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Coming to America – part 2

August 17, 2018 / / 0 Comments

You may remember a few weeks ago I introduced you to five young men, the Crist brothers who left their home in Germany in 1738 and traveled to America.

I “met” these young men while doing some genealogical research into my family and a significant historical event in which the Collings branch of my family played a major part. More about that later. For now, I want to tell you a little more about the Crist family.

Remember, Nicolaus Heinrich Crist kept an “account book” given to him by his father when he left for the New World. Nicolaus wanted to tell about their trip “so if we die they will know who we are,” which I found very touching. The boys did not die, they reached America after a long and arduous journey.

Here’s where I begin to have problems in my research. Crist named his brothers and he also listed several other young men who traveled with them, saying “There’s fifteen of us that knows each other we have labored – fought and laughed together all our lives.” One of the names he listed was William Edward Collings.

William Edward Collings is my 6th great grandfather, and I knew from other research that the Crist family and the Collings family had a long history together, but this record does not match with what I know.

My William Edward Collings was reportedly born in Somerset Co., PA in 1724. His father’s name was Zebulon and he was also born in America, so the account of William Edward Collings coming to America with the Crist boys confuses me, and I’m still working on that.

The facts I can confirm are this…the Crist boys did come to America and Nicolaus Heinrich did keep an account book that proves to be correct in many other details, so we’re going to follow this thread. Our families did come together at some point, because Nicolaus’ son George married William Edward Collings’ granddaughter, Elizabeth, called Betsy, and that we can confirm. The inconsistencies are what make genealogy so fascinating!

Throughout ensuing years, the same names keep cropping up in our family history even as these pioneers moved from landing spot into Pennsylvania/Virginia, Kentucky and Indiana. Crist, Collings, Richey, Cauffman, Biggs, etc. Throughout history, groups of people tended to live together, struggle together, fight together and stay together as they traveled to new parts of the country.

Setting aside how these families got to know each other, they all ended up (or began their new beginnings) in an area of the new world that is very confusing. There is a place on our modern map of America where Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia sort of touch. Back in the 1700’s the boundaries in that area were very fluid and one might have ancestors living in Pennsylvania one year and Virginia the next without ever physically moving. The names of counties sometimes got moved with the boundaries…sometimes new counties were created from old counties that disappeared completely.

This is the area where my Collings branch and the Crist family became neighbors, strong friends and eventually family. They lived in this area through the troubled years leading up to the Revolutionary War and the men of both families fought from here in the French & Indian War and later for the independence of the colonies.

Once again, the account book of Nicolaus Heinrich records the action. After arriving in America on September 15, 1738, by November 24 of that same year, he writes: “I saw and talked to my wife to be today. She is more beautiful than my mother if that is possible. Did not tell her that she was going to be my wife.”

Just three months after arriving in this new world, on Christmas Day of that year, the Crist brothers were invited by Sir John Henry Nowlin, Esq. to share in a Christmas feast and at that time Nicolaus asked Sir John for the hand of his daughter Catherine in marriage. Sir John responded favorably and with a hearty handshake the deal was done. The young couple married on January 25, 1739.

By October 29, 1739, the 23-year-old Nicolaus and 19-year-old Catherine had started their family by welcoming their first son, John Jacob.

Over the next few years, the couple added five more sons, lost a daughter at birth, and suffered the tragedy of Catherine’s mother, father, two brothers and a sister drowning when the raft they were taking down river to visit family broke apart in rough water. In Germany, Nicolaus’ parents both died of pneumonia.

In 1754, Nicolaus went to fight in the French Indian War and came home wounded. He wrote: “I came home today. I was wounded in the leg at the Battle of Great Meadows [aka Battle of Fort Necessity]. I am lucky to have my sons. It looks like I might lose my leg, it is real bad.”

He did not lose his leg, but suffered from that serious injury for the rest of his life.

In 1767, one of their sons, George Heinrich, married Elizabeth Collings who was the sister of my 5th great grandfather William Elston Collings, son of William Edward Collings.

By 1776, all six of Nicolaus and Catherine’s sons were fighting in the Revolutionary War.

Stay tuned. It only gets more exciting and yes, there will be drama and tragedy.

That’s Better, Right?

August 10, 2018 / / 1 Comment

Not my family, but pretty typical.

