by MarianBeaman | Apr 16, 2014 | Coming of Age, Family / Nostalgia, Memory, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Romance, Uncategorized
This is a sequel to a previous blog post: Flying the Coop: Leaving Mennonite Land with a link to my original story on Mary Gottschalk’s website. His Story: I proposed to Marian my Mennonite girl friend one snowy evening, my car stuck in a snow-bank. When she...
by MarianBeaman | Apr 12, 2014 | Family / Nostalgia, Literature, meditation, Memory, Purple Passage, Quotations, Reflection, Uncategorized
LILACS April is the cruellest month, breeding Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing Memory and desire, stirring Dull roots and spring rain. T. S. Eliot The Waste-Land When Lilacs last in the dooryard bloom’d And the great star early droop’d in the western sky in...
by MarianBeaman | Apr 9, 2014 | Coming of Age, Family / Nostalgia, Memory, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Uncategorized
Mother Longenecker still lives in the same house she and Daddy bought soon after they got married in 1940. Their bedroom looked the same for decades, but it’s changed over the years. Here’s what is missing . . . and what I remember from so long ago. 1. The...
by MarianBeaman | Apr 7, 2014 | Amish, Amish fiction, Coming of Age, Conflict, Family / Nostalgia, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Uncategorized
In the movie based on Beverly Lewis’ best-selling romance novel The Shunning, pretty Katie Lapp senses something is missing in her simple Amish life. Then a fancy woman comes to Lancaster County looking for the baby girl she gave up for adoption nearly 20 years...
by MarianBeaman | Apr 5, 2014 | Family / Nostalgia, Literature, Memory, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Uncategorized
* Poem for Easter – British poet George Herbert loved to explore the soul’s inner architecture. He often wrote poems with shapes representing a theme, the resurrection in this case. The poetic lines, “increasing and decreasing to imitate...
by MarianBeaman | Apr 2, 2014 | Coming of Age, Family / Nostalgia, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Uncategorized
Easter eggs on the farm? Why sure – Fresh eggs from Aunt Sue’s chicken pen, popped into her kettle of water brought to a boil in the kitchen. And then in short order, eggs cooling on the counter soon ready for us to paint. With paint wands made of little wisps of...
by MarianBeaman | Mar 29, 2014 | Amish, Education, Family / Nostalgia, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Uncategorized
When I bring 5-pound bags of Wenger’s famous ham-loaf frozen from Pennsylvania to Florida, the plastic-coated tubs of meat are wrapped in newspaper and then shrink-wrapped in plastic. The wrapping on one of the packages revealed answers to the intriguing question: Who...
by MarianBeaman | Mar 26, 2014 | Education, Family / Nostalgia, neighborhood, Quotations, Tips, Uncategorized
Signs . . . they’re everywhere . . . billboards in the city, stickers on cars, comments on Facebook. I found some wise ones in a novelty shop, on a car, on a piece of paper, on a writer’s sweat shirt. Some you’ve seen before. Others, I hope, are new....
by MarianBeaman | Mar 24, 2014 | Uncategorized
Author and blog friend, Merril Smith writes about what happens when opportunity knocks: Be prepared for romance, inspiration, and an introduction to the Dabba Wallahs!
by MarianBeaman | Mar 22, 2014 | Education, Gratitude, Literature, meditation, Memory, Purple Passage, Quotations, Reflection, Uncategorized
Purple Passages with a Fish & a Kiss, March 2014 Edition Winter Winter lies too long in country towns; hangs on until it is stale and shabby, old and sullen. Willa Cather, My Antonia If winter comes, can spring be far behind? Percy Bysshe Shelley “Ode to...
