The Spectrum of Life Ruth Smith Meyer

Life presents us with a whole gamut of experiences. 2013 has certainly already imparted much thus far—both elating and distressing, personal and world-wide.

Just in the last few months the distressing has almost seemed over-powering.  On a larger scale: the Boston bombing incident, the Bangladesh factory collapse, the news of the three Cleveland women held in captivity for ten years, the New Orleans Mother’s Day shootings, the killing of Tim Bosma, a young innocent, husband and father.  There have been recent stories of political people who seemed to be reliable seriously violating that trust, costly actions taken at the expense of taxpayers only for political gain. In our personal lives, we’ve experienced the ups and downs of a cancer journey and physical ills.  This line of thought could be further expanded with more incidents.  One could think if there wasn’t bad news there would be no news at all. Life could get discouraging.

Then quietly, we become aware of the other end of the spectrum.  Spring arrives, slowly, but surely.  New growth appears.  The buds on trees burst into leaves, bedecking the branches in a myriad colours of green.  Shoots emerge through bare ground, unfurling into innumerable variety of plants and blossoming into countless varieties of flowers.  Shrubs and flowering trees in succession explode into beauteous array and rapturous aroma. Our hope and belief in a living God are renewed.  

We begin to take note of other hopeful things happening around us: new babies arrive with the smell of heaven and the aura of innocence; men and women finding each other and happily wed themselves to each other with the promise adventure and growth of love and fulfillment; people giving of themselves to help someone in need; those who didn’t think of their own safety, but raced to help those hurt in the bombings; people helping for days, to dig through the rubble to find those still living, the public honouring the need of privacy for the women who had been held in captivity; virtual strangers organizing a ride to raise funds for the grieving Bosma family; a young child writing a book to raise funds for a friend with a life-threatening disease and far exceeding his expectations and those of his parents; a politician going above and beyond the call of duty; a teacher applauding a child who has made great strides in his school year.

New babies arrive with the smell of heaven and the aura of innocence.  Men and women find each other and happily wed with the promise of adventure and growth of love and fulfillment. 

Yes, life presents both good and bad. We can become bogged down if we concentrate on the bad, if we only bemoan the chaos and sin in our world.  But if we look, we can find ways to turn those very things into opportunities for growth, for compassion, for ingenuous ways of showing ours and God’s love and care.  Yes, there will be scars left from many of those tragedies, there will be chasms of emptiness that seem too big to ever be filled, but one step, one act of kindness, one touch of understanding at a time and something new can rise from calamity.  It’s up to you and to me.

 

With God's Help, a Mother Copes with the Disappearance of her Son by Rose McCormick Brandon

 

Robbie Brown
 

It was a hot Saturday in August 1968.

