Dearest Dorothy,
Slow Down, You're Wearing Us Out!
Charlene Ann Baumbich
Copyright
Diversion Books
A Division of Diversion Publishing Corp.
443 Park Avenue South, Suite 1008
New York, NY 10016
www.DiversionBooks.com
Copyright © 2002 by Charlene Ann Baumbich
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
For more information, email [email protected]
First Diversion Books edition September 2014
ISBN: 978-1-62681-390-8
More from Charlene Ann Baumbich
Dearest Dorothy, Are We There Yet?
Dearest Dorothy, Slow Down, You're Wearing Us Out!
Dearest Dorothy, Help! I've Lost Myself!
Dearest Dorothy, Who Would Have Ever Thought?
Dearest Dorothy, Merry Everything!
Dearest Dorothy, If Not Now, When?
Dedicated to the real Oldster Characters in my life who inspired creativity; taught sensitivity; modeled kindness, acceptance and wahoo fun; were unabashedly thier own True Selves; and cheered me on—all the way from heaven. Especially my Dearest Dorothy.
Acknowledgments
How do I begin to thank everyone who helped wing these books to life? I mean, the cast of characters (real ones) is huge! Although I have already written my dedication page to the Masters of My Inspiration, there are OH! so many more friends, family and just plain good folks who helped knit these books together. Their range of contributions is nothing short of astounding: inspiration (“I know you can, I know you can”); education (teaching me details about stuff I know nothing about so that my fiction doesn’t get too many “I don’t think so!” responses from you astute readers); cheerleading (“Great chapter!”); shrink duty (“Yes, sometimes ‘reality’ is slippery, Charlene”); hysteria stopping (“Snap out of it!”); listening to me whine (yes, I do my fair share). And a WAHOO! thanks for friends who never gave up on me, even when I was impossible; who provided laughs when I needed them, breaks when I needed them, tolerance when I needed it, mercy when I needed it and a kick in the butt when I needed it.
Without Terri Castillo, there would be no Dearest Dorothy books. Her verbalized question became the materialized project. She asked; I knew; it was. (Okay, there were years of hard work and creative flying in the midst of this, but the short and True Birthing Miracle version is this: She asked; I knew; it was.) As I type, I pray blessings upon her journey. She has gently launched me with full spiritual sails into the delicious waters of Story.
Regina Hersey, my editor, was a constant bellows to the all of my all (and she’ll probably tell me “ ‘the all of my all’ doesn’t make sense,” but I’m writing these acknowledgments and she’ll just have to live with it—HA!). Again, without Regina, no Dearest Dorothy books. Simple as that. From the very first e-mail forwarded to me after she read my first draft, to the very last conversation I’ve had with her (which was probably yesterday, since she’s become my True Friend), she has been nothing short of a pure-gold gift. I have no doubt that our synergy was God designed, and ’twas the genius of Terri Castillo who matched us up. Even though I sometimes quake at Regina’s ability to be a self-ordained Grammar Nazi who always has “just a few little things” for me to address in my manuscripts, she is, without exception, grace upon grace in my life.
Oftentimes we need a mentor who has honorably journeyed down the road before us. Novelist Terri Blackstock graciously gave me ninety minutes of her time during one frantic, out-of-the-blue phone call. It was ninety minutes’ worth of genuine, literal, literary and Big Picture guidance. My journey became instantly lighter and wiser.
Between Are We There Yet? and Slow Down, You’re Wearing Us Out! the following are people who fell into that “education” category I mentioned before, going above and beyond the call of duty to help guide a stranger through the back roads of things like commercial real estate development, long-haul moving, heart conditions, auto repair, demolition derby and a host of other details: Steve Gibson, Larry Alexander, Thomas Wood, Harold Benware, Dave Thompson, Bruce Bradley, Mary S., Donna Manley, Robin Webb, Joanne Boppart and Gregory Baumbich, who, against his Chevy heart but for the love of family, talked to me about a Ford product. My apologies to anyone I left out before this rolled to press. Your exclusion implies no less importance but speaks to my fuzzy, midlife brain cells.
