Pennington Orientation

April 30, 2013:  I arrived at Pennington for an orientation session and was measure for BMI, blood pressure, weight, and height.

A poem about me from a former acquaintance

 

One day a girl – she came over

I felt like I’d found a four leaf clover.

We walked through parks with streams and trees

Skipping, jumping, very at ease.

We hunt and fish at our own leisure

Scaling and skinning, gutting for pleasure.

Also, when in my turck we do ride

I sit on the passenger side.

Hither and yonder, driving she goes

Clutching and shifting, dodging potholes.

I do not mind when she comes over

She is my own personal chauffer.

Thinking of her, I get melancholy

Her voice is a song – her eyes like a puppy’s.

So bright, so brown, tranquil they’re seeming,

But then look again, and you’d swear they were scheming.

She’s a girl, a woman, a companion worth mention

A give of laughs & smiles, not tension

Now it’s time that I be proposing

The eventual cause of this closing.

Before I do – I thought I’d mention, uh,

This girl, her name, it is Cynthia

-by Kenneth Harvey

 

Wild Child - By Shelby G. Bush

a poem from my Dad to my sister; his 3rd child and daughter "Dana"

Now I take up my pen to write
This daughter of mine, "Dana", who seems to be gone every night
Now I can't remember what she looks like
I've tried to get her to come see me with all my might
She could be fat or she could be slim
I don't know, because she's always gone with a "him".

Still I'll be hoping someday soon
She'll come and help me go run a coon
Or maybe she'll take time to give me a call
This daughter of mine who's no telling how tall.

Oh well, I guess I'll just have to understand
how at her age she's always chasing a man.

To My Red Haired Hussy - by Shelby G. Bush

A poem from my Dad to his 2nd wife.

Now I take up my pen to write
Something other than my usual gripe
To the most special person in my life
and that is non other than my wife.

A note in which to say
How much I appreciate her every day
All the little things she does for me
Really does open my eyes to see

And now I continue on
About the last couple years gone
How she must have really cared for this man
and how I plan to return that caring, if I can.

Now as more days come to pass
I do not plan on her to hear my sass
But instead if I use my head
Before one of us is dead
To make a joy of each day
and let actions speak instead of what I might say.

The Perfect Year by Unknown

Ring out the old, ring in the new
a midnight wish to share with you
Your lips are warm, my head is light
Were we in love before tonight?
Oh, I don't need a crowded barroom
Everything I want is here
If you're with me next year will be the perfect year

No need to hear music play
Your eyes say all there is to say
The stars can fade or they can shine
Long as your face is next to mine
I don't need a crowded barroom
Everything I need is here
If you're with me next year will be the perfect year

We don't need a crowded barroom
Everything we need is here
If you're with me next year will be the perfect year

It's New Year's Eve and hopes are high
Dance one year kiss one goodbye
Another chance another start
So many dreams to tease the heart
We don't need a crowded barroom
Everything we need is here
If you're with me next year will be the perfect year

The Friend who Just Stands By - by B.Y. Williams

When trouble comes your soul to try
Love the friend who just "stands by"
Perhaps there's nothing he can do -
The thing is strictly up to you.

For there are troubles all your own,
And paths the soul must tread alone
Times when love cannot smooth the road
Nor friendship life the heavy load.

But just to know you have a friend
Who will "stand by" until the end.
Whose sympathy through all endures
Whose warm handclasp is always yours

It helps, someway, to pull you through
Although there's nothing you can do
And so with fervent heart you cry
"God Bless the friend who just stands by".

The Baby - by George McDonald

Where did you come from baby dear?
Out of the everywhere, into the here.

Where did you get your eyes so blue?
Out of the sky as I came through.

What makes the light in the sparkle and spin?
Some of the starry spikes left in.

Where did you get that little tear?
I found it waiting when I got here.

What makes your forehead so smooth and tight?
A soft hand stroked it as I went by.

What makes your sheek like a warm white rose?
Something better than anyone knows.

Whence that three-cornered smile of bliss?
Three angels gave me at once a kiss.

Where did you get that pearly ear?
God spoke, and it came out to hear.