Between lunch and supper duties at a local kid’s Bible camp, Shirley Brown took ten month-old Cathy and twelve year-old Robbie to the beach while her two middle children, Ross Jr. and Michael stayed at camp for afternoon activities. Shirley watched the interaction between her budding teenager and his baby sister.  Robbie, not thrilled at first with the news of a new baby, had quickly become the adored big brother.
About four o’clock Shirley gathered their belongings and prepared to return to the camp. Robbie walked the short distance home, intending to do his daily paper route and then wait at home for his father to return from work.
“Don’t forget to let Dad know where I am and that I’ll be home as soon as I can,” Shirley reminded Robbie. Watching him stride down the rural road from the beach to home, Shirley thought how responsible and grown-up her Robbie was becoming.
At 6:30 that evening Shirley and Ross pulled into the driveway simultaneously. The boys ran for the house while Ross swooped Cathy into his arms. “Where’s Robbie?” he asked noticing he was missing from the family’s reunion.
Rushing inside to prepare dinner, Shirley said, “He went to do his papers but he should have been back by now.” Ross Jr. ran off to meet Robbie but soon returned alone, with a bundle of undelivered newspapers.
“What has he been doing the past two and half hours?” asked Shirley with an edge of irritation in her voice.
Ross Jr. and Michael delivered the papers while Shirley worked in the kitchen. How could he be so irresponsible? I’ll ground him for a whole week.  These thoughts grumbled in her mind all through dinner. She expected Robbie to burst through the door any minute with a reasonable explanation – he’d stopped at a friend’s house  – “sorry Mom, I lost track of time,” he’d say.  He would pledge never to do it again and that would be the end of that. 
After dinner Ross and the boys drove back to the campground thinking Robbie may have returned there to look for Shirley. They searched the camping area and side-roads stopping to ask each person if they’d seen Robbie. No one had.
At 9 p.m.  Ross’s car pulled into the driveway. Shirley ran to embrace Robbie. Her frustration with his behavior had turned to worry. She no longer cared about grounding him. She wanted to see his face again and have him safely inside the walls of their home. But Robbie wasn't in the car.
Ross couldn't hide his concern.  “No one has seen him for hours. I think we’d better call the police.”
Officers from the Pefferlaw Police Department took a description of Robbie and asked where he’d last been seen then they also searched the campground. This time they found someone who saw Robbie walking toward the beach at about 4;15 p.m. This meant instead of heading home after parting from his mother, he had returned to the water.
Investigators probed into the Brown’s family life to determine if Robbie had reason to run away. When it was determined that running away was unlikely, they assumed he had drowned. But if he went into the water, where was his clothing? He had been wearing bathing trunks under his shirt and pants. And swimmers at Georgina Beach walked several hundred yards before reaching deep water. Besides, Robbie was a strong swimmer.
In spite of darkness, police organized a search party of summer cottagers, friends and neighbours. Shirley and Ross stayed awake all night, watching, praying and fighting off nightmarish thoughts of what may have prevented their son from returning home.
At daybreak, a police helicopter joined the search. Reporters arrived. Friends and relatives came to console the family.  Jo took one look at Shirley and suggested she get some rest. “I need to stay awake and pray,” she protested.
“You go to bed and I’ll do the praying for you,” Jo said. Five years earlier it had been Jo who shared her “born-again” excitement with Shirley and invited her to church. There, Shirley heard that Jesus Christ, God’s Son, gave His life for her and she too accepted Jesus as her personal Savior.
Each time Shirley awoke she saw Jo kneeling beside the bed. Shirley recalls this act of kindness as one of the finest things anyone has ever done for her.
After resting, Shirley visited the beach. Columns of searchers waded through the water like a giant comb, hands joined, eyes downward. Weakened and shocked by the sight, she climbed back into the car holding in wails of anguish by stuffing tissue in her mouth.
At home, Shirley fell across the bed groaning in pain. Ross rushed to hold her, panic and horror binding them together in a moment only they could share.
By the end of the first week Shirley’s mind ached from terrible thoughts of what may have happened to her son, and from probing questions:  What kind of parents were she and Ross? Did they tell the truth about their son’s disappearance? Was there reason for Robbie to run away? Was the Brown marriage a happy one?
Considering the alternatives, Shirley began hoping that Robbie had drowned. If his body surfaces, then at least we’ll know the truth, she thought. Truth is better than uncertainty.
Sightings of Robbie were reported, some hundreds of miles from home. At first Shirley and Ross became excited but as one after the other proved false, they stopped paying attention to rumors.
One day while shopping a woman approached Shirley. “I’d like you to come to my house,” she said, “I’m having a séance and we’ll try to find out where your son is.”
“I talk to God every day and when He wants me to know where my son is, He’ll tell me," Shirley said. Another psychic sent a message giving directions to a pit where Robbie’s body lay.
“Father, please help me,” Shirley prayed. “If Robbie is there, let someone else find him. I won’t even look. I will trust only you, Jesus.” Later Shirley read Deuteronomy 18:9-12 and realized God forbids all occult practices which includes séances and divination of all forms. Today, she thanks the Lord for giving her wisdom to avoid the deceptions of spiritual darkness that could have been a temptation.
At this point, under severe mental strain, Shirley knew if she allowed herself to give in to the desire to scream Robbie’s name, as she sometimes felt driven to do, her mind would snap. She describes this period - “I lived in a circle of God’s peace but a world of madness lurked at its perimeter.”
After two years of alternately believing Robbie was alive and hoping he wasn’t because she knew only horrific circumstances could keep him away from the family, Shirley phoned a local police officer and asked, “Do you believe Robbie is alive?”  

