Telling Stories – Holding Onto Memories

Posted on October 16, 2012 by Pat

“If stories come to you, care for them. And learn to give them away where they are needed. Sometimes a person needs a story more than food to stay alive.” — Barry Lopez in “Crow and Weasel”

This quote by Barry Lopez expresses how I feel about stories and the telling of them. Like many of you, I have material for story inspiration from many scenarios and unique people in my life, as you can tell if you’ve read any of my stories on this site. I enjoy sharing them and feel a connection to you when I tell them. I feel someone out there might have a similar experience and together we can recapture the moment and hold it in time.

This is a picture of a personal, historical family book published in 1905 about the life of Thomas Edward, Associate of the Linnean Society (one of the highest honors that science could confer on him).

Family Book Photo © Jim Ruppel 2012

He is my great-great grandfather and I inherited the book when my father died.

It was given to him by his mother, my grandmother, and granddaughter of Thomas Edward. This hundred-year old book entitled “Life of a Scotch Naturalist” by Samuel Smiles, LL.D, tells the life story of a lad growing up in Scotland with a passion for nature.

So much so, I learned, was his passion that he was kicked out of a number of kindergarten schools for smuggling in all sorts of critters, i.e., young rats, moles, hedgehogs, horse-leeches, bees, snakes to name several. His love of nature led to continued exploring and the collection of many unidentified species throughout his entire life but without an education, which he regretted.

As an adult with wife and family, each day would find him working 12-plus hours as a shoemaker’s apprentice and at night searching caves, gullies and Scotland firths for the next, undiscovered new species to collect and send off to scientists to identify.

Nearing the end of his life after many years having never received any recognition or compensation for his contribution to science, he was finally given an award and a monthly stipend by Queen Victoria (my dad told me of a wooden box his mother had given him with Thomas’s award from Queen Victoria but I could never find it after my father’s death).

Even more important than the award and compensation, Thomas Edward finally became known to the world and placed upon the Civil List Fund by Her Majesty, Queen Victoria, with a memorial signed by many distinguished gentlemen of the time to include Charles Darwin, F.R.S.

If this cherished century-old book of my great-great grandfather had never been written and his life story documented, I would never have known about it. If we don’t pass along our stories, they will be lost forever and generations that follow will never get a chance to know us and what the world was truly like, as we saw it and lived. Many people will write historical journals about our era but only we can truly capture it first-hand and share it with our loved ones and others connecting us now and in the world to come.

I like to hear people share their stories capturing the memories and I want to hold onto the moment with them for just a little longer. There’s one such book you may be interested in called “The Figurine” by Rona Simmons, an author featured on Denise Baer’s “Pay It Forward” Skipping Stones Memories site. Rona writes of WWII experiences, as told by a nurse.

I will be sharing guest short stories on my site from time-to-time and I would like to hear your story. If you would like to participate with full copyright, please send your contact information via comment of this post or email me at pcruppel47@gmail.com. Please, under separate cover, send only true, personal story types (nonfiction) that are funny, unique, historical, inspirational or encouraging giving others hope and perhaps tools of lessons learned.

Let’s keep our stories and ancestors’ stories alive by telling them. It will mean something to our children and the generations to come.

Pat from the ol’ kitchen table ~~ Want to put a big grin on my face? Just leave a comment or question. I’ll be grateful!

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Rainy Day

Posted on September 25, 2012 by Pat

Backyard Puddles – Photo by Pat Ruppel

It’s a rainy September day with the feel of fall in the air. Snow will soon be flying and we’ll pull ourselves inside where it’s warm with reflections of the past summer months.

I remember one of those mornings this summer. Not many words needed to be spoken just experienced and felt.

It started with one of those rare, spontaneous moments of nature when a group of 8 young deer began playing in the backyard.

The young ones got it started and then the moms joined in bouncing, hurtling the fences between yards, rearing up and darting back and forth at each other daring a chase around the trees.

I don’t remember ever seeing wild animals play quite like that. It was a natural playground in our background. It made me smile to see wildlife play like children.

Many evenings would find my husband and I sitting on the deck looking out our backyard, breathing in the summer nights and fresh mountain air. How time passes ever so slowly but passing nonetheless – if only for a moment we could catch and hold on to it like a firefly.

As we draw inside with reflections of summer and dreams of what the future holds my heart warms with hope and love as I hear Alison Krauss sing, “You say it best when you say nothing at all.”

Pat – from the ol’ kitchen table ~~ Put a smile on my face and leave a comment or question!

Arbor Day – April 25th

Posted on April 25, 2008 by Pat

Today, at lunch time, I got out and took a walk around a park not far from work. If those old trees could talk, I wonder what stories they would tell of times past and the people they saw and the changes they bore.

It felt good to shed some of those winter garments and breathe in some fresh air. The trees are starting to bud and some of the crab apple trees are already in blossom dressed in pinks and whites. I caught a drift of the scent of those blossoms as I walked out of the building. Ahhhh.

(Photos by Microsoft Clipart) ~ What a beautiful time of the year, Spring, when everything begins to awaken from the long months of rest over the winter. The sky seems brighter and you can hear the birds chirping louder in the morning as if they’re calling up the sun. Earth shows its life force in the change of seasons – in Spring with endurance coming back from winter and vulnerability in the Fall when it gives in to dormancy and rest.

