God Sent My Love to Me

By Patricia Ann McGentry

I had loved a boy whom broke my heart. I had wanted him to become a Christian, but he wanted something else in life. I prayed and prayed if he was not right for me that God would send the one. God answered my prayer. I met a young man whom also had a broken heart. This man became the love of my life. We were so matched. We liked the same things and have worked together raising his little girl and adopting another. We loved working together at every aspect of life. We were called lovebugs wherever we go because we hold hands and have been together for sixty years. We loved each other more every day and thanked God for being our guide with mind and body.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Mar 10, 2020
• ISBN: 9781645154402

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God Sent My Love to Me

Patricia Ann McGentry

Copyright © 2019 by Patricia Ann McGentry

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Dear Reader,

I have kept a diary of things, memories since North and I married in 1957. A few days ago, as we recalled some of our struggles, North said, We should write a book. It may be a help to others as they start out in their married life.

We give God all the praise for our good health and strength throughout our lives.

Patricia Ann McGentry

Ibegin my book with my parents and how they started their married life, we three girls, and their teaching us to work and trust in God’s love.

My father was a young good-looking plumber, inside plumbing was new to homes, at this time.

Mother was a cute petite orphan girl who works in the town drugstore.

Mother told us girls that they were married during the worst part of the Depression, 1929–1930. Dad had worked in the coal mine but got a job as a plumber before they were married.

They rented a small house in East Rainelle, West Virginia. They had a bed and a stove, probably handed down by family or friends. They used wooden crates as their table and chairs, but it was a start.

They had a few chickens. Mom sold eggs to buy things they needed. As they waited for Dad’s work to pick up, it was three years before Wilma Lee was born on May 26, 1932. They bought a cow before I was born on September 24, 1934. Ida Jane was born fifteen months later on March 8, 1936. Doctors told her she’d face certain death if she were to have another child. They didn’t do caesarean surgery back then. My dad would not have a son to take hunting and fishing.

Mother had bad headaches when we were small. We would play paper dolls and have to be real quiet so she could rest until she could be up for work again.

Dad and Mom were devout Christians who attended the Church of God based in Anderson, Indiana. They would pick up my grandmother and take her with us. Dad loved to sing. He had a beautiful voice. As soon as we girls were big enough to remember a song, we were placed in front of the congregation, singing nursery songs together.

Grandmother lived on what they called government relief or widow’s pension. Her home was a couple blocks from our home. Mother would take us for a walk to visit her. It was a long way for us. We would stop and rest at a friend’s house. She had a glider swing her husband had made for her. We enjoyed swinging in that while they visited.

In 1938, before we started to grade school, Dad rented a house just outside of town. We called it the Sammet Place because we rented it from Mr. Sammet.

We had a large garden. There were several acres of land for our cow, chickens, and pigs. Dad build a barn, putting the chickens upstairs and the cows down. A pigpen was built behind it.

Dad led the church choir and taught the young people’s class. The boys from his class came to our home often, as mother always had snacks. They built a pond for us to catch the water runoff from the mountain behind our house. The three of us girl would wade around in the pond singing, There are days I’d like to be all alone with Christ my Lord (G. T. Byrd, All Alone [public domain, late 1800s]).

Dad also built a cistern that caught that water and piped running water into our home for the wash of garden and gardening.

I took the place of a boy Dad never had. I was the strongest of the three.

And I loved to work outside as well as inside. We took turns with our jobs.

We climbed trees, made playhouses of our woodshed, and fastened shoe heels to our feet with jar rings for high heels. Dad bought wood for the stove from Meadow River Lumber Company, the largest lumber company in the USA at the time.

We discovered a coal-mining tipple just beyond our fence. We disobeyed order and went to investigate. We found we could push the little coal car up the track, get in it, ride down toward the dump, and jump out before we would be dumped into a train coal car. We never told Mother but took our company here often.

Farther up the hill toward the coal mine, we met two guards. They were real nice to us. We took Mother up to meet them and had a picnic lunch. I remember Saturdays were special. Mother gave us a bath, washed our hair, and rolled it on rollers. Dad would park the car by the street where we could watch the people as they shopped. Dad and Mom would visit with folks along the street while we sat in the car.

Uncle George had a pool hall uptown. He gave his two sons and me little rubber bull based on the Walt Disney character Ferdinand. I carried mine with me often in a little handbag. I felt safe with him.

We caught the school bus to school. I took Ferdinand to school. I hid him in my desk. When I would forget him, hurrying to catch the bus, I’d call the principal, and he would go to my room, get him, and take him to his office until the next morning when I went to get him.

We lived next door to Dr. Jefferson and his family. They had two girls and a little boy. We loved playing in the girl’s fancy playhouse and seeing their little pony. Paggy, Molley, and Carl were their children.

We lived beside the highway. Many bums would stop by to ask for food. Mother would give them a job to do and fix them a plate. One Sunday morning, she set our dinner on the porch to cool until we came home from church. When we returned, it was gone, pot, pans, and all. She never did that anymore.