“We’re almost certain that if your son were alive he would have been able to get away by now.” This reply guided Shirley to an important decision – the acceptance of Robbie’s death. With acceptance, the turmoil of wondering and waiting ended. She helped her children come to the same decision by explaining that Robbie was with Jesus. They cried but it concluded their pain and enabled them to remember happy times with their big brother. Gradually, they forgot the sorrow of the past and built new family memories.
As a family, Shirley, Ross and the children placed Robbie in God’s hands. In return, God gave them peace to accept the mystery of his disappearance.
Shirley’s vibrancy and joy make it difficult to imagine the depth of her suffering but like many who have suffered deeply, she enjoys God deeply. An active Christian worker, speaker and woman of prayer, Shirley has invested her life so others may know the Savior she calls her best friend.
A few years ago, Ross, Shirley’s companion for forty-six years, went to be with Jesus.
Of her new journey she says, “It makes a difference when you know your God and His promises. He gives a peace within. I remain focused on Him, He is now my husband. Ross and I walked the road of grief together when Robbie disappeared, but this road I walk alone, yet not alone because my Lord is with me.” 
Today, Shirley makes her home in the Hamilton, Ontario area where she enjoys  spending time with her children and nine grandchildren. She's active in her church and speaks about her experience. Ross Jr. is pastor of People's Church, Hamilton.

Vanished - What Happened to my son? by Rose McCormick Brandon and Shirley Brown

Read the complete story of how Shirley and her family coped with Robbie's disappearance in Vanished: What Happened to my Son? available here.
Families with missing loved ones can find help through the Brown family's foundation, Courage to Cope.

 

 

Perception: Two Circles . . . What Do You See? (Peter A. Black)

It’s interesting how something is seen for what it is when alone, but once placed adjacent to something else in a certain way, the sight can grab your attention and seem funny, absurd or ridiculous. Take, for example, something that happened this morning.

Our son had to be off to work, and his wife had left long before to start her nursing shift, so my wife and I were over at their place at 7 o’clock, in order to see the young’uns up and fed and off to school.

First up was the eight-year old. As she often does, she soon got busy with pen and paper. This time she practiced drawing circles freehand and came over to me, brandishing her efforts. Remarkable! Believe me . . . I couldn’t have done better myself.

She had some really well-formed circles on the page. “That’s a really good one,” I said. “. . . and that one there is very good, too—very round.”

 “Hah! Hah! Grandpa. See those two together – they look just like a kid’s butt!” she snickered. I chuckled.

Yep, what we often perceive in what we see is not so much in the eye of the beholder, as it is in the mind, of course.

Later on this morning I had occasion to call in at our community senior centre. A Zumba fitness class was in progress. There might have been forty-five or more senior ladies swinging to the music, but only one lone man. It wasn’t funny or even ridiculous, but it caused me to ponder what likely accounts for that enormous statistical contrast. I reckoned the situation offered a study in sociology.

Ah, but I could see a lighter side, too. “One lone, brave soul!” I grinned when chatting with the coordinator. I can imagine the fellow’s family and friends teasing him about how lucky he is to be the only guy with all those good-lookin’ grandmas.                  

Perception is a significant faculty, and we humans have a capacity to detect patterns and perceive incongruities or paradoxes in situations. Here’s one: At a time when whole economies struggle to stay afloat and various nations teeter on the precipice of economic collapse, millionaires and billionaires continue to multiply. I read recently that—despite the international economic gloom—global wealth is at an all-time high. Boggles the mind.

Perspective is related to perception. India is known for its caste-system and towering poverty, yet millionaires are multiplying there at a rapid rate. Likewise, in China. Communist China! Was communism not supposed to bring in a classless society, with all citizens sharing equally in the wealth? Now here’s a contrast, our American cousins—were they not supposed to be a classless society, too, but based on an entrepreneurial, capitalist equal opportunity model? Despite the economic downturn there that affected the whole world, millionaires and billionaires continue to multiply, while people lose their jobs and homes . . . and pensions.

Two circles side by side. Add two round dots to each and you see eyes. Add a spot below them and a small curve below that, and you have faces. Perhaps they’re siblings or friends. Draw another two circles, adding a hooked line on the left of one circle and one on the right side of the other circle, add a short curved dash between them and you see eyeglasses. Or, for a bike add a T-shape for handle-bars, a seat and a triangular shape between the circles.

So much for my artistic prowess—that’s about the extent of it!

Two circles—what do you see? Two pennies?

Jesus observed the rich in all their finery casting their sizable offerings into the temple treasury. What a contrast to the humble widow woman who dropped in a couple of lowly coins.

He remarked, “They gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on” (Mark 12:44 NIV).

Perspective: Jesus saw a grateful heart and worshipful sacrifice.  

~~+~~

(A briefer, earlier edition of the above article was published in The Guide-Advocate on May 9, 2013.)

