Today is Pearl Harbor Day. I can’t help but wonder how many people alive today know the full import of this day. For my parent’s generation, it was their September 11th. More than 2,300 Americans died in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and about 1200 were injured. After Pearl Harbor, recruiter’s offices were full with patriotic young men (and women) signing up to serve in the armed forces.

My mother was one of them. She enlisted in the WAVES.

“When we enlisted, we signed up for the duration plus six months,” she told me. “We didn’t know how or when or even if the war would end. Hitler looked unstoppable. There was talk that the war could go on for years and years. The media called us ‘the lost generation.’ We were an entire generation that missed the years of our youth. That time of our life was lost to those war years.”

Her true love - the young man she’d spent months getting to know and love - also joined the Navy. About a year into the war, his boat was hit by a German torpedo and he suffered severe injuries and required extensive physical rehabilitation. When he came home from the war, he told my mother that he was now only “half a man” and according to my mother, he said that she deserved better and that she should forget about him and find someone else.

When she was in her late 70s, she finally told me this story. And that was only because I found a well-hidden 1930s photo of my mother and this fellow. When I showed this photo to my mom and started asking a few questions, she finally told me the whole story.  When she looked at the snapshot, tears came to her eyes, followed by a soft smile. When she spoke up and started talking, she described him as “the love of my life.”

That’s one couple, and one story. And two lives changed forever by the war. And one of millions of stories, I’m sure.

Click here to read more.

Pearl Harbor

Yahoo news is reporting this morning that a man has been arrested for accosting his wife’s face with a cheeseburger. During a heated argument, the man lost his temper and began smearing a greasy cheeseburger over her face. Apparently, it erupted into a full-fledged food fight.

Read the short article here.

As a writer, I tend to pay way too much attention to non-verbal communication. And many sensitive souls - like me - are guilty of this, too. In fact, the experts say that 70% of all communication is non-verbal. I’ve noticed that when I see wedding videos and/or attend the weddings in person, that there are two kinds of men: The kinds of men who gently feed their wives their first bite of wedding cake, and the men who think that a woman’s wedding day is a swell time to act stupid and cram that cake into her face, embarrassing her, embarrassing himself, and proving to his friends and family that his new wife just married a real horse’s ass.

When did we lose our manners? When did we stop behaving well in public? And when did men get license to start treating their brand-new wives so unattractively at such an important moment?

I have observed that there’s an interesting semi-scientific insight that comes with the “feeding of the wedding cake.” Those men who do the cram often end up divorced. Those men who do the gentle feed, remain married.

Coincidence?

Nope.

Click here to learn more about Rose.

Hordes of people have asked me, “Why do you think of yourself as ugly?”

The fact is, I don’t.

However, during my years in the world of internet dating, at least 30 men (out of 70) rejected me because (they said) they didn’t feel “chemistry” or I didn’t have “The Look.” This is really an indelicate way of saying, “You’re not pretty enough for me.”

I chose the title (Ugly Woman’s Guide to Internet Dating) because I have met *SO* many women who gave up on internet dating because of men’s ugly comments to them. The hits on their self-esteem were persistent and unrelenting. Ultimately, these women just threw in the towel and gave up their dream of life-long pair-bonding and decided to get another cat. I understand their pain.

My book is not about ugly women. It’s about the fact that in this internet dating culture, women are judged first and foremost by their thumbnail profile picture, often to the exclusion of all else. And what can you really learn about someone’s character, spirituality, maturity or goodness by looking at ¾” picture?

Nothing.

Like most women, I’m “average” looking (hence, the term). And in the process of these 70 first dates, I became disgusted with the fact that these men were only interested in women who had “the look.”

So I did a little experiment.

Continued at, “Why do you think of yourself as “ugly”? (Part II)

Buy the book here.

continued from part I.

Like most women, I’m “average” looking (hence, the term). And in the process of these 70 first dates, I became disgusted with the fact that these men were only interested in women who had “the look.”

Out of pure curiosity, I conducted a little experiment. With my daughter’s permission, I posted an ad at an internet dating site, using her beautiful headshots. Her “ad” (profile) was carefully written, and made it clear that she was high maintenance and had serious gold-digger leanings.

Within 24 hours, she had more than 20 emails. By the end of the first week, she had 75 emails from 75 men, pleading for a response. Within 30 days, she had received more than 250 letters from men (ages 25 to 62) who were begging to meet her.

Many men’s emails explained they had “plenty of money, a fine house” and blah, blah, blah. Their message was like saying, “You have plenty of beauty; I have plenty of money. We’re a perfect match.”

That made me angry.

Internet dating is only a little different from posting your picture at “Rate My Face dot com” and asking strangers to rate you on a score of 1-10. If you’re a ten, you get a few emails. If you’re a five (like me) you get six emails in 90 days.

