Happy Birthday to ME!

July 31, 1950.

Near midnight or shortly after in the maternity ward of Mechanicsburg Hospital.

A baby cries out.

"Hey!  Where's the cake and ice cream?"

Kenneth Eugene DeWalt has been hatched.

July 31, 2014.

Near 9:30 or thereabouts seated at Gunther Toody's Colorado Springs Diner. (So where DO you remember that name from? Think B & W TV)



An alledgedly grown man laughs out loud as every waitress in the place surrounds him to dance the twist (def: 1960 iconic socializing activity that involves total body oscillation, upper body in an opposite direction from lower, hence called, "the Twist"). See Mona's video on my Facebook page if you need to learn more.

 Toody's is a front range Colorado wonder.  Less than 12 of these fifties style diners are available in Colorado Springs and Denver but after one very filling breakfast (lunch too so brunch applies, actually) Mona and I say, "Don't miss this place when you come to town!"

 Buttons was our server.  None of the staff use their real name, 'to keep the innocent from becoming guilty?'  And it was she who arranged the dance party, and the cool signed hat.

We shared a Chicken Fried Steak and Milkshake breakfast!

And a good time was had by ALL!







Then we went library hopping. 5 libraries and 1 Goodwill and an independent Thrift later I had two shirts, and 4 new books.  Mona had 1 new book.



And on the way we found Fountain, Colorado. a small town just a few miles south of Colorado Springs where Texas cow herds were driven to market in Kansas City & east aboard one of the towns three railroad companies cars.  Made old Dodge City look tame, they say.

Fountain just missed being considered as the capitol city of Colorado when in 1888 most of the town BLEW UP.

 As if hundreds of cowboys, bars and brothels, and later a massive town flattening explosion, wasn't enough to put this little town on the map, check out THIS creepy story!  so creepy I'm not allowed to tell you who it was who told us about this deserted, yet seemingly once somewhat elegant home on the edge of town.


 THEY say that before abortions of any kind were allowed in the state of Colorado secret abortions were performed in the basement of this old house.

THEY also say that there may be hundreds of tiny bodies buried in the yard of this old house.

And THEY also say that it seems mysteriously ominous that the entrance to the house is decorated with a three dimensional rendering of the Greek God Pan and his flute, calling the little children inside to...   so THEY say.





We completed our celebration of my birthday at the most unusual pizza parlor we've ever been in.  Right across from the diesel truck shop where we are sleeping tonight while the coach gets its 10,000 mile once over at basement level is this highly rated, and very reasonably priced, 40 year old HUGE Italian restaurant.

Fargo's!

The coach is a tiny speck just behind the light pole at the VERY left of the photo.

We shared a baked spaghetti and chocolate cake SUNDAE.

Cake, ice cream AND spaghetti?  SURE!  It was my birthday!

Otherwise I might have CRIED.



-Ken

Five Generations of Joy

We had dropped the coach off at Pikes Peak Traveland for Jeff and his crew to spend the day playing with it and had headed into town to visit the post office, the library, and get some lunch (great fish and chips at OLD CHICAGO). Then we walked the several blocks through this very vibrant downtown to the old courthouse which is now the area's community history museum. 

Just as we reached Courthouse Park we ran into Mister Seymour. Something about the bronze statue caught my eye.  The casual way the hat was placed on the bench.  The look of comfort in the trim suit.  And the face, molded in bronze, that reminded me of my grandson Khalif.

Here was a man who had been tested by time and had met it head on.  Not a great politician, general, or millionaire.  But a MAN.  Read the plaque for a small bit of his story.

In the museum, on the second floor, is a room devoted to local black history.  It brings the stories of these folk to life.  In a land where many accepted all, there were too many in the 19th and 20th centuries who accepted only those 'like them'.  And the Negro, Black, African American was by some thought to be less than any other.  held in contempt below Indian, Mexican, or any other human simply because they were darker skinned than all.

But despite the strong KKK of  William's time, and the challenges of being a free man in a place where you'd have thought freedom would be most available, Mister Seymour strove, and never stopped striving.  Can a white person even begin to imagine the challenges that were thrown up at William when he became the first juror to assist in deciding the fate of other, possibly white, persons in the El Paso Courtroom?

I pray my grandson's Khalif, Kaream and Tristan continue their growth toward being such fine and strong men.

I had taken my pictures, and was moving on to look at the fine frontier weapon collection in the second floor main hall when I overheard a mother across the room from me setting up a photo with grandma and her two beautiful granddaughters.  Mom wanted to be sure to get the man in the white suit in a picture at knee level in the photo with them.  I wondered why so I did what any red blooded American would do; I eavesdropped.

They were related to this man!  Cool!  But who was he?  So, being the shy person I have always been, I asked.

