REUNION 2015

It was a cool night....about 59 degrees.  As different ones began to arrive, laughter and talk filled the air.  There were hugs and handshakes and exchanges of pleasantries.  I sat under the arbor that leads into the yard of Oakhill Plantation armed with printed name tags and blank ones for guests.  No one was supposed to get by me without being tagged and numbered for a later event that would include the gifts we had for all attendees.  As cars parked and attendees got out and made their way toward me, I did my best to recognize who they were and be ready to give them their correct tag.  Some were easy....some not so much.  After all, this was the first time I had seen some of them in the 45 years since we had graduated!

To me, class reunions are a fun time.  They serve a purpose in life, just as family reunions, church homecomings and such.  That's why several years before, there were three or four of us who decided we would make sure our class had a reunion at designated periods of time until we all eventually faded away.  If you look back at the years of time spent together during a required period of education, you come to realize just how much time you spent with these people who became like a family to you.  For some, these were happy years.  For others, years they would rather forget.  But, either way, we decided there should be the opportunity for those who wanted to participate to come together periodically to catch up on each others lives and keep in touch with those with whom we spent a lot of our life.

We had sent out 129 invitations......we had only 21 actual classmates attend.  We were statistically close to the norm - which is about 20%.  But, we were disappointed that we didn't have more.  However, there were extenuating circumstances.  Several illnesses that could not have been foreseen and several last minute family obligations.  Those should always be expected because life happens - not matter how much work went into the planning and execution of a reunion.

Those of us who did attend had a very good time.  We laughed and ate and socialized with our 60's and 70's music playing softly in the background.  We remembered the ones who were no longer among our number because of death and talked about those that we knew that had chronic illnesses and were not able to attend.  We signed a book for a class member who has an illness that will take his life soon so he would know how much he was missed.  He had been one of our regulars and always been such a joy to be around....we all really missed him and it made us realize all to clear how life can be cut short at any time and there may not be those opportunities to see each other again.

Each time we have had one of these over the last few years, we have had people come who were not there before.  I think slowly but surely we are realizing that it's not where you live, how big your house is, how much money you make or whether you can still wear your clothes from high school that matter anymore.  It's that these are friendships that were bonded during formative years of our lives and so will always be special to us. 

I think my husband said it best after the reunion was over.  He said "you build up your anticipation and excitement about seeing those you haven't seen in a while, you come and have a wonderful time and then, before you know it, it's over.  And, then you experience a sort of let down.  Nobody wants to say goodbye.  Because you don't know if this may be the last time......it's a sadness in a way.  But, also a satisfaction....because if tomorrow never comes, you will still have the memories of today.......".

2020.....that will be our next opportunity.....our 50th reunion.   Until then, may God watch over us all till we can gather again......

And the greatest of these is LOVE.........

Yesterday, I had my eyes opened to a world to which I have never been exposed. The world of those who are homeless, jobless and helpless because they made a mistake at an early age and it has followed them no matter how much they have tried to improve themselves since. In order to explain this, I have to tell you about one person – that is my son-in-law, Ardell Seegars. With his permission and with your patience to read what I'm about to write, I hope maybe some of the attitudes toward the population of people like Ardell will begin to change. I also hope that we will realize just how important it is to stress to our young adults to obey the laws and don't do anything for which they might be arrested or charged. Because, as Ardell's story shows, there isn't an easy fix.

Before I meet Ardell, I had the same attitudes as many of you. I thought that once a person, for whatever reason, committed a crime, paid their fines, did their jail time and changed the attitude and mindset which caused them to commit that crime in the first place had been accomplished, they could then go on and build a life for themselves and become a normal citizen of society. I labeled them as lazy, not caring and not wanting to improve themselves. Just a plague on society – takers and not contributors, never EVEN thinking that maybe they had been slapped down so many times they had basically given up. I made wrong and sinful assumptions. While this may be the case for a few, it is not the norm and it in NEVER our place to play judge and jury with anybody's life.

Ardell, like a lot of us, went through a period of time during his youth where he “tried” all those things your parents taught you never to do. Driving too fast, drinking, hanging around with the wrong crowd, trying illegal drugs. Pushing the limit. Some were not privileged to grow up in stable homes with parents who had an eagle eye and kept us from doing something stupid. If you did have that, then good for you. You probably are more the exception to the rule than the majority. However, even though many of us did grow up in stable homes, we still took the opportunity to do these things without ever getting caught and charged with a crime. We slipped “under the radar” as such. We were lucky. Because for the ones like Ardell, who did get caught, their lives just changed forever.

Ardell, because of these actions, will be the first to tell you he was wrong. He will also be the first to tell you that these actions and the reactions of law enforcement, the work force and people who think once a criminal, always a criminal are the very attitudes that caused him to be a bitter, angry and discouraged person for most of his life. He doesn't try to justify this as being right.....only as being real.