I found the whole process to be hard and harsh and it did a number of my self-esteem. I did have a happy ending, but mainly from what I learned about myself and men. I learned that the opinions of others really do not matter.

And I found myself a nice guy, too. He’s good and decent and kind and patient. And he has a job and he doesn’t sniff gasoline and he doesn’t have any addictions and he loves me with his whole heart. And he tells me that I’m his “eight-cow wife.”

Learn more here.

During the four years that I dwelt in the land of internet dating, I learned a few things about single men and internet dating. Actually, I learned a *lot* of things and the most important “red flags” are delineated below.

Red Flag #1:  Three Strike Rule. If a man mentions the ex more than three times during any one event, he’s out. The opposite of love is not hate (or obsession), but apathy. If a man can’t stop talking about the ex, it usually means that he’s not over her yet.

Red Flag #2:  If a man is mean, run away fast.  It doesn’t matter how much good a man does or how good he makes you feel; if he has a vicious side, that viciousness will taint everything and can ruin anything. Any man who shows a vicious side must be exorcised from your heart, mind and soul. There is no counterbalance to viciousness.

Red Flag #3:  Watch out, sheepies! Some of the most treacherous and lecherous wolves you’ll meet are the men who claim to wear the garment of a Christian. The most dangerous evil in this world is the evil that sneaks into our lives disguised as something good. To learn more, read Chapter Four in my book titled, “Good Christian Man Seeks Good Christian Woman for Friday Night Booty Call.” The chapter title says it all.

Red Flag #4:  Do not trust your body and soul to a man who has not proven himself worthy of trust. It is inappropriate (and immature) for a man to pressure a woman to have sex before she feels emotionally ready. Studies show that casual sex can lead to serious depression and even suicidal ideation.

Red Flag #5:  If a man uses vitriol and contempt and ugly words to describe a woman that he once cherished and loved, he’ll eventually use those same words to accost you.

Red Flag #6: Time in the wilderness. If a man from a long-term marriage has been divorced less than two years, he’s probably not ready for a new relationship. The severance from such emotional and spiritual ties takes time to heal.

Red Flag #7: Childless fathers. If a man is able to sever ties with his own flesh and blood, that doesn’t bode well for his potential as a future mate. Ditto on men who don’t pay child support.

Red Flag #8: Watch out for married men at dating sites. Most studies show that about 20% of the male subscribers at internet dating sites are married men. Be wise and be alert that too many men are not honest about their marital status.

Like what you read? Please share this blog with friends!

Next:  Eharmony vs. Match.com - which is better?

Want to keep reading?  Click here.

During the time I was dating my (now) husband, I had lunch with two women friends, and one of them (who’d never met Mr. Fiance)  asked if I had a picture of the new man in my life. I whipped out my cell phone and showed her a picture on its diminutive screen. In fact, I showed her this picture:

The one in the glasses is mine (1961)

A few days earlier, I’d used my cell phone’s camera feature to take a picture of this old photo, prominently displayed in my fiance’s home.

Once my friend focused on the tiny screen, she laughed out loud and said, “Is he the one in the glasses?”

To which I replied, “Yes, that’s him.”

My other woman friend glanced over and saw the photo. In a very serious tone she said, “Keep in mind, he’s much older now.”

Read more about Rose here.

Wayne all growed up

Somewhere around the 29th first date, I’d figured out that meeting for drinks was a far better plan than meeting for lunches and dinners. Get stuck with a ne’er-do-well on a dinner date and you’re committed to chow down 2,000 calories of fat-laden Shrimp Scampi just so you can make a fast get-away. Too many calories, too much money and way too much time invested in some pitiful man who’s got 101 equally boring stories, all of which begin or end with, “My ex-wife is such a crazy witch…”

But then I discovered that meeting for “drinks” presented its own problems because people usually meet at bars when they’re meeting for drinks. I’m highly allergic to cigarette smoke and it’s hard to be your best charming self when you’re busy trying to surreptitiously sniffle and/or wipe a drippy nose on the cuff of your pretty shirt. Further, I don’t drink alcohol, and I don’t like bars. Being around drunken sots is a lot more fun if you’re one of the sots. Or so I’ve surmised.

So then I started meeting a few guys at public places. I met a couple fellows at parks and I met two guys at a local library. Meeting at the city park was nice and gave both me and Mr. Potential Suitor a chance to walk and talk and admire nature’s beauty. Meeting at the library wasn’t such a good idea. It’s hard to be clever and cute when you’re forced to keep your voice to a whisper.

In the end, I discovered the best meet and greet places were little cafes and coffee shops and outdoor restaurants. For  these quixotic quests, such places were quiet and quaint, just right for a quirky girl, like me.

