Tuesday, February 14, 2006, 19:34
A Bigger Rocking Chair
I had just come in from going outside with Pixie this morning when I saw a flash in the living room. At first, I thought Randy had turned on the television in the living room. He goes to work later on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and I supposed that he wanted to watch the news before getting in the shower. Except the flash did not exactly seem like the television.
Then came another flash.
I took off my boots and went into the living room.
"We need a bigger rocking chair," Randy said as he took another picture with the digital camera.
There, in the rocking chair, were three of the cats, all cuddled up together.
I have had that rocking chair for about 40 years now. It was a Christmas gift from my big sister, Loretta, when I was a little girl. I loved rocking chairs when I was a kid, and I still do, I guess.
The kitties apparently love the rocking chair, too. Especially since it is "new" to them. For years, the rocking chair sat down in the basement. It needed to be fixed, and Randy always said he really ought to get around to fixing it. The chair required a couple of new spindles on the back, and Randy finally found the right sized dowels earlier this winter. He fixed the chair, cleaned it off and brought it up in the house. The dowels still must be stained to match the rest of the back, but as far as I'm concerned, that's a minor detail.
The rocking chair has been up in the house now for a couple of weeks, and since day one, the kitties have enjoyed sleeping in it.
Well, no, that's not quite right. From day one, one of the kitty cats liked to sit in the chair, looking very proud of herself as she carefully climbed up in it and then sat straight upright as the chair tilted forward.
It was only after I put a couple of quilts in the chair that the cats decided it was the best place in the world to take a nap.
I still have to find cushions for the chair, and I decided that for the time being, quilts would suffice.
Having the rocking chair in the living room is like spending time with an old friend again, and I'm glad to have it up in the house with me once more. I spent many happy hours in that chair as a child, reading, relaxing and talking to my mother when she was sitting in her own chair by the living room window.
My mother could not get around very well because she had been stricken with polio many years before I was born, and she spent hours every day sitting in her chair to read newspapers and magazines and to embroider. My very own rocking chair gave me the opportunity to sit with her.
We often think we have to spend a lot of money on gifts. But my husband's gift of a few hours of his time and the effort to find the right dowels to fix my chair means more to me than a brand new rocking chair would.
It is, in fact, priceless.
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Telephone service -- I just got off the phone with a representative from Century-Tel, who was trying to sell me a "bundle" of services. Caller ID, she said, was was very useful, for example, because her dad is a good one for calling but not leaving a message, and if my dad was like that, I would find Caller ID useful.
Guess what, lady? My dad has been dead for almost 14 years, so if he calls -- and whether he does or does not leave a message -- I think I would have to consult with a psychic to find out what it was he wanted. I didn't say that, of course, although I wanted to.
But you know what the really funny thing was? The connection on her end was extremely poor. I could barely hear her. I generally do not have problems hearing people on in-coming or out-going calls.
If Century-Tel wants to sell additional services, would it not be worth their while to make sure their connections are good when they are calling people?
I stopped her in the middle of her script, said that I was not interested in their additional services, and pointed out that in my opinion, their phone service is too expensive to begin with, so why would I want to make it more expensive? Maybe I'm too old-fashioned, but I happen to believe that almost $50 a month, just to have the phone in the house, never mind if you never use it, is too expensive.
LeAnn R. Ralph
Monday, February 13, 2006, 21:30
Pictures from Men's Breakfast
You might know that in my haste to upload the pictures before, I *would* have a typo in two of the file names. That's why they didn't upload properly and why the photo album said they were there, but they weren't!
Here are the rest of the pictures from the Men's Breakfast at our church on Feb. 12, 2006.
A nice young man who also was my student last year.
The crew in the kitchen!
All together, when breakfast was finished, about 60 people had come to church for breakfast.
Randy and his friend Randy.
LeAnn R. Ralph
