If you are anything like me, you are a moment hound. You savor moments in time that were precious to you. Sometimes it’s little things. Sometimes really meaningful times. I want to tell you about two such moments.
Swings.
We had decided to go for a drive up to the Wooster, Ohio area. 514 is a beautiful drive and I love driving country roads. (don’t even start singing that song right now) We drove up to Killbuck wetlands near Wooster and decided to head back. We saw a sign for Mohican state park, and made our way there in hopes that we might find a place just to hang out at a park or something for a little while. The campgrounds proved to be the best spot and we found a nice little playground. My son, Aidan loves swings. But as you can see in the picture below, my wife does too.
This is the moment captured. Mother and Son on the swings and both enjoying it. Aidan is just looking around while his mother is apparently in rapturous delight. This is my favorite image of the two of them together… you can see the horizon in the background all slanted… the world is upside down and both, for the moment, are children together.
The Funeral.
The Second Moment, I don’t have a picture for but hopefully I can do the scene justice as I illustrate it with words. My grandfather died recently. My grandmother and him were married for 67 years. The day after they were married, he headed to war. So he was a veteran. Now the scene.
My grandfather died the week before the fourth of July. Every year on the fourth of July they put flags out at cemeteries much like they do on Memorial day. Being a veteran, they also give military honors. It was cool for late June. Around seventy degrees and the wind blew just enough to keep the flags all flying and flapping in the breeze. All the family was gathered around and right at the beginning of the service, the veterans with rifles at the ready saluted and raised their guns and all seven fired three times. I held my son, Aidan (a gentleman from the funeral home held his hands over Aidan’s ears for the gunshots). In the quiet peace that followed, Taps was played. I am not usually the most emotional of people, but in that moment, with the wind flapping American flags as far as I could see behind the veteran soldiers as the trumpet played the tune of a soldier who has finally laid down his life, I felt something more than mere patriotism. Several soldiers then proceeded to in front of the casket and folded the American Flag and presented it to my grandmother. Bullet shells were passed out to family. I got one for Aidan. It is a scene that I will never forget.
These are the two moments that I have recently had that I will never forget. Things I will cherish. Moments that will go with me the rest of my life and be played out in dreams for years to come.
This is my most recent graphic design assignment. I put this together for my church as are partnering up with the YMCA to do this camp next month. I was originally going to use photographs but, finding a cheerleader image that wasn’t suggestive became an issue. Instead, I used the logo that will be put on the shirts as the main graphic.
It’s been awhile since I posted a cartoon. This is based off of something I wrote on my twitter account a few weeks ago. It’s also my first completely vector cartoon… I think.
My grandfather died this last week. The funeral is on Wednesday. But I want to take a moment and share his obituary with you.
NEWARK: A graveside service for Jesse Dale Morton will be held 11:00 a.m. Wednesday at Newark Memorial Gardens with Pastor Les Crossfield presiding. Licking County Veterans Alliance will render military honors. A gathering of relatives and friends will be one hour prior to service time, beginning at 10:00 a.m. at Brucker-Kishler Funeral Home, 985 North 21st Street, Newark. A procession to the cemetery will form at the funeral home.
Mr. Morton, a retired computer programmer for the Newark Air Force Base, passed away June 26, 2010 at Flint Ridge Nursing Center at the age of 87. He was born August 26, 1922 in Uhrichsville, Ohio, the son of the late Willard R. and Ruth (Utterback) Morton. Jesse married Janis Avril Holcomb on January 13, 1943. He served in the U.S. Army during WWII. Jesse attended Wesleyan Community Church.
Mr. Morton is survived by his loving wife of 67 years, Janis Morton; three sons, Gary (Nancy) Morton of Heath, Willard (Beverly) Morton of Heath and Marvin (Rose) Morton of Clarksville, TN; two daughters, Sheryl (Robert) Williams of Newark and Linda (Bill) Lehman of Buckeye Lake; a sister, Louise Thompson of Uhrichsville; 11 grandchildren; and six great grandchildren.
In addition to his parents; Jesse was preceded in death by his brother, Faye.
To sign an online guest book, please visit www.brucker-kishler funeralhome.com and click obituaries/view full details/add memorial guest book entry.
Did you catch it? If you didn’t, the title of this post certainly should have clued you in. My grandfather and grandmother were married for 67 years! Another tidbit to the story is that when they got married, they married the day before my grandfather was shipped off to war. In today’s age, I am proud of this. It’s a testament to commitment, love… and those vows that are so often uselessly repeated each day by people supposedly in love with each other. I wish this kind of love and commitment every time I go to a wedding.
Here is a man who kept his word, A man I am proud to say was my grandfather. Not because he was rich or powerful or famous, but because he demonstrated with his life something I wish more people would “get” today, the value of commitment & keeping your word.
I often have been in some kind of situation where I felt like there was little to no hope and somehow God created something wonderful through it. I’ve been in the middle of a situation like that right now. I am on the backend where God is putting things in place to show me how He can work to create something amazing; something I never saw the possibility for. I’ll be able to share more very soon, but not yet.
Lately I have been pretty busy with some new projects. Namely, the lookup center and a website called the savage athlete for a guy from church. The Savage Athlete site is still in the designing stages, but the lookup center site is beginning to take form.
It’s not on it’s final domain name just yet, so you can check it out at www.lickingcountyjob.com for the time being.
After that, I’ll begin working on the local jail ministry website.
With family life, I’ve been really praying about a job I interviewed for this last week. It would be a lot of time away from my family if I took it. Pretty much a hotel each night/road warrior type of position. After talking with my family, I am still at the crossroads on taking it. I have a second interview lined up on Wednesday.
Becca has been feeling a little better as she is in her second trimester with baby #2. Though work has been tough on her as of late as they are making snide comments and hassling her about her sitting down in between customers. I have put a lot of resumes out there but have yet to find a job that I’ll make enough that Becca could just be a stay at home mom like we had originally planned.
Aidan is growing every day. He actually fell asleep with a french fry in his hands earlier when I dropped off Becca at work and headed home.
My grandfather on my mom’s side is not doing well. Dale Morton. He was put on dialysis a few weeks ago but they have determined that it was not doing any good. The other day, he decided to not go through with dialysis anymore and let nature take it’s course. He is not expected to make it though the rest of the month.
The image at the top of the post is of a turkey vulture I saw when I went to my interview wednesday of last week. There were two but one flew away when I pulled up to take the picture. It would probably be a better picture if I retouched it but it’s okay.
- Posted from my iPad
Location:N 40th St,Newark,United States
I’ve been deling with a relly frustrating problem. Maybe you caan guess wht it is by these first few sentences. The “A” key on my lptop is freking out little. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. I’ve tried clening it nd dusting it out using one of those little ir cans, but nothing relly seems to have fixed it.
Now if only I could educate myself in not using the letter so often, then I might be better off without it.
I created this little scene using the iPad and the brushes app for iPad.
