Here’s a post on a great blog that I enjoy….and resonates with me, especially now that I have more leisure time on my hands. I think I will follow Kirstan’s example!
Author: Val Rogers
The Good News & The Bad News – January 5, 2014
The Good News: I’m going to try my best to be more faithful this year in making note of the good (and maybe not so good) things that happen in my life! Today the good news is that we were able to drive up to Dillon to our lake condo. It is a winter wonderland (and f-r-e-e-e-z-i-n-g!!) up here! We are only staying one night…..I have to take down all of the Christmas decorations that we put up in November.
The Bad News: Because of our trip to Dillon, I’m missing the premier of Season 4 of “Downton Abbey” AND “The Bachelor” (Juan Pablo!) But (the other good news is) I am recording it at home so I hope to be able to catch up on those two shows this week!
My 2013 Year in Review
The video in this post is of my 2013 year in review (as seen on my Facebook page.) The music is my favorite song of the year: “Give me Jesus” by Fernando Ortega.
As I look back on 2013 I realize it was a year of momentous events sandwiched between ordinary ones. We got to enjoy traveling to some new places (Oahu, HI; Hot Springs AR; Islamorada, FL; Belize City, Belize; Cozumel, Mexico) as well as revisit some places we’ve already been. We celebrated birthdays and our 35th wedding anniversary. We learned what it meant to be parents of a son who was deployed in the Middle East as a Navy pilot, and to experience the joy & relief of his safe return. We spent precious time with old friends and made some new friends along the way. My life took a big turn when I retired in July! At Christmas we enjoyed a Holiday cruise in the Western Caribbean with members of our family whom we have not seen in quite a long time.
All in all, I’d say 2013 was a pretty good year! Here’s to 2014 and the new adventures it will bring!
Merry Christmas 2013!
Merry Christmas from the USS Nimitz! Redgie and I are currently on a “Tiger Cruise” on board the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier! A Tiger Cruise is when a Navy ship that has been on deployment is on its way home and along the way friends and/or family members of some of the personnel assigned to the ship come on board and sail to the home port with their “sponsor” (military personnel responsible for their “Tigers”.) Redgie & I met Brooks in Honolulu, HI on December 3rd when the Nimitz pulled into the Navy yard at Pearl Harbor, and on the 5th we checked onto the Nimitz as “Tigers” and began our cruise towards San Diego. We are having a blast spending time with Brooks, learning about his experience as he was deployed with the Nimitz in the Middle East these past 8.5 months and learning a lot of interesting facts about life on board an aircraft carrier! We will arrive in San Diego on Thursday, December 12, 2013 where Brooks will be reunited with his wife Christina after his long absence.
A quick review of 2013 reveals quite a bit of change and travel for us in 2013. On December 31 we rang in the new year with our annual New Year’s Eve party at the “BBH”. A lot of friends and family (including my sister Vickie, her husband Jim & their youngest son Justin as well as Brooks & Christina who were visiting from CA) were there to celebrate with us.
Also in January I accompanied Redgie to Orlando where he had to attend a conference. We stayed in the Ritz Carlton and enjoyed a few days of warm weather (and at least for me) a few days of relaxation!
In February Redgie went on his annual Myrtle Beach golf trip with several of his buddies from Altoona, PA. The trip usually lasts around 5 days and in that amount of time they usually play 8 rounds of golf. Redgie looks forward to the fellowship and fun of that trip all year long.
March was a red-lettered month as that is when we officially finished the remodeling of our condo in Dillon, CO. Ever since we purchased it in June 2012 we had been working on remodeling the condo from the bottom up! Thank goodness for the help we received from our friends Ray & Donna Kent or else we may not have finished the job in time for our first vacation rental guests who checked in on March 7, 2013. We are very pleased with how everything turned out and our guests seem to have been very pleased as well! To date we’ve received 18 five-star reviews on our listing at http://www.vrbo.com/382 !
Also in March we spent Easter weekend in San Diego with Brooks and Christina before he left on his deployment. We were glad for the opportunity to spend some time with them before Brooks left. The Nimitz carrier strike group was supposed to return home from this deployment in October but on September 1 they were diverted to the Red Sea because of the situation in Syria, which extended their deployment until December. Christina stayed busy with frequent trips due to work obligations and personal reasons. In fact in September she went to Africa with a group of family & friends and climbed to the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro ….quite an accomplishment!
