MARCH 2012 —-Became a member of THE SISTERS ON THE FLY CLUB (member # 3513)
This is a group of ladies that travel all over the Country in a caravan so to speak in vintage trailers. No Men, No Kids, No pets. Just woman having fun. It looked like a fun NEW thing to try. So I became a member of THE SISTERS ON THE FLY.
MARCH 2013
We bought a vintage camper ( 1967 De Camp) from a young man who received it from his grandparents and had been living in it -in their backyard. I looked it over, paid the young man and we pulled it home. To say it needed some help was a total understatement, but it was what I could afford …so THE DREAM BEGAN.
MARCH 2015
We pulled it out of the fence row where it has set for two years and pulled it into one of the garage stalls attached to our home. There my “great” friend Cheryl and I began to gut the old camper. It was a fun day as we ripped and tore and entertained the idea of a girls weekend when the restoration was complete.
TODAY–FEBRUARY 2017
You cannot move a mountain in a day, or maybe a year, or two. That’s a given. My original concept was great, but implementing the time and attention it would take to make this restoration happen is something I sorely underestimated.
Life can be crazy busy. Mother Teresa said once “we all have that same amount of hours in a day, its what we choose to do IN THOSE HOURS that matter”. Between Three grown children with spouses and 12 BEAUTIFUL GRANDBABIES……(and i do mean beautiful, there isnt a throw away in the bunch…. lol) time for working on this ” trailer dream” is slim to none .
AS YOU WILL NOTICE IN THE PHOTOS BELOW, THIS TRAILER HAD FAR MORE EXTENSIVE DAMAGE THAT WE ORIGNALLY ESTIMATED. ONCE WE BEGAN TEARING DOWN TO REPAIR…..WELL THE “TEAR DOWN” KEPT GOING DEEPER AND DEEPER.
This January (2017) We began yet again. We tore it all apart….literally down to the frame. up to a point, all systems were a go, then while i was attempting to cut the side walls separate from the roof with a reciprocating saw… and smash and cut my index finger between the neck of the saws hammer head and the trailer. Pinched the finger and then blew the whole under side of it out and open. I saw the blood and about one inch of the bone and felt pretty sick. Quite painful, throbbed for days and took 3 weeks to heal.
As you can see, it’s almost not worth re-modeling. And I admit that while I can have the tenacity of a wolverine once I sink my teeth into something, I have contemplated several times of just throwing in the wrecking hammer, chopping up the frame for scrap and just “buying” someone else’s dream.
However, at this point it is our goal to have this back together and in useable shape by Memorial Day 2017. We will make repairs to the walls, and once we sand the frame, spray it, lay it, insulate it….set the new walls and run new metal on the exterior then the interior will begin.
These are a few of the reasons we wanted to go with a vintage camper ,
This vintage girl came from the Masonic Temple (Masons) in my township. When I helped moved the old lodge to the new one almost 18 years ago this gem was headed for the scrap yard. It is my intent to use it in my camper. We come from 6 generations of biscuit makers so its important to me to be able to cook biscuit in this stove for those two reasons.
I began a quilt almost 30 years ago of a Dresden pattern …made with the clothing from our three babies. I have made many quilts through the years, but this one has lingered in a tote far too long. I was waiting for the right purpose. Over 22 years ago, ” a friend” at the time told me these little “material wheels” were ugly, didn’t match, and she wouldn’t make anything out of them.
My Lemonade today to her lemons is….I am going to sew them strategically together on pieces of distressed muslin and then when I have large enough pieces of them all sewed together, I will cut our curtains and they are going to be the curtains in my camper. I know every piece of clothing in these wheels. I know which was our first daughters dress, or jammies, our sons shirt, and our second daughters little dress, skirt etc. I hope to surround myself, and fill my camper with the BEAUTIFUL THINGS I CAN FROM MY LIFES JOURNEY.
I will leave this writing for now…. with God’s Blessing and a lot of family labor, I hope to update it soon with more photos and share the continued progress of our vintage camper restoration.
UPDATE: In 2025, the camper was scrapped only after it was deemed beyond repair by several people, but not before I nearly cut off my first two fingers with a reciprocating saw while trying to separate the roof from the side wall. To this day, I still dream of a small vintage camper but I have decided that I am too old now for buying one to repair, rebuild and make mine. One day, I will buy a small trailer for myself. Maybe.
Today is your birthday (June 20)…all that I want to is to sit in here at my deck, and sort through this box of pictures, and letters, till the day is gone, maybe wear one of your t-shirts and drink a Coors-lite in your honor.
As long as there is a breath in this human body, there will always be “question marks” regarding some of the chapters in the Grand book of Life. I KNOW that I will not understand on this side of Heaven why things happen as they do. The good stuff and the bad things. It’s strange how something incredible can happen to us, perhaps a once-in-a-lifetime thing; we accept it and move forward to the next station of our lives, rarely revisiting that good fortune. We live in it, and we may be all the better for it happening, but we continue walking the path of the daily grind and don’t give it much thought.
Alas, this cannot be said about a rough time, a sad time, one of those moments that broke our hearts in two. Those moments live inside of us daily. They never go away, and only time eases the intensity of the pain or the brokenness, but it never removes it. IT’S THE CIRCLE OF LIFE. We learn from the tough times, and appreciate the good times…What doesn’t kill us makes us more alive.
Larry is my cousin. He was born 13 years before me. On June 20, 1949. By the time that I was 5 years old … Larry had been drafted into the Vietnam War. By the time I was 15…I saw him once or twice at his parents’ house, which was just west of my parents’ home.
Most of the time, we, the younger brood of cousins, kept our distance from him. His family quickly discovered, upon his arrival home after serving three years in NAM, that Larry was in a fragile state of mind. If you started a vacuum sweeper without warning him, or a loud truck drove by, he would DIVE under a coffee table or chair and start yelling for his comrades to take cover. Larry would not speak of the horrors that He saw over there, and normally, he wore a beautiful smile, and no one would have guessed the damage within his mind.
When I was 16, He had a wedding and was married. A little boy was born of that union. Then another marriage to a wonderful gal, two little boys were born from that union. And I believe there were 2 other marriages after those two. Eventually, Larry moved out west to Nevada and bought a mountain. His own mountain and he was proud of it. It had no electricity and no running water, but he LOVED it. He used generators for power, and He carried a 300-gallon tank in the back of his black Ford Ranger pickup. Once a week, after work, he would fill up in town at his brother’s home and drive it out to his mountain to offload it. He used a gravity feed system to supply his RV park model trailer with water for showering and such. He also had a poly take on the roof of his little cabin, to heat the water for showers. He was inventive.
I saw him in 1989. He flew home for the funeral of his sister-in-law. We spoke a few words to one another but nothing long or meaningful. In the summer of 2000, through another cousin, I was given his email address. I touched base with Larry then and we began to visit via the net regularly. Larry invited us to come out and see his Mountain, see where he worked and how he lived. His mountain he said, 4 miles off the road, and clear around to the top. By March of 2002, I was making plans to visit Nevada with my 18-year-old son.
On June 17, 2002, we landed in Reno, Nevada. From the moment we saw one another, Larry and I instantly became “like twins”. We were so similar in our actions, thoughts, and feelings. We used to joke and say, ‘Isn’t it funny how much alike we are? Do you think it’s our spirits meshing or just the fact that we have the same DNA?’ We would be talking about our childhood memories and suddenly reminiscing about the same room at Grandma’s house, or the red hip-roof barn that we were not supposed to go into, or all of Grandpa George’s rose bushes in the garden, which we were not allowed to disturb. Then, suddenly, we would laugh at the fact that we were both talking about the same grandparents, the same home, but our memories were 13 years apart. He could remember a younger and more vivid Grandma than I could. He had a small Golden Book about the Lone Ranger sitting on his bookcase. He said, my Grandma gave me that for Christmas when I was four. It was signed to Larry, Merry Christmas 1953. Then he would laugh and say….well OUR grandma.
While we were there, we visited many of the area sights. Silver Springs, Fallon, The Ponderosa and BEAUTIFUL, HISTORICAL Virginia City. Where we walked on old, weathered, boarded sidewalks. I loved the sound of boots walking across it, and just about every man out there wore spurs that jingled when he walked. I was mesmerized by the sound. My Son spent a lot of time missing his girlfriend, and that cell phone bill when we got home is something we laugh about today, but didn’t find it funny in 2002. ($350.00 roaming charges. On a dis note, He married the girl and they have 5 beautiful children today. First a Son, and four girls followed close behind him.)
A few days after our arrival to Nevada, Larry’s celebrated his 54rd birthday. One afternoon Larry told My son and I that there was a mountain he had still never climbed since he moved out west almost 20 years prior and he wanted to drive out there. So, the three of us did just that. Out west, it’s always dry and everyone has a cooler in the back of their truck or car. It will have water, beer, pop, tea, etc but no one travels without a cooler because it is hot and dry out there.
