A good, sweet man passed away this morning – James Epps. James was a security guard for many years at Wyeth. He was there for as long as I can remember – I’m not sure if he was there before me or came just after I started, but he was definitely a constant smiling face for most, if not all of the 23 years I have worked there. James retired a few years ago and then was back at the front gate waving and smiling at us as we arrived each morning. I have missed seeing him and am so sad to hear of the news of his passing. I didn’t know James outside of work, but he was a kind, sweet man who left fond memories with me that will last forever.
Back in the early days – when we were Praxis Biologics – there was only a handful of us that worked third shift. James was the night guard back then and he watched over us and made sure we were all safe and well as we rattled around in that big old building. He brought in birthday gifts on our special days and always had a story or a joke to help us pass the time. He was there to greet us when we arrived and sent us home with a smile and a wish for a great day when we left. Through the years, the mergers, the growth, he was still there smiling and offering a cheerful greeting.
But, I have a very special, personal memory of James that always warms my heart when I think of him. I will be forever grateful for his kindness and compassion one very late night on March 20, 1999. It was the day my Dad passed away. I found out late that Saturday afternoon and couldn’t get a flight out until the following morning. I packed and took care of things at the house and then I just sat in the living room staring at the walls and crying. I couldn’t sleep. I just sat there watching the clock for the time I could head to the airport. Finally, about 3:00 am, I decided to try to take my mind off things and went in to work to wrap up a few things, send some emails, and leave some notes for my staff and co-workers about things that I left undone that they should be aware of. When I arrived, James met me at the door and asked what in the world I was doing there at that hour! I told him that my Dad had passed away and I needed a distraction – it was the first time that I said it out loud and I started to cry and he hugged me and just let me lose it right there in the lobby! He walked me to my office, brought me some coffee, and checked on me every 1/2 hour or so to see if I was OK and to be sure I knew I was not alone! I will never forget him for many reasons, but this is the memory that shines through them all.
May you rest in peace, James Epps – I know the angels have a special place ready for you because they know, as we did, that you were a kind, sweet, good man! Farewell, my friend.
What a great weekend this was……perfect weather (until it got a little cooler today, but still nice), and lots of thoughts clanging around in my brain! So, it is time for a brain dump and to just ramble on about the things I did this weekend and other random thoughts. Not sure where to start, really, guess I should just jump in with the weekend activities and go from there.
Thursday was St. Patrick’s Day – we had Irish Pub music playing in our office area all day, which was interesting. I went by Southern Jewelers to drop off the items I gathered for their Scavenger Hunt contest – I am now in the running for the Grand Prize – a pair of 1/2 carat diamond earrings!!! Yes, that is a 4-leaf clover on my cheek!
Friday evening wasn’t all that special. I thought about going out to eat, but ended up just staying home. I didn’t want to be out too late, anyway, because Friday night is my night to watch “The Defenders” and “Blue Bloods” on TV. I LOVE those shows! Yeah – I DVR them, but I’d still rather watch them when they air, unless something really special takes priority over them. But, when I got all settled in and comfortable in front of the TV, I discovered that – for the second week in a row – both shows were preempted by basketball games! Uugghh! When is the basketball season done so that we can have our TV back??? At least last week, was just local games, so there was a “new” episode of each on and I was able to catch them on HULU the next day. This week must have been wider spread coverage or they were reruns, because I haven’t seen new episodes posted on HULU, yet. So, I ended up watching a couple of hours of back-to-back “Say Yes To The Dress” episodes – most of which I saw before, but sat through again cause there wasn’t anything else that interested me on!
Saturday was cool, though. The weather was FABULOUS!!! 80+ degrees, sunny, and totally enjoyable! The weather has been very good the past several days, but Saturday, I actually got to enjoy it because I wasn’t inside working all day! I bummed around the house and played with the girls most of the day and took a much-needed afternoon nap. Then, I got ready and went out for the evening. First, I had a perfectly cooked rib eye steak dinner at Cafe 121 – YUM!!! Then, I went to the Temple Theatre and got a ticket to the Saturday performance of the current show – “Proof”. The show wasn’t to start for an hour, so I took the opportunity to stroll around downtown and enjoy the gorgeous evening. It was still 70+ degrees and so quiet and peaceful. I looked in all the store windows and just wandered around in an attempt to walk off just a little of the delicious dinner. I got back to the theatre and it was still a little early, so I sat on the bench outside and continued to enjoy the evening. Between dinner, my stroll, and my time at the theatre, I was able to say hi to several people I know and that was so nice. The show was good — as always, the Temple Theatre did a very nice job of bringing the performances to life. After the show, I went back home and had the chocolate pound cake I got “to go” after dinner at Cafe 121.
The other neat thing about Saturday night was the moon. It was not only a full moon, it was a super “pedigree” full moon! Apparently, it was the closest it has been to the Earth in about 20 years, so it appeared much bigger and brighter than the typical full moon. It was quite beautiful.
