Growing Up

Jane Ann and Mary Pat Peasley 1944

When I was visiting my mother over Thanksgiving, I left Creston with a zip lock bag full of photos.  My mother wanted us to go through an enormous box and take the photos we wanted (she is trying to get rid of things), but my brother Larry pointed out that many of them might be of interest to more than one sibling. Instead he suggested the photos be scanned and shared, and I volunteered to make a start on the project.

At the Knudson House 1949

I began scanning the photos last week and, to my surprise, became fascinated with them.  Some were pictures of us kids when were small, but the most interesting pictures were those of my mother from the 1940s when she was a girl on the farm in LaHarpe through her high  school and college years, her marriage to my dad and ending with her life as a young wife and mother. Somewhere along the way she stopped being Mary Pat and became Pat (doubtless more fashionable).

The photos chart her evolution from a plain teenager squinting awkwardly into

Pat Peasley and Don Hall 1950

the sun, trombone in hand, next to her pretty younger sister, through her first two years of college at a girls' school through a summer job at the Knudson House, a resort in Wisconsin, through library school at the University of Illinois where she met my father. A photo booth picture shows a young couple radiant with glasses glare and happiness. By her account, she loved library school and enjoyed some extracurricular activities -- there is a wonderful

Pat Peasley at the U of I 1951

picture of her as Bing Crosby with three male library students in drag.

Some people (not very many) are born lovely and stay that way (Angelina Jolie and Ron's sister Susan come to mind), but most people grow into their looks and, like my mom, are most attractive in their 20s, when, often, they marry.

There is at least one benefit to middle age though -- I'm past my peak attractive stage and am not too worried about how I look. Frankly I like it -- feeling this way frees up a lot of time and money.

I sure wish that I had taken more pictures from my mom's house though -- I'm already done with the batch I took!  I need to get back soon.

Fairfield and Revelations

Growing up in Creston, Iowa, I made many, many trips in the family station wagon down Highway 34 to Illinois to visit my grandparents in LaHarpe. It was a boring drive and we got to know the order of the towns along the way -- Osceola, Chariton, Ottumwa, Fairfield, Mount Pleasant, Burlington.  We seldom stopped -- there was nothing to stop for.

After I married and moved to Illinois, I traveled often to Creston to see my parents, usually taking the Illinois back roads up through LaHarpe, crossing the Mississippi at Burlington then taking Highway 34. I don't know how I discovered Revelations  off the Fairfield square, maybe 15 years ago, but I knew when I walked in that it was a gem. Here were well-marked used books lining every room and, toward the back, a counter selling coffee and food.  As I sat munching my organic sandwich, I noticed something else -- Revelations customers weren't the usual Iowa Walmart clientele -- instead they were a fascinating mix of small town moms and kids and some very nontypical hippie-types wearing bandannas and sandals sporting backpacks and body piercings.

It turned out that these unusual customers were students and faculty at Maharishi University of Management, which had bought the Fairfield campus of the now defunct Parsons College in 1973, creating a media bonanza at the time for the Des Moines Register and massive interest among us bored small-towners. For a while we speculated that a bunch of crazies wearing robes and beads were going to take over Fairfield, but that didn't happen. Instead Fairfield morphed into an interesting and progressive town, with a large population of artists and an active cultural life.

Revelations grew as well, and now occupies two buildings, including upstairs and basements.  The food is interesting with selections like an avocado and feta sandwich with fresh tomatoes, mayonnaise, and baby spinach on toasted local wheat bread.  Because the building used to be a pizzeria, it boasts an Italian wood-fired oven and the pizzas are incomparable. Selections (which are also mostly organic) include the Revelations pizza with local organic mozzarella, grilled onions, greek olives, garlic, fresh mushrooms, roasted red peppers and basil pesto (local when available).   And of course you can still buy books or Iowa memorabilia.

Highway 34 has been rerouted around the town, and it is harder to get to Revelations, but we always make a side trip. It's definitely worth it.

