Some Things We Don't Get

So, there Mom was, watching TV. She switches the channel and a movie’s title comes across. The first thing she says to us is, “This is the stupidest movie ever made.” She then proceeded to watch one full hour of it and then said again, “This is the stupidest movie ever made.” She still continued to watch. When it was over she said. “I’ve watched this fifteen times.”

“I thought you said it was the stupidest movie ever made,” said Rose.

“It is.”

Why did she watch it? We’ll never know.

Sometimes I Wish...

I am forever grateful to be home schooled but there are times when I want more than anything to be public schooled. For more friends? No. I have some of the best friends anyone could ask for.

It’s those times when I think about all those kids longing to fit in and I want to show them that being themselves is fine. It happens when I think about all the kids who need a friend, someone willing to stand up for them even if they don’t look as good as everyone else. And when I think about all the kids who need God’s love and how few are showing the way.

That’s when I want more than anything to be that person. To be the square in all those circles even if I wasn’t liked or accepted.

Some days my heart screams to be able to help. I want it so bad but I’m home schooled. On those days I’m saying, “God, I’m here! Let me help.” And He is saying, “This is not what I want for you. Wait for my plan. I have others for that.”

And then I see me, as myself, getting on a bus, riding two hours to school, going to class, eating a home made lunch since there would be nothing for me to eat, and coming home. And it seems so absurd I want to laugh because I realize why God left me home to be schooled.

Then I’m saying, “Lord, whatever you want! I’m waiting, Lord. Show me what to do and when.”

But on those days, I still wish I could help more.

A Report from Pery.

[Tap, tap….I say, is this thing working? Somebody put me on air…. Oh, I’m on air, righty oh.]

Good day, chaps. This is Reginald Peryweather Cornwalter reporting live from…[What’s all this about? Well, tell him not to send notes when I’m on air….click.] live from the Black Hills. Today’s weather will vary from very cold to very hot depending on where you are. [Yes, what is it? ….Oh, right] and probably middle temperatures too. As for the rain, there will be scattered storms in places so just put your umbrella in the car.

There are two urgent missing person’s reports…. [Yes? They are. Oh dear…] but they are just a dog named Larry, bad name for a dog, I think, and fluffy the cat. [….I was getting there.] Please don’t call in every dog or cat you see because they aren’t near you...probably.

Depending on when you hear this (because our station is so unreliable) I want to remind you to eat a good breakfast, lunch or dinner. Good for the health, you know. […I know but I was just covering all my grounds….I know it probably won’t even reach them until lunch. Stop interrupting.]

With today’s winds there are probably all kinds of things being broken so don’t forget to call your local handyman service. [Yes, I was about to tell them the name. What, do you think I’m new at this? ….Okay, so I am new at this but that is beside the point.] Call into Honey Do Services today! They're in the phone book!

This is Reginald Peryweather Cornwalter, signing out.

Painting

We went painting. Painting? You ask. Yes, painting.

I started out my day as I always do. Got up, ate breakfast, wrote my book, heard Mom get up and was told we were going with her to paint a house. I was once again left out of planning things. From there we went to Deadwood. Attempting to find the house we were to paint, we went up a very steep, narrow road. I commented, “I would hate to drive up this in winter,” winters being so bad here. At the top of this first road was a house with a lady sitting on her porch, just watching the scenery. We turned left, went up another road that was just as steep and found a total dead end. This was obviously the wrong road. Turning around was not an easy task but with my dad, an excellent driver with over one million miles with not even a small ticket (okay, one small ticket but that’s because he forgot to put money in at the library), we got out. We went back down and instead turned right when we reached the house at the top of the first road. After a few minutes going that way we reached another sign saying ‘dead end’ and it defiantly wasn’t anywhere around, so we turned back. As we passed the house and went back down the first road the lady was laughing hysterically. She obviously thought it quite funny. I saluted her as we passed, as I always do.

We did finally find the place. Did we stay? No. We got a paint chip and headed down to the hardware store. The first place did not have the right stuff, so we went to a second place. This place had it but they had to mix it, so we went back to Deadwood from Central City and got lunch. After lunch we went back to the store and picked up our paint. Then we finally got to the house. Dad did some scrapping and on to the painting!

We spent the day painting this house. Of course our van had to go dead too. So we called in emergency help! Our neighbor came and got us out of a rout.

Tomorrow we are going back to do more painting. Oh, fun.

Extreme Sports of SD

White Water Rafting – Try to stay in the boat. Wear a helmet in case of crashes.

Snowboarding – Take skiing lessons first. Wear a helmet in case of crashes.

Skydiving – Jump from a plane. Remember to pull your cord. Wear a helmet in case of crashes.

Ect. Ect. Ect…….

