Mother’s Day with my mom and family was a blast. Brother Jimmy and his crew boiled shrimp, crab and lobsters, and we had fun playing games and visiting with our delightful cousin, Amy, who flew in from New York.

We didn’t use fancy dishes or plates, and we didn’t worry about what we were wearing. The conversations never stopped as we reached over each other for paper towels and bowls of butter.

The best family shindigs are ones where we don’t worry about impressing anyone else. But so many times, we work ourselves into exhaustion because we think we must have a clean house in order to have a successful gathering.

That’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the long list of “you musts.” It’s time for parents to shred that list.

Magazines and websites try to make us feel guilty if we’re not entertaining like royalty is visiting.

The shame they create is tough to resist because we all want to be the best at taking care of our families.

One area where we’re shamed is the laundry. It’s not enough for them that we wash and sometimes fold our clothes. Now they want us to do laundry stripping.

This requires people to soak clothes in a special mixture of borax, detergent and baking soda for six hours, rinse, refill the tub and soak the laundry for another six hours.

Who has 12 hours to devote to one load of laundry?

Who can tie up a bathtub all day long and who wants the back-breaking job of hauling all that wet laundry to the washing machine?

Not me. Cheap laundry sheets in the dryer will have your clothes smelling just fine.

Unless there’s someone in your family with severe allergies, forget dusting furniture. During the pandemic, I decided to dust the shelves in our living room. The last time I’d done that was eight years ago when we moved in.

No one, and I mean no one, has ever looked on those shelves and no one ever will.

Don’t beat yourself up because the tables in your bedroom have a fine coating of dust on them. My friend Pat has a great rationalization for not hauling out a can of Pledge – dust serves as a protective covering for furniture.

Check picking your child’s outfits off the list.

Years ago, our eldest son was participating in the Cub Scout Pine Wood Derby race. I went early to set up, and my husband brought our two youngest boys later.

The kids showed up in plaid pants, striped shirts, tube socks pulled up over their knees and full cowboy get up – boots, hat and holster. Dad and sons were proud of themselves for getting ready all by themselves.

I worried the other moms would judge me. But our kids had a blast, clomping around in their boots, waving their hats, and were confident in the choices they made.

Cooking a magazine-quality family meal is always on the mom guilt list.

Growing up, one of us spilled a glass of Kool-Aid every single meal. We ate from plates my mom got using stamps from Winn-Dixie, and we our drinking glasses were washed-out jelly jars.

To this day, my memories of family dinners is one of fun discussions, great food and knowing our family loved each other.

And that’s what moms really want – for their families to love each other.

Remember, you don’t have to be perfect.

It’s okay to have an unorganized pantry. It’s okay to have peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches for lunch and dinner.

It’s okay to have a bowl of plastic fruit on the table.

So sit back, shove the unfolded laundry aside on the couch and watch “Moana” with your kids.

Perfect is boring. I’ll take a messy, spur-of-the-moment life any day of the week.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. 

We talk about giants in society.

They are the trailblazers, the ones who take huge risks and believe there’s no reason to live half a life.

They push limits and ride high in the saddle.

Bill Hartman was one of those giants.

We lost a titan this week, and the Texas newspaper world and the business community have both lost one of its greats.

A native Texan and Baylor graduate, Mr. Hartman wrote about the small-town communities where he lived and worked. He was much more interested in the youngster who earned a blue ribbon at the county fair than a big-shot politician.

He was involved in his community. According to the Fort Bend County Historical Commission’s Oral History project, Hartman served on the Rosenberg/Richmond Chamber of Commerce, the Rosenberg Rotary Club, the Economic Development Council, the boards of Polly Ryon Hospital and Richmond State School and was active with the Fort Bend County Fair.

Three generations of Hartmans served as president of the Texas Daily Newspaper Association.

He not only served as president of the Baseball Writers Association of America, he loved writing about the Astros from their press box. He prized his dogs and horses, and there were pictures and ribbons in his office reflecting a love of riding and competing.

When I started at this newspaper, I had no idea the owner had an office right next door. We seldom saw him, but we knew Mr. Hartman critiqued and read everything we published.

His keen eye for prose and style earned my respect, but I was also terrified of him.

The first time I got a letter from Mr. Hartman, my hands shook as I opened the envelope. My column was a good one, he wrote, and closed with “keep firing.”  I framed that note and kept it over my desk for years.