Where did you get those arms and hands?
Love made itself into hooks and bands.

Feet, whence did you come, you darling things?
From the same box as cherub's wings.

How did they all just come to be you?
God thought about me, and so I grew.

But how did you come to us, you dear?
God thought of you, and so I am here.

Piano Lessons written by my Aunt, Irene Bennett

Written by my aunt, Irene Vinyard Bennett, as a Christmas gift to the family in December 1997.

In her accompanying letter, she wrote,

            This narrative version of the truth about our piano is my 1997 Christmas present to you.

It is fairly accurate, although I can’t remember exactly when the Osborns gave us the piano, but it was between 1953 and 1960.  Daddy built the “shack” in two weeks the summer I was 11 or 12, 1953 or ’54, and then he had the Jim Walter home built in 1960, the summer I graduated from high school and had eye surgery.  I don’t know why but I don’t remember moving the piano from one to the other house.

I don’t remember exactly when, or how I went about deciding to return the piano, except it was in 1968-69 when Phil and I first lived in Nashville.  Daddy died in November, 1969.

The Christmas timing made it a better story for the contest I first wrote it for.  Our local paper, the Augusta Chronicle, chose someone else’s work to publish on Christmas Eve, so I deleted most of the fiction and changed pretend names back to the real ones just for you, but I left the fictional Christmas reference.

PIANO LESSONS

“Whispering Hope,” the large group of post-World War II teenagers in Sunday School that day sang a cappella because the adult classes had asked the only two youth pianists, Ray Lee and Judy Osborn, to accompany them.

“That makes me SO mad,” Irene complained to her friend, Virginia Bailey.  “Why don’t the adults let them stay in here?  They don’t seem to realize that we need a pianist, too!”  A little while later, she said, “I think I’ll just teach myself to play, so we won’t have to sing without music anymore!”

 

“Oh, can you really do that?” Virginia asked.

“Watch me,” replied Irene.

Irene Vinyard lived in Hammond, a small town in southeastern Louisiana, with her parents, maternal grandmother, and five younger brothers and sisters.  Her father worked as a maintenance man for Southeastern Louisiana College on the north side of town, while Mama and Grandma cared for the children on the south side of Hammond, in their crowded, three-room home Daddy had built with salvaged lumber in 1953 during his two-week vacation.  They all affectionately called it the Tar Paper Shack because of its single-canted roof and black insulating paper-covered walls.  The paper was attached with roofing nails and shiny protective washers.  Somehow he never got around to finishing it with the siding common to the gabled-roof houses in the neighborhood.  Every Sunday they walked about two miles to the small Woodland Park Baptist Church for Bible study and worship.

At Sunday Dinner when Irene told the family about her idea, Mama frustrated her by saying, “We don’t have the money to pay for lessons, and we don’t have a piano for you to practice on.  I don’t see how you can learn to play.”

One Sunday afternoon Irene went to church early.  Discovering no one in the fellowship hall, she began with one finger to pick out the melody of a hymn on the piano.  Several years of school chorus classes had taught her to read music, and she already knew the tunes from singing in church services.  However, as soon as anyone entered the room, she stopped, self-conscious about her lack of skill.

Such a start-and-stop-and-start-and-stop method might appear to be quite ineffective.  But, week after week as she tried to play with one finger, then two fingers, improvement gradually came.

First, the soprano, then the alto, next the tenor and bass lines, individually and then together – Irene worked determinedly one afternoon on the song, “Wonderful Words of Life.”  Suddenly she clapped and shouted, “Hooray!  Hooray!!”

“What’s all the yelling?” asked Raymond Osborn, coming in the door.

“Success!”  she grinned.  “That’s the first time I’ve played a hymn all the way through with both hands.”

“Well, congratulations,” the family friend replied. “Who is your piano teacher?”

“Me!” she joked and then said, “Seriously, no one.  I’m just trying to learn on my own.”

“Keep up the good work,” he said on his way out of the room.