Games

Games were a part of Hall family gatherings when I was growing up. I guess it was a way to involve five kids, but also I think both my parents enjoyed them. We played games like Masterpiece, Monopoly, Yahtzee and Scrabble, as well as card games like Spoons and Crazy Eights. I remember my dad trying to teach us kids Pinochle and making an elaborate series of charts showing card values and scoring.

One of my favorite games was Charades and since many of my family members were dramatically inclined, this was quite enjoyable. One memorable charade had one of my brothers swimming on the floor, while another gazed up at the sky. The song -- "By the Light of the Silvery Moon."

When we were in Iowa over Thanksgiving, I took my latest obsession, a game called Blokus. This is a deceptively simple game that involves putting squares down on a board to try to get the most squares down while blocking opponents. I bought it originally to take to the girl that I mentor, but when I played it I realized that it was beyond her capabilities. However, Blokus is addictive and the more you play it, the better you get. I am hooked, and occasionally Ron even consents to play with me,

Lately I discovered that games are available in the App Store on my iPAD. I started with Solitaire, which I have played endlessly, but unfortunately not won endlessly. I then got a gift card for iTunes and promptly bought the full version of Scrabble. Usually I play against the computer and I thought I was pretty good until I hit the "Hard" level and discovered that most of the words that the computer comes up with are words that are totally unknown to me.

A limited version of Blokus is also available as a free app, but I have to pay about five dollars to buy the full version of the game.  I know that's not a lot, but I am cheap and it seems frivolous to spend money on a game. I'll probably get it though. What can I say -- I love my iPAD!

Nests in winter

Except for the evergreens and the pin oaks, the trees in this part of the world are all bare now. It was a beautiful fall, and the trees were ablaze with yellow and red leaves, but within a few November days the weather turned cold and the trees dropped their leaves.

The tree branches are bare now, exposing what the leaves were hiding.  Secluded houses, obscured by a wall of greenery in the summer, are now visible along with junked cars, piles of trash, and cloudy sky.

You can also spot nests in the bare branches. The small, neat nests belonged to birds, most of which have left this area for the winter while the bigger, messier nests belong to squirrels who  are having a heyday in our backyard. In the summer you could hear them running across the roof, but now that the leaves are gone, you can also see them running around through the trees, jumping from branch to branch, chasing each other.

Seeing the nests in the bare branches made me think that people are like trees.  When we are young, we are beautiful, or at least as good-looking as we are going to get. But we don't realize this, and instead we spend an inordinate amount of time picking out clothes and makeup will enhance our attractiveness.

Luckily, when we reach middle age, we lose our fascination with outward appearances (or at least most of us do). We have dropped our leaves, so to speak, baring the nests in our branches. Whatever it is that makes us who we are is exposed. Some have no nests in our branches, but many of us do. The nests can be old wounds or insecurities or an inability to forgive ourselves. The nests can also positive, like a great relationship between spouses or a strong belief in God.

In this part of the world, spring eventually comes and trees sprout pale green leaves. Soon the branches are again covered, and we forget about the nests, but they are still there, under the leaves. The nests in the trees don't disappear, and neither do ours, but we can decide to acknowledge them during the chill of winter or sigh and wish that spring would come soon.

Iowa, the Knotty Pine and Thanksgiving

 We drove to Iowa last Wednesday to spend Thanksgiving with my mom and siblings. Going over, we took a route through that crossed the Mississippi at Hannibal, then headed up through up through northern Missouri into southern Iowa. The land is hilly and not good for crops -- mostly pastures. Abandoned houses in various states of decay litter the landscape --rather than than tear down a farmhouse when they moved, the inhabitants just left.

After about six hours of driving, we arrived in Creston, a town of roughly 8,000 people. Dinner was at the Knotty Pine, on a hill outside of Afton, where we ate some wonderfully complex steaks and enjoyed the hunting lodge decor -- deer heads and pheasant festooning the walls while a stuffed wildcat perched on the bar.

