Category: Uncategorized

It starts with an unexpected knock on the door. “Are we expecting anyone?” the residents ask. Probably not if it is Charles McClelland with a smile on his face and a bouquet in his hands. He works part time delivering flowers for a local shop. “Every once in a while they are shocked. You can…

“To do no harm” meant any life in Jefferson’s world. Simply stated Jefferson said, “I am not willing to stand aside and allow this concept of expendable human lives to turn this great land of ours into just another exclusive reservation where only the perfect, the privileged and the planned have the right to live.”…

Facebook tributes lauded the late Jim Robinson, submariner and founder of Labella, for his love, helpfulness and friendship. Author Kimberly Woodhouse and her young family once lived in El Dorado. She wrote, “More than two decades ago, Jim was a huge factor in getting help for our daughter when she was a baby and the…

Recently there was a county wide sew day. I invited my sister to fly in for it and to visit a couple sewing groups. Add tourism and I promised her a busy week. Instead we learned that “The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” Two weeks before her departure I texted,…

Prince Charming knelt before Cinderella, pulled out the glass slipper and slipped it smoothly onto her foot. It fit. Birds sang, flowers floated through the air. For he had found his One True Love. They married and lived happily ever after. I was reminded of that last week as my 80 year-old Prince Charming with…

My hubby and I just had our birthdays last week. Despite the our latest turn around the sun, we stay active and independent. Case in point: remember how they moved those giant blocks to build pyramids in the 1950s film, “The Ten Commandments”? 1. Place a few sturdy rods under a bulky object. 2. Attach…

Good thing we celebrated my husband’s 80th birthday a week early. He did not get a party on the actual date. I woke up with an elbow so swollen with arthritis that I could not comb my hair, let alone applaud his eighth decade of life. He left me to exercise while he finally heeded…

Brakes screeched the day Fred Belin saw a bobcat in the tree in front of a house near El Dorado Chemical. He had to take a closer look. “We stopped and asked the man at the house, ‘what is going on?’” The bobcat did not wait for an explanation. It jumped out of the tree…

 The holidays have ended with all their festivities, gift exchanges, baked goods and other ways of saying “I am thinking of you.” For better or for worse, the new year has come with its time for resolutions. One resolution everyone should make is to write eight letters to family and friends. Just eight letters. Not…

This year I resolved to try recipes from cookbooks I find at yard sales. Last summer, I chuckled when I read the title, “The Non-Chew Cookbook.” I bought the cookbook for that oxymoron of a title. Then I read the foreword and quit laughing. The inability to chew presents a serious nutritional problem for folks…

Forty years ago in a modest two-story house in Indiana, we switched to bunk beds to give our growing family of five boys room to play and sleep. My handy man used 2″x4” beams and sheets of plywood to build two sets of bunks for the boys. Each set had drawers on the bottom. He…

I huffed a bit after climbing the steep stairs to the third floor of the newly re-dedicated Thomas Administration Building at South Arkansas Community College. I had skipped the elevator in order to see everything in the new interior. The little lady who joined me on the top floor walked into a room once filled…

A locked door welcomed four grandchildren to our house. I stared at the very locked up house. No Grandpa came to greet us. “Grandpa is gone.” I said. I picked up the phone and called him. No answer. I could only leave a message to a person who never checks messages, “I left my keys…

t all started last spring: my husband’s excitement and interest in bringing the One Man Volleyball team of Bob Holmes to Union County. Holmes visits communities, plays volleyball with students in various schools and then talks with the students about bullying and suicide. Hubby thought Union County needed him to visit. Hubby researched the One…

 am so far behind in this month’s posting of a daily item for which I am thankful that today I will catch up and finish all at once. With that in mind, I am thankful for … My handy husband fixes before replacing anything and enjoys the whole process (well, he enjoys it until it…