After years of staying at home, in July of 2000 I went to work at the new Kohl's Distribution Center. Cliff was thrilled. We finally had some extra money to do things we wanted to do. However, since he worked the evening shift and I worked days, he was on his own until time to leave for work. He said he hated the empty feeling he got when he walked into the house. So he spent as much time as possible outside or in the shop until he left for work at 2:30.
And then God sent Cliff some little buddies, and that empty feeling faded away. The twins were home-schooled. Once they wandered over to the shop and got acquainted with my husband, they stayed. After they showed up, not only did Cliff quit missing me, but he was quite happy with my being gone. If I got off work early, or had a day off, I was a bit of a wet blanket on their activities.
If Cliff needed somebody to run the tractor for him, he'd say, "I'll get one of my boys to help."
Those boys were so cute in their little coveralls. Cliff taught them to weld, and he let them use his tools and his shop for all sorts of do-it-yourself projects of their own.
Need somebody to help haul hay? No problem. Cliff's boys were right there to help with a job that NOBODY wants to do. Ryan, the twins' cousin, is also one of Cliff's boys.
When we picked up free corn for our hogs, the boys helped out.
Sometimes the twins would bring their lunch over so they could eat with Cliff. Once in awhile he took them to Subway or Pizza Hut.
When I wanted a cabin in the woods, guess who helped Cliff fix up the old storage shed for me? Yep, the twins and Ryan. Cliff's boys.
There's Travis, all grown up.
That's Tyler. Poor guy, every time his hair grows back, it's time for more chemo and he loses it again. He's doing OK, all things considered.
To this day, if Cliff needs a hand with something, he'll say, "I guess I'll call one of my boys." They are night owls, so he usually has to wake them up. But one of them will usually crawl out of the sack and come to his aid.
Even Grandson Arick calls on them from time to time. He recently called on Tyler to help him get his Jeep out of a hole.
Today Cliff's boys turn twenty-one. They're still kinda cute, even all grown up.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, TYLER AND TRAVIS. MAY YOU BOTH LIVE TO BE A HUNDRED!
We first moved to this area in 1975. The Pitts family lived next door: Bonita babysat, and Ronnie worked in Kansas City at Sears. They had three children.
My kids would ask to go over there to play, and since Bonita had a houseful, I'd let Jimmy and Rachel go over, but I'd set a time limit: Be back in an hour.
One time they came home after spending their allotted hour over there, and I asked six-year-old Rachel, "What have you guys been doing?"
"Singing," she answered.
"Singing?"
She answered that yes, Donnie (who was perhaps thirteen at the time) had been playing the piano and they had been singing.
Hmmm.
Later on, we got to know the family. They were all musically inclined. Ronnie played guitar, Bonita sang. Donnie played piano, and he and his sister, Ronda, sang in harmony. The youngest boy, Kevin, is the only one I never heard singing or playing an instrument.
Bonita sang a country song I had never heard anywhere else, and she did it with style. It was so good that, in my mind, I can still hear her singing it. Google tells me that a guy named David Wills had a hit of the song in 1975, and I sometimes hear it nowadays in Cliff's shop, on his satellite radio. But for years, I actually thought Bonita wrote the song. She sang it with that kind of feeling.
Here's the song by the person who actually recorded it; I'd give a hundred dollars if I could hear Bonita singing it again, because I swear she did it better:
The kids got older, and sometimes I'd sing along with Donnie and Ronda. I even bought an old piano once just for them. We put it in our kitchen, so Donnie could play and we could all sing together. One time we moved the piano outside and had the Pitts family over for a singalong in the yard! There was one song that Ronnie did especially well:
Oh, they were a talented family. Did I mention that they're related to country singer Sara Evans? But it didn't stop there.
Ronda is still singing. So is Donnie. And Donnie's boys, the twins that Cliff considers his grandchildren even though they aren't related, are picking, grinning, and drumming. I've shared this video before. I know the quality leaves something to be desired, but I recorded it with a dinky little Powershot camera, so what do you expect? Travis is on guitar, Tyler is on drums. Their dad, Donnie, is playing keyboard.
