Yesterday we had drizzle in the late afternoon and evening here at home. When Art got home after dark, a little later than usual, I asked was traffic bad. He said that the power was out at the office, and it was raining so hard that he could not leave the office, and there was wind, too. He did not make it sound too rough though. This morning the weather report said they got 4 inches of rain! The airport got almost 3 inches. I asked if there were puddles in the parking lot and he said it was a lake.
Morning! It was a cool 37 degrees in this forest this morning! 😊
I am off to have breakfast with a friend then some errands to run. Grandson’s 15th birthday today and I must drop off his present…and he got his braces off just in time for his birthday…he is one happy fella.
That is cute little birdie up there!
Yesterday we were discussing children and what parent’s were and were not expected to do these days. As you know I am an only child of an only child and have an only child. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. I made sure that BG has a close relationship with her two cousins. I want her to have someone she is close to when her dad and I are gone.
Now it seems that those with more than two children are somewhat shamed. I have an agent who has 10 or 11 children and homeschools them. I pulled her aside and told her how much I admired her. She doesn’t get that much. I am of the opinion there is nothing you can give a child monetarily that takes the place of “connection”.
Along that line Peter anounced his 7th grandchild yesterday and this was D1’s 6th child. Congratulations!
I decided to stay home today. I asked Mr. P if we could please do something today. He asked what. ANYTHING. I don’t care. I am tired of being cooped up in this house or at work. I want OUT. So his idea is to ride down to the beach and see if there is a place where we can eat outside. Sounds PERFECT.
Good morning. Off for the morning walk, harvest grapes, and collect blackberries. Then we start school in earnest, though we work on some all year round, we do get serious this time of year.
Oh, Kim. Connections as a gift is perfect. I have never been able to do that with Wesley since he has no close cousins. That is why his friends are so important to him. His Christian friends are his family. Art and I have had few relatives in this area to connect with either. Our discussion on here was making me realize that is one way that my family and Art’s family were the same. His parents and my parents bought chose an urban lifestyle over the agricultural lifestyle of the relatives. From what Art has told me, his parents were seen somewhat as snobs for doing that, but they were just looking for work. And my dad came from a large family where he was the only boy who went into the Navy to get away from all the estrogen in his family and to do what work he could with an 8th grade education. The Navy buddies became his family and our home was within a twenty minute walk of the first Naval Air Station in Atlanta.
Overflowing with relatives here . . . and thankful. My only child of an only child of an only child sister-in-law once laughed and said, “I married your brother for his family.”
And she’s been cooking Thanksgiving dinner for 50+ relatives ever since my mom died!
She also had four children and said to me once, “I don’t understand why they fight all the time! I would have done anything to have a brother or sister.”
I’ve got cabin fever as well, and we’ve got smoke as well. No walk for me.
The EMT is coming up on Wednesday for her fifth dental appointment of the year and will finally get a crown. I think we’re going to head for lunch at the beach on Friday . . . just to GO somewhere.
So, no matter where we are, we have something in common! LOL
In other news, during my Sunday school Zoom meeting yesterday, I pointed out I’d reorganized the bookshelf behind me. (From the Zoom camera it’s all books!)
One of the men laughed. “I’m so glad you did that. It’s been bothering me for months!”
Who knew? 🙂
Mr. COVID told me I should have been wearing a mask the entire time I was at work on Friday. We were working six feet apart and I put on the mask whenever I went near my colleague, but the recirculating air (smoke outside) was the issue.
As a result, royalty report work is coming to my house today.
I would not have done well in a job where you have to wear a mask all the time. 😦
Congratulations, Peter L. on your latest grandchild. They are so precious!
I know a few women with ten or more children. They are all energetic and young looking moms. They obviously enjoy their families and the children are all doing well as they become adults.
There is a real bias among the ‘elites’ for big families. Or a phobia as some point out. That was true in the late sixties and seventies, as well. One family moved by my aunt out in the country, because her neighbors were so dismissive and snobbish towards her and her many children. She was relieved my aunt also had a large family. It was the population explosion teaching era.
OTOH, some can be snobbish against those who choose to or have small families through no choice of their own. I guess there is no end to the ways we can sin. At one point, Jesus basically told one of his disciples to MYOB. There are times we should do the same.
I was once walking with a Christian couple, and another group was on the same trail, with their young children. One young woman had a stroller with a youngish toddler in it, and the mother was visibly pregnant. My friend commented on how close the children would be together (seeming to think it would be too close, less than two years), and then she said, “But maybe she wants to ‘get them over with’ quickly.” I said, “Maybe she wants to have more than two children.” And she said, “Yes, maybe” but she said it with the sense of “Oh, I didn’t even think of that possibility!”
