Impressions while ringing bells for Salvation Army

I just thought I'd send this out without any editorializing at all. It is sort of a slice of the Christmas scene that we all see.

So many different kinds of people. So interesting to watch. So many who have bad legs and have trouble walking. I asked one man who had legs that seemed to splay out all over the place and had a cane if the cold weather made them feel worse, and he replies with a smile that he can’t even feel one of them which I took to mean he had a wooden leg. He forked out $5 to put in the kettle.

The bus stopped in front of the door. He left it running and the door open while he came in the store to use the bathroom. The desire to take the bus and take off was overpowering and when he came out I told him I almost took your bus and took off, he said cheerfully Well, here you go and I’ll ring the bell for you.

Mothers with new babies all covered up against the cold. Little children, many with their grandparents, toddlers. One grandfather wasn’t so nice. You could tell he wasn’t too happy taking care of his grandchild. The child did not want to let go of his hand when they went through the door and he was very irritated with him. The child wanted his grandma on one side and his granddad on the other.

The people who quickly walk by and put in a dime or a quarter are few. Most give a dollar or a lot of change. Some walk by so guiltily not giving. I figure they gave to another charity or maybe sent a big check to the Army and feel no bad vibes for them.

I never realized there are so many people with bad legs, crooked backs, and yet they are trying to shop for their loved ones. I even had a woman in a wheelchair with a beautiful seeing eye dog. It was a golden retriever. I admired the dog and asked if it was permissible to pet it knowing that sometimes you are not supposed to. She said the dog was working now and therefore I should not.

Big burly men with wild hair, sometimes long, would always stop and give some bucks and two very poorly dressed men each gave a dollar or two. One guy happened to come in when a whole bunch of ladies and such were coming and he stayed at the door and opened it and held it for all of them! Such a gentleman. Not many do that anymore these days.

The old ladies on pensions would put in a quarter or two. The young women would give a host of change out of their purses which amount to two or three dollars. So many surprised me by making such an effort. Their arms were filled with packages and they would either put them down and get the money out of their tight jeans or fish it out with great difficulty still holding on to their packages.

There was the little old lady from Denmark, WI who was Danish and stood and talked with me for a while, my being a fellow Scandihoovian. She said she was probably the last of the old Danish settlers in that town.

The people would sometimes come in droves and stand around waiting for their turn to put money in. The men would peel off a dollar. Some came prepared. A foreign lady and her husband, I think they must have been the Russian immigrants they have been talking about, made a great contribution and wished me a very Merry Christmas—so happy they were it seemed to me to make the contribution.

I wish I had had a pad and pencil as they came in so I could remember all of the different people who came in. I get such a kick out of the older men who treat me as if I were a young lady. It makes me feel warm all over.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder

"So all night long the storm roared on:

The morning broke without a sun:

In tiny spherule traced with lines

Of Nature's geometric signs,

In starry flake, and pellicle,

All day the hoary meteor fell,

And, when the second morning shone,

We looked upon a world unknown....."

SNOWBOUND John Greenleaf Whittier

Many of you probably lived through the same storm, but I took a few pictures of my back yard and I thought I would send them out to those of you who live in warmer climes to see. I also included a picture of the geraniums which I rescued prior to the storm and saved a touch of summer.

GIVE THREE CHEERS

I don't know about the rest of you but when the first snow hit us on Friday, even if it didn't stay, I was not happy to see it. I used to love the first snow. Got down to 18 in the night. Wrote to my daughter in Texas that she can expect a visitor after Christmas, if I am welcome, that is. Course they haven't been having such great weather either. Too cold for dipping into the lake like I did one Christmas. Winter is upon us and I wish I lived where Goosebreeder lives down in Australia where she is looking forward to Spring and Summer. (I mixed up names/places in my previous edition of this post. Please visit Bernie in Alberta. She has a most beautiful post up right now.)

Not much doing on the blog scene either. Everyone is busy this time of year getting ready for Christmas. Jim has decorated the outside and that looks nice and will be prettier when the snow stays. So many people go all out and really decorate more than they used to. The whole city is aglow at night with all the different lights and it gets dark around 3:30 here now.

Have just about finished reading Julie & Julia. It really took until the near middle of the book for me to really enjoy it. I loved her wrestling with killing the lobster. I remember my mom saying they screamed when you threw them in the boiling water. Jordan, my other son, goes to a Christmas party where they each buy their own lobster, and he brings his big outdoor pot, but he won't throw them in. He splits when that part comes. He always was an animal lover and a softy.

