REMEMBERING AND HONORING ERSKINE EUGENE ROUTE' JR.

I’ve delayed writing this post because it is surreal to me that Erskine Eugene Route' Jr. is no longer with us. Erskine departed this life on August 1, 2019 at the young age of fifty. Erskine and my brother, Larry, had been friends as long as I can remember - so when I got the news of his passing it was deeply painful and felt like I had lost a brother from another mother.

Although I have many fond memories of Erskine from over the years, one of my favorite occurred almost twenty years ago when I obtained my first master’s degree. You see, Erskine attended my graduation along with my family. They all came up the night before from Springfield, IL and stayed at my house in Hanover Park, IL. Unbeknownst to me, Erskine and I had something in common - we both snored loudly. After waking up, my family complained about how Erskine and I snored so loud it was ridiculous, they couldn’t get any sleep, and that it didn’t make any sense how loud we both snored. Erskine and I brushed off the negative comments about our snoring — after all he and I slept well — and we all laughed ourselves silly. I am smiling thinking about this memory.

After the graduation, I remember talking about some of my other educational goals and dreams with Erskine. True to his character, Erskine said, “Why not? You should go for it.” He also shared some other encouraging words. Truthfully, the fact that he accompanied my family to my graduation spoke volumes to me and will forever be etched in my heart.

As I write and reflect on Erskine’s life, tears are falling down my face. I’m saddened he’s no longer with us, but thankful God allowed our paths to cross on this journey called life.  In closing, the following words express what Erskine’s life meant to me:

E-encouraging (always provided words of encouragement to others)

R-relationship-oriented (loved being around family and friends)
S-soft spoken (didn’t need to be loud to get his point across)
K-kind (treated everyone with kindness)
I-intelligent (spoke intelligently about any subject)

N-no nonsense (didn’t take any mess and always stood his ground)
E-easy going (got along with everybody and didn’t let folks stress him out)

Finally, my thoughts and prayers are with Erskine’s father and mother, brother, son, daughters, and grandson, family, friends, and colleagues at the Illinois Comptroller’s Office.

Erskine you are truly missed. RIP!

© Carla J. Curtis, August 2019

Mourning’s Over: It’s Dancing Time

Photo by Spencer Dahl on Unsplash

Wow! While cleaning out files on my computer recently, I ran across this article that I wrote in November 2015 that was never published. Writing has always been cathartic for me, so writing this article during such a tough year was necessary and therapeutic. You see, in 2015, I lost four close loved ones: my Aunt Sylvia, my beloved mother, Carline, my Aunt Shirley, and my Uncle Clarence, in addition to coping with all kinds of life stressors. Truth be told, 2013 and 2014 were tough years too, but in 2015 I thought that I would end up in a psych ward. If you are going through some tough times, I hope something in this article will encourage you to keep pressin’ on no matter what.

• ≿————-　❈　————-≾

Sickness, death, financial strain, family issues, stress, worry and transitions on many levels have been constant these last few years for me. In the midst of them all, I’ve been blessed too, but there have been some days when getting out of bed was a painful chore. What I found interesting, though, during these times, is that when reading the Bible—no matter what chapters I chose to get me through the particular tribulation--I always ended up re-reading the scriptures that I had highlighted earlier:

Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing: thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness; To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee, and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give thanks unto thee forever (Psalm 30:11-12 KJV). 

Each time after reading these scriptures, I say to myself, “Here go these scriptures again.” 

This morning while thanking God that I had a great Thanksgiving even though this is the first one without my mother, I felt a sense of peace. Now, leading up to this day was not easy, and of course there were many tears shed, but I got through it. About thirty of us gathered together at my cousins’ house eating some great food and having wonderful conversation. I truly thank God for this time! And, although Christmas and New Year’s Eve are just around the corner, I am thanking God in advance for the great time that I am going to have even before my plans are made.  

