Friends and memories remain through the years

Last week I heard about the death of our friend, neighbor and my editor of the Butler newspaper, C.A. Moore. During the years that Lester was minister of the Ohio Street and Mt. Zion United Methodist Churches, C.A. and his wife, Ann, were neighbors across the street. His mother, Bea Moore, was a member of our church, but C.A. and his wife were good Presbyterians where he sang in the choir among other responsibilities.

Although I had written an anonymous column in the Archie News called "Go Tell Aunt Rhody," my first regular column writing was in Butler, and C.A. was my first editor. In his honor this week I got out some of my old columns, which had the title, "Caught in the Middle." I chose that title because I was a middle-aged woman in a middle-sized town in the mid-west and always seemed to get caught in the middle of things. Maybe you can see how the title morphed into my present title.

The old column I reread was based on an article I had seen about making sure that the first glimpse a person has after stepping into your house reflects the real you. At that time our oldest son, Michael, was at the University of Missouri as a freshman, Shirley was a junior at the Butler High School, Mark was in the junior high at Butler and Susan was in third grade at the Butler Elementary School.

My column mentioned that a person stepping into my front door of that parsonage would be looking straight ahead to the dining room table after first seeing the piano and piano bench to the left and a bookcase filled with the Encyclopedia Britannica on the right wall of the living room. What they would see first would be Mark's track shoes on the piano bench, several of Susan's music pieces scattered on the piano along with some homework to go back to school. On the wall over the piano they might notice the six-month picture of each of the four children hung in order left to right and a wilted paper turkey that Susan made in school.

They wouldn't know it by looking, but the bookcase that held the encyclopedias, was made by Michael while he was a student at Archie's school shop class two years before. But they could see Shirley's clarinet case on the dining room table, along with a stack of Leslie Weatherhead's "Will of God" ready for me to take to the young adult Sunday school class I taught. The buffet had a time honored Christmas decoration that I had kept since Lester's and my first Christmas together. It was made of red and green tissue paper. On the table was a nice ornament given to me by the Sunday school class and Mark's science textbook partially covering a brown stain on the lace tablecloth.

After reading that 43-year-old column I wondered how much different would the same type of article sound today. What does the view from my present day front door tell about my personality?

Well, before they would open the front door they might have to step over the dish where we feed our two outdoor cats in bad weather, since I don't want to risk stepping outside in my slippers. Inside the door they would notice the blue and white Nevada hanging that the Soroptomist Club was selling a few years ago. But it isn't hanging; it's covering the old oak library table that my brother Harold made for Mama when he was in the Nevada High School in 1925. Above it hang two Christmas wreaths; one was made by Nelle Hillier from Bittersweet branches.

On the table is a sack of birdseed, three squares of bird suet, two different types of Welcome signs, a stained glass candleholder and an American flag rolled inside a plastic wrapping. One step in and they would see a picture of my family at my parent's 50th anniversary, pictures of Lester's parents, my grandparents, each of my parents in separate frames, a family collage of the Lester Thornton family made by our granddaughter-in-law, two ornaments won in the races held at the Wayside Reunions in different years and a stack of books waiting for Susan to take them back to the Cottey Library. A bookcase holds one copy each of my books and Ellen's books and my brother Ralph's book of poetry. A bench nearby holds a package addressed to Shirley for her to take up to her apartment, and a nearly worn-out rag rug woven by Ellen.

Straight ahead is my office where I am writing this column today and realize I am about out of space for my column. But I also see that the 43 years hasn't changed me that much judging by the views from the door. I always was a careless housekeeper with beloved family members and friends.