loumercerwordsofwisdom.blogspot.com

Saturday, December 14, 2013

If the bubble wrap arrives, can the earrings be far behind?

For all you people out there who have come to think of me as someone who can be depended on to do the right thing, I have a surprise for you.  Apparently I am either the most inept woman on the planet, or I have got a poltergeist on my shoulder.  On December 9 (my late husbands birthday) one of my auctions on ebay closed with a $4.99 sale.    As with all my auctions, I went and got the product, which happened to be 5 pairs of clip on earrings.  I put them in a box on the buffet and printed my shipping label.   I pride myself in same day shipping so I  stapled the receipt to the invoice, attached the  label to the package and drove over to the shipping center.  A job well done!
 
 
That evening I was jacking around in the office and low and behold!  The package with the clip on earrings was on my desk!  Damn!  I immediately emailed the intended recipient and told her that I had inadvertently sent her 13 pairs of pieced earrings which was on the same shelf.  I told her I would immediately get these in the mail and she should keep the pierced  earrings as a penance on my part.  She was very understanding.  I told her she would first receive the pierced earrings and the following day would be her actual purchase.  So, I printed the shipping label, stapled the receipt on top of the first receipt on the invoice and the next morning scurried off to the shipping center.
 
A day passed and I got an email from the little lady in California that she had received the first box and it contained, not earrings, but empty jewelry bags.  What the hay!  I went to check on my plastic bag supply and what do you think I found?  Nothing!  I went to the desk and what did I see?  Those wretched clip on earrings twinkling at me in their plastic bag.  Grabbing them in my tight little fist I crammed them in the box.  I showed the box to my daughter and together we sealed the box and held it while I printed yet a third label!  This we attached to box, stapled the receipt on top of all the other receipts on the invoice and decided I must be losing it.
 
 
Last night I received an email that the second box had arrived and it contained bubble wrap!  By this time I am doubting my sanity completely.  Where are the damn pierced earrings that I so carefully sent the first day?  I have a 2400 square foot house which I have turned upside down and not found them!  They have got to be here some where.  I sent plastic bags, bubble wrap, and clip on earrings (I hope).  Now this is a total of $7.14 to send what should have been one item.  I can see where I am going in the hole here.
My daughter decided that I must be wound a little tight so we needed to relax a bit.  She treated me to a pedicure, which I have not had since Marlene went to Las Vegas and stayed!  That will be reviewed on    Hey! I Been There!  in a day or so.
 
In the meantime, I am just letting you know that I am NOT infallible!  So if you make an appointment with me and I don't show up, it is nothing personal.  Know also that your secrets are safe with me, not because I am trustworthy, but rather because I forgot them.  If my house looks like a hurrican hit it that is because I am still looking for my MP3 player and those damned pierced earrings!
And thank you, dear Amy, for being so patient with an old woman!