My daughter Jeannie saw the side of Ardell that could be gentle, loving and good. She reached out to him, taught him about Christ and in the process, fell in love with him and he with her. As with every love story, theirs was not without problems, especially when you put together an explosive situation of someone who has been deathly ill all their life and are approaching the end of their life and someone who has been through an unbreakable system of knockdowns all his life. It would seem to be a recipe for disaster. But there was some beauty from ashes – albeit, plagued with problems occasionally. One thing there was, despite all the outside opposition, was deep love for one another. For this, I am grateful. My daughter spent her last 8 months on this earth experiencing the kind of love for which she had always longed and the life of which she had always dreamed.

During the last year since her death, Ardell slipped back some into the old lifestyle to which he was accustomed. Sometimes, even though it may not be the best thing for you, in times of tragedy, you seek that which has in the past brought you the most comfort. But, just as Jeannie told him, it was no longer meant for him to live this life. He was better than this. He could do better. He deserved better.

We kept up with him, here and there, after he chose to leave our house a couple of month after her death to try to go back to the roots from which he had come......but something was different. Jeannie had taught him about God and the Bible and he could not run from it. It followed him where ever he was. He tried to teach those he was with, but their hearts had not been opened to accept the gospel and God's word yet, so it fell mostly on deaf ears. He tried to combine the old ways with the new, but found they did not mix. And he found himself not welcome. He drifted from here to there with different places to lay his head most nights. Until he finally realized, he was on a road to nowhere. Jobs would not come because of that old plaguing record from 1998 – yes, 16 years ago – but yet future employers slammed the door in his face. Even the jobs that not many other people wanted turned him away because of one problem – he had a record. Unemployment rates are so high right now that if a business or company has 10 people with equal experience apply for a job and 9 of them have a record and one does not, who do you think they are going to hire. So, he did the only thing left for him to do. He became homeless. He slept in his car where ever he could find a place to park it for the night. Took showers at truck stops. And ate at soup kitchens.

When I learned of this, it broke my heart. I knew there was a good person in there somewhere just needing a hand “UP”, not a hand “OUT”. He truly WANTED employment. In fact, he wanted all the things all people want – a home, a family.....a life. So Gene and I discussed it. We had fallen on hard times ourselves many times in the past – not because of a criminal past, but because we were trying to find medical help for our daughter who suffered from a rare disease that had no cure and the expenses piled up. We had to rely on other generous and kind people to give us help to make it through. But by the grace of God, we could easily have been in the same situation as Ardell now found himself. So, what to do. We chose what we felt was the Christian thing to do. We extended the hand “UP” and brought him back to our home. When Christ was on this earth, he didn't go to the people who were comfortable in their lives. He went to the sinners, the prostitutes, the people who were the ones less thought of by others. He helped those who had no way to help themselves. This was our chance to give back in the way we had been prospered ourselves. And it felt right.

Yesterday, Ardell and I spent the whole day in Columbia, SC going to the different law organizations trying to get his record straightened out because this is his best shot at finding a decent job. Some of the things we learned were heartbreaking. There are so many agencies involved when someone is arrested, the records do not always get recorded in all the areas needed properly. This is what happened with Ardell's record. One government office shows an offense one way, another shows it another way. Even though Ardell made restitution and paid for each of his crimes, if the records are not kept properly, it's a hard sell to try to make law enforcement understand – especially when the charges are from 1998 – 17 years ago. Even the governor does not have the power to override some of these decisions. We must have gone back and forth between 6 or 7 offices yesterday trying to get this cleared up. Some of the charges were eligible for expungement (being taken off the record), so we at least made some head way there, But, when they could not find the full history of a charge, those were just left hanging. He now has to apply for a pardon for those. And, even if they are deemed eligible for pardon by a judge, it may take 7 months to a year to get them removed. In the meantime, employers are seeing those every time they run a background check. So his chances for a job – other than jobs where the companies are small and pay you off the books or under the table – are few. Yes, if you look it up on the internet, there are many websites that say they hire people with a criminal background. Saying it and doing it are two different things. I bet he has filed out over 100 applications in the few weeks he has been back with us, all to no avail. There are states that are less strict about this – but SC is not one of them. Your nephew, niece, cousin, uncle or friend may have found a job just fine with a record, but I assure you, they were extremely lucky to do so and in most cases had an inside friend or were just in the right place at the right time.

