Hair Loss? What’s This Sudden Loss All About?

Are you worried about sudden hair loss? This post might help you decided if you should inquire further in to the reasons for loss, and what you should do about it.

This post will focus on the importance of seeking early diagnosis and treatment for hair loss.

A summary of the beginnings of my hair loss journey:

In the late spring of 2010, after the sudden and unexpected death of my daughter, I began to notice extensive hair loss.  At first, I was not concerned. I’d noticed a bald place developing at top backside of my head several years earlier, and while I did not like the optics, I chalked it up to thinning hair due to aging. My mother had thinning hair as she aged, so I assumed I would too. I took vitamins and tried styling options, but mostly I ignored it until I noticed an acceleration of loss of hair when I washed my hair. I also remember that after my daughter’s death my clothing was covered with silver white strands of hair. I particularly remember my signature black hoodie, the one I wore all the time, covered with so much hair that my neighbor, and kind and caring woman, would actually begin picking the hair off my hoodie as she lovingly asked how I was doing. She commented on my hair loss, wondered if I had checked it out with a doctor as she consoled me over my recent loss. She also alerted me about getting some answers for the hair loss. She had gorgeous thick silver hair, striking in its style and color, and she too had known great loss and stress, so I valued her advice even as I dismissed my own hair loss by saying, “Yes, the tinsel is falling off the old tree.”

I had more going on in my life at that time to worrying about my hair, so it didn’t make an appointment with a dermatologist right away. In fact, I didn’t even know who I should consult for hair loss. At the time of this acceleration of hair loss, I was deeply grieving, in shock over my daughter’s death, and I also began to have arrhythmia symptoms in my heart, and worsening GI symptoms. I was seeing a mental health therapist too, so the prospects of seeing one more doctor did not appeal to me.

When I did consult doctors regarding the hair loss, I was told the loss was from stress. “Your hair will come back. Don’t worry,” I was told. Yes, stress was certainly involved in my hair loss, but it was not the total reason for it.

In a nut shell, after the initial dismissive answers for why I was losing my hair and experiencing other worrisome scalp symptoms, I went on to consult a number of uninformed and dismissive doctors, including dermatologists over the next three years between 2010 and 2013. In that timeframe, the continued hair loss, and scalp redness, itching, flaking, and pain I was experiencing could no longer be ignored by me.  None of these medical professionals took me too seriously and continued to say my hair loss was stress related.  Even as I lost my eyebrows, suddenly and completely, my primary care doctor seemed dismissive and asked if I had been plucking them.  (Yes, she did!  That is exactly what she asked.)

Finally in 2012 I spoke to my my endocrinologist about my hair loss as I was seeing her for a regularly scheduled appointment for treatment of Hashimoto’s thyroiditis and pre-diabetes. She clearly stated she did not believe thyroid condition, age, nor genetics were the primary reason for my hair loss and advised me to get a biopsy of my scalp.  It took me more time than it should have to act on her advice,  but finally sometime in 2013, I saw a new to me dermatologist and requested a biopsy. Please note that I requested a biopsy. I was prepared to demand one if I had to do so. I was not accepting anymore dismissive answers. My endocrinologist had stressed that I must get to the bottom of my problem by having a biopsy.

I didn’t know it then, but with a diagnosis of my condition, I was about to experience a completely new learning curve regarding treatment for the condition.

The results of the biopsy came back with a clear diagnosis of lichen planopilaris/frontal fibrosing alopecia or LPP/FFA).  I had never heard of such a thing.  He showed me photo of what to expect as my condition progressed and said there was nothing at all that I could do about it.  Almost as an afterthought, he said there were some treatments, but they were not proven effective and caused side effects I did not want.  I asked what the treatments were, and he said plaquenil was sometimes prescribed, and clobetasol was a topical treatment sometimes used to quiet symptoms.  I told him I had used Protopic or tacrolimus, a topical medication that had been prescribed by a doctor I’d seen earlier about very sore and inflamed follicles. This new doctor said I could continue to use tacrolimus on occasion for symptoms and he added clobetasol solution to my treatment plan, but did not include any solid instructions on how to use it. Basically, he said, “You can try this too, but nothing will stop the loss.” He did not want to prescribe plaquenil because of the side effects. 

Post-diagnosis, I promptly went into denial believing I would never lose all that hair like the ladies I saw in his exhibits, and I guess I trusted him enough to go with what he said and looked no further into the diagnosis because frankly, I had other issues that seemed more looming than my hair. I remained firmly planted in the land of denial even as my hair fell out all the more. 

When I think back on that time, I was dealing with so much loss that my sadness, while at time overwhelming me, hair loss was not the only loss I was dealing with. As the hair fell out my very identity was being altered. I no longer recognized myself in the mirror as my hairline marched ever upward and backwards. My eyebrows were totally gone, and I felt that my face disappeared with them.

My hair was more than noticeably thin, it was patchy. I could no longer hide my loss. I also had such redness along my scalp, and such flaking, that I was embarrassed over my appearance. I remember feeling helpless.  Helplessness gave way to hopelessness, and as the hair fell, so did my mood.  I became withdrawn, afraid, anxious, and socially isolated.  

Finally, I stepped out of my isolation and wrote of my hair loss on my blog, a place I previously mostly wrote about family and grief.  At the same time, I also connected with an alopecia site on the internet and began to learn a bit about my specific type of alopecia.  I still could not find a doctor who knew how to treat FFA. 

By writing on my blog, I connected with others who read my posts or sent them to friends. From there, I learned there was a support network for my condition: Cicatricial Alopecia Research Foundation (CARF). I contacted the foundation, signed up for their newsletter, and attended the conference they held in New Orleans in 2016.  That is when I finally really learned about scarring alopecia from the experts.  This was nearly three years after my original diagnosis, and ten years after I first began to show symptoms for which I had actually consulted a dermatologist. (My initial consultation for scalp problems was not because of hair loss, but was for an inflamed hair follicle which clearly showed folliculitis, but again, the doctor was dismissive as he also stated he had no idea what was happening on my scalp.)

Remember that doctor who diagnosed my condition? He saw me again six years later. In that time, he had learned nothing more about my condition, but I had.

Let me tell you about a doctor’s visit I had last week.  I was consulting with a kind and knowledgeable physician assistant about the migraines and dizzy spells that have plagued me for months.  I told him about my hair loss and how I was also experiencing scalp pain after years of not feeling such pain. 

In the conversation, I mentioned the dermatologist who had diagnosed me because I thought he was associated with the practice I have used for the last four or five years. I told him how Dr. So and So had said there was no treatment for my condition. I went on to tell him that I had seen this same doctor years later when I had been sent to him again because he had joined my primary caregiver’s medical practice.  At the 2019 encounter with that original diagnosising dermatologist, I was experiencing a sudden and unexplained flare on my scalp that presented as inflamed and painful pustules in three different locations throughout my head.

