Yeah, I'm tired by Liz Flaherty

I had a column half-written. Well, maybe a third. I really liked it, but when I read it over, then read it aloud, I realized I sounded like a bitter old person. What's really bad about that is that the subject of that first long paragraph was...yeah, bitter old people who complain about everything. So, you've been spared that. For this week, anyway. You're welcome.

But I didn't really have any ideas about what to write, which happens a lot these days (which might have something to do with being old; I'm not copping to bitter. Most of the time.) So I stole borrowed a subject from Sean Dietrich, one of my favorite columnists. 

Let's talk about food. 

It's been a lifelong love. While many people my age have seen their appetites diminish over the years, that phenomenon hasn't reached me yet. I love to eat, to have meals with friends, dinners or breakfasts with family members when my son and/or son-in-law make the best gravy ever. I love popcorn with  movies, cheese and crackers with anything, and potato chips if there is a bag or can of them that hasn't gotten away from me yet. 

Are you saying So yet? As in, when's she going to get to the meat of the matter? (Sorry. I had to say that.)

The meat is one I've talked about often, but needs to be re-addressed in case anyone missed it. 

I'm tired of cooking. I'm tired of choosing what to cook. I'm tired of choosing where to go out to eat. I'm tired of choosing when to eat. At a time when so many people in government are intent on taking away choices, they don't even address this one. This gives me a sneaking suspicion that they haven't been choosing what, when, and where to eat for most of their lives, and as long as it doesn't affect them, they're not interested. 

I don't see a solution to any of this happening soon, but I am happy to have gotten it said anyway. 

Again. 

I'm not cooking tonight, by the way. We're going to the ice cream social at Ebenezer Church and I'm going to have one of Gracie's chicken sandwiches and a piece of someone else's great pie--probably sugar cream--and whatever kind of ice cream I want. Because as tired as I am of cooking and of choosing stuff, I'm not one bit tired of eating. 

Have a good week and some ice cream. Be nice to somebody. 

Soup Supper... by Liz Flaherty

Sorry. I'll be here today. Guaranteed to be wearing chili and be very tired. But we'd love to see you all there! 

Have a great week. Be nice to somebody!

You're Not Fired, but... by Liz Flaherty

I "do" the church bulletin. Being slapdash in nature, I usually make mistakes in it. Not typos, just out-and-out errors. Wrong page numbers for hymns. Wrong numbers for scriptural verses. (Yeah, I have a problem with numbers--goes back to third grade when I met the multiplication tables.) Most Sunday morning services are accompanied with assurances that "you're still not fired."

In the real, not voluntary world, I should be, because I'm not very good at doing the bulletin. My mind wanders and I hurry too much, forget too much, and I transpose the aforementioned numbers. However, when you have a job to do in church, it's usually yours for life. The truth is, too, that I like doing it. I like praying for the names on the list when I put the praises and concerns on the back page. I like trying to make the liturgist laugh when he reads the announcements. I like including birthdays and anniversaries and Good News from everywhere. But I should be fired, or my resignation should be accepted simply because the quality of my work...isn't. Isn't quality, I mean.

I'm like many other people I know--I think there should be time and age limits on congressional years-in-service, on members of the SCOTUS, even on the President. Because we reach the age of being not as sharp. Because we get tired. Because we're bewildered by changes that have taken place despite our efforts. Because, like it or not, our minds narrow. 

When I listen, though, to some younger people, whose minds and opinions haven't had time to grow and grasp and experience, and hear evidence of more narrow minds--Okay, boomer ring a bell?--I wonder where the happy medium is. Because we certainly need one, don't we?

Maybe none of us should be fired. Maybe we should just continue to learn and do the best we can--all the while realizing not everyone learns in the same way and sometimes our best isn't that quality I mentioned up there. Maybe we should listen more than we talk. 

Yeah. Me, too. 

Have a great week. Be nice to somebody. 

Hope and Other Good Things by Liz Flaherty

Continuing with hope...and other good things... Kind of busy this week, so bear with me while I this and that it for a little while--at least until the pie is done and I have to get the brownies into the oven.

