A couple years ago, I was walking on the beach and had the realization of how broken seashells have some commonality to human beings. You may ask…how??! I was thinking mainly that we tend to look for perfection in our fellow humans and often, when we discover the lack of perfection, we turn away. I certainly do that with my seashell collecting habits. I will see a shell laying on the beach to which I quickly run thinking I have found a beautiful treasure. When I pick it up and the back is out, I toss it back. It’s not perfect. True confession, part of my reasoning is that I have several full containers and I feel, at this point, I need to be discriminating. After all, I cannot collect them all!
(The backside of the featured shell picture)
That day, as I was walking across quite a few shells that had washed ashore in a particular area, I could feel the crunch beneath my feet. Of course, many other beachwalkers had done so as well. That’s what the beach is, right? All kinds of seaweed, broken shells, and often sea creatures that are now dead because they came in with the tide and were not immediately washed back out to sea. Fellow seashell collectors can be seen with their bags and containers searching for the perfect shells among the debris.
I have always been fascinated by the hunt. Free treasures and such beauty!! Even though there are many, many varieties, each shell seems to have its own particular distinctions, patterns and depths of color. When shells are joined together in a group, it is a myriad of subtle and vibrant shades of color, designs and sizes. They are a reminder of the ocean, its waves and bird sounds, sand between our toes, and the smell of salty air. If you love the beach, they make you want to return again and again.
Recently I was at an aquarium and spent some time in the seashell area, admiring the large, beautiful conch shells, but then I saw a small jar of teeny, teeny ones that once were baby mollusks which didn’t live to grow their shell any further. Of course, there are many types of sea life that produce amazingly beautiful shells, a few of which are scallops, oysters, and clams. So how does this connect to humans?
Whether we are sea life, land or air animals, plants or human beings, God placed in all living things an ability to survive or to be food for something else to enable it to survive. Occasionally we see a flower growing through a sidewalk, or a tree that found its way to grow in a rocky cliff. We are amazed, thinking how could that grow?! God created nature and He looks after it. I believe he wants us to be encouraged by it, to appreciate it, to know He created it, and to see God through it to recognize His presence in our daily lives.
We, as human beings, do not often take the time to appreciate the intricacies of nature. It also seems we have little patience for our fellow humans in how we deal with the imperfections that we encounter along this life journey. I do understand the purpose of seashells in life is to protect that sea creature. Humans were created for much more, but there are similarities about how we view nature and how we view the human race, much like a beautiful sunset captures our attention, but do we pay as much attention to the sky when it’s not eye-catching? Yet it is there day after day, as are the needs of people around us.
To go a little deeper in this blogpost, I wrote this on February 12, 2016 and titled it “The ‘Broken’ Shell.”
Today I walked along the beach and was struck by the colorful fragments of shell.Usually I look for and pick up the perfect shells to add to my fairly vast collection.
Today I thought of something different.Looking at a group of broken shells, I was reminded of God’s love for our brokenness.We search for perfection and beauty – but God sees our brokenness that is beautiful to Him (and, yes, we are all broken to some degree, not reaching God’s perfection).He knows that we tend to come to Him more often in our broken state, than when everything is going smoothly and quiteperfectly by our standards. He knows the desires He has for us as well and wants to help us to live them out.
Some of the shell fragments were from large, bold shells, the pieces thick and strong.Others from bright, colorful small shells, thin and fragile.You can only imagine their beauty when whole.
I am reminded of the homeless, orphaned, discarded, and destitute human beings who were once whole and capable, how the rushing tide of life and the shifting sands of reality have broken them and tore at their beauty, leaving behind only remnants of who they once wereor internal scars that make it hard to do life.
People walk by and see the fragment of a shell, quickly turning away to search for perfection, for beauty, when it is in the fragment and has been all along.God created it for a purpose, and even as it is broken, because of its brokenness, its beauty cannot be destroyed.This is very much like the brokenness of individuals who are struggling just to survive.The gaunt, hollow eyes in their sadness cry out for someone to recognize them for who they are inside, who they once were, as God sees them.
