Chapel of Hope Stories

Dear Reader:

After I got up yesterday morning and had ” Come to myself” ( as Tima is fond of saying each morning) something caught my eye.

The rising sun had beat out the clouds for a short bright morning ray that landed squarely on my newly adopted cherub and he was all lit up with sunshine…the first light entering one pane on my French doors and as I lay stretched out on my loveseat… I jumped up in happiness to check it out upclose! Perfect!

Perusing reader responses from a blog post, is un- chronological… the first top responses were written much later than the last reader responses… the early birds.

So when I read Gingi Edwards’ comment… I initially was confused…it read:

” I love the suggestion for the name BECKHAM-that is ” swwleet” and her reasoning is so right.” Love you!

” Whose reasoning for Beckham is so right…”?

Then it dawned on me that I needed to keep scrolling down to the earlier comments and ‘viola…’

… up popped Linda Carson and she had come up with a name for the Cupid that Gingi was now endorsing/Linda Carson… my earliest chemo nurse and friend.

Here is what Linda wrote and it certainly brightened my day like my sun beaming Cupid. Two great ways to start the day!

From Linda… ” BECKHAM” … should be his name… the male version of Becky. You bring all of us love for so many things and a love for reading and sharing.

Linda … nothing could mean more to me than your words and my Cupid’s name. And endorsed by Gingi… a full ❤️ heart!

Happy Birthday Beckham … January 26 2024… you are already bringing joy to my life!

So until tomorrow…

AMEN………

Dear Reader:

My friend ( as I told you yesterday) Wednesday morning used my ” workout time” to help me take plants out on my patio and add on to it simultaneously. She wandered around and found the broken Cupid statue that would probably be tossed if I didn’t save it since it was in bad shape and looked …like no other Cupid in any photos.

But I instantly fell in love with my broken weathered statue… a Cupid not shooting arrows into two individuals who fall in love.

But a Cupid absorbed in reading-my greatest love, with a secret story still held within it. His personal story. A Cupid story I hope to unveil one day.

I have , no doubt, that with a little more cleaning , and a lot of love HE will tell me how he has two broken toes and a hole in his right wing. He needs to be loved, his ” true” story told and become a member in my new happy place… adopted and loved by me in my ” forever ” home.

So until tomorrow. (In the big picture recognize the ” God Wink” that brought Cupid to me and discover why!

Dear Reader.

An earlier incident Wednesday morning touched me so much that when this National Hug Day popped up on my screen … I felt compelled to share this with you.

One of my new friends at The Palms is a staff member who works with patients creating new ways to keep patients ” up and ” at’em.”

For example when she stopped by yesterday morning she asked if I was up to a walk in the courtyard … she would help me take the plants that had to be brought in … back out and move some other items in my courtyard space… and, in addition, take down Ann’s hall decor from her birthday.

Before we left on our creative ” energy booster ” activities, she confessed that she had gotten some bad news… she had been diagnosed with cancer a few years back but was pronounced cancer-free after her initial treatments.

Recently though she started experiencing the same initial discomforts and so they ran more tests and Tuesday she received the news the cancer had returned. I told her I was shocked she came to work and she said, mentally… she was better off here.

We hugged and as we were walking past the kitchen table she pointed and asked if I had Valentines cookies out… ” No.. these are ” wooden heart hugs” on occasion when you really need one. ”

It wasn’t until later that it dawned on me that is anyone ever needed a hug it was her.

So I got a card and wrote her… attaching her ” Hug” to it.

I think everyday should be Hug Day… because the touch and feeling of another human empowering us has been proven in medical, scientific, and clinical studies to improve our whole being…our ” spoonful of sugar.”

I will end with some cute pictures I found in connection with hugs.

And look at my courtyard after we worked together adding items to my patio… come on spring!!!

Eileen ( one of the employee s here) said she would help me put up birthday decorations Monday night for my next door neighbor Ann’s birthday Tuesday…hopefully while Ann was sleeping . Ann is my next door neighbor who has become a wonderful friend.

It was after 10 when we finished… we had done it… Ann never woke up.