That mindset is really what I’m countering: the idea that we owe our children a certain standard of living (each child having his or her own bedroom and an all-expenses-paid college education for just two examples) and that if you can’t or won’t give them that level, that you are being irresponsible. I understand that some people desperately want children and can’t have any (I was pretty much in that boat myself except my reason for being unable to have children was being unmarried), and I understand there are medical reasons some people have to stop their family after one or two. And of course there are the families that are single-parent families where the “one child” was conceived in sin or the father died or abandoned the family after the birth of one child. There are many reasons people have small families. But what I don’t like is the modern idea that material wealth is important–mandatory even–and siblings aren’t important at all.
I come from a large family. I know the financial limitations of large families. But I also know the benefits of them. To me personally, a child without siblings loses something (my college best friend was the only “survivor” in her family, as her mother had multiple miscarriages, so she is an only child, and she knows that she missed something, so she was close to her cousins). But I also think that a child misses something without having same-sex siblings, and misses something by not having opposite-sex siblings. The number of children a family has is up to God, and clearly a family has to have at least four children for each child to have both same-sex and opposite-sex siblings. In my family, Mom had to have six children before she had two girls. So it isn’t realistic that all families have that. But I do think that cultural dynamics are stronger when most children experience that or at least have best friends and cousins and neighbors who have both sexes within their families, and they get to grow up with some experience interacting closely with both boys and girls.
But our culture largely doesn’t even promote siblings as a child benefit. Furthermore, children provide a family no practical benefit (as, for instance, extra hands to do the work on the farm or help in the family business) and our culture actually speaks of family with lots of children not as sacrificial and selfless but as selfish and evil. We also have no cultural expectation that children will help care for parents in their old age–in fact, we tell families how to make sure that the parents’ home is titled so that the state will bear any nursing-home expenses and they won’t affect the children’s income or inheritance. We do “expect” adults to visit their parents and offer practical help such as rides to the doctor for a mother with a broken leg who can’t drive. But there is no particular material benefit to having more than one or perhaps two children, and a culture that sees it as a bad thing to do, and overall there are lots of reasons most couples stop with one or at most two children.
Nightingale and her friend Virginia have “broken up”.
They were having a conversation via text, and somehow (I forget the progression of the conversation) Virginia referred to some Blacks down south as “monkeys”. Nightingale was shocked that her otherwise semi-liberal friend would say a thing so racist, and chided her for it. Virginia doubled down on her comment, saying that she had once been robbed by a Black man at gunpoint, and “yes, they are monkeys.” (I doubt she would think the same of her fellow whites if it had been a white man who had robbed her.)
There was a little more back and forth between them, with Nightingale expressing her disappointment in Virginia’s attitude. After that discourse, Virginia unfriended her on Facebook, and there has been no more contact between them.
It’s kind of sad, being the ending of a once deep friendship. But one of my prayers for my daughters and grandson is for God to deliver them from any ungodly influences, especially those who would hinder their coming to Christ. I don’t know for certain that that is what was behind this, but it is possible. Either way, I have prayed for Virginia’s salvation.
It may also be my fault that my daughter is not married and does not currently have a serious boyfriend. 🙂 Whenever she is in a relationship, I pray that if this is not the man that God wants for her, that He will cause their feelings to fade and thus end the relationship.
When she was with X, I prayed something similar to that, and I specifically prayed that no child would be conceived who would then grow up without his parents together. Well, as you know, God did not fully grant that request, but I cannot bring myself to wish He had, as I love my grandson so much and I know that his existence is not a mistake.
I am getting cabin fever as well. Maybe it’s because summer is ending and a new season starting (but what does it matter if we can’t really do anything, right?).
Looks like a relatively busy week ahead at work, I have a video news conference to cover today (a port donation of 75,000 masks to United Farm Workers) and need to get a story planned and done about the new bridge that now should open in early October (but when we last reported on that it was to open Labor Day weekend so we need to update that date).
The other night I got up and happened to notice the motion lights on in the backyard so I went to take a look since the doggie door was locked and all the pets were indoors. It was an opossum just ambling through, poking around, he walked all the way through the yard, looking-looking for bugs or something; then he made it up onto the back terraced area and vanished under the back fence to see if there might be something better he could find in the neighbors’ yard.
I’m working the holiday on Labor Day (we all had to sign up for one so that was mine). Guess I’ll cover all the things that aren’t happening. (Editor on this morning’s staff call lamented that they’re trying to find a decent ‘back-to-school’ photo that’s not just someone sitting at a computer at home.)
I think with fall coming there’s a growing need to figure out how we can better live “with” this pandemic without losing so much of what we all look forward to each year and season.
When this first hit, it seemed like it would only last for a few months but now that we’re seeing it could be a year or (probably) longer, the challenge is how to not cancel all of life while we just sit and wait it out.