Yesterday, I got the urge to hear my eldest son's favorite record that he played over and over when he was a kid. H. M. S. PINAFORE and I went around the kitchen yelling "Then give three cheers and one cheer morrrre forrr the Captain of the Pinafore. " Was sort of an inspiring and happy memory.

Well I have Christmas presents to wrap that I shopped for the other day, so this is all she wrote.

LAST OF THANKSGIVING MEMORIES

I thought I would share with all of you some of the bits of our Thanksgiving . Jim and I were invited down to my son's house in a city about 75 miles away. Here are some of the scenes of our day.

Such a vividly beautiful Thanksgiving table setting!

Miranda showed off her Halloween Bunny

Costume

Another view of Matilda

The day ended with a quick return to catch a visit with Bill and we got him just as they were putting him to bed.

Below is something Jim ,my son who is visiting, wrote that I think holds a real thanksgiving message...

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It is his only contact with the God that has sustained him for all these years through toil, war, illness, rejoicing, tears, sweat and now Alzheimer's. He was eager to be there by 10 am, in the activity room where church is held for the residents by a WELS Lutheran pastor who accepts all Lutherans.

Dad rolled his wheelchair down the long halls to the activity room with the altar in the corner. About 13 Lutherans in wheelchairs came where two or three are gathered in His name will have Christ in their midst as we are told by our Lord.

They handed out the red LCMS hymnbooks of yesteryear. Hands that once were confident and strong are shaky, deformed from years of arthritis could barely hold on to hymnals. Eyes weary from age needed help finding the hymns while the pastor said the words, line by line so they would understand them. Feeble voices filled the air when the hymns were sung with a piano, and every stanza was sung to the end.

The lesson was on Psalm 118 of thanksgiving that mentions "O give thanks unto the Lord for he is good; for his mercy endureth forever!" (I remember singing that in the liturgy during my childhood in the red old Lutheran Service Book & Hymnal)

The sermon was on how unthankful many of us are during this time of economic downturn, job loss, and aged and broken bodies that long to be 20 years old again. However, we were reassured that God still cares and that his mercy will endure in our lives and we need to be thankful.

Then it came time for the Lord's Prayer. Dad at 87, whose Alzheimer's has taken away his speech patterns and physical mobility, started talking and reciting from deep within. I looked at him and watched, as the prayer is something that the demonic Alzheimer's has not taken away yet.

I felt a tear in my eye as it was beautiful hearing my Dad recite with confidence, a prayer, which has been instilled in him from the time of childhood. I gave him a hug. I thought of my family then who I wished were there to see the lovely moment that I had just been given.

The Lord's mercy endured today and I was able to see a glimpse of my father like he used to be. Perhaps that is what God wanted me to see today to help me be reassured that my Dad is still there despite his fading away from us

MY FIRST CAR

MY FIRST CAR



When we lived in Denver several years ago (a whole lot of years ago, I guess) I had Grandpa’s old green Plymouth Fury with the big fins for my personal use. That car had been many places and did even make the trip from Minnesota, tho it was not in the best of shape .

One day I was going to play golf over on Federal Blvd way and as I went down 104th to the six lane corner, I put on the brakes for the stop light and it decided it wanted to go right on through. I escaped unscathed only because the blue language yelled at me by the entire cross traffic covered me with a fog so that miraculously I was not hit. If you believe that, well, I have a piece of land down in……. No, I don’t know how I escaped being hit. All I know was that I was mad and I made a U turn and drove back to 104th.

Those of you who know Denver know that l04th is car sales alley and so I drove into the first one I came to which happened to be a VW garage. I was met by John who was fascinated by my red striped top. No mastectomies yet! I saw this pale yellow vokes bug which I loved immediately and began to haggle for price and allowance for my great big Plymouth. I got the allowance I wanted and I wrote a check for the rest and drove my first car home that I had bought on my own... Sure, I had been consulted about the previous cars, but this one only I made the decision, signed, sealed and delivered.



My eldest 16 year old son would take the car up in the mountains and he and his friends would ride on Jeep trails with it as far as they could. When they came to a place where there could go no further, they simply lifted the car and turned her around.

Everyone in the family seemed to love Griselda and my husband, tho he complained when he had to fit his 6 foot 2 inches frame into it, went along with it too. When we moved to Michigan, the car came along. Actually, my daughter used it often when she attended Michigan State. They had a lot of fun with that car. One day when she came out of class a gang of guys had lifted the car up umpteen steps and there it sat in front of the doors in all its glory looking down on everybody.