And in fact, that’s where I met my 70th first date. And while I was impressed with so many of #70’s fine qualities, perhaps the one that impressed me most of all:  He never said anything ugly about his ex-wife or ex-girlfriends.

Once a year, we go back to that coffee shop and sit in the same spot and drink the same drinks and hold hands and gaze into one another’s eyes. It’s wholly delightful.

In the 1930s, The “Monitor-top Refrigerator” quickly became one of General Electric’s most popular appliances. Its design was based on a sound principle and a highly efficient plan: The compressor sat atop the fridge, and heat extracted from the appliance cabinet naturally moved up and away from the refrigerator.

According to all reports, these were also unusually well-built appliances, with a life expectancy of 25 years - or more. Today, appliance aficionados are always on the look-out for these vintage refrigerators, because with a little work and a few new parts, they can be restored to their original condition and live on - indefinitely.

Heretofore, no one has created a reproduction Monitor Top refrigerator which is a surprise, especially consider how hot these used appliances have become. A thoroughly restored three-door Monitor Top fridge (fully restored) can fetch $10,000 or more.  For more information and detail on these appliances, click here.

When I was researching The Houses That Sears Built, I read 32 years of American Carpenter and Builder, a popular building magazine of the early 1900s. Whilst studying its pages, I found an ad for a Monitor Cupola and a few bells rang in my tired brain. Was this where the “Monitor Top” fridge got its name? The resemblance between this Monitor Cupola and the GE’s compressor was sound. I’ve googled all the terms I can think to google and yet to no avail. I love to know - is this the source of the moniker Monitor-top?

Update: A friend found a link explaining that monitor-top GE refrigerators got their name from the iron-clad Monitor Ship from The Civil War. Maybe that’s where Monitor Cupolas got their name?

Want to read more about Rose? Click here.

Ad from 1915 building magazine showing Monitor vent

An image from a 1930 magazine, showing the GE Monitor Top

Full ad from a 1930 magazine

There’s a wonderful book titled, “The Good Old Days, They Were Awful!” It’s an interesting book with many stories of how life “back in the day” was not all peaches and cream. I agree with that - to an extent - but there were some bonuses to life back then. However, as far as issues of sanitation, we’re miles ahead of our ancestors who lived in the early 1900s.

Here’s an ad from the American Carpenter and Builder Magazine, from 1912. (Story continues below photos.)

1912 American Carpenter and Builder ad

Close up of the modern toilet

Take a better look at this contraption. In short, the (ahem) “human waste products” were dropped into a steel box directly under your house (aka basement or foundation). After a time, you’d stir the (ahem) contents in this box and add chemicals a couple times a week.  See the handle beside the toilet (on the floor)?  That’s your stirrer. And see the large pipe behind the toilet? In a perfect world, that’s a vent pipe that directs odors out of the living space. In a perfect world.

I suppose for those who were accustomed to donning warm shoes and making the long trek to the outhouse in the backyard, this “chemical toilet” was better. I suppose.  But in the real world, that thing must have stunk to high heaven. And what poor soul was charged with crawling under the house and cleaning out the box twice a year?

I love studying the good old days and I love writing about the good old days. However, when I finally learn how to travel back in time, I think I’ll take my modern plumbing with me.

And you thought your kitchen was small? The ad below came from a 1925 architectural magazine and the ad was promoting the fine, smooth drain board (on the right). After The Great War (also known as The War to End All Wars, as President Wilson assured us), there was a fantastic housing shortage. Housing analysts estimated that 1-2 million housing units were needed immediately to ameliorate the housing shortage caused by World War I. And there was something else going on after World War I.

Hyperinflation.

For a few months immediately following the Armistice (11-11-1919), hyperinflation hit America hard. The price of building materials increased 100% in some places. Because of this and because of the housing shortage, many people converted their spacious single family homes into boarding houses and installed a few of these tiny kitchen units to accommodate their new paying tenants.

Notice, that’s a refrigerator on the right side and a gas stove on the left, and that’s a Veribrite Drain Board (for kitchens of all sizes) on the right top.

This is one wee tiny kitchen (From 1925 American Carpenter Magazine).

The time really does go by so quickly. It seems like a couple years ago that my youngest daughter Corey (now 22 years old) was just a baby. When she was little, my dear Mom would drop by our little house on Arizona Street in Portsmouth, just long enough to hug me and hug the baby and drop off a little gift. Sometimes it was a potted mum or sometimes it was a box of Little Debbie’s or sometimes it was a $20 bill to buy ourselves a little treat.

She’d look at my babies and say, “I know this is hard to believe, but this chapter of your life will be over before you know it. In no time at all, they’re grown and gone and what remains are the memories. I know this feels like an intense time of life, but enjoy it. Relish the moments because you’ll have the rest of your life to reflect on and remember these happy days.”