My purpose for writing this was not to try to generate sympathy for Ardell. It is the last thing he wants. Nor was it to try to “preach” to anyone. I'm certainly not qualified for that and don't claim to be. I have a lot of my own flaws that need to be dealt with. But, I wrote all this for two purposes. One, to try to reach those of you, like me, who judge upon first appearance, second hand knowledge, gossip and slanted information that you have about a person. Please, don't do that. It is not our place to be judge and jury to anyone. That is God's job and will come when that person meets their maker one day. I'm preaching to myself also, because I have been guilty of this as much as the next person. And second, to make you aware that there are those who walk among us who are hurting in ways we can not imagine. They are struggling to just have some kind of decent life. Many of them are Christians, as many of us claim to be. Were is the love? Where is the forgiveness? Where is the acceptance? May God help us all to open our eyes to the world around us and “see” each other in a clear light and love each other with the love of which Christ spoke as being the “greatest commandment”.

Mother's Day

      Sunday, May 10th, we will celebrate Mother's Day 2015 - a national holiday to honor Mother's that has the following history taken from wikipedia and I quote:

"The modern American holiday of Mother's Day was first celebrated in 1908, when Anna Jarvis held a memorial for her mother in Grafton, West Virginia. Her campaign to make "Mother's Day" a recognized holiday in the United States began in 1905, the year her beloved mother, Ann Reeves Jarvis, died. Anna’s mission was to honor her own mother by continuing work she started and to set aside a day to honor mothers, "the person who has done more for you than anyone in the world". Anna's mother, Ann Jarvis, was a peace activist who cared for wounded soldiers on both sides of the Civil War and created Mother’s Day Work Clubs to address public health issues.
Due to the campaign efforts of Anna Jarvis, several states officially recognized Mother's Day, the first in 1910 being West Virginia, Jarvis’ home state. Jarvis' push to create an official holiday was met with opposition by some. Sen. Henry Moore Teller described the notion of Mother's Day as "absolutely absurd," and "trifling." In 1914 Woodrow Wilson signed the proclamation creating Mother’s Day, the second Sunday in May, as a national holiday to honor mothers.
Although Jarvis was successful in founding Mother's Day she soon became resentful of the commercialization and was angry that companies would profit from the holiday. By the early 1920s, Hallmark and other companies started selling Mother's Day cards. Jarvis became so embittered by what she saw as misinterpretation and exploitation that she protested and even tried to rescind Mother's Day. The holiday that she worked so hard for was supposed to be about sentiment, not about profit. Jarvis's intention for the holiday had been for people to appreciate and honor mothers by writing a personal letter, by hand, expressing love and gratitude, rather than buying gifts and pre-made cards. Jarvis organized boycotts and threatened lawsuits to try to stop the commercialization. She crashed a candymakers' convention in Philadelphia in 1923. Two years later she protested at a confab of the American War Mothers, which raised money by selling carnations, the flower associated with Mother’s Day, and was arrested for disturbing the peace.
Jarvis's holiday was adopted by other countries and it is now celebrated all over the world." End quote.

     I'll have to say that I agree with Ms. Javis' assessment - but this holiday is not the only one tainted by the greed of money hungry companies that pull your heart strings because they have learned to do that so well and have become extremely rich doing it.

     There could be an argument made that Mothers are the most influencing factor in most people's lives.  After all, we each are made within our Mother's bodies, we develop and grow and then enter the world through her labor, pain and effort.  But, that is not the definition of a Mother any more than the sperm donor being the definition of a Father.  So, while it may be true that Mother's carry a huge influence on our lives, it is not because of the physical connection of the act of childbirth.

     Mother's are made when a loving bond is formed between two hearts........When a child attaches themselves to a woman's heart, in any form, and a woman attaches themselves to a child's heart, in any form,  a Mother is born.  I do believe God intended it this way.  Actually, if you go back to the story in the Bible of the Garden of Eden, becoming a Mother in the traditional sense - giving physical birth to a child - was a punishment pronounced on Eve and all women to follow for breaking God's commandment.  Doesn't sound like a very loving situation in that sense does it?

     My Mother was my biological Mother in the sense that I came to be her child through the womb growing, painful birthing method.  But, she was so much more...........

     My Mother had a hard life compared to most.  She grew up in a loving family - they worked hard to eek out a living on the land, farming, growing and harvesting as the weather allowed.  She only had an eighth grade education - the idea being that most women would not need education because they would have a husband later in life to provide the monetary needs.  An education was seen as a waste of time for girls when they could be home helping in the fields.  Her father had diabetes and in those days there was not a lot of knowledge about correct treatment, so he died when he was quite young, as was my mother.  Her mother took over the running of the farm and the carrying on of the family with the help of her sons.   All the children, including my mother, were taught that life was hard, but when the going got tough you didn't give up, you kept going.  They were a God-fearing, church going, Christian family - the kind of family that was the original backbone of this nation......sad to say we've come a long way from that now.  They were the rule, not the exception unlike today when it seems to be just the opposite.

