This is my weekly post where I share what I am reading, watching, writing and occasionally what I am listening to.

Ice on our steep driveway kept the kids and I in the house all week until I braved backing the van down it on Friday to alleviate Little Miss’s severe cabin fever (and mine actually). Backing out wasn’t the issue in the end; getting back up was.

We didn’t go far, just down the street to a local restaurant that is also a store that offers a variety of gifts, including toys and board games. After our lunch I headed up the driveway with complete confidence that van was going up and into our garage. I’m a country girl, even if I did live in town for 18 years, and my parents have a very steep drive, I know how to pull a van up a steep incline. Unfortunately, ice and snow on part of the driveway sent the wheels spinning in place and it took parking the van at the bottom, spreading stone on the ice and breaking some of it up for me to finally pull the van in. I also had to pull it further over to avoid hitting snow along the edge.

Aren’t you so glad I explained that boring story to you?

Well, that’s just how our week was, fairly boring, even as we started school again.

What I’m Reading

This week I will be reading Maggie by Charles Martin, Lord of the Flies with The Boy for school, and hopefully starting And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie because my husband wants to watch a mini-series of it on Acorn this week.

I haven’t read Lord of the Flies since tenth or eleventh grade so I don’t remember a lot of it. I do, however, remember it’s not the happiest book. Somehow reading a book about a group of young boys who go all crazy on an island while trying to figure out how to live without adults seem to fit in with the news of this week. I think a lot of us have realized we are out here in this country being told what to do by a bunch of children arguing over who gets to hold the conch shell.

Little Miss and I were totally thrilled this week when we discovered we have not read all of the Paddington books yet. She didn’t want to go to bed one night until I told her I had downloaded a new one into the Kindle that we could read before bedtime. She didn’t make it very far into the book before she fell asleep so we will read some more each night this week. The only nights we don’t read is when we get to bed too late. On those nights we listen to Frank Sinatra’s In The Wee Small Hours, which we have listened to since she was probably a few months old.

What I’m Watching

The husband and I are watching Doc Martin in the evenings and The Boy has discovered even he likes it. He now scolds us if we watch it without him. We aren’t used to him liking the shows we watch and for a long stretch he spent his evenings upstairs in his room, online with his friends (most of which he met online through a couple of “in real life” friends), watching memes, or, occasionally, reading a book.

I swear I spend most of my time watching Doc Martin yelling at him to stop being such an odd duck and get some therapy for his Aspergers. I hope that comment isn’t read as a negative comment toward people on the spectrum, but just to say Doc has issues and he could use some guidance to help him communicate with people.

I think my family is tired of me saying things like, “well, just tell her you didn’t stand her up, you had to meet a patient! How hard is that?!” Or “just tell her ‘thank you,’ Martin!! Argh!” I know all Martin’s rudeness and anti-social behavior is part of who he is but it’s fun to tell him off once in a while. I know I yell at him because I love him. (Don’t tell me he’s not a real person. I know he is! Right here — in my mind!)

I’m also trying to finish Beecham House before our subscription to PBS Masterpiece runs out at the end of the month. We switched Masterpiece for Acorn TV, which has a lot more British shows we like. We also have Britbox.

Yes, we like a lot of British television. It is all that British blood in us, I suppose. I have a lot of British ancestry in my family’s background (some Scottish) and my husband’s family was both British and German. Interesting tidbit about my husband’s family is that he is somehow related to Eric Idle from Monty Python fame but so far we haven’t been able to figure out how. The connection is family lore, I guess you would say. My husband’s grandmother was an Idle, but he never met her or his grandfather.

What I’m Writing

I’m currently editing The Farmer’s Daughter and writing some on The Farmer’s Son and also adding sections to other books in the series as they come to me. I really, really, really can’t wait to write The Librarian. I have so many ideas for Ginny and she’s been tapping me on the shoulder all week, asking me when I’ll tell her story. I told her to shush, I still have to finish this part of Molly’s story, wrap up Jason’s drama, and then I’ll get to her.

So that’s me this week. How about you? What are you reading, watching or writing and what have you been up to? Let me know in the comments.

I am not afraid of sharing my views of the world or politics, but I like to keep my blog fairly light for me and my readers (if you want politics go to any other site and you can find it there. It won’t be a normal thing here.) I really wanted to share this, though, because there is a lot of scary things happening that are a strike on our freedoms in this country. At least on our freedom of speech (and no, this isn’t me being upset about Trump, because for God sake he needed to hush, but things that have stemmed from that. It’s a pretty slippery slope downhill at this point and other conservative voices, even those who don’t agree with him, are being locked out of discussions, which seems to be the norm anymore.).

