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The Longenecker Sisters’ Road Trip, Part 2

by MarianBeaman | May 16, 2015 | blog, Family / Nostalgia, Mennonite History, Mennonite Lore, Reflection, Travel, Uncategorized

We pile into Heidi’s shiny black Toyota 4Runner in Jacksonville and off we go, zooming across state lines, first Florida, then Georgia, and finally South Carolina, our voices twanging to Doo Wop tunes of the 50s and 60s: All Good Vibrations as miles melt away....

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...

Mennonite Girls Can Cook

by MarianBeaman | May 6, 2015 | blog, Family / Nostalgia, Kiev Ukraine, Mennonite History, Mennonite Lore, Recipes, Uncategorized

Yummy Recipe Last week I was in the kitchen with my nearly vintage Mennonite Community Cookbook (1978) creased open to page 155 where I checked out the recipe for sautéed (Okay, I’ll admit, it’s fried!) egg-plant. Hours later when my new and improved Mennonite...

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...
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