"I Would"

The Singing News Fan Awards are over for another year, and I'm not surprised at the results. The Booth Brothers (Ronnie Booth, Michael Booth, and Jim Brady) have done wonderfully well. Look at the awards they got!

Favorite Baritone Singer -- Jim Brady
Favorite Lead Singer -- Ronnie Booth
Favorite Tenor Singer -- Michael Booth
Favorite Male Singer -- Ronnie Booth
Album of the Year -- Room For More
Trio of the Year -- Booth Brothers
Song of the Year -- What Salvation's Done For Me
Favorite Artists of the Year -- Booth Brothers

For quite a while now, I've been watching YouTube hoping to find a good rendition of "I Would." It is one of my favorites, and I'm pretty sure you will agree!



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The miracle at our house...

Yesterday I was looking through stacks of CDs in our basement trying to find one that Barry needed to play at a memorial service.

Isn't it funny how just looking at the sleeves on our favorite music from the past can make lots of memories come flooding back? I never did find the one I was looking for, but out of the piles, I pulled several CDs that I wanted to hear again, and this song is on one of them.

Coral
(Our blessing, no longer in disguise...)

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Saturday mornings...

Sometimes I wish I were the Saturday-morning-bright-and-early-hit-the-road-running kind of person. How much I could get done! My closets would be in order, bags would be taken to the Goodwill, the laundry would all be done, the back porch would be clean and inviting, all the weeds would be pulled, all the vegetables harvested, and all my transcription work would be done!

But that doesn't seem to be me. On Saturday mornings I snooze a little later than I can on the weekdays, and then I putter around quietly in the kitchen, trying to keep the clatter down so that I won't wake Coral up.

Usually this is our morning together with no real pressing agenda. Barry comes out and starts making coffee. While it perks, we make toast and eggs and sometimes bacon or pork chops, too. We sit across from each other at the dining room table. The newspaper is right side up to Barry, upside down to me. And that is the way I like it. I figure out the upside-down headlines and ask him about the ones that interest me. He reads what I want to hear and gleans other little nuggets of interest to share with me. He figures he is a little old-fashioned because holding the paper and ink right in his hand still seems so much better than reading the news on a computer screen! We chat about this and that and whatever comes to mind as we sip our coffee and take all the time we want.

And yes, my house could be gratifyingly organized and sparkling and always ready for company... but I'm pretty sure that someday when we are holding hands in a nursing home, this memory will be the one that lasts!

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Our world stopped turning...

This morning I awoke to the sounds of our favorite local radio station, just as I always do, and slowly into my consciousness came the memories of that day 8 years ago. On the radio there was a moment of silence -- dead silence -- as if someone had flipped the world's switch off. And then came Alan Jackson's song...

It might be that there are hundreds of posts like mine today. I haven't even checked. I remember exactly where I was on 9-11 -- what I was doing, why I turned the TV on, and then why I could not turn it off again.

Here is the song, just like I heard it this morning.



(For an excellent video with the song, click here.)

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Never to be forgotten...

This evening I drove to Wal-Mart. Nothing new or strange about that.

But it was new and strange all the same. I couldn't help it. I drove carefully, a mile or two under the speed limit. People behind me probably thought I was Grandma Putt-Putt. My eyes were keenly alert, scanning the sides of the road for pedestrians. Just a few days ago, I had driven the same way, admiring the mountains in the distance and thinking far-away thoughts, automatically stopping and starting at the right places without concentrating on what I was doing.

What a difference an instant can make...

Yesterday morning, we were sitting in the Perkins Restaurant near our home, our booth overlooking a stoplight on the busy street. Suddenly, the man in the next booth gasped, and immediately we looked out the window. A woman lay on the asphalt in the far lanes of traffic, thrown a good distance in front of the vehicle that had hit her as she was crossing the road.

The scene is frozen in my mind. Her motionless body except for the hand reaching to her head. The slim middle-aged man jumping from his SUV and running to her, kneeling down and stretching his arms towards her desperately.

One police car and then another and another... it almost seemed as if they had been waiting around the corner for just such a moment. A man knelt on the ground beside her and seemed to be quietly talking during the eternity before the ambulance and fire truck came. And I...the one who looks the other way when we drive by the site of an accident...I could hardly bear to look.

Through the big window, I could see the officers and the firemen and the rescue personnel calmly and carefully doing what they are trained to do, and I thanked God for them. What kind of amazing person does it take to be a first responder?

I'm not sure if driving will ever feel quite the same again...

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Zzzzzzzz...

I'm planning now what to do in my spare moments for the next 2 weeks...

So if you call and I don't answer...
If you email and get no response...

That's right! I'll be at my desk...and I just might be snoozing!

