This picture below is across the street from the front of the rotunda. Behind Jerry is the Kanawha River.
Friday, April 10, 2009
Spring at the Capitol
This picture below is across the street from the front of the rotunda. Behind Jerry is the Kanawha River.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Ahhhhhhh Retirement!
Here is a nice festive picture of me with my two friends Kathy Lester and Kathy Dent. Besides being my personal friends, Kathy Lester is an investment advisor and Kathy Dent is a partner with Komax Business Machines so they both were there. You can see the desserts in the background and the long stemmed red roses I received from Roger Topping who is the treasurer of the Assn. We had fun working together.
Here I am with Sharon Mullins on my left and Kathy Dent on my right. Sharon and her husband were instrumental in bringing "The Hawley's" to Charleston and our lives have been intertwined ever since. She was the Director of Communications at the WV Div of Culture and History and was responsible for my accounting position there and I referred her to Jesse when she was hired at WVHCA. How nice it was to work with a friend who is such a positive presence and an inspiration to me in many ways.
I met Kathy thru Unity also. Woody used to say, "Kathy is a really awesome person, you need to get to know her" How right he was!
So the party was wonderful. Jerry helped came later in the day and helped me haul everything home. I assembled all the flowers and gifts on my dining room table and then took this picture. My house was like a flower shop for a week. Check out those clubs!
It was a great place to work: A four day week, great co-workers and I had some wonderful experiences. Jerry asks me if I am going to miss the trips to the resorts and the annual trip to the Greenbrier. I might, but I think I will be too busy appreciating the opportunity to enjoy the beautiful days this spring and summer, golfing with my new clubs, the freedome to re-create myself and to pursue my other interests. Thanks for everything WVHCA!
On March 29th there was another WVHCA retirement party for my co-worker Ann Mathews. We got a great picture of the whole staff--oops except for John-- retirees and newbies both.
From Left to Right: Jesse Samples, Debra Anderson, Deatra Adkins, Ann Mathews (the other retiree) Sharon Mullins, Amy Sowards (the brave girl who has my old job), and Karen Finney( Ann's replacement). Missing is John Mullins.Saturday, May 24, 2008
Could my right be wrong?
Heidi filled us in on her incredible creative accomplishments during her say in Joseph Oregon over the winter. Everything from writing three new songs and producing a CD with her song writing group to making quilts and a soft doll. Their descriptions of the Northwest stirred my yearning to visit there. Perhaps meet up with Bob and Heidi at some point and also visit my Aunt Joan who lives near Seattle.
Of course we talked of the Vandalia Festival this weekend at the Capitol. A few of their students from the East End Family Resource Center will be playing in the Youth Dulcimer Competition on Sunday.
Jerry wants to go to the Liar’s contest which got us talking about Bill Lepp, the famous WV liar. His 7 year old son is also competing in the Liar’s contest again this year. Bob had just heard Bill and his son recently and we talked of what a great job this 7-year old does and how he loves to perform. He has his own gigs and will appear on Bill’s new CD.
Bob told us of Bill’s older brother, Tony who was also a fantastic storyteller when he was alive. “I bet Bill’s son is a reincarnation of Tony” Bob half whispered with a slight giggle in his voice.
So, that is the kickoff of my pondering this morning.
Bob’s remark doesn’t even cause a blip on my radar screen since I long ago accepted reincarnation as a strong possibility. I guess I would say I believe in it.
Reflecting back on how Bob said it, I was reminded of how many people would see that as a pretty out there, woo woo, off the edge remark, probably Jerry did and perhaps Heidi. To me, it was very matter of fact.
Reincarnation is a piece of my puzzle. The puzzle I have put together over my life to define my truth. I have my piece about the nature of God, my piece about abortion, divorce, death, meditation, capital punishment, love and sex, peace and justice and more of course.
There is a feeling of satisfaction that you have it all figured out. Like the feeling I get when I complete a soduku puzzle or when I complete my financial statements at work. I have gathered the facts, worked them out and using the best of my skills and knowledge, completed the puzzle. Of course I feel I have the “right” answers. Doesn’t everyone feel that way? It gives you a sense of security that you know the game and have the rules all figured out and the result is a nice neat package. Please don’t tell me I have made a mistake – shit- what a bitch to have to go back and re-work the whole thing.
People get their puzzles done and are so pissed if you mess with it that they might even kill you over it. They will only vote for the candidate whose puzzles look pretty similar to theirs.
