Softball Players Wear Pink for a Cause

We left Georgia in the rain this morning, and Gerald had rough driving off and on throughout the day as rain stopped and started. Sometimes it only sprinkled, and sometimes the downpour and fog in the mountains made visibility quite a strain. We are glad to be back at Woodsong, reviewing the mail, emails, and answering machine messages and happy the roofer completed the repair necessitated by the May dere

A final day in Georgia was extremely rewarding. Gerald and I drove up to Dahlonega, where the first gold rush in America occurred. We visited the beautiful 1836 courthouse built on the square there in the middle of Cherokee land after Georgia had given the land to whites through gold and land lotteries. The Dahlonega Gold Museum is now in this ancient courthouse building that was used by Lumpkin County until 1966 when a new courthouse was built. Even the locally manufactured bricks used for the building have flecks of gold clearly seen on the unpainted bricks leading to the attic. The friendly knowledgeable guides shared a great deal of local history as did the film we saw sitting on beautiful ancient metal chairs once used by the young military trainees at North Georgia College.

More amazing to me, however, was a framed letter on the wall written to local residents Daniel and Rachel Davis on January 1, 1838. It was written by their son Martin Davis, who was a supply officer on the Trail of Tears. Full of facts, the letter was written from Jonesboro, Illinois, my home town. As soon as I find out what detachment Martin Davis worked with, I will know which detachment suffered the blow-up of the Golconda steam ferry, something I have wanted to know. That explosion injured many and killed one white and one Cherokee, the letter explained.

After the very satisfying visit to Dahlonega despite the heavy rains throughout the day, we phoned Watkinsville to see Geri Ann’s game was cancelled. It had not rained there, and the game would go as scheduled at 5:55. (Evening games must start before six o’clock.) We got back to the high school park in plenty of time. Pink balloons were flying, and all the team were wearing their pink shirts as part of their benefit game to fight breast cancer. Many of the adults wore them also.

I’d already put in my donation on the admission table where a basket was waiting. The coach motioned us to the fence to whisper that Gerald might want to get his camera because our daughter-in-law Vickie was chosen to throw in the first pitch. Typically, Vickie had not told us she was being honored. She threw a great pitch and her youngest daughter Geri Ann was designated to catch it.

We had rejoiced with Vickie recently that she was through her last chemo and had been allowed to ring the bell in celebration at the hospital. She is an excellent poster girl for breast cancer because despite the March surgery and all the unpleasant treatment she has been through since then, she has not missed a beat in taking care of her daughters, her husband, her home, her dog, or her grandsons. She amazes us and fills us with pride at her upbeat attitude and calm confidence. She looks and acts great.

The rain had now arrived at Watkinsville, and the early sprinkles kept increasing until fans were seeking shelter, and I was grateful for the umbrella put up on my chair. Geri Ann was scheduled to pitch this game. Since it was with a regional team (conference team we call it in Illinois), everyone wanted the game to finish, but it had to go for five innings to be considered a complete.
We were soon far ahead and the coach was letting players have a chance to bat, who do not always get to do so. When it thundered in the fourth inning, we held out breath lest lightning call the game to a halt. We kept successfully batting and the rain became harder and harder. Finally the fifth inning arrived with the score 8-0 with the guest team batting last. Oconee High quickly shut the guests down, and Geri Ann was able to complete a perfect game.

We met up at the house to dry off and go to dinner at a local steakhouse before we visited for the final evening and retired to rest before our return trip to Woodsong this morning.

Gotta Get Up in the Morning

I better not write long tonight, because morning will be here before I know it. No sleeping in this week as I usually do. The grandkids have been unusually good this year to go to bed early and not giggle too late. They are growing up. Of course, they are also tired from outdoor play, hiking around the lake, and all the activities they dream up. When they act bored, I try not to make suggestions. Then they come up with a plan.

For many years when they were small, I went to bed with them and we told stories to each other and tried to settle down that way. They don’t need that anymore.

The girls went over to Katie’s house next door this afternoon. It was really nice of her to invite them because she is extra busy not only with her daily swim lessons, but it is also 4-H show week. She will have to have her projects ready to be evaluated. Bri and Cecelie left Woodsong wearing amazing garbs with picture hats. I figure Katie was somewhat surprised. Elijah drove them over in the “mule.”

Sam had left Vacation Bible School with one of the teachers in order to be home in Marion for his trombone lesson, but his dad brought him back out to the farm afterwards. That gave Sam and Lige some afternoon man time together before they drove over in the “mule” and brought the girls back home.

I fixed a large meat loaf for supper, since our kids seem to like it. They were hungry I’m sure. After supper, there were more outside activities. In fact, I got nervous when they were out in the “mule” after dark. We hollered across the lake at each other and I had visions of their being stuck—but they were just having a good time and were ready to call it quits and come back to the house. More giggling and play acting.

They have been preparing a skit for the opening exercise each day since Elijah makes a great director as well as actor. (He should because there is not doubt that Freeport’s high school drama coach is one of the best in the state, so he has a mentor.) Lige did a good job explaining how to project your voice. When it gets really noisy, I might wish he hadn’t done so well.

That’s all folks. I am going to bed now.

An Ill Wind

At 1 a.m. on Friday, we woke up with terrible noises pounding on our roof and against the many windows. Wind and lightening were as bad as I could remember and the hail as large as I had ever seen. Not quite golf ball size nor was the hail covering the ground like some images I have seen on television reports—but as large as a quarter and as scary as I have experienced. Both Gerald and I were wide awake because of the noise, and we walked around looking out the windows and out at the sidewalk at the hail. Deciding there was nothing to do about it and observing that the house was withstanding the noisy attack, we went back to bed and slept soundly until the next morning when we finished packing and headed on our trip to Erin’s conference tourney at Oklahoma City. Everything looked great at Woodsong when we left at 8:30 after our breakfast.

In Missouri we drove through heavy rainfall for a long time and knew it was headed in the direction we had left. The first phone call came after lunch. Our next-door neighbor phoned to say there had been some high winds that blew a big tree down on their Katie’s play house and that we had some shingles off. Scott said not to worry he was checking the roof and if needed, he would patch it up so there’d be no leak in the house. We’d left garage windows open to keep garage cool, and Scott said the wind had evidently whipped in and bowed the garage door slightly behind our pickup—but nothing serious.

An hour or so later, our daughter Katherine phoned. She started out very calm thanking me for some help I’d given them during the week and saying they were enjoying the good leftovers of some food I’d brought. I was waiting to tell her the excitement about our roof damage. Before I had a chance and after she’d skillfully made sure that I was all calm and would be thinking everything was good with her family, she launched into the account of the inland hurricane that hit Southern Illinois. (Our neighbors had not been to town yet when they phoned about our roof.)

Katherine and her aide Beth had heard and watched one big tree after another at the park next door falling over. The master bedroom in their house was designed to look out on those beautiful trees—one of which was a huge fir and a favorite of her and Sam. (As he pointed out, it had been there outside his bedroom window through his entire life.) Windows on the other side of their bedroom look out on the back yard, which also has always been special with ancient trees both in their yard and on the city alley immediately behind their fence.

Although she and Beth went into their large windowless bath that accommodates her wheelchair, they could hear the trees falling one by one. The lovely old tree in the neighbor’s yard on the other side of the back yard came crashing down destroying their fence and the gazebo roof. The remainder of the tree is still hanging precariously there. The front yard had only one tree, and it was mangled so much that it had to be cut down today. Beth left to go pick up her daughters from school and had called a half hour later and was stranded by tree limbs and downed wires from reaching the school—ordinarily five minutes away. This much Katherine knew when she phoned, and our few missing shingles seemed tame in comparison.

Then the phone reports kept coming. Scott and Sonja drove to Marion, and were astounded to see all the destruction there and the big trees in Ray Fosse Park uprooted and on the ground. Our nephew’s wife working at Southern Illinois University Carbondale had been herded with other employees to the basement and could not believe the devastation when they were allowed to come back up. The softball coach at SIUC talked to our son and told about the many large old trees on campus being uprooted and lying on the ground. Evidently the ground was so saturated that the 120 mile per hour winds simply pushed the big trees over and their six-foot circumference root systems came out with the trees leaving behind a huge hole.

Many roads were not passable and Interstate 57 was closed that night because of the trees and limbs. A four-county area was without electricity and land phone service was no more. (Places to charge cell phones became very valuable. Towns affected have curfews yet tonight.) However, Scott was taking care of our roof and our daughter Mary Ellen and Brian and kids were going down on Saturday and they would hook up a generator for the fridge and freezer. David’s friend had loaned him and Katherine his generator, and Brian said he’d bring his down also.

Conference tourneys were not kind to “our” two teams. Seventh-ranked Georgia was upset by Tennessee in their first game on Thursday down in Knoxville, and they were, therefore, out of the tourney. Consequently, our son Gerry left to see a high school game in Dallas and another game in Oklahoma City, so we connected with him and he got to see Erin play with Texas A&M against Baylor on Saturday morning.

Since A&M had beaten Baylor twice during the season, we expected to play again at 5 that night and hoped to play for the championship after that. Not to be. A&M did not play their best, and Baylor beat us and we were out of the Big 12 Conference Tournament. None of us felt celebratory as we tried to console each other before Erin had to leave with the team for lunch. We did enjoy seeing D. J. Mathis pitch an inning on the field still playing around the corner. However, the next day Missouri put an end to our hopes if we could not win the conference that D.J. and Oklahoma would.

