You say Na vaa da, I say Na vay dee. #T

We took a nice Sunday drive Tuesday afternoon since the medical equipment that provides treatment for the spouse was incapacitated.  We chose to tool along Indiana 19 heading north, just the opposite of our normal routine.  Checking out the cornfields, the bean fields, noting the high number that have already been harvested, and seeing some fields that were not yet ripe.

About two miles east of the highway sits the little unincorporated town of Nevada.  That is not what you are thinking unless you are a Hoosier.  "Na-vay'-dee" would be the correct pronunciation if your are in the area.

Nevada was first platted and settled in the mid-nineteenth century.  It boasted a U.S. Post Office until 1909.  Today the village consists of a church, a granary, and a dozen or so occupied houses.

I have lived in this area for more than a half-century and yet had never been in Nevada.  On this beautiful blue-sky afternoon we made the turn to the east.  The town is situated in Tipton County less than half-mile south of the Howard County line.  We have now been to Nevada.

I stood facing north to take this shot of the south face of the church.  Services are still held here regularly.
 

 Pivoting 120^o to face the southwest we saw this.

 No street department to maintain the only street sign in town.  The others are county road signs.

 The M.E.s turned the facility over to God.  According to the cornerstone the building was erected in 1909 and became the home of Church of God in 1986.

 At the easternmost edge of town one can see nearly into the future.
 

 On the burg's east edge sits this building which bears all the hallmarks of a schoolhouse.  What it is used for today we have no idea.

The residential area north of the main drag.

Memory Lane on West Street

 Our local Dollar General store occupies a building a block from the square and off the main drag.  It is a typical 1950s "supermarket" type store, meaning really too small for the amount of merchandise the current occupant handles.  Interpretation: narrow aisles and crowded shopping conditions, for it's about all we have in Perfect, general store-wise.

So the freezer and cooler cases are lined up against the front wall, meaning against the huge plate class windows that comprise the front of the store.  Someone decided that the backs of those cases did not make an attractive storefront

appearance from the outside, that is there was no "curb appeal."

The solution that was adopted was to post huge sepia-tone prints of photos taken around the city in its earlier days.  Kudos to the corporation for this display of civic improvement.

 The aluminum bars that support the windows cut across some of the photos.  Not long ago I posted this picture along with a current snapshot of the same locale.  (STSTT, September 2)

 This was our Carnegie Library which many of us did not want to see demolished.  We are happy, though, with the replacement.  It is a much better facility for modern needs and in fact is a library any community could be proud to call its own.

This probably would be my favorite of these pictures were it not for the placement of the ad-riddled smokers bench which is placed there primarily for the convenience of those employees who cannot get through a shift without, well, you know.  In general (get it? "general") the employees are hard-working and civil, even friendly with the customers.  But some of the younger ones, even in this day and age of enlightenment, are knuckle-headed enough to think that consumption of nicotine is cool.

Why do I like this picture?  Several things are striking.  The fact that almost all the men are wearing white shirts with vests and ties is a fine reminder that the "good old days" presented some serious drawbacks.  That span of equines suggests to me that they might be able to get the stalwart firefighters to the fire in time to see the last wisps of smoke from the smoldering remnants of the one-time building they were sworn to protect.

Qualified Leader

"He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God." --II Samuel 23:3b (KJV)

These were among the last words of King David, words given by God.  These words stipulate two requirements for one who would be a leader.  1) He must exercise justice toward men and 2) he must honor God.

Think about that.

And have a wonderful Sunday!

In a Nutshell

Night Out

Saturday night, somewhere amidst the corn and soybeans which, by the way, are turning golden and brown.  In fact we saw one corn field where the combine was making passes.  Ah, autumn in Indiana!

But this night was a night on the town.  We had dinner at Erica's which is one of our favorite places to spend money to let someone else cook and wash up.  Then to the Atlanta Music Hall.  The band was in fine form.

 The gentleman in the boater and linen jacket was the evening's dance partner to BBBH whom you may see on the far right.  I mean they cut a rug, sashayed across the floor and brought down the house.  Bob is 94 years of age, and BBBH is a spring chicken, relatively speaking..

The band director asked the couple to do another number in the second set, but they declined, claiming the energy level was insufficient to support another go-round.

We actually rolled up the streets in Atlanta; we shut the place down.  That is our car in the distance and we were literally the last to leave main street.  It was 9:30 p.m.

Grandma's Reading Record

I have a somewhat ragged old Bible that once belonged to my Grandmother.  On the front and back blank leaves she recorded her readings of the Good Book.  The last lines read, "I read the Bible through in 1957 making 28 times."

In  1957 Grandma was 77 years of age.  This record indicates that she read the Bible through each year from 1932 onward.  Grandma lived to be 98 and we have no reason to believe that she changed her routine after 1957 so it is reasonable to assume that she read the Bible through 48 or 49 times during her lifetime.

One supposes that she got a new Bible in 1957, perhaps as a Christmas gift.  Who knows?  At any rate I do not have the successor Book to this one.

Wish I had been as faithful in reading the Word as was my Grandmother.

Nature's Pastels

Our Backyard

September

Dust Bath

 

Ouabache State Park

Bluffton, Indiana

Worth Thinking About

^" It seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write unto thee in order, most excellent Theophilus, that thou mightest know the certainty of those things, wherein thou hast been instructed."  Luke 1:3,4




"The former treatise have I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach. . ."   Acts 1:1

Luke addresses both his Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles to a "Theophilus."