It was three years ago today that Hubby had gone in to work, the morning (really the middle of the night) after being told that it wasn’t yet time to worry. We’d had a nice day on his day off, and he went to work feeling relieved. Within a few hours, though, the bleeding from his bladder began, heavy enough that he couldn’t control it, and in the midst of his route, he drove to the nearest hospital in that area, St. Mary’s.
Something I often forget about was that the various tests they did on him showed that he had had some kind of “heart event” recently. It had been that Monday when he had had a pain and tightening in his chest that kind of felt like a severe anxiety attack. It had lasted for an hour. He had kept working, but later called his cardiologist to make an appointment.
It was due to the possible danger to his heart that the urologist at that hospital did not want to do a scope or something into his bladder to determine the cause of the bleeding. (I may have my facts a little skewed, but this is the main gist.)
He would spend a week in St. Mary’s, and when it seemed like the bleeding had stopped, he was finally discharged late on September 7. We thought that was the end of that ordeal.
Kizzie, I’m sorry about the friendship breakup; that is pretty shocking what she said. I was shocked, too, when a mutual friend told me how Real Estate Guy speaks about blacks (to her, not to me, I guess he knows better, though I’ve always picked up that he harbors a prejudice against minorities).
Our pastor in yesterday’s sermon said something to the effect that our racial “problem” will only end when we see all people as made in God’s image. That’s the real answer to all of it, of course.
It reminded me of something I said to my good Catholic friend who is unsure of her choice between Trump (whom she strongly dislikes – despises? – for his character and personality) and Biden (she’s also strong pro-life and realizes, I think, that Biden is not; she doesn’t follow politics closely and is kind of a babe in the woods when it comes to all of this, so she finds herself very confused over all of this right now — and I think her brother and two adult daughters have influenced and pulled her leftward to some degree through the years). She’s “making a list” of pros and cons for each candidate.
I told her in one of our texting sessions that our problem as a culture really is spiritual, not so much political. Yes, it’s important to vote and participate — but solving these deep problems we have goes deeper than the ballot box.
My friend also has been uniquely inspired to be more politically aware by seeing “Hamilton” on the Disney channel. She was smitten by it (I’m not familiar with the play and don’t have the Disney channel which I think is the only one carrying it?).
… We are disillusioned with our leaders, with the experts, with the medical establishment, with the media, with the official information, with the information we get on the internet, with people who aren’t taking the epidemic seriously and those who are taking it too seriously. Our “discouragement and stress” are palpable. I would say that we are in the disillusionment phase right now. …
(Phase 6) is characterized by an overall feeling of recovery. Individuals and communities begin to assume responsibility for rebuilding their lives, and people adjust to a new ‘normal’ while continuing to grieve losses.”
Please, Lord, may this phase come soon! It’s encouraging to consider that disasters run their course. If we can just hold on–though we don’t know exactly when (a vaccine in early 2021? eventually attaining herd immunity once enough people get infected? the virus suddenly dies out?)–we will reach “an overall feeling of recovery.”
_______________________
I know it’s wrong of me but I can’t help but be thankful every times something “racial” happens or is said that it isn’t happening in the South.
I’ve always told you the relationships between “races” are complicated. We are all very interdependent.
As a homeschool mom, you all can imagine that I did not quite fit in by having an only child. I thought the large families were great! They had all those children to help teach each other. I got worn out having to provide all the learning opportunities for a very bright child. I did find a few others who had a similar situation and we became friends who understood each other.
My father shared with me once that my mother had problems conceiving. I think he said they had to put some kind of gas through her tubes? That is why they only had two children. He wanted to adopt some but she did not. He told us when he was in the Navy overseas that people would offer their children for adoption to get them to America so I guess that made him think about adopting.
I got married late and did not conceive immediately. Then I was dealing with aging parents. I had originally wanted three children but time ran out. And I learned contentment with what God so graciously gave.
Art’s mom never expected to have a child. She was 44 when she gave birth. And the very month she had him was the same month my parents got married.
I just figure there are advantages and disadvantages for all different size families. I don’t feel sad or discontented with what God gave me. And when I worked in a preschool for several years, it rather felt like I had a whole tribe.
When Wesley was young and I had to spend a lot of time caring for my mom, it was like they were siblings vying for my attention. He did not have doting grandparents nor did I have help from grandparents as many young parents have. He learned compassion for older people with affliction and he observed us taking care of the elderly.
I am not of the opinion that children should “contribute” to the family income, such as working on the farm. Children should have chores and responsibilities as part of being in the family. We all grow up differently. My mother was doted on by her father and by everyone’s account but hers gave her everything he possibly could. My father grew up as one of 12. He hated that his mother was “forced” to have so many children. She always asked him which ones he wished she hadn’t had. (Easy, my aunt Em – they dispised each other).
