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April 16 Day 40 Richard M. Nixon’s Library
My day is always refreshing when it starts out at the gym. I am so thankful for my guest passes for this week. When I arrived home from the gym Betts was waiting for me at Linda’s house with a big bag of freshly picked oranges off her tree. Each orange is large and beautiful! Of course I ate one as soon as she left. It was big in flavor too. Oh so delicious!!! Never take for granted the beautiful, flavorful foods that God has designed for our pleasure. As I travel the country and see the great crowds of people (mostly in cars on the jam packed freeways) and go into so many grocery stores I am amazed that our world produces enough food for this country to eat. So many other places in this world are not so fortunate.
I did something today I should not have done. I went to a library and found they had a used bookstore there. Hmm…well of course I bought a few (MORE) books. Books are my downfall. All non-fiction, Christian related topics. Some I will actually give away because I already own them and just know that someone else will surely love the book as I do. Some I’ll keep. But the bottom line is that I have already bought too many other books that I do want to keep. I really go into the used book stores with one intention. I’m looking for all the books written by Norman Vincent Peale. Most are out of print and they are becoming more difficult to find. I already have several but would like to keep searching for more. If you haven’t read any of his books you might find him interesting to read. THE POWER OF POSITIVE THINKING was his first and most famous title. My favorite title that I have read by him is LIVE YOUR ENTIRE LIFE. His books actually gave me the courage to contemplate this trip I am on. One of Peale’s favorite verses is “I can do all things through Christ who Strengthens me.” Phil 3:14. I have adopted that verse as my travel motto.
I met a friend from over 32 years go for lunch at Chili’s in Yorba Linda. It was so good to see a familiar face from the past and get caught up on our lives. After we moved from Southern California in 1983 the friend Cathy that I met today traded homes with us for vacation one year. She stayed in our home in the San Francisco area and we stayed in her family home in Yorba Linda. Cathy loves the Lord and it was so wonderful to be able to just talk about the amazing grace of God in our lives and pray with one another.
We had the opportunity to meet a special lady in a booth across the aisle. She was eating a delicious looking lunch alone and I just felt I was supposed to hear her story. So when I saw she was ready to go I just started talking to her, and soon Cathy joined me and what a beautiful story she had. Her name is Lucille and she is 85 years old. She sounded and moved more like a 45 or 50 year old in good health. She was so interesting to talk to. I asked her if she would tell me her story. She opened up like a morning blossom and just radiated as she shared her life with her husband and children. She has been a widow for 8 years and had been married since she was 15 years old. She told how she and her husband built a garage on their property and for the next two years lived there with her husband and children as she and her husband physically built the house attached to the garage. She made a statement that took on a very deep meaning for me. She said “we lived in the house we built”. I heard that on a much greater scale. I saw the comparison to our lives. “We live in the house we built” meaning we live in the life we build around ourselves. I have experienced other’s lifestyles that are so different than my own and realize we all choose to live in different ways by the choices we make, by what we nurture and grow around us. We take it upon ourselves to “build” what we want around ourselves. We choose how we want to live, where we live, with whom we want to live and then wonder why life turns out like it does. Perhaps it would be better to live in the “garage” for a while and slowly with God’s direction allow God to fashion our house. As time passes our house would take shape, built on the foundation of God’s word. “Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain” Psalm 127:1. “We live in the house we built”. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather live in the house that the Lord built, even if I find myself living in the garage for a while.
Yorba Linda is where we lived when both our children were born. We owned our house there for about 8 years. That was location where we had a mudslide that took all the hill below us right up to our yard. It actually sounded like a freight train going through our house as the hills above and below us gave way. Our next door neighbor lost his yard right up to his pool. That was an amazing and dark night! At one point that night Dave was trying to help the neighbor who lived in the house one street below us and became mired in the wet earth up to his thighs and could not get out. Well, eventually he did escape by lying prostrate and wriggling his way through the heavy wet mud. It was a frightening experience. We also had to be evacuated two times because of threat of fire. The homes in our neighborhood survived more than once because they were all stucco and had tile roofs. The homes in close proximity that had shake roofs burned. When I look back I realize it really was not a fun place to live. There have been a lot of changes in the “little town” of Yorba Linda in the last 32 years. It was way out of the way back then and we were there when the first four lane Highway was built. Now that same highway has 8 lanes. 5 lanes going one direction and 3 going the opposite direction. And that doesn’t include the turn lanes.
