Look to the Sky

 Look to the Sky

In the past few days, the sky has been so intensely beautiful, I can’t express in words the vivid colors and design I’ve seen. Even Bob Ross with his happy little “wet on wet” painting techniques would be hard pressed to even come close to the excellent paintings of light that God has put on display. I take photographs of the most impressive and share them on Facebook, but they only stir memories of skies that I have seen in my past.

One such sky was while camping at The Great Sand Dunes of Colorado. As we arrived, vast arches of rainbows greeted us. There were three rainbows that slowly dissolved into one, growing brighter as they joined together. Later that night as we set up camp there were no lights for miles. The sky was a velvety black. Huge glistening stars hung just out of reach above our heads. A rain storm swept in with a dazzling lightning display. The air became even clearer and stars became more pronounced after the storm thundered by. The rain seemed to clean the air and polish the stars.

I’m also reminded of the hues of the sky and its reflection in the ocean at the northern tip of Newfoundland. While aboard the Northern Ranger the sky melded into the water of the bay almost becoming one. Only the position of our ship moored there gave definition to the location of the water.

The sunrises and sunsets from my home have been so very impressive. The colors have been so intense that they almost seem artificial. The smorgasbord of passing clouds adds even more interest to phenomenal designs in the sky. The skies’ palette is covered with pastel hues to brilliant primary colors. That boggles my mind. The old adage comes to my mind “A picture paints a thousand words.” But mu descriptions fail miserably at describing the beauty and colors of the sunrises and sunsets.

I like to think that this is the underside of Heaven and if the bottom of Heaven is this wonderful, I can’t imagine what Heaven will be like. I am at a loss for words to try and describe what Heaven will actually look like. I do know the Bible describes Heaven as being filled with jewels and having streets of gold. Heaven’s gates are huge pearls. It’s an eternal place where moth and rust can’t destroy. It is too great a thought for my human mind to comprehend.

 

Rainy Days ad Mondays Always Gets Me Down

 Rainy Days ad Mondays Always Gets Me Down

Even with the increasing daylight hours, the rain always makes me feel sluggish and sort of depressed at the beginning of the week. It makes me want to hide inside even knowing that spring is just around the corner. I’m glad that I have retired and don’t have to go out when the winter winds blow and snow falls. I won’t say I like the rain and sleet, but I guess it is better than the cold ice and snow.

I do have a metal roof and have heard others say how much they like to hear the rain falling on the roof, but with the windows closed, all I hear is thunder and the dull roar of a barrage of raindrops pounding on the roof. There are no sounds of music as the drops dance on the metal roof.

When the rains make everything soggy and water filled, it really makes me want to remain inside where I am dry and warm. When mankind started to build shelters I’m sure his wife wanted to be warm and dry as well. He would do all that he could to keep the rain, wind, and snow outside and to keep her happy and have their dwelling snug and secure. They had to carry water from a stream or spring for cooking and drinking. I’m also sure that fetching in the water day after day became more and more burdensome, so the woman of the house probably shared the desire to have water brought into the house with pipes and a pump. After years of wanting to keep water out of the house, now it became a luxury, then a necessity to have water brought into the house and a way to allow it to escape. Need I mention the need to go outside to use the privy?

Well, it’s Monday again and wondering if the sun will pierce the early morning mist with a golden glow. Even though the temperature is predicted to drop from yesterday’s sunny warm feeling and turn into another bone chilling wintery day, I have some small chores to do around the house. I am thankful that I can stay inside warm and dry and still get them done.

Feelings of Loneliness

 Feelings of Loneliness

I recently had a night when some those sharp pangs of a deep and painful soul wrenching episode of loneliness appeared. It’s a feeling that every widow and widower will get at some time in their lives after the death of their spouse. It also occurs with every person who has gone through a divorce. That feeling doesn’t happen frequently now for me, but when it happens it’s a real lowdown feeling. When I face an empty bed, empty arms, and it seems as though my very soul is empty.

This time that emptiness has been compounded. In the last few days I’ve driven several places and lately I have been listening to an oldie’s station on my car radio. I don’t recall how many songs were about being alone, loneliness, or being lonely. Some only hinted about those feelings of “The Last Dance” while in other lyrics, the teens were separated by death. One after another sad words filled my car: “Are you lonely tonight,” “Heartbreak Hotel,” “Tell Laura I Love Her,” and on and on. “Only The Lonely,” “I Am…I Said,” and “Dancing on My Own,” each one slipped through the speakers of my radio.

