Sing God's Praises

Sunday night was another wonderful experience in my new life here in Virginia.  When I was a girl, all-night gospel sings were popular, and many times we went to hear the gospel quartets sing.  They didn't quite last all night, but they did go on for a long time.  And then, in our town churches used to get together on a fifth Sunday for a hymn sing after church on Sunday night.  I remember how I always loved going to those.

Last night there was an evening sing at one of the local Mennonite churches.  Several churches gathered together to sing and to listen to groups from the different churches.  One of my early memories of Mennonites was that they used no instruments in their churches, and all the singing was a capella.  In some churches, that may still be the case, but last evening there were lots of instruments.

Bluegrass music is popular here.  I don't know if it is because of the part of the country we are in, or just what the reason, but it is popular.  One family sang and accompanied themselves on banjos, guitars, bass fiddles, and I believe I saw a mandolin.

Since it was Palm Sunday, a lot of the music centered around the resurrection.  The group above sang "Were you there when they crucified my Lord?"

The group from our church sang an Easter canon and a number about the price He paid on the cross.

We did do some a capella singing.  At a couple of spots a lady came up with her pitch pipe and led in a couple of songs.  I think that was my favorite part.  When she introduced one of the songs, she said that it was one that "we had all learned in school." When she blew the pitch, you could hear all the parts coming on right on pitch, and then it started.  I loved it!  I love it at church when the accompaniment drops out and all you hear are the voices.

I looked for it on the internet, and I found a video of it being sung by a men's chorus in India.  You have to listen hard to hear all the words, but you certainly can hear all the parts.  I'll be singing it in my head for a while, and I hope our church sings it so that I can learn it better.  Click on the link to watch and listen.

The photos used in this blog were used with permission of Ginny from Let Your Light Shine.

An afternoon at an auction

Earlier in the week, my friends told me about an auction that would be taking place on Thursday afternoon at the home of one of the ladies in the church.  She has sold her home and is moving into a retirement center in the area and had an auction at her house to sell all the "stuff."

The auction was to start at four in the afternoon.  Even though we had arrived a bit early, there were already a lot of cars there, and with them a lot of people who were milling around, looking at all the treasures to be sold.

Do you see the telephone on the table?  I remember my aunt's having one on the wall of her home in Florida many years ago.  I would have loved to have it on my wall, but I resisted.  The bell still worked when you cranked it.  Remember the party lines?

The accordian was another treasure that was there.  Everyone looked at it with interest.  The case was old and worn, like the accordian, but I know it became  someone's special purchase.  Seeing it reminded me of my cousin, Mary Ann, who was a serious accordian player in her day.

Not something that would be useful in Florida, I'm sure someone will know just what to do with these.

Jars, jars, jars.  I can just imagine that these were a hot commodity.  My mother would put these to good use.  When she died, there was a wall of food that she had "put up."

 There were lots of books there, but this one in particular caught my eye.  I would be interested  in reading this one since Mennonites are pacifists, and I wonder what role they played.  Perhaps they were in a support role.  I'll have to find out.

There were quite a few folks from the church there that I'm attending, so it gave me an opportunity to get to know them all a little bit better.  Names, names, names, I'm trying to learn names.  And so far, I'm not doing too badly.

A simpler way of life

On Monday, I went a few miles north of where I am now living to visit the Shenandoah Market. After we had finished looking around there, my friends took me to see some of the surrounding area.  Phil said, "I want to show you a church that is quite unusual."  When he drove up to the church ( and for some reason, I didn't take a photo of the church,) I saw that there were no parking spaces for cars.  The entire area around the church was filled with places to hitch one's horse and buggy

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 This particular church was of the old order of Mennonite.  There are no tire tracks, only the marks of the buggy wheels.  The parking lot, or hitching lot, is very organized.

 There are posts to hitch the horse and a concrete slab at each spot to put the feed for the animals.

Next to the church, as is seen in many areas, is the cemetary for the members who have gone on.  

 On the way back, we stopped by the lake where we saw these lovely swans.

In several yards I saw something that one hardly sees any more.  I remember we always hung our clothes out to dry.  I remember one time my mother got so upset because someone had come along and stolen some of the clothes from the line.  I don't imagine that would happen in a community like this.

In this area of Virginia where I have moved, there are a lot of Mennonites, and there are several different kinds, just like the Baptists and the Presbyterians, and other denominations.  When I got home, I googled "Old Order Mennonites" and found a very interesting article that was published a few years ago in a Virginia magazine.  I think you would find it interesting too.  You can read it here.

It's a Small World, After All

It's a small world, after all.  No, I haven't been to Disney, but I'll bet you'll be humming that song all day.  I've been in Virginia for two weeks now.  When I arrived, it was very, very cold...at least very cold for this Floridian.  Snow was on the ground, and there was more to follow.  Temperatures hovered around zero for a couple of nights, but two weeks later, spring is definitely in the air.  Right now at 11:30, it's 62 with a high expected of 72 today.  It isn't going to stay quite that way all week, but it's getting there.  Crocuses are popping up .around the city  I understand they are the first flowers of spring.  At least, they are the first I have seen.