I remember that morning well, Larry packed the cooler, told Thom and I to each grab a gun belt off the lamp post, which always had several guns loaded and ready to strap one on. In Nevada, everyone carries a gun wherever they go. Thom was all about this. We stopped at a gas station on our way out of town with holsters on and guns loaded we walked into the gas station and picked up a few more drinks and snacks. It was just the oddest feeling to me to walk around armed….in public….lol. I am a dead aim with a 44. Loved it.
As we traveled closer and closer to the distant mountains and then began our climb around the outside perimeter, it was hair-raising to say the least. The roads were narrow at times and very nerve-racking to look over the edge, but we continued our pilgrimage up this unclaimed mountain that Larry had always wanted to conquer. When we arrived…We got out to stretch our legs, and Larry let out a yell of celebration. It was amazing, and beautiful, and you could literally see for miles and miles and miles.
There was a large rock formation that would make a cool picture but there was a 3-foot-wide crack we had to jump to get to that rock. If we fell or lost our footing, it would have been an absolute death sentence. Ask me today why I ever made that jump, and I could not tell you. I wouldn’t allow my son to jump it, but I did. I was 40 years old…. should have known better but thought I had already had 40 good years, so why not. It wasn’t a smart move. Today, I realize how awful it would have been for Thom to have to find his way back to a town some 98 miles away and live with what he might have seen that could have happened. I will blame it on the elevation and lack of oxygen in my head.
On the way home from that celebration, Thom and Larry wanted to get a rattlesnake hide for Thom’s hat, so we all stopped on the Carson River and Larry and Thom hunted for rattlesnakes from the banks of the river. They poked holes in and around rocks. It was crazy to me….but the two of them were having a blast. (They never did find a snake that day, and Lord only knows how I would have taken it …if they had.)
Larry and I spent a lot of time drinking coffee in the early morning hours. We tried to catch up on one another’s lives, what we had done as kids, as adults, as parents. We talked about the family reunions at our Grandmothers house or Aunt Mary Helen’s home, and all annual Christmas Eve gatherings there. He had more fun stories to tell about our family, again, because he was older.
One morning, while the two of us were drinking coffee, he started talking about Nam and told me several stories about the time he served there, and how much of it haunted him daily. As he told me some of those horrors, I was in shock. I couldn’t move. My body was frozen, as if a rattler was crawling across my boot. I didn’t speak, I didn’t interrupt. I just tried to listen without an expression on my face. I could see it was hard for him to talk about it all, but for some reason, He was recalling it all and talking about it. A little while later, Larry stood up and walked over to the kitchen sink. He was crying hard, struggling to catch his breath. He blew his nose a few times then turned to me and said…. “I have never told anyone those stories. I can’t believe they just came out like that……. It’s so hard to talk about them, but it’s such a relief to let them out”. I stood up out of my chair, and approached him slowly, then wrapped my arms around him and hugged him tight.
I understood after that why He asked God NEVER to give him a daughter if he had children. And GOD never did. The images he carried in his mind haunted him daily, all that killing, the horrible things that he had witnessed. Among the stories………He and 5 of his comrades were sleeping in a tent; there wasn’t enough room for all of them on cots, so Larry said he would sleep underneath one of them in his sleeping bag. When he woke up the next morning, all 5 of the men sleeping above him had been killed with complete silence. Man after man, he had to find them, and radio for help to get them lifted out, or picked up, all the while wondering if the Vietcong had moved on or were waiting a few hundred yards away.
He turned to drinking to dull the pain and bury the memories, but he told me that once his body hit its limit, he would pass out, no matter where he was, but he could never DRINK AWAY the memories, and that they never gave him any peace. When he came too late, they were still there haunting him.
It did not help that upon arrival home, these men were greeted with less than a hero’s welcome. He said as they boarded planes for home, they were all excited, but once they landed on American soil, they could see civilians gathered waving signs that called them baby killers and murderers. They had invectives hurled at them, and people spat on them. Finding a job was more than difficult; if you could try to function normally again, people would see you were a Vietnam vet, and they would be met with a veil of disgust and discrimination.
The VIETNAM War lasted longer than any other war before. From 1964 to 1973, it claimed 58,000 American servicemen and wounded over 150,000. Men came HOME…they returned HOME, but it wasn’t the warm, welcoming HOME they remembered. They were broken, bleeding, and wounds that weren’t visible with the human eye, and they were told to go home, with no psychological evaluation or help.
GOD, AMERICA DROPPED THE BALL during that time. WE WERE ILL-PREPARED TO GIVE THESE SERVICE MEN ALL THAT THEY DESERVED. They didn’t need a parade; they just needed our love and support, a universal embrace for all they had endured. They didn’t ask to go over there, they didn’t get to vote on it, they were drafted and shipped out to the very PITS OF HELL!!!
The rest of the day, we continued exploring, and now and then he would shake his head and say, “I can’t believe I told you all that stuff about Nam this morning.” I soaked it all up, and still today, I feel that God placed me there, at that time, in that moment, so Larry could release and heal from a few of his scars …move forward. And He did. From then on, when he would call me, He would tell me little things like…”I haven’t dreamed of Nam in months, or he would say I stopped seeing the horror movie in my mind. He felt a sense of relief, and he was grateful for it. And I was thankful to be there for him.
GOD did give Larry a Granddaughter. And one day while we three were in town Larry wanted to stop by and show her to us. He stepped inside that door and yelled, “Haylie Marie, come see your Papa,” and just like that, a little 4-year-old girl with long brown pig tails wearing only her panties and a little t-shirt came running down the hall and leaped into her Papa’s arms. It brought tears to my eyes just watching him with her. She has no idea, the healing she brought with her when she was born.
Larry saw many beautiful, young Vietnamese children who the Vietcong strapped and concealed bombs to their small bodies and made them walk into the American soldier camps. These poor children had no idea what was happening or what they were being used for. The first few were met with love and awe, as the bombs then exploded, killing or wounding the American soldiers who stepped forward believing the child was lost or needed help. After that, a child who wandered into their camp HAD to be considered an enemy and ……..well, imagine being that soldier who has been commanded to take them out. HORRIFIC.
Larry and I became the best of friends. There was no subject we couldn’t talk about….and we loved many of the same things in life. We left that weekend to return to Michigan…and it was an emotional, sad goodbye for me. It felt like I had just found a long-lost brother, and now I had to leave him. Was it our similar DNA, or was it the fact that he had shared the darkest, haunting secrets of his soul with me, and now I felt connected to him? I carried the weight of his confession for a long time.
Three months later, Larry invited me back out for a 3-day gun show in Reno. I had inadvertently scheduled the flight out of Kalamazoo to Reno for September 1st …the anniversary of the 9-11 attack. I was scared to fly, scared to leave my little farm, and yet I hated to miss the opportunity. I, a person who had never flown, never gone anywhere except to have a baby at a hospital, was now going to fly for a second time. Alone. (An incredible story about my fellow flying passengers, I will save for another time.)
We attended a 3-day gun show in Reno, where I met Neil Armstrong. We fished on the banks of Topaz Lake, using a brown paper bag as a makeshift cutting board while eating cheese, bologna, and crackers. We also drank Coors Light off the tailgate of his Black Ford Ranger. He pulled his dog tags from his tackle box later that day and said, ‘Back during the VIETNAM war, you were only issued one pair of dog tags, and I had kept them all these years, but now he wanted to leave them with someone who would care about having them.’
Sweetest coincidence. I have my dad’s army tags, my uncle Fred’s army tags, Burt’s army tags, and now Larry’s. How I became THE KEEPER OF THE TAGS, I am not quite sure, but I treasure them all just the same. I hang them on the Christmas tree every year, and then they go back into the lock-fireproof box and leave me wondering, who will care about them when I am gone?
Here we were at the HAAS center, and there were several signs. After I got home, I noticed a sign that said ‘Wayne’s Gun.’ Larry’s dad (my dad’s oldest brother) was an avid gun collector and had been selling, trading, and repairing guns his entire life.
This is Larry fishing in Lake Topaz. Here is where he passed on his dog tags to me. What a great day fishing we had. I fished from the shore. He walked out clear up to his belt, and at one point ask me to bring him a beer. I rolled up my jeans to my knees, waded out only that far and yelled “Haas, if you want this beer you are going to have to walk this way, because I don’t aim to soak myself and wear wet clothes the rest of the day” His brother and sister-in-law just roared with laughter. He met me but filled both his front pockets with cans of beer.
After I came home, He and I talked via emails every day, and about once a week or so by phone. Larry was the plant manager for Northern Kenworth where they made Allison Transmissions. For a short 15 months Larry and I shared a beautiful, powerful, deep friendship and then late one night on November 14, 2003, Larry was killed in an accident. In that same black truck, we had explored the countryside in, and had picnic lunches on. He was turning into his driveway off the main road, and turned in front of a young man going 90 miles an hour in a silver Jag. Both drivers were killed instantly. It is believed that Larry, saw nothing…that he began to turn into his driveway in the same way he did everything, slowly and methodically and this young man flying at 90 m.p.h. was on top of him before he knew. Investigators said that even if Larry did look before he began to make his turn, the kid would have been on top of him that fast. . …And just like that Larry was gone.
