So far this weblog has introduced readers only to the wordsmith side of my character. Writing is definitely one of my favorite things to do, but I also enjoy making handmade gifts. Creating personalized glass jewelry pieces is one of my favorite artistic endeavors.
This hobby has its roots in a fundraiser for Laura’s eighth grade basketball team, the Trinity Lutheran Lady Tigers. The girls were having a great season and hoped to be invited to the Lutheran Basketball Association of America national tournament held at Valparaiso University.
One of the moms suggested personalized glass pendants. She had made them as gifts for another sports team, and they were relatively easy and inexpensive. We decided to make pendants for all of the teams coming in for the annual Trinity girls’ basketball tournament.
Somehow I ended up with the job of making images for the pendants. The athletic director gave me the rosters from participating teams and I came up with a design that utilized the initials of the school and each player’s name. We had team parties to make the pendants and assemble the necklaces with ribbon and pony bead sliders in team colors.
Pendants for players and magnets for coaches.
At a modest $5 price point, the pendants were a huge hit, especially among girls with unusually spelled names. We sold every necklace.
Many Trinity school parents were interested in buying additional pendants and magnets, so we took special orders. With a materials cost under a dollar per item this project turned out to be one of our best fundraisers. The girls went on to win their school tournament, placed second in the state tournament and played in the national tournament. Six of the nine girls went on to play high school ball.
I liked the idea enough to use it again to make locker magnets for Laura to give as Christmas gifts to her teammates on the freshman basketball team. Later, when Hanna went on a mission trip to Vietnam, we made refrigerator magnets for her supporters.
Pray for Hanna in Hanoi
By now, I had the hang of the technique, but wished to try something nicer than the bulk bag of craft glass pieces from Hobby Lobby. I discovered Sun and Moon Craft Kits, a wonderful online supplier of jewelry glass in various shapes, as well as bails (the metal piece glued to the back for the chain or ribbon to go through), metal trays that the glass fits into like a picture frame, ribbons and chains and materials of all kind. They also have great tutorials for jewelry projects.
My first major project with new and improved supplies was making gifts for Laura’s basketball team last Christmas. This time I designed pendants using small rectangular glass, medium bails, navy blue organza ribbons, and basketball charms.
Helias Lady Crusaders 2012-2013
Laura and I decided that her male coaches might not appreciate a pendant necklace and made bookmarks with basketball charms for them instead.
Kyle, Laura’s boyfriend, is goalie for the soccer team. She asked me to design pendants for his mom and grandmothers.
These feature square pendant trays instead of bails.
Because glass jewelry is labor-intensive, I like to work in batches to minimize waste of materials and maximize use of my time.
My preferred supplies: • Card stock run through a color laser printer • Jewel-It or Sun and Moon Glaze • E-6000 glue for attaching to the bail or tray • nail polish remover • x-acto knife, paintbrush (or cotton swabs), emery boards
My latest batch included pendants for friends I visited in Houston and Little Rock this summer.
Incorporating unusual spelling, favorite colors and individual interests make a truly personal gift.
For my mom’s milestone birthday this month, I designed a pendant using a wavy text generator and the names of all her children, their spouses, and the grandkids.
Happy 55th anniversary of your 25th birthday, Mom!
In December my mom and a couple of her friends host an Advent by Candlelight table. I offered to make nativity pendants for her to present to her guests this year.
Eight different Nativity silhouettes in square pendant trays with white organza ribbons are simple yet meaningful party favors.
I’ve got plenty of supplies on hand and lots of ideas for new glass jewelry, so who knows what I may come up with next. Maybe my own Etsy shop.
Consider these versions of The Golden Rule as taught by some of the major world religions:
Bahá’í: And if thine eyes be turned towards justice, choose thou for thy neighbour that which thou choosest for thyself. —Bahá’u’lláh
Buddhism: Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful.—Udanavarga 5:18
Christianity: (Jesus said,) “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” Luke 6:31 NIV
Confucianism: (Confucius said,) “What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others.”