We live in a pretty amazing world. The changes I’ve seen in my lifetime are…well, I’ve seen a lot of changes.

TV’s

Our first TV had a very small screen and a big cabinet that also included a radio and a record player. Every time Mom went through the room on Saturday morning she said “Scoot back away from the TV, you’re too close.” Every year, screens got bigger and brighter. Every year we still sat too close. Every year she still told us to scoot back.

The other day I walked through the Commons at the school where I work and noticed a student sitting at one of the tables, hunched over the table with both hands wrapped around his cellphone, watching some video on a screen no bigger than a 3” x 5” index card.

Better, right?

Phones

Speaking of phones, we had one phone in the house. When it rang, everyone yelled “Got it!” and ran. First one there got the honors of announcing the caller.

Eventually, we figured out how to run phone wire to other rooms in the house and put phones within reach in the bedroom, kitchen, even the bathroom.

Today, we’re all getting rid of “land line” phones for cell phones. No more phones in every room. Now we have one phone again—that we have to carry with us at all times. Or else it’s laying in the car cup holder when we’re in the kitchen. Or in our sweatshirt pocket by the back door when we’re in the bathroom. And when it rings we have to yell “Got it!” as we scramble to keep one of the youngsters from grabbing it and announcing to our boss where we are and what we are doing.

Better, right?

Gas Stations

Years ago, when I stopped for gas on the way to my after-school job, one of the Mundy twins would pump it and also wash my windshield and check my oil. At least until I jokingly tooted the horn while he was under the hood. After that he thoughtfully unplugged the horn every time he checked the oil. That never got old!

When he the oil was topped off and the gas pumped, he would take my money and make change. I drove away happy. (I didn’t mind the horn bit, he was kinda cute.)

Today, when I get gas I have to sit in a line glaring at the guy who needs to approach the pump from a different way because his gas door is on the other side from mine. Once I get to the pump, I have to get out and do the pumping. If I don’t pay with a debit card that may or may not be “skimmed” when I use it, I have to go into the convenience store where I also buy two candy bars, a bag of chips, a hot dog and a huge cup of pop. The price I pay at the cash register reflects not only the gas I pumped, but the gas I’ll develop on the way home as I consume the junk I bought.

Better, right?

Cars

Speaking of cars, can you remember when we could call the neighbor’s nephew and tell him the car was making a funny noise and he’d tell us to bring it on over. He’d raise the hood and fiddle around for a few minutes. When he emerged with a smear of grease on his cheek, the car would start up and purr like a kitten. “What do I owe you?” you’d ask and he’d grin and say “How about a 6 pack of Bud?”

Today, you make an appointment two weeks out to leave the car with a mechanic all day so he can plug your car into a computer. He’ll present you with a list of several repairs that will cost you from $300 to $500 each to complete. “Which one of those repairs will quiet the noise I hear?” The mechanic shrugs. “I didn’t hear anything when I pulled it around to the bay.”

You drive away and turn the radio up real loud, problem solved.

Better, right?

Shopping

Every year before school started, Mom took us to Ritter’s Shoe Store. One by one, we’d sit beside her as Mr. or Mrs. Ritter would gently take our ankle and guide our foot into the metal device that measured not only the length, but the width of our feet. From the back room they would fetch 4 or 5 boxes of shoes that would suit Mom as being cheap enough, yet tough enough to get us through the school year. Final approval went like this: Mr. or Mrs. Ritter approved the fit; Mom, the appearance and price; me—well, my opinion didn’t matter too much after that.

Today, kids get dragged into the nearest Big Box Store, plopped down in the floor and subjected to much tugging on and off of every conceivable style of shoe with strewing of boxes everywhere. There’s crying and wailing and whining on the part of the children, grumbling and ultimatums on the part of the parents until finally shoes and kids are loaded into a cart along with $70 worth of soda pop and corn chips.

Better, right?

I know, I know. All this makes me sound like an old fogey, but you know what? I love most of the improvements we’ve made over the years but I wouldn’t take a million dollars for those good times I had growing up.

Of course, if I could have a million dollars AND those good times…that would be better, right?

Just Smile

August 3, 2018 / / 1 Comment

Sometimes silly humor is all we need to brighten our day.

This is a true story of a sorta bad day turned kinda nice by one guy with a simple mission, and I think it’s important to share.