    She ran away and married my father - her family forbidding the union because of age and need for her help on the farm.  She regretted it from the first day......  My father was a hard man..strict, demanding, hard to love.  But my mother had been so ingrained with the idea that you took the cards you were dealt and made the best of them that she forged ahead.  She was a farm wife who never got a thank you, a gift, even an act of kindness from her husband for 25 years.  Her life consisted of trying to meet the many demands laid on her by my father daily and the raising of five children.  We were a church going family and my father was a deacon and a highly respected man of the church because, unfortunately, the church didn't know the real man the way his family did.  When I was ten years old, my father grew tired of the boring life of a farmer and decided he needed a change - a mistress, a different job, a different town and a completely different way of life that excluded church.  So my mother was tossed aside like a rag doll and left to her fend for herself.  I always loved my mother and was proud of her, but I guess this is the time of her life that I will always remember her as being one of the strongest women I would ever know.  Amidst unfathomable odds, she reinvented herself.  She walked into the bank in our small town and boldly asked for a loan - on her own signature.  She had nothing to offer.  Just her word.  She asked for money to buy a used car, to rent a house and to keep her afloat until she could get a job at a local factory doing the only thing she knew how to do - sew.  The bank gave her the loan on her word only.  My older sister taught her how to drive.  She got the sewing job, rented a house and moved the remains of her family to town, starting all over again.

     Most mothers don't have it that hard......many others have it harder.  But there is a common thread that runs through all mothers of all types........they would lay down their life in a heartbeat for the safety and welfare of their child....that child to which their heart bonded in love many years before.  See, there's something every mother knows.  That card that their child makes for them that is smeared with extra paint, has messy writing and sometimes just has their name means more to them than 10,000 commercially printed and sold cards.  THAT is the one that will be kept for years to come, will go in the scrapbook or the memory box or the drawer that holds the special items that speak to a mother's heart.

So, yes, Mrs. Jarvis, there will be a lot of flowers and cakes and commercially sold cards this Mother's Day and a lot of people will make a lot of money off those things.  But you were wrong about one thing - the bond between a heart-connected Mother and child will never be commercialized.  Because the most important thing to that Mother on this Mother's Day and EVERYDAY is the knowledge that their child loves them.  No amount of money in the world can purchase that bond.




     

    

     

Cruising.......the good, the bad and everything inbetween.......

DISCLAIMER:  What you are about to read is entirely OUR experience.  Please do not let it influence you in any way in making your own decision about whether this is the vacation for you or not.  There are two kinds of people - ones who LOVE to cruise and one who DO NOT LOVE to cruise.  I do not want to be responsible for keeping you from experiencing something that might be the best thing you ever did.  So, please before you read, keep in mind.  Everyone is different, everyone has a different experience, everyone sees things in a different way.  This is just my story of our particular experience.  Just as watching the movie "Jaws" has not keep us out of the water, please take our experience with the same thought in mind.  Just because it happened to us, does not mean it will happen to you!!

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All of us have things in life that we want to experience and see before we leave this beautiful planet that God has so generously given us to enjoy.  For years, Gene's dream has been to take a cruise.  I, on the other hand, had always been afraid too, because of seasickness.  I have never had good experiences on the water, except in other people's boats in the river or inter-coastal waterways.  We have family in Savannah that lives on the inter-coastal waterway and when the girls were little, we would go spend the weekend and go out in their boat and have a wonderful time - every time!  But, every other time, when I went out on a boat of any size or in turbulent waters, I ended up sick as a dog.  Case in point, after we had been married a year, Gene took me to Miami and we went out deep-sea fishing.  My trip consisted of laying on the inside bench of the captains room, throwing up in a bucket.  And as if that weren't enough to convince me, we chartered a boat out of Key Largo once to take us snorkeling on the other side of the reef there and me and both our girls ended up very, very sick.  I even got sick on the "Maid of the Mist" ride at Niagara Falls!

But, over the years, I have talked to many,many people who said the same thing.  "On a cruise ship, you don't feel it.  You don't get sick because they have stabilizers and it keeps the ship from rocking and rolling.  You hardly know you are moving."  If you were one of those people who told me that, I don't blame you, because no doubt this was your experience or you wouldn't have said it.  And also, people told me to get all the things available now for seasickness - patches behind the ear, bonine, dramamine, sea bands (bands that go around your wrists that have a pressure point ball that presses into your wrist).

So, I decided Gene and I would do it!  We would take that cruise that he had wanted to go on for so long.  Well, it seemed that other plans were in order for us from the beginning.  The first cruise we booked in December went bust when two days before we were supposed to leave for Florida, Gene's eye surgeon went to take the stitch out of his eye where he had cataract surgery and the cornea began to tear and fluid began to leak out.  They had to immediately put stitches back in the eye and of course we were not about to go on a cruise with his eye like that.  So, we cancelled and re-booked for January.  Two days before the January trip, Gene is diagnosed with the flu.  Again, no cruise for us.  Still determined to do this thing, I booked again, at a lower price which we took as a good sign, and we were set for February.