Hinduism: One should never do that to another which one regards as injurious to one’s own self. This, in brief, is the rule of dharma. Other behavior is due to selfish desires. —Brihaspati, Mahabharata (Anusasana Parva, Section CXIII, Verse 8)
Islam: “That which you want for yourself, seek for mankind.” – Muhammad
Judaism: That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn it. —Talmud, Shabbat 31a, the “Great Principle”
Taoism: Try to treat others as you would want them to treat you. — The Way to Happiness, Precept 20
Despite the ubiquitous nature of this maxim, bullying runs rampant in our society – in public schools, in Christian schools, on buses, on the playground, on the playing field, on the internet, in the boardroom. Even Miss America contestants – beautiful and smart and talented – are increasingly admitting to having been bullied and are competing with anti-bullying platforms. Schools can pick from dozens of anti-bullying programs.
Unfortunately, this approach just seems to drive bullying further underground. Bullies are insidious. They know how to hide or disguise their behavior. They are also smart and can figure out ways to get around the new rules.
There has been a major shift in our society. It used to be that we focused on the good of the community; now the focus is on what is best for the individual. I have a deep appreciation for the JFK quote: “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.” Substitute just about anything else into that sentence – family, school, class, team, company – and it still works! If I were Miss America, my anti-bullying platform would be a little different. We need to shift the focus away from the individual – the bully – and onto society – the greater good.
I was hoping to post this on Monday from Texas, but could not manage to log in from my iPad. It may be a little late this way, but it will also be more complete. Thanks for your patience.
We were last in Texas nine years ago. Joseph had asked to see the Alamo, and we obliged. In fact, we toured all five San Antonio missions, strolled the River Walk, visited the Texas Air Museum and the Tower of the Americas. We took day trips to see the USS Lexington at Corpus Christi and crossed into Mexico at Nuevo Laredo. We took Hanna to a college visit at Concordia University Austin and stopped to see the Oklahoma City National Memorial on the way home.
It’s been a while. Laura, 8, and Joey, 6, waiting to see the Alamo, 2004. They saw it again this year, but I’m willing to bet they did not have their picture taken together.
As you can probably tell, we don’t mind keeping busy on vacation. For that matter, it does not faze us to do a lot of driving. These traits served us well this past week as we rushed Laura from a week at Missouri Girls State to meet her youth group in San Antonio for the National Lutheran Youth Gathering.
Nine hours of road time Saturday took us from Warrensburg, Missouri to just south of Forth Worth, Texas. Then another four hours Sunday morning met us up with the youth group in San Antonio for lunch. This actually turned into four and a half hours since our GPS decided to deliver us to a warehouse on the south side of the city rather than a restaurant on the north side. But I digress (much as the GPS did). Then four more hours to Galveston.
I had planned a little getaway to test the waters of empty nest living. We checked into the Coppersmith Inn, a bed and breakfast in a lovely Victorian house about six blocks from the beach.
Our suite featured private access to the second floor veranda.
The following day we ventured into Houston. Phil wanted to see the USS Texas, so San Jacinto Battleground State Historical Site was our first stop. The USS Texas is the only remaining battleship to have been in service during both world wars.
This park volunteer turned out to be from Carthage, Missouri. He and Phil had a nice chat about battleships.
We visited Space Center Houston in the afternoon. Things have changed quite a bit since I was last there as a kid in 1968. We have landed on the moon. Skylab, the space shuttle program and the International Space Station have been developed. The experience of visiting the space center has changed as well, from strictly informational to a multimedia extravaganza. Despite all of the interactive displays, my favorite part of the visit was seeing actual spacecraft on the tram tour of Johnson Space Center. I would have loved to see Mission Control, but that tour was not running the day of our visit.
I got to touch a moon rock!
The best part of our trip began that evening, when we were invited to dinner at the home of a woman I got to know through an internet support group along with another member of that same support group. Priscilla and her husband Mark treated us to fajitas and margaritas. Kay and Dave brought their three beautiful daughters, the “curly girlies,” who entertained us along with the neighborhood kitties. I am so glad to have been able to meet up with them.
Three uncommon women, three uncommon neurological conditions: Sara, hemifacial spasm, Kay, acoustic neuroma, Priscilla, petrous meningioma.
The next day, another 8 hours on the road took us to Little Rock, the home of another support group friend. Angie and I share the same rare disorder, hemifacial spasm, as well as the even more rare and unfortunate surgical side effect of facial paralysis. Angie and her husband Hunter have three handsome boys, one newly adopted.
HFS twins. Even our facial problems are on the same side (left).
