Why do you like to...

Saturday morning Jaydon and I took my big embroidery machine to the shop.  This machine (AKA "Lucifer") has been having multiple issues so it was time for it to go; this is its second visit since I got it less than two years ago and I'm hoping this visit will also be under warranty.

 

As we were driving along Jaydon asked me why I like to sew so much.  I had a quick response with another question, "why do you like to build Legos so much"?  He had started a project the night before and had to reluctantly leave it to go to bed.  He was up early Saturday morning to finish the project, too.  So this led to a little conversation about why we like to do certain things. We discussed the fact that there is just something within each person that attracts them to certain things. I can't explain why I like to sew and why it gives me a feeling of satisfaction.  It is just something deep within me. 

 

So, why do you like to....                                 .

 

 

Problems

I'm starting a new class tonight. Its title is Organizational Communications and the text deals with organizational behavior.  I had to laugh today as I was reading the text on my lunch break when I came to a chapter on problems and encountered this sentence "Unfortunately, most problems don't come neatly packaged and labeled "problem.""

I could just see the UPS (or /Fed Ex) delivery person bringing me a package labeled "Contents: problem".  I certainly wouldn't be excited and would definitely refuse delivery.  No one wants problems, that's for sure. 

Sometimes life's problems do come suddenly, just like a package off the delivery truck.  But sometimes they are like the sink holes that you see on the news; they start off small in a tiny crack and grow and, if left unattended, grow into a massive problem.  They sneak up on ya!

Sometimes when problems pop up in our lives we say "why me Lord?" But as I read this text I was reminded that we just need to pray and ask God to get us through the problem.  So just refuse the package and send it back!

How Did They Do It? Part One

I've often wondered, how did my grandparents survive?  Their lives were so different, and not just in the sense that they didn't have cell phones, computers, and microwave ovens!  Even I didn't have those conveniences when I was growing up, well yes, we did get a microwave when I was a teenager but on with this story. I have to note here that I intended to write just one post on the subject but it grew and grew.  So, this is part one:

My father's family just lived a few miles from town when he was small. The roads were all dirt/gravel and often their travel into town was limited because of bad weather; my grandfather gave up farming and they moved into town when my father started high school. His family from that time on  were "city folks".  My grandparents both had jobs and enjoyed city conveniences even though their finances were still limited. The years in the country were harsh, it was the depression and everyone was struggling.

My mother's family lived way out in the country, also on dirt/gravel roads, until my mother was about 9 years old when they moved just a few miles outside of Eupora.  They bought a small house and (I think) about 35 acres.  My grandfather built around the existing house and added a barn built from lumber salvaged from an old house (yep, recycling was going on then, too). There was no air-conditioning, just cross-ventilation and box fans. As I "suffered" and complained about the August heat last week I thought about how hot it was in Mississippi in the summers without air-conditioning.  My grandparents never seemed to mind, they just took it in stride. Their car wasn't air-conditioned either!

This was my grandparent's house, as I knew it.  This picture was made in late December 1964.  There was a light snowfall; my cousins and I were thrilled!  Daddy walked across the highway and made this picture.  The car on the left was ours, my uncle's on the right.  My grandfather put his car in the barn!

Steps

I don't know why but a set of steps along a curb has always caught my attention.  Especially ones that lead to a vacant lot. I always have to wonder about what was there that the steps led to and why that building is no longer there.



Gulfport, MS

I didn't have to wonder about what happened to the building these stairs led into; it was destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.

 

These steps lead up to the abandonded T& P Hospital. I had to wonder about all the patients and their families that went up and down these steps.





No steps here, but still made me wonder about the house that had once been there.  Now this was all that was left - two lions at the end of the sidewalk, guarding the vacant lot.



A man's heart plans his way, But the Lord directs his steps.  Proverbs 16:9

An interesting find

When Bentley and I were on our way to Marshall Pottery I spotted an old building as we were going into Marshall.  On our way back I circled around the block to get a better look and some pictures.  There really wasn't much place to park and it was clearly posted "no trespassing" so I had to take what I could get picture wise.  There were no signs or anything, really to identify the building.

It appeared to be a school.  There was a building to the side that was connected by a covered walkway on a lower level and an enclosed walkway on the upper level.  What puzzled me was that this side building had what appeared to be a carport that was under part of the back side of the building.  The area was big enough that several vehicles could have easily parked under the carport.  It seemed odd for a school but I thought maybe it was a Catholic school and that was where the nuns or priests lived.

Here's a full view from across the street, obviously this building has been abamdonded for a while.

Here's the view from the back,  you can see the covered walkway.

When I started searching on the internet for this building I first thought it was one of the old high school buildings but I couldn't get the address to line up with the historical information.  I looked at it on Google satellite and could see a circular drive in front of the building, very interesting.  And, this building is adjacent to some of the current day school buildings.

Some more searching and I had the correct identification.  This is the T & P Hospital and it served all employees of the Texas & Pacific Railroad.

 

 This isn't a very good picture, it actually came from a post card on the T&P Railway site, but it gives an idea of the size of the hospital and a (somewhat) before picture.  Knowing that it was hospital explains the building to the side; that was the emergency room where the ambulances or emergency transports could pull under the carport covering.

As usual I found myself picturing this building as it was when new and in use, although I had envisioned students coming and going and not patients and ambulances.   There was a roof fire about a year ago and the owner commented that he would love to sell the building.  The article in the Marshall paper stated that the building was inspected after the fire and was deteriorating.  It also has asbestos so it will probably continue to decline until it is torn down and a little piece of history is lost.

The Clothesline

I put my pillow out on the glider today, in the extremely hot sun.  I do this from time to time and always love the way it smells when I go to bed. The fresh clean smell of sun on the fabric will envelope me as I drift off to sleep. As I brought the pillow in I took a quick smell, just to check.  Yes, it has that heavenly fresh air clean fragrance.  I wish I could have that fragrance on my pillow every night! 

When I took that quick sniff I remembered hanging sheets, towels and family laundry on a clothesline and how sweet the sheets would smell after hanging in the sun to dry.  At one house I had an old-fashioned clothesline with two "T" shaped poles and several lines strung between them.  Another house had a modern clothesline; it was square in shape and would spin around.  But my initial training with a clothesline goes back to my maternal grandmother.

My Mamaw had the old-fashioned clothesline, strung between the "T" shaped poles.  Hers actually had several poles in between that would be used to raise the lines after the wash was hung up.  Sometime during my teenage years she got an electric dryer, but I don't recall her using it (my mother did when we visited in the winters).  During the summers I stayed with her, and even on visits in later years, hanging out the wash was a ritual that I always enjoyed.  As a child she taught me how to hang the clothes, and I worked right along side her with no restrictions on what I could hang up. She would hang all the socks together, all the underwear together, all the shirts together, everything was hung up in orderly fashion. I also remember that just like while we washed the dishes we talked while we were hanging out the day's wash.   I also washed my doll clothes and would hang them right along the human clothes.  In the late afternoon we took the wash off the line (sometimes sooner if it looked like rain) and would fold the clothes and put them away. 

Hanging out the clothes was one of those simple things, a necessity that had to be done over and over again.  I never tired of standing at the clothesline, as a child or an adult. It was a chore, but it was an organized routine and when the job was done there was a sense of satisfaction that the chore had been done in an orderly fashion.  Today I dry my clothes in an electric dryer, but my pillow goes outside to bring the laundry day scent into my dreams.