A storehouse of blessings

Thanksgiving was never meant to be shut up in a single day. ~Robert Caspar Lintner

The unthankful heart... discovers no mercies; but let the thankful heart sweep through the day and, as the magnet finds the iron, so it will find, in every hour, some heavenly blessings! ~Henry Ward Beecher

Warm happy memories are like a storehouse of blessings.  When the days are long and dull and that normally thankful heart is having difficulty finding the blessing in every hour, we can draw on those happy memories.  They cheer us, bless us, and transport us.

A few months ago I purchased a relatively inexpensive slide scanner.  In the 1970s and early 1980s we used slide film for our photos.  We have boxes and boxes of slides stored in a trunk.  Occasionally we get out the slide projector and have a viewing, but digital photography has spoiled us.  And we want to be able to preserve the slide images and share them.  

And so I've been scanning - an entire tray at a time in the beginning and a few slides at at time recently.  The scanner doesn't like flash pictures or any pictures with a great difference in light levels.  But nevertheless, I am happy to get as many images as I can stored on my computer.  And even happier to be remembering all of those vacations and holidays when we were young parents with small children.

 Each one of those memories is a blessing.  Through the month of November, I want to share some of them with you.  

 We're a family of readers, and the children got an early start.  My oldest daughter was almost always happy to read to her sister and later to her brother.  

I did a little running in my younger days - even ran in a couple of 10ks.  My sister encouraged me and stuck with me through those races.  Here we are returning from a run on Thanksgiving Day in the early 1980s.  Don't you just love the socks?

Summer vacations at the lake - the hammock - so many great memories!

More to come - stay tuned!

A way of holding on

Memory is a way of holding onto the things you love, the things you are, the things you never want to lose.  ~From the television show The Wonder Years

A year ago I was sitting on the porch of this house, nearing the middle of a wonderful family vacation. My father had been diagnosed with inoperable cancer just months before, but had responded well to treatment and was feeling well enough to enjoy walks on the beach, a dinner date with his beautiful wife at his favorite little restaurant, and a game of bocce ball.

This beach was one of my father's favorite places and for many years he spent a week or more there every Spring or Fall.  We felt blessed to find this house that seemed nearly perfect for our gathering.  Family members came and went throughout the week, staggering and overlapping their visits.  Some stayed at a motel just a short distance away.  The group around the dinner table varied from evening to evening, but every seat was always filled.  At the beginning of the week we shivered under blankets on the porch, but at the end we were sunning on the beach.  We talked, read, played games, laughed, and took hundreds of pictures.  We built sand castles, fished, collected shells, and shopped.  We watched the sun set.  We thought about how much we loved each other.  We made memories.
See the slideshow at the top of the blog sidebar for more pictures.

To live in hearts we leave behind

Is not to die.

~Thomas Campbell, Hallowed Ground

Memories set to music

She glances at the photo, and the pilot light of memory flickers in her eyes.  ~Frank Deford


A DVD arrived in the mail today - a DVD my brother made using 8mm home movies taken at a slumber party and on a trip to the mountains with about eight of my junior high friends.  He set the home movie to music, and it was amazing.  Much more entertaining than the silent version, especially so because he chose just the right music.
One of the people captured on film was my childhood best friend, Lou, who died of leukemia when she was a  young mother with three small children.  Lou and I became friends before we started school, when we had to have someone help us cross the street.  I can still recite her phone number even though I can't remember my own cell phone number.   In my senior yearbook, Lou wrote a long list of things she wanted me to remember - and though they are almost in code, I remember them all.  She was an artist with an incredible imagination.  She still claims a piece of my heart.
Most of the film captures us acting our age - that is, silly and ridiculous, with lots of dancing, 60's style.  I still remember what it felt like the day after one of those slumber parties.  


"In memory, everything seems to happen to music, " Tennessee Williams


I was blessed today with memories that were recorded to music!  Thank you, sweet brother!