Phoebe Brown

My writings about her:
I was blessed to spend a lot of time with my Granny during my growing-up years.
So many things remind me of her…the smell of Hershey chocolate, working crossword puzzles, chicken and dressing, small cans of gray spray paint (like the ones she carried in her car glove compartment for quick dent touchups when she bumped into something), back scratches, reading Edgar Allen Poe, the gold locket necklace I gave her when I was a child (that I wear around my own neck often as an adult), Elvis, playing cards, and pork rinds.  Phoebe Brown was truly an inspiring person.  She lived a simply pure and wonderful life.  She was just good and had no hidden agendas.  She read literature and God's Word daily, prayed daily, enjoyed words, told silly jokes (too sharp to get the punchline wrong), loved people, laughed easily (usually at herself), and watched "Murder She Wrote" and "Jeopardy" (she knew all the answers).  I admired how she always made a point to exercise her mind…she played solitaire at the dining room table (and cheated by turning over cards she wasn't supposed to), and made lists of guests in attendance and then counted up the total the day after any event.  One such event was her famous annual Christmas parade party, where she always had sausage balls and an apple with olives on toothpicks stuck in it.  She also kept a journal to document the day's events and her thoughts and prayers.  Though she made these efforts to care for her mind, she didn't have quite the same concern for her teeth.  She took a chocolate bar to bed most nights.  She was funny in the best possible way and was always pleasant to spend time with.  You would never know that, like anyone else, her life had seen its share of disappointments and even tragedies.  She had a knack for forgetting negativity and letting her heart dwell only in a good place.  Her life and death are the perfect example for me personally, of how I hope to live and die…at peace, pure, full of joy and calm, Christlike, united with others, placing my love for other people above everything else, and leaving only smiles on loved ones's faces.  I will be forever thankful for my relationship with Phoebe Brown, her beautiful presence, and the stamp she left on my life.

You probably noticed a lot of commas in my tribute to my granny.  That is because Phoebe Mohundro Brown inspires creativity.  She was multi-faceted, like a splendid diamond.

She had a brilliant mind.  She would give me back scratches…but she would also write letters on my back with her fingernails.  Her letters were not only soothing, they were enriching to the mind.  She might have started one of those letters out like this:  "Dear, Andrew Lloyd Webber,…"

Words seem to be a common theme in remembering my precious grandmother.  In my adulthood, I've been saddened to learn and experience that some people never learn the power of their own words and the damage that negative ones can do.  This is definitely a lesson I've learned the hard way myself…but I feel like I do have a grasp on it at this point.  I found a card that Granny gave me for Valentine's day when I was in middle school (the most awkward phase of my life).  The following is a direct quote from Phoebe Brown and a complete study in building another person up with positive words:
 
        "What can I wish for you on Valentine's Day?  You are already rich in the things that really count: a loving heart, a sunny outlook, talent, contentment, friendship, spirituality and laughter.  The only wish I can make is that some of the joy you bring to our family will return to you and warm your heart as you warm ours.  You make every day I'm with you brighter with your special brand of sunshine.  Stay as sweet as you are!  Love, Granny"

I simply pray that my life can continue to be influenced for the better by her.

-Lauren Brown McElwain

Ruth Priester

Ms. Priester and my daughter at her breakfast table

A brand new, shiny silver Volvo (speeding through the neighborhood) and a cold glass of white wine are the two things that come to mind when I think of my 94-year-old next-door neighbor,  Mrs. Ruth Priester.  When we first moved in beside her, we made the mistake of addressing her as Ms. Ruth.  She asked my husband, "could we please call her Ms. Priester?  because only two people had ever addressed her as Ms. Ruth and one of those was a janitor."  This comment is representative of her attitude about everything, from the rearing (and scolding) of our children to her strict aversion to the kitchen and anything having to do with cooking.  Her housekeeper, Alma, cooks all her meals.  

Ms. Priester drives herself to the "pavilion" to exercise and then to the latest movie on a Friday night.  She also frequently dines with friends at one of the nicest restaurants in town.  Most days, she has company visiting and every Thursday afternoon, the young daughter of former neighbors comes for a tea party.  I have witnessed the tea party fare and it is lovely....Haagen Dazs ice cream, served in a crystal parfait glass and topped with Le Petit Ecolier biscuits.  There have been many times that we have called Ms. Priester and she simply could not talk because she was entertaining a guest at the moment.

