Reminiscing- Part Two

Well, I'm returning to take a little bit of time to reminisce about my favorite childhood memories.  In my last post, I mentioned how we used to jump in the hay, play outside in the rain, and make war paint out of mulberries.  I promise, I won't hype on this diatribe much longer, but allow me this post. 

Growing up on a property of five acres was nice.  We would play hide-and-seek so much in the summer evenings.  Our outside rules were always that nobody could hide in buildings, trees or cars.  Eventually, we also had to create the rule that our property line couldn't be crossed (because a few times, some of my siblings ventured off the property and won the game).

I mostly remember always being horrible at choosing good hiding spots.  I usually hid in typical spots close enough to the home base: the wood pile, the log fence near the cow trough.  Home base was always our  glider swing, which sat outside the side door of our house, under the old pine tree.

There was ONE time I remember more clearly though.  That was because it was the one and only time I won hide-and-seek.  When "it" (Sarah was "it", as I recall) started counting to 100, I ran down toward the old apple orchard, looking for another typical place to hide.  I happened to notice our goose pen though.  This pen was made of metal fencing, and the structure was made of skid wood.  The last goose had recently died or been sold, so this pen was vacant.  There was a child's plastic pool still in this fenced area full of dirty, green water.  This pool used to be the goose's fake "pond". 

Since Sarah was getting close to 100, I quickly dumped out the disgusting, filthy water, and hunched down on the ground, pulling this pool over me just as Sarah shouted "100, READY OR NOT, HERE I COME!"

It was torture, hiding in that putrid pool for what felt like hours.  But I grew excited as I listened and heard my siblings running past several different times.  After a long time, I heard those amazing words "Okay Virginia, I give up!!!"

My first and only time, winning at Hide-and-seek.

 Some evenings, my dad would join in on the fun too.  It was always a little more fun when daddy played with us.  The rules changed.  We would play INDOOR, and only in the late evening, when it was dark outside. 
The best rule was that all lights must remain turned off, except for in the family room, which was where home base was.  It was a good thing that my mother loved using electric candles and had one at nearly every window, especially on the front of the house. 

Hide-and seek in the dark is 100 times more frightening as a child.  Again, I never hid in good spots because I was scared of the dark, so I would always hide in either the kitchen or living room- the closest rooms to home base.  Some of my siblings and daddy would find some amazingly creative spots.  One time, they even hid in the small crawl space under one of our bathrooms. 

Last year, Dan and I babysat four of our nieces and nephews for two days.  One evening, I suggested we try this, hide-and-seek in the dark at our house in Baltimore.  It was a real hit.  Dan went all out and hid under a pile of paint clothes in the basement. 


My second memory is that of Oregon Trail.  In our family homeschool, we were all required to read stories of pioneers and Indians and the Oregon Trail.  We would often re-enact the Oregon Trail when we were quite young. 

 

Our "conestoga wagons" were actually red wagons.  One year for our birthdays, Lydia and I got red wagons with nice, wooden removable gates like this one. 

 

We also had a smaller, metal wagon that we used.  I always felt a little bit bad for my older sisters, since they always had to be the ones pulling the wagons.  But it usually went that Katie would pull Lydia in her wagon in the front, Sarah would pull me in my wagon next, and then Martha would pull Oliver last.  Katie and Sarah always created amazing scenarios and obstacles for us to face.  Landslides, steep mountains, we even forded the river once.  We would usually bring along blankets to bundle up in. 

 

This particular game was amazing.  I'm fascinated when I look back on it, at how creative and imaginative (and also historically knowledgeable) my sisters were! 

 

Small things like this probably helped to instill in us a deep appreciation for history. 

 

I find that today, this imaginative, re-creation and re-enacting of historical events is missing.  Someday, I want my children to think outside of the box as well.  I want for my children to imagine how things were and how they will be, not to be shown (via movies and media) what to think or what they can aspire to be. 

 

 

Reminiscing-- Part One

     I never thought that I would reach a day when I'd look back to when I was 8 years old, and feel a deep reminiscing come over me. 

However, lately I have been reminiscing about my childhood favorite activities SO MUCH. 

 

   As a child, I was a follower.  I rarely came up with games to play on my own.  I followed my siblings' ideas and plans.  And with four sisters and one brother to play with (my older brother was already involved in politics and debate teams when I was around this age, so he didn't play with us much), I had a great group of creative comrades.   

 

     Our barn was a decent size, with a large hay room, and loft as well as the pens and stalls inside.

I don't have a picture of the barn, but the loft looked something like this, with beams of different heights.

 

 

 

 

      In the late summer, my parents would purchase a lot of big, round hay bales.  I never actually counted them, but it filled up the whole room, and the bales went quite close to the ceiling.  From the very day that the hay arrived, Katie, Sarah, Martha, Lydia, Oliver and myself would spend all evening in the barn, playing in the hay.  I never kept track of time...but many days, we would all go outside after we were all finished with school, chores and piano practice, and we wouldn't come inside again until it was well after dark. 

