I’m going to a party and I’m really quite excited. 

I thought because of last time, we might be uninvited!

We’re all the best of friends who like our birthdays celebrated.

And I swear we never, EVER… get inebriated.

No, the water and the Texas tea we never have to spike.

And in the beginning… we all act ladylike.

Then as the day wears on and we’ve eaten our potluck,

And all the cake is gone, we seem to get dumbstruck.

The birthday cards are opened. Each one funnier than the last.

That’s when we start forgetting both the present and the past.

We love to tell our stories. One reminds us of another.

We joke about ourselves, our husbands, kids and Mother.

We have to stop our telling with the punchline still to go

While we all try to remember… good old so and so.

Who told us what we laughed about? Was it me or was it you?

A nanosecond later, no one has a clue.

We laugh until we cry and take pictures all the while.

And we never have to ask a single one to smile.

When the fun is finally over and we all say our goodbyes…

No one can believe, how fast a fun time flies.

We don’t tell each other’s secrets because everyone forgets.

We think tomorrow we’ll remember…hmm

Now that’s as funny as it gets!

Yes, I’m going to a party. I’m excited as can be…

I just wish I could remember who invited me…

MG and Lav just found a locked tin box buried under Grandpa’s trees. There was an envelope taped to the bottom of it telling them to open the box when they turned sixty.

MG: Is there a key in the envelope Lav?

Lav: Yeah, MG…We were supposed to open this when we were sixty. Maybe we should get permission before we open it.

MG: Oh for heaven’s sake, Lav. You have said that a gazillion times over the years. What is it with you about always wanting to get permission? Who are we supposed to ask? Now give me that key. This whole thing is creeping me out!

Lav: What if it’s a bomb? Maybe this is a set-up! Do you have any enemies in Murdo MG? Someone who wants to blow you to smithereens?

MG: Let me think. No! Now let me have the key.

Lav hides behind one of Grandpa’s bigger trees while MG bravely unlocks the tin box. Inside is a funny shaped container. It says time capsule on the container so that must be what it is. The time capsule is not locked…you have to pull the end-cap off, which MG proceeds to tug  on.

Seeing MG struggle, Lav comes out from behind the tree and starts pulling on the other end. Finally, the stupid caps come off. It appears the exercise class MG and Lav took part in while they were visiting Gus in Ontario has paid off.

MG tentatively reaches inside the capsule and the first thing she pulls out is an envelope, which she tentatively opens. A photograph falls out and it tentatively (just kidding) falls to the ground. Lav reaches down and picks it up.

Lav: Hey MG! This is a picture of our moms. It was taken in 1938. That was eighty years ago. What else is in there, MG?

Sisters Ella and Loretta Sanderson. (Do you know where this was taken Lav? My mom was only about eighteen. Aunt Ella must have been in her early 20’s.)

MG: They were young girls just starting their adult lives. I wonder what their dreams were?

MG: Look Lav! Here’s one with you and your mom. Is that a crown on your head?

Lav: I think it was a sailor crown. I love crowns almost as much as I love convertibles.

MG: Yeah…we’re kind of alike that way.

Woven threads of color,

A beauty to behold.

Each thread a chapter of a life.

The tapestry unfolds.

There within the richness,

Are tears of golden hue,

While silver threads of laughter,

Are gently woven through.

Hanging there in splendor for all the world to see.

The beauty of a life well spent, in richest tapestry.

Grandpa Sanderson in his chair in the house next to his trees

Lav: What else is in there, MG?

MG: All I can see is  more pictures…Oh, wait! I see two letters. One for you and one for me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Murdo Girl and Lav are in the process of interviewing the residents of Murdo to gain information regarding MG’s existence between the ages of eight and eighteen. It seems there have been no pictures found of her during those formative years other than some pretty bad school pictures.

They have just returned from having coffee at the local Subway. (It’s inside the Pilot Station and it’s really good!)

Lav: Well, that didn’t get us anywhere. I thought that lady at the counter was kind of rude. I just asked her if she recognized you from fifty-eight years ago.

MG: I know Lav. Do you think it could have been because she’s about twenty years younger than me?

