I really like Mama’s Empty Nest’s idea of sharing old posts each Thursday so I’m doing what any good blogger would do and stealing the idea from her. Haha! Seriously, I probably won’t do this every week. I am thinking once a month instead.
I thought I’d share this post from about two years ago when my Aunt Eleanor passed away.
I think what I will remember most about Aunt Eleanor are her hands.
I remember those hands holding thread and a needle and pillows or quilts she just made. I remember those hands gluing buttons to frames, cutting out patterns, pinning needles in place for her next project. I remember those hands holding stacks of family history she had just typed up.
I remember those hands laying a flower on her mother’s, my grandmother’s casket.
I remember the first time I noticed the tremor in those hands and wished I could hold those hands and make that tremor go away.
I remember one of the last times I held those hands, how warm they were, how firm the grip despite all her body was fighting. We were in the nursing home where she had been living for several years. Parkinson’s was making her body and mind weaker.
I told her something I didn’t say much to her or my grandmother when I was younger, simply because they were a family who didn’t say it as much in words as they did in actions: “I love you, Aunt Eleanor.”
“Oh, sweetie I love you too,” she said and she held my hand even tighter and we sat there for several moments in silence, the TV on the wall blaring the news or the weather channel, I can remember which.
I don’t think she wanted to let go. I didn’t either.
I wasn’t sure she even remembered who I was that day but looking back it didn’t matter if she did or didn’t recognize me or even if she thought I was my mom, since some days she called me by her name. All she knew was love – that she felt loved, that she felt love for me and that at that moment the room was full of peace.
The day Mom called to tell me Aunt Eleanor was gone I thought about how much I hadn’t wanted to let go that day.
A week later when I drove by the nursing home I realized I still didn’t want to let go.
“You know, I really miss her,” My Aunt Doris, Eleanor’s sister, said to me last week when we visited her for her birthday. “”We don’t realize what we have until it’s gone, do we?”
I agreed and we sat there a couple moments in silence but then it was time to leave and head back to our home in Pennsylvania. I left Aunt Doris there, in her chair by the window, thinking about her sister. My kids, dad and I, got into the car. We drove down the road and we thought about Eleanor too.
We missed her and I wished that I could hold those hands one more time.
My aunt Doris and aunt Eleanor when they were children and it looks like they are in the driveway at their grandparents’ home, which is where I grew up.
Sometimes I like to convert my photographs into black and white, simply to see what they look like and what moments are focused on without the distraction of color.
Sometimes I see a photo in black and white in my head and sometimes in color. To me, photos are meant to tell a story and there are times that that story is better told if there aren’t a variety of colors, which can be a distraction, to pull the eye away from the story.
I don’t agree that just any photo can be converted to black and white, however. I’ve seen photographs of flowers converted to black and white and don’t get it. I think flowers should be in color. However, that’s only my personal opinion.
Native American dancers?
Color. (My photo of this was taken on film and I didn’t take the time to scan it in for this post.)
Photos from autumn? Color.
Flowers at a greenhouse? Usually in color but sometimes black and white tells the story better and the colorful flowers aren’t needed.
I thought I would share some of the “story telling” photos I took in the last few months that I thought told the story better in black and white. Even though lately I like most of my photos in color simply so the world doesn’t seem so dark.
I’m addicted to reading stupid and controversial things on Facebook and it’s making me physically ill.
I deleted my account last year and it was awesome but I added it back because I was in a homeschooling group that made all their announcements about upcoming events there. Now my son is connected to a friend through messenger kids and if I delete the account he’ll lose that connection.
So I want to do another detox. Even for a week but I would love to do a month.
Anyone want to join me? This would be for Facebook, Instagram and Twitter and if you need to log on for a group you run or to check on an emergency in your area, that doesn’t “count against” your break. I’m adding news sites to my detox as well since I think the national media orchestrates a lot of the drama of the world today.
Let me know if you’re interested. I’m going to start mine today and plan on a week, with the ultimate goal being a month. I have done this before and made a list of things I can do otherwise to distract myself. Should I fail, though, please don’t be too hard on me. It’s easy to want to be in the know but right now – I think I’d rather not know. You know?! 😂
I decided to break up some of my light fiction this week with crime fiction suggested by my husband (after I asked for a recommendation.) I needed something different than what I usually read. So I’m trying Earl Stanley Gardner’s The Knife Slipped and so far I like it. I love his character descriptions. Here is one of my favorites:
“Her face was the color of a tropical sunset with rouge over the cheeks, and crimson lipstick trying to turn the upper lip into a cupid’s bow. The thing must have been weird enough so far as the average spectator is concerned, but to a detective who trains himself to look closely and see plenty of details, it looked like an oil painting done by Aunt Kate or Cousin Edith, the kind that are hung in a dark corner in the dining room where the open kitchen door will hide ’em during mealtimes.”
