mother and son

Patillo Ainsworth was the youngest of the Finlayson clan.  He adored his mother.  You can sense the gentleness and closeness in this picture of Ainsworth and Jennie Wait.  His devotion never changed; from childhood into adulthood.  I've read a good many letters he mailed to Cheraw, SC from aboard his ship during the war.  I could feel it in the very paper - the love and concern that was there.  It was an adoration that remained into old age and to his last day.

I believe in God.  I believe in His Son.  I believe that Jesus has gone before and prepared a place for us; where we unwrap the promises of Heaven, where our joy will be made complete and eternal.  In Heaven families are gathered back together and all made one...a grand reunion.

more Burruss

 Burruss Finlayson 1868-1950

Here's another image of Burruss Finlayson.  This image looks about a year or two younger than in the post I made last Sunday.  I'm surprised how many photos we have of him now.  Growing up, I remember only two framed photos around our house.  My grandfather was born three years after the War of Northern Aggression ended.  His father, Murdoch Uriah Finlayson had been a dry goods merchant before the war.  He moved his family from Wilmington, NC to Cheraw, SC when Burruss was a child.  It's Cheraw where Burruss grew up and became a merchant like his papa.  Burruss married twice.  His first wife Florence died, as did his young son Herbert.  He later married my grandmother Jennie Llew Foster.  They had seven children together: Rutha, Florence, Murdoch,Wofford, Westbrook and Ainsworth.

being and becoming

“There ought to be a law against any man who doesn’t want to marry Myrna Loy.”
-James Stewart

Mryna Loy had it all: smart, funny and drop dead gorgeous.  She was stunning.  That's what got her noticed by Rudolph Valenteno back in the silent film era.  Her early work involved playing mostly bad girls - the seductive vamps.  Mryna started in film in 1925, and it wasn't until 1934 that the audience experienced the full range of her talent.  Someone noticed that she had more than a pretty face and cast her as Nora Charles opposite of William Powell in The Thin Man.  Wow!

About ten years ago some friends and I were sitting around at a party.  The subject of handsome men and beautiful women in the movies came up.  The ladies present mentioned the guys they thought were pleasing to the eyes.  The guys mentioned who they thought were attractive.  Beauty of course is subjectively in the eye of the beholder.   I couldn't think of anyone on screen today that possessed any quality near what once was.  There's no one today that can match the kind of talent we had on the screen back in the Hollywood of yesterday.  Mryna Loy is at the top of my list of the most beautiful and the most talented women.  I watch her today and I am still captured by her beauty - in every stage of her life.  She aged gracefully on film and her rolls just got richer.  She was an actress with such incredible range and dimension.

"Life, is not having and getting, but a being and becoming."
-Myrna Loy

One of my favorite rolls of hers is The Best Years of Our Lives where she plays the wife to returning soldier played by Frederic March.  She's not the primary character in this film, but her roll as a loving wife to a husband dealing with a transition from soldier to citizen.  Both Frederic and Myna gave a very real, a very tangible performance.  It's a beautiful thing.



 

familiar face

1868 - 1950

Here's a young photo of my grandfather, Burruss Finlayson.  Gina took one look at this photo tonight and said, "You've got his eyebrows".  Yes, those are Finlayson eyebrows alright. She said, "You've got his nose".  I think mine is a little pugger than his..but yeah..I can see that.  She said, "You've got his curly hair".  I HAD his curly hair!

Studying this photograph of a grandfather I never met. I see so many common features that I see in the mirror, or see upon the features of my siblings.  It's amazing what is passed down from generation to generation well over a century.  What else was passed on in the genes?  If we could look back, spend a day with an ancestor, would we recognize other qualities in his or her daily life?

I have a connection to my father when I am working at his old workbench in my garage.  I've learned that my father's father enjoyed working in his shop after work too.  My dad could actually build things.  I primarily repair things that have been broken around the house.  Where my dad had skill to actually construct, I merely restore.  Even though my skills out there are very limited, I find piddling in the garage a quiet enjoyment - a connection.  I think it's something my grandfather passed down to his son and his son to me.  What else is back there that is also in me today?

One day our children's children will be looking at old photos of us.  Who is this fellow on the mantle, this young fellow who was my grandfather - my great grandfather?  What little will be left of us fifty to a hundred years from now.  Maybe just a name.  Maybe a day of birth and a day of death, an occupation, hopefully a story or two.  More than likely, not much more than that.  

Miss Florence

187-1903

My aunts and uncles referred to their Papa's first wife as 'Miss Florence'.  Mary Florence Brock Finlayson had one child together, Herbert Carlisle Finlayson, who died at the age of six resulting from a stomach obstruction.  Florence died of a cancer shortly after little Herbert's passing.


"I don't know much about the Brocks (Miss Florence's folks), except that they all were pretty girls and a nice Methodist family there in Cheraw."
-Jennie Llew Finlayson Guyton

Both Florence and their son are buried in the Finlayson section of the Old St. David's Church in Cheraw, SC.  They are buried next to the Burruss and Jennie Wait Finlayson family.  Her father Peter Haley Brock and mother Mary E. Lyles are also buried there.

