“You can’t fill someone else with an empty cup.”

I met the Coffee Divas from my high school class yesterday. We try to meet once a month or so but I’ve been gone so much this year, it’s been a little less than that. When I returned from my WV tour in the Girl Camper charity raffle trailer, I was really ready to just be at home for a little bit. I wouldn’t say I was burned out…that sounds so negative and it wasn’t a negative kind of feeling at all. I just missed home and missed my sweet Mr. FixIt and I was ready to just be in one place and not move for a while.

“At the end of a dreary, grey day, the sun peeked through the clouds.”

We went to town yesterday to do “Phase 2” of the Thanksgiving shopping. I have a tip for you that will save you TONS of time if you’re shopping at Sam’s. Quite a few years ago, I downloaded the Sam’s app on my phone then never did anything with it. About two weeks ago, I was walking into Sam’s with my phone in my hand. I happened to look down and I had a notification that I was near the store. I clicked on it and the app opened and my Sam’s card popped up on the screen.

“The Three Girl Camper Amigas…Ginny, Gail, and Janine!”

You’ve heard me refer to a “big project” I’ve been involved with over the last year and the time has come for the big reveal. It all started when my dear friends, Janine Pettit and Gail Bable, were having an impromptu “slumber party”. Janine was driving cross country and called to say she was headed to Gail’s in Ohio to spend the night. I was the same distance away on the opposite side so I threw some things in a bag, kissed Mr. FixIt on the forehead and off I went.

“Here’s a soft kitty to take your mind off of things!”

It’s a well known fact…I hate television. I’ve spent long stretches of time in my life without watching TV and have never missed it. But, I’ve always owned one and had basic cable. I found that to be particularly important when I lived alone out at the family farm here in West Virginia. If there was some kind of alert or a national emergency or impending bad weather, it was important to me to be able to tune in for updates. I just never sit in front of the TV watching endless hours of mindless drivel. That is, until the hearings started.

“We’ve been following Little Gwen since she was born with Arthrogryposis. Look…she’s standing!!!”

Last year I wrote about little Gwen. Her grandma is my friend, Jody who graduated with Daughter #1. Gwen was born with Arthrogryposis. I posted a picture of her back then with her little twisted legs and hands. One knee bent completely backwards and her foot sat in front of her face. Her jaw is severely recessed and because of that, her swallowing is restricted. She has had a feeding tube ever since she was a newborn. 

“Although grief is never finished, healing can occur and you can use your scars to help others.”

Grief doesn’t run in a straight line. Anything but. We’d love to see the slow and steady climb from that deep, dark valley head right up the side of that mountain to joy. But, unfortunately…it just doesn’t happen that way. Grief runs all skwiggly-skwog…up and down, back and forth, around and around and around. 

“The truth isn’t always what it seems.”

The first time I saw a Computer Generated Image I thought, ”Uh-oh…we’re about to open Pandora’s Box here.” I think it’s worse than anyone could have ever imagined. Oh, airbrushed models is one thing. But Photoshop and other programs like it have the potential of wreaking havoc on an already insane world.

My grandkids liked SnapChat when it first came out. They would send funny pictures of themselves with bunny ears or puppy noses. Then the app became more and more sophisticated and there are several filters that can really alter your appearance. True…anyone with a critical eye can tell the photos are filtered, but SnapChat is like the “Fun With Dick and Jane” of photographic manipulation.

“Bathing on the back porch was all I knew at the farm till I was six.” (not my photo)

This picture makes me smile. I found it on one of the Facebook pages I follow about Appalachian life. I remember in the days before Grandma had indoor plumbing, she would fill a canner full of spring water, heat it up on the kitchen stove, and fix a bath for my brother and I when we stayed with her. In the winter, the old galvanized tub was brought into the kitchen so we wouldn’t catch a chill. And in the summer, we bathed on the back porch. It was a great way to cool off and prepare us for a night of blissful slumber. I would pad up the staircase with bare feet, dressed in a clean cotton nightgown, and Mom would tuck us into bed…one on each side of her. I would drift off to the sounds of the night…a screech owl, katydids, crickets, and the sound of the creek bubbling over the rocks just at the side of the house.

“Setting boundaries is like building a good fence. It keeps life neat and tidy.”

Growing up in a dysfunctional home in the ‘50s and ‘60s with an alcoholic father taught me a lot of things. But how to set and keep boundaries was not one of them. Heck, I didn’t have a clue what the term meant. My family of origin was so codependent, there was very little demarcation between where I ended and where others started.

“What a beautiful night for a date at Rural King…my favorite farm store!”

A couple of days ago, Mr. FixIt needed to go into town to get a special drill bit. He’s back to working on our master bath! We have to fit in home jobs when the grass isn’t growing and he’s finished with all the outside jobs he does. When the weather turned cold, I came in off the road from my camping tour and we set to doing the things around here that have been put on hold.