For the first time this year I missed the Wofford Football game. Last weekend, the game was in Birmingham, Alabama with Samford University. David made the trip to Birmingham while I stayed home and listened to it through my laptop. Gotta love technology. David and other Wofford fans in Birmingham kept me up to date through text messaging and mms. Wofford fans in Pennsylvania watched the game with me through their streaming video online. It was almost like being there.
Wofford came away with a close win again and now we are heading in to this weekend's game with Appalachian State University in Boone. This will be a good game and a fun time. ASU and Boone have changed a lot since I was there in the early 70s but I am looking forward to seeing friends and family at the game. App and Wofford are ranked #3 and #4 in the FCS Brackets and Wofford is undefeated in the SoCon so this is a big big game.
This is also a big week for Jay. Gardner-Webb will be playing their first game at UNC-Charlotte on Friday and their first home game against Mary Washington on Saturday night. We head out for Charlotte to watch GWU and Jay, then on to Boone to watch David and Wofford. Logistics make it tough to get back in time for the Saturday night basketball game. When I mentioned this to Dad he grinned and suggested I call Mrs. Manning to see how she handles it. I bet she has text messaging.
Mainly this week I spent some time in Lattimore and that is always fun for me. The dogwoods on the road in front of Mama and Daddy's house have become very fallish. Dogwoods are great because in the spring they have the beautiful white blooms and in the fall they are a pretty deep red. This year the leaves on most of the trees haven't been as brilliant as last year. Beth and I noticed this on our drive down east. There hasn't been the right combination of rain and cold weather to get the best fall color, but the dogwoods look good and there have been some pretty maples.
Our tennis team had an end of the very challenging season Italian dinner at the Cabin on the farm in Lattimore. Cindy and Mary Beth had the Cabin all warm and cozy with red checked tables, lots of candles and a fire in the fireplace. Everybody brought a dish and of course Dad made his cream cheese and olive sandwiches. Our tennis team had a building season as they say but it was fun and we really did enjoy the season and the friendships.
I was back in Lattimore all day Wednesday because Mom and Dad are going through a lot of old pictures and wanted some help with sorting them out. They have had this project going on for a good while with tables and boxes set up in the living room. Mama was ready to put the chaos into order and to get her living room back in shape before the holidays. So everybody has been helping now and then with sorting and it usually turns into a lot of story telling and laughing while looking through the pictures. Which is why the project has gone on so long.
But this week we got down to business and so each of my sisters and I now have a box full of old and new photos of ourselves and our children through the years. And Mom and Dad have a fairly well organized set of boxes with labels describing pictures from the 20s, 30s, 40s, up to now. Pictures of our grandparents, our parents as children, pre-marriage, college life, weddings and anniversaries, army life, political life, holidays, reunions and many changing years and seasons.
Looking at old pictures can literally make your life flash before your eyes. There are so many stories for so many of the pictures that it would take a lifetime of blogging to get it all down. I see some photo scanning in my future.
All of the pictures are a reminder of the experiences we have had as individuals and as a family. Most of the experiences have been fun, some have been very tough. Both kinds of experiences remind me of how fortunate we really are to have a family that can enjoy the fun times and get through the tough times together.
Back at the cabin last week, I took a photo of a sign that hangs over the cabin fireplace. I made the sign for my parents one Christmas years ago. Mama loves the state bird - the cardinal. She loves anything red but red birds are all over her house and everywhere else that she decorates. So a long time ago my friend Liz helped me paint a cardinal and a dogwood branch on an old piece of wood with a phrase I had read that described what home felt like in Lattimore.
Home is Dad's kingdom, Mom's world ... and a child's paradise.
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