by MarianBeaman | Jul 18, 2018 | blog, Coming of Age, Family / Nostalgia, Quotations
Jenna is our only grand daughter. This July she turns thirteen. She is still very girly, but she is growing up fast and now prefers a more sophisticated look. Once upon a time, this little girl was a three-year-old princess. She woke up in the morning, got out...
by MarianBeaman | Jul 4, 2018 | Cliff Beaman artist, Family / Nostalgia, Mennonite History, Mennonite Lore, Neighborhood / Environment, Uncategorized
This is a photograph of my mother, Ruth Longenecker, in the tobacco field located in our family’s acreage in Bainbridge, Pennsylvania seven miles from our home. Until the photo was restored, I did not realize the presence of a figure in middle distance, who I’m...
by MarianBeaman | Jun 20, 2018 | blog, Cliff Beaman artist, Family / Nostalgia, Mennonite History, Mennonite Lore, Quotations, Uncategorized
At Mark’s funeral, a church friend recalled his wisdom. The friend, who admitted to have complained about something trivial at the time, heard Mark say, “Oh, it’s not so bad. We’re just passing through this life!” My brother passed...
by MarianBeaman | Jun 13, 2018 | blog, Coming of Age, Family / Nostalgia, Mennonite History, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Uncategorized
My dad was a workhorse. He plowed with mules in the 1930s in our field in Bainbridge Later I stood beside him on a mechanical “beast” here in the same field cultivating the soil with a Massey-Harris tractor soon to plant tomatoes. Poet...
by MarianBeaman | Jun 6, 2018 | blog, Family / Nostalgia, Memory, Mennonite History, Mennonite Lore, Uncategorized
Once upon a time a five-year-old girl went to Cherryl Hill, a one-room school with a big bell on the rooftop . . . Early in the morning she rode over hill and dale In the back seat of the brown Terraplane Hudson with her teacher-aunt at the wheel . . . She...
by MarianBeaman | May 23, 2018 | blog, Family / Nostalgia, Memory, Mennonite History, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Quotations, Reflection, Uncategorized
I am blessed because I had a Mother who . . . Read to me In appreciation, I once gave this book as a Mother’s Day present to my mother. It came back to me when we sorted through her books and papers in 2014. A well-worn book Mother read to her...