As most of our friends know, my husband and I love to cook and try new recipes......so when we find a new recipe, we pack up pots, pans, ingredients, kids and diaper bags and walk the 15 steps or so, over to Ms. Priester's kitchen and fire up her stove top.  She always sets her breakfast table (that is pictured above) with her best dishes and flatware.  Once the recipe is cooked, we sit down to dinner.  Over dishes such as pecan-crusted trout, roasted dijon chicken and sweet potatoes, and kale hash, we talk about so many interesting things.  For some reason, she is truly interested in our life.    

When I asked Ms. Priester her secret for living such a long and healthy life, she simply replied "good genes".  Any day I ask her how she is doing, she says "better than I deserve".  What a truly inspiring 94-year-old lady!

Andrea Bell

I am technically an only child....my parents only have one child...me.  However, I don't feel like an only child.  My first cousin, who is six months younger than me, has always been a big part of my life and seems more a sister than a cousin.

My earliest memories of Andrea Beck
Every Christmas, I would receive just a few nice gifts...like beautiful, collectible dolls not for playing with, keepsake jewelry, or nicely bound books.  I was always surprised and delighted by these gifts and contented with my Christmas haul....until....my lovely cousin Andrea would come to our grandparents house with her ginormous garbage bag full of loot, the likes of which I had never seen before.  Anyone who knows my Aunt and Uncle know that they are professional yard sale shoppers.  Every year for Christmas, they would gather cheap but hours-of-entertainment-for-a-child odds and ends...but also really cool toys.  It only took a few minutes for me to show her my presents and then an eternity for us to get to the bottom of that garbage bag!
From the earliest time that I can remember, Andrea has been consistently friendly and a friend to many.  At a very young age, I admired this about her and knew that I wanted to be more like that.  People just are drawn to her because she is beautiful, outgoing and genuinely caring about others...and she has always been that way.  I have spent a significant portion of my life trying to be more like my cousin.  I'm so thankful for the influence she has always had on me.
Something should be said here about my Aunt and Uncle.  They are rock solid in their Christian faith just like my parents.  My Aunt Nettie is retired now but when she was working as a teacher, she was the one parents hoped their child would have.  She is a very talented artist and has the most calm and pleasant demeanor.  Just her presence is calm and relaxing.  My Uncle Bruce is a true servant to many.  He would do anything for anyone and is so friendly to even strangers.  When Andrea was growing up, he would send extra lunch money with her to school and tell her to find someone who needed it.

Working overseas with Mission Lazarus

Now that we are older, and both married, Andrea and I live a great distance from each other...so we don't get to see each other often.  Even though this is the case, no more than three days go by without a call or a text.  She also came to stay with me soon after each birth of my children.  My cousin is a social worker and has a lot of counseling experience.  Whenever I have an issue and need to talk to someone about how I should handle it, she is the one I talk to.  She is down-to-earth, calm, reasonable, and grounded in her Christian faith.  When I feel like I'm losing it, she puts everything into perspective.  She gives me practical advice for maintaining emotional health.  I could not have gotten through Postpartum Depression without her.

When my daughter was born, I knew I didn't want her to be an only child.  I wanted her to have the blessing of a sibling.  My relationship with my first cousin, Andrea Bell, is the main motivation for that wish.  I'm so thankful to have her in my life.

Christopher Schager

Let me set the stage, literally. Chris Schager, "Schager" as he told us to call him, is a professor I had for 3 classes my sophomore year of college. The classes he taught were Speech, Voice & Diction, and Movements for the Actor (yoga). I enjoyed all three but Voice & Diction is the main one that stands out in my memory. We met for this class in an auditorium. Students sat in the rows of audience seats and Schager stood on the stage. He is a teacher like no other I have ever had. He is adept at keeping students engaged because of his unique and entertaining approach to teaching.  I remember his warm-up drills of saying "red leather yellow leather" over and over.

Background on Schager: 
He is an actor who has received his Bachelor of Arts in Theatre from San Francisco State University in 1991. He moved to Mississippi in 1993 and completed his Masters of Fine Arts from the University of Mississippi in 1996. In 2001, Mr. Schager completed 18 graduate hours in Communications at Mississppi State University. He’s appeared in stage productions of 'The Segull', 'A View from the Bridge', 'Gillian on Her 37th Birthday', 'The Lover', 'Macbeth', 'Betrayal, 'King Lear', 'Hamlet' and 'A Midsummer's Night Dream.' Mr. Schager has several film credits, and has taught numerous theatre disciplines in both California and the Southeast.  Literary inspirations for him have been Dostoyevsky, Charles Dickens, Thomas Merton and Nikki Giovanni.


