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It all started innocently enough.

It was a Monday morning.  The night before was one of those nights that I love.  My Bible Study gals with their husbands and their kids (All of ’em!) had been together in the Gathering place of Laws Mennonite Church for our Christmas supper.  Good food, good company, and a great time made some wonderful memories for this Delaware Grammy, but even with excellent clean-up help, this gal was so very, very tired.

My Sweet Mama had been away for two weeks but came home while we were having our supper.  I was under the impression that she was going to be late, and so, when I came into the house around nine o’clock in the evening, I decided against calling her.  My good sister in law was driving her, and I knew that she was in good hands.  I had checked to make sure that someone was going over to turn up the heat and make sure things were in order, so I thought all was well.

Monday Morning.  There was piles of laundry to do, and I had an appointment in Dover for Nettie.  I needed to take Mama to Denton in the afternoon for an appointment with her primary care physician.  I got my ladies up, gave Cecilia her shower and got her dressed and combed, got breakfast and medications done, packed the lunch, and tried to keep up with the laundry.

This was also the day that our chickens were going out.  We would like it very much if our chickens would never go out on Sunday night for Monday’s processing, but we don’t choose that, so Certain Man was up most of the night, putting up feed lines, raising the drinkers, and making sure that not too much extra damage was done.  He managed to break his glasses somewhere along the way, so when the last house was finally under the control of the catching crew, he decided that he would go to work so that he could stop at his Dover optometrist and get those glasses fixed!  So he was on his way around 9:10.  I drew a deep breath, so tired, so tired.

Around 9:20, the phone rang.  It was my Sweet Mama.

“I thought you would be coming out here this morning,” she said.

“Um, no.  I am coming out this afternoon to take you to the doctor, though.  You have a four o’clock appointment with Dr. Jensen.”

“Oh, well.”  She sounded let down.  “I got home around seven last evening.”

“Really?  Did you hear from anyone?”

“No.  No one.  I thought for sure you would come out this morning.”

“We had our Bible Study supper last night, Mama, and I was so tired when I got home.  I think Beebs is coming out there this morning, but our chickens went out last night, I’m trying to get laundry done this morning, and I need to take Nettie to Dover for an appointment at one.”

“Well, I guess I’ll just go back to Pennsylvania with Rose,” she said.  “Nobody comes, nobody calls, nobody cares.”

That really hurt my feelings.  Being tired probably made me touchy, and she was probably (at least a little bit) joking.  “Mama. I’m so sorry.  I think that Beebs can get what you need and bring it out, and then I will come this afternoon and take you to Dr. Jensen.”

She had been so sick while she was up and Nel and Rose’s house, and I was very anxious for her to get to her PCP.  Two rounds of antibiotics, strong cough medicine and huge doses of rest hadn’t managed to knock out the bug that was bothering her.  She gets incredible care while she is with Nel and Rose, and I know that we don’t cover the bases as well when she is home. Sometimes I feel really, really insecure about that, and this time, secretly, I was suspicious that we could never measure up.

The injured feelings cast a long shadow over my morning, but there was so much to accomplish before heading to Dover.  The doctor’s office had faxed me fourteen pages of things to fill out.  Actually, Nettie was to fill them out, but this is the stuff that ordinary people have trouble with, much less handicapped individuals.

“On a scale of 1 to 10 how would you rate your pain?”   “Is your pain a stabbing pain, an aching pain, or a throbbing pain?”  “Would you say your pain is sharp or dull?”   “Is it constant or intermittent?”  “Is your pain made better or worse by lying down?”  “Is your pain made better or worse by standing?”  “Is your pain made better or worse by sitting?”  “Is your pain made better or worse by daily activity such as getting dressed or household chores?  “Does your pain interfere with— (there was a never ending supply of those questions!).

My head was spinning.  I was trying to answer as questions with answers like I thought Nettie would answer, but the end result was frustrating and time consuming.  Plus, there were all those questions about her general health, social adjustment, medications and mental illness.  I finally carried the questionnaire in to her table and asked her several questions while she signed the necessary papers. And finally we were ready to go.

And then the phone rang.  It was Certain Man.

