My grandpa’s license plate. My dad’s tool box. He added the State Farm sticker; I added the Mortise and Tenon sticker.

I’ve lived in different areas of Lawrence County for my entire life–but everything started in one particular town, Springville. That’s where my maternal grandparents lived their adult lives. Bud (real name Clarence but universally known as Bud) and Alta (pronounced AL-tee) were both born in the Kentucky counties of Wayne and Pulaski, respectively, but their families moved to the area for the limestone jobs. I plan to write more about them but first I’m working on getting the chronology of their early lives straight. In the meantime, suffice it to say that Springville is where their children were born and it is the place of my earliest memories.

Two buildings come to mind today.

First is the Trinity Pentecost Mission. (The Holiness people, bless them, weren’t always clear that their churches were Pentecostal, not Pentecost.)

Grandpa helped build this church and served as Sunday School Superintendent for thirty years. I have the bell he used on those Sunday mornings.

It’s possible that my great-grandpa was a preacher at this church but that is unconfirmed. I’m waiting to hear back from my uncle to see if he knows anything about that.

My earliest memories at this church:

• Stacking hymnals up to make buildings for the action figures and cars I brought with me.
• Dozing under the pews while people sang and danced and waved their arms.
• Listening in rapt amazement as a preacher (not the pastor) described what would happen in the end times. I vaguely remember speaking up during the sermon and saying something like “really?” and the preacher responding in the affirmative.
• Hearing the strange—almost distressing—way Brother Chet, the barrel-chested pastor, would catch his breath as he preached. Holiness preachers don’t talk, they yell. A preacher who didn’t yell for 90% of his sermon was a rarity. So it wasn’t that Chet was unusual in volume, only in the way he sucked in oxygen at the end of a sentence like a man having a heart attack.
• The painting of damned souls dropping off a cliff into Hell, with a caption along the lines of “Eternity. How long?” I may visit the church again sometime just to get a picture of that painting.

Second is Springville Grocery. A picture as it is now:

My aunt started this store many years ago. Maybe in the 70s? I remember it especially from the time when my grandparents moved from their little house in which my mom and aunts and uncles grew up to a trailer on the lot next to the grocery store. My guess is that my aunt owned that lot and helped my grandparents move there so they would be close by.

I stayed with my grandparents a lot during childhood so I remember walking over to the store with a handful of pennies and nickels for candy. I don’t really have many specific memories about the store—just that it was a fixture and landmark during my childhood.

I’m very glad to see that it seems to have taken on new life. I hadn’t been there in many years until very recently and they’ve added booths and hot breakfast. It looks like the sort of place the local retirees might gather. And, more relevant to us, they have become Springville’s source for locally raised meat and dairy products. Seeing my aunt’s store turn into a market supporting local agriculture is gratifying.

This morning I’ll be preparing the final tax returns for the beard products business I co-own with three friends. We had a decent year or two but it’s been effectively defunct for two years at this point. We’ve all been too busy and our interest waned over time.

It’s 7pm and that has come to mean one thing at the Abel house this winter: it’s time for tea and Azerbaijanians.

Eighteen years!

Poor Darcy is spending her last day as a minor on the couch sick. Likely won’t be much better tomorrow. Her requested birthday celebration–getting her ears pierced, buying a lottery ticket, and going to that great Italian restaurant in Bloomington–will likely have to wait.

So, my daughter has an interest in doing some volunteer work before college–both in order to get some life experience and figure out what she’d like to do. Something like the Peace Corps. Does anyone know of good organizations or resources to find such organizations? Can be domestic or overseas.

The big winter storm is moving through our neck of the woods and the result is mostly relentless rain and gray skies. But maybe some snow on Friday evening.

I made a New Year’s lucky lunch of sausage and sauerkraut and black eyed peas. I got choked on it. Gonna be a good year!

The holiday party at work did not go my way…