Thoughts and Musings From an Old Man in Maine
April 2014
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Blueberries
Yesterday, I got an email from The Home Depot. It said that this was the time to plant Blueberry Bushes if you lived in New England! Do they know that we still have snow and that the ground is frozen?
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The North Country News

News, Notes and Memories from Pastor Charlie in Eliot, Maine

February 2013

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Critters Seen Around the Bird Feeders

This winter has been a very exciting time for feeding the birds and other critters at our outdoor, but, close up feeders. I say close up because one feeder is hanging only six inches from our kitchen window. It has taken a few years to get the feeder this close. Each year over the past several we have brought the feeder closer to the window. Now we are able to observe them just fine.
For the first time in memory we have a flock of Blue Birds at the feeder each day. Also coming regularly are Chickadees, Buntings, Bridled Titmice, Grackles, Cardinals, Blue Jays, Finches and Woodpeckers. Eating roasted, salted peanuts in the shell from the ground are Squirrels, Chipmunks, Blue Jays and even one Barn Rat which we call Templeton. Templeton was the friendly rat featured in Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White. In the movie version Paul Lynde was the perfect voice of Templeton!
So we stay busy feeding the creatures then watching their antics from just a few inches away!

How Cold Is It?

Folks in the North Country are enjoying (?) a good old-fashioned winter. I mean the kind with plenty of snow and extremely cold temperatures. Did I mention the wind? Well it has been blowing for nearly a week now with gusts well over 40 miles per hour!
Oddly, the January thaw came two days this week and the outside temperature hit 60° F and all the snow is gone. The strong winds have dried the ground nicely. Tomorrow, February arrives and that has been historically our heaviest snow month. We who make our home in the North Country love the weather even if it means spending more money on heating oil and winter clothes than almost all folks in the country.

Enjoying Life As Never Before

At the age of sixty-seven, I can say that I am enjoying this great gift of life. This is especially true as a part-time pastor. I could not handle all the demands of working fulltime but twenty or so hours a week serves me fine.
It is an awesome call to represent the Lord by preaching His word every Sunday. I have a wonderful congregation even if it is small in number. Nearly every month we have one or two new folks attend. Many times they return the next Sunday.
I also work from my home office so Mary Lou and the dogs are close at hand.

The Snowy Burial of Jim Norton

Jim Norton died ten days before his 94^th birthday in early January. Jim had served the Lord and His church for nearly seventy years. Jim had preplanned his services and wished to have only a short and modest graveside service. In keeping with Jim’s wishes, I conducted a ten minute graveside service on January 15^th in the middle of a snowstorm. There were nearly eighty people hovering under an overhead canopy. When I finished my part two soldiers in sharp dress uniforms played taps and folded the flag and presented it on behalf of the President and the grateful American people for Jim’s service. The graveside service in a snowstorm was a first for me but I assure you it was just as Jim wanted.

Jace, Our Grandson Is Now Eighteen Years Old

Jace Ryan Howard Downes turned 18 on January 12. It certainly was a red-letter day for him. He was able to insure and register his 1982 GMC pickup truck the day before his birthday so he was able to drive it on his big day.
Jace is a Senior at Noble High School in nearby North Berwick, Maine. He has taken classes at the Vocational section majoring in Automobile Mechanics. At his tender age, Jace has owned thirty-two used Simplicity garden tractors, all in working condition. He has bought and sold ten pickup trucks and as many cars. Using his computer over the years, Jace was able to find out how to repair anything with an engine. We are very proud of him.

Fillin’ the Wood Stoves
Mary Lou and I supplement our oil burning boiler with two woodstoves. One of them was built by her father forty years ago. I say built because Guy Morang bought the stove kit by mail. It consisted of a door, a smokestack and four legs. Guy supplied his own 55 gallon empty oil barrel. Once assembled he had a “corker” of a stove. It takes large logs up to 36 inches long and when it is roaring it will drive one out of the living room!
The other stove I also bought in the mail a few years back. That one is in our kitchen and it does a great job of keeping us warm while saving oil. The stove was built by a Christian company named Vogelzang.
We also have a “retired” Glenwood Parlor Stove down cellar. The stove was built in 1910 and was given to my father in 1950. It was used to heat the small home that I grew up in. Dad burned white pine buttings from the mill where he worked. Being softwood, they burned faster than a cigar and kept us kids busy feeding the stove!
I have kept the stove with us after my parents no longer needed it. Every household move we made with Woolworth’s (nine times in eleven years) that old stove moved with us over the protests of the moving men. Some things are just too sentimental to give up! My kids threaten to bury my cremated ashes along with the stove. That’s it for now; stay warm and I’ll “visit” with you in March, Charlie