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Archive for October, 2011

Join Black and Orange Cat Foundation for the Second Annual Fall CAT-illion at Eldchrist Winery on Saturday, November 12, from 6-10 pm.

Eldchrist Winery, located at 8189 State Route 736 in Plain City, has kindly agreed to host the second Fall CAT-illion to benefit Black and Orange Cat Foundation on Saturday, November 12, from 6-10 pm (the OSU football game is AWAY that day, so no reason to hold back). Tickets for the CAT-illion are now available.

Tickets are $40 per person or $75 for a couple. Included in the ticket price are unlimited wine by the glass, soft drinks, coffee, and tea, as well as hors d’oeuvres and entertainment by classical guitarist Tip House.

B and Mittens are the kitties that are featured on the label of Kitten’s Kiss Wine. These two went through a Black and Orange clinic to get neutered and vaccinated. Thus, to thank Black and Orange, the Winery has graciously offered to conduct this classy fundraiser once again.

Besides everything that Eldchrist Winery has planned, Black and Orange also plans to have Christmas gift items and baskets for sale during the event.

A former adopter and good friend to B and O, Olivia Brininger, will be selling Lia Sophia jewelry with a portion of the proceeds benefiting Black and Orange.

We plan to have a lot of fun, so if you want to come, get your tickets now. The Winery can only hold 50 people per fire code, so Eldchrist will be selling around 50 tickets for the evening. If you would like tickets, you can purchase them by credit card by calling the Winery at (614) 874-6240. You can also stop in while they are open on Fridays from 6 pm to 9 pm and Saturdays from 2 pm to 8 pm.

Additionally, we have tickets for sale here at the drugstore. Just ask Joe or me for more information or to purchase a ticket. Eldchrist Winery will also have some tickets available to purchase at the door the night of the event.

Happy Halloween and Happy 12-Year-Anniversary To Plain City Druggist!

As Halloween arrives, we will be celebrating our 12-year-anniversary–the drugstore dozen. We would just like to take the time to thank all of our wonderful customers and the Plain City community for supporting us over the last 12 years.

Trick-or-treat will be on Monday, October 31, from 6-8 pm and, while we won’t be throwing one of our giant parties this year during Beggar’s Night, that does not mean we are not grateful to everyone for shopping locally with us!

We could not do what we do without those of you who walk through our front doors, ring the bell at the drive-thru window, and request deliveries. Thank you to all the wonderful people, like Kenny Banks (pictured here sporting his Happy Halloween shirt), who we have met and grown to love through the years.

We hope, with your help, to be in Plain City for a dozen more years.

The Race to be Mayor of Plain City. Sandra Adkins and Doug Saxour Are the Candidates on November 8.

On November 8, voters in Plain City will be choosing a mayor for our growing village. In the running are current Mayor Sandra Adkins, who has served for 8 years in her position as Mayor and 2 years on Village Council, and Doug Saxour, who has served for 3 years on Village Council.

You can meet both mayoral candidates at The Madison County Meet the Candidates Night on Wednesday, October 26 from 6-9 pm at the London High School Auditorium, 336 Elm Street, in London, Ohio. To find out more, go HERE.

You can find out more about current Mayor Sandra Adkins by visiting her Facebook page, Sandra Adkins for Mayor, HERE.

There is also information about her on The Columbus Dispatch’s Voters Guide, which can be accessed HERE.

You can find out about Doug Saxour on his web site www.saxour4mayor.com or by visiting his Facebook page HERE.

One thing Joe and I were interested to see on Doug’s Facebook page was his question, “What type of business or amenity would you like to see move into Plain City?” Four people said that they wanted to see a CVS at the corner of 161 and 42. When we looked at who had voted for that, we only knew one of the people listed (the others were all from out of town). Sadly, though, there are still many people here in town who don’t know Plain City Druggist exists just down the road from the corner of 161 and 42! Joe made me add the category, “Keep and Support Current Local Businesses” (so if you go on to vote for your favorites, please vote for that, too).

And make sure you VOTE on November 8!

The Magic of Silver Pennies: Happy 89th Birthday to my Grandma Timmons Who Died in 1999.

On October 19, my grandma, Florine Payne Timmons, would have turned 89. She died on October 13, 1999, less than a week shy of her 77th birthday. I wrote this story about silver pennies a few years ago for our local newspaper, but I think it is worth repeating here for her birthday. Happy Birthday, Grandma. You are loved and missed.

When I was in the first or second grade, I discovered, in the elementary school library, a children’s book of poetry called, All the Silver Pennies.

