Winds of Change

Winds of Change

 By Elece Hollis

Sun slants into my room, making light places on the floor,

 on the furniture, but no warm places.

It is a winter sun,

 nearly an hour late,

likely to be gone by early afternoon.

The sky is clear, a slate gray, the trees bare and dark

 against it. The hummingbirds are gone,

 moved south to places where flowers still bloom.

Crows caw at the leaden sky,

arguing among themselves.

There is no garden left for them to plunder.

The first frost has blackened it,

 the cold winds of October have dried it. We have pulled up the tomato stakes and mowed.

I am glad to live in a place

 with a definite change of seasons! It is a great joy

 to see the first signs of spring poking

 green spears from the earth.

Then after a long summer of simmering heat

 and vibrant green growing,

it comes as a relief to feel cooler shorter days of autumn

 with brown leaves falling.

 It refreshes and heals to have a winter of cold and snow following. Father God, I do need change.

 Help me to explore and enjoy all the seasons of my life.

 Teach me to accept and learn to love change in all the activities, callings and

the structures of my days.

Let There Still Be Roses

 Dear Jesus,

 I read in Isaiah 55 these words:

 "So you will go out with joy, 

and be led forth in peace. 

The mountains and the hills will burst into singing before you 

and all the trees of the fields will clap their hands.

Large cypress trees will grow where thornbushes were.

 Myrtle trees will grow where weeds were.

 These things will be a reminder of the Lord's promise,

and this reminder will never be destroyed."

 I love roses on their thorny bushes. 

I love roses and can't think that heaven on earth could lack them.

 Oh, Jesus.......

Oh, please, Lord say there will still be roses!

Letter to My Heart

Dear Heart,

Hasn't it been a summer to remember? Through personal counseling you have come to understand yourself better and learned secrets to growing closer to family members while maintaining boundaries. Through marriage counseling, you and Ron have grown closer as you learned to overcome communication roadblocks. Through nature you have grown closer to God and learned to accept and appreciate who you are.

You have learned some patience through trials. You have gained some wisdom through reading the Bible. You have studied and educated yourself on some subjects that can make you a happier, fulfilled person. The use of a camera has opened up a new adventure, a new way of looking at things, a new appreciation of the world around you.

Watching your granddaughter, Madison, be born and welcomed into the world by a her family worked something golden into your spirit, like a glimpse of some treasure too beautiful to describe, one that makes your tongue go still and your heart ponder.

The trip with friends and family to Kentucky made you realize God's unquenchable love for you and that He longs to have you walk closer and serve together with Him to reach the coming generations with the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Giving up your grip of motherhood on your daughter as she left the States was a trial, a pain-filled trial, but one that can build a stronger reliance on your husband and a stronger faith in God.

Yes, it has been a summer to remember, a summer of growth and change, a summer of God working in you to carry out His plans for you. Remember that.

Love you,
Elece

His Mercy

Dear God,

Here we are seeking Your face; asking for Your Answer. Give us mercy. It is the one thing we know to ask for. Here we are and we admit that we don't know the answer for this situation and so we pray for mercy.

Grandma Helen signed a "living will," but did she know then the value of her life today? Everyone who knows and loves her considers her precious and valuable even in her condition. We vacillate. We want her to stay with us. We don't want to lose her, but we think it would be better for her to die today and come home to You, Lord. It seems the best for her not to suffer, for her not to be consigned to a bed the rest of her days, unable to open her eyes, unable to speak, unable to eat.

But we are only human and we make such decisions while only able to see one side of eternity and that not clearly. We make such calls in fear of the fate of all men; in fear of the human condition that You wrote to us about in the Bible. That fear of having to be tended in our old age. Fear that others will come to feed us and dress us and take us where we don't know and where we don't want to go--a second infanthood.

Does going there or being there change the perspective enough to contradict it? Does Grandma now want to stay alive?

We are fools, Lord. We don't know. We can't judge.

Your mercy endures forever. It is best that You decide these things, that You allow our emotional convulsions to hold no sway in this situation.

