The Archivist~Part 2

16 Mar

SUNDAY MEMORIES

 Judy Wills

Judy Wills

                                           

Recently I wrote about being the family “archivist.”  In keeping with that theme, I want to talk about one of my great-grandparents.  I had often heard her spoken of as “Grandma Mac.”  She was my mother’s grandmother.

I don’t know a lot about her – she was quite a lovely lady…she loved having flowers around the house…she had one son and three daughters (my grandmother being the oldest of those daughters), and that son died at about age two.

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Not only do I have a bunch of family pictures, but I have a few “keepsakes” of hers.  I have a “pressed glass” dish that was hers.

I also have a silver-plated flower arranger.  I really didn’t know what it was for a long time, until my mother told me that Grandma Mac always had some type of natural flowers “arranged” in that dish.  It made it quite easy for people to have a nice flower arrangement on their table, without having to have the knowledge or knack of arranging flowers.  The pedestal stand and “bowl” are one piece, and the removal top is lattice-shaped, with holes where the flower stems would be inserted.

After holding onto that piece for a while, I decided that I would like to have a more permanent silk flower arrangement for my solid teak dining room table, and thought that arranger would be just the thing.  So I took it to our local florist, and asked them what they could/would do with it.  The sales person began suggesting this flower, and then that flower, and nothing really appealed to me.  Then she said, “oh wait….what about gardenias?”  And just like that, it was decided.  Gardenias are absolutely my favorite flower!  Why didn’t I think of that?

What do you think?  I think it’s gorgeous, and it sits on my dining room table every day except for Thanksgiving and Christmas, when I have other special arrangements.  And every day I am reminded of my heritage, and the sweet lady that loved lovely things.

I am blest.

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So What’s Another Disaster?

15 Mar
With permission: wikimedia.org

With permission: wikimedia.org

 

Walking by Faith, Not by Sight

Janet Perez Eckles

 

 

When will I learn? You’d think by now, aware of the limitations of my blindness, I’d be careful, really careful with the experiments and projects my 6-year-old granddaughter and I do.

“It’s a disaster,” she groaned.

She was right. I had placed the hot iron on the paper covering the group of beads she creatively arranged on a pegboard. The iron was too hot? I pressed too hard? Or missed one step in the instructions?

Don’t know. But after I lifted the iron, part of the melted beads had spread on the carpet, burning a baseball-size spot. Gulp.

After we dried her tears of disappointment, I took a deep breath, and then wisdom trickled in.

I knelt on the carpet and once the rug had cooled, I gently rubbed the palm of her hand on the scorched spot. “Feel this? This will help us remember that when we mess up, it’s not a failure if the mess-ups teach us a lesson.”

“What lesson?

“To read instructions more carefully.”

How many disasters have you have in life? Broken relationships, financial troubles, bad decisions, failed careers.

And the mess is there. They formed a rough spot in our heart, difficult to clean up. Heartache and regret melted in areas where they shouldn’t.

What if we didn’t consider them failures? Instead, those very events can become God’s powerful reminder that He still restores. Because of Him, we may stumble, but will never fall. Relationships end, but His love still remains vibrant. Finances crumble, but He still provides. Careers end, but He gives new beginnings. Illness wants to shake away our peace, but His hand stops the fear.

When embracing the lesson, life smiles again as we repeat “I will praise the LORD, who counsels me; even at night my heart instructs me. I have set the LORD always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken” (Psalm 16:7-8).

Father, how often the failures, mistakes or calamities of life have threatened to shake me. But now, because you’re near me, peace still sings in my soul. And I know each broken area is the lesson that teaches me to wait in expectation for something new, something better, something richer and something worthy of your praise. In Jesus’s name, amen.

• What has failed in your life lately?
• Where do you find the lesson?
• How will you allow God to turn it to good?

Janet

Learn more about Janet, her books and her ministry as an Inspirational Speaker  at Janet Perez Eckles.

