Thursday’s Thinking

What a world we live in. I remember walking to the store with my mom when I was little. Older brother was at school, and we would stop at the neighborhood grocer/meat market store next to my grandfather’s drug store. Paskach’s Groceries had sawdust on the floor. I wasn’t sure, but maybe they did meat cutting in the basement. Some restaurants used to do that. Not so much in this modern world.

Mom couldn’t buy more than she could carry. That was good, we never froze our meat. The freezer held only two ice cube trays and maybe a mushy carton of Ice Cream. That freezer didn’t work well, and was way too small. What a difference there is today. You can buy anything ready to eat, ready to freeze, ready to prepare almost anything you can think of in today’s supermarket.

Fast forward to today. I just placed my first online grocery order. We’ll pick it up after we get Addison from school. I’m willing to give it a shot and see how I like it. No, I do not want to be in the stores this winter, between the flu and COVID. Why take an unnecessary risk? Not my way, really. More about that tomorrow. And Amazon delivered my first order of ENSURE. I’m getting that to have on hand as a protein drink (that has a lot of other nutrients in it to help keep hunger at bay). The Babe and I are going to try Keto for a bit and see how we do. Not extreme, just make some good habits from our bad ones. We’ll let you know how well it works.

Photo by Gareth Willey on Pexels.com

I miss the sawdust on the floor behind the fresh meat counter. I loved the old neighborhood grocery partly because it meant our Grandma and Grandpa were right next door. It would be so amazing to speak to them now that we’re retired ourselves. Just imagine the possibilities! One beautiful sight I remember in the drugstore is the sight of my Grandma standing behind the candy display case. Far as the eye could see, all kinds of delicious candy. She loved to let us pick out something, and Mom would always say, “No, we can’t accept it for free, we have to pay.” Grandma usually overruled her. We didn’t take advantage of it, though.

I’d love to have our other Grandma make frozen juice for us, and give us store-bought cookies (a luxury to us, mom always baked ours). After having our snack, we would go outside where they had gigantic shade trees, and there was always a pleasant breeze to cool us. Nowadays, it seems as if it is still outside or a gale force wind. Never an in between.

The image featured at the top of today’s blog reminds me of the block my Grandparent’s Drug Store was located. My parents lived a block and a half away from it, and I see it every time I go visit Mom. I can picture a quilt made from the picture. Somewhere, I have a photo of Grandpa and his three sons standing in front of the store. That would be cool to add those elements. And I picture making from my imagination the sight of Grandma behind the candy counter. The glass was spotless, inside and out, and the oak wood that held the glass was shiny as a new penny. It would take some work to get the proportions correct. Those are ideas I have that recur and tell me someday I must set them in fabric or drawing once I learn to draw. It’s part of a creative mind. You have way more ideas than what you might complete in a lifetime.

We all have stories in our minds. Some are wonderful and warm. Some are frightening and chilling. You can remember the good in all events to create wonderful memories of your family, your friends, and your co-workers. Everyone has far too many terrible stories. Let’s try to concentrate on forgiving and learning from our hurts. It’s a lot easier than carrying baggage around that doesn’t belong on our trip around the sun every year. Leaving the baggage behind also opens your arms to embrace new people and things. Learning to do that is hard, but so rewarding.

Love Makes Our World So Much Better

Thank you for reading today. I appreciate it. How about if we meet up again tomorrow and do it again? I’d love to see you again. Be Safe out there! We all need to take care of with other. It’s our job.

Another Friday

Amazon Delivery is a wonderous thing. Or a very bad thing, depending on your view. Internet ordering can be a blessing or a curse. You could live a long time, I think, just ordering essentials for delivery. Who knows? We may get to test that theory if the nation shuts down again. I don’t know anyone really knows. Too many things in play at once, and with the crowds who will be out this weekend, it could get much worse. I just pray if it does that my mom stays healthy.

I ordered a couple of books for research. One is “You Can’t Make This Stuff Up,” which is about Writing Creative Nonfiction – – from Memoir to Literary Journalism and Everything in Between. It should arrive today, and the other, “Creative Nonfiction: Researching and Crafting Stories of Real Life.” Most of the experiences I’m writing about have a root in my own life. I just want to find the best way to write about them.

If I tell it correctly, I won’t have to write a caveat telling my readers I’m not complaining about all the bad stuff; instead, I know if it hadn’t happened, I would not have grown into the strong woman I am. The events were a lot of forging the steel of my nerves; the prayers I said took my relationship with God to a completely different level; the heartbreaks have built my character; I held onto the idea I had about relationships and I met him after the positively worst event of my life. I was looking at a possible crushed spinal cord from a tumor in my spine, which was life altering and took many normal activities from me at the age of 44. That’s far too young. But I’m still here, twenty four years later.

I need to learn I’m not bragging about all of this; it’s a story; it’s part of my story. And I’m just grateful I survived and was not paralyzed from the chest down. I would have missed so much of the wonderful life I’ve been blessed with. It’s hard to talk about yourself when you were raised to be humble, meek, compliant, and to go along with whatever your parents or husband decided for you. The world cannot work like that anymore. I hope our daughters and granddaughters are learning that. Please, teach them.

