Today I have reached a milestone, 100 blog posts and counting. Thank you, thank you for all your clicks, views, and commentary so far. I am commemorating this event in pictures.
“Sunshine and Rain” by Ian Christopher Beaman
Blogging is like life, up and down, sad and happy, rain and shine, day in and day out. Here is how Ian sees his Grandma/NaNa, picturing me with a split image, one eye blue, the other rosy pink. Does he see me as both a realist and an optimist? I can only surmise because I don’t know what is going on in his six-year-old mind. The bluest eye sees cold, hard facts; the other eye views life with rose-tinted glasses. A balanced view, if you ask me! Also, if you notice, he pictures me as being fruitful too: bushels of apples in the tree.
Did I say blogging is like life? Here’s the inside scoop on what writing blog posts is really like:
But I love every minute. Really, I do!
Most importantly, I get to send stories out into the ether and then “talk” to you after the writing is posted. We make a connection.
Only connect the prose and the passion, and both will be exalted, and then love will be seen at its height.
E. M. Forster Howard’s End
My heart leaps up when you join the conversation.
Now it’s your turn:
What blog post is most memorable to you? What would like to see more of? Less of?
Voting is still open for My Gutsy Story.
To read the story: http://soniamarsh.com/2013/12/rising-above-the-pettiness-to-focus-on-the-positive-by-marian-beaman.html
To vote for my story: http://soniamarsh.com/2014/01/vote-for-your-favorite-december-2013-my-gutsy-story.html Thank you!
Anna Quindlen in her splendid 84-page book How Reading Changed My Life describes reading as her “perfect island.” She doesn’t say where the island exists, so it can be anywhere the reader imagines it to be.
My perfect island as a girl was the attic under the sloping roof, unless it was summer steamy hot, or winter frosty cold. Then my nest was on my bed, or flopped on the davenport, across a chair, anywhere . . . .
My books were not like Quindlen’s list of “10 Books for a Girl Who Is Full of Beans.” I didn’t read her noble suggestions like Little Women, Anne of Green Gables, Madeline, or even A Wrinkle in Time as a young girl, but I did become addicted to the Cherry Ames series, books in the mold of Nancy Drew: Cherry Ames, Student Nurse, Army Nurse, Flight Nurse. If you have read them, you may know Cherry, short for “Charity,” is the heroine in a series of 27 mystery novels with hospital settings between 1943 and 1968.
I slurped up Lucy Winchester by Mennonite author Christmas Carol Kauffman, the story of Lucy’s spiritual quest to find peace “set against the backdrop of two difficult marriages and many sorrows, broken promises, sickness, infant deaths, alcoholism, and poverty.”
In a trip up to the attic again as an adult, my sisters and I rummaged through the stash of antique books (they’re over 50!) and divvied them up among ourselves.
Yes, I read books, books, lots of them, but these are what remain from girlhood days:
The book whose spine is taped up is entitled Bird Life in Wington (1948) a book of parables by Rev. J. Calvin Reid, pastor of Mt. Lebanon Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh,
Willie the Wolf with fangs in roadster ready to pounce on naive Gertie Goose
who invented the First Birderian Church of Wington to deliver sermonettes to parishioners named Professor Magpie, Baldy Eagle, Mr. Heron, a fisherman–you get the idea.
More Friends and Neighbors (Scott-Foresman & Company, 1941)
The images in this Valentine story are imprinted on my mind with cookie cutter precision, the secret to the surprise valentines that replace the snow-damaged paper cards by the window. This reader also contained the story of the “The Woman Who Used Her Head” by chopping a hole in her roof to accommodate the lofty altitude of her Christmas tree.
I always loved to turn the page and find an etching in the Elson Junior Literature Book One
Finally, a “real” literature book with Hawthorne’s The Great Stone Face, Emerson’s poem The Snowstorm, announced by “all the trumpets of the sky,” Longfellow’s The Courtship of Miles Standish, and Joan of Arc, the heroic maid who saved France from conquest. A vision, voices, an ancient prophecy–what could be more romantic for a plain Mennonite girl who dreamed of castles, and princes, and fulfillment, oh my!
Did this post jog your memory of textbooks, gift books, library books from your own past?
Please tell us about them.
Another invitation to vote for my story in The Gutsy Story Contest:
As the article in the Elizabethtown Chronicle explains, my Grandma Fannie stomped cabbage by using “her old potato masher to draw moisture from cabbage in the process of making stone crock sauerkraut.” The Longenecker family always had pork and sauerkraut, along with mashed potatoes and apple sauce, for New Year’s Day as well as other times during the year.