When I criticized a big box store in town, he sent me an email – next time, include the offending company’s name.

Call ‘em out when they do right and nail ‘em when they do wrong was the message.

He was an outstanding writer. For years, he covered the Masters Golf tournaments from the sidelines, just as he did the Astros.

Well into his 70s, Mr. Hartman wrote a popular weekly Sunday column, “Sunday Slants,” and I loved reading about his family, the people he admired and the causes he championed and condemned.

There was no guessing where Bill Hartman stood on an issue, and he was never afraid to call out the weasels in public office and those who tried to slide underneath public decency.

He was an outstanding editor. Years ago, Lee Hartman asked me to write a story about a deaf baseball player on his son’s team. The father was also deaf and Lee thought the story was one I’d like to write.

Before the story was published, Lee said his dad wanted to read it first. I sweated and inspected every word in that feature story. I sent him a final draft and was shaking when I saw the editing marks on the page. All the changes Mr. Hartman made were absolutely right on the money. He trimmed the fat so the prose was lean and accurate. The parts he cut needed to go as they detracted from the main story.

I still have the marked-up page and reference it as to how to make a story pop off the page. The lesson – keep my eye on the heart of the story.

As the years passed, Mr. Hartman and I formed a friendship. He insisted I call him “Bill,” and I would but I was never comfortable doing that.

You see, Bill Hartman was a man who earned the esteemed title of “Mr.”

There are few people these days who can point to a lifetime of service to their community and a commitment to small-towns that are the country’s lifeblood. His many newspaper’s main directive was to cover those communities with dignity and thoroughness. Never forget the little guy and gal counted.

My condolences and prayers are with the Hartman family. Your dad and grandfather loved you all and left an enviable legacy in capable hands.

Keep firing, bh.

You’ll be missed.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. 

I’ve been watching The Oscars ever since I was a little girl. My mom would narrate the awards, and I’d gobble up every morsel.

We’d ooh and aah over the dresses, the jewelry, the make-up – everything about this night was magical to us as we were sitting in our pajamas on our old plaid couch.

That was then.

This year, the Academy Awards were awful.

Like millions, I tuned in but then switched channels halfway through.

Even though I’m just a speck on the movie screen, I’ve got some suggestions for the producers for next year’s show.

Pomp and circumstance. Magazines and websites are filled with daily stories about the English royals.

They don’t really do anything for the country except give British subjects someone to put up on a pedestal, whether or not those princes and princesses deserve it.

Movie stars are America’s royalty. We know them by their first names – Meryl and Lupita – and we keep up with their lives, loves, hopes and dreams.

The Oscars are when our Hollywood royalty really shines, especially when it comes to their clothes.

I’m a red carpet fangirl. I love seeing what the stars are wearing to The Oscars.

I can picture that horrible swan outfit Bjork wore one year and the gorgeous gowns Grace Kelly wore back in the day.

I love the pre-Oscars show where we get to see the flowing dresses up close and find out the designer’s name.

Give us back our Harry Winston jewels.

Showcase those Armani and Chanel tuxedos and chiffon gowns.

Let us choose our new hairstyle based on what Sandra Bullock or Viola Davis wore to the ceremony.

While we’re talking glam, who chose the building this year? This year’s ceremony looked like it was held in a high school gymnasium where the prom committee put up plastic curtains and crepe paper to make things look festive.

I want the ritzy auditoriums, the luxurious red drapes, the thousands of twinkling lights on the stage and television screens the size of a Winnebago so I can see clips from the nominated movies.

As so many of them were on streaming services, few of us knew anything about the movies.

Give us the clips so we can see what we’ve missed and, if we were lucky enough to see one of the nominated movies, a chance to revisit an intriguing story.

A host. When the producers asked the popular Kevin Hart to host last year and then pulled the offer back after he was involved in a scandal, the academy thought they could go on without a host.

Big mistake.

Hosts are vital to the awards ceremony. Bob Hope was the master of ceremonies 19 times, and viewers loved his ability to crack jokes throughout the whole show.

He was also a beloved figure in America, having entertained the troops for over 50 years from World War II through the Persian Gulf War.

His jokes were often corny, but the troops loved that he gave of his time to bring home to them and we loved a familiar face in our living rooms.