We had a lovely dinner down in Bricktown Saturday evening on an outdoor patio with Erin and with Gerry before he drove all night back to Dallas to catch a plane home to Atlanta. We kept congratulating Erin on making the Big 12’s first team as catcher, but she’d rather have beaten Baylor and stayed in town. She was to leave for College Station and her two remaining final exams at 6 a.m. the next morning. Nevertheless, we had a good visit and a good time with each other.

We went to bed early and left at 5:30 on Sunday morning dreading what we were going to find when we returned to the storm zone. A sweet older lady, who laughed a great deal, presented me and the other woman in their restaurant at breakfast with a carnation for Mother’s Day. Later I got Mother’s Day phone calls from the kids. We unexpectedly connected with Mary Ellen and Brian, Trent and Bri as they returned through Saint Louis after they had spent the weekend helping at our house and Katherine’s, so we had a fine 3 p.m. Mother’s Day dinner at the second restaurant we found next door to the first one we went to. (The first one was going to have a 45 minute wait.)

We shared and re-hashed all the stories Gerry and we had heard by phone about the hurricane and listened to the first-hand information from the Taylors. People were thinking it might be two weeks before all the power was back on. The talk did nothing to relieve our dread of having to see what was coming even though our house and Katherine and David’s house were both in good shape in comparison to the many that had a big tree land on their roof.

We were in Marion before dark and drove through the limbs lining the trees watching out low lines overhead. People took turns patiently where traffic lights did not work. As soon as we had checked on the Cedars, we came on to Woodsong, ate peanut butter and crackers for supper and sat on the deck until the outside light was gone. We went to bed in deep country darkness, and Gerald planned to reconnect the generator this morning.

Very soon the land phone rang. Our neighbor was telling us that our Rural Electric Association power was back on. Gerald turned on the main switches on the control panel in the garage that had to be turned off when the generator had been running for the freezers. He stayed up and I went back to bed after enjoying the electric lights that got me there instead of my flashlight.

Today the truncated newspaper, which had to be printed in Paducah, Kentucky, during the emergency, carried photos of the damage and of many of the volunteers and workers pouring in to help. Rather amazingly, it is being predicted most people will have electricity by midnight tomorrow. Feeding stations are set up in all the area towns, and there is a great deal of backyard grilling going on. David took Sam and Beth’s daughter Emily uptown and came home with tacos for all the gang as some establishments must have alternate generators. Gerald and David worked in the back yard wielding chain saws on all the fallen trees there. I cleaned off the bits and pieces of leaves beaten against the back windows as Mary Ellen had to do for our front door.

David’s workplace and the colleges and schools are all closed at least until Wednesday, and people are hard at work repairing damages. Today was beautiful, but rain is predicted. Most houses are just fine, which makes it especially painful when you see those that will never be livable again. We stopped at Kroger’s on our way out of town and a friend appeared just as I was leaving. She had come in to get repair supplies for her husband. “I need a hug,” she said. “My bed has a tree in it.”




I

Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep

But before I do, let me write a bit. Our day started early as Katherine has a tooth pulled very early this morning. Gerald took her in their van, and after I had helped a tiny bit with her shoes and raincoat, I stayed behind and relaxed at her house reading on in a novel I started over the weekend.

Then Gerald got a haircut and I read some more. We did a quick run into Target as I have been looking at various stores trying to find four lightweight pots to replant the huge vine that has just gotten too long and luxurious in one of our windows. I still have not found exactly what I want, but at least am beginning to store what is out there that I must settle for.

Katherine’s night aide had to move out of the area and Katherine's bad tooth had made her MS worsen, so I have tried to help a bit this week before we leave for the weekend. Her sheet of directions from the dentist said she was to eat soft foods today, so I told her I’d make chili for supper since the rain had made the day not only damp but also chilly. She said that sounded good.

I try to keep chili ingredients on hand so if a shift in the weather calls for it, I can easily make a simple dish to warm us up. Unfortunately after I got home, I found I had used up my supply of beans and tomato juice usually on the bottom shelf of the pantry. So after a restful afternoon, I browned the hamburger and onion, but needed to run into the store before I was able to complete the chili.

Since it was Senior Citizen Day, I just went ahead and bought the monthly supplies I get from that store as well as the fixings for the chili, which I completed at Katherine and David’s house. I was glad I did since I found out Katherine had been looking forward to it. I am always a little self-conscious about my chili as David makes delicious chili from the deer he slays. But it was a cozy meal for us I did not bother with dessert other than taking in some bananas because they still had sweets left over from her birthday weekend.

Their family watches American Idol, and I completely enjoyed watching it with them. I have watched bits of it before but had never watched an entire program.

When I came home awhile ago, it was slightly foggy. Not enough to make for difficult driving, but enough to make the night scene look vaguely different than usual. I can remember one night taking home one of my mother’s assistants when the fog was so bad that I could not see houses to know where I was. I went by one turn-off on my way back home and was so relieved when I finally made it safely into our garage. I have driven in that kind of fog once or twice since.

Tonight, however, it was just foggy enough to make the drive seem romantically mystical and the road seem longer between landmarks. I remembered when we first moved over to the hog farm and I used this road for the first time at night. I had driven it many times in the daytime when our brother and wife lived at the hog farm; and of course, I had driven to work from there after we moved.

But we were in play practice at the high school at that time, and coming home in the dark at the end of the night’s practice, I drove the road alone for the first time in the dark. It was not foggy, but it looked completely different than in daytime and the country road seemed much longer than usual. I grew afraid I was lost. I wasn’t. I had the same sensation tonight of the road being longer than it usually seemed although I always knew exactly where I was. The damp misty quality of the evening gave just enough of an edge to make an ordinary drive seem heavy with mystery and stirred my imagination and my memories of days gone by.

A Spring Week at Woodsong

As I drove into the Shawnee National Forest on Tuesday, the pinkish purple blooms on the redbud trees brightened the still bare tall black-limbed trees all around them. The drive there had been stunning with the redbud at the height of its glory. Inside the forest, there were also a few scattered dogwood showing white blossoms and foretelling that time was running out for the redbud. Sure enough by this morning, though still lovely, the redbud trees had begun to shed the blooms for green leaves. And everywhere in yards and roadside, the white of the dogwood was beginning to dominate.

Tuesday Gerald left the house early to go with his friend Herman on an Angel Flight. Before I was through my breakfast and coffee, however, he was back home because the weather had cancelled their flight. I unexpectedly needed to figure out something for his lunch before I left the farm, and I did and hurried on to errands in town and my plan to consider going up Hamburg Hill to revisit the cut of the 1838 road there.

I knew I would not go unless I completed errands quickly enough that I could go there and back in time for our grandson Samuel’s jazz band concert that night. Since this group of youngsters had just won superior at state recently, I wanted to hear their performance. Sam’s junior high band was playing at the high school before their jazz band played, and Sam and fellow trombonist Ben were going to be improvising together. Coming home, I cut through the country by way of Goreville, one of my favorite towns in the universe (cause my grandparents lived there), and I was home from the forest in time to fix our supper. Gerald and I were sitting in the auditorium as the curtain was ready to open.

Gerald did take the Angel Flight on Wednesday, so he wasn’t there for lunch. But I had the same sort of rushed day with emails and phone calls to take care of as I worked on the final collection of handouts to mail to Rend Lake College for copying for the thirteen participants who will be on our river-to-river van trip this week. On Tuesday we will traverse Route 146, the designated Trail of Tears auto tour across our state.

After I completed the handouts and stopped to replenish our fruit supply, I went through the drive-in for supper and then hurried to the car wash to get the mud from Hamburg Hill taken off so Gerald wouldn’t feel he needed to do it. I arrived early at our village church in Crab Orchard for a First Place meeting at 6. I had neglected the Bible study all week and needed to attempt to catch up before the others arrived. With only three of us there, we lingered sharing our thoughts, our troubles, and our opinions in addition to the Bible study review. Consequently, it was later than usual when I arrived home to hear Gerald’s stories about the day’s Angel Flight and find out who won Georgia’s and Texas A&M’s games. The stories were interesting as always, and we had won both games.

Thursday afternoon I left the farm with all kinds of extra trucks there as once again some service was helping Gerald burn off our fields of native grasses. I thought this was a government requirement for these fields, but he explained that it was just the recommended plant culture. The two women in charge were careful to burn by creating V-shapes that allowed wildlife to escape safely. The eggs of one turkey nest, however, required our brother Keith and nephew DuWayne to come rescue them for their incubator.

Again I had a tad of shopping to do, ran by Katherine’s, and got a sandwich at Subway before meeting Jari Jackson to go to our Southern Illinois Writers Guild meeting. It was a Critique Night. I had hoped to have something new to read, but hadn’t completed anything. I did grab an article out of the file cabinet marked for revision and was amused to see it was written when my youngest daughter was still in high school as her son is now. I decided it was a little too old to share, but I may yet revise it someday.

It was fun just to relax and listen to the wide variety of offerings presented by more prepared members. When I got back to the farm, Gerald was in bed with the light on and his book of Appalachian humor in his hands and was fast asleep. I debated whether I should wake him and tell him good night or let him wake on his own when the book fell from his hands. That seemed the simplest, so I went on downstairs to check emails and surf a bit.

Friday morning for me started with a long welcome phone call from that youngest daughter who has been too busy with house revamping lately for leisurely calls. The weekend soft ball games would start on Saturday, and Gerald was hurrying to mow the yard and finish his shop project of modifying a sprayer for Scott, the next-door neighbor. This lengthy project turned out to be more complicated and challenging than Gerald, a perfectionist, anticipated. He was glad yesterday to take the completed sprayer home to Scott. In the meantime, our son-in-law Brian had arrived at the other farm for some weekend farming, and at the end of the day he dropped in and ate a waffle with us.

