Finding Direction: The Wind Vane Chronicles

As our trip from Picayune to Texas worked out Friday, July 4th, we ended up driving all of the way to Abilene late Friday night.  We left home about 8 a.m. Friday morning and spent a long, boring day on the road up through the middle of Louisiana (Interstate 49) to Shreveport.  There we hit I-20, driving straight west to Dallas (Grand Prairie), where we arrived about 5:30 p.m.

We headed straight to a Mexican food place and ate an early dinner, which was very good.  We hung out around Grand Prairie with Tom's daughter and family, who had orchestra camp kids staying with them, until about 8 p.m., when we decided to go ahead and drive on over here to Abilene to my mom's house where there was more room to sleep.

We got a good night's sleep and had a great breakfast and lunch with my mom, my sister, Laura, and my 23 year old niece, Erin, who was visiting from Amarillo for the weekend, on Saturday.  Tom left about 3:30 p.m. to go back over to Grand Prairie as the start of his long trek home, which is about 750 miles from here.  That's a long way, folks!  We were on the road Friday from 8 a.m. until 10:30 p.m. Friday night when we got here to Mom's. 

Poor Tom is going to have to make that long trip, again, next weekend to come up to Grand Prairie to bring his grandkids home.  Fortunately, my stepdaughter, Kristine, is going to be able to drive over from Grand Prairie Saturday morning to eat lunch with me and my mom and then take me back to Grand Prairie with her to meet up with Tom and the kids, who will be arriving Saturday evening.  Next Sunday, Tom and I will go back home together. 

It's been a good weekend.  It was great visiting with Laura and Erin both Saturday and yesterday.  Tom and I hadn't seen Erin in at least a year and a half or two years, since she graduated from ACU.  She was in and out over here Saturday, but Laura stayed until fairly late Saturday night, so we could catch up on all the "latest."

Then, yesterday morning Mom went to the early service at Hillcrest and Laura, Erin and I went to the late service and got to see the newly renovated auditorium afterward.  Hillcrest will be back in its auditorium and back to one morning service on Sundays beginning next Sunday, but we won't be here (Erin or I) so we were excited to get a sneak peek of the changes.  It's beautiful!

We all ate lunch together, again, and then Laura and Erin spent most of the afternoon here visiting some more.  We always laugh a lot when we're together.  Isn't it great to have a Christian family, y'all?!

Today it's just me and my mom hanging out.  I think I'm going to read blogs the rest of the afternoon and try to get caught up a bit.  I'm pretty caught up on reading lots of blogs, but haven't had time to comment around, which I really like to do.  I know I love to get comments from my readers.  It's always very encouraging.  So, I like to do the same on others' blogs to let them know I appreciate the time and effort they put into blogging.  It takes dedication (and time and energy), y'all, to keep up with one.  I know - I've done it for 3 1/2 years now.

What are you all up to this week?  Looks like it's going to be a quiet week here.  Rebecca (my daughter) is not going to be able to come over from McKinney this week, but my brother, Neil, is hoping to be able to come down from Lubbock Friday afternoon for a day or so.  Of course, I'll be leaving Saturday afternoon, anyway, but will be glad to see him because it's been a year.

How often do you get to see your family?  It's hard when everyone is so scattered across the country.

Y'all comment and share your thoughts today, okay?!  I'd like to hear from you.

Cheers & Blessings to you all today!  Dee

Hi, guys!

I said I was going to post Tuesday or yesterday about some wild weather we experienced while in Biloxi over the weekend at the Mississippi Press Association convention, but ran into some technical difficulties.  Tuesday I was still busy unpacking and straightening up from being gone and also spent the entire afternoon working on paying bills and using Quicken.  Do y'all use a computerized accounting system like Quicken?

I LOVE it!  I keep up with it nearly daily and am always posting in it.  I check our bank account online nearly daily to keep up with activity through our bank account.  Tom loves to use his debit card and doesn't carry checks at all any more.  He just swipes one from me occasionally.  Rarely.  

Do you have a debit card?  Do you use it much - at all?  

We use ours most of the time any more because a lot of stores no longer let you write checks, or else they make an electronic transfer immediately from your account and hand you your check back (Wal-Mart does that), so I've gotten to where I use my debit card and keep close track of all of the little receipts (and Tom's).  That's one of the reasons I check our bank accounts online every day, too.  To keep up with debit expenditures that I might have missed (of Tom's, usually).