I also loved this dialogue:
“To hell with that stuff. I’m objective, Donald. I have no more feeling than the bullet that leaves a rifle barrel. If it’s a charging elephant that’s in front of it, the bullet smears him. If it’s a poor little deer, nursing a fawn, the slug tears through her vitals just the same. I’m like that Donald. I’m paid to deliver results, my love, and by God, I deliver ’em.”
I’m still reading my daughter Paddington books at night and right now we are re-reading Paddington Abroad, which is one of our favorites. I’m also finishing up Sweet On You by Becky Wade.
We are loving our new house and the children are too, especially Little Miss who wants to spend just about all day outside as long as it isn’t hot. I love that she loves to be outside, even though sometimes I need a break to do things inside. She was never outside this much at the old house, which had a smaller yard, was in town, and where we always felt uncomfortable because people drove and walked by and watched us (or maybe that was only in our heads.)
There was a lot of concrete and asphalt there and it wasn’t as friendly. Here we have neighbors who love to pet our dog (one of our neighbors up there did love our dog), welcome us to the neighborhood with hanging plants; wildlife to watch (I caught a toad the other day for my daughter who promptly decided it was her pet and she didn’t want to let it go), we also have bunnies hopping through the backyard, a space for a garden, and all kinds of plants and flowers popping up all over. And for my son, the best thing is that we are 5.3 miles away from his best friend’s house.
We have discovered peonies on one side of the house, which delighted me because I had peonies at the house I lived in when I was a child and they were over 100 years old. I’m so excited for them to bloom I just want to sit next to the bush and wait. My mom says they usually bloom around my brother’s birthday which is June 9. She said when they did bloom they would bother her asthma and a friend told her to have them pulled up so they would stop coming back each year.
“I can’t have them pulled up!” she cried. “They’re over 100 years old!”
I think there was some story about my great-grandfather being very sick one time and when he woke up and was healthy enough to leave the house, the first thing he saw was the peonies. It was some relative anyhow. Later this week I will have an interesting story involving my great-grandfather and his sister Mollie. (I know. You’re just on the edge of your seat waiting to read it, aren’t you? Ha. ;) But it has to be better than the news these days.)
We spent a lot of time outside on Memorial Day weekend too. It’s a family tradition to visit the cemetery down the road from my parents behind a 150-year-old (or so) church where my ancestors and sister are buried. My mom gave birth to my sister prematurely four years before I was born and she did not survive.
My daughter seemed oblivious to the fact she was dancing on the final resting places of her ancestors as she ran around, twirled, jumped and sang Frozen songs and occasionally helped my dad plant flowers. My son told her she needed to stop but I told him if the dead people could see my daughter they’d probably be delighted to watch her with all her en
We found a pigeon when were there and my daughter loves all animals so I thought she was going to try to take it home, especially when she saw it was injured. It couldn’t fly at all. Instead it would try to walk, limp and then fall forward on it’s face. We decided to let it go it’s own way since we weren’t sure what was wrong with it, but it was very sad to see. I wish we could have helped it but I think it was sick and not only injured.
My son thought he was funny to lean on the gravestone of his namesake (his great-great-great grandfather who was a Civil War veteran) and call him a “boomer” but then realized he shouldn’t joke since without the man he wouldn’t even be here. I agreed and that’s when I launched into a Biblical-type lineage speech.
“Yes, son, because John begot J. Eben who begot Ula, who begot Ronnie, who begot me, who then begot you.”
My son didn’t find me humorous. Why would he? He is a teenager now. (Don’t let the smile here fool you…his laughter was at his own joke, not mine.)
I finally finished planting our garden after my dad, son, and husband finished building the fence around the raised garden beds my son and Dad built. I have one more plant to . . . er. . . plant. Broccoli I almost forgot it. I’m really not sure what is going to grow and what isn’t at this point but the green beans and some of the lettuce are already sprouting. My dad finally found us some summer squash. The garden centers around here were wiped out. Summer squash was what I really wanted in the garden because that was the one plant that survived at the other house and actually produced a veggie I could use.