After she was up Tuesday morning…she was still clueless about the outside decorations until I took her out in the hall … and she was thrilled.

I had gotten so involved with her birthday that Cindy Ashley arrived (which I knew about)and thank goodness she heard my loud mouth next door and came over.

Cindy and I had a great visit …always falling back on our shared love of books and reading.So enjoyable! Aww…Summerville friends always make me a little homesick. ( though she and husband Dennis have moved to Folly Beach fairly recently.)

Ann’s sister-in law showed me a picture of Ann in a beauty contest to family and friends in high school-you go Ann!

One of the sweetest stories came from Faith who just started working here three weeks ago …when I asked her name and she replied ” It is Faith.”

Ann and I both told her what a beautiful name that was…she then continued by adding that she was an identical twin…and her sister’s name is ” Hope.” She said they always stayed close because you can’t separate Faith from Hope or vice-versa.

Again I was reminded how close to a memorable story we always are …if we take time to let another person in.

She was right and her parents knew it too when they named the twins. You can’t have one without the other.

Walsh called and invited me to an early supper and to watch Rutledge’s basketball game! What a fun day and evening!

I went outside in hall yesterday afternoon and good timing.. one of the staff had wooden hearts in a wagon and was giving them out for free… this woodwork fit perfectly in my winter wreath! 💗👍Ready for Valentines!

In Life’s Extras … Archibald Rutledge tells this story. ” I once had a curious experience with a star. I was driving home to the plantation in the old motor-less days, when I was overtaken at dusk by a storm of hurricane violence. Inky darkness shrouded the world. I could not even see the road ahead or behind. The thunder and lightning were appalling.

Finally , a bolt struck a pine not twenty feet from my buggy. My horse had stood a good deal from this storm: but now he made a sudden dash. He broke away through the forest and I could not hold him. In a moment he had run between two pines standing close together, had smashed both shafts, , and had torn loose from the buggy and me. Into the howling darkness he vanished.

The rain came down as if it meant to make a joke of The Flood. The thunder blared. The lightning became most uncomfortably intimate and intrusive. I heard near me great trees go crashing down in the fury of the tempest. Alone I was, defenseless, in profound darkness. I knew in a way where I was, and to locate myself the better I looked toward what I believed to be the west.

Through the heavy arras of the rain, to my amazement, I saw a little rift in the storm- rack , hardly bigger than my hand, in the very heart of which the evening star gleamed in dewey- silver solitude. I all the stillness of felicity it shone sternly, saying to my heart, ” This storm is an imposter. It is momentary. The sky is here , and the stars: all shall be well”

Amid all the desolation about me, and the seemingly hopeless chaos, here came a celestial message. Shining through the storm-rack, it’s light reminded me of something past our world. Taking heart , I waded out to the road, found my horse waiting for me half a mile down gleaming it’s gleaming length, rode through homeward through the breaking storm, and reached the house in full , calm starlight.

Stars fill me with a sense of God; and the heart cannot help being grateful when it remembers that the beauty and the wonder of them may be accounted things not to enable us to exist , but gifts of love to make us JOYOUS!

I kept turning up the heat but the difference between what it was set for and the actual heat coming in was in a double digits lapse. So the first “aide” to come into my room quickly turned off the heat vents completely ( cold air was coming down in every vent-felt like air-conditioning…. Burr! I was miserable…

Mandy and John to the rescue … they came bringing an electric heater… between that and the freezing vents closed plus the electric throw blanket… I knew I could make it through this latest challenge .

Later in the day Tommy arrived bringing home-made soups along with George and Pip. They immediately hopped beside me on the electric throw and Pip began snoring away.

Later Kaitlyn came by … bearing items from Publix for me and texting me a photo of her last Friday… (upon my request.) She took the soon to be adopted puppy for a Vet’ visit and a medical clearance .

Jo Dufford sent me her favorite Winnie the Pooh powerful quotes…So touching!

Closing with a piece of prose ( that Patty Knight sent me) that cements turning our problems over to GOD!