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Ordinary People Living in Extraordinary Circumstances

14 Mar

From the Heart

Louise Gibson

author of Window Wonders

 

 

I was a “Depression” baby
born in 1929-
Times were hard, jobs were scarce,
but I managed to grow up fine.

My father lost his job at Goodrich,
as the economy took a downward spin.
To put food on the table, he found
a job delivering milk.- much to his chagrin.

Times were hard for the working class,
but they learned to help each other out.
When dad could no longer make payments on our house,
the owner requested that we stay
’til the economy turned about.

Both of my parents had a “sweet tooth”
which they tried to satisfy
Mom would bake her chocolate cakes,
and candied orange slices dad would buy.

A lollipop was a rare treat-
a much appreciated event;
so, if dropped in the dirt,
you brushed it off,
and back in your mouth it went.

We kids found joy in simple pleasures,
like greeting the ‘Ice Man” on delivery day.
Everyone had “Ice boxes” to preserve their food
(no refrigerators on display).

While the Ice Man delivered the
large block of ice to the house.
we would scoop up the chips left behind.
It wasn’t exactly a “snow cone”,
but joy came in whatever form we could find.

No TV, cell phones, or I Pads,
Can you imagine such a catastrophe?
No computers to send e-mails,
and we never heard of a CD.

Letters were written by hand,
so communication was slow.
Mail was delivered direct to your door-
through rain, sleet, or snow.

Doing laundry was an all-day chore,
No automatics,- clothes were put through a ringer,
and you had better pay attention as you worked,
or you could damage a finger.

We had no clothes driers-
Clothes lines were strung in the basement ceiling.
Weather permitting, we hung our wash outside.
(No secrets then, it was all very revealing!)

Sunday afternoons were spent socializing.
Relatives and friends would drop by.
All of this stopped when television came along-
We said “Goodbye” with a sigh.

I thank God for His blessings.
‘though not rich monetarily-
We were rich in all the things that count;
Christ, friends and family!

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Robots~Part 2

12 Mar

A Slice of Life

Bill Lites
Bill

 

The military is developing unmanned combat air vehicles (UCAVs), which are an upgraded form of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), that can perform a wide variety of missions, including combat.  UCAVs are now being designed which will have the ability to fly themselves, pick their own course and target, and to make most decisions on their own.  How scary is that?

                                   

Almost every unmanned space probe ever launched could be considered a robot of one type or another.   Those launched in the early 1960s were very limited in their abilities, but more recently their ability to fly, land, survey and take samples on foreign planets is an indication of the advancement of robotic technology.

                                               

Another example of the use of robotics is in the dairy industry.  I just received an email about the dairy farm in Fair Oaks, Indiana that uses computer assisted robotics to process (feed &  milk) their approximately 32,000 cows per day, to produce enough milk for 8 million people.  As part of the daily processing, a transponder that is attached to each cow, reads and records the amount and quality of the milk from that cow, as it is automatically milked.  Also, a pedometer is attached to each cow that records the distance the cow travels in each 24-hour period.

 

                                                                       

Due to the hazardous nature of mining operations, in particular underground mining, the prevalence of autonomous, semi-autonomous, and tele-operated robots has greatly increased in recent years.  A number of vehicle manufacturers provide autonomous trains, trucks and loaders that will load material, transport it from the mine site to its destination, and unload it without requiring human intervention.

                                               

Robots in healthcare have two main functions. Those which assist an individual, such as a person with a disability or a sufferer of a disease, and those which aid in the overall operation  and processing of such industries as pharmaceutical companies and many hospitals systems.