Freedoms for ALL of us will eventually be threatened but for right now they are affecting a certain group mainly. My idea is if you don’t like what a person says then don’t read it or listen to it or watch it.

The fact that people I know who once cried out for free speech are now crying out for speech to be silenced has been a hard thing for me to wrap my mind around. I still have not processed all of that so I’m focusing on mainly sharing fiction and “nothing ” posts. Except for this one. Watch it before Youtube censors it for too much free thought.

This is a story I’ve shared a bit of here before and that I work on off and on. I haven’t worked on it in a while but thought I’d share part of it today as a distraction from so many bad things going on. It is something that will need a lot of work on, so bear with me, friends. This is an excerpt from in the middle of it.

---

He’d asked her if she would take a walk with him after dinner and she’d been nervous, but she’d agreed. They walked for half an hour, chatting about the dinner they’d had, the weather in India, the weather in their perspective countries, the work they were each doing in India and then suddenly he stopped, turned toward her, and held his hand out.

“Have you had the chance to dance in the moonlight in India yet?”

His uniform had been replaced with khakis and a plain white button up shirt like those commonly worn by the Indian men. His dirty blond hair was combed over to one side and though she couldn’t see his eyes clearly in the moonlight, she knew they were blue because she’d caught herself staring at them before when they were talking.

She looked nervously at her feet, unsure how to react to this pivot in their conversation. “I can’t say I have.”

“Well, come on,” he said with one corner of his mouth turned up. “Let’s be brave and see what happens.”

“There’s no music.”

“I can hum a tune or two.”

His hand was warm, the palms rough from days of working hard to build hangers for the Indian Air Force planes. He gently pulled her closer and placed his other hand lightly against her waist but pulled it back again.

“My apologies. Is it ok if my hand rests there?”

She immediately felt embarrassed and looked down at her feet.

“Um… yes? I guess so.”

She was ashamed to admit she had no idea how to dance and had never had a man ask to dance with her.

His hand barely touched her as he began to sway and gently guide her movements.

“Over in Killarney

Many years ago,

Me Mother sang a song to me

In tones so sweet and low.

Just a simple little ditty,

In her good old Irish way,

And l’d give the world if she could sing

That song to me this day.

“Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, Too-ra-loo-ra-li,

Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, hush now, don’t you cry!

Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, Too-ra-loo-ra-li,

Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, that’s an Irish lullaby.”

She couldn’t look up as he sang.

Her heart was pounding and her head felt light.

What would her father think if he knew she’d come to India to care for orphans and tell others about the love of God but now she was dancing in the moonlight with an Irish airmen? And if Pastor James saw them? What might be said? Thoughts raced fast through her mind but she couldn’t seem to pull away, reveling in the feel of her hand in his and the smell of his cologne. She’d met him only a couple weeks ago before at the market, looking for vegetables and lamb for the mission and orphanage kitchen, and now here she was letting him lead her in a dance in the heat of the Indian summer.

He stopped singing, leaned back so he could look into her face and she looked up to see his blue eyes staring into hers.

“Tell me Emily Grant, the American girl with the very Scottish name, have you ever thought that God has made you for something more?”

The muscle in his jaw jumped a little as he started talking about what he expected for his future, not waiting for her answer.

“I mean, I grew up with my family, on a farm, thinking ‘There must be more to life than this.’ My brother loved farming, the shoveling of manure, and rounding up cows, but I just knew there was something more for me and I knew when I saw those children at the mission, my something more was here in India or at least in helping others.”

“Does it sound arrogant to say I believe God has a plan for me? A plan to show others His love not by what I say but by what I do? Is that what brought you here to India with your mission group? Did you think God would do something grand? That life could be something more and beautiful; the more you showed love and felt it back?”

Emily didn’t know what to say.

She felt her face growing warm.

She knew exactly what Henry meant but she’d never known how to explain it. Her parents couldn’t understand why she had signed her name to the list to travel to India with the missionary who had been visiting their small rural church in Pennsylvania. They were worried for her safety, terrified she’d be killed by people her father called “Devil Worshippers” and “dark skinned heathens.” Emily had read the Bible. She believed God had created all humans and if that was true, then he had also created the Indian people and He loved them as much as he loved a white-skinned American farmer’s daughter.

