sweet story

One of the residents came out on the porch today as I was reading the newspaper. She is a sweet old lady who lives in a world of her own. She wanders around talking to herself all the time. She's very curious and comments on absolutely everything, but her thoughts and her comments don't have any logical continuity to them. She is always smiling and is quite soft spoken and just sees to be vocalizing whatever thought is passing through her head at the time.

This morning she wandered out on the porch as I was reading the paper. At first she just mumbled to herself as usual ("There goes a girl running by." "Oh, listen to that!" "They're in a hurry!")

Then, all of a sudden, she reaches over, grabs the paper out of my hand, and stares at it, transfixed. I look to see what's happening and see there's an ad with a full page picture of a man's face. He's in his 30's, and vaguely resembles George Clooney.

"Good looking!" she says.

I examine the ad. "He's a doctor," I say.

"Hmmm..," she says, thinking. "I go to doctors..."

Whoever created that ad ought to get a raise!

David

David, the organist, was my closest friend in all the world and my dearly loved soulmate. He was gay, so there was never anything physical between us, but our souls were united. He did an incredible job in this church. There was a long period of time when there was no permanent pastor, and David really carried the church and kept it going. Not only was the music program wonderful, but he did all the banners, and special seasonal services, and social events, etc., etc., etc. I can’t even BEGIN to cover it all. He even got a janitor from his school to do the cleaning just before Easter so it would be spotless. I just wish he could play this nice organ.

David's memorial

This is what the church put out to announce the dedication of the new organ they got in memory of David.

Organ Dedication
January 31, 2010

Please Join Us
for
The David R. Willis
Memorial Organ
Dedication
Sunday, January 31st
2:30 p.m.




A dedication recital to celebrate the acquisition of Christ the Servant's beautiful new Rodgers Allegiant 658 Two Manual Organ will be held in the sanctuary on Sunday, January 31, at 2:30 p.m. A reception will follow in the Narthex. The recent purchase of this organ was made possible by the many generous contributions to the David R. Willis Memorial Organ Fund which was established shortly after David's death in 2008.

David R. Willis


Christ the Servant Lutheran Church was enormously blessed to have David Willis as Minister of Music for sixteen years. All who knew David were enriched by his talent and creativity and touched by his kindness, generosity, and compassion. His untimely passing left a deep sadness in our congregation. The celebration of our new organ is in David's honor and memory.

Song

Sing to the tune of “I've Been Working on the Railroad”


I’ve been working on elections
Twenty-four long years.
Complicated new procedures
Don’t cause excess fears.

Then I hear the Board start going,
“Debbie is embarrassing to me.
We just hate her awful wheelchair,
So we all agree!.

Debbie’s got to go. Debbie’s got to go. Debbie’s got to roll away-ay-ay.
Debbie’s got to go. Debbie’s got to go. Debbie’s got to roll away.

Let’s say she retired!
That could work, you know-ow-ow-ow.
Let’s say that Debbie has retired!
‘Cause she is embarrassing, you know.

Singin' fi, fie, fiddly-i-o
Fi, fie, fiddly-i-o-o-o-o
Fi, fie, fiddly-i-o
Debbie’s got to go.

Goodbye job

The Electoral Board of the City of Falls Church fired me (or, actually, forced me into early retirement) immediately after I’d successfully managed the largest and most complicated election in the City’s history. I had served the City as General Registrar for 24 years during which I conducted 54 successful elections. I never experienced any allegations of electoral misconduct, and, despite 2 recounts, have never had a vote total change. Throughout my years of service, the City led the state in voter turnout, which means, not only that the citizens turned out in force, but also that the voter registration books were uncommonly clean and free of dead wood. After all, if lots of the registered voters on the books don’t live in Falls Church anymore or are dead, then they don’t show up to vote, and the turnout % goes down. Clean registration books don’t create a high turnout, but having the highest turnout in the state on a consistent basis certainly does prove clean registration books.

Throughout my years of service, I’ve consistently done a wonderful job. Among the laundry list of reasons the Electoral Board gave for retiring me, the main reason given was that they didn’t like my wheelchair. I have that reason in writing with all three signatures on it. ADA has been law for years now, so I guess this incident proves that appointment is a private rather than an employment issue and that, when making appointments, one doesn’t have to obey laws targeted at ending discrimination. I just expected better from than discrimination on the basis of disability from the City of Falls Church, but I guess I was wrong.

An Accomplishment!!!

I’m going to my friend’s house this afternoon so I’m really psyched. Anytime I can leave here is wonderful. I carefully arranged with the care manager for her to come at 11AM to get me ready, and I have Metro Access coming at 1:30, so we’ll see what really happens. It’s really frustrating to have so little control over the basics of one’s life.
I just into the bathroom and got on the toilet and peed and actually that was a major accomplishment. The thing is that nobody here offers encouragement or tries to help me learn to do things by myself. It’s much easier for them if I just follow the usual program and let them keep putting diapers on me and only get up and change location twice a day. They use a big machine to pick me up and move me. It all makes me wonder “Well what is the point of getting up in the morning at all, then?” BUT, to put it all in perspective, I DID accomplish something today because I got the bathroom and got on the toilet and peed.

Counter

Wow - I added a counter to this blog all by myself and it actually seems to work! This IS A GREAT accomplishment, because I am very untechnical!

I am also surprised to see that "Ad Sense" has added a bunch of religious junk due to my Sunday School entries. This just doesn 't seem like the kind of blog that would draw many mainstream religious types, but I guess Ad Sense knows best!

I get two showers a week here, and tonight is shower night, so I AM PSYCHED! (It doesn't take much to make me happy these days!)