Visiting a Widow

 Visiting a Widow
When my wife Cindy Morrison Beck was alive and we went shopping together at Pechin’s in Dunbat, Pennsylvania we would buy some extra fruit for a friend who lived along our driving route home. We knew the woman before she lost her husband and would sometimes we would stop to visit for about half an hour.
I knew the couple as a child from the old clapboard, one room church in Clinton Pennsylvania. Ahe and her husband were good friends with my dad and mom. As I mayured from childhood, they became my friends as well. He was a thin man with a ready smile and she was a sweet woman who laughed easily.
Because they lived along the Springfield Pike, it became natural for us to stop when my wife and I saw them on their porch. From those visits my wife and our children grew to know them as well. We were always welcome and they seemed to enjoy our children. Our children became comfortable with them almost as much as with their grandparents.
It was hard to explain to our kids when her husband died. We didn’t take them to the funeral home. We didn’t think it was appropriate for them and would have been a distraction to other mourners. It was difficult to stop at her home, but we needed for her to believe we hadn’t abandoned her. It was more awkward for my wife and me, but our children continued where they were before her husband’s death, climbing onto her lap and playing.
It slowly evolved for us to buy some extra fruit: a bunch of bananas and a container or two of whatever fruit that looked good. That might be a bag of apples, a tray of oranges or a container of pears or tangerines.
She never said that she needed the fruit, but was always thankful. Cindy and I knew that she could use it, because after her husband’s demise, she took on jobs cleaning other people’s homes and became a sitter for sick clients at night.
When we moved fro Normalville, we didn’t drive by her home nearly as often, but we would occasionally make the detour so we could visit. She slowly aged and her family moved her into the same nursing home as my dad. We could visit more often. She remembered us and still called me Tommy when we would stop and talk with her. She and my father are gone now, but the pleasant memories linger.

A Memorial on Memorial Day

 A Memorial on Memorial Day
The United States of America set aside an entire day to honor those brave men and women who marched off to war knowing full well what might be asked of them and they still left home to protect their home, family, and country. There might have been a person with stray thoughts of glory, but I’m sure that all of those thoughts evaporated at the first taste of battle, of seeing the carnage of war, or of watching fellow soldiers falling dead around them. As the sounds of bombs falling, guns being fired and the screams of pain from the wonded, and moans of dying assaulted thir ears. Thoughts of home and hearth became more intense and more important to them and yet they continued to advance through the jungles, onto the beaches, and travel in ships and planes to stop the tide of oppression.
I would like to honor the brave men and women who sacrificed all to allow America to remain free and to break the grasp of despots of the past.  I was going to write about a close friend and honor him, but expanded it to include all the military men and women who gave their lives to preserve freedom in the Unuted States.
My friend and I were playmates as children and grew up together. We spent summers together at is grandmother’s home. He was canscripted to fight the war in Vietnam, the war that wasn’t a war. He was killed in action. When I heard the news I felt crushed and heartbroken. I was the same age. I was a corpsman in the Inited States Navy. But by the hand of God, I was spared the Hell that was Vietnam. I was relegated to care for those who sacrificed body parts, who were maimed and wounded when they returned home. I was responsible to help mend their broken bodies.
I searched for him on Google to be sure to spell in correctly. I knew his name, but I had never actually seen it written. As the screen popped up, I felt my chest tighten as I scrolled down through the names. Fifty-eight thousand men and women died in just that war. The weight of that number pressed down on me as names flitted by. Not too far down that list I found what I was searching for: Earl Duane Barkley, Sgt. Army, Indian Head, PA.
Since then, the bridge in his nearby hometown now is honored by being named in honor of him. Thank you for your service and sacrifice.

