52 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 7-8-19”

  1. Good morning turtle and everyone else but Jo.
    Good evening Jo.
    I’m up 15 minutes early this morning. Don’t know why.
    Every week has to start with a Monday.
    .

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  3. Don’t get us started on that RK.
    I just checked on yesterday’s Daily Thread and concluded that everyone’s crazy but me.
    And I’m beginning to wonder. ??????

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  5. I’m not sure that turtle is ready to greet the day, he seems to be hiding.
    Well I got off to a good start, but never made it to the weight room or school.
    oh, well, there is always tomorrow…

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  8. Good morning. Hope your week goes well, Kim.

    I’m still breaking in my new running shoes, walking around in them parts of the day. I plan to ease into running very very gradually this time, and do way more stretching before I do. My old five minutes or so of pre-run stretching I’d done back in my teens and twenties doesn’t go as far now that I’m in my 50s.

    I’m reading an inspirational (and realistic) book right now called Running Past Fifty: Advice and Inspiration for Senior Runners. The first 12 pages contains the Foreword and the Introduction. Most of the rest of the 250 or so pages has stories of about 35 runners older than 50 about their joys and challenges in starting or continuing running at their more advanced ages.

    I’ve only read 5 of the stories so far, but they’re all quite interesting and varied. Their personalities come alive, and you feel like you can relate to each of them in some way. Almost like they’re running buddies with you, even without having met them.

    A very enjoyable book to read, full of great human interest stories.

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  9. No new piano yet. But the latest news on the piano front is that we’ve decided to also keep the old piano instead of trading it in.

    There is a certain little 11-year-old player who has become quite attached to the old one. You might remember she was the one who a few years ago had fished a pair of my old tennis shoes out of the garbage can in my room, not wanting me to throw them away. They were the only shoes she had ever seen me wear around home, and to think of them getting thrown away was, to her, like having a piece of Mom thrown away.

    So I told her I’d keep them under my bed, and she could go in there and look at them anytime she’d like, to remember them.

    To my knowledge, she never has gone in there to take a peek at them since, but was simply comforted knowing they were there.

    She’s older now, but I think it’s a similar thing with the old piano. But it’s more than just an instrument that Mom played (still plays) — it’s the only instrument on which she’s learned piano. So it holds a special place in her heart.

    She suggested we keep the old one and put it outside to play it there. She’s maybe seen too many Piano Guys videos. 🙂

    I said that pianos can’t stay outside — they’d get wrecked being out in, or too close to, the elements.

    However, a few days later — yesterday, actually — we figured out a place that the old piano will fit.

    In the master bedroom. 🙂 (Kizzie, I thought of your mentioning that one day not too far back.) 🙂

    We will put it where the crib used to be for many years, and will move the boxes of photos we have stored currently in that spot to another area.

    We don’t need to sell the piano to have enough money to buy the new one, thanks to the generous gift that made the new one possible in the first place, and now to have been able to find a suitable place for the old piano, too, is a great blessing.

    6th Arrow can then choose which piano she’d like to play on, and can slowly get used to the grand’s action while continuing to play the older, beloved instrument.

    If she’d like to take the older piano with her when she moves out someday, she could do just that.

    I’m glad it’s all working out so far. 🙂

    Liked by 5 people

  11. Ah, sentimentality. It seems strongest in the young and the old, but not too much in the middle. That said, we have a lot of boxes of sentimentality in this house, and not the courage to get rid of things. D1 is good about that, so she’ll probably be the one to pitch it all.

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  12. I never was attached to an inanimate object, except my ’50 Chevvy. But Elvera still has, sitting in it’s original chair, a doll she had about 80 years ago. She says she spent hours dressing paper dolls, but doesn’t have any.
    Becky (oldest GD) still has a collection of Barbies.

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  13. 6, Husband’s aunt started running in her 70s and has completed many marathons. Just did a half-marathon and she’s 86(?) Not too sure on her age, but she IS in her 80s.