I felt like someone had just crushed my chest and all breath was gone. It was impossible to believe. I could not wrap my mind around the fact that He and I would never talk again, I would never hear him say my name again, or hear his laughter.
I had agreed earlier that week, to take my daughter and her boyfriend (now hubby with four beautiful children) hunting for the first time on Opening Day of deer season. I went forward, I smiled my way through it, and once we were back in my woods, and I knew that I was alone, I sat with my back against a large oak tree and cried and cried and cried. The blow was so hard to take. If the biggest, most beautiful buck had walked right up to me, I couldn’t have lifted my gun to shoot it. I was devastated.
I flew out to Nevada one last time for his funeral. My Dad and Uncle Fred also flew out with me. Nothing…..,NOTHING ,,,,,,prepared me for seeing him lying in a coffin. I stared at him, till it hurt too bad to breath and took the nearest exit out of that little white church. It was hot and dry outside and his sister was standing to my left smoking a cigarette. It was the first and only time in my life that I wished I smoked. Can’t even explain why, perhaps it was because I subconsciously remembered at that moment that he was a smoker too.
In the hot, Nevada desert sun, we attended his memorial service. Through a flood of my own tears, I had to laugh and whisper “OH Larry, you would get such a charge out of seeing all these women here crying over you”…and the men in wranglers and Stetsons never stopped walking up to the graveside. It was an awesome sight. Couldn’t help but wonder if this was the same scene that we would have viewed at the funeral for Wyatt Erp or Tom Mix. It was that real, that authentic, that true blue western saga. The stuff that legends are made of and books are written about.
Larry died at 54. He was much too young to leave this world. Much too young.
LIFE IS SO FLEETING, SO SHORT. ACCEPT THE LOVE THAT IS OFFERED,
GIVE LOVE IN RETURN AND REMEMBER to
ENJOY THIS DAY TO THE FULLEST…..BECAUSE TOMORROW MAY NOT BELONG TO YOU.
FIFTEEN months wasn’t long enough, why did it have to happen, why did God created it so that we would be so close just BEFORE he passed. I don’t know. I do know I miss him, I miss his smile, his laughter, the sound of his voice when I would call and he would answer “Hello this is Larry”. He LOVED my soaps and kept himself and half his workers at ALLISON’S TRANSMISSIONS stocked up with it. He heard me when I spoke, there was nothing too silly or ridiculous, or unimportant to him…He wanted to hear anything and everything I had to say, and it was that way for me when he would talked. The beauty of the memories, the strength of the bond will live on.
Whenever we walked down the street in Virginia City, He would never say a word but would just step behind me and end up on the “Street Side” of me, saying ” Out here, woman don’t walk on the curb side of the road, same with planes. No matter what the ticket says…. the women always give a man the aisle seat.”.
Larry Served His country proud in Nam, and he truly is one of the last REAL COWBOYS that I had the PLEASURE and BLESSING of getting to know. He fit the bill of everything a cowboy was.
Today He would have been 67.
HAPPY HEAVENLY BIRTHDAY MY DEAR COUSIN. I love you always…look forward to having another cup of coffee with you one day. Save me a seat, and get a large table. I am sure that our friend Burt and your Dad, our uncles, aunts, and other family members will be joining us for a great visit together
Larry Karl Haas June 20, 1949 – November 14, 2003
Garth Brooks sang it best:
“And now, I’m glad I didn’t know, the way it all would end, the way it all would go.
Our lives are better left to chance, I could have missed the pain, But I’d have had to miss the dance.”
(I Wouldn’t have missed our time together Larry…not for all the world. Lots of love and laughter, no regrets, no goodbyes, I will see you on the other side.)
“Be of good courage and I will strengthen your heart.” When we are going through tough times and there is no relief in sight, we usually start looking for the nearest and quickest way out. It’s that “escapist” in us all. We tend to think that MAYBE we deserve better conditions than what our current situation is. When we think like that, we are ignoring that God is in every detail of our days. Any painful or difficult circumstance is not worthless. We should try to muster the courage to say “yes” to life and trust that GOD is in control and with us throughout all struggles. Large or small.
Recently, we took an unexpected trip to Branson Missouri to meet up with my Brother in Law and his wife, whom we had not seen since 2007. They live in Texas and it seemed that Branson was about equal time for us all. Our Son and his wife and five children also met us there, though He left at midnight and drove the 8 hours straight for sanity sake and so his children would sleep their way to Missouri. In total it was only a four-day trip. We would spend 2 days on the road and 2 days off the road visiting. I am NOT a travel-bunny. I am a “stay on my farm and tend to whatever needs tending to bunny. I am happiest in my little corner of the world. It takes more courage that you would believe for me to climb into my truck and drive out of this drive way.
I am not comfortable at all going 70 miles an hour or faster if heavy city traffic is breathing down our necks. I ride in “zombie” mode. I try to converse with others, but my right hand has a death like grip on the passenger door and I admit at this point I do a bit more “foreboding” than I should. The human mind schemes up the worst things happening and there is no comfortableness in my own skin and sometimes not for the driver either.
I took my Bible along as I usually do, but after some good advice from my ” wise owl friend” Cheryl, I decided I would keep track of how many times I saw God throughout the trip. Mind you, I could not possibly list them all, but I was happy to see that even in the smallest, silliest, details HE is still there.
Our first morning, we all ran to the local Walmart for a few things we needed. Our oldest Grandchild Ben, found a perfect small video camera and wanted to record the trip. Since He had been saving his birthday money He was ready make a purchase. When He got up to the counter to pay, He couldn’t find his roll of cash. His Dad paid for the camera and He and his Mom went back inside in hopes of finding where he might had lost the money. Within 15 minutes they came walking out of the store with his roll of money. Someone who worked at Walmart found the money and had already turned it in. It wasn’t even 9 a.m. GOD KEPT HIS MONEY SAFE.
That same morning, one of his four sisters had been to visit the Disney Store with their Mom, gotten a darling pair of pink sunglasses. If you have ever been to Branson, it’s a whole town built on a hill, parking lots leave your vehicle leaning heavily to one side, the lobby of hotels are level with the road on the front side and the 3rd floor from the back of the building. The entire family walked and walked for probably 4 miles. Shortly after noon, we all walked to the top of a hill, and sat below a huge cement Chicken that towered above us all by 30 feet and rested. Then we all decided to walk into the local McDonalds further up the road and get a drink and use the restrooms. After more walking we all went back to the hotel, children napped and around 6 that evening when my brother-in-law and his wife finally arrived. Everyone went out to dinner. We decided to eat at the Great American Chicken and Burger Barn. My son and his family pulled up in their van, got out and Little Carly noticed her bright pink sunglasses were still sitting on the cement pad where we had all rested almost ten hours earlier that day. What are the odds with all the tourist in that town that NO one took those little girls glasses. GOD KEPT THOSE GLASSES THERE.
Just before we left on this trip, I was talking with our oldest daughter Tonya, about an idea I had for writing my own publication. She was very encouraging and was honest that she also thought what I had in mind really should be done. An untapped source that needed to be tapped. We discussed it for a long time and I concluded with:
“Well, you know I would have to find a publisher to publisher it and I would have to find the time to interview these certain key SENIOR CITIZEN people (before something happens and they aren’t here to interview) . I wanted to mix in Bible verses throughout the publication showing how GOD is still just as present in our everyday lives today as He was in the lives of our ancestors. I already have a full plate with family and farm animals, crops due to be in when Springtime finally arrives, and harvest in the fall. Not to mention hay throughout the summer months. I decided that I would just add it to my prayer list and see what the Lord thought of it all.
On Saturday, in Missouri, the whole family was dining out. I walked over to look at some souvenirs for the grandkids and our two daughters that were not able to come with us on this trip. (We always travel together like a gas-powered wagon train). I was checking it out when my son Thom happened by and grabbed a hat that said CIA (Christian In Action) and said I love Jesus all over the back of it. He said “Mom, Uncle Jeff would like this hat”. I told him he was right and I bought it.
Sunday Evening, we went to a large horse and dinner show called the DIXIE STAMPEDE. After the show there are hundreds of people leaving the arena in a dozen way. A tall, older cowboy walked up to my brother-in-law and said “I sure like your hat, I’m a believer also”. My brother in law walked on, and the gentlemen turned to me and said something. I muttered that I bought the hat for him and then the cowboy showed me two magazines he was holding and said He wrote them and He explained how He uses books from the Bible He studies, and then intertwines stories with a few stories from the old west. He said he carries a few magazines with him everywhere he goes. So, we bought the two he had with him.