Dear Reader:

It was August 7, 2010 … three months after my first grandchild ( Eva Cate was born) when Honey persuaded me to visit her… Mike had discovered a ” treasure” on one of his motorcycle trips and now she wanted to show me the The Chapel of Hope in ( amazingly named town of Trust North Carolina! So off we went!

From the first moment I entered the chapel I felt the builder’s and creator’s presence-Beverly Barutio ‘s amazing story of faith in fighting cancer that lead her from Savannah to Trust and her mission to thank God and St Jude for directing her path and giving her more years of life.

On one of my visits, a news reporter from a nearby newspaper in Tennessee told me that he always wanted Beverly to tell the story of how her little Chapel had changed so many lives… but she adamantly declined.

Her mission was to create it and that she had faith someone would come along one day to tell the story. Bill looked at me… “You are that storyteller .”

I had never even heard the term ” blog” but with a leap of faith on August 7, 2010. I started….( Beverly had passed away from the next return of cancer …five years before I took up her quest) …but I have heard from her husband and children thanking me for ” taking up the torch.”

Soon I realized I would have to find a way to combine my journey with cancer amid Beverly’s earlier trials and do my part intertwining our separate mission stories and also our missions together. And to date it has been a daily love task to continue this combined unity of love!

As my blog grew I began to pick up familiar expressions you still recognize today… ” God Winks” ( from Squire Rushnell’s books) and my eyes became open to seeing these daily signs on ordinary days.

When the tenth anniversary arrived ( August 7,2020) Anne Peterson… my multi-talented friend, sent this to me.

In fact yesterday I received the most beautiful card and message from Anne. along with the most beautiful spiritual verse … that I now have memorized!

And my final ” contributing ” Editor” Winnie the Pooh… with his words of common sense wisdom

” Be JOYFUL in HOPE, PATIENT In AFFLICTION ( me) and FAITHFUL in PRAYER.” *** I will memorize this verse to heart!

This August 7 2024 will mark the fourteenth year of my daily blog post!

Another contributing ” editor” is Winnie the Pooh … of course.

So until tomorrow…

Dear Reader:

Actually he relented and gave mom enough time to get a wedding dress and tell family and friends to show up on a certain day … and POW they were married! ( As a child I loved hearing mother dreamily retelling the story and I would call out” Again, Again!”

***. When this little narrative was published and given to Henry Ford the, ” The Auto King”, he was so moved by the novel idea behind the book… he ordered 25,000 copies for his employees!

One day it came to Rutledge… ” Creation supplies us with only two kinds of things: necessities and extras. Sunlight, air, food, shelter-these are among the bare necessities. With them we can exist. But moonlight, and starlight are distinctly extras; so are music, perfumes, and flowers. ( The wind is perhaps a necessity-but the song that it croons through the morning pines is a different thing.”

” The fascinating thought behind these startling observations is this question… Who put them here and for what purpose.

One night-sitting with a ” dying friend” something happened to Rutledge’s friend that he never forgot… a mockingbird broke into song in the moonlight… if was as if the mockingbird was chanting divinely. Suddenly Rutledge’s friend sat up… pushed all the medicine off his bedside table and declared that he was going to live! He felt like all that beauty and peace were really the love of God and now he understood that God just doesn’t love us with words but He loves us by giving us everything we need … plus the extras in life.”

” Rutledge concludes that all he knows is that life’s extras had done more for his faith in GOD than all the sermons he had ever heard!” The human mind might reject these different Divine observations but the human heart can hardly do so. And in things spiritual I do not know but that the heart is by far the the better guide. “

The night before mother left for the Presbyterian Home she brought this book over and told me this book did more for her faith through all the hard times than any other but now she wanted me to have it.

I started crying… mother was in middle stage of dementia but still I wanted her to take it… but she admitted she could no longer read… but she wanted me to read it and one day pass it on down. As I started sniffling again… she reached out and squeezed my hand as she smiled: ” Don’t worry… I know it line by line and it is memorized in my heart and I don’t have dementia there. ”

So when Mandy, Lassie, and Doodle left yesterday to return to 100 Rainbow Road to turn off the water… and cover the pipes before the weekend freeze … I made them promise to bring that book back to me… and they did!!!!!!💗

So until tomorrow… stay WARM! And bring in your extras-plants and flowers and watch a sunset!

