Updates

 Good afternoon, Classmates.

By now you've heard that Muriel Felder Haysbert went home to Jesus earlier this week. Of course it's early for arrangements but keep a look out and I will too so that we can inform everyone. I thought you all would enjoy this article as Muriel was a forever Dancing Doll who attended every DD reunion if she was physically able: https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/louisiana/articles/2019-11-02/dancing-dolls-brought-pizzazz-to-southern?context=amp

While you're lifting up her family in your daily prayers, remember that our sister Pamela Locket Banks' mother also went home.  Pam really needs your prayers and words of encouragement. Arrangements are also pending. Pam's mother was one of those who was mother to all of us.

Lift up our sister Joycelyn Harrison who is recovering from surgery. Prayer is extremely powerful in healing. Ask me how I know.

Keep Russell Kelly and his in your prayers as the weeks following recent homegoing services bring home the heartbreaking reality of the absence of our loved ones. 

The blessed family of Michael Thomas are all safely living in Zachary for a time until Mrs. Thomas's house can be rebuilt. Mrs. Thomas told me she was glad to have a place to stay but she cannot wait to be in her own home in Parkwood Terrace among her PT neighbors. She is blessed to have Michael as a son who will blow in from Texas and take care of business. In case you were not aware, there was a fire in the home in the wee hours of the same evening of our gathering in Baker. 

As for our meeting that did not materialize it did not happen due to more serious considerations--and that is the COVID situation in BR.  The Delta Variant is a real danger here among folks who don't comprehend the urgency of this deadly disease and feel their freedom to go maskless out-weighs the general public's freedom to life! We fall into the age category that can possibly be hit hardest by this disease... and the folks who think it's fake.

As you will recall, we had a Zoom meeting before, however only four people logged in. I rather blame myself a bit as I did not send out a reminder a day or two before for all of our 65-66-year-old brains. So we decided to have a part in person / part virtual meeting and dinner at the Drusilla Seafood Restaurant in hopes that more classmates would show. As soon as I get the go-ahead from our prez Rose, I will send you the link to our new Zoom meeting which is how we'll have to roll on the next get-together/meeting.

For short announcements and links to this blog to your phone, please join our Remind notice group through your CELL PHONE. The app is not as effective through email and that part is being slowing phased out. No one else, not even the admins, see your phone number or that you sent a reply to admin. Our talk via text can continue but the Remind is for announcements. Covering all bases, I will continue to send emails as well, and ask you to forward to others who may not receive them-- another way of covering all bases in an attempt to make sure we communicate with everyone. Text or email me for the Remind code. 

Reiterating-- We. Are. Collecting. Dues. It's  $20 a month or $240 a year. Send them to Sheldon Johnson or Anthony Beasley. They've been doing a wonderful job collecting and Anthony's record keeping and reporting is immaculate as evidenced in the email he sent and the last blog entry.

Dues cover our hospitality extended to our beloved classmates in their time of bereavement. Valerie Woods Triggs has been doing a wonderful job of  making sure arrangements and cards get to our classmates. You can still send your individual cards and gifts but these are being sent from us as a group. Dues are also for special events for which we will gather and to make future reunion costs more palatable. When it is safe to do so, we will continue our getting together socially a few times a year. I  think there was another reason for dues, however, I cannot think of it right now and I have written enough to judge that you have zoned out by this time as information leaks out of your ears as it does mine.

For whatever I forgot to mention, someone with the other half of my brain, please mention it in the comments below.😋

One more thing! You all know Rodney Reese from the CO'74. He has been the ambassador for those with sarcoidosis in BR for years. According to Sheldon, Rodney needs our prayers as he has been hospitalized in an ICU. People, besides cancer, we should not know as many people as we do with this rare disease nor Lupus. They are in the list of auto-immune conditions more common among those of us who attended the Lab School during the decades that we did. IJS.