In June we took a short trip to Islamorada, FL with Redgie’s company Perdue Farms, Inc. We got to stay at the Cheeca Lodge Resort which was right on the beach and very nice. Also in June we hosted a BBQ lunch up at our Dillon condo for the “Colorado Iron” biker group of which Redgie is a member.
The biggest change for me happened in July when I retired! I had worked for VRBO/Homeaway for over 11 years but finally came to the decision this year that it was time for me to resign from my position as US Manager of Email Support. Since then I have been enjoying all of my free time and have not yet committed to anything else on a regular basis. After the holidays I may see if I can find another job that interests me, but I’m not making any promises! : -)
We spent the 4th of July in Dillon again this year with Ray & Donna. Every time we get to spend some time in the condo we pinch ourselves to make sure we aren’t dreaming! The condo is so comfortable and the view of the lake & the mountains is breathtaking! Immediately following Independence Day Redgie & I flew down to Hot Springs, AR to attend a reunion of the “EnPsalms” which is the vocal group that Redgie was a part of during his years at Liberty University. Seeing all of his old friends from the group was wonderful….in some ways it didn’t feel as if hardly any time had passed since the last time we were with them. The weekend flew by with lots of laughter and good music, fellowship and love.
In August Brady experienced a big change in his life….he transferred to Colorado State University! He had decided that he wanted to experience life on a large university campus during his last years at college. While we were happy that he was going to be closer to home we were also disappointed that we would no longer be attending football games at Augustana College. We’re crossing our fingers that Brady might be able to try out for & win a walk-on spot as a kicker on the Rams football team next year. Brady is studying Business Administration at CSU.
We went RV camping at Golden Bell camp in Divide CO with Dave and Lynn over the Labor Day weekend.
Later in September Redgie traveled to Altoona to participate in the annual Precious Life Gold Tournament…another time of reunion and fellowship with his Altoona buddies.
In November Redgie traveled to Lynchburg VA to attend a football game at our alma mater Liberty University.
Then we celebrated Thanksgiving at the BBH with family and friends. (Dave & Lynn were in California so they were not able to be with us on Thanksgiving.)
And so we are back to the beginning of this letter where Redgie & I are on the Tiger Cruise for another three days. We fly back home to Colorado on December 13 and will be home for exactly one week before we have to leave again! This time Redgie, Brady & I will be flying to Ft. Lauderdale where we will meet up with Brooks & Christina, my Mom & Dad and my sister Vickie, her husband Jim & their youngest son Justin. We will all be boarding a Royal Caribbean ship (the Liberty of the Seas) for a Holiday cruise that will stop in Belize City and Cozumel before returning to Ft. Lauderdale on December 26, 2013.
Unfortunately, Shannon & Robert are not able to join us on our holiday cruise. Shannon has spent this year developing her Personal Chef business. She has a couple of regular clients (including Dave & Lynn at the BBH for whom Shannon cooks on a weekly basis.) She is hopeful to be able to acquire a few more regular clients. She & Robert still live in Parker not far from us.
As always, at the close of this letter we send our love & wishes to you all for a wonderful and blessed Christmas holiday. May we always remember the Reason for the Season, the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Redgie, Valerie, Brady (& Bebe!)
Related articles
- USS Nimitz took an 80,000-mile world tour (heraldnet.com)
- Nimitz Back in U.S. Waters (myeverettnews.com)
- U.S.S. Nimitz brings sailors home for Christmas (examiner.com)
Pre-WWII Love Letters – Chapter 3
Postcard of Shoshone Falls in Glenwood Springs, CO dated Sep 17, 1939 (1 cent stamp)
It has been quite a bit of time since my last post on this blog. I must admit to being quite affected by the helicopter accident that claimed the lives of two Navy pilots on September 22, 2013 that I wrote about in my last post. This accident hit too close to home….Although I did not know the young men whose lives were lost I am sure that my son did, and it could have so easily have been my son involved in such an accident.
