Olympics

Now that the Olympics have started, I probably won't log in to my journal.

School Daze

September is rapidly approaching as well as the beginning of my second year away from the classroom as a teacher. My husband teases me about getting ready to go set up my classroom, which I traditionally started on the closest Monday to the 15th of August. But, honestly, there is not the slightest urge on my part to return to the classroom.

On the other hand, there is a tradition which I do look forward to continuing. For the past seven years, every August I send a letter of encouragement to those students I have taught who have graduated from high school. Through the years I have lost a few who have moved and left no forwarding address. Each year I hear from many of them. Sometimes there are gaps of a few years between replies. Often there are letters thanking me for the encouragement and telling me how much they look forward to hearing from me in August and at Christmas when I send a greeting their way. These letters and cards are sent the old fashioned way, by snail mail.

Those who know about this tradition of mine are amazed, saying they never had a teacher who did that. Why do I do this? The answer is simple. Through the years of my teaching career I came to realize that many of my students had no one tell them, "I believe in you." I have always and will always believe that each human being is unique with talents and experiences no other human can exactly duplicate. Success is possible for every human being but the key ingredient must be present: knowing that someone besides themselves believes in them.

Sometimes in the hurry of our very busy lives we forget to verbalize to those we love how much we appreciate them for who they are and support them in whatever they choose to do. Say this simply to the one you love without conditions or spoken reservations. We all need to make a habit of not only making affirmations to ourselves...out loud...but also make these affirmations to our loved ones on a daily basis as well.

Trials and Tribulations

We all have bad days. Times when things seem to go wrong through no fault of our own. Thankfully it doesn't happen too often. My daughter and her husband have had more than their share lately, all having to do with their cars. It started back in late June. In preparation for driving to Tennessee to pick up her son for a summer visit, Monica took her car to be given a once over for the sixteen-hundred round trip and have the air conditioner serviced. The shop where she has been taking her car for quite awhile found several things needing attention which would cost over two thousand dollars...money they did not have. So she okayed the more important repairs to the radiator and had the airconditioner serviced. They picked up the car and drove home, a few miles from the garage. Later in the evening they were headed to the grocery store, but they didn't quite make it. Suddenly the car went dead. They pushed the Jeep Cherokee into a parking lot...no easy feat...and called for a tow back to the garage where the work had been done. They found out that the problem was the clamp connecting the radiator to the transmission had not been properly attached and they lost all the transmission fluid. The garage was able to correct the problem with no damage to the transmission and they were able to make the trip to Tennessee. Three weeks later, Monica and her husband were running some errands in his car when it would not start. So they had to have his car towed to the same garage where her car had been repaired. They thought it was the generator but were told it was the battery which was replaced. A few days after they had Sam's car back, they noticed a strong smell of gas and a puddle of gas from under Monica's car so they took her car in to the garage. She had noticed a few days before that her car made strange sounds when she turned on the airconditioner. The garage informed her that the compressor would have to be replaced. That alone would cost a thousand dollars. She decided she would have to live without airconditioning, not easily done in Houston, Texas, in August. The gas smell was coming from the fuel pump, which had to be replaced for nearly three-hundred dollars. Today she called on her cell phone, angry and frustrated. Her husband called to tell her his car would not start and asked her to come get him. That was an hour-and-a-half drive across town in heavy traffic. By the time she got to him, her husband discovered that the connections to the new battery were so loose he could hand-turn them without tools. Now they are wondering how this could be a coincidence in such a short time that these types of mistakes could happen in the same garage.

Nothing is more disconcerting than to think that people you trusted might now be taking advantage of a lack of mechanical knowledge and causing these incidents. They certainly don't want to think that is the case. For Monica's father and I, it is upsetting to see our kids struggle to make ends meet only to have these things happen. These days with the high cost of everything, it doesn't take much to push a young couple over the edge.

They are a resilient couple who put their trust in God and leave all things with them. I pray their days will get better and they will find the blessings hiding beyond these trials and tribulations.