All of that came to a grinding halt, though, yesterday morning when we lost our DSL modem internet service.  I was NOT a happy camper, let me tell you.  I was on the phone with our phone company for nearly an hour, but couldn't solve the problem.  Fortunately, they were able to schedule a service guy to come out yesterday afternoon, for which they are to be commended (AT&T, no less) and he "fixed" the problem.  We needed a new modem.  

So, I'm back in business.  

Meanwhile, I've been working mightily on laundry and grocery shopping and have to pack this afternoon because we are leaving again in the morning.  We're on the road to Dallas this time.  It will be an all day trip (probably 8 1/2 or 9 hours) to Tom's daughter's house in Grand Prairie.  We'll spend the night and then Tom will drive me on over to Abilene Saturday morning to spend a week with my mom.  Yea!

He'll be bringing his grandkids back here Sunday for several days and then take them home and come get me next weekend.  I'm hoping to get to see my brother this time, whom I haven't seen since last July.  He and his wife live up in Lubbock where he is a social worker in a psychiatric prison hospital and Roseanna is a professor at Texas Tech.

As you know, my sister and family live in Abilene, too, so we'll get to see them.  Tom will be around for a while on Saturday before he has to go back to Dallas.

I've got a lot to do today, so am going to leave you with this picture of Tom and me with Sherry and Randy Ponder of Bay St. Louis taken last Friday night at the MPA convention.  Tom is the outgoing president of the MPA, while Randy is the incoming president, so they took our pictures together.

I was looking at our pictures from the last two years of conventions, and could noticeably see a difference in myself (besides looking older!).  You see, I've lost 23 pounds since last summer!  I'm down a size in clothes and am really happy with the results.  I'd like to lose some more, but don't know.  It's hard, isn't it?

Cheers & Blessings to you today!  I'll write from Abilene, hopefully Saturday.  

Dee 

We're back home from the Mississippi Press Association's summer convention and had a blast!  We went over to Biloxi to the lovely Beau Rivage early Thursday morning and got home yesterday (Sunday) afternoon about 2:30 p.m.  We met and visited with a lot of our newspaper friends, ate lots of really good food and even experienced some wild weather adventures.  (I'll tell you about those tomorrow or Wednesday, so tune back in!)  

Friday night at the President's dinner, Tom stepped down as this past year's President of the Mississippi Press Association.  He enjoyed a great year as president and went on several trips that were really good - one to Norfolk, Virginia to the National Newspaper Association's convention and one to a governmental conference for press members in Washington, D. C. - but is glad to be stepping down, as well.  It's been a real hectic year with him being gone a lot, and I don't like to be by myself so much, so I'll be happy to have him home more.

He's still got several responsibilities for the MPA Board this coming year, so will still be really active and gone on short trips to Jackson on a regular basis, but will be home a lot more for the most part.

However, we've got a big trip (for me, anyway) coming up this week - Friday, July 4, to be exact.  Tom has to go out to Dallas (Grand Prairie) to pick up two of his three grandkids, 15 year old Julian and 12 year old Veronica, to bring them down for a week.  (He'll be picking up his other granddaughter, Hayley, 11, in Jackson on the way home.) He worked it out last week with his daughter, Kristine, to come back out the next weekend to bring them home if they pay for his trip (they had planned to come down to get the kids, but something came up). 

Kristine agreed, so Tom worked it out, too, for me to come along AND not only is he going to take me on over to Abilene Saturday morning to see my mom, I'm going to stay and visit with her all next week with Kristine coming to get me and take me back to Grand Prairie (a 2 1/2 hour drive) Saturday morning, July 12.  

I called my mom to ask her if it was all right for me to come back out so soon (I just flew out there the first of May, if you remember).  She was very surprised by my request, but what's a mother to do, you know?!  She couldn't exactly say she had big plans for this weekend and next week.  And although it's hot out there in west Texas in the middle of July, as Tom said (when I was protesting going out there with him because I thought it would be too much, having just been gone this past week), Mom and I don't tend to spend much time outdoors, anyway, when I'm there.  We just sort of hang out!