Not long after that exchange, Irene received a call from Mrs. Pottle, a local piano teacher and wife of the head of the music department at Southeastern College.  She said, “Irene, I would like to teach you to play the piano without charging you.  Can you come over Tuesday afternoon at four o’clock?”

“Of course,” a surprised Irene said quickly.  “Thank you!”

On Tuesday afternoon, Mrs. Pottle explained, “A friend of your asked me to teach you.  He thinks you have promise as a pianist, so let’s begin.”

For thirty minutes, Irene was thrilled, carefully following instructions as she played the marvelous baby grand piano in the living room of the Pottles’ large, two-story, white frame house with a wrap-around porch next to the railroad near the college campus.  Then Dr. Pottle arrived home.

“What is happening here?” he asked.

“Meet Irene, my newest student,” she replied.

“Oh, no,” he announced, “you are not taking on another student.  You have been ill and there is no way you can add something else right now.  You know what the doctor said!”

Irene sat in stunned silence until an embarrassed Mrs. Pottle reluctantly said, “He’s right, Irene.  I really want to teach you, but I can’t at this time.”

So after only one half of a piano lesson, a dejected Irene plodded home alone.

Later on a warm July evening, as the Vinyard family ate their usual beans and rice and cornbreadc supper, the phone rang.  Mama answered it and almost immediately said, “Oh, no!”  When she finished talking, she turned and said, “Raymond Osborn has had a heart attack!”

After his hospitalization, Mr. Osborn recuperated at home for several weeks.  The doctor thought the south Louisiana heat in an unair-conditioned office might be too stressful for Raymond.  On his first day at home, his wife, Emilie, called Irene.

“Dr. Aycock wants someone to be with Raymond at all times in case of an emergency.  Since I work in the mornings and Ray Lee and Judy both have other obligations, I need help.  Would you come and sit with him?”

“Of course,” Irene answered.

When Irene arrived at the Osborn home the next morning, Mrs. Osborn explained, “I need you here while I work from 8:30 until 11:30 and then I will come home to prepare lunch.  Each day my husband will rest in the living room and read or do his paperwork.  You may bring something of your own with you to do.  If there is any problem, call the emergency number for help and then call me at my work number posted next to the phone.”

“Irene,” Mr. Osborn asked, as his wife left the house, “how are your piano lessons coming along?”

“I’m improving, sir,” she replied truthfully, “but it’s hard to do when I only practice once or twice a week at church.”

“Let’s make this a useful time then,” he suggested.  “We moved the old upright our children used into the hallway under the stairs when we bought our baby grand.  Why don’t you play it every day while you are here?  I will correct you when I hear something wrong.”

Delighted, she headed for the piano stool and twirled around on it until it was the right height.  “Start with some favorite of yours,” he called from the living room.  So she tried Christmas carols, only to discover that except for “O Come, All Ye Faithful,” most were written in keys she had difficulty playing.  She decided to try an easier hymn, “The Light of the World Is Jesus.”

“No, no, no,” Mr. Osborn finally objected.  “Stop jumping around, Irene.  Start with Hymn Number One, “Holy, Holy, Holy,” and work on it until you can play it all the way through without a single mistake!”

Irene groaned, but complied – day after day, three hours each morning for two weeks!  Following the same practice pattern she used at church, she could soon play several familiar hymns.  For some inexplicable reason, flats were always easier to play than sharps, so she preferred songs with those key signatures.  More importantly, she definitely developed the habit of daily practice.  So, after her “adult-sitting” job ended, she returned to her sporadic sessions at the church piano.  However, she still wasn’t ready for an audience of more than one.

Shortly before Christmas, Daddy cut a small pine tree from the nearby woods, anchored it in a pail of rocks, and all the children decorated it.  Reading Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books about frontier family life inspired the Vinyards to make popcorn strings and cranberry rope of their own.  Presents, however, were meager.

On Christmas Eve, a big truck backed into the front yard and five strong men piled out of it.  With Daddy’s help, they unloaded the extremely heavy piano that Irene practiced on at the Osborn home.  Maneuvering and re-maneuvering, they finally managed to squeeze it into Grandma and the girls’ ten-by-sixteen-foot bedroom along side their two full-sized beds, a cedar chifforobe, and a bookcase topped with a black rotary-dial telephone.  As they called “Merry Christmas!” and drove away, all the children were shouting, “Play something, Irene!”

