Afternoon with Eleanor

I had the nicest visit with my remarkable aunt Eleanor Sunday afternoon.  Everything she has ever done, she has done well.  Until a few years ago, she sang in the choir at First Methodist, often singing solos in her lovely contralto. She published a book in 1992, and is currently working on another.

She's a wonderful cook and hostess, gardener and bridge player, has traveled the world over, and recently donated her large collection of Meissen porcelain to the art center.  I could go on and on and on, but it will suffice to say that Jane Austen in Pride and Prejudice would have called her "an accomplished lady."

As many times as I have been in her house all my life, I've never asked or known the story behind so many things until yesterday.

Eleanor commissioned this watercolor of the house where she and her husband Bill lived in Germany

She gave these original watercolors to Bill for his last birthday, before  he tragically  died in the Berlin airlift  in 1948

This oil painting, bought by Eleanor and Bill together in Germany, has hung in the upstairs hallway for as long as I can remember.  As a very small child, I thought that it was a picture of Heaven, and that if I looked long enough, I could catch God peeking out from behind the big cloud.

And I just remembered: she was Jimmy's 2nd grade teacher!