I’ve also planted tomatoes, zucchini, carrots, and potatoes. We will see if any of them come up or not. It will be fun to watch.
So that’s about it for me here this week. How about all of you? What have you been reading, watching or doing this past week? Let me know in the comments.
As I started getting back into reading in the last couple of years, I’ve noticed there are all kinds of opinions among book readers. Everyone has different tastes, everyone has different interests and what one person likes in a book another one doesn’t. Of course we all have our own preferences. It’s part of being human.
One varying perspective among book readers is chapter lengths. Some like longer chapters, some like shorter. Personally I’m in between. I don’t enjoy super short chapters but I also don’t want chapters so long that I feel like the story is dragging on.
I know I mention Jan Karon a lot but when I was thinking about longer chapters in books, she came to mind because her chapters are quite long. Even though her chapters are long they are interesting enough to not make it feel like I am pushing through and dying to get to the end of the chapter. She makes the chapters easier to read by breaking them down into sections or scenes throughout the chapters.
The only issue is that sometimes these sections are too short so it feels like I am reading clips from a movie and not a fully cohesive narrative. At times, but not always, it feels almost as if I am jumping in and out of scenes and I lose track a bit, but I still love the stories Jan weaves.
As a writer it is hard to know how long to make a chapter and it’s even harder when a writer is sharing their book or chapters on a blog. When I share the chapters of my stories on my blog I tend to make them shorter because I know most people don’t want to read a long blog post, but when I rewrite them for the final book, I tend to add sections together and make the chapters a little longer.
There are tons of opinions online about how long a chapter should be too. Wordcounter.com says that 5,000 is too long and 1,000 is too short, in the opinions of many. However, Writer’s Digest says that as a writer, you should make your chapter as long as you need in order to propel your story forward. The article’s author, Brian A. Klems says that he thinks of a chapter as an act in a television show.
He writes: “When a TV show finishes Act 1 (which almost always happens just after something significant is revealed or an important question is raised), it goes to commercial break. Ditto for Act 2, 3, 4 and so forth. Look for your chapters to have those similar elements. When you find those “commercial breaks,” end your chapter and start a new one. In other words, let your content dictate your chapter length, not the other way around.”
So, how about you? As a reader, when you read a book do you like short chapters or long chapters? Do you like chapters with lots of scene breaks in them or one big, long scene? If you are a writer, how do you decide how long to make your chapter? Let me know in the comments.
I have been blogging about 12 years, although I don’t have all the posts from all those years. I do have some and I found this post today from around Memorial Day in 2014 while looking for another post. I thought I’d share it here again today and maybe share some of my past posts like Mama’s Empty Nest has been doing recently.
I remember the day Harry gave my son the VFW hat. We were at a celebration at the local Veterans of Foreign Wars where they were honoring Harry because he was moving from the area to live with family.
I had taken Jonathan with me so I could grab a photograph for the local newspaper, but also so I could say goodbye to Harry, who I had interviewed years ago about his service during World War II. We had visited Harry at a nursing home a few weeks earlier while also visiting my aunt. My son, Jonathan, was 7 at the time.
I told Jonathan that Harry had fought for our country during World War II and to free the Jews during the Holocaust, something we had been talking about one night when he had asked me some historical questions. I remember how horrified he was about Hitler treating the Jews so awful and because of his age, I left out the worst of it, mainly only telling him how much the Nazis had hated the Jewish people and how wrong it was. After I introduced Jonathan to Harry, who was in the hallway sitting in a wheelchair, Jonathan, without prompting, saluted him.
Harry was touched and overwhelmed. As I sat and chatted with Harry, often having to almost shout since he had lost some of his hearing by then (he was almost 93), Jonathan drew a picture of Harry in the war, jumping out of airplanes and fighting in the Phillipines. Again, Harry was touched and impressed with Jonathan.
A week later when we attended Harry’s farewell celebration, we were surprised and emotional when Harry asked to see Jonathan and handed him two of his VFW Commander hats. Harry was thrilled to see Jonathan and smiled and talked to him, thanking him again for the salute and the picture.
We were definitely sad a year later when we heard Harry passed away. He had dedicated more than three decades to the local VFE post, where he served four years as post commander, 20 years as post quartermaster, 10 years as district quartermaster and three years as district commander. During his time at the VFW he had been named an All-American post commander, an All-American quartermaster three times, and also received several awards through the VFW.
