my grandmother

This is my grandmother Jennie Wait Foster Finlayson.  I found this image among old photos from Columbia.  It wasn't in very good condition so I did some minor restoration in Photo Shop this morning.

Born 3 November 1880 in Spartanburg, South Carolina.  Died 24 October 1969.  Jennie Wait Foster was born into a large family but the children were scattered when her parents James Turner and Rebecca Wofford Foster died.  She and a brother Louie Eugene Foster were raised by her relatives, Rev. Washington Lafayette Wait and Mrs. Jane Wofford Wait who also lived in Spartanburg, SC.

Jennie Wait Finlayson is the grand-niece of Dr. Benjamin Wofford who founded Wofford College.  Jennie was a 1901 graduate of Columbia College.  She married Burruss Finlayson and they started their family in Cheraw, SC.  Burruss ran a dry goods store and Jennie taught music and piano from her home.  She is buried next to Burruss at the Finlayson section of the Old Saint David Episcopal Church in Cheraw South Carolina.

I have only faint recollections of her.  I remember her gentleness and her soft sweet smile.

all gone now

A crew of Finlaysons from Gadsden drove to South Carolina Thursday upon the news of Jennie Llew Guyton's death.  She was the last of my dad's siblings to go home.  Dad left us twenty-one years ago.  He's the one on crutches.  Each of Burruss and Jennie's children were so very unique.  We miss them all.

Mother, Brooky and Cindy and I drove up in one car.  Irene and Carrie in another car.  We arrived Thursday night at Jennie's house in Rock Hill, SC and met up with other family members.

We all caravaned to Cheraw, SC for Jennie Llew's funeral at the old Saint David's Church.  There we laid to rest the last Burruss and Jennie's children.  I know that we were all thinking to ourselves that it was the end of an era.  Before the trip I had been a little melancholy.  I hadn't felt that way when Pat and Murdoch had previously passed on.  I told Gina that I knew it was because Jennie Llew was the last one - they were all gone.

The Finlayson kin spent the rest of the day after the funeral roaming around the cemetary, the old church, the old town, as well as the vacant lot where the Burruss Finlayson home once stood.  The trip wasn't a sad one in the least.

I knew that Jennie Llew was experiencing a grand eternal reunion with her family.  Her husband 'Guytie' had died 50 years ago.  I know that she is one joyful being - reunited with loved-ones.  So my trip to Carolina washed away any sad mood that had briefly shadowed my spirits.  We all had a wonderful day time last week - not a tear - not a frown.  We all enjoyed our time with each other and celebrated some wonderful kinfolk who have gone on.

It might be the last time we all meet in Cheraw, some of my siblings may never go back there.  I know I will.  I'll go back with my immediate family and retrace with them the steps of my grandparents and their children.

wofford's painting

My Uncle Wofford Finlayson was an artist.  He earned his living making signs in Columbia, South Carolina.  I sure wish he were around today, I would love to learn from him.  He once told me that as a freelance artist, he took on every job that came his way.  Uncle Wofford would paint the front of theaters  for movies like Gone With The Wind.  He designed company logos, banners for grocery store windows and he'd even paint flag poles.  If it had to do with paint, he said he'd take on the job.  To be a commercial artist in those days meant you did anything and everything.

The above watercolor is of the old Saint David Episcopal Church. Wofford wasn't hired to do this job.  He created various paintings of his old Pee Dee River hometown, Cheraw, South Carolina.  His paintings resurrect Cheraw from a century ago.   This particular painting once hung on the wall of our house on Scenic Hwy here in Gadsden, AL.  I am very familiar with it.  This is hanging on a wall at my sister's house in Rock Hill, SC.

I snapped a photo of it while visiting Don and Jennie last May.  It's a beautiful piece of work.  The paintings I've seen of Uncle Wofford's are not realistic - they were not meant to be.  His work is unrealistic like Thomas Kinkade's are not realistic.   Both Wofford and Thomas capture something in the heart.