“Hon, could someone run out to the chicken house and make sure that the catching crew turned off the tunnel fans?  They said they were going to, but I just want to make sure.”

“Well, I’m just about ready to walk out the door to take Nettie to Dover . . . “

“Maybe Rachel could go, then,” he said.  “All you gotta’ do is check to make sure the fan on the front side of the house is off.  I’m sure if they turned off the front one, they also turned off the back side, too.  I just don’t need all this cold air getting pulled into the house and causing trouble.”

“Tell you what, Sweetheart,” I said, “I will go out there in the van and check when I am on my way to Dover.  I can just drive out there and I won’t even need to get out of the van.  I can just look!”

“That will be fine,” he said happily.  And so, that was the plan.

So I got Nettie and her black book.  I got the 14 pages of paperwork and my purse.  I got a tall glass of water and got everything loaded in my trusty mini-van and headed out towards the chicken house.  Whew!  I was tired.  Did I mention I was tired?  That bone deep weariness that feels like it will never get better.  I contemplated my lot in life as I headed off the side drive onto the chicken house lane.

Wait a minute.  Which house did he tell me to check?  House two or house three?  Oh, well.  I guess it didn’t matter.  I would just check them both.  On the front side of house two, all the fans were quiet and unmoving.  I checked the back side of house two and found things the same there.  On back the lane I went and checked the front of house three.  Nothing there, either.

“This is good,” I thought.  “But what if they had somehow inadvertently let the fans on at the back of the house?  I will check there just to be sure, then I can tell Certain Man that everything is totally off.”

Which, of course, it was!

But now I had a dilemma.  The thing is, I’m not the greatest backer in the world.  And I had about a hundred feet to back with chicken houses on one side and sturdy fence on the other.  I decided to cut in between the chicken houses and make the backing part of my departure shorter.  So I turned my wheel while looking out the driver’s side to make sure that I had enough room.  I noticed that there was a very soft place in the ground beside the tunnel fans, and having had a previous experience with getting VERY STUCK in that same place on another occasion, and noting that there were deep ruts from the chicken trucks that I needed to avoid too, I cut a wide berth and was carefully watching out the driver’s window when — KERSHLAM!!!

I jerked my head around in time to see Nettie rock in her seat like she had just had a jarring experience.

“Mare-Ann!” She said reproachfully.  “You really hit that hard!”

“Oh, dear!” I said.  “I guess I did!  What in the world –?”  My heart sank to my shoes as I looked out the window and realized that I had somehow collided with the feed bin at the end of the chicken house.  I put the car in forward and pulled out a bit.  I got out of my side of the car and trudged to the back to see what the damage was.  I couldn’t see anything!  I looked and looked all around the back of the car and there was nothing.

“Whew,” I thought ruefully.  “I would have thought there was some sort of damage for how hard that hit!  I must have gotten away with it this time somehow.”  But then I happened to look on up the side of the van and my delight was short lived.  On the sliding door, just behind the front passenger’s door, there was a nasty, nasty dent.  I betook myself up there and mournfully surveyed the damage.  I tried to open the door.  That was out of the question.  There was a very sharp place on the handle, anyhow, that discouraged too much effort.  What was Certain Man ever going to think?

Time was slipping by, and I had an appointment to make, so I got back into the driver’s seat and began my trek to Dover.

“I had better call Daniel,” I thought.  “Might as well let him know.”  I’m so glad that Certain Man is usually kind and understanding about such things.  There have been times when I’ve been surprised at how nice he is when things like this happen.  Rarely does he fuss at me about such things.  But I still dreaded calling him.  I dialed his number and waited while the phone rang and rang.  He didn’t answer.  That would give me more time to cry, I mean, THINK!

Then the hands free device on my visor announced, “Phone call from A-Daniel.  Answer or ignore?”

“Answer!”

“What’s up?” Asked my good-natured husband.  “I saw you called.”

“Well, hon, you will be glad to know that the fans are all off.  I checked both houses front and back and everything is off.  The bad news is that I did something bad to the van.”

“Hon!  What did you do?”

“I ran into the feed bin.”

“Hon!  How did you do that?”