I can’t think of the names of the many other songs, but their sadness filled my car on the air waves. Many songs were jazz selections or the blues. One was “The Thrill is Gone.” When I had the lonelies attack, I thought about writing my blog about the feelings of loneliness, but then thought not. The subject was too depressing. I decided to let it pass like I do when those thoughts about being alone appear, but after three days of constantly being bombarded by listening to “being lonely” music, I was prodded to write about it.

Like I said, this feeling doesn’t happen often. I have friends that I lean on and God is always there, however the physical intimacy of a spouse isn’t present. That need remains buried, lurking beneath the busyness of daytime chores, appointments, and the many daily things that press that need done. I find it’s the nights that press close and there is no one to talk with that reveals the emptiness.

Excess Baggage

 Excess Baggage

While stationed in Orlando, Florida, I became friends with Lt. Chris, a Naval Episcopalian chaplain. He drove an ancient pale blue Peugeot. He was the type of a person who made friends no matter where he was. One of those friends was the widow of a merchant marine captain. The captain fetched souvenirs from all over the world and the widow was down-sizing. She was moving to a smaller home and told Chris that she wanted him to have something by which to remember her. She gave him a huge bronze incense burner. It was not a small one that might sit on a desk, but it stood over six feet tall.

Chris had a silver tongue and could cajole a monkey out of his fleas. He talked me and another corpsman into going with him to collect it in the U. S. Navy’s two and a half ton truck. If I’d known the size of it before I got to the widow’s house, I would have run the other way.

The incense burner was constructed of three large sections and several smaller pieces. The base was three feet in diameter. Each segment tapered smaller until the top piece formed a rounded dome. It had a bold relief oriental motif of entwined vines and dragons with removable leaf-shaped platforms to hold the incense. If it hadn’t been in sections we could never have moved it. There were no bolts to hold it together. Its raised lip fitted inside of the piece belpw it and its weight held it in place. The weight kept each piece secure.

The size and weight of the base alone made it difficult to handle. Lifting it into the bed of the truck was gut wrenching. I thought for sure I would have a hernia before we got it loaded. The middle section was actually the heaviest, but its smaller size made it easier to lift. We struggled to remove each piece from her home without damaging her walls, hardwood floors, or doors. The only way to remove it was to carry it through a shaded garden and down a long walkway to the truck.

Now that Chris had it, he needed a place to store it. Claiming the huge incense burner was unusual, but this was the real gist of the story. Chris talked the commanding officer of the hospital into keeping it in his office. The bronze tower was so heavy; we had to place a 3/4 inch thick square of plywood beneath it to prevent its weight from crashing through the floor behind his desk. I felt sorry for myself at having to lift and transport it, but I pitied any sailor assigned to clean and polish it.

Old Postcards

 Old Postcards

In the past I’ve shared old postcards that were left to me by my mother-in-law, Retha Morrison. Some were sent to her while others were bought traveling with my father-in-law, Bud. After Bud died, she gathered more as she travelled with her best friends, Conrad and Dorothy Auel. Conrad and Dorothy lived in Sheridan, Pennsylvania. They were great friends. They met at Camp Christian, near Mill Run, Pennsylvania. Bud was the caretaker and Retha did much of the cooking.

Sadly, all of those people are gone and I miss them terribly.

But back to the postcards, there are well over five hundred cards some postmarked and sent while others remain unsent. The earliest card that I’ve found was 1938, but I haven’t looked at al of them yet. What I once posted on Facebook had been a condensation of a camping trip for our church with the teenage kids. It was an experience that I look back on fondly.

There were things that we saw and things we shared that I will never experience again, even if I should live another hundred years. Two of the most lasting memories centered around Sundays and the two different church services that we had.

The first was at King’s Creek Campground in Utah. We actually had the service on a Saturday night, because we had to get up early for the Sunday journey. It was an open air service in an amphitheater with tall evergreen tree walls and a starry sky roof arching high overhead. It was a feeling of closeness to God that I haven’t felt since then.