I have had it pointed out to me that maybe I put too much pressure on BG by her knowing how much she was desparately wanted. I don’t know.
I think we are getting to a different place these days. She will be 23 next Wednesday!!!! Whew. How did that happen. She is dating a different guy and while I have not met him, what I have heard about him I like, EXCEPT they are having some trouble getting past something he did and there is a trust issue at play. She talked to me about it Friday and I finally channeled my father and told her, “Baby, I can’t tell you what to do (in this situation), YOU are the only one who can make that decision. I did make sure she knew I was expecting him for Thanksgiving.
I do know that his parents bought a fixer upper house and he is living in it. He is to make the payments and do the fixing up under their instruction. He is working his day job and delivering pizza’s at night to do what is required of him to live in the house. Like I said, much better than the one she was dating who was an “entrepeneur”.
A few months ago she told me what Other Boyfriend was really doing. “Oh REALLY! Ya think??? Of course I knew what he was doing.
Kim, I think if a family has a farm, children will quite naturally do work on it and contribute to the family–and will in return feel as though they are a valuable part of the family. (Their work actually matters to the family; it isn’t just busywork. And they are learning skills and learning a work ethic.) There are extremes on both sides. I’d rather see an eight-year-old whose work really makes a difference to his family than a 36-year-old perpetual student who still has his mother wash his laundry and who complains about how she does it. But there are lots of ways to grow healthy, responsible children.
Interesting scene in the Mel Gibson film “Signs” — the tale of a disillusioned (former) pastor, a recent widower, who must protect his young children with the help of his brother when aliens invade. The scene reminded me of the pandemic situation somewhat and how we look at things through lens of God’s sovereignty.
Seeing it again last night brought our pandemic to mind, how things happen that can so unexpectedly change everything in a community or nation, turning things upside down. What are we to make of it all? How do we cope? How do we see what is happening around us?
As a coincidence that we curse — or as something brought, for whatever reason or reasons, by God? How do we maintain that view for the long run, as it goes on and on? (Admittedly I’ve found myself at times grumbling as I’ve forgotten there is a purpose to this, whether I ever understand it or not — and having to remind myself that it really hasn’t been all that ‘long.’)
DJ, in some ways it seems doubly long to me because being stuck at home feels very similar to all that time I could not drive. And to us it may not see so long with the lengthy span of our lives, but for the young who have not lived so long, it must seem like a good chunk of their lives.
My former pastor’s father owned a car wash as their family business. He expressed he was not very content being expected to put in so many hours there. I do not know if he was paid.
Congratulations on the new grandbaby Peter and Mrs. L…what a delightful joy!
I had breakfast with dear friend…we met at 9:30 and did not leave the restaurant until 1! She can talk! But it was good to catch up and encourage one another in the Lord…blessed…
We had a couple more showers with just a spit of rain but moisture none the less. I loved wearing a sweatshirt all day long..Oh and I saw pumpkin scones at the grocery and now upon reading of Jo’s pumpkin muffins I regret not purchasing at least one…🎃
Oh and I have a friend who has 23 children. They were all homeschooled for the most part…some of the younger were sent to Christian school for a bit. All of the children had chores and were expected to work at the nursery owned by the family. Today several of the sons own nurseries around the country and many of the kids are still quite involved in the business. 😊
Seven billion people on the planet. Bound to be some parenting differences. Seven billion people on the planet. Most of them have determined either to parent like their parents or totally opposite and a wide range in between. Many of them, at some point, have complained about their horrible childhood. Many had idyllic childhoods like mine and have nothing to complain about. Others may see my childhood differently and complain about it. People. You just gotta love em.
Thanks for all the congrats. D1 wants a large family. One of er best friends has 11 children. She was D1’s matron of honor. The family visited our small church when they only had 9 and the children were so well behaved you could hardly realize there were so many of them. They were quiet throughout the meeting.
Wandering Views 
Good morning everyone.
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Good morning! 🙂
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Good day!
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Yesterday we had drizzle in the late afternoon and evening here at home. When Art got home after dark, a little later than usual, I asked was traffic bad. He said that the power was out at the office, and it was raining so hard that he could not leave the office, and there was wind, too. He did not make it sound too rough though. This morning the weather report said they got 4 inches of rain! The airport got almost 3 inches. I asked if there were puddles in the parking lot and he said it was a lake.
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Morning! It was a cool 37 degrees in this forest this morning! 😊
I am off to have breakfast with a friend then some errands to run. Grandson’s 15th birthday today and I must drop off his present…and he got his braces off just in time for his birthday…he is one happy fella.
That is cute little birdie up there!
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Yesterday we were discussing children and what parent’s were and were not expected to do these days. As you know I am an only child of an only child and have an only child. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. I made sure that BG has a close relationship with her two cousins. I want her to have someone she is close to when her dad and I are gone.
