Dear Xanga friends,
I have another prayer request: I may be having surgery to repair my broken left arm ("interarticular fracture of the head of the radius") tomorrow. I went back for my dr. to check it today...he sent me for a CT scan, and after seeing those results, said the break is more complicated than he'd thought, and he's referring me to an orthopedic surgeon in Fayetteville., who he said may want to do surgery. My appt is at 10 am Wed. and they told me not to eat or drnk anything after midnight in case the doc thinks I need surgery---they'll work me in tomorrow. It will be outpatient and I'd get to come home tomorrow. Please pray that I'll be at peace during the whole thing, and that fear won't overtake me, and that all will go well!
Thanks, dear friends. And maybe soon I'll be able to type with TWO HANDS again!

I've just finished reading several novels set in the time I grew up in
- the late Fifties and Sixties - and found myself really enjoying the
vivid images they evoked of that long-ago Ozzie-and-Harriet world.
Since lots of you are close enough to my age to share some of these
Baby Boomer memories, I thought you might get a kick out of walking
with me through a typical day in my life in 1962:
My
mom wakes me up on a cool September morning for my first day of second
grade. I've been dreaming about Lassie, the beautiful collie dog on my
favorite Sunday night TV show. I sit at the breakfast table, my hair
still in pink sponge rollers, with one little sister in her chair next
to me and another in her high chair, and Daddy at the end of the table.

Our housewife mother fixes us cinnamon toast, bacon, and eggs fried
in bacon grease, along with orange juice she mixes up every morning
from a can of frozen concentrate. Daddy kisses us all good-bye before
he hurries off to work smelling of Old Spice aftershave.
I get
dressed in a new dark cotton plaid dress with a full skirt and a fabric
sash, bobby socks, and brown and white saddle oxfords. I have on a
scratchy, stiff petticoat to make my skirt puff out. Mama brushes my
hair and ties my sash in a big pretty bow.
 I pick up my book
satchel, carefully packed the night before with a spotless Blue Horse
tablet, a wooden pencil box with new yellow No. 2 pencils, a brand-new
Pink Pearl eraser, and a small box of fresh, sharp Crayola crayons. My
mother hands me my colorful tin Roy Rogers and Dale Evans lunchbox -
containing a waxed-paper-wrapped bologna sandwich on Wonder Bread, a
banana, and a twin-pack of Hostess Twinkies and a nickel to buy milk -
and kisses me good-bye.
I catch the school bus on the corner, happy
to get a seat next to my friend Sarah. We face each other on the seat
and play our favorite hand-clapping game as the bus lurches along,
chanting as we clap each other’s hands:
"A sailor went to sea, sea, sea,
To see what he could see, see, see
And all that he could see, see, see
Was the bottom of the deep blue sea, sea, sea!"
At
school, we go through the routines of the first day, including being
issued our new second-grade Dick and Jane "Friends Old and New"
readers.
At First Recess in the morning, some of us girls line up
to wait our turn at foursquare or tetherball, while the rest of us line
up to jump rope. Two girls "turn" at either end of the long rope, and
then, in turns, each girl "jumps in" to the turning rope and jumps
until she misses. As I jump, we sing together:
"Cinderella, dressed in yellow
went upstairs to kiss a fella
made a mistake
and kissed a snake
how many doctors
did it take?
1-2-3-4-5..."
After
the freedom of summer vacation, the school day seems long, but I like
my nice new teacher, who has a neat beehive hairdo and high heels.
After
school, I get off the school bus at our corner and run home, anxious to
see Mama and my little sisters. I change into my play clothes - yellow
pedal pushers and a striped shirt, and my battered summertime Keds.
Cissy
and I have a snack together, then run outside to play kickball with the
neighborhood kids. When we get tired of kickball, we climb up in our
favorite tree in the vacant lot across the street with a couple of
other girls, and play like we’re in Cinderella's castle. The boys in
the neighborhood disappear into the cool treehouse they built over the
summer, but it has a big sign that says, "No Girls Allowed."
Mama
calls us inside to wash up for supper. Cissy and I run to the door to
greet Daddy when he gets in at 6, and we all sit down at the table for
supper - meat loaf, mashed potatoes, green peas, and biscuits, and Mama
even made banana pudding for dessert.
As we're eating, we can hear President Kennedy's voice on the television news from the living room.
After
supper, Cissy and I take our baths and come in the living room to watch
our black-and-white TV while Daddy reads the paper and Mama gets our
baby sister to bed. After "To Tell the Truth" and "I've Got a Secret"
are over at 8:30, it’s bedtime for me and Cissy.
We kiss Daddy
goodnight, and Mama comes to our room to tuck us into our twin beds,
which have bumpy pink chenille bedspreads, and listen to our prayers. I
prop up in my bed and read a chapter of my new Trixie Belden book, "The
Gatehouse Mystery," before I fall asleep wishing I could have a secret
club and solve mysteries like Trixie and her friends.