I ask him again “you write these? “He just smiled as he was walking away and said “Yes, just check out page 6 when you have time”. And just like that the “messenger” was gone. I didn’t take time to read through them that night. In fact, I stashed them away in my truck for the long journey home.
I call Elliot Johnson “a messenger” NOT because HE SPREADS THE WORD OF CHRIST in every moment of his day…..but because when I opened one of the magazines to page 6 , sure enough there He was. Explaining everything just as He had mentioned in those few seconds we met. What hit me was this:
I felt like GOD brought a “human messenger” right to my face. Everything that Mr. Johnson is doing is what I had talked about doing with my daughter the week before. What I had been praying about. Should I begin this endeavor, Do I have time, what will be my startup cost, where will I get it published, how often should I publish it. Right there on page 6 was all the answers and GOD PLACED IT IN MY HAND DIRECTLY FROM THE AUTHOR himself. I believe with my whole heart that it was NO ACCIDENT that I met ELLIOT JOHNSON.
PROOF….for me anyway that GOD is alive, He is listening to all our prayers, all our conversations, He is PRESENT TODAY in EVERYWAY.
**The publication that I have been contemplating doing will take me out of my comfort zone and put my writings and beliefs OUT IN THE WORLD. A scary thought for me. I Will keep the readers of this Blog posted as to my progress.
When the telephone rang tonight, I knew why it was ringing before I answered it. I felt it. Clear down inside my heart. I knew My Grandmother was gone. As I answered the call, my uncle confirmed my thoughts, and with my Dad away on a fishing trip he asks if I would have to convey the message when he returned home that his mom was gone. That was a hard piece of news to deliver to my dad at 3.a.m. Yet, she lives on so VIVIDLY in my heart.
In May of 1921, my grandmother met my grandfather while they were both living at a Boarding House. Stan was a third-grade teacher by day and took classes at night. He was within six weeks of obtaining his pastoral degree and had plans of going west to teach on a reservation and preach the gospel. Doris was a stenographer. They were introduced by a principal that was also staying at the house, and within days they both felt deeply towards one another. By May 20, of 1922 they were married, and had seven children together.
My Grandfather, Stanley Arthur Haas, had left this earth on May 16, 1948. He was only 47 years old. The two of them were barely married 26 years when he died at home on a Sunday afternoon. He had danced a jig around the Livingroom, excited that the farm they had bought together on May 18, 1946, was paid off. They had let their home in Vicksburg go back to the back during the depression rather than loose it.
Four years later, after living in a small outbuilding at Grandma’s parent’s home, they found a farmhouse and some acres home, the whole top story was broken in. A large pine had fallen on it. There was snow a foot deep in the upstairs when they first looked at it. By Springtime, they used a team of horses and block and tackle to hoist the massive tree off the house and they set about replacing the walls and the rebuilding the roof. They had paid off the note in full, and soon after his celebratory dance, he sat down in a chair and died. (At the age of ten, Stan had his appendix removed on the kitchen table by a doctor who told his parents then, that he had a smaller than normal heart and heart rate, and a small tear it in.) Afterwards, his parents were careful not to allow him to jump and run as other children did. He played, but never to the point of real exertion.
Forty-seven years had come and gone since Grandma lost the love of her life. There was never a moment that lapsed that she didn’t think of him. In many ways there was a part of her that left when he did. Her grief justifiably was debilitating to her.
I never met my Granddad face to face, but I felt like I knew him from all the stories Grandma would tell me. Each Sunday, of my youth I would walk the mile west from our farmhouse (the same house they bought in 1946) and I would sit at her feet while she talked about their life together. She shared stories and poetry she wrote for him or about him. She never held back when it came to talking about Stan and I sat and soaked it all up like a sponge. She kept his memory alive and graciously shared him with anyone who would listen. She was proud of him.
Grandma had three of her older children married, the fourth was a teen, and my dad was ten when he lost his dad. Little Fred named after grandma’s Dad was six, and young Kathleen Eva was four. I cannot begin to imagine how hard her life was during the years that followed. By the time I was soaking up her stories, she had remarried a man at the end of the road, Mr. Labadie and My Dad bought the farmhouse from her in 1961.
I believe with every fiber of my being that Grandpa Stan was waiting at Heaven’s Gate for “his dearest one” no doubt as anxiously as he awaited the birth of their seven children. (Though their last baby was born in a hospital he was very cross about that, and insisted on standing outside the room and the moment the baby was born, the nurse had to bring the little one to the door so he could tie a string to the arm. He was afraid they would mix up the babies.) You gotta love that kind of thinking. Otherwise, they delivered their other six babies in the same bed they were made in, and she spoke frequently of the love, coaxing, the nurturing and strength that he offered her during those times.
(Their Seven kids behind Grandma. Merle, Wayne, Kathy, Fred, Mary Helen, Lola and My Dad Jim)
I imagine, their oldest son Wayne, is with him. I could almost feel his excitement once he received the news that she was finally coming to join him. I am sure he has had many wonderful reunions up there, but this is the one he must have been waiting for. The one important part of his heart that has been missing far too long.
I want to imagine him with his arms stretched out wide, leaning as far forward as he can to make her journey to Heaven smoother and quicker. I can almost hear his laughter and see his face all ashine. As I write this tonight, I can see my grandma walking with grace and eloquence towards his waiting arms. The arms that held her and always gave her such warmth and comfort, the arms that she has missed wrapping up in for 47 years.
I want to believe GOD IS THERE. He is watching them and nodding his head in approval as if to symbolize “Yes Doris, the time has finally come, your time on earth is through my good and faithful woman. I can almost see their embrace, feel their tears as their hearts overflow at their feet. This is the moment they have both waited for, dreamed about in separate realms.
I like to imagine them walking hand in hand again. Strolling across heaven now instead of their small Volinia farm with Grandpa almost absent mindedly whisking Grandma off to show his dearest to the Lord, as if the Lord didn’t already know her, know of her kind and gentle spirit. As if he didn’t KNOW exactly when she was coming.
Like so many years before, they walk hand in hand again. Together they will look down and view their every growing family. There are many new generations now since 1948.
For the last several years of her life, Grandma was in a Nursing Home, and she missed out on a lot of changes in the family. Births, deaths, weddings, graduations, new careers, new homes spreading all across this great country of ours.
UNITED once again, they will watch over us all together now and are no doubt praying for those of us who linger behind them.
For me, at this time of great loss, I reflect on what a positive role model she was for me. Within each of our little visits SHE taught me how to be a wife and mother. She tried to instill in me how to love, and how to find a man as good as special as my grandfather. She taught me how to write simply because she shared her stories and journals and poems with me. No matter the weather, every Sunday we would walk up to her home. If she had company my Dad would ask that we just come back home and not bother her and Grandpa George.
Those were sad Sundays for me. Not because she always dished up some little dab of sherbert in a glass bowl for you or whipping up some homemade apple fritters by cutting up an apple and stirring it into a bowl of bisquick and plugging in the little deep fryer soon the house would fill with the best aroma while she dropped Spoonfuls of the batter into the hot grease.
A missed Sunday visit for me meant, I missed out on hearing a new story, or sometimes the same stories, but I would pick up on another little tidbit I missed the first time she told it. She began painting at 55 years old and painted the most beautiful scenic landscape pictures. She had seven children and way too many grandchildren and greats to count but she NEVER forgot anyone’s birthday, Christmas or graduation. The gifts were big candy bars, a pack of pencils, a journal, a book, a stack of comic books, a wooden whistle, a box of notecard, a pack of gum or cookies. As little as those gifts were, those are the ones that us adult remember the most today.
TOGETHER, may their spirts go well into the days ahead and may their great SEPTEMBER LIGHT shine will all their joined Brillance down upon us all, and may we feel their warmth and love trickling into our own busy lives.
Of all the many gifts that I gleaned from Grandma Doris, and there were many, the one that will remain with me as long as I live is I KNEW where I came from, it made me feel proud of the two of them and all that their love built together, and I wanted to be sure that my children KNEW where they came from also. And they do. And that, is a good feeling for this momma to carry on around in this troublesome world.
A BLESSING FROM GOD: This week, our two daughters decided to clean out their homes and wanted to combine their things, some of mine, and have an impromptu yard sale. Funny thing about these sales, going to them is always so much fun, and if by chance we stumble on to some quaint little things, some little vintage Tom & Jerry Jelly glass, well, it’s what I refer to as a red-letter day. Yes, going to them is great fun, and in all honesty, we three women have discovered that the best ones tend to be the ones where the people do not have time to make big fancy signs or don’t have time to post it all on social media. Nor do they have time to organize and price every tiny piece of clothing or plastic cup as if they were selling bits of silver.
We set up at my oldest daughter’s house for the convenience of an open garage, and we ceremoniously hauled truckloads to her place. The sale began on Wednesday, then came Thursday, and by Friday, well, we are all tired of moving things in each night. Seven children are way over this yard sale thing, and they are ready to have their summer days back. Though the older they get, the more help they are to all of us. Carrying things, doing the math, and watching the sale while we make lunch. It’s really a fun little project to work on together.
