08 10 10; 5:00 p.m. Jenna S as Thelma
Scott: Hello Thelma.
Thelma Barnes: Hello Scott how are you?
Scott: I am well. A bit stressed. It's been a tough day.
Thelma Barnes: Oh why is that? Did something happen?
Scott: Kid problems. Client headaches. The usual.
Thelma Barnes: Oh i see. Well what is the problem with your kids are they well?
Scott: It's not so much the younger ones, it's Emilia, the teen.
She is a challenge.
Thelma Barnes: Pardon me if i am being too inquisitive
Scott: Oh, not at all.
Scott: I know it sounds perhaps cliche, but I do believe either side (her - me) do not understand each other.
Thelma Barnes: Why yes that does tend to happen often because teenagers seem to change rapidly in those few short years and it is just as confusing to us as it is i am sure to you
Scott: Do you find that your mother doesn't understand you?
Thelma Barnes: Sometimes... she thinks i am still a young child, but you see i want to roam around and experience life but she is very protective
Scott: I wonder what she is scared of. Surely you can handle yourself in so many things?
Thelma Barnes: Yes i think i handle myself very well i do extremely well in school and help her around the house. She thinks i will get myself into trouble or something
Scott: You don't strike me as the sort that looks for trouble.
Thelma Barnes: oh i certainly don't although a few times i have accidently gotten into some problems i am more forgetful than anything
Scott: Oh? Have you forgotten anything lately?
Thelma Barnes: Well i don't remember quite exactly how long ago but i forgot to let poor patches back inside when i went to get lunch thankfully we found him wandering right by the door~
Scott: Patches...your cat?
Thelma Barnes: Yes he is lovely
Scott: Ah, so you like cats. How fun! I have a cat, a Calico. Name is Allie. Did I mention her the last time we met here?
Thelma Barnes: I think you did mention having a cat mine is just a kitten i found him recently what about your cat Allie?
Scott: She drives around with me in the passenger seat of my car, er, motorcar, you know 'horseless carriage'? She stares at people whom we pass on the sidewalk. She even hops in herself from time to time. It's a convertible. The car, the motorcar...it has no roof.
Thelma Barnes: How fascinating a horseless carriage! My you know many strange things. It sounds wonderful. Patches jumps around too; he is a feisty fellow but lovable all the same.
Scott: I'm sure he is. I do believe cats can read our minds. Or at least know how to get one idea from their heads into our own.
I wish I could do the same with Emilia.
You know, get an idea into her mind...and make it stick!
Thelma Barnes: I do believe that could be possible. Does your daughter Emilia like Allie?
Thelma Barnes: I am sure Emilia listens to you and takes everything you say into consideration
Scott: Ah, therein lies the rub, as Shakespeare might say. I offer that they have a "tolerate relationship."
Scott: Well, perhaps so, but if she does, she seems to hide it well.
Thelma Barnes: How funny you are. Young ladies often think that they know all there is to know in the world, as is sometimes in my case, but don't worry every mistake always leads too new knowledge and chance to improve oneself.
Thelma Barnes: Do not give up on teaching though
Thelma Barnes: Many people learn by example
Scott: And many cats, I suppose.
Scott: Though I confess, that I never taught Allie to walk without a leash. She just follows along side me wherever I walk. Strange.
Thelma Barnes: How lucky you are. I would have to carry patches wherever we went for fear that he might run away
Scott: The other day, I was walking her on a path behind a small baseball diamond. She brought the outfield players to a halt. They'd never seen anything like it -- a guy walking his cat, and without a leash.
Scott: One of the boys, a left fielder yelled, "You walk your cat?!" And without missing a moment, I replied, "Don't you walk yours?"
Thelma Barnes: I do believe there is a special bond between human and cat. One that can't really be explained, its as if they are a kindered spirit. They are made for each other.
Scott: So true.
Scott: Tell me about your mom, Thelma.
Thelma Barnes: My mom is a very strong Godly woman who has raised me completely by herself. I am very grateful to have her in my life
Scott: That takes tremendous courage. I have four kids. I feel sometimes like I inherited a "package deal," if you will. My friends tell me I went from zero to 180 in five seconds; well, if you were in a car, a racecar, a motorcar that's very quick.
Scott: Although I suppose there are fast horses.
Thelma Barnes: hmm i am not entirely sure what the numbers mean but i don understand what a big responsibility that must be. I myself have no brothers or sisters. I always wanted a big family.
Scott: Your dad is gone, correct?
Thelma Barnes: Yes i don't remember him
Thelma Barnes: I am sure he was a very fine man though.
Scott: From speaking with you, I'm trusting you're correct.
I lost my dad too. I’m okay with it, I think. It’s been three years now. I keep waiting for some breakdown, but it hasn’t happened yet. Sis says everyone works on their own time frame.
Do you agree?
Thelma Barnes: Yes I agree completely. I did not fully understand what it meant when i was younger and i had no father, but as time came I started realizing how important a father really was and how much i missed having one in my life. I understand though that i was blessed by having a wonderful mother was has taught me so many things both physical mental and spiritual.
Scott: Spiritual? Such as?
Thelma Barnes: That there is a God looking out for all of us and blessing each of our lives. Although we are put through obstacles and trials if our faith prevails we are true believers and thats all you can ask for in life.
Scott: You know, sometimes I feel like a ping pong ball bounced between God and the Devil. Sometimes I wish they'd just leave me out of the game and let me go on with my own life. But my pastor tells me that that's impossible. There is no 'middle place' without either side. You're either with God in the moment...or with the Devil.
Scott: Of course, anyone who has ever found himself pounced upon by Chloe (age 6) and Matty (age 9), might come to understand this.