I told the PA how in that appointment, I confronted the dermatologist by asking him to observe how I had lost all of my frontal hair because I had not received early intervention for my loss when I initially sought treatment from him years before. Sadly, the man was still uninformed about FFA and had never bothered to learn more about the condition than he knew eight years before even as he continued to practice dermatology.  He commented and commended my for my vast knowledge of FFA. Even at that appointment, he did not biopsy to seek the reason for this flare, and I didn’t think to ask for a biopsy. He clearly did not know how to treat a reoccurrence of troubling symptoms.

At that point in my story, the PA interrupted me, “And that is only one more reason why he is no longer a part of our practice.”  Unknown to me, this dermatologist was no longer affiliated with my primary care practice .  To my knowledge that means he has been associated with at least three practices in two different states since I’ve known him.

I guess I feel a sense of believing some justice has been served knowing that others in the medical community of which I am a part held a high standard of care high in the practice where I go for medical treatment for other concerns and removed a practitioner giving substandard care.  As always, I felt seen by this PA.  I knew I was heard. I knew I was respected. I felt believed.  I felt upheld in my feelings of anger over the lack care I was given.  I appreciated that he listened, gave me compassion, and then told me that the doctor would no longer be giving bad medical information in the capacity of being associated with this clinic.  

Fight for your hair.

My point is:  seek the best medical advise that you can if you begin to experience hair loss Don’t be dismissed with an “I don’t know” diagnosis. Find another doctor if you are able to do so. Fight for you hair.  In the end, the outcomes may not be what you hoped for, but at least you will know that you armed yourself with the best advice and treatment you could get. You will know you fought to the best of your capability and capacity.  

Coming to terms with hair loss

I long ago came to terms with this bad treatment plan (no treatment plan) I was given.  Hair loss acceptance is a process and a journey.  I have met the most amazing community of intelligent, beautiful, informative, and supportive people because of my hair loss.  I am mostly at peace with where I am in my journey. 

If you are suffering from hair loss, know that I care. I am here to support you on your journey to diagnosis, treatment, and acceptance of the condition. Please feel free to contact me by leaving a comment. If you have a friend or a family member suffering from hair loss, please send them a link to this post. I hope my post has been informative and helpful for all who experience hair loss.

Also, please sign up for my newsletter. I will be writing more on this topic on the blog, and in my newsletter.

I’ve added a few photos at the bottom of this post to give you some visuals about the hair loss I experienced.

My bio hair in February 2010, on my 65th birthday, was already changing in its texture, but I didn’t think much about it.

Three years later: my hair the year of my diagnosis. This photo was taken at a professional conference where I was presenting with a friend. My hair could still be styled somewhat, but that little curl in the middle of my forehead was getting pretty thin.

Five years later: my hair loss on my birthday of 2015. I remember being so self-conscious when we went out to celebrate. I hated how high my forehead had become, and the loss of eyebrows which I tried to draw on. Also, it was nearly impossible to hide all the loss. I bought my first alternative hair covering later that year.

Hair loss 2020 - all frontal and side hair is gone. There is scarring in its place. I now shave the remaining few hairs several times a year. I had eyebrows tattooed six years ago. And, I’m still wearing that same black hoodie I was wearing when this all started! I gained my self-confidence back, and I don’t mind being seen in public sans hair.

What Does Grief Feel Like?

This past year has been so, so hard on so many of us. We have all suffered losses. When I think of the over half a million people in the United States whom have lost a loved one due to COVID, I can’t even begin to fathom the depth of sorrow that is present in the lives of so many after this year that changed all of us in one way or another.

Dear reader, if you are feeling tired, and if you are feeling like you are carrying a load, I have no doubt that you are so fatigued that you don’t even know why you are tired, why you feel like crying, or why you feel like you just want to sit down and never get up again.

Maybe What You Are Feeling Is Grief.

Grief feels tiring.  

• I am tired.

• Grief is tiring.

• Grief is tiring because it is heavy.

Grief feels heavy.

After losses, great or small, one becomes burdened by carrying around heavy thoughts, unresolved problems that seem never to be resolved.

Losses sometimes begin to pile up, one on top of the other.

Grief can make one feel as if one is lugging around a ton of bricks.

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I actually have a bag, one of my favorite bags by the way, that has these words imprinted on it:

Schlep

(shlep) schlepped, schlepping, schleps

-verb (used with objects)

1. to carry; move; lug

I’ve been schlepping this bag around all day.

My schlep bag is sturdy, designed as if it were made to schlep around heavy objects all day long. The bag actually has some black scuff marks which are all over the bottom half of the back of the bag. I’ve not been able to wash out those black scuff marks. They now seem woven into the very fabric of the bag.

Those marks are a testament of the bag having been lugged around full of heavy objects. They indelibly marked the bag one day in an airport as the bag filled with heavy items and slung across my suitcase flipped to the backside of the bag on wheels and was dragged on the floor as I raced to catch a flight.

Grief feels like one is schlepping around a load of complex heaviness.

Grief can be complex and that is why it feels so heavy. It is complex because griefs and losses pile on top of each other and before long, one knows that something feels heavy and hard, but one does not even know exactly what it is that causing the feeling of grief, heaviness, and sorrow.

Grief feels like a unidentifiable sadness that makes one want to cry.

Sometimes, I just sense grief as a need to cry and I don’t even know why I want to cry. I will just have days when I want to sit and cry even as the tears will not come. I feel a burning in my eyes, and weariness behind them that makes me just want to close my eyes against the nearly blinding stinging pain of unshed tears. On those days when I won’t give way to tears, perhaps those eyes of mine are saying to me, “Close me. Squeeze me. Let the tears come out!” Maybe my eyes are in touch with my grief even as I won’t let my emotions go there because I’m just to tired to cry.

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Let me discuss the word schlep for a minute.

Grief involves schlepping. It involves carrying around heavy things. I think we have already established that premise. Right?

Ok, we agree.

I hope we agree.

I think we can agree.

I’m pretty sure that I have established grief is heavy.

It is so heavy at times.

It can be so hard to carry around.

Grief can be hard to carry because it is heavy.

Grief involves schlepping around heavy things that are hard to carry.

Who wants to schlep around heavy, grief filled feelings all day?

NO ONE WANTS TO DO THAT!

If I’m carrying around a bag of bricks or rocks or books or what ever else weighs a ton, I’m just not going to sling it over my shoulder or my suitcase or drag it along the floor forever. Right? Sooner or later, I’m going to want to lighten my load. Right?

A schlep bag is great, but after a while if I’m dragging it along, it is going to wear out, get a hole in it, or become completely unpresentable for further use.