It was truly a treat to spend time with these remarkable ladies and their families. Thank you all for your hospitality.
Phil and I spent another six hours on the road yesterday. We picked up the dog from the neighbors and have settled in for a nice relaxing holiday at home. Laura and Joseph will be home in a couple of days, so we have a little time to preview the empty nest experience at home. It seems like just yesterday that we snapped the picture at the top of this post. That was nine years ago; we have just three more until Joseph leaves for college.
I can tell we are going to have to schedule more trips.
I like research. I think it’s fun to ferret out information, and often learn fascinating new facts in the process. Someone just has to say “I’ve always wanted to know . . .” or “I’ve always wondered . . .” to make me itch to find out.
So when a friend asked in passing why Jefferson City’s Highway 50 expressway is named after Rex Whitton, my curiosity was piqued. This is what I discovered:
Rex Whitton is a Missouri boy done good. Born in Jackson County and educated at the University of Missouri, Whitton worked for the Missouri Highway Department for more than forty years beginning in 1920, working his way up from levelman to chief engineer. The Highway 50 Expressway project through Jefferson City was planned and engineered while he served as chief engineer.
In 1955, Whitton became president of the American Association of State Highway Officers. In that capacity, he lobbied for creation of the Federal Interstate Highway System. On June 29, 1956, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956. Under Whitton’s leadership, Missouri became the first state to award a contract using the new interstate construction funding for work on US Route 66 (now I-44) in Laclede County.
In January 1961, Whitton was appointed as Federal Transportation Administrator, and on August 18 of that year, the $7.6 million Highway 50 Expressway project through Jefferson City was dedicated. A 100-car motorcade delivered state and local dignitaries to the stretch between Madison and Monroe Streets, where Jefferson City Mayor Forrest C. Whaley presented Whitton with a city resolution naming the expressway in his honor, and local restauranteur John Adcock bestowed Whitton with the grand champion Cole County ham.
Although the expressway was not part of the interstate highway system, Whitton seized the opportunity to explain that the interstate and defense highway system was designed to meet the traffic needs of 1975. Furthermore, under the recently enacted Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1961 (Whitton received one of the pens President Kennedy used to sign it into law), all 41,000 miles of the interstate system would be open to the traveling public by 1972.
“It has always struck me as ironic,” Whitton stated in his address, “that so many of our citizens—so ingenious in quickly devising ways of ending almost every minor irritant—would so readily tolerate every morning and evening, the incredible congestion of our antiquated highways that takes a heavy toll in automotive costs and depreciation, to say nothing of human nerves and temper.”
Congestion—along with funding and safety—was one of the key issues that Whitton addressed during his six-year tenure as Federal Transportation Administrator. Whitton spent his retirement years farming and consulting in the Kansas City area, where he died in 1981.
That’s the main story. Sure enough, I also dug up some fascinating facts along the way. For example, did you know that our expressway utilized the first radar-controlled traffic signals in Missouri?
Another benefit of this research project is that I learned how to use the microfiche reader at the Missouri River Regional Library. The reference librarian handed me the correct reel, instructed me on the use of the reader, and turned me loose. Once I got used to the dizzying sensation of seeing the pages fly by on the screen, I relaxed and enjoyed the ride.
The August 17, 1961 edition of the Jefferson City Post-Tribune featured an extensive spread dedicated to the expressway’s opening. I was disappointed that a black smudge obscured the part of an article that told how long the expressway project was, but learned that it ran from the West End Fire Station to the Moreau River. (Note: I’ve since learned that the expressway spans six miles.)
My favorite image is this huge construction drill. You just don’t see captions like this nowadays:
Any resemblance between these drills and those used by the dentist are purely coincidental. The sizes are different. These drills are used for boring holes for dynamite, for solid rock excavation, not for piercing dentine. Such excavations were necessary during the construction of the new Jefferson City expressway.
And I admit to getting a chuckle from the champion Cole County ham. Though at the time I’m sure it was given solely as a token of appreciation, half a century later I see some irony in presenting a highway project administrator a gift of pork.
I am thrilled to announced that my latest Arch Book story is now available from Concordia Publishing House.
I have been an Arch Book fan since I was a little girl. I remember having them read to me at bedtime and receiving them as Christmas and Easter gifts. My favorite was a retelling of the Parable of the Talents, Eight Bags of Gold (now out of print).
