in Nashville, so they couldn’t stop on their return trip. (Mike sometimes has a 4:30 a.m. client. I wonder if he did this morning.)

Friday evening Gerald and I had picked up a friend from a Marion retirement center and gone down to Anna for supper. One of his classmates phones us with an invitation to this annual gathering of Wolf Lake classmates. We knew we’d be home before Mike and Les arrived from the drive up from Nashville after work, and so at the kitchen table over 10 p.m. cold cuts and deviled eggs and peaches from a local orchard, I loved hearing about Leslie’s new job at a music publishing company. And I knew I must learn more about the recent break-in at their duplex which caused Leslie to describe the “ransackage” on Facebook. I was relieved to find out that Mike had renter’s insurance for them, and they had a call on the way up that the police had already arrested one of the three suspects. So maybe their misfortunate will prevent many future ransackages for other Nashville residents.

Before I went to bed, I fixed a pot of coffee for the next morning with the special blend Erin had brought me as a souvenir when she returned from a tournament in Hawaii. She and I enjoyed our last visit together over Saturday morning coffee, and I confessed how very sad I was about her leaving even though I was happy for her new opportunity. Gerald and Erin were both long gone before Mike and Leslie woke up at a more decent time for a Saturday morning. Leslie and I had another visiting time over our coffee while Mike conscientiously ran into the gym before their 6-7 hour trip up to Freeport. I actually left before they did that morning as I had signed up to go to a preview of a new Sunday School curriculum in Marion that I was interested in. Yes, I drank another cup of coffee there. I caught up on my sleep that afternoon.

Yesterday I taught our Young Adult Sunday School class, but left before the worship service to go to Katherine’s since I knew she had not secured an aide for yesterday. We visited and later watched TV including Tangles, a Walt Disney production of the Repunzel fairy tale. The music was good and the visuals pleasing. I was surprised how much I enjoyed watching a children’s story. Sam is all smiles these days because he received his learner’s permit to drive, and spending time at the wheel with his dad telling him to slow down is now one of his favorite activities.

I came home, ate a late night supper, and tumbled into bed and slept for nine hours. The first thing I had to do this morning was to call our classmate friend who had left two phone messages on Sunday worrying if she might have dropped her billfold in our car Friday night. It was after l0 when I heard her message and I knew the billfold was not in the car, but I went out and looked anyhow so I could tell her I looked. But I felt it was too late to call her back for fear she was in bed.

One of her messages mentioned a black purse, and I remembered she had carried a light beige purse. I was aware of the purse because when we arrived to pick her up, she was in a dither about lost keys to her apartment inside the center. When they were finally located, they were in her black purse. She had changed to the beige one and she had forgotten to take the keys to the new purse.

So I was hoping my telling her that her billfold was probably in her beige purse would solve her problem. In the meantime, however, people there at the center had helped her look and someone had found the billfold, she said. The bad news was that she had put it up and could not remember where she put it. So she was looking again. Usually when I lose something, I look for it for a reasonable time (whatever that is) and then force myself to stop looking. I figure that the lost object will eventually show up on its own. That usually works, so that was all the encouragement I could give her.

She has always been one of my most admired acquaintances and she has achieved so much despite many disadvantages and problems that life threw at her. Watching her handle her present disability with grace and good judgment increases my strong admiration for her, but touches my heartstrings.

My only other item on my agenda today was to call my brother and sister because I have failed to do that recently. Before I made the first call, my sister called me and we had a long catch-up session. Before I called my brother, our cousin Kenny from California phoned to tell us about the death of one of our mutual cousins out there. He would later call our cousin Leonard in Michigan, and he called me back to give me the address of another cousin’s widow. He asked me to call Rosemary and Jim to let them know, so I had sad news to share when I called Jim for our long catch-up phone visit. Then I called Rosemary and talked to her again. Except to walk down the lane with Jake to retrieve the mail and the newspaper, that is about all I have accomplished today. Usually Gerald walks down every morning to get the newspaper and it is on the breakfast table when I wake up. Jake always bounces along with him as he did with me today, but I know he will be happy when Gerald, his best friend, returns.

The Holiday's Over

Our weekend was indeed special with the Archibalds, Taylors, and Leslie and her boyfriend Michael visiting. It was not as good as it would have been if Katherine had been well enough to come out to the farm or if Vickie and Geri Ann had been able to come visit Gma Shirley as planned, but that trip from Georgia was not to be. A last-minute softball practice for yesterday was called, and that reduction in the weekend ended their plans to drive up. Everyone was bummed, but I am sure the unexpected weekend at home was more restful than the long trip up here from Georgia.

