The Orchard

I already knew her name--Isabella.
I occasionally caught a fleeting sight of her slipping around a corner as I entered a room in the old farmhouse. Or sometimes she'd flit between the trees in the apple orchard. She was always playing tricks on me. Cupboard doors would be left open. Items would disappear from where I knew I'd left them only to reappear days later in corners of the house that I hadn't explored yet.
The house was full of angles and corners and surprises.

The house was an old northern New Mexican farmhouse made of light brown stucco with a blue metal roof. An old adobe wall divided the front porch from the apple orchard. A statue of a young St. Francis stood by the wall watching over two teenage frogs enthralled with each other caught in stone. Cecil the pottery pig should have been there too. I think Isabella must have taken him. Hidden him.

She has left presents for me some days. A pink mottled Gravenstine apple on the rocking chair, a small round Jonathan on the table on the upper deck. She had a lot to choose from in the old orchard. I still don't know all the varieties that are growing there.

In the kitchen there are a couple of terrones in the kiva fireplace. A cast iron kettle sits by the pot hanger waiting. I wonder if she cooked her dinner there. The terrones are adobe blocks cut out of the Bosque' to make adobe bricks and these two were put in the fireplace---a reminder of Isabella' s home. I think the porcelain farm sink must have come from her home too; as well as the tin light fixtures hanging from the beams over the table. The floors are red brick.

I'd sit on the upper deck early in the mornings listening to the birds calling in the Bosque. A heron and a couple of sand-hill cranes wandered through the orchard one morning.A wild turkey made himself at home. Raccoons and neighboring horses helped themselves to the ripe fruit and a friendly neighborhood skunk visited with the dog next door. Poor dog.

Several times that week I'd see an old blue Chevrolet drive slowly down the dirt road. A dark haired woman in her late forties would gaze out the window as she drove past and watch. I don't think she saw me sitting under the metal roof of the second floor deck. Tomorrow I will go out to meet her.

Maria was quiet, reserved, and lonely. The house use to belong to her. She had lovingly added pieces of her grandmother's home to her own. Isabella, a child bride from Spain came with her darkly handsome husband to start a new life in New Mexico. Divorce had not only taken away Maria’s husband and home, but her grandmother’s remembrances. I don’t know yet whether I’ll be friends with Maria. I want to keep the home happy, away from anger and sad memories. I’ll have to think about that in the coming months.



...............................................

And now the orchard is mine to watch over. The house our home, and Isabella my constant companion. Her spirit is comfortable living here with us. I hang the painting of my own grandmother’s home above the fireplace in the kitchen. It is a picture of an old stucco home in a cherry orchard that my mother painted. I’m adding my mother’s and grandmother’s spirit. We’re coming full circle.

Warrior Mothers

I was talking to my daughter the other day. She has a new job at an answering service for funeral homes. She’s not always comfortable with this enployment. Sometimes the callers need answers that she isn’t able to give them in her position. But one woman called recently who needed to just talk out her grief to someone who would listen. It was hard but she was able to help. Have you had the opportunity lately to make just a little difference in someone’s life?

“You are the guardians of the hearth,” said President Gordon B. Hinckley in the general Relief Society meeting in 1995. “You are the bearers of the children. You are they who nurture them and establish within them the habits of their lives. No other work reaches so close to divinity as does the nurturing of the sons and daughters of God.”
Our most significant responsibilities are centered in strengthening families and homes—no matter our current circumstances. “ Barbara Thompson, upon hearing this thought “ remembers, “I felt the significance of the message. I also found myself thinking, ‘This is a great guide for parents. It is also a big responsibility for parents.’ I thought for a moment that it really didn’t pertain too much to me since I wasn’t married and didn’t have any children. But almost as quickly I thought, ‘But it does pertain to me. I am a member of a family. I am a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a cousin, a niece, and a granddaughter. I do have responsibilities—and blessings—because I am a member of a family. Even if I were the only living member of my family, I am still a member of God’s family, and I have a responsibility to help strengthen other families.’”

I was reading an article last week about warrior mothers. These are women who went to battle for their ideals, their children, their country. These are women like the Celtic Queen Boudicca, Cleopatra, Catherine the Great, Isabella of Spain, Harriet Tubman, and Susan B. Anthony. While I was reading I kept thinking of the Mother’s of the 10,000 stripling warriors in the Book of Mormon. They taught their children to uphold their values and fight for their rights, and country, and faith.

Susan B. Anthony said,
• “The older I get, the greater power I seem to have to help the world; I am like a snowball -- the further I am rolled the more I gain.”

My mother was a warrior in her own way. She grew up in a time when women were not accepted equally with men. She was the first woman to graduate from the school of landscape architecture at BYU and her professor was not happy to have her in his classes. He felt it was not a womanly occupation. When she was hired by the Utah state government as a landscape architect her boss had her only use her initials so that she would get equal pay for equal work. When we moved to New Mexico in a small company town she fought and changed government policies to benefit the women in town giving them more options.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said that a hero is no braver than an ordinary person, but they are braver for five minutes longer.

How can you become a warrior mother, a guardian of the hearth?

Hurry! Hurry!