Scholars have speculated about Theophilus.  Who was he?  What is his background?  What was his relationship to Luke?  And so on.

Sometimes, and you draw your own conclusions, the simplest explanation for an enigma is the correct explanation.  It occurs to me that in the Greek "Theophilos" means "Friend of God."

Thus Luke addresses his writings to those who are friends of God-- to you and to me if we have surrendered our will to God's will.

Margot Goes to Kindergarten: Reread

TBT:  I presented this little tale about a year ago.  Maybe I haven't run out of anything to say, but an encounter of sorts with Margot recently suggested it might be fun to revisit the five-year-old Margot, especially given that a new crop of kindergartners are starting school.
 
Little Margot sat primly at the table.  The pink bow tied her long honey-colored ponytail, the perfect accent to the pink-on-white polka dot pinafore she wore.  Margot's hands were folded atop the table and she listened intently as Miss Roz was giving first-day instructions to the new kindergarten class.  It was a bright, hot August day outside, but the whir of the air conditioning fans overhead promised comfort in the classroom.

The table accommodated five scrubbed and enthusiastic, or frightened, or subdued children and Curtis.  Miss Roz knew within moments of the day's opening exercises that Curtis would be a handful.  What she had yet to learn was that Tina, seated next to Margot and across from Curtis would,  over time, make Curtis appear to be angelic, in a manner of speaking.

Curtis was jumping in and out of his chair grabbing pencils and books that did not belong to him.  Miss Roz, not yet frazzled,  was making a valiant effort to corral the tyke. Tina leaned toward Margot and said, "That is the ugliest dress I ever saw."  Margot, stunned, never said a word, but a tear formed in the corner of her left eye.  And Tina said, "Why don't you cut off that awful hair?  It looks like throw-up down your back."  The floodgates opened and Margot's cheeks were inundated with tears.  She turned toward Miss Roz, but Miss Roz had heard what was going on.  She, too sweetly Margot thought, chastised Tina and asked her to apologize.  Tina turned to Margot again and said, "I'm sorry you can't take a joke, you skinny stick.  Bet your mama starves you so she can eat it all herself, the fat pig."

Margot turned full in her seat, faced Tina, put her pointer finger within an inch of Tina's nose and said, in a clear voice, "You're just a little shit."

This is essentially a true story, especially the last line which is a completely accurate quote.  I have lived to see Margot elected to the local Board of Education. Names changed of course to mask the identities of the real-life participants in this little tableau.

Word of the day: pinafore
 © 2015 David W. Lacy

Thingamabob

Ever need one of these?  Do you know what to ask for?  I have known the correct terminology for many years, yet I can never remember it when I need to ask for one so I have to resort to "I need four large thin washers with a small hole."  Then the hardware person says, "Sure.  We have a large assortment of fender washers on aisle three."

How hard can it be to remember "fender washer"?

By writing this the author hopes to amuse you, but more importantly he hopes to be able to ask for the item by name the next time he needs one.

Just for Laughs.

Would you believe we actually have one of these?

It cannot do anything that a slice of bread cannot do better.  Then you eat the bread, no fuss no waste. With this thing you have a messy piece of plastic to clean.

The mind of man knows virtually no limits.  If it cannot think of something good, something useful, it will come up with something like this.

Oh, yes we have the little pick thingies to poke into the ends of the cobs.  We do.

If God be for us who can be against us?

"And ye murmured in your tents, and said, Because the Lord hated us, he hath brought us forth out of the land of Egypt, to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us.

"Whither shall we go up? our brethren have discouraged our heart, saying, The people is greater and taller than we; the cities are great and walled up to heaven; and moreover we have seen the sons of the Anakims there."  --Deuteronomy 1:27,28

The Israelites had wandered in the wilderness forty years and now the people are directed to take the land which the Lord their God had promised to their fathers.  And we hear this response.

Many times God's people are led into situations where trust in God and forging ahead is the correct response, and yet the task seems impossible.  Of course it is impossible in our human strength, but with God on our side it must be accomplished!

Oh, but the sons of the Anakim are in the land.  We've no chance against such a foe.  And again, we today face assignments that are daunting or difficulties that seem insurmountable.  And of course they are in our own strength.  But God is on our side.  He will neither leave us nor forsake us.  If it is God's will we will overcome.  Invest your trust in the Maker and Master of the Universe!

When God gives you a mission, He will equip you for the task.

Right Here

Downtown

West side of Square, Tipton, Indiana

 Picture not dated but doubtless more than a century ago.

Picture September 1, 2016

The first picture is hanging in the store which currently occupies the red brick building.  It is a somewhat faded sepia print and the above is the best reproduction I could make.

The second picture was taken Thursday afternoon.  I tried to replicate the scene from the past and missed a little bit.  But note the wall around the courthouse lawn.  The first building that shows on the right side of the top picture does not show in the recent picture because it is no longer there.  Parking lot and outdoor displays for the merchant occupying the building.  Note, too, that utility poles are prominent in both pictures, yet they are different.

Traffic signals  were introduced sometime between the making of the two pictures, yet I would guess that if someone who lived in Tipton in 1916 were dropped down to view today's scene they would know where they were.  Might be both amazed and appalled.  The first reaction because of the obvious changes, the second at how little commerce is actually conducted in this formerly hopping and busy locale.  (You know, malls and automobiles.)

Heads up! Tipton's 48th annual Pork Festival will take place right here on the square next week, Thursday September 8; Friday September 9; Saturday September 10.  Be there.

 

Friday night, 9 o'clock.