Yet I know Vickie and Geri Ann wanted to see everyone—especially Gma Shirley (Vickie’s mother) as well as Geri Ann’s sister Tara and husband Bryan and nine-month-old Maddux and three-year-old Aidan. We all felt bad for Shirley since she can’t travel to Georgia and other places because she is so conscientious to take good care of her very sick little sister Janice. Shirley now stays next door with Janice since their elderly mother died in May.

When Gerry and Vickie were dating, Vickie’s family and her grandparents and Janice lived in adjoining homes on down the road from us and around a corner and down that road—not close enough to be called neighbors even in a rural community—but still close to us. In fact, during high school days, Gerry sometimes visited and courted Vickie and her entire family by riding his horse down to their place on a Sunday afternoon. So when Gerry and Vickie come up from Georgia, it is easy to see both families during the same trip. But sadly, only Shirley and Janice remain in the two-home family compound that had eight back then in those high school days. Nevertheless, Shirley had Vickie’s brothers and families in for her famous chicken and dumplings for Tara’s family even though Vickie and Geri Ann could not come. Aidan played baseball with his cousin Drew, a high school athlete, and he felt big indeed, and Tara caught up on the Johnson clan news. And everyone got to take turns holding and loving on Maddux, who Tara says is the lover in the family.

Although he can cry if disturbed enough, Maddux is usually smiling. He immediately stole Gerald’s heart when thet arrived Saturday by not only by smiling and cuddling continuously with him but by reaching up his little mouth to repeatedly kiss his great grandfather.

Gerald had been so excited to know Aidan would finally have time to dig in the lime pile here at Woodsong. He had bought Aidan a little digger after their last visit. That time Aidan wanted to work, and he kept the whole crew of grown-ups busy. He dragged shovels and hoes out of Gerald’s shop to put people to work on that lime pile. When his mother showed up and there were no more shovels, he dragged out the heavy post hole digger and handed it to Tara. “Here,” he said, “You use the nabdabber.” No one was sure where he got that name for that tool, but somehow it seemed to fit. After he wore all of them out and they began sneaking away, I came outside and he had us climb into the “mule.” He wanted me to drive it, but I honestly told him I had forgotten how. He snorted disgustingly, “Well pretend.” And pretend we did for the next half hour.

So in preparation for this visit, Gerald had our little red wagon, the new Aidan-size shovel he had bought him and the digger all ready for Aidan’s use. Despite the rains throughout the weekend (especially heavy Saturday night), there were sunny spells that allowed Aidan to use the tools Gerald had ready for him, and I suspect Gerald enjoyed the play even more than Aidan.

Leslie and Mike arrived right before midnight on Saturday after being in a church retreat in Nashville all day, so we were pleased Sunday morning to be able to hear Leslie sing a new song she had written at church. Leslie cautioned us not to ask Mike to play guitar because he would want to so badly, but he cannot right now because of tendonitis. Weight lifting and guitar playing had done a number on him, and he is in therapy to regain proper use of his arms for his passion for guitar.

The Taylors were down from Waggoner for a late Sunday dinner, and we had a relaxing afternoon and evening. When Tara’s family returned from Gma Shirley’s, Aidan was fascinated by teenage Trent’s Stitch hat, which he entertains us with at holidays. (Maddux thought it was scary.) Trent was wonderful giving Aidan lots of stories and attention, and Brianna played Candy Land with Aidan. Everyone wanted their turn with Maddux.

Somehow the old worn-out Sorry game was found; and after the kids got it out, all the men (Brian, Bryan, and Gerald) ended up at the dining room table playing Sorry. Tara was there for part of the game when she did not have to stop and take care of Maddux or talk softball on the phone with Gerry. I had not seen Gerald play Sorry since Erin was a preschooler, when we played many a game at the old farm house under her directions. Bryan was as competitive at Sorry as he was at football. He was a stickler for the correct rules and Gerald griped. However, after he won, I figured he may have liked the real rules better than Erin’s changing rules—which I think probably let her win most of the time. Everyone was missing Erin since her birthday is coming up. They wanted her at the farm to celebrate, but she was in class yesterday as Texas A&M did not take off for Labor Day.

People slept as late as they wanted yesterday and had cereal and fruit or whatever they could find as they came to the kitchen table. Some fished, rode the mule, took paddle boat rides, or texted friends. And there was plenty of time to visit. At noon there were 10 of us at the dining room table for ham with biscuits and gravy, fresh corn-on-the cob and garden tomatoes and all the left-overs from previous meals. (Brian was not at the table because he was up on the other farm spraying with his fancy new spray rig. He came in mid-afternoon sunburned but happy.) After dinner the packing of cars had to begin. Sweet corn was bundled up to return with them to the city. By late afternoon everyone was gone again their separate ways. Woodsong was so quiet.