I tend to live under a rock, a rock that the world generally insists upon turning over so I’m forced into the sunlight.  Or as is usually the case in our neck of the woods, into the rain.  Meaning I don’t always know what’s going on around me as far as news is concerned.  It’s […]

It had been a terrible night, filled with blowing rain and howling winds and skies illuminated by fingers of lightning that stretched from the heavens to the earth below . . . and thunder.  ALL the thunder, continuously rumbling like a freight train parked outside the bedroom window.  At one point I was trying to […]

It promised to be a busy weekend—something I usually despise.  I am fond of my ruts and the scheduled events and required preparations were most definitely going to drag me out of them.  Between Thursday night and Sunday evening, there were two batches of homemade ice cream to freeze (one strawberry and one chocolate), a […]

“I have lived longer without him than with him.” I was mindlessly scrolling through Facebook several months ago when these words magically appeared on the screen and demanded my attention.  They were a part of a friend’s status and I thought to myself how hauntingly poignant they were.  The “him” in her post was her […]

Most of you are familiar with our memorial videos—the ones that contain X number of pictures that usually have a nice, appropriate-to-the-person background accompanied by some lovely, non-copyrighted music.  They’re usually played during the visitation, sometimes during the service, and hopefully for years afterward in someone’s home. What you may not know is, at least […]

It was Saturday, October 26, 2019, between the hours of noon and 1:30 PM.  I was in a cabin in Shiloh, Tennessee, listening intently as the wind roared through the woods, toppling trees, blocking the drive out in five different places and both ends of the road that might have led to safety.  But I […]

I was seated at my desk in bookkeeping on Sunday afternoon, mired up to my eyeballs in paper, trying to pull together the financial information for our board meeting which was scheduled for later in the week.  I’m assuming the sky grew dark and threatening, based on the amount of rumbling I heard outside, but […]

William Cecil Rose was already married and a father when he enlisted in the United States Army on October 8, 1943.  At the ripe old age of 19, he was going to war, the terms of his enlistment being “Enlistment for the duration of the War or other emergency, plus six months, subject to the […]

Things have been a bit . . . how shall I say it? . . . different? this year.  And I know that sentence is far from being punctuated correctly, but different times call for different methods of expression, especially if you’re writing rather than speaking. Last Sunday was Mother’s Day and I know for […]

It was 1967 when they married.  August the 12th, to be exact.  She was a beautiful 20 year old, kind and loving with a heart big enough to encompass everyone she met.  And he was a man who knew how lucky he was.  It was something he never forgot in their almost 53 years of […]