Pushing Spring

Meeting People of Substance...

I know. It's still winter and will be for another month, but on these warm days interspersed with Southern Winter temps in the 50s and 60s, when they rise into the upper 70s, I can't help but think of Spring. The daffodils are already blooming in my back yard, which makes me feel that it's pushing into spring. It's a kind of feeling of renewal, and it seems that all of a sudden, I've begun another round of meeting people.

It was my pleasure one night at Harvey's restaurant to see Fred Kinder and his partner Ralph Null come into the restaurant. I knew them both on sight from their various appearances in the Commercial Dispatch. I had been wanting to meet them both since I first arrived here in Columbus in late May of 2016. As people here know, Fred Kinder was the recipient of the Book of Golden Deeds award in 2016, presented by the local chapter of the National Exchange Club. These are the kind of substantial, inspirational people I've been wanting to meet.

The National Exchange Club – a service organization with 700 clubs and more than 21,000 members throughout the United States and Puerto Rico – celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2011. Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Michigan by businessmen who wanted to “exchange” ideas on making their community better, the Exchange Club moved its headquarters to Toledo in 1917. For a hundred years, Exchange Club volunteer efforts have supported the needs of the country and of local communities, making it the country’s oldest American service organization operating exclusively in the United States. Its second oldest club is the Exchange Club in Toledo, Ohio formed in 1913. (source: Wikipedia)

The fortuitous meeting at Harvey's led to invitations from Fred and Ralph to visit in their home, and then on another night to meet a group of men from the area who meet weekly at Zachery's, a local cafe.

In March my twin calico girls will be a whopping one year old, and now, any time I go through all my pictures of them, it's almost melancholy to see the two pint-sized squirts running through the house like they own the world and then seeing them now, each a gallon of cat. But they bring to mind life burgeoning as spring does.

And on the home front, pushing spring and its renewal, my partner is set to close on his house in Columbus next month, sell his house in Mesilla, NM, next month, and close on an apartment complex in Las Cruces, NM. These things need to unfold like clockwork, however, and he will be under stress to get all the loose ends tied up. All I can do from this end is make room in my house for the furniture he will be shipping to Columbus—that is if he isn't quite ready, when the movers come to send it to the house he's buying. At least when he gets here, he won't have to blaze a trail as I did, and I'm hoping with the renewal that spring offers is a renewal of his life's options in a less stressful place.

The post's video is of Eden Brent (born 16 November 1965 in Greenville, Mississippi^[1] She is an award-winning American musician on the independent Yellow Dog Records label. A blues pianist and vocalist, she combines boogie-woogie with elements of blues, jazz, soul, gospel and pop.