“I don’t know.  I was just backing around, trying to miss the soft spots when I crashed the side of the van into the feed bin.”

Great was the discussion for some time about what we were going to do and when and how.  It was only a short time until the kids were all coming home for Christmas and we were planning to use the van for family expeditions.  We finally agreed that, since I couldn’t get the door open, that Certain Man would call our faithful body repair shop and see if he could get it in pronto.  We said our “love you’s” and “Good-bye’s” and I waited to hear, “Call terminated” coming from my device.  What I heard instead caught me flatfooted.  It was my husband’s voice, frustrated and a bit cross, coming over the airwaves in a tone that I have almost never heard directed at me.

“I JUST DON’T UNDERSTAND!” Ranted Certain Man.  “WHAT IS SO HARD ABOUT THIS???  YOU JUST LOOK WHERE YOU ARE GOING, LINE THINGS UP AND BACK OUT!!!”

“Uh, Hon,” I said, “I’m still here.  I can hear every word you are saying.”

“Call terminated” chirped my hands free device.  And believe me!  It WAS!  The thing was, I didn’t feel bad about it at all at that point.  I was so upset with myself that I could hardly see straight.  I mean, this is the same van that I hit a deer with last summer that made it need so much repair work.  That was all covered by our insurance, but this?  Um, I think not.

It wasn’t long until Certain Man called back and said that he was going to meet us at the doctor’s office and see for himself what the damage was.  The body shop said that they needed to know what kind of door it was, but that they would work it in and do it as soon as possible, even though it didn’t suit them very well.  And so he met us there, strong armed the door and got it to open and decided that we could live with it until after Christmas.  He didn’t mention the things that had been said in my hearing.  I didn’t either.  I found out later that he never heard me.  But whenever the subject came up, he looked a little sheepish.  He never once said that he didn’t say them.  Like I said, He isn’t inclined to speak unkindly to his addled frau.  He should be allowed to let off some steam now and then.  The LORD KNOWS I deserve it.

There was still the doctor’s appointment to get through.  I handed in my paperwork and decided to arrange other transportation for my Sweet Mama’s appointment in the afternoon.  Niece Carmen agreed to do it.  I called Mama to tell her my troubles and that Carmen was going to take her to her appointment.  I couldn’t help crying.  Mamas are pretty good at detecting what is really wrong, and it wasn’t long until she realized that part of my problem was the hurt feelings from the morning.  Mama was so sorry that I had taken what she had said as truth.

“You weren’t hurt by what I said this morning,” she said with that element of wonder in her voice.

“Well, Mama,” I said, feeling so petty, but also still smarting, “You SAID that nobody called, nobody came, nobody cared!  And that you were going back to Pennsylvania.  Of course I was hurt!”

“Oh, you girls!” she said.  “I’m going to have to stop saying anything.  I say stuff and I mean it kidding, and you take me serious!  I didn’t mean it!”

I managed to tell her that Carmen was taking her to her appointment, that I had messed up the van, and she was fine with all the arrangements.  “Don’t worry about anything,” she said, cheerfully.  “Everything is going to work out okay.  You’ll see.”

Back inside the doctor’s office, we waited and waited.  Then they took Nettie back and did vitals and went over her paperwork.  Then we waited some more and finally the nurse came in and said that the doctor wanted to talk to me privately before seeing Nettie.  And there ensued the strangest conversation I have ever had with a healthcare professional.  The upshot was that he was not going to treat Nettie.  He was certain that he could not help her.  He was uncomfortable with her mental illness, and critical of her former doctor’s treatment.  As we left the consult room, I noticed that he didn’t even turn in the direction of her room.

“Is he not even going to talk to her?” I asked the nurse who was walking with me.

“Well, he CAN, if you want him to,” she said a bit cautiously.  “Shall I ask him to come tell her?”

The adrenalin had been flowing since the feed bin episode, but suddenly all of that was gone and I felt a hundred years old.  I thought about my girl, Nettie, on the other side of that door, and of all the rejection and disappointments of her life, and suddenly, I didn’t want him setting foot in that treatment room.