Now it seems that those with more than two children are somewhat shamed. I have an agent who has 10 or 11 children and homeschools them. I pulled her aside and told her how much I admired her. She doesn’t get that much. I am of the opinion there is nothing you can give a child monetarily that takes the place of “connection”.
Along that line Peter anounced his 7th grandchild yesterday and this was D1’s 6th child. Congratulations!
I decided to stay home today. I asked Mr. P if we could please do something today. He asked what. ANYTHING. I don’t care. I am tired of being cooped up in this house or at work. I want OUT. So his idea is to ride down to the beach and see if there is a place where we can eat outside. Sounds PERFECT.
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Good morning. Off for the morning walk, harvest grapes, and collect blackberries. Then we start school in earnest, though we work on some all year round, we do get serious this time of year.
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I will do school with the littlest grands today
Time to walk. Smoky here
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Oh, Kim. Connections as a gift is perfect. I have never been able to do that with Wesley since he has no close cousins. That is why his friends are so important to him. His Christian friends are his family. Art and I have had few relatives in this area to connect with either. Our discussion on here was making me realize that is one way that my family and Art’s family were the same. His parents and my parents bought chose an urban lifestyle over the agricultural lifestyle of the relatives. From what Art has told me, his parents were seen somewhat as snobs for doing that, but they were just looking for work. And my dad came from a large family where he was the only boy who went into the Navy to get away from all the estrogen in his family and to do what work he could with an 8th grade education. The Navy buddies became his family and our home was within a twenty minute walk of the first Naval Air Station in Atlanta.
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bought=both
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Overflowing with relatives here . . . and thankful. My only child of an only child of an only child sister-in-law once laughed and said, “I married your brother for his family.”
And she’s been cooking Thanksgiving dinner for 50+ relatives ever since my mom died!
She also had four children and said to me once, “I don’t understand why they fight all the time! I would have done anything to have a brother or sister.”
I’ve got cabin fever as well, and we’ve got smoke as well. No walk for me.
The EMT is coming up on Wednesday for her fifth dental appointment of the year and will finally get a crown. I think we’re going to head for lunch at the beach on Friday . . . just to GO somewhere.
So, no matter where we are, we have something in common! LOL
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In other news, during my Sunday school Zoom meeting yesterday, I pointed out I’d reorganized the bookshelf behind me. (From the Zoom camera it’s all books!)
One of the men laughed. “I’m so glad you did that. It’s been bothering me for months!”
Who knew? 🙂
Mr. COVID told me I should have been wearing a mask the entire time I was at work on Friday. We were working six feet apart and I put on the mask whenever I went near my colleague, but the recirculating air (smoke outside) was the issue.
As a result, royalty report work is coming to my house today.
I would not have done well in a job where you have to wear a mask all the time. 😦
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Congratulations, Peter L. on your latest grandchild. They are so precious!
I know a few women with ten or more children. They are all energetic and young looking moms. They obviously enjoy their families and the children are all doing well as they become adults.
There is a real bias among the ‘elites’ for big families. Or a phobia as some point out. That was true in the late sixties and seventies, as well. One family moved by my aunt out in the country, because her neighbors were so dismissive and snobbish towards her and her many children. She was relieved my aunt also had a large family. It was the population explosion teaching era.
OTOH, some can be snobbish against those who choose to or have small families through no choice of their own. I guess there is no end to the ways we can sin. At one point, Jesus basically told one of his disciples to MYOB. There are times we should do the same.
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Peter – Congratulations on your 7th grandchild!
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I was once walking with a Christian couple, and another group was on the same trail, with their young children. One young woman had a stroller with a youngish toddler in it, and the mother was visibly pregnant. My friend commented on how close the children would be together (seeming to think it would be too close, less than two years), and then she said, “But maybe she wants to ‘get them over with’ quickly.” I said, “Maybe she wants to have more than two children.” And she said, “Yes, maybe” but she said it with the sense of “Oh, I didn’t even think of that possibility!”
That mindset is really what I’m countering: the idea that we owe our children a certain standard of living (each child having his or her own bedroom and an all-expenses-paid college education for just two examples) and that if you can’t or won’t give them that level, that you are being irresponsible. I understand that some people desperately want children and can’t have any (I was pretty much in that boat myself except my reason for being unable to have children was being unmarried), and I understand there are medical reasons some people have to stop their family after one or two. And of course there are the families that are single-parent families where the “one child” was conceived in sin or the father died or abandoned the family after the birth of one child. There are many reasons people have small families. But what I don’t like is the modern idea that material wealth is important–mandatory even–and siblings aren’t important at all.