The smiling grandmother is William Seymour's granddaughter!  The statue in the park is her families founding pioneer. The smiling mother is her daughter and the two cute and precocious young ladies are the next generation of Seymours since the American Civil War to live and love Colorado Springs.

They said yes, I could take their picture. So I did, and you can see for yourself, the joy that has come down through certain challenge, fear, and strife of the 19th and 20th, into the 21st century.

Meet the Seymours.  Daughters all of William, who along with Elizabeth, his wife, decided to homestead Kansas, and then Colorado, and build a life for these and all who follow. 

 -Ken

A day to Serve, and Play

It starts with a meeting. A Trustee meeting, right Audrey D?  You set a date to begin the project in Spring.  Then it snows.  Another date. Another snow storm.  A third date and a third storm. Then busy weekends, then end of school stuff.  Then... its Summer.

We arrived here at Stratmoor UMC Saturday evening and attended church Sunday to find that today, Monday, some of the men of the church were meeting to finally get really GOING on putting up their two donated children's play sets behind the already donated and installed metal fence. We don't take the coach for service till Tuesday, and we will be in the area for a while, and these folks are so nice... I rose this morning to join the crew at 9 am.  Well, we are parked only about 60 feet from the playground!

First things first.  Decide what to do first.                                                                                                 Then go get what you need to do it out of the shed.

                                                        Then Pastor Dave brings donuts.

Then we get to work!

Then... LUNCHTIME!!! Pizza's on!!!

 And get going again.  Jim, Jimo, Bill, JB, Pastor Dave, and I got to know each other, joked around, and worked together till I was told it was time to close down for the day at about 2:30 pm

So I took a few pictures to send to Tech Team Leader Bill.

"Say JB.  That hat is ME"

"Don't interrupt us with the instructions. We're busy here!" 



You probably know the routine.  Some of the guys are still at it as I type. Planning next steps or putting finishing touches on and tightening bolts.

And when I stepped away from the church to get a long shot I found Trustee Team 2 hard at work in their own special playground!

 Colorado Red Fire Ants

OK. Not funny. They bite. They swarm. You will hate yourself for pitching your tent over a nest for a week.  And if you don't keep your pets away from them they may be injected with enough stinging venom to get very sick and even die.

But they are everywhere here, and in a few other Great Plains states too.

Just not as cute as prairie dogs, or the Stratmoor UMC Trustees.

Thanks for letting me play with you all today!  It was fun!

-Ken

Breakfast, Best Friends and Bibles

 

Today we worshiped with the great folks of Stratmoor Hills United Methodist Church, situated across from the World Arena, a popular major performance venue, and home to the local Ice Skating and Hockey Olympic Training Centers here in Colorado Springs, CO.

We watched the cars arrive for the 9:15 am traditional worship service from our breakfast table in the coach and walked over to join folk from that, and the 11 am Contemporary Service at their 10:00 am Fellowship Time. Every Sunday the fare is different, depending on what the bringers decide to bring.  Today there were scrambled eggs, pastries and fruit. Sound familiar Verna R?

PS: Every good breakfast deserves 

                                                      dessert.

Mona got to meet an almost-a-cousin!  Sherry Sheehan grew up in Brockway, Pa as a Youngdahl, about 30 minutes from Mona's home, Brookville, Pa.  AND it turns out Sherry's brother once rented his home from a close friend of ours in Reynoldsville, another suburb of the metropolis of  Brookville, Dorothy Reed.

This world is always astounding us with its size.  Its getting smaller and smaller every day we travel.

The worship was great and Pastor Dave McGee's sermon was inspiring and challenging as he encouraged us all to live our lives for Christ by living them for others. I was happy to learn that once again we had traveled to a UMC with a Licensed                                                         Pastor, as I was until becoming a
                                                      Clergy Associate Member of my conference.


 At the conclusion of the service there was a children's message and Pastor Dave handed out rhythm instruments to all of us who wanted them and the Children's Sunday School came up from their downstairs class.

Well, Mackensie came up.  Last week the class had 18 kids.  Today just one.  Sound familiar Jen C??


The 100 or so attenders of this congregation are very involved in several ministries to the local families and persons in needs of all kinds.  But this June some of them, along with 600 other United Methodists from around the Rocky Mountain Conference, traveled east to almost the Colorado-Kansas border where in 1864 a former Methodist preacher and Indian hater, Colorado Militia Colonel Chivington led 700 of his volunteers south from Denver to an Arapaho camp of about 200 mostly women and children under the leadership of Chief Black Kettle and spent the morning killing every person in camp who could not hide along the Sand Creek banks.

The United Methodist Church nationwide has led many ministries which meet American Indian needs from improved education to adult job training and new church starts as a result of its desire to atone for the Sand Creek Massacre, though no one has ever found reason to consider 19th century Methodists or Methodism ever innately opposed to Native American freedoms.