“No,” I said.  “I will tell her.”  I put my happy face on and went into the room.  “Well, Nettie,” I said, “this is your lucky day!  You don’t have to get any of those long needle shots after all.  The doctor doesn’t think it will really help anyways, so he is recommending that we don’t do it.”

“Does that mean I have to live with this pain the rest of my life,” she asked, sounding a bit non-plussed.

“We need to go back to your pain management specialist,” I said, “and see what he has to say.  Maybe since this doctor feels like this wouldn’t be the best course of treatment for you, Dr. Coveleski will find something else that will work better.  Besides, Nettie!  Just think!  We can go get some shopping done now and we don’t have to worry about those shots.”

She looked a little unconvinced, but before long we were happily on our way for a little retail therapy.  At the mall, she bought a sixty-eight dollar bottle of Red Door perfume and I bought a Chrismassy sweater and both of us came home in a much better frame of mind.

Four weeks later, the van is repaired, looking better than it ever has on the passenger’s side.  Nettie has had a change in her pain meds that seem to be working quite well, and Certain Man and his wife have been living harmoniously and in forgiveness concerning the van mishap.

She stands in my kitchen, asking for money for gas.  

She speaks of Victoria’s Secret spray perfume wasted on her motel mirror by a child who was trying to clean the mirror.  She laughs, and her words stumble over themselves and slide together in a drugged sort of way.  She tries to give me a piece of the cake that she bought for her youngest’s birthday to the tune of 38+ dollars or at least a cupcake from the ones that she bought for the girls for theirs for fourteen.  

I feel sick.

Her children have new shoes.  The sparkly eye shadow circles her eyes and the tattoos peek from neckline and sleeves while the piercings, some so new I don’t remember them glitter in my kitchen’s bright light.  She left her car running for almost a half an hour while she tried to get gas money, and talked of other things.  I knew that there was something more on her mind.

“If I meet you part ways can the kids go back to Sunday School?” she says suddenly.  “Where could I meet you to bring them?  I’d like the kids to get back in church.”

I puzzle over this momentarily, but then name a place where she could meet us if she wants them to go.  I wonder again what it is that she really wants, but even though she hesitates on her way out like she almost has to say something else, she collects her two youngest ones and heads out.

Today she calls again, asking for my husband’s number.  I ponder asking “why?” but decide I don’t want to know.  I call him and warn him.

Yes.  She did need something else.  

Homeless since April, living in first one motel and then another, she has reached the end of resources.  The family is about to be put out onto the street.  The only way she can stay is if she comes up with $400.00.  She cries so hard he cannot understand her and so her live-in comes on the phone and explains the situation.

My husband’s heart is full of compassion for people.  He has tried so hard to help this family, and I hear his pain as he says, “I can only help this much.  If it is not enough, then it will have to just be that way.”  He is speaking to the person at the desk of their motel.  “It seems like they are buying what they want and begging for what they need and I cannot go on.  This is the last time that I will help them.”  There has been a lot of church money that we’ve given as well as pouring incredible amounts of our personal resources into this family.  My husband has reached the end.  I’ve known this was coming.

And I am glad.

Even when I write that, I feel guilty.  On one hand.  On the other, I am (just a little bit) excited to see what it is that God is going to do next in this situation.  I am so depleted that I cannot imagine anything good coming out of this.  But Jesus said that He can do the impossible.

I don’t even know what that looks like in this situation.

“Oh, Lord Jesus!  Once again, hold the little ones in your great love and may you accomplish your plan in their lives.  I do believe that you have a plan.  But oh!  This hurts!”

 

We were on our way home from church, Certain Man and I. I looked down at the ashes on the back of my left hand, and I took a tissue and wiped them all away. My heart felt sick and sad and I just didn’t feel like remembering.  The smell of the oil of lavender that I had mixed with them persisted faintly. I resisted the tears that had been threatening all morning, and wondered again at severe mercies and best laid plans going awry.

The previous Sunday, there were seven faces around the table in my Sunday School class.  It was an unusual situation with us practicing for the Christmas program, but it was still a good time together. I was hopeful that the kids would come back.  I knew that there wasn’t going to be oranges and candy bars and possibly gifts to lure them in, but I was still hopeful.  Saturday night I was especially glad for the promise that four of them would be there.

