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God is sooooooooo AWESOME!!!!!

5/20/2013

Words cannot express how excited I am to go back to Honduras again! If anyone would like to share this experience with me, please send me your name and email address so that I can share it with you. I will be posting on my blog as often as I can and sharing pics of the precious people that I love so much! God has provided ALL of my funds for the trip and for that I am in complete AWE! We are still collecting funds for Food Bags, and for one of the National Pastors as we try to help him to get a motorcycle as he goes from village to village doing the work of God. Pastor Eddie is probably one of the hardest working, most loving, and completely driven and sold out to spreading the gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! He goes into remote villages that are often hard to reach and he does this by foot......He has already raised 500.00 for the motorbike and he still needs 1000.00 to be able to obtain this motorcycle. Please let me know if you might be interested in donating to either! All donations are tax deductible.......and very much appreciated!!!!! I also want to ask all that would like to pray, please contact me and I will fill you in on our prayer needs not only now, but as we are in Honduras. Thank you......and may God bless you greatly!!!

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The Soda Jerk.......and his beautiful bride!

5/10/2013

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Today I am honored to include the beautiful bride of Mr. May! I did not get the chance to talk with her very long, but I can tell you what I learned about Mrs. May in my visit with her. Mrs. May is quite a beautiful woman.......she is so well put together and she carries herself with a very graceful confidence! I also believe she is quite a hoot herself! I am looking forward to spending time with Mrs. May and learning about her life! She seems to be quite an incredible woman who is married to quite an incredible man.........a former Soda Jerk! With my next post, I will be doing stories from both Mr. and Mrs. May, but I think I will write about each of them separately with bits of interwoven pieces of their lives.

The Soda Jerk
One day I was on my way to visit Mr. May and I was talking to his daughter about visiting her mom. As we talked, she told me that I might want to ask her dad about his days as a Soda Jerk, hmmmmmmmm, PERFECT!!!!!! When I walked in to see Mr. May, I immediately got my sweet smile shining across the room........oh how this makes my day! "Mr. May", I said, "I hear you used to be a Soda Jerk, tell me your story!" Then the journey began.............

In Bergenfield, NJ where Mr. May lived growing up, there were 4 different Ice Cream Parlors in his town during the years he was in High School. After leaving the NYC Boys Choir at the age of 12, he came back home to NJ and landed his first job in one of these Ice Cream Parlors as a Soda Jerk! Incredibly, Mr. May worked at all 4 of these Ice Cream Parlors at one time or another. The first one he worked at he was there for a few years. In this time, he honed his skills and made a name for himself! This was a job that you can tell he THOROUGHLY enjoyed. There was a new Parlor opening up in town and they really needed someone with experience. They needed someone who knew what they were doing and knew how to close up at night. Well, Mr. May fit that bill! It was not much longer after it opened that the owner decided to close that store and open up a new one in a better location with higher visibility and foot traffic, and of course Mr. May came along. The last Parlor he worked for was for an Independently owned operation that had opened up, and he really wanted Mr. May to work for him. I asked Mr. May which was his favorite.......and he told me the first one was his favorite by far. NOW.....we have gotten the work history out of the way, let's get on to the fun stuff! When Mr. May first started working, the one thing he loved was coming in first thing in the morning. As a now 13 year old, he loved walking up to the store and seeing the news papers waiting for him lined up on the sidewalk. It was his job to bring them in and set them up for the day. This just thrilled his heart to no end! As I thought about it, this is something almost foreign to kids today. One, kids today don't really get the chance to work like this.......which to me is kind of sad. Second, the world of printed newspapers has dwindled because of computers and the internet. Most kids don't even read news stories anymore because they live in the world of YouTube......and the written word is quickly fleeting. As I talked to Mr. May, you could just see the joy and excitement that he had during this time in his life. Over time as Mr. May honed his skills, he became a bit famous in his neck of the woods for a drink that he had created. This drink was called a, "Gizmo"! Part of being a Soda Jerk included mixing the Seltzer water and the Soda syrup to create what we now drink out of a plastic bottle. They also mixed ice cream in with the sodas to make floats and made yummy milkshakes behind the counter. Mr. May had people who sometimes did not want a Soda per say, but still wanted something carbonated, thus the Gizmo was born! He took chocolate syrup and added seltzer water to it, and TAAAAAADAAAAAAAA!!!!!! (you have to sing the tada in you mind!) He was sort of famous in the eyes of those who drank this! (ok, so, I am imagining that he was......I was living in the moment...hehehehe!!!!) If you wanted one of these, "Mr. May" creations, it would set you back a WHOLE DIME! When Mr. May graduated High School, his career as a Soda Jerk came to an end. I asked Mr. May if he was covered up with young women wanting him to make their Sodas and Ice Cream delights.........hehehe......and his eyes got big and he said, "Oh Yeah!!!!!" He makes me laugh!!! Not only was Mr. May the town Soda Jerk, but he was also a Baseball and Football player. (I am sure that also endeared him to to girls!!!) He said he was not a star, but he was not a bench warmer either! On the dresser in Mr. Mays room, there are two pictures that sit side by side. One is of his grandson in his football uniform.....the other is a pic of Mr. May when he was around the same age. If one were not black and white, you would almost think it was the same person! He was, and still such a handsome fella! I will try to snag a shot of these two pics so your imagination can go back in time with mine as we piece together parts of Mr. Mays life! (I am a visual person......and I have quite an imagination!!!!) The next story coming soon.....the early years of Mr. May and Mrs. May......stay tuned!!!!! May God bless you all!!!!!