Besides, it's gotten to be a tradition for me to go out there in the middle of July, somehow.  I was looking back through old blog posts the other day and found where I had been out to Abilene in July of 2005 - "Confessions From the Edge of the Sun" - (then immediately back again the end of August during Katrina for two weeks -  see D(estruction)-Day +2 - On the Road, P.S. One More Thing & Joy! Joy! Joy! for starters), July of 2006 -  "More Confessions From the Edge of the Sun" - then not again until July of 2007 - "Greetings From Abilene, Texas - I Think" - exactly one year ago! 

 Now, heading into July 2008, I'm heading out to Abilene, Texas once again for my 4th year in a row during that delightful month.  Lord willing.

Well - that's the news from here in Picayune, Mississippi this late June Monday.  Besides, I've got to "run to town" to catch up on a bunch of errands, which is always interesting in this small town.

But before I go, let me leave you with what I learned at the Mississippi Press Association's convention.  I post this cartoon every summer for y'all, but just love it and never get tired of seeing it again because it so represents the difference between my life as a blogger and my former life as a journalist and Community Editor for the Picayune Item.  Hope you aren't too bored by seeing it again:

Cheers & Blessings to you all today!  Leave me a comment, y'all, to let me know what's going on with you this week and what you are going to be doing for the 4th of July!  Dee

There's just so much one can take of noble Brits, after all.  (See yesterday's post.)

I have no idea what to post about today . . . so . . . what's on your mind?

If you're a blogger, what did you post about today?  (Or what would you post today if you posted?)

Sometimes, I just enjoy going around reading other bloggers' posts.  Do you ever do that?  Just follow some bloggers and then their commenters to even more blogs and so on.  That can be kind of fun.  (And time consuming, of course, but sometimes I have the time.)

If you are a commenter, but not a blogger, what would you like to see me post about next?  What's on your mind?  I've "met" some of you just lately through comments and emails and really enjoy getting to know you better.  I've met many readers who have been following this blog since the awful days of Katrina back in August of 2005.  We're in hurricane season, again, and have been talking about what we need to do (and where I could go) in the event of a bad one this year.  Pray for us that that not come to pass.

Let's hear from you guys today in comment.  What's going on with you?!  

Cheers & Blessings to you all today!  Dee

I took my watch off the other day to take a shower and wash my hair and forgot to immediately put it back on.  I felt totally lost in an odd sort of way.  It felt sort of like being sound asleep where there is no time, but I was wide awake - well, as awake as I get anymore, which isn't very wide some days - and without references to reality.

I started thinking about how many times a day (and night) I look at my watch and/or a clock, either in the house or in the car or somewhere else.  It probably ranges in the hundreds of times, I'd say.  At least dozens and dozens.

Do you wear a watch?  If not, why not?

How often do you look at it (or a clock) during the day - a 24 hour period, do you estimate? 

Do you think Americans are overly obsessed with time, or is this a more world wide thing, i.e. especially more technologically advanced countries?

I find this an interesting topic, for some reason.  I'm not sure what it means or if it is a problem.

What do you think about all of this today?  Comment and let's talk about it!.

Cheers & Blessings to you all today!  Dee 

There comes a time in life, and I've arrived there, when "saving" good things - the best, whatever it is - for "company" seems to be a loss of the lovely for each and every day.   The one we're living now.

I did not come to this realization on my own.  

As with most of the important discoveries of my life over the past 29 years, the number of years I've known Tom, he was the one who led me to this place in my thinking that I am now in.  Savoring each moment for itself, not letting it pass by in a rush to find something better.

In doing that, we have started using our "good" dishes every day.  

By good dishes, I do not mean fine china, for I never had much of that to begin with and what few pieces I had I gave away to someone younger a long time ago to cherish more than I ever did.  I'm not exactly a fine china kind of girl.

But, I do have a beautiful set of ceramic dishes - service for 12 - with a good many extra pieces that I have had since I was very young.  I've had the dishes for 45 years!

When our house in Slidell flooded from excessive rain back in 1995, we had to re-do practically everything and one thing we had to do was totally tear out and renovate the kitchen.  When we did so, we put in one upper cabinet with a glass front to show off the dishes, which had long been packed away.  That was the beginning.