Getting Out

Getting Out
Saturday I went hunting wheen my brother Ken called and asked if I wanted to try hunting for a deer. Saturday, old people could hunt with a rifle for antlerless deer. I accepted. I have been much too sedentary lately. My dad Edson Carl Beck would say, “You need to get outside and get the stink blown off you.” I really needed the time away from my computer and television. I have been spendingg too much time inside.
My brother has a small mobile hunting blind. It is handbuilt on a trailer with a door on one wall and three windows on the remaining three others, allowing an unrestricted view of the terrain. An office chair on wheels make the perch comfortable and the hunter is able to scoot around inside to have access to shoot out any window when a deer should wander into view.
I’d hunted from the hunting blind before and was comfortable once I had been dropped off and settled with my rifle at my side. It was still dark outside and I loaded my gun in the dark. Once done, I sat in the darkness waiting for the sun to rise. The weather was chill. It was silent with no breeze, no bird sounds, and no movement at all.
Slowly the morning sun crept over the distant horizen to my left to cover the valley below me. The dark terrain evolved into shapes before gaining any color at all. Gradually I could see the pale vapor cloud that came out of my nose as I exhaled. Eventually birds began to stir around me wakened from their sleep and their small cheeps and peeps greeted my ears. The air was still otherwise. There was no wind, not even the sligtest puff of a breeze. As I rearranged myself in the chair, it would groan under my weight.
The sun climbed higher and the golden aspen trees began to glow in the diffuse light enhanced by a crystal robe of frost. They looked bright among some dark evergreen trees. It was a beautiful sight. Brown weed carpet and occasional thorn trees covered the field that spread from the building to disappear at the feet of the woods and I began my watch for a deer. The minutes passed into hours and nothing appeared other than the birds I was once graced by the arrival of a brilliantly fearthered cardinal. Its bright red plumage was intense against the green leaves that remained on the bush.
Empty handed I returned to my car and drove back home, but it wasn’t wasted time. It was a needed vacation from myself. 

It's Remarkable

 Remarkable

It has been fascinating to watch the skies at sunrise, sunset, and the hours in between. I have been drawn upward by the sun, clouds, moon and stars. I can be enticed even on the days when the sun refuses to shine and a vast panorama of clouds seethe and churn darkly. Occasionally the clouds are charged with twists of lightning, stirred by the deep rumbles of thunder. Sometimes the ground vibrates beneath my feet as the lightning flashes dance close causing the earth to quiver in response to the roar of thunder.

Sometimes the clouds are only a misty veil. It stirs, just thick enough to play a game of hide-n-seek with distant mountain tops. Sometimes the clouds sag low wrapping the trees and bushes with a damp blanket of fog to cover the ground with its thick blanket of cotton. When the cloud rolls away, the grass is covered with dew that sparkles as the sun or the moon rises.

The moon appears as a celestial orb, full faced and bright or as thin slices. The calendar shaves away the moon in slivers to make sickles of light. The moon evolves into the smile of a Cheshire cat or into fishhooks that snag stars in the dark night sky. Slowly stars fade as night ends and the sun begins its rise. This is where another remarkable fantasy begins. The sun’s rays pierce the darkness and dance on the passing clouds. Pale yellow light cuddles with the surface of the clouds. The light intensifies, turning the rosy glow into colors of glorious orange-gold or into a blazing hot red hue. Then the sun itself rises. It shows its brilliant face above the horizon then the clouds reclaim their virginity, white and pure.

The clouds scurry across the sky pushed by prevailing breezes. The sky’s color may vary from a pale milky hue to a deep azure blue. The wind swirls the clouds like creamer in a cup of coffee. The sun continues its journey overhead. Its path marked by shadows that the light paints on the earth beneath. Hour by hour shadows lengthen as it nears the end of the day and the time for the sun to put on its pajamas and go to sleep. The sun leaves goodbye kisses on the clouds to create fantastic scenes of light and as it settles in for the night. The sunset colors rival the morning’s sunrise, but in reverse. As the light lessens and the sun finally slips below the horizon, I sometimes think that we are looking at the underside of heaven, what will our actual view of heaven be like? It’s too grand for me to imagine.

Aging

 

The Chair

The old man sits in a chair by the door

waiting for someone who's been there before.

His skin is as thin as rice paper page,

drooping face speckled with spots of his age.

Drowsy head bobbing with white hair askew,

as light leaves the sky and lawn fills with dew

No headlights appear and shaking his head

Weary he rises and shuffles to bed

The old man sits by the door in a chair

no children or friends come visit him there.

Stirring as thoughts of them surface and rise.

With muscles twitching he opens his eyes,

through rheumy lenses and limited view

he sees youth passing, amazed how time flew.

The door remains closed, sealed tightly with rust.