Other favorites are Billy Crystal who hosted nine times, Johnny Carson, Whoopi Goldberg and Chris Rock. These were popular comedians in our culture, and they brought a bit of political bite and humor to big business in Hollywood.

Not having a host is a big mistake.

In a year where we lost so much due to Covid and social distancing, we could’ve used some old-fashioned charm and style from Hollywood.

We could’ve used the glitz, the glamor and the American royalty that movie stars give us.

So next year, let’s go back to the elegant Shrine Auditorium and see if the Avengers would host The Oscars.

Three hours of Iron Man and Thor?

Count me in.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. 

Hospitals are scary places.

People go there to get better, but the process can be terrifying.

Our family spent a few days in at Lane Regional Memorial Center in Zachary, La. when our mother underwent procedures to have stents inserted into blocked arteries.

Physicians thread a long, thin tube into a blood vessel through the wrist and place the stents. Patients usually go home that day, and the relief is almost instantaneous.

Because Mom’s a tiny person, the team had to insert the tube through the groin, a bit more involved.

Mom’s a trooper and accepted the tougher procedure. The first time was exploratory to see where the stents needed to go, but her second procedure wasn’t as smooth.

A swelling about the size of a softball developed at the insertion site. My sister and I went to the cafeteria for a quick lunch, and we came back to find two nurses working on Mom.

One was using a sonogram to find where the bleeding was coming from and one was applying direct pressure to the area.

For over 30 minutes, these two kept searching for answers and solutions, all the while talking to Mom and us to keep us calm.

We were fortunate in that both had prior experience in a cardiovascular center and knew what to do.

Mom pulled through in fine fashion, and we were relieved and grateful these conscientious health-care professionals caught the issue before Mom was in serious trouble.

After that scary experience, she wasn’t keen on returning, but she was still short of breath and wanted to feel better.

So back to the hospital we went.

The doctor performed four stents on her – a lot, by the way – and she came out of the procedure groggy but cracking jokes.

She seemed to be stable, so my brother and I decided to grab a quick lunch.

Not more than a minute after we sat down at the restaurant, his cell phone rang. It was the nurse and the message was quick – come back to the hospital right now.

Mom was experiencing a “vasovagal syncope,” a fainting spell, but the episode was more complicated. Her blood pressure dropped to the double digits and she was as white as the sheet.

We stood in the doorway as five nurses and doctors surrounded her bed.

Laura, the head nurse in the cardio wing, was calm as she monitored her team and the machines.

What I noticed, though, was that all the while, she was stroking Mom’s hair. In a quiet voice, Laura was reassuring her patient she’d be okay and they wouldn’t leave her.

In what seemed like an eternity, Mom finally stabilized.

Most of the nurses left the room but not Laura. She moved to the side of Mom’s bed and held our mother’s hand for over 30 minutes as she monitored the machines and talked us through what had happened.

Professionally, the team was on point every step of the way.

Personally, they went above and beyond, and that care was evident in the small gestures.

Every nurse who came in Mom’s room, day and night, not only took her vital signs but didn’t leave without tucking in her sheet and blanket.

They checked her ankles for swelling and then gently rubbed the bottom of her leg as they asked how she was feeling.

They brought heated blankets without being asked.

They called Mom by name and thoroughly answered all our questions, even though they probably heard the same lines every single day.

The kindness the nurses, doctors and aides showed to our mother means more to us than we could ever express.

Thank you for remembering the scared person wearing a cotton hospital gown is first and foremost a human being.

Thank you for treating our mother with dignity, professionalism and compassion.

Thank you for saving her life.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.     

When I was a young teenager, my dad took my brother and me to New Orleans’ Ponchartrain Beach to revisit his childhood fun place.

He bought us tickets to ride The Zephyr, a huge roller coaster, because it was his favorite.

I’d never ridden a roller coaster but if Dad liked it, the ride must be okay.

At the end, my brother was laughing but I shook for over an hour.

That fear jumped up again on a trip down the Pacific Coast Highway a few years ago.

This road has a mountain on one side and a cliff, with no rail or shoulder, on the other.

After a couple of hairpin turns, I spent the rest of the ride on the back-seat floor board with my eyes shut.

Whenever we choose a vacation spot, making sure there aren’t any mountains is always in the back of my mind, hence the reason we go to the beach so often.

When my niece raved about a visit to Sedona, Ariz., I figured the desert is flat and warm, so this spot should be perfect for a spring vacation.