We don't know what to ask for her, God. So, we ask for mercy; not for mercy as we define it, but for mercy as You, Lord, know it.

Amen and Amen

Love you,
Elece


Note to readers: Grandma Helen died peacefully in a hospice in Rogers, Arkansas one month after her collapse as a result of a brain aneurysm. She died with her family around her and just after Joseph had visited with her. God knows best. Bless His holy name.


Isaiah 57:1-2 says: Those who are right with God may die, but no one pays attention. Good people are taken away, but no one understands. Those who do right are being taken away from evil and are given peace. Those who live as God wants find rest in death.

Dear Mama,

Today is your birthday. I wish I could come by and visit, but there are so many miles between us. I sent you flowers and a copy of my book along with family pictures of your grandchildren and greatgrands, the farm, and our pets. You seem to enjoy seeing our life.

This summer is slowly creeping toward fall. Before we know it the leaves will be cascading down and the days will be shorter and the nights cooler. What have I accomplished this summer that I could brag to you about?

Last night I finished sewing curtains for my back room and I remembered how I struggled to learn to sew.  You taught me the basics and then through trial and many errors I learned. I have sewn curtains, clothing, tablecloths, even cloth dolls with yarn braids. Still, I am not a master of the threads and cloths like you are.

I canned tomatoes and applesauce and put up food for winter in my pantry and my freezer. How many rows of jars lined the shelves of your pantry when I was a child! There were plums and peaches, apples, pears, beans, corn, tomatoes, jellies, meats, and soups. How industrious you have been. I want to be like you.

I entertained this summer-- cooked and served and even carried meals for friends, family and strangers. I stirred up cakes and cobblers and I fried chicken and made gravy. All these skills I gained from you who gave me my first cookbook and first apron.You taught me by example how to be hospitable. Many people ate at my table this summer as I remember folks praying, eating, and socializing around yours.

I read books this summer. The love of books is another proof of your touch in my life. I listened to music, watched birds, arranged wildflowers in vases and took photographs of them. You taught me to love reading, music, the glories of God's creation, laughter and work. You taught me my need for family, friends, and faith. You taught me to face realities in life and to be brave.

What a great mother you have been to me! Happy Birthday!

Love You, Elece

Pianos and Ponies

Dear Jesus,

You certainly know how to make children happy.  A day or two ago, Brenna came riding up to the back porch  on her "borrowed" horse White-Tee. I took this picture of her docile steed and her joyful face. It reminded me of another little girl and an old piano.

You recall the piano, I'm sure. It was an old upright that had been in a little clapboard country church for decades. Its varnish was cracked and its keys were yellowed, but the tone and tune even after being moved in the back of a pickup truck were fine.

Rachel had wanted a piano since she could talk. She ached for one of her own. She asked us again and again, but at that time we really couldn't afford to consider it. When your daughter wants something so badly it is painful to say no.  We told her that there was no way we could buy her dream for her, at least for a few years. We told her to pray and tell you  about her wish. That night she prayed for you to send her a piano.

She must have had great faith because the next afternoon the phone rang. It was Rachel's Grandma. Her church was purchasing a new piano and had to move the old one. She wondered if Rachel still wanted one. If we would come pick it up within a week, she could have it. We did, of course, and that old piano was a thrill to Rachel. She learned to play on it. When she was teenager she was able to buy a better instrument. But that first one was her own personal miracle and her faith and talents grew.

Brenna wanted a horse to ride. This beautiful and calm horse is her personal miracle. She keeps him and rides and trains him, but for now he belongs to a neighbor. The neighbor even provided a saddle and tack and a request that she keep the horse in our pasture and ride him often.

Jesus, you are good to bless us with such things. You show us that you know our needs and our hearts' desires and that you care, even about dreams like pianos and ponies.

Love you,
Elece

A Baby Born

Dear Mama,

This week I was the grandma. I rushed to Audra's house to keep the children while she gave birth to another little one. This time she was experiencing a slow labor with long gaps in the pain. The work was worrisome. The hours passed slowly. Eventually, the contractions picked up and soon my third daughter was birthing her third daughter.