On Friday, a woman stopped by the sale. She and her friend looked around at the things that we had left, and by this time, my daughters were ready to make deals to get things moved. The younger woman said she had lived in the house for almost 50 years. While they visited and explored all we had set up, they noticed we had a twin bed, spring, and mattress for free. “Susan” mentioned she had an elderly friend who was moving into an apartment and had nothing to move into. She knew she would really appreciate having that twin bed and it was just what she was hoping to find, but she didn’t know how she could get the bed to her.
Our kindhearted daughters asked where the new apartment was. It turned out to be in the next town over, about ten miles away, so the girls offered to deliver the bed to Susan’s friend that Friday evening after the sale was closed. Immediately after they delivered the bed and placed it in the older woman’s new apartment, they called me from their truck and suggested that I donate a table and 2 chairs, a dresser, an end table, and some other things that the three of us still had at the sale.
Saturday at high noon, at noon, our lovely daughters, and granddaughters, Tonya & Cate, and their daughters, Allyson, Alaina, and Emma and I loaded up the truck again and drove more furniture to Miss Johnnie Mae. We also took a new crocheted Afghan that my mom had just made and given to me, along with a few small dishes, some good/used pots and pans.
Johnnie Mae turned 96 in January, and she is the sweetest lady. She had owned her own home for many years and welcomed some of her family to live with her. (Johnnie never have children of her own, thus her niece Stella Mae was named after her). Johnnie Mae explained to me that she felt it was a good time to make a change in her life. She was getting older and needed more help. She decided to her family have her home, and move to a smaller place, a little quieter and she knew some of the people that lived in the apartment complex already. In this apartment everything is handicap accessible, the kitchen, bathroom etc. She can cook for herself and be very content or just open the door exterior door on the east side of her dining room and it opens into a nice hallway. There is a laundry area, and she can partake of community meals if she wants to or not. Its her choice but the nicest perk is that someone from the facility will check on her daily. That brought her alot of comfort as she didn’t was to be a burden to her niece. She had a grace and beauty about her that just radiated from within her. And she loved the Lord.
Also in the photo is Johnnie’s nice, Stella Mae.
We all stood around this small, but quaint little apartment for 2 hours chatting with Johnnie Mae and Stella. WHAT A GIFT, A TRUE BLESSING FOR US. These ladies were kind and appreciative, and as we were leaving, everyone was shaking hands and hugging, and those two women were saying ” I love you” to all of us, and we were saying it right back!!! Complete strangers hours ago now loving one another. That the GOOD STUFF life can be made of.
I called all the girls back inside and ask the ladies if I could take a photo, because while WE KNOW and understand the beauty of a visit like this that was PLANNED BY GOD, I knew our ” little girls” will never forget this day and I wanted to be sure they had a photo to put with their memory. One day they will recall all six of us driving to Cassopolis and carrying all these things into a stranger’s home and how sweet and loving the people were. What a great lesson for them to carry all their years. And Johnnie was such a graceful receiver. We can all give, but learning to accept and receive with elegance and appreciation is an art.
There is genuine goodness, kindness, and new love in these photos. Everyone is happy and thrilled to have met each other.
Tonight, as I looked at these pictures over again, I saw Tonya and Miss Stella holding hands. Strangers just 24 hours ago. How precious to meet folks like this, folks that put the heart back into you, makes you believe the world isn’t such a bad place, and that beauty can still be found when your eyes are open to it.
I have always been proud of our three children. They have all grown into really great adults, great parents and not one of them has ever been selfish, rude, or haughty. Never acted as if they were better than anyone else. That’s not to say they don’t have a bit of my temper when I have been walked on a bit, but they are truly good people. Today, as a momma I was able to sit back for a moment and witness not only my daughter’s kindness and gentleness towards these women, but they were also setting YET ANOTHER fine example for their daughters.
This momma, the writer of this blog…….. feels PROUD and very BLESSED.
A Gravetokker- is someone who takes it upon themselves to scrub and clean headstones, especially when its people whose stories they are telling or researching. They do it for free, and for the preservation of the stone and all its history.
As a genealogist, and history buff from way back, I get excited about old things. Family heirlooms, tiny pieces of history that I stumble across.
Today is what I would classify as an awesome day. I was able to do something that I have wanted to do for years but couldn’t see to find the time to just get there! I was conversing with a dear friend one morning about my good intentions when he suddenly offered some extra muscles and his help leveling. I jumped on the offer. I couldn’t pack the bed of my truck fast enough. Where is “there” you ask? A local Cemetery. Yes, I like those places. It’s not about the deceased, or anything remotely ghoulish. I like seeing the names, and dates and some of the unique, older headstones.
I believe, I have a very rich family history. Rich in the sense of absolutely cool findings, ancestors who were strong, good, upright, wholesome and hardworking people. Allow me a moment, to jump off the trail and give you a little insight to this old town and why its cemetery matters to me.
Nicholsville Mich, is a small little town, well it used to be. About one mile north from Marcellus, Mich. It its day, it was a booming little town. First sawmill built in 1835 and was up and running by December of that year. In 1840 they had a town doctor. By 1844 Nicholsville consisted of the sawmill, two houses and a school, that months after being built caught fire.
By 1851 the NICHOLS brothers, Jonathon and Marshall passed through town and decided to buy the sawmill, erected a grist mill and built homes. The town name was then changed to Nicholsville. Soon there was a post office, a hotel, and a restaurant. By 1875 the town population was over 100 people, contained 25 homes, two general stores, a blacksmith shop. Jonathon Nichols was considered a very jovial man, a good friend to the poor and downtrodden.
Originally this town had the prospect of a bright and booming future. However, when the Michigan Central Railroad went passed by it in 1848, and then Gand Trunk Railroad passed it by in 1871 and created stops in the towns of Decatur and Marcellus, the small town of Nicholsville suddenly became an island town.
In 1860, when Douglas was running for Presidency against Honest Abe Lincoln came the call for 75,000 troops to crush the rebellion in a month. The little town of Nicholsville alive with patriotic enthusiasm answered the call. Every able-bodied man left all the businesses at a standstill. Nicholsville gave their all, while the brave faced woman left behind bore the sad, hard burdens of everyday life alone during those four long years. These men left the warmth of their homes, jobs paying three to five dollars a day to take up the hardships of camp, marching, firing lines, and all for 13 dollars a month!
What came from that old boom town? These men who answered the call and came home to finish their lives. Rocky Woodmansee became a great educator and leading citizen in Lambert Oklahoma. Marshall Nichols was a leading railroad man in Kansas with a cultured wife and a fine family. Fred Row was a wealthy banker in Hill City Kansas, Charlie Thorpe became a regimental surgeon in the U.S. Army with rank and pay of a Major.
Elmer Thorpe became a medical expert and married Buffalo Bills Oldest Daughter. Rollin Thorpe is a leading surgeon in Denver and runs up to Cripple Creek often where he is the president of a gold mining and milling company. There are many others too numerous to mention. My point is, this small town gave their all, and in doing so, reaped a beautiful harvest despite the fact that the trains past them by and turned them into a ghost town.
On this day, we packed some gentle cleaners, scrub brushes, and a plastic sprayer full of warm water and stopped at the Nicholsville cemetery to clean the headstones of my ancestors. My family.
My Great, Great Grandfather Jim Riley lied about his age to join the great Civil War. He was only 17 at the time. (More about him and what really made him famous in a later post. ) When he returned from the war, he married Miss Martha Nichols in August 1865. Together they had nine children. When Martha died in 1903, She was buried in the Nicholsville family cemetery. Jim remarried in 1905 to Miss Clara Marsh. Her mother also lived with them. As they all left this world, they were buried in a line together in Nicholsville Cemetery. Martha lays to the right of Jims (who passed in 1919) Clara lays to the left of Jim, and Clara’s mother lays to her left.
Of the nine children Jim and Martha had together, one of their son’s Fred married a woman by the name of Eva Orilla Polmanteer, their daughter, Doris Martha Riley, is my father’s mom, and my grandmother.
Below are before and after photos of cleaning and straightening the old headstones of my family. They have almost 121 years of biological growth, algae, lichen and moss covering their surfaces to the point that you could barely read their names, and those growths will cause the stone to decay. This was not done in a disrespectful manner at all. It is with great reverence and love that I chose to do this, and we tended to these stones as if they were made of glass. We even brought along a shovel and lifted one stone that was sunken into the earth and propped it back upright by retrieving some small rocks from the edge of a field. Our intent was not and NEVER will be to make them look new. I wanted them visibly clear for future generations who might care to search history on their own sometime. We can only hope.
A few of the stones, have begun to deteriorate to a state that you cannot read their name as well. Like my Great Grandmother Eva O. Riley. (Her birth name was Eva Orilla (meaning Rippling water) Polmanteer. Then she married Fred Riley. It is her name that I chose to write under when I began writing and publishing my books.)