Yesterday Vickie and Geri Ann had gone with Gerry to Auburn University to watch Georgia play, and we were following them and also Erin at Oklahoma University at Norman, where she started the first inning with a RBI double. Gerald was also trying to follow Lucas Hileman at Baylor in the other room on TV.

Interspersed with the games for me was a trip to the village to return overdue library books and collect Revolutionary Road that the library had ordered for me. The florist shop where I owed a bill was closed but the wonderful owner/hostess of The Mustard Seed in adjoining quarters assured me she’d see that LaRonda got my check. There in that haven of crafts and antiques, I could not resist a small good-looking and inexpensive alarm clock for a downstairs bedroom. Then I took a drawing and some photographs that needed framing up to Tom Ribedeau, photographer, wood craftsman, teacher, and owner of the most beautiful long driveway imaginable through a certified wildlife habitat. I went back to Woodsong for more softball inspired by the beauty of the drive and Tom’s delightful personality.

After sleeping with the sound of rain on the camper all night, Brian dropped in to say goodbye before he headed home to the city. I was able to hand him John Elder Robinson’s Look Me in the Eye that I had told Mary Ellen about and wanted her to read.

As always today I was inspired by siblings Miranda and Caleb as they participated in various learning activities in our preschool classroom. Watching their faces as they learn new things and discover new words and new concepts is a joy. Since our story was about Jesus healing ten lepers and only one saying thank you, we played with band aids and wrapped bandages. Miranda had noticed my tiny “owie” on my hand and her band aid is still there tonight. Caleb was very interested in counting the ten pennies, ten marbles, and ten pencils that Miss Kim brought. He quit his independent play to go over and sit on her lap to try and figure out what this counting was all about. He could say the word “two.”

Since Erin’s game today was on ESPN, we watched as we ate lunch and then went downstairs to the bigger TV to see the rest of the game. David dropped in to pick up some left-over vinyl for a project he was working on to try and make Katherine’s chair more comfortable. We were quite unhappy to see Texas A&M lose, but despite our sadness, we had to be proud of Oklahoma’s D. J. Mathis who was back on the mound after a shoulder injury. D.J. played with Erin for Southern Force here in Illinois and won everyone’s hearts with her enthusiasm, and probably knew she needed to keep walking Erin.

At our evening service, Becky Belt handed me her copy of The Shack that Kim had finished, so it looks like I have plenty to read in the week ahead.

A Blessed Easter at Woodsong

After a leisurely breakfast with the newspaper, we went to our village church to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus.

Our three little ones in our preschool classroom looked adorable. Wearing pink with ruffles and lace, Miranda explained, “Grandma made my dress.” When Miss Kim took pictures, we knew we were not the first to admire these children today, because one-year-old Caleb without prompting posed and said clearly, “Cheese!” Bobby, looking sharp in dress pants and matching vest, was all excited that Grandpa was coming to dinner. The Easter card he made was to be for his daddy and grandpa.

In the service after Bible study, many had visiting family members with them to worship as a family on this special day. Our oldest member, Zella Cain had family members filling two entire rows. And that was only half of her family, she told us. We sang, “Up From the Grave He Arose” and other traditional hymns. Deanna Odom had a special reading for us, and we sang “Happy Birthday” to Dewayne Covey, who had been looking forward to this tradition, and he had visiting cousins and aunts and uncles there to participate.

Our beloved interim pastor had a second sermon prepared—he and several had gathered earlier at the church for the sunrise service and breakfast that Gerald and I seldom make. In the early years, I would have been out on the lawn hiding eggs and candies in our children’s nests they made on Saturday—just the way my mother was taught to do as a child. Then when our children took over the nest filling for their children, I would be in the kitchen preparing the ham and lunch for the bunch when we came home from church.

Today was different. For the first time in our 52 years of marriage, I did not dye Easter eggs. For the first time in decades, I did not cook Easter dinner. For the first time in several years, most of our children and grandchildren could not be with us. Yet it has been a special and blessed Easter.

We arrived back in Marion last evening from our trip to visit daughter Jeannie’s family and see Elijah and Cecelie participate in the 29th annual Showtime at Freeport High School. Before we refilled the gas tank and I ran inside Kroger’s to get fresh fruit and milk, Katherine phoned and said, “Mom, David has arranged to pick up a prepared Easter dinner for all of us, and we will bring it out to the farm tomorrow. There will be plenty for Mary Ellen’s family too if they are able to make it.”

We took Samuel on home as he was eager to check out the Easter egg doings at Josh’s house—his buddy just behind the park and their house. Sam carried in a large portion of the colored eggs that he had helped dye at the Eiler house and his Aunt Jeannie had sent home with him. So they became part of our dinner today.

He even was invited to participate in the dyeing session going on at my brother’s home when we stopped at Mattoon for a break. Jim’s wife Vivian, who always remembered her grandmother’s huge dishpan full of colored eggs for her many grandchildren, has always tried to approach that sense of bounty for her kids and grandkids. She and her sister Jo, who had arrived from Chicago by train the day before, were laughing and working with a dozen of so cups of color on the large dining table and assisted by my niece Judi getting ready for the egg hunt at their house today. When Sam unobtrusively took a wax crayon from the kit and put a star on an egg, his mother’s cousin Judi had a moment of wonder and confusion when she took a green egg out and unexpectedly saw a star on it.

So after we dropped Sam off at his house, we returned to shop for the few needed items. With the delightful surprise and neat gift for the next day arranged by our son-in-law, I did not even think about what I might need to buy to go with the little half ham I had stowed in the fridge for Katherine’s family and also Mary Ellen’s family if they were able to come down from Lake Saint Louis. I knew Easter dinner would be scant in comparison to some past feasts, but I also knew my children would understand.

David works extraordinary hours already both at the plant and at home helping care for Katherine and Sam, and that he would go to the work and trouble to arrange to bring an entire holiday dinner out to the farm was very touching—and absolutely lovely. When I phoned her an invitation, we found out that Mary Ellen’s family had gone to Springfield—she had known we might not even get back from Freeport for Easter.

So I took the usual leaves out of the dining room table. With Sam’s friend Josh added as a guest, we had six present. Thus, I was able to use the white china with pink roses that I bought long ago at the thrift store when our family had only six members, and the light green cloth that usually only fits the kitchen table. The green stemmed glasses (also from the thrift store) made a pretty table with lilacs and white tulips for the centerpiece.

While the men talked and rested, Katherine and I looked at photo books and enjoyed seeing Tara, Erin, and Leslie as tiny ones. Sam and Josh went looking for minnows and rode the “mule” and played with Scooter and whatever boys do outside.

All too soon the Cedars had to go back home, and Gerald and I were alone again at Woodsong after the flurry of weekend activity. We enjoyed ham sandwiches and reflecting on the day.

We knew from Facebook that Leslie, who’d been in Freeport for the weekend, had succeeded in getting her first car yesterday and was driving it back to Belmont. Tomorrow she finds out about her summer job. Gerry had been off work from recruiting and had been able to go to church with Vickie and Geri Ann at Athens. Like Gerald, I am sure they were in touch with Erin down at College Station and with Tara’s family in northern Illinois, who celebrated with Bryan’s family this weekend. We were still enjoying Gerry’s proud accounts of Erin’s winning home run on Friday and A&M’s second victory against Texas Tech yesterday. And the Georgia Dogs won all three games against Ole Miss this weekend despite rainy weather and lightning delays.

We know that softball is fun and despite its importance to our family, it is not that important in the grand scheme of things. We know that every one of our family members have challenges and concerns—some of which cause us to live life with broken hearts. We know that many good people are out of work in our state, and they didn’t sit down to ham and all the good food that David carried in. We remembered the poignant presentation of world hunger that we saw at Freeport’s Showtime. We know that they are still pirates and thugs and terrorists in the world despite our rejoicing at the captain’s release. We are grateful for a living God who is willing to help us through the struggles here on earth.

Old Toys for a New Generation

After taking Geri Ann to high school Thursday morning, Gerald just kept driving towards Illinois and arrived at Woodsong with beautiful weather here that afternoon. Very soon he had photos of all the family in Georgia printed and spread out on the family room coffee table.

This morning shortly before 5 a.m. after driving all night and taking her Gma Shirley down the road to her home, Tara arrived at Woodsong from her parents home in
Georgia with our only great grandchildren, Aidan and Maddux. Today we had chilly rainy weather. Gerald had been up since before 4 and had called her to make sure she was awake. (Gerald assumes that responsibility when he worries about family on the highway) Gerald told her he’d have our car slot in the garage open for her, so she would have a dry place to bring the children into the house.

When I heard Maddux crying because he was hungry, I knew they had arrived and hopped out of bed. Tara fed three-month-old Maddux and the two of them disappeared in the bedroom so Tara could get some sleep before driving on to the Chicago area. Aidan, who’d slept coming up, was going strong, and we fed him breakfast and enjoyed having him as our special guest while his mother and brother slept.

Before daylight with bright lights flashing, Gerald had given him a tractor ride much to Aidan’s delight. The rain prevented also riding the lawn mower or the “mule,” which Aidan was also hoping for. However, he is an agreeable and reasonable child and took that disappointment in good grace.

We soon rounded up numerous toys bought for earlier grandkids or else left behind by them and a couple that I remember buying at a rummage sale when his mother was born. In the bathroom, which he handles like a pro, he would not allow me to put on the little seat, which makes the stool opening a more appropriate size for someone not yet three. He assured me he could manage and he did.