The folks at Guideposts Books and Inspirational Media Division, especially Elizabeth Kramer Gold and her snappy sense of humor, were definitely guideposts. I thank them for their courage and their ministry.
The first time I met Carolyn Carlson, both my professional and personal life brightened. Her enthusiasm for the first two books in the Partonville series, and her sensitivities to what really matters in all of life—which is the same message in the novels—made for a rousing combination. When it became official that Penguin Books would be bringing the books into book stores, a shout of joy erupted from my soul (once I stopped freaking out), which has yet to stop twirling with delight.
And to my husband, George, I give my utmost thanks for standing watch at the door to Our World. He has countless times stood there alone, staring down the road (or up the stairs to my office, or into my eyes), waiting for me to return from Partonville. I love you, my Honey Bunny.
Introduction
To be seventy years young is sometimes far more cheerful and hopeful than to be forty years old.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes
And now, welcome to Partonville, a circle-the-square town in the northern part of southern Illinois, where oldsters are young, trees have names and characters are just that.
1
Dorothy leaned against the doorframe, her keen brown, eighty-seven-year-old eyes slowly casting back and forth across the horizon. From her favorite and sacred spot in the barn, all her senses—her very soul—drank in the June glory of the tiny rows of corn marching across a bountiful earth. She delighted in knowing these young, green stalks would yield pure gold come October. Distant trees separated earth from sky, and varying twilight shades of amber lavishly swirled the firmament like a ball gown flared to its fullest billow.
Dorothy turned and gazed into the barn, willing herself to memorize the whole, and each detail, of what spread around and before her: a familiar, safe and cavernous space lined by sturdy wooden floor slats and beams, powerful and centuries-old, honed and built by her father’s father’s sweat.
In silence, she made a slow, 360-degree turn and drank deeply of the familiar. It was then she knew God was whispering, Remember well all you see, for these splendid images will sustain you in the days to come. Within a blink, a sharp pressure, a clenching claw, seized her chest, and she slumped to the floor where she remained until she could draw a deep, trouble-free breath. Once the pain subsided, she slowly up-righted herself, brushed the dust off and went about her day—her life—neither fretting a moment nor telling a soul.
Four of the five-strong Social Concerns Committee were seated around the old wooden table in the hospitality area of United Methodist Church, awaiting Jessica Joy’s arrival. It was twenty minutes past their “seven o’clock sharp, the third Wednesday of each month” starting time, as it was stated in the bylaws. When Partonville’s acting mayor, Gladys McKern,
dramatically raised her wrist and stared at her watch, Dorothy Jean Wetstra, one of the few in Partonville brave enough to spar with Ms. Mayor, jumped in before Gladys could utter a disgruntled word.
“My, how I remember those first few months of new motherhood. Nothing, I mean nothing, could get my Jacob Henry to settle down when I was trying to get out the door! I was so tired I thought I’d plumb lose my sanity about once a day. Vincent and Caroline Ann were much better babies, but oh that Jacob Henry gave me a run for my mind.”
May Belle, too, had spied Gladys’s chastising windup. She brushed a wispy strand of silver-white hair back up toward her bun and chimed in. “Well, Earl was just the opposite. That boy could hardly be roused to eat, even when it was well past feeding time. Homer and I would try to wake him by pulling the cozy flannel blankets away from his little body in hopes the chill would do it. When that didn’t work, and it usually didn’t, we’d talk louder and louder. Why, we had to practically take to shouting, and you know my dear Homer wasn’t one for raising his voice, so that took quite an uncomfortable effort. Finally, Earl would open his sleepy eyes, peeking at us, one eyeball at a time.” She giggled at her own silly expression and memory, and then out of habit covered her mouth with her hand. “Quick as a toad hops, I’d start nursing him before he could fall back to sleep.
