Survival in a Northern Wilderness: A Mother's Story--Part XLV

Violet mulls and cogitates about the adventures she had and personal family events. She particularly enjoyed looking back at family gatherings. One she enjoyed was when the boys would come in from duck and goose hunting from the “Big Marsh” and she would stuff those ducks with a sweet dressing, put them in the big-pot-bellied iron kettle and roast them in a large oven that Orrah had bought for her so many years before. Orrah and the kids told her that they were cooked to a queen’s taste and that they could smell them a mile away. Orrah and Violet preached safety and she thought it paid off many times. One year on Bad Vermilion Lake, Wesley was walking across the lake with a young friend and noticed that the ice was becoming honeycombed and he told his friend not to follow to closely. Wesley made it to shore the other lad was a big boy and much heavier than Wesley and fell through the ice, the ice kept breaking and he couldn’t get out, Wesley got a long pole got on his belly shoving the pole ahead of him telling the boy to hold the other end of the pole and start pulling himself up on the ice and hang on and he to made it to shore. Orrah had showed the children safety around bad ice and how to get out when they fell through but Violet was crestfallen that Wesley had fallen through on Tustumena Lake on the Kenai Peninsula, she professed that she would never know until she see saw him again during the resurrection.

For Violet it had been her sincere belief in Almighty God that her family would live again as prophesied in God’s Holy Word the Bible whereas per Violet “God tells us that he will open up our graves and bring us into our land”. Violet opined that she could not have coped with life after losing half of her dear family without her belief in God. Violet stated that life had been nothing but a challenge, many times depressing and many times it was a wonderful life. Violet was thankful that she never lost a child in infancy and saw them all grow up to man and womanhood, she saw their tears and smiles and knew each one’s characteristics.

Violet’s husband Orrah often quoted a little poem to her: “there is nothing useless or low in its place, each thing in its place is best. What seems like idle show strengthens and supports the rest.”

Violet was Eighty-One (1994) and claimed to have seen the signs of the times, she saw the machine age come to pass, saw the horse and buggy replaced, she saw the airplane come into its own and witnessed two World Wars. Violet saw the Korean fracas, Vietnam and the Gulf War, she saw the great jets come to pass and flew in them. Violet saw men put on the moon and saw the computer age come to pass. In Violet’s words “I marveled at the wonders of God because everything in the Holy Scriptures is coming to pass.”

In closing I have appreciated the opportunity to introduce you to Violet her family and their adventures. Violet closed her thoughts by iterating personal ruminations and as per Violet “As for me if I had to live it all over again the answer is yes, but with the husband that had repented, changed and overcome. With him I would live it all over again and have thirteen children with him.”