Then one had somewhere else to go, but that still left three.

Our lesson on this morning was on mercy.  It was the second half of the story of Jonah, and our book did a great job of bringing things together for teens in our world today and situations that they find themselves in.  My life had been so hectic at the end of this Christmas week with some heartaches that have been peculiarly my own, and I found myself needing to do last minute Sunday School prep at the expense of spending time with my family.  And I felt like I really needed to do that stuff for the Sunday School Class.  Plus, I had made a promise to one of the kids about editing an original creation of hers and printing it out so that she could hand it out this morning at church to anyone who might be interested.  I remembered it late Saturday night and managed to squeeze it in on Sunday morning, editing, formatting and printing it, then stapled things together on the way to church.

One of the things that I really like about our current Sunday School curriculum is that it often has something special for the teacher to prepare that will give a visual reminder to the students about the lesson.  For this lesson, I was to take ashes and mix them with oil and take them to class in a small container.  Just before closing, there was a thoughtful question about a time when we were in need of mercy and it was granted to us.  As a way of acknowledging that we have been recipients of mercy, we were to brush the mixture on the back of our hand to symbolize the sincerity of our repentance (as in “sackcloth and ashes”) and the consequential mercy we received.  So I got some fine ashes, mixed them with some Lavender and olive oils, put the mixture into a small container and put it into my teacher’s bag.  I felt as prepared as I could be under the circumstances, and was eagerly looking forward to the class time together with the three gals that were going to be there..

All around me, throughout the whole morning in the household of Certain Man and Certain Man’s Wife, the activity went on.  The Ohio Heart Throb was quite ill.  The three little villains were cuter than bugs, but testing the limits.  Eldest Son was very tired.  He had been out late with Youngest Son to Beloved Son in Law’s house.  Youngest Son and Girl with a Beautiful Heart were trying to pack to go back to Virginia.  There was lunch to make, showers to give, oven to set and relationships to nurture.  There were three hungry little boys, and this is never good.  I toyed with the thought that this might be a good morning to call my substitute and ask her to fill in.  But Certain Man and I were scheduled Greeters and there was also the promise made to my young friend to bring her the copies she wanted.

And so, I decided that I would go and be greeter with Certain Man, teach my class, give the stack of edited papers to my friend, listen to nephew Josh’s sermon (that I hate to miss) and come home as quickly as possible.  The “coming home as quickly as possible” was because an early lunch had been requested by the Offspringin’s.

A group of warm and friendly people gathered at our country church on Sunday morning.  And being greeter is always a joy.  For a church as small as ours, you would think the opportunity would present itself pretty often, but actually, It seems like it doesn’t come around often enough.  As the smiling faces passed through and the minutes ticked by and time for opening rolled around, my heart got heavier and heavier. It looked like there would be but one pupil in my class.

As quickly as I thought it, I was reminded that one student is ONE PERSON, and I happen to like this gal rather muchly, so I figured that God had a special reason for our time together, and that He intended for me to throw myself as much into the lesson as if the entire class was present.  I believed that God had a reason for my careful preparation and that He would use this lesson for good in Emily’s life as well as my own.  And so we gathered at the end of one table, close together.  I prayed for Emily, for the lesson, that our time together would be profitable and that we would both learn more about mercy.

I did the things that I had planned to do.  We discussed different situations in their degrees of “fairness” and discussed what should be the punishment for certain infractions.  We went over the story of Jonah and his desire for the Ninevites to be punished for their extreme cruelty.  We wondered what it was that moved the Ninevites to repentance and we talked about a God who desires to have mercy on us, but also desires us to have mercy.  Emily read a moving story in the student book of a Jewish woman who, at great cost to herself, had physically protected an Arab  man who was in danger of being murdered by an angry crowd after he had slashed two Jewish teenagers.  I refused to think about the fact that there were some other kids who desperately needed to hear this lesson.  When it was time for the final question, I brought out the small container of ashes and oil.  We talked about times when we have been in need of mercy, and I shared several instances from my life and brushed the dirty mixture across my left hand.  The lavender and the ashes stained the back of my hand.  Emily was wary, unconvinced.  It just looked too dirty to her. Besides, she could think of anything to share.  In the end, there was only one of us who climbed the steps back to the assembly with ashes on our hands.  It may have been on my left hand, but the Holy Spirit seemed to be witnessing to my spirit that it was truly on the right hand.