For the Love of the Children

Tonight I admit I was channel surfing and came across Dr. Phil. His show was about families who are only able to communicate by shouting at each other and threatening to either do physical harm to each other or abandon the family. That brought a flood of memories from the past and also a feeling of thankful relief when I consider my life now.

My childhood was far from nurturing. My mother worked herself into a drunken fury by late afternoon every day. Her target was my father who sat silently drinking cold beer after beer while she screamed accusations and obscenities. As I grew older, I began to realize that her accusations were of unfaithfulness on his part. These delusions on her part intensified as I grew older. When the screaming grew too much for him, he would take my twin brother to a motel for the night, leaving me alone with my raging mother. She would keep me up all night, not allowing me to sleep, while she talked about her childhood and her innocence when she married my father at the age of nineteen. He was thirty nine. A year after they married, she said he was impotent and never made love to her again. She was always telling me over and over from my earliest memories as a child how babies were made by a boy putting his peepee inside a girl's peepee. I didn't know what she was talking about and it scared me. When my periods started, she began accusing my father of touching me. She even asked our family doctor to examine me to see if I had been molested. I was horrified! My father never even hugged me or gave me a kiss. He was always uncomfortable with closeness. The horrible fights went on nightly until my mother passed away in her sleep when I was sixteen. I was the one who realized she was dead. It was a hot summer night and I stayed up late watching a scary movie on TV. I suddenly became aware I could not hear her breathing. She was asleep on the couch as usual, after having drunk herself into a stupor. I reached out to touch her body. I will never forget the coldness of her skin. I knew she was dead. I woke my father and told him. He tried to wake her, then called an ambulance. I don't remember crying. I just went to bed. The funeral is a hazy memory. All I really remember is being led to her coffin by a family fiend who said I should say goodbye to my mother. I remember when I looked at her, I thought how beautiful and peaceful she looked, like an angel.

I am so thankful that my life has been so different from my childhood. My husband and I have never gotten into a verbal battle. He, too, came from a home in which screaming was the norm. We agreed to follow the Bible's admonition to never let the sun set in anger...Literally to never go to bed in anger, even if that meant staying up until we had talked out a disagreement rationally and calmly. My daughter never witnessed a verbal battle. Now, in her own marriage, she and her husband maintain the same Bible-based admonition.

It is so sad to see so many families in upheaval, even violence. Husband and wife raging endlessly in front of their children. Children verbally and sometimes even physically attacking their parents. Parents, for the love of the children, find ways to rationally talk out your differences and do so privately beyond earshot of the children. If nothing else, agree to disagree. And if after doing all you can to resolve your problems and being unable to do so, then move apart rather than subject the children to your endless battles. Children mimic adults and often began to mirror back to their parents the behavior of the parents. It can be a vicious, violent situation that results.

A Day of Rest

Sunday is one of my favorite days. Today proved that to be true. We got up and read the Sunday paper together, commenting back on forth on the interesting news items, laughing over the comics, sifting through the myriad of ads and enjoying how much money we were saving by NOT buying the latest and newest of whatever was being pitched to us. All these years married...it will be 41 years on August 24th...and I still enjoy the company of my husband. He makes coffee and brings it to me. That is, of course, after Sweetie has been fed. The sun filters through the living room window and dapples us in gold. Birds can be heard outside greeting a new day. Generally the neighborhood is quiet except for the occasional passing of a car.

There can be so much going on around us and in our lives but our Sundays are our own. That is what makes them so luscious. My husband always manages to make me laugh in the morning. His quick wit is a delight. I never know what he may say or do which immediately sends me into childlike giggles. Isn't it oddly wonderful that after all these years, my life with him is still filled with surprises and unexpected twists? I must be the most fortunate of humans to have him in my life.

It really does not seem like we have been together this long and yet it seems as if we have always been together. Oh, he can be cranky at times and even momentarily exasperating. We are such opposites. I am the calm one always thinking the best of things whether it be about people or how the events of the day will eventually resolve. He can be easily excited and often expects the worst case scenario even before anything has gone wrong. But somehow we end up in the middle and all comes out as it was meant to.