Today, between five and eight PM, if you're not busy, ride out to the corner of 1100 N and Meridian Road for a sandwich, a piece of pie, and some homemade ice cream. Try a couple of flavors, because Ebenezer UM Church's Ice Cream Social only comes once a year! Free will donation and a bake sale right there when you come in the door!

Tomorrow, head south, where Peoria Church is having their ice cream social at 4:00. Three Old Guys are playing music while you eat and talk on the church's beautiful grounds. I haven't been there yet, so I can't recite their menu, but the address is 5575 E 325 S, Peru. 

One night this week, I got to attend the meeting of the book group my daughter-in-law Laura is part of. They'd read Window Over the Sink, which was pretty exciting in itself, but it was also several hours of some of the best food and the best conversation! 

Two of our grandboys, Skyler and Shea, had birthdays this week. Although they were six and five only a few days ago, they're 26 and 25 now. Skyler, with his parents there to watch, was promoted to First Lieutenant on his birthday, Our grandgirl, Tierney, got engaged this summer. Fionn is getting ready to go to Ball State. 

Someone else's granddaughter mows a nearby churchyard and cemetery every week. She's never late and she does a great job. Someone else's granddaughter sells eggs. Grandkids of the people who lived in our neighborhood when we moved to our house 45 years ago are homeowners here now. The neighborhood is better for them being here. I'm grateful.

A young woman who lives close shared this on Facebook. I've seen it before, but it's a great reminder. I don't think she'll mind me posting it here. 

You read and hear a lot of complaining about "these kids today," just as you always have. I am so grateful for them and proud of them. Not just ours, but yours, too. They think, they work, they're hilarious, they're caring, and they give me hope that things will be better. 

The sun has come up through the east window and the bob-whites are talking a mile a minute. Wishing you a great week. I hope you go eat ice cream and talk to your neighbors. Be nice to somebody. 

Liz 🌟

Ice Cream Social

I don't have a post today because I will be here at Ebenezer helping to prepare for and serve the ice cream social. Except for last year, it is an annual event. We are at the corner of Meridian Road and 1100 North. The ice cream, sandwiches, pie, and fellowship are all excellent! Free-will donation. Bake sale on the premises. 

All Are Welcome by Liz Flaherty #WindowOvertheSink

Last week, I got political in the column. Thanks to everyone who read and responded. To the friends I lost because of a stance I took, I'm sorry to have lost you. I wish you happy.

Regardless of the title above, I'm not going to step further into controversy by talking about religion; however, I am going to talk about church. No, about churches. 

A cradle Methodist, I grew up in the Gilead Church. I say I grew up in it, but quite

honestly I got out of going every chance I got. Eventually I stopped altogether. Over the years I started again somewhere else. Stopped. Went occasionally. Then went and have stayed. Most of the time. One thing I know now if I didn't know it before Covid is that the church is its people, not its buildings. 

But, oh, the buildings. I'm not sure how I would feel about them if I were non-Christian, but I love them. All of them. I've managed to visit at least one in every city I've ever visited. I like the old ones best, the ones where you can feel the weight of centuries of heartbreak and hope when you go through the doors. I am always overwhelmed by the sheer size of the big ones, and usually slide into a pew to do my praying, because once I'm in the pew I'm one-on-one with God again.

In the wayback, when Duane was in Vietnam, St. Charles in Peru kept its doors unlocked--at least during the day--and I used to go in there after work and light a candle for Duane, dropping a dime into the metal coin box on the table. I'd go to Mass sometimes, too. I don't know if it was because I actually preferred the Catholic faith to my own or because I liked wearing a lace mantilla--women all covered their heads then.

At the little church in Ammons, Kentucky where my mother-in-law grew up, the floor used to slope so much on the left side that leaving the church was like doing a mini-mountain-climb. 

The title to this column, of course, is...I don't know, wishful thinking, maybe. Or selective memory. Not everyone feels welcome in every church. Not every church makes everybody feel welcome. There are "Christians" who go to church because they want to be seen there. "Christians" who go to church until they've taken advantage of every avenue of mission open to them. "Christians" who, as Father Hoffmeyer said all those years ago at St. Charles, "Hit the bars, hit the booze, and hit the box [confessional]." He said something else about hitting their knees, but I don't remember it well enough to quote it. There are Christians who aren't Christians. 