Lav: More like thirty…but I didn’t get what she meant when she said, “We are the curators of our own contentment.”

MG: Beats me…she said if I keep ruminating on the past, I will always be adrift. Do you think I should stop looking for the identity of my youth?

Lav: Yeah…it’s not much fun. Let’s go south of sixteen and see what’s going on in the old neighborhood.

MG: Okay…but first I want go to the drive-in and get another rhubarb milkshake.

So… MG and Lav consume yet another treat, and walk all the way to where their grandpa and grandma used to live and decide to rest a while under Grandpa’s trees. A slight breeze comes up and floating along in the midst of the leaves from the trees is a sheet of 8 1/2″ x 11″ paper, which falls on the ground when the wind suddenly stops. Lav rushes to it.

MG: What is it, Lav?

Lav: It’s a sheet of typing paper. It has an X on it and it says, “DIG HERE.”

Both of them immediately start digging with the spoons they ate their rhubarb shakes with until Lav hits something as hard as a rock. It is a rock, so they keep digging. Guess what they find?

MG: It’s a metal box and it’s locked!

Lav: Look here! There is an envelope taped to the bottom.

MG: Hurry up and open it. (Stay with us.)

Lav: It says:

Dear MG and Lav,

Open this box when you turn sixty, if you happen to be in Murdo and you’re looking for your identity.

Yours truly,

Anonymous time capsule

Does anybody know time capsule etiquette? We’re slightly over sixty, so can we still open it?

 

(I fully expect to hear from some family members after they read the Murdo mysteries. It’s one way to get your kids to call you.) Just kidding…

 

The grocery store in Murdo is where Super Value used to be and it had everything I needed except Bing candy bars. I got a pot pie and a potato. I remembered that Mom used to bake potatoes and we mashed them on our plate. Then we mashed a chicken pot pie on top of the potato. I had forgotten how filling it was. I remember having to hide behind a book in school after having pot pies for noon dinner. It was all I could do to stay awake.

I was sitting in the living room, trying to get the TV to work when the doorbell rang. I was somewhat surprised because not many Murdo people know I’m here. Who am I kidding. The whole town knows I’m here. I went to answer the door. The person standing there looked kind of familiar. I trusted her immediately because she was wearing the most accurate indicator of trustworthiness…a crown.

“Hi,” she said. “I’m Lav.”

“You’re Lav? You are the one everyone tells me has been wandering around Murdo wearing a crown and a gown ever since the all school reunion in 2016? What are you doing here?”

“I heard you bought this house and brought it back to life. I remember it like it was yesterday…or the day before. I was one of the relatives who stayed here when your mom rented the basement out during tourist season. We didn’t know the unwritten rule. We would have stayed someplace else if we would’ve had cash.”

MG: That’s what Mom said. It’s been over fifty years, but it’s starting to come back to me. Please forgive me, but there are holes in my memory. I don’t remember anything up until I sealed the deal on this house.”

Lav: You don’t? What about the orange and black Mustang you rented in Rapid? I was wondering if you had to take it back. I love convertibles.

MG: Me too…where do you live, Lav?

Lav: I was staying at the cousin’s motels, but the unwritten rule is now in writing. It was posted on the door this morning. If you don’t pay, you can’t stay…

MG: Bummer… Do you want to live here, Lav? You can have Billy’s room. I haven’t heard from him, but then, I haven’t answered the telephone.

Lav: Sure, MG, I’ll hang my crown here for a while.

MG: Good, Lav. You can help me piece my life together. There are no pictures of me from the time I was eight.

Lav: Whoa! That could take some serious time!

MG: Yeah…can you help me get this TV to work? I wonder if Murdo still gets ‘As the World Turns’… I haven’t seen it in years.

Lav: I always loved Captain Kangaroo. Remember when all the ping-pong balls dropped on Mr. Moose’s head? I laughed my crown off.

MG: We’ll have fun, Lav. We know lots of Murdo people.

Lav: Yup… and people in Pierre and Ft. Pierre and we’ll go see Sheila again. Let’s go get a rhubarb shake at the drive-in. I’ll drive.

