Angela

By Jerald L Hanson

Beautiful Lee Sanitarium, on a bluff overlooking the Mississippi River in Natchez, Mississippi, is the setting for this tender story of Angela Lorraine Demming. She is a fifty nine year old identical twin who is given a second chance at youth. Her husband unknowingly makes a necklace for her from a radio active gold nugget. The odd and short lived radiation affects her in an amazing way. The story follows her backwards through the aging process with her twin sister Betty at her side.
Angela is fortunate to spend her convalescence in a very unique nursing home. It is an antebellum mansion in Natchez Mississippi which caters to ladies who wish to spend their later years in a genteel mid ninteenth century setting.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trafford Publishing
• Release date: Aug 3, 2006
• ISBN: 9781412211383

Jerald L Hanson

    Born August 31, 1942 in Aurora, Illinois, Jerry Hanson grew up on a dairy farm in rural Yorkville, Illinois. As a teenager he worked as a printers devil for the Kendall County Record and as a teller at the Farmers State Bank. After leaving for college and four years in the U. S. Air Force, he returned to Yorkville and a job at the bank. At age fifty two he retired from the banking business with a list of things he wanted to experience. He has since studied Anthropology at Northern Illinois University, attended the J. B. Hunt truck driving school, been trained as a Harley Davidson Mechanic and written two novels. For information about other books by Jerald Hanson please visit: The Innocent Hero, William, Forth and Back and Pure Gold

Book preview

Contents

Chapter 1  Natchez

Chapter 2  The Gift

Chapter 3  The Test

Chapter 4  The Funeral

Chapter 5  The Illness

Chapter 6  Family

Chapter 7  Lee Sanitarium

Chapter 8 Rosalie

Chapter 9  Settling In

Chapter 10  The Awakening

Chapter 11  Where Next?

Chapter 12  The Visitor

Chapter 13  The Entertainer

Chapter 14  The Concert

Chapter 15  Natchez Farewell

Chapter 16  Happ y Holidays

ALSO BY JERALD HANSON

WILLIAM, Forth and Back

Chapter 1

Natchez

It is springtime in Natchez, and the gardens of Lee Sanitarium are alive with color. The pleasant aroma of magnolia blossoms is somehow calming to the soul as these magnificent trees compete for the attention of honey bees. Visitors to Lee this afternoon will be drawn away from the beauty of the gardens to the band shell by the haunting music of a young girl’s voice.

Lee Sanitarium is, by modern standards, a nursing home. It was established at the end of the Civil War for soldiers whose wounds made a normal existence impossible. Lee was a place where they would be made comfortable and looked after for the rest of their lives.

The building, a Southern Planter mansion built around 1812, and the grounds, which covered over 25 acres of lawn, gardens, live oak, and fruit trees, were made available for this noble purpose by the owner, whose husband and sons did not return from the war. The band shell, on a bluff overlooking the Mississippi River, had been constructed of the same cypress wood as the mansion and was in wonderful condition nearly one hundred ninety years later.

The pure soprano of a child’s voice, I dream of Jeanie with the light brown hair, born like a vapor on the summer’s air, was coming from a little girl in a gray cotton dress. She was playing the piano and singing Stephen Foster songs. She looked so very small, all alone at the center of the band shell stage, but her voice was strong and pure. With the amplification of the band shell, she could be heard clearly by riverboat passengers on the Mississippi.

Angela was her name and her age varied, depending upon whom you asked. But the one certainty was her musical talent. Nearly every afternoon she would play and sing in the band shell to an audience of up to fifteen elderly patients, the staff members who assisted them, and an increasing number of Natchez residents who came to hear her music. She played music that she felt was appropriate for her audience, music that she loved, music that carried pleasant memories for her. However, the residents who were able often requested more spirited renderings.

She would play a few moments of ragtime piano for Linda, a blind patient who would soon be ninety-one years old. Linda requested ragtime during every performance, and the other patients perked up when they heard Angela play it.

Angela would occasionally play these spirited numbers on the keyboard in the band shell. But when the weather kept them inside, she would not violate her respect for the concert grand piano in the mansion ballroom. She would not play such rowdy music on this wonderful instrument.

Nearly a year had passed since Angela came to Natchez. She had appeared to be dying of something the medical profession could not identify and was admitted to Lee Sanitarium where around the clock medical attention was available. She adjusted to the routine, but would become restless each day after the noon meal.

After dinner, most of the residents would nap or fall asleep in front of the television, but Angela would wander about the mansion and the beautiful grounds of the sanitarium. She would often sit on one of the park benches on the bluff overlooking the river. There she would rest quietly with her thoughts.