This day will live on in my heart for years to come. Not only for the improvement that we made to the headstone, but for the time my friend took out of his day, his schedule to help lift and adjust the headstones, and he helped scrubbed on them when he didn’t have to. They were not his people. His kindness here, I will never forget.
It all began at a yard sale FOURTEEN YEARS AGO . My dearest friend Burton (37 years my senior) had driven up here to my farm from South Bend, IN to spend the day with me. We were going to take picture of creeks, trees, old buildings, that was a fun adventure we liked to partake of a couple of times a year.
As we were driving on the back roads from Cassopolis we stumbled upon a yard sale. The place looked pretty well picked over but we stopped anyway. We looked around and was about to leave when off in the corner underneath a piece of plywood that was being used as a table for clothing I found an old Claw foot tub.
I let out a yelp and Burt said without turning around to look at me “UT oh” and smiled as he walked in my direction.
“Burt, look at this cool old tub. ” He laughed and began explaining to me that it wasn’t that cool or unique that he took many a baths in a tub like that when he was a boy. The price tag was $100.00. I did not have a hundred dollars and if I did I would be paying off bills as i had three young teens at home, electric bills, phone bills, groceries etc.
The owner walked over and said….”Today is the last day of this sale. I am moving out west so i would accept any offer on this heavy old thing.” I smiled and told him i couldn’t possible afford it but it was a cool old tub. Then he persisted….”Make me an offer, honestly you cant offend me i want the thing gone today. ” I told the guy i only a twenty and then out of the blue Burton piped in “I have a twenty Sher” and just like that the man yelled “SOLD”.
I was so excited. Burt has a very distressed look on his face and then ask me how on earth were we going to haul that thing home. We’d have to come back and get it with a truck. I assured him that i had brought a seven foot couch home once strapped to the back of my 78 Thunderbird i could make this happen. He didn’t look convinced or comfortable. lol.
Burt was driving a new Chrysler LHS at the time. I convinced him to help me take the legs off the tub, turn it upside down and it would slide into the back of his trunk without hurting the car at all. We did it and it worked. Off we went towards my farmhouse with my vintage tub. (This was also the farm owned before selling it to me). It was in dire need of repairs when i bought it and it was a slow restoration project as i had to do all plaster, plumbing, drywall, etc myself. No money for hiring anything out.
After we arrived back at the farm. we carefully slide the heavy cast iron tub out of the back of the Chrysler , slide the feet back on and turned it over to its side and then upright. It was now sitting upright in the middle of the yard. I was so pumped I thought it was the best find since buttered bread. I ran inside to get us a drink of water and when i came back out this was the imagine I found . I snapped this picture quick and told Burt that some day i would hang this photo of him and his car in the bathroom over the tub.
As I stated earlier it taken 14 years to finally get the tub in and plumbed. Mind you it was no small task getting it upstairs. My girlfriend ( 20 years my senior) was positive her and i could push this tub UP 16 steps to the upstairs south bedroom where i was going to take the 9X12 room and make it into a bath. Me having the “bull in a china shop” determination I agreed with her and so Cheryl and I turned the tub on its side, pushed it through the door way and started to push it up the stairs. I could hold on to the top and pull upward as it was too heavy and if we both pushed from the bottom the top would get hung up on the riser of each step. This stair way is tall and narrow so we couldn’t stand on either side of the tub.
Then I came up with the idea that if i put pine 1 x 8’s under the top of the tub it would glide up like grease lightning. So I raced outside, got the boards and had to race up the kitchen stairs through the hallway and down the dining room stairs to place the boards, then back up the stairs , down the hallway and down the kitchen stairs to get back to the bottom of the dining room stair case where my friend was literally left holding the tub. Yeah, that didn’t work either and pretty soon … you guessed it. Us two woman had this heavy cast iron tub half way up the stairway and half way down and couldn’t move it one more inch. (It s hilarious picture in your mind right.).
We finally shimmed the tub and waited for my son Thom to come in from outside and after a bit of scolding for trying to do it ourselves, then he called Dad in from the barn and together the two of them got the tub to its final resting place. I use the word final here, because Carl said the only way that thing was coming back down stairs was in pieces. He was serious too.
This last February I finally made Thom’s old room into a Bathroom. Imagine a farmhouse with two bathrooms. What a luxury. Its everything I could have dreamed of. I didn’t do anything to the tub except sandblast the outside of it and painted it white. The old wooden cabinet was my great grandmothers, the fireplace mantel was from a BEAUTIFUL three story mansion in South Haven that was torn down, and the land split into three partials and new homes built. They were going to burn it.
All the years growing up on the family farm with my three brothers, I was second in command. My much older brother, Stan (by 14 months) , relinquished his title of oldest to me whenever it came to house cleaning or babysitting the younger brothers. There fore I assumed the role of first born and from that moment on my brothers referred to me as “Sargent General Sir”. It wasn’t a term of endearment. They were plenty angry at me when I hounded them to help clean the farmhouse before our mom returned from her routine Saturday hairdresser’s appointment. Back in the day, she would tease all her hair straight out, and then take strands thin and about 3 inches wide, spiral them up on the top of her head, and secure them in place with hairpins, and then she would spray hairspray for 5 minutes to hold them in place. And hold they did….. forever.
Our Dad had a strange affection towards his farm machinery that, as a young person, I didn’t get. I took in his trait, but never took a moment to understand the “bond” he shared with sheet metal. We were raised on John Deere Tractors and Ford pickup trucks. If there were any other kinds of makes or models out there, we surely didn’t know about them, and they surely weren’t welcome on the farm. And Dad would call his truck and tractors pet names, like “Old Bessie” or “old Girl” or “Julie” it was just something he would spit out when he was talking and never miss a breath.
Alas, fast forward 32 years. I bought a 200-acre farm from Farmer Burt, and He believed in farming the old way. He slowly converted me to Dodge trucks, and Since He was an Oliver and White fan, it slowly became my choice of tractors also. Burt never owned a tractor with a cab. We did once, in 1995 but of course we sold it or traded it or some such thing. I didn’t care. I love the open stations. Love the sun beating down on me, the smell of dirt and diesel in the hair, I prefer mud over makeup….seriously it a nature thing I guess.
The years have gone quickly by, and suddenly, when I have field work to do, I wait and wait for the sun to come out completely, or the wind to die down. Then I have a small window of work opportunity before the sun moves out and the cool sets in and within a few hours my knees and joints are locked up tight from the cold. We decided its time to find an affordable cab tractor.
On Monday before Easter, we found one. Much nicer than any we had looked at. By Tuesday, I finally got a hold of a salesman, and by late Tuesday afternoon, it was ours. The salesman asked if I was going to drive down to Ohio and look at it. I said, “Nope, I can feel it. It’s supposed to have a Cass County Home. Just bring her home”.
They set up delivery for Good Friday. They were 90 miles away and called that morning to say they would be here sometime in the afternoon. I had some of the grandchildren that day. It was almost 3:30 p.m. and suddenly I could feel it. I am completely serious. I knew it was in the neighborhood. I grabbed my camera and stood by the glass door and within 20 seconds the white semi crept through the pines . I started snapping pictures.
So, she is here. She is 36 years old and I am so beyond tickled with her. I can hardly believe how fortunate I am to have such a nice tractor. Not just because its a cab tractor but because its a WHITE FIELD BOSS and it so immaculate!!!! When I think of all the nasty, rusted, worn-out tractors we entertained the idea of buying this winter, I just shiver. I was willing to make anything work to have a cab. Oh we could sand it and paint it I had said, it will do…ANYTHING will be better than nothing right.
HERE’S THE MEANT TO BE PART OF THIS STORY……I LOVE THIS WHITE TRACTOR. From the moment I saw it on the trailer my heart flipped. I believe clear down to the bottom of my feet that Burt commandeered this tractor from Heaven and helped navigate it right here to HIS FARM/OUR FARM.
See, how I refer to it as a her. Isn’t it the strangest thing how we pick up some of our parents’ traits, and some 53 years later, I cannot explain why. What I can explain is that when I am near the tractor, I say odd things like :
“Sorry you are sitting in the rain old girl”
“Sorry, I haven’t been able to take you for a run today old girl”
“Man she’s a nice tractor isn’t she”
“Man, we hit the lottery with her”
Unbeknownst to me, our four-year-old granddaughter noticed that a tear or two had fallen from my face when the tractor was unloaded and sitting in the front drive. She looked at me and said “Omie, why are you crying, you don’t like your new tractor”. I said “Oh Honey, these are happy tears, but we don’t have to tell anyone the Omie cried a little ok..”