But I'm not talking about Christians--or I wasn't; I'm not sure how that paragraph happened. I'm talking about churches. About places of worship regardless of the faith they represent. They are way up there on my gratitude list. In action as well as intent, most of them are places of sanctuary, places where they will feed the hungry and clothe the naked (Matthew 25:40). Places that do indeed open their doors to all. Places of fellowship and worship and acceptance and tolerance. 

It saddens me that so many churches are closed. I'm glad to see some of them being restored and repurposed (thank you, Dave Van Baalen). I don't pretend to know what comes next in religion--I can only take care of my own--but that doesn't make me any less grateful for what I have learned and for the places I've learned it. 

Have a great week. Stay safe. Be nice to somebody. 

Important Places

“All these places have their moments…” – Lennon and McCartney

My father-in-law was here this morning for a while. Seeing him, naturally enough, made me think about my mother-in-law, and miss her. And my mom—and miss her, too. I gave him a cup of coffee and thought about how many cups of coffee there had been at how many tables and then I thought of places that have been important to me.

          In case you didn’t know it, this is how a writer’s mind works. Forget any idea of sense or linearity or neatly dovetailing thoughts—there aren’t any of those. A writer’s mind is a whole lot like the junk drawer at the end of the cabinet, full and messy.

          But, yes, places. Starting with kitchen tables. My mother’s, where the homemade bread and sugar cookies cooled and she taught me to iron pillowcases. My sister’s, where no one was ever a stranger. My mother-in-law’s, where we sat while she cooked and gave the grandkids whatever they asked for. The tables from our 30s where girlfriends and I sat and shared coffee and confidences. Our kitchen island now, where we play Farkle and I write Christmas cards and make plans. Kitchen tables are so many things—pulpits, confessionals, meditation sites, places of both privacy and society. They are where we laugh and cry and make life-changing decisions. They are important.

          Desks have been instrumental since the first day of first grade, when I

learned the word “Look” and from there on couldn’t be stopped from reading every written page that crossed my path. It was at a desk where I learned to love American history although I never got good at it and where I had to stay through several recesses because of talking in class. It was where I was sitting when an editor first called and said, “I want to buy your book.”

          Bleachers are way up there on my list. They are where I watched my kids grow up and learn things that might have been missed outside the arenas of sports, drama, and music. They’re where I had my first experience with civil disobedience back in high school. When I was 19, I sat in the bleachers at the softball diamond in Maconaquah Park and tried to figure out what I was going to do next.

          Church. Obviously, it’s the accepted place to worship, but I believe you

can worship anywhere. It’s also where people are married, baptized, dedicated, and eulogized. It’s where we have chili suppers, noodle suppers, sauerkraut suppers, and tenderloin suppers—and that’s just in September and October; there are plenty more to be had throughout the year. It’s where, if we’re lucky, party affiliations and grudges are left outside the open-to-all doors. It is, when all else fails, a safe place.

          Norris Lake, Tennessee is important because our family in its entirety spent Thanksgiving weekend there a few years ago. It was one of the best times I’ve ever had—it’s also the last time we’ve all been in the same place at the same time. That could be bittersweet, but it’s not—it’s all sweet. Although it’s important not to live in the past, keeping good memories in a pocket inside your heart is just as important.

         The Nickel Plate Trail. I don’t walk much these days, but it’s still my favorite place when I do. I’ve done a lot of plotting there, spent quality time with family and friends, and remembered what a gift nature is.

          The school up the road is important if for no other reason than there have been family members in it ever since it was built. It’s where I have so many memory bank deposits I can’t begin to keep track of them all.

          There are so many others. Favorite vacation places, the side yard where the deer graze and the birds dive-bomb each other and the sun slips quietly and beautifully into the horizon, places I’ve voted, music that has been so stirring it created places of its own.

          The pleasure in important places is that you don’t have to go back to them to experience them. As faulty as memory becomes—and it does—happy times still live there. You may not be able to remember how to get back to the physical places that are important to you, but you’ll remember how you felt there. You’ll remember the perfect meal with 16 of you at the table and the day you were laughing so hard you were falling off the barstools in the kitchen and the taste of those sugar cookies that you’ve never once been able to emulate. And you’ll know those places—and times—were important. Capture the joy.