Bad days come in all shapes and flavors and this one was just mildly bad…troublesome traffic, stores that didn’t have what I needed, annoying phone calls, a schedule that could not be conquered.

I don’t often eat in at fast food restaurants. Fast food is something you grab to take home, but on this day, for some reason, maybe because I was starving and yet had more errands to run, I decided to eat in. It was the middle of the afternoon, there were only two cars in the lot. I thought this could be pretty quick and I’d be on my way.

As I entered, a young man who had been mopping the floor held the door for an elderly woman in front of me and then for me. As we entered, he cautioned us about the wet floor.

He came in the store behind us, went behind the counter, washed up and then took our orders. The elderly woman (I’m old, but I’m not elderly yet!) went on to get her drink and her meal. I ordered and as I fumbled for my money, the young man started telling jokes: “Do you know what the fish said when it swam into the concrete wall?” “No.” “Dam!” said the young man. I smiled, handed him my money and prepared to move on…but not before he got off a couple more pretty good jokes.

After I got my drink and my meal, my mind was full of muttering about the day I was having when I noticed that the young man had come out from behind the counter and was finishing his mopping. As he went past me, he said, “You’re probably going to get tired of me, but I have a million more…” and he proceeded to tell me about the guy who went to a costume party with a girl strapped to his back. The host said “this is a costume party, what are you doing?” “This is my costume…I’m a turtle.” “But you have a girl strapped to your back.” “I know…that’s Michelle.”

Now that one made me chuckle, and by this time, I was feeling less stressed about my day, so I asked him how he came up with all these jokes. I never expected what I learned next.

He’d been in a serious accident some years earlier, suffered pretty critical injuries, some brain damage. Unable to work or care for himself while recovering, he moved back in with his mom. After many months, as he got stronger, he began volunteering at a food site and over time was hired as a permanent part time worker at the site. When he was able to go back to work, he continued to work at the meal site and also got a job as a cashier at a dollar-type store.

He said that as he worked with the public, he began to realize that everyone had their problems. In his words, “You only encounter these people for a short time, you don’t know when they go out the door, what kind of life they’re going back to. So, I figured if I could just put a smile on their face, it might be the highlight of their day. When I worked the checkout, I even carded a lady for toilet paper.” “Did she laugh?” I asked. “No, she got pretty ticked, (comic pause) …but her boyfriend thought it was hilarious!”

I know one thing for sure, that guy, in his humble job at a fast food restaurant, sure put a smile on my face that day, and I left with a renewed appreciation of the fact that since we don’t know what kind of life others have, we should just go with “Be kind. Make someone smile.” What can it hurt? We may be the highlight in their day.

The Big Puddle

July 29, 2018 / / 0 Comments

I was thinking the other day of childhood and what it was like. Being a kid is probably one of the most overrated, underappreciated conditions of life.

Some 60 years later, this is the actual site of the Big Puddle. Water filled the grassy area, I had only to make it to the block building!

One of the reasons it seems like such a golden time to us is because we conveniently forget how we really felt about things back then.

One of the earliest memories I have, is one of total humiliation and frustration.

Not sure how old I was, but probably around four or five. It had been raining all day. Our family consisted of Mom and Dad and I and we lived in a trailer back before trailers became mobile homes. As an adult, I learned that the trailer, which seemed so big to me as a child, was only 25 ft. long, smaller than most modern RVs.

It had been a long rainy day for Mom, cooped up in a tiny trailer with a four-year-old and no TV (yeah, it really was that long ago!).

When Dad came in from work, I recall some low-pitched adult talk and then Dad asking me in a very casual voice if I thought I could handle going to the store for him.

Some perspective here—it was a tiny trailer in a tiny trailer park and the store was the park office in the middle of the park, in full sight of our front door. But at age four, I had never been allowed to go anyplace “all by myself.” This was my big chance. I was excited. I was also, as I always have been and probably always will be, practical.

I parroted the phrase I’d been hearing from Mom all day: “I can’t go outside. It’s raining.”

A man of few words, Dad said, “Is not.”

I looked outside. Sure enough, as if he’d arranged it himself, late afternoon sunlight was pouring from behind the clouds.

This was it, my big chance. I had new boots, those pull on kind that wrap around your ankle and fasten with a small elastic loop over a button. I sat out on my big adventure wearing shorts, a t-shirt and…those boots.