Now, as an adult, I welcome the opportunity to give a child the gift of a Christian storybook for less than the cost of some greeting cards. As a Christian, I appreciate that every story is Biblically sound. As an author, I am thrilled to be published and grateful for the opportunity to do the kind of writing I love.
I am often asked how I got into writing Arch Books. One day when I picked Laura up from kindergarten, I took her and Joseph to Hanna’s eighth grade book fair. I mentioned to the kindergarten teacher that I loved Arch Books and had always wanted to write one. She told me that a friend of hers had gotten published after attending a writing workshop. The next day she sent information about the 2002 Writing for the Church Workshop home in Laura’s backback. I signed up right away.
The workshop took place at Concordia Seminary in July. I was fortunate to live just a two-hour drive away, but other participants flew in from all over the country. One of the first things our facilitators, Resolute Rod and Electrifying Earl, asked of us was to introduce ourselves with a descriptive alliterative adjective. Unfortunately, Sassy Cindy took mine before I had a turn. There were only a few participants sitting between us, so I didn’t have much time to come up with a new one. I briefly considered Sweaty Sara, inspired by the sweltering St. Louis summer heat, but settled on Splendid Sara. For someone like me, who is terrible with names, this exercise was wildly successful. I can still remember many of my colleagues’ nicknames: Chortling Charles, Ornery Arlene, Jovial Jonathan, Jazzy Jane, Fun Phil, Candid Karen, Zealous Zeal.
The workshop was intense. Besides refreshers on writing styles, we learned specifics about writing for the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod. Many of the workshops dealt with writing for the devotionals Portals of Prayer and My Devotions and the preschool magazine Happy Times, all publications that were actively recruiting writers. I anxiously awaited a visit from the family editor later in the week and worked on a draft rhyming story about Ruth from the viewpoint of Boaz.
When the family editor finally arrived for her session, she focused mainly on devotionals with just a few comments concerning Arch Books. Arch Books have evolved over the years and now have a consistent 16-page, 64-line format. Every book, even the Old Testament stories, must contain a Gospel message. All stories must be scripturally sound and feature no whimsical characters or talking animals (which explained why Donkey Daniel in Bethlehem is out of print).
I asked more about Arch Books during a personal interview. I learned that CPH publishes just four Arch Books each year – one Old Testament story, one New Testament story, one Christmas and one Easter story. CPH already had a stable of Arch book authors, so unlike the periodicals, they were not recruiting. She enjoyed my draft of Kind Farmer Boaz, but encouraged me to pursue other opportunities.
Disappointed, I spent the rest of the workshop working on a manuscript for Happy Times. By the time the conference ended, Sassy Cindy and I had a joint contract for the next year’s December issue.
But once home, I couldn’t stop thinking about Arch Books. Every time I sat down to try to write something else, “Old Testament, New Testament, Christmas, Easter” kept running through my mind, nearly becoming a mantra. After a while, I recognized it as a nudge from the Holy Spirit and developed four stories. For an Old Testament story I wrote God Said, “It Is Good,” based on the story of creation. A New Testament story, Which Son Did Right?, was based on the parable of the two sons and the vineyard in Matthew 21:28-32. The Christmas story I wrote was Anna Tells God’s Promise, about Jesus’ presentation at the temple from the point of view of Anna the prophetess. Finally, Mary Magdalene’s Easter Story was based on the account of Mary Magdalene’s visit to the empty tomb in John 20:10-18.
The entire process took about exactly a year after attending the conference. While I did not anticipate publication, I felt a sense of peace, relief and accomplishment when I mailed the packet.
Just a few months later, I had a voice mail from the CPH family editor. Mary Magdalene’s Easter Story had been selected as the Easter Arch Book for 2005! The timing of my submission had been perfect. Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code was on the best sellers list and CPH had never published an Arch story about Mary Magdalene.
And that is the story of how I became an Arch Book author. Looking back, I can see God working to my benefit in so many ways, and I am truly grateful and humbled.
__________
The Warrior-Poets from the 2002 Writing for the Church Workshop have produced a prodigious number of Arch Books:
I discovered three internet sites last week that tickled me pink. As I am feeling particularly generous, I’m going to share them.