Wofford's colors are ancient, and always ventured back to capture the old South.  Though the people seem a little on the cartoonish/caricature side in his paintings, the atmosphere is always alluring to me.  Wofford had the ability to resurrect the essence and atmosphere of a time lost.  This is a painting that I would love to step into - take a stroll down that old dirt road beneath the shade of the mossy trees.

great grandmother

Martha Lucinda Pate was Murdoch Uriah Finlayson's wife.  I know nothing about her.  There is no story to tell about her but who you see in this photo and what can be found by looking at dates.  I looked at the birth dates of their children and noticed when Murdoch had enlisted into the Confederate Army.  She was left to raise five young children during her husband's absence.  I can't imagine what it was like to be raising children during a war that was being fought on southern soil.  There's something I have learned about warfare.  When men march off to defend their country, their families sacrifice as well.   Martha must've been a strong woman to have handled such hardships at home while her young husband was off fighting.  She had her own daily battles to fight - keeping her family safe in perilous times.  I know nothing about my great grandmother.  Just by looking at her face and the dates I have - I know that she must've been an incredibly strong woman, a good wife, a good mother.

my great grandfather

My sister Jennie called Friday afternoon and said that she was in town and had a box of photos for me from Columbia, SC.  I drove over to mothers to see my great father's face for the very first time.

Murdoch Uriah Finlayson married Martha Lucinda Pate on January 10, 1854.  Murdoch had left his wife and children to fight in the War of Northern Aggression.  He enlisted on May 7th of 1862, at the age of 27.   He marched among the men of Company G, 55th Infantry Regiment of North Carolina (pg.18-20 of URL link).  He fought in numerous campaigns including Gettysburg.  At the time, he was a resident of Wayne County.  I ran across some information regarding the 55th Infantry Regiment online that you can read about here. 
Murdoch Uriah Finlayson enlistment information states that he was a merchant before the war.  I have posted advertisements in the past of his store in Wilmington.  He eventually moved to Cheraw, South Carolina when my grandfather was very young and set up shop.  My grandfather Burruss and his older brother Henry Wright Finlayson eventually became merchants and had stores of their own.  My father and his siblings were born in Cheraw.

Both Murdoch & Martha Lucinda are buried in the old St. David's cemetery in Cheraw, SC.  Their graves are not in the Finlayson section, but only a short stroll from that area.  I am very glad to have a picture of my great-grandfather - to now be able to put a face with the name.  I hope my siblings take time to visit the links I've provided here and find out a little more about the their ancestor.

securities for liberty

"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both."
-Benjamin Franklin

Last night I attended a Veteran's Day presentation at my daughter's high school.  Many times the word 'freedom' was mentioned and I couldn't help but feel saddened each time the word was spoken.  I wonder if folks truly understand the freedom that we have and the freedom that we are loosing and have lost as a nation.  I wonder if twenty years from now, if people will still be singing about America's freedom, but not noticing that they have been stripped of it all together.

I am deeply concerned for my country.  I am not an old man, but this isn't the place I once knew.  What will America be a decade from now?  I want my children to truly know freedom - to have what we had.  I don't want them to grow up wards of the state.

True our freedom is from God.  It is true a multitude of troops have sacrificed to pay a terrible price to preserve our freedoms.  It is true that freedom isn't free...so why do we trade it so easily?

I am thinking of the story about Jacob and Esau, how Esau was so willing to swap his birthright for a bowl of lintel soup.  I feel like that's what the American people are allowing our government to do - swap liberties for securities.  Esau was foolish to give away something so precious as his birthright just to sate his belly for a few hours.  The more we let a government is allowed to do for the people, the less people are allowed to do for themselves.  Eventually we will be left without any choice but what a bureaucracy deems best for us.  Government wants the people to think the idea of entitlement as a good thing, but it's just a link in a chain to bondage.  We do not need to feel entitled, we should need to be FREE!

A powerful and overreaching government leads to totalitarianism, and that is where we are quickly heading. We must demand LIMITED GOVERNMENT for our nation to survive.  No way did our founding father's intend for government to turn into what it has become today.  Our founding documents were made not to restrain the people, but rather to restrain government!

"A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicity."
-Thomas Jefferson

I have been deeply troubled these days about the state of our nation and her people.  I turn on the television and see a president trying to seduce the people with a bowl of soup.  I see too many of us clamoring for it.  All we have to do is give up a little liberty here and there and we'll be safe, warm, and fed.  I see America's young people angry in the streets protesting - demanding that they are entitled to something.  I hear the term freedom spoken so freely, but do we all know of that of which we speak?  I think of all the blood that has been spilled down through the years to preserve that freedom.  And I see too many American's too willing to trade away what was paid for so dearly.

"Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same."
-Ronald Reagan

Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!

of yards and toilet paper

I never really understood the rolling yards thing.  We had A LOT of trees in our front yard on 2624 Scenic Hwy.  Back then toilet paper cost a dollar for five gazillion rolls. A kid could do some real yard decorating back then.

I remember my yard got rolled back when Gina and I were youth directors of Fountain Square Free Methodist Church in Bowling Green, KY.  We don't know who did it, but we were pretty sure is was a collaborative effort of the youth department.  The church didn't have many youth, and any one of them could have easily have been a culprit.  When it came to toilet paper, we decided to turn the other cheek.

Gina and I didn't say anything about our yard being rolled.  It was a blessing in disguise.  We simply went outside with a couple of large Hefty bags and retrieved as much as we could from the trees.  We had harvested so much toilet paper that day that we didn't have to buy toilet paper for three months.  That's saying a lot because Gina really uses a surprising amount of bathroom tissue.

I don't see as many yards rolled these days.  I can only guess that it's because we are living in difficult financial times.  Kids today really have to count the cost of committing such an expensive prank.

I have only a few trees in my front yard.  I'm waiting for someone to come along and roll what little yard I have so I don't have to buy toilet paper for a while.  If you're up for the task, but feeling a little lazy, just leave the paper in the package at my front door.  I'll take it from there.

Cain in Talledega

I heard it through the grape vine that Herman Cain was in Alabama and that one of his stops was Talladega, AL this past Friday - October 29.  My brother in-law Robby Elrod joined me for the trip.

We headed out early to make sure we'd find a park.  We located The Ritz theater and then soon found a place to park the car behind the old train station.  Robby and I walked around town.  It didn't take that long because downtown Talladega is a small place.  We ended up at an Arby's to stay warm until the event.  Herman Cain was supposed to speak outdoors in front of The Ritz, but the sky was already looking overcast.  Robby and I made our way over to the theater about 30 minutes early and the place was already filling up.

When Cain came out, he didn't disappoint me one iota.  I'm not completely sold on his 9-9-9 plan.  I'd rather he push a flat tax.  He's 100% right about doing away with our current tax system.  Other than 9-9-9, Cain is the candidate that is moving in the right direction.  LIMITED GOVERNMENT!
 
Herman Cain sounds a lot like Ronald Reagan.  I believe it he becomes president, that people will be referencing Cain decades from now as they do Reagan today.

He just doesn't sound like a politician.  I find that down right refreshing.  I'm sick and tired of politicians.  Herman Cain sounded more like the old camp meeting preachers that I knew and heard growing up.  Unlike Obama who wants us to believe on him, and in big government - Cain pushes the message of believing in God and in ourselves (the individual) and in our country (in that order).

I like it that he didn't sound like another politician.  Herman Cain is a business man who has a history of being able to turn failing businesses into profitable ones.  This is something we lack today, men in leadership who have actually run businesses.  We have so called representatives who are career politicians who don't the first thing about business.  Our economy is on the skids, and we don't need anymore freaking politicians telling us that we have to spend our way out of our debt.  Idiocy!  The folks in Washington are going to have to live within a budget.  I like it that Cain is a business man.  He's not the kind of guy that's going to kick the can down the road.

Cain spoke on all the issues that concerned me, abortion, illegal immigration, Obamacare, entitlement spending, foreign policy and the economy.  Cain spoke about all the crisis's, but at the top of this list, he said we are experiencing a moral crisis.
AMEN BROTHER!

my B - I -B - L - E

Years ago Mom and Dad said they were limited on funds for Christmas. They asked us if it was alright if they gave each of the six of us kids $35.00 for Christmas. It might've been 30, but for some reason 35 is the number that surfaces.

At that time Irene was dating a young man who was trying to work his way to seminary. It seemed appropriate that he was working his way to becoming a preacher by selling Bibles. Knowing Emory, I know that he'd rather had given them away, but he was on a mission from God.

I took great interest in his product, seeing how the only Bible I had been given was a standard Lord's army issue Bible that was given to me by the church as a very young boy.  I figured if I wanted to be a serious Christian, I needed a serious Bible.

I knew what my Christmas was going to be before mom and dad had clipped the envelopes of money to the tree that Christmas Eve. I was going to spend every dime on a sharp looking sword. I told Emory that I wanted to buy one of those Bibles from him.  He pulled out his sales material and showed me some pamphlets and a few samples he carried with him.   I was very impressed with his large selection.  At the time I felt it was the most important decision I was making in my entire life.

