A Look Backward

A look Backward     

By John W. Vander Velden

As the year comes to its conclusion, it is perfectly normal to look backward at the year or years behind us. Personally, I take too much time looking in the rearview mirror for my own good, dwelling upon stumbles I’ve made. It’s OK to look back, but I should not dwell there, and overall I don’t.

But as I look forward to the new year ahead, I hope I have learned something from 2018. For the year contained many firsts. Imagine that, this old dog had new experiences. I, like most, faced a few frightening things during the year, and have overcome a couple of threats to my person. To clarify, these dangers came from life in general not from an angry individual. But I have had many wonderful experiences that outweigh the negative many times over.

The thrill of holding the first copy of my book cannot be measured with a ruler. The wonderful people I have met while I promoted Misty Creek will long be remembered. Watching my son graduate from Purdue University will always be a pinnacle of my life, though moving him out of state carries its own melancholy. Life goes on and to the fortunate it brings new things, but it is up to us to reach out and grab the golden ring isn’t it.

We did a bit of traveling in 2018 and saw new places in a way we haven’t before. Life is meant to be lived and there are many ways to live it. Watching our children’s wings grow stronger, even if that means they fly further away. Trying something new like writing a book. Traveling to new places. Facing new challenges and difficulties. All these things are part of the life we have been given. All these things...the good and the bad as well are gifts and should be appreciated.

So a new year stands before me and I have no idea what it will bring. But that’s the magic of it. To be wide open to the 365 days of possibilities. Yes, there will be setbacks. Yes, there will be things I would rather not face, but must. Yes, there will be heartbreak. But there will also be those amazing moments, fantastic sunrises and sets, the huge full moon when it breaks the horizon, there will be friends and laughter, and there will always be love. And that is  the greatest thing of all.

For each day I know I am surrounded by love. Love from people I know, friends and family. Love from my faraway son. Love from my beloved, Jackie, who makes my life livable, and love from God that makes my life possible.

So take a look backward...but don’t dwell in the past. Look forward...but don’t get lost in what might be...it is the now that matters and the love that surrounds.

12/25/2018 (479 Words)

2018 Christmas Letter

 Can it be? Can it be December once again? But the calendar tells me that Christmas is near, and so I find myself at a familiar place attempting to put together a few words about our year.

Where to begin? 2018 has been a whirlwind in so many ways that I couldn’t go into everything in less than fifteen pages. So allow me to pick and choose a bit to give you the gist of this year’s adventures. Hmmm...OK...well I’ll try to stay in chronological order...mostly.

They are real and spend time on the roof of
Al Johnson's Restaurant, Sister Bay, WI

Door County Sunset

Lake of the Clouds, Porcupine National Park, MI 

January saw the release of my novel, Misty Creek. The years of work came at last together at last. I cannot completely describe my feelings when I first saw a copy of my words in print. January was also the month I began work on revising the sequel, a task that is not yet complete.

 

 

 

We’ll push past winter snows and such and jump to May. That was the month that Nick graduated from Purdue University. Our son graduated on Mother’s Day no less. What a crazy weekend that was for all of us. We spent days wandering around campus taking pictures and meeting up with family to show them around too. Seeing the thousands of young men and women in their caps and gowns gave me optimism in the future. 

May was also the month we moved Nick OUT-OF-STATE...hmmmph. What a day that was, renting a truck, unloading his apartment, rumbling down the interstate between all the construction barrels, and trying to get things unloaded before the thunderstorm hit. I did say trying...not succeeding. Carrying “stuff” and furniture up three floors reminded these bones just how old they are. Too old!

But Nick is settled into a nice apartment on the outskirts of Elizabethtown, Kentucky, just ten minutes from his work.  He’s a design engineer for Altec a manufacturer of bucket trucks. The kind of trucks used by utilities and tree trimmers. They keep him hopping but he is settling into the area.

Things at work prevented Jackie from taking vacation days until July, so our usual spring escape was pushed back. So we headed out just after Independence Day on our first outing.  We went north. What can I say it was summer. We checked out some new territory along Lake Michigan’s western shoreline. Door County Wisconsin came highly recommended, and just between you and me they weren’t foolin’. Spent three days near the tip of the peninsula just “checkin’ things out” and knew when we left that we were coming back.

Lake Superior

Eagle Harbor Lighthoue, MI

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From Door County we went north to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I had longed to return to Keweenaw Peninsula. My last visit a whirlwind pass on a motorcycle in 1982, so I was glad to have the opportunity to go back.  We love the UP, the shoreline, the waterfalls, the lighthouses, and the hiking trails. Went to the Porcupine Mountains National Park to see Lake of the Clouds on an overcast day. It was beautiful all the same. On another day we went north to see the lighthouses at Copper Harbor and Eagle Harbor. We took time to hike along the Lake Superior Shoreline to reach Montreal Falls. Went into a copper mine. It’s cold down there...42⁰...and dark too!

Greenfield Village

With vacation stacked up August found us going to Eastern Michigan. Had never gone to Greenfield Village before and was impressed to say the least. A second day at the Ford Innovation Museum filled our time in the Detroit area then north to the Lake Huron shore and finally to Frankenmuth. Enjoyed good weather while we spent time in a part of Michigan we had not visited before.

High upon a lighthouse

 

 

If two trips almost back to back were not enough we went south in September. Oh, we had the most noble of motives, to visit Nick on his Birthday. So we headed down to Elizabethtown, Kentucky for a four day stay. Nick had to work so we visited with him in the evening which left the days for exploring. An    interesting area to say the least. Spent most of a day in Mammoth Cave National Park. The cave itself is amazing, but we also enjoyed the hiking trail. The next day we visited Abraham Lincoln’s birthplace. The monument there is older than the Lincoln Memorial in DC and is impressive, standing atop the hill. Our next stop was the site of the farm Lincoln spent his early childhood years.