I guess that is enough of my history. Let’s go to today.
I actually went to two libraries today. The second one, also in Yorba Linda is President Richard M. Nixon’s library built next to his birthplace. The actual house and bed he was born in is on display on the grounds. Also the helicopter he flew in is on the grounds and we were allowed to go through it. A lot of famous people both from the United States and around the world at one time sat in those seats.
The library was beautifully designed and had interesting and informative displays both about his political career before his presidency, during, as well as a comprehensive coverage on the circumstances that led up to his resignation. Very interesting reading. I did not have the opportunity to see all of the library as my time was limited due to my overscheduled day. Days are never long enough for me. There is too much living to fit into my daylight hours. I thoroughly enjoyed the self-guided tour. I recommend seeing as many Presidential libraries as you have opportunity to do so. I always learn so much. Tomorrow Linda and I are going to President Ronald Reagan’s Presidential Library. I am really interested in going to his. The one thing I am going to try to do is to remember to take more pictures on my IPhone so I can blog more. When I take them on my camera I cannot put them on the blog. I did have one taken by my phone today and I have already put it on for you to see.
In the room behind me there is a home Bible Study taking place. It is on I Corinthians 13. I’m half listening and it is a very interesting discussion. My friends attend a Lutheran Church here in their “little town” of 137,000 people surrounded by millions. The city of Orange covers 25.2 square miles. In Orange County California you cannot tell where one city begins and another ends. The homes just keep going on and on and on…The area is laid out in square grids on the flatlands. Very easy to navigate. All you have to know is North and South and East and West. The highest recorded temperature is 110 degrees and the coolest recorded temperature is 22 degrees. When we lived in Orange County we often experienced 90 degrees on Christmas day. I would not recommend retiring here. There are just too many people. Wisconsin is looking better and better. I’ll take the snow.
Well, this is an overview of my day. It has been a fun one. And the good part is that it is not even 9:00 p.m. yet and I am finished with my blog.
Good night
April 14 Day 38 Life is different here
Everyday is so different. When you walk into someones life, their life must go on. So today I lived in the shadow of my friend. When we say we are busy what does that mean to each individual? My busy is different than the next persons busy and the next person’s busy is different than the next and so on…It was a busy, lovely shadow to live in because I was not the one that had to do all planning and work and schedule or deal with the traffic and rushing not to be late. So I just sat in the back seat during California rush hour traffic as Linda was busy maneuvering in and out between cars and constantly being certain that the exit she was taking was the right one. We left the house at 6:50 a.m. and arrived SAFELY (whew!) at 7:30 a.m. to the school where she drove her granddaughter so she could attend a class many miles away.
Today is Linda’s birthday and her driver’s licence is now expired. So…we drove down to San Clemente (where the crowds would be smaller) to go to the Dept. of Motor Vehicles so she could renew her expired licence. We stood in a long, long line for quite awhile (and that was before we got into the building) and by the time we got into the building, where the line was about three times as long as the line outside, it was time to leave so we could pick up granddaughter because her class would be over by the time we arrived back to the school. So no licence renewal today. Picked up granddaughter and then made a potty stop at McDonalds and drove to another school for another class. We drove around looking at multi-million dollar houses until time to pick up granddaughter at school number 2. It doesn’t take much to make a house be a million dollar house in this area. A normal three bedroom ranch in a nice neighborhood, probably 1800 to 2000 square feet will sell for about $500,000 plus. It is crazy!
