To The Generations of the Future

Dear Future Generation,
I am writing to give you an idea of what life was like in the year 2009. This year has been a start of a new beginning in life for me. My life changed completely after my mother, Pastor Joyce Dreiman, went to be with the Lord on Easter Sunday of 2008. I made the call to stop CPR and prayed with her as the Lord took her home. She had lymphoma cancer. I had given up my thrift store business and allowed my parents to borrow money on the house to remodel it so they could move in with me. They moved in with me and I cared for mom. The sad thing is I only had two years left on the house loan and the house would have been mine. After my mother’s death my dad refused to help pay any current or future bills and during mom’s illness he had been verbally abusive to Mom and me, so I made him go home with my sister and brother-in-law, who live in Virginia. I was afraid the verbal abuse would turn to physical abuse because I thought he was showing signs of Alzheimer’s disease because he would say or do things in anger and then ten minutes later would not remember what had angered him or what he had said. He always had a close relationship with my sister. She lives in the country, and he always preferred to live in the country where he could sit outside and listen to the frogs croaking, etc. My sister has three beautiful children, two boys and a girl. She is forty-three years old and my brother is forty-one. My brother is married and has four beautiful children, two boys and two girls, and they live in Indiana. My mother was an ordained pastor and co-founder of the ministry called Ring of Fire Evangelistic Ministry located in Olney, Illinois. She spent her life serving others and trying to make them happy. My dad was a school bus driver and self-employed plumber in Olney until he retired. He did not finish high school, but despite that, he was able to retire with a nice pension from the school system.
A few months after my dad left, I was able to sell my house for what was owed on it. The man who purchased the house promised me a job at the Executive Inn (a motel) in Vincennes, Indiana, and a place to live in Lawrenceville, Illinois. I moved to Lawrenceville only to find myself alone and unemployed. My faith and trust in the Lord along with faithful friends kept me alive. I want to point out that if someone seems to have the answers to all your problems, as this person did by providing a way for me to sell my house and promised to give me a place to live and a job, be sure you check everything out first and don’t make quick decisions. I was desperate and felt like I was alone (even though I knew the Lord would see me through this difficult time) and so I could have been living on the street because of my quick decision.
I moved to Vincennes, Indian, in the latter part of January 2009. I had to send my beloved dogs to rescues, and two of them found homes with the help of a friend who volunteers for a local shelter. I was able to take Lucky, who was my mom’s calico cat, with me, and I had to leave my other five cats at the Lawrenceville Humane Society. So I arrived in Vincennes with Lucky, a kitchen stove, bed, computer, desk and clothes. I also had the beautiful cross my mother made for my ordination ceremony and the picture of Jesus walking on the water, which was one of the last items I purchased on a shopping spree before mom knew she was ill. Sadly, these are the items that were left from the last thirty-four years of my life. It took me a month to get settled, and then I was able to go back to the Humane Society to retrieve my cats. Unfortunately, two of the cats had been adopted and the other three I brought home with me were very sick. I took them to the vet and he did everything he could to save them, but two of them died anyway. The only survivor was Markee, who was my grandmother’s cat. I was so upset that I went to the county board meeting in Lawrenceville and spoke on behalf of the animals. I also made reports to the proper authorities, but they could not undo what already had been done. One thing I want to point out is sadly in this time of society, justice is not always achieved because of the friends and political connections of the person who committed the offense. So it was in this case of the neglect of my cats at the humane society.
That brings you up to where I am today. Today I live in an apartment in Vincennes. My apartment is a grand mansion in my eyes because it gives me shelter and a place to call home. But my neighbor considers where we live to be a slum area of town and she is not happy here. I admit the neighborhood has a few drawbacks. For example, there was an explosion next door, and it is rumored that it was due to illegal drug activity. But I am still thanking and praising the Lord for my apartment because it is a warm place to stay – “my home.” I am currently unemployed, and this gets to be overwhelming because I am dependable and willing to learn new skills. The economy is bad so there are no jobs available, and those who are lucky enough to have a job are keeping them. I sometimes have panic attacks because I do not have a steady income and fear what could happen if I don’t find a job. I am an online student at Kaplan University working toward my bachelors in psychology. I hope one day to be employed as an elementary teacher. I pray this will become a reality, but I will be over fifty when I finish my degree, and today’s society does not look favorably on older workers.
I really don’t have any family I stay in contact with on a regular basis. As far as family goes, my pets are my family. I could die and it would be a long time before someone found me because no one checks on me on a regular basis. I missed my dogs so much and because I couldn’t get them back, I placed an ad on a free website asking for a puppy or dog. That is where I found Otis, who is the newest addition to my family. He is a beautiful dachshund with a reddish coat of fur, and he was housebroken, leash-trained, and neutered. His owners traveled, and it was just too lonely for Otis to be left all the time. I was lonely and broken-hearted and so Otis gave me the desire to get up in the morning by being anxious for his morning walk. I have no friends here in Vincennes except for my pets. I stay to myself because I am wounded from what I have been through this past year. I have one friend that lives far from here, and we keep in touch through e-mail. My friend is a retired college teacher, and I would not have made it through this difficult time without his prayers, e-mails, moral and financial support. He still supports me in my call to the ministry because I am an ordained pastor and founder of a ministry called Ring of Fire Evangelistic Ministry. The physical ministry is on hold until the Lord opens the doors for me to reopen it. I pray daily for the Lord to take my life and use it for his glory.
