A Story Within A Chapter The Conclusion

A bit of warmth and a Christmas from many years past.

I end the story of "The Barn" With the same music behind its words That I used as I first introduced This chapter of my life to you It  IS  funny how time slips away And how it will find a way to repeat itself To make you remember lessons Of the past already learned The story of the barn Was lived by us at least sixteen years ago And yet .... It seems As if it were only yesterday It didn't take Hersh too long To contact our landlord With a few choice words After finding out That the man of the house Was not nearly the pushover I had been He agreed to make a few changes To improve its living condition One change promised was to lay New carpeting throughout the first story Another ... He would pay to have All of the floors leveled Before the new capet was put into place You haven't lived Till you have lived in a house Where they are pumping Gypcrete Directly on to your floors It was pumped by a truck through A large hose and it reminded me Of the episode on Family Matters Where two young people had made Their get-away to talk within a Cement truck and somehow pushed A lever that lowered the troth Through a window and poured the Whole load all over their kitchen floor In order for the floors to be leveled We had to move completely out of the house And stay with my Mom until The floors had hardened Our furniture or what was left of it Remained in our front yard Of course all this came about After the one hitch Of getting new carpeting was completed If we wanted the new carpeting It was left up to myself and Kenneth To pull out all the old and dispose of it I wanted the new carpet If anyone ever needs A good carpet puller-upper I'm your gal It seems I have pulled miles of it I decided against trying to dust the logs When I really looked at all the dirt That had accumulated on them over the years The clincher of that whole idea Put to rest After looking at the scaffolding Aready in place waiting for me To climb and then stand on To reach most of them Nope heights is not my bag Rustic . . . Yep that was the look I was going for And rustic it was In its own way It held a certain charm Very long railroad spiked nails Did quite nicely to provide a way to hang pictures All I had to do was place them between the logs And leave them away from the logs long enough For what I was hanging to hang flush to its roll   While we were putting the house together Hersh's challenge to me was Let me see You hang your usual gallery On these walls In the end telling me If he hadn't seen it He wouldn't have believed that I could Figure out a way even there To wallpaper the walls With pictures and family photos He should have known better Than to present me with a challenge Of that sort LOL Eventually we did get the old place Looking presentable And even kind of cute if I say so myself Winning the fight with the critters We just mostly had to give up on There were so many cracks where the logs met And under the windows and doors were the same You've heard of the whistling wind I had whistleing logs It was nearly impossible to keep The lizards out of the house Their favorite hangout The huge wall of windows in the living room I swear certain ones would come back to visit me We also had what was called there at least A Boxcelder tree I don't know if any of you have seen The pesky little bugs That make the Boxcelder tree their home They look somewhat like a roach And at certain times of the year Infestation was nearly impossible to avoid As we found out in the time We were barn dwellers Hersh would chase them around With our Shop Vac "Stupid things don't do anything But wiggle their antennas at you" He would grumble Kimberly and I Couldn't stand the thought Of setting killing traps for our Many resident mice So Hersh bought live traps We should have owned stock In Skippy Peanut Butter that year Did you know mice like peanut butter Well let me tell you they do As fast as they would be caught Kimberly would take them to the creek And set them free They in turn . . . . Would beat her back to the house Keeping warm was the real problem We did make it through that winter there But only by not running the electric heaters Using the small wood burning stove In what used to be the mouth of the fireplace As our only source of heat We were the first family To survive a winter there In eleven years We rigged a fan to try to blow Some of the heat out to ourselves Because otherwise what little heat it put off Rose to the loft and second story There was no way Hersh could make the stairs And the bedroom downstairs had only The electric heaters So we did not sleep in it The winter that we were there No matter what we did to try to conserve The electric bills were aboslutely insane We bought a couple of second hand Sofa beds and placed them As close to the stove as was safe Without worring they would catch fire Poor Hersh slept with his feet At that stove all Winter The bones in his feet have been Fused since childhood because of the Polio When they get cold ... They ache So it was a very long winter for him It seemed that the cold Was with us always that yeart But at least our feet stayed warm Because of that little stove Here was this huge room all around us And we found ourselves huddled around it And it seemed it was always begging to be fed And what did we feed it Why roof shingles from our roof That was being replaced A little at a time of course We learned real fast to make Good use of everything at our dispossal Quite different from the family That used to place great value on 'Things' of no consequence There was something captivating About this old house that I had found For us to call home Or more likely that the Lord Had given us to call home As bad as it all seemed to be This shelter taught us many things Humility ... Being one Of the greatest lessons learned It seemed that everyone knew of this house Except for ourselves Years before The owner of a logging company Built the house for his family And the other small cabins around us Were for his crew to live in When logging near by There were stories of it being haunted By his little girl after she passed away there It became to feel as if The entire town of Prescott Sympathised with our predicament A prime example to share with you . . . When I applied for work At a Convalescent Hospital in town During my interview the Director Of Nurses In looking over my application made mention Of the fact that she noticed we had rented The 'Old Log Place' I really needed that job I had used all of our resources renting The house and Hersh had not yet found work She hired me on the spot I can tell you that the residents and staff At that hospital gave to me Far more than I ever gave of myself Each of their faces I can still see Their voices I can still hear It was now Christmas   And the weather had turned really nasty and cold The first morning I was to report for work The old car we had bought to replace what I had Would not start and I knew even if it would It would not make the snow and ice Of the twelve mile jaunt down the highway to work I had no choice but to call and tell them The spot I was in I was just sure that after the call There would be no work for me there One of the male nurses brought his four-wheel drive And picked me up at the door and brought me home When my shift