As the baby was born to us and we saw her little self all wet and soft, we realized the awesome power of life, and at the same moment felt the complete helplessness that defines us as humans. The baby girl was well prepared for her earthly journey. God built into her all that she would need to survive her lifetime. Her heart, her lungs, her stomach and internal organs, her skin and hair, her brain, and even her ears and eyes would  make her able to grow, walk, read, talk, explore, and work in her spot on the planet.

Yet, we could do nothing for her except to love her and make her comfortable. We could not guarantee her to be strong and well. We had not given her breath or made her blood flow through the arteries and veins.We could not keep her alive if God deemed otherwise.

It is hard to be the grandma knowing what I know now. I know that this new baby's infant days will pass quickly and that before her parents can imagine it, she will grow into a toddler and then a little child twirling in the center of the living room showing off her pink dress ruffles to Daddy. In a few more months (or so it seemed to me) she will turn thirteen, and a few minutes later go off to college and/or head down the aisle as a bride. Before long, she will be calling her Mama to come assist with her own baby's introduction into the world.

My girl will try, as I did, and as you did with your brood to make them happy and healthy. She will try to never miss a day of fun and learning. To make every day count, but time marches unmercifully on.

I helped my daughter and I watched her suffer and strain and I saw the tears of exhaustion turn to tears of joy at the sight of her precious baby. I was honored to be there. I was happy to be there, and terror stricken, and dismayed, all rolled into one grandmother.

I laughed. I cried. I hoped. I feared. And I thought of you, Mama, and how much I have always depended on you. How much I needed you and still do. I hope that I am as good a mama to each of my daughters as you have been to me.

Love Your Third Daughter,
Elece

 Audra with her new baby girl, Madison Louise.

Mimosa Morning

Dear God,

The morning was bright and beautiful. The sky was clear and blue with billowing white clouds. I drove through the park alone just out wandering and then I saw it, a mimosa tree. What a creation!

The pink and white flowers are so much fun, like fist-sized firework bursts, a tiny golden pollen speck on the tip of each red streamer. The green buds of future blooms are like little side bursts.

The leaves are compound, a delicious green, each leaflet edged with golden sunlight. It is a spreading tree which branches out low to the ground and a cheerful sight to those who stop to notice. I want you to know I do notice. I love your handiwork, your art, your creations.

That mimosa morning reminded me of how intricate and diversified the earth's foliage is. It brought to mind the scripture song we sometimes sing about you. Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised, in the city of our God, in the mountain of His holiness. Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth is mount Zion on the sides of the north, the city of the great King. I love the words "Beautiful for situation."

Oh, Yes, beautiful.

Love you, 

Elece

Dear Carpenter,

Have you ever wondered what happened to your old tool box? Probably, you left it in the detached garage beside the first house you rented forty-five years ago.I wish I could ask if you made the box yourself and if it was always painted sage green.

You might be irked to know that I bought the odd antique at a garage sale for two dollars. The straight rod that formed the handle and fit in the holes at each end was broken and held in place with masking tape. I tried to fix it, but gave up and removed the handle altogether.

The lids were still hinged in place, so I folded them open before I filled the base with broken pottery pieces and covered those with potting soil. I filled it with purple petunias which have bloomed happily where once screw drivers, hammers, a hand drill, chisels, sand paper, and nails mingled.

I know you haven't forgotten this tool box. Surely, you set it aside with a bit of nostalgia when you purchased your first metal one to replace it. Maybe, you thought your grandchildren would like to see it someday. So you set it on the garage shelf where it collected up rolls of fishing line, random extra tools, and a 3-in-1 oil can. A mud dauber built a stucco apartment on the underside of the lid and it was forgotten.

Years later, someone cleaned junk from the garage and took it with a load of salvageables to the sale, where I saw it and invested two bucks in my love of the mysterious. Every antique has a story and a mystery. I can resist neither. So, I thank you for the fun and though you may be miffed at my turning your manly toolbox into a flower planter, you have to admit, it does a beautiful service.

