Dearest Dorothy, Merry Everything!
Page 1
Table of Contents
PENGUIN BOOKS
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
A Note from the Author
Praise for Charlene Ann Baumbich’s Dearest Dorothy Series
Dearest Dorothy, Who Would Have Ever Thought?!
“In a sea of CBA heroines who are unfailingly young and beautiful, readers identify with Dorothy, the plucky 80-something grandma who’s a demon at the wheel. Baby, you can drive our car.”
—Publishers Weekly (Picks for Funny Faith Series)
“With the down-home spiritual wisdom and small-town-living laughs that made the first few books of the series so successful, author Charlene Ann Baumbich has served up another entertaining slice of Partonville life for longtime Dearest Dorothy fans and new readers alike.” —Boomer Times & Senior Life
“Charming.” —Albuquerque Journal
“There’s something for everyone here: love, laughter, inspiration, mystery and hysterical mayhem caused by a hacksaw wielding mad-woman. . . . I recommend taking frequent trips to Partonville.”
—Everything! Naperville (FL)
“Another fantastic chapter in the continuing saga of Partonville, Crooked Creek Farm, the Happy Hookers and Dearest Dorothy. One of the most phenomenal aspects of Charlene’s writing is her ability to create developing characters that are both unbelievable and wholly believable at the same time, and, in this book, she employs that talent to the max. . . . You can’t read one of Charlene’s Dearest Dorothy books without recognizing the characters, empathizing with the characters and gaining new insight into your own heart. Thank You Charlene!” —Epitaph-News
Dearest Dorothy, Help! I’ve Lost Myself!
“Fans of Jan Karon’s Mitford or Philip Gulley’s Harmony will revel in the antics of the residents of Partonville . . . the characters are quirky and charming; there are several laugh-out-loud moments; and Baumbich offers gentle inspiration without hammering readers over the head with God, whom Dorothy delightfully calls ‘The Big Guy.’” —Publishers Weekly
“Every small town needs a resident like Dorothy Jean Wetstra.” —The Hartford Courant
Dearest Dorothy, Slow Down, You’re Wearing Us Out!
“Be warned—this series is addictive. You’ll soon be hooked on the small town of Partonville and its cast of assorted characters.” —Bookreporter.com
“For readers who enjoy books that celebrate life’s simple pleasures, 87-year-old Dorothy Jean Wetstra and her beloved town of Partonville, Ill., are sure to become instant favorites . . . hilarious and touching.” —Evening Star (Hanover, PA)
“Baumbich has created a town readers will want to visit and people they’ll want to meet . . . engaging, believable, real, funny, and poignant.”—Church Libraries
Dearest Dorothy, Are We There Yet?
“All of the other crazy wonderful characters in these books make the pages come alive. The whole town has a life, an energy to it. From Harry’s Grill to the Happy Hookers meetings, you just know that something exciting’s going to be happening. If you enjoyed Jan Karon’s Mitford series, I think you’ll love the Dearest Dorothy series.” —Christian Fiction Reviewer
“[Baumbich] has crafted a story using humor and Christian values to follow the issues facing everyday people.” —Northwest DuPage Press
PENGUIN BOOKS
DEAREST DOROTHY, MERRY EVERYTHING!
Charlene Ann Baumbich is a popular speaker, journalist and author. Her stories, essays and columns have appeared in numerous magazines and newspapers, including the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times and Today’s Christian Woman. She is also the author of the first four books in the Partonville series, 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?!; and six books of non-fiction. She lives in Glen Ellyn, Illinois. Learn more about Charlene at www.welcometopartonville.com.
ALSO IN THIS SERIES
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?!
PENGUIN BOOKS
Published by the Penguin Group
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375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto,
Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
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Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
First published in Penguin Books 2006
Copyright © Charlene Ann Baumbich, 2006
All rights reserved
Publisher’s Note
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product
of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons,
living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Baumbich, Charlene Ann, 1945-
Dearest Dorothy, merry everything / Charlene Ann Baumbich.