The book, with its silver cover, was an anthology that combined two volumes of poems, both of which were edited by Blanche Jennings Thompson: Silver Pennies and More Silver Pennies.

I was intrigued, however, by the words in the preface:

“You must have a silver penny

To get into Fairyland.”

My best friend, Amy, and I fervently believed in fairies.  We used to spend our recesses in grade school building fairy houses at the back of the playground lot using twigs and grass and leaves.

When we spent the night with each other, we would troop through the pastures surrounding our houses looking for fairy rings, circles of worn grass that showed where the wee folk had danced.

We would try to stay up until midnight, a magic hour, eyelids heavy, hoping to see twinkling fairy lights on the lawn outside the bedroom window.  Several times we did see tiny glimmers in the rooms of Amy’s dollhouse and we knew the fairies were abroad.

We knew the lore about fairies, too. Fairies, we had read, were supposedly angels who wouldn’t take sides in the Battle in Heaven between God and Lucifer. Cast out of Paradise for their indecisiveness, the fairies did not go to Hell, but rather were sent to Earth. Once here, they tried to make Earth a magical place like heaven.

We knew that Fairyland was located somewhere on Earth.

When we found the Silver Pennies book, filled with poems about fairies and elves and other magical beings, we were delighted.  Even more so, when we learned that all we needed to get into Fairyland was a silver penny.

But where to find a silver penny?

As with all things confusing or unknown to me, I knew my grandma would have the answer.

“When I was younger,” Grandma said, “My Aunt Lulie had a grocery.  On the front counter, there used to be a jar filled with silver pennies.”

A jar of silver pennies!! Hundreds of tickets to Fairyland.

“So silver pennies really exist?” I asked, breathlessly.  The only pennies I knew of were the copper ones I stuffed in my piggy bank.

Grandma told me that the silver pennies were made during the second World War when copper was needed for the war effort.  They were only around for a short time in the 1940s and then again for a year or so in the 1950s.

“They weren’t real silver, though.  They were nickel.  But everyone called them silver pennies because they were a bright silver in color.  You know, I think I might have one somewhere.”

After searching through several of her old pocketbooks, Grandma found a coin purse at the bottom of one bag.  Hidden among the letters Uncle Donnie had sent from Vietnam, the flat, deflated wallet appeared empty.

Inside the coin purse was a silver penny.

My friend, Amy, and I tried on numerous occasions to get into Fairyland with the silver penny.  Eyes squeezed tightly shut, fingers gripping the edge of the coin, we chanted, “You must have a silver penny to get into Fairyland…”

But we never went anywhere.  Opening our eyes, we would still be standing in the exact same spot in a field or in Amy’s bedroom or on the school playground.  The silver penny never transported us anywhere.

Moving from childhood into the realm of adults, I forgot about silver pennies and fairies.  I tucked the coin away in a change purse, just like Grandma had done, and I didn’t think about it.

Until Grandma died.

When we went to have Grandma’s headstone made, I knew exactly what I wanted etched on to the surface with her name.

“You must have a silver penny to get into Fairyland.”

Because while the silver penny never physically took me from Ohio or my home, I was transported during my childhood to magical places due mostly to the love of my grandma.  Grandma always had the tokens, the charms, the silver pennies that made the world special and moved my life out of the mundane and into the secret areas of my imagination.

“We can put the penny on there, too,” the man at the monument office told us.

Today my silver penny is embedded in black stone, its surface shining in the sunshine atop a grassy hill.

I touch the penny every time I visit Grandma in the cemetery and I am transported back in time to days spent on Grandma’s lap reading books, telling stories, and being rocked to sleep.

I am transported in my memories to a time when Grandma braided my hair, put apple butter on my toast, and cut the edges off of my sandwiches.

Finally, when I close my eyes, that penny whisks me away to the Fairyland of my youth.

I had to grow up to know how to use it.

Public Library Remembrances: Vote Yes for Our Super Library!

Harper Lee wrote in To Kill a Mockingbird, “Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing.”

While I cannot remember a time when I did not love reading, there have been moments when I, too, have taken the ability for granted. Even more so, I have taken for granted the many public libraries that bestowed the great gift of books and reading upon me.

Until now when my library, the Plain City Public Library, cannot be taken for granted any longer.

I think the Plain City Public Library is one of the nicest libraries I have ever used.  But if the tax levy does not pass this November, it may not be able to maintain its level of service to our community.  If the tax levy does not pass, the library may be forced to cut many programs currently offered.