When Harry passed away the new post commander, Dan Polinski, told the local paper about the countless times Harry and others of Harry’s generation had stood in all kinds of weather to honor veterans who had passed away. Dan remembered one specific day where the rain was coming down, cold and stinging, against their faces.
“The younger of us, and I use that term loosely, said to Harry, O.C. Spencer, and some of the other World War II guys, ‘Listen, you guys, don’t stay out in this.’ The wind was whipping and it was brutal,” said Polinski. “Harry, and O.C., and all of the old crew — all of the old World War II guys who had stood with this Color Guard guy at many other funerals — just said, ‘No. He would do this for us.’” (Morning Times, Sayre, Pa. August 1, 2014)
I can attest to Dan’s story because I remember those rainy Memorial Days (in fact, I remember more rainy Memorial Days in Bradford County than sunny ones. It seems it always rains when there is a parade or a ceremony to honor veterans here.) I covered a few of those ceremonies for local newspapers and when I first saw Harry, and fellow World War II veteran O.C. Spencer, standing out in inclement or sweltering hot weather, I wondered why someone didn’t get them a chair or an umbrella, or usher them inside. Looking back I know it was because they stood not only to honor the fallen and those who served but to honor our country. They did what so many of us don’t, or won’t, do. They did what they’d done years ago when called to fight; standing when others turned or walked away.
We keep Harry’s hats sealed inside the clear plastic case he handed them to Jonathan in and we keep them in an honored spot next to a sealed American flag given to Warren’s family after his great-grandfather passed away. And when we do pull the hats out we not only remember the man who stood at every Memorial and Veterans day service, no matter the weather, in full uniform, honoring those who served and those who fell, but the man who came home from war, worked with troubled youth with his wife for a decade, worked hard at every job he did, and also showed us how to persevere during the toughest times in life.
It’s hard sometimes to look at the local Color Guard during Memorial Day services and not see Harry standing there, rifle propped against his shoulder, back straight, jaw firm, gaze steady. I find myself choking up at the memory of the dedication he showed and how a new generation is missing out on the lessons of perseverance his mere presence there taught us.
What is important, I remind myself, isn’t that he isn’t here anymore, but that he was there at all and that there are people still around who will work to keep his memory and legacy alive.
I see Zooma the Wonder Dog found her way onto my blog again yesterday.
Because so many of you seemed to like her post, I thought I would link to some of her past posts for any of you who are terribly bored and need some lighthearted entertainment and photos of Zooma when she was a very tiny, cute puppy.
I can’t believe how long it’s been since I’ve been able to take over the blog. A lot has happened since then (like two years ago!) and I’ve been so busy I haven’t been able to sneak over to the laptop and take it over again before Mom sees!
In case some of you don’t know who I am, I’m Zooma the Wonder Dog. I’m really just Zooma, but Mom added “The Wonder Dog” because when I run my tail and fur streams out behind me like a cape of some sort. I was born on a farm with cows and other puppies and was adopted by Mom and Dad, Little One and The Boy two years ago (or so). I also got to know The Beast, as I call her, and she loves me, even though she sometimes pretends she doesn’t.
I love life, especially when I can be outside with my boy or girl or following Mom or Dad (or Grandpa) around to see what they’re doing. I’m always very helpful, even though sometimes they tell me I’m in the way or not being very helpful because I roll on my back and wait for them to pet me when they are trying to do something they call “work.” I don’t know why they would want to do “work”. It sounds boring and awful. Rubbing my belly and exploring nature with me sounds like a lot more fun.
Not long ago our family moved from our house to live with Grandpa and Grandma. I liked living there. I followed Grandpa everywhere and slept with him at night. I’m not sure he liked taking me out so I could pee in the mornings but I had fun with him anyhow. I smile more there than anywhere else.
Then we moved to what Mom and Dad said is our new house. I like our new house because there are lots of birds for me to chase in the backyard and new people for me to bark at. I don’t know why those birds keep running away from me when I try to talk to them but since they do, I just chase them. I think they like our game. I play the same game with the little human and the little bit bigger human.
I also bark at the neighbors when I think they are in our yard because it’s hard to tell where our yard is at this new place so I figure I better bark at everyone just to be safe. We don’t have a fence here so I’m never sure. Mom says to stop the whole barking thing because the new neighbors will think I’m so vicious creature instead of the sweetheart I am.