Still Friends?
Elece

 

Dear Ronee,

Thank you for being such a close-as-family friend.  I know that at any time I could knock at your door and you wouldn't mind answering. I might be wrong, but with you I feel secure that you aren't pretending to be nice; you are nice for real. Last week, I felt lonely and sad, so I headed for your house. I knew you would be glad to welcome me in for a hug, a talk, a cup of comforting hot tea, and a cry if need be. Usually, we just have a nice visit, like a visit with one of my own sisters. 

We talk about our children, our schoolwork, our housework, our hobbies, and our social activities. We get all the latest news and views from each other. If I visit you in a dreary mood or in a cheerful mood, I find your ear ready to listen, your heart ready to understand, and your hand willing to do anything you can to help.

It does my heart good to see your children playing happily. Sarah let me take her picture on the swing she and her sisters had made. Joe gave me one of his sweet, no strings attached little boy hugs, which I needed. I love your children.

Every woman needs a friend like you to walk beside and to talk to. Alas, not all women have one. There are too few true friends on the earth to go around.

Love you, 

Elece

Other things may change us, but we start and end with the family. Anthony Brandy

Dear Mama,

Mother's Day is coming up and I was thinking about you even more than usual. When spring arrives and the flowers bloom, I recall Dad bringing you a huge bouquet of salmon pink gladiolas he had stopped and chosen from a local gardener. You put them in your tall gray pottery vase and set it in the sunlight in front of the picture window. It was spectacular!

When we lived in Michigan, you planted snapdragons and pansies in the flowerbeds along either side of the driveway. You have always been a flower lover. I know you would be thrilled to see the roses, irises, lilies and azaleas that I have blooming around my house now.

I have an old straw hat hanging on the wall that reminds me of you. I know you love straw hats, gardens, and the country life. You were an Oklahoma girl, growing up after the dust bowl years, the third eldest of a group of eight siblings. You loved farm life, riding horses, swimming in the creek, and walking in the fields. You loved your Uncle Stoney and Aunt Blanche from Tecumseh.

Be sure of the fact that I will be thinking of you next Sunday as we celebrate Mother's Day.

Love you,

Elece

Dear Wild Prairie,

How I love to see God work in you. I love to watch Him change and renew you.

On an April morning, I walk between two rusty gate posts into the past. The house once built here by homesteaders is gone. Steps, which a child once sat on to pout lay discarded on their side in the grass. Someday, they will break down and disappear. 

The grass, once kept neat and trim, is waist high. The briars have begun there repossessing of the land. Weeds, wild berry bushes, and milkweed mix with a few enduring domestic plants over the burial ground of the past. 

Small trees have taken root where they will grow unnoticed under the old trees that once held children's rope swings and  provided shady play space for little girls creating mud pies; shade trees that helped keep the house cool and made a porch into a leafy retreat for family to gather and rest in after a hard day's work. These big trees will be toppled by wind and time and the small trees will have their day.

 

  

Yucca plants, blue iris, daffodils and daylilies still herald spring here and speak of summer and whisper of the past. Rocks circle a dry pool where little children once clamored, capturing lizards, and frogs on happy carefree afternoons.

A tired housewife laid her baby to sleep in a shaded spot and sat on a slat-backed chair enjoying the quiet time shelling peas for supper. Her husband has taken a trip to town to sell produce from the back of his old truck. Her older daughter is out back pulling weeds in the garden. Maybe a son is busy chopping wood for the winter ahead.

She's enjoying the iris, takes in a whiff of its fragrance, almost overshadowed by the honesysuckle trundling along the fence. She plans to divide the iris and plant more on each side of the new gate her husband put in this year. The gate that the prairie has bent, that rain now has rusted, that is missing from the iron posts that sit like an a book cover encasing missing pages.

That was long ago. You and God have ongoing plans for this spot on the prariie. Every year the past is further erased, and someday the farm that once sat on your welcome mat will be completely forgotten; not one person living will know it was there.