However, I didn’t realize Sedona was up in the mountains, and the only way to get there was over switch-back roads and hair-pin turns.

The road was terrifying.

At one point, I was looking over the edge and there was nothing between us and the rocky ground 4,000 feet down.

I closed my eyes and started praying.

As bad as the road was going up the mountain, it was worse coming down.

Seeing signs about runaway ramps for 18-wheelers, warnings about a 6-percent grade the next five miles – which I found out means the road drops so much truckers have to worry about their brakes catching on fire – did not make the trip any easier.

When we finally returned to the somewhat flatter grounds of Phoenix, I relaxed a bit. Until we decided to take in some of the trails.

I went up the first one and my knees and nerves cooperated. But when we started up a pretty steep trail, I stopped half way and told my husband he could go on and I’d wait for him there.

I relaxed on a rock and took in the view. After about 15 minutes, two mountain bikers stopped in front of me.

“Ma’am, are you okay?” one asked me. I assured him I was.

“Well the rangers are down there watching you, and they asked us to stop and check on you,” the second one said.

I was mortified. Sure enough, there were two white trucks in the parking lot and a man with binoculars was looking my way.

I waved and signaled a thumbs up.

Another man came after the bikers left and asked if I was okay. He said the rangers were getting ready to come up there and take me down the mountain as I could be in distress.

There was no way I was going to face the humiliation of having two park rangers with rescue gear come up there and get my scared self off that trail.

I had to get down to the parking lot and tell them I was okay. However, that meant I had to walk the trail by myself.

The longer I sat there, the greater the chance those rangers would come after me and cart me down there like a bag of potatoes, so I started down the slippery gravel trail.

Luckily there were kind people along the way who let me hold on to their backpacks on the steep sections and the narrow parts with a steep drop off.

Once down, I thanked the rangers for their concern and for not making me feel like a big crybaby.

They assured me people get in trouble because of dehydration or the altitude, and they’re always on the lookout for folks needing a helping hand.

Rationalizations are so comforting.

For our next vacation, the sea-level beaches of Texas and the flatlands of Florida are looking pretty good.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.         

Over 35 years ago, my husband explained the difference between a full-court press and a zone defense.

I’m still not sure what exactly they are, but I know what it means when he mutters “they need to stay out of the paint” during a basketball game.

I learned to appreciate basketball when I was in high school.

I was a member of the pep squad, and cheering in a warm gymnasium beat sitting in the football stadium in the freezing rain.

Few of us understood the basketball rules, but we could see the players’ faces and the gym always seemed to reverberate with feet stomping their encouragement on the wooden bleachers.

I grew to appreciate the athletes, both male and female, as their sweat and strained muscles reflected their love of the game.

That appreciation should’ve come earlier as the guys in my family are die-hard fans.

We grew up in Olean, N.Y., and my dad loved watching St. Bonaventure play basketball.

When we moved to Louisiana, Dad was a frequent fan in the stands where he cheered for LSU hoopster Pete Maravich as “Pistol Pete” made his way into the history books.

That love was put into action as our brothers had a perpetual basketball game going in our parents’ driveway.

At family barbecues and holidays, the brothers and brothers-in-law would invariably lace up their sneakers and the game picked up right where it left off.

The games were friendly but competitive. I don’t remember if anybody every won or lost, but the score wasn’t the point.

Friendly competition, non-stop heckling and showing off were the primary goals.

Our nieces and nephews would play when their uncles and dads let them.

One afternoon, we girls decided to play. The game started off friendly, but our natural competitiveness kicked in and there was elbowing, shoving and pushing.

I think I might’ve hurt my sister.

With three sons who all liked sports, we had a basketball goal in our driveway. With almost-daily games, when our thoughtful neighbors, Dwight and Neta, put in a new fence, they put the handle on their gate on the outside so the boys could get their ball out of their back yard.

Recently, when my alma mater, the University of Houston, made it to the NCAA finals along with Baylor, another Texas school, we settled in to watch the game. Baylor took the lead and never looked back.

Since we were already settled in for the evening, we watched the Gonzaga and UCLA game even though we didn’t have a favorite.

Without a dog in the fight, I came to admire both teams, and it was obvious they were well matched and both wanted to win.

