Delaware Grammy

Rest in Peace

Ralph Yutzy

June 9, 1924-November 11, 2010

 

He did many things well.

But the best thing he did

was to give life to

the man I love most.

 

 

 

Certain Man began his Christmas Village work in earnest last week.  With Youngest Daughter coming home for Thanksgiving week, and our family wanting to have “Little Christmas” while she is home with us, he looked at his schedule and saw chickens coming in, a nephew’s wedding, and then commissioning for Rachel and said, “If I’m going to have this done before she comes home, I need to get busy!”

And so, he did!

 

 

Slowly, under his careful craftsmanship, it took shape:

 

 

 

And what would we have ever done without the help of Middle Daughter?  I took these next pictures to show how she really does endanger life and limb to organize the shelf over the basement steps so that all the boxes fit there properly. 

With lots of tender care —

                            

. . .she turns this                                                                                into this!

 

 

My precious pilgrims take second place.  I still have many of them out (and actually just received a beautiful set from Cracker barrel this week that I set up).  But I know their time is limited this year.  Soon it will be time to hang the stockings and set up the tree.  In the meantime, Certain Man worked and worked and finally, last night, it was time to turn on the lights.

 

And so, the Christmas Village at Shady Acres is open for business.
Come on down and see it if you get a chance!

 

Besides, the Thankful Wall is still up, and many a person has escaped without giving thanks.
So there’s lots of room there to put your thanks into words for the rest of us to see.
I even filled our nine quart canister with Yutzy’s Hot Chocolate Mix, and I’ll fix you a cup and you can sit a spell and chat.

I couldn’t mean it more.  Hope to see some of you over the next few weeks.

 

A friend who is rather new to my Xanga account asked me today if I’ve always enjoyed writing.

That question really brought down a ton of memories!

And actually, yes, I have written since I was a wee girl. 

The first time I realized that I could put my thoughts down on paper was when I was a third or fourth grader, and one of my friend’s father had died, leaving a young wife and six children aged 18 months to eleven years old.  He was one of my father’s best friends, and my daddy was really affected by his death.  I remember coming home from the funeral and my Daddy sat dark and quiet in the living room.  Sometimes wiping tears.  This was my world gone so wrong.  My friend’s Daddy suddenly gone, and my Daddy so grief-stricken. 

I remember going upstairs to my room, crawling into my old metal bed, and listening to our old stereo playing in the living room below. “Under his wings, I am safely abiding, though the night deepens and tempests are wild.  Still I can trust Him, I know He will keep me.  He has redeemed me and I am His child.  Under His wings, Under His wings.  Who from His love can sever?  Under His wings, my soul shall abide.  Safely abide forever.” 

I had this burning in my soul, something I couldn’t define.  It was a need to put this into words, and I crept out of bed and found a tablet and began to write what I was hearing, what I was feeling, what I was thinking.  But then I didn’t know what to do with it.  Here was this piece of paper that I had written stuff on and it felt important to me, but what did I do with it now?  I didn’t know what to call it.  I never wrote anything in a tablet unless it was a letter to my pen pal that I had gotten out of the Words of Cheer Sunday School paper that came in our family’s box at church every Sunday morning.  And this wasn’t a letter to anybody.   It really confused me.

I pulled the paper out of the old lined tablet and folded it up and took it down the steps to the trash can.  I felt embarrassed and uncomfortable.  I wanted to show it to someone, but that didn’t feel right either.  I came around the stairway and came face to face with my mother.  I must have looked guilty (something that I often was!) and she said, (not unkindly) “What are you up to, Mary Ann?”

“Aw, nothin’,” I said, unconvincingly, standing there with the paper in my hand, wanting to show her, but feeling so strange.  She would have encouraged me if I had just shown her, told her, something, but I was so unfamiliar with what I was feeling and what I had done.

“Are you writing a letter to someone?” she asked.

Ah, relief, an excuse! “Uh, yes,” I said, “but I decided not to.”   And I went on to the trash can and threw it in.