I kept catching a glimpse of the smudge during the service.  Josh preached on the fifth Sunday of Advent with his topic being JOY.  There was much to think about as I felt the curling of sadness around the edges of my soul. There have been many shadows that have fallen on brightest hours in these December days.  I kept thinking about how mercy is a compelling reason for Joy.  That the mercy extended to me should bring a wellspring of joy that cannot not be silenced.  That the pain, and darkness and even sin that threaten my joy are nothing in comparison to the gift that I’ve been given — not just once, but over and over and over again, in an ongoing stream, deeper and wider and longer than I can begin to comprehend.

“O depth of mercy!  Can it be? That Gate was left ajar for me?”

For me?

When I allow impatience to bring out ugliness towards the ones I love best?

For me?

When my judgmental heart reserves the right to think I know best?

For me?

When my way of life and my way of doing things and my way of family builds walls instead of bridges?

For me?

When I expect others to extend grace for my imperfections but I expect them to do live in a way that doesn’t require grace from me?

For me?

When my disappointment in others makes me want to withdraw from their lives, to withhold that which I could give?

. . . I should have left the smudge on for another day, another week, another month, another year.

I need to be reminded again and again.  Severe mercies are mercies none the less. And they can be the well spring of joy if only I let the mercy river run deep and wide and long.

For me.  Yes, for me.  Grace enough and mercy granted for me.

It only becomes joy when it intentionally slips through my hands to others.

“Oh, Lord Jesus!  Of all the gifts you’ve given me, may I be the least selfish with mercy.”

“Mom, you never make Swedish Tea Rings anymore,” said Middle Daughter on an afternoon in November.  “You used to make them every Christmas, but we haven’t had them in years!”

“Maybe this will be the year I get that done,” I said.  “We can certainly try!”

“You always say that,” she said, “but it seems like we just never get to it.”

“Okay,” I said.  “This year will be different.  I promise to make Swedish Tea Rings some time over Christmas this year.”

She didn’t say it, but I could tell from the look on her face that she was a bit skeptical as whether this would ever happen.

Swedish Tea Rings.

When I was a young wife, one year around Christmas I stopped over at the home of our neighbors, Earl and Alice Yutzy.  They lived down the road from us and I knew some of their daughters.  Alice was up to her elbows in baking on that particular day, and I was intrigued with the beautiful round pastries that she was turning out.

“What are those?” I asked.  “They really look good!”

“They are Swedish Tea Rings,” she answered.  “I make them at Christmas to give away.”  The rings were set around her kitchen in various stages of completion.  Some were rising, some were just baked, some were iced, and she had even decorated some of them with red and green candied cherries, cut and placed to look like Christmas greenery and berries or flowers.

I was young and foolish and impulsive and over-confident.  “Could I have your recipe?” I asked her.  “I would like to try to make them.”

I’ve often wondered what she thought.  If I had known how much trouble they were to make I would have: 1) Understood why she only made them once a year, and 2) Never attempted to even begin to make them.  But Alice was, first and foremost, gracious.  She was also encouraging.  And I watched her make those tea rings, and I called her one day and scribbled down the recipe on a page in our local phone book that didn’t have much on it, and I learned how to make tea rings.

There came a day when my paper was almost unreadable, and I wrote it in a recipe book that was just for writing down personal favorites and that is where I was able to keep tabs of where it was when I needed it.

This season has been busy.  Certain Man finished his village a full three weeks later than usual.  There are some of my Manger scenes that haven’t even gotten up.  Those that have made it up through the faithful help of Middle and Youngest Daughter.  At the back of my mind, though has been this promise about making Swedish Tea Rings this year.  On this gloriously quiet Christmas day, I decided that there was no better time than now to get started.  And so, I DID!