So, today – the last day of the weekend, but the first day of Spring – is Sunday! It was cooler today – a friend on Facebook said it best: “Only in NC can the last day of winter be 84 and the first day of spring be 54!” But, I don’t care – it is still the first day of Spring and I am so happy to see this day come! It was a rough winter for just about everywhere in the country this year! I love Spring! It is my favorite time of year – with the exception of the pollen weeks!
I went out for a little bit. I needed to fill my gas tank — something I dread, along with most of the rest of the world! I started to head to Lowes Foods to fill up there, but decided to go to the Murphy Express station at WalMart, instead. I’m glad I did! Along the way, most of the stations I noticed were posting gas prices of $3.50 – 3.51 a gallon and there was one place I noticed that was $3.49. Murphy Express price was only $3.46!!! Five cents cheaper than most other places. Then, I was REALLY glad I went up there, instead of Lowes Foods — I went by there on my way back and their price was $3.52!!!! What’s up with that??? I thought they were supposed to be a discount gas station!!! I usually go there because it is closer, but will definitely go to the other end of town from now on! Six cents a gallon less is absolutely worth the drive to save!
Then, I had lunch at the Dairy Bar and went to get some groceries.
Other thoughts:
The Food Lion on Hawkins Avenue is going through major renovations. I mostly like the changes – looks more like some of the higher end grocery stores and is very pleasant to shop in. The only problem I have found, so far, is the produce section. They have fruits and some vegetables on old-fashioned looking market carts – very appealing to the eye! But, they are high to begin with and then they put some of the items in baskets on top towards the center of the cart – nearly impossible for short people (and I’m sure some elderly people) to reach. I wanted to get some pears – they were in those baskets – I looked around to see if there were more somewhere lower, but there weren’t and the baskets were no longer full, so the pears were down inside the baskets, almost hidden from my view. So, I stood on my tippy toes and reached the basket and pulled it forward to dump a few pears out onto the next shelf so I could pick out a few and then put the rest back. The same thing with the sweet onions I wanted to get! So, I stopped by the Customer Service counter and told the lady there that I had some feedback for her about the new design. I said it all looks great, but that the carts in the produce section make it very difficult for short people (and also mentioned the possible elderly it may impact) to reach. I told her my story about what I had to do to get some pears and sweet onions. She seemed genuinely concerned and promised to pass the information on. Even just putting some both in the baskets and within reach would be a big help. I know - all stores have high shelves that have always been a problem for us short folks, but I can deal with that - I can usually get up on my toes and use my finger tips or a pen from my purse to knock a box off the top shelf and if there aren’t any within reach that way, I either get a different brand or sometimes a kind fellow shopper reaches it for me. These baskets are different – you have to reach over the lower shelves on the cart and then down into the basket! Not good! I hope they fix it!
Pet peeve of the day — people who think they are the only ones in the grocery store and that no one else needs to get down the aisles or look at the stuff on the shelves! I linger longer than I probably should when trying to decide what to get, if not something I normally buy, but I do try to stay over to the side and watch for people who may need to get around me or may want to get something in the section I might be blocking.
I had to get new tires on the pony this week. Ronald changed my oil last weekend and noticed several spots with exposed threads and bald sections! So, I went to Perry Brothers and got new tires and a front end alignment. The guys at Perry Brothers were great, but it was still a hefty expense I wasn’t planning on…….oh, well!!! Them’s the breaks! (oh, dear – don’t let the use of the word “breaks” be a trigger for new “brakes”, too!) The old girl may be 6 years old, now, but she only has 52,000 miles on her – I would think that tires would last longer than that!
With all the stories about purse snatching and other such crimes we hear about far too often, it was a real joy to read the letter to the editor in today’s Sanford Herald about the happy ending for the lady who left her purse in the cart in WalMart parking lot. Apparently, when she realized she left it, she went back assuming it was long gone, but discovered that someone actually found it and turned it in – there it was waiting for her! Sad, though, that the person who turned it in didn’t leave her name so she could be properly thanked!
I got a little bloody nose this morning — I was wrestling with Megan on the bed and we were having fun, until she rolled around the wrong way and banged her hard head into my nose!!! It didn’t bleed much, but man, it was sore for a couple of hours and still tingles a little! That’ll teach me! hahaha
My last post was about the joy that a good cry brings. Now, I think I’ll give smiling some equal time. And, yes, the title is a quote from Steel Magnolias - Truvie, played by Dolly Parton, said it in the movie that always brings a lot of both smiles and tears when I watch it, so it is fitting to use for this post. Afterall, aren’t laughter and tears so closely tied you often find them all wrapped up in the same emotional situations?
When I first sat down with the idea for a post on smiling, it was going to head in a very different direction than where my thoughts ended up going. I intended to focus on things that make me smile. When thinking of a good title, I immediately thought of using the Steel Magnolias quote (duh – isn’t there a great Steel Magnolias quote for every situation?) and that led me to wondering what other quotes are out there about the value of smiles. So, I ran a search and found a ton of them. Then, I started thinking of songs that talk about how smiles hide inner pain or deception. And then, I started thinking about the close ties that smiling and crying have – as I’ve already talked about in my opening paragraph. I soon realized that the topic of smiles is so much deeper than just coming up with a bulleted list of what makes me smile. So, this will be a mixed bag of all that the word “Smile” brought out in me this morning. And, yes, there were tears along the way – but not sad ones!
