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Fun

A Red Hat Tops the Annual Meatloaf Dinner

Posted on December 28, 2018December 28, 2018 by Easin' Along

I’ve written about this party before. For at least ten years (and probably more), Helen (adorable wife) and I have gathered with a group of dear friends from our former neighborhood in our home for a traditional meal of meatloaf and mashed potatoes. I make the meatloaf and, without bragging, I do a pretty good job. One of our guests brings the mashed potatoes, and they’re equally as good.

This event is always a highlight of the season for Helen and me. Our time with our friends is special and goes back over forty years when we all lived a few doors from each other and watched our children grow up together. The ladies take a trip to Hilton Head every year and no one would dare miss it. The guys have fished, hiked, camped, and drank together for many moons. Now we share pictures of our grandchildren and share some memories along with a few laughs from “the good old days.” The only difference is that we don’t stay up as late as we used to. Nevertheless, those memories meld together and stir in the mind like a well-seasoned, slowly cooked gumbo.

Helen worked hard and had the house decorated and the table set in plenty of time to take a few deep breaths before everyone arrived. She even hung a wreath she made nearly fifty years ago when we were living in Germany. She sent the wreath to a favorite aunt back home in Tennessee and her aunt hung it on her front door every year after that. Sadly, Aunt Anne passed away this year and Helen’s cousins returned the wreath to its creator. She hung it over a kitchen window.

When our guests arrived, we took the party to the annex for cocktails. (We’ll have more about the annex in future posts.) Things started pretty lively with Helen leading the conversation. The night sky was clear but the temperatures were cold. The heat in the annex was a bit lacking but everyone was having a grand time and hung in there until it was time to pull the meatloaf out of the oven. Before we left for the house, I persuaded the ladies to pose for a group picture which turned out well.

Once the serving line opened up, things moved smoothly on to the dinner table. Helen’s snow village served as low-level lighting for the dining area. I just wanted to show off the addition of the campers to her village because camping has been a big part of our year and the snow village needed a trailer park.

Dinner went well and the delightful conversation lingered long into the evening. I even had a few takers for seconds on meatloaf and one request for the recipe. The recipe is one that I found many years ago in an old magazine and I have not changed one ingredient in all of the years I have made it. I only went back through the serving line once so that I had room for dessert.

After dinner, it was time for the Red Hat Award which goes to the male who has had a significant accomplishment or persevered through a tough event over the past year. Bob, last year’s recipient was on hand to present this year’s award which went to yours truly. The award was for a successful hip replacement although my struggle was not nearly so difficult as that of the past two recipients. I also suppose that the award was for achieving three years as the author of Easin’ Along. Bob placed a notepad and pencil inside the hatband. I am honored and saying so is understating my true feelings.

In addition to the Red Hat Award, Bob handed out candy canes to everyone who needed a cane in the recent past. Almost everyone in attendance received one—Helen and I included. Helen posed with Ralph for a great picture as both have had joint replacements. Great idea, Bob!

Time spent with friends and family is time spent well. We love this gathering and hope to continue it well into the future. Making meatloaf is easy. Making friends is a treasure. Helen and I wish all our friends both here and online a Blessed 2019. We hope to see you somewhere on the road less traveled as we’re…Easin’ Along.

Fundamentals

Spreading a Little Cheer Beneath a Mountain Fog

Posted on December 21, 2018December 20, 2018 by Easin' Along

Twenty years ago, our church began a tradition of adopting families in a small, rural Appalachian community, and providing them with gifts to brighten up the Christmas season. In previous years, Helen (adorable wife) and I have adopted families and shopped for them, but three years ago (post-retirement) I volunteered to deliver the gifts to the Community Center which serves as the collection point. On Monday of this week, our volunteers gathered at the church for another year of spreading cheer.

I arrived at the church to find it already abuzz with activity. Stacks of wrapped boxes and brightly colored gift bags sat in SUVs ready for the trip. I placed gifts for two families in Freddie (my car) and joined the group inside for last minute instructions from Margaret, our volunteer leader and organizer, and a prayer led by Mark, our associate pastor. Minutes later, the convoy moved out.

The Clearfork Community Center sits in the tiny Appalachian town of Eagan, Tennessee. Eagan is a former coal mining community tucked into the Clearfork Valley a few miles below the Tennessee and Kentucky border. Our church has always referred to the area as Roses Creek. I don’t know where that name comes from unless it is the name of one of the small creeks that flow into the Clearfork River running alongside the community center. Hopefully, a reader will tell me.

We left Knoxville in heavy fog to begin an hour and a half drive traveling 75 miles north on I-75. We planned to cross the Cumberland Mountains in Campbell County and meet up at the state line in Jellico where all nine cars would form a convoy to Roses Creek. The fog persisted until I punched through it at the mountaintop, around 2,000 feet above sea level. The bright sunshine illuminated the dense fog covering the valley floor and I couldn’t restrain myself from taking pictures from Freddie’s front seat at 70 miles per hour (photo above). I was the fifth of nine cars when I arrived at the rendezvous point.

Within about five minutes the rest of our group arrived, and we began snaking our way up, over, and around the mountain to our destination. Once again, we found ourselves beneath the fog that filled the valley. We proceeded slowly for the last 20 miles and followed a creek for most of the drive. In some respects, this is an area forgotten by time. We passed several abandoned homes and small country stores that I assumed sprang up at a time when coal was king. Coal mining continues in the region, but the coal industry offers few jobs now, and there are even fewer young men willing to brave the dangers of coal mine work.