I come from a large family. I know the financial limitations of large families. But I also know the benefits of them. To me personally, a child without siblings loses something (my college best friend was the only “survivor” in her family, as her mother had multiple miscarriages, so she is an only child, and she knows that she missed something, so she was close to her cousins). But I also think that a child misses something without having same-sex siblings, and misses something by not having opposite-sex siblings. The number of children a family has is up to God, and clearly a family has to have at least four children for each child to have both same-sex and opposite-sex siblings. In my family, Mom had to have six children before she had two girls. So it isn’t realistic that all families have that. But I do think that cultural dynamics are stronger when most children experience that or at least have best friends and cousins and neighbors who have both sexes within their families, and they get to grow up with some experience interacting closely with both boys and girls.
But our culture largely doesn’t even promote siblings as a child benefit. Furthermore, children provide a family no practical benefit (as, for instance, extra hands to do the work on the farm or help in the family business) and our culture actually speaks of family with lots of children not as sacrificial and selfless but as selfish and evil. We also have no cultural expectation that children will help care for parents in their old age–in fact, we tell families how to make sure that the parents’ home is titled so that the state will bear any nursing-home expenses and they won’t affect the children’s income or inheritance. We do “expect” adults to visit their parents and offer practical help such as rides to the doctor for a mother with a broken leg who can’t drive. But there is no particular material benefit to having more than one or perhaps two children, and a culture that sees it as a bad thing to do, and overall there are lots of reasons most couples stop with one or at most two children.
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Nightingale and her friend Virginia have “broken up”.
They were having a conversation via text, and somehow (I forget the progression of the conversation) Virginia referred to some Blacks down south as “monkeys”. Nightingale was shocked that her otherwise semi-liberal friend would say a thing so racist, and chided her for it. Virginia doubled down on her comment, saying that she had once been robbed by a Black man at gunpoint, and “yes, they are monkeys.” (I doubt she would think the same of her fellow whites if it had been a white man who had robbed her.)
There was a little more back and forth between them, with Nightingale expressing her disappointment in Virginia’s attitude. After that discourse, Virginia unfriended her on Facebook, and there has been no more contact between them.
It’s kind of sad, being the ending of a once deep friendship. But one of my prayers for my daughters and grandson is for God to deliver them from any ungodly influences, especially those who would hinder their coming to Christ. I don’t know for certain that that is what was behind this, but it is possible. Either way, I have prayed for Virginia’s salvation.
It may also be my fault that my daughter is not married and does not currently have a serious boyfriend. 🙂 Whenever she is in a relationship, I pray that if this is not the man that God wants for her, that He will cause their feelings to fade and thus end the relationship.
When she was with X, I prayed something similar to that, and I specifically prayed that no child would be conceived who would then grow up without his parents together. Well, as you know, God did not fully grant that request, but I cannot bring myself to wish He had, as I love my grandson so much and I know that his existence is not a mistake.
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I am getting cabin fever as well. Maybe it’s because summer is ending and a new season starting (but what does it matter if we can’t really do anything, right?).
Looks like a relatively busy week ahead at work, I have a video news conference to cover today (a port donation of 75,000 masks to United Farm Workers) and need to get a story planned and done about the new bridge that now should open in early October (but when we last reported on that it was to open Labor Day weekend so we need to update that date).
The other night I got up and happened to notice the motion lights on in the backyard so I went to take a look since the doggie door was locked and all the pets were indoors. It was an opossum just ambling through, poking around, he walked all the way through the yard, looking-looking for bugs or something; then he made it up onto the back terraced area and vanished under the back fence to see if there might be something better he could find in the neighbors’ yard.
I’m working the holiday on Labor Day (we all had to sign up for one so that was mine). Guess I’ll cover all the things that aren’t happening. (Editor on this morning’s staff call lamented that they’re trying to find a decent ‘back-to-school’ photo that’s not just someone sitting at a computer at home.)
Sigh.
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I think with fall coming there’s a growing need to figure out how we can better live “with” this pandemic without losing so much of what we all look forward to each year and season.
When this first hit, it seemed like it would only last for a few months but now that we’re seeing it could be a year or (probably) longer, the challenge is how to not cancel all of life while we just sit and wait it out.
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Today in “Kizzie’s Reminiscences”:
It was three years ago today that Hubby had gone in to work, the morning (really the middle of the night) after being told that it wasn’t yet time to worry. We’d had a nice day on his day off, and he went to work feeling relieved. Within a few hours, though, the bleeding from his bladder began, heavy enough that he couldn’t control it, and in the midst of his route, he drove to the nearest hospital in that area, St. Mary’s.
Something I often forget about was that the various tests they did on him showed that he had had some kind of “heart event” recently. It had been that Monday when he had had a pain and tightening in his chest that kind of felt like a severe anxiety attack. It had lasted for an hour. He had kept working, but later called his cardiologist to make an appointment.
