by jphilo | Mar 3, 2014 | Family
Thank you.
Two words I wanted to say to C. J. Gauger face-to-face at his 100th birthday Saturday. But a snowstorm and frigid temperatures thwarted my plans. So today’s post is devoted to thanking a man who touched my parents and their young family in profound and positive ways.
Thank you…
for taking an interest in Harlan Stratton, my dad, in the mid-1950s when he was hired as Youth Extension Director in Plymouth County and later as Mills County Extension Director. Thank you for mentoring him and taking an interest in his wife and kids.
Thank you…
for observing a stumble in Dad’s gait as he walked away from you after at a 4-H function and telling a co-worker, “Something’s wrong with Harlan. We need to be ready to stand beside him and support his family.”
Thank you…
for acting upon those words after Dad was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1959–for calculating exactly how many days, minus vacation and sick days, he needed to work to reach the five year mark and qualify for a Civil Service pension.
Thank you…
for arranging for Dad’s Extension Office co-workers to pick him up for work once he couldn’t drive, to complete his paperwork once he couldn’t write, to read to him when his vision blurred, until Dad reached the five year mark.
Thank you…
for a pension that allowed my parents to buy a house built for a wheelchair, something they couldn’t afford to do on Mom’s teaching salary and in the absence of Social Security, which Dad didn’t receive until 1990 when he was 62.
Thank you…
for a pension, from which Mom gave Dad $40 as spending money every month. Not much, even in the 1960s and 70s, but enough to allow him to purchase birthday and Christmas presents for his wife, take his family out to supper now and then, and maintain his dignity.
Thank you…
for collecting money to purchase a small life insurance policy for Dad to provide something for Mom and her three small children…just in case. When Dad died in 1997, Mom and us kids were surprised to learn about the policy. Since we didn’t need it, we used it to start the Harlan Stratton 4-H Scholarship given annually at Iowa State University.
Thank you…
for the small pension Mom still receives as Dad’s beneficiary. It’s only $211 a month, and she doesn’t really need it. So she donates part of it to the scholarship fund and spends the rest on college text books for her grandchildren.
Thank you…
for calling some years ago, after reading a newspaper article that connected me to Dad. Thank you for confessing, over the phone, the extent of your kind involvement on behalf of our family when my siblings and I were very young, when Mom was vulnerable and in need of hope.
Thank you…
for showing how a small thread of kindness weaves goodness into the fabric of a family for decades and generations until its members are strong enough and grateful enough to weave kindness into the lives of others.
Thank you…
and happy birthday, C. J. Gauger, one of the great men I have ever known.
by jphilo | Feb 11, 2014 | Top Ten Tuesday
10. When taking an 85-year-old woman out for lunch in zero degree weather, Panara’s has the best soup and coffee.
9. But Applebee’s has the most abundant, safe, close-to-the-door handicapped parking spots.
8. Snowblowers are worth their weight in gold.
7. As are handwarmers tucked inside mittens designed to hold them while snowblowing.
6. Laura Ingalls Wlider’s children’s classic, The Long Winter, looses its childlike appeal after a string of days below zero.
5. Bitterly cold Saturdays offer the perfect opportunity to declutter the house and purge closets.
4. Cold winter days are the perfect time for novelists to write touching, heartrendingly sweet summer scenes. Conversely, sparklingly bright winter scenes are best written on hot summer days.
3. Soup is always a good choice for supper.
2. There’s no such thing as too many pairs of warm, woolen socks.
1. Central heating is a blessing taken for granted far too often.
Photo Credit
by jphilo | Dec 9, 2013 | Out and About
Thanks to my trusty little Toyota Corolla,* I am writing this column from the comfort of my own home. If not for its good handling on slippery roads, I might be shivering in a ditch somewhere between home and frigid Lincoln, Nebraska.
Now don’t get me wrong.
As my friend and Ohio native Katie Wetherbee says about her first trip to Lincoln last weekend, “The weather is cold, but the people are warm and welcoming!” The people truly were warm and welcoming during our three days working with volunteers and ministry leaders at Lincoln’s First Free Church. Their passion for and commitment to developing a quality, inclusive special needs ministry program is phenomenal.
But the weather.
Now that’s a different story. Katie mentioned the cold, but it’s about the same cold in Iowa where I live. So that wasn’t the problem. The problem was the light snow that began falling in Lincoln after midnight Sunday and proceeded to move east along the route I took home. By the time I left Lincoln a little before noon on Sunday, the interstate was wet and messy, but not slippery. The first 70 miles of interstate in Iowa weren’t bad either.
