Gift of Reading, Key to a Good Life

By Rick Blumenberg  / @rickblumenberg

I grew up in a reading home. Mom and Dad would read the paper together, trading sections as each finished. Living in a home before the days of television (and even pre-electric for the first few years) I realize we didn’t have some of the distractions of our present day but some evenings every person in the family would have a book in hand, or, be listening to one. And that fostered a love of reading. When Mom was an older teenager, she wrote a column for the local newspaper about neighborhood happenings. She was paid with a subscription and years later, when I was growing up, we still got a free paper that she had earned for us.

One of my fondest early memories was when Dad took us to the library in Charleston, Missouri, and we went home with an armload of books! And I discovered that when we had read them we could take them back and get more! It was an awesome experience for a boy who couldn’t remember a life without reading and had just discovered to read for himself. All of our family members are readers and book lovers, and many of us are writers. Some time ago I wrote two of my favorite poems on the subject of reading. I share them with you here. I dedicate them to my family—past, present and future—and to their love of reading.

The Gift

I received it from my parents

a lifetime ago.

The family read together—

it was part of being home.

One reading, others listening,

or each with book in sheltered cove

In summer ’neath the shade tree

in winter by the stove.

We gave it to our children—

this gift of love received,

before they could know or understand

the words that we would read.

Dr. Zeus and Eggemier, The train that Tried

            and the Little Red Hen—

We watched their bright eyes sparkle

as reading would begin.

And now our children's children

are readers once again.

I don't know when it started.

I hope it never ends.

                                                --Rick Blumenberg

The Key

Read my child

            and no one can enslave you.

A book shall be your golden key

            to a strong unopened door.

With a book and time to read it

            the whole earth you can roam

And where others cannot travel

            you will be at home.

Read my child

            and travel far upon the deep.

Walk abroad on distant shores

            while others are asleep!

A book shall be your ocean barque

to sail the distant seas

And reading be your shining wing

            To ride upon the breeze.

                                    --Rick Blumenberg

I’m Rick Blumenberg and that’s My View from Tanner Creek.

  

Mama Still Sings

Thinking about mom, Mollie Callie [Arington] Blumenberg

“Does your mother always sing?”

The question was asked by a schoolmate who had come home with me for the night.

“Well no,” I answered, “but I guess she does sing a lot.”

As I thought about my friend’s question I realized he was right. Mom almost always sang as she worked around the house. It was so much a part of my life I really didn’t think about it until he mentioned it, although I knew I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was just one of the good things in life I had always taken for granted.

That conversation took place many years ago, but I still remember because it helped me realize another thing for which I was thankful. Throughout my life I enjoyed Mom’s singing more because my classmate’s question made me realize it was something very special.

Later, as an adult I became interested in genealogy and began to do family research. I had faint memories of my great-grandparents, but until I began to trace our family tree I knew nothing beyond that. As I searched, researched, and talked with the old folks, I began to see patterns emerging that made me realize Mom’s singing went back for several generations.

One of Mom’s favorite Aunts, was Grandpa’s sister, Ethel Elliot. She lived into her nineties and a couple of times I visited with her and listened to and recorded her family stories. Born in the latter part of the nineteenth century (1899), she grew up on various farms in Western Kentucky where her father was a tenant farmer and her grandfather, my great-great grandfather, was a Baptist Preacher, church-planter and farmer. Great-great grandpa Wiley Jackson Arington moved his family to Ballard County, Kentucky from Obion County Tennessee in the late 1860s, shortly after the Civil War. He was a farmer by occupation and a church-planting minister by call of God—founding pastor of First Baptist Church in Wickliffe, Kentucky.

His Granddaughter (Aunt Ethel) recalled growing up in a time when life was primitive and you had to make your own fun. One way they did it, that brought back such good memories for her, was when her Dad, my Great “Grandpa Jack” Arington would get out his pitch pipe and the family would sing together. They sang gospel songs and fun songs and Tennessee mountain songs—in the summer on the front porch and in the winter around the stove, in the fields as they worked, and in church when they worshipped.

So Mom’s singing was in her genes. Her brothers and sisters sang naturally and beautifully at the slightest opportunity, or as they would say “At the drop of a hat”. Many played instruments, not so much to entertain others, although they sometimes do that, but just to entertain themselves, for the sheer joy of singing, and to worship the Lord.

At an Arington family reunion there is always a lot of “pickin’ and singin’”— and the songs continue now into at least the sixth generation. The Arington Family Reunion is held every year on the Sunday of Labor Day in Cunningham, Kentucky. The first one was held at least some time before 1869, somewhere in Tennessee.

Mom died about six and a half years ago on July 31, 2004, after living for years with Alzheimer’s disease. In those last years she usually didn’t know who we were when we came to visit until we would tell her. But she still remembered the old songs and until the very last, if you told her it was your birthday she could still sing “Happy Birthday” to you in a voice that was sweet and perfectly on key.

Now she’s in heaven, and I have no doubt the angels often stop to listen as she sings. But she won’t notice, or be aware of their attention, because, as she sings, she’ll be putting something in the oven or maybe hanging out the white robe laundry.

Mom, we were so blessed to grow up in your home. Your beautiful songs were typical of how beautiful you were.

I’m Rick Blumenberg, and that’s My View from Tanner Creek.