In theory, we enter this world as babies, innocent and vulnerable. As we grow and mature, the world around us begins to teach us and to mold us. We search for the perfect life, yet the search is often elusive and we are forced to accept the things that come our way. As long as we live in this world, we must adjust, adapt and change, just like the living sea creatures as they gradually enlarge their shell to survive. As we go through our days, taking the time to see, really see, people in need may help us to have more empathy for them, and just might make us more aware of our own shortcomings.
I decided to tell the story of how I became a bass player in the church band and, like a lot of stories that start at the beginning, I thought I would go back 9 years before the beginning. I was born in February of 1957, the 6th child of Raymond (Pete) and Ruby Edmonds. Growing up, my Dad had only one hobby and that was playing music with family and friends. Dad played with his four brothers and a brother-in-law. He played with coworkers and people he met around town. He worked at the Radford Army Ammunition Plant and seemed to know almost everyone around, including his friends from the Moose Lodge. I think about how only the men played music. Although Dad had 9 sisters, only the men sang and played. Dad had a younger brother that became very talented playing the banjo.
I have no idea how Dad got started playing music. I have lots of questions I now wish I had asked Dad before his passing in 2000. His father, my grandfather, played banjo but my Dad was really talented. He played guitar, mandolin, fiddle and was very talented at all three and he played by ear. He had no musical training. My Mother and Dad both went to school in rural areas 20 miles from one another and neither had access to high school. Although they were very smart, both of them repeated 7th grade because there was nothing else for them to do. They took jobs at a very young age. So how did my Dad become so talented? I wish I could answer that question. Whenever Dad was playing with others, you could hear and see his abilities. I never listened to him play and thought that others were more talented than he was. He was also an entertainer. He would always tell a few jokes and throw in some funny stories between songs. This is a picture of James Covey and the Virginia Partners taken on March 15, 1948. This is my Dad on the right in the white shirt and tie at age 18. What a handsome young man. Years ago people wrote down the date on the back of the picture, thank goodness for that.
James Covey and the Virginia Partners
What I remember hearing was this band was very good and they played at schools, bars, community centers and live on radio. They also had recorded 78 speed records. The oldest records came out as 78 revolutions per minute, then newer ones 45 and then 33 1/3. Live radio shows were common back in the 40’s and 50’s. I envision it like the scene from “O’ Brother Where Art Thou” where George Clooney and the band played at the radio station out in the “boonies.” As Dad’s band grew in popularity, some of the band members wanted to go to Nashville where they hoped to make it big. My Dad was one of those who wanted to go, but all the members had day jobs that provided for their families. Some band members felt that it was too big of a risk to quit their good paying day jobs to chase a dream making music. Jobs were often very hard to find. So on Saturday May 15, 1948, you could see James Covey And His Virginia Partners live at Newbern High School for 50 cents or 25 cents if you were a student. What a deal! Notice this is the same photo that they had made two months earlier.
My Dad shared one story with me about his need for a job beforeI was born. A friend drove him down to Bassett VA, where a furniture factory would often hire people on the spot. Dad said he was just standing in front of the building when the boss came out and said “who wants a job today?” His friend grabbed Dad’s hand and up it went before others responded. They both were hired. Dad said that he was told that he would be paid $1 per hour but not to tell anyone how much he was being paid or they would fire him immediately. So the work was hard and the hours were long. He said an old guy across the assembly line from him asked him every day how much they were paying him. But Dad needed this job so he would not say. He later found out that the old guy was making $0.95 per hour after working there for many years. Dad understood then how the factories were taking advantage of their workers.
There was always a guitar in the house when I was young. Dad had a J45 Gibson that was his prized possession. He didn’t want kids to mess with his guitar but he showed my brother and I a few chords. One night Dad was playing outside and he backed up his car, driving over the case. He was greatly relieved to learn his guitar was not in its case.