When Gonzaga’s Jalen Suggs threw the ball from half court with less than a second on the clock, sunk the basket and won the game, we both jumped off the couch yelling in amazement.

We were eager to see these two teams take each other on for the championship title.

A sluggish, disjointed Gonzaga team took the court, but the Baylor Bears came on the court strong, bold, united and ready to win.

They easily took the 2021 NCAA Champs title.

Sometimes games, like life, are decided in a split second.

Sometimes, the winning outcome is evident from the start.

Other times, the underdog will fight with everything they have and take the win.

What matters is getting out there, playing with skill and abandon and accepting defeat or victory with grace and a handshake.

Not bad rules for life either.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. 

 

 

April Fools’ Day has different origin stories – which fits this day perfectly – but most of us use April 1 as a time to pull pranks and jokes on each other.

Our family’s favorite April Fools’ Day joke was one my brother played on my then-2-year-old son.

Nick was sitting on my Mom’s kitchen counter and my brother noticed he was wearing tennis shoes with Velcro laces.

Knowing it was April Fools’ Day, Jeff looked down at Nick’s shoes and said “Your shoes are untied.”

Nick looked down and his uncle said “April Fools’!”

We all laughed so Jeff said it again. Nick looked down again. This back-and-forth went on for probably 10 minutes with Nick innocently looking down at his shoes every single time, and teenage Jeff and my youngest sister Donna wondering when the child would catch on.

Perhaps this was a foreshadowing of what was ahead as Nick did graduate from Texas A&M University.

The best April Fools’ Day pranks come from people who aren’t known for telling jokes or doing silly things.

Such is the case with our middle son.

Stephen has a good sense of humor but he’s our serious child. He’s never been a joke teller or one who participated in the silly games and pranks other kids did.

But he pulled off the perfect prank when he was in college.

Stephen had been offered a summer internship with a national accounting firm, but he wasn’t sure which location they’d send him to.

One afternoon, he called.

“Mom, the firm made me an offer. There’s a catch though,” he said and my heart stopped.

He explained that the firm was going to send him to a Third World country in the Middle East. They couldn’t guarantee his safety but they were going to give him extra money because of the risks he’d have to take.

I asked him a lot of questions about what kind of security measures they were promising, did he know which country and if he was sure he wanted to take a chance with his life for money.

“Yes, I’ve thought about all of that,” he said. “There’s only one thing that concerns me.”

I held my breath.

“That you actually fell for this. April Fools’,” he said with a laugh.

He had me hook, line and sinker.

I told him to call his dad and play the same prank on him.

“Oh he’s too smart to fall for this joke,” Stephen said.

Intelligence had nothing to do with whether or not his dad would fall for the joke, I told him, ignoring his implication that I was the dumb one.

Stephen took up the challenge and called his dad who fell for it just like I did.

That’s why April Fools’ jokes are best carried out by those who don’t normally joke unlike my dad who loved telling jokes and telling tall tales.

If he’d tried pulling an April Fools’ joke on us, we’d have instantly suspected he was pulling our leg.

When Dad passed away, my brother Jeff and I were alone in the emergency room. Jeff looked at the clock, and said quietly that Dad died on April Fools’ Day.

Neither one of us realized the date before that moment, but we both agreed it was fitting that our father, the one who loved jokes and told a joke better than anyone else, passed away on this day.

Remembering to laugh in the midst of sorrow was the last lesson my dad taught me. So Happy April Fools’ Day, Dad. Thanks for reminding me that life has its share of smiles as well as its share of tears.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. 

In a family with seven children, times when we were all together were often scarce.

But there was one meal that was sacred, one meal we did not miss no matter the reason.

Sunday dinner.

But first, there was Sunday Mass.

My dad “found religion” when I was in high school and our church habits changed.

Before he saw the light, we sat on the back row and Dad snored through most of the service.

After his religious weekend, all nine of us had to sit on the front row. This wouldn’t have been so bad except we were always late.

For a teenager, that march up the aisle was the walk of shame. Add to that humiliation was that my dad insisted on singing every single hymn as loud as he could.

Dad couldn’t carry a tune to save his soul.

So there we were, late, on the front row with dad belting out “Here I Am Lord” for the angels to hear, although they probably had no problem picking him out of the congregation.

Once home, we’d set the table while Mom made the salad dressing. The menu didn’t change much – roast, white rice, gravy, mashed potatoes, salad and corn. No problem – our Mom’s a fabulous cook.