There were some very confused and worried moments while they were mixing because I forgot a whole cup of evaporated milk that the recipe called for.  But I put it in and it all mixed up very nice.  Then I weighed everything else, dividing the dough into individual pieces so that I knew exactly how much dough would be in each ring.  Then I weighed and divided the filling so that there would be the right amount for each ring, and I wouldn’t have to guess.  I set these on a sheet of waxed paper, close at hand.

When everything was completely ready, I set to work.  The dough had to be thoroughly chilled, so I put the first ones into the freezer while I finished weighing everything out.  Then I got the first pack and the greatly simplified assembly proceeded.

First, I rolled the dough into a rectangle, approximately 9″X12″–

Then I took one of the premeasured filling portions and spread it over the dough like this:

Then, I rolled it up like this:

And then joined the ends together to form a circle like this, and placed it on a sheet of foil that I could transfer it to a cookie sheet.

This next process is one that took a very long time for me to understand and learn to do.  The instructions were to make cuts all the way around the “wheel” like this:

Then the trick is to carefully take each section and turn it gently on its side like this:

Then the creation is allowed to rise for about an hour — less if it is really warm in your kitchen and more if it is chilly, then it is popped into the oven at 375 degrees for about twenty minutes and it comes out looking all brown and good, and we put icing on them and they look like this:  Ready to eat or give away, or package for later.

Alice always had beautifully proportioned and perfect looking things.  Mine usually taste okay, but I just cannot match the perfection that I still see in my mind’s eye when I think of hers.

But my family say they taste as good as ever.  They have been effusive in their praise.  I don’t think they taste quite right, but I cannot say that out loud.  They forbid me to complain about the food that I make.  They said that I am never satisfied with food I make.  Which is pretty much true.  I think that something is wrong with my taste buds.  Nothing ever tastes quite right.

I think it must be something that comes with six decades of overuse.

1 box (20 or 22 quart size) Powdered Milk 

1 – 12 oz. can of Ovaltine Rich Chocolate Mix (blue plastic jar)

1 – 30 oz. canister regular chocolate Nesquik

1 – 22 oz. jar of regular flavor powdered coffee creamer (I like to use the store brand)

2 pounds of Domino powdered sugar

Mix all together thoroughly, and store in a large container

 (This recipe fills a 9 quart Tupperware container)

Directions:

Fill cup 1/3 t0 1/2 full of mix.  Add Hot/boiling water to top.

Stir and enjoy!

I was tying BL’s shoes the other morning, getting her ready for the DART bus that would take her to Easter Seals Day Program, and I suddenly remembered that there was one Christmas when I put red ribbons and jingle bells on her shoes and the Powers That Be removed them rather promptly.

And that made me suddenly homesick for Old Gertrude.  This season was her favorite of all.  She believed in Santa Claus with a childlike faith that put him right up there next to God.  Sometimes Oldest Daughter would tease her and say, “Gertie, Santa Claus isn’t coming this year.  He got hit by a car and he DIED!”  That would really set her off.  She knew that Christina was teasing, but she honestly felt that she was guilty of a terrible sin, probably blasphemy in the nth degree, and she would hush her and scold her and raise quite a fuss.  She loved for me to put red velvet ribbons on her shoes with jingle bells that jingled merrily with every step she took.  She would sit in her chair and shake her feet and smile conspiratorially to herself while the bells rang on and on.  After BL’s center reacted so negatively to her bells, I wonder what Gertrude’s Day Program must have thought.  I’m so glad they didn’t make her take them off.  They gave her so much joy.!  Here is an old post from 2006 that couldn’t be truer if I had written it just today — except for the dates which are glaringly off.  I had forgotten that I had written it, so I enjoyed it as much as any of you will.  As the years pass, there are things I almost forget — and I want to remember.  The memories make our lives so rich, our hearts so full.  I’ve been so blessed.  My heart gives grateful praise.