An intoxicating sense of freedom swept over me…not only because I was going to the store by myself for the very first time, but because those new boots were so empowering. I could walk anywhere I wanted and not worry about getting in trouble for getting my feet wet or muddy.

Money in my fist, fully briefed in what to ask for, I crossed the park drive and there encountered—the BIG PUDDLE. To my four-year-old eyes it looked as large as Lake Michigan. On the other side I could see my goal, the brick building that housed the park office. Behind me I could feel the confidence of the parents who thought I could handle adult responsibility (so I thought at the time, but who I now know stood at the window, chuckling at my shuffling, booted, four-year-old swagger).

I hesitated only for the briefest moment. After all, I had my new boots and a mission. What could go wrong? Without a backward look, I marched fearlessly into the puddle.

It was the boots that did me in. They gave me too much confidence—and they were just enough too big that when they sank into the mud and I tried to take my next step, my foot came out of them. And of course, there’s that silly physics rule that says “For every action there is a reaction.” When my foot came up out of my boot the water rushed in. And when in dismay and shock, I crammed my foot back into the water filled boot, water shot up around my little four-year-old behind like a fountain, which is what I must have looked like, standing there in the middle of the BIG PUDDLE, yelling like a banshee for my daddy.

I have to give him credit. He only stood at the edge of the water for the briefest moment laughing and he even tempered my humiliation by sweeping me high in the air, dripping water like a little fish, for a ride to the store in his arms.

This story doesn’t have a moral. There’s no great human truth that I learned here and took with me through life, but I must admit that I do sometimes stop before I plunge into some big undertaking, full of the sort of confidence that comes with new boots and ask myself, “Is this The Big Puddle all over again?”

Coming to America

July 20, 2018 / / 0 Comments

Sailing vessels such as this brought many to America in the 17th and 18th century.

On March 1, 1738, all five brothers of the Crist family, boarded a ship in Rotterdam, Amsterdam and set sail for America.

We can’t know for sure why they left Germany although we do know that in the 1700’s thousands of Germans traveled to America for both economic and religious reasons. In addition, there was a fair amount of real commercial wheeling and dealing going on.

Earlier settlers were traveling back to Europe to purchase supplies and goods for resale in America. Ship owners and captains, anxious to keep their ships full and in constant use, would promise these merchants (who became known as “newlanders”) free passage and/or shipping if they recruited passengers for the trip back across the Atlantic. From 1735 to 1737 the numbers of Germans traveling to America increased from 268 to over 1500. Business was booming and in 1738 the numbers continued to grow.

The Crist brothers, John Jacob (24), Nicolaus Heinrich (22), Peter Ludwick (20), Philip Henrie (18), and Michael Jorge (17) may have set off for America for the adventure of it or they may have gone for riches and glory. The reasons for emigration in those days were as varied as the number of emigrants.

We’re lucky, though, that the Crist family had a real sense of the magnitude of their decision and journey. Before they left their home in Germany, their father Jorge Nichlaus Crist gave them each an account book, and son Nicolaus kept a detailed account of their days at sea. In fact, he kept his account book all his life turning it over to his son in later years, and while the Crist family are not  direct descendents of my family, they are related by marriage. This account book has given my family some insight into our history while recording some very historic times and events.

On March 2, 1738, Nichlaus wrote of their second day at sea: “It was cold and dark last night – so many became ill – it was stormy – high winds and heavy rains. The vessel was rocky.”

The routes the ships took to America were varied. Many of the Germans left from Rotterdam, Amsterdam and stopped off at some port in England to further provision and pick up any other travelers before setting off across the open ocean.

On May 10, 1738, the journal reads: “The vessel smells of stench. We are stopping for supplies tomorrow. I hope they will stop long enough to clean and air the vessel.”

Two months on the ship and they had not even really started across the Atlantic. Do you begin to get a picture of what travelers to America endured? Well, read on…

May 14, 1738: “I am going to write in my account book about me so if we die they will know who we are. There’s fifteen of us that knows each other we have labored – fought and laughed together all our lives. Now it looks like we will cry and likely die together.”

He lists his brothers and eight of the others who are traveling with them, then says of his parents, Jorge Nichlaus and Anna Crist, “…I wish they was here, they would know what to do and it would be better.”

On the 14th of May, the ship set out to cross the Atlantic.

