dual personalities

Tag: family

July 5, 2024

Let freedom ring

by chuckofish

We had a lot of rain early on July 4th, but the sun came out and “America’s Birthday Parade” went forward although there were not a whole lot of people in downtown St. Louis. I watched from home.

Daughter #1 and Mr. Smith and the boy and his family came over in the afternoon and we celebrated in our traditional way.

Why mess with a good thing? Daughter #2 and her family celebrated with their own backyard BBQ along with some new friends. The prairie girls were dressed appropriately!

The local town fireworks display was postponed until tonight because of dire weather predictions (note the blue, nearly cloudless sky in above photos), so we’ll probably go over to our usual spot in the high school parking lot to watch. But I have to say there were a lot of local, unofficial firework displays in our own neighborhood last night. More than I remember in previous years.

Well, I’ll wrap up with some wise words from Calvin Coolidge:

About the Declaration [of Independence] there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.

–President Calvin Coolidge, from a speech given on the 150th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1926

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July 2, 2024

“The vast space of the sky overhead so clear, and the buzzard up there sailing his slow whirl in majestic spirals and discs”*

by chuckofish

We enjoyed another beautiful summer day yesterday with low humidity and a high of 81 degrees. Zut alors! Practically unheard of for our part of flyover country in July!

I ran errands and busied myself getting ready for the 4th of July. By then it will have warmed up considerably and will do doubt be raining. But c’est la vie.

I thought this video about vultures was great. They are indeed one of God’s ugliest creations, but also one of the most amazing. (There is a lesson there.) We see them frequently around here, sailing their slow majestic spirals, but I have never seen one up close (except at the zoo). Once when crossing the Missouri River we saw a tree filled with them on the riverside.

Never stoops the soaring vulture
On his quarry in the desert,
On the sick or wounded bison,
But another vulture, watching
From his high aerial look-out
Sees the downward plunge, and follows;
And a third pursues the second,
Coming from invisible ether,
First a speck, and then a vulture ,
Till the air is dark with pinions.

–Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, from “Hiawatha”

Sometimes vultures make for a scene of horror, such as in the movie The Four Feathers (1939). And sometimes they save the day as in the book The Searchers by Alan LeMay.

Meanwhile, Idabelle learns how to water the porch…

…and the Hibiscus is ready to pop!

Enjoy the day!

*Walt Whitman, from “A July Afternoon by the Pond”

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July 1, 2024

Abide with me

by chuckofish

Happy first day of July!

Another weekend has come and gone. Did you have a fun one? Daughter #1 and I had our usual happy hour on Friday, followed by the OM bringing us Chick-fil-a and watching a movie–this time we watched Wayne’s World (1992). I had not seen it since the 1990s and it was surprisingly harmless and amusing. I enjoyed bringing daughter #1 up to speed with the cultural references.

Saturday night I finally got to watch The Longest Day (1962) which I enjoyed very much. I know my father must have enjoyed seeing it when it came out. He was 40 years old and only ten years out of the army. He had a desk job during WWII, but he was proud to have served. In the Korean Conflict he was in England in the Strategic Air Command. My brother told me when we were together in Michigan a few weeks ago that when ANC III flew home from England when my mother was giving birth in Savannah, GA, his plane crash landed. I never knew that. Wow.

The other highlight of the weekend was going to church with the boy and the twins. We had a good adult Sunday School class followed by a sermon on Psalm 4. (We are working our way through the Psalms.) Once again the twins were minimally depraved. Their father said, “They could have been better,” but I gave them an A for sitting through a 30-minute PCA sermon like good Calvinists. We went home afterwards and frolicked with Mr. Smith…

…and enjoyed some driveway sittin’.

We ate leftovers from the OM’s casserole which he made for the men’s breakfast on Saturday. Daughter #1 brought fruit salad. Of course, there was Prosecco. Life is good.

You have put more joy in my heart

than they have when their grain and wine abounded.

–Psalm 4:7

And a happy, happy 7th anniversary to daughter #2 and DN!

A toast to you both and that happy day! Time sure flies!

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June 26, 2024

She’s borne the burden and heat of the day

by chuckofish

Time continues to march on and we are nearly halfway into the year.

It is hot here, and the hostas are looking pretty droopy and sad. The lawn, despite copious watering, is burning up. But the day lilies are amazing as usual–they love the heat! They scoff at the lack of rain. They just keep going.

(Photos taken from my car!)

This old plant is native to Asia and arrived on our shores early during the colonial period from Europe. It was so popular, and “passed along” from so many gardeners to their neighbors, it now grows happily from coast to coast, often along roadsides. When wagon trains went west, the old orange day lilies rode along with many a frontier gardener. I think that’s great.

Everyone should have some day lilies in their yard!

Today we remember my mother who died on this day in 1988. I can’t believe I have lived over half my life without her. Here she is with her baby sister Donna circa 1934.

Weep not, weep not,
She is not dead;
She’s resting in the bosom of Jesus.
Heart-broken husband–weep no more;
Grief-stricken son–weep no more;
Left-lonesome daughter –weep no more;
She only just gone home.

— from “Go Down, Death” by James Weldon Johnson (who also died on this day in 1938)

Amen.

3 Comments
June 18, 2024

Postcards from Michigan

by chuckofish

We had a wonderful time hanging out on Lake St. Clair with my brother and his wife. The marsh is beautiful there and a treasure trove of birds and other wildlife.