However, I am back working on my “Walt & Gertie” project….the collection of pre-WWII letters that I found in a box of craft items that I bought at a yard sale years ago. (See the post Pre-WWII Love Letters: The best yard-sale discovery I ever made! for background…..)
I have made some progress documenting and scanning all of the letters that were not dated. Most of them were written when Walt was a student at the Colorado School of Mines. I believe that he was a junior in the year 1938.
Today I began to document and scan the letters that were dated. I am beginning with the year 1938. The mystery deepens because these letters are dated beginning in March 1938 when Walt should have been finishing his junior year at the School of Mines. But instead it seems he is working for the US Geological Survey in New Mexico on a job that lasts from March – April 1938.
His supervisor’s name is “Mr. Walker” but he also mentions the “big boss” who is related to the job. Walt is staying in a 3-room apartment at a “Cottage Camp” in Carlsbad, NM. He is rooming with Mr. Walker, his wife and two young sons (Charles & Bob). The Walkers are charging Walt $1/day for his room & board, but Walt is happy to pay it because if he rents a room on his own he will pay $36-$40 a month for room & board. (In his words “Boy prices are high!”) An excerpt from his letter dated March 6, 1938 says:
If I got board and room some place else it would cost between $36 – 40 a month. I told Mr. Walker that if my living with him was putting him out that I would find other accomadations. He said that it wasn’t, and that if I could stand the kids I was more than welcome. Because he is boarding & rooming me so cheaply I have been helping as much as possible. Such as helping washing dishes, setting the table, etc.
At this point, I don’t know if Walt has dropped out of school and gotten a job instead, or if working for the US Geological Survey is perhaps some kind of internship. I hope to be able to go up to Golden to the School of Mines Library sometime soon to see what else I can find out about Walt’s tenure there as a student.
In the meantime, I thought I would publish the letter that Walt wrote to Gertie on March 16, 1938. It is particularly “newsy” and has some good material giving us a picture of his life at the time. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did!
(NOTE: All punctuation and spelling are copied exactly as Walt wrote it.)
3-16-38
Dearest Gertie,
What a screwy time I have had the last three days. Monday we had a nice (?) high wind with a dust storm. We couldn’t work so layed around the house. I took the kids back + forth to school, and the rest of the time placed rags in the doors + windows. Tuesday was fairly decent and nice and warm. Just after we had started to work I nearly got rid of a years growth. I was walking to the next point whistling and having a good time when I nearly stepped on a rattler. I don’t know whether the snake was scared, but I sure left the ground. I yelled to Mr. Walker, and then tried to kill the rattler. I couldn’t kill him before he went in a hole. He didn’t get me, didn’t even strike, but from now on I will sure watch my step. We ran across another one about 40 ft from there in a sink hole. He also got away from us. I promise you that I will be careful and won’t go out of my way to meet them.
Again today we didn’t work due to more dust in the air. Mr. Walker transferred some of our traverse onto the main sheet while I worked on the truck. During the past few days the boss has been feeling rather low due to the dirt in the air. So far I haven’t been bothered by it, and don’t think I will.
Monday I bought three airplane glider kits (5¢ each), and then made one over. At least it will give me something to do on week ends.
Tonight up until time to do the dishes I helped Charles with his arithmetic. After the dishes were finished I started to write this letter (?).
Keep this under your hat, but its really funny. Mr. Walker has a farm back in Illinois. About all he does during his spare moments is read the Sears & Roebuck Catalog. His wife & I kid him every once in a while by asking him the price of some article. He just laughs, and then quotes the price.
We finally got two new tires + tubes for the truck so now we have a spare tire. Thank gosh! I didn’t like the prospects of walking 14-18 miles into town.
I suppose we will spend the rest of our time in this same Cottage Camp. The Rio Vista Cabins are all taken and paid for two weeks in advance. Rio Vista has fridigaires while this place has a common ice block. If there is an opening we may move, that is I hope we do.
I had a letter from Balvin and the pressure caused by final week must have warped his mind. He wrote the darndest crazy things. Sounded like a nut on a spree.
At the rate we are going this work should be finished about next year, but I think the last week or two in April will be a case of lay around + loaf. We can’t turn in more than 12 sq miles per month. So far we have 2 sq miles filled in and about 20 miles of control traverse run. By the end of this month we could finish our part of the work. If we did that though it would be working ourselves out of a job. So all I can do is let the boss worry about the situation.