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  14. QoD: Matchbox® and Hotwheels® cars, along with other such miniatures. I still have most of them in a box. I built towns with them, using cardboard roads (the kind you used to get in t-shirts and other clothing items). Then, my older brother got me a set of plastic road pieces that snap together. I spent hours playing with them.

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  15. QoD: Rocks. I still have my rock collection somewhere in the shop from when I started collecting as an 8 year old 🙂

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  16. 6
    A friend from church recently ran in the Senior Olympics in San Diego and said that a 103 year old woman, who only started running when she was 100, competed.

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  17. Good morning. Interview later today. Trying not to be nervous.

    QoD: I lost my sentimentality very early in life and was somewhat ruthless in ridding myself of objects that I had grown out of. My siblings held for a long time onto favourite blankets or stuffed toy. But, I lost my blankie (I distinctly remember that the loss of the blankie made me decide to stop sucking my thumb) and after my diagnosis with asthma, stuffed toys, due to their dust carrying abilities, were a nemesis to me. I got rid of most of my dolls in my early teens during my mental problems. But somehow, the knitted goose, which had accompanied me on imaginary adventures as a preschool child, survived all purges. It was not intentional on my part, I just lost track of where it was until I had reached adulthood and was beginning to think of saving the few remaining mementos of my childhood.

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  18. I have nothing from my childhood and there’s nothing in my childhood I want to remember.
    I still have a gold plated Whittenaur watch I bought at the PX in Arabiaa for $35.00 I only wear it on Sundays because the spring is weak. It still keeps good time, but has to be rewound often. I also have a pair of binoculars, 8×40 Stinheil. Same deal. ( i had to look that up.)
    And I have zillions (not really that many, just billions) of CD’s and tapes I collected over the years. Country mostly.

    Liked by 1 person

  19. Chas – Here’s something that made me think of you:

    “See How the Moon Has Been Mapped Through Time
    A new exhibit in London has 300 years of celestial ephemera on display.”

    https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/historic-moon-maps-astronomy-exhibit?utm_source=Atlas+Obscura+Daily+Newsletter&utm_campaign=cbdc2d1e59-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_07_08&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_f36db9c480-cbdc2d1e59-68177353&ct=t(EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_07_08_2019)&mc_cid=cbdc2d1e59&mc_eid=e9bb612a93

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  20. I was attached to a blanket when I was young. I was just starting second grade when we moved from one house to a new one. I was so disappointed to find I had a new blanket and remember questioning my mom. She told me the old one was too ratty to bother moving. I remember being quite sad.

    I still am attached to items that have meaning to me. That was a problem when our parent’s house had to be emptied. A couple of us had those attachments and a couple less so. My sister could care less. She once offered a desk free on facebook to anyone who wanted it. The desk was made by my dad and I was quite upset with her for not giving anyone in the family a heads up first. After some maneuvering I did get the desk. The doll house my parents made is one such item, as are other things made by them, my husband or children. People are enormously more important than material things, but material things do have meaning. Wedding rings come to mind.

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  22. I have a table my dad made in high school shop in Iowa. it’s little, it is a 3-cornered side table for a hallway or small spot, I have it next to the front door. Our family saved things like that so I have a lot of old furniture that has “history.” 🙂

    I had a pillow I toted around as a small child but my dad confiscated that at some point. I have wondered what ever happened to my baseball glove, my mom had saved it but I haven’t really seen it in any of the boxes that wound up here.

    I have a large, thick, stick that I brought back from a family camping trip in Sequoia a long time ago. Part of the bark had been peeled off and the wood underneath was really pretty. My girlfriend was along for that camping trip and we argued over who would keep it — so my dad chopped it in half and we each got part of it. He also took the rest of the bark off so it’s nice and smooth, really a pretty “stick” as far as sticks go. 🙂 It’s on the shelf in my den/office space now, it’s traveled with me through the years, for whatever reason. Go figure.