Now, let me assure you that I am a person who thoroughly investigates everything before I do it.  I check out every review I can read, I go to consumer reports and read everything they say, I read blogs of other person's experiences, etc.  Then armed with all that information, I make a half way educated decision.  Well, on this one, I somehow failed.  Now - after the fact - I can find all kinds of bad reviews about the boat we took, the cruise line we chose, etc.  Maybe I investigated from a slanted point of view because I wanted to go so bad!

We were excited when we left home, looking forward to a good trip.  Gene felt weak from having had the flu a few weeks before, but insisted he was well enough to go.  RED FLAG #1 - Do not do this if you are not at your height of health.  In our case,  we were going to be visiting 4 islands in 7 days.  That's a lot of walking in heat and sunshine to which you are not accustomed.  While cruising may be a relaxing experience to some, it did not prove to be so for us.  It was exhausting....

We used one of the Park and Go lots to park the car because those were $7.99 a day instead of $12.  They drove a shuttle right up to the car and they loaded our suitcases and us and carried us directly to the cruise terminal.  RED FLAG #2 - the driver of the shuttle was in a big hurry so he THREW one our larger suitcases off the shuttle, breaking a piece off the handle which had the identification tag on it.  However, the crew from the ship said "don't worry, we will take care of it and it won't get lost".  More about this later. Gene used his walker because he still did not have all his strength back, which ended up being a good thing for us because that put us in the disabled line and we were able to go straight through check-in and directly onto the boat without delay.  We were greeted by one of the nice staff members and told our cabin was already ready even though it was only 1:00 and we could go to our room.  We did and were well pleased.  It was a nice room, with TV, DVD player, good size bathroom, lots of storage space (however, still not enough for the RIDICULOUS amount of stuff I packed), sofa and a spacious deck.  Here are some pictures of us on the deck before we left shore:

We waited for our luggage to arrive, and three of our four suitcases made it.  Which one didn't, you ask?  You guessed it!  The one that had been thrown off the shuttle and the handle had broken!  I called the front desk and they said give it an hour and if it still didn't show up, come to the Customer Service area.  In the meantime, we enjoyed watching the shoreline of  Ft. Lauderdale and ordered some drinks and ice for the room.  There was a mandatory safety meeting at 3:15, so I wanted to be sure to check on the suitcase before then.  So, off to Customer Service I went, only to find a long line of other people experiencing problems.  I finally was directed to a shorter line that was just for people who didn't receive their luggage.  They were taking us one at a time into another room to look at the excess or unmarked luggage or luggage that had gone through x-ray and was being held for some reason.  The man in front of me had a prosthetic leg.  He said to the rest of us "I'm sure they are holding my suitcase, because I had my swim leg in it.  I use a different one to swim.  When they x-rayed it, I'm sure they saw a leg and freaked out!"  Sure enough, he was right.  He was made to open the suitcase and get the leg out so they could see that it was a prosthesis!!  Even he had a good laugh with that one!  When my turn came, they took me in the room and there were (of course) a ton of black suitcases that all looked alike.  Finally, I saw mine way in the back.  They said "do you have a way to identify it".  I said "yes, it has a broken handle, because it was broken by the shuttle guy".  Sure enough, that one did, so they shuffled everything around until they got it out and sure enough the ID tag was gone.  So then I had to open one of the compartments to make sure it was my stuff.  Nothing like pulling out your socks and underwear in front of a bunch of strangers!  So, suitcase problem solved.

We had our safety meeting, the final call for boarding was made and it was time to leave.  We stood on our deck and waved at all the other ships in port and workers and anybody that would wave and with anticipation set out on what we had hoped would be a wonderful journey.   I had discovered at the hotel the night before that we had forgotten the patches prescribed for seasickness and left them home (I had 8 million other things I DIDN'T need, but not the one I did!), so I was wearing my sea bands.  These go on your wrists and put pressure on a certain point on the underside of your wrist to stop nausea.  They work!!!  And believe me, it was a good thing they did!