Well darling it is almost 9 P.M. so I will have to hit the hay as tomorrow is another day. There is exactly 45 more days until I will be out of here. Each day I draw a line through the day that just passed. Just like a convict waiting to get out. Sometimes I almost feel like one. Please write when you have time as I wait for your letters with all my patience. Remember I love you with all my heart.
With loads of love,
Walt
(Bunny Duck)
A Military Mom’s Diary: Tribute to HSC-6 Screamin’ Indians
Today we learned the identities of the two lost pilots in Sunday’s terrible accident aboard the USS William P. Laurence. They were Lt. Commander Landon L. Jones and Chief Warrant Officer Jonathon S. Gibson, both married with small children.
I created this tribute to them and the HSC-6 “Screamin’ Indians” and hope that the photos, sentiments and the lyrics of this song will ease the hearts of their friends and families and all Americans who join in mourning their loss & sacrifice.
(To view my original post about this accident click here .)
Related articles
- Names released in Navy helicopter crash (utsandiego.com)
- Search ended for 2 in Navy crash (utsandiego.com)
- Two Still Missing After Sunday Knighthawk Crash (news.usni.org)
A Military Mom’s Diary: “Safe and Sound”
MH-60S Knighthawk
Yesterday I received the best email I’ve ever received in my life. In the span of about 60 seconds I experienced the emotions of fear, joy, guilt and grief:
FEAR – Something bad has happened…are they involved in hostile activities?
JOY – Thank God my son is safe!
GUILT – My son is safe! But five other mothers’ sons are not…God help them!
GRIEF – Lost at sea…if they are alive they are probably hurt and afraid. Will any of them be found? Will any of them survive? Lord be with them and hold them in Your hands!
The email that I received was from my son Brooks who is currently deployed as a Naval aviator assigned to the USS Nimitz strike group. Brooks is a pilot and a member of the HSM 75 Helicopter squadron “Wolf Pack”. He pilots the MH-60R Seahawk. (I wrote about the experience of Brooks receiving his Naval Aviator “wings” in this previous post .)
Brooks’ email (Subject: safe and sound) was received on Sunday, September 22, 2013 10:11 AM and said:
“Family,
I can’t respond with any details but if you read the news I just wanted to calm any worries you might have and let you know that I’m okay. Please keep our sister squadron in your thoughts and prayers.
Love you all,
Brooks”
A quick search on the internet revealed a news article that reported the crash of a MH-60S Knighthawk helicopter while either taking off or landing on a guided-missile destroyer, the USS William P. Lawrence. Five crew-members were on board the aircraft at the time of the crash. These helicopters are flown by the “Indians” of Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 6, sister squadron to Brooks’ squadron (HSM 75 Wolf Pack.)
At the time we viewed this article originally, all five of the crewmen involved in the crash were still unaccounted for. This was very concerning because the crash happened six hours earlier, but we hoped the delay was just in the reporting of the events. Later in the afternoon the article was updated to report that three of the five crewmen had been rescued and were in stable condition and that search and rescue operations were being conducted for the missing two crewmen.
Sadly, this morning at 11:50 am EDT this Navy News article reports “Search and Rescue Efforts for MH-60S Aircrew Suspended.”
As the mother of an active-duty serviceman who is deployed in the Middle East I have had to learn how to live each day without being consumed with worry. It is not easy but my faith in God helps me trust that Brooks is always being held in His hands. Even so, I am realistic enough to know that bad things happen all of the time and no one is exempt from that possibility.
I saw this slogan on the USS Nimitz (CVN 68) Facebook page: “One Nation, One Navy, One Family” and it is so true. Two families are being informed that their sons (brothers, husbands, maybe even fathers) were lost at sea. My heart is so heavy with grief for them and I know that it could have so easily been my son involved in such an accident.
Joy > Guilt > Grief….such a dichotomy of emotions.