MG:  We don’t have anything to drive. I’m pretty full, but I’ll go with you. We’ll ask everyone if they remember me.

It turns out the people at the drive-in don’t remember MG after the age of eight. They also said they agreed with her mother. She was gangly. The picture below shows her teeth have grown back in. Could this be a clue?

Stay tuned as more people are interviewed and freely tell Lav and MG the untold story.

 

 

If you read my last blog, you’ll remember that I am leading a life that’s parallel to my regular life. My second life is in my hometown of Murdo, SD.
I bought my childhood home and restored it to the way it was when my brother and I were kids. He was nice enough to give me the money I needed. The phone keeps ringing and it might be him, but I haven’t had a chance to answer it yet. I have no idea what my other self is doing. That’s the thing about having a parallel life. You don’t know about the other life, so you never have to wonder about it because the other you is living it just like nothing ever happened.
Anyway, I was cleaning up the furnace room downstairs and I found a little box. I remembered it from my childhood. It used to sit in front of the bookcase close to the fireplace. I opened it and guess what?

It was full of pictures of the things I described in my last blog. I swear, If I have ever seen these pictures before, my mind has blocked them out. I promise…I just found these.

This is Billy, me, and our cousin from California, John Pat Francis. Remember how I described the nice wood bookcase and fireplace in the living room? If I had seen this picture, it sure would have been easier to restore all of that. I remember the cute picture of Billy on the bookshelf. I wonder if Billy has it…

The bathroom tile is pink and black. I remembered the pink and black towels Mom had, but I didn’t remember the faucet was on the side of the tub. Dad was a plumber so I guess he knew what he was doing. The shower is on the other side of the towel wall.

I remember this like it was yesterday or the day before. I was in Mom’s room standing on the bed. I told her I was just standing there for a while. I had no intention of jumping. I would have taken my shoes off, but I wouldn’t have been able to tie them when I put them back on. I don’t know why we all had to wear those white leather high-tops, anyway.

Another one with Billy in it. Mom had those gold plates too high up on the dining room wall…and too far apart. Mom was the queen of minimalist living. It’s funny…I don’t remember Dad wearing a colored shirt. He always wore white shirts.

These front yard pictures show the planter I talked about and the breeze-way between the house and the garage.
Now…here is where the mystery begins. In this next picture, I’m wearing the Easter outfit Kitty Reynolds made for me. I’m standing at the front door. I must be about seven or eight because I don’t have my front teeth.

Here’s the kicker…
There are no pictures of me after this one. Oh, there are some school pictures, but that’s it! There might be some of Billy. I’ll look, later.
Do you suppose someone removed all of the pictures of me after the age of eight? Or…did my parents not take any. I do remember going through sort of a gangly, big-tooth stage.
Regardless, I think I should check it out and make sure there isn’t something more sinister going on. I still know quite a few people around here. I’ll start a full-fledged investigation tomorrow.
I wonder where people buy their groceries now? I suddenly have a craving for a chicken pot pie. And I wonder where I can get a coke and a Bing.

mmmmm

Now that’s just crazy…I don’t need a million dollars. I want a million dollars. And then the second thing I want is to live a parallel life.

Continuing on with my nostalgia- filled week, this is what I want to do with my parallel life once I get my million dollars or a hundred thousand. It’s negotiable. This  might be what my other life would look like…

Low and behold, I got a check in the mail from Billy. He said he had some money lying around and he knew I wanted to live a parallel life. He hoped the two hundred thousand would help finance my dream. What a guy!

The first thing I did was call the people who currently own the house I grew up in. (Not the basement house…the one next to where Mowell’s used to live.) I asked the owner if he would consider selling it and he said I was in luck because the renters just moved out and he hadn’t found another renter yet. He gave me a price, and even though Dad built that house sixty-five years ago, I thought the asking price was fair and told him I would be in Murdo in a couple of days and we would seal the deal.