3. Chemistry Cat – Three of my favorite things – cats, science and puns – rolled into one. I Zn these are hysterical.
2. Internet Anagram Server – More fun with the English language. Enter a phrase or name into this little gem and it will return anagrams using the letters. For instance:
Sara Lynn Hartman = Ha! Snarly Man Rant
Chemistry Cat = Scratchy Time
I Love English = Oh, Single Evil
1. Seussville – This should be pronounced “Zoice-ville,” by the way. Random House has created a truly Seuss-inspired funhouse of activities. Visit your favorite book, learn about whimsical characters, discover little known facts about one of America’s most beloved children’s authors. Oh, and design your own Who!
Five years ago, on June 2, 2008, I underwent brain surgery: microvascular decompression of the seventh cranial nerve in an attempt to cure hemifacial spasm. Unfortunately my facial nerve was damaged during surgery and I awoke with left side facial paralysis; I could neither smile nor blink, and my eye no longer produced tears. In addition to the trauma of losing my pretty smile, I experienced extreme pain from dry eye. Over time the nerve healed. I have recovered quite a bit of facial function. My smile is not what it used to be, but most people don’t notice that anything is wrong. I’ve learned how to make a smaller smile to minimize the difference between sides. I now produce tears when I cry or eat spicy food, but not under normal circumstances. I have tried every type of eye drop and gel I could find, but Refresh PM ointment is the only one that keeps dry eye pain at bay. My brain learned to compensate for the blurry vision on the left side, but over time it became mentally exhausting. This is the story of my nearly lifelong quest for sharp vision. It’s long and a bit on the clinical side now and then, but I feel it is important to be as thorough as possible in case it can help someone else out there.
I grew up nearsighted. In third grade I failed the school vision screening and made my first visit to an ophthalmologist. I remember leaving the optical shop after getting my first pair of glasses and marveling at seeing individual leaves on the trees. I was 8 years old. Thus began a progression of horrible nerdy glasses, the early ones complete with real glass lenses. Every year my vision got progressively worse and the lenses thicker. I disliked wearing eyeglasses, but couldn’t see without them.
OK, they were never that bad. Or maybe they were. I am having trouble finding my grade school pictures, but when I do I will post one. Or not.
Those despised spectacles did provide some dramatic moments. Once during a bombardment game in elementary school PE, I got hit in the face with a beanbag. My glasses flew across the gym and the glass lenses shattered. I was blind for a week waiting for a new pair. In high school I was invited on a horseback ride. During the home stretch across a hayfield, the horses began to gallop and my glasses – new of course – flew off my face. The next day my friend’s father, a career military man, organized a search line. Miraculously we found the glasses. Fortunately for me, lens technology had progressed to thinner and lighter plastic with scratch resistant coating.
My senior year in high school, a miracle occurred. I had my annual appointment with the ophthalmologist, anticipating yet another pair of geeky specs. To my amazement, my mom and dad had decided to surprise me with contact lenses. I was fitted with soft contacts and was at long last able to forgo the coke bottle glasses. I could see better and looked better. Win-win.
By the time my three children had been born, my prescription was -7.5 on the left and -9.0 on the right.
A twilight driving scene as it appears to a person with normal vision, left, and to a severely nearsighted person like me, right.
Weary of glasses, contacts, and solutions, I also hated not being able to see my kids at the swimming pool. I had been monitoring the development of laser surgery, and it had finally progressed to the point where I felt comfortable asking my ophthalmologist about it.
In February of 2000 I had LASIK performed in Kansas City. My refractive surgeon was reputed to be one of the top three in the country. He gave me ten units of correction on the right eye (at that time, the most that he would do) and eight on the left. I had been warned that my level of correction would probably require an enhancement surgery a few months later, but I was fortunate not to need it. My eyes healed perfectly. (I do see halos and starbursts around light sources, but I had that before surgery due to extreme nearsightedness and large pupils, so it causes me no distress.) After some mild post-surgical dry eye that resolved after a few months, I never looked back.
How LASIK works. Take note of the change to the curve of the cornea after surgery. That will be important later in my story.
For eight years, I was able to take my vision for granted. Then came the microvascular decompression surgery and severe left side dry eye. I do not know how I was able to tolerate the plane ride home, but I made it somehow. After a few weeks of trial and error, I settled into a routine of applying Refresh PM ointment around the clock to keep my cornea moist. It gave me relief from dry eye pain, but also blurred my vision. In August I had a 1.8 gram platinum weight implanted into my eyelid to aid in closure. It helps to keep my eye shut at night, but unfortunately does not provide a complete blink.