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  23. Morning! Busy week here too!
    6…good for you following your desire to get back into running! The furthest I have run is 3 miles and I used to do that every morning while living in town. I would take Babe with me and she was my motivator! I began having knee issues and now I am walking and working out on the elliptical. There are times when we are on a hike I break out into a run…usually when we are heading downhill!! I love running downhill…uphill not so much! Husband started running ultra’s when he was 46….he has run and finished numerous 100 and 50 miler ultras. It can become an obsession….not for me though! 😊
    There is one tangible item to which I am attached….my Great Grandfather’s desk. It is a smallish console type antique desk and I have many sweet memories of it sitting next to his red velvet chair. He kept “krogers” in it along with his tobacco and green ink bottles. There is the remnant of spilled green ink on the inside of the drop panel. When we were evacuated during the fire…we grabbed and loaded it into the back of our truck….

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  25. Thanks Karen. Problem is, that is a bigger subject than I can address here.
    Fact is, ACIC did assist in Lunar mapping. But out sites are the one they visited. It just happened that way, not planned.
    A long story here. I’ll tell part of it.

    When the Apollo program ended, our branch was disbanded in 1975. I was branch chief at the time. I saw them throwing my maps and other material away, so I “rescued” some of it. That is, I took some of the maps and other material from those projects home with me. I have kept all that stuff in my garage, basemen, attic, depending on where I lived
    But, I started wondering “what am I going to do with all this stuff?” Chuck has nothing to do with it.

    Very long story short: I asked the University of South Carolina if they wanted it.
    They did. On 11 April, a guy came up with a van and loaded maps, briefing boards. other stuff and took it to Columbia. They said they were going to make a display celebrate the Apollo 11 landing on 20 July.
    I sent several (over 5) pages of explanation with it.
    I haven’t heard from then since. Which is ok with me.

    Liked by 3 people

  26. I went over to my attachment. It is seven (7) pages long. I did notice something that may be relevant, but not connected: I use this “Lunar Bikini” spiel when I give briefings.i

    I see on TV tonight (3/27/19) that Vice President Mike Pence wants to return to the moon. China has something on the far side. I have a picture of an Apollo 12 astronaut in his lunar garb. I say, “This is as close to a bikini you will get on the moon.” I do not recommend returning to the moon. We cannot colonize the moon.

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  27. Linda, the 103-year-old your friend met didn’t happen to be Julia Hawkins from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, was she? Because said Julia is featured in one of the stories in the book I mentioned, was born in 1916, and started running at 100. How many women in the world can there be who match that description?! 🙂

    The picture of Julia makes me smile. She’s standing in a small clearing of a wooded area, smiling big in her running shorts and t-shirt, in a leaning-forward pose that looks like she’s about to box with the photographer. 🙂

    She began bike racing at 80, but gave it up when there were no more women left in her age group to compete against. So she decided to then take up running, setting a world record for her age group competing in the 100-yard dash at the 2017 National Senior Olympic Games in Birmingham, Alabama.

    Funny tidbit about her: the author of the book writes, “Hawkins was a pretty little girl with long blonde curls but she was also a tomboy, mischievous and a talker. She was once paid five cents to just sit still and be quiet for five minutes.” LOL!

    Interestingly, she got married over the phone. 🙂 Her beloved got sent to Hawaii very suddenly after Pearl Harbor. He proposed over the phone, as there was no time for Julia to get to Hawaii before he left port.

    After months of letter writing, finding pastors who would marry them, and getting loved ones together, they got married in November 1942, with the Ponchatoula Savings and Loan Office on one side of the phone and the US Navy on the other. 🙂

    After the war, her husband came back and taught at LSU and they raised their family in Baton Rouge.