My mother was very wise.

On Thanksgiving Day, my husband and I sat quietly with each other in our spacious dining room and enjoyed our freshly-cooked turkey and home-made stuffing and yams and pumpkin pie. I’m sure we were both thinking about our children. I’ve had a couple Thanksgivings utterly alone and I can tell you, it’s 5000% better to have someone with whom to share a holiday and yet, your thoughts return to those days when there were little kids running around the house making their happy noises.

Corey - about seven months old in this photo

Part of the fun of traveling to 23 states and giving 200 talks on Sears Homes is seeing all kinds of wacky and wild stuff. One Sunday morning in 2003, as my host was driving me back to the airport (to return home to the Midwest), I saw this Sears Madelia (see second photo below). It was in Zanesville, OH (or a nearby town) and we were actually several blocks beyond this building when I told my host, “Please turn around. I think I saw something.”

He reminded me that we didn’t have much time and I told him I understood and this wouldn’t take but a second. And there - in all its painful glory - was this badly butchered Sears house. It’s actually a Sears Madelia and it was not that popular a model for Sears. (Sears sold 370 designs of kit homes from 1908 - 1940.)

The first picture (first image) is a happy, healthy Madelia in Wood River, Illinois on 9th Street. There are 24 Sears Homes in a row, a remnant from the days of Standard Oil’s purchase of $1 million worth of Sears Homes for their refinery workers. The second picture I’ve titled,

A Madelia trapped in a tavern’s body.

A happy little Sears Madelia in Wood River, IL

And here’s the Madelia trapped in a tavern’s body.

A Madelia trapped in a tavern's body

This next house is a Sears Crescent in Norfolk, Virginia. It’s a happy little Crescent with good self-esteem.

A happy Sears Crescent

And this next picture was taken by Rebecca Hunter, a kit-home expert in Elgin, Illinois.

An unhappy Sears Crescent in Illinois

Here's a Sears Westly, as it appeared in the 1919 Sears catalog

Unhappy Sears House in the Midwest. Too much plastic in one place.

Okay, so it’s from a February 1911 Ladies Home Journal, but still, it sounds so intriguing.

At first glance, I assumed that this fireproof house was 90% asbestos content, but upon reading the full article, I saw that I was wrong. It’s made of poured concrete and has lots of hollow tile, plaster (applied over metal lath), ceramic tile and block. Even the floors are poured concrete. Ater all that concrete is dried, the wooden forms are removed.

Very interesting idea for a house, and it’s nice-looking, too but good luck hanging up any pictures on the walls. Small price to pay for a fireproof house - I suppose.

A picture of the Fireproof House (from 1911 LHJ)

Back in the day, Ladies’ Home Journal was (get ready), a magazine devoted to improving the lot of women who wanted to be homeowners, or women who had achieved that high goal of homeownership.  Today, the magazine is heavy on diet tips and light on home related topics, but it wasn’t always that way.

This 1911 issue of LHJ devoted an entire section to fixing up old houses. The photos (and their captions) tell the whole story. One caption reads, “The foundation and timbers [of these old houses] are often better than are found in the houses built today.”

For the two images below, the caption reads:

It seems almost impossible to realize that the hospitable-looking house on the bottom (see second house below) was once the gloomy, desolate house on the top (see first house below), and the changes which transformed it were not great. First of all, the dull color of the old house and the overgrown condition of the ground in front of it are most forbidding. A comparison of the two pictures shows how much a little careful planting and fresh paint will do toward changing the whole atmosphere of the house. More rooms were added at the rear and a gambrel roof was built and into this were let two good-sized dormer windows. A large porch, which was extended into a porte-chochere was built, and the latter forms a nice balance to the right wing of the house.

Here's the "before" photo

And here's the "after" photo

More photos are below!

Take a moment and read the caption - and remember - this is from 1911!

Another photo pair from the 1911 Ladies' Home Journal

In 2002, I walked out of the house I’d spent seven years restoring. My marriage had ended and I knew the old house needed lots more work and I knew that as a fledgling writer, I didn’t have the financial wherewithal or the emotional energy or the time required to work on the old house. My soon-to-be ex-husband, on the other hand, was strong, competent, capable and had the skills to build and/or repair anything with nothing more on hand than a leatherman, a speedometer cable and a couple wagon wheels. And maybe some duct tape, too.

In 1995, my (then) husband and I had moved into the fixer-upper in Alton, Illinios. The purchase price was a mere $50,000.  The house wasn’t in the best of shape, but we knew that going in. As the years passed, we installed new ductwork, new central air, new furnace, some new plumbing and repaired the box gutters, and replaced the massive, 14/12 roof.