My brother playing Dad’s J45 with all my sistersat Christmas
My brother Grey was 11 years older than me. He had a couple guitars he had purchased while working and he moved out of our house at age 17; I was only 6 at the time. Grey was drafted into the military but then joined the Air Force and spent time in Vietnam where he played guitar in clubs at times. When he finally received his papers to come home, the bar owner gave him the guitar from the bar in which he had played. The guitar had song titles and some lyrics carved into it. My brother refused to take it saying that others will need a guitar to play but the owner insisted. The owner promised to buy another guitar for other soldiers to play. My brother was so proud of that cheap guitar from Vietnam because of all the memories.
So what about me? I’m going to get to that, just bear with me. As I grew older, Dad still didn’t like me playing his J45 but he seemed to tolerate it a little better. Dad would do all kind of crazy guitar riffs. I remember asking him how to do that and Dad would do it again at full speed and I would respond, “thanks Dad.” Two times at full speed didn’t teach me much. Dad was really talented, but his teaching skills and patience were limited. So I learned a few chords and life moved on.
In the 6th grade, I found out I could take band so I quickly enrolled. Before long I had a trombone. I wanted to play trumpet, but I think the director had too many trumpet players and need some trombone players to fill out his band. Oh well, I was the first chair trombone player for years and learned what I could about music. Marching band was fun and the trombones were always out front leading the parade. I attended all the football games, including away games, participating in the half-time shows, and had a group to hang out with in school. Life was getting better. I eventually became part of the Jazz Band and played in Jazz Band competitions as well.
Before you know it, I graduated high school, entered the working world and met Karen. When I worked at Wade’s Grocery, one of the guys had a used Yamaha guitar for sale. I was excited to buy that guitar from him. As life moved on, Karen and I were raising our kids and doing life and making a little more money. I came across a guy who had a D35 Martin guitar for sale. I remember taking Dad with me to purchase it. Dad knew guitars and I didn’t want to purchase a guitar that had problems. So we looked at it and when the seller walked away for a moment, I asked Dad if I should I buy it. He said if I didn’t buy it, he would. I had done well finding a nice guitar and buying it at a fair price.
So I continued to learn a few songs here and there and learned some new chords as well, but in order to really improve I needed to have a group of musicians to encourage me and to learn from. I didn’t have all the musical friends that my Dad had.
We started going to church in the mid-1980’s. Our church had a piano player and an organ player. Years later, we became members of a contemporary church with a contemporary band. Wow! this was different, and they had guitar players who were very talented. So life goes on. Then several years later, after the kids were grown and out of the house, the bass player left our church. Weeks later, the backup bass player took a job out of state. No bass player – interesting, so after weeks of not having a bass player on Sunday, I inquired about the position. If only I knew how to play a bass… I did know that the bass had 4 strings that were the same notes as the top 4 on a guitar, only octaves lower, so hopefully that information would help me. So I borrowed a bass, because buying one would be useless if I couldn’t get past the audition. Then the band leader gave me three songs to learn. So for 3 weeks, I played those songs over and over until I had done everything as well as I could to prepare for the big day.
Audition day! So I showed up at band rehearsal on Thursday evening, and the band played the songs for the upcoming Sunday. When they were done tweaking the songs, it was time for me to play. I was very nervous, but I knew I had worked hard and playing more by myself was not going to help me grow my skills. So we played. I felt that I had done well, but then my opinion didn’t count. I packed up my borrowed bass and the band leader said they would discuss how I did and get back to me. So I headed home, thinking that if they were pleased with how I did, I would get a quick call. If they were not pleased with my performance, then it would take some time for them to discuss how best to tell me I didn’t make the cut. You know it’s best to be sensitive on how you deal with these matters. So the minutes clicked by, one hour then two. Finally the phone rang. The leader said I played all the right notes, I kept time well, and didn’t seem to have any issues with one song that was in 6/8 time. They were quite surprised how well I had played because they all knew I had only been playing bass for three weeks. “Welcome to the band” the leader said. Yeah! Those were some sweet words.
