Sunday, January 13
Since Edith said she was going to try to go to church and Ernie and Billee would pick her up, we headed straight to Sunday school. However, when we got out, we couldn’t find anyone; so we called Edith’s and she hadn’t been feeling well so she didn’t come after all. Ernie and Billee did come so we all wound up sitting together. They said they were fixing lunch and we all would meet at Edith’s at 1:00; so, after church we changed clothes and headed that direction.
It was nice for all 5 of us to sit at the table and visit. Edith was really hurting and tired by the time the meal was over so once we cleaned up, we all left. Then Jim and I went over to Ernie’s and Billee’s to visit for a bit more.
Once home, Jim parked himself in front of the TV to root against the Dallas Cowboys! We were a house divided!!! What a traitor he was today.
Jim: What can I say…I used to be a diehard Cowboys fan, but the takeover of the team by Jerry Jones and the way Tom Landry was terminated as the coach left a bitter taste. Now my favorite team is New England…my second favorite is whoever is playing Dallas (sorry about that, Jean).
Monday, January 14
After we got moving this morning, Jim told me he was going to have to spend several hours working on some paperwork that he needed to finish and get in the mail. So, I planned to occupy my time with checking bills, catching up on email, and trying to put together the slide video. However, I was saved from those wonderful chores by a phone call from Nancy, who wanted me to come over for hot chocolate and visiting. I was literally saved by the bell!
While over at Nancy’s, Jerry called and invited us to go to Hagerman tonight with them to hear a seminar on John Wesley. After checking with Jim, we decided it sounded like a good idea.
Once Jim finished the reports, we drove by to see Edith. We found that she still hadn’t had lunch so I fixed her a plate of food before we went to the funeral home to make copies of the reports.
After putting them in the mail, we headed to the print shop to see if the Journal 3’s were put together yet. They were and we were delighted with them which meant another trip to the funeral home to show Jerry the cover he put together for us. Once again it was over to Edith’s before going to Sonic for our lunch.
Around 6:30 Jerry and Nancy picked us up and off we went without Jim having to drive. What a treat that was for him! Hagerman is a small town about 20 miles north of Artesia, so the ride gave us time to converse and enjoy the company.
Having grown up in the Methodist Church, I was surprised to find that I had much to learn about John Wesley. For instance, I don’t think I realized that he only came to America for a short time and then left with very bitter memories and in disgrace. I suppose, if I thought about it at all, I thought he was one of the circuit riders of that era.
Just one story about Wesley that I found interesting:
Wesley came to Savannah, Georgia, as an Anglican Church chaplain. When the ship docked, he found the townspeople gathered with their barrels of rum to welcome the travelers. In short order, Wesley used a hatchet and whacked each barrel, which didn’t endear him to the people of the town.
He quickly fell in love with 17-year old Sophie, one of his religious studies students (he was 35) which caused quite an uproar. Finally, seeking advice from some German Moravians he had met on the ship, he was told, “Think no more about the matter!” (Give up this line of thinking).
When he told Sophie that they would continue seeing each other, but marriage was not to be, she promptly went out and within a week was married to someone else. This angered Wesley so much that when she and her new husband came to church on Sunday, he refused to serve her communion, disgracing Sophie in front of everyone.
This action of his caused thirteen grievances to be filed against him. Two of these were: speaking to a married woman without her husband’s approval and baptizing an Indian baby without 3 witnesses.
Once found guilty of these charges, he left to go back to England with everyone knowing of his failure.
Tuesday, January 15
Happy birthday to sister, Nancy, in Cleburne, Texas!
Since doing laundry and cleaning house aren’t really newsworthy, I’ll use the LHS Redskin phrase, “Enough said!”
I seemed to have caught some kind of bug last night and bowed out of returning to Hagerman for tonight’s lecture. So…I will turn the journal over to Jim…
Jim: Jerry, Nancy, and I went back to Hagerman this evening for the last presentation in the Wesley Adventure series. Tonight’s topic was about the scriptural foundations of Methodists. It was a very interesting topic and the presenter discussed how the modern church is in danger of reversing the priorities as established by Wesley.
When it came time for questions, I asked how the Methodists got their name, considering that John Wesley was a lifelong Anglican. Tom (the presenter) told us that the term, “Methodists,” was originally a very derisive term used by others because members of the sect were very methodical and narrow-minded in their scriptural beliefs.
Wesley’s plan was to educate and train the masses in methodical scriptural beliefs and daily life and then send them back into the Anglican congregations to influence a change in the church; but, the Anglicans didn’t accept the “Methodists,” so those folks eventually formed their own groups, leading to the formation of the denomination known as “The Methodist Church.”
Wednesday, January 16
Happy birthday to brother, Jerry, in Roswell, New Mexico!
Congratulations to granddaughter Jaycie…Jaycie finished in the top 10 at the Murfee Spelling Bee.