We decided we would go find this wonderful abundance of food we had been told about because by this time, we were hungry.  We found these to be our choices - there were three restaurants on board that charged just like the restaurants you eat at anywhere else, there was the main dining room which had two major entree choices every night an appetizer and a couple of dessert choices but at least it was included in the fare - main drawback was men were expected to wear jackets at dinner, there was the cafeteria style serving line (which is where most people at) that would have self-serve salad, desserts, breads and drinks, but you had to go through the line to get your main entree and sides.  They had some pretty decent tenderloin steak a couple of night, but the other nights, it was chicken fixed 500 ways or spaghetti and sauces.  The sides were  rice or potatoes and mixed vegetables.  That was it!  We did have pork loin one night and cod and mahi mahi one night which were both pretty good,but other than that, it was pretty skimpy.  And, when they fixed your plate, they were very skimpy.  They would put half a spoonful on the plate of each thing and that was it.  Let me say one thing right here - NEVER DURING THE ENTIRE TRIP DID I EVEN SEE A LOBSTER - MUCH LESS PUT ONE IN MY MOUTH!  The cafeteria was only open certain hours.  Otherwise, you had room service which had a hamburger, a club sandwich,  potato chips, fruit and cookies on it or you could go pool side to the bar area and get slices of pizza from 11:30 am until 6 every day or to a hamburger/hotdog stand called the "Dive In" to get hamburgers or hotdogs from 11:30 to 9 every day.  I don't know what we had built up in our mind, but this was not it.  We had heard about eating constantly, food everywhere, all the lobster and sea food you could handle, and on and on and we saw NONE of that.  Now, I know there are those of you who are saying "wasn't that enough".  Well, quite frankly, for the price we paid, no, it wasn't.  I expected better choices more often.

The first night at sea, we experienced our first storm.  If I have any piece of advice for you that you will consider important PLEASE let it be this.  When you are choosing your room, go middle and go low.  We were the second room from the front of the ship on the outer port side on the 4th deck.  The engines were LOUD and we felt every little move the ship made.  The wind howled outside our door so loud it sounded like a hurricane.  We had to lock our deck door to keep it from constantly blowing open and sucking everything out of the room.  We could not use the deck when we were moving.  The wind was so strong you had to hold on or you would have been blown overboard.  That night it stormed and rained and the ship pitched back and forth and back and forth.  I didn't get seasick, but I thought I would go mad.  We couldn't lay still in the bed.  It was constantly throwing you back and forth and back and forth.  I finally took towels and pillows and stuffed them all around myself to try to stay still.  The next day wasn't much better.  Everyone was having trouble walking.  No one could balance.  They had to hold on to things to stand up.  Praise God for sea bands!!  I also took a couple of Bonine (like Dramamine) and those I'm sure helped me to not have nausea.

I'll address the stops at the islands and then post some pictures and be done because I realize I'm getting long winded.  At each island stop, they put you into port and you got off and went directly to THEIR shops.  How do I know they were their shops?  Because they had advertised them to us before we got there.  Their main focus was to sell diamonds and jewelry.  If you didn't buy their expensive excursions into the towns, all you had a choice of seeing was their expensive stores.  Everybody had their hand out.  They gave seminars on the ship giving out 50% off discount cards to be used on the islands.  That's all well and good, but if you take a $5,000 ring and take 50% off it's still too high for my pocketbook.

By the second day Gene was running fever and feeling terrible again.  He went to the ship's medical center, where the doctor checked him over, did not run any tests and pronounced a relapse of the flu.  He gave him Tamiflu and Mucinex and charged us almost $300.  Gene ended up feeling terrible the rest of the trip and as you know, had to be hospitalized in Savannah for a serious case of bronchitis.

All in all, we went through 4 bad storms while at sea, one woman broke her arm because the boat pitched so badly she feel and her arm broke, Gene was too sick to ride his horse like he had so wanted to - luckily they resold his ticket and we got that money back, I was too sick to even get off the boat in San Juan because of a storm the night before and seasickness did overcome me for a while and Gene was too sick to get off the boat at Half Moon Cay.

Now that I've told you all the bad, I will tell you the good.  The staff - all of them from the highest paid down to our cabin steward - were some of the nicest people I have ever meet.  They went out of their way to try to help us have an enjoyable trip, but it just wasn't meant to happen for us.  Now that I look back on it, I kinda feel like God sent us two chances to not take this trip, but we were determined - so He let us have our way.  "There's a way that seems right to a man....."

Here are some more pictures - one sure thing about it - God made a beautiful world for us to enjoy!

My Review of 2014.....

There are some years in our lives that are "milestone" years.  During those years, something or things happen that are major milestones that can either enrich and change for the better the course of lives forever, or can impact our lives in such a profound way, that we ourselves are changed forever - whether for good or bad.  Examples of these years are the year you were born, the year you become a Christian, the year you graduate high school or college, the year you marry, the year(s) your children are born......you get the idea....  I think if God could talk directly to us (which he does through the Bible), He would tell us that every year, month, day, hour, minute, second is a milestone - because we are either using it to do something to glorify Him or we are wasting it on something nowhere close in importance....this takes work, concentration, study and a purpose, but are exactly what Paul means when he says we are to "daily renew our minds" in Romans 12:2.