Church band where I began playing bass (I am at the far right)
It was time to buy a bass guitar. My daughter Kim’s husband Paul had a nice 4 string bass but he wanted a 5 string bass so I purchased his Ibanez. Great choice! I don’t know exactly what day it was when I became part of the band. I wish I had a picture with a handwritten date on the back, but it’s been over 10 years now and I’m still having fun. I enjoy the practices as much as, maybe more, than playing before the church. At the first church I played, we rehearsed every Thursday and played every Sunday unless we were out of town. Our old church would occasionally open the service with a Rock and Roll song that related to the message. I remember playing Fleetwood Mac’s “Go Your Own Way” and the Pastor’s message was Don’t Go Your Own Way. We played Bon Jovi’s “Livin On A Prayer” that had a rocking bass part, and many rock and contemporary Christian songs. Once we played Mumford and Sons’ “The Cave” that had a banjo part and I used my Dad’s banjo. I remember trying to learn banjo chords and a friend Gregg told me just to crank up one string a couple notches, then I could play guitar chords on a banjo. I would have never thought of that. I remember him grinning while telling me that it wasn’t even against the law.
I played at my daughter Kim’s church in Roanoke for several months
Dad had purchased a banjo many years before I joined the band but when he decided to sell it, he seemed surprised that I wanted to buy it. It had been in the family a long time and I saw no reason to let it leave us. Dad accepted Christ in the 1990’s and began taking his guitar to church to sing and play. He also learned to play some songs on the church piano. He seem to think if an instrument had strings, including a piano, that he should learn to play it. I have played with some amazingly talented people over the years and I am grateful for the many fun opportunities. I am also grateful for the opportunities I had to play with my Dad. I still play with some of the people from that first church band where I auditioned. There is so many layers and ways to look at music. I remember talking to a talented guitar player and he didn’t seem to care much about the notes he was playing in a song. It was more of a numbers thing with him. If he started at a guitar string and fret, he knew where he could go and what frets he needed to avoid. And my Dad knew a lot by just being able to hear and play what he just heard. I think even the most gifted musicians are able to continue learning new things regarding music their whole life.
Sunday morning at Belmont Christian Church, Christiansburg VA
I hope I can continue to play in the band for years to come and I wish my Mom and Dad could see me play now. You never know exactly where all the roads in life will take you, but I have found a lot of happiness and met a lot of great friends along this musical path. And this story isn’t completely finished. I have a grandson, Christophe, learning to play piano and a granddaughter, Marie, who is playing alto sax. I have other grandkids who have shown musical interest, so there are lots of future possibilities. So we will all have to wait and see what roads and opportunities the kids take. I hope you enjoyed my story and found it interesting. If it has encouraged you in any way, let me know. I would love to hear from you.
Food is part of the history of people gathering together. Whether it was in churches, among family, with friends, an important part of the get-together had to do with food.
Food breaks down barriers; it helps people to show love to each other and provides a central point for human interaction. A high priority of an event may be what kind of food is being served, but ultimately, it is about the people being served. Food is the connector. My roots go way back to food being a focus in my life, not just for daily nourishment, but for pleasure, for relationship building, and for sharing time together. It makes for lasting memories.
When I attended church with my parents as a little girl, quite often lunch was served after the service. Everyone brought several dishes and they were all laid out on tables for everyone to enjoy. Years before that, the food was actually spread on quilts on the ground. Churches eventually built tables for the spreading of food and most people brought their folding chairs on which they sat, ate, and talked with others. The women compared notes about their various dishes, often sharing recipes later. My mother and I began on Saturday to prepare food to take to church on Sunday. She taught me how to bake and help in the kitchen. As much as we could prepare ahead of time, the better, since there was not a lot of time on Sunday morning. Pies and cakes, congealed salads, and bread could be done early. Sunday morning was reserved for the hot dishes, which were cooked and put into containers to keep them as warm as possible for the mid-day meal.
One important note is that when I was young, we had three meals - breakfast, dinner (which is now lunch), and supper (which is now dinner). It later changed to the second and third meals of the day becoming lunch and dinner. I have fond memories of the older people around me still sticking with the former way of expressing their meals.