In the meantime, I will walk here and ponder the past, the courage in the face of hardships that our ancestors possessed, and the love of beauty in a human heart that planted iris.

Love You, Elece

Dear Rachel,

I wanted to write and thank you for the beautiful basket of Bougainvillea that you brought me on Easter Sunday. I hung it on a branch on the sycamore tree beside my birdfeeders and it is gorgeous. Its pale green and pink petals fluttering in the spring wind remind me of ruffles on a little girl's Easter dress.

Didn't it seem to you that spring green burst out of nowhere? It seemed sudden and I have been enjoying the sunny skies and warm breezes. The oak trees have unfurled their leaves like green pennants and catkins shower pollen on the newly mown grass. The pecan trees and the sycamores are just "breaking bud" as Dad would say.

The tulips have nodded in the wind until their petals dropped, and the redbud tree out front has begun to shed pink, the color of frosting on a strawberry cake, in a circle beneath its branches.The purple iris are blooming, and today a first yellow rose bud popped open on the bush outside the picture window. The azaleas are opening and they will soon be a splash as bright red as a cut ripe watermelon beside the white of the house.

The best thing about the flowers you sent me is the fact that you bought them for yourself and then loved them so that you decided to part with them. You were thrilled with the blooms, yet knowing I would love them you gave them to me. I know it was a gift from your heart.

The flowers have given me joy, just like having you for a daughter does.

Love You,

Mama

What the heart gives away is never gone...It is kept in the heart of others.

Robin St. Johns

AHHHHHHH

Dear Jesus,

What a beautiful day Easter has always been to me because of you! Dad used to take us to the early sunrise service and then to a lodge in the woods where they served pancakes with maple syrup for breakfast. We sang and prayed and ate at long rustic tables festooned with bouquets of buttery daffodils as the sun slanted through the windows on us.

I remember sunrise service at our home in Texas at the Jesus House. Mama served up platters of pancakes and filled pitchers with fresh icy cold milk. We had bouquets of daffodils there too. Someone played a guitar and we sang about how we cherish the cross because it was there you died because you loved us so and wanted to bring us the hope of overcoming death.

On the lawn at Grandma June's house in Louisiana, we watched the sun leap into the morning sky and we sang with the brothers and sisters there, "He lives! He lives! Christ Jesus lives today! He walks with me and talks with me along life's narrow way!"

Oh, do you remember how Jiggs and the men's quartet sang for us on Easter Sunday? They started out slow and low and dreadfully woeful.

"Low in the grave He lay, Jesus, my saviour;

Waiting the coming day, Jesus, my Lord!"

(Then with such pomp and power they sang:)

"UP FROM THE GRAVE HE AROSE,

With a mighty triumph o'r His foes!

He arose the victor from the dark domain,

And He lives forever with His saints to reign!

He arose! He arose!

Hallelujah! Christ arose!"

"Death could not keep its prey, Jesus, my saviour;

He rolled the stone away, Jesus, my Lord!

"UP FROM THE GRAVE HE AROSE,

With a mighty triumph o'r His foes!

He arose the victor from the dark domain;

And He lives forever with His saints to reign!

He arose! He arose!

Hallelujah! Christ arose!"

I can still hear them. Their deep and marvelous voices thundering in the old stone dome of the First Baptist Church in Manistee, Michigan. It was greater than any theater surround sound system on earth! I am sure that of all the praises you have heard, you must remember those.The sound went right through a person's soul and overpowered him. It made me laugh and cry at the same time!

This morning the sun rose bright and warm on my bedroom window and I watched these tulips open to the light. I thought about you and how good you are to us. I thought what a wonderful day it was when my spirit and heart opened to your light and I knew you were alive!

Thank you, Lord, for coming. Thank you for dying and for living again, for making all things beautiful in your time. And thank you for tulips waving like flags to the spring sky and oh, yes, thank you for songs to sing.