I always liked February.
Fury little creatures
Poking out of the ground
Looking for sun;
The quiet stillness in the air;
The sun shining
In spite of the cold;
Plants buried in the snow
All straining,
Waiting,
Anticipating
Spring

The Quilt

The fabric in old quilts is different from that in new quilts. I don’t know if the weaving was done differently or if the fibers just get old. Maybe like my own hair they dry out and change texture. It’s sometimes hard to decide whether to combine the two when making a quilt. Should I be true to the quilt, or let impatience rule. Usually my goal was to finish a project quickly I wondered whether to just be picky and go with what I had each time.
I’ve really gotten excited about quilting. It’s something that has passed haphazardly down the generational line in our family. I have a quilt made by my grandparents and aunts, my mother, and several of my own. I have one that’s over a hundred and twenty years old made by my husband’s grandfather. I hope my children continue the love and tradition of making and collecting quilts.

But this quilt venture was different.
I drove into the driveway on 5th west. The old brick house held many memories for me. I wondered how many ghosts still roamed in the apple orchard. Grandma and Grandpa are long gone. Charlie and the sisters mostly, too. Only Lane and her husband live on the other side of town. The house was being torn down, sold to the Medical Center across the street for doctor’s offices.
The key was the old fashioned one I remembered from childhood. People, the cousins and grandchildren, had been through the house looking for treasures and memories from their own childhood. I remembered the little bedroom down stairs, next to the old coal bin. My mother and her three sisters shared it. They had one cupboard with four drawers, one for each of them. It had a place to hang their two dresses each; a winter one and a summer one. It makes my life look so cluttered in comparison.
Upstairs was the tiny bathroom my grandfather built. The girls were so excited when they no longer had to trot out to the back garden in the middle of the night. My grandfather locked the door at ten o’clock and once or twice Mom and her cousin had to sneak into the house through the bathroom window.

In my mind I could see the laundry that Grandma use to hang on the clotheslines between the apple trees, the sheets billowing in the breeze. The lines were also used to hang the rugs on to be beaten clean and the quilts to air on a warm sunny day.

In the kitchen the old range that had replaced my grandmothers black wood-burning cook stove, was cold and lonely looking. It seemed like I could still smell the pot roast with carrots and potatoes, fresh home made bread, and my favorite, chicken soup with hand made noodles.

I found the box in the closet of my grandmother’s dark bedroom. I remember being frightened of going into that room. Now I could see it was the dark wallpaper and furniture that gave it an oppressive air, not my sweet grandmother. How had everyone missed this treasure, I wondered. Inside a cabinet wrapped in an old white cotton sheet were the quilt blocks. There were twelve of them in the pineapple flower design. Grandmother had loved it when Bella, the oldest had taken them all to Hawaii, and wanted to make a quilt to remember the trip. They were white and the colorful fabrics of the 60’s. I stroked the fabric lovingly, sensing the soft powdery feeling of my grandmother’s cheeks in the vintage fabric. How should I finish this quilt, I wondered. I wanted to find vintage fabric to keep the integrity of the quilt this time.

Taking one last fond look around the house, I walked out to the large front porch. My brothers use to sit out on the wall surrounding the porch playing an identification game. “I see a 1952 Ford” said Jay, “There’s a 55 Chevy” jumped in Dale.“ “A 58 Pontiac”! Not wanting to be left out my sister and I chimed in. “I see a red one.”

Off to the right near the irrigation ditch was an old Jonathan apple tree. Many times Ann and I crawled up in that tree and ate the green apples, watching the ants climbing the branches and the bees darting through the leaves. Childhood! Sometimes I miss it.
As I drove home I thought about the quilt blocks I had found. Where would I get Vintage fabric to finish my treasure?

Looking on my computer for vintage fabric I happened on an EBay website. This might work. Surely someone had old fabric to sell. I had to laugh when I saw some of the fabric. This “vintage” fabric looked familiar. I had used some just like that to sew clothing in my college classes. I even still had some in my “fabric stash” (which every quilter collects.) How had I forgotten that? Well for one thing I never thought of myself as Vintage. I was off to the attic to explore.

For the next few days I sorted and chose, washed and cut. I was ready. I laid the blocks on the floor to arrange them. Usually with twelve blocks I would do three rows of four blocks, but this didn’t show the pineapple flower. Eventually I decided on an arrangement of two rows of six blocks, which made a nice table runner. I added a purple border and began to quilt. The ghosts of my grandmother and her children watched over my shoulder as I sewed. I could hear them laughing about the funny things they did on that trip, the good time they had.

I wrapped the finished quilt, carefully folding the ends in and mailed it to my niece Leigh. She would be the holder of my grandmother’s treasure. As I looked slowly around, I wondered if I would complete another circle. Would I return to my roots-- an apple orchard?

Happy New Year

A car hit a motorcyclist trapping him under the car, which was burning. A group of passerby’s rushed to his rescue, tipping the car up while others pulled him out.

A driver lost control and went into a river. Many observers jumped into the icy river in Logan Utah to rescue the children trapped inside.