The other day a lady came into the part of the yard that I know is our yard to talk to Mom and Dad and I barked and barked at her but her voice was sweet so I rolled on my back and let her pet my belly. Humans seem to like when I let them pet my belly so I tried it again on the other lady on the other side of our yard. She liked rubbing my belly too.
I still don’t trust those male humans who come into the yard though. Their voices are deep and scary so I don’t let them pet my belly, even if it would make them less scary. I tell them to go away and let the women pet me instead.
My biggest job, besides alerting my humans to any movement (like people, birds, other dogs, cats, animals, leaves or wind) in the yard or anywhere outside by barking, is keeping The Beast out of trouble.
The Beast likes to run outside when I go outside for my “pee sessions” (as Mom sometimes calls my potty breaks) but I’m a good girl and stay out of trouble (especially when Mom and Dad hook me up on that thing they call a lead. I don’t get why it’s called a lead. It doesn’t lead me anywhere. It actually keeps me from going very far and being able to explore the way I want to and that’s not cool.) but The Beast is always wandering where she isn’t supposed to be. Sometimes I let Mom and Dad know she’s getting into trouble by barking loudly and sometimes I just take the matter into my own paws and gently usher her back inside by chasing her while she yowls and slaps at me. She loves me, though, I know she does.
I met another cat when Mom and I went on a walk when we first moved to this town but Mom wouldn’t let me get to know him. I’m pretty sure he would have liked me as much as The Beast does if I had been able to talk to him more.
Well, that’s it for this time around. All this sneaking around has wiped me out and it’s time for my nap – in Mom’s favorite chair, where I look too adorable for her to kick me out so I always get to take my nap there. Hopefully Mom will wander off somewhere again soon and I can share another update with you. I bet my updates are much more interesting than her’s anyhow.
It finally happened. My brain snapped this week and I had to impose an overall media break on myself.
Social media.
News media.
Gone for three to four days at least, if not longer. After snapping at people, shaking from anxiety every time I logged off, and having crying fits based in depression and anxiety I knew it was time.
Luckily, after starting the break I felt so much better with less bouts of anxiety. Until I went back on and got in a completely unnecessary word exchange with an acquaintance
I broke it a couple of times for brief updates then went right back into my clueless hole and blocked the sites on my phone and Facebook.
If anyone else wants to join me on my break, you’re welcome to. Just make a list of things you would rather be doing and then commit to staying away from news and social media and at the end of the time you set for your break write about you felt during the break and after.
So far, I have filled my time with some reading (not as much as I would have liked), blog reading, working on formatting novel two and writing novel three, researching gardening and compositing (Lord Jesus, help me. I’m not sure I’ll be able to figure all that out), and watching The Chosen.
I also spent two days avoiding looking out the window since it snowed. Yes. Snowed. In May. I did not take any photos of it because it was insanely depressing.
I thought I’d share what the family is reading this week, since I’m reading pretty much the same books that I’ve been reading for a while.
What I’m reading:A Light in the Window by Jan Karon and Sweet on You by Becky Wade and About Your Father by Peggy Rowe (I read one story a night from this and talked about the book first HERE).
Planning to read soon: Death of A Gossip (A Hamish Macbeth Book) by M.C. Beaton
Husband: The Poet by Michael Connelly
Description: An electrifying standalone thriller that breaks all the rules! With an introduction by Stephen King.
Death is reporter Jack McEvoy’s beat: his calling, his obsession. But this time, death brings McEvoy the story he never wanted to write–and the mystery he desperately needs to solve. A serial killer of unprecedented savagery and cunning is at large. His targets: homicide cops, each haunted by a murder case he couldn’t crack. The killer’s calling card: a quotation from the works of Edgar Allan Poe. His latest victim is McEvoy’s own brother. And his last…may be McEvoy himself.
Son: Harry Potter and the Half-Bred Prince
Daughter (with me) Ree Drummond’s book Charlie and The New Baby and Ramona The Pest.
Mom:Somebody’s Daughter by Rochelle B. Weinstein
Description:
Emma and Bobby Ross enjoy a charmed life on the shores of Miami Beach. They are a model family with a successful business, an uncomplicated marriage, and two blessedly typical twin daughters, Zoe and Lily. They are established members of a tight-knit community.
Then, on the night of the girls’ fifteenth birthday party, they learn of Zoe’s heartbreaking mistake—a private and humiliating indiscretion that goes viral and thrusts her and her family into the center of a shocking public scandal.
