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The Longenecker Sisters’ Road Trip, Part 1

by MarianBeaman | May 12, 2015 | blog, Family / Nostalgia, Nostalgia, Reflection, Travel, Uncategorized

Girls’ road trips are part of the landscape of American pop culture. Who can forget Thelma and Louise? Wanting to take a short vacation from their dreary lives, Thelma (Geena Davis) and Louise (Susan Sarandon) head out from Arkansas to the Grand Canyon in a 1966 Ford...
An Orphan Speaks on Mother’s Day

An Orphan Speaks on Mother’s Day

by MarianBeaman | May 9, 2015 | blog, Family / Nostalgia, meditation, Mennonite History, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Quotations, Uncategorized

This is my first Mother’s Day without my mother, Ruth Metzler Longenecker. To say I miss her is an understatement of the highest order. Technically, I could be considered an orphan with both my mother and father gone. However, with my own extended family and...

Rhubarb in Grandma’s Garden

by MarianBeaman | May 2, 2015 | blog, Memory, Mennonite History, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Recipes, Uncategorized

Grandma and I in the Rhubarb Patch It’s me, pigtails flapping in the May breezes, skipping beside Grandma toward the rhubarb patch. Behind Grandma’s house toward the woods a thick nest of rhubarb stalks stands sentinel over a ridge facing the twelve sweet...

Lincoln, Lilacs, and Grandma’s Outhouse

by MarianBeaman | Apr 29, 2015 | blog, Coming of Age, Family / Nostalgia, meditation, Memory, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Uncategorized

Lilacs in Washington State Earlier this month, my husband Cliff and family laid to rest his father Lee Beaman in a tiny urn above the coffin of his wife in the cemetery adjoining the church. Across the street from the simple, white-plank Methodist Church near...

My Little Black Bookends Tell All

by MarianBeaman | Apr 24, 2015 | Coming of Age, Conflict, Family / Nostalgia, Folk Songs of the South, Memory, Mennonite Lore, Nostalgia, Recipes, Uncategorized

Growing up in rural Lancaster County in the 1950s, I had very little opportunity to meet people of other ethnic groups, but I did have a Little Black Sambo book that introduced me to a culture different from mine. So, I have not always been embarrassed by this book....

Button, Button, Who’s Got the Button?

by MarianBeaman | Apr 15, 2015 | Conflict, Family / Nostalgia, Literature, meditation, Nostalgia, Quotations, Reflection, Uncategorized

Do you lose things? Misplace your glasses, keys, cellphone, or worse? A few weeks ago I saw advertised a bit of wizardry called TrackR bravo, a coin-sized, wireless device that attaches to anything you want to track. The two wholesome-looking, geeky guys who invented...
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