Growing up on a farm, our food mainly came from our gardens and apples grown in our orchard, along with wild berries. Blackberries, black raspberries, and wild strawberries made very tasty jams, jellies and preserves. These berries grew at different places in the area and there was general freedom to pick unless someone lived pretty close to that spot. Then we might ask permission. The occasional cherry tree fit into this category.
We worked throughout the spring and summer to plant, grow, harvest, and preserve this food. To this day, it is my favorite type of food, and I still enjoy having a garden. My parents generally worked several gardens. We didn’t buy canned food; we canned our own, mainly because of the cost, but also, it was just better. The harvest included lettuce, tomatoes, green beans, sweet corn, white potatoes, sweet potatoes, peas, onions, October beans, pattypan squash, and cantaloupes.
Some of the vegetables from my garden this year.
Swiss Chard from my garden
My parents were industrious people. They worked in the fields a lot, but we also had quite a bit of company. Family and friends would stop by, as well as people who helped with mowing and putting up hay. It would be nothing to open up some cans from the basement, heat up the contents, and add to the bread that my mother made every day. Her loaves of homemade bread were delicious. I’ve only had bread that was somewhat comparable a few times. I surely enjoyed it, with homemade butter, which was a frequent as well. It wasn’t sweet, but the texture and flavor I still remember to this day. My mother’s creamed corn, wilted lettuce (a heated vinaigrette that she made poured over fresh cut lettuce and green onions), and her creamed potatoes (not mashed, but a thick cream sauce over fresh potatoes) were the BEST!
Donnie went hunting several years ago and he brought back a turkey, not having a clue how to clean it. My mother immediately grabbed it, heated the water, and began plucking the feathers from the turkey. He was fascinated by how quickly she handled it.
My Aunt Ora Conner (my mother’s sister) was also quite the worker. All my aunts and uncles were hard workers. She could split wood, plow a garden (with a hand plow), kill a chicken, as well as all the things that my mother could do in the kitchen. She fed a lot of people in her lifetime. One of my favorites at her house was honey (with the comb), to which I was not accustomed. She made the best coleslaw with her own cooked dressing on top. No food processor in her life, just a hand shredder. She lived by us for awhile, and I would sneak off to go visit her when I heard she had made pumpkin pies. They were slightly browned on top from the wood stove. Excellent!
Mama and Aunt Ora taught me a lot about the kitchen, which I passed on to my children, as best as I could. Given that I was quite busy raising three children and working a demanding job, my picture of food may have been a little different than my mother’s, but, nevertheless, it was important in our home. We ate our meals together as our family grew, just like I had as a child. Although we had more prepared food (which was generally quicker to get ready), I never lost sight of the value of fresh food. I had the memory base of tables laden with food. I was blessed, I know. From there, my daughters and I began to create our own legacy of food dishes. When my daughter, Kim, was leaving for college, she gave me a journal with recipes in which she had included those that we had come to like, including the Jello cake recipe that came from Donnie’s mother. This is part of what Kim wrote in the journal inscription –
“The recipes I have written in here are only a beginning. It includes recipes we have made together, recipes you all love, and recipes we have always wanted to make but haven’t yet. Cooking is something the Edmonds girls will always have together…”
Kim Edmonds Tulou
My sister-in-law, Linda Walters, taught me how to make a good biscuit when my husband I were first married. She also shared her pickle recipe with me that my family loves. For years, Linda hosted the Edmonds family for Christmas Eve dinners. Her food was always great. My friend, Pam Harris, has given me many recipes over the years. One that continues as a favorite is her Sweet Potato Casserole, which my family loves. I’ve made her soft sugar cookies with my grandchildren many times.
In my kitchen today, I have more cookbooks than any person should have. My Facebook page is filled with recipes. I continue to have the passion for food that was instilled in me. I do like to eat, but mostly I enjoy finding just the right recipe to please people. My family has many treasured recipes and is still discovering new ones that are becoming traditions. Food is still the focus of our family get-togethers. We have had celebrations, joyous occasions, wedding and baby showers, holiday meals, birthday fun, and, sadly, we’ve had times when we must grieve around a food table.