In addition, I painstakingly removed thousands of gallons of beige paint from ornate newel posts, staircase baulstrades, quarter-sawn oak fireplaces and more. As anyone who’s stripped paint knows, this is a laborious process that involves meticulous work, mind-numbing detail and very sharp dental picks.

The house consumed thousands of hours of my life. The research alone consumed too many hours to count. I pored over countless magazines and books, reading, reseaching and learning the best way to restore old wooden shutters and how to mix lime mortar for the 100-year-old limestone foundation and what color of paints were most appropriate for a home built in 1904.

It was a labor of love and an enormous undertaking. I even wrote and sold a few articles about the projects. Read a snippet here:

And then in 2002, the marriage ended and I moved out of the house and into a crummy singles’ apartment. Yes, it was hard to see a 24-year-old marriage die. It was hard to leave the family home. It was excruciating to have my sweet daughter only 50% of the time. But there was another loss that no books on divorce ever talk about: Walking away from my semi-finished pièce de résistance. It was to be the crowning jewel of my old house projects. For so many years, it had been my raison d’être and now it was gone.

I still remember working on that house for hours and hours and asking myself, “Is this really a productive use of time? Is this a worthy way to spend a life?” And then I’d reassure myself by saying, “Yes, this is your legacy. This is your gift to the neighborhood, to the community and to the city. This house will endure long after you’ve left this earth.”

Turns out I was wrong.

Two years after the marriage ended, my ex-husband lost the house to foreclosure. And then last month, a well-meaning friend called to report that the bank had gutted the house. Every *&^% thing I did was erased. Those 100-year-old louvered shutters -  replete with vintage hardware that I’d been painstakingly restored - were tossed right in the dumpster and replaced with some shiny new vinyl shutters. That beautiful wood with its deep rich grain - covered again in some nice latex beige paint. The quarter-sawn oak fireplace mantel is - after a brief respite - again covered in crappy beige paint.  And all those old vintage photos that I discovered after much legwork, the photos that showed the house in 1906, with smiling families standing in the foreground, well all those crummy old photos were pitched, too. It’s all gone.

I tried to interrupt my friend as she told me this.

“Please stop,” I told my friend.

I don’t think she heard me.

“Please, I’m serious. I don’t want to hear anymore. This is heart-breaking. Really heart-breaking.”

And finally, after all the horses and the cows and a couple pigs had escaped the barn, she finally shut the doors.

I look at the house I own today - a lovely 1924 Center Hallway Colonial - and my passion for a pure and faithful restoration has ebbed a bit. What will happen to this house when I’m gone, I wonder.

I wish my friend had kept this news to herself.  I would have been far happier not knowing.

Teddy (Theodora Duncan Donuts) was sleeping on the leather couch, with her head on the pillow when her father (Pop) decided that she looked a little chilly. So he draped a little blanket on her.

Teddy is a Sheltie (Shetland Sheep Dog) but with an unusual amount of white on her face. Plus, her ears have never flopped over at the tips. However, her long fur coat is become thicker and longer and more luxuriant with every passing month.
Teddy is a happy girl.

I’ve told her frequently that many dogs sleep outside and live in primitive structures called Dog Houses but she just laughs out loud and trots away and chews on her squeaky lamby toy. Every now and then when we’re out for a walk, I point out dogs that are behind fences and tell her that some dogs never go out for walks. That makes her laugh, too.

One of the things I admire about Teddy is that she lives in the moment. She shows no remorse or regret for the time that she gnawed on my cell phone (and the charger), or the time she ate the stuffing out of her one of her chew toys, or the time she walked through a blackened mud puddle and then came into the house.

Dogs know how to live in the moment.

Teddy rests blissfully and dreams of the day's fun

My beloved mother died the first day of 2002. And then my marriage of 24 years ended abruptly. And then two of my children moved far away. And I ended up with 50% custody of “the baby” - my then 14-year-old daughter. This all happened in the first six months of 2002. Many nights, I wondered if I’d survive all this stress and change.

One night, during this difficult time in my life, I had a dream that I was in a burned out forest. Burnt-out stubs of trees still smoldered from the intense heat of the forest fire. Charred debris and pieces of still-smoking branches littered the forest floor. It was a scene reminiscent of hell itself. In the middle of this blackened landscape, I was lying on my side in a fetal position atop an oval-shaped oasis of green, lush grass. As I rose to my feet, I saw an angel stand up with me. I saw that I’d been shielded from the awful heat and flame by the wings of this angel, carefully covering over my body, protecting me as a mother eagle protects her young. As I stood up, the angel spoke.

“Every remnant of your old life is gone,” she said. “But a new life will grow out of the very ashes of this old life. The old has been cleared away to make room for the new. This is not just an ending but a new beginning. You’re going to survive this and the second half of your life will be very, very good. Hang on. Don’t give up.”