The chair's now empty, filled only with dust.

 

 

The Sink Window

The old woman stands and leans on the sink,

she stares through windows to look and to think

Her steps now falter on knees filled with pain.

Wistfully her eyes stare down the long lane.

Wrinkles map her face. Age spots back her hands

wearying quickly from daily demands

No family’s seen, she turns and shakes her head,

closing the curtains she hobbles to bed.

The old woman wakes and on the sink leans,

her body is bent, face lined with ravines.

She stares at her hands, once supple and sure,

resting on the sink, misshapen and sore.

Puckered lips sag into a toothless frown.

Her youth’s flown away and her clock’s wound down.

The curtains are closed as stray breezes sigh,

The windows are dark. The sink is now dry.

 

 

The Problem

Children are caught in personal affairs

no time for one who sits alone in chairs,

no time to give them, and no time to think

of someone who waits and stands at the sink.

Busy with family everyday

not recognizing how time slips away.

Someday you will be waiting for a call,

wanting affection, no matter how small.

Quickly the children grow and leave the nest,

lifetime spouses die and are laid to rest.

Embers of hope weaken and barely glows

when no one calls and no one shows.

Traveling salesmen are greeted with glee.

The “Witnesses” invited in for tea.

It will happen much sooner than you think,

It will be you with the chair or the sink.

Masquerades

 Masquerades
There was a time as I was growing up that Halloween was little more than dressing up and taking on the persona of a scarecrow, a hobo, a princess, a cowboy, a bride, an Indian, or even a clown. I’m not talking about the scary live-in-a-storm-drain clown, but the classic ones like seen in a circus. One of the easiest costumes of all was being a ghost by using an old sheet with holes cut out for the eyes.
The decorations for Halloween were mostly dried corn stalks arranged and tied into shocks with pumpkins at its feet or maybe some old clothing stuffed with newspapers sitting in a lawn chair on the front porch. But today, the decorations have expanded to the point that many people have spent more to decorate than at Christmas. So, what’s the problem? Halloween is just another holiday, right?
Not so. it’s a celebration of the dark things in the world: a celebration of the evil things that go bump in the night; demons, skeletons, monsters, ghosts, vampires, witches, and even Satan himself. Costumes have gone from spooky to overly bloody and gory. Homes have light displays; mechanical blow up decorations, and front yards filled with Styrofoam tombstone cemeteries. Skeletons climb over cobweb covered porches to rest on rooftops. Skeleton horses pull horse-drawn coach hearses. I’ve seen plastic cat skeletons and rats for sale at Wal-Mart. I can hardly wait for skeleton dogs to join them on the shelves.
Even trick-or-treat night has a sinister past. Druid priests would go door to door to collect tribute and if the homeowner refused, the priests would refuse to bless the house and not chase away unwelcome spirits. The Celts believed that the dead returned to earth at the festival of Samhain, which is celebrated on the night of October 31st. Bonfires and sacrifices to the dead were offered. The Celts would disguise themselves in costumes of animal skins to drive away the phantom visitors. The priests would perform “blessings” in exchange for food and drink. Later people began to dress as ghosts, demons, or other malevolent beings. This custom evolved and is considered the precursor of trick-or-treating.
Too often the celebration of this season overshadows and swallows up the next holiday, Thanksgiving. The blessings of God are lost in the evils of Halloween. Our gratefulness is deferred by the rush toward the Christmas holiday. Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus the Christ child; the Light of the world and our gratefulness at the birth of our Savior should outshine the darkness of Halloween.