By Celia DeWoody
Published March 12, 2007
Harrison Daily Times, Harrison, Ark.
Copyright CPI, Inc.

Hey, friends....
This has been a good day. We're feeling relieved about Erika. My arm is feeling better. A group of us from the paper went out for our regular bi-weekly lunch and laughed a lot. And tonight, a sweet work friend brought our supper to us, in honor of my injuries, which was so sweet of her. And tomorrow night, my sweetheart and I have free 'press' tickets to one of the most popular shows in Branson, Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede.
AND....THE DAFFODILS ARE BLOOMING IN THE OZARKS!

Just quick note: Erika sent a quick email a little bit ago saying she got her CT scan results and they are NORMAL!!!!!! Thank you all for your prayers.

 Dear Friends,
Thank you all so very much for praying for Erika. We don't have any news yet...she had the CT scan today and won't hear any results for 3 days or so.
Meanwhile, on a lighter note, Ill post Monday's column for you about my recent catastrophe.

Y'all may have to read this column slowly, because I sure am typing it slowly, using the right-hand-only method.
My
left hand is currently velcroed in place over my middle, closed into
something called an "immobilizer" the doctor gave me yesterday morning.
Yup, I'm afraid it's broke. Well, cracked...the difference apparently
being that a "crack" in an armbone doesn't demand a cast.
To go with
my stylish waist-cincher of elastic to which my arm is anchored, I also
have a black-and-blue goatee of bruises and cuts on my chin, and a few
other minor random scuffs and scratches. I look like the loser in a
barroom brawl.
I wish I could tell you  I did it skydiving or
mountain climbing, or that I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named Fu
Manchu, but I'd be lying.
I grabbed Darnit Kitty by the tail when he
darted out the front door at noon on Friday, trying to get him safely
in the house before I went back to work. We were at the edge of the
front porch, and I grabbed his tail and leaned over to reel him back in
— and the next thing I knew, I had a faceful of the concrete sidewalk
four steps below.  I was hurting all over, and all I remember thinking
dazedly was, "Oh, no! Oh, no!"
When I took my hands away from my
face, they were dripping blood, so I figured I had probably broken my
nose. My next thought was, "I hope nobody sees me sitting here on the
sidewalk all bloody and covered in dirt!"
I halfway crawled back up
the front steps, using my hands to help, and got myself inside to the
bathroom mirror, where I realized the blood was all coming from a
couple of cuts on my dirty chin. I spit the dirt out of my mouth,
pressed a wet cloth against my chin and called Dwain to tell him I
didn't think I could make it for our 1 p.m. shift at the Business Expo.
He said to call him if there was anything he could do.
By this point
I was kind of shaky, and because of the amount of blood pouring from my
face, figured I probably needed a stitch or two. I tried to reach my
son Jamie, but he was in class at NorthArk and didn't answer. Then I
just gave in to being a baby and called my husband, who was at work in
Carroll County, because he's my rock and my security blanket and I just
wanted him. He jumped in his truck and came right home to see about his
injured wife.
Our original idea was to go to a doctor, but we called
two who turned out to be out on Friday afternoon, and the third's
receptionist said, "We have a three-hour wait, and if you don't already
have the flu, I wouldn't advise you to come in here. "
We didn't
feel my face warranted an ER visit, so Doyle ran downtown to Sam
Alexander's pharmacy, where Sam kindly advised him about closing up
cuts with steri-strips, and my pre-med major husband hydrogen
peroxided, antibiotic-creamed, and patched up my chin.
By that night
I was noticing my left elbow hurt pretty good, especially if I bent it
sharply or tried a twisting motion, like turning a doorknob. I used a
package of frozen butterbeans for an icepak, took some aspirin, and
figured I'd be better the next day.
By Saturday night, it was really
swollen, more bruised, and hurting like crazy. Sunday morning, we
decided to try the local drop-in medical clinic. There, a nice lady
named Sue x-rayed it, and Dr. Lee decided it was cracked, prescribed
the "immobilizer," patted me on the shoulder kindly, and told me to
come back in a week or so.
So as I write this on Sunday night, with
half of my hands strapped to my tummy, typing with five fingers, and
wondering how I'm going to get ready for work in the morning.
Ladies,
have you ever thought about how much of our morning routine requires
two hands? I'm pretty sure I can't put in contacts with just one hand.
I need one hand for the hairdryer and the other for the round brush...I
have a strong feeling this going to be a Bad Hair week all the way
through.
And look - I'm only telling y'all, my reader friends, what
really happened, I mean about grabbing the cat's tail and flying down
the steps behind him like he was the boat and I was the uncoordinated
water-skier. I think I'm going to try the skydiving story on everybody
else, so y'all don't let that bad black-and-white kitty out of the bag,
okay?