But the feeling didn’t end when I threw that away.  The need to “write it down” or “put it into words” or “tell the story” became a very familiar feeling to me.  And then I got into eighth grade and a young English teacher, Henry Shank, began assigning weekly compositions to the eighth grade class.  While the others moaned and labored, I secretly loved it with all my heart, and then he told my parents that I had a gift!  And that he was harder on me when he graded my compositions because he knew I could do better!  I remember that when my Mama came home from parent teacher conferences and told me that, her eyes were shining and it made me feel like working really, really hard at learning all I could about crafting words into something people would like to read.

And then I had one year at the local public high school and I had the incredible opportunity to be in the college prep English class taught by Mr. Lou Reynelds.  He was a legend when it came to English comp.  I will never forget the day he publicly ridiculed me for using an apostrophe in “its” when I was using it as a possessive.  I remember his voice thundering out over the whole class while he made sure that I (and everyone else there that day) never forgot that “the only time “its” has an apostrophe is when it’s a contraction!”.  I wrote for him all through my junior year of high school, and his vicious red pen tore my compositions apart.  And what a stickler for spelling!  He would send my compositions back with an A over a D for spelling and he would average the two grades and that would be my grade for the composition.  It ground my gears to be writing stuff that was worth an A and be knocked down to a c+ because of technicalities.  So I learned to look things up and figured out that it wasn’t for his sake that I needed to be accurate, but rather it was for my sake.  If people were ever going to take me seriously, I couldn’t go around making grammatical mistakes and spelling and punctuation errors.  Especially if I ever wanted to be heard.

I still love to write.  I still love crafting a story.  I’m still careful about grammar and spelling.  I believe that words are the most powerful force in the world.  And it is a sacred trust to be able to write things and have people read them.  I think people should be careful about a whole lot more than grammar and spelling when they write things for people to read.  They should be careful to write things that will build understanding between people.  They should write things that help people verbalize what is in their own hearts so that when someone reads what they wrote, there is a sense of being understood, and a sense of community.  I believe that we need to know that the damage that words can do is so devastating that people sometimes never recover from things we say without thinking.  And words can bring encouragement and light and life where there seems to be only a hopeless abyss.

But what I love most of all is that Jesus, my Redeemer and Lord, referred to Himself as “The Word.”  Listen to these words from John 1.

 ¹In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Every time I hear someone say, “It’s just empty words,” (something we’ve certainly heard a lot in the last month!) I think about this verse, and think of the incredible power in words.  And remember that God Himself described Himself as “The Word.” 

There is nothing so powerful. 

And those of us who love words should stand in awe of what has been entrusted to our care.

 

Certain Man has today and tomorrow off — as well as half of Thursday.  One of the perks of living in slower, lower DE, is that if you are a state employee and live or work in Sussex County, you still get to celebrate “Returns Day” with a half day off.  There is no other place in the United States that still celebrates this holiday, so we think it is pretty special!  Two days after election day, there is a parade, and the candidates ride together in open carriages and there is a symbolic “burying of the hatchet”.  (I wonder if the “two Chris people” will be able to do this.  )  All this on Thursday afternoon.  So this week is one when Certain Man decided that, with all his time off, he was going to get his Christmas Village up.

I know, I know.  It is early.  But it is another one of those years when the Yutzy family will be celebrating Thanksgiving on Thursday and “Little Christmas” on Saturday of the same week.  This is what our family does when one of our offspringin’s can’t be here for actual Christmas.  We decorate the tree, we set up the village, we hang the stockings, we draw the names.  And then on the eve of the last day that the particular child is home, we have “Little Christmas”.  I make shrimp chowder, bring out the sparkling fruit juices, and we eat our traditional Christmas Eve meal together.  Then the family does the gift exchange arising out of the name drawing, and the departing member gets her Stocking gifts and any other gifts that the family is going to give her.

I’m in a love/hate relationship with this arrangement.  And this week, I turned the calendar page and I can no longer ignore the notations there:  November 19th: To Ohio — Commissioning.  November 20th: Rachel home from Ohio.  And then a week with heart stickers and various appointments and celebrations.  Then, November 28th — Rachel back to Ohio.  And December 2nd, penciled in the empty places at the end of the week on the November page —  Rachel flies to Thailand.