                                               

 

                                                                        —–To Be Continued—–   

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Great Aunt Allie’s Blindness

10 Mar

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Author, Poet and ArtistI met Great Aunt Allie when I was twelve years old. My granddad and grandmother took me to Illinois to meet some of my kin. I enjoyed my second and third cousins and had a wonderful time, but I’ll never forget meeting Allie, my great grandmother’s sister. She was the first blind person I’d ever met. She was sitting down when they introduced us, and she asked if she could feel my face. I thought then, and have always thought, it would tell her about my appearance. Recently, though I’ve talked with Janet Eckles about it and she says, no, it doesn’t tell much. But now that I know more about Allie, I think she just wanted to touch her great-grand niece.

The Illinois families had always been farmers. They lived harsh lives, and I think they must have kept a thin layer of armor around their hearts so they wouldn’t be hurt beyond bearing. I don’t remember any hugging from any of my people.

That’s one reason the next story is so sad, though it goes back in time to when I was a newborn. Apparently, the meeting in Illinois wasn’t our first. Allie traveled to Colorado around the time I was born. My mother tells the story with much regret. Seems in those days the medical community decreed that if you held babies unnecessarily you spoiled them. Unnecessarily was any time when you weren’t feeding them or tending to their needs in some other way. My mother followed doctors’ orders and did not allow Allie to hold me. But Allie wasn’t easily discouraged. She stood by my Bathinette while Mother bathed me, and rocked it with her knee as she sang, “Rock-a-bye Baby.”

The last story isn’t about me, but it’s the best one. Allie and all my female relatives, in Illinois, were quilters. Allie managed to live alone, but I’m sure she received help from her family. Anyhow, she had her quilting frame set up in her living room and she’d piece together scraps of material into warm coverlets and give them away. It’s amazing that she could do that. She didn’t have anyone in the house to thread her needles so every morning she took several to a corner on the tiny Main Street and waited for someone to come by. Many times, it turned out to be the town judge. She had known him since he was a boy. She probably gave him lots of fresh fruit pies when was growing up. When the judge threaded the needles, he was showing his respect for Allie in the way it was most needed.

What is the point of these stories? Whatever you like. Maybe it will encourage you to tell some of your own family stories. Believe me; someone will appreciate them if you do. I’d like to read them myself. And they make terrific grist for a writer’s mill.

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The Archvivist

9 Mar

SUNDAY MEMORIES

 Judy Wills

Judy Wills

My Mother died in 1993.  After that time, my brother handed me all the family photos and documents he had, and informed me that I was the family archivist, so….here you go!  And there were hundreds of items!  It was quite a daunting prospect. However, a friend from church was a Creative Memories consultant, and I sought her out as to how to go about “organizing” all that stuff.  Her suggestion that I separate them into “families” sounded good.  So I set about it – putting my Mother’s family in one pile, and my Father’s family in another.

There were still hundreds of items to work through!

For whatever reason, I decided to start working through my Mother’s family first.  Perhaps because she died more recently than my Father.  So I began to gather the scrapbooks and paper and ideas to work on putting those photos in some chronological order, to put them on decorated pages.  I always had at the back of my mind, that this was a “legacy” for future generations to know their ancestors.

I was never very fast at that project.  It would take me quite a while to decide how I wanted to decorate the page, and what pictures I wanted on the page.  But as I went along, I realized that I was, indeed, getting quicker with the ideas.  I also realized that I was getting rather “immersed” in my family and it’s history.  I have pictures of my great-grandparents on my Mother’s side.  It really turned out to be quite a lot of fun.

My Great-grandparents and their three daughters. My grandmother is second on the right.
My Grandfather (right) and his father

Of course, other “projects” came into play, and I had to set aside the archival project once in a while.  A driving trip we made with our daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren.  Those pictures just had to get into a book before I forgot what we did and when we did it.  Then back to the archives.  Then a cruise, and those pictures had to make their way into a book.  Then back to the archives.  You get the picture.

My Grandmother and Grandfather. Purported to be their "wedding" picture. They eloped.

My Grandmother and Grandfather. Purported to be their “wedding” picture. They eloped.

But I never lost the feeling of really “knowing” my family’s history – where they lived, and when they lived in that town and on that street.  It’s something that I’ve come to cherish.