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Back to the word: Schlep. Schlep is a verb. Schlep is a transitive verb. A transitive verb is followed by an object. One must have something to schlep in order to schlep.

Grief feels heavy.

Grief feels like one is schlepping around a bag of bricks.

Grief feels overwhelming and heavy and makes me want to escape from carrying it.

Sometimes, I just want to lay down that bag of grief that I’ve been schlepping around, so I do. (Hint: sometimes things get added to the bag without me knowing it while I think it is just on the floor waiting to be picked up again. Big things, little things, medium weight things, they just keep getting put in the bag unconsciously by me when I don’t want to be bothered by grief.

Grief feels like intrusive.

Grief interrupts, inserts, and keeps on being demanding. Her intrusiveness keeps calling, but sometimes, I just didn’t want to go there, that place where she is. I’ve grieved this and that and now there is some other loss, and that loss has the nerve to demand that I acknowledge its presence in my life.

Honestly, sometimes, I just want to be let off the grief hook.

When a new loss, major or minor, enters my life, I know I need to acknowledge the loss, but I don’t want to!

Grief feels like an uninvited visitor to my life.

The lesson here is that grief, when she makes her unexpected appearance in my life, often brings with her unwelcome emotions, thoughts, and pain that I just don’t want to experience. Grief certainly is not greeted warmly and invited into my life with joy and happiness. I know what she is like. Her heaviness and hard nature can begin to weigh me down, but because I don’t particularly feel open to welcoming her into my already full and complex life, I often think I can just shut the door on her and she will leave me alone.

Grief feels like a presence which must be acknowledged.

Ignore grief. She will go away. Right? She’s knocking and ringing, but I’m not answering. Soon she will leave me alone, right?

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Oh dear, I’ve gone from describing grief like an inanimate object, a brick that is heavy, and now I am giving grief human qualities by describing grief as a woman who won’t stop knocking at my door.

Grief, my friends, feels confusing.  

Yes, it is so confusing. Sometimes grief feels like a brick in my bag already filled with bricks that I don’t want. Then grief feels like some unwelcome and uninvited person beating my door down seeking admittance into my life.

I once wrote in my journal after a loss of someone whom I admired greatly and had grown to love dearly even though she was not a close friend. She was one I’d treasured the presence of while she was still on this earth.

I have not completely allowed myself to feel the sorrow welling up inside because grief just doesn’t seem to be something I want to experience right now. Grieving is hard work and it drains. I’m already drained, so I’ll compose myself while my heart skips beats and bottle up my sorrow. I’ll cry tomorrow - when I’m not so tired, so drained, when I can work grieving into that schedule that I don’t even have.

Personal journal entry from March 2019

I’ve probably done this type of “grief work” more often than is healthy for my body, soul, and mind. The “grief work” of ignoring, or putting off, or moving on without really grieving is not really grief work. It is however a way that grief can work on the griever in a way that only compounds the heaviness of grief.

Grief feels like ugly jumbled emotions.

Those bricks of grief that we carry around are feelings, memories, hurts, emotions, losses, gains that are no longer seen as gains. Grief feels like a lot of jumbled up feelings tied in a knot.

Grief feels like ugly emotions that stir up dark feelings seeking light.

Grief shows herself in our tired, tired, hearts, but sometimes, we don’t know who she is. We don’t know her name, nor do we know what she looks like, so we don’t know what to do with her. Perhaps, by God’s grace, we’ve never really known her before.

If that is true for you. If you are tired. If you feel sad. If sorrow seems to be the song that keeps playing in the background as you try to step into the sunshine of a promised new spring, then you might be experiencing grief.

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Eleven years ago, when my daughter died by suicide, I immediately booked an appointment with a counselor. Her words that day spelled out the first rules of grieving well: feel your feelings.

Grief makes me feel vulnerable.

It takes courage to identify, name, and feel all of those feelings that grief causes the griever to lug around.

Quite frankly, some of those griefs and sorrows and feelings will never go away, but that does not mean that you will forever lug them all around like heavy loads. The goal here is to feel the feelings and begin to integrate those painful feeling into the fabric of your life.

One must open one’s heart to the vulnerability of the hard, heavy feelings that grief can bring to a life.

No one welcomes the losses of life: the loss of a loved one, the loss of a loved life, a loss of identity, the loss of a loved career, the loss of a job, or the death of a dream. One’s heart does not want to open to such feelings of rage, anger, sorrow, disbelief, confusion. It simply does not. The heart wants to wall off such feelings so that the heart, which is broken, can keep on beating.

Grief feels like a heavy heart.

A heart full of grief is a heavy heart, but it does not have to become a hard heart.

A hardened heart walls off the pain that losses and grief bring. A hardened heart refuses to feel the hurt, does not allow the tears to flow, will not acknowledge how dark, deep, and distasteful the feelings surrounding great loss can signify.

When my daughter died, I did not want a hardened, stiff, broken heart. I wanted a heart that could again be open to love, to laughter, to loss that might come in the future. The thoughts of possibility experiencing even more unspeakable grief lurked around in my mind whispering that I could form a protective coating around my heart so I would never go through this devastating grief again, but I knew that realistically, I could not live life well if I was afraid to enter the arena of life again. I wanted to be able to experience whatever life had for me in the future.

Grief feels courageous.  

I needed, and I still need courage to move through grief, to lay down all those heavy loads, to open up to new unwelcome losses. You may or may not know this. The word courage comes from the Indo-European root word for heart: coeur. The courage to identify and feel the pain of grief involves the heart.

Grief feels vulnerable.

Grief feels like remembering.

Remembering can bring up such feelings of sadness, but remembering also bring up feelings of joy, of hope. Remembering, we connect with times when all seemed right with the world.

Grief feels like mourning.  

Mourning comes from an open heart, a heart willing to receive all that life has to offer. An open heart is able to take in all the feelings, all the vulnerabilities, all the thoughts.

Listening.

Feeling.

Remaining open to all the feelings and lessons of grief lightens the load she brings.

Do your best to welcome her when she comes.

I’ve learned, she won’t weigh you down forever. I promise. She comes and goes. Sit with her when she comes. Cry if you must. I’ve always said that tears are what keep our hearts tender and soft. They water the garden of the soul.

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When my daughter died, I vowed her death would not change me. I do not know from what source of ignorance that thought came. In truth, I will never be the same, nor have I been the same since that terrible day. That day a dark like was drawn through the timeline of my life. A heavy, black line was drawn. A demarkation. Time was marked forever: Before. After.

Grief feels like an unknown wilderness that I am still learning to navigate.

I kinda know the landscape of the land of grief.

I’ve been here a while. I’ve been here a decade and a year (almost).

I know where the landmines are. Well, maybe not. I’m sure there are more in this wilderness.