Excitedly she tried, only to discover that all eighty-eight keys were stuck hard and fast.  Not a sound came from that piano!  With disappointment written all over her face, Irene cried, “What an awful Christmas present!  Why would anyone give us a piano that we can’t play?”

Daddy explained, “The roof at the Osborn house leaked and dripped water onto the piano, Irene; and no one saw it until it was too late.  Raymond thought we might be able to save it enough for you kids to enjoy anyway.”

“But, how?” they all chorused.

An experience maintenance person, Daddy thought out loud, “The presence of a steady, low heat should dry out wet wood so it doesn’t crack.  Let’s hang a light inside the piano that will burn all the time,” he proposed.

He quickly installed the bulb and then instructed them, “Every day, I want each one of you to play every key at least once.” And, that’s what six children, and sometimes Grandma, did, day after day, until the sound of each ivory-less key slowly rejoined the piano.  A trained musician would have flinched at the cacophony, but to Irene and her siblings, the old piano made mellow music.

With everyone wanting to play, the home-grown piano lessons sometimes became so enthusiastic that Daddy had to yell for peace and quiet.  Everyone, even the boys, Charles and Gary, took turns plunking away, although not all persevered to conquer the instrument.  Soon the once-wet-now-dry Christmas piano added daily tunes of joy to their lives.

Ultimately Irene reached her original goal.  Her friend, Virginia, proudly watched as she, and eventually two other sisters, play hymns on Sunday morning for the sixty-five teenagers in the Intermediate Department.  Later, on Youth Sunday, the Osborns and the Vinyards all beamed with pride as Irene played the organ and sister, Paulette, the piano.  Of course, Irene used the foot pedals only on “Flee As A Bird,” the offertory she and Paulette had worked on for hours.

Irene decided her next challenge would be to play hymns she didn’t know, so she began to sight read and then deliberately to learn new songs.  Her skills grew until she began to accompany congregational singing at the SLC Baptist Student Union chapel services and eventually she became the pianist for Sheilah Baptist Church in Tickfaw, a nearby community.

Several years later, Irene learned an even different piano lesson, when Daddy telephoned her to say, “Ray Lee, the oldest Osborn daughter, asks that we return the piano to her.”

Shocked and hurt, Irene asked angrily, “Why would anyone want to take back a Christmas present?  Especially after all these years?”

“Well, Irene,” Daddy explained, “she and her husband are into collecting antiques.  For sentimental reasons she wants to redo the old piano she and her brother and sister used growing up.  You can understand her feelings.”

“Oh, Daddy,” she groaned.  “I do understand that they all learned to play on it, but we did, too.  I love that old piano more than anyone can imagine.  What am I going to do?”

“It’s your decision,” he said.

The piano represented so many joys and accomplishments, years of fun and work to all the Vinyards, how could she give it back?  Besides, it was a beautiful piece of oak furniture that she had dreamed of refinishing herself for her own home one day.  For a person who possessed little of significance, owning that old piano filled with memories really mattered to her.

“It was a gift, after all, and no one is required to return a gift, is she?” Irene argued with herself for days.

Then on the Sunday morning before Christmas as she played carols on the church piano, she smiled, remembering how difficult those songs had been to play that first day at the Osborn home.  “What would Jesus do in this situation?” she asked herself.

When the congregation sang, “We Three Kings,” the words bearing gifts kept repeating in her mind.  Suddenly her hands faltered on the keyboard, because she realized that on her long ago Christmas Eve, Mr. Osborn had come bearing not the gift of a piano, but the gift of music.  He had given her the opportunity to learn to play ANY piano.

Tears of gratitude slid down Irene’s face as she realized she could give the gift of music, too, by returning the piano to his daughter.  The beloved old family treasure would evoke memories, memories of piano lessons and life lessons that now included the Vinyards as well as the Osborns.  The issue settled in her mind, Irene humbly sang with the other worshippers as she played, “Guide us to Thy Perfect Light.”