August 12, 1738: “I wish I was home. Peter and Philip and Michael does too but John Jacob thinks because he is oldest that he can not show his real feelings. We are all sick, Michael is real sick but we can not do anything to help him.”

August 28, 1738: “It is so hot during the day and the smell is terrible. Every body has dysentery. We have lost many lives. I wonder if we will make it to America.”

September 15, 1738: “We landed in America yesterday. It felt so good to set, walk and lay on the dirt in the land that we had all dreamed of being able to live to see. Our prayers was answered. I cried myself to sleep as did many others. The air smelled and tasted so good. I only know one thing that I do not ever want to get on another ship for the rest of my life.”

Their journey took five and a half months. The journal gives us just the barest idea of what these young men endured to come here. Estimates of the deaths that occurred during the wave of emigrants traveling in 1738 range from 1,800 to 2,000 souls, victims to various diseases, such as typhus, or starvation, or shipwreck.

I have more of this journal and as I said earlier, it plays some part in the history of my family, so you can expect to meet up with some other members of the Crist family in future posts.

To Tell a Story

July 14, 2018 / / 0 Comments

In my humble opinion, it takes a pretty big ego to say or even claim one is a writer. I’m still working on that. What I think I am is a story teller, which is a very different animal. Writers aren’t always good story tellers and vice versa…a story teller is often a lousy writer. In very rare situations you do find a person who can handle both.

Photos are stories we tell when we can’t say the words. I think that’s why I fell in love with photography. I love to look at old photos like this and imagine the stories.

Stephen King comes to mind, Mark Twain was the ultimate story telling writer and I would love to meet Jessamyn West some day at Starbucks just to hear her stories (yes, I know she has passed but I’d still like to talk with her).

See, writing is about rules and structure. Story telling is more free form. A writer can write something very learned and even readable as long as he sticks with the norm, stays on the path. A story teller, on the other hand, just as often wanders off into the brush chasing rabbits and deer before bringing you, the listener, back around to an ending you never saw coming.

And here’s the thing, the story teller’s tale does NOT have to sound the same the next time it is told. Stories are alive, they live and breathe, they grow and change with the audience, the teller, the time they are told. A story floats in time. It can begin yesterday when you thought of it, or it can begin two years ago when you made the decision to turn right instead of left. It can end now, at the telling, but it can go on in time to the next telling and the next, never really ending.

A story can be true or it can be a lie, but a good story teller always makes you at least WANT to believe.

I have stories always waiting to be told. I can tell at least two stories about a visit to Boston, one about a visit to Montreal and probably several about my travels in Haiti. I met and talked with Al Unser in Albuquerque, NM in 1965, fell for the old broken-part-on-your-car-but-there’s-only-one- in-town-and-it’ll-cost-$300 scam in a little gas station in Arizona and toured the Texas-Mexico border with the border patrol. I’ve lived through a flood, witnessed a helicopter crash, seen horrible things that tear at the soul, and I can tell you stories about all of it.

Lately, I’ve been doing genealogical research and the most important thing that I’ve discovered is that we all have stories. Stories tell us who we are and sometimes even why we are who we are. No one tells a story about something unimportant to them so stories also tell us about the teller.

I know stories about my generation and have been told stories about the previous generation. I know those people and I can tell the next generation about them. That family history deserves to live on when the people are gone. I’ve heard it said that we never really die until our name is never again spoken. Our stories keep us alive.

I have a real fascination with words, their meanings, their origins, their evolution, so it’s not lost on me that the root word of history is story. As I’ve learned about my ancestors, I can’t help but learn about the daily life they saw and experienced, the world events they lived. It’s made history come alive for me in a way school history classes never did.

I started out telling stories with photos, the gradually I found my words, but a few years ago, I lost my “story vision,” that part of me that saw the stories all around me. I’m working to get that back. Over the next few blogs, the weeks or months I am able to keep this up, I want to tell stories of my family and find new stories that can speak to my readers. The other day, in my car at a red light, I looked over and the lady in the car next to me, also waiting, sat with her face buried in her hands, sobbing. There was a story there, but the light changed and as we have all been trained and must, traffic moved on. I’ll never know that story, but I will continue to watch for the stories that I can know, listen to the stories of others and more importantly, tell them so the lessons, understood or not, are not lost.