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My Favorite Choirboy......continued!!!!

5/6/2013

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On my last post, I gave the history of Mr. May in his young days as a Choirboy for the NYC Boys Choir. On my visit this week he told me a story about one of the most incredible experiences of his life! One day the Boys Choir went to sing at Madison Square Gardens. At this concert, they shared the stage with none other than the great Frank Sinatra! Mr. May described him to me as the, "Greatest singer of Pop Music EVER!" As most of us know, Frank Sinatra is a legend from the 1940's on. The one memory that he holds dear to is the moment he got to not only meet Sinatra......but Frank Sinatra shook his hand! Now the funny part of this story is that at the time, he did not really recognize the magnitude of this visit until he grew up and came to love the music of the man who shook his hand many years before!

I asked Mr. May what he remembered most about Sinatra and he told me that he was incredibly good at his stand up concerts. He had this way of capturing his audience and bringing them into his surroundings. As we sat talking about this experience, I asked Mr. May if he remembered one of the songs that Sinatra sang that day, and it was at this point that Mr. May sang, "I Get a Kick Out of You"! Now let me describe this to you. Mr. May because of his health, has a very soft and sometimes strained voice. As he sang to me in this precious soft voice, I felt so honored!
He sat there so bright eyed and excited to sing for me and Devon, and it melted my heart into mush!

One thing I am personally learning is that Memories can do one of two things. They can either become more precious over time, or if they are bad ones, and if you let them, they can destroy you and lead you into a dark and depressed state. I am so glad that Mr. May has memories that allow him to keep his incredible smile living so graciously on his face. When I talk to him, his heart is filled with joy and peace! I have never left his room and felt depressed or sad. Instead, when I leave, my heart is floating on the clouds full of peace and love! I am so blessed that God has given me the honor of writing you all about this sweet, incredible man. May God bless you all!!

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My name is Lorri and I am a proud wife, mother, Honeygram, and band manager! I pray that you will laugh, cry, find needed information, peace and encouragement as you pa-ruse this site!

March 2011

God is sooooooooo AWESOME!!!!!

The Soda Jerk.......and his beautiful bride!

My Favorite Choirboy......continued!!!!

AuthorMy name is Lorri and I am a proud wife, mother, Honeygram, and band manager! I pray that you will laugh, cry, find needed information, peace and encouragement as you pa-ruse this site!

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My name is Lorri and I am a proud wife, mother, Honeygram, and band manager! I pray that you will laugh, cry, find needed information, peace and encouragement as you pa-ruse this site!