Arbor Day is officially recognized the last Friday in April and people all around celebrate by planting a tree.

I remember one year we got 10 free Colorado Spruce trees for becoming a member to the Arbor Day Foundation. We had 8 of them going strong until we had to transplant them. We had started them in the wrong place behind our shed and they were growing fast.

We only have 2 left after transplanting but they are doing well – about 2-1/2 feet tall. Not bad from small beginnings as a suckling in the Rocky Mountains. One day, I hope to see them grow tall enough to decorate for Christmas.

It makes me wonder – one group is encouraging the planting of trees while the other group is thinning forests and mitigating. I hope they all are in balance in what it is they’re promoting.

With all that humans have done to disrupt the natural cycles, it is all the more fitting for more of us to join in and give our support to turn things around and support Nature and this beautiful planet on which we live.

So, go plant a tree, rake up the grass, clean out the flower beds, get your hands dirty and smell the earth.

With Nature doing its job of stirring and waking up, the reflections of books read and lessons learned also begin to rise in my Spirit. I’m connected to the awakening process of this season and the stirrings within my soul. I’m excited for the new growth and fresh beginnings.

It’s a new season. Look all around, you can see the signs and you can also see the secret language within emerging in this new awakening.

Pat from the ol’ kitchen table

“Go Feed the Birds” (from The Tracker by Tom Brown, Jr.)

Posted on March 21, 2008 by Pat

This morning as my husband and I were walking out to the car to go to work I was surprised to see 4 deer pull their heads up and look directly at me only 20 feet from where we stood. I talked to them for a moment and they just stared not really bothered by this interruption to their morning. They were standing next to our parked car, so we had to walk towards them to get in and my husband got as close as 8 feet. Then, as we were about to drive out, we saw the rest of the herd walking down into our yard with their buck. In total, there were about a dozen deer. What a way to start out your morning, huh?

Living in the Rocky Mountains, I always marvel at the wildlife as we see it more frequently living among them in their habitat. We’ve had bear get into our metal shed and tear it up, hear the coyote howl regularly all through the year, see the bunnies and fox. If we had a fresh snowfall the night before, in the morning the yard is transformed into a wonderland of tracks. It is such a blissful sight to take in.

When I was a little girl and saw Disney’s “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs”, I always fantasized playing and walking and just being with the animals like Snow White. When I’d go to the zoo and see the wild tigers and elephants, I’d wonder what it would feel like to curl up with one of those big creatures and experience their energy and power. Dr. Wayne Dyer in his book, There’s a Spiritual Solution to Every Problem, quotes from Patanjali (author of Yoga Sutras who lived C. First to Third Century B.C):

“When a person is steadfast in his abstention from harming others, then all living creatures will cease to feel enmity in his presence.”

Dyer talks about St. Francis of Assisi and how he would tame wild wolves that were destroying livestock by merely being in their presence.
Wild animals would feel the love that radiated from him; doves would fly to his hands. They all ceased to feel enmity. What a wonderful image. St. Francis didn’t have any special powers – no more than you or I. He just made himself available to and aligned himself with the Creator. ~~~ (Picture by Microsoft Office Clipart.)

There is a series of books I read some time ago that I fell in love with. They’re about a tracker’s life and experiences in the New Jersey Pine Barrens. The tracker and author’s name is Tom Brown Jr. and when he was a child all he wanted to do was spend time in his beloved Pine Barrens. When he was around 7 he met another boy, Rick, about his age that liked the same things. Rick had an elder that taught them about the seasons and wildlife and how to walk in harmony with nature – his name was Stalking Wolf (Grandfather). In the beginning of his book, The Tracker, Tom describes what he felt about Stalking Wolf when he says:

“Stalking Wolf taught us how to be silent and watch what was going on. He had a special look that said he was giving us a hint to something that would seem obvious to us in a moment. When he saw that I didn’t understand why he had to be silent to see better, he said, “Go feed the birds.””

All the experiences and mysteries of the woods, birds and wild creatures unfold in these books as he learns to listen, track and move in harmony with nature.

Like St. Francis of Assisi and Tom Brown Jr., we can also learn to experience the wonder of nature if we approach it with reverence and are steadfast in abstaining from harming others, as Patanjali said. Animals can discern your intention from the energies we give off. They can read our hearts and sense more about us than we know about ourselves. As we become more awakened, the animals will respond to our new beingness, and we’ll walk among them in harmony and peace. Can you imagine that?!

Tom has a tracking school in New Jersey – Tom Brown Jr.’s Tracking School. He has written 16 books, and I’ve listed a few you might be interested in:

The Tracker
Awakening Spirits
The Way of the Scout
The Quest: One Man’s Search for Peace, Insight, and Healing in an Endangered World (Paperback)
The Vision: The Dramatic True Story of One Man’s Search for Enlightenment (Religion and Spirituality) (Paperback)
The Search: The Continuing Story of the Tracker

SPECIAL NOTE: I apologize to my fellow bloggers for not being as active in reading your posts and stumbling and commenting. I just started a full-time job this week. I haven’t had as much time to keep up with the feeds and e-mails and I’m a little overwhelmed. I hope to get a handle on it as I get used to being back into the corporate world. Thank you for your continued support and patience.

Pat from the ol’ kitchen table