On a rainy afternoon while Angela was admiring the furnishings in the ballroom, she was drawn to the concert grand piano. It faced the windows overlooking the gardens at the far end of this very large room. Angela sat down on the piano bench and ran her fingers lightly over the keys, barely touching them. She thought about the piano lessons she and her twin sister Betty had taken so long ago.

Angela pressed the soft pedal and began to play. Very softly, she played songs that she remembered from a happier time, a time when she and her family would gather around the piano and sing from the Stephen Foster song book.

She began to sing, softly, Way down upon the Swanee River, forgetting about her illness, and thinking only pleasant thoughts of an earlier more carefree time. Angela lost herself in the music and the memories. She played her favorite song, Jeanie With The Light Brown Hair, singing in a pure soprano voice.

The pleasant music traveled like a whisper through the mansion, attracting almost everyone’s attention.

Nearly the entire Lee staff had gathered to listen to Angela. Her gentle music and pure sweet voice held them spellbound.

Chapter 2

The Gift

A golden peanut on a simple golden chain. Angela’s husband stood behind her and lovingly placed the necklace about her neck. It seemed heavy, Angela thought, as Art fastened the clasp and centered the peanut on the chain.

Happy anniversary, he said, as he guided her to the mirror. I found the nugget in the desert and have been working on it in my shop. I just couldn’t wait the four weeks until June third to give it to you. He put his hands about her waist and she held them in hers as the two of them gazed at the happy couple in the mirror.

What a beautiful necklace! It was just perfect. I’ll never take it off, she said, as she gently squeezed his hands.

Angela Lorraine Parsons was born July 14, 1943 about a minute before her identical twin sister Betty Lenore. Her parents, Harold and Martha, were teachers in the Indianapolis school system. They were great parents and so proud of their twin daughters. Mrs. Parsons had found raising two children a full-time job and did not return to teaching until the girls were in the seventh grade.

Her first priority was raising her girls. She immersed herself in the task, helping with kindergarten and Sunday school and nearly every school and church event in which the girls participated.

They grew up too quickly for Mom and Dad Parsons. The twins were good students from grade school on, and other than an occasional twin prank, they were easy girls to raise.

In high school Angela and Betty stayed involved in extracurricular activities. They were in band and chorus and played softball, the only sport which girls were allowed to play. They were very athletic and their team enjoyed several winning seasons with, of course, mom and dad cheering them on.

During basketball season the twins were on the cheerleading squad. They were extremely busy and still managed to stay on the honor roll throughout high school. Angela and Betty often talked to each other about the ideal, nearly-perfect life with which they had been blessed.

Their father often told them, With hard work, things come easily. They would chuckle at that, but realized the wisdom of his words.

After high school, Angela and Betty enrolled in nurses’ training at one of the Purdue University affiliated hospitals. This was their first taste of what Angela called the real world. This was also where the girls met the engineering students whom they would eventually marry.

Milton Phillips and Arthur Demming both served in the army after high school. They met in boot camp in the fall of 1960

and became friends. Both were Hoosier farm boys and encouraged and helped each other through boot camp. They served their tour together and were discharged from the Army and on their way to Purdue University on the same day.

Art and Milton were as serious about their engineering studies as Angela and Betty were about their nursing careers. They met the first week of school during a library orientation. It was attended by a small group of the more dedicated freshmen, and everyone was asked to introduce themselves.

Art wrote on his note pad, Angela red sweater, Betty blue. He showed the note to Milton and tore the words Betty blue off and handed them to him. They grinned at each other and followed the Library Science student who led the Purdue University library tour.

The tour ended on the third floor, and Art seized the opportunity. Angela, what is your major? She was surprised and hesitated a moment. Art extended his hand and said, I’m sorry Angela, I’m Art Demming, pre-engineering.

Milton introduced himself to Betty in similar fashion, and the couples chatted as they made their way from floor to floor by way of the escalators. By the time Art and Angela got back together with Milton and Betty in front of the library, two love stories had begun. Introductions were made, and they agreed to get together again soon.

Art and Milton talked of nothing but the girls on their way to class. From the beginning, the twins were treated as individuals. Art thought Angela was the nicest, smartest, most attractive girl he had ever met, and Milton felt exactly the same way about Betty. They vowed to avoid the twin trap and recognize each of the girls as her own person.

The girls had a very similar conversation on their way across campus. Angela was quite taken with Art and Betty thought Milton was the nicest boy she had met. They especially liked the individual