Then he decided he would like to take a bath. So I pulled out our net sack full of accumulated toys and sundry plastic junk that our grandchildren have played with in the tub down through the years. I figure they are learning science as they pour water from one cup to another, watch the water come out the holes of the metal drainer planted with the toys, and they soon notice that some things float and some do not. I checked to see if he could count the plastic baby ducks he had caged in a plastic container that had once held produce from the grocery store. He could.

Later I showed him photographs of his mother when she was a baby. I am not sure he knew his mother had once been a baby. That was hard for him to believe. I understood. I have the same problem—except for me it is difficult to believe she is an adult with two precious children.

It was hard to see them heading up to their home in northern Illinois, but we knew Tara was eager to get there before dark. And we knew her husband was even more eager to see her and than boys than we were reluctant to see them go. The family grapevine kept buzzing until we knew Tara and the babies were safely home. I hope she sleeps good tonight.

Spring Breaks and the Western Part of the Trail of Tears through Southern Illinois

Spring breaks have started for our grandchildren. Samuel like all the kids here in Williamson County has been off school this week. And so has Geri Ann down in Georgia, which allowed her to go with her mother to see Erin play softball in Boca Raton. Her sister Tara, husband Bryan, and the two little boys also took a vacation there. Leslie was in Puerto Rico with her church group since Belmont was having spring break.

The Eilers up at Freeport will be off next week, so Jeannie is bringing Cecelie thorough here on their way to visit Les at Belmont while Elijah goes to Mount Rushmore and that region with his high school choir performing most of Showtime at various venues. They’ll be well rehearsed when they get back to perform at Freeport. Trent and Brianna will be off that week also and are going to Florida to see their Grandma Dot.

I wanted to grab some time with Samuel while he was on vacation, so we planned a day trip down to Union County to see the western part of the Trail of Tears through Southern Illinois. We first stopped at the Trail of Tears rest stop on Interstate 57. Oddly, that rest stop has pictures of Cairo but no mention of the Trail of Tears. Our Illinois Chapter of the Trail of Tears Association finally got permission to place brochures there—something Sandy Boaz, Illinois TOTA president, had tried to do for years but wasn’t allowed. But the brochures were all taken the day Sam and I stopped by. We obtained an Illinois road map there, and Sam was able to follow our journey to the west where we were to cross the Mississippi River.

The Trail of Tears rest stop is actually on top of the trail. When I-57 was built, that spot on the highway goes over a short tunnel on the road beneath it, where the Cherokee actually walked. To see that, Sam and I exited I-57 less than a mile down the highway and were on State Route 146, Illinois Designated TOT highway and also the National Park Service’s TOT auto route.

Next we took the first country road to the right and were driving through beautiful rural land, which has been built up with many fine homes in recent years. Soon we were down below I-57 and drove through the tunnel and down the actual Trail. It was chilly enough that we weren’t tempted to get out and hike, and we turned around and went back to the cemetery where Southern Illinois University Carbondale geologist Harvey Henson and his students have located at least 19 graves in the area that oral tradition had always indicated the Cherokee had buried their dead during the bitter cold of December 1838 and January 1839.

Since there had been perhaps as many as 3,000 camping there at one time and more before and after those weeks, it is a sign of land owner George Hileman’s kindness that there were so few deaths. He allowed them to cut down the woods to obtain firewood for warmth, and he sold them corn meal from his grist meal for sustenance to go with the wild game they foraged. He approved their graves in his pasture where he and his wife had buried two small children a few years earlier. Later he was to donate land for the church established there, and he donated more land for the cemetery.

Sandy Boaz, a descendant of Hileman, has been searching for what roads went from Camp Ground over to Jonesboro in the first half of the 19th Century. As a favor, she recently was helping someone with their genealogy questions, and serendipitously found some good hints about the road, which she intends to investigate. She has often talked about Dog Walk Road, and since Sam and I were not on schedule, we decided not to return to Route 146 but to leave on the Camp Ground Road going west until we came to Dog Walk, which we took over to the Lick Creek Road and finally back to Route 146. It took a little longer than it should have since I have no sense of direction, and I turned in the wrong direction on the familiar Lick Creek Road. I turned around when I noticed on the dash we were headed east. On 146 in Anna, we soon were passing the Trail of Tears Junction, the elaborate gas and more station owned by Ron and Deb Charles, who both descended from Cherokee families around Elco.

We were hungry by then, and we stopped at the Country Cupboard, more often called The Potato Barn, created in the old Goddard Feed Store, where county farmers always headed to buy garden seed, tools, and bib overalls as well as feed. As always, the food there was absolutely delicious. I had a bowl of creamy potato soup and a Reuben while Sam had a shrimp basket. I should have ordered either soup or a sandwich since both turned out to be over-sized. I had fun explaining to Sam the complicated family connections to the Bridgeman daughters who own the restaurant now. His great Grandma Ada’s Aunt Ollie Bridgeman is seen holding Sam’s mother in the first baby photo we have of Katherine. Part of the pleasure of going to the Potato Barn is wandering around looking at the antiques and artifacts, so we took time for that before we got back on the Trail.

We left Anna by Heacock Street and down Boettner Hill, and I was able to tell Sam how folks used to block off traffic on a few nights when the snow made that hill a perfect place for sledding. I took him out to the Old Fair Grounds, where Lincoln and Douglas gave one of their 1858 debates while running for the Senate. Sam enjoyed the new statues there of the two famous debaters.

And then it was up to the Jonesboro Square, where the bank stands on the storehouse site of Winstead Davie. Behind the store was his and Anna (Willard) Davie’s home, where the Davies invited Rev. Jesse Bushyhead and his pregnant wife Eliza and another “chief” and his wife and baby to stay with them. The name for this second so-called chief has been confusing, but I am convinced this was native preacher Rev. Stephen Foreman and his wife Sarah and baby boy Jeremiah Evarts Foreman. Darrel Dexter tells us that Davie applied for a license to keep boarders the very day that little Jeremiah was born, and Davie family tradition tells of the Cherokee baby and parents who stayed with them.

On the west side of Davie’s store on the other side of the road from the Old Fair
Grounds was where Davie’s brother-in-law and competitor William Willard had his store. Sadly William never married but died of tuberculosis at age 31 in 1843. His two brothers, Elijah and Willis, ran the two ferries near Willard’s Landing on the Mississippi River. (Some folks still called the Landing by its earlier name—Green’s Landing.)

Sam and I drove down Cook Avenue past the school , and I showed Sam where I grew up. Then we drove as far as the road went to the top of Bauer’s Hill where some Cherokee crossed over and down to the other side to camp at the southern end of Dutch Creek. We came back and got back on Route 146, now also called Willard’s Ferry Road.

Because of the swamps in The Bottoms by the river, the Cherokee were backed up in the Dutch Creek-Clear Creek area. Perhaps as many as 5,000 or more were waiting for the ice floes to melt or float away. We turned at the Lockard Chapel sign onto Berryville Road and explored one of the many routes some of the 11,000 took. As usual I got lost and took a wrong turn before we reached Hamburg Hill and Atwood Tower, but eventually we were back on Route 146 and continued to the village of Ware.

Directly west of Ware was the road that took early travelers to Willard’s Landing, where there was a storehouse and some homes to greet the boats bringing merchandise from Pennsylvania for Davie and Willard’s Jonesboro stores. (The eastern boats came down the Ohio River to Cairo and then up the Mississippi.) Since the river has changed and been changed so radically by levies and flood control since 1838, we have never discovered any residue of Willard’s Landing.. Several Cherokee detachments crossed here including Jesse Bushyhead and his wife Eliza Wilkerson Bushyhead, who gave birth on January 3, 1839, to Eliza Missouri Bushyhead at what is now called Moccasins Springs. There Bushyhead’s sister Nancy Bushyhead Walker Hildebrand died and was buried.

We drove on south now on Route 146 past Ware Baptist Church, where Sam’s mother was enrolled in Sunday School as an infant, We continued on the TOT Auto Route past the fine goose-hunting and corn-growing farms there in The Bottoms. At Reynoldsville, we noted the road crossing called The Old Cape Road, but we kept on the new highway to the Flea Market, where the Route 146 turns back west to cross the bridge to Missouri. In Cape Girardeau, we enjoyed the beautiful murals on the river flood walls u before we turned to go back across the stunning Bill Emerson Bridge into Illinois.


We did take the Old Cape Road on our way back to Jonesboro because no doubt some of the Cherokee detachments went to the ferries at Hamburg Landing through there. Either there or further south, some Cherokee found themselves crossing on the Smith Ferry and going to Cape Girardeau. We got Sam back to his house, so he could get to bed early for the spring vacation trip his dad had planned for him on Friday to Saint Louis sites.

Yesterday I went to Sam’s last Upward basketball game and found out that son-in-law Brian and daughter Brianna had come down late the night before from Lake Saint Louis to their camper up at Wayside Farm. So in between watching softball games for Georgia and Texas A&M, Gerald and I had Samuel with his new puppy Scooter and Brianna .with Fifi to play here at the farm on Saturday afternoon.

That was a good diversion because Gerald is still at a painfully red and quite ugly stage of his skin peel treatment and has been reluctant to get off the farm much. He did take neighbor Scott to Carbondale to catch a train, but they went through the drive-in for breakfast rather than going inside. We hope by his birthday next Sunday, he will have skin as soft as a baby’s. Reckon?

Lazy Post

I have been busy all day with housekeeping details--they never end--and working on an article that was first started in 2007. It needs cutting, adding to, endnotes reworked, etc. For the most part, this is boring work. (Although sometimes I run into something new while checking out sources and then I get excited.)