Halloween Boo Boos

 Halloween Boo Boos
I was remembering several scenarios of a time when I worked in the emergency department of H. C. Frick Hospital in Mt. Pleasant, Pennsylvania and this one stood out. One Halloween, Dr. Vandy was on duty in the emergency room when a young man presented himself with both of his hands injured. It was one of the Flinn boys. For some reason Dr. Vandy had always called the brothers “The Flying Flinns.”
We quite frequently treated the Flinn boys for various injuries. It wasn’t that they were abused, but accidents just seemed to seek them out then find them. They looked a lot alike. They were two peas in a pod, except they weren’t green. Each man had sandy red hair and a wide scattering of freckles spread over their faces.
When we looked at the presenting Flinn boy’s hands, they were abraded, bruised, and scraped. The doctor ordered x-rays. While we were cleaning both of his hands and waiting for the x-ray tech, he began to share his tale.
“I was working at a haunted house tonight. I had huge rubber feet, rubber hands and a big, bushy wig that partially covered my face.”
We could see that the clothing he was wearing were old and tattered with red paint smeared on them to simulate blood.
“Two obviously gay guys came into the maze of the house. All of us tried our hardest to really scare them.  I could hear them coming closer down the darkened hallway. The one was saying, ‘Oh, Franzie! I’m so scared! Franzie, hold me, I’m so scared!’ and I thought, ‘Here’s where I get them.’ Just as they reached the doorway to come into my room, I slapped both of my hands on the door frame in frontt of their faces and howled as loud as I could. I heard ‘OH, FRANZIE!!’ and the guy slammed the door on my fingers. Now, I really did scream. I had a reason to yell. My hollering must have scared them, because they ran through my room and disappeared into the darkness beyond. Now I’m here to see whether or not they broke my hands.”
When the x-ray films came back, He only had a small non-displaced fracture. We dressed his wounds, splinted the finger, and sent him home. It took all we could do to keep from laughing while we were treating him. The Flinn kid was obviously in pain, but what a story he can tell his grandkids.

Barbecued Bears Balls

 Barbequed Bear Balls
I made barbecued meatballs for lunch at the Chestnut Ridge Historical Society and it reminded me of my first wild game banquet. My brother Kenneth Beck had a spare ticket and asked if I wanted to go. Just like most Saturday nights, I was free and readily accepted. I had no idea what to expect. It was all new to me. Before this, the only wild game I’d ever eaten were the animals my dad killed or venison that I killed during deer season.
The first things on the menu were trays of hors d’oeuvres of cheeses, deer sausage, homemade pickles, pickled peppers, and a variety of crackers. The next course offered were soups, regular chili, venison chili, white bean moose soup, turtle soup, squirrel & navy bean soup, or wild mushroom soup. I sampled the turtle soup and the squirrel bean soup.
The next round of foods that was shared was the main course, fresh cloverleaf buns, small buttered potatoes, and green beans. Then there were the display of meats: elk meatloaf, slices of venison roast, wild turkey, bear goulash, venison meatloaf, some type of sausage in sauerkraut, and the barbequed bear balls. The bear meat had been ground up, rolled into meat balls, and cooked in a barbeque sauce.
I didn’t try the sauerkraut and sausage and I wasn’t impressed with the bear goulash. I didn’t like the flavor of the spices that were used in it and I didn’t like the bear meat’s mushy consistency.
A large urn of coffee and several coolers of iced water and lemon Blend graced a small table at the end of the line to wet our whistles and clear palates between the different meats.
Another small table was festooned and piled high with a plethora of desserts:. Cakes of all flavors with their varied icings, small muffins of banana bread, and a few cookies. All were bundled in individual clear plastic containers. It made them easy to select and to carry back to your table.
Door prizes and other ticket prizes for T shirts, car care products, cash prizes, framed pictures, appliances, and several guns were given out to people with matching ticket numbers.
I remember sitting at my computer typing on my computer with a full round gut. At that time, I prayed that the food had settled. The foods must have called a truce, because I had a quiet night of sleep and the herds of wild game didn’t fight for territorial rights during the middle of the night.

Over the River and Through the Woods

Over the River and Through the Woods

Friday and Saturday were both fry days. I fried sausage for the annual Buckwheat, Pancake, and Sausage Festival as a volunteer to support the Ohiopyle & Stewart Volunteer Fire Department. It is their biggest fundraising event for their fire department. It’s an annual event I have worked for nearly fifty years. My father-in-law twisted my arm when I was dating his daughter Cindy Morrison. I must have passed muster, because I eventually married her. I am aging and this year, I fried sausage only on Friday with my son Andrew.

The drive from my home takes almost twenty minutes. Many of the spots along the road are filled with memories. I shared my memories with my son as we drove to Ohiopyle. Some of these places have disappeared or changed. The one that is most noticeable is the metal truss bridge that spanned the Mill Run Reservoir. It was narrow and because of the metalwork overhead, it was damaged by several taller trucks. The new span is wider and has no metalwork overhead. It is smooth and sleek, but lacks any architectural detail or history.