Sunday, December 8, 2013

Aunt Lena

Woke up this morning with Aunt Lena on my mind.  Aunt Lena has been gone for many years, but she still resonates in my mind on a regular basis.  Aunt Lena was my Grandfather Haas's sister.  She was, and I must put this delicately, a "spinster lady who rented rooms to other spinster ladies who were school teachers." 
Back when the Haas family migrated through Ellis Island and settled in and around Abbyville, Kansas things were very different.  The patriarch of the family, Johann Jakob Haas, had already buried his first wife, Elizabeth Beck who bore him 7 children.  This was known as the "first family.  He then married the woman who took care of the first family, Dorathea  Schade and started another family.   This family consisted of 9 children, but one died an infant.  When plans were made to migrate, the two oldest girls, from the first family, boarded a steam ship and then a train to travel to Nickerson, Kansas to stay with their Beck relation who lived on the outskirts of Nickerson.  As a tiny girl, I remember going to the Beck house once.  That is all I remember.  I went to school with a boy named Ronnie Beck, who I am sure was a shirt tail relative.  I never dated in Nickerson because I was a distant cousin to everyone there one way or another and I just never wanted to do the incest thing!
But, I digress.  As a teenager I went to live with my grandmothers in Plevna, Kansas, and became well acquainted with my Aunt Lena.
That was when I learned why she had never married.  Seems back in the dating years. that Great Grandma Hatfield (nee Gagnibien), was at the time married to a man named Franklin Miller.  They had 3 children, Lou Miller and 2 girls, Mable and Josie.  Next farm over was the Haas family with lots of marriageable kids.  Mabel married Goll Haas.  Josie married Christoph Haas.  Uncle Goll was checking out Lena Haas when Great Grandma put her foot down and said her whole family was not going to turn into Haas family and so Uncle Lou and Aunt Lena said their goodbyes and he married a complete stranger.  Aunt Lena embrassed spinsterhood and moved into Plevna and starting renting rooms to school teachers.  Back in those days school teachers were predominately women and more often than not, single.
Aunt Lena always seemed tall.  She stood ramrod straight at all times and talked with her teeth clenched together.  Her teeth were always clenched.  I used to think she might have lock jaw, but I think that is just how she talked.  Expect there was a lot of "Keep that mouth shut!"  with a total of 16 kids running around and her being towards the end of the line they all bossed her! 
Aunt Lena always wore a dress.  Always.  Well, I can't say what she wore during harvest and before I knew her, but I am betting it was a dress.  But trust me, when she wanted to go wade in the creek, or chase a calf across the field, she knew how to modify her dress.  She would slam on the brakes in that old jalopy she drove and jump out of  the car.  "Come on, kids!"  She would spread her legs and reach back between her knees and catch the hem of the skirt in the back, pull it forward and up and tuck it in her waistband.  Instant culottes!  And she taught us the fine art!  She would put one foot on the bottom barbed wire and pull the wire above it up so us kids could crawl through with out ramming a barb in our back, usually.  Then off we would gallop across the field in quest of what ever Aunt Lena had seen.  Sometimes we ended up wading in a creek.  Sometimes we picked Sand Hill Plums.  Sometimes we just walked across the field and kicked clods. 
Aunt Lena kept a horse tank in her front yard.  In the summer it was always full of water and when we went to her house we could jump in and cool off.  The only item of clothing we removed was our shoes.  When we got out we just "dried out."  Kansas gets very hot in the summer and those little dips were always just what us kids needed. 
I remember the last time I seen Aunt Lena.  It must have been about 1992.  She was born in 1893.  She died in 1994. She would have been about 99 years old.  It was at the Auditorium in Plevna where I had gone to high school  The school was gone, but they used the auditorium for reunions and such.  I had a cousin of sorts, Earl Boyd who was at the time 88 and legally blind.  Had been for years.  He and Aunt Lena were talking and it went like this.
"Oh, Lena, I would love to see the old homestead, but I don't have a car."
"Oh, Earl, I have a car, but I can't drive."
"Well, you have a car!  I can drive us there.  It is just a couple miles and it is all dirt roads."
"But, Earl, you can't see!  How can you drive?"
"You can see, Lena!  You can tell me where to go."
"Do you think it would work Earl?"
"Sure!  Let's plan on doing that someday soon."
I don't think they ever made the trip, but it made me happy to know they wanted to.  I thought several times, after I returned to Colorado, that I should make the effort and make that happen for them, but I never did.  It was the procrastination thing that always trips me up. 
And now, I am the older generation.  Now, I am thinking I would like to make a trip back to the old home place and I keep putting it off.  Maybe some day.  For now, I will set here and remember.  I miss my mother.  I miss my husband.  My brother, sisters, uncles, aunts, grandparents and on and on and on.  I can see them all, just like they were.  Is that a sign of old age?  Senility?  Or just wishful thinking?
 

Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Take time to read this and save your own life!




 Gluten free recipe #1 without nuts.  Looks very good, but pretty crumbly.  Moist.  Very choclatey.  A definite to make again.







Gluten free recipe #2 with nuts.  Very good flavor.  Holds together well.  Freezes and travels well.
  This is the clear winner.