p. cm.—(Dearest Dorothy ; bk. 5)
eISBN : 978-0-143-03791-0
http://us.penguingroup.com
Dedicated to:
Humane Societies everywhere
and
in particular
the
Winona Area Humane Society
from whence came
the
Real Kornflake
who is
a
Very Good Dog
Acknowledgments
The older I get, the more amazed I am by the HUGE wad of stuff I don’t know. That in and of itself wouldn’t be such an issue (HA!) if the fine folks in Partonville (from those who do the planning and building, to the guy who does the burying) didn’t have to know what they were talking about. So in order to help them wax knowledgeable, I called on the expertise of a fine batch of gentlemen in Winona, Minnesota, the beautiful place I “hide” to write. Thank you, Jim Carlson (see if you can spot his “s
ecretly coded” character’s name so you can detect what he helped me with), Howard Keller (who will probably be hearing from me again as the mini-mall renovations continue), Nick Deones (Realtor Extraordinaire) and Tim Hansen, who is a licensed funeral director, not an “undertaker,” like Eugene insists on being. I also send a sincere thanks to Croft Waddington, another fine gentleman, but one who lives in Illinois and who therefore understands what needs to happen in a law office in Partonville.
Lest you think I don’t seek the company of women for guidance, thank you Shirley Johnson (back to Winona) for helping this old lady learn that things HAVE changed in driving school. Kudos to Katherine Carlson for your careful editorial eye and for teaching me how to spell D’oh! Carolyn Carlson, bless your Executive Editorial Heart for continuing to believe in my circle-the-square town and for so gracefully helping me bring it to life. To the rest of the crew at Penguin Books, especially Maggie Payette, bless your hardworking hearts. Now hear me SHOUT from the rooftops that Danielle Egan-Miller, my sterling agent, has not only guided me, but steered, dragged, drop-kicked, cheered and carried me through a wild year in the cyclonic waters of publishing. She is a patient saint.
George John Baumbich, thank YOU (XOXOXOXOXO) for allowing me to circle the square for months on end. There would be no Partonville without your freedom, your anchor, your love.
Introduction
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 chickens sometimes do odd—very odd—things.
1
Josh flipped the interior light on and looked in the rearview mirror, not to check on the traffic traveling seventy miles per hour behind him but to take note of the arch of his eyebrows. After a quick study he realized his stepmom had been right: same as his dad’s. He flipped off the light and drew his attention back to the road in front of him, to the darkness made darker by what looked to be an impending storm making its way across the flat farmlands. He could barely make out the silhouette of a barn maybe a half mile off to his right. Looks like a giant down on its haunches sneaking through the storm. Eerie. His eyes darted back to the mirror for one more quick peek, especially at that left eyebrow, the only one he could raise independently of the other—same as his dad. He flipped on the light and watched himself give the inherited brow a quick up-and-down salute, which is what had first caused his stepmom to notice the similarity.
Keep your eyes on the road, Joshmeister! He turned off the light and faced forward, assuming a posture of one who’d been scolded. Although the keep-your-eyes-on-the-road thought came in the form of a self-inflicted reprimand, he knew it was just the type of thing his friend Dorothy would say to him if she caught him looking at his eyebrows in the mirror rather than the road. Although she was one of the few people to call him Joshmeister, especially in their e-mails, she’d never be as harsh on him as he was on himself. He knew the feisty eighty-eight-year-old well enough to know she’d have said the words kindly, but she would have made her point. His mom, now she would have YELLED it. Nonetheless, he was over four hours into the last leg of his first solo road trip and getting careless with his driving only fifty miles from home would not be smart. He needed a stern word, even if he was the only one present to deliver it. He stiffened his spine and snapped his full attention back to the task at hand. Of course, his mind wandered. . . .
Before Josh left Partonville, Dorothy was reveling in the joy of having her sons and grandsons in town to take part in the Thanksgiving festivities. The only time Josh had gotten to spend with them was a brief hello the night before he left. Their lively company made him sorrier than ever that he had to go. All in all, I’ve only been gone less than . . . let’s see . . . fifty-five hours. But he missed Dorothy and wondered how things had gone for her, how the community Thanksgiving dinner at the church had turned out—really. During a brief phone conversation with his mom, all she’d told him was that there had been some kind of a “wrestling match” with a turkey. Said he wouldn’t believe it. Said she’d give him details when he got home. He was also anxious to get the recap on Dorothy’s birthday party yesterday. Although her birthday was actually on Thanksgiving this year, May Belle had invited everyone, including his mom, the day after Thanksgiving for a birthday celebration complete with turkey leftovers. He hated to miss all the fun. Well, not that he hadn’t had any fun in Chicago, but it was not the same as spending time with a whole pack of people he’d grown to care about, which reminded him of his beautiful Shelby. He wondered how her holiday had gone and hoped she’d missed him as much as he’d missed her. She had so many cousins and nieces and nephews that she’d probably been too busy to even give him a second thought. He guessed that’s why she hadn’t answered the e-mail he sent from his dad’s. Maybe she could go with him to deliver Dorothy’s birthday gift which he had wrapped and ready in his bedroom. He could hardly wait for Dorothy to see it. When would he give it to her? Tomorrow at church? Nah, Shelby won’t be there. Or maybe later in the day. He inhaled, imagining he could already smell the clean scent of her silky blond hair.