I remembered a few landmarks from previous trips and, after about thirty minutes, they came into view and we were turning onto the gravel drive leading to the Community Center. Everyone began unloading packages. Margaret had organized the families by name and number and we completed the unloading and assembly process rather quickly. The director of the Center was on hand to greet us. She was truly grateful for our support as well as excited about the joy that would come from the recipients. I’m not certain when the families would receive the gifts. None were present when we were there.

I spent a few minutes walking around the community center. Mounted on the entry hall wall was a large picture depicting mining activity during the 1920s. Other pictures told the story of the people who had formed the community around the same time. From the time Helen and I began adopting Roses Creek families, I’ve always felt a kinship to the people of this region. My father grew up here with two brothers raised by a single Mom. He left after serving in World War II when the GI Bill made college affordable.

The center itself once house the Eagan School, but a former nun named Margaret Cirillo came to the area around 1960 to assist Appalachian families and secured a grant to convert the school into an institute for the benefit of the job-starved residents of the Clearfork Valley. Margaret has devoted her life to the people of Appalachia. A YouTube Video tells her story and I have posted a link to that video that is viewable by clicking here. Margaret was not there to greet us, but I hope to have the opportunity to meet her sometime in the future.

The director prepared cookies and sandwiches for our group and we enjoyed them before the return to Knoxville. By the time we said our goodbyes, the sun had penetrated the fog with just enough light to reach the floor of the Clearfork Valley. Looking to my right as I drove away from the center, I spotted a small clapboard house below the road. A chimney poked through a tarpaper-covered roof, billowing smoke. Stacks of split firewood surrounded the house. I guessed that the owner gave up on coal long ago…probably for reasons having nothing to do with heat.

I drove on feeling extremely blessed for the life I have — Merry Christmas to all, especially to those in Roses Creek. We’re Easin’ Along…

Fundamentals

Been to Bethlehem? An Advent Devotional

Posted on December 7, 2018December 7, 2018 by Easin' Along

Over the past two years, I have shared with Easin’ Along readers two devotionals (click here and here) that I wrote for an Advent Devotional handbook given to members of our church. Our church did not publish a handbook this year, but my intention was to prepare a devotional anyway. I spent some time thinking about the subject matter around Thanksgiving but never could settle on a topic. My frustration continued until this week.

A few days ago, I received our church newsletter which contained a very timely message written by our interim minister, Dr. Steve Eason. Dr. Eason is not only an exceptionally gifted speaker, but he is also an excellent writer, and his message spoke to me as someone who, at times, finds Christmas overwhelming. I asked Dr. Eason if I could reprint his message on Easin’ Along. He graciously consented, and his words are printed below. Please read on because I am certain that, if things get a bit stressful over the holidays, his message will help bring into focus the reason for the season.

Grotto of the Nativity

You ever been to Bethlehem?

Some of you have. Underneath the Church of the Nativity is a grotto where early Christians claimed Christ was born. It’s a stone cave that would have been underneath a home. Animals would have been bedded there for the winter. It’s now a holy place. There’s a fourteen-point star on the floor that marks the spot where the Manger would have been. You can place your hand in a hole in the middle of that star and touch the stone where some claim this historical event occurred. Whether it did, or whether it didn’t, it’s a good place to remember.

There’s obviously a lot going on as we gear up to celebrate Christmas. Parties, concerts, parades, shopping, decorating, baking, travel, church, family, traditions, ending a semester, wrapping up the old year and preparing for a new one. All of that is happening at the same time. Holiday fatigue!

Then I think of that grotto, the oldest site of worship in Christianity. Catholics, Greek Orthodox, Armenians, Coptics, Protestants….we all trace our heritage to that site. God did something there, on that spot, in real time, in a real place. “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us.” (2 Cor. 5:19)

We can’t all go to Bethlehem. The important thing is that God went there in Christ. Everything was born there! Our salvation, our reconciliation with God, our hope, the gift of eternal life were all born there on that spot in Christ.

While all these other things are going on, I want to go back to Bethlehem in my mind and in my heart. I want to touch that stone and remember what happened there, in a simple cave, in a simple village, with simple people and an extraordinary God!

O come, all ye faithful, joyful and triumphant, O come ye, O come ye to Bethlehem! Come, and behold Him, Born the King of angels! O come let us adore Him, O come, let us adore Him, O come, let us adore Him, Christ, the Lord! (John Francis Wade, “O Come, All Ye Faithful”)

About the author:

Dr. Eason received a B.A. from East Carolina University in 1976, M. Div. from Duke Divinity School in 1979 and D. Min. from Columbia Theological Seminary in 1993. He was ordained in the United Methodist Church in 1980 and transferred to the PCUSA in 1984. He has served as pastor/head of staff at churches of different sizes and his longest tenure was from 2002-2015 at Myers Park Presbyterian in Charlotte, NC which has a membership of approximately 4800. He left Myers Park voluntarily to pursue ministries “outside of his comfort zone” and spent a year as a church consultant with Macedonian Ministries, Atlanta GA during which he traveled the country working with churches to help them with a wide range of challenges. He now serves as an interim pastor at Sequoyah Hills Presbyterian Church, Knoxville, Tennessee.

Helen (adorable wife) joins me in sending a sincere wish that your holidays are filled with love, joy, happiness, and peace. We’re Easin’ Along now…with one hand holding a shopping list and the thought of the other hand reaching into that hole.