It was due to the possible danger to his heart that the urologist at that hospital did not want to do a scope or something into his bladder to determine the cause of the bleeding. (I may have my facts a little skewed, but this is the main gist.)
He would spend a week in St. Mary’s, and when it seemed like the bleeding had stopped, he was finally discharged late on September 7. We thought that was the end of that ordeal.
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Kizzie, I’m sorry about the friendship breakup; that is pretty shocking what she said. I was shocked, too, when a mutual friend told me how Real Estate Guy speaks about blacks (to her, not to me, I guess he knows better, though I’ve always picked up that he harbors a prejudice against minorities).
Our pastor in yesterday’s sermon said something to the effect that our racial “problem” will only end when we see all people as made in God’s image. That’s the real answer to all of it, of course.
It reminded me of something I said to my good Catholic friend who is unsure of her choice between Trump (whom she strongly dislikes – despises? – for his character and personality) and Biden (she’s also strong pro-life and realizes, I think, that Biden is not; she doesn’t follow politics closely and is kind of a babe in the woods when it comes to all of this, so she finds herself very confused over all of this right now — and I think her brother and two adult daughters have influenced and pulled her leftward to some degree through the years). She’s “making a list” of pros and cons for each candidate.
I told her in one of our texting sessions that our problem as a culture really is spiritual, not so much political. Yes, it’s important to vote and participate — but solving these deep problems we have goes deeper than the ballot box.
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My friend also has been uniquely inspired to be more politically aware by seeing “Hamilton” on the Disney channel. She was smitten by it (I’m not familiar with the play and don’t have the Disney channel which I think is the only one carrying it?).
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Veith goes through the “6 phases of disaster” today:
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2020/08/the-six-phases-of-disaster/https://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2020/08/the-six-phases-of-disaster/
Where are we now? Stage 5:
(Sounds about right)
__________________________
… We are disillusioned with our leaders, with the experts, with the medical establishment, with the media, with the official information, with the information we get on the internet, with people who aren’t taking the epidemic seriously and those who are taking it too seriously. Our “discouragement and stress” are palpable. I would say that we are in the disillusionment phase right now. …
(Phase 6) is characterized by an overall feeling of recovery. Individuals and communities begin to assume responsibility for rebuilding their lives, and people adjust to a new ‘normal’ while continuing to grieve losses.”
Please, Lord, may this phase come soon! It’s encouraging to consider that disasters run their course. If we can just hold on–though we don’t know exactly when (a vaccine in early 2021? eventually attaining herd immunity once enough people get infected? the virus suddenly dies out?)–we will reach “an overall feeling of recovery.”
_______________________
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I know it’s wrong of me but I can’t help but be thankful every times something “racial” happens or is said that it isn’t happening in the South.
I’ve always told you the relationships between “races” are complicated. We are all very interdependent.
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As a homeschool mom, you all can imagine that I did not quite fit in by having an only child. I thought the large families were great! They had all those children to help teach each other. I got worn out having to provide all the learning opportunities for a very bright child. I did find a few others who had a similar situation and we became friends who understood each other.
My father shared with me once that my mother had problems conceiving. I think he said they had to put some kind of gas through her tubes? That is why they only had two children. He wanted to adopt some but she did not. He told us when he was in the Navy overseas that people would offer their children for adoption to get them to America so I guess that made him think about adopting.
I got married late and did not conceive immediately. Then I was dealing with aging parents. I had originally wanted three children but time ran out. And I learned contentment with what God so graciously gave.
Art’s mom never expected to have a child. She was 44 when she gave birth. And the very month she had him was the same month my parents got married.
I just figure there are advantages and disadvantages for all different size families. I don’t feel sad or discontented with what God gave me. And when I worked in a preschool for several years, it rather felt like I had a whole tribe.
When Wesley was young and I had to spend a lot of time caring for my mom, it was like they were siblings vying for my attention. He did not have doting grandparents nor did I have help from grandparents as many young parents have. He learned compassion for older people with affliction and he observed us taking care of the elderly.
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I am not of the opinion that children should “contribute” to the family income, such as working on the farm. Children should have chores and responsibilities as part of being in the family. We all grow up differently. My mother was doted on by her father and by everyone’s account but hers gave her everything he possibly could. My father grew up as one of 12. He hated that his mother was “forced” to have so many children. She always asked him which ones he wished she hadn’t had. (Easy, my aunt Em – they dispised each other).
I have had it pointed out to me that maybe I put too much pressure on BG by her knowing how much she was desparately wanted. I don’t know.
I think we are getting to a different place these days. She will be 23 next Wednesday!!!! Whew. How did that happen. She is dating a different guy and while I have not met him, what I have heard about him I like, EXCEPT they are having some trouble getting past something he did and there is a trust issue at play. She talked to me about it Friday and I finally channeled my father and told her, “Baby, I can’t tell you what to do (in this situation), YOU are the only one who can make that decision. I did make sure she knew I was expecting him for Thanksgiving.