While the turkey was cooking the next day, we went to Creston's deserted downtown. Bernings Café, once a local hot spot where all five of us Hall kids worked, is no longer in business. Even on a regular day, there isn't much going on downtown. Most of the stores are closed -- run out of business by Wal-Mart. I remember walking downtown on Saturday 40 years ago for a lemon Coke at Hansen's Drug Store after sighing over Bobby Sherman in 16 Magazine, shopping for bell bottoms at JCPenney's, and checking out books at the Matilda J. Gibson Library.

On the way home on Friday, we stopped in Eldon, the location of the house that was used in Grant Wood's famous painting American Gothic.We had our picture taken in front of the house in American Gothic garb -- fun (even though the picture didn't turn out very well).

Back home on Friday, we introduced Chelsea's boyfriend Chris, who had brought her down from Elgin, to the Springfield horseshoe. The horseshoe is a real gut-bomb, invented right here in Springfield. In a horseshoe, toast, some kind of meat, and fries are covered in cheese sauce. Sounds gross but it tastes great.Chris pronounced it "fantastic." Saturday was Chelsea's 22nd birthday, which we celebrated in style at a local restaurant with Emily and Jake (note -- no horseshoes were consumed).

Today after church we went over to Ron's folks for dinner and afterwords Chelsea and Chris checked out his dad's 3-D TV with dark glasses.  All in all-- a great holiday!

Unanticipated freedom and Lincoln Memorial Gardens

Intrepid photographer

It was very liberating to me when, last week, during the unseasonably warm weather we were having, Ron and I went to Lincoln Memorial Gardens. We live close to the Gardens and went there a lot when the girls were little, but we haven't been there lately. Now that Ron is interested in photography, we decided to visit again.

I took my scooter, assuming I could only access the paved trails, but when we started exploring I discovered, to my delight, that the scooter could go "off-road," handling the unpaved trails with no problem. This gave me a feeling of unexpected freedom and Ron took a number of pictures (see below).

Jens Jensen

This morning, a fog enveloped the yard and Ron decided to go to the Gardens again. I stayed home and found the following article in today's paper -- "Celebrating Jens Jensen, preserver of Midwest landscapes" -- interesting timing. Jensen designed the Gardens!

We are so fortunate to live near such a beautiful place, and I feel like it was an unexpected gift to be able to go on the trails. Life is full of surprises!

Lincoln Memorial Gardens Bay by Ron McDonald

Changes

As the parent of a 26-year-old daughter who is scheduled to marry an extremely nice young man in October,  I suffered a rude awakening when I began to help Emily plan the happy event.
 

1979 --Lena Hall, me and Julie Nelson

In 1979, when I married Emily's father we had a very modest wedding, even by Iowa standards. As the daughter of a frugal man, I wasn't interested in spending a lot of money on this event and besides this was still the era of hippies. Weddings were considered "establishment" and really cool people just lived in communes. My only sister was my (one) attendant and Bob asked a friend of his to stand up with him. The reception consisted of cake and punch in the church hall, followed by games and conversation on my parents' front porch. It actually was pretty fun.

Emily gets a kiss

In 1987, Emily was flower girl in October my brother Larry's wedding.  Was she ever cute!  She was an adorable flower girl, but shy -- halfway down the aisle, she broke away, ran over to my pew and buried her head in my lap.  Just too much for a 3-year-old.
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Fast forward to 2010. My first clue that things had changed was when Chelsea and I were watching a reality show called "Say Yes to the Dress." During the show, willing salespeople bring young women mountains of wedding dresses, which are then modeled by the girls for their mothers and friends. The show's drama comes from the angst that these young women experience as they try to figure out what dress to purchase. Invariably, the dress they love the most costs more than what they have intended to spend. I would not be saying yes to any of these dresses -- they're way too expensive to be to be worn once, regardless of the significance of the occasion!

Emily and Jake have selected a venue for their October wedding/reception and I am attempting to adjust my expectations to present day when six attendants are the norm and the reception could be a sit-down dinner for 150. It's a far cry from cake and punch in the church, but times have changed and I need to change too. They are a lovely couple and the wedding will be beautiful!

Jake and Emily