My Great-grandparents and my Grandmother. She was about six months old.

My Great-grandparents and my Grandmother.
She was about six months old.

            

I’ve gotten away from it now, for a while.  I’ve been rather busy with scanning all the old 35mm slides Fred and I have taken over our 50+ years of marriage.  I hope our daughters and grands will someday want the pictures of their grands, and parents as small/growing children, but I’m sure they don’t want the slides.

My Grandmother at age 2 years 3 months. The "frame" around the picture is the back of the photo, blown up. I thought it needed to be seen - to show how photographs were done in the early 1900's.

My Grandmother at age 2 years 3 months. The “frame” around the picture is the back of the photo, blown up. I thought it needed to be seen – to show how photographs were done in the early 1900’s.

In any case, it’s been a wonderful journey, and one I don’t think I’ll ever finish.

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Slaying the Giants in Your Life~Destroying Discouragement

7 Mar

From My Heart

Louise Gibson

author of Window Wonders

Can you recognize the enemy?
There’s a battle to be won.
Know who you are fighting-
Your armor is the Son!

There are three ways to live,
Of this there is no doubt:
You can live out-
You can wear out, or
You can burn out!

It is erroneous to say
“working too hard is burnout”-
Working hard “at the right thing”
is what it is all about.

Bring everything out of that “anxiety closet”,
and expose it to the ” Light”-
When looked at as they truly are,
You can put them all to flight!

Emotions are treacherous advisors.
We need to be disciplined to stay on track.
Work can be wonderful therapy;
It will get your confidence back!

The Biblical story of David
can turn your life around.
Get your slingshot ready,
“Discouragement, you are going DOWN”.

Psalm 46:1-3
God is our refuge and strength. A very present help in trouble, Therefore, we will not fear. Though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; Though its waters roar and be troubled, Though the mountains shake with its swelling.

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Robots Part 1

5 Mar

A Slice of Life

Bill Lites

Bill

In a letter I received from my friend Leon the other day, he mentioned that he had gotten interested in “Robots & Droids.”  I had no idea where he was getting his information, since I knew he didn’t have a computer.  So, I decided to check out the internet to see what I might find there that might interest him.  WOW, was I surprised!   We are surrounded by robots, whether you realize it or not.  Wikipedia started off by saying, “A robot is a mechanical or virtual agent, usually an electro-mechanical  machine that is guided by a computer program or electronic circuitry.”  Then it went on for pages to describe all kinds of Robotics, Soft Robotics and Virtual Software Agents (otherwise known as Bots).

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This immediately brought to mind the “Star Wars” movie series with all its robotics in action and living color.  Of course, there were the “Good” robots that were always there to help Luke Skywalker and his friends with whatever had to be done.  These robots were even lifesavers at times, giving up their vital parts for their owners.

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 Then there were the “Bad” robots, coming (as it seemed) out of the woodwork, lead by the evil Darth Vader.  This guy was determined to get rid of the good guys and take over everything they had, not to mention the whole Galactic Empire.  Boy, did we enjoy watching the good guys defeat the bad guys for a change, even when they were bigger and badder that anyone could imagine.

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Then I thought about the trip to Alabama I made last year to see another friend.  On the way back I stopped in Montgomery, at the Hyundai plant, for a tour and, saw how the automobile industry is using computer assisted processing and robotics.  It was amazing to see how most of the heavy and dangerous jobs have been replaced by robots. 

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Of course there is the military use of  Teleoperated robots, or telerobots,  which are  devices remotely operated from a distance by a human operator rather than following a predetermined sequence of movements.  These units are being used for such dangerous jobs as bomb locating and disposal.

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                                                                 —– To Be Continued—–

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A Time for Everything Under the Sun

3 Mar

Author, Poet and ArtistThere’s a time for everything under the sun, even in our mundane, daily lives, even a time to clean the refrigerator.