My daughter, Sarah, has been helping me get settled in by unpacking boxes and moving some things to the basement that I won't be using for a while.  She has broken down boxes to make them easier to take to the recycling center.  I hope I can find someone who might need them before I take them.  David has been a great help too.  He did all the legwork in my buying this house.  In fact, he found it for me.  It is a perfect fit.  I really like being on one level, but this means I have to do more exercising since I don't have stairs to contend with.

I was at a dinner the other night at David's church, and I sat at a table with a couple who have ties with Haiti.  As we were talking, the gentleman said that his wife's parents had been missionaries in Trinidad, so I asked him if they knew one of the missionaries who had been with the board I was with.  It turns out that the ladies were best friends.

This morning I had occasion to go to the post office, and when the clerk saw the package I was mailing, she said, "Oh, I used to live there."   She graduated from Riverview High School in Sarasota, was in the band, and later lived in Bradenton.

There is another couple here in Waynesboro whose daughter graduated from BCS with my son.  I found out about that when I mentioned Waynesboro to a friend at home before I moved.  He said, "Oh, I'm going to be going there for a family reunion next summer.  My brother and his wife moved there to be near the grandkids."

So, it is a small world, isn't it.

Spring is on its way

The snow has melted.  At least the snow that had accumulated on lawns.  There are still piles of snow in parking lots, and it will probably be there a while.  The photos in this post are from years past.  Looking at them has made me want to get my camera out and start taking photos.  Nothing is budding yet, but it will come!

 In my old age, I'm experiencing some things I haven't before.  Someone asked me in church yesterday how long it had been since I had seen snow, or if I had ever seen it.  When I lived in Cincinnati back in the late 60's, there was some snow, although it wasn't the norm.  I've been here in Virginia a few times in the last few years when there has been some, but I haven't lived here during the winter.

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 I did have a frosty welcome.  Friends in Florida had asked me if I was sure I wanted to come when I did.  My response was "If winter come, can spring be far behind."  In Florida one of the signs of spring is spring training for baseball, and I must say I am enjoying the posts on Facebook that show the Pirates and the Rays getting ready for opening day

 I am quickly becoming a fan of UVA sports.  The basketball team has been ranked #2 for most of the season, having lost only 2 games.  It will be fun to see what they do in the post-season.  The baseball team does well too...if they can just get the football team up there, we'll be all set.

 

 Back to the snow...the other evening I made the mistake of getting a caramel mocha about 9 o'clock and found myself awake most of the night.  As I was lying in bed, the light was so bright outside, and as I looked out, I was in awe of the light of the full moon on the snow.  That was a first, and one that I hope I will see again, just not this year.  In the morning when I got up and looked out, I saw the hoof prints of deer in the snow, some large and some small...perhaps a mother and her fawn.

David said, "Mom, you might see some on your street at night. Be careful when you're driving home."  Sure enough, last evening when I came near my house, there was a large deer in the middle of the street, and when I turned to go into the driveway, I saw a small one run toward the back of the house.

Now back to unpacking....stay tuned.

Changes

Over the last year, I pondered making a move to Virginia to be near my children.  All my life, except for college years and ten years after that, were spent in Florida.  I'm one of those rare Florida natives that one runs into occasionally, and I've always been very proud of that fact.  I love looking at sites, like Old Florida on Facebo*k and seeing photos of cracker houses and sugar cane mills that remind me so much of my grandparents' home in north Florida.

Whenever I'm out with friends, I invariably run into someone I've known, either from high school, from church, from work, from Sweet Adelines.  I've always loved that...that feeling of familiarity with everything around me.

Well, at my ripe old age, I've moved from Florida to Virginia, to the Shenandoah Valley, to new surroundings, where I will find I have to find my new normal.  I've been coming to Virginia for the last eight years, spending lots of time here with my granddaughter and my son.  Five years ago, my daughter moved here so that she could be closer to Ella and David.  The only time she would see Ella was when they might come to Florida, and she said to me, "Mom, I want to see Ella grow up." So she moved.

So I've moved.  They are the only family I have.  I've bought a home here, and I am in the middle of boxes being unpacked and things put away.  I'm waiting for the delivery of bedroom furniture tomorrow...hopefully, but it is supposed to snow, so I don't imagine it will make it tomorrow.  It will be over a week before I get internet and TV, so I'm spending time during the day at David's using his internet.   It's amazing how unnecessary TV becomes when you don't have it.

I hope to blog more.  I'm looking forward to a trip out west in May, and then I hope to get really settled in and get to know this area more.

So...while they're singing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" in Florida, folks here are singing "Let it Snow" or, maybe I should say, "Snow, Snow, Go Away.  Come again another day."