Emma agreed, but, per standard operating procedures, she couldn’t wait to blurt it out to her mom that afternoon. “Mom, Mom, Omie cried when the man brought her tractor, but it was just a little bit. ” Her little Brother Logan, a boy of few words, because he is that much like his Daddy. He rode in the tractor and never moved his facial expressions much. Acted like he has been in this tractor forever, but when I stop it, he says ” Why did you stop Omie, lets go again”…
And my favorite tale of the new tractor……..Yesterday I walked past the tractor carrying 5 gallon buckets of feed in my hands I muttered “Old Julie, you are such a nice tractor.”… and Logan who was following behind me slows and rubs his hand over the top of the front time a few times and say “This is a nice tractor” “Omie’s New Tractor is nice”. Then he picks up his 1 gallon bucket of feed and continues to on. You just can’t write stuff this precious.
These photos were taken in December 2015. My Great Aunt Carole was helping make blankets and pillows for all 7 of my granddaughters. We made them wooden cradles out of solid cherry , so she and my Mom sat in their home and made the blankets and sheets and matching pillows .
I write this morning from the bed side of my great Aunt Carole. She is 79. She moved here in December from Florida in hopes of building a small apartment on our farm and finish out her life here. She was very excited at the prospect of Spring arriving as she wanted to sit on the deck and watch the farm animals, ply with my 12 grandchildren and she thought she would be able to cook meals while I was in the field putting in crops.
She talked very candid with me these last few months about her life . The mistakes she made she couldn’t go back and fix, about the loved ones that had written her off, and about two of her sons passing. When you are dying I believe especially then, that YOUR STORIES MATTER, YOU MATTER, and MOST THE TIME people want to talk about their past, and they need a listening ear…. not a judge.
She spoke of the Son she gave up to her sister to raise. How she was on the sidelines of that young boys life as his “Aunt Carole” for 36 years. Upon her older sisters death , the man ask Carole to explain the circumstances that caused her to relinquish him to her sister. She said with a big smile. “We spent all of one day talking and talking and at the end of the day, He covered my hand with his and said “Its ok Mom, I understand why you did what you did. I forgive you”. And just like that the two were inseparable until his death years later. Everyone deserves forgiveness. And I am thankful she received that gift from him and that finally she had a son “outloud” and He called her mom.
In February, she was diagnosed with lung cancer, after she was coughing up blood. And so plans have changed. For the last 2 weeks I have been her 24 hour hospice care team. We have a n RN that comes in once a week to be sure that Aunt Carole is out of pain and checks her over all condition. There is another darling little gal that comes in mid week and offers a bath if Aunt Carole wants one.
My Grandchildren come to visit with her daily and Aunt Carole loves it. Emmalynn plays tic- tac- toe with her when Aunt Carole can’t push down hard enough to make her mark on the electronic tablet Emma just smiles up at her and pushes it for her . At lunch time Emma was eating her macaroni and cheese and suddenly she asks me if she can help Aunt Carole eat , and she fed Aunt Carole as if she were feeding her doll. It was too precious not to get a photo of.
And in the last two weeks Aunt Carole wanted a puppy. I understand completely why, she wanted something fuzzy and live to hold and pet. She hated that she wasn’t able to get up and go see all the new farm babies. Pigs, cows, sheep. One morning she ask if I would bring one of the new sheep into the house and show her. Of course we did. And our miniature poodle Moxie became our mascot. She loved the coloring of the little sheep and so every afternoon I would wonder out into the pen and steal away another baby for Aunt Carole to see and hold.
Aunt Carole is my 6th loved one that I have provided hospice care for. It is NOT my career choice, or my calling. I would say it is something that I FALL INTO . My Daughters and girlfriend Cheryl would tell you that I was chosen each time. I only do this for someone that I love, that I am close to, or they ask me themselves to do this for them.
It is a very hard job, and its leveling to me for weeks afterwards. I watch my loved ones from the side of the bed as DEATH like a speeding train comes racing at them . We see it coming, we feel its rumble, , We hear it off in the distance and we KNOW its coming …closer and closer and its going to HIT our loved one and there is no DETOUR. No rescuing them. We sit and watch helplessly.
We both sit for hours, talking about movies, and shows, memories, in between the deafening sound of the oxygen machine, and her labored breathing. We shared many sweet “end of a life” conversations. I watched her daily as she depleted quicker than the human eye or heart could believe. Speaking for her became labored but she insisted on talking and would never just finish the sentence where she lost her breath, in her true PERSERVERING spirit she would start over. Again and Again. She wanted to say the full thought all at once.
Aunt Carole is a fighter from way back. Never intentionally mean. Yet, her life had some pretty high hurdles and it didn’t make her bitter and nasty towards others but it gave her an “edginess” that could be taken as mean or crusty. When she ask me if I thought she was a difficult person to be around, or to get along with. She patted my arm and said to be honest. I told her, she wasn’t mean or hurtful , but I thought that perhaps her FILTER was plugged sometimes cause she would say things in a way that could offend people unless they really knew her. And then again sometimes….it offended you even when you did know her. lol She was that much like her momma Aena . She spoke straight from the hip.
Four day into our ” hospice care” on a Wednesday afternoon , Aunt Carole removed a gold necklace and a gold dome ring that had originally belonged to my grandmother (her sister) and she put them on me. I watched as she removed the ring from her middle finger and slid it onto my middle finger. She said she wanted me to have them . I thanked her through tears and told her that I loved her, that her life mattered and that I would miss her when she wasn’t here.
It was the last time she was able to raise both her arms and put them around my neck . She hugged me and said “You know I love you, I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t taken me in. I didn’t want to die in a nursing home.” We both cried .
Now We talk, we cry, she sleeps. When she wakes in pain, I try to get her medicine down her using applesauce. Its about all she will eat not and just a few bites. One for the pills, and one for a “chaser” she called it. I feel her pain and hurt clear down to the bottom of my feet and I hold her hand until it subsides. She doesn’t want to be alone anymore. So each night I push HER hospice lift chair next to her bed, and I crawl into it and I sleep holding onto her forearm that is now lots of loose skin. Each time she wakes, she pats my arm. Neither of us is getting much sleep.
Oddly, before this Aunt Carole wore hearing aids. Yet now her hearing is so acute. And as a care giver the ONE area that I constantly fall short in is in regards to my hands. I have had cold hands and feet due to Reynaud’s Disease and I always forget that, so every single time I touched her ..her eyes would widen and she would say “Oh those cold hands of yours”. And we would laugh as I apologized for the hundredth time.
I would hold her hand at night and say prayers together just like I did with my children when they were small. She doesn’t want to watch much television now, though before any kind of a detective movie was her pick. Now we visit, she sleeps, and she stares at the ceiling. Yesterday afternoon a girlfriend of Aunt Caroles and mine was visiting and we took photos of her parents, her siblings, the love of her life, and photos of her son and ran upstairs to my office. We used my HP printer and blew up their faces into 8 x 10’s. Then we tacked them in a collage above her bed while she was sleeping.
When she awoke she gasped and tears fell down the side of her face. I ask her why she was crying and she pointed to the ceiling and said “I love it”. Cheryl and I told her everyone of those people were waiting for her and she was fine to go on to meet with them anytime she was ready. On this day she also wanted to play a game of yatzee with Cheryl and I…
…and we did.
We are nearing her final hours. I can tell by that “far away glaze” in her eyes. She can no longer use her hands to hold anything , it has become impossible for her to swallow without choking badly. I hate to put her through that every 12 hours with medication prescribed by the hospice Dr, so I have called in and requested something different. A rubbing compound for her wrist will be put in the over night mail. The hospice team have been so great. They come and talk with Carole and check on her. When the RN would talk with her and how happy she was to be here in this little bungalow with me the tears would run down her face and Cindy would say “carol why are your crying hon”…and she would whisper “Im so happy to be here. I just kept waiting for it to get done so I could be here.
A few days earlier she told the aid Rachel
“You know its just normal for all kids to get into trouble. We have all done it. But not her kids….(she pointed to me) she hasn’t had any trouble with her kids, they are all very nice people,, and all her grand children are just like her children. Most kids run away from sick old people. But her grandchildren just come up to me and hug me ….” then she was wore out from that conversation. I remember hurrying to my journal to write it down as I never wanted to forget it.
All the sadness and hurts from this human life will soon be gone for Aunt Carole. I know that only one of us will be crawling out of this BLACK DEATH HOLE and trying to re adjust to normal life again. You wouldn’t think that is hard to do. When HER journey is complete you would thing I could just spring back and move forward. Alas, it is not that easy when your heart is connected. I CHOSE to climb down here with my Aunt. I promised her when she got bad I would take care of her and not allow her to die alone, OR in the purple room at the home she was staying at, and I promised NOT to put her into a hospice home or nursing home. I listen tonight to the sounds of eminent death, the rattle in her chest, the heavy breathing, the sound of the oxygen machine and my heart is hurting. I wipe my tears EVERY TIME she stirs and I stand by her bedside and talk with her. She tells me over and over “stop fussing so much” and then she winks.
Wednesday April 20, She was between pain medications, the old pill and the new rubbing compound and she was very aggressive. I understand many people go through this stage just a day or so before they pass. Hopsice team says its completely normal. She was angry, yelling and I can attest that the old lady still has a good right hook. Felt it twice. I cried big tears as I tried to calm her, and when hospice returned my call and told me to go to the SURVIVAL KIT they left in the refrigerator I gave her a dose of meds to calm her.
