Tag: Loretta Magary

Surprise!

Surprise!

by | Apr 4, 2024 | , | 1 |

One of the things that my mother was notorious of was always wanting to surprise people.

Her entire life, she really seemed to enjoy surprising others.  On her travels, she brought this to an entirely different level.  She would simply show up on the doorsteps of friends and family who had no idea that she would be there.  This was long before the days of social media, so in most instances, people had no idea that she was in the area.  Many times, they didn’t even know that she embarked on her solo road trip across the country.

I did a leg of that trip with her down the east coast from Pennsylvania to Florida between my Junior and Senior year of high school.  On just that short span, she thought that it would be a great idea to stop and surprise my cousin, Paul, or “Tink” as we still called him.  He was a Lieutenant in the Marine Corps, stationed at Quantico.  Sure enough, she thought that it would be “neat” to show up unannounced on his doorstep at about 7:15 in the morning.  We arrived in his driveway, and the debate started.  She wanted me to go up and ring his doorbell and tell him that I was lost.  I said, “No way!”  Tink was the oldest of our cousins on my mom’s side, and to say that he was an intimating figure would be an understatement of epic proportions.  He was a former Division I college football player and as I had mentioned earlier, currently a Lieutenant in the Marine Corps.  I hadn’t seen him since I was probably about 11 or 12 years old.  The thought of a soon to be 17-year-old kid with a mullet waking up a Marine at 7:15 AM by ringing his doorbell just didn’t seem like it would end well for said soon to be 17-year-old with a mullet.

However, debating with my mother was rarely a winnable task, so, there I was walking up to Tink’s door, stopping and turning around and seeing my mother, then continuing what would surely be my death walk to the front door.  I sheepishly rang the doorbell and anxiously waited for my certain demise.

Tink answered the door in his gym shorts and torn up t-shirt and went about the routine saying that I was lost as my mom quickly sprung out from around the corner, yelling, “Well I figured if you wouldn’t be able to make it to the family reunion, we had to stop by and see you on our way to it!”

“Aunt Loretta! …and is this, Danny!?  Oh my God, you’re so big now!”  Tink exclaimed.  “What a great surprise!  What are you guys doing here?”

There it was, she did it. Tink was so happy to see us.  He immediately invited us into the house and introduced us to his wife and stepson, who neither of us had even met yet.  I can only imagine what they may have been thinking at that moment.

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A Day to Remember

A Day to Remember

by | Sep 11, 2022 | , | 3 |

September 11th is a day that I will never forget for multiple reasons.

I remember it because of the tragic events that took place that day and I remember it because of the work that my mom did during relief efforts with the Salvation Army at Ground Zero in the months following that fateful day.

Today, on September 11, 2022, 21 years after that horrific day, I sit in a Wal-Mart parking lot in Antigo, Wisconsin waiting for Sandy to get our supplies for the next two weeks as I write this.  Once she gets back to the RV, we’ll head a few miles down the road to meet our friends from A Year to Volunteer (Y2V) and prepare for a two-week volunteer project at the Raptor Education Group (REGI).

I find it ironically fitting that we are preparing for a volunteer project on September 11th.

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The Gratitude of a Community

The Gratitude of a Community

by | Mar 13, 2022 | , | 0 |

A Year to Volunteer has taken over Sam Houston Jones State Park for the next two weeks!  This group of ninja volunteers is ready to help with the continued restoration efforts from the devastation caused by Hurricanes Laura and Delta in 2020.

This beautiful park needs a lot of TLC.

Sandy and I were here for a short time between the two storms and the one thing that stood out then was the resilience of this community.

This time around, it’s the gratitude of this community.

From the owner of The Laundromat in Sulphur who let us do Laundry for free when he heard that we were helping, to the A-Plus RV Park who let us dump and fill our tanks, to the Deputy Sheriff who is patrolling the park, to the members of the Henning United Methodist church that we attended with our dear friend, Lori Carter Pritchett who all thanked us for being here to lend a hand, it was nothing but gratitude that was expressed to us.

The material things in this community may have been crushed by those storms, but its spirit was not.

Many people outside the area have forgotten about it, but there is still so much more work to be done.

You may not be able to volunteer for two weeks, but there are other ways to help.

Research how to give and how to help.  I’ll try to get some of our friends in the area to put some links to ways to help in the comments.

Just because it’s not in the news everyday doesn’t mean that the job is complete.

Do what you can with what you have.

Peace.

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Edward Medlin – An Entire Life Lies Ahead

Edward Medlin – An Entire Life Lies Ahead

by | Jan 28, 2022 | , , | 0 |

Edward was the youngest member of the discipleship program at the Dream Center of Southeast Texas while Sandy and I were there to volunteer.  At only 18 years old, he originally thought that he’d be entering into his freshman year of college, but God had other plans for him.

He had to get his life right and his addiction under control before God could use him as He had planned.