I learned that at one time Peter Brock and son in-law Burruss Finlayson resided next to each other.  Both were dry goods merchants.

i doubt it

JUNE 1970

This photo may not seem like much to many.  You can't make out the faces or see what's going on, so I'll tell you.  Everyone's back is to the photo.   We were all having such a good time around the coffee table that evening that Uncle Pat heard the commotion and deemed it a Kodak moment. 

The Finlayson's (my dad's siblings) from Columbia, SC and Macon, GA had come for a visit.  This particular night we taught our Aunts Jennie Llew and Rutha how to play the card game 'I Doubt It".  I remember how Jennie Llew threw herself into the card game.  To be good at the game you have to be good at bluffing (LYING).  Jennie Llew took a liking to the game and it was so much fun watching and listening to her bluff and challenge bluffs.  Our aunts made loud "AhhhhWoooo!" and "MERCY" exclamations as lies were exposed.  These two Carolina southern belles scolded each other and us for lying like that and acting ever so innocent when they were caught committing the same sin.  I remember our being crowded around that little round table playing and laughing at and with one another.

I know it won't mean much to most, but it was a good moment and I'm glad Pat had the camera.

doors beyond doors

I've been distracted by life lately.  Since the office closed I've been in limbo.  Life is so different now and I have yet to get in sync with this new phase, this new day.  There are things to do...and I do them.  I find leads and I pursue them.  I am merely going about life.  I don't really know what to write because I don't really know how to think about this time.

I've been pursuing opportunities but so far they all have been like mirages.  Every time I get nearer, it all evaporates.  I start all over again.  I know the economy is bad, countless other folk are struggling too.  I know that we only lose if we give up.  It's simply not an option to give up, I have to keep moving.  We each must have a plan, a compass to keep from wandering.

There was another door this week, but nothing was behind it...again. I'll find another door, be faithful while acquiring a little more patience. In my soul I know that one door is leading to another door.

Maybe I'll start posting more when I get solid footing in life.  In the meantime, I'll keep the faith and encourage you all to do the same.

letting go. leaning forward.

Well, the new health care reform laws finally forced our clinic under.  We are broke.  We could not hold out any longer. We had to let go of an old dream of ours.  I will not go into now because quite frankly I have told the heart breaking story time and time again.  Maybe later, but not at this minute, not in this post.  We closed August 31.  We packed up our stuff through out the month and tried to make a clean break of it.  It's not that easy, we are still trying to get old business behind us.  Nevertheless we let go of it.  We are not bitter or angry, we are letting go.

Throughout this ordeal I have experienced a weariness on every level, body, mind and soul.  I am glad August is behind us.  I look back at what was our business as one would look back on where a sunken ship had disappeared beneath the surface.  There is nothing back their.  There is nothing to look back to.  There is no comfort there.  There is only this small lifeboat and faith that God will bring us to shore.

He will.

We are survivors.  Throughout this ordeal God has graced us with a peace that we will be alright, just hang on and remain faithful.  Each of us have experienced times we've found ourselves lost in dire situations.  We can either fret and succumb to the delimma, or lean into Him and press on.  It all boils down to trusting in God - or not.  This is not my first hardship, but I hope I've become a wiser fellow by this time.  I'll confess that I have a checkered past of succumbing to fear.  I feel that I have grown a little, knowing this time that God always gives us sure footing if we only trust in Him. 

Throughout this ordeal, He's given me a peace and His gentle presence.  I have found joy in the thick of it.  Yes I am weary.  Yes I am tired.  But I don't have to rely on my own strength and understanding.  Opportunities come and fall through and that of course is disappointing but not essential.  I don't know about tomorrow, or what I will do.  I will just wake up and follow through with what comes my way.  I can't declair that I am confident in the future.  I just know that I am confident in God's faithfulness.  I want to come through this one bravely and faithful.

Thanks God.

am i interfering?

I was on the couch yesterday, well into a movie while occasionally filling in a crossword puzzle.  I woke up a about an hour before the rest of my family had and so I had been quietly entertaining myself.  I had heard a noise and saw my 9 year old daughter at the door.  She was holding a big bouncy ball.  I could only see the ball and not her face nor much of her torso.  She stood there quietly.  I looked back down at my puzzle.

I looked back down to fill in a word.   I soon felt something big and round and plastic at my head.  She had come over to where I lay.  I looked up and still only saw the ball instead of her face.  I said "Good morning".  She stood there for about a minute quietly as my eyes went back up toward the television.  She moved across the room and positioned herself and her big bouncy ball in between me and the set.

I asked her if she was wanting someone to play ball with her.  She said, "Am I interfering?"   I said "Not at all!"  Down went the puzzle and off went the television.  Mother joined us in the hallway as we rolled and threw the ball back and forth to one another.    We had a good time together yesterday morning.

considering the lilies

Tomorrow is unclear.  The future seems so dark and foreboding from here. Big change in the next few months.  We know it.  Gina and I have talked a lot about the future without any sure direction.  We've got decisions to make and new courses to plot into vast uncertainty.  Change is always scary, but always certainly a part of life.  I admit that I am not all that brave about it.  I know that being fearful will only make matters worse.  I have learned that God is good and that He takes care of His children.  Gina and I will embrace the inevitable and lean on Him to help us make the right decisions - count on Him to establish the path we choose.  There are old doors to close and new doors to venture through.  In times of decisions, in times of change, often all we have is our faith in our Lord and His firm promise.

"Commit your works to the LORD And your plans will be established."
-Proverbs 16:3