Love you, Elece

Dear Joe,

I didn't close my eyes when you prayed Sunday. Sorry, but I wanted to watch your face. I watched you and I was happy to get a glimpse of who you are. I wanted to see what sort of a person you are becoming, what kind of husband you are to Audra, if you are strong enough and good enough for our precious girl.

When she chose you - I was surprised. Almost, I will admit, appalled. You did not at all fit the image I had formed in my mind of the man Audra would choose. (Maybe no son-in-law does.) But Audra was convinced. She was certain and I was happy with her and for her. Yet, I have not stopped watching.

Now, you have fathered six children and each child has changed you. Each year of your walk with God and your marriage to Audra has seen a new person emerge more and more.

As you prayed, I thought about what a miracle you are. You, Joseph Michie, once a lost and lonely young man, staggered by the weight of life and stumbling in the way of sin. Now, a new man, praying there for your wife, your mother, and your mother-in-law. How amazing is that transformation? How wonderful is that!

It made me so glad! You have come so far since you turned onto the path of light and began to become a man of God.  You have grown so much since you determined to be a good father and a great husband. I want to watch as you become the man God sees in you--the man He sees when you pray.

Of course, I wasn't the only one looking during your prayer and I bet it made Him glad too.

Love you, Elece

Dear Ellen,

I am so happy to have met you this winter. If you were ever in Brownie Scouts, I'll bet you remember the little song: "Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver and the other is gold." We sang this diddy in a round and it could go on and on. I guess I will still remember it when I have forgotten who I am and where I live! :)

You seem to be a quiet person. The thing I liked about you right away was your smile and your friendly voice. You are not pretentious.You just let people see who you are and take you or leave you. That is a pleasant way to live.

You are an unselfish person. I noticed how you always wait on people, offering a chair, or something to drink, or your own sweater.You are hospitable and that is a good characteristic in a friend. You invited us all into your home for a visit and made us all feel welcome and at home. I like to know I have friends I could drop in on and they would be glad to see me and not upset.

You must know that I am that sort too, so come visit when you can. I may be a little hard to decipher, but I like people and I love having company. I enjoying getting to know a new friend. I know sometimes those friendships last for years and years. Let's hope for that!

Love you, Elece

Dear God,

It is the end of March in Oklahoma. My daffodills are blooming and the other bulbs sending up their spears to the blue sky. Soon the irises, the tulips, and the hyacinths will bloom. But this morning sleet is pelting the side of the house. The rain fell all night followed by freezing rain and then an hour or two of sleet, sounding like rice popping as it hits the windowpanes.

I ventured out into the cold wet wind to fill my empty bird feeders, grab the mail, and pick a bouquet with ice on it. The mud puddles and the water still standing from the last rain are frozen now. Snow is swirling out of the northwest - large soggy flakes. The weatherman predicts four to eight inches before the day is over. We have had these last of March snow storms before and they are soon gone and spring moves in with southern breezes and warmer days soon afterward.

In Louisiana, I was enthralled by the camellias that budded out on bushes and produced assorted orage, red, pink and salmon colored blossoms against shiny leather-like green leaves. What pretty flowers! I brought a potted one here to try my hand at raising them. Though roses grow well here, camellias don't stand a chance against the freezes we have. The lilacs I carried home from Michigan failed for want of enough cold.

Here we have the Indian Paintbrush, the Prairie Primrose, and the wild rose that trundles in great sagging sprays over pasture fences. Every place has its natural graces. Cardinals, cowbirds, chickadees, white-throated sparrows, downy woodpeckers, and nuthatches are busy outside my window like so many mobile flowers.

Brenna's little donkeys have eaten the center out of a round coil of hay. They seek the shelter of their open-sided shed on days like today. The cows and horses don't seen to mind the cold. They graze lazily along the wooded side of the orchard.

Winter clings and then is gone. Spring, summer, and autumn each hold allure and trials of their own. I love living where I get to experience all the seasons fully. Things change and new joys and challenges entertain us.

Thank you for the seasons, especially these that keep us hopeful.

Love you, Elece