I’ll start with what makes me smile – my original intent for this post – in no particular order, except for the first three:
Family
Friends
My dogs – the girls
Daisies – the happiest flower on the planet
Yellow roses
Pearls, opals, and amethysts
Root Beer
The wind blowing across my face
A beautiful blue sky
Babies
A job well done – especially if it was particularly challenging
Fond memories
Listening to the sounds of nature breaking the silence of a quiet morning
The pony with the top down on a warm spring day (like later today, for sure)
The following picture makes me smile and it just screams “life is good”! You may not see it, but I do. It is of my Poppie – the main reason it makes me smile, but that isn’t all. To know why it screams “life is good”, you have to look really close and know more about the bigger context. First, he is on the phone doing what he loved to do – working on his locksmith business – in this case, it looks like he was placing a parts order. He is surrounded by drawers and racks of tools and little bitty pieces and parts on the shelves behind him – he LOVED stuff like that and it simply sent him into a tizzy of happiness just knowing he had everything he would ever need to fix anything that would ever need to be fixed and it was all within reach at all times! He is sitting in front of his computer – something else that brought him pure joy and a hobby of building computers for friends and family. Then, on the wall beside him there are photos of the grandchildren and others and above that, where you can’t see in this photo, is a photo of him with all his siblings with their mother on her birthday. The filing cabinet behind him has a clipping of his niece’s engagement announcement, a plaque that reads “It’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice” – something that describes him to a “T”, and the name “Marilyn” – his wife, my mother! So, yes – this photo makes me smile every time I come across it – it looks like a busy mess, but it is a perfect image of who he was and what meant the world to him. Of course there was a lot more that he found joy in and every photo of him makes me smile, but this one says so much all in one brief snapshot in time.
What is the first thing that comes to mind when thinking of a smile? Maybe a big toothy grin – like the ones in the Pedigree Doggie Dentures commercials or Whoopi Goldberg in The Color Purple when Shug Avery finally makes her realize that she has a pretty smile? Maybe something funny, like perhaps a clown? Clowns – there is a word that can bring a lot of depth to the topic of smiles. Aside from the evil, scary clowns, the typical image that comes to mind is a clown with a big smile painted onto their face. But, not all clowns are happy clowns. Take Emmitt Kelly, for instance. Arguably the most famous clown ever, Emmitt Kelly based his clown on the depression era and always had a sad, worried look on his face. I loved the image of Emmitt Kelly. I used to do ceramics and did a figurine of Emmitt Kelly for my Mom, who also had a soft spot for the famous clown. We also had a large portrait of Kelly in our home for many years (in fact, it is on the wall beside Poppie in the photo above) – one that I would love to find out where it ended up and put in my home.
Thinking of Emmitt Kelly and the old saying “Tears of a clown” brings to mind two Smokey Robinson songs that focus on how a smile or someone who is trying so hard to make you laugh may be hiding heartache. The first song was titled “Tears of a Clown” and the other was “Tracks of My Tears”. If you want to listen to them, you’ll need to click the link that comes up to take you to YouTube because of licensing issues (definitely something that does NOT make me smile whenever it happens).
A song that focuses on the deceit that smiles can hide is one by Undistuted Truth called “Smiling Faces”. Oh, and by the way – if the big white afro wigs don’t make you smile, nothing will!
Like I said earlier, I found tons of quotes related to smiling. Here are some that stuck out for me – most reflect my opinion that it is so much healthier and easier to go through life with a positive outlook and find the joy in things that make you smile.
“A smile is a curve that sets everything straight.” ~Phyllis Diller
“A smile confuses an approaching frown.” ~Author Unknown
“Before you put on a frown, make absolutely sure there are no smiles available.” ~Jim Beggs
“A smile is the light in the window of your face that tells people you’re at home.” ~Author Unknown
“Life is like a mirror, we get the best results when we smile at it.” ~Author Unknown
“I have a tickle in my brain. And it keeps making the corners of my mouth point toward the heavens.” ~Jeb Dickerson
“Keep smiling – it makes people wonder what you’ve been up to.” ~Author Unknown
And finally - a video full of clips of Charlie Chaplin – the MASTER of mixing tears with laughter. I dare anyone to watch this and not break out into a smile at least once – even if only from listening to the song that comes along with it!
Now – go out and find something to smile about……I hope this post put one on your face!
To close out this post, here are the lyrics to “Smile” – by Charlie Chaplin
Smile
Tho’ your heart is aching
Smile
Even tho’ it’s breaking
When there are clouds in the sky
You’ll get by
If you
Smile through your fear and sorrow
Smile and maybe tomorrow
You’ll see the sun come shining thru for you.
Light up your face with gladness
Hide ev’ry trace of sadness
Altho’ a tear maybe ever so near
That’s the time you must keep on trying
Smile
What’s the use of crying
You’ll find that life is stillworth while
If you’ll just smile.