Tonight I went to First Place at Center, and afterwards some of us filled our last week of Angel Bags that Charlene and Gerald Morris have been kind enough to deliver to the school for us each Friday. I haven't heard what community church will be doing the bags during March.

Before I left, I fixed Gerald a supper plate for the microwave. When I returned, I did the same for myself. I watched a mite of TV while I ate. Then I needed to check emails, which led me to some post by grandkids on Facebook. Who could resist pictures of our great grandsons posted by Tara?

I am either tired or lazy. So I am going to cheat and post something about my writing that was written for another purpose. But maybe it will tell you a little more about my writing.

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Writing has been a part of Sue Glasco's life since her freshman year at Anna-Jonesboro High School in Union County, Illinois. Much of her writing has been in letters, journals, and publicity releases for organizations she was helping to promote. In addition to her pro bono writing, she also seriously tried to write as a part-time freelancer from 1966-71. Despite the two-cents a word that she usually received, she was always pleased that she had an avocation that provided the family with a little extra income rather than a hobby that cost the family money.

During her children's busy growing-up years and her parents' growing feeble years, she put aside freelancing and concentrated on family.

Then she continued her career as an educator. Writing was mostly limited to writing syllabi and work materials. (She calls her career as an educator haphazard since she has subbed in preschool through high school classrooms, taught in secondary and college classrooms, and finally worked six-and-a-half years in family literacy for Rend Lake College.)

Since retirement in July 1998, she spent one year slowing down and catching up with friends and family. Then she began to write to share family memories for future generations. That got interrupted for one year as she and her husband built a house and moved to a new home after 36 years at Pondside Farm.

After settling into their retirement home, she began writing again. In 2005, she has published Down on the Farm: One American Family's Dream, a compilation of columns she originaly wrote from 1962-1966 telling the story of the family achieving their dream to become farmers in Southern Illinois.

Since then, she has continued publishing occasional short articles, and her twice-a-week blogs are published on Woodsong Notes, Amazon Connect, and Red Room.

Sue says that for her to write is as necessary as breathing, and she has always drawn comfort from Madeleine L'Engle's assurance that it was all right to be a minor writer. In fact, Sue believes everyone's story has value. She has always urged students and friends to put their stories and thoughts into writing. Two-hundred years from now, descendants will cherish an ancestor's writing more than any best seller!

Watching Softball at Woodsong

A weekend highlight happened Friday afternoon when our granddaughter Leslie dropped by Woodsong. She was on her way up from Belmont in Nashville, Tennessee, to see two girl friends at the University of Illinois.

The next day the three were heading over to Belleville to meet up with the Freeport High School speech team at the state tournament. Today Leslie made the long drive back to Belmont after going to church with a friend in Effingham. Her Aunt Mary and cousin Brianna were able to come across the river and have lunch with her at Belleville.

Otherwise our weekend was taken up with following Texas A&M softball team playing in the Marriott Houston Invitational tourney and the University of Georgia softball team hosting the 6th annual Georgia Softball Classic at Athens.

When Leslie arrived, we were able to report Texas A&M’s first victory where they beat Northern Illinois 14-2. Her cousin Erin’s exciting 5 for 6 hitting success with seven RBIs, which included a three-run homer, kept the phone lines buzzing between Woodsong and Tara up at Aurora and Vickie down in Georgia. Her heavy hit over the score board excited the game-tracker announcers—but not as much as Erin’s family fans. Oh, yes, she also put out the two Northern runners who were silly enough to try to steal. Later that night, A&M defeated Prairie View 11-1. More phone calls followed.

Ranked 16th in the nation now, Georgia also won both their Friday games, winning against Ball State 15-3 in five innings and Tennessee State 8-0 in five. We went to bed happy for Erin and happy for our son Gerry at Georgia, where he is assistant coach.

Saturday morning the grey rainy day suddenly turned to a snowy day. Since Gerald needed a tool at Sears, he volunteered to take me to my hair appointment in his pickup. I hadn’t thought about it being slick, but evidently it was because we passed a car on Route 13 that had flown across the medium and across our west-bound lane and into the ditch. We got home in time for me to fix lunch and for us to have it eaten before the afternoon games began.

After A&M shut out McNeese State 3-0, and Erin batted .500, we were pumped to listen that evening to the game against home-team Houston Cougars, who were ranked 18 while A&M had slipped to 19th because of recent away-game losses. After battling the wind in a come-from-behind game, A&M forced the game into an eighth inning. The game-breaker rule placed Erin on second base in this inning. She made third thanks to Alex Reynolds’ sacrifice, and then onto home, thanks to Kelsey Spittler’s game-winning single. We went to bed happy after that 4-3 victory. Georgia had won over Marshall 9-1 in six innings and over Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis 15-3 in five innings.

Today started with a very early phone call from Gerry to his dad, and I am sure they talked softball. We thought we would see both of “our” teams won their respective tournaments with five wins apiece. But that wasn’t to be. Georgia did win their tourney by defeating the University of North Carolina Greensboro 12-2 in five innings—their ninth straight victory with the mercy rule. They had hit 10 home runs in this tourney, and their tournament batting average was .425. Next weekend they travel to the National Fastpitch Coaches Association Leadoff Classic in Columbus, Georgia.

Texas A&M was to play University of Illinois for the championship at Houston, and the game was in the fourth inning when we got home from church. Soon Gerald had the game going, and I brought down chili for our lunch, which is what we also ate last night while we watched their game.

When Kelsey Spittler made a big hit in the bottom of the seventh to tie up the game, I thought for sure we’d repeat last night’s victory. But Illinois scored a run, and then despite our game-breaker runner making it to third, we couldn’t get the hits to bring her home. We lost 5-4 and are going to bed sad tonight, but I am sure we aren’t as sad as those kids on the bus heading back to College Station, However, they will be playing on their home field for awhile now, and I predict more sweet dreams next weekend.

Mid-Winter Mish Mash

One day the weather is Southern Illinois allows us to go coatless; and the next day when we try it, the wind makes us sorry. Today was pretty again although a jacket was in order.


Son-in-law Bryan and Brianna were down from Lake Saint Louis yesterday. Somehow Brianna and Sam ended up at the Illinois Centre Mall, where I spent the day with Southern Illinois Writers Guild members at our fourth annual Winter Book Fair. The mall sets up tables for us in the center section by the fountains, and we sell and sign books and SIWG anthologies while talking to mall strollers. It is always fun to table hop and visit with the other writers as well as talk with past and potential customers. With the economy like it is, no one expects to sell many books.


Brianna had been to the nearby movie theater with the older sister of Sam’s friend Josh. Not only do cousins from afar keep in touch by texting, but they meet and become friends with each other’s friends. Thus, Brianna came from Missouri and ended up at the movies in Illinois with Josh’s sister. Then Sam, who had been under the weather earlier in the day, was feeling better, so son-in-law David brought him out to meet Brianna to explore the mall until we wrapped up the Book Fair at 4 and they could ride out to Woodsong with me.


I needed to buy bananas to give us potassium, and we were out of grapes and getting low on oranges, so we ran by Kroger’s as I had planned and bought sandwiches from the deli there and gas for my near-empty car with our 15 cent discount on the Kroger credit card. Then Brianna, Sam, and I headed out to Woodsong, where Gerald and Brian were finishing up their afternoon projects.


We soon were eating the sandwiches and chips with ice cream and the cookies the kids chose for dessert. (I meant to send the rest of the chocolate milk and those cookies home with one grandchild or the other, so Gerald and I would not be tempted. However, in the concentration to get to Sunday School this morning, I forgot the cookies and milk, so maybe I can take them into Sam’s tomorrow or the next day.)


After helping teach our preschoolers during Sunday School, I stayed on for the extended session during worship. One of our high schoolers came in to help me. It pleases me when teens like Cody come in, because I can remember well many years ago when our son Gerry and his friend Tom were among the boys who helped with the babies and toddlers and preschoolers. Always under the direction of an adult, of course. What real training those sessions were for parenthood.


Worship must have been through hymns today and a little shorter than usual as our interim pastor became ill and had to go home before the service started. Cody said maybe it was a good thing he was not in the choir that long as he was tired. He had not slept well last night, so he got up and texted his friend over in Britain, where the sun was shining. Nevertheless, tired or not, he interacted with the children who keep us hopping.


Preschoolers crave watchful attention, and we give it. One-year-old Caleb delights himself when with intense concentration he learns to manipulate various toys or blocks. Then my heart melts when he looks up to make sure I am watching to admire his achievement. To know my watching means that much to him is as great a reward as our mutual handclapping when he gets the blocks stacked right or places the coin in the slot on the little toy farm barn that he gravitates to every Sunday.


After church, we headed down to the Old Home Place at Goreville to introduce the Taylors and Sam to Patrick and Tina’s new restaurant. Our meal was delicious but plentiful, so three take-home boxes were asked for. Sam left with Brian and Brianna for them to drop him off in Marion on their way back to Missouri.


Gerald wanted to check out an uncommon way back to the farm, so we wandered through country roads like Webb Town road, where we passed the Glen Webb Family Farm established in 1856, and on to roads with names like Wagon Creek Road and Creal Springs Road and finally back to Route 166 where we would turn off onto New Dennison Road and be home to check the softball scores.


The Georgia Dogs had had another good weekend with four shut-out victories in the Black and Red Showcase there at Athens. However, after winning a 14-inning game Wednesday at Huntsville, Texas, against Sam Houston and winning against them again on Friday in the opener at the Easton Tiger Classic at Baton Rouge, Texas A&M had a bad hair day yesterday losing to Ohio State and LSU. Then in bracket play today, they were ahead of LSU until the bottom of the sixth, when LSU rallied with three runs. A&M lost 3 to 4, so I know Vickie and Geri Ann left Louisiana with heavy hearts just as Erin did traveling back to College Station. But Coach Jo Evans was upbeat about all the things the girls did right.


