Poppie's great pumpkin, Dad's garden, siblings reunited.

Poppie harvested his great pumpkin this week, it was sort of like the birth of a new child. He was very proud of it. He had to tip the wheel barrow over to get it in the wheel barrow. He rolled it down to the house and parked it in front of the deck. I took numerous photos of it all nestled in the wheel barrow. Cubby posed by it. Later once we got it in the house Bubbles sat on it as Yogie posed. Poppie unfortunately left it unattended in the wheel barrow before it got in the house, the naughty little goat brigade nibbled on it. It nearly broke Poppie's heart. They nibbled it and scarred his dear child. I was not a happy thing to see. Bug tried to lift it but was unable to just pick it up, they finally rolled it onto a blanket and Bug drug it into the house. They are going to try to figure out how to weigh it, whole is probably not and option, I am thinking I will weigh it in pieces after we chop it up. I am going to take one final photo of it with Poppie before it is chopped, the nibble marks will not be seeable as they are on one side. Poppie is going to whine but I will have my picture.

My dad's birthday turned out great. I got there just after the other sibling began to arrive. Dad took me out to his garden to show me his wondreous aray of squash, melon's, watermelons and all his other many harvests. He had several banana squash and as Lady had asked me to asked for one I got one of those. He had some nice watermelons and cantalope that we had for dinner. He had five or six hubbards that are 50ish pounds apiece. My dad was his old self, which is nice, he is usually at his most normal when several of the kids are there together, I think it makes him more comfortable and less in the new or now. It was a wonderful visit with him. My mom was at her most lovely and that is always nice. All of the siblings were there, I don't think we have all been together in probably 10 or 15 years, maybe more. I forgot my camera but hopefully some of my sibling will bless me with photos. We got to take a all family photo and that will be something I will cherish. Not all of the grands or the greatgrands were there, Mokie was the oldest grand there, she is the 6th from the top so lots couldn't come. All the in laws (well except Poppie, as he was sick in his chair at home with stomach flu and cramps) were there too, even the two ex in laws that are still the significant others. It was a wonderful day, the most pleasant I have had with my siblings in years. All were there just because they wanted to be and all loved each other, there was no fighting among the grands and will that many littles all together that was nice too. I did not have the most gray hair among the ones of us that are all natural, I have two sibs that have much more than me. Of course one of the brothers in law had to make it a competition. Little Brother manned the grill and made sure all were filled up. Lots of good food, good family all in good company.

We stopped by Grandpa's on the way home, he gave me some cabbage, tomatoes and peppers, I am going to barter him some soap. Grandma has had a bloodclot and will not be able to go to PA in October, hopefully they will be able to reschedule to Christmas time. She was in a good mood, and sometimes those times are far between. She had actually blamed Cubbie earlier in the week for kicking her and causing the bloodclot. Cubbie can be as naughty as they come but she is not a child that kicks people so it had made Son and Mokie unhappy that Grandma is not more loving to their kids and would make such an accusation even in her pain. I think Grandma had had time to reconsider her accusation. She was especially nice to Cubbie, which was good, while we were there. So needless to say when I come home from Church, which Poppie won't be attending, I will add more cabbage to my sauerkraut, make more salsa, and begin the process of freezing and canning the great pumpkin. I put it in everything that I make, spaghetti, pancakes, soups, breads, cakes, and anything else I want. Poppie's only rule is "I don't want to know its there, I just want to be obliviously ingnorant."  Funny, if you know it's somewhere in the food can you really still be oblivious?..... tomorrow.

Yesterday my dad was 75 today we come together to surprise him.

How does one look back on a long life?  How do the ones that love him do it?  I saw a lady in the store yesterday that I have never really known well, but have know a long time.  I on one occasion was at her home, years ago, and I have not been an EMT in 9 years, to help take her husband to the hospital.  He at the time was just become truly ill and had just started down the path to become long term bed ridden.  I saw her in the store and took a moment to tell her I was sorry for her loss she has just lost him.  I told her I was sorry and asked her if in the end it was a blessing and asked if she was okay.  She said it was truly a blessing that he had passed on to the Lord, She was fine and maybe she is but she is tired and now will have a chance to heal and become physically strong again.  She looked so frail and worn down.  She loved her husband with all her heart and took care of him to the end.  It helped that she had been a nurse but it could not have been easy on any level.  She surely can attest to a life time of loving one man, and a life time of sharing her life with him. She will miss her love, and I am sure in moments miss the time she cared for him in his illness.  My grandfather did this for my grandmother.   I think that a life long love ends in this way quite often.  Oh, not all the time there are those events where the truly aged live a life of almost no health issues then go in a quick manner in the end.  One of my childhood memories is my father telling us of a couple he and my mom meant in northern Idaho.  They had just gone to a new Church with my grandparents.  They had become quite fond of an older couple in their late 70's there, they asked them to dinner on one Sunday shortly after they meant them.  The couple politely declined.  The older gentlemen said "oh, we couldn't we always go to see the folks."  My parents and grands thought they meant they went to the cemetery to visit them but no, they actually went to dinner with their folks on every Sunday.  They at the time were the oldest married couple in the US.  Paul Harvey learned about them later and used them as an example of a long loving marriage.  He said he would start to look for a couple that had a longer marriage and when he found it he would stop.  It took him 50 years to find a couple that broke their record.  They were both well into their 100's and I am sure lived a long and happy life and marriage. My dad used them as an example at ever marriage I ever heard him officiate.