“When I think back, it seems like just yesterday I held that sweet, soft bundle in my arms.” May Belle closed her eyes and continued speaking. “I can still feel my thumb bumping across the top of each of his tiny toes…his soft breath against my cheek as he drifted back to sleep, propped on my shoulder…”
The women sat in stillness, each lost in her own moments of memory. Finally May Belle’s eyes flew open and she broke the silence. “I can’t believe Earl’s already forty-five years old!” She paused, then added, “Nor can I believe I’m eighty-six!”
“Well, he is, and you are, and you can also believe this,” Gladys belted out. “My Caleb was a cranky, colicky little pistol, and I was glad to get away from him when I had the chance, and especially when I had an outside responsibility.” With that, she once again held her wrist high in the air, tapped her oversized watch face three times with her short, thick index finger, threw back her shoulders and stated, “Children are children, not excuses for tardiness. We have a big agenda this evening, and I have an early meeting in the morning and goodness knows I don’t need to be held up because of…”
“I am so sorry!” Jessica said as she burst through the door and into the room. Having been startled into action, Sheba, Queen of the Mutt Dogs, sprang up from sleeping beneath Dorothy’s feet and began barking. The moment Dorothy said “Hush!” Sheba stopped barking and trotted back to resume her slumber.
Jessica’s shiny, straight, brunette hair, which normally danced atop her shoulders, was haphazardly pulled back into a ponytail not quite centered on the back of her head. Faded jeans and a bleach-stained sweatshirt replaced her usual delicate, hand-embroidered clothing. The bags under her beautiful hazel eyes were so dark that they all but clouded out the sparkle in her irises.
What Dorothy, and nearly anyone who’d raised a newborn, had suspected was of course true. In Jessica’s case, it was double the stress, since not only did her husband, Paul, work long hours in the coal mines of southern Illinois, but together they also ran the Lamp Post Motel. What with Sarah Sue and late check-ins keeping her up all hours of the night, and motel clients occasionally checking out early in the morning, she was worn to a frazzle.
Jessica had spent the last hour trying to get her firstborn to concentrate and finish nursing her evening meal. Of course, the more anxiety Jessica felt as she watched the clock, the more Sarah Sue sensed that tension and fussed. When she finally handed the sleeping babe—with a heart-shaped mouth exactly like her own—to Paul, it was then she remembered she hadn’t typed up the minutes from last month’s meeting. This kind and highly organized young woman couldn’t even remember where the file was, and it hurled her into a thus far stifled crying fit unlike any other her husband had ever witnessed.
“Honey,” Paul had said quietly as he embraced his daughter to his chest with one lean arm while reaching out with the other to draw his wife close, “you’re worrying me. You’re just trying to do too many things.” His gentle voice, often mistaken for shyness, washed over her as she looked up into his dark green eyes that seemed to lighten a shade when their eyes met. “The ladies will understand. Just go, tell them the truth, get some time in with your friends, eat you some good desserts, then come home and go to bed. Sarah Sue and I will be just fine. If she gets hungry before you get back, I’ll try giving her that bottle again. Doc said it would be okay.” Jessica tilted her head forward and rested it on Paul’s chest, close to where Sarah Sue’s head was snuggled. As their family threesome stood sacredly bonded, a quietness had enveloped her. Finally she sighed, grinned at her husband, kissed his cheek, put her finger to her mouth to indicate silence and scurried off to the meeting where she’d just made her entrance.
Nellie Ruth McGregor launched from her seat, ran over to Jessica and threw her arms around her, as if to shield her from the angry-faced Gladys. Even though sixty-two-year-old Nellie Ruth had never married or had children, Gladys’s grumbling had galvanized the rest of the women into a mighty force of protection for this fragile beauty. Nellie Ruth’s short-cropped, fading red Irish hair framed her pretty oval face, and her wide-set eyes sparkled with compassion.