I did not choose to walk this path in the wilderness. It is the path that a mom left behind by a child who dies by suicide walks. My daughter, my dearly loved Julie, would never, ever leave me on this path if she’d known how terrible it would be. She just wouldn’t, but it is where I ended up when she died.

Once, on an early spring day in March of 2010, just a few months before my daughter’s death, she and her sister invited me to go with them on path they followed as they ran together. Because they were running, training for something perhaps, they left me at some juncture so that I could walk as they ran off. Julie, always the protective one, said to me, “Just stay on this path. Keep on walking. We’ll be back, Mom.”

They did come back as they circled around on their well known path. I saw a robin that day and noted its arrival as signal that spring was coming. Little did I know what that spring would bring before it gave way to summer. Little did I know that in just a few short months I would be a path in the great wilderness that grief can bring to a life after such great loss.

Early in my entry into the wilderness of grief, while I was so shocked that Julie would leave me feeling lost and stranded on a path that it seemed she chose for me, I also had a sense that I would survive and even be transformed somehow in the wilderness of grief.

Grief feels transformative.

My heart, while broken, has also been healed by grief. Shattered hearts open up new pathways for light to enter. I have been forever changed by grief.

A heart willing to be open to grief is a heart that while broken is also willing to keep on living life. It is in the living with a heart open to the brokenness of life that one learns that while the burden seems heavy at time, and while the body is tired and just does not want to experience all the deep emotions at times, still this one truth remains:

“I have been trying to make the most of grief and just beginning to learn to allow it to make the best of me. ”

— Barbara Lazear Ascher quoted in “Understanding Your Suicide Grief" by Alan D. Wolfelt

The transformative work of grief has changed the basic core of who I am as a person. I believe it has made me a better person because I have gained new insight into life. I become a more compassionate person. I hold life with an open hand knowing that everything about it can change in a moment.

“Loss provides an opportunity to take inventory of our lives, to reconsider priorities, to determine new directions. ”

— Gerald L. Sittser

This past year has brought new grief to my life, and, no doubt, it has brought new grief and loss into your life too. With each new grief, I believe that we find ourselves in different stages of experiencing grief. We may have moved through a grief that seemed to be our undoing and find ourselves not undone, but in a sense redone.

Then a new grief comes along, and we may say, “I’ve been here before. I know what to do.” Then we find that this grief feels different from anything we experienced before.

We may find ourselves heavy with grief, unable to drag around that bag of bricks, or, we may now recognize the sources of the heaviness we are hauling around with us, or maybe we are unwilling to do the work it takes to discover the reason why a bricks we are carrying feel so heavy.

Grief feels like a learning curve.

Grief always has new things to teach us. I’m learning that.

New grief.

New learning curve.

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Dear reader, I’ve been moving through much grief this year. I suspect you have also.

As I have walked through this past year, I have needed to remain silent about the details of that grief in the public arena. I needed space and time to process new griefs.

At times, I felt as if I were schlepping around that proverbial bag of bricks where new bricks got added every day. At other times I knew I needed to cry, but the tears were locked inside of a heart afraid to crack open. Often, I saw others also struggling under a load of grief. Sometimes, I didn’t think I could handle my own grief and enter into theirs too. In time, I have begun to name and unpack all that I’ve been carrying around for what seems like a lifetime. I’m remembering what grief feels like, and I remember that grief does not destroy if you allow her to do her transformative work.

When I look back on 2020, I think I will remember it as the year of the long winter, a winter where much seemed frozen over in the landscape of my inner world. Now, in the beginning months of this new year, I am sensing that shoots of new life are beginning to crop up in many areas of my life.

Now, I’m moving forward into the future with renewed energy and vision. I’ve marked a milestone. I just celebrated a birthday. And I made a discovery that Camus summed up better than I ever could.

“In the midst of winter, I found there was within me an invincible summer.”

— Albert Camus

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Winter ~ A Memory of My Youth and Winters in Leadville, Colorado

The headlines in today’s news are about weather. The news from CNN just hours ago is astounding as this news agency reports of about 200 million people in our country are under some sort of weather-related alert regarding winter storms. Also, the news agency reports that about 5 million people are without power, mostly in Texas, during freezing temperatures that are lower than the low temperature reported in Fairbanks, Alaska!

In Colorado this past week, we had freezing temperatures that even by Colorado standards were lower than the average.  In fact new low temperatures were recorded.  By the end of the day two days ago, the weather app my phone informed me that it was -15 F outside as I sat bundled up in front of my gas fireplace.  Grateful, that I live in a place where we are prepared for such low temperatures, I began to reminisce about the days when I lived in Leadville, Colorado, as a teenager.

Leadville, Colorado, at two miles high, or 10,200 feet, is the highest incorporated city in the United States.  According to one source on the internet, the average snowfall in Leadville is 127 inches a year.   It also averages 310 days of sunshine a year. That sunshine is nice in the winter, but that doesn’t mean it heats the place up. While it is a is a beautiful place to live, it also is a challenging place to live because of the altitude, the snow, and the cold weather.

The time frame for this story of this memory is:

Winter of 1962 - 63.

The place:

Leadville, Colorado.

The setting:

mostly takes place in our home which was a reclaimed baggage and freight building that had been turned into housing for railroad employees.

Yes, we lived in building which once served an old train depot as baggage and storage area. Here is a photo the place, but it did not look like this when we lived there, thank heavens. It wasn’t a great looking place. It was a humble abode, but not quite this humble. In fact, this old building is now in a different location from where it stood when we lived in the building.

Once upon a time, this was my home sweet home

This is a photo of my youngest sister and I standing where our house once stood in the old rail yards of Leadville, Colorado.

Originally, once it no longer served as a baggage storage area, the building had served as housing for railroad employees. When we were set to arrive on the scene and make this place home, it was in very bad shape. My father was transferred to Leadville as an agent for the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad in the spring of 1962.  As part of the requirement for the job, and as a salary “benefit” we had to live in company housing.  This old baggage building had a long ways to go before my father would move his family from the new home they occupied before his job transfer and promotion, so he went to work and gutted the place before he moved his family. He built new cabinets in the kitchen. My mother painstakingly painted all the walls and made curtains for the windows. Together, they installed new flooring and wall to wall carpeting in the bedrooms and living and dining room..  Despite all these improvements, it was a shock to us when we moved into a place without the modern conveniences that we had in our previous home.   

When we actually moved to Leadville, we had to learn to adjust to a house heated by an old Stokermatic coal stove. There was no central heating in that old place. The coal that heated the house was railroad coal that was provided as part of the salary for my father's job.  He was employed by The Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. The company paid for our house and our coal. The agent was given these perks.  One would not consider these as perks these days.  The coal was delivered by the work crew from the railroad. It was stored in a coal shed behind the house.