Dear Reader:

Never let your fire go out spark by spark in the swamps of the ” not quite, the not yet, and the not at all. ”

Each of us must follow our own paths that match the unique insights and dreams that reveal who we really are… never imitating someone else’s personal revelation or dismissing it… but respecting it… like we desire others to do for us.

And how blessed I am! Yesterday Mandy, Doodle, and Lassie went back over to the house to check the water pipes and then secure them before the deep freeze hitting record lows for our area of the state arrive this weekend …They will also bring ” Big Red” inside…( my beloved red geranium that was waiting on me after my first breast cancer surgery in 2008. No card or ID was on it… but it has never left me… for the past sixteen years it has bloomed and bloomed and bloomed… never deserting me… so it is going inside until the temperatures get above … below freezing nights and early morning temps!

They are also bringing precious items (from family long ago) that mean the world to me! They will be exhausted, no doubt, when they leave! Another dent in the on-going arduous process of moving! I feel so useless watching others give up their time so generously to help me and our family… I am so lucky… so blessed.

I am having some more medical issues that require dressings and added medical attention. Another obstacle, another challenge that tests my faith …allowing God to pick up the lantern and guide me ( once more) through it .

So until tomorrow… thank so many of you for responding with memories of the happy role Winnie the Pooh played in your life and as Jo Dufford reminded me… especially on Pooh’s birthday ” Today is my favorite day!”

Today January 19th is Robert E Lee’s birthday and my ” insanely talented” nephew – jazz guitarist Lee Barbour!!!!!

PS. … Stay tuned tomorrow… changes are still happening in new additions here at The Palms…under Mandy’s creative foresight!

Dear Reader:

Today is the ” The Cuddliest National Holiday- Winnie the Pooh Holiday” and its author AA Milne ‘s actual birth date!

Many people mark today with Teddy Bear picnics… featuring plenty of 🍯 honey!!!

The history of Winnie’s creation goes back to a black bear named Winnie the Pooh ( the former mascot of the Winnipeg Regiment of the Canadian Army in WWI. … thus the name.

The little black bear was given to the London Zoo to protect it ( when the regiment was sent to the front) Meanwhile while AA Milne’s son, Christoper visited the zoo every day until his father returned home and took up the daily visit.

Based on his observations over time the children’s author wrote in 1926 the first series of Winnie the Pooh and Christopher Robin … now his son’s name. Soon after the first series was published ( an over night sensation) Disney bought the rights to its character and his image was created by illustrator E H Shepard.

One of Winnie’s largest invitations lately, was to the King Charles’ courtyard coronation celebration…where he shared his history with Tom Cruise in a video shown the courtyard guests.

Today Winnie the Pooh’s books have been translated in 22 languages….****The 1958 LATIN translation… spent 20 Plus Weeks on the NY TIMES- the only book in Latin ever to do so!

Pooh’s popularity remains undiminished ! A 2004 Forbes article describes her ( yes her) as the second highest earning fictional character – only supplanted by Mickey Mouse!

And now… how about you? Was Winnie the Pooh a part of your childhood or do you even still have your childhood Winnie the Pooh bear…please send comments or even photos… if Pooh played a part in your life.

Email: rebecca_dingle @ hotmail.com

Even as cognitively gone as I was when first entering The Palms …Pooh was already here waiting on me – amazing what a difference it made to me! Stephanie Ballard … my long ago baby sitter … picked this Winnie the Pooh (the Gardner) out for me when she and her daughter went to Disney World several years ago and found this Pooh at Epcot,,, and it stayed in my bedroom from the moment it arrived until moving with me to our new happy place… accompanied by the book /Positively Pooh/ … Jo sent me first thing after the move!!!

So until tomorrow… Isn’t it remarkable how one childhood fictional character or toy ( Polly the doll) stays faithful by our side through out our lives… a reminder that love and faithfulness comes in many different forms !

Have a great day… since it is one of the last warm afternoons before the next frigid cold blast arrives this weekend for the Lowcountry … Teddy bear picnic day!