The other memorable Sunday was the one following our tour of Yellowstone Park, Wyoming was our overnight stay in a small church. It was located in Wapiti Valley, Wyoming. The word wapiti means white rump according to one definition, describing an elk.

The church was built from the timber and boulders that were removed from the site where it was build. The mountains surrounding it, only enhanced its beauty. Inside, were the heads of several antlered elk hanging on the walls beneath high, wooden, cathedral ceilings and over the doors. It was s if the members were paying special attention to one of God’s creations for which the valley and church were named and we were allowed to sleep in the basement and cook inside, instead of having to set up camp to stay overnight.

We would run late if we stayed for Sunday morning service, but how could we refuse to such gracious hosts and I am glad that we did. The most memorable incidents that I can remember were the sharing of music and the collection of the offering.

Unusual memories? Not really. Our group was the special music and the “passing of the hat” was literal. When the ushers collected the offering, they used two white Stetsons as collection plates. It isn’t a memory that will quickly fade, for me and the rest of our troupe.

Should I

 Should I ?

I woke and was unsure what I should write about this morning. Several thoughts came to mind. One was pushing me to write about the rheumatoid arthritis that my Grandmother Rebecca Rugg Miner developed in her old age. That disease caused her hands and feet to be misshapen. The joints became gnarled and painful. Her knees became large and deformed causing her stance to be bowlegged. The effect of the disease causes me pain and to a much lesser degree deformity.

The second is married to the first. This weather swings stir the arthritis to increase the aching in my joints. The cold intensifies the discomfort and sharpens its edge. I feel so blessed when the sun shines and the warmth interrupts the cold and snow.

For some reason a random thought of the dream I had last night lingers. I rarely remember the content of my dreams unless it happens right before I wake. I dreamed that I was helping a friend from Frick Hospital where I worked before retirement. She was sorting through clothing to be resold at a church bazaar. I had been working outside and came inside to help. I was wearing shorts and a Tee shirt that were filthy and filled with sweat. In my dream I thought that I could find something I could wear and change into some clothes that were more fitting, but no. She had taken all the clothes off the racks. They were jumbled together. She decided that the clothes needed to be separated differently.

I am picking through different piles, putting them on hangers then replacing them onto the racks. For some reason I intended to attend a church service adding to the haste to find something clean to wear. I can remember a though that filled my head, “If I can’t find something clean to wear, I will have to go to church in filthy, stinky shorts and a Tee shirt. That thought spurred my frantic search for something to wear. I found a pair of gray slacks. But they were ladies and much too long in the legs, but they were clean and I tried them on…then I woke. I have no idea if I kept them or not or whether I made it to the church service.

On thing I am sure of is that the arthritis is still here

Paying It Forward

 Paying It Forward

Monday morning I went to get my blood drawn as part of a trial medication study. Although I had to stop taking the meds earlier because of side effects from the medication, they wanted to keep me as a “normal” control patient. The reason I stayed in the study was that I was getting paid for having three tubes of blood drawn two times each month. All I needed to do was to fast overnight, be weighed, have my blood pressure checked, and then sit still for the blood draw. This appointment I had to answer a questionnaire. Once I was released, I drove to Valley Dairy restaurant to eat. After my food arrived I took my daily medications.

Monday was my birthday and no one was there to help me celebrate. I was feeling just a little bit down. As I sat there a tall black man came in and sat at a table near mine. He nodded and said “Good morning” his smile spreading across his face. He was a complete stranger, but his friendliness made me take notice. When I finished eating my food I decided to pay for his breakfast. I walked to the cashier to where my server was standing. I handed him my bill and cash asking him to cover the cost of the other man’s bill and keep the rest as his tip.

My next stop was Ollies. While “springing ahead” this weekend resetting my bathroom clock I was clumsy enough to drop it and the hands popped loose, useless. It had bitten the dust. It was no longer able to keep the time. I needed a few groceries and stopped at Aldi’s before heading home.

Once home I washed a load of clothing and dried them before folding and storing them away. I sat in my recliner and the boob tube claimed the rest of the day.

It wasn’t an exciting way to spend my birthday, but I’m still alive and kicking. My kids said they would celebrate another day when we can all get together.

All in all it wasn’t a bad day and I had that good feeling of anonymously paying it ahead.