I think of my father today, he is not that old in the realm of truly old people but for our family he is quite old.  His grandfather and his father both died at 67 from heart attacks form heart defects that are genetic in our family and before modern heart surgery was unsurpassable.  He actually had had two heart attacks before he turned 67, the second lead to his triple bypass surgery 7 years ago.  He has aunts that are into their one hundreds but the men, his father being one of them didn't live that long.  His brother has had a quadruple bypass.  He has been many things in his life, a child that lived through the depression.  A young adult that made his living horse logging, then stepping into his fathers job while his father spent six months in Warm springs hospital for tuberculosis.  He worked the job of a man as an 18 year old, took the check home and gave it to his mother so she could feed her kids.  He got another job after his father came home and only missed 11 days of work the rest of his working years, those 11 days were the days he spent in the hospital and recuperating after his first heart attack.  He was a trapper, and then a coon hunter but in 1972 his dogs could no longer feed themselves with the harvest of the hides, due to changing laws, so he had to give that up.  He was a wanderer and took his family from town to town to keep a job and feed them.  He never took a dime from the government in the form of foodstamps or welfare.  He paid his taxes and lived from pay check to pay check. He raised, well is in the process of raising the last three, twelve children.  He has loved God all his life, he has loved my mom through thick and thin and I think there has been alot of thin in his life.  He had dreams, I am sure, but he never sought them out, he had kids to raise and dreams come second to raising kids.  He has been raising kids for 52 year in a couple of weeks, well maybe an additional 5 being as he did help his mom with his siblings. 

Today we come together to honor his life, the life he has given to us kids without complaint and without meanness, he is a fine man.  He is becoming a lost man in many ways and his mind wanders and sometimes you have to tell him over and over what you want him to hear, and in many ways he never grasps the concept you are talking about if it is new.  He never did anything magnificent in his life or wondrous but he loved his kids, his wife and his Lord.  He will get a reward in heaven to match the love he gave in this life when his life ends.  I am my father's daughter, I can be opinionated, love history, have a steadfast political view, love my kids, and the ones that come my way that I can share my love with, love my husband with instincts of a mother bear protecting her young, and I love the Lord my God.  That is a testimony to the things my father gave me and the love he has had for me my whole life.  Today we will sing happy birthday to the man who made us who we are, as his children, and the Lord will smile down on our gathering.... tomorrow.    

Looking forward to the end of political commericals are you?

I read a facebook status from one of my friends the other day.  She was telling one and all that she had had her mindup from the beginning so no status forwards were going to make any difference to her vote so therefore she was hiding all political jargon on her facebook.  She had assured us we all had the right to freedom of speech but she was not listening.  I agree with her right, and thought she may have had a point but.....  Another of my friends had said the same thing in a different manner a week or so earlier.  She was not really concerned about the status of her vote either she had her mind made up as well but was tired of the mud.  I agreed with her rights as well.  It is funny to me that both of my friends are dyed in the wool embedded in their parties and no one was ever going to change their vote to begin with.  They are on the exact opposite sides of the voting spectrum as well.  They are both then well and truly encamped in the very decided voters camps, the ones no one, at this point, are trying to reach, their votes are a sure thing and they cancel each other out.  What I did find ironic is that their statements began to wear on me, not either as individual statements because I would imagine that most people, or most of the people that are politically aware all the time are tired of hearing the jargon because we have been connected to it for months, or maybe years, or maybe we just never aren't right on top of it in our lives.  What their statements did make me contemplate about is the undecided people, the people who don't plug in to politics but for a few minutes, or days or at most a few weeks every four years.  My friends who are both very caring and very much aware of the importance of the out come of this elections, more than most, and who want that out come to go their way, had made statements that was so counter productive to their wants for this election. If they had but looked past the personal pain of the on going inundation of views. Both of these dear friends care deeply about the path our country is on and where it will go in the future. Both of these friends want desperately for their party to win, and both will care much more than the undecideds when one of their agendas does not win and the others does on NOV 6th. 

I think that when you no longer care about the noise, or maybe it is when the noise has become more important than your beliefs and you give up the fight you lose to the other side in this.  Yes, the jargon is horrible, some of my facebook friends and my friends in real conversations go to far and use bad or mean wording to get their point across, or in trying to get their point across.  Some of them have no patients for the "idiotic" ideas that their friends, have and spout about.  They genuinely no longer want to hear any more political adds but don't they do a disservice to the ones that only are just starting to care by checking out on the subject?  Don't they have a duty to explain their point of view to the newly interested, don't they want to have a chance at talking in a peaceful and reasonable manner to some one who doesn't know what the politicians stand for?  Don't they have a duty to explain what at Liberal is to the unknowing, or what the conservatives want for our children?  Politics is and can be a storm in a teapot, it can be a hurricane coming down on the Innocent,  it can be the mean streets if you let it.  It can also be a place of understanding and a place to share your beliefs with someone who is just dipping their toe into a greater world than themselves and their immediate lives.  The way you react to people wanting to learn can destroy or uplift that person, who for the first time, wants to know what all the hullabaloo is all about.  Did you become the political expert you are in a vacuum?  Did no one have to teach you what the parties were about?  Are you just a blind sheep that followed your families politics and vote that way because you are supposed to and are trained up to do so?  Do you have a political view that is the product of knowledge and true belief in a platform, an ideology or way of life?  If you do, shouldn't you try to help those who don't find theirs?  Shouldn't you still be open to having a conversation with someone that might value your opinion and want to know why you vote the way you do?  So to those of you that no longer want to hear it because you know who you are voting for and don't care about the other sides point of view or care about helping others find their point of view. I am truly sorry for the inconvenience you find the politic of facebook and the media to be, but I think you will deserve the outcome of the vote especially if you check out and don't try to enable others to find their voice in this democracy.... tomorrow.