Letting Go

My cousin writes of the highly difficult and emotional trip to take his only son to college at USC last week. His wife is still recovering from her horrific car accident in June and, so, Steve handled this major rite of passage alone.

In writing words of commiseration to Steve I was reminded of how the "lettings go" are such a part of life. I remember thinking that I wanted to somehow freeze those pre-school years because I knew that I'd have to "turn the boys over to the system" when they began kindergarten. There was the first time they went to a friend house alone. There was the first sleep-over, the first week at camp, David's high school summer in Spain---all sorts of small lettings go before college. Since both boys went to college nearby, that wasn't too big a deal.

Then David got married and Kevin went to grad school in Boston....in the same month.

Don't get me wrong. Both of the above events were wonderful and we were thrilled....but in 2006 David and Kevin were officially adults and officially independent and it's thrilling to watch them make their decisions and make their marks on the world.

The Mom in me, however, still lurks. Kevin flew to Miami for an audition today. I couldn't help myself! I still had to ask if he had his wallet and cell phone, did he remember his dress shoes, did he have cash, was his hotel in a safe neighborhood....

Of course Kevin knows how to pack and plan a trip, but he patiently answered me.

He knows he still has a mom who has a hard time letting go and I hope he is secretly a bit happy about that.

Vignettes of El Paso

Since I try to have as many French examples as Spanish examples in my seminars it seems appropriate to have a bi-lingual title! During these two days I've also had a variety of unrelated experiences so vignettes it will be.

THE SEMINAR....
was excellent and oh so typical of teachers. The teachers had orientation meetings in their buildings on Monday and Tuesday, went to a departmental seminar today, and tomorrow they will finally get to work some in their buildings...provided their principal doesn't want to have more meetings. Into this environment I walked! One hundred foreign language teachers who were required to spend all day in a seminar when they really wanted to be preparing for the first day of school. I've been there!

The excellent news is that the vast majority of the teachers were delightful, enthusiastic and respectful. They wrote wonderful comments and filled in an overwhelming number of magic sevens on the evaluation form. Hurray.

I recognized some of the teachers, however, because I've worked with people just like them. Some obediently put away their laptops when their supervisor was in the room. (She had actually threatened to take away their laptops if out!) Those same teachers, however, took the laptops out the minute the supervisor left the room. A few sitting in the back chatted instead of doing whatever activity I had asked them to do. A couple left early. I'm sure these are the same teachers who get super irritated when their students commit similar sins.

TECHNOLOGY...
is annoying. The hotel was super organized and had my mic and the sound system set up by 7:30. The supervisor arrived later with a brand new LCD projector. She and her assistant then messed around with it for half an hour but couldn't get the image on the screen. She then went to her car to get the other older projector. Same problem. Several times I said that I've always had to use a dongle cord to connect the LCD to my MAC but was assured that it wasn't necessary. Finally a minute before starting time, I asked if we could try it with the dongle and, guess what, it worked.

It worked EXCEPT I never could get it totally focused. Except the image was too small for people in the back half of the room to see. Except the image was trapezoidal. Except the color was off. Except the bulb burnt out mid-morning and the supervisor had to go to her office for a new bulb. Except I tripped over a plug that wasn't taped down and lost power to both machines.

Miraculously, no one complained about tech problems!

TEXAS HIGHWAYS...
are also annoying. They have highways that parallel the expressways. They are one way. The highway on one side of the expressway has a different name than the highway on the other side. When you make a left turn under the expressway you have to be in the second to the left lane. If you are in the far left lane you are forced to make a U-turn. It took several detours before I remembered these Texasisms from a Dallas trip last summer.

STELLA...
is our GPS. She traveled with me and made it possible to do some sight-seeing which was cool. When I traveled with a speech pathologist friend to see a pastoral candidate in Indiana we laughed about how Stella pronounced "ninety". The computer referred to Interstate 90 as "nine tee" rather than the colloquial "nine dee". That was nothing! Let's just say that Stella found Spanish street names challenging. I can't even pronounce what she did to "Socorro".

STELLA....
did take me to a very interesting place this afternoon. "We" went to the Socorro mission. This is one of the oldest of the missions built along the "Camino Real" from here west. It was built in 1683! What was most interesting was the cemetery. Loads of flowers on every grave....all plastic since a real flower would die in seconds in this heat. Some very simple graves - wooden crosses with hand-lettered names - some with stone markers, some with elevated ornate stone memorials. I found it touching. Somehow the testimonials, simplicity, and location in a desolate dessert area made all these deceased strangers and their families seem very real to me.

MEMORIES...
came back. The plastic flowers made me think of a friend (thankfully I don't remember who the guilty party was) who once asked me if Mexicans really like plastic flowers. We were in an inexpensive Mexican restaurant in the middle of winter when this question was asked. And, yes, there were plastic flowers on the table but NOT because Mexicans like plastic. It was just the option in mid-winter Chicago.