 

 
By Celia DeWoody
published 3/5/07 in the Harrison Daily Times
Copyright CPI, Inc. 2007

Dear friends, here's a prayer request:
Please pray for Doyle's daughter,  Erika, 31, in Sarasota, who just found out the severe headaches she's been getting while working out in the gym may be caused by an aneurysm or blood clot in her brain. She's having a CT scan tomorrow. Please pray for her health, as well as peace and trust in God for her and all of us who love her. It's a very scary situation. Thanks, friends.

Hey, friends,
Well, it was painfully brought home to me yesterday how quickly one can HURT themselves!
I fell from my front porch down the three steps and landed with a face-full of sidewalk yesterday, trying to catch our Bad Kitty and keep him from running away. I was just headed back to work after lunch.
One second I was reaching for the cat, who darted down the steps. All I got was his tail...next thing I knew, I was stunned, with hands full of blood from somewhere on my face, afraid I had really hurt myself.
I halfway crawled up the stairs, and inside, realized the blood wasn't from a broken nose, but from a couple of cuts on my chin. I figured I'd need a few stitches...called my boss and said I couldn't make the appointment we had at 1. My sweet husband ended up coming home from work and doctoring on me. The doctors we called were either out on Friday afternoons, or said they had a waiting room full of flu, and if it wasn't terrible, to get some Steri Strips.
Anyway, now I've got a black and blue chin and lower lip, some steri strips on my chin, scraped hand and knees, and a left arm I can barely bend because I did something to my elbow that  hopefully will wear off soon!
It all made me extremely grateful that I didn't seriously hurt myself or break anything...also made me realize how quickly we can go from everything being "normal" to  everything being topsy-turvy, literally!
I am VERY grateful for my sweet husband, who has been doing laundry and waiting on me all weekend. I'm getting pretty spoiled. It's great!
How are you all, my friends?

A straight flush might be the top hand in poker, but when it comes to my family, you can't beat four-of-a-kind.
Back in the old days when I was a kid, five wasn't an unusual number of children for a family to have.
I was born first, then my sister Mary Katherine, or "Cissy," just 13 months later. Five years after Cissy came Marie ("Re.")
We
thought having three girls was great fun, so when we found out Mama was
going to have another baby, Cissy and I prayed that our new baby would
be another sister. I remember us screaming with joy when Holly was born.
Four of a kind. Just like in one of my favorite books, Little Women.
Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy.
Celia, Cissy, Re and Holly.
And like a poker hand, there was one more card - our brother Jay came along to finish out the hand when I was 14.
My
three little sisters have been a lifelong gift to me, and next to my
husband, are my dearest friends. I deeply love my brother, too, but
today I want to write about my sisters.
Like the four suits, each
one of us is different, with our unique personalities and gifts - and
faults - but together, we make a pretty good hand of cards.
Cissy
was my childhood playmate, 15-year-roommate, confidante, chief rival,
and sometimes protector. She could run faster and jump higher than I
could, and could almost always beat me at any kind of game. A tomboy
who loved to climb trees, she still dearly loved her dolls. She
challenged me to work harder in school, so my little sister's report
card wouldn't outshine mine, and encouraged me to put my books down and
play outside with her.
Cissy is a elementary school librarian by
trade, much loved by her students. She's also a devoted mother, a
faithful teacher in her church, a prayer warrior, a sailor, a scuba
diver, a reader, an adventurer, and a wise mother to two remarkable
young women.
She's the one I turn to when I need sage advice, an
expert listening ear, encouragement, and when I need a cheerleader.
She's also the one I turn to when I need someone to storm Heaven's
gates for me. She prays for me, believes in me, and loves me no matter
what.
Cissy's always been my favorite sister. I don't know what I'd do without her.
Marie,
or "Re" as she's been ever since she was a baby toddling around holding
onto my finger, was my little student. I helped teach her to walk, talk
and tie her shoes, and always felt very protective toward my spirited
little sister. Now, she's a "retired" high-powered executive currently
on sabbatical at home, lovingly taking care of her four-year-old son
and our mother.
Re's a devoted mother to her three boys, a gourmet
cook, a wonderful organizer, and a natural leader. She's the one I turn
to when I need a careful listener and a logical problem-solver. She's
got an analytical mind that can break problems down into manageable
bites. Deeply compassionate, she's the one I've called in years past at
2 a.m. when I just needed a shoulder to cry on. She prays for me,
believes in me, and loves me no matter what.
Re's always been my favorite sister. I don't know what I'd do without her.
Holly,
or "Hozzie" as she was nicknamed somewhere along the way, is the Baby
Sister. Because I was 10 when she was born, my love for this beautiful
little sister has always had a strong maternal streak. She shares my
love for books and nature - in fact, when we couldn't find her when she
was a little girl, we'd often discover Holly settled comfortably in her
favorite tree, reading a book. From the time she was tiny, we knew she
was gifted, because she always had a different way of looking at the
world.
She's a nurse, a business owner, a sharp businesswoman, and a
loving mother to her daughter and son. She's a mountain biker, a
runner, an explorer, a reader, and an adventurer, and she helps Re take
tender care of our Mama.
Hozzie's the one I turn to when I need a
unique take on a problem, when I need to laugh until I cry, and when I
need a big sweet dose of love. She prays for me, believes in me, and
loves me no matter what.
Hollys always been my favorite sister. I don't know what I'd do without her.
Each
of my sisters has our mother's beauty, our Daddy's wide warm smile, and
the deep springs of love that come only from walking in the Lord's
green pastures. All my life, He's poured out His love for me through
these three precious sisters.
I'm real grateful He saw fit to deal us four-of-a-kind.