The drive to Ohiopyle consists of a series of hills and curves. It seems to wend its way down into Ohiopyle. The early morning drive was beautiful. Patches of fog often hid the colors of the autumn hued leaves. The fog also veiled the rising sun into a blurry spot of light giving the fog surroundings an ethereal feel. Most of the fog curled in the dips and hollows of the road like a cat curling to sleep. The wall of fog would suddenly disappear and the bright robes of the autumn leaves would appear glistening with dew in the soft sunlight. The oak and maple trees were wearing their finest coats. The poplar trees had shed most of their leaves standing tall and stately with their bared limbs raised toward the sky.

Situated close to the road is the church and school house at Bear Run Conservancy. It is near the entrance to Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater. My wife’s grandmother, Pearl Jackson Morrison lived in the school house until she died. The Conservancy has returned it to it’s original construction, removing a garage and closed in side porch.

Another notable site along the route is the church that was part of the movie, “Four Weddings and a Funeral.” The changes made by s\the state parks have robbed Ohiopyle of its sleepy little village and natural beauty, but it still stirs memories of that time. 

Shine On

 Shine On
I thought I’d share one day I had to myself when I visited a place I would visit around Christmastime to shop for gifts for my wife. I’d not visited for several years. It once was a Red & White store on Route 30 just west of Ligonier. After the store closed, it became an antique/flea market. It was a wonderful place to stroll through and take in all of the items from the past. Anything and everything gathered on the shelves. It was a marvelous building to wander through, trying to decide if it was something I wanted, needed, or could afford.
I climbed into my car and dreamed of exploring the store and browsing through the accumulated oddities. The trip through the gray drizzle did little to dampen my anticipation. When I got to the location the entire building was missing. It had been torn down. My heart fell. I turned around and drove back into Ligonier to satisfy another craving. I ate lunch at Ruthies, a small diner to the east of Ligonier on Route 30. I wasn’t disappointed. The food was great, but now Ruthies is gone too, claimed by fire.
I went home, deciding to rest and allow my food to digest. Feet up, I snapped on the television. The program Moonshiners popped up. It was a program I hadn’t seen before and watched it to the end. It did bring to my attention of an incident that happened years ago while Connellsville Senior High School. In chemistry class lab my lab partner and I were to do a distillation project. I knew that I had some elderberry juice that I concocted was still there in my parent’s basement smelling a bit yeasty. Perfect. I smuggled it into school and then into the classroom.
After setting up the Bunsen burner and the glass tubing necessry for the “distillery” I eased the lid off the jar and poured the elderberry juice into the glass still pot, fired up the Bunsen burner, and waited. Controlling the heat was difficult. The temperature would fluctuate, but soon we had some distillate dripping from the coil and collecting in a beaker. Because we were unsure of the “purity” of the distillate, we decided to run it through the still a second time.
We controlled the heat much better and soon the liquid flowed clear as water. My partner said, “Do you think we should try it?” But before I could answer out instructor said, “I’ll take that boys.” So we never knew if we ever achieved liquor, what proof it was, or if it was palatable.