Tom began to use the bowls every morning for his cereal.  We used them other times, too, but not just real often.  We still rather saved them.

When we built our new house here last year we again decided to have a cabinet with glass doors in which to put our good dishes.  It is a highlight in our kitchen.  And, now, we've started using them.  Rather, Tom since has, while I tended to still use the plain white "everyday" dishes I'd bought a long time ago cheaply at good ol' Wal-Mart.

But I got to thinking about it and all of a sudden wondered why on earth we weren't using our beautiful things all the time.  What exactly were we saving them for?  Who loves and cares about them more than me?  When will the day come when they will be anything more than some treasure on display, but not to be touched.  Or used.

So, now we're using our beautiful dishes every day.  I love them and even decorated my kitchen around them.  I want them to shine, and they do.

 I have to admit that it has been a long time in coming to this place where we are using lovely things like we are.  I wish now I had come to this thinking much sooner because life is as ephemeral as fog. We have but the moment we are now in.  We must cherish each moment and savor its sweetness, because all too soon it will be forever gone.

 If you have good dishes, get them out and enjoy them.  Or else give them to someone who will.  That is what I have been doing over the past five or six years of my life.  Giving most of my possessions away.  What remain, we use.  Our lives are much simpler now and that is good.

I hope you enjoy the pictures I've shared with you today.  If you'll come over to visit, we'll share a meal with you and enjoy our lovely things together. 

Hope to see you soon!  In the meantime . . .

Cheers & Blessings to you all today!  Dee

It's about 4:30 p.m. Wednesday afternoon and cloudy, with very rumbly thunder.  I sure hope it rains.

It's been very hot the past couple of weeks, but dry (although the humidity is high, of course), which is very unusual for south Mississippi this time of year.  Some afternoons you see a few clouds pop up, but then they evaporate and dissipate quickly over one small area, leaving the rest of the region with sunstroke.

If y'all have been watching the national news at all, you know that the entire northeast has been under a terrible heat wave, much worse than here, even, while vast parts of the midwest are soaked with rain and flooding away.

It all seems "highly unusual" according to the weather forecasters, but then, life always seems that way, to me. 

What's the weather like where you are right now as you read this?  Livable, bearable, not so great, or maybe - for some of you - wonderful?  Comment and share with us how your weather is where you live and how you are surviving it, if it's not so good.

As for us - we're mostly staying inside under the A/C with all the fans going, day and night.  I haven't even sat out on the back porch in several days, which I really miss. 

*   *   *   *   *

Maybe it will rain and cool things off so I can go sit under the fan on the porch in my white wicker chair and meditate.  Rainy weather is a good time to do that.

What say you today?  Dee

Summer is here.  Well - nearly.  As of June 21st it is.  

So, are y'all going to be going on a vacation this year somewhere?  Yes or No?

We typically don't take vacations.  When we have the time (and now money for gas, etc!), we go visit with family.  Either one or more of our kids and grandkids or with my mom.  Or else, they try to come here for a few days.

I really don't know if and/or when we'll even get to do that this summer or fall with the price of gas as it is and all.  We have been wanting to fly or drive to Virginia for the past year and a half to visit with my son David and his family because I haven't seen them since a year ago last month - May of 2007.  But, we didn't make it up there last fall.

Then, through the winter, David talked about either coming down here or to Texas this summer with his brood of four little kids for a big family vacation to see everyone.  But, I haven't had the chance to talk with him about such events lately, and highly doubt that's on the drawing board now.

A couple of nights ago, Tom and I talked about possibly driving to Virginia this fall, but that's a really "iffy" deal at the moment.  We've already abandoned the flying option.  It's really not an option for us any more since airline tickets between New Orleans and D. C. in the past year have gone from about $200 a ticket to about $800 a ticket!!  Can you believe?!

So, what are people going to do?  What are you going to be doing?  We're already eating out less than we were, which wasn't much to begin with, and now have decided to eat less meat. 

Comment and share what your take is on the state of things right now and how you think they're going to go.  Are you depressed yet?  Anxious?  Optimistic that everything will get better soon, despite the predictions?

Let me know.  I need some fellow support and guidance!  Or maybe just empathy.

Cheers & Blessings to you all today!  Dee