was over I had been working about a week and I came home One afternoon and parked the car in the carport Noticing as I did so at least two cores of split logs Stacked neatly at our back door Wood was expensive unless you cut it for yourself And as I mentioned before we had been burning shingles They were tearing off our roof for heat When I asked Hersh about the wood He said that two men had showed up With a pickup truck just before I had gotten there And when they started unloading he had tried To tell them that they must have the wrong place Their only reply ... Tell Lesa that Santa and couple of his elves stopped by Merry Christmas to ya They would never admit it to me But I know that it was the hospital staff That had taken to their hearts A small ... very tired ... rather beaten little waif And by doing so had given to me So much to be cherished in our today's At our Christmas party gifts were exchanged By pulling a name from a bedpan And just guess whose name was drawn For the main gift "Well look it is Lesa Gay" There was so much food ... Laundry soap ... Dog food Cereal ... Toilet paper and etc There was no way for me to get it all in the car Evem with Hersh coming to get what I could not We were hard pressed to get everything in They had even remembered my Cocker Spaniel Mandy With doggie toys and treats By the time we got everything home and into the house It was pitch black outside and we heard something At our front door We didn't use that entrance because we had sealed It with heavy plastic as we had all of the windows To try to keep out some of the cold Automatically we assumed it was someone trying to Reclaim Hersh's Grand National Kenneth snuck out the back door and chased Two figures all the way to the highway LOL On the way back noticing something on our front porch It was another huge box of groceries With a Hundred Dollar check taped to its top We of course had no idea whose name Appeared on the check There was only a note telling us to "hang in there" And to have a Merry Christmas We never knew for sure Who was so loving and generous But to this day I can see clearly my children Going through those boxes Laughing and getting excited over finding treats We had not had in such a long time All because of 'The Barn' Answered prayers And the beautiful angels that were sent to us Whose only desire was to help make things easier For relative strangers While living within its shelter We regained our faith in humanity As well as our faith in our Lord I promised this to be the last chapter Of our year long stay Within a small settlement Of log homes and a house That will forever live in our memory So much is left to not be placed here Some good ... Some bad It was a year spent in realizing That as long as there is love Within the walls of the dwelling Where you at night lay your head ... You lay your head ... At home The Winter passed to Summer With still no work for Hersh We would still at times find checks Taped to our door from people we had never met With just a note to apply the money to our electric bill Our something we may need for ourselves The Summer brought to us weiner roasts over bondfires Between the cabins of our little settlement And the wonderful people we were glad To call friends and neighbors In the Summer the house was cool and bright And we finally was able to sleep in our bed The Summer months there were wonderful Except still for the lack of income One of my favorite memories was of Kimberly running to the house With an old rusty tin can from the creek All excited and asking me what These funny looking things were That she had caught to show me They were Crawdads LOL . . . And the mystery was finally solved Of the large bird that kept chasing her away From her 'Thinking' spot at the creek Where she would go to find her peace of mind It turned out to be a large Hooping Crane With a nest of eggs nearby Our time at 'The Barn' Taught us who we really were And what we were made of All that we had grieved for in its loss Became in truth the greatest gift anyone could be given We had been betrayed by friends in the beginning We had now been picked up and loved by friends That had started out to only want to touch The heart of a family that needed help to survive Finally a resume in Reno was picked up and looked at Hersh was again employed We were leaving the Barn And moving to Nevada I will be the first to admit That our time spent living at 'The Barn' Especially at the beginning of our stay Is not something that I would rush To live over again but our time there Was also a blessing and a lesson That we as a family will never forget So many gifts we were given That without this time of hardship Would have never been recognized The beauty of nature that surrounded us For that brief time time in our lives Will forever live in memory The greens were the greenest I had ever seen And the air so fresh it was as if It was always cleaned by a Spring rain The beauty of sunsets And Antelopes just outside your windows Grazing undisturbed because of the glass That stood between you is an experience That is granted to very few Just prior and during the time We lived within that old log house Has probably been our greatest challenge In our lifetime together A cold beginning ... A very warm departure With the knowledge that we are never given more Than we can handle by our Lord He had granted the promise We had lived the proof As we were pulling away onto the highway To start our new lives I said to Hersh "We will laugh at this one day" His reply . . . "I don't think so" I turned one last time To see it standing in the twilight Just as I had seen it that first twilight The year before ... Peacefully standing to find a new family To teach the valuable lessons of what it is To bridge their lives to their tomorrow's One final gift was given to us as we pulled away From what had been home I can hardley believe this Illustration shows it so truly I will probably never live down The teasing I still get from my family Of renting an old log house that Resembled a barn If the truth be known from each They too have a special connection To our time there that they Will carry with them for their lifetime I thank you my friends For allowing me to reminisce with you Throughout these chapters Sometime in your lifetime If you have not already You will face your own story of trials That you feel you will never see your way out of Remember . . . . Watch for the hidden blessings Take the hands of angeles For they are God's messengers Showing you that he will Never leave you nor forsake you We are told to thank the Lord for all things And I truly do thank him for This story within a chapter of our lives Blessings to you and yours From The Pen Of Aspiring Angel TRIPLES with EMMA

Author's Note

I want to especially thank "Rain" for taking the time to read each of these chapters and leaving
his lovely reviews. If you have not met Rain, he is on my friends list. You will not be sorry that you
have dropped in to meet him I promise. I leave my Blessings here for Christmas 2008 and the New Year 2009. May we each continue our journey in love.

Hugs to all,
Lesa

Reviews

[Rain]

The more I read about it, and the pictures of it..it's become a dream house. I love the way it looks, amd it has history to it.
I would have been sad to leave it with all the memories. It was a wonderful story. Rain..