Just like many Pennsylvania Dutch families in 2013, we observed this New Year ritual with a menu of pork & sauerkraut and mashed potatoes.
Pork basted with mixture of meat juices, minced garlic, fresh dill, onion salt, dry mustard Sauerkraut with caraway seeds; baked apples
Around the table, counting our blessings: “. . . . Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.” I Samuel 7:12
Here is a postcard from precisely 100 years ago: Grandma Fannie Martin Longenecker’s New Year’s greeting passed down to me and then to our daughter Crista who now displays it in a frame with her holiday decorations:
They were called penny postcards for a reason!
Yes, it’s 100 years old, postmarked December 30, 1913. Notice there is no street address in a town of thousands and certainly no zip code, not instituted until the 1960s. “R.R.” means Rural Route. Dauphin County adjoins Lancaster County to the west.
Have you held on to old postcards or letters? Where do you keep them?
Inquiring minds want to know! Please join the conversation.
And twilight was turning to dusk as Cliff and I sat down to eat supper.
He said, “Let’s light a candle.”
She said, “Well, that’s a good idea. It’ll look pretty.”
One of us said, “Let’s put the candle into the curio cabinet. The mirrors behind will amplify the light.”
“Okay,” said the other. And so we admire the ambient light illuminating the cups and curios.
“It would look even prettier if we closed the glass door. More shimmer and glisten.”
Just so you know: We have surrounded a lighted candle with irreplaceable china (Dumb)! The deceptively romantic light disguises the fact that the candle flame is heating the upper glass shelf (Dumber than Dumb)! We leave the dining room momentarily to clear the table.
BOOM, BANG, POW—The glass shelf shatters, and shards of glass cascade into the once placid display of nineteen antique cups, some from Grandma Longenecker, some from Mother, and some from the travels of itinerant artist Cliff.
I scream with the first boom. Then I scream louder as I survey the damage. Cups with dismembered handles.. Saucers in slices. Family heirlooms gone with a poof!
Just because a scene looks artistic doesn’t mean it‘s not dangerous.
Just because a candle is seated in a pretty place doesn’t mean the laws of combustion won’t operate.
What remains:
Doll bell from Mother & Mug from Buckingham Palace
Japanese teacup from Grandma Annie Metzler
And a few more cups and saucers, not pictured.
Have you experienced the loss of family heirlooms? Other losses? What remains of value?
Your comments make me happy, and I will always respond.
Do read My Gutsy Story on author Sonia Marsh’s website:
A matryoshka doll also known as Russian nesting doll refers to a set of wooden dolls of decreasing size placed one inside the other. The first Russian nesting doll set was carved in 1890 by Vasily Zvyozdochkin from a design by Sergey Malyutin, a folk crafts painter. Traditionally the outer layer is a woman, dressed as a traditional Russian peasant. The smallest, innermost doll is typically a baby carved from a single piece of wood. Much of the artistry is in the painting of each doll, which can be very elaborate. The dolls often follow a theme, from fairy tale characters to Soviet leaders.
My own matryoshka doll from Ukraine is usually nestled between two volumes on my library shelf: Arthur Gordon’s A Touch of Wonder, and A Treasury of Religious Verse. But now on display during this season the largest doll tells the story of Christ’s nativity . . .
. . . and, un-nested, the story of his subsequent life on earth unfolds, culminating in the Crucifixion and Ascension.
Well, there was none. Not one. Not ever. Despite the fact that the Christmas song, “O Tannenbaum” is of German origin, most Pennsylvania Dutch Mennonite homes of the 1950s and 60s did not light Christmas trees. Decorated trees were lumped together with other worldly pleasures like jewelry, makeup, and movies and therefore not permitted. At least the Ray Longenecker family did not have one. We were plain and I longed for some fancy.
One year I found a limb from our maple tree out front with little branches that looked as forlorn as Charlie Brown’s tree. I brought it into the living room and tried to find trinkets and a red ribbon or two for decoration.
It was a sad little tree. It looked something like this, only wedged into our living room radiator and anchored by balled-up newspaper no doubt.
Good grief! I know how Charlie Brown must have felt. But at least his had “a wooden trunk and soft green needles” with a red ball on the end of a branch instead of a timid little ribbon.
Charlie Brown’s luck seems to change when Lucy appoints him as director of the Christmas play in which Linus reads Luke 2 from scripture. After the play, the performers migrate outdoors toward Charlie’s sagging tree. Charlie Brown eventually gets his wish for a fine Christmas tree as the gang “donate” the festive string of lights from Snoopy’s doghouse to the dress up the little tree. Charity in action.