I stand out on the back deck this evening after the chilly night has moved in, look up at the expanse of stars that light our dark corner of Delaware and sing a song of parting and sad farewell.  My voice, getting old sounding now, and cracking on the higher notes, feels insignificant against the darkness.  I think about partings and how we have no promise of tomorrow and I blink back the tears and come back into the warmth and light of my laundry room.  There is so much that I could finish tonight if I just would.  Standing by my trusty washer and dryer, I feel the dead sadness in my soul, and put my head against the cool metal and whisper a prayer for my far away girlie and for all the things that feel so out of my control right now.  But I know that someone will catch me if I linger there too long and worry.  So once again, I blink back the tears and take the clothes out of the dryer.  They are warm and clean and dry and they smell so incredibly good.  I find myself feeling so grateful for these machines that make my life so much easier.

It’s a good time to count blessings.  There is an honest need to focus here.  Not to deny the sadness.  Not to pretend that everything is okay.  But to acknowledge that God has blessed this family abundantly.  He loves our offspringin’ with a far greater love than Certain Man and I can imagine.  He is to be trusted to reach where our hands cannot.  He will do far more than we can ask or think, and for this, I give grateful praise.

 

 

“Are you going to go over your bean patch today?” I hear the cheery voice of Youngest Brother in my ear as I am frying hamburger for casseroles for the Hymn Sing our church is having on Sunday.

“I sorta’ thought I might,” I answer, mentally juggling the day ahead of me, and wondering how I would get everything done.  “I heard it’s supposed to get cold tonight,”

“They’re calling for frost,” says Mark, Jr., “I’m out here in my patch right now.  Figured it wouldn’t hurt to go over them one last time, just in case.”

“Are you getting any?” I ask, though I figured he must be or he wouldn’t be asking about mine.

“I got that little blue bucket of Mama’s almost full,” he says, “not really all that many, but still some.  I thought the way your patch has produced this year, maybe you were going to go over yours.”

“If it’s going to frost, I DO want to go over mine!”   I look over the kitchen with the hamburger almost done, and get a few things out of the way, and then head out to my patch.  Friends JR and Linda are with me, to see if there are any green peppers out there.  They have in their heads to make coleslaw for the Hymn Sing, and the recipe calls for a few green peppers.

“I’m sure I have some,” I offer.  Let’s go look!”

I have some alright!

In fact I have lots!

(That’s a five gallon bucket!)

JR and Linda only want a few, so the others will get given away or made into relish.  JR and Linda take their peppers and head out to look for cabbage.  I decide to pick my beans as quickly as I can.  It’s cold out here today, and my house and my chair and my fire beckon me.

Last week’s frost wasn’t too hard on them, but the vines are definitely loosing their luster.  I find some nice beans hanging amid the turning leaves as I make my way down one side and up the other and then start all over again.

Whoops, I did miss a few in the last picking!

There is a steady wind, and the chill settles into my bones.  I wonder a time or two if it is really worth it.  My hands feel stiff and awkward.

Oldest Son’s jacket that still hangs on the basement door is really warm, but it doesn’t help those fingers.  I remember the hot, hot days of August when I picked beans and thought I would die of heat out there.  The thought of those days keeps me plugging on.  Besides, every time I think I’m going to quit, I find a whole big bunch of beans, all together on a heap, (as it often happens) and it inspires me to keep going.  

Halfway through the first row, and pickup pulls in the chicken house lane, stopping me mid verse of “What a Friend We Have in Jesus” and an elderly man gets out and walks over to the garden.  He wants to paint the chicken house roof.  I tell him that we aren’t doing that right now.  He wants a few cherry tomatoes that are falling off the vines in great abundance and I tell him to help himself.  He does, then leaves and I go back to my row and my song.

