Janet's Blog

When Victoria was just learning to read, I bought her a book entitled "One Sad, Glad Man," about a sad, lonely man who kept accumulating pets, two of one kind, three of another, until his home was filled with pets and happiness. For all I know, that book might have influenced Victoria's lifelong love of animals. This particular book came to mind recently when I was thinking of a pastor I knew, years ago. He was really the first pastor I knew well, because I sat in his office, along with eleven other eighth graders, every Saturday morning for almost a year, as we prepared for confirmation. He was the Lutheran pastor who confirmed me and, a few years later, he married Bill and me. It was a sad story that led Pastor B and his family to move to Fairbury, all the way from Hawaii. You see, his wife had recently died of cancer, leaving him to raise their four young children, who ranged in age from two to about twelve. Pastor B's sister, Dorothy, had been working in Hawai...

A couple of weeks ago, I published a blog called  "A Matter of Integrity."  In it, I suggested that undecided voters should take the time to check out all of this year's presidential candidates, including the marginal, third-party candidates. Well, I've followed my own advice, and discovered that the lesser-known candidates seem to be just as flaky as the two main party candidates. Have I mentioned how frustrated I am with this year's presidential choices? I've been comparing this election with previous elections, and I've come up with the not-so-novel opinion that the main difference this year is the negative, and often exaggerated, media coverage of every candidate. Recently, a friend of mine wondered aloud why any decent person would ever consider running for president, knowing that the media would rake up every little mistake he or she has ever made or, if mistakes were hard to find, would fabricate the "news" needed to attract readers/l...

I hit the wall last night. Yes, I literally hit the wall, or, I guess I should say, the  door. I had turned out the family room lights and was walking down the hall to get ready for bed when I remembered that I needed to move the wet laundry from the washer to the dryer. So, I scurried through the kitchen to the basement, switched the laundry, and headed back upstairs. This time, though, I strode through the dark family room toward the bedroom and, forgetting that the pocket door leading to the hallway was closed, I charged right into that solid, wooden door. "Ouch!" doesn't even begin to describe the pain! My nose is still tender today, and I've had a splitting headache all day long. As a result, I can honestly say that I understand the true meaning of that idiom, "hit the wall." Our oldest daughter, Erin was about fifteen when she really, truly, hit the wall. She was up long before the sun, just about ready to leave the house to catch an early morning ...

integrity : doing the right thing even when no one else is watching This is Levi's working definition of integrity. He knows what the word means, and can quote the definition at will, but that doesn't mean he can always live a life of integrity. We have been working hard on the concept of personal integrity, and we are making slow progress, but it has become increasingly harder to find good role models for him to imitate. And, when we look to our nation's presidential candidates this fall, the task becomes nearly impossible. I am not, by nature, a political person. I am not interested in arguing with anyone about the upcoming election, or the merits (or lack thereof) of any of the current candidates for president. I am not writing this article for those of you who have already made up your mind to vote for either one of the main party candidates because you agree with the party's platform and the candidate's interpretation of that platform. If you are wholeheart...

When I was in late grade school and Junior High, my summer days were well-scripted. Most days, I slept in until 9:00 or so, then got dressed, and had breakfast, and read until lunch time. Technically, I was probably supposed to be monitoring Dan and Laura, if they were in the apartment and not following Mom or Dad around the hotel, but realistically, they didn't need much oversight, since they were probably reading, too, or watching TV, or playing quietly. In the summer, we usually ate lunch in the MaryEtta Cafe, because when Mom worked in the hotel in the mornings, she certainly didn't have time to fix lunch for the family. Then, after lunch, I often watched a couple of game shows on the lobby television (more about that later) and walked, or rode my bike, to the library, three blocks north of the hotel, to return the books I had checked out a day or two earlier, and check out four more. At 2:45 every summer afternoon, my presence was expected in the cafe, to wait on co...

I walked out to the garden this evening to pick anything that was ripe--more green beans than I was expecting, a solitary cucumber, a wealth of little grape tomatoes, several Romas, and two nice, plump Beefsteak tomatoes. It was a good harvest for a balmy, early October day. And the biggest tomatoes were just perfect for BLTs! I've loved bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwiches for as long as I can remember. I've ordered toothpick-skewered, triple-decker sandwiches from a restaurant, now and then, over the years. They are a little hard to eat, but always savory and delicious. I prefer my BLTs on two slices of whole wheat or whole grain bread, lightly toasted, with nice, crisp bacon, a little crunchy, green lettuce, and thin-sliced, garden fresh tomatoes. And, in my family, we always serve BLT's the Bauer way, with a fried egg inside. We started making our BLTs with eggs when our girls were little, when we figured out that Erin really didn't like tomatoes. So, to fill...