Short video

Weekend photo essay Part 3/ plus a little more.

This is the first house we lived in when we moved to Richmond. I think I was three when we made that move. I have good memories of this house and neighborhood. I attended my first birthday party in that neighborhood. I had friends, I had a tricycle and a wagon and my dad had moved my swingset along with us, so I had a swingset in the back yard. I remember going to one neighbor's house and picking her rhubarb and dipping it in sugar and eating it.
I've always remembered the driveway of this house as being really steep because one time I was pushing my wagon down the driveway and it went so fast it got away from me and I fell down and skinned my knees. Now I see it is nearly flat. I must have just been a fast runner. In the house next door on the right there lived a little old lady. I was very afraid of her because she didn't like us to get on her grass. Every holiday, however, she would buy us special little gifts. In the back yard there was a big patch of mint and a trellis with either morning glories or clematis on it. I really liked those. We lived here while Bobby was in high school. We moved shortly after I started first grade. While in the house I attended Charles School and I remember I had one good friend named Malia, down the street, and a friend at school named Julie Neufer.
This is the second house we lived in. 4016 National Road West. My bedroom was on the upper right with the short window. My bed was on the side of that room under that window. I think we moved here after Bobby graduated from HS, which makes sense if I was in first grade. At that time there was a lot of open land behind the house which had an old, decepit barn to play in - probably horribly dangerous - and a little pond where I would go catch tadpoles.
the house was white in those days and I think the front yard was bigger. They must have widened the road and taken some of the yard. This was a great house in a lot of ways, the land, a basement, and next door to one of those old-fashioned one story hotels with a big parking lot to ride my bike in! I attended Rose Hamilton School while we lived here. I had a friend named Kim Willis and a friend named Rhonda. We also had friends in the neighborhood we could get to by going back behind the property. They had a big German Shepherd they kept chained up, named "Lady" and I was terrified of her. Chris has said he remembers the dog knocking me down and standing on my back. I don't remember it, but no wonder I am afraid of and don't like most dogs! We stayed here until the end of third grade and moved that summer, I think. Nope, now I remember we moved during third gradebecause Mrs. Slick was my teacher at this school and in the next school I had my first male teacher.
This is a shot from the parking lot of the hotel. The upper left window was the other window in my room. There used to be a big tree on this side of the house. lilac bushes and those bushes that grow little "bouquets" of tiny white flowers. I would pick those bouquets and use them to pretend Barbie was getting married. Bobby left for his mission to Canada and Alaska while we lived in this house.

This is the last house we lived in in Richmond, We moved while Bobby was on his mission. I was afraid he wouldn't be able to find us when he got back if we moved! Dad finally reassured me that we would go pick him up from the airport so it would be okay. This house is a double, it even had two kitchens, but we lived in the whole thing. This is the first place I remember having migraine headaches. The episode of "Half-Wit" called "Headaches" took place in this house. I remember Dad making a big garden in the backyard of this house. I would go out and pick a turnip and hardly wipe the dirt off and just eat it straight from the garden! I had best friends next door named Tincey and Lindy Barnett. I also had a friend named Phyllis who lived a couple of blocks down the street and a friend named Louise. I went to Baxter School while we lived here for fourth grade... hmmm it seems like I should have lived here longer than one grade. Maybe we moved in third grade. You know, I bet we did because I started third grade when I was seven and turned eight that October and Bobby baptized me when he came home from his mission. Bobby and Karen lived in this house for a while after we left, until he joined the Marines, I think. They worked hard on cleaning it up and making it nice. This is the first house I remember realizing that if I was going to live in a clean house I was going to have to be the one to do it. That is when I started taking the role of caretaker/ cleaner a lot in the family. Mom and Dad bought this house, instead of renting. It turned out to be bad deal, because they could never sell it after we moved. I think they ended up selling it to a guy for $1 and he would take over the payments. I think my dad still feels bad about that. Ann - you will love this. This house is on E street. 101 NW E street. It took me a long time before I figured out that the E didn't stand for East, but was actually the name of the street.