But through it all, there is always Sunday. A day of ease and total lack of planning. The day is what the day is without any manipulation on our part. And so my Sunday wends its way to its end without struggle or an attempt to mold it to my wishes. Perhaps that is why the Creator declared there should be a day of rest. After all, who better would know that humans need a day that is not muddled by life and the inevitability that humans will find a way to mess that day up as they do all days they deign to force into their particular pattern. So,if you haven't done so already, give yourself Sunday as a Day of Rest. Go to God's house or play in the world He has given to us to enjoy. Just let go and give it a rest.

Sweetie Napping with my husband 

Sleeping in Late

I slept in late this Saturday. That is not my usual habit. But habits go by the wayside now in retirement. Our cat, Sweetie, was at the bedroom window at 6:45, meowing loudly and plucking at the screen with his claws like a tone-deaf celloist. I tried to ignore him but his persistance grew in intensity. Grumbling aloud, I got out of bed stiff and blurry-eyed and stumbled to the kitchen and out to the screened-in patio, and opened the door to let him in. He rushed past me without acknowledgement or even a thank you, as if he were on a mission of immense importance, as all cats do. I noted sleepily that the door on the screened patio did not have the chain lock engaged. That was unusual but my husband may have let Sweetie out that way earlier. Sweetie likes to go out at 3:30 in the morning. It never ceases to amaze me how he knows what time it is. I also noticed that my husband was not in bed when Sweetie woke me so I walked through the living room to see if he had gotten up early and was playing solitaire on the computer in the back room. Instead I found him sleeping in the back bedroom. That means I must have been snoring. That usually happens when I am really tired. Good thing we have a guest bedroom.

I wandered back to bed, crawled under the down comforter, amd fell asleep. That's something I rarely do. I woke up at 9:30! A day in the life of a retired school teacher seems pretty sweet to me. I love having no dayplanner filled with must-do's. There are no back to school nights or English department meetings or district committees on language arts standards or homework to grade. But I do miss the interaction with young questioning students who engage me in the great debates of the day.

Friday Night Fights

A fond memory of mine centers arounf Friday Night Fights. It was one of the few opportunities I had to spend some one-on-one time with my adopted father. He really was more like a grandfather rather than a father because he was thirty years older than my adopted mother. I don't think he felt comfortable around girls. But I found a way to get closer to him by sharing a love for prize fighting. Now back in the late 50's TV was black and white, there were only two channels to watch, and the screen was small, often rolling horizontally, with little to add glitz and glamor.

Every Friday night, my father would watch Friday Night Fights. He would let me choose white pants or black pants (the "color" being worn by each fighter). It was our special time together. Sometimes the fights were brutal and blood flowed freely. There was rarely a stop called due to injury. The fight went on until somone could not get up or the scheduled number of rounds were completed. Sometimes the brutality got to me, but I never said a word because this time exclusively with my father was too important to me for me to bail out. I enjoyed everything about Friday Night Fights. The Pabst Blue Ribbon commercials, the ring girls who would circle inside the ring carrying a placard high above their heads to show what round it was, even the monotonous off-key sound of the bell calling the fighters back to another round.

I still watch the boxing matches on ESPN and HBO. But modern boxing is never as exciting as those days of my childhhood shared with my father. The point of this memory is to hopefully make fathers aware that their daughters need one-on-one time with their fathers. And it doesn't have to be doing things mothers might normally do with daughters. Quite the contrary, it is about doing things together that open communication and understanding between child and parent.

We live in such a busy world and are often stretched so thin that it seems as if all we can manage as an adult is making enough money to keep a roof over our heads and food on the table. But somehow enough time must be found by each parent to spend one-on-one time with each child individually. That investment now will pay back richly when that child becomes a teen and young adult who needs you to be the one approachable adult who will be there to listen and advise.

Try to find a tradition that is solely unique between you and child. It can make all the difference when difficult times threaten to separate child from parent.

