Tag Archives: Memories

I think I’ll call her Goldie-locks

Her real name is Marigold. Youngish and still a bit skittish with strangers, our new Gran-pup came to visit with her mom and dad. Marigold was rescued a few months ago and then adopted into the family a few weeks ago. This is her first visit and we found her to be a lovely houseguest, quiet and polite. Isn’t she lovely? The sound of her nails on the floors brought back so many memories of our Ada and the silence when she had gone was loud.

August days bring parties and birthdays and here in the “land of pleasant living”, steamed blue crabs covered in seasoning are on the table. Smiles are on faces and warm memories are being made. I hope you are enjoying these last warm days of summer!

July 3

The day started too hot, too humid; the heavy still disturbed by cicadas calling.

A single blue hydrangea bloom glows; the extreme winter freeze caused the old blooming wood to die off many of the hydrangeas.

By 5 pm, darkness had closed in, then thunder rolled and crashed across the sky chasing lightening flashes. I count the seconds between, marking the distance. I remember my parents’ front porch on the house at the top of the hill where I’d stake claim to the chaise and watch the storms rolling in from the west streak the sky with jagged lights and feel the gratitude of rain laden breezes cooling hot skin on summer evenings.

So I went outside and sat under cover and listened, quieting myself. In the midst of the storm the hummingbird came and drank and sparrows flew in for dinner too. None seemed concerned by the din or rain. Their Father had provided bloom and feeder and with that they were content. I went in and cooked our simple meal, it was delicious.

The rain continues; the air, 20 degrees cooler, refreshes.

Scent of spring

Early in the morning on the warm spring air, scent drifts through the garden chores and speaks to me of Mom.

And I remember the bottle with the French name that sat on her dressing table tray. She taught us to take the tiniest bit on a finger and daintily apply it to wrist and neck. Muguet Des Bois Eau de Toilette.

I only pick a few Lily of the Valley blooms but they are enough to bring back her smile and her laughter this spring morning.

I’m From Twelve Days of Christmas

It has been about seven years since I stepping into the family history adventure. In this time I have met new family and said good-by to several senior members of these wonderful tribes. My life has been so enriched by the stories and I have grown interested in memoir. How I wish to come upon some long ago writings!

This year I found Spiritual Memoirs 101 and sometimes I even do the exercises!

This is a quiet time and so I’ve mused on the “Where Are You From?” Christmas exercise, one which you might find fun as we continue on through these twelve days of Christmas. So many are ready to put out the tree but for my family, we would still be in Christmas mode, and would stay so past Twelfth Night giving Dad a chance to celebrate his birthday in a festive house before boxes had to be fetched from the attic, packed and then hoisted up again.

I’m from twelve days of Christmas

I’m from sugar cookies rolled thin, Quality Street candy and candy canes too

I’m from homemade fruitcake, family dinners and packages sent ’round the world

I’m from Advent wreaths and singing O Come, O Come, Emmanuel on dark December mornings

I’m from candle lighted windows, frosty cold bedroom and a warm, cozy kitchen

I’m from prickly holly and an angel topped tree

I’m from red felt stockings hung down the stairs and secrets and laughter and Christmas tears

I’m from row house grandparents and Manger gardens with trains

I’m from Christmas movies and carols sung off-key

I’m from department store Christmas windows and market stalls of treats

What Christmas treasures have been mine! Like an amazing box of ornaments from a storehouse, each one unwrapped, the beautiful, the not so, some broken and ugly and all come alive again in memory. I sit here long years later, listening to wind howl, gazing into candlelight and feel the smile play on my face. For just a moment it can all real again, the crisp snap of a cookie, the pungent smell of sherry soaked fruitcake, the couch where I sat in tree and candlelight and longed for snow. I can feel the cold and crowds pressed in to see the wondrous animated scenes in the store windows and smell the roasting peanuts near the market bus stop and even warm my hands once again on the large bag of them I hold for the long ride home.

There were tears that stained Christmases too. Time and understanding have faded them gently to the background like the soft crumpled tissue that will cradle it all until another Christmas comes.

Joyous Christmas Greetings!

Susan Branch did a lovely post on houses today in which she likens a house to a bank into which deposits are made with the life experiences that happen there. Today I did some baking and listened to old Christmas music and thought about the immense comfort it brings, stirring memories of early home so deeply etched in my soul.

As I worked along, I could see again a Christmas eve. I sat on the steps behind stockings lined down the banister and watched as Dad painstakingly hung silvery tinsel from every branch while A Christmas Carol played on the radio. Sometimes I would be called to come behind the closed bedroom door to choose paper and ribbon for a gift I was to give.

I am grateful for the sweet spirit of Christmas past hovering near this cold, snowy Christmas Eve comforting in the loss of several friends who leave empty spaces in our lives this year.

My today house has many deposits in its walls. It is a quiet place this year but the laughter hidden in its walls makes me smile and decorate and enjoy living in this moment.

This nativity from our family room is special to me with its collection of animals and angels in great variety!

All are welcome at the manger.

September 9th musing

Today I remember Mom…

I love the look of expectation on her face in this photo.

I met a distant relative and her first in person words to me were, “You look just like your mother!” And my thought was, “You had not seen her in decades!”

I remember “The Day” in my early teen years when Mom came home from the hairdresser – A Blond! I don’t think I knew anyone whose mom had done such a thing; I was a bit scandalized.

But for Mom, it was a perfect fit with her blue/green eyes and golden skin. She was never going to be grey or white and was always a bit dismayed that I chose that route. I had not the eye color nor the skin tone of a golden girl.