The year 2014 did not get off to a good start for our family.  Right from the beginning, we knew our precious Jeannie was not going to make it through this year.  She had ended 2013 and started 2014 in hospice.  After 21 brave years of fighting this monsterous disease called severe gastroparesis, we finally had to accept that the disease had won.  It would take her body before the year 2014 was over.  So, this would definitely be a very big milestone year in our lives, her husband's life, her extended family's lives and her friends lives.  If love could keep someone alive, Jeannie would have lived forever.  But even abundant love cannot stop death, so we knew it would come....we just didn't know when.  Jeannie herself was ready - or rather, as ready as one can make themselves to face death.  She had given us her wishes of how she wanted everything carried out and we had made promises that we would do as she asked, no matter how hard it became before it was over.  I don't say this just because she was my daughter, but she was one of the most compassionate, kindest, sweetest, most loving, most forgiving and thus most extraordinary person I have ever known.  God gave her that......we didn't have anything to do with it.  It all just seemed so unfair.......But fairness is not a word you use when you look at the sacrifice Jesus made on the cross for each of us in order to give us eternal life.  Death came in June.  It was hard....much harder than I had imagined......I thought I was prepared, but have since learned there is no such thing as preparation to never see your loved one again on this side of heaven.  You keep expecting them to walk through the door with that bouncy personality, that unforgettable laugh, that beautiful face, that unbreakable spirit...........it changed me......it changed me forever.  I did not lose my faith, my relationship with God, my desire to continue serving Him all the days of my life.....but it did give me a greater respect for the brevity of our time on earth and the preciousness of each moment together.  Yes, this was definitely a milestone year.......one that will live forever.....the year we lost our precious baby girl of 36 years..

Then on top of that loss, two months later, I lost my sister, Dee.  My sister, who had been more like my mother all my life, lost her life to heart disease.  Mentally, I had lost her years before, when vascular dementia took her away into it's cruel world of confusion, forgetfulness, hallucinations and hauntings.  She was alive physically, but there had been no real quality of life for years before.  The death of the physical being I think to me was much less painful than the death of the mental being had been.  When she stopped knowing who I was when I called to talk, it had broken my heart.  That was when the real loss had come.  When I spoke at her memorial service, I tried to do justice to a remarkable woman who was incredibly smart, witty, beautiful and had a passion for life that was unmatched.  Try as I may, I will never be half the woman she was.....definitely a milestone year.......

I would not be fair if I did not point out some of the good milestones that happened this year also.  Melissa, my older daughter, who has poured her heart and soul into singing with the Metro Nashville Chorus over the last several years, had the privilege of competing in Internationals this year and her chorus came in 7th!!!  Seventh greatest chorus in all the world!!  The hard work, dedication and many years of practice had finally paid off and paid off big!  I got to watch it all through the magic of the wonderful new technology called live streaming over the internet......who knew......wouldn't have been available just a few years prior.  I am so proud of her.  Her leadership, her dedication, her work ethic, her competitive spirit....it all paid off this year.  Yes, it was a milestone year.....for all of us.

My youngest grandchild, Reagan, became a teenager this year, turning 13 in February.  So hard to believe.  Just yesterday, I was holding this precious little bundle of joy in my arms and now, she's almost as tall as her Dad, drop dead gorgeous and as talented as the day is long.  She has perfect tone, perfect posture and a unique and hard to achieve sound when she plays her trumpet for the school band.  I see nothing but more and more wonderful things from this young lady as the years progress......milestone year for both her, her parents, her grandparents and the world she will so profoundly impact in the coming years.....not just by musical talent, but by overall talent of just being a well-rounded and grounded young Christian woman.

Every year that Pierce, my autistic grandson, grows and learns and communicates better with his surroundings is a milestone year.....and this was one of the best.  This year saw him compete in Special Olympics and win several metals.  He grew by leaps and bounds in his communication skills.  He makes some of the best cookies you have ever tasted as a result of training in his life skills class. He's one of the most likeable and pleasant individuals you could ever want to be around and is respected and admired by so many who know him.  I am SO proud of him and his abilities that are showing themselves more and more each day.

As for Gene and me, we just keep getting older and keep watching the years slip by faster and faster.  Neither of us have good health, so we have no idea how much more time we have together.  But, today, as I reflected back on our life together, we've done some good things for starting out as a nieve 18 year old and a confirmed bachelor 23 year old.   When you make that commitment to each other and stand in front of God and witnesses to pledge your oath to each other, it's for life.......we've always believed that and still do.  Through sickness and health, dirt poor and comfortable, young and worn out, mad and glad....it's a milestone.....one of those that you never forget.

What will 2015 bring?  Only one knows and this is what He says through His apostle James in James 4:13-15:
 13Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit." 14Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. 15Instead, you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that."…

So, I will leave you with that thought.......In 2015, I wish you and your family the best of milestone years........"If the Lord wills".........and His love, strength and wisdom to guide you, uphold you and watch over you as you grow in Him every day.

