Today is Monday, June 19th, 2006; Karen's Korner #826

Maybe it is because it was Fathers' Day yesterday; maybe it is because I am reading "Chicken Soup for the Soul for Grandparents", that I started to think and remember my Grandpa Zirbel. He was my dad's dad.
 
While there are five of us girls, only the older four of us ever knew Grandpa George. He died before our youngest sister was born; I was in seventh grade.
 
Our family lived on the family farm. Grandma and Grandpa Zirbel built a house in Fertile when my dad returned from World War II. Our two families lived about three miles apart. Grandpa helped my dad with farming during the busier farm seasons.
 
Grandpa came out to our house almost every day. He nearly always wore solid-colored blue overalls. Excitement always mounted when Grandpa came into the driveway or our house. The word would start to pass, "Grandpa's here!" The doors to our house would fly open and we would run out to see grandpa. We could expect lots of things when grandpa would arrive.
 
We met him with great anticipation. He always had "penny candy" stashed in his pockets.He always had his pocket watch stuffed in the front of his bib overalls. Whoever was the smallest could probably be found on his lap, unsnapping his chest pockets, digging out his treasured pocketwatch, and holding the ticking timepiece up to his/her ear and listening to the magic sounds.
 
But the #1 reason we kids would always run:  some of the times, he would give each one of us a dollar bill!  Our Grandma Petrea thought his extravagance was unnecessary. I can remember hearing her say on more than one occasion, "George, you are just going to spoil those girls!"
 
He would smile, chuckle and say, "I know!"
 
A dollar in the 1950s was a lot more than today. That would have been the days when $1 may have been the pay for one hour of work. One dollar was a lot of money and we girls knew it!
 
I can remember hanging on to those dollars for "something special". Our family had one radio:  a pretty good-sized wooden one that sat in either our living or dining room. I had my heart set on a new fangled small, pink plastic one from down at our local hardware store. After about ten "special" visits from Grandpa George, I bought my radio. I loved it and spent many hours listening to it upstairs in my bedroom. It was wonderful. I have no idea what happened to my radio as the years passed. But my memories are as vivid today as they were when I was a kid.
 
I wonder if this is the type of a relationship God wants to have with us "as His Children"? Does He want us to get excited by His Presence often? Does He want us to run to Him? To check His pockets to see what He has for us this time? Does He never worry about us being spoiled? Instead He wants to lavish gifts upon us that we can barely believe are possible? We never know what we are going to get next, because He is so creative, loving, kind, caring? 

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