We’d say grace and pass the food to the right – Dad’s rule – and talk about everything under the sun while we ate.

Sometimes we’d talk about what was going on at school or sports but the conversation usually turned to politics.

We all had different views on the world, especially when we got to be teenagers.

Dad believed every word out of Archie Bunker’s mouth was the gospel truth.

We thought Archie Bunker was an idiot.

Dad thought voted for Richard Nixon.

Nixon single handedly shattered my belief that the president was right up there next to the pope and The Beatles.

We’d all chime in with our opinion. Some, like our sister Diane, loved to argue for the sake of argument.

Neither she nor my dad ever took their often loud disagreements personally. To them, those debates were verbal and intellectual exercise.

Our dad ended the discussion with his trade-mark wrap-it-up opinion.

“It’s a communist plot,” he’d say.

We’d throw our hands up in exasperation and took care of the dishes and leftovers, each one seamlessly taking on a task, from washing pots and pans to sweeping the floor, until the kitchen was clean.

Those Sunday dinners taught me invaluable lessons.

Although we differed in our views, we still allowed the other person to state their opinion, and we respected their right to have that opinion.

My incredibly smart siblings made me look at thorny issues in a different light.

Sometimes I changed my mind. Sometimes I stuck with what I thought. But I’m so glad they made me look at life from a different angle.

Social media and the opportunity to rant from a keyboard instead of face to face has turned civilized debate into a blood sport.

And that’s a shame.

Making political or religious disagreements personal doesn’t allow our minds to see an issue through a different lens and causes rifts in the family.

It’s sad how many relationships are splintered because of this unwillingness to honor another person’s point of view.

Our political and religious views are one small sliver of the pie that makes up each and every one of us. In our determination to be right, we forget that our right-wing friend is also an incredible artist, writer or gardener.

We need to remember our differences don’t make us enemies.

They just make us different, a message learned over hurried Sunday mornings and passing around a platter of pot roast.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. 

My uncle Marshall died unexpectedly when he was 21 years old. I remember hearing my grandmother wailing in the bathroom that night.

For the rest of her life, she wore nothing but black or navy blue clothes, seldom smiled and we were forbidden from mentioning Marshall’s name in her presence.

This once vibrant woman turned into a bitter, angry person.

That’s what I thought bereavement looked like.

But Dana McBride completely changed my outlook about death and grieving in less than 10 minutes.

Many years ago, I heard about children at Austin Elementary collecting coins for Chandler’s Tree Farm. My first thought was they were planting trees at the school.

Their project was much bigger.

Chandler McBride was the younger brother of Chelsea McBride, a student at the school. Chandler was battling cancer at Texas Children’s Hospital.

The McBrides understood first-hand the hardships quarantined families faced as they spent weeks isolated on the ward.

Dana and Kevin decided to make those families’ lives a little brighter with the help of the children at Austin Elementary. On every holiday, Dana, Kevin and Chelsea bought gifts for all the families on the ward.

Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and Valentine’s Day were all celebrated with the families by the McBrides. At Christmas, Kevin dressed up like Santa and pulled Chandler in a little red wagon to deliver the gifts.

As much good as they put out into the universe, 2-year-old Chandler quietly died in Dana’s arms.

There are few parents who could recover from such a heartbreaking tragedy.

But the McBrides chose a different path.

Instead of shutting their hearts, Dana, Kevin and Chelsea remembered the exhausted parents on the cancer ward.

Every Christmas for 18 years, Kevin dressed up as Santa and Dana and Chelsea delivered gifts from the back of Chandler’s little red wagon.

This family that brought such joy to so many was dealt an unbelievably cruel blow last week.

Chelsea was tragically killed in an automobile accident.

When I read Dana’s post about Chelsea receiving her heavenly wings, I had to read the post three times for it to sink in.

Surely God could not be so cruel as to take both of the McBride’s children.

Not the bright and happy Chelsea who volunteered at the local cancer center and worked with children. Not this family again.

I drove to the funeral reception in Lufkin with a heavy heart, crying, yelling at God, wondering how Dana and Kevin could survive this gut-wrenching tragedy.

When I saw Dana, she jumped up and hugged me. I told her how sorry I was and she said she was too, but they’d had Chelsea living with them and she was so grateful for that time with her daughter.