Last night, after supper, while Bill went to a meeting, I decided to clean the refrigerator. The cherry juices in the produce drawer and the smears on the top glass shelf have been bothering me since I got my new eyes. (“Believing is Seeing). He and I planned to finish watching “Fiddler on the Roof,” when he got home, so naturally, when he walked into the kitchen and saw what I was doing, he immediately wanted to help.

Everything that had once been in the refrigerator was now on the counters in colorful, casual arrangements. We had red apples, orange oranges, a jar of green pickled okra (which has been in there for a year or more), and a big clear pitcher full of topaz-colored iced tea.

The glass shelves slid in, shimmering with reflections from the light. As Bill handed me the items one by one I rejoiced in the quality and abundance of food. We had too many avocadoes, but we like them in many things, and they will stay good until we take them out and let them ripen. We had a re-run dish of mushroom meatballs with homemade basil sauce and some perfectly cooked (if I do say so myself) spring pole beans for a side.

Jasmine, our domestic cat, who likes to help with everything, sat on the damp cloth I’d used to clean the floor. I suppose she was guarding the cloth for me. I can’t think of any other reason a cat would sit on a wet cloth, can you?

When we finished, I was thrilled with the sparkling cleanliness and the beauty of the colors gleaming within. I hadn’t touched the inner door shelf or the outside of the refrigerator, which is splacked with favorite Bible verses, quotations, photos, and magnets. I’ll de-clutter all that when the time is right.

Ecclesiastes 3: 1-8 NIV

There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:

 a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
 a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
 a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
 a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
 a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
 a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.

colors of the fridge

Nice and clean

#MondayBlogs #Ecclesiastes 3: 1-8

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Earthquake

2 Mar

SUNDAY MEMORIES

 Judy Wills

Judy Wills

                                                    

I don’t remember there being much said about earthquakes in New Mexico as I was growing up.  Many other parts of our country – and the world – had earthquakes, but not New Mexico.  It used to fascinate me how the earth would “shift” and rub against another part of earth and produce such a thing. I never thought I would be involved in an earthquake, myself.  But it did happen.  Fortunately, it wasn’t a very big quake, but it was definitely enough to shake me up just a bit.

Fred and I were living in San Jose, California at the time, probably sometime in 1966, where Fred was acquiring his degree in Meteorology from San Jose State College, in preparation for his military service.  Fred’s dad was Command Chaplain for the Air Force Logistics Command (AFLC) (headquartered in Wright-Patterson AFB, Dayton, Ohio) at that time.  One of his duties was to visit the chaplains and the inspect the working of their respective chapels within AFLC.  One of those was in Sacramento, California.  So, when he came to visit that AF base, he brought Fred’s mother with him, so they could visit with us as well.

Kitty and Charles Wills 1980

Kitty and Charles Wills

We drove from San Jose to Sacramento and settled down in a hotel room.  Fred’s mother and I stayed in the hotel room and visited, while Fred and his dad visited the base chapel.  I was sitting on the bed in our room – knitting a sweater as I remember – and all of a sudden, the bed began to move!  It was an up-and-down movement, and nothing strong enough to toss me off the bed or anything, but definite movement!!

The movement didn’t last very long, but we were both going “what was THAT??!!”  Turns out, it WAS a mild earthquake.

I doubt that we were on the big fault line that will “someday” break California in half and dump it into the ocean, but it certainly gave us pause.

It certainly also gave me reason to know that I am prepared – ready – to meet my death, if it is in God’s timing for me to join Him.  I’ve tried my best to rely upon Him each and every day since then, to be ready for whatever He calls me to do.

My God is such a GOOD God!  And I love him.

One of my favorite scripture passages:

 1 Chronicles 29: 10-11

David praised the Lord in the presence of the whole assembly, saying,

“Praise be to you, O Lord, God of our father Israel,

from everlasting to everlasting. Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power

and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and earth is yours.”

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