Some Days You Just Can’t Stay Off the Internet

July 5, 2018 / / 1 Comment

You know how it is. You’re just about to sign off and something catches your eye, makes you go “Huh?” and you’re hooked for another hour or so. The other day I scanned a news item about the new laws that would go into effect in Indiana on July 1 and had just such a moment.

Illustration by Arwin Provonsha, Purdue Department of Entomology

It wasn’t the announcement of a new state insect…I have a real soft spot for Say’s Firefly, also known as pyractomena angulate or more commonly here in southern Indiana the lightning bug. Great choice. There’s nothing like a summer evening, dusk falling, kids still out playing and then…that first flash. Then another. Suddenly the kids are running around, jumping in the air, begging for jars with holes punched in the lid. What kid hasn’t dreamed of collecting enough lightning bugs to fill a jar and light their room at night? Lightning bugs are the most benign, gentle and rewarding bugs I know.

But the notice that the lightning bug is now Indiana’s official state insect isn’t what caught my eye (no pun intended). What actually grabbed my attention was the new law that makes eyeball tattoos illegal.

Wait…what?

I asked a young co-worker about this and it turns out this is a very real “thing,” tattooing one’s eyeball. I was young once, and I did some very stupid things both as a youngster and as a supposedly mature adult, but two questions come to mind…1) who would want this done and 2) who would agree to do it? Oh, and question #3…what could possibly go wrong?

Anyway, this triggered an interest in seeing what other wacky laws got passed this year, so here are some interesting ones:

Sunscreen: Public school students are allowed to carry and use non-aerosol sunscreen without having to provide a doctor’s note to their school or store their sunscreen in a specific school location. School personnel also can help students apply sunscreen with the written permission of the student’s parent. (Senate Enrolled Act 24)

It’s just a shame when common sense has to be legislated, don’t you think?

Soft Skills: Indiana schools must include employability skills in their curriculum, beginning in the 2019-20 school year. The specific “soft skills” to be taught, such as on-time arrival and ability to take direction, will be decided by the Indiana Department of Education and Department of Workforce Development. (Senate Enrolled Act 297)

Seems a shame we have to have a law to teach these skills…and have to mandate the schools to do it…just saying’.

Cursive: School corporations are explicitly authorized to teach cursive handwriting as an optional curriculum component. That’s already been the practice since 2011 when keyboarding instruction replaced cursive in the state’s educational standards. (House Enrolled Act 1420)

Whew! They haven’t outlawed cursive yet and schools can teach it if they want to. Good to know and also good to know there is a law to make that clear!

And my personal favorite:

Obsolete Words Eliminated: The words “herein, hereafter, hereinafter, therein, theretofore, hereunder, hereinunder, heretofore, hereinabove and thereunder” are replaced throughout the Indiana Code with simpler terms. State officeholder duties are revised to eliminate gender-specific pronouns. (HEA 1031)

I have nothing sarcastic to say about this, except maybe, it’s about time!

If you want to know more about what has become legal or illegal in Indiana as of July 1, 2018, you can go to The Indiana Lawyer website at:

https://www.theindianalawyer.com/articles/47413-new-laws-for-2018

Seeking the Promised Land

June 28, 2018 / / 1 Comment

My great-grandpa, first generation in that branch born in the US.

At the risk of trivializing what’s going on in our country today, I have been spending some time lately thinking about current events on a more personal level. Recently I have been doing some genealogical research which has led me to a discovery about my very presence here in the US, and secondly, I’ve come to understand “catch and release” on a very personal level.

First, the fact is that I (and my family) may be here under questionable circumstances. I’m not sure what the statute of limitations is on entering the country in a manner that is not entirely legal, and maybe that has passed for my family, it’s just that I can’t help smiling a little at the audacity of my ancestor before being a little embarrassed about the way he got us here.

It all started when my great-great-grandfather sort of lied about why he wanted to leave his home country by telling the officials there that he wanted to come to the United States to fetch his brother back home so they could both fulfill the military duties they owed their Fatherland. He swore an oath he would not renounce his citizenship while he was gone.

See, the thing is, he lied. Not only did he renounce his citizenship, within 6 months of arriving here, he applied for citizenship to the United States. Now, maybe by applying, he was legal as far as the United States was concerned, but he was here based on a lie and he was mostly trying to avoid serving in an army he did not support. I’m not real sure if that is legal grounds for asylum. While it is true that I was born on US soil, and my ancestor (who will remain nameless, just in case someone decides to look into this case) did marry a woman who was a US citizen, you can see where I feel just a little uneasy about judging anyone who wants to come to the US for a better life.

