Sunny daffodils part of Easter past and present at Belknap home

by Peter Jakey, Managing Editor

Rosemary Trapp, 82, is tough as the Easter flowers that line the southern edge of her house in Belknap. The daffodils were planted following an Easter morning service at St. Michael Lutheran Church across the roadway more years ago than Trapp can remember. And they have proven to be a resilient flower, surviving the cold temperatures and high winds since making their annual appearance. They also endured two waves of snow showers this week. Not the light and fluffy stuff either, it was wet and heavy stuff that drivers can?t handle when it is on the road.

Yet, surviving the trials of the season change-over have been these beautiful yellow flowers, bringing color where there just doesn?t seem to be any. ?People bring in potted flowers that are used on the altar for decoration, for the Easter holiday,? said Trapp. After the regular morning service at 10 a.m., anyone who purchased flowers took them home. Trapp planted hers and they keep coming back. ?They bloom before the snow is off of them,? she added. The same can be said for Trapp, who has lived alone since her husband Elmer passed away in 1990.

?I?ve been manning the fort since then,

? said Trapp. Elmer and Rosemary moved into the house she still lives in 1959, when it was the only structure on the east side of County Road 451. The couple had two children at the time, Alan, 3, and Kevin, 1. Alan, who is now 63, was the New Year?s Baby 1948 for Alpena and Presque Isle Counties, before Rogers City Hospital opened. Kevin, 61, served in Vietnam at the age of 19, who has a son, Michael, currently serving his first tour of duty in Afghanistan in the Army, which has created a whole new batch of concerns. Elmer and Rosemary also raised two daughters, Marilyn Hyatt, 55, and Carolyn Moriarty, 54.

Rosemary, a 1946 Rogers City High School graduate, when asked how she has gotten by all these years, with quick wit, answered, ?If I had started weeping, I would have never stopped.? Life goes on, despite the cold, despite the dark days.

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