Lord in Heaven, I pray that you will be with the families and friends of the two crewmen who were lost yesterday in this terrible accident. Please envelop them with Your comfort and peace and give them the strength to bear this realization of their greatest fear. Be also with their fellow crewmembers that experienced this tragedy and those who helped with the search and rescue operations. Give them the comfort of knowledge that they did all that was humanly possible in the situation. Help them stay strong and courageous during their mission. Please bring them all home safely and soon.
Related articles
- Navy suspends search for two crewmembers after helicopter crash in Red Sea (stripes.com)
- Search Suspended for Two Missing Crew from Red Sea Knighthawk Crash (news.usni.org)
- U.S. Navy Helicopter Goes Down in the Red Sea, Two Still Missing (gcaptain.com)
- 3 rescued from Navy helicopter crashes in Red Sea – KFMB News 8 (cbs8.com)
- US Navy helicopter crashes in Red Sea (stripes.com)
- Two Still Missing After Sunday Knighthawk Crash (news.usni.org)
Pre-WWII Love Letters – Chapter 2
Tuesday
Dearest Gertie,
What a life, do we have to do some dumb things they call problems. So far we have had five of them. The first one was to walk 300 ft counting the number of steps and then find our average step. Imagine about 50 fellows walking up and down in front of the frat house for about an hour. Today we had a chain problem out on the baseball field. Redmond went around talking about being a fugitive from a chain gang. One of the fellows knows the prof. quit(e) well so the other day when he told us to go chain the road this guy pipes up with “why chain it it’ll stay there”.
Well honey I will have to close now and go get my lunch. The way things look now I won’t be able to come home until Saturday.
Love,
Walt
As this is only the second installment of my “Walt & Gertie” project, I am still working through documenting the letters and copying them. I’ve learned a little bit about Walt in the process.
Here is some of what I have learned so far:
Walt was a student at the Colorado School of Mines and was a Junior in the year 1938. He was also a member of the Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity the same year. But so far I cannot find evidence that he graduated from the School of Mines the next year (1939). It is possible that he might have transferred to another school, because in another letter to Gertie he mentions discussing the possibility of transferring with his father:
Monday evening
Dearest Gertie,
Well here it is the end of the first day. We haven’t done much in the way of work today and from now on they say it gets easier.
I told mom that your mother wanted you to go with them to dinner, and she said that she was sorry you couldn’t be with us.
Sunday night when I was getting ready to go to bed Dad came up and started talking to me about school. He said that next year I hadn’t better think of driving back and forth. He ask me how I came out in Chem. I told him the straight facts and did I get a surprise when he asked if I wanted to take some other course. It ended by him telling me to inquire at Boulder and Ft. Collins about Mechanical Engineering. This is rather hard to explain in a letter but I will tell you all about it in my next letter, or the next time I see you. I am coming in Wednesday night and if your home I will tell you then. Please don’t mention this until I talk to you as there are some facts I don’t like to write in a letter.
I hope some of the board members don’t walk in tonight as some of the fellows are throwing a party and it might be embarrassing. I don’t know what is going on, but I have an idea.
Well honey I will have to close as it is getting late and I still have some work to do.
Love,
Walt
I believe Walt was studying some kind of geology or surveying discipline at the School of Mines because he has mentioned having to make maps and of having to do some field work. An excerpt from one letter says:
Well here it is the end of the first day. Today we had a problem in differential leveling which Redmond and I have just finished calculating. I had to make a mistake in the field so we had to check it all over.
In the same letter, Walt tells Gertie about a good grade he got on a quiz….I thought it was funny:
In our first lecture the prof gave us our quizzes back and was I surprised when I got a 96. No fooling! Boy I made some good guesses.
I hope I discover more information about Walt & Gertie as I continue this project, and you can be sure I will share my discoveries here!
The Good News & The Bad News – September 18, 2013
The Good News: I started my “Pre-WWII Love Letters” project today. (Read more on this post .) This is going to be fun and challenging!
The Bad News: I received a call from my Dr. to inform me that recent x-rays reveal I have arthritis in my knees. Not happy about that!
Pre-WWII Love Letters: The best yard-sale discovery I ever made!
1939 Hallmark Valentine’s Day card
Dearest Gertie,
Just a few lines to let you know that I am always thinking of you. Honey, my work has stacked up so that I haven’t time to write a letter. Tomorrow I have two Quizzes so will have to do lots of studying tonight.