No, there was no Christmas tree in our home or in the sanctuary of my family’s home church, Bossler’s Mennonite Church. But like Linus and friends, we heard the Christmas story from Luke 2 faithfully recited and at the end of the service, we received hand-outs of navel oranges every year, the orange orbs passed hand to hand down the rows.
Nowadays in the Longenecker-Beaman home there is a happy fir tree, bedecked with ornaments from several generations. And we all rehearse the precious old story of the nativity in the Bible passage Luke 2 on Christmas morning.
A wondrous story, plain and simple, read beside a fanciful tree.
Traditional luminaria of the Christmas season have their origins in the culture of Spain. Impressed with the paper lanterns from the Chinese culture, Spanish merchants decided to make their own version when they returned home.
Killarney Shores, our community, has kept this tradition alive during the Christmas season with votive candles seated in 2 inches of sand all enveloped in white paper bags. We space them 3-4 feet apart ringing the curvy streets of Emerald Isle Circle, Leprechaun Court, St. Patrick Lane, and Killarney Drive in the neighborhood.
Recently, the candle-lighting event has become a family tradition too with grandchildren lending a hand in the preparations of bag filling and lighting the votives. Last year it was the Dalton duo, this year the Beaman boys.
Grandboys Curtis and Ian, outfitted as shepherds, placing bags on the curb of the street.
White paper bag glowing from within
All done, surveying the view.
A little tipsy – both the boy and a bag!
Lighting dozens of candles is exhausting, we need a snack . . .
What favorite things do you do this season, maybe like us, repeating year after year.
Join the conversation. Inquiring minds want to know about yours!
Your comments welcome; I will always reply!
Woo-hoo, a chance to play with fire!
To view my entry to the My Gutsy Story Contest, click here. Voting takes place in January 2014.
Quilt exhibited at the bicentennial celebration at Bossler Mennonite Church
You won’t find the definitions for rumspringa or bundling, (often referring to the Amish) in this mini-dictionary of Pennsylvania Dutch words, but here are some expressions the Longeneckers and other Mennonite families in Lancaster County often used growing up in the 1950s and 60s:
The word “Dutch” is actually a misnomer. Many Pennsylvania Dutch settlers originated in Switzerland before migrating to Germany, not the Netherlands. Thus, “Dutch” may be a corruption of Deutsch (German for the word German).
(Spellings below are dubious, an amalgam of what sounds I heard and some expressions “translated” in modern media from the German.)
ach: variously paired with yes/no/not sure, meaning “yes, of course” and so on.
brutzing: as in “stop your whining, crying!”
dopplich: clumsy with yourself
daymedich: not too smart, slow-witted
ferhoodled: not neat, messy–as in a messy house
fire-ich-butz: one who “flies off the handle,” flares with anger
hipschick: snazzy looking, stylish in fashion. Referring to machinery: working well, no glitches
“It wonders me. . . .” meaning, I wonder (Grandma Longenecker said this often.)
Kunst du Deutch schwetza: Do you speak Pennsylvania Dutch?
kutz: to vomit
nix nootz: mischievous child
rutschy: restless (something you shouldn’t be in church), squirmy. Also: “giegling,” as in “quit your giegling around,” wiggling on a chair at the table, or at a desk at school.
schmutzich: smeary, messy, or runny–like ice cream from a cone melting onto your fingers
schnickelfritz: troublemaker, usually referring to a child
schtrubelich: messy, uncombed hair
schuslich: in a hurry and leaving a mess behind
spritzing: raining lightly
shit-mo-link: Coined by my dad, a good Mennonite brother, who would never curse or use 4-letter words. His definition: Someone who caused him trouble in business; a crook. It’s only a guess, but his invented word could have originated from the Minneapolis Moline tractors he sold in his dealership, Longenecker Farm Supply:
Cultivating nearly 10 acres of land for our tomato crop in Bainbridge, PA with a Minneapolis Moline tractor
“Gay” (church): non-Mennonite church where people dressed fancy without coveringsand cape dresses. Some daughters from the Alvin Longenecker clan got married in the Evangelical United Brethren Church, a dressy church in Elizabethtown, PA and wore lovely bridal gowns and shimmering veils at their weddings. As a plain Mennonite girl, I dreamed of having such a wedding. (Now “gay churches” often refer to churches who welcome alternative lifestyles.)
Interestingly, many of the words and expressions we used growing up express strong feelings. Many of them seem onomatopoeic to me now, the sound giving a hint to the meaning.
This listing is just a start. What words can you add to this lexicon? From the Pennsylvania Dutch?
From a different ancestry?
Join the conversation! I’d love to hear from you, and I will always reply.
*** Here is the link to my story set in Ukraine submitted to the My Gutsy Story Contest:
Plain and Fancy 