For almost twenty Christmases,
Old Gertrude
shared our carols, our Shrimp Chowder, the ageless Christmas story and the gifts.
Oh, how she loved the gifts!
How fervently she believed in Santa Claus!
Last year, she went to Heaven in October and was buried in early November.
At Stockley Center.
In the cemetery for the indigent and Mentally Challenged.  (That’s the new word — Gertrude hated the old one.)
Then Daddy died and nothing was right about last Christmas.  I hardly had time to think about Old Gertrude and how much she loved the season.  Besides, there wasn’t much to enjoy last year.  Just a new, wrenching grief and so many things for my hands to do that my heart didn’t catch up for several months.
Today, getting ready for our family celebration tonight, the gifts are wrapped, the tree is twinkling, the village is resplendent in it beauty, and, out of the blue, Youngest Daughter says,  “You know, I MISS Gertrude so much today.”
Suddenly, the ache in my heart gets wider.

Gertrude!
She would have parked herself in the chair beside the tree every night since it went up and would have sang the carols and eaten chocolate, (getting it all over herself!)  She would have rubbed her hands together in gleeful anticipation of the packages under the tree, and would have listened as Certain Man read the Christmas story and Christmas prayers were offered. She would have rooted through her Christmas stocking and made a royal mess of things and would have been delighted with stuff that I could have imagined that she wouldn’t have looked at twice, and dismissed the things I chose so carefully with a sniff and an impatient wave of her hand.
Gertrude!
I miss her songs and I miss her childlike faith and enthusiasm.  I miss her unconditional love and her uncompromising loyalty.  She didn’t care if the house was a mess, she loved the simplest things to eat, she made me laugh and sometimes she frustrated me no end. She never wanted to hurry, and she didn’t care if everyone in the house was telling her to move, she would stand where she was and say with dignity and force “Don’t rush me.  You’ll cause me to fall!”

The picture above was taken at a small group caroling time several years ago.  Old Gertrude never could read, but she loved to pretend that she could.  I snapped this priceless photo and it couldn’t be more definitive of what Old Gertrude was like.

Oh, Gertie.  What a gift you were to our family!
I wish that you were sitting by our fire tonight.

I pull the flannel sheets from the dryer.  They belong on the beds of Nettie and Cecilia.  I bought them from Kohl’s some time ago on a magnificent sale.  They are so soft and warm and fluffy.  When I clean the lint from the lint trap it is soft and airy.  I would like to put these soft, warm sheets back on their beds.  They feel so comforting!

But when I strip the beds in the morning, Nettie cannot bear to wait until the sheets are washed and dried to have the beds made up again.  I’ve learned that to her, an unmade bed speaks of my neglect and uncaring towards her and it feels like nothing is right or predictable in her world.  If I even procrastinate at making up the beds once they are stripped, it worries her exceedingly.  So I learned early on to strip the beds and try hard to have them made before the timer goes off marking the 30 minute wait she has on Saturday mornings following her weekly “bone pill.”  The timer tells her that she can safely eat her breakfast.  It tells me that I should be done stripping and remaking the two twin beds in the bedroom that she and BL share.

A few weeks ago, when the weather turned cooler, I brought out the two sets of flannel sheets that I use alternately on the the ladies’ beds during the winter.  One is the wonderfully soft and warm set that I spoke of earlier.  It is light blue with white puffs on it that look like clouds, and looks warm and inviting.  The other set is flannel.  It is steel gray-blue.  It is serviceable and warm, but it is not very soft.  Even dried in the dryer with softener doesn’t seem to change the fact that it isn’t all that soft.  But it keeps Nettie and Cecilia warm.  And Cecilia never acts like there is anything wrong with it.  Nettie thanks me for making her bed sometimes and for putting an extra blanket on it, but she never seems to notice the difference in the sheets.  When I take one set off, I put the other set on without mention or fanfare.

Why does this make me think about Grace?  I was pulling that soft, airy lint from the lint trap today and thinking about the Grace that is so welcome in my life.  The Grace that is so warm and comforting and attractive.  And I wonder how often I miss that kind of Grace because I am so insistent on things being done in my time and in my way.

But there is that other kind of Grace.  It is not soft.  But it keeps me warm and it is certainly serviceable in my life.  And just maybe it will prove to be more durable over the long haul.  And if it accomplishes what it was intended to accomplish, maybe it doesn’t matter so much how pleased I am with what it feels like.  Because when all is said and done, aesthetic values aside, I need grace for the long haul, not the short pleasure.