My Precious Mom

My young mom

Mom loved her plants

This picture was taken long before any of
us were a gleam in her eye

Mom & my brother Richard

Margaret Ellen John Gano

1916 - 2013

What can you say about a little lady who was always a pillar of your existence? No matter where you went or what you did, you knew she would be there somewhere routing for you. It feels strange that after all these years, she isn't here anymore. Well, maybe not here in person, but I know her spirit lives on in all of us.

I guess the best thing you can say is:

Thank you

Thank you for sense of humor you instilled in us

• Mom used to say that whenever things look their worse, think about how funny this story will be one day.
• Mom found herself in any number of situations that if it hadn't been for her sense of humor, I'm not sure how she would have coped. Traveling across the country and oceans with children of varying ages would try any reasonable person, but mom took it in stride and laughed a lot about it later
• Mom could see funny parts of a movie coming long before they occurred.  
• She would start laughing when everyone else in the theatre was silent.    
• Once it embarrassed my brother Jim so badly that he got up and moved to another seat far away from us. 
• Another time, she and I went to an afternoon showing of “My Fair Lady”. The theater was packed to overflowing and the opening segment showed a screen full of beautiful flowers. Mom leaned over to me and whispered “Boy, Kathy, this is a dark movie”. I looked over at her and said “It wouldn't be so dark if you took off your sunglasses!” You could hear her laughing throughout the entire place! Good thing Jim wasn't with us or he would have had no place to move.

  Thank you for the love of needle art and fine fabric

• Mom loved to sew and do needlework.
  • She made most of the clothes I wore to elementary school and you could normally find pieces of odd fabric and remnants in boxes around the house. This is one trait I definitely inherited.
  • The first time she went to Callaway Gardens for the needlework school, she told me she was envious of a lady who had her daughter with her. So the next year, what did mom do? She outdid that lady when she paid the tuition for Jeanie and me to join her there. She was so proud to have both of us with her that year.

Thank you for the love of good music, theater, and especially ballet

• As we were growing up, about all we heard mom and dad listen to was classical music and show tunes on old 78 rpm records. Then dad built a stereo system and the very first record they played on it was the Broadway musical “Camelot”. One year as an anniversary surprise, I lured them to Miami without telling them why. I was able to get tickets in the orchestra section to see Richard Burton do “Camelot”. Mom sat there with tears in her eyes when the show started. At least she didn't start laughing.
• Mom put me in ballet classes at a tender age. I was never quite sure why but I know Jeanie took ballet when she was about the same age. It may have been to get me out of her hair for a little while or to try to make a young lady out of an incorrigible tomboy. Oh the hours she spent waiting at ballet studios – I will ever be grateful. She also found ways to get to tickets to see any of the touring ballet companies that came our way. But mom was never a pushy “stage mom” and I am ever thankful that she wasn't. She allowed me to dance on my terms and that may be reason I love ballet to this day.
• Besides ballet, whenever a Broadway musical touring group came to town, she would get tickets and we would all get dressed up to troop down to the auditorium to see the show. Without a doubt, her favorite musical was “Oliver” and, of course, we had the record and knew all the songs. I can distinctly remember her putting dinner on the table singing “Food, glorious, food” and if you asked for seconds, the first thing out of her mouth was “Mooooorrre? You want some mooooorrre?

Thank you for the love of history

• I was always awed by mom and dad telling us about their experiences during the bombing of Pearl Harbor. I used to ask “Did you really see Japanese airplanes flying over your head?”
• And being in Pensacola was a neat place to live because mom took us to all the old forts where we ran wild through them all.
• Then when we lived in Norfolk, she took us to Williamsburg at least once a year and I think she found the old town as fascinating as I did.

Thank you for your culinary gifts

• Oh, how mom loved to make sweet things. She always ended a meal with dessert. Woe be unto he or she who did not eat their dessert right after dinner – you had to become adept at hiding it! Memorable treats – raisin-filled sugar cookies, Christmas danish, but most of all, cherry pie.           
• Mom also fixed colorful meals. She always said all the foods on your plate had to be different in color. None of knew why or cared, but our plates were sure pretty.
• Another thing mom insisted on was that the television could not be on while we ate dinner. Maybe that is the origin of the “Seven minute meal”? Let me tell you about the “Seven minute meal” - mom worked hard to prepare a very nice dinner, called us to the table, and when everyone got up to leave the table after eating, Jeanie noticed it was only seven minutes from the time she sat down. The “seven minute meal” joined the ranks of family lore.

Thank you for the faith I carry

• One Sunday when I was about eight years old, I went to church with a friend. The service really bothered me and when I came home, I asked mom if we were all going to hell because we didn't go to my friend's church. Very patiently mom looked at me and said, “There are lots of good people in this world and I simply can't believe God would send them to Hell just because they don't go to your friend's church.” Mom was so wise when it came to answering questions from her young daughter.

There is so much more that I can thank mom for but the best thing I can thank mom for is for loving us unconditionally and for allowing us to grow up to be the individuals that we all became. Please join me in wishing mom “God speed.” 

Love you lots, mom.

Move to Gore, OK and The Boys's Ranch

Saturday, October 5, 2013

Rainbow over our RV camp at The Boys' Ranch

Rainbow over The Crossings Building/kitchen

 

We finished the project in Tahlequah on Thursday afternoon and moved ourselves 30 miles south to Gore, OK on Friday morning. Temperatures in the 70s and 80s yesterday, beautiful blue skies. Early this morning, a storm rolled over us and seemed to forget to move off. It rained on and off the entire day. While Bill went to try his hand at fly fishing on the Illinois River, I hung around the RV doing laundry in the building next to where we are parked and sewing down a quilt binding. The quilt is getting finished just in time – temperature right now is 52. Quilt will feel nice while I welcome fall.