In September 2008 I first asked my ophthalmic surgeon about the advances in scleral lenses being made by the Boston Foundation for Sight. Instead of resting on the cornea, the edges of these lenses extend to the sclera, or white of the eye, creating a moisture chamber on the surface of the eye, relieving dry eye pain while providing clear vision.
The surgeon dissuaded me, stating that the lens was only indicated for debilitating facial injuries such as Gulf War soldiers who had lost their eyelids altogether and had no protection for their eyes. I resigned myself to a lifetime of accepting less than optimal eyesight in exchange for keeping my cornea healthy and pain free. But it seemed to me that a scleral lens would be ideal for a situation such as mine, so a little more than a year ago, I brought the subject up again. I think the doctor realized I would not be giving up the idea, and reluctantly granted permission to find and consult with a specialist in contacts for dry eye. He warned me that my eye might be too sensitive to be fitted successfully.
Extenuating circumstances kept me from pursuing it right away, but a few months ago I began to see an increasing number of posts on the Acoustic Neuroma Eye Issues Forum concerning scleral lenses. I live in a small city, so I was not surprised to find that my local ophthalmologist does not fit scleral lenses. I contacted the manufacturer of one of the lenses mentioned on the forum and received a referral to an optometrist in a nearby city.
I emailed a brief history to the doctor and received a reply that he believed he could help me. At my initial appointment he recommended that I try Restasis twice a day for a couple of months to see if it would give me relief without needing a lens. He also recommended eyeglasses because the vision in my right eye had degraded slightly, to -1.0.
Unfortunately, I did not do well at all with Restasis. Both of my eyes burned whenever I applied it, and I could hardly stand to wait for the required fifteen minutes to pass before I could apply drops or ointment. I did some research and discovered that Restasis was not effective for dry eye due to nerve damage and contacted the doctor to ask to discontinue the Restasis and proceed with a scleral lens fitting.
The first lens turned out to fit too loosely even though it looked perfect from the fitting kit. I brought it home so that I could practice inserting and removing the lens. I could only wear it an hour at a time because the lubricating drops slowly leaked out of the bottom of the lens making the lens uncomfortable and blurring my vision. I am currently testing a second lens with a tighter fit. If my eye doctor was 10% satisfied with the last lens, he is 80% satisfied with this one. We will decide at my appointment next week whether to tighten the fit a bit more as it still settles just under center. I can wear it for increasing lengths of time, starting with 3 hour increments and increasing by an hour every day.
On the right side, we tried several regular soft lenses, but my cornea is so flat post-LASIK (remember the diagram above?) that the lens slides and does not hold its shape. I can’t afford a second scleral lens at this time, so my doctor has recommended a custom soft lens to take into account my flat cornea and large pupil size. I’ll be able to try that next appointment also.
Update (07/15/13): The name of the custom soft lens I tried is SpecialEyes. I have also seen one called RevitalEyes. There are likely others as well; if you are interested I suggest googling for “custom soft contact lenses” or “post-LASIK soft contact lenses.” I did not keep the lens. As it turns out, the -1 in my right eye with the corrected vision from the left scleral gives me more-or-less textbook monovision. The increase in distance vision from the right lens was not enough to compensate for the loss in near vision.
Although I did not reach my goal of crystal clear vision for my fifth post-MVD anniversary, I am close enough at this point to celebrate. I am happy to report that – severe myopic, post-LASIK and post-MVD – there is light at the end of my tunnel.
Here is a list of scleral lenses I have been able to identify. Let me know if I have missed any, and I will add them.
Some unusual cases and harder-to-fit eyes may require custom scleral lenses. Instead of starting with ready-made fitting kits, these lenses are custom designed for each eye. The fitting process requires approximately a week of travel to their location.
BostonSight PROSE – custom scleral lenses by the Boston Foundation for Sight. US providers are located in Needham, MA, Los Angeles and San Francisco, CA, San Antonio and Houston, TX, Chicago, IL, Ann Arbor, MI, Miami, FL, Baltimore, MD, and Great Neck and New York, NY. Overseas in India and Japan.