And then she changed my life.

With a serene smile on her face, Dana told me how she’s coping. We all have a purpose in life, she said. They were parents to Chandler and Chelsea and now God needed her and Kevin for something else.

“Chandler and Chelsea will be waiting for us when it’s our time,” she said. “Until then, we need to do what we can to fulfill our purpose here on earth.”

I came to Chelsea’s reception with an angry heart.

I left with forgiveness in my heart.

I took Dana’s words as a life challenge.

Live with a purpose, even on the days when you think you can’t get out of bed for the overwhelming sadness.

Live with forgiveness, even on those days when anger is the only emotion you feel.

Live with hope, even during the nights when overwhelming memories threaten to drown you.

There’s a reason and a purpose for your being here.

Never stop searching for your purpose here on earth and continue to pray for comfort, strength and peace for Dana and Kevin.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald

One year ago, we were slowly waking up to a new vocabulary and reality –face masks, social distancing and pandemic.

We’re still separated into the anti-maskers and the pro-maskers, those who will never take the vaccine and others driving an hour to an appointment where they can receive the vaccine.

Schools, however, have Spring Break on the calendar and no matter where you stand on the coronavirus debate, the kids will be school-free for an entire week.

Many are tired of staying home and looking at the same four walls. Others aren’t ready to venture out too far, so here’s some ideas to appeal to some and perhaps spark some interest in others.

Fun can be found within 50 miles of Fort Bend County, and most of these activities are right in our own backyards.

In no particular order, here’s some recommendations for Spring Break 2021:

 “The Berg:” Businesses have worked to make Rosenberg an up-to-date tourist destination.

The downtown neighborhood is filled with beautiful murals and quaint shops where the prices are right and choices plentiful.

Bargain and antique hunters are sure to find something in their price range.

Chain restaurants are reliable, but for a true adventure, take in one of Rosenberg’s home-grown eateries and listen for the train whistles. Save money, stay away from crowds and delight your taste buds.

Parks, like Seabourne Creek and the gorgeous Brazos Bend, offer adventures for bird watchers, families wishing to fly a kite, barbecue some hot dogs or kick around a soccer ball.

Eagle Lake:  If you want to stay away from crowds, consider a trip to Sealy and back home through Eagle Lake.

The easy drive north on Highway 36 to Sealy offers a first look at emerging wildflowers.

Stop at the railroad park in Sealy a few blocks away from the town’s square. Stretch your legs, stroll the square and head back home through Eagle Lake.

This tiny but beautiful city has lots to offer. There’s a museum and thrift store open during limited hours, and the Railroad Depot museum will be open the first weekend of Spring Break. History buffs will find the Masonic cemetery, established in 1872, a treasure trove of Texas’ past.

The big draw in Eagle Lake is the Attwater Prairie Chicken National Wildlife Refuge, home to this endangered species. If you love seeing a coastal prairie, the refuge is a beautiful spot.

Chances of seeing a chicken are slim, but chances of seeing some wildflowers are pretty good.

The visitor’s center is closed, but the restrooms are open. Best of all, the 20-minute driving tour is free. The center is open from sunrise to sunset. Driving time to Fort Bend County from Eagle Lake is 30 minutes.

Surfside:  There’s a free public beach but some spots require you to pay to park. Whatever you do, don’t park on the sand as you’ll get stuck.

Remember, since it is Spring Break, chances are this usually quiet spot will be filled with beach lovers aching to get away from memories of the recent arctic freeze. Driving time is an hour and a half.

Bellville:  There’s a nice town square here and a few barbecue places, but the biggest draw of all is Newman’s Castle. Step back in time in a real castle complete with a moat. Reservations are required, and admission is a little steep – $20 per person – but if it’s adventure you’re looking for, this is the place.

Finish off your medieval day with a treat from Newman’s Castle Bakery. The inside is nothing fancy but that doesn’t matter when munching on fresh kolaches and doughnuts. Newman’s has tables set up outside for those still cautious about inside dining. Driving time is one hour.

All of the cities in Fort Bend County have some historic or beautiful draw for all ages and interests, from the courthouse and beautiful gardens in the heart of Richmond, the boutique shopping and big-city feel of Sugar Land and the free playgrounds, restaurants and parks in our smaller cities.

Spring Break fun, even in a winding-down pandemic, can be found in your own back yard.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.