You are currently browsing the monthly archive for July 2007.
I have five nephews and these are two of them who I love dearly, Zildjian and Misha. Z.J. with the flame red hair is my sister Tora and Jeff’s son. They wanted Zildjian to have a playmate so a year and a half ago they flew to Russia to adopt Misha. Of course all have experienced “moments” in the family adjustment but it seems that Misha is fitting in just fine. I can’t wait to see these two monkeys this upcoming weekend when Ken and I go down to the Twin Cities. Today is my nephew Elan’s 16th birthday and I was in a quandry yesterday to know what to send him for a present. I bought $6 worth of candy at our famous local candy store and then I went to chat with a high school classmate of mine. I told her my problem. What do you get for a boy who has everything and is only interested in girls, video games and computers? She gave me my answer, give him a gas card. I would have NEVER thought of that but what a superb idea since he has his driver’s permit and can’t wait to get his license. So, in lieu of finding a gas card because I was running short of time, I just put a $10 check in the gift package I sent yesterday. I hope he appreciates it since I want him to know that I love him on this very special day of his. Happy Birthday Elan!!! Meanwhile, I have my work cut out for me with these two little squirts, Z.J. and Misha, who are NOT flirting with girls yet but into computers and thankfully several years away from putting their foot to the accelerator pedal.
Samavors are said to have been invented in Central Asia though Russia claims their origin. Consequently, the samavor has become a Russian national symbol since they started to mass produce it. I happen to believe the claim that the samavor originated in Central Asia since that is where I first encountered them when I lived in Almaty and Bishkek in 1993-95. I used to own a beautiful silver one once that I found at a Kyiv flea market but alas I had to leave it behind. I would have had trouble getting it past Ukraine ‘s customs because it was considered an antique and maybe came from the Tula factory best known for manufacturing them. Fortunately, the 20 tiles pictured on our maple hardwood floor made it back home to the U.S. from Ukraine several years ago but we are having trouble figuring out where to put them. The fact that all 20 made it back in our suitcase unbroken is a marvel in itself since they are quite heavy. So, where is the rightful home for these tiles? Where is home for me? Some say it is where the heart is. Thus, when we have company over and share a cup of coffee from a pot not as elaborate as a samavor we are in keeping with the Kazak or Kyrgyz nomadic tradition of firing up the samavor to savor the smell along with enjoying the friendship. Presently, I feel like my heart is in 20 pieces, shifted from box to floor, vulnerable to get stepped on, missing my friends in Kyiv.
How I LOVE stained glass windows in churches!!! This photo is from a Lutheran church in Sheyenne, North Dakota which I took about a month ago. This more contemporary version displays nicely the rural themes so important to farmers of the Sheyenne area. On the bottom left is the ubiquitous windmill and the left panel depicts night while the right shows a sun which helps produce the abundant crops. Grapes, sunflowers, wheat and flowers show God’s bounty as well as seeing the visual of the two fish jump out of the lake on the bottom right. On the left are the Christian symbols with the lamb next to a cross which is just below the finger of God doing His creative works. A rainbow shows God’s promise that He would not let a great flood destroy the world’s inhabitants again no matter how evil while the dove signifies God’s Holy Spirit descending when Jesus was baptized. Those are my interpretations of what I see, the artist who put this collage of symbols together may have entirely different ideas I haven’t thought of. In any case, stained glass windows were originally created to draw in the viewer to experience how majestic and magnificent our great Creator really is. Today I am ready for Sabbath in our own church at home despite the fact that we don’t have any stained glass windows to behold.
My husband is brilliant, a CAN DO kind of guy! He can do anything like electrical, plumbing, gardening, you name it!!! Right now he is ambitiously working on our shop that was lifted several years ago from the earth to rest on old railroad ties as a foundation. Otherwise, the shop had been slowly sinking into the Red River Valley soil. My Dad and Ken had joked they were “shoplifting.” Now they are both roofing the old shop and it was wonderful to see the two work together on the scaffolding last night, also both were on the top of the roof. (My Dad is 77 years young) In this photo Ken is using his Ford Ranger truck to stand on in order to saw off the old shingles on the edges. While they worked on this project in the glow of the setting sun, I collected all the grass clippings and weeded the garden to the south. Simply amazing how FAST weeds grow especially during out absence of two weeks. I also have a smart husband who will teach economics this fall at KIMEP in Almaty, Kazakstan if all goes well with the paperwork. Some snafus with visas and other bureaucratic manueverings have slowed things down a bit for our eventual departure on Aug. 13th. At least that is what our airline tickets read, we may leave later which is fine with both of us. In any event, Ken is very happy to do the manual labor to make our farmyard look more loved. How I love my man!!! To think I had to fly all the way to Kazakstan in May of 1993 to find him is God’s grace to me!!!