But maybe we are all wrong. Jerry just said that there is truth “If I drop this quarter, what will happen? Will it fall to the ground?” “Yes” I said, “But go to the moon and try it and see what happens”.
Perhaps truth is like this poem that was recently forwarded to me….
194. THE AFTERLIFE - Billy Collins
While you are preparing for sleep, brushing your teeth,
or riffling through a magazine in bed,
the dead of the day are setting out on their journey.
They're moving off in all imaginable directions,
each according to his own private belief,
and this is the secret that silent Lazarus would not reveal:
that everyone is right, as it turns out.
you go to the place you always thought you would go,
The place you kept lit in an alcove in your head.
Some are being shot into a funnel of flashing colors
into a zone of light, white as a January sun.
Others are standing naked before a forbidding judge who sits
with a golden ladder on one side, a coal chute on the other.
Some have already joined the celestial choir
and are singing as if they have been doing this forever,
while the less inventive find themselves stuck
in a big air conditioned room full of food and chorus girls.
Some are approaching the apartment of the female God,
a woman in her forties with short wiry hair
and glasses hanging from her neck by a string.
With one eye she regards the dead through a hole in her door.
There are those who are squeezing into the bodies
of animals--eagles and leopards--and one trying on
the skin of a monkey like a tight suit,
ready to begin another life in a more simple key,
while others float off into some benign vagueness,
little units of energy heading for the ultimate elsewhere.
There are even a few classicists being led to an underworld
by a mythological creature with a beard and hooves.
He will bring them to the mouth of the furious cave
guarded over by Edith Hamilton and her three-headed dog.
The rest just lie on their backs in their coffins wishing
they could return so they could learn Italian
or see the pyramids, or play some golf in a light rain.
They wish they could wake in the morning like you
and stand at a window examining the winter trees,
every branch traced with the ghost writing of snow.
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Oglebay
Monday, August 20, 2007
River Ponderings
Last month I saw Sr. Molly, “I have this insatiable desire for nature. It feels like a love affair.” I told her. “ When I look at the river or the blue sky through the green trees, I am filled with such joy and elation.” She suggested that I ponder it and ask what the invitation is. When I think of this intense desire in my heart to commune with nature and I consider that God is in the desire and inviting me to something through my feelings, I feel God very close again. I feel God loving me and beckoning me to trust and relax - lay back in my tube and let Her carry me to the next stage in my life.
Not far before I reach home there is a tree whose branch bends down to the water. I grab the branch like the brass ring on a ferris wheel and hold on so I can stay in that one spot and enjoy the beauty all around me. I put my hand into the water and watch the water push my hand and spill over the top of it and I am amazed again at how fast the water is going but when you look at the surface of the water it seems serene. It is similar to getting caught up in the events of our lives while the clock keeps ticking and time keeps moving the seconds keep slipping by. They say time does not really exist. I say Ha to that. Then what are these lines and little bags on my face and that white sprouting on my head.
Looking back on my life I see how the current has taken me down the river of life through so many different places and views of my world. From childhood to young adulthood, a first marriage, a second long marriage, raising my son, moving to another part of the country and then back again to live the life of a minister’s wife. The death of my spouse, a time of grief, becoming a grandmother and now in another marriage and in a place I never thought I could or would ever be. A place with so many blessings and gifts I think I may have already reached heaven and no one told me I died. I may not have died physically, but I have had to die to certain people and places and situations. I have had to let them go. Sometimes I didn’t let go very gracefully or well and sometimes I did.
I have learned in both the river and in my life that the current can be very strong in places and seem non-existent in others. The times when life seems to go on and on in endless sameness is when the current has slowed. But when the tide changes and it is time to get moving, the current gets swift again. You can hold on and try to stay in the same spot or try to swim upstream. You can stay in the same spot if you want but it takes a lot more energy and effort to fight the current than to go with it.
Before I moved to this house, I had no idea the gifts it had in store for me. I liked the house at first sight with all its large windows and view of the river. It has a little park-like setting in the front with two benches, a little waterfall coming down to a fish pond and all surrounded by my plantings and flowers. Inside, I have a room of my own. One that is filled with my numerous books and the things I love. It too has the high double wide window that look down through the trees onto the river. I resisted buying this house because you drive through some undesirable sections to get here including the gas company and some storage tanks. But once you get here it feels like a retreat.
August 19 Float
Putting in
Above me you will see the Mink Shoals. They make a beautiful noise. Sometimes we go in above them and ride downthe rapid on the side.