The main part of the building was our living room, dining room, my parents' bedroom, and there was also a long narrow room on the left rear of this building that we used as a t.v. room and a place where my brother would stay when he was in town.  The attached building at the left in this photo was the bedroom that my sister and I shared.  There was a partition about two-thirds of the way into this room that provided an additional "room" that served as a bedroom for my youngest sister.  

That first winter, we found out that this part of the room could not be used because the ice on the windows would build up half an inch thick!  That rear portion of the house was the farthest from the stove, and I think it had absolutely no insulation. Mother would hang blankets across the large archway doorway (there was no door) to that part of the room to keep the cold from reaching where my sister and I slept. She moved my youngest sister to the “tv” room to sleep because it was warmer.  

Attached to the rear of the house was a kitchen and bathroom which had not been part of the original part of the building. It was designed almost like a “lean to” structure. My youngest sister rememberd climbing snow drifts against that part of the house that reached the roof. That portion of the house was heated with a small propane stove.  

We had left a brand new house in Pueblo, Colorado, when my father was promoted to this job in Leadville. At the time, I wondered how this house, and this job was a promotion.  It seemed to me that we were going back in time, and, I guess in some ways we were.  

Guess where the warmest place in the house was.  You are right if you guessed that is was on top of that old coal stove or, if the fan came on, standing in front of it was great, but we were not allowed to do that because we needed the heat to circulate.  The stove was located in the dining room which was right next to our bedroom.  

Memories of Winter Mornings

We never went to bed dreaming of snow days where school might be called off during the winters when I lived in Leadville.  Never.  In 2012, there was quite a stir because there was a snow day called and school was cancelled in Leadville.  Many said it was the first snow day ever called in Leadville. 

On cold winter nights, my sis and I would turn on our electric blankets and try to stay warm.  Our room was pretty cold, but we would stay quite toasty in our beds. Mornings came early when we would be awakened around 4:00 a.m. by the sound of a snowplow scraping and moving ice and snow off of State Highway 24 right outside our window. Soon the plow would move up close to the house to clear the small dirt road that ran in front our our house to the Standard Oil bulb plant which was right next door.  Mr. Carson, my best friend’s dad, who was the distributor and owner of the plant, had to be able to make deliveries of propane and gasoline to his customers in Leadville, Frisco, Climax, and Breckenridge, no matter the weather.  And, my father had to keep the freight trains running on time.  For these reasons, we were plowed out early.  

Sometimes when the early morning snow plows awakened me, I would actually get out of the warm bed and make my way to the window to see how much snow had fallen.  Memories of those early mornings when the town was asleep under its thick blanket of snow are precious.  I recall being mesmerized by thousands of silent fluffy flakes falling to the ground outside my window. Soon, chilled, but peaceful,  I'd make my way back to bed.  

When my mother would awake me for school, I had an early morning college-prep English class at 7:00 a.m., I would resist getting up until the last possible moment.  Once up, I would run into the next room and stand next to the Stokermatic coal stove to get warm.  My father would have been up early to get the coal into the stove so the house would be warm.  

Before I made my quickly executed move from the bed to the furnace, I had gathered my clothes.  These were placed on top of the furnace to heat up so I’d have warm clothes to put on.  Believe me, that helped.  Oh how I remember the shivering that simply getting dressed in the morning created.

My father would drive me to school on mornings when the snow was especially deep or the temperatures were especially cold, but that meant that I had to be up early so I could be ready when he left for work, otherwise, it is true, I had to walk the mile or so to school.  The snow could be up to my knees at times in those days in Leadville, and, as my dad would say, “I have the picture to prove it.”

That picture showing a moment in time in my youth captures more than just a teenage girl with wind swept hair standing in snow nearly up to her derriere.  It so many ways, it truly captures the core of who I am as person.  

At My Core I Am A Colorado Mountain Girl

I am a proud Colorado native, a railroader’s daughter, a mountain girl at heart.  When we moved to Leadville, I devoured stories of the tough miners who believed their fortunes just might be buried in those hills. Beginning in 1860 the discovery of silver brought rough and tumble men to Leadville hoping to strike it rich. They were tough men and so were the women who came with them. 

Fortunes were made, and fortunes we lost in this place.  I loved the stories of Baby Doe Tabor hanging on the Matchless and Molly Brown surviving the sinking of the Titanic. 

The gifts of that season of my life

Those stores about the history of the area and about men and women who lived that history were woven into the fabric of how I began to see myself as a Colorado girl. The stories informed me in times when it took fortitude to move forward.  Yes,  I have often relied on the grit I learned from others and from the experience I also had while living in a climate that is less than hospitable.  

In the photo above, I see a young woman with a smile on her face, happy to be in her element, and happy in the elements of her environment.  I remember the optimism of that time in my life, but I also knew, based on the challenges of living in a harsh environment, that optimism and grit would not be enough to bring about the future I hoped to have. A successful future would also mean that I would have to bring passion for my goals in order to accomplish the dreams of my future. I would also need perseverance.  It would mean that I would need to plan to deal with days when the world out there was cold and unwelcoming.  It would mean that I would have to plan for the unexpected and to bring a shovel because at some point, I just might have to dig myself out in order to go down the path I chose.

The ability to acclimate is a powerful gift in life.  My parents gave me the gift of learning how to adapt and acclimatize when they moved me kicking and screaming just before  my senior year in high school to Leadville.  Did you know that the body, actually produces more blood cells in high altitude?  Breathing rarified air, my body was transforming itself to adjust. I learned to adapt to living a new place that seemed so foreign to anything I had ever experienced before. I also learned to embrace change and the unexpected transformation it brings to the body, the mind, and to the living of life itself.

The body adjusts to rarified air in time.  This served as a reminder to me that I could adapt, acclimate, and adjust whenever I encountered new experiences in life that seemed to being taking the oxygen out of me due to the environment in which I might find myself that was less than ideal. Embracing such changes brings growth and depth to life and to the soul. One learns what one is made of when one learns to live in tough environments.

Another gift of those winter days in Leadville was the gift of learning that there are some things in life which you just can’t control.  The weather is chief among those factors in life over which one has no control.  Acceptance, adjustment, and again, acclamation to the climate in any setting is key when learning to live life successfully.

Those days, those experiences, that setting, the history of it and the climate of it, shaped me in ways I never could have imagined at the time.

The Gift of Reflection and of Memory

Now, having lived three quarters of a century, I live a city at foothills of Colorado rather than in one of her high mountain hamlets. Now, living in the luxury of a well built home with central heating and a gas fireplace, when the cold wind blows, when the snow piles up outside my window, I remember those days of long ago.  I bask in the memory of the warmth of the times and in the memory of the warmth of the home my parents created for us in what first appeared to be the harshest of settings. We often said those were the happiest times in our family’s life. In my memory, they were the happiest and best of times.

