Fern Ridge Review
Creswell Chronicle
Sweet Lorane Community News
January 03, 2019
By Pat Edwards
Happy New Year!
Personally, I was glad to wave good-bye to 2018, although I have to admit, it produced two wonderful, beautiful new great-grandbabies for us.
Transitioning has never been an easy thing for me, but it seems that about every 10 years or so, I feel the need to move my life along so I can experience new and different things. Once I reached adulthood, it was as a farmers’ wife and then mother. Soon, I donned the hats of active school parent and the Lorane 4-H coordinator. That coincided and eventually morphed into a sports mom with 4 kids all playing on different teams in different sports at the same time. When the kids were getting ready to begin leaving the nest, we bought our store – the Lorane Family Store – and I ran it for the first 8 years until Jim took over the reins. By then, my love for writing resulted in Nancy’s, Marna’s and my first book on the history of Lorane. The new computer skills I learned led me to my very fascinating job at the University of Oregon, working with a group of renowned scientists in the Institute of Neuroscience. Then, after 15 years, came retirement, and soon, my involvement with Judy Hays-Eberts on the Groundwaters magazine and, eventually, the establishment of Groundwaters Publishing.
I’m still the managing editor of Groundwaters and Jen Chambers and I hope to continue producing the anthology for as long as we’re able. I love writing my weekly columns for the Fern Ridge Review and the Creswell Chronicle and researching and producing what I hope to be annual books based on Lorane’s history.
But, the years are beginning to take their toll on both Jim and me. This new transition is possibly the most difficult yet because it means divesting ourselves of the responsibilities that go along with being business owners and landlords for 41 years. It’s not easy to let go even though we know we need to. Thank goodness we have the help and support of our family, but it is a huge burden on them, as well.
Once we get through all of this, we hope to free up time to do a bit of traveling and experience some of the things that we have saved for true retirement, if possible. We welcome 2019 and are excited to find out what it has in store for us.
My hope is that each of your expectations and resolutions for the year are fulfilled and that we all begin to embrace a kinder, gentler, more tolerant and forgiving world for all of us.
All Things Lorane 