Quite a legacy, I'd say.
Continue to keep Tyler in your thoughts and prayers. So far he has refused to let cancer whip him. If anybody can beat the "big C", he can.
Last night, Cliff, his sister, and I went to a benefit for our neighbor, Tyler, who has rhabdomyosarcoma cancer. We were only going to show our support for Tyler; figured we'd stick around for a half-hour or so and come back home.
However, the band started playing and sounding pretty good, and next thing you know, we'd been there for three hours.
My grandson and his girl friend were there.
So were the folks who used to be our renters.
That's Tyler, the guest of honor, with some young lady.
In this video, Tyler is on drums, his twin brother Travis is playing bass guitar, and their dad is on keyboards. They are a very musical family. Country musical, that is. When their dad and his sister were growing up next door, at one point I bought an old piano just so Donnie and Ronda could come over and sing for me and with me. Their parents (Tyler's grandparents) were also excellent singers.
Here's a video of the twins' aunt, Ronda, singing. Of course you realize the quality is lacking on this type of recording, but hopefully my kids will be able to take a walk down memory lane by watching it, if nothing else.
Does anybody use that phrase these days? In my own mind, I figure it must have come from ladies who sewed a lot and were left with scraps of yard goods and spools of thread... odd-shaped pieces, and the ends of remnants, yarn, and thread.
I did not rejoin Flylady yesterday, but I did clean out my refrigerator and toss some things. Cliff asked me what the goo was that I found in the bottom of the refrigerator under the crisper. I told him I didn't have a clue what it was, but at least it didn't stink. See, this is why I need to get back with Flylady.
I had no sooner gotten the refrigerator clean than the electricity went off and stayed off for a couple of suffocating hours. We went and did our shopping, and after we got home I sat in the shop with Cliff. It was pretty cool there; his shop is insulated. But I kept thinking about all that meat in the freezers!
There's absolutely nothing going on around here; we're trying to keep cool, like most of the country. I understand that people in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas are really hurting for rain, and that farmers are selling off cattle. Do you suppose that means there will be cheaper meat in the stores? Funny how those prices never seem to trickle down to the consumer, isn't it?
That's my check-in, dear readers. Unless something of note occurs, it may be a couple of days before I blog again. I'll leave you with a picture I took yesterday of Cliff and Tyler, the twenty-year-old neighbor who is fighting cancer. Actually, he looks the picture of health, doesn't he? He and Cliff sat in the cool of the shop and chatted for awhile. (Prayers and positive thoughts for Tyler are much appreciated.)
Ten years ago, he and his twin brother spent most of their waking hours in the shop with Cliff, learning to weld and creating masterpieces.
This was taken eight or nine years ago the day after Cliff bought the John Deere.
You wouldn't believe some of the creations those boys came up with. Sometimes they'd fabricate strange vehicles with Cliff telling them, "That won't work," but they'd go right ahead with it and find out that, sure enough, it wouldn't work. I guess that's the best way to learn.
I was working at the time, and Cliff was lonesome; and the twins, Tyler and Travis, just happened to show up to fill the vacuum. They hung around right through to the time I retired, which was also about the same time they discovered girls.
Funny how things happen like that, isn't it?
First of all, I went walking with Cliff this morning and made it ALL. THE. WAY.!!!! I even went down and back up the steepest hill. This is taken before I had done any hills, and I was walking at a pretty good pace.
Cliff wanted me to turn around and smile, so there you have it.
This was taken near the end of our walk as I was getting ready to head to the house, and I can assure you I was walking a whole lot slower than when I started. I don't wear shoes when we walk in the pasture unless it's below freezing outside, by the way.
When we moved behind the barn three years ago, I planted a trumpet vine. This year it has finally bloomed; I hope the hummingbirds enjoy it. I know my cows enjoy eating the vine; Cliff had to put an electric fence up to keep them from destroying it.