It was the last year I would ever live at home. When the next fall rolled around I was off to college and never returned to live at home again except for times when college was not in session.

I give thanks for the memories of that time and for the lessons I learned about life when I was just a young Colorado mountain girl. What a gift those years were!

Christmas ~ A Reflection of Christmas Past Part 2

On that day, the day I walked up to the home of my grandparents,

It seemed almost surreal to see that house again and realize anew that the house is there, as are the memories, but the loved ones who gave it life and meaning are gone.

I can't walk up the path and step on to my grandmother’s porch and find her and grandpa sitting in the dining room reading. My grandmother died on Christmas Eve over thirty years ago.

I stand in front of her house thinking how in those days of childhood,

My world was small.

It was filled with rich relationships,

many funny stories,

great laughter,

long held traditions,

and

solid foundations for

faith

and family.

My head turns so I can look across the street where the other

foundational structure of my childhood

still stands.

More memories of Christmas Past fill my mind.

Every year in that little church across the street a Christmas pageant was held where the Christmas story was read by a very solemn elder of the church as he sat in what seemed to me to be an ancient high back oak chair upholstered in black leather. I imagined it to be like the very chair upon which God Himself must sit in heaven on his throne. My brother believed God lived in the upper room the church when he was a child.

As I gazed at the building, my mind went back to the year when my sister, my cousin, and I, along with other girls our age were finally able to participate in the service. Dressed in white dresses made of gauze belted at the waist with silver tinsel ribbon, and crowns of the same ribbon, we were to light candles set in evergreen boughs placed on each of the widow sills beneath the glorious stained glass windows that adorned the church.

Before the procession of the candle lighting angels, and after the welcome and opening prayer, my mother stepped from the choir loft to take center stage, and without the use of a microphone, she began to sing “O Holy Night.”

Standing at the back doorway in anticipation, holding a lighted candle, I am in awe of both the the beauty of my mother and of her beautiful clear soprano voice which fills the sanctuary. I can still see her, a tiny and strikingly attractive 4'll” tall dark haired woman dressed in a green shantung silk dress she made herself, adorned in crystal jewelry which sparkles as she sings.

With a lighted candle in my hand,  I listened with tears rolling down my cheeks as she sings.

I will never again be able to hear that song sung without remembering my mother in that moment. I will remember her voice, her beauty, and the feelings of awe that I had for the holiness I felt in that moment as words to that beautiful Christmas hymn penetrated my very soul.

Oh Holy Night!  The stars are brightly shining.

It is the night of our dear Savior's birth.

*********************

My mother died in March of this year at the age of 103.

Oh how I long to once again be standing next to her in church listening to her sing that song of 

praise and adoration 

for her Savior,

Immanuel,

God with Us,

The One whose birth we celebrate on Christmas.

*********

My father is also gone.

He, the one who found sleigh bells to ring outside our house near midnight to let us know Santa was near by.

He, the one with the very best storytelling skills of all the others is gone. Oh how he loved to tell stories. Oh how he loved to laugh. Oh how he made us all laugh.

He, the one for whom family meant everything after his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

All the aunts and uncles are gone.

Only the memory of the 

times we spent together, 

remain

**********************

Many memories are stored in black and white photos,

But real life is not always black and white.

I don’t remember tensions, undercurrents, resentments in those days of old and long ago.

Were they there?

Not in my memory.

I lived a family made up of real people with real emotions, real problems, real joys, real triumphs, real defeats, real conflicts, real unresolved issues.

Those generational problems don’t just go away.

Part of the story has to be that those stories that were told were stories of a large family made up of individuals who didn’t always agree on everything. It seems that whatever problems individually or between each other they had, in the end, love for each other and the devotion to family they all seemed to have as demonstrated by the legacy they left us, must have been the glue that held them together.

***********

This year,

Christmas 2020,

Will be a Christmas like no other.

This year, a year where black and white seem to blur together,

we sometimes wonder if we will ever make sense of it all when we look back on it.

Most of us will not celebrate this Christmas with loved ones.  

Perhaps, more than ever this year,

In the year of our Lord,

2020,

It is more important than ever that we not focus on the trappings and traditions of Christmas.

We live in a time of such

Brokenness,

Division,

Unrest.

*****************

I know what I am yearning for.

I am yearning for

Healing,

Reconciliation.

I am yearning to give and to receive

Forgiveness,

Grace.

*********************

This year,

In the Year of our Lord,

2020,

Now,

More than ever,

We long for,

Indeed,

We pine for,

A song of hope.

The world is weary.

I remember the words of the song my mother sang out so many years ago as if they were the last words she would have wanted me to hear, as if they were the last words she would send to her family:

Truly He taught us to love one another.

He law is love.

His gospel is peace.

************************

May your Christmas be filled with 

Hope,

Healing,

Reconciliation,

Forgiveness,

Joy,

Love,

and

Peace.

Merry Christmas to All.

Thanksgiving

I’ve been thinking about gratitude. Now, isn’t that original? I mean, after all, it is the Thanksgiving Eve. Aren’t we supposed to be thinking of gratitude? That is the point of celebrating Thanksgiving. Right?

I have a sneaking suspicion that while almost all of us could quickly come up a list of ten things for which we are grateful with no problem at all, and while I also think that most of our lists would look very similar in that we would list husbands, wives, kids, dogs, homes, jobs, faith, etc., I seriously doubt that most of us are able to say, “I am especially grateful to be celebrating Thanksgiving under circumstances that have come into play during a pandemic.”

Let’s be honest here. Are these lists indicative of all we are feeling and experiencing right now?

If I had to make such a list, it would be authentic in that I am richly blessed, and I have much for which to be grateful, but deep down inside, I just want a break from all of this time of isolation, pandemic news, illness, and loss. I am tired. I am missing my loved ones. I want to celebrate Thanksgiving with my family.

I am also convinced that a sense of deep gratitude is rarely found in identifying those things in our material world that give us a sense of appreciation or thankfulness. I believe that true gratitude is a work of the heart that has learned to rejoice and give thanks no matter what the circumstance. As I pondered this thought, I did a quick search of the word gratitude in the Bible. The source I used listed only reference to the word gratitude. It is found in Hebrews.

“Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.”

— Hebrews 12:28 ESV

During these days of a pandemic, of political and social unrest, and during a season of Thanksgiving, I found this verse to especially affirming to me personally because the Hebrew people were reminded that they were to be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken. They were living as marginalized people in a group of already marginalized people. Their traditions had been turned upside down when they believed in Christ. They were reminded that only created things will be shaken, but God’s kingdom will not be shaken.

