What is on the table

It has been almost a full year since I have visited my own blog. Just watched "Juile and Julia" and thought about some things that were mentioned or brought to mind by that delightful movie - like how narcissistic it is to have a blog, or the way a blog seems to help you sort and validate your experiences, or the very discipline of the act of journaling. All in all, I can see that it is time to get back to it. I stopped writing because the "Balcom House" was something that I understood - it was a place. Then it became an out-of-control sit-com sort of situation, and now the Balcom House is more of a concept of sorts. In my last post we were just returning from a college tour in NYC. We, the Balcoms still all lived in the same house, which, at that time, was still a yucky greenish grey color with peeling trim. We enjoyed the hub-bub of many friends and friends-of-friends coming and going. We were beginning to get a studio going, and that was in use by us a little and by a friend of ours a lot. I was working in Mesa as a First and Second Grade teacher. Oh, I need to correct myself. We WEREN'T all living at Balcom House! Ken, my husband was living in Whiteriver during the week, three hours away, and working there in the high school, only coming home on weekends. SO I should have said that we, the Balcoms still all lived in the same house on the weekends. I quit my job, realizing that if I intended to live with my husband more of the week, I would need to get a different job. I got a job as a house mother in a maternity home that is a part of the Living Hope Women's Centers ministry. We now live there, and Ken commutes to Whiteriver only forty-five minutes from the Hope House. Caralie went to the King's College in NYC, which meets in the Empire State Building. She lives two or three buildings down from there in the Herald Towers. Tully, now 21, is living in the Balcom House in Mesa with a renter, Phil, who is a nice addition to the family. So .. . . Ken and I are in snow country in the White Mountains. We live across the driveway from the Hope House in a ministry-provided two bedroom house which we lovingly call the "Butter Yellow Cottage". I have many things to write to catch up, but for now I will tell you what is on my table here in the "BYC". There is a sewing machine that I used to sew drapes that are for room deadening for the studio I am running on the weekends in Show Low at Lewis Music. My pack of harmonicas, a stack of books including "Lullabies from Around the World" and a video - "A Fiddler's Guide to Waltzes, Aires, and Haunting Melodies" both purchased last weekend at thrift stores. There is a paper cutter and the templates that I am cutting for our CD jacket for our new 13 song CD "Rise Up". A heart-shaped box of chocolates from my son that he gave me for Valentines Day, my training note book for our ministry to counsel in the Crisis Pregnancy Center, a plastic container with banana cake in it that Jean Ann, the relief house mom made today and brought over, the notebook I put editing notes in for the video editing work I am doing for Heritage House, and various other books and papers including a paper I am supposed to fill out about our family and our "doin's" for mom's family reunion coming this summer. What is on your table?

New York College Tour

We, Caralie and I just returned from a chilly 10 days in NYC. This wasn't the regular visit with lots of site-seeing and shopping. This was a mission to find out what the City has to offer in the area of higher education. Caralie is a good student. She has worked hard, and, as we promised, we intend to help her find a school that she really wants to go to for college. We heard about the King's College from our school's headmaster, Dr. Farbishel, and so we looked into it. The school is in the Empire State Building! The majors all have a Philosophy, Politics and Economics core, with different areas to focus on - business, Education, and now a new major - Media, Culture, and the Arts. Well, that saved them on the list of possibilites, because although Caralie is very interested in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, she really wants to learn to paint well, and get an art degree. So, along with the King's College, we toured the art department at the City College (part of City University of NY) and School of Visual Arts, and Pratt Institute. This picture is of Caralie near the City College - it was FREEZING cold when we were there, and then we came home to 85 and 90 degree weather! It is very like coming back from a different planet! Now we are doing all the figures to see what is possible, and waiting for Caralie to make a final decision - oh - and applying for and waiting on word about many different scholarships!

Back from the fry bread procurement mission

Here are the new friends walking back from the gas station where they got the fry bread. It had been Caralie's idea to invite these two over for lunch after church, and the girls cooked a delicious pasta dish again. We had a good time getting to know Ariel and Marquez - they are so much fun! It is funny how some people become friends so easily. Marquez and Ariel and another friend will come visit us in Mesa next weekend!

Nice day!

We spent some time outside on Sunday afternoon in Whiteriver, because the weather is so perfect up there right now! Not so here in Mesa - it was 105 degrees or more today! Anyway, we spent some time in the church yard of the beautiful little Catholic church that is just a short walk from Ken's apartment. Here are those kids. They love you.

Cultural Curios

This is a pickle. A dill pickle. It has kool-aid mix and salt on top. This is something quirky that our new friends from the reservation had Caralie and Johnnie try. They walked down the street to get some fry bread, and decided to get this "delicacy" while they were there. Funny, but Marquez didn't have one. Caralie and Johnnie said it was really very sour. I guess that was the whole point. Who thought of that?

New Friends

So Johnnie said that she had never seen a Native American before, which, of course could not be possible, as she lives in Arizona. She must have thought that any Native Americans she saw were hispanic, or something - anyway, it was funny. But we went to the game and there were very few of us - we stuck out like a soar thumb! Ken was busily introducing us to any and all of the students that he knew, one of which was Marquez. He was wearing marching band pants, which sort of look like snow pants. He was with a girl named Ariel. We found out that Ariel goes to the Southern Baptist Church there in Whiteriver, and Marquez has been going there with her recently so we decided to go there on Sunday. After the game we went to a ministry house called "The Kennel" where the kids hang out - met some other folks and saw Ariel and Marquez there. This is a picture of them "playing" at the game - sorry it is fuzzy - the bleechers do not stop moving as everyone is walking up and down and everywhere.

Apache Football

Caralie and Johnnie and I went to the Reservation for the weekend. It was the first time we have been to Whiteriver, where Ken spends his weeks. We showed up later than planned, and missed the half-time show, but got to see the amazing Alchesay High School Football team. They have a (big) girl on the team, and they always clean up on the other team! We also met a couple of marching band players that turned out to be friends by the end of the weekend.