Today was our usual Chaos Wednesday with the lunch bunch.
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Tonight, while Jim went over to Jean’s to watch the Texas Tech/Texas A&M basketball game, I watched some lady give up $198, 000 only to wind up with $33, 000 on Deal or No Deal! Disgusted with TV, I returned to the computer to catch up on mail, make some travel plans, and generally goof off before calling it a night!
Thursday, January 17
We woke up to a bitterly cold morning…either 15 or 16 degrees, depending on which thermometer or weather service report we chose to believe.
While we were warm inside Big V, we soon discovered that we had no running water…some part of our waterline had frozen during the early morning hours. Luckily, it takes only the flick of a switch to change over to our onboard water tank, so we were quickly up and running as usual. Jim spent a good part of the day working on a plan to get the water running again once the temperatures cooperated. I only acted as “cheerleader.” (from inside where it was warm!)
The afternoon and evening was spent making reservations and co-coordinating plans for our next trip. We are taking Amtrak from Albuquerque, NM to Flagstaff, AZ!
Why Flagstaff you ask? Easy…it’s the only train route we could find without traveling across the state and half of Texas. And…more importantly, we’re going to take the Grand Canyon Railway from Williams to Grand Canyon! Is that not exciting? More on that trip later.
Friday, January 18
Jim: Today was another relatively slow day for us…since it was so cold outside during the morning hours, we just spent the time reading or working at the computers.
This afternoon I took apart a section of our waterline to determine exactly what would be needed to fix it. It seems that when I was installing a pressure regulator between two hoses a couple of weeks ago, I didn’t seal off a water leak soon enough; the water soaked through the fiberglass wrapping around the hose, and when the temperatures dropped into the teens, the insulation froze around the hose, causing the water in the hose to freeze…oh well, live and learn!
After going into town and checking on Mother, we made a run to the local Do-It Center and bought a couple of lengths of foam pipe insulation and some more fiberglass wrap.
Once back at Big V, Barbara stripped the old, wet insulation off the hose while I set a new cover over the standpipe. Who knows…maybe by June we’ll have this thing working right!
Barbara: One exciting bit of news, and something for us to really think about…back in November, I finally tracked down a friend of mine who taught across the hall from me at West Middle School in Liberal. Margarita went back to Puerto Rico the same year we retired and it’s been fun corresponding with her. One of the last things she told us before we all left Liberal was that now that we were retired, we needed to come see her in Puerto Rico. On a whim, I asked her how two people could find her if they wanted to. To make a long story short, after exchanging some emails with Margarita and checking airfares and schedules, we are thinking strongly about going to the Rio Grande municipality of Puerto Rico to see Margarita and her family! More on that later, too. At least we can dream!
Saturday, January 19
Jim: Today was another “take it easy” day. Barbara worked on some travel plans while I did a few (very few) chores inside. Since it was way too cold to go outside and work on the plumbing, I decided to cook up a recipe of refried beans while Barbara baked some muffins for breakfast.
By noon it was warm enough to get outside and re-wrap the water hose, feed it through the 3’ PVC pipe, and get everything hooked back up. Fortunately, it all went together well and we soon had running water again. You gotta love these modern conveniences! I guess we’ll find out early tomorrow morning whether we have the proper insulation. Of course, we can always hope that the coldest of the cold has passed us for this season.
This afternoon we made a trip to town where we visited with Mother, Ernie, and Billee. Billee had come over to cut and style Mother’s hair and Ernie was working on clearing a clogged kitchen drain. Barbara also used the time to start washing a load of clothes while I busied myself by playing with the dogs.
Barbara: When we returned to town for our laundry tonight, I took the camera so we could capture Edith and her new hair-do, courtesy of Billee. It was so great to see her perky and peppy (amazing what having your hair done can do for morale!) that we just had to document this occasion.
Upon returning to our place we went in to visit with Jean for a few minutes before going to Big V for the rest of the evening.
Tonight: Work on the journal for this week and chill out (literally and figuratively).
We’ve been sent some photos this week and decided that this was a good time to share them.
First: Our good friend Gary (the one in the cowboy hat…boy, he takes
this move to Texas in style!) with his granddaughter Riley. Riley is the daughter of Joyce and Gary’s daughter, April, who is a lawyer in Houston.Joyce and Gary have 3 daughters, but Holly is the only one who is not pictured here. This photo shows Ginger (on the left) with her
son, Owen. April is on the right with daughter, Riley. Now it’s obvious why Joyce and Gary chose to move from Maryland to Texas, isn’t it?Before the holiday season, Charlene and Dann
y’s son Chance graduatedfrom Northwestern Oklahoma State University at Alva. Charlene sent us this photo of her with Chance (center) and Spencer (right).
Not much going on this week, but sometimes that’s not all bad.
“When you’re down to nothing, God’s up to something.” - Unknown
Love to all,
Jim & Barbara