Given the Boot

Given the Boot
Seeing a photo of myself that my daughter Anna Beck Prinkey posted for Veteran’s Day, dredged up some memories from that time. The photo was from boot camp at Great Lakes Naval Facility. I saw the face of a nerdy teenaged boy looking back at me with dark rimmed glasses. The memory was of the chaos after emerging from the bus on the base. My emotions were already in turmoil, I’d just flown for the first time from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to O’Hare airport Illinois. I’d just celebrated Thanksgiving at home and knew I’d be away from home for Christmas. Gathered with other confused kids in a large hall we were hustled from one spot to another; gathering shoes, underwear, clothing and a duffle bag. The group was then herded into a barber shop where we were shorn. The clippers flew over my head. As I ran my hand over the stubble, I was reminded of a plush stuffed animal. What a strange sensation. I’d only had a crew cut twice in my life. My dad deemed it necessary, and I hated it. I believe that is why I still wear a cap today.
I mentioned in past posts that the commander of our sister company was a real hard nose. The “Soon-to- be sailors” under his leadership were so angry with his constant derision, they made plans to kill him. If they did, we as their sister company would be kept in boot camp FOREVER or at least until things were sorted out. A goodly number of our company and theirs were black kids, many from the south. Our company thought we’d have to break the tension to salvage our training. Everyone in our company stripped the sheets and pillow case from their beds. Wrapped in the sheets with the pillow case tilted back on our heads so our faces would be recognized, we marched down the aisle of out sister company’s barracks.
The men of our sister company were at first shocked, but as they began to distinguish familiar faces they began to laugh. We were used to marching together and were easily recognized. The mounting tension was broken and we graduated on time.
Another thought that was almost like an oasis in the confusion and myriad of new experiences, routines, and faces was in the first week of basic training, I was in line at the chow hall. One of the men “slinging hash” was a guy with whom I graduated high school. That was the only time I ever saw him, but it was just a bit of normalcy that I needed in the madness of boot camp.

Back to School

Back to School
This is the time of year that kid’s and parent’s thoughts turn to getting ready for the new school year. Most of the children have some reluctance and most of the parents have mixed feelings of relief and anxiety. The first day of school may be the child’s first ride on a school bus, meeting a new teacher, or wearing the new school clothing.
Near the end of summer I would hear the cicadas rasping their songs in the heat. There was nothing to dread from these small creatures, but as a child, I developed an unsettled feeling of angst when they would began their concert. I knew my summer freedom was nearly over and the routine of schooldays would soon begin. Days of reading, math, and spelling, months of history, science, and geography, and nearly a full year of penmanship, hard seated desks, and other not-too-polite kids lay ahead. It also meant recess, lunches, and making new friends.
Going back to school always meant going to the Gabriel’s store with my mom Sybil Miner Beck to shop for clothing. My first recollection of that store was its location in Uniontown, Pennsylvania. It waas coposed of two housesthat were conjoined by built-in walkways. Bins and tables were full of jumbled pants, shirts, and other items that had to be sorted through to find “seconds” that were still in wearable shape. Several years later, the store moved to a larger much roomier building, but the need to examine the clothing was real: checking for missing buttons, working zippers, tears, and to be sure that there were no major flaws.
Then came the role reversal, I got married to my wife Cindy Morrison Beck and we had three children of our own. School days meant something completely different, but then again, my wife was a school teacher. She taught at the private Christian school where our children were enrolled. School days meant visiting stores for school supplies and new clothing. The entire family would make the traditional pilgrimage to Gabriel Brothers to shop for school clothes or to the J. C. Penny outlet in Columbus, Ohio.
Gabriel’s has now expanded to have multiple stores. Growing up people called the original two stores Gabe’s. Apparently, the owners of the stores heard the public’s nickname for them and have changed the signage renaming the stores Gabe’s. The tradition of going to Gabe.s has been lost, but now as an adult when I hear the cicadas and the school days draw near, the sound always stirs thoughts of the old conjoined houses and shopping at Gabe’s for school clothes.=

Names Have Been Changed to Protect the Innocent (Namely Me)

Names Have Been Changed to Protect the Innocent (Namely Me)
With Halloween coming closer, I thought I would share this brush with this spooky season. It really isn’t a ghost story, but it will have to do.
I may have shared this incident before but I still laugh when I think of it. Because it is in the same vein I will tell it anyway. While I was employed at Frick Hospital in Mt. Pleasant, Pennsylvania,  I had just taken the body of a deceased person to the morgue. I, placed the cart in the cooler and was finishing the paper work in the log, when I heard voices in the storeroom through a connecting vent high on the wall. It was our maintenance man, Franz and Niecie, one of our female central supply techs. They were retrieving a bariatric bed. Bariatric beds are oversized beds for the larger patients. The bed had always been stored directly beneath the vent in the storage room next door.
I moved across the morgue until I was underneath the vent. I cupped my hands around my mouth and making a funnel I moaned, “W-O-O-O-O-O-O! W-O-O-O-O-O!”
They immediately stopped talking. Then I heard Niecie ask, “Franz, did you hear that?!”
When Franz didn’t answer right away, she persisted, “Did you hear that?”
Franz said “Yes! Yes I did.”
“What was that?” She asked.
I heard Franz shush her.
They were quiet and I could tell they were listening. So I waited. When I heard them start to move the bed in the next room, again I moaned, “W-O-O-O-O-O! W-O-O-O-O-O!”
Niecie said, “Let’s get out of here!” I heard the supply room door pop open and the wheels of the bed rolled out of the room at a high rate of speed.
Later I met Franz in the hallway and told him what I had done. He laughed and said, “I didn’t know what that noise was. I knew the morgue was next door, so I thought at first it could have been a ghost. The second time you moaned, Neicie’s eyes bugged out. She grabbed my arm and almost climbed up onto my shoulders. I think she would have if I would have let her.”
            We never told Neicie and if you read this, I apologize.