He sat up straight again and repositioned his hands on the steering wheel to nine and three o’clock, just the way he’d been taught in drivers’ education not that long ago. He remembered how his mom had said, “When I learned to drive, it was ten and two o’clock. Are you sure you heard your instructor correctly?” “Yes, Mom. Sometimes things change after a billion years.” And sometimes she made him nuts, he thought.
He’d spent his Thanksgiving weekend in Chicago at his dad and stepmom’s and ended up way behind on sleep. Their daybed was like a brick, but it was either that or the floor since his two half-siblings and his stepmom’s extended family members filled all the real beds. Between getting to sleep late the night before his journey to Chicago, spending the full day after Thanksgiving in downtown Chicago looking at Christmas store windows followed by another restless night of sleep, he’d awakened tired. Then a late brunch with “the family” (his dad had insisted) and a few too-brief hours this afternoon with his best friend, Alex, he was not only exhausted, but distracted and—he never thought he would admit this—wishing his mom, no matter how annoying she could be, were in the car with him, if for no other reason than the conversation and/or yelling to help keep him awake.
Air! I need some fresh air! Despite a falling mixture of rain and snow he decided to crack the two front windows, at least that had been his intention. He pushed the electronic buttons hard, causing the windows to automatically open all the way as he fumbled to readjust them. Since he wasn’t wearing his coat, which made him feel crowded when he drove, he cranked up the heater to compensate for the sudden cooldown. But even with the windows cracked it soon became so hot that his windows started to fog over, so he lowered the climate control again and fumbled to find the defogger button. When he finally got the defogger activated, he looked up and discovered that the car had drifted across the center line of I-57. Without thinking to check his sideview mirror, he veered back into his lane. His heart began pounding as he realized the disasters he’d mindlessly and miraculously missed. Good thing nobody was passing me—on either side!
When he spotted the road sign for the next exit, he flipped on the blinker. Time to mainline some caffeine and pull myself together. Although he hated to stop so close to home, it felt too dangerous not to. If he only stopped for a few minutes that should still get him home by 9:30 P.M. He’d use his cell phone to call his mom and tell her he was running a little behind. But not until you are off the road and parked! No more distractions!
Dorothy was seated in the middle of her couch, her teen grandsons, Steven and Bradley, flanking her, with Sheba, Dorothy’s wiry-haired, brown-and-black, eight-year-old mutt dog, curled up in her lap. They’d made a big deal out of tucking their grandma in with an old quilt she kept tossed over the back of the couch. They’d placed a throw pillow behind her head, scooted the footstool over from the side chair and propped her f
eet up on it, lifting her legs as though they belonged to a pink (her trademark color and today she wore a pink sweat suit) rag doll rather than a five-foot ten-inch woman with an ample body. A little too ample, she’d mused lately, but nonetheless a mostly working body, one for which she gave thanks—even though she did take a heart medication and pop an occasional nitroglycerine.
Jacob, her older son, handed her a mug of hot tea with a dollop of honey stirred in. Vinnie, his younger brother and the father of Steven and Bradley, followed close behind with a TV table in one hand, and in the other a plate piled with the last piece of lemon chiffon cake left over from her birthday party the day before. “You boys are spoiling me! I tell you, I won’t know how to take care of myself after you’re all gone!” A shadow flickered across her face just thinking about the void their absence would leave. Less than eighteen hours until Vinnie and the boys depart for Denver! she noticed with a quick peek at the old Register wall clock. Jacob was scheduled to leave for Philadelphia on Monday, just one short day after that.
“I doubt you can be spoiled, Mom,” Vinnie said, handing Steven the cake while he set up the table. “You’ve been taking care of yourself for decades now, and none the worse for wear, I might add. Better let us wait on you while you’ve got the chance.” When he reached to retrieve the cake from Steven, he caught his son sliding his finger around the edge of the bountiful icing. “HEY! That’s Grandma’s!”