“Oh, honey! You look absolutely tuckered out! But I am so glad to see you! So glad you’re here. Come on and sit down by me, I’ve saved you a seat.” She guided Jessica to the folding chair next to hers. Dorothy and May Belle, being lifelong, fast friends and of a like mind, both headed for the coffee pot to pour Jessica a steaming cup of decaf. May Belle yielded the task to Dorothy and instead plopped a couple of her homemade snickerdoodle cookies on a paper napkin. The bustling ladies soon flanked Jessica with goodies. Gladys, her stout frame as stiff as a board, just sternly eyeballed her across the table as Dorothy and May Belle pampered one of their favorite dears. The moment Jessica looked up at Gladys’s intimidating face, she burst into tears.
“I don’t have the minutes!” she wailed in a full-out confession, once again breaking into heaves of crying. “Not only do I not have them, I don’t even know where they are!” Her voice sounded nothing like the sweet, melodic one that belonged to her. She buried her face in her hands, her elbows crunching into the pile of cookies.
“Now, honey, that’s just fine,” Dorothy said as she patted Jessica’s shoulders. “I reckon we all remember what we said last month anyway.” She paused a moment to shoot Gladys a threatening glance. “What’s important is that you’re here and that God has graced the world with our precious Sarah Sue. Why, I’ll take the minutes for you this evening. You just drink some coffee and eat some of May Belle’s healing cookies while we tend to business.” Dorothy’s touch and affirming words helped calm Jessica. She sank back in her chair, took a sip of coffee and, through dwindling sniffles, began to chow down on a cookie, first retrieving the broken bits stuck to her elbow and popping them into her mouth. It suddenly occurred to her she had not eaten dinner and she was famished.
Gladys, the chair of the committee for the year, made her way back to her seat, picked up the gavel, banged the table a little too loudly and called the meeting to order. Although Sheba didn’t arise, she did raise her head and give one swift, halfhearted bark.
“We can begin by making note that the entire committee is finally present, that we are coming to order at 7:30 P.M., and state that the minutes to our last meeting cannot be read because we don’t have them.” She turned toward Dorothy, raised an eyebrow and waited to see that she was properly taking notes. Dorothy stiffened her stately five-ten frame in her chair, stared right back at her and said, “Yes, Gladys, I wrote that all down.”
When Gladys called for the treasurer’s report, Dorothy had to put down her pink pen, pick up her worn pink backpack from the floo
r next to her and retrieve the folder. In the shuffling to help Jessica relax, and then preparing to take minutes, she’d forgotten to get ready for her own report. Gladys tapped her pen on the table through the entire wait. May Belle grinned, knowing her otherwise quick-moving friend well enough to realize she was proceeding in intentional slow motion. Dorothy could still be the defiant, rebellious kid when she wanted to, and somehow that always tickled May Belle. Luckily, for the most part, Dorothy, via God’s grace and design and the tutelage of her patient parents, had learned to aim her stubborn energies, using them for the good. But every once in a while, the devilish girl within sprang out of her like pent-up waters blowing through a dam.
Finally, the totals were read. Dorothy reported, with very slow and deliberate words, that there was “exactly $107.52 left in the treasury after last month’s twenty-five-dollar-monetary donation to the nursing home for candies to be distributed to those without family, and another twenty-five dollars was given to Lester K. Biggs’s collection jar at Harry’s Grill for the DeKalb family in Yorkville, whose father had recently undergone a kidney transplant.”
“Well, then, if there are no additions or corrections to the treasurer’s report,” and Gladys paused a moment to defy anyone to open their traps, “we’ll be moving right to old business, which is, of course, our annual Fall Rummage Sale, held in the barn at Crooked Creek Farm,” which was Dorothy’s place, although Gladys wasn’t about to say that, since naming the farm sounded so much more official—not to mention appropriately stinging to Dorothy. Although the sale actually took place on Labor Day weekend, which wasn’t fall at all, it had, upon its inception, been recorded in the minutes as the Fall Rummage Sale and always advertised as the Fall Rummage Sale. Since nobody questioned the matter or complained about the inaccuracy, the Fall Rummage Sale it remained.
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