Tests in Schager’s classes were not multiple choice. They consisted almost totally of vocabulary words for which you had to really learn the definition. The reason being, he would literally give you a sheet of paper with only the words (around 30 or so) and you had to fill in the definition yourself. My major in college was Communicative Disorders. I then enrolled in graduate school to get my Master’s Degree in Speech-Language Pathology. A particular requirement for this field is knowing the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) like the back of your hand. I felt so prepared and ahead of the game because my favorite teacher, Chris Schager had already taught it in Voice & Diction. He says that his motto is "Every teacher has both an ethical and moral obligation to make the next generation better than his own."  It is my opinion that he truly works toward accomplishing that daily.

My Parents-Bert and Helen Brown

My childhood was a really good one, thanks to my hard-working, money-savvy, and rock solid Christian parents.  



 My mom is a very talented interior designer.  She can just look at a room and know what would be the best look for it as far as furniture arrangement, upholstery patterns that flow together, and knick-knack/book/photo frame placement.  She is also a very skilled seamstress and delights in finding high-quality fabrics at bargain prices with which to make drapes and table cloths.  My memories growing up are of her sewing smocked dresses and rompers and then (in high school) copies of fashionable outfits for me to wear.  The main sewed clothing memory that sticks out in my mind was…when I was in seventh grade, the movie “Clueless” came out, thus starting an age of trendy plaid skirts with knee-high stockings and mary-jane shoes.  My talented mother set to work making me these skirts in assorted colors of plaid.  In Clueless, Cher also wore little jackets with fur on the sleeves.  We found the same fur in a fabric store and she sewed some to the sleeves of jackets I already had.  The best Halloween costumes I have ever owned came from the skilled hand of my mother.  These include: Little Red Riding Hood, a Spartan cheerleader, various poodle skirts, princess dresses, witch capes, and a very detailed genie outfit.  Now that I’m an adult and have my own home, I was blessed to be able to enlist my mother’s skill once again with the decoration of my house.  She single-handedly painted the walls, picked out furniture and knick-knacks, and fabric for curtains which she then sewed and installed.  She has acquired quite the reputation for her design skill in our home town and has commissioned several homes for friends.  I am so thankful that some of her talent has rubbed off on me throughout the years.  She has always encouraged me to do creative things.  I remember early on preferring crayons and paint over baby dolls and Barbies.  Still, painting and crafting are therapeutic hobbies that I can get totally absorbed in.  I have my mother to thank for right-brain delight.



 My dad is an extremely brilliant and hard-working optometrist whose main hobbies are golf and announcing football games.  He has always just been good at living and takes time to reflect on pleasurable experiences.  From him, I learned how to be present in a moment and how to savor good times and then look back on it later and cherish experiences.  Early memories of my dad are mostly made up of leisurely golf cart rides and nights spent swimming at the country club.  Every year around Halloween, he would make a ghost out of a white sheet and a basketball and hang it in a tree in the backyard just for me.  Another cool thing about my dad is that he has always enjoyed interesting music and some of the same things I enjoy…such as Wallflowers, Edwin McCain, Collective Soul, Buffalo Springfield, Carole King, and Neil Diamond.  I have inherited my dad’s intense enjoyment of coffee.  Both of us could drink it all day long…regular in the morning and flavored in the afternoon.  We both like it strong too, but Dad takes his black and I need milk at least…but he is proud that I don’t sweeten it anymore.  It is always a pleasant experience being around my dad.  He is quick to laugh and we enjoy lots of silly conversations.  

My parents have done so much to ensure that my life has been a great one.  For their sacrifices and efforts, I am thankful.  I pray daily to be the kind of Christian example to my children that they have always been to me.  I so appreciate their individual talents and personality traits and am proud to call them Mom and Dad.  

Lauren's Inspiring People

This blog is dedicated to people in my life who have inspired or motivated me in a creative or spiritual way.  People posts are in no particular order...just whatever and whoever comes to mind and moves my hand to write.