About two years after I had this amazing dream, I finally shared it with a friend. I was visiting his town to give a talk on Sears Homes and we had dinner together at a local restaurant a couple hours before the talk. I’ll remember his response for the rest of my life.

“Soon after Mt. St. Helens erupted,” he told me, “I visited that site. It was only a few weeks after the mountainside was decimated by flowing lava and fire, but already, down in the ashes of that burned out forest, you could see thousands of tiny green sprouts poking up toward the light. The ranger told our group that the ash actually fertilizes and prepares the soil for the new crop of trees. It’s amazing how fast a burned out forest can grow again.

“When people go through an experience such as you had, where they lose everything, they either get bitter or they grow and evolve in ways they never dreamed possible. You chose to grow. You chose to follow a dream and turn your dream into a career. You’re one of the most successful people I believe I’ve ever met.”

His comments touched my heart and soul. After our talk, I walked out of the restaurant feeling about 10 feet tall and I had a new view of myself. Later that night, this good and decent man attended my lecture and when it ended, he shook my hand and said, “It was an honor to meet you. You’re a remarkable woman and I meant what I said. You’re one of the most successful people I’ve ever met.”

I wrote those words down in my journal and also put a copy of my bathroom mirror. The lovely aroma of this man’s kind words have remained with me for many years.

Good Christian Man Seeks Good Christian Woman for Friday Night Booty Call.

That’s what his profile should have said. I found him on a popular Christian dating site. The relationship started off so good and happy and full of hope, and it ended on a very sour note when he told me that he didn’t feel any “chemistry.”

“No chemistry between us?” I asked him. “What are you talking about? Are you certifiable?”

I’d heard that dreaded phrase so many times before, but this time, it came as a surprise and a shock. Date #32 and I had had so much in common on so many levels, not to mention our long talks about God and spirituality. We’d had so many interesting chats about our faith and our study of the Bible and what it meant to be a Christian. We’d been on a handful of dates and when we were together, we had a lot of fun. I’d scored high marks with him in the categories of intellect, wit and good companionship.

Too many men had dumped me unceremoniously with this “no chemistry” garbage, but this guy? It was not believable. It seemed disingenuous at best, and an outright lie at worst.

“Maybe,” I told him, “You’re just too much of a loser to be honest with me and tell me that I’m not pretty enough for you?”

He said a few things but all his comments smacked of insincerity. He’d been hoping to get away clean and I was ruining it for him. The conversation was ugly and hard and it hurt like hell.

I thought we’d had so much in common and we had so much fun and there was so much that was right between us. But a cursory glance at his wife’s many photos made this fact clear: He probably wanted a blonde Episcopalian. His ex-wife was beautiful. She was petite. She was short and slim and had enormous attributes and could have been a model. He’d had that once. I guess he wanted the same thing again. He wanted a girl just like the girl that he’d married once before.

But those were just the meanderings of my overtaxed and overtired brain. What I did know, beyond any doubt, was that he did not want me.

Before we parted forever, he made one last suggestion for a “special” relationship: We’ll never have a romantic relationship, he told me one night on the phone, but could we get together from time to time and just have hot sex?

Every time I see television commercials for this dating site, I want to send them my testimonial.

“Thanks to Blankety-blank.com, I got me a regular Friday night booty call!”

No thanks, was my response to Mr. Christian-in-name-only. It was a truly crummy ending to what should have been a decent relationship between two Christians. Because of this man and his abhorrent behavior, I revised my mission statement that night and removed the statement, “He must be a Christian.”

Next:  On my 33rd date, my life flashed before  my eyes. I should have refused the date when he recommended we meet in a secluded place…

I had not intended to bring a puppy home that day. My daughter Corey and I had gone out to Ahoskie, North Carolina  “just to look.” And then I saw her. She was far too cute to be real. I’m such a sap for puppies and this was one of the cutest living things I’d ever seen.

Theodora Duncan Doughnuts (”Teddy” for short) made the 90 minute trip back home with only three incidents of puppy puking. By then, I suspect she was done. I had never known that one little tiny puppy could hold so much kibble in her little tummy.

My daughter Corey went along for the ride and ended up being the one who held the puppy for the long journey home. That Christmas, Teddy was the happy recipient of about a dozen presents. And she chose to play with a cardboard tube instead. Just like a kid.

Teddy at Christmastime

Teddy and her new father

One of my favorite movies of all time, perhaps my all-time #1 favorite movie is, “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

In this post-WW2 film, George Bailey gets to see what his town, Bedford Falls, would have looked like if he’d never been born.  Without George’s positive influence and his ever-fledgling Building and Loan, the modern subdivision of Bailey Park would never have been developed and countless citizens would never have had the opportunity to become homeowners.

