CCF LETTER

My husband and I support some children through Christian Children’s Fund (CCF). Their teachers make them write us a letter now and then.

You can tell sometimes that they really don’t want to write a letter. Here’s one I received recently. I couldn’t stop laughing:

Dear Maggie and George,

Greetings to you all. I received your letter and photos of you and your family and I was happy to see your family photo and reading your letter. School is great. We just finished our end of term exams. I am looking forward to getting some good grades. I like to help with the house chores. School will be closed for summer on the 8^th of July. I still like science and mathematics. You have beautiful children and they are all adults. That’s all now. Bye.

Ya think this kid was happy to get finished with his letter?

Bullseye

I read an article about how to change your outlook on life from negative to positive. It said to pause at the end of each day and think of three things that went well that day. Isn’t that like shooting a barn full of holes then painting bulls-eyes around them?

OK. Here goes…

#1 - The cap was easy to get off the paint tube today.

#2 – The yellow paint came out of the carpet easily.

#3 – The cat didn’t kill me.

SALT LICK

To say that my husband likes salt would be an understatement. He puts salt on dill pickles! I’m thinking of giving him a salt lick for Christmas. (Does anyone know what that is any more?)

I like salt too. I don’t put it on corn or cantaloupe or, God forbid, dill pickles. But I do heap extra showers of it on my popcorn. I even rub my fingers on the bottom of the bowl and lick the salt off, causing unquenchable thirst the “morning after.” I guess I can’t say much about his dill pickles, can I?

Black Tea

OMG
Black Tea
It has made a mess of me!
I woke up and had a cup of the new tea I had bought. It was designed for mornings. Innocently, I gulped two cups down, and pretty soon I was at warp velocity, running around the house in a frenzy, mind racing and mouth yapping like a 45 rpm record at 33 1/2 speed. One day I’ll learn!

TRAILER PARK LOT

When my husband and I were engaged, he picked me up one day at the school where I was doing my student teaching and handed me a slip of paper with something scrawled on it. It was our new address! A small shady lot on a corner in McSwain’s Trailer Park in Cary. Now how much more romantic can you get? This marriage thing was starting to look real. That was forty years ago.

Recently we were driving through Cary and I said, “Let’s go see if that trailer park is still there.” Sure enough, it was. He pointed to a lot and said, “That’s it. I think.” I said, “No, I think it’s this way. Let’s look for the one with no back yard.” We didn’t have steps in the back, but you could exit by jumping out the door if you needed to.

Eventually we identified our lot by the retaining wall beside the driveway where I knocked off a hubcap. Sweet memories. The lot didn’t look too good that day. But then, neither do I after forty years!

GREAT AMERICA THEME PARK

We spent a bunch of money to get into Great America, then we asked the kids what they wanted to do first. “Find the Arcade!” they cried, as I felt a sharp stab in the pocketbook.

They found the arcade, and my husband and I found the pizza. Then the ice cream. Then the Nachos. The kids spent dollar after dollar shooting water at bubbles and such stuff. We eventually lured them from the arcade to the popsicle stand. Then they wanted to go to the arcade again. We made them eat fried chicken and corn for lunch. Then we went to another arcade.

Once during the day the kids agreed to go on a ride. They wanted to get wet. The sun was going down, but that didn’t have any meaning for them. We headed in the general direction of the wettest ride. I felt a shower of water when a drenched little girl passed me and shook her hair. My son said, “I know we’re near the water ride. I just felt some drops of water from it!”

After the water ride, we got in line for the Whizzer, and we watched it stop right on top of the first hill. (I figured out where it got its name!) Three maintenance men walked up and gave it a push. With that, the coaster catapulted down the first dip of its two-minute course. I heard someone in the crowd utter doubtfully, “It’ll never make it on just one push.”

My husband and I wanted to see the parade and fireworks before heading for home. We entered another arcade and the kids watched another kid play an arcade game. (Their money was gone.) My husband got in line for coffee while I watched at the entrance for the parade to start. There it was! I ran to the game where the kids were hovering to tell them. They glanced over their shoulders and said, “Yeah.” I waved to my husband and pointed to the door. He peered from his place in line. By the time he got to the door to look outside, the parade was over.

The fireworks were next, so we joined the mob of people exiting the park. I squeezed against people on my left, protecting my right hand, which held the full cup of steaming coffee. We burst into a clearing beside the exit gate. No good. No view of the sky. We ran to the parking lot. My husband alternately looked into the sky and searched for the car. I said, “Whoa!” as my coffee and I landed on the pavement.

Patriotic music and static blared across the parking lot. Bursts of voices (both laughter and arguments) blared back. Everyone - Americans, foreigners, kids, teens, babies – did his own thing while the fireworks proclaimed party-time USA. I thought, “We should be more reverent.” Then I thought, “This is America – the good, the bad, and the crazy. And the free.” I smiled and thanked God I was in America. I thanked Him that I had some coffee left, too.

SNIFFING CHICKENS

The smaller the chicken, the better it tastes. We’ve found a place to buy small chickens. It’s a little gas station/hardware/grocery store out in the country.

One day I purchased a chicken, and when I opened it that night a bad smell hit me. No barbeque that night! The next time I went to buy a chicken, I picked one out and took it to the counter. I explained what had happened and asked how I could tell if these chickens were fresh.

He told me to just open the bag and sniff. God bless the small business owner!

Eight Foot Step Ladder

I’ve been wanting a ladder for a few years and yesterday I got one. I have a vine up on a trellis which I can’t reach, and its tentacles are aggressively probing for a grip on something. Not me, I hope. I think it’s morphing into “The Blob.” Remember that movie? I also need the ladder to change a ceiling light bulb without risking my life again by standing on the top of a four foot ladder. I’m too old for this!

My new ladder is aluminum. My husband said I should get a fiberglass one, but I asked him when he planned to use it and informed him that I knew exactly what I wanted. Enough said.

I had to postpone the climbing/reaching/pruning exercise because I woke up with a crick in my neck. Do you think maybe my husband twisted it accidentally in his sleep?

Graduation Day

Do you like graduations? I don’t. Heck, I didn’t even like my own. Everyone else was sentimental, with tears and hugs, while I was grinning from ear to ear when I shook the president’s hand, grabbed that diploma, and trotted off the stage squelching a scream.

It’s a ceremony. A ritual. And such a pain! My great niece graduated the other day, and her mom’s email said it all: “The graduation was LONG, LONG, LONG!!! Being a ‘B’ for Briscoe, our daughter’s ‘walk’ came up fairly quickly. But after that, I thought it would never end! With nothing else to do, I actually had time to count (twice for accuracy) the 2,300 graduates sitting in their chairs. Apparently many parents had gone through this before, because they had brought rather large books to read!”

To graduate from college is indeed an honor. You’ve accomplished a major undertaking. So put on your robe and mortarboard and do your thing. Just don’t ask me to sit patiently - because it ain’t gonna happen!