Peter A. Black is a freelance writer in Southwestern Ontario, and is author of “Parables from the Pond” – a children's / family book (mildly educational, inspirational in orientation, character reinforcing). 

(Finalist -- Word Alive Press ISBN 1897373-21-X )
His inspirational column, P-Pep! appears weekly in The Guide-Advocate. His articles have appeared in 50 Plus Contact and testimony, and several newspapers in Ontario.

~~+~~

 

The Influence of Children - Eleanor Shepherd

   

 Dallas Willard, who was a great teacher of spiritual formation passed away this week.  As we say in The Salvation Army, he was promoted to Glory.  It was just a few days before Mother's Day.  I read in a tribute to him written by John Ortberg in Christianity Today that the mother of Dallas Willard died when he was only two years old.  Her dying wish must have been fulfilled as her last words to her husband were: "Keep eternity before the children." Evidence that he did so, is seen in the biography of her son, Dallas.

The timing of this story is quite incredible.  After living a life that demonstrated the influence of his mother's desire for him, Dallas Willard entered forever into eternity just a few days before Mother's Day.  How fitting.

As I have been scrolling through Facebook this week, during my travels, I have seen so many express gratitude for the influence of their mothers.  I have never noticed before such a widespread changing of profile pictures as adult children post photos of their mothers.  I was thrilled to see the faces of some of my friends who went to Heaven several years ago.  I see proof that their influence lives on in the lives of their children.

This year, circumstances prevent me from being with my children on Mother's Day, yet this week I have had the privilege of special intimate moments with each of them.  I had to be in Toronto for some meetings at the end of the week.  My son, graciously provided me with a place to stay at his apartment.  We were able to do some very ordinary things together.  It seems like when there is unhurried time just to do household tasks and chat together, we realize the joy there is in our relationship.  John even shared his animals with me, his dog sharing my bed and his cats sleeping on the floor beside me.  I felt so at home in his home.  Then after I left I received a text message from him thanking me for the food I bought to fatten his larder.  I loved his gratitude.  What more could a mother ask to celebrate Mother's Day.

Then on the way home on the train, I received a lovely email from my daughter expressing her gratitude for what my husband and I have been able to do for her and her husband and little daughter, since they moved to the city where we live.  I wrote back to remind her what she is now learning herself as a mother.  There is nothing that is too much when it comes to doing something for our children.  Nevertheless her gratitude was a beautiful gift she too offered to me.

It is true that mothers are able to have a great influence on their children.  However it seems to me equally true that children have the unique ability to draw forth from us as mothers qualities like nobility, gentleness, kindness and unselfishness.  I know that I am a better person because of what my children have needed and expected from me and I am grateful that they have given me opportunities to nurture these virtues in my developing character.

As a mother, my children have also taught me that I do not have within me enough nobility or gentleness, or kindness or unselfishness to be the person they want me to be.  However,  when I read the story of a life like that of Dallas Willard, or a hundred other Heros of the Faith, I am reminded that the resources are avialable to me to approach more and more those lofty ambitions I have to be a mother who makes a positive difference in the lives of her children.  When I keep eternity before my eyes and reach for help from He who fills eternity with His loving presence, I can bask fully in the joy and gratitude of my children.

Word Guild Award
2011

 

Word Guild Award
2009

http://emshepherd.blogspot.com 

HORROR-- Alan Reynolds

            A recent item in our newspaper noted the 20th anniversary of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. Attending were former U.S. President Bill Clinton and Nobel Prize laureate and Holocaust survivor Eli Wiesel, who as a boy was interned in the horror of Auschwitz.

 Despite movies and books which seek to portray situations of horror for our entertainment, we have not
completely domesticated the word. The bombings at the Boston Marathon, the continued bloodshed in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as Somalia and other parts of Africa, the collapsing of a garment factory building in
Bangladesh -- the horrors seems to be endless. Of all the horrors of the last hundred years, one stands out,
perhaps because we feel a part of it, bearing some responsible for it: that is the Holocaust, the attempted
elimination of the Jewish people during World War II by the Nazi regime. You may not like reading the following (as they say on TV, you may find the contents disturbing), but it is important that we remember. It is important that we wrestle with the questions it raises, and to read the comments of Francois Mauriac from a Christian point of view.    