Thelma Barnes: I have never heard of a ping pong ball. What a funny little name, but in all seriousness we are all sinners and it is a uphill struggle everyday to stay true to our beliefs and not fall into the devils temptations.
Thelma Barnes: And we all constantly fail in the battle, but the important part is that we get back up and keep trying because all God wants is for us to strive to be like him.
Scott: Have you ever seen Him? God I mean?
Thelma Barnes: No i have not. It would be an amazing sight to see though wouldn't you agree?
Thelma Barnes: I think we all have a purpose hear on earth and once its completed God calls us home.
Scott: Well, to be honest, Thelma, I was reading a few pages in the Book of Revelation the other night and I have to confess: Heaven, at least the way it was described by John of Patmos, sounds like a pretty creepy place: flashes of green lightning, a sea of glass...creatures with eyes on all sides of their head. Not exactly cherubs strummin' harps if you know what I mean.
.
Thelma Barnes: To be honest i have never fully read through Revelation, it makes me nervous and i don't quite understand it. I think once we reach Heaven we will have a new outlook on life and now eternal life and with all the new found knowledge we can't possibly understand now what we will want then.
Thelma Barnes: Maybe all those things described will be beautiful and enchanting.
Scott: I wonder if they'll let Allie the Cat in.
Perhaps you're right.
Thelma Barnes: I hope they do and my little patches too
Scott: You may want to forewarn Patches...Allie grew up on the mean streets of Oakland. She loves people...doesn't take particularly well to other animals. Saw her rip the tar out of a Pomeranian last week. Horrible. I couldn't get to her fast enough.
Thelma Barnes: Patches is a little rascal sometimes, but is dreadfully fearful of other animals so I am sure he would not come close to Allie. If a person walks by and patches is with me he jumps from my arms onto their head. He is a little too friendly sometimes
Thelma Barnes: Allie is probably protective.
Scott: Like both of our mothers!
Thelma Barnes: Yes exactly. My mother isn't very fond of patches.
Scott: Oh no. That certaintly must cause a bit of tension. Speaking of your Mother, does she ever ask about me? us? you know, talking here in the park? I ask because I think my friends think it's all a bit nuts, you know?
Thelma Barnes: Yes it certainly does. Patches tries to warm up to her, but i think ever since he spilled milk all over my mothers new dress she has been a bit frosty towards him. I am sure my mother would be fine with it she would probably like you very much a cook you a huge meal as if it was Sunday.
Thelma Barnes: "a bit nuts" what does that phrase mean?
Scott: Um, well...
Scott: like...
Scott: crazy, odd, peculiar?
Thelma Barnes: oh peculiar i see. Now why would it be peculiar?
Scott: Well, to keep from scaring them off or having them conclude that I'm nuts, er rather, crazy, I refer to you as my "friend in the park." I'm not quite sure they accept that you live in the 19th century. Um, no offense, but it's hard for people here in the 21st to quite get their heads around this.
Thelma Barnes: Oh yes i am sure that would be hard for people of the 21st century to understand. It is hard for me to understand some of the things you describe of the future.
It sounds like a very exciting place full of wonderful and adventurous inventions.
Scott: Oh, yes, inventions and breakthroughs we have many. I wouldn't know where to start. But I think after you take away all the really cool stuff (the cars, the iPods -- I'll explain sometime, the cell phones -- I'll explain that too, the televisions), people are pretty much the same no matter when they lived. You agree?
Thelma Barnes: Well i agree somewhat people no matter what generation always have the heart to love, the brain to soak in more knowledge, the character to improve themselves and their surroundings, and their dreams to strive for better, but i do believe the more you are given the more you want as much as you can get.
In the much simpler days life was easier. All I wanted was to live a happy life. I live in the now and how to be a good person to everyone, but it seems like in the future people right now try to buy things and get things to make them happy later.
And that happiness does not sound like it lasts. Me and my mother did not have a lot of money, but we managed and were happy.
Are you happy?
Scott: I should like to know that happiness. Am I happy? At times, yes. I try to find enjoyment in small things, things that might fall off the radar or rather fall below the clothing line that others might miss. I do take time to "smell the roses," as it were. But to be honest, Thelma, I, too, often wonder where life is going, why I'm here, why there is so much struggle...and I stand back often and see what appears to be a very lost generation. Of course, they've been saying that since the time of Socrates. But especially with my kids. I see the games they play (often using these little electrical devices in their hands) and the television programs they watch: time) and I wonder what they're missing. I'm sure they're missing something. But try to convince them that there is more to life than sitting around and entertaining themselves and I actually get a better audience with Allie.
I find it very revealing, actually, that one of the surest ways to communicate between species (people and cats, for example) is to pet them on the head. That requires reaching out and touching, making contact, you know? There is not enough reaching out today.
Thelma Barnes: The small things, I think, are some of the biggest things in life. Many people are waiting for something big to happen, but life is about stringing together the little things and making them count. I think your kids are missing out in the world around them. You should take them outside like to the park maybe or a nearby lake. Things that the Lord created are here for us to experience and make memories together. Not alone in front of a what do you call it? television? To me that seems very dull.
Thelma Barnes: Love is a very important factor in life. Its what drives many of our actions and thoughts. I love my mother very much.
Scott: You certainly hit that on the mark. Yes! I completely and totally and honestly concur. Oh,
Scott: wow...look at the time! Thelma, sadly, I must go now. I enjoy our chats. Will you be here in the park again soon?
Thelma Barnes: Oh it is getting rather late. Our conversations are splendid and I am sure I will be here when you come back. Farewell my friend
Thelma Barnes: Blessings until next time
Scott: And blessings to you, too, Thelma!
(6:16 p.m.)