    Amazing woman, and full of spunk and vigor. The author reports that Julia (interviewed at 102) says she feels like she’s 60. The author summed up the article with a few tips Julia gave her:

    1. Keep moving. Whether it’s gardening, housework, or walking, be active.

    2. There is a fine line between pushing yourself and wearing yourself out. Don’t overdo it; just be the best you can be. When I compete, I want to spend all my energy on the track but have a little bit left to wave to my family and friends at the finish.

    3. Don’t worry about things you can’t control. At 101, anything could happen. But I don’t worry about that.

    4. Surround yourself with family and friends. They are the most important things in life. Be a part of a community.

    5. Enjoy everyday “Magic Moments” that take your breath away. Maybe it’s a flower in bloom or a sunset. Notice and appreciate the natural world around us.

    Linda, Kare, NancyJill, and others who enjoy running or have friends / loved ones who do, I think you / they would enjoy that book. (Title above at 8:22; author, Gail Waesche Kislevitz.) And, really, there’s a lot for any reader to enjoy about the lives of these runners — it’s not only about running.

    If you enjoy reading a good story about real people, there’s plenty to love in this book. 🙂

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  28. What a great list, thanks 6 arrows. And how fun, getting married over the phone … They were ahead of their time (but all done out of necessity, of course).

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  29. So even if we can’t colonize the moon, maybe there are other things that we could benefit from on a return trip? Perhaps it’s just further exploration that will provide more information about space. Returning could be appealing because we’ve been there and done that, it poses fewer risks and issues. We “know” the moon, somewhat.

    I haven’t read anything about it, though, so I don’t really know what the objectives would be — but I assume they have some.

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  30. My husband told his story yesterday during Sunday school and explained why authorities are trying so hard to colonize Mars.

    The sun is expanding and it burns from the outside, which as it expands means more ultraviolet light and heat. In 10 million years, it will be so hot as to make the earth uninhabitable.

    For that reason, many $$ are being spent trying to understand and set up a colony on Marsh–which Elon Musk and others think is the only solution to “saving humankind.”

    I’ll be heaven by then and won’t be worrying about it.

    It’s interesting, though, the countless billions of dollars that people will spend to accomplish something that has no hope of success nor that they’ll ever see in their lifetime. (And in the case of Musk, he has no children anyway).

    It’s much easier, cost-effective and promising to spend you $$ on the kingdom of God that will never go away–and will help so many more people in this day and age.

    Tragic.

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  31. Can you imagine the winters on Mars?
    If there has been no life on Mars, where would the energy come from?
    What is the growing season like?
    It would call many millions to answer those questions and I don’t want to contribute a nickel to it.
    As for Lunar colonies: Everything you need on the moon comes from Earth. Including the air you breathe. You puncture that suit and you’re soon dead.

    A theological answer is not a satisfactory answer. However, It seems that God arranged for people and the Erath to have unique compatibility. Think about it. It is so “people friendly”.

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  37. My husband has relocated a couple of turtles across the road (box turtles can live up to 100 year, but unfortunately they are easily hit when crossing the road–and some people hit them on purpose, and some people take them for pets, which also takes them out of the breeding pool), since we saw them periodically up north, but I’ve never photographed a land-based turtle species. Cool!

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  38. Crazy morning, I had to talk to my gardener about yanking out some wild honeysuckle that has taken root in the front yard but he arrived right as I had to take a noon phone interview that had been set up last Wednesday. Luckily, by the time I got off they hadn’t left yet so I was able to put in the request — I also asked if he could get those weeds out of my Mexican sage, I got some out over the weekend but I think he can do it faster and I’ll pay him extra for it this month. I told him they could do it next time (or today, whatever worked out for them) but I think he tackled it today from the sounds of it.

    I found some flowers I like for my front yard sometime, I think: Lantana — took photos of it last night while I was walking the dogs and with the flash on the phone it registered well enough for my plant app to ID it. We pass by a few houses with those bushes, I just need to find out more about them, what colors they come in (these are yellow), if they’re annuals or? …

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  39. The Boy is involved in a football training camp this week in the mornings. Last week, his coach announced on Facebook that he and his son were doing some conditioning at a park, and invited others to join them, so for two or three evenings, Nightingale took him to work out with them. One of these weeks in July, there is an evening football training thing she’ll be taking him to.

