May Reads I

Short list for the first half of May reads: "Gunpowder Green" is the second book of Laura Childs' "Tea Shop Mysteries" series. I think I have written about this series before - this is the 4th or 5th one I've read. Theodosia Browning is the owner of the Indigo Tea Shop in Charleston, SC. She seems to always be in the area when a murder is committed. Of course, she has to do what she can to help capture the culprit. I like these little quick-read mysteries as much for what I learn about tea as for the crime solving. Childs always includes recipes in the back of the books. This one's "Cucumber and Lobster Salad Sandwiches" sounds yummy.

"Jim the Boy" by Tony Earley is one of the books Kristina recommended last winter. I found and read the sequel, " The Blue Star" the first part of April and was immediately entranced. I was quite happy to find "Jim the Boy" at the Half-Price Bookstore when I checked out its new location earlier this month.

I think one of the reasons I liked these two books so much is because I relate to the ways the adults teach Jim about right and wrong. His experiences are so similar to the way I was raised. Earley has the talent of giving his readers entire scenes with only a few words. As I wrote after finishing "The Blue Star" - I hope there will be a third novel about Jim Glass.

Ian Rankin's "Strip Jack" was my third May read. It is Rankin's 4th Inspector Rebus novel. The book I bought is a 2008 Orion Paperback reissue of the 1992 original. It contains an introduction by the author with information about when and where he wrote the novel and what was going on in his life at the time which I found interesting.

I wish I could have read this series in order. I had to read 'em where I found 'em. I think there may still be a few I haven't read to look forward to.

Finally, I'm in the middle of the third Inspector William Monk Victorian Mystery by Anne Perry. This series I am reading in chronological order. I was wrong about Monk & Nurse Hester Latterly becoming investigative partners as I surmised at the end of book two. In fact, she seems to be forming an attachment to the barrister, Oliver Rathbone.

Their current case has the three of them trying to prove innocent a woman who has already plead guilty of killing her husband. I love my English mysteries.

"Sunshine on My Shoulders....

Makes me happy

Sunshine in my eyes can make me cry

Sunshine on the water looks so lovely

Sunshine almost always makes me high" John Denver

Today's sunshine after days and days of rain does make me happy. It also reminded me of John Denver's song and of him.

John Denver was one of my favourite singers in the 70's. I still love to listen to his albums. I think "Annie's Song" and "Take Me Home Country Roads" are my most favored although I like them all.

As he became more popular and I learned more about his career, I remember thinking very briefly that we might be related. It was when I heard his real name was Henry John Deutschendorf. I didn't catch the name at first and hadn't seen it in writing. All I could remember was De.........dorf. "What was that? Deardorf? Wow. Maybe we are distant cousins."

I'm not even sure how my great-great-great grandmother Isobel Deardorff spelled her name. Her daughter Catherine married David Lippincott. Their daughter Matilda married George Means. Their daughter Delphia married Joe Ridnour and they were the parents of my Mother, Ruth. At one time I had a copy of some Deardorff family history clear back to the 1600's in Germany. I hope it is still in a box somewhere and not lost in my moves.

John Denver's song "Rocky Mountain High", which is now one of two official state songs of Colorado, was a hit around the time of my first trip to Colorado. I remember wanting to fall in love with the mountains because my brother and sister-in-law loved them so much. Instead, I experienced altitude sickness and felt like: "You've seen one mountain; you've seen them all." I am a self-proclaimed 'flat-lander'.

"If I had a tale that I could tell you

I'd tell a tale sure to make you smile

If I had a wish that I could wish for you

I'd make a wish for sunshine for all the while.."

(The accompanying picture is one I took on Cinco de Mayo. The morning sun and the fountain combined for a surprising rainbow over the pond.)

Facebook Friends

I've had some nice surprises since joining Facebook - reconnecting with classmates and people I once worked with. But the Friend Request from my grandson, Brock, this morning has to be my best so far.

There are discussions about whether or not parents should friend their children and vice-versa. I think those are aimed more toward parents with children still living at home. For me, being friends on Facebook with my children and grandchildren has been a wonderful way to stay in touch - to know what's going on in their lives.

When Brock and his half sister's and brother reconnected last month, they suggested I friend him on Facebook. I told them I would wait awhile - that I didn't want to scare him away. The thread was still too tenuous. That he was the one to send the friend request to me gives me great hope that I may be a part of his life again - and that of my great-grandson, Ridge.