I loved my little yellow VW but one day Bill started sounding the ominous note that the ball joints were going and therefore it was no longer safe to drive. Knowing nothing about that sort of thing, I agreed and Bill turned her in for a Nova. I later found out that VWs do not have ball joints. Men—got balls, but such liars!!!!

My first car was fun. I shall never forget it.

Old? Who me? Of course

"The advantage of being eighty years old is that one has had many people to love" Jean Renoir



Hey, everyone, I just had another birthday! I am 85 years old or at least working on it. How can that be, you ask. You were just 83 the last time we looked. This is my way of looking at it.

Years ago, I read somewhere that the Chinese way of looking at age is that when you are born you are not counted to be one year old until you have completed that year. Therefore your birthday is always behind by one year. You follow? So when you get to your birthday, you have been working on that year all the time before and therefore you have finished that year and are starting a new one. So this next year I shall tell everyone I am 85 and then when my birthday comes again I won’t feel so bad because I have been that age for a whole year already. Is that nuts? My kids think so.

There seems to be also something in my memory bank about how they also count the 9 months in the womb some way. Some of you won’t like that. You are already older than you think. Bad. Well, age isn’t such a bad thing. You cannot stop time and although I would like to go back, as does everyone I think, one cannot. So you accept it and enjoy each day you can.

There are a lot of misconceptions about old agers. One that I always debunked when I was teaching school was to tell the kids that just because someone is old does not mean they are wiser. If they were stupid when they were young, they are just as stupid when they get old. Harsh? Perhaps, but wisdom does not come automatically with experience and long life.

This post came out of the blue. I did think of a topic yesterday as my son and I were driving home from Appleton after a brief shopping trip. But I forgot what it was and he can’t remember it either, so there you go. It probably will come back to me sometime. So for now, this is it.

In Your Face Laughter

“Laughter is the sun that drives the winter from the human face “

Mark Twain


Have you ever gone back in your life and thought about the things that really can still make you laugh? I, of course, have a huge advantage here as I have lived longer, but then again I have forgotten more.

One of the funniest memories that can really make me haw haw laugh is the following. Bill and I were attending one of our daughter’s friend's wedding and were staying in this cool hotel along with the other guests. At the reception which followed, Bill had a great time dancing like a mad fool and drinking probably too much.

The party broke up and we got to our hotel and as we were going to get ready for bed, Bill in slurred speech said that he wanted “one more drink with his daughter and that husband of hers” and took off out of the room. I tried to stop him. Apparently my daughter didn’t enjoy his drunken self either for he came back to the room fairly soon. I was already in bed and he was trying to get undressed in the near dark as quietly as possible.

I lay there listening to his efforts and his blistering comments under his breath as he got tangled up in his clothes. Finally he made it. He turned toward the bed and I heard him take a deep breath and throwing his arms in the air made a flying leap toward what he thought was the bed. He landed Kerplunk right beside it on the floor!

I turned on the light and looked at him sprawled out on the carpet and I could not stop laughing. He wasn’t hurt, just mad. My mom used to say that God takes care of drunks and babies. And I guess that was the case that night. But I can still see his big 6 foot 2 inches frame flying through the air and landing –thump. And I have to start laughing all over again.

And then there was the time we were on a trip to Canada in my son Jon’s new Regal Buick. . We were staying in this hotel and I had gone into the bathroom. The fire alarm sounded and Bill and the boys all ran out of the motel (Jon to move his precious new car away from the building) and without a thought for their mother and wife left me in the john. The fan must have drowned out the sound of the fire alarm and when I finally came out and heard it, I grabbed some suitcases and struggled down the hall. When I reached my gang outside they took one look and laughed and laughed. Especially Bill. He said he could just see the headlines of the morning newspaper WOMAN DIES IN BATHROOM WHILE SITTING ON THE THRONE and laughed and laughed again. Oh, by the way, it was a false alarm.

Then there’s the story of my new vacuum cleaner. Lorraine my best friend and neighbor came over and we were reading the instructions on how you put the dustbag on. It was a good old Hoover with the plastic hose sticking out upon which you were supposed to put the rubber thingy which was attached to the bag. As we struggled to pull the rubber like attachment onto the hose, all of sudden we both thought the same thing- and we rolled over in laughter on the floor. I think of it every time I change the bag on my present vacuum (still a Hoover) and laugh and laugh again.

I’ll bet every one of you could think of funny events that occurred in your life to make you laugh. How about sharing some of them?