THE END

Our Love Was Meant to Be - a poem by Terry Matz

It amazes me
That out of the whole world
I would find the one person
Who would make my life complete ...

And that we were both
At the right place to meet,
And at the right time
In our lives to fall in love.

It makes me so thankful
for all that happened
To bring us together
And once again I realize
That our love
Was truly meant to be.

Crashed EHD and lost photos

I've been so bad with keeping up with my blog posts.  I suppose I should start doing a schedule or something.  I now have that wonderful little app on my phone that I need to utilize.  Anyway, I'm back here to search through all of my uploaded photos and recopy the ones I've uploaded.  Why?

Because my external hard drive died.  And in it's deceased state it took with it all my photos and videos from 2006 - this present time.  Six years worth of photos and videos are gone.  :(  The first six years of my baby's life.  Except for the few photos I've uploaded to Blogger and Facebook. 

I'm not sure about data recovery.  I've called a few places and have been told that due to the damage on the EHD, the data CAN be retreived but how badly do I want it?  Prices start at $250 just to make an attempt at retreival.  The techie I spoke with told me that it could get up to $2500 to retrieve those photos and videos.  Personally, IF I had the money, I would do it.  But reality is, I don't have that kind of money. 

Meanwhile, I'm gonna hang on to the hard drive, save my pennies, and hopefully, maybe one day soon, someone can dig out my memories for me. 

Longing - a poem by Matthew Arnold

Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again!
For then the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day.

Come, as thou cam'st a thousand times,
A messenger from radiant climes,
And smile on thy new world, and be
as kind to others as to me!

Or, as thou never cam'st in soother,
Come now, and let me dream it truth;
And part my hair, and kiss my brow,
and say:  "My Love! Why suffrest thou?"

Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again!
For then the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day.

Garden of Prayer by Elaine Arnold

I have found a peace in my garden
That rarely I've found anywhere;
In the growing things
There's a silence that sings,
So that mine is a garden of prayer.

Just to feel life lifting in beauty,
Up through the dirt and the sod!
In the growing of green
From the dark unseen,
I am learning the nearness of God.

I am learning the power of a Presence
As I walk in my garden there;
And I find that His love
Brings me peace from above,
For mine is a garden of prayer.

LOL Books - A List

Can You Keep a Secret? - Sophie Kinsella

Confessions of a Shopaholic – Sophie Kinsella

Shopaholic Ties the Knot – Sophie Kinsella

A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole

Mamma Makes Up Her Mind:  And Other Dangers of Southern Living - Bailey White

Being Dead is No Excuse - Gayden Metcalfe & Charlotte Hays

Skinny Dip:  The Series – Carl Hiaasen

We Thought You Would be Prettier:  True Tales of the Dorkiest Girl Alive – Laurie Notaro

The Idiot Girl’s Action Adventure Club:  True Tales from a Magnificent and Clumsy Life – Laurie Notaro

Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café - Fannie Flagg

A Girl named Zippy – Haven Kimmel

She Got Up Off The Couch – Haven Kimmel

Little Altars Everywhere – Rebecca Wells

What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day – Pearl Cleage

Dress your family in Corduroy & Denim – David Sedaris

Me Talk Pretty One Day – David Sedaris

The Egg and I – Betty MacDonald

Mennonite in a Little Black Dress:  A Memoir of Going Home – Rhoda Janzen

Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress:  Tales of Growing Up Groovy and Clueless – Susan Jane Gilman

Like a Lampshade in a Whorehouse:  My Life in Comedy – Phyllis Diller

The sex lives of cannibals – J. Maarten Troost

Fraud – David Rakoff

Being Family

Sometimes being family means more than just smiles and good times,
It means caring for each other and building bridges of trust ...
It means not being afraid to ask and answer difficult questions ...
It means accepting one another for what we are ...
It means pulling together when things get rough,
Knowing that love will be there no matter what.

Because Someone has Faith in Me

 

Because someone has faith in me
I cannot fail though all the way

Winds up the hills.

My staff in hand and cheerily,
I can but fare me forth each day
With right good will.