Gardening – The only sport where killing, maiming, squishing and karate chopping are allowed! They say it is relaxing! Wear a helmet in case of flying dirt clunks.

Last night we decided to do some planting (I didn’t, Mom did.). So, we trudged out to the garden with our onions, beats, radishes, turnips (all of which I think are gross) and carrots (which I like). We also had a bowl of flower seeds. We’d spent the last half an hour tearing open flower seed packets and dumping them together. How many are you thinking? Fifteen packages? No. Something more along the lines of a hundred. How many seeds are you thinking? A cereal bowl full? No. More like an eighth of a bowl full. Don’t worry, I couldn’t believe it either! Those packages only have about ten seeds apiece.

So we planted these seeds and then decided to explore the many bushes lining our fence. Most of which are berry. This year, to our complete surprise, there are flowers on these bushes! I’d given them up to dead. But no, obviously SD bushes are stubborn, too.

Mom was very impressed with one of dead apple trees (yes, we’re rough on plants but the winters up here don’t help) which was now coming back from the bottom. Around the end of this adventure Missy exclaimed, “Who ever said a green thumb marked a farmer? I say it’s a black pinky.” We both stared at our black pinkies. Of course, she was right. To make the lines for the seeds you use the side of your hand with your pinky and by the end of such a process you have a black pinky. I must be twice the farmer since both of mine were black! (Or, since I’m double handed, I just switched hands without thinking.)

Well, it wasn’t a bad night but since Missy was bugging me about writing more of my book (since she reads along she often has to wait for me to feel like writing and it bugs her), I did. By then, it was an hour past my bed time (10:00) and I was exhausted, so I left.

In fifteen minutes Mom wants to be woken up, according to this note, so I’d better go.

Yours truly,

Mandy

My Week

Where have you been? You ask. Why are my posts so ridiculously thin? Well, as this Blog’s name implies, this is just what I think and lately there has been no time to think.

First there was a virus that up routed my whole system. How rude! Thankfully everything was saved but the virus took out Microsoft Works (the program my books were on.) and I now have to use Microsoft Word. Nothing is the same. I’m having to relearn where everything is. Dreadful! But, I am stubborn. This close to sending off my book, I’m not giving up. No, sir (or ma’am).

A long time ago, at the beginning of the week, we had a whole troop of relatives out. It was awesome but guess what? It left no time to think up great posts! (Even if I did come up with relatives) We did not completely get rid of our dear, fun, energy stealing cousins until Wednesday. We then mowed the dreaded lawns in our lovely town. And I mean huge lawns, by a hand propelled push mower! That after noon I got a life giving, right on time, lovely letter from one of my three pen pals. (God is SO good and His timing is perfect!)

I was once again not informed of things until an hour before we were supposed to be at church. This was a surprise because being in the middle of nowhere, we don’t have Wednesday nights. We went to church for this special Missionary presentation.

Thursday, more mowing. After mowing, house cleaning. Then, learning how to maneuver the new program with my book and fixing spelling and punctuation mistakes. And then, I crashed. I probably could have written but it would have been something grand like “I mowed, I got sunburned, blah, blah, blah, goodbye”. A total of nine words, three of which are ‘Blah’.

Today is a beautiful, sunny, not too hot, day and I will probably walk to the post office just on principle. I am enjoying God’s love, as always. I’m happy, safe and tired. Yet, a little work never killed anyone…

….’little’ being the operative word.

Yours truly,

Mandy

Relatives

Relatives, we all have them. Some of us just have more. Like me. My mom’s side has a family reunion every two years and you won’t believe the amount of people that show up. I have something like fifty cousins and nearly as many aunts. Uncles, sure I have plenty of them too. I also have second cousins, third cousins and a few people that I’m not sure how they are related at all. They come to the reunion, so they are.

There are over a hundred people and not all of them come which is a good think since we only have one tiny community hall. Any more and we might start suffocating.

This all takes place around the beginning or middle of August, in Broken Bow, at the same time of the fair. (The same fair mentioned in my Aunt’s book, The Double Cousins and the Mystery of the Missing Watch.) It is usually scorching but do us kids mind? No. We all head down the road to the nearby park where we endure the heat as long as we can.

That’s only my mom’s one side. She had a quite a few on the other side as well but we don’t see them that often.

My dad’s side doesn’t have so many but we’re a lot closer. Most of us live right in or around Rapid. So, generally, we just gather whenever we feel like it.

I am very proud of my family and I must also say this: I got my writing talent from God but I also got it from them. They have written stories and books, newspapers and Calendars, Birthday cards in endless amounts. So, yes, this is for all of you. Even those who I don’t understand how they are related.

For God, and for my family.

P.S. No, I can't remember which ones. All I know is that it's confusing how they are connected!