I am greatly disturbed by the creation of a “black anthem.” I understand it’s being called the Black National Anthem. I feel this divides our people more significantly than before. I feel it’s a bad idea, to start including it in the pre-game festivities of NFL and NBA games. I think it will drive a wedge in between people that we won’t be able to remove later. At what point will this stop? All people need to be responsible for their own errors of judgement, whether it be breaking the law or a character flaw that gets you in trouble.

Before there is reaction about this, I’m going to mention a tort lawsuit filed last week by the families of the four Gretna girls who died in a car accident last summer. The fifth girl survived and her family is not part of the lawsuit. Yes, it’s sad. The fact of the matter, though, is being 14 and 15 year old girls, they thought they were adult enough to handle drinking and driving over 90 mph on a gravel road. The tort lawsuit is against the county for a poorly constructed road. I say this is wrong.

I believe the fault is not with the road. I believe the fault is with the driver and the group of girls who knowingly broke the law by drinking underage then somehow thought it was a good idea to get into a car, with the sober girl only as a passenger. The driver crashed under the influence and was killed. The sober girl was too, along with two of their friends. The survivor was badly burned, and has to live with her injuries and memories for the rest of her life. I hope she vows to never drink again.

I believe strongly in personal responsibility. Unfortunately people are sometimes in a state of denial. As a parent, I know my kids did dumb things. All kids do. I did dumb things as a kid. If you live through that phase, you are eternally grateful you survived yourself. Four of these girls did not, and it is sad. Denying the truth and filing tort lawsuits don’t make the outcome any different.

One thing I deeply believe is that with the rights we have, either given or earned, comes a set of responsibilities of which we need to be very mindful. Yes, the State of Nebraska may allow kids to drive (outside the city, limited trips, etc.) at a very young age. With that right comes many responsibilities. I told my kids as they started to drive they needed to understand the financial future of our family depended on them making good decisions while they were driving. A lawsuit would have wiped us out. I told them I would trust them until I discovered I couldn’t. And I hoped I didn’t have to renege on my trust.

Yes, you may be able to bear arms, but you need to be a responsible gun owner. It is a matter of common sense. Don’t play with firearms. Don’t leave them lying about where a child can access them. Don’t use them if you are intoxicated of under the influence of drugs of any kind. There again, it just makes sense.

People lament all the time about the death of common sense. I think it started back in the 1980s with the “Drive Safely – Baby On Board” signs people had on their cars. It was almost laughable, why would I drive less safely if you were alone in your car? I had three kids in my vehicle most of the time, where was our sign? Were you more or less careful? Who needs to be reminded?

America is indeed, a beautiful country. Take time this weekend to look around wherever you are. Look up and out and see this land that is all of ours. Pray for it’s safety, pray for it’s leaders, pray for it’s protectors, and pray for each other. We need to get our stuff together and start acting like the great land we are, and stop bickering over everything. Past is past. Yes, parts of it are very ugly. If we knew then what we know now, we would have all behaved differently.

If we want to have a future, we need to concentrate on today and how to make it better for all of us. With that, I thank you for reading today. Working on some things the rest of the day, and hope to finish something by Monday. It could be a surprise to all of us when revealed on Monday! Be safe, Be kind, distance, wash your hands, cover your sneezes, be kind. We all need it! See you tomorrow.

Snowy Thursday

Hi, gang! It’s a little snowy here at the Home Office in Gretna, Nebraska. Omaha should get less snow than we do, if I’m to believe the weather forecasters. All I know is it will do what it does, you know? I did a little book editing this morning, while the Babe went to Honda Cars of Bellevue to have the oil changed in his CRV. The dogs were quiet, so I took advantage of the quiet to do some work. I still have some masks calling to me, so I’d better get ‘er done, so I can mail some to my in-laws in South Dakota. Mom wants one, too. If I want to make her mad, I should make her one from Denver Bronco or Nebraska Football fabrics. I have a lot of both of them. She most likely wouldn’t wear them.

It’s falling ten times as hard here now. Buckle up!

Deliveries are fun, especially in the days of this quarantine/pandemic/COVID-19. Amazon dropped this at my door today. Now all I want to do is settle in front of the fireplace and read. I’m sure this is an hilarious book. I’ll let you know when I finish.

Mom ought to have quite the narrative on these topics. I love Mike Rowe.

The Babe stopped at Runza on his way home. Lunch today was their good chicken and berry salad (for me) and burger/fries for him. And a $1 bowl of ice cream. The Babe knows the way to my heart. Ice cream. Always a great idea! When Addison was little, we would take her for ice cream as much as we could. Haven’t done that lately, maybe we should when we get to see her post-pandemic. Of course, Gavin will be included, too.

I have to say Pro Writing Aid is a good package. It has flagged overused words and has forced me to restructure my sentences. Some places, I leave the word alone, if it makes sense to do so. It’s interesting to see where we repeat ourselves. I think the longer we’re quarantined, the more I feel I’ve lost my ability to verbally communicate. Wow! Hope it isn’t so! I can work on sections at a time, then I know I’ve cleaned up a lot. I’m enjoying learning from it. No software is perfect, but it can help you write better.

I’m cutting this short today, since I’d like to ready some masks for mailing tomorrow to South Dakota. Hope you all stay cozy this afternoon. Don’t shovel, it’ll all melt away before you find your gloves. Thank you for reading today, please stop back tomorrow, I’ll have pics of our mask collection. I appreciate you very much. Take care.