We are so caught up these days in our created world. Being grateful for something that likely seems esoteric to many during times like the ones in which we live just does not seem to be a concept which is easy to grasp. To those within the household of faith, such a statement of hope and faith as is found in the preceding quote from the Bible may not seem mystical or abstract, but during these difficult days, I sense that even true believers are feeling like the earth is truly shaking beneath their feet because of the days and months of uncertainty which we have gone through this year.

There are fractures every where we look. The brokenness of this old world is ever before us.

How do we lift our voices in praise and thanksgiving in times like these? Yes, we can look at our beautiful families, at our homes, our jobs, our health, or whatever else in this material work that we acknowledge are truly blessings, but what if one of those whom we most love was suddenly taken from us? What if all we had was destroyed? What if we lost everything? What if our health was also lost? What if our friends and loved ones turned against us? Would we still be grateful? What if we had no photos to show the world via Instagram that we are indeed blessed? Would we still be blessed? Would we still be grateful?

As I wrote those words, I thought of Job. Who wouldn’t? Job lost everything, yet, what did he say? He said,

“Though he slay me, I will hope in him...”

— Job 13:15 ESV

---

The past year has been so difficult for all of us. Many have lost nearly everything. Many have lost loved ones. Many wonder how they will pay the rent, or what they will do if they get sick because they don’t have health insurance. Thankfully, my husband and I are not counted among these, and I am so very grateful for that.

Others, while they are financially stable are struggling with loneliness, isolation, depression, and fear.

These are days when many are just barely surviving and feel as if they could go under in the currents swirling around them.

These are days of trying to make sense of the times in which we live.

These are days when I am again tempted to curse the brokenness I see everywhere around me.

---

This past year has been one of the most difficult ever for me personally, but I know that I am not alone. It has been so difficult for all of us. A year ago today, I had just recently returned home from a memorial service for my dear youngest sister. Her death shattered me in so many ways. My mother was dying. My family of origin was fractured and hostile. A granddaughter was hospitalized with a very serious mental illness. I sat down a year ago today and poured everything out onto the pages of my journal. I wrote:

“-This is the day I curse brokenness in this world and wonder just how much more heartbreak I can take becaue of the mental illness that seems to surround me.
-These are the days when I know prayer is the only weapon I have to fight the battle we all are facing at this time.
-These are the days where I hope for fresh faith and remember that the mercy of God is new every morning.
Now I am off to bed to rest in that great grace and mercy. The Lord will watch over it all. ”

— Personal journal - Sally Wessely November - December 2019

This year my thanksgiving gratitude list is not one that only includes material things or objects or people. Instead, my list will also be one of praise for answered prayers, fresh faith, sustaining hope, and truly mercies that have been new every morning.

This year, I again think of that verse that has proven true for me throughout my life,

“Great is you faithfulness...”

— Lamentations 3:23

For this great faithfulness I give thanks.

Happy Thanksgiving. May the God of all Grace bless you all and sustain you in the days to come.

Election Day Memories and Reflections

Election Day Memories

The first clear memory of a Presidential elections goes back to 1952.

 My earliest memory of things political involves a visit to see President Harry S. Truman when he came to Colorado Springs by train in October of 1952.  He was actually on a Whistle Stop Campaign for Adlai Stevenson.  The photo below was taken in Colorado Springs, Colorado on that very day when I had the exciting opportunity to view the first President of the United States that I remember.  I was only seven years old when I had this introduction to political campaigning. 

My parents took us to the train depot that day and stressed how we were not only fortunate to see the former president, but also they wanted us to see history in the making. My father always brought us up with a rich appreciation for history. He also taught to take very seriously our responsibility to be informed voters who used our voice by participating in the political process.

Reflection

Today, I took some time to listen to the speech that Harry W. Truman gave that day, October 7, 1952, in Colorado Springs, Colorado, at the old Denver and Rio Grande Depot. He was campaigning for Adlai Stevenson and against the election of Dwight D. Eisenhower.

As I listened, I realized just how my much my political teeth were cut on the times, and on the conversations of my grandparents, parents, and aunts and uncles. Also, I think I was a somewhat astute child at the time and most likely absorbed the core concepts of the speech and the discussion I heard afterwards by my family.

Times were so different then. A military band played “Hail to the Chief” before the speech, and the speech itself only lasted a mere 15 minutes or so. Truman thanked the band, saying, “You did a good job of it.” At the very beginning he spoke of what all of us growing up in the early 50’s heard repeatedly, the threat of the Atomic Bomb, while warning that the President whom would be elected would be the one to protect our “future lives and civilization.” Then, he used a reference we associate with him, saying, “This is a decision the President has to make for himself. He can’t pass the buck…”

What struck me the most from the speech were his words at the end of the speech when he spoke of his view that Eisenhower had succumbed to compromise for the sake of winning votes. As he spoke of this view, he clearly expressed his “disenchantment” with Eisenhower, and said that he had lost his moral compass in order to win votes.

I realize more than ever, that my political views have always been formed by the basic fundamentals of which Truman spoke that day. I leave a few of those words here for you to read.

“We have not and never will subscribe to doctrine that the end justifies the end.

Communists and fascist say the end justifies the end. They are out to destroy freedom. They use dictatorship and terrorism and concentration camps to obtain their end.

The great men who founded this nation believed the means were just as important as the end, and that is why we have the Bill of Rights and the rest of our Constitutional guarantees. ”

If you would like to listen to the speech Truman gave on that day, you can listen to it here:

https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/soundrecording-records/sr59-140-president-truman-trainside-address-colorado-springs-colorado

My paternal grandparents, Avery and Elva French were staunch Democrats. (They are shown in this photo from 1971.) They always, as far as I know, voted the straight Democratic ticket, and they were very involved in local Democratic politics. Grandma French was an active member of the Jane Jefferson Club of Colorado Springs.

Avery and Elva French ~ 1971

We all turned out for that day in 1952 to see Harry S. Truman come into town. I was surrounded by my parents, my siblings, my grandparents, my aunt and uncle and my cousins. We all loved Harry. I remember being hoisted up on my father's shoulders so I could see the President. I still remember the excitement I felt that day. The memory has stayed with me with great clarity these nearly seventy years later.

I remember my grandfather’s collection of political buttons and pins. I remember how much he wanted to see Stevenson win. Later, when Ike ran for a second term, I somehow obtained an “I Like Ike” pin and wore it to my grandparent’s home. He was the President at the time I was growing up, so I must have thought it would be good to support his re-election. I learned otherwise when I boldly wore that pin into my grandfather’s home. Now, I understand better why he was not in favor of Eisenhower and why he supported Adlai Stevenson.

Those days, politics seemed kinder and gentler. Even so, I remember hearing tales from my grandmother of back room deals that were brokered in the game of politics. Such things always angered her.