    He also has Boy Scout Camp (a day camp) one week. And then football practice and training starts up in earnest (five evenings a week) for the month of August.

    His liking and participating in football is good for him, keeping him active and exercising in an enjoyable way. He really throws himself into it.

    Please continue to pray that he can get and keep his weight down. (He’s been doing pretty well so far, but he struggles with wanting to eat more than he is allowed.) Most of all for his general health, of course, but also so that he can play other positions on his team. The kids that are over a certain weight (for their height) can only play a certain position. His coach thinks he would make a great quarterback someday. He sees a lot of potential in him.

    (Meanwhile, this grandmother cringes at some of the things she reads about how dangerous football can be.)

    Liked by 2 people

  40. Wow, the guys made fast work of those weeds and the honeysuckle, root and all. I saw a lizard scampering away, his hiding place/home demolished. I would have been working on that for a month, off and on. They did it in probably 30-40 minutes.

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  41. Kizzie, his coach might well be a good one to motivate him on fitness matters. And yeah, I would cringe at football too. But which is worse, the no-risk childhood we see everywhere or some risks? (Don’t know the answer to that. But risk-taking on some level is part of healthy male development.)

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  42. My tax guy — who has coached youth sports for years and whose sons were very accomplished in hockey and other team sports growing up — told me a few years ago that his oldest grandson was entering high school and signing up for football. But the program didn’t have many signups, he said, contrasting it with our growing up years when high school football reigned.

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  43. Oh Dj I planted Lantana for the first time this year! Such a variety of colors and for some reason the blossoms remind me of those little floral bunches we had on our Easter bonnets back in the 50’s 😊
    The lady at the nursery told me the texture of the leaves discourages the deer from munching on them….so far so good as they have left them alone! They are said to be a perennial but I guess I won’t know until next Spring if that holds true for our area!

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  44. Dj, have you heard from your tax guy??
    Mine did a lot of sports. Especially soccer. I like soccer because something was always happening and you didn’t have to wait, like in baseball.
    Worse thing I ever did was be a soccer ref, especially with the little ones when you couldn’t see what was happening as they played ‘bunch’ ball.
    Also the parents did a lot of yelling at the ref.

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  45. Nancyjill, Lantana also is a mosquito repellant!

    I live in a “planting zone” (9?) where it’s supposed to bloom year round which is an added benefit.

    Jo, no, I haven’t heard from him yet — nor from the company his phone line forwarded me to. Hmmm.

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  46. My friend had girls who were active in soccer (so was their mom, being a coach and a Team Mom, etc.). I had to cover Croatia’s games in the playoffs last year (our town is heavily Croatian) and I was lost through most of the games; just watching the time clock going backwards confused me.

    I love baseball. 🙂

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  47. Thanks for all the neat stories about treasured objects from childhood and beyond!

    I have a second, much more serious QoD. Kinda late in the day for it, I know, but I could really use advice from anyone who’d like to offer it tonight or tomorrow or whenever this post might be seen.

    My four siblings and I have been in general agreement on most issues concerning our parents, but as the list of problems grows with my mom (who is still trying to take care of Dad), there is getting to be more diversity of thought (a euphemism for disagreement, though respectful, in this case) regarding how to handle those problems.

    Regarding Mom, I see accidents waiting to happen that could result in great bodily harm or death, including people outside the family. A certain number of my siblings are more laissez-faire about confronting her with what we know about potentially dangerous things she’s doing. One thinks it’s not worth the bother to tell her, because she’ll only deny it. Others don’t want her to feel bad, or like she’s being ganged up on.

    Well, she’s going to feel awfully bad if she maims or kills someone, driving impaired.

    Some are questioning whether to tell her doctor because she just switched docs and they don’t think Mom would receive negative information well from a practitioner who hardly knows her.