With no church services tonight to allow our pastor to recuperate, we watched some TV, and I am reflecting early on the past week to write this blog. There was the trip up to Rend Lake College to the little restored school house on campus, where Lori Ragsdale had a reception to announce all the life-long learning opportunities coming up. I gave my pitch for our tour through Southern Illinois to revisit the Trail Where the Cherokee Cried. Since it was Lincoln’s birthday, Lori had arranged for Abe and Mary Lincoln performers to give a brief program too. Of course, I was also thinking about granddaughter Geri Ann's 15th birthday.


As always when I am passing by and have time, I pulled off at the Sesser exit at Whittington and visited the Southern Illinois Arts and Artisans Center. It truly is a visual buffet, and although I can’t afford the expensive art objects there, I like looking. I was able to pick up some books and items from the bargain table.


I stayed in Marion to attend Sam’s winter band concert, and before I headed home, I stopped off at Latta Java and was able to hear the last couple SIWG readers there.


Gerald had gone on an Angel Flight with his friend Herman Hood to Arkansas to pick up a patient in route to hospital treatments. I wasn’t sure if he would be at home when I returned or not. He had been playing with going down to Louisville, KY, to the annual farm show after the Angel Flight, but he was back at home asleep in his armchair watching television (ha) when I returned to Woodsong.


The next morning at 3:30 I woke up to see a wide-awake husband with his cap already on and a dance in his step as he scooped his change from the dresser and anticipated his adventure heading to Louisville. I wasn’t surprised, because I knew he really wanted to see all the new stuff that would be on display down there in the acres and acres under roof. I was surprised when he called before 6 that night and instead of staying all night in Louisville as he and his brothers’ custom was for years, he was already back in Illinois and heading home wanting to know if he should pick up supper in Harrisburg or would I like to celebrate with a Valentine’s dinner in Marion. I figured he must be tired, so I let him choose and soon we were eating a lovely dinner at my favorite restaurant in town.


It has been a good week with one afternoon spent studying Gary Hacker’s new book on the Trail of Tears through Johnson County and now several new books from Southern Illinois writers waiting for me to find time to read or at least skim through them. While I sat at the mall yesterday, I was able to read Joanne Blakely’s just published beautiful poetry chapbook. I certainly recommend it and Gary’s book.

Thawing and Freezing

The ice here thawed enough I could drive to town yesterday morning for my weekly hair appointment. I ran by my daughter’s, but she was asleep and never knew I had visited. In the afternoon, Gerald and I went over to Southern Illinois University Carbondale to watch his friend Steve Soldner’s daughter Regan play basketball with Missouri State against the Salukis. Steve sells Peterbilts down in Texas, and Gerald always has to go by and see him when he visits friends in that area.

With five generations of our family affiliated with SIUC, I could not believe I was cheering for Missouri State, but I did. It was easy during the first half when SIUC was far ahead. As the Bears got within 10 points in the last quarter, I felt more of a traitor although I was very proud of Missouri State for coming on strong at last. After winning in Evansville, the weather had kept them stuck in this area and unable to return home between games as planned.

We were able to visit a bit with Regan’s grandparents from Farina and met her grandfather’s twin and his wife also. Steve couldn’t come up from Texas because they were planning a trip to California to see their senior son play there. They will have three more years to watch Regan’s games.

We ran by Katherine’s and had a nice visit after the basketball game. We missed picking up a prescription at the pharmacy by five minutes, and then ate a lovely dinner at Honeybaker’s because we were tired of my cooking. By the time we got back to our lane, it had frozen again. Fortunately Gerald had scraped enough in previous days that there were bare spots to give us traction as we glanced nervously at the lake.

This morning we drove the pickup to our village church, where George Barker had had about the same experience Gerald had here clearing roads. He could not scrape too deeply without tearing up the gravel beneath the ice, so nothing was completely bare, and then last night froze it again, but we greatly appreciated what he did for us. There was some slipping and sliding in the parking lot as we drove in, and we oldsters walked carefully. When we came out of services, it was thawing again with puddles of water mixed with the snow and ice.

In counties south of us and over in Kentucky and southeast Missouri, many people are still without electricity, and some of our church members have been impacted by those problems. Most of those schools are still closed tomorrow. (Our county’s kids are going back after their four-day break.) A friend in town has her Kentucky son and his three Labs at her house since he is without electricity. Fortunately she loves dogs. Motels are full with people wanting heat and hot showers.

With the bad roads and the Super Bowl on tonight, our pastor declared he was giving us a “double dose” sermon this morning so that we could all stay safely home tonight. He even used two different texts and carefully divided his sermon in two. Both sermons were excellent, and we left being glad we had been in the House of the Lord.

While the ice had thawed quite a bit this afternoon, Gerald did some more driveway scraping including working on a neighbor’s drive. Since I am not a sports fan, while he watched the Super Bowl, I enjoyed surfing and playing around with an article I sent out once in 2007. It is now tweaked to send out again. I joined Gerald to watch the final exciting moments of the game, and then I watched the PBS preview of We Shall Remain, a five-part documentary coming out in April on the American Indians trying to show a more complete history of our nation’s interaction with the primary residents of this continent.

BRRRRR!

We are iced in here at the farm, but we are warm, well fed, and with electricity. I wish everyone were so blessed.

Yesterday our daughter Katherine phoned and asked if it was pretty looking out our large curtainless windows. Although the roads were covered with ice, the fields were largely brown. I had to say no. But when we woke up this morning, it had snowed several inches, and the white lawn runs downs and joins the white snow-covered lake. It is beautiful. Gerald had filled the bird feeders just in time for this, and we’ve enjoyed watching the hungry ones feast out on our deck. Schools are called off. And kids (and some adults) are enjoying sledding and snow play. Schools are still closed tomorrow.

We had follow-up appointments yesterday with a dermatologist in the Saint Louis area, but we finally made the decision Monday afternoon that we better cancel that rather than go up a day early to try and beat the ice. We’d probably still be stuck up there at Mary Ellen’s if we had not.

We have not had mail nor paper delivery either day. However, Gerald says if we need to go anywhere, we can get out with his pickup. He was out and about clearing sidewalks today with a scraper on the lawn mower. Although he occupies himself with phone calls, photography, reading, and television, he gets cabin fever pretty quickly and finds excuses to pile on the outerwear and go outside for some task or other.

I haven’t been any further than using the washer/drier in the garage, which is pretty chilly right now. I have filed a few papers and written a few notes, but unfortunately, I have not managed to get into a book yet although it would seem this would be the perfect time to snuggle up with one.

I loved snow days when our children were still at home and in school. I loved being isolated, making hot chocolate for them with marshmallows on top, and using the days to work on the family scrapbook when I wasn’t helping them get in and out of snowsuits and boots.

It has been years since I have finished a scrapbook. I have boxes of newspaper clippings and mementoes of grandchildren’s drawings, but I no longer have the ambition to spread them on the dining room table and spend entire days reminiscing and sorting and pasting. I claim I am saving that project for my frail elderly years when I cannot get out of the house even in pretty weather. I suspect I may not be that ambitious then either. We’ll see.

In the meantime, I am enjoying the coziness of watching the weather in the warmth of home.

Clearing Out to Start Afresh

It is that time of year. Looking back and looking forward. Although I had taken down the door wreaths and the many table top accessories and small items lining the books on one book case, both trees were still up yesterday morning when the phone call from Mary Ellen came. Her family was sleeping while she was driving, and she was getting sleepy too. So she phoned to get her dad to talk to her, so she’d stay awake. They were trying to make it home to Lake Saint Louis from their holiday trip to Florida since the kids had friends to meet and things to do (of course) and so did the adults. Gerald suggested they meet at Cracker Barrel for breakfast, but a later phone call pleaded to just come crash here at the farm. Of course that was fine with us. All the beds were empty.


While they slept, I turned on the trees for the last time thinking they could still feel a bit of holiday spirit when they woke up—which wasn’t until noon. They were ready to head out the door, but I’d already doubled our left-over pot of chili from the night before, so they were persuaded to have a bowl of chili first, so we could hear about their trip to Disney World and their visit with Brian’s mother.


This afternoon the decorations quickly came off the upstairs tree and it is ready to be stuffed into its box in the morning and crammed back in the closet.. The guest room bed is covered with its ornaments and earlier removed accessories that still must be boxed. I climbed onto a step stool and took down the angel looking down on us from the cabinets in the dining room.


Just to get started, I even took a few ornaments off the downstairs tree, which has the accumulation of keepsake items from 52 years of marriage. There are some pretty plaid bows Jean Harrison gave me on a gift many years ago (20 or 30 years?) and a bright red and yellow bow from a flower arrangement that Hua-ling Hu brought to us at Woodsong once. There is an adorable white miniature plastic cowboy boot with attached tag promoting Kathie DeNosky’s first romance. She gave it to us when she spoke to Writers Guild, and I loved it and knew the tree was the perfect place for it.


There are many ornaments made by our children and grandchildren—including some made from toilet tissue tubes to slip over branches. There are some made by Texas relatives and Wyoming relatives and some made by my sister-in-law Ginger before her stroke. There is a red poppy bought on the street one Memorial Day from an American Legion member. I put it on the tree in remembrance of all the fun my friend Lynn and I had selling poppies in Anna for her grandparents’ veterans group.. (They treated us to lunch at a restaurant, which was a big deal to me. Lunch came with vegetables served in cute little white bowls beside your plate.) Leukemia claimed Lynn’s life a year ago right before Christmas, so I lingered over that poppy. There are so many many ornaments and memories to be mulled.