Like Father Like Son

Like Father Like Son
My father-in-law, Elmer “Bud” Morrison was a man who used his hands and his brain equally well, creating solutions to problems that arose. He was caretaker and handyman for Kentuck Knob, the Frank Lloyd home of I. N. Hagan our local ice cream producer. The house is located near Chalk Hill, Pennsylvania overlooking the Youghiogheny River gorge. The house is designated as a National Historical Landmark. Bud later became the caretaker of Camp Christian which is located near Mill Run, Pennsylvania. The camp used to be called Killarny Park and was a retreat for people who came from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to vacation. Before that it was also a summer camp called Red Feather.
Several churches from Pittsburgh purchased the camp for a summer camp and as a retreat for the people of their congregations. It was also a summer camp many of the youth of Pittsburgh. Bud also worked for the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation repairing roads and keeping them maintained.
During the summer, he drove the heavy-weight road roller and in the winter he drove snow plows that kept our roads passable. Both positions were very demanding physically the vibrations of the roller wore out his hips and the “on call” work of the winter’s plowing and lack of sleep would tire him especially when he was compelled to work the long twelve hours shifts if the weather was bad and the snow fell heavily.
His son Kevin has always been one who enjoys working with his hands and given time, he can stare a hole in a wall and get things done. Mechanical things are second nature to him. He has worked at Lennox Glass Company and as a sanitation driver. Now, he has decided to step into his father’s shoes. He is one of those people that drag themselves out at all hours of the day and night to keep our roads clear, to allow us to travel in relative safety during the winter months. He drove a snowplow like his father. He has now retired and lives in Mull Run with his lovely wife Beverly Crider Morrison.

Recognizing Miracles

 Recognizing Miracles
Have you ever taken the time to stand back and really look at the time as the day passes by or by reviewing the occurrences at the end of the day and evaluating what has happened? Small incidents will appear that can only be described as miracles. They will often emerge from the jumbled thoughts of the day if you look for them. Pick out each oasis of blessing, take note of them, and thank God for those precious moments. It may be as small as finding the spot where you placed your phone or getting a call or a text from someone unexpected. How about bumping into someone that you haven’t seen in ages while you’re out shopping? What about when a stranger holds the door open for you and gives a cheerful greeting? How about when you’re in a hurry and the traffic is molasses slow, you’re grousing about how you’re going to be late, yet a mile down the road there’s an accident from which the delay has saved you.
There are times that you miscount the stair treads and stumble almost falling but are able to catch yourself. Older people break more easily and the recovery from a near-fall is both a blessing and a miracle. Sometimes daily chores sap your strength and you’re absolutely sure that there’s no way to continue, but a sudden burst of energy carries you through. That certainly could be considered a miracle.
You may not consider having a flat tire while you’re driving is a blessing, but if it would have occurred a mile ahead or a mile back, it could have been disastrous and put you in jeopardy. You may find a parking spot near the front door of a business while it’s raining. What about leaving the house and forgetting your checkbook or the shopping list and returning home only to find you left the stove on or you receive an important phone call as soon as you step inside, coincidence? I prefer to think of them as miracles. Maybe they aren’t the size of the parting of the Red Sea, but they are blessings none-the-less that God has sent your way. Have you ever been the recipient of a “pay it forward” or finding money in your dryer, in a jacket pocket, or on the ground…manna from heaven.
Take the time to review your day. Look for the blessings and be truly grateful for each and every one of those God-given miracles.