Thursday April 21…we talked very little today , but I continued my bedside vigil . She last spoke to me about noon . When she woke I said ‘Hi, Aunt Carole” and she replied
“Hi Babe”…I ask her if she knew who I was as i was rubbing her wrist with her medication for pain , and she said, ” why yes” and she called me by name. I told her that last night she was not too happy and that she didn’t know me and that she had a mean right hook, and she started to cry and with a lot of effort said “Im sorry”. I wiped her tears, and kissed her forhead for the hundredth time during this ordeal and said I know it wasn’t you..its ok…
Aunt Carole and I holding hands and praying.
Friday April 22 ………………At 1:18 p.m. She was freed. Free of this life on Earth. Free of the past mistakes or decisions she had made throughout her life that others would NEVER let her forget. Free to go see Stan, the love of her life. (The man she loved for 9 years . His former wife being catholic would not consent to a divorce, she set him free but would not legally release him. ) She kept his photo and that of her son next to her bed. She would be able to hug her parents, her Sons, her Grandma that she said she saw before she died.
For me, once again I am cleaning up a body, calling a coroner, and waiting for that black Hurst to coming pulling in. This time it drove into my farm yard. What a sobering sight.
On top of this job, which is not a pleasant one at all when it comes to cleaning and changing an adult human. Watching their bodies run rapid with fire fever and infections. Watching the skin start to loose its shine and moisture and begin to peel…all of these and more are part of the last few weeks of life. I met them head on and wanted to. It was after her death, and I contacted her immediate family members that she said had disowned her years ago, that I really got hit hard with judgment’s, ridicule, questions of why they weren’t called…..and they went so far as to request an autopsy convincing themselves that there was foul play involved in her death. We understood, then …the stories that Aunt Carole had told us were accurate.
I still cant turn the handle of that door without expecting to hear the oxygen tank, hear the tv or Aunt Carole saying “Good Morning”. It is my belief that we all DERSERVE TO HAVE A DIGNIFIED EXIT from this world, and I believe each and every one of us on this planet deserve to be forgiven for things we did or did not do intentionally. Forgiveness heals. It is not so much a gift for the offender but more of a gift for the one who graciously offers forgiveness with a smile and says its ok..none of us are perfect……lets go forward.
ONLY GOD HAS THE RIGHT TO JUDGE AND HE ALWAYS FORGIVES HIS CHILDREN AND RECEIVES US ALL WITH OPEN ARMS.
Many years ago, around 1999, when our children were still young and attending school, we began to host exchange students from various countries. As time passed, over fourteen different students stayed in our home. Some we chose and some were dropped off here when the house they were staying in wasn’t working out for whatever reason.
Our home seemed to be the designated “safety” zone for any child. Not to mention that, along with several exchange students, we also had a house full of teens non-stop. We were blessed with three really great kids who never gave us an ounce of trouble. Therefore, we made sure that our home was also a fun place, a food place, and a comfort place. It didn’t take long for me to realize that I would not be able to save enough money to send ourr children to college. If they wanted to go, we would have to consider loans, grants, scholarships, etc., as feeding that many teens on a regular basis required a lot of creativity on my part and money. We loved it. Those were some great times, and I wouldn’t change any of them.
That being said, Nina came to us from Hamburg, Germany. She was a very frail-looking 17-year-old girl, and I remember when we picked her up at the airport, I was deeply troubled by her weight. She smiled politely and her English was pretty good, but she didn’t talk much, sort of stayed to herself for a few days. Back then, there were no cell phones or social media apps you could contact your family and friends a hundred times a day. I believe she spoke with her own mom 3 times while she was here, and she had one phone call from her Dad, and though we won’t discuss that conversation, he devastated his only daughter that day, and she and I played hooky from school the following day together, in an attempt to mend her broken, bruised heart. We watched movies, ate lunch and snacks in front of the tv, and just spent the day together talking about life and its many aspects.
Nina, warmed up to our family fairly quickly and she became one of us. Just as the numerous other exchange students had done. She worked outside on the farm with us pitching hog manure, baleing hay, cleaning the yard, and she helped in the house when it was time to do laundry, dishes, or dinner. She and our two daughters, and our son, all got along well together, and they enjoyed cooking together. Below are some photos of Nina from 1999.
FAST FORWARD 23 YEARS:
On April 15, 2022, Nina visited Michigan, back to our farm and the family that loved her and missed her. When she left here twenty-three years ago, she was a teenager, the whole world bright and fresh and beautiful. She was cheerful and fresh, beautiful, full of life and ideas. When she drove into our driveway on Friday evening, close to 9 p.m., she sat in the car for a moment before she opened the door and got out of the rental. I was standing on the sidewalk looking in the window and shaking my head in disbelief. I knew the girl, still see the girl and her heart, but a woman who just turned 40 was sitting behind the steering wheel. Seemed so surreal. How had that many years passed by? She stood before, the same tall girl, just a little older, and worldly wise. She looked at me for a long moment, then said, “Mom, I can’t believe it. 23 years. I just can’t believe it”. I said I know, and began to cry. It was a happy cry, a celebration, a reunion we never dreamed would happen.
Nina, spent seven days and eight nights here. Our children were all grown now with children of their own. For Nina, it seemed unreal that her host brothers and sisters had so many children, almost fully grown. Many things around the farm were the same to her, and some things she picked up on right away. They would trigger her memory, and she would laugh and share the discoveries with us. For instance, this old house was built in in 1880. The door knobs are 142 years old. They have a unique piece of metal that forms on the side of the knob. It’s curved to fit your thumb just perfectly as you grasp the handle with your hand, and you have to squeeze it inward to release the old latch. She remembered that, and it made her laugh. She remembered all of us sharing one bathroom, remembered our typical friday nights with pizza and a VHS movie. She reminded me of quite a few things that I had forgotten also. With a farm to tend to a home to remodel and three kids of our own, there were alot of things that i had forgotten while I was busy doing whatever had to be done.
Nina, is a fabulous cook, and she can make dishes that look like they came straight out of a Rachel Ray magazine. She’s had dinner parties back in Germany for several of her friends, when she has cooked all day and made a seven-course meal. She eats very healthily and enjoys spices, onions, garlic, etc. She showed me photos of her many of her creations, and one included stripping down an octopus, cleaning its legs, and restuffing them with “something” and then deep frying them. She has been a skydiver for many years, well until about three years ago when the wind velocity worked against her and caused her to land with her knees locked, tearing all the ligaments surrounding her knees. That forced her to retire from skydiving, and now she literally travels all over the world seeing sights, and hiking the mountain terrains of Sweden, Switzerland, France, South Africa. I cannot name all the places she has been. She is a delighted, satisfied “woman of independent means” with stories that could go on forever and are never boring.
We spent the week together cooking new dishes, shopping at the grocery store for things my cupboards have never seen in forty years of housekeeping, and we had a surprise lunch invitation that we accepted, and we all had a marvelous meal and visit. We went to a sporting goods store, and while I pretended to hold a few articles of clothing that Nina wished to purchase, she looked for a specific lightweight tent. I raced to the front of the store to buy the articles for her as a gift before she could tell me no. (Previously, we shopped at the supermarket together, and before I made it to the pay machine, she shoved me aside and slid her silver Mastercard before I could. We laughed and the cashier laughed, told us to enjoy our reunion/adventures together and try not to kill each other. We never ran out of things to talk about. I especially enjoyed hearing about Nina, the adult. The career woman, and all the choices she has made that have landed her working for Johnson and Johnson in the eye department. She is a web designer, owns her own flat in Hamburg , Germany but her heart belongs strickly to Switzerland. The beauty of that place, the hills, the terrain, the trails, the solitude, it all calls to her soul.
We celebrated Easter while Nina was with us, and that was an enjoyable day also. She helped fill easter eggs for the 7 of our 12 grandchildren that were here for the meal, she helped hide the eggs and of course the day before there was an entire day of pie baking, where she was learned to “pinch a crust” just like my granddaughters have done over the years with me.
Also, because she is so good with computers, I had her look at mine, and when we and her genius brother figured out that Dell Inspirions all have the same issue I determined it that i should quickly go out and purchase a new laptop while she is still here and I can glean from her knowledge. I did buy a new laptop and I am happy to say that after 25 years I have made the switch from DELL to HP and I am elated.
Nina left here the following Saturday morning, April 23, 2022, a little after 9 a.m. It was a difficult goodbye, we cried and hugged one another several times. More than anything else, I wanted to be sure she knew that she heard me when I told her how proud I was of her and the woman she has become, and I wanted her to know, to always believe how much she is loved here. She is a remarkable woman, and I am truly blessed to call her our adopted daughter and friend. Below are pictures from her trip here to the States.
whispersofmylife.com 
