Postscript

This morning we went to a couple of schools in search for my dad’s high school yearbooks. He only has the yearbook from his senior year, and he wanted to look through ones from the others years he was in school. The school he graduated from is no longer around, so first we checked at the current high school for that area. No luck. We went on to the middle school that is located where his high school used to be. There they were. They had yearbooks from his freshman and junior years. So, I learned some new things about Dad from our perusal through the books. During his junior year, he was a class officer, and he played Torbald Helmer in the classic play, A Doll’s House. One of his neighbors played his wife in the play.

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I’ve been enjoying a wonderful, all-be-it short, visit in Indiana with my dad, mom and sister. My dad grew up in Lafayette, Indiana, and he still has friends and family here. Today, we got together with many of them. We had a great visit. He shared with them about being diagnosed with brain cancer this past summer and how God has been acting since the diagnosis. It was great to be able to visit with everyone! See pictures of some of the people we saw and hear a few clips from what Dad had to say to everyone in the movie above.

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We arrived in Wheaton, Illinois yesterday to take my sister, Ashley, back to college, visit with some friends of ours, Madison and Regina, and speak at their church about our ministry with Wycliffe. Our drive out here included a stop at a Stew Leonard’s grocery store in Connecticut (see our blog entry from last year). We wanted Ashley to experience this place. She’s standing in front of the Chiquita banana animatronic lady. Push a button and she’ll sing about the bananas.

Then we stopped in the home of a wonderful couple that is on the Wycliffe Associates hospitality roster. They showed us the movie, The Ultimate Gift while we were at their house. What a great movie!

We made another stop in northern Indiana to see one of my friends from college, Kelly. It was great to see her, her husband Ryan and now their TWO kids! We enjoyed some great Mexican food together. Jeff says this place has the best tacos outside of Los Angeles!

Oh, and check out this row of soda machines in their town. That’s a serious selection of soda!

We hit the ground running yesterday, arriving in Wheaton early in the day, collecting all of Ashley’s stuff for her on-campus apartment and beginning to unpack it. We visited with Madison and Regina today in-between stops at Ashley’s apartment. It’s always great to see them. Jeff has know them for many years. I met them when Madison worked for Wycliffe in Orlando.

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We came back to Lafayette yesterday. We’re staying with my Uncle Dale and Aunt Lilly. We’ve had a good visit with them. My Aunt makes the best chocolate chip cookies!

Today, we shared about our ministry at their church. These opportunities are always special. Sometimes we wonder who God may be speaking to through the things we share.

They had a special missions service where several shared about their missions experiences. It was followed by an international pot-luck lunch. They had fried plantains, yum!

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When I was a kid, my family took an annual trip to Indiana to visit my dad’s family. We use to visit all of my dad’s aunts, uncles and cousins. Many of them have died since then. So, I took Jeff out to where different ones used to live, where my dad lived, etc.

Below is my great-grandmother’s house in Lafayette. My grandfather and all of his siblings lived here when they were young.

This was the house my dad lived in until he was 12. My grandfather built it.

My grandparents moved to this house in West Lafayette when my dad was 12. This is where we spent the summers. It used to be out in the country, but now it is surrounded by Purdue student apartments.

Then we went out to Westpoint, where my grandmother grew up, where my aunt & uncle had a farm, and where my grandparents, grandmother’s parents (the Turners) and my aunt and uncle are all buried. I didn’t know exactly where things were, but we headed in the general direction and hoped to find things.

The first thing we found was Turner Rd. My great-grandparents (paternal grandmother’s parents) had a farm on this road, and the road was named for their family. On this road is an old white farm house where my grandmother, Uncle Clarence and Uncle Earl used to live.

Then we found the cemetary where they are all buried. There are several generations of Turners in the cemetary.

And, our real adventure that day was finding my Uncle Clarence and Aunt Dorothy’s farm. I remembered that it was near railroad tracks, near a stream, and it was somewhat close to Turner road. We decided to drive down roads that went close to the railroad tracks. After driving around for a while, we found it! The railroad bridge is across the street from their farm.

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