We went out in the boat…

…and drove to Port Huron, a nice town on Lake Huron with a good coffee shop. We sat on folding chairs and watched the big boats go by on the lake and on the St. Clair River.

Mostly we talked and talked. We are great talkers. We also celebrated my brother’s upcoming birthday…

Sunday we went back to Grosse Pointe and then I flew home without much ado that evening. Daughter #1 picked me up at the airport and I got home around 9:30. (The OM managed to get to Nashville and back and not burn the house down in the meantime. 🙌)

After the gorgeous Michigan weather it was a blow to return to 95-degree St. Louis! But bright and early the next day I arrived at church for the first day of VBS.

It was hot as blazes outside but I survived. Afterwards I went home and ate a big bowl of ice cream and took a nap. It will be a wild ride, but I think I’m up to it!

“They will not hunger or thirst,
Nor will the scorching heat or sun strike them down;
For He who has compassion on them will lead them
And will guide them to springs of water.”

–Isaiah 49:10

5 Comments
June 17, 2024

Home again, home again, jiggety jig

by chuckofish

Just a quick post to say I got home safe and sound after a lovely sojourn in Michigan. The weather was lovely and it was, of course, great to spend time with my siblings.

I’ll post more postcards tomorrow! Now on to VBS!

4 Comments
June 13, 2024

Gaily bedight

by chuckofish

So I am off to Detroit this morning and points north. As usual, I am traveling alone (the OM is going to a conference in Nashville), but I tell myself:

You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes
You can steer yourself
Any direction you choose.
You’re on your own. And you know what you know.

I can handle it, right? I am thankful that my brother will be there to meet me.

See you soon!

P.S. Happy Father’s Day to all you good fathers!

3 Comments
June 12, 2024

Questo e quello

by chuckofish

We are experiencing some lovely weather this week and–bonus!–the cicadas seem to be gone! I was working outside on Tuesday when I suddenly noticed how quiet it was. The incredible din was gone. Thanks be to God.

The boy and his family have been in Florida this week–first at DisneyWorld and then in Sarasota with the other grandparents–so, even without the cicadas, it’s been pretty quiet around here.

(I had no idea it ever rained in DisneyWorld!!)

But I am getting ready for a short jaunt of my own up to Michigan on Thursday to meet with my sister and brother at his lake house. It has been a decade since I ventured up there, so I am looking forward to it.

The summer moves along…

I watched the great Italian movie La Strada (1954) the other day. It is one of my favorites. Federico Fellini’s masterpiece about a traveling strongman who buys a young girl from her poverty-stricken mother in ugly postwar Italy should be depressing, but somehow it is not. Anthony Quinn plays the strongman, who is a brute, a beast without an inner monologue. Giulietta Masina gives a shining performance as Gelsomina, the simple girl who follows him, and Richard Basehart is the Fool who tries to teach her that everyone has a purpose in life. It is a hard lesson to learn under the circumstances. “The Road” is a metaphor for life, of course, and so it is full of sadness and comedy. Here is Martin Scorsese talking about it.

“And a highway shall be there, and it shall be called the Way of Holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it. It shall belong to those who walk on the way; even if they are fools, they shall not go astray.” (Isaiah 35:8)

Have a good day–enjoy the good (or bad) weather, watch an old movie, and remember that your most important attachment is to God.

*This and that

5 Comments
June 3, 2024

Postcards from the Land o’ Lincoln

by chuckofish

Well, the whole family converged on Champaign County to celebrate sweet Katie’s 4th birthday. It was quite a gala event. It would have been nice if it hadn’t rained all day on Saturday, but we count it all joy and DN managed to grill!

The birthday girl was delighted with her presents and with her cousins who are more fun than a veritable barrel of monkeys.

We will all, no doubt, need a few days to recover.

We gave Katie the Little Tikes Cape Cottage Playhouse and she was quite taken with it. It will move outside but the kids were entertained in it for hours on a rainy Saturday afternoon after DN was kind enough to put it together. (And he did it without swearing once!)

Lottie drew a picture of the girls excluding the bud from the house–girls only! (Some things never change, do they?)

That didn’t last long.

We took very few pictures of any grown ups but we were all there. Quite a treat!

God bless America!

4 Comments
May 30, 2024

This and that, here and there

by chuckofish

Today marks the 113th anniversary of the first Indianapolis 500 race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Ray Harmon was the first winner of the 500-mile auto race in his Marmon Wasp.

I will toast Harmon and his Wasp with an orange soda and the wee bud, who, as you know, loves all things with four wheels and a motor.

It is also the birthday of film director Howard Hawks, born in 1898 in Goshen, Indiana. I appreciate him more and more as the years go by. As Orson Welles once said in an interview with Peter Bogdanovich, “Hawks is great prose; [John] Ford is poetry.” I think that is a good assessment. Anyway, I will watch one of his many great movies tonight. Maybe Air Force (1943) since I have been on a WWII kick since Memorial Day.

Meanwhile the new Longmire book arrived on Tuesday and I am happily catching up with Walt and Henry…

Katie and Ida are hanging out on the deck…

…and the bud is playing it cool on the driveway…

And Anne hits the nail on the head several times in this one.

Here’s to the last day of school! Hang in there! God is in control!

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