Back to the busy day. Granddaughter was picked up after the second class and then we were off to do some birthday shopping for the birthday girl. The item she was looking for was not there so we left and drove back toward home to meet Linda’s daughter, (mother of the granddaughter) for lunch. Had a delicious Mexican lunch and left. I was dropped off at home because I needed to go and pick up another friend so we could continue to have a busy day.
This friend is a woman I first met almost 40 years ago. As I briefly mentioned in a previous blog post, our daughter Rebecca is adopted. This friend I speak of now is our daughter’s birth mother’s mother. My husband I first met her when we were interviewed by her daughter as possible parents for her unborn child. We found out later that no other couples were interviewed because once they (Carole and her mother) met us it was decided that we would be offered the position as parents to Carole’s unborn child. Well, to fast forward 30 years later we located both Carole and her mom, Betts. Through an amazing work of God our lives were reconnected. The entire story is awesome so if any of you who read this blog is interested in knowing more just let me know and I’ll write up the whole story. Well since we found Rebecca’s birth family, her maternal grandmother has come to our home every year in the summer to visit us for a short while. Needless to say we have become good friends. Betts is an amazing woman! She has given me much encouragement and inspiration in many areas of my life, one being the writing of my memoirs and the other, regaining my health so that I could be healthy and vital going into my later season of my life. She is true inspiration not only me, but to many others whose lives she’s touched. Betts is a published author and has accomplished many awards in her life for her outstanding works. She received the most prestigious award from China that is given to a non- citizen. I read a quote once that went something like this: “To inspire someone actually means to blow new breath of life into them”. That is what she did for me.
Well, I picked up Betts and we had a wonderful afternoon together. First we got lost in a construction zone and turned around and went the wrong way on a street that only went the other way. But we wove ourselves out of that mess and ended up where I intended we should go. We visited the first home my husband and I purchased 6 months after we married. Next we drove by the next house we bought 3 years later. The first house we purchase was $33,000. Now it would sell in the ballpark of about $600 to $700 thousand dollars. Yes, you read that right.
The second house sits on a high hill that overlooks the Anaheim valley area. When I say “overlooks” I mean it only overlooks the valley when you can see through the smog.” It was sunshine and hazy today. I could actually see the Anaheim hills a few miles away. While at the last house I introduced myself, explaining that we were previous owners of the house. We were invited into the back yard so we could see some footprints we made of our daughters feet in 1977 when my husband poured a concrete piece covering a drainage area in the back yard. There they were, little footprints and the date still clearly marking the slab. I’ll post a photo.
After leaving the Yorba Linda Hills we drove to Anytime Fitness where my friend works out. She was able to sponsor me for a guest past. When they heard the story of my trip and my 80 pound weight loss they offered me a pass for the days I would be in town. I thank you Anytime Fitness for your generous gift to me. And what a gym! Never was I so impressed. It is in a large mall. You enter on the main level and then go downstairs into a massive group of rooms filled with up to date exercise equipment of all varieties. After having the rapid heart episode in the mile high cities of Denver and Albuquerque and not being able to exert myself, this workup was my first true equipment work out in a couple of weeks. It felt good and I pushed hard. Hope to be able to attend each day I am here.
I took Betts home and then came back to my current place of residence and freshened up and changed clothes so I could attend a family birthday party for Linda. Pizza and salad. Very delicious salad. I took a bite of pizza but was too full to eat more. Now the party is over and I am tired after that one and a half hour workout without a hydro-massage afterwards. Bed beckons. There is always so much more I would like to write but must turn in as I want to get up very early tomorrow to work out, come back to the house and leave by 9:00 a.m. I’ll be off to see some more very important people in my life. Tell you more tomorrow evening if the Good Lord wills.
Goodnight.
p.s. Posting a photo of a quilt that Carole made for her mother. All the photos on the quilt are of Betts and family throughout her life. I even took a couple of them when they came to see me in Wisconsin.
Visions of Poetry 