Lyfting Me Up

My soul has finally caught up with my body. There is nothing like a 3000 mile, 13 day road trip,to test a 75 year old body. I got to see a number of sites that I had only heard about. The Salton Sea in California should not be there… but it is—all 30 miles of… Continue reading

In 1964 I became an indentured servant at the family business—Cleaver Carpet. I became the “assistant” to both the cleaning crew and the installers. Being the owner’s kid gave me very little perks, other than that I got to learn a whole lot about how people live—for $1.15 and hour. When we were working at… Continue reading

In 1958 my parents loaded up their 1957 Buick station wagon and pulled a 14–ft. Aljo travel trailer on the first of many road trip adventures with our family. The destination was the great Northwest. My dad, who was born in Bellingham, Washington, was like a salmon who had to migrate to the place of… Continue reading

I have been thinking about the words nice and kind for the last 45 years. It all started when a man who was a member at Central Christian Church in Pueblo, sported a bumper sticker that said—“Niceness is kind of Nice”. It’s a decent thought on first blush, but the problem I had with this… Continue reading

The pandemic of 2020 has been part of our history for five years. Travel was an integral part of my life until then. My dad Bill died 25 years ago today. To say I was privileged is an understatement. He made sure that we saw the world. By the time I was 18, I had… Continue reading

The inpouring of memories that keep coming this time of year—keep it up! I was listening to some friends talking about the various things their families shared, that only seemed to come at Christmas. My mom was half Swedish. Her father was raised on a farm near Essex, Iowa, by immigrant parents who came to… Continue reading

Last night, a friend asked me “Did your mom put baking soda in her peanut brittle as she was stirring it”? My answer was “No, Birdie made our peanut brittle”. It will be 66 years ago tomorrow—December 22nd, that Birdie came into our familie’s life. It was a Monday morning and my dad had written… Continue reading

One of the many joys of growing up in Belmont, was that a 10 year old Mark could walk four blocks to the corner of Yorktown and Horseshoe, and ride a bus all the way downtown, for a dime. I suspect I did this dozens of times, as the YMCA was on the corner of… Continue reading

This is the year that we sold our fake tree, tons of lights, assorted snow men and whatever we could pass off as no longer being used. It’s “Christmas light” at the Pumphreys. Our house is now adorned with a small nativity, an18 inch fake tree, an ornament hanger that has seven of our most… Continue reading

I am not much of a shopper. Actually, my approach to shopping is more like going hunting: go get it, bag it, get out. It took me two minutes to buy my “Rollater” on Amazon. Red or blue was the only question. Two days later there it was. Recently, a good friend, who also grew… Continue reading