In the picture above, Brock is on the left and Ridge on the right. Ridge looks so much like his Daddy. I can't wait to meet him in person.

I grew up believing in the importance of family - not just immediate family, but grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, great-grandparents. The older I get, the more important my family is to me. I hope Brock understands this someday - that no matter what, he has always been and always will be my first grandchild.

Bicentennial Blog

Wow! My 200th posting in nine months of blogging. I thought I was going to start it out with some pictures of some unknown white birds on and around our pond until I got the binoculars out to identify the water fowl and discovered they were just a bunch of white plastic grocery bags. Bummer. (There was a white heron here last spring, though.)
When I began blogging last August it was mostly to share some family history, family stories and some of my memories with my kids. I discovered it also to be a way to fulfill some of my pent up writing desires as well as a means of keeping my mind active. And even though I am mostly doing this for myself, I sometimes wonder if anyone else is reading my musings. Then I get a comment or two posted or I talk to a family member that tells me how much they liked a posting or if I haven't posted for awhile wonders when I'm going to start posting again. Encouragement is just that - encouraging.
There are days when I wonder what to blog about. There are days I have an idea but it doesn't go in the direction I planned. There are days when I think I'll quit blogging. Am I sharing too much? Am I sharing too little?
Sometimes when I don't have an idea, I read what I wrote in my diaries on the date. For instance, 54 years ago today, May 12, 1956: "Went to town this morning to practice." I didn't write what the practice was for, but it was for 8th grade commencement. So I could blog about how the 8th graders from all the country schools went to the High School auditorium in Corning for 8th grade graduation exercises. That was a really big deal.
I went on to write: "Went to Brooks for plants. Dad planted corn at Ivy Rimmer's" Did Dad plant Ivy's corn to help out a neighbor? For hire to make a little money? Or did he rent Ivy's crop land that year? I could write an entire blog about the Rimmer's - who they were, where they lived, who their kids were and how, years later, after they and their house were gone, Mom & I dug up some peonies from what once was their front yard and moved them up to Mom's yard.
"Went to Brooks for plants." That I will save for a future blog - remembering the Stalder's/Stillinger's greenhouse in Brooks; how much I loved going there - how there was a time when we thought it was for sale and Dad was going to help me buy it so I could move back home.
I can't write a bicentennial blog without writing about what the word bicentennial makes me think of - our country's bicentennial, of course - but specifically of the "76" Bicentennial Flag I had flying on our pole at the acreage NW of Des Moines. Preston was almost five years old. He loved being outside. I had been raking the yard. He picked up the rake and was raking the gravel in the driveway. It was a perfect picture - blue sky with white fluffy clouds, the spirea lining the lane in bloom, the flag blowing in the breeze and my little boy working on a gorgeous spring day.

May 11, 1968

If Kari Leigh had been born on her due date 41 years ago, she not only would have been born on Mother's Day, she would have been born on her parent's 1st anniversary.

Dennis Edward Fleming and I were married 42 years ago today. His brother Chuck was the minister at the Fairview Christian Church south of Pleasantville, Iowa. (I thought it was ironic that I was married in two different 'Fairview' churches.)

Denny and I met when his parents moved to Corning the summer before his senior year in high school. We were both in Journalism and both on the school paper. We were friends, but never dated. After graduation he went to Iowa State University and I married Kenny and had Doug. This picture of the three of us was taken in December, 1968.

When Doug & I moved to Cedar Rapids every time I drove past the "Vinton - 13 miles" directional sign I thought of Denny - someone had told me he was a teacher at Vinton High School. I finally wrote him a letter in care of the school. It took awhile for him to answer because he had left Vinton for a teaching position at Hillside Junior High in West Des Moines. My letter was forwarded to him there.

We had a somewhat whirlwind courtship - from our first date until our wedding was little longer than two months. We had gotten engaged, but didn't plan on getting married right away. The change in his draft status, from 2-A to 1-A made the difference. The Vietnam war was escalating after the Tet Offensive. By marrying me and taking on the responsibility of my son, his draft status was no longer 1-A. He wouldn't have to worry about being sent to a war we were both against.

Our marriage didn't last long. Our divorce became final on May 10, 1974 - the day before what would have been our sixth anniversary. I have wondered if we would even have married had we waited longer and gotten to know each other better. But then I wouldn't have my daughter and youngest son. I can't imagine my life without them in it.

Little Delphia Means

Yesterday's blog about Mother's Day had a couple pictures of my Grandma Ridnour taken on her 80th & 90th birthdays.