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Loving the Nomad Life

Loving the Nomad Life

by | Jan 27, 2022 | , | 0 |

Many times, throughout our lives, before going full-time, we’ve had conversations with friends talking how they’d love to have a house on the beach or in the mountains or fill in the blank.

The beauty of our nomadic lifestyle is that we can have all of those things and more.

There have been times when we have had our home on a mountain.  There have been times when we have had our home on a beach or within walking distance to the beach.  There have been times when we have had our home in the woods.  There have been times when we have had our home in a desert.  There have been times when we have had our home near a city.  There have been times when we have had our home in the middle of nowhere.  There have been times when we have had our home in the yard or driveway of friends and family.  There have been times when we have had our home on a farm.  There have been times when we have had our home in a minor league baseball stadium parking lot.  There have been times when we have had our home in a rehabilitation center.  There have been times when we have had our home in the middle of a strawberry festival or RV show.  There have been times when we have had our home in a Wal-mart, Cracker Barrel or rest area parking lot.  The list goes on and on.

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Beauty in the Broken

Beauty in the Broken

by | Jan 20, 2022 | , | 0 |

There isn’t one single person on this earth who doesn’t have scars and broken pieces.  Some of those scars may have been self-inflicted.  Some of them may have been caused by other people’s actions.  Some may be easy for others to see and understand.  Most are hidden deep under layers of complexity.  In the end, how we got the scars and how easy they are for others to see really doesn’t matter.  It’s how we heal from them and how we move forward from them that does.

To each other though, we must be more empathetic.

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The Power of One

The Power of One

by | Jan 13, 2022 | , | 0 |

We can’t change what other people are doing in the world, good or bad.  We can change how we approach the world and those that we interact with on a daily basis.  That’s where we can change the world for those around us.  Just by being kind, doing good, volunteering, surrounding yourself with others who are trying to make a positive difference in the world as well.  Just be out there planting seeds of goodness and grace everywhere that we go.

There are times that you may see the fruit of your labor instantly, but we just need to make sure that we’re always going out and planting those seeds.  Regardless of whether or not we get to see the harvest, we just need to keep planting the seeds of love and kindness.

Help other people in any small way that you can.

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A New Year, a Time to Reflect, a Time to Look Forward

A New Year, a Time to Reflect, a Time to Look Forward

by | Jan 6, 2022 | , | 1 |

First, I’d like to reflect a little bit on 2021.

It started off in our new hometown of Melbourne, Florida at my Aunt Sally and Uncle Randy’s house.  It was a quiet celebration that had us sitting around the fire at the house.  Many of the neighbors made up for our quaint little celebration as the fireworks nearby started as the sun went down and didn’t stop until well after midnight.

Nine days into the year, we started our trek further south on our way to Key West.  We stopped on the way down to see friends and family along the way.  For the next several weeks, we zig zagged up and down and across the state of Florida.  Making sure to connect and spend time with more friends and family.

In early March, we made an unexpected trip to Pennsylvania due to a dear friend of ours passing away.  We Spent the next few months there.  We were able to celebrate Easter with our family and headed back to Florida on the Monday after Mother’s Day.

We again took our time and stopped to see new friends, surprise an old friend and meet another new friend for the first time in person.

We got back to Melbourne on May 17 and stayed in Florida long enough to celebrate milestone birthdays with three of my cousins before leaving to head back to Pennsylvania on June 12.  We took the long way to Pennsylvania, via the Florida panhandle to Buccaneer State Park in Mississippi to Selma and Montgomery, Alabama before getting to my sister-in-law’s house in Pennsylvania the Saturday before Father’s Day.

While in Pennsylvania, we stayed with family, reconnected with old friends again and scattered in a few stays in an amusement park and some other campgrounds.

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Kyle Denton – From Rock Bottom to Finding Hope by Giving Back

Kyle Denton – From Rock Bottom to Finding Hope by Giving Back

by | Jan 4, 2022 | , , | 0 |

He recently moved from heading up the warehouse at the Dream Center and overseeing the food panty to a case worker in the office.  Through my person interaction with Kyle, I can see that he has a heart for helping others.  I feel that his recipe for a successful and life-long recovery is to dive headfirst into the ministry of helping others.  Focusing on making other peoples lives better will allow him to move forward successfully in his own journey of recovery.

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Alex Smith – The Journey of Two Mother’s Sons

Alex Smith – The Journey of Two Mother’s Sons

by | Dec 3, 2021 | , , | 0 |

Alex is the son of my good friend, and fellow full-time RVer, April Crossley.  We met back in September at Henrys Lake State Park in Idaho.  We were able to stay a few days in the same campground as April and her husband, Justin, and Alex and his girlfriend came out to visit them during that same timeframe as well.

During the podcast, Alex and I exchange stories of what it was like when our mothers told us that they were going to be embarking on these crazy journeys.  I was much younger when my mom decided to travel around the country in an old 1967 Plymouth Valiant, but it was interesting to get the perspective of what someone else’s reaction was like when they received the news as well.

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