Can’t tell you how many times my emotions have been going zigzag like a crazy quilt but they have these past several weeks. These quilts hang in the museum in Ulysses, Kansas instead of covering a bed. Exquisite design and beauty are shown in each but the one that represents my life right now is the crazy quilt. It has its own beauty by NOT having a pattern but the pieces of felt and satin are woven together by decorative stitch. (a kind of postmodern work of art done 100 years ago) My experiences over the past 20 years have taken me to many different countries and consequently I’ve had many other ESL/EFL teaching opportunities. My life is like a crazy quilt that has an elaborate stitch which ties all my experiences together. I wonder where the next adventure will take me? What threads will the Master Craftsman use to hold me together with the other pieces of my life?
Now photos help me to remember our two week odyssey through middle America. Common sights were delapidated buildings such as in St. John, KS where Ken’s grandfather on his father’s side was once the town studio photographer. (Ken and his oldest son, Liam are in front of the studio) But also I captured a spider’s replication of a tire at our friend’s 150 year old stone house where the stone barn is in very sad disrepair. Then on the gravel roads of Ulysses, KS I captured the railroad crossing signs close to where Ken’s grandparents on his mother’s side had a farm. (railroads trains and tracks are becoming more scarce in rural America). We visited the homestead place where his cousin has taken over the farm and the grain harvest fortunately was good this year. When Ken asked if they made any profit, the typical farmer answer was, “we did okay, we can pay the bills.” The last photo is something that you would NEVER see in the Red River Valley and that is open storage of grain once the harvest is done. If it is bountiful, as it was this year, then the granaries are filled and it is left out in the open. Not so in humid areas where there is heavy dew each night or predictable rainfall. Western Kansas where Ken is from is very dry and droughts have afflicted many a farmer in those parts. When we returned to NW MN, we saw the fields are ripe and ready for harvesting. The Lord is good in season and out of season.
Our last day of travelling was all about seeing the countryside by using the backroads of South Dakota and North Dakota until we got on the Interstate the last two hours of our trip. We would not have seen Strausburg, North Dakota after leaving the state capitol of Pierre, South Dakota if we had taken the high(way) road. BTW, Pierre is the only capitol that does not have an Interstate running through it, it had the steamboat river traffic on the Missouri River when the state of South Dakota entered the Union in 1889.
The fact that we stopped off at Lawrence Welk’s birthplace just west of Strausburg does not mean we were great fans of his. However, he was faithfully watched on t.v. every Saturday night by my Norwegian grandparents’ generation who had lived about 150 miles north of Strausburg. Turns out that Lawrence Welk’s parents were immigrants in the late 1800s to North Dakota from the region close to Odessa, Ukraine. These immigrants are known by researchers as “Germans from Russia” which is a misnomer really since they were actually from Ukraine. Lawrence had many brothers and sisters and worked hard on the farm, they insisted he practice his accordian in the hayloft of the barn instead of in their small house. On Welk’s 21st birthday he left the farm in Strausburg to start into show biz with his love of music. He was known for saying “wunnerful, wunnerful” because English was his second language, German was his first. Lawrence Welk died in 1992 but his legacy lives on in the refurbishing of his birthplace. He wanted to make sure visitors would know more about his parents’ sacrifices when they left Ukraine and built up a farmstead on the soil of North Dakota than about him and his brand of music.
Fun time talking in Russian to Check out the students from Former Soviet Union, especially the two girls from Kazakstan. Ken was in his element speaking Russian to all the young FSU students at Wall Drug in Wall, South Dakota. Also, our faces are below famous faces at Mount Rushmore! Last day of being tourists for us at a famous place and another obscure place such as Wall Drug but which draws in 1,000s of visitors every day. The billboards brings in the customers for 5 cents per cup of coffee. It worked for us.
Off to the right of the third photo which showcases the Bob Dole Institute of Politics in Lawrence, KS is a typical water tower. However, the two water towers that read “hot” and “cold” are just a joke in some other small town in Kansas. Finally, the first water tower looks like a coffee pot just peeking above the Iowa corn. This was the first place we stayed on July 11th which seems long ago now. We will head to Rapid City, South Dakota this early morning and then through North Dakota to home. Many miles and 15 hours of driving later we should be back in NW MN, the Lord willing.
Very eerie to see the devastation that blew through Greensburg, KS on May 4th, over two months ago. Insurance companies may cite a tornado of this magnitude is an “act of God,” but do atheists or agnostics believe that? Do those dissenters accept their insurance claim check while not believing in God’s power? How hypocritical, the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) should probably wipe out that catch-all phrase if they don’t believe in God. As you can see, the trees are attempting to grow back, looking like green peach fuzz. The only things that didn’t get twisted in this giant funnel were the brick foundations. All residential homes made of wood blew away to who knows where. Fortunately there were very few deaths in this small, rural town of Kansas because they took the warnings seriously. Same should be heeded about where we will spend our lives eternally. The signals are everywhere about the fragility of our lives in the tempests of our world. Will we know and love God or reject Him? That’s the question of the day. Very few hours left as God’s timepiece graciously keeps ticking while He awaits acknowledgement of His sovereignty whether He is suspected of wrecking peoples’ days or not.
True History Matters 