Without the Bailey Building and Loan, George finds that Bedford Falls is full of substandard rental properties. And because there are so many rental properties, there is less stability in the family structure and in a broader context, there is less stability in the whole community.  In this alternate sans-George world, Ernie the cab driver does not live with his family in their own “nice little home in Bailey Park,” but instead, his home is a decrepit shack in Pottersville and it’s implied that this hardship is partly to blame for the fact that Ernie’s wife “ran off three years ago and took the kid.”

The streets of this alternate-Bedford Falls (now named Pottersville) are lined with liquor stores, night clubs, pawnbrokers, striptease shows and pool halls. Gaudy neon signs flash “girls, girls, girls” and illumine the night-time corridors of Main Street. Citizens are neither calm nor law-abiding and brusque policemen struggle to keep peace and order.

George’s revelation that he really had a “wonderful life” stemmed in part from the realization that his meager efforts to give people the chance to become homeowners gave them a feeling of accomplishment, prosperity, security and pride. By extension, the whole community benefited in important, significant and enduring ways.

The early Sears Modern Homes catalogues stated this basic philosophy in different ways, but there was an elementary core truth therein: Homeowners have a vested interest in their community and communities with a large percentage of homeowners will enjoy a greater proportion of  prosperity, stability and peace.

Perhaps Sears was, to small communities in the Midwest, what George Bailey was to Bedford Falls. Sears empowered and enabled tens of thousands of working-class and immigrant families to build their own home. What would countless Midwestern towns have become without Sears homes?  How many towns in the Midwest were spared the fate of becoming a Pottersville? Probably many.

Sears Modern Homes made a significant difference in many communities throughout the Midwest. I’m sure of that.

The Velveteen Rabbit is a children’s book that tells the story of a little plush toy that dreams about becoming “real.” The real hero of this story is the old Skin Horse, who’d lived in the nursery longer than any of the other animals. He was the resident old soul and he was wise and kind and knew much about life and love and truth. The Velveteen Rabbit longed to become real and it was the wizened old Skin Horse that had the answers.

The Skin Horse told Rabbit, “Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

Beauty - true beauty - is about being real. It’s about becoming the real person that our Creator intended us to be. It’s just as Margery Williams said in The Velveteen Rabbit. “Real isn’t how you are made,” the skin horse told the Velveteen Rabbit in this meaningful story. Rather, “it’s a thing that happens to you” (when you are loved).

Conversely physical beauty - that beauty which is skin-deep - is about conformity.

“Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder,” was a Twilight Zone episode that told the story of Janet Tyler, a grotesquely ugly woman. Checking into the hospital for her 11^th and final plastic surgery, she desperately hoped this surgery would be successful. All prior surgeries had failed and in this modernistic society, there was a mandate to conform. Ugliness (as defined by their government) was a failure to conform and a criminal offense.

Down the hallway from Janet’s room, we hear Dear Leader giving a speech about “glorious conformity,” broadcast into the hospital waiting rooms via a large television set. The Hitler-esque voice booms with ominous messages about the importance of conformity. Differences, he tells the masses, are dangerous and will weaken their culture. Conformity is essential to their very survival.

A few days after the woman’s surgery, the medical staff slowly removes the bandages and we see the young woman’s face for the first time. She is a real beauty, a blonde bombshell, perfect in every way.

The doctors and staff gasp in horror. The operation was a failure - again. The camera pulls back and we can now see their faces. They’re hideous-looking creatures, with swinish faces and long snouts, oversized mouths and deep creases. They are the beautiful people in this alternate reality.

Next, Janet is sent away to a special village, where people like her go to live out their lives. A handsome man escorts her out of the hospital with a promise that she’ll now know how it feels to belong, and to be loved. (Originally airing on November 11, 1962, this episode was very well written and absolutely haunting.)

The “glorious conformity” of skin-deep beauty is a moving target and its standards are forever changing, following the lead of the rich and famous, and their copious leisure time. In earlier times, the beautiful people were fair-skinned, un-tanned, pleasingly plump and soft. Most “working women” of that same period toiled in the fields for hours every day, developing muscle mass, dark tans and calloused hands. When women went to work in windowless cubicles, stuck behind a desk for eight hours each day, the beautiful people became the ones with deep tans, hard bodies and sleek figures. Beauty follows wealth and leisure.

True beauty - authenticity - is not about the world’s standards but about rediscovering that kingdom of heaven that is within you. It’s not a moving target, but a changeless standard with its roots in the divine.

The above is from Rose’s book, The Ugly Woman’s Guide to Internet Dating. To read the rest, click here:

From 1908-1940, Sears sold houses by mail order. These 30,000-piece kits came with a 75-page instruction book that told the wanna-be homeowner how to put it all together. Sears promised that a “man of average abilities” could have it 100% complete in 90 days. Sears offered 370 designs, including foursquares, cape cods, neo-tudors, trailing edge Victorians, Colonials and more.