We spent the remainder of our time visiting an antique car museum, the Kentucky Railway Museum, Elizabethtown Veteran’s Memorial Park, and the remnants of a Civil War era fort overlooking the Ohio River. We just wanted to touch base and check things out because we are sure to be back there again soon.

Mammoth Cave, KY



 

That pretty well covers the most noteworthy parts of the year. When it comes to work and such, nothing much has changed. Jackie works for Martin’s Super Market’s Pharmacy, and I sit at the keyboard trying to turn keystrokes into another book.

Lincolns' Birthplace , KY

 

 

So as we come to this important time of the year, as we reach out to you, family and friends, we hope you know that you are often in our thoughts. That Christmas carries a meaning deeper than Black Friday discounts and Ho, Ho, Ho.  For Christmas is a reminder of how love came...God’s gift given in the form of a baby. Jesus born for you and me...

Merry Christmas from the Vander Veldens here in the greater Tyner Teegarden area of Northern Indiana.

  

We Stand Upon The Threshold

We Stand Upon the Threshold           

By John W. Vander Velden

Our satellite TV provider teased us by offering the Hallmark Channels for a few weeks.  In October for a time we had two, then one, and later the third I’d never heard of. It was during Hallmark’s “holiday push” season and we saw many, and I do mean many, Christmas movies.

We enjoyed the presentations we watched but I would say that of these holiday specials only a few were truly “Christmas Movies”.

You see most focused on the “magic’ of Christmas, how things became different around a calendar date, or how a romantic event hinged on a specific number. It is as if December 25 is, of itself, some sort of mystical power to change people’s lives...though temporarily...into something amazing.

Pleasant little stories.

But we stand on the threshold! And those of us that KNOW that Christmas is much more than a date understand that.  Yes, we too get swept away by all the “stuff” that we think we need to accomplish...before, but we have not forgotten the reason. Hopefully while we hustle about writing cards and letters, while we shop for and wrap gifts, while we set up decorations and play holiday music, our minds remain focused upon “the reason for the season”.

It isn’t the date that matters. The twenty-fifth of December is not some magic number. We set that day aside to celebrate a flashpoint in history. The event that changed how we view the universe. The method we used to count history is based on a singular event...the birth of Jesus.

Gifts, cards, music, decorations, movies, are all just fluff.  For God, the master and creator of everything that was, everything that is, and everything that will be, so loved the world that he sent his Son, a baby born of peasants, born in the humblest of circumstances, born to a dark lost world.  Yes, God loved the world...the seas and mountains, the grasslands and lakes, the valleys and rivers...He loves it all. But God’s love...the love that powered the greatest gift...His Son...was his love for you...his love for me.

That is the thought that brings me to tears time and time again. The effort God took to reach out in love to me. That He sent his son to live as a human, so I am unable say, “God, You do not understand what I face,” because Jesus faced it too! Jesus was poor. When Joseph and Mary fled to Egypt to escape the madman King Herod, Jesus became a refugee. Jesus had been hungry. Jesus faced loss, and pain, and disappointment. There were time when Jesus became angry. He was human in every respect. You see God understands, and the birth of Christ proves that He cares.

Christmas is the beginning of Easter. You might think that is a strange statement.  But the birth of Jesus Christ began the series of events that led at last to the cross and resurrection. Jesus...Emanuel...God with us...lived to teach us about God with firsthand knowledge. Showing us the truths about His Father...our Father...we could never have learned any other way. That is what brings me to tears...the truth exposed of just how much God loves me...that Jesus saves me...that the Holy Spirit will never abandon me. That no matter how dark the nights of my life might seem I know I am never alone, that the journey I walk will at last lead me home.

We stand upon the threshold...and Christmas is the opening of the door!

12-21-2018 (609 Words)

A Part of the Mechanism

A Part of the Mechanism              

By John W. Vander Velden

 

I have always been fascinated by how things work. The way individual pieces move in coordination with one another. It came in handy all the years I farmed. An example: I operated a machine called an “automatic bale wagon”. A machine that picked bales off the ground and arranged and stacked 103 on its bed and then placed that stack in the barn—for the most part by itself. At first glance it appeared a very complex device of hydraulics, chains, and many trip mechanisms. But it became important that I understood the purpose for each part of the mechanism.

For when it worked it worked wonderfully, but when it didn’t it was up to me to figure out which particular piece needed repair or adjustment. I handled more than a hundred thousand of bales with that red machine and learned a great deal along the way.

Recent events have led me to thinkin’. A dangerous use of time perhaps. But I have wondered about my place in things. My part in the mechanism of the world I share with you. I wonder if I, like those hoses and levers of my bale wagon, am humming along doing what I should as I should, or if I am that suborn valve that would fail at the most inopportune moment. Am I in need of an adjustment—today.

I know I am not the one that determines such things, for I am not the one operating the mechanism—just a piece of the machine that is bouncing along the universe. God is in charge of this machine that you and I share. But when I think of all the things I have over the years repaired, the gears and bearing, belts and motors, plumbing and electrical, I imagine myself among them in a grander wider mechanism. When I think about the things I do, and the things I avoid doing, I wonder if I am a useful part of the machine or just taking up space.

Something happened yesterday that brought these thoughts to the front of my mind. An action I took that I may not have been prepared to deal with, but I injected myself into the situation because I could not just walk passed and ignore it. Some might have seen my action as intrusive. Others as noble. But I see it as neither, I did what I did because it was who I am.

In the end I may not have been any help at all, but I tried and sometimes trying is enough.

You see I’m just part of the mechanism.

(435 Words) 12/7/2018