1. The best picture I have of the front of the house. 2. Dining room… Dad and Aunt Elna had birthdays one day apart. 3. Dining room…the air conditioner window and doorway to the kitchen 

A couple of days later, I flew from Dallas to Rapid City. I rented a little orange and black mustang convertible and headed for Murdo. It was a great drive. I stopped at Wall Drug and had a hot beef sandwich and a piece of cherry pie. It was delish…

By the time I got to Murdo, it was too late to investigate the house, so I decided to find a place where I could stay for a few days. I have two cousins in Murdo who own motels, but it’s the middle of the tourist season. There is an unwritten rule that you don’t stay at a relative’s motel during tourist season because they might feel they are obligated to give you a good deal. I paid the going rate at the motel next to what was about to be my house again. The motel also happens to be owned by the seller of the house.

The next morning, I got up early and walked over to the Star Cafe and got a good cup of coffee. Even though I know they make a great breakfast, I was too excited to eat anything. A couple of hours later, I had purchased my childhood home, without even walking inside. I didn’t care what shape it was in.

It was harder than I thought to find a contractor to do the work right away, but fortunately I had Billy’s cash to do the talking. In no time at all, the house was almost as it was the day we moved out.

1. Front yard 2. Mom and I on front steps

When you walk in the front door, to your left is a beautiful wood, built-in bookcase. Next to the bookcase is a brick fireplace. Continuing down that front wall, there is a huge picture window. That’s where Mom put the aluminum tree with the color wheel. The window sits up high. In fact, you can look out the window and see the brick planters below on the outside. On the east wall, there is another smaller window in the corner and a window in the area where the dining room table goes. That’s where the air conditioner was.

There is a doorway that goes into the kitchen. The first thing you see is the broom closet. On the wall between the dining room and the kitchen there is a cut-out place to put your phone. It makes it convenient to answer the phone from the kitchen or the dining room.

Sitting at the booth in the kitchen. Mom always pulled a chair up to the end. The picture is not very clear, but the other people are Harold and Elsa Peck and Irma and Jeff Sanderson.

Living Room…Harold and Elsa Peck

When you walk into the kitchen, to your left is a landing with a door that goes outside. If you turn to your right you can go downstairs. The basement is completely finished except we never did put carpet or linoleum on the stairs. We didn’t even paint them.

Billy’s room, a bathroom, a built-in bar, a laundry area and a huge living room area with a fireplace are all downstairs.

The hole Mom blew in the ceiling when she threw the shotgun shells in the burning fireplace had been fixed…I was hoping it was still there. I have so many memories of playing with my friends and cousins in that basement. The only problem was when it rained hard, the window wells filled up and flooded Billy’s room and the living area. We had to scoop the water up with buckets and mop what we couldn’t scoop.

My room is upstairs… across from the master bedroom. If we would have said master bedroom back then, people would have said, “what?” There is a linen closet in a small hall area and a nice bathroom with a separate tub and shower. I remember the wall was painted a burnt orange and there was a round mirror hanging there.

Kitchen and living room -I took these from a DVD

Kitty Reynolds made beautiful layered pink and white curtains and a matching bedspread for my bedroom. I also had a vanity with a mirror in the middle, and drawers on each side. One day I came home and Mom and Kitty had sawed off the middle and put a set of drawers on each side of my bed like end tables. I threw the biggest fit you ever saw.

I had to do a lot of work to get my house back to the way it was, but when I was finished. It was even better than before. I refinished all the hardwood floors upstairs and the stairs to the basement. I had to replace the yellow booth and table downstairs, and the red one in the kitchen. I bought some great, comfortable furniture and the last thing I did was fix up the one car garage and put a whole new yard in. I now have a fenced back yard with a covered deck.

My understanding is that when you are living a parallel life, you don’t know it, so I wouldn’t know if Kip and I are having fun on an RV trip with the dogs and cat.

Now that I have my old house fixed up just the way I remember it, what will I do? I know. I think I’ll stay here and turn my little Murdo Girl memories into a book. I can interview other people and I’ll give everyone an alias this time. I’ll have to move fast or there won’t be very many people who will remember the people places and things I’ll write about.

I wonder if Billy has a little more cash lying around…I heard that once you decide to have parallel lives, there is no going back to just one. But how could anyone know for sure?

 

Never underestimate the power of a story.

I have more tales than I can count, in my inventory.