Photography is a passion that has unexpectedly overtaken
me in my middle years, and has started to compete with my lifelong love
of words in filling up my unpromised hours.
Artists blossom here and
there on my mother's side of the family tree. My grandmother, mother,
and both of my sons are painters, and it's my older son's chief calling
in life. Secretly longing to be one of those who can translate wonder
into beautiful colors on a canvas, I've contented myself for most of my
life with wordsmithing as my creative outlet.
When I was 16, my
father taught me just a little bit about using his 35 mm camera. I
roamed the woods near our Rhode Island home shooting trees and rocky
beaches, and Daddy helped me develop the images in his makeshift
darkroom. I still have a little album I made for a class project,
black-and-white prints carefully glued onto black pages and labeled
with old-fashioned white ink. Something about those stark shots of
trees and stones was very satisfying to me.
For many years, my
photography efforts consisted of color photos of my children and our
family activities, usually just unimaginative shots of people stiffly
smiling for the camera. Every once in a while, I'd accidentally capture
one that really said something. I particularly loved an unposed
close-up of my beautiful sister Holly holding her baby daughter
cheek-to-cheek on a blue, windy day in New Mexico, their hair blowing
wildly in the wind, and a look of delight on their faces.
Point-and-shoot
cameras are all I ever owned. I've never taken a photography course,
and to this day have no idea what an "F-stop" is, and only the vaguest
notion of what technical terms like "aperture" and "depth of field"
mean.
My friend and former boss Scott, who owns the little
Mississippi paper where printer's ink first infected me, is an
extraordinarily gifted, award-winning photographer, and I always had a
huge appreciation for his black-and-white work. During the years I
worked for him, he did almost all of the paper's photography, so I
never had much of an opportunity to learn the art, except maybe by just
soaking in his wonderful images.
When I came to work at the Daily
Times, I got bitten hard by the shutterbug. The staff writers here do
most of our own photography, so Doyle bought me a really nice digital
camera last summer, and I haven't looked back since.
My
pride-and-joy camera is the best tool - and most spellbinding toy -
I’ve ever owned. I don't have to understand F-stops and apertures - all
I have to do is frame the shot, focus a little bit, and there it is.
Photography
is changing the way I see the world. I find myself looking more deeply
into what my eyes are scanning, and looking for opportunities to
capture a sliver of life.
I had another chance to practice
yesterday, when we piled into our pickup truck and headed out on one of
our unplanned expeditions into the Ozarks. Our goals were to blow the
cobwebs out of our brains, enjoy the bright sunshine and the warmer
temperatures - and of course, for me to shoot photos of everything in
the world that caught my eye.
Down Highway 43 south, we turned
west on a road because we liked its name - Possum Trot - and
immediately started to fall under the enchantment of a unexplored
country road on a bright blue winter day.
Some of these things I saw through my camera lens, and some through just my eyes, but they're all in my memories today:
White
ruffles of ice hanging beneath horizontal branches stretched across
busy creeks, like petticoats peeking out from beneath a lady's skirt.
Springwater gurgling merrily out of rock layered like a birthday cake.
Indigo buntings flashing across the road, winter sun glinting on their bright wings.
Almost a mile of an old, old lichen-encrusted stone wall, meandering through the hills beside a creek.
Just glimpsed through the trees, an old home place tumbling down, rich in textures and contrasts.
A weathered, ramshackle outhouse, open to the sky.
An incongruous longhorn cow, wide horns silhouetted against the hills.
A row of peg-shaped white lichen lined up along a fallen branch like an old man's teeth.
"The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera," photographer Dorothea Lange said.
Learning to see all over again is a fascinating undertaking at any age.

By Celia DeWoody
Published in the Harrison Daily Times Feb. 19, 2007
Harrison, Ark.
Copyright CPI, Inc.

Note: If you'd like to see some of my recent photos, click on the photo album in the left sidebar of this page.