Sharing plus 10..........

Ah, 'tis the Christmas season.  Decorations are going up everywhere, the stores are crazy wild with people, those bell ringers are out in front of Walmart and other stores again with their buckets for change.....and, the celebration of the birth of our Savior seems far away......

This year will be the first Christmas without our daughter Jeannie in over 36 years.  She LOVED Christmas.....the sights, sounds, music, food AND celebrating the birth of our Lord.  Every year, even though she had little to no money because her illness prevented her from working, she would save what little bit she did get and make sure she got some small present for all her friends.  But, that was just Jeannie - giving of everything she had.....if she had a $1 and you needed it, it was yours.

I've been reflecting lately on Christmas and how much money changes hands this time of year.  Don't get me wrong, I've done it too.  Overspent......promised not to do it again.......then done it again the next year.  Especially when it came to my kids.  My theory is that I'm somehow trying to make up for the years I was not allowed to celebrate Christmas - no Christmas tree, no Santa, no presents - because my father did not believe in Christmas.  He believed the whole thing had a pagan ritual beginning and therefore was bad and should be avoided at all cost.......there may be some truth to that pagan ritual thing......but here's my thought.  Jesus didn't tell us to celebrate His birth, but what can be bad about having a day to celebrate the birthday of our Lord and Savior who came into this world to give us a way to have everlasting life through Him.  A lot of people DO remember that this season is for celebrating His birthday, even though we are not commanded in the Bible to do so and have no example.......and ANY day that a LOT of the world is focused on Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior CAN NOT BE A BAD DAY!!!

As most of you know, I have a foundation that I set up in Jeannie's name after her death that is for the sole purpose of raising money for those families who have a member with severe gastroparesis and must travel to doctors away from their area for treatment.  Even if they are lucky enough to have insurance that covers the patients direct medical costs, there has to be money for gas for get to the destination, food along the way for anyone accompanying that patient - because most of them are on so much medication and are too sick to drive themselves - lodging for either both the patient and their accompanying travelers or the travelers while the patient spends time in the hospital and so many more expenses that happen when you have to LIVE away from your home for a period of time (laundry is one that no one thinks about, but eats into money quickly).......

So what has all this got to do with Christmas you ask.........well THIS is what:

So, yes, this is me, asking again for you to give.  But, this time, I'm asking something different.  One of the things we need with this fund is for more people to see it and read about it.  Each of you has a lot of FB friends, just like me.  So, here's what I'm asking.  PLEASE SHARE THIS BLOG ON YOUR FB PAGE.  The more eyes that see this, the more opportunities for donations.  So SHARE is the first thing.......the second is this.....if you can find it in your budget this Christmas to just give a donation of $10 to this worthy cause, PLEASE do so.  If you can't give $10, then give $5, or $1.  You can do this anonymously.  You don't have to put your name.  You can just put Anonymous when it asks for a name.  I can't stress enough that if ENOUGH people give just $1, that will add up to hundreds, which adds up to helping more families.  BUT, if you can't give, please, please, please SHARE this blog to your page so more people will see it and perhaps give.  Jesus said in Matthew 10:42 if you just give a cup of cold water to someone in need and do it in MY name, you have served ME!!  Please, GIVE if you can.....but if you can't SHARE......I wish I could share the tears that have been shed by those who were so grateful for the dollars we have been able to give so far.........Do I ask this boldly and unashamedly?.....YES.......and you would too if you had seen your child suffer and die from the ravages of severe gastroparesis - for 21 years we watched helplessly, going from doctor to doctor, city to city, trying to find help.......sometimes there were no Christmas presents for us, but that's OK.  We would have given EVERYTHING we had to find a cure for her........and now I will unashamedly beg for money for families suffering our same fate.  I know you want to know if WE have given anything and the answer is yes.  We have helped some of these families out of our own pockets...and will continue to do so as we can.  We've been there....we know the desperation..............

I'm going to include the link here so you can share it.  But, I'm also going to include some pictures of our Jeannie that are hard to look at.....because they are her progression downhill at the end....one of them being just two days before she died a painful death.   PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE......either SHARE or SHARE PLUS 10 (OR 5 OR 1 OR WHATEVER).....but, at the very least SHARE......Thank you....from all the families who live life daily with a patient with severe gastroparesis and from those patients who have very
 little quality of life.........


 

One of the good times before the last decline started..............



 










The last one was two days before she died..................with her is her sister-in-law, Christie Seegars.....she is having to hold her up for this picture.  She could no longer walk, talk, or swallow without gagging.  She'd had multiple strokes...........June 5, 2014


TO GIVE NOW CLICK ON THE LINK BELOW:

http://www.youcaring.com/medical-fundraiser/jeannie-pierce-seegars-fund-for-gastroparesis-patients/266314