 After lunch at a local Village Inn (um-um GOOD!) we returned to church for the 2:00 pm Bible Study led by Pastor Dave.


And as evening draws near we got a glimpse of Pike's Peak between cloud coverings throughout the day from our parking spot.  That's the lighter mountain in the distance between the two closer, darker peaks.

Scrabble (yes, Mona is winning) and supper on board just about concludes the most 'average' Sunday we've had since departing June 8. If living every day with new views out the coach windows and new people to meet is at all average.

-Ken

We broke the law and the law... ignored us.

Pikes Peak is in the clouds to the right of the right hand big tree.

Tonight we are safely and quietly parked in the parking lot of Stratmoor UMC in Colorado Springs, Colorado. We haven't heard back from our two phone calls and one email to Pastor Dave yet about being ALLOWED to live here but we think that's a good sign, since the crowd will all get to meet us tomorrow at their 10:15 fellowship Time and the 11:00 am Praise service.  Yes!  A band!





Speaking of being ALLOWED... but let me show you something we only saw one other time on the plains. A train load of windmill blades!  Not blades for drawing water from a well.  Not blades for milling wheat.  But modern electric generating station wind mill blades.  Each blade was on two flat cars, because they are so long.  I imagine there are very few rails straight enough to get these blades to their field of operation anywhere but on the plains of Canada or the US.  But they sure can't overnight them Federal Express!



Now back to being ALLOWED... But wait!  Check this out!  we went to a Kings Food Store tonight near our home and found THIS!  An antique motorized bucking bronc for the kiddies and it was still set to cost only 1 cent a ride!  Mona refused to ride it for a pic, and she made me leave before the clerk called security.



OK. Finally. ALLOWED.  All last week we told you, and others we met through the week, how we'd been staying at the one Walmart west of Denver where overnight parking is allowed.  And we knew this to be the case, because of all the over-nighters in coaches of every size, fifth wheels and smaller trailers, and cars, parked everywhere each night.

 Some folks seem to live nightly in their cars, head off to work every day and park there again every night. One guy pulled Mona's heart strings.  We could see him reading a book every evening in his front driver's seat for hours until the light went out.  He'd be gone before we were up each morning. I have no idea where he, or others, bathed, but I assume in the 24 hour Walmart bathroom.

Last night and this morning I took a couple of shots to be able to remember this interesting modern Hooverville (with a very eclectic blend of social status). Last evening around 11 pm I walked the lot and counted over 30 overnight parkers. This morning, when I took a walk at about 8:00am I was able to greet several folks just rising (one young lady in a slight state of undress behind her tinted windows) but all were friendly and their dogs barked happily to see me.


Where do they all come from?

Some, like us, are full timers seeking to save money and enjoy proximity to shopping and restaurants.

Some are vacationers, looking for DITTO as above.

Some are obviously professional truckers just resting for the night.

Some are transient workers who need to save a few bucks in order to eventually live somewhere more permanent.

Some have lost jobs, homes, and families. Some have been kicked out of their families.

Some are young kids following in the crazy footsteps of Jack Kerouac and the 1950's BEAT GENERATION or the sixties HIPPIES..


And some just want to be left alone.  They like being totally independent, even if it means abject poverty. Freedom, and independence, being more possible in the USA, especially in the west, than almost anywhere else in the world.

So we return this afternoon from a wonderful day in Golden at all the Buffalo Bill Days events (see our Face Book posts). We hook up the car, check the lights and tow functions.  Mona gets into the passenger seat and settles back when for the very first time she sees what neither of us have seen all week.

Too hard for you to read?  Obviously for us too!

Try a CLOSEUP:

Then she looked out the left side window, Just as I blast the twin trucker horns to announce we are moving and everyone should dive for cover.  And this is what she sees.

Oh. Still too far away, eh?  Yeah. For us too. Try THIS:

Now here's the deal.  We called the store before we ever showed up the first night.  They told us , "No problem!" So whats up?

Well, some of these people, so we've learned, have been coming here every night for weeks, even months.  No one checks on them, we all used the trash bins several of the local stores pay for and none of us left a mess anywhere that I could see. (Well. One of my cherry tomatoes fell off a stem and smashed on the pavement but, hey... it was a CHERRY tomato!). No one checks on the bins either.

Bottom line:

-Overnight parking is NOT ALLOWED, but rules unenforced will always be broken until they are.  Even, as in our case and the case of the person who told us to park here, in ignorance.

-We were not towed.

-No one was towed.

-We all, even the poorest of us, bought stuff at Walmart.

-BUT.... we WILL check out the signs from now on no matter what the local management says.  Sometimes the right hand really doesn't know what the left is doing!

Good night!  Morning fellowship with coffee and goodies at 10:15 am is coming FAST.

-Ken