We love our family time, and it is always fun to eat at my children’s homes. A new chapter has begun with our grandchildren now making dishes that are quite delicious. It is such a joy to spend that time with them in the kitchen and to taste their dishes that amaze us. When we are all together, it is nothing to ask someone to stir or drain a pot, chop or peel, or set the table. That’s where we usually are – in the kitchen. So the legacy continues with the next generation.
Since we retired several years ago, we’ve had many travel adventures, fun with grandchildren, and amazing experiences. We decided to start a blog to share some of our stories and insights. We are not always on the go, although some probably think we are, but life is going, whether we are or not. So we might as well get the most from our days as they slip by. Sometimes it is on a motorcycle or a Miata ride, maybe in our camper or somehow exploring the world around us. Sometimes, for me, it’s still working on a Human Resources project, reading a book, or writing and reflecting on life. One thing that we have discovered is that God and our friends and family make life better; and learning, growing and experiencing new things are always part of our Fun Days On the Go!
1/20/23. My Dad’s Birthday
My Dad had an independent spirit. I have several friends who have their own business and I see how hard they work to pursue their business dream. As I reflect on my Dad and his life, he too had that dream and he made it a reality twice – one of his stores was at the intersection of the Blue Ridge Parkway and Shooting Creek Road in Floyd, Virginia, and the other was on Lick Ridge, Check, Virginia. I was about one year old when my Dad sold the store on the Parkway, but looking at the ledgers of both stores (which I now have), that store had quite a few customers. Daddy only had a 4th grade education. He loved his middle name Keen, and he had a gold tooth in his denture plate. That was done quite often in those days, just to be snazzy, I guess. Within the family, he often went by Morris K. to distinguish him from his nephew, Morris Ray Agee.
We saved his store sign. It now has a proud place on our basement wall.
I remember some things about the store in Check. Daddy loved being a merchant. The store was a small cinder-block building beside a gravel road in the Lick Ridge area of Floyd County. He sold flour, sugar, animal feed, eggs, overalls, socks, coffee, kool-aid and candy treats, among other necessities, which was a real variety for such a small store. He even had salt-cured hams at times. Animal feed and flour came in sacks with flowers on them, so later they became pillow cases in thrifty households.
Neighbors and family members who bought from the stores had a tab that was kept open until it was paid. One particular memory was of a man who lived several miles away who would come with a sack on his back to carry home what he bought. He didn’t come by a road; he walked over the hills to get there. So the store had a valuable purpose to the neighbors who lived on the Ridge and in Floyd, and so did Daddy.
Couple pages of his ledgers.
He worked hard each day on the farm, in addition to the store, milking cows, feeding the pigs, gathering eggs from chickens (we had a lot), building and fixing fences, but his favorite thing was going to church on Sunday. He wore a hat and suit with a tie. He loved to sing. In fact, when we went to visit someone, he greeted them when they opened the door with a few lines of a hymn, generally Amazing Grace or What a Friend We Have in Jesus. He was a simple man; he didn’t ask for much. He would often say, a “pack of nabs and a coke” was all he needed.
Even though Daddy was independent in many ways, he showed his dependence on Jesus when times were hard. I would often see him on his knees praying. He taught me about living out his days with purpose and prayer.
My Dad and Mom on their wedding day, February 25, 1956.
Jan. 2, 2023. Karen and I took our E-bikes to The New River Trail at Draper VA and headed to Allisonia. We crossed several bridges along the way including the bridge crossing Claytor Lake. The weather was very nice, 60 degrees and calm considering our normal January weather. We were some of the few who took advantage of such a beautiful day on the trail. We retrofitted Karen’s trike a couple months ago, adding a battery and motor, to make it an E-trike and I purchased an E-bike around the same time. We have really enjoyed our e-bikes. We took the Huckleberry Trail a few weeks ago from Christiansburg to Blacksburg for a fun ride.
Fun Days On the Go 