Fall also brings other changes to our lives. My mom is not doing too well right now. Most people do not make it to age 97 and it's been amazing how well she has done over the past few years but time and infirmities seem to have finally caught up with her. Not long before we left for Tahlequah, Bill and I went down to Gulf Breeze to see Staci and our granddaughters (Eric was overseas) and also to see mom. The first day I went to see her, she had been up all night and all morning so was asleep when I got there. I sat with her a while and she woke up some when I chatted about her great-granddaughters but I worried about getting her up for fear of her falling. The next day, she was awake but not moving very much. She had become so unstable on her feet that she had fallen a number of times so the staff was keeping her in a chair. Funny, though, she kept trying to get up and showed the spirit I remembered my mom always having. The little lady in that chair was my mom and I loved her but she had moved off to a place I could not follow.

So here I am in OK getting ready for three weeks of working at a boys' home. I am bound and determined to do something worthwhile that I know she would be proud of me doing.

It finally quit raining late this afternoon and I happened to look out the window to see one of the prettiest rainbows I have ever seen. It was a complete arch that reached from one side of the sky to the other side and was so bright. I grabbed our camera and tried taking some pictures through the window. The van was smack damb in the way so I decided to run outside, even though it was still misting rain at the time. Eventually, I took some really good pictures, one of which I will try to add to this message.

Friday – October 11, 2013

Oh, the joys of playing on a computer. I just erased half of the above message, couldn't get it back, couldn't remember what I wrote, so I ad-libed the best I could. Gerrrrrrr!!!

Today the guys went fishing and the ladies went into the metropolis of Gore (population – 900) to have lunch in a cute tea room and stop in the few decent gift shops. Then we wandered down to the quilt shop. For a town this size, it was not a bad shop. Fairly decent selection of fabric with good prices. I found a pattern for a small purse that takes fat quarters then a cute fish fabric grabbed me so now I have the stuff to make it. Too bad I left the sewing machine at home. Lunch was good – had a piece of quiche and salad. I'm not hungry anymore.

We finished our first week of work here. Amazingly, I started the week without a paint brush in my hand! Next weekend is the 50^th Anniversary Rodeo at the Boys' Ranch so we areD spending most of our time helping get ready for it. I helped take some old splintery boards off the bleachers and add some 2x4s to other seats to add support to them. I was all ready to help put the new boards up on Tuesday when (1) the boards had not been delivered, and (2) my edging expertise was needed in one of the houses. Soooo, back the paint brush went into my hand, and back to up the ladder, paint, down the ladder, move the ladder, up the ladder, etc., etc., etc. I'm getting so good at this, I may just repaint our bathroom when we get home.

Oh, on Thursday, Elizabeth, Phyllis, and I were asked to paint the 24' bleacher boards. Easier to paint before they are bolted to the bleacher frames. We decided to paint them in the morning before it got too hot. Need boards needed priming so we did that then started with the dark green paint. That first coat of green paint looked awful. Of course, we had to put a second coat on. Stupid boards took us all day to do! And we ended up in the afternoon sun afterall.

The bleachers are down this gravel road right next to the rodeo ring. There are a number of pole barns and closed in barns where the ring is. At the end closest to where our RVs are parked is a swinging gate with a cattle crossing in the ground. There are well over 20 horses at the ranch and people are always donating unwanted horses. Two painted horses were dropped off a few weeks ago – one brown spotted and one black spotted. Larry, our main contact, told us that they weren't sure how the other horses were going to take to these two new ones, so they left them roaming around on their own around the ring and barns and all up and down the road. Elizabeth started calling them Frick and Frack and decided the brown one is the leader. Wherever brown-Frick goes, usually you will see black-Frack following. Sometimes they are in the tractor barn, sometimes around the bleachers, and then other times you see them up the gravel road by the gate. When we were painting yesterday, Frack started over towards us. We've been told they are gentle but curious. Great! The closer Frack got to Elizabeth, the more she moved down the boards towards the other side. I just wanted him to be curious on her side of the boards, not mine. Just like me, she likes horses, as long as they are on the other side of the fence. These two act like two lost puppy dogs, except BIGGER.

I'll have to take some pictures of them and post them next time.

And speaking of lost puppies, the team has adopted this poor lost dog. The guys are working up on the hill top (they call it a mountain here, but it's an awfully low “mountain” in comparison to NC mtns.) on a cabin. Yesterday this young dog wandered onto the site during lunch time. What did the guys do? Feed it, of course. When they left at the end of the work day, they noticed the dog running behind the truck. They stopped, opened the door, and the dog jumped in and made itself comfortable in the back seat. Next thing we know, she has made herself part of our group. Question is – who's going to take it home? She is so friendly but so pitifully skinny with ribs showing and hip bones protruding. But she has clear blue ice eyes and wags her tail at everyone. Larry thinks she's mostly Australian terrier but she looks just like a dingo. Phyllis has a friend in Texas who would like to have her so now she's trying to convince one of our other team members to take her to Texas when they leave here.

The poor-lost-puppy-dog – to be continued.

Nice thing about this project is all the cooking that's going on in the kitchen to get ready for the rodeo. One non-NOMADS couple has been coming to the ranch for 20 years to do the cooking. Donna is this dynamo of a little Oklahoma woman who can cook anything. She and two of our lady team members have made tons of cookies and dozens of cobblers, some of which they ask us to sample and critique. And, of course, there are always cookies that fall apart that need to be eaten. Makes for yummy break times.

Ok, enough said. Bent your ears long enough. Now to try to get this whole message from the word processing program to the Internet blog site and download a picture. Patience, Patience, Patience.

More to follow later . . .