May 2004 My 60th Birthday Celebration 

A Day in the Life

Each day begins as a blank page. I woke this morning to the sound of birds greeting the rising of the sun. My first awareness of my physical body was stiffness as I turned to my side. As I pulled myself to a sitting position, I smiled at the thought of those long gone days of youth when I could jump out of bed and begin my day effortlessly. A poet's comments come to mind...Youth is wasted on the young. I am not sure if I agree with that statement. Call me crazy but I truly do believe that the stiffness of my body and the silver hairs I see at my temples are badges of honor...a way in which my body reminds me that with age comes added wisdom that can only be gained by growing old in years. I don't feel "old" inside. I greet each day with expectation of the unexpected. There is always something new in the folds of a rose bud or the soft flutter of a butterfly passing my way.

I have met people half my age who are old internally. Their bodies no longer respond to the external stimuli around them. They fixate on their 24/7 schedule, deaf to the song of a bird, blind to the folds of a rose bud. These same people look at me and think how sad it is that I limp a little and tire easily. But who has the better quality of life? Who greets the day as new and full of expectation?

No matter how bad the previous day may have been, each new day begins fresh and filled with positivity. Looking back is counter productive. It is not what the Creator intended to be our focus. We all have bad days and experiences from the past that were dark and perhaps even destructive. Why bring those days back into focus? Past experiences have already passed into the void. Instead of thinking, "Why did this happen?", start the day by thinking, "Today is a blank page open and ready to be written upon." Open your eyes to the possibilities around you...the smallest of possibilities begin with an awareness of the Creator and His perfect creation around you. Begin your day with expectation of the unexpected.

Life does not have to be nearly as complicated as we think. Simplicity is the key. So many people these days fixate on what they think they must have to be "happy"...
a high-paying career, prestige, an expensive behemoth of a vehicle, a large house in an upscale neighborhood, membership in a healthclub, children enrolled in a private school. Yet they feel empty and unfulfilled at the end of a ten-hour day. How much more enjoyable can be a career that you enjoy doing, the love of family, simple adequate transportation, a comfortable little home filled with love, a walk in the evening greeting your neighbors, doing homework with the kids after dinner. The Good Life is not something you can buy or finance or lease. The good life is a feeling of satisfaction for a job well done and the love of those you love. Simplify and your life will be richer than you ever dreamed it could be. Start with tomorrow morning. Begin by expecting the unexpected.

Finding Joy

The search for joy can be elusive. All around us we are inundated by media to find joy. But what is joy? It is not a commodity that can be purchased. It is not a precious jewel that can be discovered after a long exhaustive search. It cannot be taken from another. It cannot be inherited. It is within each of us from the first moment we draw breath. Yet, many of us are totally unaware that it is within us. We may spend our lives searching for that which will bring us joy, never realizing it was there within us all the time.

Remember as a child those magical moments when the shear wonder of life surrounded you as you watched a tiny ant struggling through the grass with what seemed an impossible load three times its size or a cloud above you took a magical shape that took you far away to a magical place?

As we become adults, we lose the ability to experience those magical moments. We stop dreaming and imagining and believing. We lose the joy of discovery. But we can find it again. One such moment of pure joy I experienced was when I stood in a jungle gazing at a Mayan ruin. I was completely alone. Unable to climb up into the ruins with my husband, brother, and sister-in-law and the rest of the tour group, I sat down on an ancient block of stone. It was so peaceful and beautiful. A pair of black butterflies tinged in scarlet circled over my head. I sensed being watched and turned my head to the left. Less than two feet away from me sat a large green Iguana. I experienced pure joy at that moment, as magical as any moment from my childhood.

Finding joy as an adult requires a willingness to be in the moment, open to the unexpected. You cannot plan for a moment of pure joy. It comes when you least expect it. It can be as simple as a cooling breeze on a hot, tiresome day or as overwhelming as the birth of a child. If we allow each day, no matter how difficult, to weigh us down, our spirit becomes dulled and we are unable to experience or even recognize joy. You can be rich materially and have no joy. You can be poor and maltreated and yet know joy in the smallest things because you are open to the experience.

How do you find joy in living after years devoid of any joy? Become a child again, opening your eyes to the minute wonders of life everyday. That requires slowing down. When is the last time you got up early enough to watch a sunrise? When is the last time you lay down in newly mowed grass and looked at clouds taking magical forms or watched insects moving in their own tiny universe?