That tree will take more time than the more stylized tree upstairs did, which didn’t have that many ornaments. (The upstairs tree has always been decorated with artificial roses and blue and silver ornaments.)


I am eager to finish up Christmas tomorrow, although I will probably still be sending a few belated cards and thank you notes next week. On Christmas Eve I had to follow my usual tradition of realizing that some cards would have to go out late. I started in early December with cards to shut-ins first, then the cards I carry to Sunday School rooms to pass out at church to save postage. ( I do this in honor of our late friend Helen Beasley who had her little G.A. girls do this so we could give more to our mission offering. I conscientiously added that postage saving to my mission check.) Then I addressed cards to all the relatives—except some whose addresses had been misplaced. Finally this year, I started on our lists of friends. Then suddenly it was Christmas Eve and time to celebrate whether the cards were finished or not. I always think I will do better the next year and get cards out earlier, but so far I never have.


I love the plainness of January after the richness of December. The house bared of decorations pleases my eye and refreshes my spirit just as much as the color and brightness did when the decorations went up. I cooked white beans and corn bread for New Year’s Day, and that menu has tasted good also after the richer holiday fare.


With the holidays behind us, I look forward to a reestablishing a daily routine. And I want to use the cold wintry days ahead to go through some closets and chests and see if I cannot buy some storage space by eliminating unused items. Most of all, I want to unclutter my office, but that may never happen. Papers, pamphlets, and books accumulate almost as quickly as I can sort and throw out. We will have to wait and see what is accomplished in 2009. I am looking forward to it, but grieving the violence plaguing the planet. I wish we could throw out hatred and misunderstanding and start afresh.

Where Is It? Let's See Now

Mary Ellen called from up the road apiece on Friday that they had discovered the controller for the TV in the den was accidentally in their basket of games picked up just before they left our place to head to their other family’s home. Should they return it? Naw, just wait until Christmas when you come down. They can also then retrieve Trent's black left-foot shoe (a thong it is too cold to wear often now). Later Mary Ellen reports that Elijah’s coat was left in their camper. Brianna’s coat, however, was left at Geri Ann’s Grandma Shirley’s house.

Leslie and Gerald assured me that Erin’s winter A&M jacket was left behind at Woodsong deliberately because she won’t need it down there until she is back for Christmas break. So it is in the coat closet waiting for her. Geri Ann’s charger for her I pod is ready to be taken to the post office. Trent’s Nintendo is on the table in the den. Jeannie left behind ingredients she brought down for a cooking project she started but didn’t get to finish. Someone’s electric toothbrush is still in the guest bathroom. I recovered my purple comb from Katherine’s vanity yesterday, where evidently someone must have been primping with it there.

Katherine got tickled thinking that all over America, families are trying to find and retrieve and figure out where their possessions are after all the Thanksgiving holidays. Most families in our area try to visit both sides of their families, and it is a challenge to keep belongings under control.

I used to marvel many years ago at the goodness and the energy used when my daughter-in-law would bring her little ones to my parents’ home in Goreville and then hurry on to another Christmas Eve gathering at her grandparents. The next day after she and Gerry observed Christmas morning at their house, they would come to ours for Christmas dinner and then onto her folks’ home for yet another dinner.

After the grandparents no longer had their observances on Christmas Eve, life did temporarily get simpler. However, now Gerry and Vickie are in far-off Georgia. Tara, their oldest, is in Aurora far north of us. We are all eagerly awaiting the birth of Tara and Bryan’s second son any day now, so holiday celebrations are definitely complicated. We will welcome whoever is able to show up before, on, or after Christmas.

Jeannie and Rick are entertaining his family at their house for the first time this year, so they won’t be down from Freeport either. She’ll experience left-behind objects at her house no doubt.

We received our first Christmas card on Saturday from cousin Valerie, who wins that contest every year. Our second card came today. I better start thinking about mine. When we can’t get together with friends and family at this time of year, it is lovely to connect by mail. And belongings stay in their rightful place when we visit by that method.

Still Thankful But Winding Down

There is still a piece or two of pumpkin pie left. Broth from the turkey carcass is ready to be put in the freezer tomorrow. And it will be time to cook something new to go with the left-over turkey from yesterday and the lasagna we had on Wednesday night. My house is quiet right now because Jeannie and the kids have gone into town to the movies. With just one family in the house, there won’t be any questions about who sleeps where tonight.

Mary Ellen and Brian and Trent and Brianna left in their camper this morning heading north to visit their family in northern Illinois. Brian’s mother Dorothy, who had driven up from Florida visiting relatives as she came, followed in her car. (The grandkids will probably take turns riding with her.) Brian’s sister Vicki has her camper all ready for Dorothy’s extended (but brief) visit there to celebrate her semi-retirement and catch up with all her grandchildren in the area.

We were reluctant to see them go, but the cousins had all seen each other, and we adults had done lots of talking around kitchen and dining room tables during the days they were here. The kids had gone to the Crab Orchard High School basketball tournament Wednesday night to see Geri Ann and Erin’s cousin Drew play, and Brianna went to Gma Shirley’s afterward to spend the night with Geri Ann.

We’ve watched the tape of Leslie’s concert at The Curb on campus, heard Lige on the piano, and as we sat around the dining room table Thursday night, we were surprised and pleased to even hear Christmas carols in the living room with Brianna on the clarinet and Sam on his trombone. I extracted a promise from Trent to help me with my computer some weekend when I am calm. I am sure the kids did whatever conferring they needed to do on their ongoing Designia project/book/campground. They have always got something going, and with texting they can keep up with each other even when miles away. And the granddog cousins--Lucky, Leah, Fif, and Chloe had all been here at least briefly to visit the farm.

Vickie and Geri Ann had left her mother Shirley’s house around six this morning also heading to northern Illinois to see Tara and Bryan and Aidan. The doctor is moving up the arrival date for Aidan’s baby brother, and Vickie is needing to see this little family since Tara can’t travel now.

Despite a terrific cold, Erin borrowed Gma Shirley’s car to come to Woodsong for the great hair highlighting project and Leslie’s hair turned out beautifully. After she gets that business degree from Texas A&M completed, Erin’s ambition has long been to go to a cosmetology school and someday open her own salon. She swore Leslie to secrecy so that her own hair would be able to amaze everyone when she arrived. I figured that Gpa’s offer of John Deere green for Leslie had inspired her. Erin’s naturally brown hair looked quite cute with a puffed blond back and streaks of turquoise and black framing her pretty face. Dave brought Sam out to play again after their futile bow-arrow deer hunt.

While I was in town to pick up Leslie on Tuesday evening standing outside at Wendy’s, my cell phone dinged and I assumed it was Les saying they were almost there. Instead there was a photograph of guy and a deer and the caption: “26-point deer shot outside Pyramid Park.” Since Katherine, Dave, and Sam live beside Pyramid Park in Marion, I assumed one of them had sent it. I did not recognize the man in the photo but it wasn’t too clear and I thought it might be one of Dave’s brothers or buddies. I figured hunters had scared the deer into town. I remembered when a wild domestic deer hung out at that park—but that’s another story. The Cedars were as puzzled as I was at the photo.We finally realized the sender must have meant Pyramid State Park and someone had misdialed my number in their excitement.

We are winding down and enjoying Jeannie’s family since they won’t be with us at Christmas. I hear people up in the kitchen home from the movies.

Autumn Activities

Members of Southern Illinois Writers Guild offered their books at our table Saturday and Sunday at the annual AutumnFest at John A. Logan College. We also display and sell our anthologies, but we have noticed a big decline in buying since the rise in gas prices. I enjoyed the day there Saturday with other writer friends.

Our village church will be having our Thanksgiving feast this Saturday night. We can’t have it the next Saturday night because that is in the middle of deer hunting season, and some on our young adults will be occupied securing heart-healthy venison to feed their families this winter.

Because I am to bake one of the turkeys with dressing for the dinner, I bought two on Monday. One is thawing in the fridge for this Saturday, and one went into the freezer for November 27.

We are excited at Woodsong because it seems like all four of our children and spouses will be present for Thanksgiving Day. I am not positive how many grandchildren can make the trip here, but there will be a house full. I think the Taylors are going to move their camper down from the other farm. If the beds and couches fill up, we’ll put blankets and bedrolls in the middle of the living room floor.

I made sure I grabbed some more of the turnips from Charles’ garden that he is sharing with us at our church. I’d already used the first mess, and I wanted some to cook for Thanksgiving Day although Gerald and I may be the only one who eats them.

Preparation for the coming holiday has centered on who is going to highlight Leslie’s hair when she arrives from Belmont. It will not be the first hair adventure that has taken place at Woodsong. Gerald joined the discussion and volunteered claiming he had experience at coloring things and was accustomed to working cheap. However, Leslie declined his offer of his variety of coloring agents—John Deere yellow and green aerosol paint and Kiwi brown shoe polish. So it looks like Erin, who has long pleased her sisters and their friends with hair-dos for special occasions, will get the job.

Our Writers Guild will be having a monthly reading tomorrow night at a local coffee house, and our anthology editor is bringing the newest anthology which is just off the press. We are all eager to see this latest volume. Our grandson Samuel is having his first middle school band concert also tomorrow night, and I am not sure I will be able to make both of these events. I may have to wait to see the new anthology at our regular meeting the next Thursday.

A Nice Fall Day

Fifty years ago today one of my fondest wishes came true. I had a new baby son. So naturally I have thought about Gerry all day today.