While she was known to take one aside and give a bit of unwanted advice, I don’t think anyone doubted her good intentions. She wanted only the best for her family and gave her best whether she made a favorite dish for a holiday meal, sent a special card, gave a word of encouragement, spent hours on a hand-crocheted afghan, prom dress or even a wedding gown

If you were excited about something, she wanted to be in on the fun. She loved life.

Happy Birthday, Mom, you’re never forgotten.

Remember me…

This afternoon we went to pay respect to the life of an older friend. In these last years that I have known her, her conversation would always flow to family and festivities and the cakes she would be baking. The list of cakes would sometimes include a 1,2,3,4 Cake and always a Hot Milk Sponge Cake, both of which would make me yearn for my mom’s cakes. So we would talk cake and Brownies – actually, she would do the talking, I rarely bake and no one is going to give my cakes rave reviews – just saying. I never had an opportunity to sample her baking but I always had a sampling of her heart in the joy and love radiating from her as she anticipated the occasion.

So I talked about cake today and watched eyes fill with memories and tears and heard again of the Hot Milk Cakes. I also listen for stories and today I heard, “She was very old school and wrote letters and cards for everyone. No one does that these days.”

When it was time to leave I noticed an amazing assortment of beautiful hanging baskets of flowers. In an unusual and gracious gesture, her sons had purchased these for their visitors to take home, to remember.

So, in remembering LaRue, I share my flowers and I write to you.

Peaceful dreams to you this night.

Garden Tending

Then the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend it. Gen 2:15

Gardens and yards have always been in my memories. My first memory is of being in the back yard of my family’s first home. It must have been after a heavy rain for a rivalette of water had cut a path through the grass revealing tiny stones along its bank. A magic world opened before me.

I shared this memory with my older sister a while back musing over the tall tress that enclosed this private world. There was a long quiet while I looked back into that place. Finally she said, “You were very small, so I guess the trees would have seemed tall to you.”

And so they did! How glad I am for my memory with child-size rivers and rocks and grass to capture my young soul with wonder and beauty.

Years later I would listen to my mother refrer back to that yard in wonder – “You could grow anything there!” And the litany of flowers and Victory Garden offerings would follow. This, of course, was in contrast to the yard around us of hard clay. They worked and coaxed and composted and supplemented and tended. It was hard work but they persisted and were rewarded.

I now tend gardens, not everything I plant grows. Plants mysteriously disappear in winter, vacation somewhere and sometimes return years later having taken up residence in another part of the yard!

It is a wild place where we do battle with deer and racoons and rabbits and the occasional ground hog and thorns and thistles, too. But still we tend and the first harvest is a special delight even if it is only radishes!

Recently my friend took me to visit a secret garden and I was so delighted to visit this beautiful place tended with love. I’m glad I took my camera so that I could share a bit with you.

Spring Cleaning

Cleaning e-files, I found a devotional piece I wrote several years ago; just on the day I needed it!

The flowers appear on the earth; the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land Song of Solomon 2:12 NKJV

The rising temperatures of spring bring bird song and light, changing the view to fresh green and bright color. Spring is a gift that lightens the spirit, lights the days and stirs us to brighten the world around us.

When I was very young, there was a great flurry of activity each spring. Windows were thrown open, rooms aired and cleaned. Draperies were changed, walls were washed and sometimes freshly painted, carpets were changed out and floors had the wax renewed. Everyone was energized, everything seemed light and fresh. Then finally the freshening of wardrobes with things outgrown discarded.

Housekeeping customs have changed in many ways and I am grateful! But there is still that inner stirring, a nesting instinct, to clean, clean out, throw open the windows and to make things fresh: in home, garden and wardrobe.

But while working on home and garden, I think about the need for an interior cleaning of a different kind. I find some dusty, actually rather grim and dirty attitudes lurking in corners of my soul; petty things that had loomed so large in the shadowy light of winter gloom. Now seen in the light, I find no use for them. It is time to really lighten up, cast off negative attitudes and sing a new song.

And I find myself praying – Lord, shine the light of Your Word into every corner of my soul. Help me to let go of old ideas and weed out grimy thoughts. Please do the necessary repairs on my weariness that I might have freshness. Blow through my attitudes changing and renewing my mind. Let me hear the singing birds and please, clean even my glasses that I might see beauty in the more colorful folks around me. Amen!

Some things don’t change and spring cleaning is still needed in me as well as around me. I’ll be pretty busy this spring!

The detour

The last time we went to the park, I asked for a detour on the way home. It would not take long to visit the past, I thought. So we drove down a country road where nothing looked familiar but the railroad tracks that ran alongside. The end of the road and a sharp turn left and instead of waterside cottages of the past, modern three story floodplain compliant homes confused us as we drove slowly down streets with only familiar names. Finally we saw it.

The tiny house with the separate summer kitchen shadowed by trees I hardly remember.

I remember countless hours splashing about in the river on summer days, long bamboo fishing poles, crabbing from a boat, blankets spread for reading in shade, chatting with cousins and aunts and uncles and the smoke of grilling burgers and hotdogs. There was freedom to run into the cool of the summer kitchen in wet bathing suits dripping on the concrete floor. Adults chatted late in the night while we chased fireflies and then dragged reluctant feet for the long ride home.

We grew up and brought our own young ones to play and enjoy the river. I could see and hear it all in the few minutes I leaned over the fence and breathed the air and captured this scene. The power of memory!

Like my Grandfather, we can hope to build a space in time for future generations to dream and create memories of laughter and family. It doesn’t have to be a cottage on a river; so many more memories came from simple city rowhouses and suburban back yards and porches. The important thing is to make time and space for those we love, isn’t it?