Then the phone in my pocket rings.  Eldest Daughter is stopping by with Love Bug, and I welcome the diversion, going over to the car window to talk to the little girlie who always gives my heart a song.  While I’m talking to her, I notice a strange van parked in my driveway, and so I head to the house to see who might be coming to see me.  Too late, I realize that I’ve been chosen (again!) to be visited by the members of a local cult that like to proselytize on days like this.  I speak to them briefly, and then send them on their way.  I really need to get these beans picked.  The last time I went over the patch, I got two bushel.  Today is not quite so beneficial. 

But it is still a good amount, and Our Girl Nettie will shell them this evening for me and they will be a blessing to someone.

Before leaving the garden, I make a quick survey of the end of summer things there.

The ground cherries are almost all finished:

Certain Man’s steer comes over to the fence to see what I am doing.

He pokes his nose in my directions and snuffs at me with a disdainful sort of noise.  I go into the barn where Certain Man has the straw stacked for the winter. 

A barn cat, snuggled on the corner of the pile startles when I come in and disappears into the cracks somewhere.  Our barn cats are not pets.  They are servants.  Keeping down the mouse population is an important job, and we appreciate their help.

Back out in the sunlight, I pick up my two buckets of produce (the peppers and the beans) and head for the house.  Certain Man will be home before long, and I have lots to accomplish yet tonight.  The countryside is peaceful, and the air is crisp.  It’s a wonderful day to be alive.

Back in the house, it isn’t long until JR and Linda return, their mission successful.  They found beautiful cabbage for only $1.50 a head at Tucker’s produce, and they get right to work on turning their seven or eight heads into coleslaw.

JR runs the food processor, dumping the cabbage, carrots, peppers and onion into my big old mixing container.

Linda mixed the dressing together, and then worked at getting everything thoroughly mixed.

It took a strong arm and some persistence

But things always go better when it’s a team effort!

Finally!  Almost all done.  The measurement on the side says about six gallons.

Do you think it will be enough???

Maybe.  If we can just keep Mr. Campbell out of it!!!  One way to do that is to distract him.  He also is great at tuning pianos.  One of his intentions for this day is to get the piano tuned that belongs to Certain Man’s Wife.  So when the coleslaw is all made and some supper is eaten, he gets busy on the piano while the ladies get busy on the five big casseroles for Sunday’s Hymn Sing.

Doesn’t look like much here, but it is one wonderful casserole. (And we couldn’t have made it without great help.)

I know, I know, it looks like grand chaos, but it was really a great organizational feat!  Ruby got things commandeered, and the gals really marched through it.  Before we know what is happening, the food is all done and the kitchen is getting cleaned up at a remarkable rate.

What this picture doesn’t show is Mrs. Ilva’s irritation at the piano tuning that is going on.  A musical soul, she is, and the never ending “plink, plink, plink” really is getting on her nerves.  Especially when JR trills a scale and doesn’t quite finish it.  At the end of the evening, she has quite enough.  She and Shirley each get some money and march into the living room where JR is attentively slaving away on the piano.

“Here!”  She says insistently.  “We wanna’ give you this.  We want you to go get some of them thar’ pianer lessins so that you can learn to play decent!”

He looks at them like — Well, you can pretty much tell how he is looking!

“We want you to get some of them thar’ lessins,” reiterates Ilva, “so’s you can learn how to finish them thar’ scales.  You always leave off a note or two.”  She plinks a few notes to demonstrate what she meant.

Poor JR.  He is not impressed.  And she finally gives up goes went home. 

And when the casseroles and the coleslaw were safely in the fridge, and the kitchen was cleaned up yet again, I pull out the ingredients for yet another Hymn Sing specialty.

Before the morning service, we are having some “come on in, we’re so glad you’re here!” kinds of things — one of which is homemade cinnamon rolls.  I mix up four batches of dough and get them into the fridge, and call it a day. 

Well, not quite yet.  For the first time in my computer career, I field three intense conversations at the same time — one with Eldest Daughter, one with Youngest Son, and one with my far away, almost a daughter, Lupe.

And then I find Certain Man asleep on his La-Z-Boy, and almost give him a heart attack when I rub his foot to wake him up.  It’s eleven-thirty.  And we really do call it a day.  Climb that mountain to our comfy bed and I’m asleep almost before I can turn out the light.