    Mom has hinted she doesn’t want to hear about problems from people who didn’t witness the problems, but when there are serious problems that have been witnessed, and those observers are the ones who don’t want to say anything directly to her, then I feel it needs to be brought up, anyway, by whomever is willing to address it. (That would be me.)

    We talked about honor in yesterday’s Bible study, specifically about what honoring our parents looks like after we’re no longer in their households and under their command. Am I right that it is more honorable to disrespect their wishes about who tells them what, to try to prevent a tragedy, than it is to keep silent because they don’t want to hear it from me?

    I guess this is just as much a request for prayer as it is a plea for advice.

    Thanks.

    Liked by 3 people

  49. Lantana is a great choice; drought tolerant, too.

    I think a discussion of liability with your siblings would be a good way to start on your parents, Six. An automobile accident when you knew she was having trouble driving–opens up you and your siblings to liability.

    We had a huge fight with my father’s doctor after he had a series of strokes. The doc would NOT take away his driver’s license because he thought it would discourage our father.

    Dad had already hit a child on a bicycle, but didn’t injury him.

    My brothers and I would NOT allow our children to ride with him because we didn’t think it was safe. If we didn’t think OUR kids were safe in the car, what did that say about the other “innocent” people out there?

    About this time, an 80 year-old man hiti the gas instead of the brakes in Santa Monica (where our dad lived), and zoomed into a farmer’s market where he killed several people.

    That was it for us.

    We only got the doc to act when I told him we would require HIM to take responsibility if there was an auto accident. That’s when he finally signed the papers.

    My father, of course, never understood what a danger he was.

    A helpful book I read earlier this year, Being Mortal, talked about risk and responsibility for the individual. If I’m old and I choose to behave in a way that is not safe for me, that’s my responsibility and I should have some autonomy to choose. The author commented that adult children want their parents to be safe–in part so we don’t have to worry about them.

    But elderly adults may not want to be so boxed in by safety that their sense of self is agitated, shall we say. As the responsible adult children, we need to find a way to give them some automony without compromising other people.

    It’s a fine line to walk–but if there’s a car involved, you’re involved and need to discuss the liability, if nothing else, with your siblings.

    I’m so sorry. Taking away the car keys was the hardest thing we did–even though we DID hire him a driver to take him everywhere he wanted.

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  50. I guess what I really want to do is to appeal to her sense of concern for others. “Mom, you’re putting others at risk, doing these things, and I know you don’t want others to be harmed.”

    But she thinks people who didn’t witness it might not have their facts straight. Which can be true sometimes. But I don’t think a lady from her church who saw her do a dangerous thing on the road and called one of my siblings to report what had happened, supplying identifying details (went through a red light at a specific intersection, using the shoulder to pass a bunch of cars that were sitting and waiting for the light to change) would be confused about those details, as she was one of the cars just sitting. It’s a lot easier to witness what others on the road are doing when you’re at a standstill, rather than driving, yourself.

    Anyway, that’s not the only thing, but it’s the more potentially serious one of the two recent vehicular events. Imagine if there had been a bike rider using the shoulder about the time Mom swung around the stopped cars to enter the intersection.

    I could use prayers, because I really think it should be discussed. Too bad it wasn’t, though, right after my sibling heard about that. We’ll probably never know now whether she realized her mistake at the time she sailed right through the intersection, or whether she was totally oblivious to the violation. 😦

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  51. Thank you very much, Michelle. I never thought of the liability issue for us siblings. I will talk to them about that.

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  52. Autonomy is an important point, Michelle. I agree we should not try to take away their freedom to choose things that won’t bring harm to others.

    One of my siblings some years ago thought Dad should quit farming because he fell in the barn once and injured his knee.

    No! You don’t urge someone to give up a lifelong love just because the person got hurt once doing it.

    The distinction between whether your actions can only bring harm to yourself, or whether your choices could hurt others, is key.

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