I chose a leather bound oxblood Thompson Chain Reference Bible.  I opted to have my name imprinted (in Helvetica) on the front cover in gold.  I also ordered my Bible pages in gold leaf. It was a red letter edition, meaning every thing Jesus said popped right off the pages.  I also ordered my Bible with each chapter tabbed.  I didn't want to find myself in spiritual combat fumbling around with my sidearm.  I wanted to be quick to draw from the Word of God!

I was very proud of my Bible.  I didn't know what a concordance was at that time, but mine had one of those too.  I figured if the warfare got too intense, I could probably  bash my way out of any close combat situation with such a big volume.  I was good to go.

My favorite chapter is what has been called 'the love chapter' - 1 Corinthians 13.  I ALWAYS had a bookmark there.  I would read it over and over again and never tired of it.  I still don't.  Did I say I was proud of my Bible?  It bears repeating.  I had colored pencils and colored pens and studied my Bible religiously.  I would mark up the text that I thought were the most important parts.  I soon realized that my Bible was soon becoming a coloring book because every line in it was important.

About six months later the Finlayson family all drove down to camp in Florida.  It was a holiness camp that lasted 10 days of each Summer.  Of course I took my Bible with me.  It was a fine looking book and I thought it brought a lot of attention to my faith.  For some reason I thought it qualified me a Christian and somewhat of a theological scholar.  I was just a kid and my passion for God was very real, but I hadn't lived enough as a Christian to understand that humility is an essential part of the walk.  Still almost 40 years later, I still find myself stumbling over the essential stuff.  I look back and appreciate God's grace throughout my journey here on Earth.

While at camp, I stayed in the boys dorm.  At camp you had to bring your own fan if you wanted to have a chance at a cool breeze during the night.  You also had to bring your own bug repellant too.  Everyone had to prop the fan in a window by their bunk and take the good (breeze) with the bad (bugs).  Camp Bethlehem offered no comforts - just God stuff.

Every night we all gathered upstairs before lights out for a devotional.  It was usually hot and stuffy in the dorm.  We sat around in a big tight circle and sang songs, heard a word, prayed over each other, and would go around and share stuff.

I was going to share from the book of I Corinthians that particular night.  I had my beautiful deluxe Bible opened and ready to dispense very deep wisdom and enlightenment about love.  One boy would share and then the next boy would share, and then the next boy would share.  A lot of God stuff went on at camp and everyone had something to share at the end of each day.  I wasn't listening  to them though.  I was absorbed in more important things, what I had to share.   I was reading over my favorite passages and thinking about what I was going to say.   I couldn't wait for MY TURN.  I held my beautiful deluxe Bible steady & ready, locked & loaded for my turn.

But just as the attention neared my position, the kid next to me looked over to me with the queerest expression.  Momentarily I pondered the strange hue of blue that colored his face.  Before I knew it, I was experiencing incoming projectile vomiting on my lap.  Well, I wished that he had vomited in my actual lap.  My beautiful deluxe Bible caught the most of it.  The kid didn't just hurl once.  He hurled three or four consecutive times before I could get out of the way.  Like a horror movie, it seemed as if he were spewing in slow motion.  And I was in a dreamlike state balked in horror, moving in slow motion as well.  I don't know what he had eaten during the course of the day, but it didn't mix well with the long hot day and back to back holiness preaching.

The aftermath wasn't pretty.  It was everything anyone could imagine it to be - sloppy, smelly, chunky, etc.  Immediately The Holy Spirit told me right then and there to forgive that kid for doing it.  How could I lose my temper in the middle of a devotion?  How could I get mad because someone threw up on the love chapter?  I had to forgive him.  It was after all the very funky stained pages that instructed me to not be easily angered and to keep no record of wrongs.  There was nothing to do but forgive him.  He was innocent and had known not not what he had done.  I put the best face on I and told him that it was okay.  I laughed about it but inside I felt sick.  My Bible was never the same after that. 

From that day on I never had any interest in fancy Bibles.  I read from a  New American Standard Bible that looks more like a text book - hard cover - no frills.  I don't like tissue thin pages with gold leaf.  I want a Bible that can weather whatever the world hurls at it.  Better yet, the best place to keep His Word is safe is inside one's heart and soul.

"My son, keep my words, and treasure my commands within you. Keep my commands and live, and my law as the apple of your eye. Bind them on your fingers; write them on the tablet of your heart."
-Proverbs 7:1-3

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