After I had put on a roast for our noon meal, I had time read a bit of Charles Frazier’s thirteen moons and regretted having to stop just when I got to the part of the story about the Cherokee Removal.

Being able to leave a clean kitchen to come home to barely gave me time to make it to the optometrist appointment at 2:30 in Marion. But I arrived early even after circling the block to find their beautiful new building, which still did not have an identifying sign since Dr. Power had only moved into it on Monday. Remembering the news account of a car accidentally slamming into his old office and sending patients flying, I knew he was relieved to be in a brick building with a little more space between the building and parking lot.

There I had a couple of concerns taken care of. On Saturday I had received notice from the insurance company that the over $200 left on my bill for glasses last December was not covered. I had already paid $95 in December and assumed the rest was all paid off. Immediately the women in the office assured me that this was properly covered because of its being related to the cataract surgery I had just had. They said the insurance company did this all the time and a simple phone call from them would fix it. (Why do I suspect that the insurance company enjoyed using the doctor’s money all this time?)

Then the doctor himself relieved my concern about the cataract on the other eye. I was afraid that it might have become so much worse that I would need to have the surgery before Christmas, which was exactly what I was planning to do when I had made today’s appointment many weeks ago. He assured me, however, that I could have the surgery safely with the new procedures despite being on coumadin. But also that it would probably not hurt for me to wait the six months until I am off coumadin. We talked politics during and after the exam, so the entire appointment was pleasant and interesting.

Then I was on my way around the block to Dr. Kaarsbery’s office in this newly developed professional park out by our new hospital. She wanted me to have another INR reading today to make sure she is adjusting the coumadin dosage correctly. Last week the reading had been high. A single prick on the finger and the meter assured me I was in the normal range this week.

By now it was getting cool and dark. I had to put on the jacket in the car that I’d avoided wearing. After a quick visit with Katherine, I was back to the Kroger store to pick up the prescriptions I had left there to be filled. I bought as few groceries as I could get by with because it was past supper time and I needed to hurry. With three baked chicken thighs from the deli and fresh fruit, I figured I had sufficient other foods to fill in the blank for Gerald’s supper. We were eating within l0 minutes after I arrived home, and I emptied the car after supper and Obama’s infomercial.

It had turned out to be a good day—just as it was 50 years ago.

Coming and Going

The presidential candidates are all over the map meeting up with America’s citizens to win their votes. The citizens themselves also find travel much more a part of their lives than any other time in history. Not very long ago, it was not unusual for someone to say when someone died that the person had always lived in a certain locale and had never been further than the nearest city. After the Depression, many young men and a few young women served overseas during World War II. As that Greatest Generation dies off and leaves us, we read in their obituaries of the foreign soils they traveled to.

With the cheap gas of the last decades, Americans have enjoyed and become habituated to going and coming often more limited by time than expense. People have to commute to work in places miles away. Many folk travel to shopping in larger cities without much thought. Then as our local stores went out of business, we began to find out we didn’t have anywhere else to shop but at larger communities in our regions.

Gerald and I were so tied down by livestock on the farm that we couldn’t travel for years and looked forward to that opportunity in retirement. In fact, as soon as Gerald retired from farming, his first project was buying a new truck and modifying it to haul efficiently. For the next three years, he worked as a trucker—whenever he chose to take a trip or whenever he could get a load. He loved going all over and seeing the industries back in the mountains or learning to navigate in a new city. When he travels in the same territory today, he still likes recalling those trips, and he is constantly aware of other truckers and can get envious in a hurry when he sees a beautiful truck.

Gerald left for Columbus, GA, yesterday in order to see Geri Ann’s Oconee High School softball team in the state tourney this afternoon. His plans were to stop in Nashville for a dinner date with Leslie, his blond granddaughter at Belmont University.

This is also the weekend that Erin is using some flier miles to come from Texas into Nashville. She and Les will also be having dinner together. Erin will meet a fellow Johnston City friend there and they’re driving home to Johnston City for another friend’s wedding.

I don’t even know where all Gerry’s work has taken him during the past two weeks. I do know he was able to see his grandson Aidan briefly last weekend while in Chicago. And he and Vickie like the other softball parents will be in Columbus motels right now. Tara wanted in the worst way to go with Gerald to see her little sis in the state tourney, but she knew she needed to stay in Aurora. Her December due date is taking its toll on her traveling comfort. But Mary Ellen’s family is excited that she is to be coaching in Lake Saint Louis next weekend for a Southern Force tourney. I’m excited that Jeannie’s family will be spending Halloween night here (briefly) as they arrive from Freeport on their way to spend weekend with Leslie in Nashville.

I was planning on going to the Georgia tourney also, but my doctor on Monday felt it was a risk with me still healing from the blood clot in my leg that had caused the lung clots. So I am at Woodsong instead of on a trip, but I have had a variation in my life style.

Son-in-law David is working in California this week, so I’ve been going into town to spend nights with Katherine and Sam. I come back home during the day. Katherine had a tysabri infusion yesterday and her morning aide was able to drive her to the hospital. Suddenly Tuesday night she realized she needed a ride home and both David and her dad would both be out of town. Fortunately, the evening aide came to get her instead of coming later in the evening.

Gerald believed I could drive the van, which has a lift for Katherine’s chair, but I never have and I was fearful of trying with no one to back me up if I failed. The only time I tried to drive the van, I did not get out of Katherine’s driveway. I quit to avoid hitting Sam’s basketball goal with the projecting side mirror as I backed. I also don’t understand the lift’s operation. The van certainly takes enormously more gas than the wise choice David has for travel to his work place, but we’ve come to expect that those in chairs should no longer have to live their lives confined to their homes.

Our other sons-in-law and our next-door neighbor are also often away from home for coaching events, conventions, or meetings. Our only other near neighbor travels nightly from her farm to her job in a plant over an hour away. This time of year we pray for her safety from the deer dashing across the highways, and soon we will once again fear the icy roads for her.

While the increase in travel is partly pleasure gratification, travel has been built into our work lives. We can never go back to living in insulated geographic bubbles with little contact with the outside world no matter how attractive that nostalgic pull feels. I have always loved reading about village life and also loved experiencing it. How people connect and interact is fascinating and when people can’t easily go elsewhere, there is no question their local community connections are more vigorous and often more life enhancing. One of my all-time favorite books was poet Elizabeth Bishop’s translation of The Diary of Helena Morley, the actual diary of a young teenage girl who told of her life in her village of Diamantina in Brazil in 1893-1895,

The same sort of village or community life is created within cities as people connect with those of common interests. When two of our daughters lived in the same city, we had to laugh at the interconnectedness that made it just as indiscreet to talk negatively about someone there as in it was when my mother moved to Dad’s hometown of Goreville, where everyone was either our family’s relations or relations of relations.

Now we have farm friends and city friends who are hurting while trying to keep gas in their cars to get to work. We have friends who have had to cut out attending functions they really want to attend in order to save gas. We have wise friends with no economic problems who, nevertheless, have cut gas consumption because it is astute to do so and because it is patriotic to do so.

How our nation will come out of this dependence on foreign oil and our present economic crisis will be interesting to observe. I have a feeling that we are going to find out what we are made of in the next few years. Will we be as strong as our grandparents who survived the Depression with much suffering and ingenuity? Will we be as self-sacrificing and as tough as the Greatest Generation who helped us survive World War II?

Home Sweet Home

Dear All--

Late yesterday afternoon, Gerald brought me home from Barnes-Jewish Hospital after 5 days there following our combined trip for BSU reunion/cardiology appointment/stress test for Gerald//visit with daughter Mary Ellen's family in the west St. Louis area.

Gerald's test results were good,, and Dr. Alan Weiss was kind enough to work me into Gerald's appointment time and send me to the hospital, where it was determined I had blood clots in lung making my breathing difficult.

I am in good shape with no serious harm done. No restrictions at all on my activities tho I was warned that my energy level will be low for a week or so, and that is true. There was no pain involved in any of this except for minor pain of shots, etc. What caused this clotting? Nobody knows. Doctors focused on traveling, and Gerald wondered if it was the hours at the computer! (Surely not!! Ha. Ha.)

The serious blood clots are now dissolved. As I understand it, the coming six-month regimen on warfarin (blood thinner) will help the body in its natural fight to keep blood from developing too-large clots. After six months, if all goes as expected, I will go off the warfarin. (For your edification, Gerald is quick to call this med "rat poison." He is quite experienced on all this INR coumadin testing, etc.)

I am grateful for the blessing of having the timing on this episode work out so that I was seen by Gerald's cardiologist, whom daughter Mary Ellen had researched and recommended to us. I felt very comfortable knowing I was being seen by one of the best in the nation, and I felt that was comforting to our children. I was as relaxed as one can be in the hospital when every few minutes, someone was in the room asking questions that often I did not know the answer to--or taking me for yet another test. No time or energy for phone calls, etc. After all the tests, I am reassured that my heart is just fine.

I know to never again postpone going to ER if I get breathless again. Actually I already knew this. And in a difference set of circumstances, I would have gone to Marion ER earlier--but I was not at Marion. So oddly, the timing on this turned out to be perfect. This makes me feel that I am meant to complete some writing projects important to me and to de-clutter my messy office that I am very ashamed of. So I thank God for the new lease on time on this planet.

I also thank so many of you for your kind thoughts and prayers. Last night as I worked my way through emails and read your notes saying you were praying for me, I felt very loved and encouraged and grateful for good friends. You will hear more from me when my energy returns and I catch up. Tonight I have to listen to the debate.

Love from Woodsong,

Sue