I’ve heard them told so many times, I should know them all by heart.

On both sides of my family storytelling is an art.

First there was my Grandpa, whose stories never ended.

Just as it was winding up, his story was amended.

I try to tell Dad’s stories. Most are favorites of mine,

But I usually crack up, before getting to the punchline.

“How many guys work for you?” The question made Dad laugh.

“I’m not really sure,” he said. “But I think it’s close to half.”

Though Mom could tell a story, the ones about her are the best.

She was outspoken, quick and witty… and by far the funniest.

They’d ask, “Can you keep a secret? She’d say, “Not even for one day.”

She said they always told her… their secret, anyway.

Gus tells stories too, when we’re all reminiscing.

But everyone can’t talk. We need him for listening.

Brother Billy knows all the good ones… and tells them perfectly.

You know the story’s over when he laughs and slaps his knee.

The stories I like to hear again

are those that start…remember when

Passed from one generation to another,

They make us feel part of each other.

Remember

Jesus taught his children through those great stories we call parables… another story category.

No, never underestimate the power of a story.

*******************

The photograph is of my Mother’s family. LB: Jeff Sanderson, Grandpa M.E. Sanderson, Wayne Sanderson…FL: Grandma Mary Sanderson, Ella Leckey, Helen Haverberg, Loretta Gustafson, and Elna Miller. They are all together again. What a beautiful and remarkable family to have been and continue to be a part of.

There is a show on HGTV called love it or list it. A designer tries to make the owner who wants to move, love their old house and the real estate agent tries to find the perfect house that will convince the one who wants to stay, to move. In the end they have to decide whether to love their old house and stay, or list it and move to the new house.

The transformation is remarkable, and I can never decide what I would do.

(This has no connection to the inspiration for the poem below! It’s just how I came up with the title of the blog.))

What to do with your list

I’ll take a little time to spend 

On this list that just won’t end.

Its full of things that sound like fun.

Mundane things? No, not one.

It has no chores I should attack

It isn’t passion that I lack

I’m less young now…

I looked today and realized

The list should be prioritized.

The U(s) should come before the I(s).

Hello(s) turn quickly to goodbyes.

I can’t decide where I should start

The beginning, end, or middle part.

Where were these interests years ago?

The seeds took too long to sew and grow.

Sew what?

As for those things not yet begun?

Here’s a thought that really stung

I’m too old now to die young.

(Think opposite of cheek in tongue.)

When I have a good idea

others quickly say, “I’ll see ya!”

They all know how my mind works.

(Think craziness and lots of quirks.)

I was once more reserved, you see

I think that tinfoil crown  unnerved me.

(Pretend unnerved means took away nervous shyness)

Anyway…

That list that caused me so much strife

Is no longer part of my life.

I’ve embraced… ashes to ashes

The list is now where the trash is.

I’m over it.

The dog days of summer were supposed to end August 11th. My dogs don’t agree, but then we live in Texas. They think Kip and I are crazy. I have no argument. We always wait until the fall when it’s nice, to take our yearly motor home trip. 

We’re getting ready to head out on another six to eight week trip around the 20th of September. Our destination is Maine. We are trying to time it so we can see the fall colors in the New England states, and also see a lot of other historical things along the way.

We don’t want to miss any bad snow storms, so we’ll be coming back through North Dakota and we’ll swing down as far as Pierre, South Dakota in mid-October. This will be the fourth year we haven’t escaped one hot  summer day in Texas.

In the meantime, I have been busy with a few projects. I was going to get my water tower collection updated before I left, but to tell you the truth, it’s much more time consuming than I thought it would be. They were supposed to be a perfect thing to collect. Especially since I live in  a tiny home. They don’t take up any room and they don’t cost me anything.

I forgot that I am not an organized person and the whole thing got out of hand. I lost track of which ones were already named and who submitted what. I also have no idea what city or state some of them are in. I’m sorry. Some of you went out of your way to help me collect. I’ll try to figure out a way. At least unlike most collections, I don’t have to worry about them collecting dust while they wait.

 

 

I wrote some storybooks…(More about these later….) Here is my favorite page from Nikki’s…

My head is a busy place!