The specialty catalogs  - devoted to “Modern Homes” - averaged about 100 pages with the peak being 1924, when the catalog hit 140 pages, with 100 designs.  These “Sears Modern Homes” catalogs can now be found on eBay for a variety of prices.

And these really were modern homes. Think about this. Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote her “Little House” books describing life on the plains in the 1870s and 1880s. She talked about living in a soddie - a house made with dirt blocks - and waking up to find frost on her comforter.

At the turn of the 20th Century, American architecture evolved very quickly. We went from living in tiny cabins and soddies (sans lights, central heat and indoor plumbing) to these sweet little bungalows with three bedrooms, a full bathroom, and a kitchen - wired for electricity!

Sears Osborne, catalog image from 1924

In fact, sometimes these mail-order homes were more modern than the communities in which they were sold.

And that’s why the plumbing and electrical fixtures were NOT part of the kit home, but were purchased separately. If electrical service and municipal water systems were not available in your community, you wouldn’t need to spend money on the plumbing and electrical supplies!

In the back pages of the Sears Modern Homes catalogs, this little jewel was offered:

And it has two seats - for more family fun in the outhouse!!

The Sears Modern Homes department closed their doors in 1940. During a corporate house-cleaning after WW2, all sales records, blueprints, ephemera and other items were destroyed. The only way to find these 75,000 kit homes today is literally, one by one.

To learn more, buy Rose’s book, The Houses That Sears Built.

When my 26-year-old daughter called to tell me that she’d made the decision to donate one of her kidneys to her best friend, Kaycee, I was not a happy woman. In fact, I was against it - wholeheartedly, or in this case,  whole-kidneyedly.

A few days later, I talked with her father and he made a valid point.

“Rose,” he told me, “the odds of those two girls being a match are one in a million. Don’t worry about this. Chances are good that once she’s tested, it’ll all end right there.”

Several weeks later, there was another phone call from Crystal.

“Mom, please understand,” she pleaded. “There’s a good chance Kaycee will die if she doesn’t get a kidney within the next year or two. She’s 24 years old and has already been on dialysis for 18 months. This is something I have to do. Tell me that you’ll support me in this.”

And then I sighed a motherly sigh and promised her that I’d try to grow into a supportive parent.

A few weeks passed when the next phone call came. “Mom, we’re a match. The doctors are stunned. They say that we’re as good a match as if we were siblings. I told Kaycee that there’s a reason that we always felt like sisters. I knew we’d be a perfect match. I just knew it.”

The surgery was scheduled for April 23, 2007. I told Crystal that I’d fly to Peoria, Illinois for the surgery. I was still not happy about this but I knew I had to do the right thing for my little girl.  My sweet little girl.

Less than five weeks earlier, I’d remarried and now I asked my new husband to fly with me. I couldn’t imagine doing this alone.

Continued at Kidney-shaped Hearts, Part II

Crystal (on the far left) with her sister Anna, Grandma Betty and cousin Laurel (1985)

continued from part I

My new husband and I arrived in Peoria the day before the surgery and spent some time with both girls. I needed to meet this Kaycee person. Despite my best “thy will be done” prayers, I still felt resentful toward Kaycee. I asked God again and again to open my heart and let Kaycee in..

Kaycee was a soft-spoken, sweet girl with freckles, fair skin and red hair. The moment I laid eyes on her, I felt an outpouring of maternal love that could only have its source in the divine. Crystal took me aside and said, “A few weeks ago, Kaycee told me she couldn’t go through with this. She said that it was better for her to pass on than to take a kidney from her best friend. I told her that I wanted to do this.”

Crystal also told me a little about Kaycee’s background. She received her first transplant when she was two years old. That kidney (from her mother), had lasted almost 20 years. Since then, she’d been on massive amounts of drugs and had already endured countless hospitalizations and surgeries. A few years earlier, Kaycee’s father, who’d been a touchstone throughout her difficult childhood, had died suddenly. And now Kaycee was in dialysis three times a week, three hours per treatment. It was after Crystal accompanied Kaycee to dialysis that she realized this was no way for a young woman to live. In additional to the physical and emotional strain, there was a financial strain, too. Twenty-four-year-old Kaycee was more than $100,000 in debt, due to the incredibly expensive dialysis treatment.

At one point during the five-hour surgery, Kaycee’s strong and stalwart mother stepped into a corner of the waiting room and sobbed uncontrollably. I felt a wave of compassion for this woman. How blessed I’d been to have had three healthy girls. How short-sighted and small-minded I’d been to rail against this procedure.

Continued at Kidney-shaped Hearts, Part III

Kasee (left) and Crystal (right)