I will give you an example of a typical day for me. I wake up around 7:30 a.m. and take Otis for a walk. Then I feed Otis, Markee, Lucky and myself. I don’t really cook, so most meals are cereal or a microwavable meal. After breakfast I check the internet and newspapers for job possibilities, and if I find some, I go and apply for them. It is usually afternoon by that time, and Otis and I take another walk. After the walk Otis naps at my feet while I watch reruns of the TV show Seventh Heaven. Then around 6:00 p.m. Otis and I take another walk. After the walk I feed Markee, Lucky, Otis and myself. Then I work on homework and write down my thoughts for a book I hope to write and publish. Then around 9:00 p.m. Otis and I take another walk and then prepare for bed. I usually take a shower, brush my teeth, pray and then go to sleep.
The culture of this time has many definitions of morality. I believe what a person believes is that morality is based on the culture he or she was raised in or influenced by. For example, today teenagers having sex seems to be a normal part of life. The choice of living a homosexual lifestyle and having tattoos or body piercing are also common place today. There are many public service programs warning people of the dangers of the risk of getting pregnant or a sexually transmitted disease from having multiple sexual partners and the risk of infection from tattoos and piercings. In today’s society there are many choices of religion and ways to worship. Here in Vincennes, there are mainstream churches that have been here for one hundred years or more and then there are those that were recently started by a group of local people desiring to worship the Lord in a more modern way. It is my belief that by choosing to serve the Lord, it makes living in this world more difficult because you will have to go against what is the popular trend or normal for that point in time because it will cause you to fall into sin if the choice is sin.
My definition of freedom is the ability to make free choices that make me happy. I believe God gives us a free choice to do what is right or wrong. The choices can be moral choices, or choices may be based on what the Lord considers to be right or wrong. God also gives us the choice to do what we want and then allows us to suffer the consequences of the wrong choice. My happiness is based on doing the right thing because it gives me peace in my heart from the Lord.
The poem I have chosen to include in this written time capsule is called The White Flag and was written by Joe Medreck. I chose this poem because to me it explains how I feel about serving the Lord until He takes me home. The flag waving represents my surrender to the Lord. The road represents staying on the path God has planned for my life. The last part of the poem gives me the impression that I will receive peace in my heart even though the storms of life rage around me.
The significant piece of art I would like to share with the future would be Chagall’s Job in Despair. I choice this piece of art because the book of Job shows that even when people are living faithful lives to the Lord, disaster can still fall upon them. The test of the faithful person is to remain faithful to the Lord no matter what the circumstances. This image (in my opinion) shows Job in his misery choosing not to curse God. The being in the background to me represents Satan, the fallen angel who asked the Lord’s permission to test Job. He is waiting to see what Job’s reaction to the disaster was.
The song and artist I thought to be important are Amy Grant and El Shaddai. The song talks about the Lord and how he has been with people since the beginning of time and had the plan to save them. God never changes, and we should give Him praise and glory. I feel this is important for future generations to know because God has the power to save your soul and if you choose to turn your back on God, He has the power to condemn you to the eternal place of fire.
Now the film I am going to tell you about is a classic for its time called House of Dark Shadows. The movie was released in 1970. The story begins when a vampire called Barnabas Collins is released from a family crypt at Collinwood estate. There is a doctor (Julia Hoffman) that falls in love with Barnabas and so does research and finds a temporary cure for his condition. She creates a serum that is a temporary cure as long as he receives regular injections. Barnabas falls in love with a girl who looks like his lost love from centuries before. The doctor becomes jealous and changes the serum, and this causes Barnabas to grow old. Barnabas then drinks the girl’s blood, she dies, and he becomes young again. The movie ends with Barnabas being staked by his assistant who was the one who freed him in the first place. I think this movie was unique because the vampire was a killer but yet the people give him sympathy. This was in my opinion a good horror film because of the plot which was the ease with which the vampire was able to re-establish himself in the family by claiming he was a long lost relative from England. I haven’t gone to movies very often, but because I wanted to see this movie, for some unknown reason my mother took me.
The significant toy that I believe would be important to mention would be the Chatty Cathy Doll. This doll was produced from 1960 to 1964. She was the first successful talking doll that had a pull-string mechanism and would say a phrase such as “Please, brush my hair.” Mattel was the producer of Chatty Cathy, and it was made of vinyl, including the face, and was about 20 inches tall. The value of a doll in excellent condition would have been from $300.00 to $400.00 in the 21st century, and if you could find one this far in the future, it would be worth much more. The doll would be silent because it was based on a pull-string mechanism. The system inside contained a needle, small turntable and a record. After time passed the governor belt, which was a glorified rubber band, broke and so the phonograph system would not work and left the doll silent.
Now it is time to close my letter for the time capsule. I hope that the future is a place of peace and happiness. However, I feel in my heart that there will be no true peace and happiness until the Lord returns and the new heaven is established by the Lord. I hope what I have shared with you will give you an idea of what it is like to live in the 20th and 21st centuries.

In His Service,
Rev. Kimberly Dreiman