But then.
The roads got a little slippery. And a little slipperier. A semi was in the ditch in the westbound lane. I slowed down. Then I noticed an armored car decorating another portion of the ditch. I went a little slower. And passed a couple pick up trucks in the median. So I went slower still, until the exit came into sight and the intrepid Toyota crawled along the exit ramp, tires firmly gripping the snowy surface until turning onto the two lane highway.
Which wasn’t slippery at all.
The rest of the trip was uneventful. And this morning, I’m very thankful to be home since more light snow fell through the night, and the road reports say it’s slick, slick, slick out there. Which is why the man of steel drove the Corolla to work. It’s better for winter driving than the big ol’ pick up truck.
Thank you, trusty little Toyota Corolla, for keeping us safe once again!
*In the interest of full disclosure, the photo above is not my car. It is the same year, make and color, though mine has a sun roof. And even though the dealer who sold me the car said white cars don’t show as much dirt as other colors (I’m not making this up. The dealer really said that, and in the process, created an instant, inside family joke), my car is much, much dirtier than the pictured vehicle.
Photo Source
by jphilo | Nov 26, 2013 | Top Ten Tuesday
10. Our home is pet-free, so we can take off whenever we want.
9. Costco’s yellow legal pads and architecture mechanical pencils. Don’t know why, but they make me very happy.
8. The internet. It makes the writer’s life so much easier.
7. Public libraries. Without them I’d have to sell internal organs to pay for my reading habit.
6. We are healthy and active. Good health is an undeserved blessing we too often take for granted.
5. My husband. He said “Go for it” without batting an eye when I decided to quit teaching and give writing a try.
4. A mother who taught all her children to cook. Really, really well.
3. Grandma Conrad’s pie crust recipe. Yes, the recipe came from Mom when she taught us to cook.
2. The family’s coming to our house for Thanksgiving. I’d much rather cook than pack.
1. Mom will tell the same stories she always tells. And I’ll be glad to hear them all over again since that means she’s still here!
What will you be thankful for this Thanksgiving? Leave a comment!
by jphilo | Nov 18, 2013 | Family
I’ve never been one of those people with a direct line to God’s voice. I spend most of the time begging him to speak in a without-a-doubt-God-is-speaking voice and waiting for it to happen.
It rarely does.
But this weekend, God spoke loud and clear through, of all things, a song in a hotel lobby. Mom, my brother, and I were checking in the evening before Aunt Lois‘s funeral, and one of my favorite songs was playing.
Matt Redmann’s Blessed Be the Name of the Lord.
I didn’t think much of it at the time. My mind was focused on conversations shared with Lois’s son and daughter. Their descriptions of last visits with their mother and how unexpected they felt her death to be since the doctor had pronounced her heart strong enough to make it to 100. Their stories of how their mother chose to use lessons learned through her losses to minister to hurting friends and family.
Their stories of her faith and faithfulness.
I didn’t think of the song from the hotel lobby again until the end of yesterday’s church service. A service spent rembering Aunt Lois, praying for her children and grandchildren, thinking about her two remaining siblings, Mom and Aunt Donna, wondering what it is like for them to be the last living children from a tightly knit group of eight. I was reaching for another tissue when the worship band played the chords of the last song in the service.
Can you guess what it was?
Yup. It was Blessed Be Your Name. I sorta sang along. But it was hard, what with the lump in my throat and wanting to plug my ears because God was speaking so loud it hurt enough to make me laugh and cry and laugh all at once. Until I ran out of tissues and wished I’d picked up the extra funeral home packets off the pew at the funeral, knowing such frugality would please Aunt Lois and her living siblings to no end. World without end. Amen and amen. While God spoke the life of Lois through the words of this song.
Blessed Be Your Name
Blessed Be Your Name
In the land that is plentiful
Where Your streams of abundance flow
Blessed be Your name
Blessed Be Your name
When I’m found in the desert place
Though I walk through the wilderness
Blessed Be Your name
Every blessing You pour out
I’ll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name
Blessed be Your name
When the sun’s shining down on me
When the world’s ‘all as it should be’
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be Your name
On the road marked with suffering
Though there’s pain in the offering
Blessed be Your name
Every blessing You pour out
I’ll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name
You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord, blessed be Your name
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