 

     Each hay season, we would put on an original  "musical" or "play" written by Katie and Sarah.  These usually included many fancy somersaults and jumps, choreographed original songs, and a plot.  At least two of these plays I was privileged to play the part of a wicked person, or some such devious character.  I remember this because as we held auditions once in the hay loft, though I wasn't very talented as a solo singer (like Lydia), or brave enough to climb the highest beams (like Sarah), I had an ability to use my diaphragm and force out a truly evil-sounding laugh (or cackle). 

 

Call it a co-incidence, but none of us are allergic to hay that I know of to this day. 

 

 

     The property I grew up on was located at the bottom of a hill, right beside a cemetery.  Often, when it would rain for a length of time, the water would run down both sides of the road in the gutters and dump right into our cow pasture, past the barn.  Between the pasture and the cemetery was a large drain and a sort of little creek. 

 

     I always got so excited when I would go to bed and it was raining heavily.  I would wake up, hoping that it was still raining.  If it was, I would hope that it would continue until after we were all finished with school and free to play. 

After school, chores and piano, we would all pull our rain boots on. 

     As I recall, we would play outside until we were soaked.  I don't remember a single time going to the creek and the drain, but I know that Sarah, Martha and Katie did.  I don't know if mommy had a rule about the younger children not being near the creek or whether I was just too scared to go near it.  But I mostly just remember the feeling of walking in sludge, mud, and even cow manure, and sometimes having your boot get stuck. 

 

     It was never a guarantee that your boot was without holes too.  Why was that so much fun?  I don't know...but it clearly impacted me a lot.  I'm still thinking about it. 

 

 

The last reminiscent activity I'll mention in this post can be explained in just this one picture. 



 

 

    In the cow pasture, near the road, we had a wild mulberry tree.  I ate so many mulberries each spring and early summer...

 

    But many times, we wouldn't eat the mulberries, but would use them as war-paint for our faces.  I can only imagine what our neighbors thought when they saw six children running around our property with faces completely painted with mulberry juice, in different designs.  We stopped eating them after so long in the mulberry season because we discovered that the berries carried tiny white worms.

 

     Bear with me as I reminisce about my favorite childhood activities.  When I ask many children today what their favorite things to do are, it is rare that the things they list are creative, healthy OR imaginative. 

 

     I think that could be part of the reason why I enjoy reminiscing about my own childhood.  It wasn't perfect, and times weren't always rosy and exciting, but I'm grateful to have these amazing, fond memories. 

 

What did you do for fun as a child?  Think about it sometime...

  

 



The Granville News Updates

The town we have moved to, Granville New York, is so gorgeous.  It is an old town, and the houses in it are beauties!  I took a walk with our German Shepherd a few weeks ago and took a few pictures while I did so. 

 

This photo was taken on the main street, of the sight of the old quaker meeting house.  It is no longer standing today, but this Presbyterian church is there. 

 

 

This is one of the most beautiful home in the town, I think.

 

Behind the library and museum is this pretty bridge, crossing the mettowee river.

 

I think that this is the second most beautiful home in town.  I don't believe that anyone lives in it, but it is lovely!

 

We are very much enjoying living in upstate New York!  A few weeks ago, we visited the L.L.Bean outlet store near us in Lake George.  We had several gift cards from different friends, and we came out of the store with a whole bag of winter clothes and nice pants for Dan- and we only had to pay $4!  Pretty amazing. 

Turns out that because L.L.Bean is typically sized larger than average, anything that is Xsmall or XXSmall, goes straight to the 50-75% off clearance shelf!  I'm definitely not an XSmall, but at L.L.Bean, I am...so we got some great deals!

 

 

Chula absolutely LOVES our new home here.  She sometimes helps Dan to paint at the church...

 

 

And although she is fully-grown, she likes to sit on Dan's lap.

 

And she is an awesome ball-catcher!  Catching and playing fetch are her favorite games.

 

A few days ago, we drove to pick up a window that a woman was selling, and we crossed the Hudson River.  Isn't this GORGEOUS? The leaves are just starting to turn beautiful!

 

And to end this post, I have to tell you a funny story.  Now that I have my own phone, I like to play pranks on Dan.  The other week, I called his number after plugging in *67...that causes my number to show up as a "no caller ID" caller on his phone.  Each time he answered, I hung up.  

 

A few times, I would whisper something unrecognizable, and THEN hang up.  I finally confessed that it was me, after Dan told me "This person is annoying me so much that I'm gonna go to the police and see if they can track the number."

 

This was the face he made when I came clean.    

 

Sometimes, it's just necessary to have a little fun. 

I know that this post was a hodge-podge of everything, but that's what has been happening in our lives here in New York. 

 

I hope that you all are doing well!

Bob and Joe

I experienced kindness from a stranger yesterday whom I have never met and never will meet in this life.  And it was too exciting to not talk about. 
One never knows who may read this, so for the sake of this person, I will use aliases. 

Except for myself: you all already know my name. 

In 2010, I purchased a computer program to be included in a package deal when I bought my first laptop for college.  I received a good price on this program, and it came with the whole works.  In four years of my undergrad and one year of my masters, I used this program faithfully and never considered upgrading it to the newer years' product.  2010 suited me just fine!