Work was less frantic today. A lot of agencies and offices had the day off for a three day holiday. Also the phones were slow. I was in a talkative mood with my coworkers so it was a good day for it to be slow. After work I went out to the Wal-Mart hot dog stand, talked to the students and Ms. Kvale and had a doggy for dinner. Michael had a Bike Project meeting afterward, so he rode there and I came home and started my usual weeding. When he got home he sat out and talked to me for a while and played with fireworks a little bit. It finally got too buggy and I am too itchy with poison ivy already so we came in! I have three different types of itch cream so I can probably triple up without overdosing on one single medicine or killing too many brain cells. I am sure this is from the day I was pruning trees and pulling down the parasitic vines. I know better. I know those woods are FULL of poison ivy, but I was too lazy to come in a dress appropriately for protection. I am paying!

For the Richmond pictures, I decided to not do the day in chronological order. I ended up driving back and forth across town a couple of different times. I may even do Richmond in more than one installment. Tonight I am starting with houses we lived in.

Weekend photo essay

Part three may have to wait. I spent most of Sunday in Richmond (after sleeping in the car in a Wal-mart parking lot!) and toook quite a few pictures. I just spent the past hour or so going through some of the pictures i have taken from Mom and Dad's and some of them are from Richmond, so I kind of want to scan some of those in a put with the Richmond part of the essay... maybe, or maybe it detracts from what I really saw last weekend. I will have to decide.

I am definitley going to go to FB now and post a few of the pictures I scanned today to the "Growing up Hoppy/Hopie" album!

Positive thoughts... Ed brought Michael home tonight we get three days to be NORMAL, or our version thereof!

YAY!

Weekend Photo Essay Part 2: Trip to Indy

Red Teddy. This one really stands out when you see the shrine.
Side view.
This is the way you see it when you drive down the street - only you kind of just whiz by...
The cross placed among the teddies was a reminder to me of how many people use their faith for comfort in the face of tragedy. It made it seem more ironic or maybe even a little cruel that I have always called these shrines "Crucified Teddy Bears."
Pictures of the victims, I believe, posted on the pole. I would like to do a little research and be reminded of what happened here. I have always thuoght it was the shooting of a single boy who was caught innocently in the cross fire, but then I see the picture of these three guys together and I wonder if this is a commemoration of a different incident than I thought or if these guys are his brothers or what.
but then there is this picture of the single boy, so maybe it IS the incident I thought. I am sure I can do some research and find out. I think there was also some stuff printed near the photos. I felt really self-conscious, however, standing there and taking the pictures. I might feel more comfortable if I try to read the stuff without camera in hand.

Saturday evening after we went to the Bike Project/ Sustainable Living event it was time for me to take Michael back to Ed's (at least that was Ed's opinion). On the way we stopped by Heather's to pick up some sheet music she had purchased for him and to attempt to put her mattress on her bed frame. It turned out the mattress was the wrong size, so that was a failure. This is the memorial that we always pass as we head from Heather's back to the highway. It has been there over a year. I always think of it as "Crucified Teddy Bears" and have wanted to take pictures of it for a long time.

I am very interested in this type of memoriam. In Indiana they seem very common on sites where children are killed. Also people put white crosses and photos and flowers near the highway where people have been killed in accidents. I always wonder if this is a regional thing or do people do this all over the state? the midwest? the country? the world? Part of me would like to start take photos of different memoriams I see. I'd like to document things like different types, how long they have remained since the death they commemorate, different styles and such. It seems morbid, I know. Part of my work at the newspaper is taking and placing memoriam ads for families and friends of dead people. Part of me wants to make fun of the customers placing the ads...wasting hteir money on something the dead person will never know about. One time a few years ago I was talking about that and Sue, one of my coworkers who had a grandson who was shaken to death by a babysitter as an infant, said, "It's not for the dead person. It comforts the people who are still here." I have tried to be more respectful of the people with the memoriams since then. Every once in a while I still let my cynicism about it slip... especilly when people use this poem, "If tears could build a stairway"

If Tears Could Build A Stairway

If tears could build a stairway,

and memories a lane.

I would walk right up to heaven

and bring you back again.

No farewell words were spoken,

No time to say "Goodbye".

You were gone before I knew it,

and only God knows why.

My heart still aches with sadness,

and secret tears still flow.

What it meant to love you-

No one can ever know.

But now I know you want me

to mourn for you no more;

To remember all the happy times,

life still has much in store.

Since you'll never be forgotten,

I pledge to you today-

A hollowed place within my heart

is where you'll always stay.