Doing the gluten free thing is always a challenge.  When I do find something I really like I make a mental note and then I forget all about it.  When I want to make it again, I can not remember what book it was in or what the name of it was, or why I even liked it.  So I am beginning to wise up.  I now have a notebook for all the little recipes that I like as well as ones I do not use and why. 
Seems like gluten free is now becoming rampant.  Ever wonder why?  I have my own theory.  Years ago on the farm we raised our own food.  Grain was grown with the seed from last years crop.  Beef was raised from the momma cow and the neighbor's bull.  Vegetable seeds were kept from year to year and if your seed was lost, you borrowed seeds from your neighbor.  We ate cream so thick you could put it on toast with a fork and sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar, it was to die for.  People were skinny cause the worked hard and ate natural.  My ancestors lived to be 90+ and many hit 100 years of age.  When mom died at 80 years old, they all said, "Oh!  She was so young!  Her whole life ahead of her!"  But that was then, when we grew our own food.  This is now. 
Now we have people like Monsanto helping us.  We plant thier seeds and we grow very big crops.  Used to be dad would check the wheat and pick a head and rub it in the palm of his hand.  He would do this several times in a week.  One day it would "shatter" and it was pronounced "ready to harvest."  What I am telling you is that the wheat we grew then and the wheat we grow now are not the same.  It all becomes "ready" according to when the harvest is wanted to happen, which is incumbent on when the machine that harvests the grain will be there to harvest it.  And what all that means to you and I is that the gluten is not the same and we can not digest it.  Couple that with the fact that farmers are now growing corn that will cause a worm to hemorrage inside and die, and we are in some big trouble.
It is amazing that countries over seas will not allow this stuff to be grown in thier countries and will not allow it to be imported.  We call these countries "third world" and backward.  Get on your Internet and check out cancer rates here and abroad.  Check out obesity here and abroad.  Do not take my word for any of this.  Do your own research.  Remember when cancer was something that happened to some one else?  Autism was a rarity?  Casearean births were not an everyday occurence?  Is the world really changing that fast or are we allowing it to be changed by big corporations and thier need for more money and power?
The good old days were naturally organic.  Now we have to make an effort to find organic and we pay a lot more for it then the crap they are smiling and handing to us with a glass of grape koolaid.  All I am asking is that you take an interest in what your government is doing to you in the name of Corporate Greed.  Sure they are pushing national health care.  We are sure as hell going to need it!

Monday, November 25, 2013

Another busy day in the life of Lou Mercer

 Hopped in my litttle Ford at 8:00 this morning load with groceries and bound for Los Pobres, the migrant center run by Sister Nancy.  Our church had gathered food stuffs all month and today was delivery day!  And I get to do it!  Hooray for me!


 Snowed last night and the mountains were beautiful.  Since I had almost a half ton of food in the trunk and back seat, I was not worried about sliding off the road.  Can't slide when you are that heavy.  Very soon I arrived.


 I went inside while Rosie made coffee and we waited for the workers to arrive to unload the car.  I knew I had to run back into town and get another load and bring it back before I had to be at the library at 11:00 for another appointment.



 So off I went and very soonly was packed again!








44 bottles of oil and 43 bags of flour later and I am headed back east.







This time Sister Nancy is there and little kids are playin on the computer.  With this picture of serenity in my heart and mind I am once more in the Ford this time headed West to the Library and the delivery of the AIDS Quilts.



My watch and my speedometer are keeping me on track.







Met these two guys from SCAP at the library and dropped off the AIDS Quilts to be hung later, had coffee at the Pantry and then decide to head for the post office.
 
Luckily when I reached for these two packages, I dropped my keys and headed inside.
 
And this was my next stop.  This is the Auto Tower from Colorado Springs that Triple AAA sent to get me back in my car!
 
 
And this is my new friend, Cisco, who actually opened the door so I could retrieve my keys from the floor!  Guess God just thought I should have a little break.  I sure appreciated it.  When you are standing in the middle of a parking lot waiting for some one to open your door, you meet a lot of nice people who tell you,  "Oh, been there, done that!"  And then you don't feel nearly as stupid as you did 20 minutes earlier!  And Triple AAA is very fast!  They call it a "lock out", so I am pretty sure I am not the first one to do it!
 
 



 

Sunday, November 24, 2013

Just a few memories of Tom and Mary...

I remember when we lived on A Street and Tommy worked at the photography store across the alley.  That was when they first met.

I remember he gave her a Ford Sunliner (the roof retracted into the trunk) for her 14th (?) birthday.