Politics has never been a game for the faint of heart, but I find the nastiness and dishonesty or half truths that we hear today during a political campaign especially upsetting. I wonder what my grandparents and my father would think of the world of politics of today. I know my father in particular would be very upset with the current administration in the White House.

Election Day Memories from the 1970’s ~ My Days as An Election Day Judge

I haven't always been registered as a Democrat.  I have always had a more moderate view of politics as an adult, and for many years, I registered as an Independent.  

When I was a young wife and mother who stayed at home and did not work, I did a few odd jobs to earn money. One job I had, involved working as an election judge. I followed in the steps of my paternal grandmother and some of my paternal aunts in fulfilling this task.

In the 1970’s, the precinct where I lived in Utah was Democratic. They needed Democratic election judges, so I changed my affiliation to Democratic from Independent. The first election I worked was not a Presidential election. In those days, we voted in homes as well as in public places in Utah. The home where we voted was in a very poor part of Ogden, Utah. The woman who had the election in her home had done so for years. She was the mother of at least 12 if not 13 children, and she must have weighed about 250 pounds. She was in her late 50's, about 5' tall, and had stark white hair. I thought she was fascinating. She was a very well read, intelligent, and spunky woman. Her children were great successes, but they all came from this very humble home.

During the day, the woman in whose home we held the election, told stories about elections of the past and of raising all of her many children. She reminded me of the Old Woman Who Lived in A Shoe. This house was tiny! It had three bedrooms, a living room, a bathroom and a kitchen. It was crammed full of furniture, books, papers, junk, and people. This is where our precinct voted!

The other judges and I brought food for the day. There were crock pots of great chili, veggies, chips, cookies and etc. I met some great ladies working as the other judges,  and I met many interesting people who came to vote. Of course, as folks left from voting, the other judges told me all the gossip and life histories of these folks. I just wish I would have recorded the events in a journal. 

Times were very different in those days.  The polling places were held in homes, not always in schools or other public places.  There was no early voting.  This year my husband and I voted by mail.  That did not happen in the 70's.

Election Day 1976

In November of 1976, on the two hundredth anniversary of our country's founding, I hosted the presidential election in my home. I earned $50 for working the election that year. I made $25 for hosting the polling place and another $25 for working. Let me tell you, it was hard work doing all that bookkeeping by hand. We had to check each person’s signature, receive the ballots, count them by hand, and call them in to the county clerk’s office. I remember it being very stressful as we counted up and tallied all the votes with our #2 lead pencils. Oh how things have changed!

The polling place itself had to change in our precinct that year, and my home was selected. Our home was a bi-level, so there were complaints by those who came to vote about the site being moved from where it had been for years, and about the stairs they had to climb to vote.

On the day before the election, my husband and I had moved much of the furniture out of the living room so that the tables for voter check-in could be set up there. Voters then could either vote in booths in the kitchen, or the booths in the basement family room, which also had been emptied of furniture.

I remember that our neighbor was one of the judges. Her ex-husband and son traveled around the neighborhood with a speaker system in their truck exhorting people to get out and vote. My youngest daughter Julie was just a baby at the time. She slept in the back bedroom in her crib during most of the day. I was still nursing her, so she stayed at home with me. My second daughter Amy was a toddler. The other two children were in school. I think that my in-laws must have taken care of my other children that year as I was working as an election judge.

Jimmy Carter won the election. My folks were for him. I have a letter from them to prove it. I was not for Carter. So, as you can see, I have not always voted the Democratic ticket.

In 1976, I had planned on using the extra money from working the election to help buy Christmas presents. Instead, I think most of it went to clean the gold carpets that were black by the time the day was over. Do you have any idea how dirty gold carpet gets after a presidential election is held in your home?

The Presidential Election of 2020

This year, history will again be made in this election. Please vote. Record your memories of why you voted the way you did.  I think your children and grandchildren will be interested someday in reading about your views.  More importantly, your commitment to voting and being a part of the political process is a teaching moment.  It is not a responsibility to be taken lightly.

 Today, I will take a bit more time to record my own thoughts and impressions and memories of today in my journal. I decided to have may husband take a photo of me on Election Day 2020.

I’m grateful to live in this country. My roots run deep. On my paternal side we have been in this country since about thirty years after Plymouth Rock. My family has fought in every war this country has ever had since the Revolutionary War. When I was younger, when I would hear my grandfather speak of family history, I would ask, “Grandpa, what is our nationality, our heritage?” He would always say, “We’re damn Yankees, and don’t forget it.”

I’m grateful I live in a country that is not perfect, but one that strives to make sure each of its citizens has a voice and vote. I urge you to use your voice and vote if you have not yet done so.

I’m writing and using my voice as I reflect on elections past and present. I am wearing a blue shirt I bought in Scranton, Pennsylvania, the birthplace of the man I hope will be the next President of the United States. It seemed appropriate to dress in Biden blue today.

I’m also wearing pearls in honor of RBG, but my pearl selection might be different from others. I am wearing a string of pearls given to me by immigrant students I once taught. They brought them to me from China, their home country. I wear these pearls in honor of the immigrant populations with which I worked as an educator.

I am remembering the stranger among us, the alien resident, the ones who came here for freedom and liberty. I am praying we don’t let them down in this election. But mostly I am remembering and praying for the children being held in immigration detention centers separated from their parents and held by this current administration.

I am mindful of the health I have at the moment because I have lived most of this year in separation from society at large. I have not seen most of my family for exactly one year because of concerns over COVID transmission. I am grateful for my health care, my home, and an income, but I am deeply aware of the many suffering because of the mishandling of the COVID pandemic by the current administration.

I end this reflection with a few words from Psalm 146. This psalm was the psalm I meditated on as we ended 2019. I am not putting my trust in princes, or kings, or presidents, but in the Lord God Almighty. I voted according to the man I believe to be on the right side of history. In the end, I know that whomever is elected is a “son of man, in whom there is no salvation.” (Psalm 146:3a) I am also hopeful that the people of this Nation will vote for the one whom I believe will execute true justice for the oppressed, feed the hungry, lift up those who are bowed down, watch over the sojourners, and uphold the widow and the fatherless.” (from Psalm 146)

As a Christian, I clearly state that I understand that my allegiance is to power much higher than those civil authorities in the country in which I live. I also believe that as a Christian blessed to live in this great country I have an obligation to use my vote to uphold the person I believe will best uphold the principles upon which this great country was founded. I have watched the last few years unfold with great dismay. The times truly have been turbulent and I have witnessed history being made that I never thought possible.

In the end, I have great hope for our country. May the process of keeping our Democracy be peaceful. May you all vote wisely, watch the results with patience, and remember do not lose heart no matter the outcome. God Bless you all and God Bless the United States of America.