Now the “catch and release” part of this story has nothing to do with my ancestry, but I have some critters in my yard that don’t belong there. They are criminal and they engage in criminal activity and I have begun a campaign to remove them by trapping them and relocating them to a place I think is much better for them.

The problem is that sometimes traps don’t always catch what we expect. The little thieves that I am waging my war against are chipmunks (so cute, right?). They eat my birds’ food, they dig up anything I plant because apparently roots are delicious, and they are trying to move in under my home where I am sure my wiring and my very walls look like natural resources to them.

So, I set a trap. Now I’m not a bad person. I don’t intend to kill them. My plan is to move them to the country…way off on the other side of the river. Good luck to them trying to return to their families! Not my problem, right? Hopefully, one by one, I’ll move their entire families to the general neighborhood where the first two went, they’ll reunite and live happily ever after.

The first day of trapping went well. Got one of the little critters and took him for a drive.

The second day was a totally different animal…literally. Rolled out my door and down the steps to inspect my trap and came face to face with a VERY upset possum! Now, I’m a country girl, so I have a little knowledge of animals and I know this chipmunk trap I am using could not hold a full-grown possum, so obviously this little guy was a youngster, but he had learned the mad possum hiss which is pretty intimidating, whatever the size of the possum.

I made a very quick and well-advised retreat to think over my options. I watched from a safe distance as he reached his strangely humanoid little hands through the cage and quickly decided I did not want to wrestle with him for the handle, nor did I want to travel with him in an enclosed vehicle! We have people for that, so I called Animal Control.

Long story – short…I don’t know where they took this guy. That’s sort of the point, isn’t it? I think the phrase is: “…not in MY back yard.”

If you want to draw some analogies from my stories, you are welcome to make of them what you will, but in the future, when I sit out on my deck drinking my coffee, I hope to see a yard that serves as a haven for me and does not contain any vandals or alien creatures…I’m just not sure that’s possible.

I have the distinct feeling that my yard is some other creature’s “better life.”

Weeds

June 21, 2018 / / 0 Comments

Welcome to Summer, 2018.

You’ve probably heard the song…“Summertime, and the livin’ is easy?” I’ll lay you 10 to 1 odds, that song writer didn’t have a garden. I have had gardens in the past, but this is not going to be a gardening post. Anyone with a lawn and/or flowerbeds will appreciate this along with the gardeners who are reading. The subject today is: Weeds—You Can’t Live With ‘Em and You Can’t Live Without ‘Em.

For the last two weeks, every evening after supper, I’ve been going out to study weeds. I thought you might be interested in some of the things I’ve discovered.

Weeds are tricky. Some of them look like what they are not, and many of them grow where we plant other things, so I’ve developed a sort of checklist for some of you new gardeners.

How to tell if it’s a weed:

  1. If it starts to sprout 3-5 days after you planted something…it’s a weed.
  2. If it grows 6 inches a day…it’s a weed.
  3. If it’s green in late June, July or August…it’s a weed.
  4.   If it has a pretty flower on it shortly after it breaks through the soil…it’s a  weed.
  5. If that pretty flower turns into thousands of little seed sails that fly away at the slightest breeze, or stick tightly to your socks, your dogs, your hair or any food product carried by a child…it’s a weed.
  6. If you yank on it and it has a root that pulls up your septic tank lid, or it snaps off neatly at the soil, leaving the root to sprout again…it’s a weed.
  7. If it comes up in the middle of your blacktop driveway or concrete patio…it’s a weed.
  8. If it grows anywhere you don’t want it…it’s a weed. This rule is a little tricky, because somebody in the audience always brings up grass. While it’s true that grass is not technically a weed…you’ve all seen or experienced grass that will not, no matter how much you weed and feed, simply will not grow in the vast expanse of your lawn, but can’t be kept out of your flower beds. For you I will repeat Rule 8: If it grows anywhere you don’t want it…it’s a weed!

