For days, I have been thinking I need to put something out on my blog, but I have been busy with the holidays and a book covers class I have been taking. I just went out to see when I last posted. I am appalled! So, here is a piece I wrote about a month ago. I had the good fortune to talk my husband and daughter to drive a couple of hours to mark an item off my bucket list. Here is the post I wrote but forgot to put on my blog.
One of
my favorite activities while traveling is discovering new
places and visiting the lives of famous people from the past. This past week my family and I journeyed to
Missouri to see my younger son graduate from Military Police school for the
National Guard at Fort Leonard Wood. We
flew out a couple days earlier grabbing the opportunity to see some sites.
We drove to Mansfield, Missouri to
see the home of Laura Ingalls Wilder.
The rundown little town showed no signs of fame. In fact many buildings stood in dilapidated
ruins in need of repair. In less than
six blocks, we traveled down a country lane meandering through the hills with
naked trees lining the asphalt. Rusty
and gold leaves carpeted the countryside forming a natural quilt keeping the
tree roots warm in the colder temperatures.
A sign
distinguished the small white farmhouse from other properties along the
road. We turned up the drive to be
greeted by an elderly volunteer. She
invited us into the warm building housing a nice size collection of family
photos and treasures, including a fiddle.
I enjoyed the photographs which reminded me of my own family photos I
have inherited. My daughter loved the
old typewriter. The photos captured my
interest, but I anxiously awaited the announcement for the tour to begin. Old West museums bore me due to the fact that
I have grown up with them all my life.
After
sitting through a video and looking at farming implements, of which I have some
in my garage, we finally entered the house, the little house. Laura stood only 4 foot 11 inches. The kitchen displayed the love Almanzo held for
Laura. He built custom countertops for
her to cook on. She hated making bread,
so he installed two tall windows framing her counter to be able to look outside
as a distraction as she kneaded the dough.
He also built a wood room to store all the firewood off the kitchen so
Laura needn’t go outside in the cold.
This warmed my heart.
In my
favorite room of the house, Laura showed her love for Almanzo. He slept lightly and awoke at the smallest
sounds. In the middle of the night,
Laura would be inspired to write. She
softly walked to her writing room just off their bedroom. Not much bigger than a closet, Laura sat at a
small desk writing the beloved Little House on the Prairie books. Instead of waking Almanzo up upon her return
to bed, she instead spent the rest of the night sleeping on a chaise lounge in
her little office. Two nice big window
on two of the walls let in the sun giving her plenty of light during the
day. Besides the desk and lounge, only
enough room allowed for her to walk through to the living room. I thought it a perfect writers retreat.
The
information I learned about Rose Wilder Lane, Laura and Almanzo’s only living
child, surprised me. I knew she worked
as a journalist in San Francisco, but I didn’t know she was one of the highest
paid writers of her day. She wrote quite
a few books. With her money, she built
her parents a retirement home just up the road and she installed the old home
with electric lights and other modern conveniences. I found two of her books on Amazon and
downloaded them to my Kindle. I look
forward to reading them in the coming months.
I loved
learning all of these little details of Laura’s life. When I was a little girl, I wanted to be just
like her back in the world of riding in buggies, dancing to a fiddle, baking
from scratch, and gardening. Of course,
I also dreamed of teaching, writing, and falling in love. The simple life of Laura still calls to
me. Granted, I would be very hesitant to
relinquish my kindle, computer, and modern machinery, but I look at my modest
home and hope I am keeping to a simpler life than most.