Whew!  What a grand, rewarding day.  It was truly worth every minute!

 

The rain fell in cascades down the windows of the sun room today —

 

The ferocity of it beckoned me out, and I opened the side door and watched it fall.

It pooled under the Crape Myrtle tree and the swamp maples that Certain Man has planted.

 

The leaves stuck to the new lumber on the deck with their soggy beauty like a designer rug, brought out for this rainy Autumn day.

 

The wind was wild, and it caught my Harvest flag and tossed it up and out into the unrelenting spray.
Under our grand old Magnolia, the water ran in a gentle stream.

On the back side of the garage, the gutters overflowed, dumping gallons of water on the patio below.  Certain Man would have gotten up there to clean them out.  Me???  Not so inclined.

 

The impatiens were lovely in the downpour.  I watched the raindrops slide over their soft petals and off to the deck below.  Summer flowers, still so lovely in this last week of October.  They bring joy to my heart, even as I revel in the colors of this season.  Somehow they speak courage to me, and remind me that we never know how and when and where God might choose to use us to encourage someone along the way. 

Even (maybe ESPECIALLY) when the time has come that you feel like you should be long gone, our Heavenly Father just might have a plan for you to stand quietly in the storm and let the beauty He’s given you shine through the tears that slip quietly off your face.  Don’t give up, dear friends.  There is beauty in the wildest storm.

We are in a short series of Revival meetings at our little country church.  Over the years, with children and ladies and homeschool and all the many things that occupied our time, We would often hire someone to come in and watch the ladies so I could go to church and enjoy the meeting without distractions.  But Cecilia and Nettie go to church with us on Sunday mornings, and I decided against trying to find someone for this week. 

Yesterday afternoon, after lunch was pretty much cleared away, I went in to Nettie’s room and said, “Nettie, we have church tonight.”

She looked up in her usual Sunday afternoon sleepiness and said, “Do I hafta’ go?”

“Yes, I think you will.  I don’t have anyone to watch you and Cecilia, so I thought you could just go along.”

She looked a little displeased, but said, “What time do I hafta’ be ready?”

“Six-thirty,” I told her.  “We’ll probably try to get out of here around then.”

She snuffled around a bit, but didn’t fuss too much.  She has been very comfortable with the women of our church, and she had not been to Sunday School yesterday morning because Middle Daughter had worked the night before, got in very late in the morning and opted to stay home with Nettie and Cecilia.  I suspected that she really wasn’t too upset.

We had a good service last evening, and even though we were done by around eight o’clock, people hung around and talked.  I wanted to get my ladies home because Nettie likes to be in bed by nine o’clock.  But the fellowship was sweet, and before we knew what was happening, once again, it was almost 9:30 and it was Gary, Robert and Loretta and Certain Man and me — and our two ladies, sitting in their chairs at the back of the sanctuary.  Robert and Gary locked up and turned out the lights, Certain Man went and got the van, and I got Cecilia’s shoes on her and gathered up the various belongings and headed out.  Certain Man helped Cecilia down over the troublesome front foyer steps and out into the car, and I made sure that Nettie didn’t need help with her seat belt.

“I tell you what,” said Our Girl Nettie as we pulled out of the parking lot,  “Cecilia and I are nuffin’ but a pain in nuh neck!”

“Don’t say that, Nettie,” I said good naturedly.  “You are NOT a pain in the neck!”

“I ‘fink we are — ” she ventured.

“Nope,” says Certain Man, who teases Nettie whenever he gets a good chance (to her great delight — she loves him to death) “You guys aren’t a pain in the neck, you’re a pain in the BUTT!!!”

That made her laugh, but I got to thinking about who was really inconveniencing whom, and I said, “You know, Nettie, Daniel and I are the real pains in the neck.  You guys wait and wait and are so patient and we stay around and stay around church and never go home ’till the last cat dies, and you never complain–“

“I doan wan’ you never to mention ‘at to me again!” I heard a very firm voice in the back seat say.  It had a tenor I have seldom heard.  I was very confused.