As the family’s core is shattered by disgrace, judgment, and retribution, the fallout takes its toll. But for Emma, the shame runs deeper. Her daughter’s reckless behavior has stirred memories of her own secrets that could break a marriage and family forever.
and before that Angel Killer by Andrew Mayne (My mom reads much faster than me so I have trouble keeping up with what she is on).
Description:
In this self-published bestselling e-book by a real illusionist—the first thriller in a sensational series—now available in paperback, FBI agent Jessica Blackwood believes she has successfully left her complicated life as a gifted magician behind her . . . until a killer with seemingly supernatural powers puts her talents to the ultimate test.
A mysterious hacker, who identifies himself only as “Warlock,” brings down the FBI’s website and posts a code in its place. It hides the GPS coordinates of a Michigan cemetery, where a dead girl is discovered rising from the ground . . . as if she tried to crawl out of her own grave.
Born into a dynasty of illusionists, Jessica Blackwood is destined to become its next star—until she turns her back on her troubled family, and her legacy, to begin a new life in law enforcement. But FBI consultant Dr. Jeffrey Ailes’s discovery of an old copy of Magician Magazine will turn Jessica’s carefully constructed world upside down. Faced with a crime that appears beyond explanation, Ailes has nothing to lose—and everything to gain—by taking a chance on an agent raised in a world devoted to seemingly achieving the impossible.
The body in the cemetery is only the first in the Warlock’s series of dark miracles. Thrust into the media spotlight, with time ticking away until the next crime, can Jessica confront her past to embrace her gifts and stop a depraved killer?
If she can’t, she may become his next victim.
I tried to distract myself this week with movies, but mostly failed on that front. I had considered the newestversion of Emma, which you could have rented on Amazon for $20 and now can buy for $14.99. I knew I didn’t want to buy it and after reading some reviews, I’m not sure I even want to rent it. This was my favorite review on Amazon:
“I am sitting here alone, in the midst of quarantine, because the rest of my family couldn’t handle this movie any longer and fled. I have not left my house in five days, but death by coronavirus would be more merciful than continuing to watch this movie. Everyone in this movie is so unlikable, which is not Jane Austen’s fault. The other versions were good. The only saving grace is Chummy from “Call the Midwife.””
Ouch.
So then I tried Little Women. My brother and sister-in-law loved it and telling them I didn’t was hard, but I didn’t. I just didn’t. I guess it was supposed to be artistic but I had to agree with what a reviewer on Amazon said: “The film felt like a very long trailer.”
Saoirse Ronan and Timothée Chalamet in Greta Gerwig’ LITTLE WOMEN.
All the flipping back and forth between the past and present was extremely confusing at times and the orange glow on all the outdoor scenes made me want to adjust the lighting on my computer. If the story had been told in a more linear way I might have been able to actually like the characters, but since it was a movie of five minute clips here and there, I never really had a chance to get to know them unfortunately. Of course, I know them from other movies. I should say I know them from the book, but I never finished the book. I know. I’m awful, but it’s true.
The actors were very good, however, so I really wanted to give the movie a shot again after stopping it only half an hour in the first time. The guy playing Laurie looked 14 whether he was actually supposed to be 14 or in his 20s and he looked slightly stoned the entire time so I really had little interest when he came on the screen. I won’t lie and say there weren’t parts I didn’t cry through, because there were, but I’m not lying when I say I barely had time to cry for Beth because they had flipped to another scene before I knew what happened.
Instead, I watched a more traditional version I found on Amazon that was split into four episodes and featured actresses who seemed to fit the parts more for me than the other actresses did.
I also distracted myself from the news of the world by blogging last week:
When Harry passed away the new post commander, Dan Polinski, told the local paper about the countless times Harry and others of Harry’s generation had stood in all kinds of weather to honor veterans who had passed away. Dan remembered one specific day where the rain was coming down, cold and stinging, against their faces.
We keep Harry’s hats sealed inside the clear plastic case he handed them to Jonathan in and we keep them in an honored spot next to a sealed American flag given to Warren’s family after his great-grandfather passed away. And when we do pull the hats out we not only remember the man who stood at every Memorial and Veterans day service, no matter the weather, in full uniform, honoring those who served and those who fell, but the man who came home from war, worked with troubled youth with his wife for a decade, worked hard at every job he did, and also showed us how to persevere during the toughest times in life.