I do know that his parents bought a fixer upper house and he is living in it. He is to make the payments and do the fixing up under their instruction. He is working his day job and delivering pizza’s at night to do what is required of him to live in the house. Like I said, much better than the one she was dating who was an “entrepeneur”.
A few months ago she told me what Other Boyfriend was really doing. “Oh REALLY! Ya think??? Of course I knew what he was doing.
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This is worth a read, I think. Makes some good points, even if you might not agree with all of it.
“Do Pro-Lifers Who Reject Trump Have ‘Blood on their Hands’?
Taking a look at the true state of the pro-life argument in America.”
https://frenchpress.thedispatch.com/p/do-pro-lifers-who-reject-trump-have?token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjoxNDU4NjExMCwicG9zdF9pZCI6ODg0NTAyLCJfIjoiczFVZ0wiLCJpYXQiOjE1OTgxOTk4NzEsImV4cCI6MTU5ODIwMzQ3MSwiaXNzIjoicHViLTIxNzY1Iiwic3ViIjoicG9zdC1yZWFjdGlvbiJ9.am4BkpSFfBwH38pQCy6pYDyTXvxakSvhAD35WmhwBbo
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I made pumpkin muffins with a 2 and 4 year old. I think I need a nap.
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Kim, I think if a family has a farm, children will quite naturally do work on it and contribute to the family–and will in return feel as though they are a valuable part of the family. (Their work actually matters to the family; it isn’t just busywork. And they are learning skills and learning a work ethic.) There are extremes on both sides. I’d rather see an eight-year-old whose work really makes a difference to his family than a 36-year-old perpetual student who still has his mother wash his laundry and who complains about how she does it. But there are lots of ways to grow healthy, responsible children.
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Interesting scene in the Mel Gibson film “Signs” — the tale of a disillusioned (former) pastor, a recent widower, who must protect his young children with the help of his brother when aliens invade. The scene reminded me of the pandemic situation somewhat and how we look at things through lens of God’s sovereignty.
(
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Film is set in the farmlands (Bucks County) just outside Philadelphia, so beautiful.
And yes, Gibson regains his faith.
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DJ, we have seen and enjoyed that film several times.
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Me too 🙂
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And isn’t that house gorgeous?
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Seeing it again last night brought our pandemic to mind, how things happen that can so unexpectedly change everything in a community or nation, turning things upside down. What are we to make of it all? How do we cope? How do we see what is happening around us?
As a coincidence that we curse — or as something brought, for whatever reason or reasons, by God? How do we maintain that view for the long run, as it goes on and on? (Admittedly I’ve found myself at times grumbling as I’ve forgotten there is a purpose to this, whether I ever understand it or not — and having to remind myself that it really hasn’t been all that ‘long.’)
Signs.
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DJ, in some ways it seems doubly long to me because being stuck at home feels very similar to all that time I could not drive. And to us it may not see so long with the lengthy span of our lives, but for the young who have not lived so long, it must seem like a good chunk of their lives.
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I am hungry for pumpkin muffins!
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My former pastor’s father owned a car wash as their family business. He expressed he was not very content being expected to put in so many hours there. I do not know if he was paid.
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Elvera’s mother had seven children. What happened is the oldest girl raised her. Her oldest sister was her “mother”.
Thnax for the note Mumsee.
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Congratulations on the new grandbaby Peter and Mrs. L…what a delightful joy!
I had breakfast with dear friend…we met at 9:30 and did not leave the restaurant until 1! She can talk! But it was good to catch up and encourage one another in the Lord…blessed…
We had a couple more showers with just a spit of rain but moisture none the less. I loved wearing a sweatshirt all day long..Oh and I saw pumpkin scones at the grocery and now upon reading of Jo’s pumpkin muffins I regret not purchasing at least one…🎃
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Oh and I have a friend who has 23 children. They were all homeschooled for the most part…some of the younger were sent to Christian school for a bit. All of the children had chores and were expected to work at the nursery owned by the family. Today several of the sons own nurseries around the country and many of the kids are still quite involved in the business. 😊
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Seven billion people on the planet. Bound to be some parenting differences. Seven billion people on the planet. Most of them have determined either to parent like their parents or totally opposite and a wide range in between. Many of them, at some point, have complained about their horrible childhood. Many had idyllic childhoods like mine and have nothing to complain about. Others may see my childhood differently and complain about it. People. You just gotta love em.
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Thanks for all the congrats. D1 wants a large family. One of er best friends has 11 children. She was D1’s matron of honor. The family visited our small church when they only had 9 and the children were so well behaved you could hardly realize there were so many of them. They were quiet throughout the meeting.
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