~Author Unknown~

I really don't like this poem. I am sorry if some of you (what my two readers) like it or have used it in a memoriam for a loved one. Last week I had a customer use it in a memoriam and then ask if we had to credit the author. I said, "well, if we know the author, we generally try to, but we usually think of this as author unknown." She replied, "Oh, It's Led Zeppelin." I swear I almost peed my pants. I just said, "Well, we don't have to put it." So yeah, I laughed at that customer and her memoriam by "Led Zeppelin" after she left. Worst part is, it left me with "Stairway to Heaven" stuck in my head all day and I don't know all the words by heart so it was only selected phrases. I can't listen to music at work anymore so I couldn't purge it until after work.

I would like to take more photos of memoriams. Maybe if I see more, read more, know more about the people whose lives they commemorate, and the survivors they comfort I can understand them more. It may be a project I will take on some day. I could start near home. There is one right at the intersection where I always enter Hwy 37. It probably wouldn't take too much to research what happened, who placed it and who maintains it - it often has new flowers and is always neatly mown around it.

I think I comfort myself with a loved ones death by thinking about their lives. As I have looked through many of the family pictures I have recently taken from Mom and Dad's house I have thought a lot about Grandma Holt. As a child I didn't know her very well and always felt somewhat afraid of her. Now I have seen so many pictures always happy, smiling, looking like she's having a great time. I didn't realize she and Grandpa went to Vegas quite a few times. Now I can't wait to go again and go to Fremont Street and get my picture taken at the Lady Luck Casino too! I have already taken her name informally. I can't wait to have enough money to change it legally. That will be my memoriam, instead of memories of the slight fear I had as a child, to have her name and try to live up to the fun-loving and vibrant woman she appears to be in these photos. As I scan some more I will post them.

Positive thoughts for good memories of those passed on and for whatever methods we use to remember or honor them that we try to be respectful of one anothers' needs for comfort and caring.

Weekend Photo Essay Part 1 BIke Project/Center For Sustainable Living Annual Meeting

There was music!
There were dancers!
This is THE place.
The band set up in the workshop. There was also a fifteen foot (vegetarian, of course) sub in there!
Nummy cakes donated by the Bakehouse. I had the chocolate. It was delicious.

the band was pretty relaxed about the children.
People ate and talked.
People had a good time.
I THINK this is Greg, who may mentor Michael when he does Bike Project as a class.
This is Justin. I took his picture, just because I think he's hot. Hey, it was like ninety degrees, okay?
This is MY hippie boy. He's a sweetheart. Look! He is wearing a shirt that is not ripped, stained or faded.
Some old people came too.
Amazing awning the bike shop guys managed to put up using the bike stands that hold the bikes while they work on them and some other really rigged up stuff.

It was fun. I went late because I had gotten so into working on the yard that it was hard to quit. There was still plenty of food and music. I had my fill of both. At first I was very uncomfortable because I didn't know the old people and to all the Bike Project guys I am just Michael's mom. After a while I finally just plopped down at a table full of old people and listened to the conversation until I knew what was going on. I was so relieved that we had finally gotten a garden in. I would hate to be amongst the Sustainable Living people and have to admit to BUYING all my produce. At least I could have said that in the summer I buy everything I can at the Farmer's Market. Phew - close call with my secret consumerism almost escaping!

I don't know why this is underlining and I can't make it stop!

It's 11:55 and I still have five items on my list and I did NOT nap today. I weeded for two and a half hours. That reminds me I have an essay to write when I am done with the postings of the weekend photo essay. If you don't see it soon, remind me about "Eat the Frosting First."

Positive thoughts are for a nice conversation with a neighbor tonight. I haven't been feeling too neighborly and this was short, but nice.

No more tonight.

I cut down things, I dug up things. I staked other things (not vampires), I moved more things. I pulled things. I mowed things.

I'm so tired. I have to go shower and go to bed.

No thank you note tonight and no picture posting either, just clean me and sleep me.

I deserve atreat this time!

I weeded from about 11:15 - 1:30. You will all be so proud. I stayed in the shade as much as possible and I wore a shirt that covers my shoulders. No more sunburn! I need to keep remembering Stephanie having patched of skin removed and grafted on and NOT let it get out of control. I also need to eat something during this break. So my goals now are to drink my ginger ale, eat something at least fairly healthy, and drink some water in addition.

My front garden bed only has a couple more Canada Thistles and it will be weed free, at least until tomorrow.