A Hope Thrift Story

Pam and I worked the afternoon shift at Hope Thrift this past Saturday. Almost every time we work there something special happens. When we got into the car to drive home, Pam told me the following story.

Pam was working the checkout counter like she always does when a young lady came up with a shopping cart full of children’s books. Pam asked her if she was a teacher and the lady said yes. She would be starting her first year of teaching this coming fall in Chesterfield County. She was buying up children’s books for her classroom library. Pam, being a lifelong teacher herself, started telling her how glad she was to see her going into teaching, pursuing such a noble calling. The young lady seemed so thrilled that she had found such a large collection of books for only $66. 

At this point a middle aged man in line close by had been listening to their conversation and interrupted with, “Excuse me, are you a teacher?”

“Not yet,” she replied. “But I will be this fall.”

Then the man looked at all the books stacked on the counter and asked, “Does your school reimburse you for these”?

She answered shyly, “No, I don’t think so.”

Then the man removed a credit card from his wallet and handed it to Pam. “Well, these books are on me today.”

This brand new teacher was overwhelmed and at first had that What is happening? expression on her face. Pam thanked him for his generosity, and that new teacher had an experience she will never forget. A stranger had valued her and her chosen profession. It meant the world to her.

I’ve had several people ask me, “why does your church run a thrift store??” This is why. It’s a place for people to come to find great bargains on necessary items that people need. It’s a place where people can bring things they no longer need or have outgrown so someone else who does need those things can find them at very reasonable prices. But it’s more than that. It’s a place where connections are made, a place where people find blessings, an environment infused by the principle of joyful generosity.

You should come by for a visit. Better yet, become a volunteer. 

Curbing My Enthusiasm

Is It Just Me?

Ok, I need to know something. Is it just me or is the same thing happening to you?? Two days ago, around 6:30 in the morning when I opened my iPad my Facebook feed was crawling with what has seemed like a thousand ads for every weed-infused consumable product you can imagine. And it was not just Facebook. Instagram was the same way. At first there must have been a dozen different brands of cannabis laced seltzer water in every flavor known to man. They were all pitched as alternatives to alcohol—“Great buzz without the hangover!!”

Then today it was gummies—hundreds of varieties of chewable weed with clever names and the promises of something called guilt-free euphoria. I swear today I’ve lost count of the competing brand names. It’s like all of a sudden the hemp business went on a date with a Madison Avenue ad man and BAMM!!

Each of these ads reminds me that their products are “legal in 46 states” but do come with the warning that if you use the gummies or drink their seltzer water you will not pass a drug test.

So, what’s the deal? Have you guys noticed this over the past few days, or am I being targeted by an out of control algorithm? 

News About “A Life of Dreams”

It doesn’t seem possible but it’s been an entire month since the launch party for A Life of Dreams. Many of you have contacted me to let me know how much you enjoyed the story. Others have taken the time to write a review. Both have meant the world to me as I navigate the tricky waters of being a first-time author. At 66, I’m not accustomed to being a rookie at anything, so this has been an adventure.

For all of you who ordered a hardcover, I have news. I am told that they are scheduled to be shipped the week of the 10th of June. That’s next week!! This means that I will be hustling to get all of them in the hands of their rightful owners before Pam and I leave for Maine on the 21st of June. This printing fiasco has been the only hiccup of the publication process…but what a disaster! Hopefully when they finally arrive they won’t have 25 pages of someone else’s book sandwiched somewhere inside!

For your edification, the book is now for sale on three major outlets in addition to my website…

…Barnes & Noble, Kindle, and Amazon. If you are one of the kind folks who wrote a review, it would be wonderful if you placed it on all three sites. 

So far I have no idea how the thing is selling, and I won’t know until the first week of July when the first sales report is generated. I’m cautiously optimistic.

Cheesy Baked Beans

As many of you know, on occasion Pam asks me to fix dinner. Usually she does most of the prep and my job is simply to put everything in the oven at the right time, set the table and have it ready to serve when she gets home. Thus was the case the other night when I was tasked with grilling up some brats on the grill to serve with Pam’s famous baked beans which she had already mixed up and placed in the Pyrex dish for me to pop in to the oven for 30 minutes prior to go-time. Everything was going swimmingly, after all, I have done this enough times to know the drill. But then…

Ok, every now and then I get out of my lane. Such was the case on an evening last week as I stood over the rich, dark brown dish of baked beans. I saw the bacon in there, the diced green peppers and onions floating around in that tantalizing brown sauce, the tangy aroma of Worcestershire sauce thick in the air.  I remember thinking, “That really looks brown.” Then a wild thought came into my head. When I had opened the fridge to get the beans I had noticed a container of fresh parmesan cheese by itself in the corner. I am something of a cheese freak. I love all kinds of cheese, by itself or slathered on top of basically anything. In a flash of inspiration I thought, “You know, those beans could use a little color…the yellow of the cheese would be perfect…and cheese makes everything better, right?” Before I could stop myself, there I was sprinkling a handful of fresh Parmesan cheese over the top of the beans. It looked amazing. I thought of how proud Pam was going to be of me and my culinary initiative. 