The library is hoping to renew their current operating levy, which amounts to approximately $21 per $100,000 valuation (the same amount as it receives now).  This would be carried out over a five year period.  To put this into perspective, recently published hard cover books cost somewhere in the $25-30 range.  New DVDs cost nearly $20.  For the amount of tax you would pay, you could buy one or two books per year and one or two DVDs.  Or you could vote yes, support the library, and use an unlimited number of books and DVDs (the library has approximately 67,000 books and 10,000 audiovisual titles, plus access to millions of items through the Ohio intrastate library network) for an amount that will benefit the library in a huge way.

That seems a small price to pay for something I consider priceless.

Priceless, because public libraries made me the person I am today.

I always received books for birthdays and holidays, but my small collection was never enough to satisfy my insatiable appetite for reading.

From the time I could have one, I had my own library card.  Mom took Bobbie and me weekly to the public library in Mechanicsburg.  I always checked out my own books.   At that time, you had to actually sign your name in a card in the book!!  How archaic, I know.  Usually, my name was followed or preceded by my best friend, Amy’s name.  We read all the same books.  I was cool back then.  I only signed “Robin T.” and everyone knew it was me.

I’ve looked at some of those old signature cards as an adult and my childish handwriting brings to mind dozens of kindred spirits.

I made many childhood friends at the library.  Friends I still cherish.  Nancy Drew and Anne Shirley and Jo March.  Those friends are a part of me, haunting the shadowy halls of memory.

Every summer, we arrived at the library, clutching a box of crayons and a bumpy pillow from our bed.  We were members of the “Pillow and Crayon Club” at the Mechanicsburg Public Library.  The librarians, who were like members of our own family, shepherded us into a back corner of the adult section of the library (the only time we children were allowed in that forbidden realm).  We perched atop our pillows, legs and arms splayed out at awkward angles, while a librarian read books to us, holding them up so we could see the pictures.  I sat entranced, a spell of words cast upon me, lost in the worlds that appeared before me on smooth, cool pages.

Before she began reading, the librarian lit a candle.  Whoever sat quietly, no wiggling or whispering, during the entire story time, was chosen to blow out the flame when we finished.  I sat so still.  It was a big deal to get to puff out your cheeks and send a giant burst of air at the tiny spit of fire.

I was never chosen.

I never understood why the librarian picked the most unruly kid in the group to blow out the candle; the one she bribed with the ritual when he kicked his neighbors and guffawed loudly at inappropriate points in the story.

I would have sat still for a book, though, even without the candle and the librarians knew it.

Then one day, I was too old for “Pillow and Crayon Club.”

I was never, however, too old for libraries.

There were many other libraries to explore and, exquisitely, an endless supply of books.  In the summers, when I stayed with grandma, I rode my bike to the Hilliard Library.  They bagged my treasures up in a plastic drawstring bag and I rode home, books banging against my shin as I pedaled.  Often, grandma walked to the library with me—she loved to read as much as I did—and we spent whole afternoons wandering the aisles of books.

At home, I curled up in grandma’s lap and we became acquainted with James and the Giant Peach or Harriet the Spy or Old Yeller.

My aunt also took me, on special occasions, to the Upper Arlington Public Library and sometimes to the enormous library in downtown Columbus.  She possessed library cards to both.  You can imagine my jealousy!!

In those long ago days, before the internet, I had to search the library for information for book reports and papers.  Libraries were filled with magic; filled with all the knowledge of the world if you only knew where to look.

Libraries also served other purposes for me as I grew to be a teenager.   I was never as comfortable as in the confines of a library, surrounded by books.  Libraries were safe havens.

And, so, for a time, I hid out in a library.

When Joe and I first started dating, we weren’t allowed to see each other for a stretch of time.  I told everyone that I was going to the Urbana Public Library after school and I met Joe there.  We sat at a table well in view of the whole world, whispering, passing notes, doing homework, and giving each other starry-eyed looks.

Joe and I also went to the downtown library in Columbus on dates.  We didn’t have any money, but there was plenty to see and do at the library.  We watched the people who came in; we searched the reference section.  Mostly, we just wanted to be together, so it didn’t matter what we were doing.  The library served as a backdrop to our budding romance.

I have fond memories of public libraries.

I don’t want our public library to become only a memory. So PLEASE Vote Yes for our library!

To read a recent Madison Press article about the services provided at the Plain City Public Library, go HERE.

Please vote Yes for the Library Renewal Tax Levy this November.  You can also help by becoming a Friend of the Library.  For more information, please contact the Plain City Public Library Director, Chris Long, at 614-873-4912, ext. 23 or via email at clong@plaincitylib.org

To visit the Library Facebook page, go HERE.