The world as we know it today is hurried and demanding and dehumanizing. But we don't have to live our lives without joy. We can find our way back to the uncluttered, joyous life of a child. If we take time to be a child again in open wonder, then those dark days that come from time to time will not weigh so heavily upon us.

Sweet Smell of Success

Success....What does it mean? Well it depends on each individual's idea of what seems successful to them. I have not really let the need for success be an important part of my life. Some say I am a Pollyanna...always seeing the best in things and never expecting the worst of anything or anyone. I guess that is because I am a survivor at heart and gladly take each day as it comes without expectations and thus without disappointments. In today's world, so many people agonize over what could have been...what might have been...what should have been. What a waste of energy and precious time! What really matters is how you live your life. Live it in the NOW. Forget the past. It is already beyond change. Don't obsess over the future. None of us can control what will happen before it happens. Instead greet each day as new and full of surprises. Even when things go wrong...as they will from time to time....there is a lesson to learn.

How my daughter hated to hear me say that. She would let her frustrations boil up in her and feel like the whole world was coming down on her. My answer was and is always the same...learn from mistakes...that is the only way you can turn something negative into something positive. Wouldn't life be a bore if everything went smoothly just as we planned it? I think so.

Today I got email from one of my old students. It fills me with joy to hear from them. 'Teaching was more than just presenting lessons. It was a way to touch lives and let lives touch me. So often we go blithely through life having no idea what impact we may have on others, be it positive or negative. We so often think no one notices what we do or hears what we say. But that is not true. Every word ever spoken, every deed ever done, is forever inscribed in the universe of time...a spiritual web of eternity. It does not matter how we see our world...whether in the hands of a divine creator or the natural stream of things...what we say and what we do does matter.

I am happy I had an opportunity to be a teacher. Although retired from the classroom, I am still and always will be a teacher. It as natural to me as breathing. People interacting with people is what keeps us unique from other life forms. The worst thing we can do is waste our individual talents or hide them under a basket where no one else can see. Don't be afraid to touch others and don't touch only those you know. Be willing to put yourself out on a limb by sharing yourself with others. Random acts of kindness is the best way you can reach out to those you don't know. Look for ways to show your humanity.

I could let these difficult times keep me from reaching out. There are so many reasons why. But I know each individual can make the world better by showing kindness to others without expecting anything in return. What goes around, comes around. Negative returns to negative. Positive returns to positive.

That is true success. Worth more than money or fame or anything else material in nature. No one can take away the good you do for others. No one can diminish you as a person.

All in the Family

I have an unusual family. Why do I say that? Well, including my twin brother and I, there were eight brothers and sisters. While we were still infants, our mother died of cancer, leaving our father to raise us alone in 1944. He hired a housekeeper to care for all of the children. But she kidnapped us. The Nebraska state troupers caught her in Lincoln and returned us to our father. His relatives convinced him that he could not care for such a large family alone. For some reason, none of the relatives were able to step in, so it was decided that the four youngest should be put up for adoption. My twin brother and I were adopted by one couple and the next oldest brother and sister were adopted by another couple. At that time, Gary and I were 21 months old. Although Gary and I knew the circumstances of our adoption and that there were other brothers and sisters, we did not know our birth parent's name or any other specifics. It was not until I was 26 that my oldest sister contacted me and opened the door to my birth family. I learned that my birth father died two years before my sister found me. I have met all my brothers and sisters except for the second oldest brother who has chosen to separate himself from the family for reasons no one will reveal.

The circumstances of my adoption were not good. The four oldest brothers and sisters thought the babies who had been adopted lived rich, pampered lives while they lived barely making it with a hard working father in rural Arkansas who never recovered from the loss of his wife and babies. It was the sister who found me who told me this. In truth, my twin brother and I were adopted by a couple who had financial stability but gave little love. Their marriage was in turmoil, they were both alcoholics, and my adoptive mother was mentally ill. I grew up being told I was not wanted but in order to adopt my brother, they also had to take me. I don't ever remember hearing the words "I love you". But don't feel sorry for me. I grew strong and independant as a result. I loved school because it was a place where I could escape abuse and be happy. My father died when I was 16, nine months after my mother died. Family friends were appointed by my father to be our guardians when my father realized he was dieing. They were good to us and provided a home that was stable and welcoming. Then I met my husband right after graduatng from high school. He was and still is my Rock.