I remember after they were married and lived on 25th (?) Street that two cats were on the roof making a spectacle of themselves and I thought Tommy was going to sell the house!

I remember when Mary and I thought a tornado was coming so I left work and went to her house.  We carried food, water, blankets, and half the house into the basement and barricaded the door.  Then we realized we had left Dorothy upstairs alone!

I remember her losing her contact in the middle of 5th Street.

I remember when we were hanging clothes out at mom's and Dorothy climbed up in the cabinet and ate the Ex-lax and we had to take a cab to get her to the emergency room and how hard the cab driver laughed about what Mary was in for that night!

I remember that when one of us girls was pregnant another one was also pregnant.  Everyone of our kids has a cousin the same age.

I remember starting my nomad life and only returning home on occasion so I did not see much of Mary or any of the family for several years. I settled in Pueblo in 1977.  At one point one of Mary and Tom's kids passed through Pueblo and when they told Mary and Tom, Mary asked " Did you stop and see Aunt Louella? "  The kid replied, "Well, we thought about it, but there was no way to find her since we don't know her last name!"  Sad, but true. 

I married my last husband in 1983.   She and Tommy paid us a visit 2 or three days before  Tom passed in 1993

 It was not until later when I lost my husband in 2003 that Mary came to stay with me several times.  After the last good visit we had she returned to Hutch and Donna had gotten new coffee cups in the restaurant.  They proceeded to have a picture of the 2 of them together toasting me with the NEW cups and the caption "Wish you were here!

I could tell by looking at them that they were gloating!  But you know the old saying, "He who laughs last, laughs best?"  I glanced up and my eyes came to rest on the "to go" cup that Mary had brought when she arrived and used every day she was here.  So I had my own picture made!
Click this little place here...The forgotten cup story told here!   Now that I think back, I do believe I still have that cup! 

The family is slowly dwindling and that makes me sad, but on the upside, we are being replaced and the family tree is branching out.  That is as it should be and that is good.  Like they say "Time marches on."  I remember the great grandmother, and the great aunts and uncles.  Never really had a grandfather, but always wished I had.  Never really knew my cousins.  I just knew who they were.  Never knew their kids either. 

So, I set here in my little corner of the world with my memories, because when it is all said and done they are the best part of growing older.  This old world is spinning so fast that there are times when I think I may fly off into the heavens.  Then I can see clearly, and isn't that what we are all looking for?

Thursday, November 14, 2013

She belongs to the ages now.

 
Go rest high on that mountain,
Girl your work on earth is done!
Go to heaven a shoutin'
Look for the Father and the Son..........
 
Mary Bell Bartholomew Shea
June 16, 1945
November 13, 2013


Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Myself-Edgar Guest

I woke up this morning with this in my head.  Kept playing it over and over until I went and found it so I could print it here.  Know where  I first heard this?  They always say that a teacher can make a lot of difference in a kids life an this one sure did mine.  I was in the 7th grade and his name was Mr. Bollinger.  He also ran the movie house in Nickerson. 
I remember him  as a little round man with very thick glasses.  I was devastated when he left the school after only a few years. At least it seemed a short time to me.  He would set on the corner of the desk and for the life of me I can not remember what class he taught, but he was always quick to give us something like this to "think about".  
 





Myself 

I have to live with myself, and so,
I want to be fit for myself to know;
I want to be able as days go by,
Always to look myself straight in the eye;
I don't want to stand with the setting sun
And hate myself for the things I've done.


I don't want to keep on a closet shelf
A lot of secrets about myself,
And fool myself as I come and go
Into thinking that nobody else will know
The kind of man I really am;
I don't want to dress myself up in sham.


I want to go out with my head erect,
I want to deserve all men's respect; 
But here in this struggle for fame and pelf,
I want to be able to like myself.
I don't want to think as I come and go
That I'm bluster and bluff and empty show.


I never can hide myself from me,
I see what others may never see,
I know what others may never know,
I never can fool myself- and so,
Whatever happens, I want to be 
Self-respecting and conscience free.




Another year down the tubes!

Counting today, there are only 5 days left in this year.    Momma nailed it when she said "When you are over the hill you pick up speed...