In June, Barry and I spent 2 weeks away from home. First, we spent a week in New Jersey where we helped to provide special music for our church's annual convention, and then we drove up to Toronto, Canada, to visit my mother and sister and her family. (We had a great time, by the way!)

I wanted to work while I was gone, but as the time got closer, reality set in, and I knew I wouldn't be able to do it all. So... I kept up with the dictation from the internal med doctor who is my client close to home, and I took 2 weeks off from the work I do as an independent contractor for a transcription company in Missouri.

Other transcriptionists covered my work while I was gone, and now it is time for me to return the favor! So I have promised to put my fingers into overdrive and take my turn. (Thank goodness I don't have to type on a clunker like this!)

I'm in for a difficult and busy 2 weeks, but I'm thankful for my job, a job I really love (well, MOST of the time!)

Snow on the Mountain!

I was driving to an appointment yesterday morning - driving west on the street next to ours, straight toward the Rocky Mountains. A little jump over the houses down below, and I could be right there! Usually by this time of year, all the snow is gone from the front range, melting quickly in the hot weather, running down the ditches, and spreading out on the plains below. But not this year! It is the middle of July, and there is still snow on the mountains.
When I was a little girl growing up in Africa, I could not remember seeing snow. I remember one time we somehow got an apple. I wasn't used to apples, and I didn't much like them. But I remember my dad wished he could figure out how to grow an apple tree, and thinking to help him along on that, we carefully dug out the seeds from the core of the apple and planted them in a little can. After a while, a little green shoot came up, and we carefully watched and tended it until one morning, to our great dismay, we discovered that one of the cats had snacked on it overnight! This was a huge disappointment to us, but Daddy did not seem too upset. He said it would not have made apples anyway, because apples need frost.

I puzzled about "frost." Even though I had seen lots of pictures of snow and people wearing coats, I could not imagine it. The coldest thing I knew was the little tray of ice cubes in the little freezer compartment of our kerosene refrigerator. This is the same refrigerator that struggled and groaned and smoked its little kerosene wick trying to freeze one little tray of sweetened powdered milk into ice cream! I thought surely one little exposure to those ice cubes, and an apple tree should definitely be as cold as any apple tree needed to be! So I made the helpful suggestion to my dad that if we grew an apple tree and wanted apples, then we could take the tray of ice out and spread it around the bottom of the tree so that the tree could make some apples. I still remember the grin he gave me, just like it was yesterday!

If you had asked me what "snow on the mountain" was, I would have told you it was the hedge outside the bathroom door! Most of the little round leaves were a mottled green and white, but all the tiny young leaves on the top were delicate pink. Remembering it now, it was one of the most beautiful hedges I have ever seen.No apple trees for me. But if I had the seeds and a can full of dirt, you know what I would be trying to grow! A "snow on the mountain" hedge of my own!

(I look at this picture of me, and I can't recognize myself in that face. I don't remember that red dress except for seeing this picture of it. But I know it is me because of the hair! Check out those waves carefully coaxed into shape with a comb dipped in water! But the real giveaway is the end of my braid. My mother never let loose ends hang down. She always wrapped the end of the braid around and clipped a barrette on it to hold it! And that is how I know this is me!)
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Making ends meet...

I know you must be wondering. Has Jeanette disappeared from blog world? Is everything okay?

No, I haven't quite disappeared...not quite! Yes, everything is okay, but it would be my longest post ever if I were to explain why I feel like this rope! So I will give you the bare bones.

New Grace, the quartet Barry and I sing with, traveled to New Jersey in June to provide the special music at our church's annual convention. This required significant practice time prior to going, as we have not really been singing together for the last year, so for quite a while before we left, my stress level was high as I tried to cover work, Coral's normal care, extra practice, working out the details of Coral's supervision and care during our absence, and then actually packing and remembering everything to take with us. Aunt Paula took charge of all Coral's care for the 10 days we were gone, and Andrea arrived from California and was able to help for the last week or so.

The convention went well, and besides that, we were able to see Barry's mother and actually stayed at her house the whole time we were in New Jersey. This was great, as I have not seen her for quite a long time, and it was wonderful to catch up a little bit with extended family and friends. After the convention was over, we (Barry, my brother Gord, and I) drove north from New Jersey to Toronto, Canada, where we spent two days visiting my mother and Carol-Ann and her family (which, as you know, is one of my VERY FAVORITE things to do!)

All in all, the time away was a blessing and refresher for me. But, as with most of my little jaunts away from home, there is a price to pay when I get back, and this time was a doozey. We jumped right into work catch-up, arrangements and funeral services for our friend Warren who passed away just before we left home, and helping with Gord and Paula's departure for a 5-week trip to Liberia.