Global Refractive Solutions Laserfit – custom designed lenses using high resolution digital imaging. The design process was developed and patented by Dr. Greg Gemoules of Coppell, TX (Dallas area). Lenses are manufactured to his specifications by TruForm.
Update (09/17/14): I ran across this option that is manufactured to order by the manufacturer of AVT Sclerals (the lens that I wear):
EyePrintPro – Custom prosthetic scleral cover shells made using a direct impression of the surface of the eye. The developer of the scleral shell practices in Iowa City, IA. According to the website there are additional practitioners across the country, but I was unable to find a list on the website, though there is a contact form for questions or comments.
Hanna and I took a field trip to St. Louis last Friday to see the Civil War in Missouri exhibit at the Missouri History Museum before it closes. It was nicely done with lots of information, artifacts and a number of interesting interactive touchscreen activities (that would in all honesty make great iPad apps). We discovered that we had been to many of the battlefields referred to in the exhibits, including Wilson’s Creek, Lexington, Pilot Knob, Pea Ridge (Arkansas), Shiloh (Tennessee), Vicksburg (Mississippi), and Gettysburg (Pennsylvania). A feature about James Eads’ ironclad warships reminded us that we had seen the USS Cairo during a family vacation.
The USS Cairo was sunk by a naval mine in 1862. Sections of the ironclad were recovered and reassembled at the Vicksburg National Military Park.
There is an interesting story leading up to our visit to Vicksburg. Like many good tales, it began long, long ago. Every family tree has its colorful characters; with a name like Jefferson Green Fields, my great-great-grandfather was predestined to be one. He had three known wives (with rumors of at least one more) documented through census files and marriage records. No divorce decrees have surfaced, thus it is possible that he was married to all three at the same time. JGF is known to have fought with the Confederate Army during the Civil War and later to have been a livery stable/general store owner as well as a circuit-riding Primitive Baptist minister.
Jefferson Green Fields: Portrait of a Polygamist
I am a descendent of the second wife (family lore identifies her as Native American, but this is undocumented). In 2000 a grandson of the third wife contacted members of my family with an idea to reunite the descendents of JGF. He called it the “First Fields Family Union,” because never before having gotten the three branches together, it could not accurately be called a reunion. His idea was to meet the following summer in Memphis, Tennessee, where Jefferson Green Fields had enlisted in the Confederate army. My half-something-cousin-some-number-of-times-removed was also recruiting someone to write a paper about his experience in the War. Any guesses who volunteered?
I pored through Confederate payroll, parole and veterans records as well as books and websites about the Civil War. In summary, Jefferson Green Fields served as a teamster for the 1st Tennessee Heavy Artillery at the Siege of Vicksburg. At some point he was injured and hospitalized, but had returned to the battlefield by the time that General John C. Pemberton surrendered to General Ulysses S. Grant. JGF was taken prisoner and paroled. (Download the entire paper here.)
Phil and I thought it would be interesting to take the kids to Vicksburg before heading to Memphis. The Vicksburg National Military Park is huge, with memorials for every state with troops that fought there.
Missouri’s memorial is the only one dedicated to soldiers from both armies. Twenty-seven Union and fifteen Confederate units from Missouri fought at Vicksburg.
We found the spot overlooking the Mississippi River where the 1st Tennessee Heavy Artillery was encamped:
Joey (3), Hanna (13), Laura (5) and I enjoy the view at Vicksburg National Military Park, June 2001.
as well as a plaque commemorating JGF’s company.
Joey, Laura and I pose for an obligatory cannon photo in June 2001. The summer of 2013 marks the 150th anniversary of the Siege of Vicksburg.
On to Memphis and the “Family Union.” (Sort of, anyway; descendents of the first branch declined to participate.) My paper was well-received by those who did attend, but an even bigger treat was in store for us. The 52nd Tennessee Regimental String Band was in town!
As Confederate reenactors, band members were both bemused and amused by the whole “Family Union” thing, but appreciated the explanation and treated us to a concert. Appropriately, they opened with ‘Twas at the Siege of Vicksburg.
Note: The Civil War in Missouri exhibit at the Missouri History Museum closes June 2, however a traveling exhibit has scheduled stops in various Missouri cities and towns through 2015. See it if you have the chance.