Yes, my family is unusual. Brothers and sisters who once were strangers are now close to me. It is as if we had never been separated. Only one is no longer with us. The first to pass into death was my twin brother. That happened in 1999. It has been hard for my brothers and sisters who never expected to lose the youngest one first. But my loss is even more painful. When one of a set of twins passes, a part of the other twin passes too. I am no longer a part of WE. Now it is only ME. This feeling of being halved is very hard to explain. I feel that he is still in me, a part of me. We had a shared language and an internal knowing of each others well being, both physically and spiritually. I recently visited three of my brothers in Arkansas. The oldest is 75, patriarch of the family and crusty as an old dog. How I love to hear his stories about the family and his many great adventures. My other two brothers are 63 and 71. My time with them is precious.

Keep close to your family. Don't let squables and misunderstandings and pride keep you from spending time with them. Nothing could be worse than to let time distance you and lose one of them to the unexpected call of death.

Trials of Separation

It is so hard to say goodbye. Each summer my daughter has her son for five weeks. Today, she and her husband are returning him to his father. She loves her son and each time she returns him, she is so sad. It breaks my heart to see her so despondent. Divorce, for children, makes little sense. Even when the adults involved are better off apart, the children do not understand and feel somehow it must be something they have done.

I see a lot of anger in my grandson. As he gets older...he is 12 now...he will continue to feel angry and resentful towards both his mother and his father because he feels torn apart as he moves between them and is forced to make adjustments depending on which household he is residing in. When my husband and I were visiting them in their home this summer, we saw our grandson's flareups of anger and questioning of adult authority. Nothing extreme, but there was an underlying resentment. When she asked me for advice about how to handle these outbursts, I told her not to take his emotional outbursts too seriously because he is naturally in a time of emotional ups and downs that come as a result of the changes in his body as he transitions from boy to pre-teen. That just adds fuel to an already angry child working through divorce.

My daughter is a newly wed of just over a year. The blessing is that she has married a remarkable young man! He is so loving towards her and her son. He does not try to assert the role of "step-father". Rather he makes his presence felt as a caring, nurturing adult. My daughter is so blessed to have met him, accepted his unquestioning love, and married him. I really do believe he is the key to creating a happy environment which will help my daughter find her own peace as well as provide a positive, supportive environment for her son. Time heals all things. As humans, each of us must learn patience and the belief that the Creator will do all things for all seasons that our lives may encounter. That truth is still being unfolded to my daughter.

I think time is the great regulator. I could not have known that when I was my daughter's age...35. I was just as impatient and myopic as she when I was her age. I look back at my life now and am thankful that I met just as remarkable a man as her husband when I was 18. A year later, we were married. Now 41 years have gone by and I still wake each morning, reach out to him to reassure myself he is still by my side, and thank Jehovah that we are still together all these years. Oh, don't think there were no dark moments. But those days simply made us stronger and closer because we faced our trials together and weathered the tempests that came our way down through the years.

My greatest fear no longer exists. My daughter was alone for nine years after her divorce. She had become resigned to a single life with far too few days she could be with her son. I saw her spirit wither as she grew skeptical of ever having a meaningful, honest relationship. Although strong and self-supporting as a woman, I knew she wanted someone with whom she could share her love, generosity, and unimaginable spirituality. Isn't it wonderful how you find what you truly need and want when you stop looking and just let things happen? That's how it was for her. Her trial of separation was to let go and let things happen. When she did, all the good and wonderful things she had dreamed of came to her and continue to be revealed to her.

So now on this singularly most sad of days for her...Returning her son to his father...I am assured and want to assure her that the Creator will continue to bring blessings as a balm for her pain just as He has always done for me.