 And yes, I admit that this, the suffering of the innocent, the righteous, is the problem I find most difficult theologically. In fact I doubt that it can be resolved theologically. The closest I come to any satisfaction I find in the Cross. God is with us, even when God seems gone, to have left us bereft; when God seems to have forsaken us. I have found it to be true. “God was in Christ” (II Corinthians 5:9), and is with us today in the horrors we face in our own lives.

In his book, Night, Eli Wiesel tells of being a child in the internment camp at Auschwitz, a story of horror upon horror, where the SS guards would toss babies in the air and shoot at them, using them for target
practice:

One day when we came back from work, we saw three gallows rearing up in the assembly, three black crows. Roll call. SS all around, machine guns trained.  Three victims in chains, one of them a young boy, a child with a refined and beautiful face, the face of a sad angel. The SS seemed more preoccupied, more disturbed than usual. To hang a young boy in front of thousands of spectators was no light matter.  The head of the camp read the verdict. All eyes were on the child. He was lividly pale, biting his lips. The gallows threw its shadow over him.
 The three victims mounted together onto the chairs. The three necks were placed at the same moment within the nooses.
“Long live liberty!” cried the two adults.
But the child was silent.
“Where is God? Where is He?” someone behind me asked.
At a sign from the head of the camp, the three chairs [were] tipped over.
Total silence throughout the camp. On the horizon the sun was setting.
"Bare your heads!" yelled the head of the camp. His voice was raucous. We were weeping.
Then the march past began. The two adults were no longer alive. Their tongues hung swollen, blue-tinged. But the third rope was still moving, being so light, the child was still alive….
For more than half an hour he stayed there, struggling between life and death, dying the slow agony under our eyes. And we had to look him full in the face. He was still alive when I passed in front of him. His tongue was still red, his eyes not yet glazed.
Behind me, I heard the same man asking,
 “Where is God now?”
And I head a voice within me answer him:
 “Where is he? Here He is – He is hanging here on this gallows….” 

(Night, by Eli Wiesel, Avon Books, 1972, pp. 74-76.)

 In the forward to the book, Francois Mauriac tells of being interviewed by Wiesel some years later. Wiesel was now a young man, a journalist.

The young Israeli who came to interview me for a Tel Aviv paper immediately won my sympathy, and our conversation very quickly took a personal turn. It led me to recall memories of the Occupation. I confided to my young editor that nothing I had seen during those somber years had left so deep a mark upon me as those trainloads of Jewish children standing at Austerlitz [train] station [in Paris, during the Occupation]. At that time we knew nothing of Nazi methods of extermination. And who could have imagined them! Yet the way these lambs had been torn from their mothers in itself exceeded anything we had so far thought possible. I believe that on that day, I touched for the first time upon the mystery of iniquity.
 This then was what I had to tell the young journalist. And when I said with a sigh, “How often I have thought about those children!” he replied, “I was one of them.” He had seen his mother, a beloved little sister, and all his family disappear into an oven fed with living creatures. “Never shall I forget that night,” he wrote. "Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky. Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever, those moments that murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust.”

And Mauriac writes,

 And I who believe that God is love, what answer could I give my young questioner. What did I say to him? Did I speak of that other Israeli, his brother, who may have resembled him – the Crucified, whose Cross had conquered the world? Did I affirm that the stumbling block to his faith was the cornerstone of mine, and the conformity between the Cross and the suffering of men was in my eyes the key to that impenetrable mystery whereon the faith of his childhood had perished? … All is grace. If the Eternal is the Eternal, the last word for each one of us belongs to Him. This is what I should have told this Jewish child. But I could only embrace him, weeping.

My Mother's Turnips, Visits and Quilts/MANN

Childhood memories are golden. However, some don’t make much sense without interpretation. And sometimes, we can’t do that by ourselves.

Back in the 40's and early 50's, I remember my mother going to what was called “The Poor House”, a huge three story stone resident that housed people without means, situated between Elora and Fergus. She took produce from the farm; I faintly remember turnips as one item. I wondered over the years, why turnips, when The House of Industry had a mega garden across the front of the property and lots of workable farm land.

I also remember cutting, what I think were quilt blocks, for Mother to take there. She would wait patiently for an item of our clothing to wear out so she could cut it up and get a few blocks. She would use corners and lengths of material from blouses, shirts, bedding and aprons to create a colourful pile. Sometimes it would wait for the quilt frames in the upstairs bedroom and other times, she’d put it in a paper grocery bag for other places. She’d visit The House of Industry and enter at the barn side of the big house with a box. When I was with her, I'd remain in the car. This was the second memory of the mystery.