It seems like each day I get up at the usual time and hope I can get a good start on my work. But then the time gets eaten up by other very important things, and I arrive at the evening with most of my work still to be done. I have been working until 2 or 3 a.m. and getting up again at the usual time each morning with less and less "oomph" for what has to be done.

So I have been a little shadow in blogland, but I hope -- oh, how I hope! -- that things will soon be back to normal! I may never totally catch up, but as soon as I can, I will visit you!
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I Can't Even Imagine It....Part 4

Memorial Day is now in the past, but my thoughts about it continue on and are the reason for the title of this series. This year I was thinking about the moms of the young men and women who serve in the military, and I just can't even imagine what they go through.

While Trent was gone on this hike, I found that my mind was quite divided, and I could not really concentrate on the things I should have been doing. I admit that this was mostly because he was not well when he left, and I guess there is no way to turn off the mom-instinct! (Exhibit A -- me, worrywart!)

But compared to the moms of the young people in the military, I was skimming down Easy Street. I knew his plans, I knew his companions, and I knew where he was, for goodness sake! He was carrying a SPOT! And I knew he was not in any particular danger. And yet I still had my subconscious worrywart machine messing up my mind.

Then Memorial Day came, and I realized the enormity of the gift given to us by the moms (and dads) of the young people who serve in our military.

I cannot even imagine it...

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I Can't Even Imagine It....Part 3

I'm sorry to be so long in getting the next installment done. Work has been heavier than usual, and time has been hard to find. But to continue...

Barry came home, and the hike was on! I watched the SPOT signals and could see the slow progress, and the terrain map showed me the steep climbing they were doing. It was rainy, gray, and cold at our house, and I knew it had to be colder and maybe even snowing up at 10,000 feet where they were.

On Memorial Day, I watched those little orange bubbles on the satellite map. Would Trent come home with the other two, or would those little signals continue past the coordinates for the end of the trail where the truck had been left?? Barry was watching, too, because he still was not sure the truck was in the right place. And if they got to the end of the trail and did not find it, what would they do? They would have no idea where the truck was! And they would be in the middle of nowhere with miles and miles to even get to phone service. To make matters worse, we discovered in the trail book that there are two different trail heads at the end of Segment 4/beginning of Segment 5. Now we were pretty sure the truck was at the wrong one! The orange bubbles came to an end in a small clearing in the forest that we could see vaguely on the satellite map. We waited. No more signals.

Several hours later, Mike's truck went by my office window. All three hikers were home safe and sound. And this is the story they had to tell us!

About 5 miles before our hikers reached the empty parking lot (yes, the dads had left the truck in the wrong place), they met four other hikers on the trail. They were actually two separate groups of hikers who had already met each other.

One was a man and his wife who were experienced hikers and in great shape but had somehow gotten off their original trail and did not know exactly where they were. The other group was two men who were totally lost because their compass was reading 180 degrees off. North looked like South! They had started out on an easy hike and had gone to much higher elevations than planned because they were lost. This was actually serious for them because they were very cold, and one of the men was visiting for the weekend from Ohio. Even though he was in excellent shape for hiking, his lungs were very unhappy with the elevation he had taken them to, and they were not working well at all.

The night before, the two men had taken stock and prayed for five specific things. God answered all five of their requests, but I only know two of them -- that they would stay dry that night, and that they would find someone who could help them. That night, it did not rain and they were dry. And the next day they met the other couple and then our hikers.

The seven of them continued down the trail and got to the cleared "parking" area where our hikers thought the truck would be, but it was not there! So there were three groups of hikers -- our group who had no idea where the truck was, the man and his wife who did not know quite where they were, and the two men who were lost and cold and having some altitude problems.

When all of them reached the empty parking lot, the couple realized that it was Mike's truck that they had passed earlier about 5 miles further down the road. So Mike and the man set off at a pretty fast pace to get it and bring it back for the others. Trent looked around to see if he could build a fire because he could see how very cold the two men were, but there was no dry wood to be found, so there was nothing to do but wait. The two got back with the truck sooner than expected because another vehicle happened along the road they were on and gave them a lift. Mike's truck has an extended cab, so they were able to fit all seven people in, and Mike drove them to the town where they had parked their vehicles which was actually on the way home anyway.

And so our hikers arrived back home safely. And Trent said, "Because of genetics, I knew that two nights out on the trail, cold and wet, were all I should do until I get over this respiratory thing." And he is making a nice recovery and planning for a later hike instead.

What an amazing God we have, and how He showed his loving care on Memorial Day weekend! Two men, lost and in trouble, prayed and asked Him for what they needed. He gave them a dry night, brought across their path two others who had seen the truck earlier in the day, and then joined them up with the owners of the truck who did not know where it was. "It was a God thing," Mike told us, and he is right!

(To be continued... with one more installment to explain why I can't even imagine it!)