“What are you saying, Nettie?” I asked.  Was she really being so protective of Certain Man’s and my right to stay at church as long as we wanted?

“I doan wan’ you never to mention ‘at to me again!”  Firmer voice.  No edge of laughter.   

H-m-m-m-m-m-m.  I looked over in the darkness at Certain Man.  He was clearly as puzzled as I was.

“Mention WHAT???”

“THE CAT!” 

Oh.

 

“I got you covered, Nettie-Girl!”

(If you don’t understand this post, see my September 22, 2010 posting)

 

First things first:

Our baby is 20 years old today!

Happy Birthday, Rachel!  

 

We are making special efforts to be sure
that this little girlie doesn’t forget her “Auntie Rach”.
(So far she gets it right every time!)

We miss, miss, MISS you!
We are counting the days!

 

This splash of color gives me a sudden burst of joy every time I see it.

Certain Man and Middle Daughter both bought mums for me in the last week.
I have never had much luck in keeping them over the winter.
You know what?
I’m going to try again!

Shady Acres had its first hard frost last night.  I looked out at the expanse of yard and saw the markings of white that circled around.  In the area that is from the house to about a hundred feet out, (a point where the “concentration of vegetation” lessens) there appeared to be no frost.  I wonder if my flowers might have made it through.  Certain Man is quite sure that the lima beans did not.  I am sorry on one hand.  But on the other, over 75 quarts of frozen lima beans from my little patch is nothing to complain about.  They surely did not owe me anything.  I did think when I picked them this week and got over two bushels that it might be my last picking, so I picked them “tight” — taking some that I would have left if I was certain to have another chance at them. 

Remember this picture?

Certain Man is antsy when his yard looks like this. 
So he got busy the very first night and worked and worked on it.
Then Chainsaw Gary came down and worked almost every day–
cutting up the usable branches into logs for his outside furnace,
and stacking the brush on a pile.
He has hauled a nice amount of firewood up to his house.
Yesterday, he came up and loaded the brush on his dump trailer
and hauled it out to the old burn pile.
(Yep, Certain Man is starting a new burn pile!)

Today, this is what it looks like in the side yard:

All cleaned up and ready for the winter. 
One of these days, we will get the deck railing on and it will all look a whole lot better.

It’s a gorgeous day in Southern Delaware. 
I am having trouble concentrating on house things that need doing.
Now that this is done, I really have no legit diversion.
Oh, boy!!!
I guess that means:
“Kitchen, kitchen, here I come!”

 

 

Five years ago, Old Gertrude went home to Heaven.

Today I mourn the loss of a good friend.

Her Love was the purest form.

Her forgiveness was up to date.

Her loyalty — uncompromising.

And I don’t wish her back.

Never!

But sometimes, the smell of Scrapple frying–

The first fire in the pellet stove in Autumn-

The sight of her Santa Claus that still sings “Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town”–

Hearing and seeing jingle bells tied to velvet red bows —

And setting up the Christmas tree-

These things remind me of a severely handicapped old lady

Whose presence in our home

Changed us all

And made us better people.

 

I have had such a happy day today!

My two sisters asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday. 

I seldom get to spend time with my sisters.  We are best friends, but we go to different churches, and we all three have very diverse lives.  Each one of us dearly loves the church family we belong to, and have good friends there.  But we often do neglect getting together like we should because we each have lots of things to attend to with our families and our church responsibilities.

And so, when they asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday, I said,
“All I really want for my birthday is a day to be with my sisters and do something fun!”

And so, they made plans to go down to Salisbury,
visit the famous Country House,
eat lunch together somewhere,
and TALK. 
Today we did just that.

I feel so incredibly cherished and relaxed and happy!
We had a wonderful day together.

And look what I got for my birthday!

Certain Man will hang it up for me and when I look at it, I will remember this happy day and be so very grateful to my precious sisters for the gift of this golden day!

Sarah and Alma, THANK-YOU, THANK-YOU, THANK-YOU!!!