This is a picture of Delphia Verda Means as a young woman. She was born 114 years ago today. Her parents were George Robert Means and Matilda Neoma Lippincott. There's no date on this picture, but I think she looks nine or ten. Her expression could be one of sadness or she may be day dreaming. I believe photographic subjects were required to sit very still for a minute or more in order not to blur the picture. I wonder how she got her little dog to pose? Perhaps that is what she was thinking about.

Delphia (pronounced Del-fee not Del-fe-ah nor Del-fa) was the youngest of four children. Her brother, Orphas Alvin was born in 1883; sisters, Delila May in 1890 and Drothel Velma in 1893. Delila died of cholera in 1891 when she was seventeen months old. Orphas named his daughter Delilah Grace when she was born June 9, 1912. (The same day as the Villisca ax murders.)

Grandma Delphia was little - only 4' 10" by the time I was old enough to remember her. She was almost five feet tall in her younger years. It was always a big deal for the grandchildren to be as tall as and then taller than their grandmother.

Other than hearing her tell about moving to Kansas in a covered wagon when she was nine, I don't know much about her childhood. I don't know where she went to school or if she even graduated from the 8th grade. I think she always lived in the Mt. Etna area until she married.

At some point in their lives she and her sister Drothel had a 'falling out' and didn't have anything to do with one another. Grandma never had anything nice to say about her sister. Drothel and her family lived in South Dakota and then moved to California. I do think they patched things up before Drothel died in 1973.

Grandma was an excellent seamstress. She could look at a picture then cut her own pattern out of newspaper and whip up a new dress for herself, her daughters or her granddaughters. When grandpa was ill she made herself a denim skirt out of some old jeans to wear when she did the chores. (Women didn't wear jeans then.) She was just as talented at embroidery, crocheting and tatting as she was at sewing. Every grandchild received a pair of embroidered pillowcases trimmed with crochet when they got married.

Her talent I most identify with and remember best was the one she had for flowers. Grandpa and Grandma had a huge garden and fruit trees over the hill north of the house. The areas around her house were reserved for flowers. Her special love was for iris. Each year she added new colors to her iris beds. When it was time to decorate the graves for Memorial Day, there were no plastic flowers for her - we took buckets of water and went through her flower beds cutting iris and peonies and ferns until the buckets were full. Then armed with quart jars, a digger and paring knife we made the rounds of all the cemeteries, placing a jar of flowers on the graves of all the loved ones.

Grandma once said to me, "I know who'll put flowers on my grave when I'm gone. But who'll put flowers on yours?" It was her way of letting me know she appreciated that I always took her around to the cemeteries in her later years. The flowers I'll place on her grave in three weeks will be plastic - her iris beds are long gone - and they will probably be pansies which was another of her favourite flowers.

Delphia had a neighbor friend as small as she was. That woman's grandchildren called her "Tiny Grandma". We would never have gotten away with something like that. Grandma was more "small, but mighty". She was strict. She was vocally opinionated. I will admit to being afraid of her when I was young. But I never doubted her love for us. I will never forget May 10 is her birthday.

Mother's Day 2010

If I were to write an essay, "What Does Mother's Day Mean to You?", it would be more about having a mother than being a mother even though this is my 47th Mother's Day on the receiving side.

The picture above on the left has always been my favourite of me, my mother and her mother. It was taken May 9, 1976. It wasn't Mother's Day we were celebrating, it was Grandma Ridnour's 80th birthday. And the one on the right, which included the fourth generation was in celebration of Grandma's 90th birthday and was taken May 10, 1986.

The second Sunday in May wasn't officially Mother's Day until 1914 even thought it had begun in 1858. Whether or not it was being celebrated, Delphia Means was born on Mother's Day in 1896. She celebrated her first Mother's Day in 1917 then had combined birthday/Mother's Day celebrations thereafter.

I almost had a similar double celebration when pregnant with my second child - my due date was May 11 which in 1969 was Mother's Day. Unfortunately Kari wasn't ready to be born and didn't make her appearance for another twenty days.

My grandson, Zach, wrote about this second Mother's Day without his Mom and how it should be easier, but isn't. I feel the same way on this, the sixth Mother's Day without my Mom. Their not being here to celebrate sort of takes the whole meaning of Mother's Day away.

That is not to say I don't appreciate the love, the cards, calls, visits and flowers from my four wonderful kids. I do. There's just a whole world of difference between being a mom and having a mom.