In case you think I’m being too harsh, though, I must say I think some weeds are really very nice. Dandelions, for instance, get a bum wrap. My grandmother used to pick and cook dandelion greens and even as a child I thought they were quite tasty. While it’s true I’ve never actually gone out into the yard and picked any myself, I intend to someday and in the meantime, it’s nice to look out at the yellow carpet that is my lawn and know I won’t starve to death if I run out of food. Besides there’s a certain charm to any weed that can make a kid’s face light up the way dandelions do. What a pretty bouquet they make, clutched in a tiny little hand.

Another weed I’ve known and loved is honeysuckle. I know, I know! It’ll sneak and creep and wrap itself around any slow moving object and pull old buildings and fences down like quicksand, but oh! the scent of honeysuckle on a hot summer night when the fireflies dance like fairies and the frogs and crickets sing songs that make other frogs and crickets fall in love.

Maybe the guy who wrote that song…“Summertime, and the livin’ is easy”…maybe he didn’t have a garden, but I bet he had smelled that honeysuckle breeze!

 

Drivin’ Dad’s Truck

June 15, 2018 / / 0 Comments

Note: I wrote the following back in 2008 after losing my home and vehicles to the catastrophic Columbus Flood of 2008. I thought this might be a nice tribute to share this Father’s Day, 2018 to recognize the 10th anniversary of that flood…and of course, as a memory of my dad, Leon Nicholas.

Yesterday I borrowed my dad’s truck.

After Dad died, with no particular discussion, our family decided to keep his truck to be used by any of us who just needed it for a few days for whatever reason. There should be no shame in asking for it, so I’m not sure where my reluctance comes in…maybe the natural reluctance of an adult child to ask for a parent’s help in any way.

Climbing into my dad’s truck reminds me of being a small child and crawling into his lap. The truck is a big ol’ full size pickup and entering requires climbing. I grab the huge well-worn steering wheel and launch myself upward. Once inside, I am welcomed by nubby soft cloth upholstery and the smell of my dad, a mix of honest workingman sweat, a lifelong tobacco habit, gasoline and old garage smell, Old Spice and maybe just a hint of one or two other types of alcohol.

My dad was a big man, not just to me as a child, but to others as well. His family’s name for him was Guy, but his nickname to the outside world was Nick, and somehow over the years, he became Big Nick to all who knew him. He was a jack of all trades, able to do anything to support his family…build houses, operate heavy equipment, lay asphalt. He built our house, the one I think of as home, when I was seven or eight — built it almost  single handed, a carpenter learning brick laying and electrical installation in the process.

Dad bought this truck sometime around the time he retired. He bought it brand new “off the lot,” a rare act in those days and I’m not sure, but I think he also bought it “straight out” which is Hoosier for “paid cash.” He loved this truck. He loved the bigness of it, the red-and-whiteness of it, the chrome of it.

The truck I’m driving today reminds me of his early years as a workman because it’s a workman’s truck. It has fog lights and a toolbox and improvised carpeting he made from cut up commercial door mats. The big bench seat can seat 3 people comfortably, but 4 sweaty laborers could get to a job site by squeezing in and clutching their thermoses tightly. The truck has an automatic transmission, something my dad really thought was essential and miraculous as his aching joints and muscles began to cause him chronic problems…no more jamming in the clutch and working the gearshift to find a gear that worked. How he would have loved to have this truck back in his working days.

The one real luxury he allowed himself when he bought the truck was the air conditioning, but it’s less than perfect now and I find myself cranking down the two front windows, prying open those little wing thingys to deflect the wind from my face and just feeling the road blow by me.

The truck is sort of a visual experience, and I see heads turn at the sight of this big old red and white truck, decked out with chrome running boards and chrome bed rails, driven by this short, somewhat sturdy, 50 something…well, you get the picture! I feel like my head is barely visible behind the steering wheel.

Probably the most remarkable thing about the truck is the huge silver ram’s head hood ornament. From the front, it appears to be only the ram’s head with dramatically curved ram horns, but from my vantage point in the driver’s seat there’s the view of an anatomically correct (if somewhat proportionately challenged) ram’s butt. You can point that ram head/butt at the white line on the side of the road and motor on, drifting a little from time to time. You have to let it drift, because if you try to force it the truck gives you attitude and you can wind up fighting it left and right. Just let it go, the best way to drive it is to just sit back and enjoy it.

Drivin’ Dad’s truck takes me back to days when we were all stronger, when our needs were simpler, when comfort and joy could be taken in feeling the wind of the highway while riding high in a big old truck.

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