“It doesn’t sound arrogant,” she said. “It sounds true and real and wonderful. I believe God has a plan for me, but I truly don’t understand it yet. All I knew was something inside me said I needed to follow Pastor James and Margaret here.”

Henry was still looking at her, eyes intensely focused on hers.

When his eyes glanced to her mouth as she spoke she tensed, suddenly self-conscious.

“Maybe God meant us to be here at the same time. For us to experience all this beauty together, ” he said, his voice slipping into a whisper.

He was too close.

Her heart was pounding too fast.

And when his lips touched hers it was too soon.

They’d only known each other two weeks and she hadn’t come to India to fall in love. She’d come to learn more about God’s will for her life.

She pulled away from him quickly and looked quickly at the ground.

“I’m past curfew at the mission. They’ll be concerned about me.”

She walked into the darkness before he could speak.

“Let me at least walk you home,” his voice followed her. “It’s dark and dangerous here at night.”

She paused and nodded an acceptance of his offer.

He fell in step beside her, silent as they walked. When they reached the gate of the mission she placed her hand on the gate and he reached out and wrapped his fingers around her hand.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to overstep. I’ve never been so bold before. Will ya’ forgive me, Emily? I’ve enjoyed our time together. I hope you won’t disapprove of seeing me again.”

“It’s okay. I’m just – it’s – I’m here to be a servant to the mission. I shouldn’t get distracted. I don’t know – I just – wasn’t ready.”

She felt foolish as she spoke.

Wasn’t ready for what? To be loved? To let this young airman who spoke of wanting to serve God love her?

“I have to get to bed. We have open clinic in the morning for the village women. Thank you for the dance Henry.”

She pulled her hand from his and rushed through the gate, closed it and walked down the path toward the mission.

In her room, with the door closed behind her, she touched her fingertips to her lips, closed her eyes and remembered the warmth of his mouth on hers. She breathed deep, shook her head to clear her mind of the memory, and reached for her Bible to take her mind off the distraction she felt God didn’t want her to have.

Written by my dad, R.G.R. Any typos are his and I just left them in *wink*. Merry Christmas to my blog readers.

   It was the path to the home of the sweetest people I knew. The path was out the door, across the lawn and down over a steep bank; Then I would go across the road and down the next short bank to open the cow gate and go katy-corner across the barn yard to the lane. From there on, it was about a hundred yards down the lane to the wooded pasture and down to the creek I would go. The stepping stones in the  creek were  the  fun and challenging part .

Then to angle up the creek bank steps, go across one of the  few flat spots in Laddsburg country to the train tracks  ( railroad); first was to either climb over or go through the hole in the railroad fence and along 4 spare sections of rails stored on concrete pillars. The same ones remained there for many years, The train ran once a day out through Dushore PA  and back.  There was no more passenger car of  yesteryears but, I remember the half  dozen or more coal cars and gondola cars loaded with coal from the Sullivan County Bernice coal mines, a few box cars and a caboose. Once I do recall two locomotives steaming  up through the valley on the same day.

So, it was over the tracks and through a brushy area, 100 feet around the edge of  a  field and across the drainage ditch. It was as you have read, an up and down zigzagging little journey. From the ditch, it was a short straight way to the back porch of the sweetest people I knew, Grandma and Grandad Grant, Eben and Grace. It was Grandma when I was  around the age of 6 that showed me the path, and by 8 or 9 I traveled it alone and did so for many years between the house I now live in and the Grant home where also my wife and I later lived, and where our children grew up. I was no longer able to keep the Grant home and sold it a year ago . It was a sad day.

          Grandmother was a gracious, perky, down to earth lady. She was very frugal. She had no choice. Granddad, who had been a carpenter  was calm in manner, kind in all his ways and a fountain of history and wisdom. I stopped by at the age of 17 to say goodbye when I was leaving to join the US Air Force. Standing in front of the Grant House he said to me “You will go through this life alone” ; And I became a man. He lived by the Grant Clan motto “Stand Fast Grant”. I knew him well, and I am thinking at this moment about the life he lived and things that broke his heart.

If I could speak to him now, I would say ” Grandad, I love you, Jesus loves you ; You need not walk the path alone. Jesus will show you the path of life; In his presence is fullness of joy; At His right hand are pleasures forevermore.” The choice to walk the path with Jesus is ours alone to make. We need not walk “the path “alone. 

R.G.R.