Because someone has faith in me
I need to keep my heart quite true
My own faith strong,

My vision clear, that I may see
Undaunted by what meets my view
And sing a song.

God help me sing the song, I pray
God keep me clean and strong to go
Clear-eyed to see

The untrod, upward-winding way
For fail I cannot; One I know
Has faith in me.

 

Parents, it's okay to push your little piano student, but not off the bench

The following article appeared in a newspaper but I don't know WHICH newspaper because I had clipped that pertinent information off when I clipped the article out of my paper newpaper.

By Taprina K. Millburn

The whining and excuses begin as soon as I call my son into the living room.

He sits, begins to wiggle and explains that he has a rash on his arm.  No wonder, it’s time for piano practice.

He pecks on middle C and turns to me and tells me about a kid at school who stuffed toilet paper up his nose.

“Let’s talk about that after we practice,” I say.

Curl your fingers like spiders, I tell him and demonstrate to him how his teacher wants his fingers placed on the keys.

“I don’t like spiders,” he tells me.

Then he begins to scratch his invisible rash.

“I need to go to the bathroom; I’ll be right back,” he says as he hurries off.

His teacher tells me that my son, as a kindergartner, should only practice for five minutes a day.

It’s the longest five minutes of my life.

When he returns, I help place his fingers on the keys and listen to him ping out “Cowboy Joe.”  Wonderful, I tell him.

Four more minutes.

“Am I finished, yet?” he asks. “Because I really have to pee again.”

He stomps on the damper pedals and forgets where to begin, although I’ve pointed to middle C at least a hundred times.

My patience is slipping away.  How I wish it weren’t true, but as my son squirms and slides his bottom from side to side on the wooden piano bench, pretending to ride a wild horse, I feel my good humor being siphoned out.

He continues to look for other things to say or do – anything but playing his assignment.

That’s when I use my foghorn voice and his whining turns into real tears.

“It’s more fun playing for my piano teacher.  You’re grumpy,” he says to me and sits on his hands in protest.

If you rode her piano bench she’d be irritated, too, I want to say but I hold my words.

Three more minutes.

I turn the page of his book to the next piece and he reluctantly plays the notes.

Then I wonder if I’ve turned into one of THOSE parents.  The kind who pushes their kids too much – to be the best ball players, musicians, cheerleaders, or beauty queens.

The kind of parent whose children grow up to write tell-all books about them.

“I like this song,” he says and continues to play it three more times.  He’s forgotten about his rash or that he needs another bathroom break.

One more minute.

We flip the page and the wiggling and scratching begin again, but he plays the song and smiles.

“I’m finished, right?”

Practice is over, and he packs up his books.

“How long did I practice?”

“Five minutes”

“It felt like hours,” he said with a sigh.

DAYS.

You can get in touch with Taprina by mail at King Features Weekly Service, 628 Virginia Drive, Orlando, FL  32803 or by email to letters.kfs@hearstc.com.

Wild Horses - author unknown

Sometimes, across this land of silver grasses,
There comes a sound upon the listening air,
As if, along the old dim trails and passes,
Horses were there.

Galloping swiftly, riderless, unbidden,
Their smoky manes a blur against the light,
Wild horses that have never yet been ridden,
Lunging in fright.

Before some scent or sound, some windward gleaning,
of distant threat, their arching necks held high,
Their ears alert to catch the inner meaning
of step or cry ...

Almost I see them down the windy weather,
Their satin muscles rippling as they run,
Wild horses that have never known a tether,
Mates to the sun.

Mates to the lightening and the crashing thunder,
The black winged night, the white on rushing dawn --
Wild Horses -- ah the beauty and the wonder
of things long gone!

Be Patient with Me

 

Be patient with me

As I am just learning how to

Feel loves,

And sometimes I still get frightened

Understand how I feel

And how new this is to me,

Because I realize how very much

I love you.

Love is such a strange feeling

To have,

And sometimes I’m not sure if

I can deal with it.

I know it will take a while for me

To open up

And completely trust you

But I know it will happen

Because I want it to,

So, please,

Be patient with me.