Have I mentioned I love coneflowers?
This is what hail does to a cucumber vine. It'll be all right eventually.
Remember a while back when I told you about Tyler, the twenty-year-old kid next door with cancer? He just had his first all-day chemo treatment yesterday, and came to report to us today. He seems not to be too much worse for the wear so far. I believe he said he has to have an all-day treatment once every month, but he has other chemo sessions in between that won't take so long. Since the doctors haven't seen cancer quite like this before, they're throwing a little bit of everything at it. I stole the above picture of him off Facebook; I figured if he's using it as a profile shot, he probably approves this pose.
Yesterday the temperatures barely got above freezing, but Cliff and I went to a friend's house and brought home his tiller... the kind of tiller you pull behind a tractor. Cliff hooked up to it to the John Deere, and within a half-hour, each garden plot was a perfect seed-bed; we returned the tiller to its home and waited for snow.
Yes, you read that right. Snow. This morning the ground is white, and there's a mix of snow and sleet coming down. It won't last long, because the weather-guessers are forecasting temperatures in the seventies for Thursday.
Meanwhile, the most exciting news around is that seeds are sprouting in the mini-greenhouses placed all over my bedroom. I've learned over the past few days that different varieties of tomato seeds germinate at different speeds. The Legend tomatoes showed themselves three days ago, but the other varieties are just now beginning to come up. None of the several varieties of pepper seeds I planted have sprouted. Saturday I took my cabbage plants out to get them used to sun, wind, and cooler temperatures; Sunday morning I started out with them and decided to check the temperature first. They stayed inside all day because it was cold, even for hardy little cabbages.
Cliff has a dentist appointment this morning, so while we're out, I'll probably pick up some seed potatoes. Who knows, I may yet plant a token few potatoes on St. Patrick's Day. I usually plant most of my potatoes on Good Friday, which is late this year, April 22.
I love my morning Eight O'clock Columbian coffee, which you can get as whole-bean or ground. That first cup of the day is heavenly, and I always think perhaps I should have made more than three cups. By the time I've drunk all three cups, though, I don't want any more. I've seen people who could drink coffee from morning til night, but once I reach my limit I don't want more unless I have a cup after dinner (the noon-day meal).
Here's something that strikes me as funny: Cliff has picked up the habit of calling guys "Hon" in the course of conversation. Now, he's called women "Hon" for years, but not guys. Here's what I think happened:
When I went to work in the year 2000, the twins next door gravitated over here and practically lived with Cliff every day until he left for work at 2:30. They'd been pulled out of school and were allowed to spend time however, and wherever, they wished. It worked out well for Cliff, because he isn't a loner; and as much as he liked me bringing in some money, he missed my presence.
The twins loved all things mechanical, and picked up a wealth of information from Cliff. Not only that, but they were excellent helpers, willing to jump in and assist him with any task, no matter how unpleasant.
I believe they were eight or nine years old when they first showed up, and being cute little boys, Cliff called them "Hon" a lot; back then he wasn't sure which boy was which anyhow, so this worked. Once the boys discovered girls, they stopped showing up regularly, but they still keep in touch with Cliff by phone, and they'll stop by the shop once in awhile to bend his ear. Travis has often confided in Cliff, saying, "You're like another grandpa to me."
They're probably twenty years old now, but when Cliff is talking to one or the other on the phone, I'll hear him calling them Hon. And now, any man on the street is liable to be addressed as Hon. I've seen Cliff get some strange looks, believe me. He said one of his co-workers asked him the other day, "Did you just call me Hon?"
One of the twins now has an aggressive form of cancer and will soon be undergoing surgery followed by months of chemo. Now, those of you who think it's nuts to pray for people, just go on your merry way, because this isn't a laughing matter; but Cliff and I, and more importantly, Tyler and his family, would really appreciate all the prayers anyone can send in this young man's direction. Any brand of prayers. This is a serious situation.