I failed the third grade. Dad was beside himself. Lee and Jane were all right, and here was me. Mom and Dad had neither tried to teach us any schooling. I felt Dad was ashamed of me. It hurt me.

Dad bought a six-acre farm in McRoss. He also bought a building in town for his plumbing shop. We had a house, barn, and a chicken coop. He tore down the barn where we had lived. He piled the lumber on a big rock behind the house. I built a house of it, no nails but a roof and widows.

The pastor of our church came to live with us. He drew up plans for remodeling our four-room house into six rooms.

Lee and I were put to work digging a space big enough for men to work under the house for a basement.

The house was raised, and Granddad as we called our pastor, turned a four-room house into six rooms. It was beautiful when it was finished, and the dirt was filled in around rocks to make Mother a flower garden beside the house.

Before school would start, Grandad bought a blackboard and began teaching me to read and spell. I vowed then I would teach my children to read and spell before first grade. I had glasses by now. I was near-sighted in one eye and far-sighted in the other.

He knew also that I loved to draw. He bought me a set of paints for Christmas. He used an old window shade and painted a picture while I watched. (Later as it fell apart, I would paint it myself to remember him.)

My dad was not one to save money. Mother would steal fifty cent pieces from his pocket. She would save enough to make the house payments each month.

She might buy a bag of candy for us girls along with the grocery. We girls divided it. I hid mine to have a little along. Jane and Lee ate theirs and wondered how I always had some left for later.

We took turns with house cleaning. I liked the kitchen bedrooms and bath. In the barnyard, I liked the barn, chicken house, and rabbit pens. I loved to smell the fresh hay in there after it was cleaned.

We girls liked to explore in the woods. We found a cabin built by boy scouts. It made a perfect place for our youth fellowship vesper service and picnic when going for hikes.

I remembered pushing Jane, who was only seventeen months younger than me, to my uncle’s store, three miles down the highway from our house in our utility cart, and mother never worried about someone kidnapping us.

Worship was important in our home. We read our Bible and thanked God each day for his keeping and asked his blessing on others. I thought our church’s teaching to be strict—no skating, bowling, or movies, or jokes were permitted.

We were in World War II during this time of our life. Our families used food stamps for groceries, gas, and other items that help clothe our men in the service. The war ended in September of 1945.

I was doing much better in school by the sixth grade. I was elected to read the class will for our graduation program.

Our principal came to our class to give us a few going-away words. He said, There is one member of our class who did not receive a diploma. Ferdinand, the bull, who has attended our class all these years. Patricia, would you please come up to receive his diploma? I was shocked. He handed me a handwritten diploma. The diploma looked like the one given by schools. When I read it after I got home, I could have cried. The words were so sweet. I wanted to keep it always.

When I was eleven, I could go to our church’s youth camp with Lee. This year, Mother joined us. She would be a councilor to the girls. Jane got to come along also.

Lee, Jane and I would sing in the service sometimes as a trio. We sang without accompaniment. The leaders thought we were good.

I would meet Joan McGuire in the seventh grade. We would share classes. We had a close friendship for two years. She didn’t read a Bible at home. She would ask me questions. I brought my Bible to school. We would read it in our study-hall hour. I really enjoyed my time with her. We often spent time at her home or mine.

This summer, I would meet Asa. He was a nice boy from town. He came to our home. Mother would let Jane and I go for bike rides with him and his friend. We would ride around to the little park close to our home. He would bring me a stick of gum each time he came. I kept the paper and wrote what we did each day like a diary. I thought I was in love. (I hung them on the wall above my bed.)

I entered an art contest in a magazine. One day, a man came to our home to sell me art lessons. Dad paid for the first class. I started working on it but found it would take a lot of time from my study. I gave it up then. I kept my books to work on later.

I started the ninth grade with Betty Pack. We took bookkeeping classes. She went to our church now as she dated Kenneth Boyd from our church.

Mother always went with our youth to church convention. One day she said, This is one trip Ferdinand has not come along. Wrong, I had him in my little bag. I always knew we were safe as I had him. I could use him as a club, if needed.

Dad hired a secretary. She was plump. He didn’t like that. Mother asked, Do you want a secretary or a model? Mother took this country girl under her wing, as you say, helping her buy clothes. I helped with her hair so she looked nice. She was a good bookkeeper as she’d had that in school.

At sixteen, I could go to work along with Lee. I began to work on the dry-goods counter with a girl named Geneva. She was born the day I was. We made skirts alike and pretended we were twins. I enjoyed working there. We worked at Murphy’s Five and Dime store

I would meet Will Spence in my junior year of high school. He was tall and rather good looking. He was real popular with the girls in school. He asked me for a date. I couldn’t believe it. He was friends with Carl, our doctor’s son, because I knew Carl. I said, I’d go. We were to double date. They came to get me in the doctor’s Catalac car.

I would date Will during my junior and senior year of school. Will went to church with me now and then but wouldn’t commit himself to the Lord. I kept