Sunday we went skiing as scheduled and ran into a snow storm. It snowed so hard that you couldn’t see where you were going, which made the driving difficult. I met Jay Nelson and Carl Ward up there and they looked like they were frozen.
If you come home this week end, and would care to go to the dance they are having one at school.
I had a talk with the Dean this afternoon, and will probably have to drop D.G. to keep from flunking it.
Well honey I will have to close and get some of my studies.
Love,
Walt
These words were written over 78 years ago by a smitten Walt to his sweetheart Gertie. The note was written on a small blank card and is not dated except for “Tuesday”. I’ve copied it exactly, including punctuation.
This card is part of a collection of letters that I (accidentally?) came into possession of some five or six years ago after a day of shopping at garage sales.
On this particular day my husband had agreed to come along. He enjoys the “hunt” as much as I do and I enjoy his company when he can spare the time to go with me. Usually I look for good books to add to my “books waiting to be read” box. Sometimes I find nice things for the house. One of the best bargains I ever found at a yard sale was four 3-pc sets of the Lennox Christmas china that match some sets that I already own. I also have been known to collect items for my “someday grandchildren” box…..such as nice little tea sets, Lincoln logs or wooden blocks, teddy bears, army men, etc. (If and when our grandchildren finally come, we’ll be ready!)
I remember it was towards the end of our yard-sale venture that day, because we were in the neighborhoods located across the busy main street that bordered our neighborhood. We stopped at a sale and both of us began browsing the “merchandise”. I came across a large box full of crafting odds & ends. Being an aspiring crafter (depending on whatever has my attention at the time) I began to dig through the box. My husband, not wanting to wait for me to pull out particular items that I might want, offered to buy the whole box for one price to which the owner of the sale agreed. My husband hefted the box into the car and we went home.
The box sat in the garage for a couple of days before I found the time to bring it into the house and begin to go through the contents. I don’t really remember at this point what else was in the box, but I do remember that at the bottom of the box was a smaller blue box. I lifted it out and opened it up, and found inside a collection of letters. I quickly scanned through them and realized these were old letters written before WWII from “Walt” to his sweetheart “Gertie”. Some of the letters were dated, and many were not. The dates ranged from 1935 – 1940….five years of letters written by Walt to Gertie.
I immediately showed the letters to my husband. We took the box of letters and drove back to the area where the yard sale was held the previous weekend. I was hoping that I might see a house with a pile of trash out by the curb waiting to be picked up which would help us pin-point exactly which house it was that held the yard sale. But as we drove around and around we could not remember which house it was where we bought the box of craft items, and we could not find any evidence of the yard sale in the neighborhood. We finally went home, still in possession of the letters. I stored the letters in my office, thinking that I would “someday” try to solve the mystery of Walt & Gertie.
Fast-forward these many years later. I have recently retired and now have lots of free time on my hands. So I retrieved the box of letters from their safe place and this week I have begun to read them. When Walt remembered to date the letters was a wonderful benefit because I can put them in order for continuity. But many of the letters are not dated so it is much harder to figure out where they go in the timeline of their story.
I am getting such a kick out of this project because it is fun to read Walt’s words in that day’s style/slang (“keeping my chin up”, “one of the fellows”, “give me some more dope about the dance”….) He signs some of the letters “Your Bunny Duck” which must have been Gertie’s pet name for Walt. Additionally, some of the letters were written on “stationery” from hotels around Colorado & New Mexico and the hotel stationery is so quaint and old-fashioned. The amenities they advertise on the top of the page make me laugh: “Rooms with and without bath rates” or “European Plan $1 up” (The Star Hotel in Glenwood Springs, CO); “Radio In Every Room”, “Fireproof” and “Artesian Water” (El Monte Hotel in Monta Vista Colorado.) (“Fireproof”??? That was an added bonus???) <smile>
Stay tuned for more installments of the love story of Walt & Gertie here in my blog! I’m looking forward to learning more about them…..I hope you are too!
Related articles
- 5 Handy Yard Sale Tips (dreamgreendiy.com)
- Open Thread: It’s Officially Yard Sale Season! (crooksandliars.com)
The View from My Corner of the World 