Just before Christmas there was a woman in West Jordan, Utah, who was pinned under a Utah transit bus. There was a news item about a young police officer that crawled under the bus to comfort her while rescue workers were trying to extract her. He held her hand, giving what comfort he could.

The reporter, in the Salt Lake tribune, wrote:
“We love such stories, because they reinforce that we are possessed of better angels who may be summoned in times of crisis. They offer a portrait of human nature that is not cynical. In short, they remind us that we are capable of great acts of charity.
The story of Officer Peck resonated in part because it occurred during this season of charity; a timely reminder that all of us — at any time — may find ourselves dependent upon the rest of us.
If there is single lesson to be embraced in the story of Officer Peck, it is this: Acts of charity need not be reserved to cases of emergency, or to a season of the year. Whenever we offer help to those in need, in the form of actions large or small, by donating money or needed items, when we give of our time to assist or volunteer, when we choose to help instead of walk away, we have summoned the same angels that led a police officer, on a cold December morning, to reach into the darkness to hold the hand of a stranger.”

Have you ever had the opportunity to offer that small comfort? I remember sitting on an airplane reading, waiting to take off on a flight to New Mexico. The woman sitting in the window seat (the center seat was vacant) was taking her first trip on an airplane. Without saying a word I reached over and took her hand and held it till we landed. Another time a sister, recently widowed, sitting next to me in church started weeping when a hymn touched her. We wept together holding hands through the whole hymn.
In the January 2012 Ensign, President Thomas S. Monson challenged us to undertake a “personal, diligent, significant quest for what I call the abundant life—a life filled with an abundance of success, goodness and blessings. Just as we learned the ABC’in school, I offer my own ABCs to help us all gain the abundant life.” He goes on to say,
“A refers to attitude The greatest revolution of our generation is the discovery that human beings, by changing the inner attitudes of their minds, can change the outer aspects of their lives. (William James A Toolbox for Humanity, 2003)”
B is for Believe—in yourself. “Don’t limit yourself and don’t let others convince you that you are limited in what you can do. Believe in yourself and then live so as to reach your potential.
C is for Challenges with Courage. “Have the determination to make the effort, the single-mindedness to work toward a worthy goal, and the courage not only to face the challenge that inevitably come but also to make a second effort, should such be required. Sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says, ‘I’ll try again tomorrow.’”
Happy New Year! Let’s make it a Great One!

The "Snow Man"

The snowman chuckled when he saw
The children in the glen.
Ice skating, sledding, a snowball fight
It made him think of when

His own two children just as small
Made angels in the snow,
Stuck cold icicles in the boots
Of neighbors, friends and foe.

He wrapped his scarf around his neck,
His hat upon his head.
Looked lovingly at nice clear streets,
And put his plow to bed.

Gifts

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and discovered many things you are thankful for. November is a good time to sit back and think about our blessings.

December is the months we consider gifts. We think about the gifts we would like to give to others. We are reminded about our blessings and are more willing to share with those not as fortunate. There are a lot of them this year and I hope you are finding many ways to share your good fortune. There are food banks, toy collections and many charities willing to share our time and talents. We should also consider our God given gifts
In I Corinthians 12 we read, “Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I would not have you ignorant. For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge. To another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing…To another the working of miracles; to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues….
What gifts do you have? Are you patient? Are you kind? Do you work well with others? Are you good to children? Do you recognize someone who has a need? Do you appreciate music or share in the making of it? Can you read?
I’m finding that there are many around us who are not proficient or comfortable in doing this one thing that I love and can’t imagine not being able to do.
Make a list of your gifts
“31 But covet earnestly the best gifts: “

I’ve decided that painting is not a gift I have. It should be. My mother was a painter. Two of my siblings paint. Each of the five of us has a child or grandchild who are very artistic and like to paint. When my mother was approaching the end of her life she said she was going to be one of the angels who did sunsets. Every time I see a beautiful sunset I smile and say “Hi Mom!’

Every ten years or so I take a beginners watercolor class or two,decide I’m not good enough and quit. As I talked to another class member in my current session, who is a successful painter;he mentioned that he painted every day. Apparently we have to practice to get our gifts. Imagine that! If I had a studio set up and ready; if I used it every day I might be a better painter.

Eliza R. Snow, who had served as secretary when Relief Society was organized in Nauvoo, was called by President Brigham Young (1801–77) to travel throughout the Church, helping bishops organize Relief Society in their wards.
She taught “If any of the daughters and mothers in Israel are feeling in the least circumscribed [limited] in their present spheres, they will now find ample scope for every power and capability for doing good with which they are most liberally endowed. …”

Do you want to be a better friend? Say hello to neighbors you see in the elevator.
Do you want the gift of good health? Exercise every day. Get enough sleep.Eat healthy foods.
Do you want to be kind? Offer to help an organization you admire.
Do you want more knowledge? Read
Do you wish you could paint? Practice! Sing? Practice! Play the guitar? Practice!
Do you want the gift of wisdom? Pay attention to what’s happening in your community. And Pray!

2012 is quickly approaching. Take a few minutes and think “What do I always wish I could do, or have, or be? What steps do I need to take to accomplish this desire?”
Merry Christmas!