Ridgeway

All posts tagged Ridgeway

Monday ~ July 06, 2015

Posted by Dave Updegraff on July 6, 2015
Posted in: Daily Posts. Tagged: , , , , , , .

1952-FirstGrade copy

Happy Monday!

They say, “You can never go home again.”  But for 12 glorious hours I did just that and it was beyond my highest expectations.

The image above is of my first grade class in 1953.  I found it a few days before the “All School Reunion” that was held in Ridgeway, Missouri.  Ridgeway is a little town of 450 people plus or minus a few people over the years.  It is located in Northwest Missouri 22 miles South of the Iowa border.

I graduated in 1965 in a class of 16 students.  Of the 16 students that graduated 12 made it back to the 50th reunion, two have passed away and two were unable to attend.  So it was a remarkable turn out.

July-04-2015

The image above is left to right, Richard, Jim, Sharon, Darrel, Shari, Terry, Diana, Me,  and Everett.  Can you match them up with the original 1953 image.  🙂

More than just our reunion however, because the school was small it was more like one big class.  We knew everyone and knew almost everything about everyone.  So it was one joyous reuniting after another all squeezed into those wonderful 12 hours of reliving a past that was filled with wondrous and happy memories.

These are the friends who know everything about you and still love you in spite of that. I do not have the literary skills to adequately convey the joy, warmth, emotion, and love that I received and gave during that period of time.  It had been 30 years since I had seen most of them, and 40 – 50 years since I’d see some of them.  So there was a lot of catching up to do and so little time to do it.

July-04-2015A

The lovely silver-haired lady in black and white was our 3rd grade teacher “Miss Marilyn.”

One of the greatest things that has happened over the last few years has been reconnecting with many of my childhood friends through Facebook.  Which was the predominate reason I wanted to attend this year’s celebration.

I have some images and video that I will share during the week.  It started Friday evening when I crashed the reunion dinner of the class of 61 and ended Sunday with a two-hour breakfast with my dear friend Kathy and her wonderful husband Phil.

The image above is from our reunion lunch at Sharon’s home.  It was a great time that was over in the blink of an eye.  I didn’t get a chance to visit with all the wonderful people in this image.   If there was one wish I would have asked for the power to slow time down for at least that day.

Thank you for stopping by the blog.  I hope you don’t mind my journey down my memories of those remarkable years.

Enjoy your day and be careful.

Thursday ~ August 22, 2013

Posted by Dave Updegraff on August 22, 2013
Posted in: General Posts. Tagged: , , , , , .

August-21-2013-A

A rambling post today.  A lot of things going on in my little world right now.  There is a school of thought that goes something like if you want to make an improvement in something you do, you have to put yourself in some uncomfortable and difficult situations to challenge you and help you grow.  Sounds good in theory but not so much in practice.  It tends to cut down on ones sleep time.  🙂

The image above is of the two cygnets at the Duck Pond.  I drive by them twice a day to check on them.  I was talking to a friend who said that as the water continues to go down they face the challenge of predators and when it comes time for them to leave they face the dangers of the flying into the power lines that are adjacent to the pond or getting hit be a car.  I’ll keep hoping they make it to maturity.

August-21-2013

I took a much different route home last night just looking for new subject matter.  Over the last 14 years (since I went digital) I think I have photographed a bunch of the more interesting barns and farm scenes in the area.  I hadn’t traveled this particular road in over two years and yet I saw a dozen things to shoot last night that I had already taken an image of.  I liked this old tractor next to the apple tree however.  They seem to just go together.

August-21-2013-B

Obviously this old tractor has seen its better days.  I suspect there is something amiss with the steering since one of the wheels is doing its own thing.  I have two friends on FB from the town I grew up in.  Their Father sold Oliver tractors.  When we drove through Ridgeway a couple of weeks ago I thought about all that farm machinery that Francis use to have sitting on the street and on his lot.  Many times on Halloween the goblins would roll a lot of his equipment out onto the street.

I delivered the morning paper so I was up town around 5:00 a.m. the morning after and would see Francis putting things back where they belonged. I can honestly say I was never one of the individuals who did that.   I was always too busy getting candy, cookies, and popcorn balls.  🙂

That’s enough rambling for one day.  I hope you have a wonderful Thursday.  Thanks for stopping by and be careful.

Thursday ~ August 08, 2013

Posted by Dave Updegraff on August 8, 2013
Posted in: General Posts. Tagged: , , , , , .

August-07-2013

Good Day.  Day one of the vacation is history.  We left home around 12:45 p.m. and drove over to Ames, Iowa to visit Jeanne’s Mother.  Several photo opportunities along the way but we had told her we would be there at a prescribed time so I passed them up.

We spent the rest of the day visiting with her and working with Media Com to help her get connectivity at her home.  The technician will be there next week so the next time we visit there will be WiFi.

Jeanne’s Mom enjoys the internet but has had an unreliable system so this will make it much better for her.

August-07-2013-A

The second image has little value other than I wanted to take a picture for Jay of her tomatoes.  I had one for dinner last night and it was very good.

Today we are traveling to the little town that I grew up in.  Ridgeway, Missouri.  When I lived there it was a community of about 450 people.  I knew most of them and wanted to spend the rest of my life there.  It was the center of the universe for me. 🙂

More to come.   Enjoy your day.  Thanks for stopping by and be careful