Here's a cool pic of Viola and Helen Slightom...ready for a meeting of Venus Rebekah Lodge #142, decked out in their rhinestone jewelry and pretty formals...yep, they made those themselves. My dad would say, "Your mother is going to the hen party tonight."
I remember those slim volumes of "secret work" that mom had to memorize. She'd get mad if she caught me looking at them. (Though I don't know why. They were written in code anyway). On meeting night there was always something yummy-smelling in the kitchen and I would hear, "Don't touch that! It's for lodge!" Dang!
As one of the last to be inducted into #142 before it folded, I can tell you that it was, really, a cool organization. Think about it. Once a month you get out and play dress-up with your girlfriends! How cool is that?
It's easy for us to think that it was a different time, and those ladies "didn't have jobs" and had plenty of time for things like lodge meetings, but then again...I'm not hanging out my laundry on a clothesline or plucking my own chickens these days. How many of us could benefit from spending a bit more time out with our girlfriends? Maybe someday we should bring back the Rebekahs to Bevier, hmm? ~CG