Reminiscing about the last few days, I rejoice that my heaviness is no longer all consuming. I decided to read these scriptures again, and this time the meaning was clearer to me.  The dark fog is melting away. That is not to say that I still don’t have some struggles, because I do, but I now no longer allow them to consume my every thought and allow them to totally drain me emotionally, preventing me from enjoying life.  

Life is not always going to be easy, but God surely reminded me today while in deep thought lying in my bed this morning, that mourning’s over and it’s dancing time – figuratively and literally – so I’m gonna put on my dancing shoes! 

© Copyright Carla J. Curtis

July 2019

Thankful for New Beginnings

My darling daughter, Terra, I want to publicly acknowledge how proud I am that today you started on your new career path as a Nurse Practitioner! All of your hard work, sacrifice and dedication has paid off. And, I want you to always remember you can achieve any of your goals as long as you keep God first, because without God in your life, none of your accomplishments would have even been possible. As your mother, I admire the woman you have become. You are an awesome wife, mother, daughter and granddaughter.

While you were growing up, I know sometimes you might have thought I was being hard on you, but I just wanted you to never settle for mediocracy, as well as to be an independent thinker, and always be in a position as an adult where you could take care of yourself. Over the years, I know our journey from Illinois to Maryland to Virginia and back to Illinois hasn’t always been easy. Even so, through the good and bad times, you’ve learned to persevere no matter what, and for that I am forever grateful.

Who would have ever known back in the day that this latchkey kid in Maryland, would go from being a Licensed Cosmetologist, Licensed Professional Nurse, Registered Nurse, and Assistant Director of Nursing, to now being a Nurse Practitioner. I know they say that Black Girls Rock – well mommies’ baby – you are a Black Girl that Sure Nuff Rocks!!

I love you very much and I am thankful for new beginnings!!!

p.s. Um, can I now retire and move in with you and your family lol? Also, you know I had to share one of my favorite pictures of us when we lived in Hillcrest Heights, Maryland. Mommie's baby...

Feeding the Dogs Rib Tips

I enjoyed spending time with family during Christmas. While there I got some much-needed rest, ate entirely too much food, and realized that I was more than ready to put 2016 behind me and welcome 2017 with open arms.

You see, last Wednesday while at my daughter and her husband's house hanging with my 3 grandchildren, 1 of their cousins, and 2 grand-dogs, I found myself feeding the 2 grand-dogs some of the rib tips that my oldest granddaughter and I had just purchased. Yes, I refer to the dogs as grand-dogs because my daughter and family always refer to me as their nana. Since my daughter is stubborn and I don’t have time to sweat the small stuff, I just went along with it. The truth is I am not an animal person - at least I used to not be - and it was just 2 days before when I was hollering at the dogs because they were in my daughter and her husband's bed. They treat the dogs like humans and spoil them rotten. This is a blog post for another day...

While feeding my grand-dogs rib tips, I knew then that I was ready for a new year because obviously, I had a moment of insanity. When my daughter came home, all that she could do was shake her head and say "Mom, you should only be giving the dogs the bones and not the rib tips." I responded "They are getting rib tips today." Truthfully, I shouldn't have been eating them anyway but let's not get into that subject right now. Then again, my doctor said that I can treat myself every now and then.

Shortly after we were all eating rib tips and I was sitting on the coach, Cocoa (pit bull) came and sat in between my legs and was just chillin'. All that I could do was shake my head and laugh because I knew Cocoa probably was thinking "Nana was hollering a few days ago at me and Chewy and today she is feeding us rib tips. Perhaps she's losing it."

Well, it is now 2017, and the next time I go home to visit, I am going to buy some more rib tips and share with Cocoa and Chewy. Why? Because I can...and just to get on my daughter and son-in-law's nerves lol.

After reading this blog post, I bet you'll never look at rib tips the same lol! 

By the way, one thing that I will never lose is my sense of humor and neither should you. After all, laughter is therapeutic.

Happy New Year!!