The third part of the triad was equally unsolved. Mother would drive to The House and bring several women down to our farm for the afternoon. I often wondered if she had some friends who moved there for better living conditions. Although I was in school, I don't remember meeting them, but I heard her tell her friends. Seriously, at times, I wondered if this snippet of memory for just a figment of my imagination.

Only recently a historian friend shared that following the WWII ‘the vegetable gardens at the Poor House were scaled back and local residents were then asked to donate what extra farm produce they had to feed the residents.’ This fit for my mother’s character, as she often shared her garden produce with neighbours who didn’t have a garden.

My friend also said her grandmother went to The House regularly to cut quilt blocks and added, “My grandmother always had one or two women [from The Home] come to visit. They'd spend the afternoon drinking tea and quilting.” This was an important piece of information for me as the residents, or inmates as they were referred to at that time, would need bedding. It seemed right, as Mom used to have benefit card parties and social events at the farm house to raise money or to wrap bandages for the local  Red Cross during the war. She also quilted, gathered items of use for them and worked diligently in her local rural church through Mission and Service.

So turnips, visits and quilts, all a part of my mother’s life who believed in ‘feeding the hungry, visiting the poor, and providing warmth on a cold night.’ One of her favourite scriptures: 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.' (Matthew 25:40).

Blessings,

Donna

http://donnamann.org

Aggie’s Voice, the third and last of the Agnes Macphail trilogy, coming early fall (Brucedale Press).

What Moms Need—Carolyn R. Wilker

Tucked into our newspaper yesterday was the “Great Gifts, not just for Mother’s Day” flyer from a well-known garden supply centre. On the front page they feature a lantern, bistro knives and a set of small garden tools among many other things. What more could a mother want?

There are cherry pitters, a picnic set and camping gear. The cherry pitters come in handy when the birds don’t get to the cherry tree first. My mother doesn’t need camping gear; she has the outdoor life right there on the farm. Getting away includes going to church, going visiting or taking a Sunday drive. Sunday drives are shorter now with just Mom and Dad in the car. No, she doesn’t need those things.

I see popcorn poppers, lemon and lime presses, and a fancy fish tongs. We made popcorn in a  heavy pot with a lid on it and shook, shook, shook it over the burner until the kernels all popped, then ate it while watching Hockey Night in Canada or some other program. I think she has a popper now too along with the lemon press and ordinary tongs.

 There are fancy skewers for the barbecue. The cooking is Mom’s job whether it’s done indoors or out. From the retired hibachi to the newer gas barbecue, they have all the tools they need.

The many fancy kitchen gadgets and some essentials in that catalog would have more than filled her cutlery drawer. There’s a cookie dropper, but she still uses a tablespoon. A butter measuring guide, anyone? Mom eyes the amount or uses the foil wrapper marks on the packaging.

On page 10 are the sun hats. Our sunhats were often of the straw variety, including the sombrero with coloured baubles that bounced when we walked, that my auntie Bea bought for my sister and me one year at the Exhibition in Toronto. That became Mom’s harvest hat, keeping her head as cool as possible while driving tractor for grain harvesting. Not a hat either. She’s surely had a dozen newer ones since then.

I look at the seed racks in the flyer and remember the bins at the feed store where we’d scoop out the amount of bean or pea seeds we needed and the clerk would put them in little bags. Mom says that the garden will be smaller this year, maybe a little lettuce and a few tomato plants, besides the asparagus that’s already growing and the raspberries that come later.

  How about telescoping rakes and plastic-handled shovels? Their sturdy wooden-handled hoes, rakes and shovels are from the hardware store, bought years ago—the kind that taken care of would last almost forever. She still has those tools, so scratch that idea.

 In retirement, Mom has some of those fancy kitchen gadgets to make her work easier or more fun, for she still loves to bake and cook.

Do you know what she still likes the best? A basket of pretty flowers to hang on the verandah, flowers she can enjoy every day of the summer. So that’s what I bought and gave to her early. She told me the next night that she enjoys those pretty pink and white Martha Washington geraniums each time she looks out the window.

The card’s in the mail since I cannot be there this Mother’s Day. I’ll be spending my Mother’s Day with my own children and grandchildren.

Another thing for Mother’s Day, or anytime—love. Happy Mother’s Day!

Mom on her wedding day