In 2015, my laptop crashed, and I lost everything that came with it (as well as a ton of personal files).  After purchasing a new laptop, I contacted the program company and told them my plight...that I had already purchased 2010, but that I had no receipt or install dvd because it had been purchased as a package deal.  This company kindly helped me, found my information using my name and email address (a yahoo account at the time), and gave me my product password, so that I might install it onto my new computer.  They encouraged me to please purchase a re-install dvd in case this computer were to crash as well.  So I did that!

Now it's 2017.  I've continued to use this program faithfully, until earlier this year in June.  My computer's hard drive failed in June, thus leaving me without a laptop to use.  I actually went without one for about a month, but finally took it to a shop, and had them put in a new hard drive.  Because the hard drive was replaced, I basically had a new computer. 

Yesterday, I went to install the 2010, trusty computer program again!  It wouldn't work because I had not written down the product password, and I had deleted my yahoo account last year.  I contacted the company, explained my plight to them again, apologized for losing the password again, and asked them to please give it to me again. 

We were chatting via live chat and the employee I was "speaking" with (Bob) said that they did not have any record of my having purchased the program, since I had originally purchased it as a package deal.  I explained that they most certainly did have record of my purchase, because I had contacted them just two years prior and they found my account just fine. 

This went back and forth for about 15 minutes and finally, being very frustrated, I asked to speak with a supervisor.  The supervisor (Joe) , after speaking condescendingly to me told me that he had no idea why I seemed "so attached to 2010, and that it was so dear to me, when I could just purchase the newest version."

Joe said that "out of the goodness of his heart" (he actually said that!), he would give me a trial of the newest version and that after a few months, I'd need to purchase it. 
Finally, realizing that I was getting nowhere with these people, (and unable to make them realize that the reason I was partial to 2010 is simply because I paid for it and it worked well!) I accepted their offer of this new version which I would eventually have to pay for. 

Joe switched me back over to Bob, who then proceeded to set me up to begin a remote session with him (which meant that he could access my computer from where he was and could install this new program). 

After getting it all set up, he began using my mouse, opened up a notepad document on my desktop, and typed "I'd like to help you.  I have the product password for your 2010 version. 
I typed back "ok"
And then Bob proceeded to give me the password, install my 2010 program, and set it up for me. 

Wow...
I was just sitting there, watching my screen in amazement. 
Some man across the country somewhere, who had never met me, was helping me out though it wasn't going to benefit him at all.

After Bob was finished, he typed to me "I'm sorry.  I wanted to help you all along, but I hope you understand my limitations.  You are my first customer tonight."

I typed back that I understood and continued to thank him profusely.  And of course, I apologized for being irritated initially. 


Bob and Joe represent two different types of people to me.  Joe realized that though he had the password on hand, it wasn't his obligation to pass it on to me.  He lied to me, told me that there was nothing he could do to get the password for me, and convinced me that I had better just take his other generous offer. 
Bob, while initially following the "protocol" of their business, BEGAN lying to me, but then his conscience must have kicked him for doing so.  He decided that he would help me. 
Bob had nothing to gain from helping me out, monetarily speaking.  But he made the choice to help someone, and I'm sure, felt better as a result. 

I learned something valuable too.  Be honest in my dealings, like Bob. 

Also, keep track of important passwords.

    

A Visit home...

 

 

 

Two weeks ago, my grandparents celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary.  My sister planned a surprise anniversary party for them with the family.  So I drove down and spent several days with my parents.  My car needed to be inspected as well, so I took my car to the auto shop for that. 

 

I arrived on Wednesday evening and went right outside and picked some raspberries.  After that, we went to the midweek prayer meeting at church.

 

Thursday was very nice because I was able to spend the whole day with my dad.  He took me to one of my favorite stores (the Amish store, BB's).   

 

 

Friday, I helped my parents around the farm, getting things ready for markets on Saturday!

 

Then on Saturday morning, I went to market in Westminster with my mother.  We were there from about 6AM-12:30PM.  It was a good day and went by quickly. 

 

We stopped and got slushies at Sheetz on our way home, which was nice and refreshing. 

After getting home, we cleaned my parents house.  Then, I drove to Hoss's, where the surprise party was to take place.

 

It was wonderful to see all of the different members of the family show up.  I, of course, was running around trying to take pictures of everyone. 

 

 

My niece, Ella.

 

Oliver, Elisabeth and Isabelle.

 

My parents, and Sarah, Billy, and Willie.

 

I DO have pictures of the surprise, but they are on my phone and will not download for some reason. 

My grandparents were so surprised to see the whole family together, celebrating them.

 

We were able to get one group photo with my whole family, my uncles whole family, and my grandparents.  It's not a good-quality photo, but at least we got one!

Stuart with Jochebed.

 



 

All of the nieces and nephews love uncle Daniel, my brother-in-law. 

 

I wish I had taken better pictures, but at least I got some!  I had a wonderful time at home, especially with my parents.  However, it was my first time being away from Dan for four days in a long time, and I missed him SO much.  After driving back to New York, it was good to be back with my husband.