She got home and sat down at the table. I served up the brats and placed the cheese-soaked beans in little glass bowls and set them down in front of her. At first she didn’t even notice. We said the blessing and then turned on our show that we were watching. Eventually Pam placed a spoon into her bowl of beans and when she withdrew it there was a long string of cheese hanging off both sides of the spoon. Her reaction was not what I expected.

Pam: What is this? What the heck? What’s wrong with my beans??

Doug: There’s absolutely nothing wrong with those beans!! Thats some cheese I added. What do you think?

Pam: (giving me the kind of look one might give someone upon discovering that they had used Miracle Whip instead of Mayonnaise on the BLT’s) Why on Earth would you ruin my beautiful baked beans by putting cheese in them??!! What were you thinking?

At this point I realized that offering an excuse that included my idea that the dish needed some color would be problematic. So, I immediately backed off of defense and went for damage control instead…

Doug: Have you tasted them? The cheese makes them creamy!

Pam: Creamy?? Nobody wants creamy baked beans. Who ARE you??

This was over a week ago. You would think she would be over it by now. But just a while ago she asked me if I had any ideas for dinner. When I didn’t answer right away she adds—“And you better not say cheesy baked beans”

Ok, ok. I get it. Never monkey around with a woman’s recipes. But I’m still thinking that cheesy baked beans needs to be given a chance. They might end up being the next big thing, like fried Brussels sprouts. Whoever thought that would happen?

When You’re in the Midst of it…

You just had a novel published. You should be all in on all things A Life of Dreams. But there’s a problem. You find yourself fully immersed in your latest effort, the one you’ve been writing off and on since the end of last summer. The story won’t leave your head. It lives there rent free. Even when you’re not writing, you’re thinking about it. There was an entire month that went by without a single line. Then it hit you while you were doing pushups one morning and suddenly it was off to the races for a couple weeks.

Now you find yourself at a devilishly tricky scene. It’s crucial to the story, it will determine how the story’s arc turns out. This is the scene that will determine what kind of story this ends up being, and you are fully aware of the stakes. The writing starts to feel like labor. You stand up and walk around the room while looking at the computer screen from different angles, as if this new perspective will conjure the right words out of the atmosphere. You feel the breeze of an inspiration, sit back down and pound out two sentences, then one more. Yes. That was good, you think to yourself. I’m getting closer, you say aloud. Then it’s off to the kitchen for something to drink. 

You feel a twitch coming on in each extremity. There’s energy pulsing through you. The story is percolating. You can almost feel it in your fingertips. But, you can’t bring yourself to sit back down at your desk. Instead, you take a break by walking upstairs to the recliner in your room where you check on the day’s box scores. This takes your mind off the story. Suddenly there’s just too many possibilities flying around in your head, so many different ways for the scene to go. Your brain has reached capacity overload. So you shut the laptop and think about Maine for a while.

After a while you open it and start writing this post. Maybe if I try to describe what’s going on in my head, greater clarity will be found.

Nope.

You go back to the story and read the 2100 words you’ve written in chapter 19. You like it. You really like it. But you always like the stories when you are in the midst of writing them. Whether anyone else will is another thing altogether. But at this point you’re not writing something with the goal of having strangers like or dislike it. You’re writing because you’ve got this story in your head and there’s absolutely nothing you can do to make it go away…except sit down and write. It is while writing, during that confounding, magical time when you think that maybe writers are a little bit nuts. The whole process reminds me of one of our candidates for President…its like having a worm inside your head.

The Greatest Email of the Year!

This morning there was a very special email in my inbox from On The Water In Maine. I’ve been waiting all year for this one. It begins like this:

“This is the email you have been waiting for! There are now 3 weeks or less until your vacation in Maine!”

Thus begins the happiest time of the year for Pam and her husband. Soon various staging areas will pop up around the house, mostly on the dining room table, as Pam begins to execute her meticulous packing protocols for the trip. The other day she laid out three new bathing suits on the bed, took a photograph, and sent it to me in a text with the words, “Ok, I’m packed and ready to go to Maine.” 

Lucy is getting hyped too. A couple of weeks ago I started reminding her that she would be heading to Maine soon. She always pays close attention when I mention the “M” word, so she is pumped.

This summer will be a little weird in that it will be the first time that neither of our kids will be there since…ever. Kaitlin and Jon will be on a trip to England/Scotland/Ireland celebrating their tenth wedding anniversary, and Patrick and Sarah will be coming up for our fall trip. We do have guests coming so we won’t be up there for six weeks by ourselves, but it will feel different without the kids. Different, but still freaking fabulous.

Here’s the plan: weeks one and two will find us at the enchanting Summer Dreams, one of our favorite camps on Quantabacook. I’ve lost count how many times we have stayed there, but its always delightful…

Yeah…that will do quite nicely. After two weeks of this, we will pack up all of our stuff and head to the other side of the lake for four more weeks at a place we have never stayed before, Fernwood Cottage. A word of explanation seems in order since regular readers of this space will be wondering why we aren’t staying at our beloved Loon Landing. Well, it seems that the owners of that property decided (without consulting me!!) that they will be staying at LL for the entire summer!! The nerve! Fortunately, Tif and Meg, the dynamic duo at OTWIM came to our rescue with this property…

I think we will manage.

So, in a mere 21 days we will depart Short Pump for six weeks in Maine where seldom is heard a discouraging word and the skies are not cloudy all day. At least that’s the plan.