That memory reminded me of the seat mate on a bus tour in Spain who commented. "Isn't is strange that every town has a 'peatones' street." Peatones means pedestrians. She had seen the word next to the lit up stick figure of a walking person on the street lights.

On that note, I go to bed. Have a 5:55 AM flight to catch!

Led by the Blind

We went to see Yo Yo Ma perform with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at Ravinia the other night. As we left the car Ken asked me to carry a small canvas bag in addition to the small rolling cooler I was toting. I fussed that it was too much!

Somehow I managed to carry these two extremely heavy (not!) items into the park, we found our friends and settled in for conversation, dinner, and music on the lawn. As we were eating I noticed a woman about my age leading a blind woman and her guide dog through the very crowded lawn to a spot just behind us. Then I realized that there was also a blind man with the group. The sighted woman calmly got the two people, the dog and their things all organized in the very congested area.

As we were eating I watched the sighted woman calmly and efficiently set up a table, put out nice table settings, prepare the food and drinks, assist her companions and settle in to enjoy the concert. At intermission I opted not to go to the washroom as it was so crowded that I feared I'd not be able to find our group upon my return. Meanwhile, to my shock, the sighted woman calmly guided the blind woman and her dog across a multitude of blankets in a zigzag path to the walkway!

As we were cleaning up after the concert I again watched the sighted woman calmly put all her things away, pile her two very large coolers and table on a luggage carrier and head to her car. Her guests waited until she returned and calmly led them and the dog out of the park.

Funny, I didn't fuss at all about carrying two bags back to our car!

Sinister

Today is National Left Hander's Day!!! Happy Day to all of you sinister people.

Being left handed is a defining part of who I am. My mother tells that, as an obedient first grader, I put my pencil in my right hand as the teacher directed. My mother wondered why no papers came home from school so she went over to the school to find out. The teacher showed her my papers which were all written in mirror writing. Once my mother explained that, duh!, I was left-handed, the mirror writing stopped. (An interesting side issue here is that in those days parents could not call a teacher to ask a question. Chicago Public School phone numbers were not even published!)

I actually give a lot of credit to this first grade teacher who, unfortunately, I don't remember at all. In 1952 most left handed children were still being forced to write with their right hands. Not only did she not force me to change, she also simply told me to tilt my paper to the right instead of the left and to write like everyone else. As a result, I have never written in the awkward curved hand position common to many other sinister people.

I may not look weird when I write, but writing has always been difficult. Left handers push the pen across the page, a much more tiring movement than the pulling done by the rest of the world. I've spent most of my life with ink stains on my left pinkie. When we used fountain pens in my middle school years it was the worst, but even now ink from many types of ball point pens also smears as my hand goes over the words I just wrote. During my teaching years I had multi-colored left hands as a result of using erasable overhead projector pens all day long. I LOVE typing - it doesn't hurt or stain - and I can go out in the evening without having to explain why my hand is purple and green!

I despise cutting with a scissors because the blade is always on the wrong side. Not only is is painful but, unlike you non-sinister people, I can't see the line that I'm cutting. I would prefer to draw a line from right to left, but rulers have numbers facing the wrong direction. Don't get me started on ring binders, spiral notebooks, or "one-armed" student desks in all the college classrooms!

Then there's the kitchen: measuring cups with the markings on the wrong side, ladles that only have one spouted side, can openers and cheese slicers and potato peelers and corkscrews that can only be used in the right hand!

At one point, four out of five foreign language teachers in my school were all left-handed. Did the constant use of both sides of our brains help us learn another language? My friend Susan who often subbed for me says I drove her crazy because the papers with my seating charts were placed on the clip board with the clip to the right! I drive Ken crazy with my mouse on the left side of the computer monitor.

To more fully understand the plight of our 10% of the population, I refer you to http://www.lefthandersday.com/about.html. Certain family members who like to buy funny gifts for holidays and birthdays may find interesting items there :-)

In the meantime, there is hope for left-handers. President Obama may be having trouble getting the country on board with his health care plans, but every time he signs a bill its "one left-handed signing for a man, one left-handed signing for mankind." Yes, we (left-handers) can!

Julia and Julie

We saw the above mentioned movie last night. It is simply delightful.

The movie tells the story of Julia Child's early years...living in Paris and elsewhere with her husband, going to Le Cordon Bleu, and the many ups and downs she experienced before finally publishing "Mastering the Art of French Cooking". Simultaneously, the movie tells the story of Julie, a young married woman in Queens, NY, who takes on the project of making all 500+ recipes in Julia's book in one year while blogging about her experiences.

What struck me, however, was not Meryl Streep's wonderful acting, nor was it the occasional view of Paris, nor was it trying to figure out how they made Meryl Streep look so tall. It was both of these women pursuing a dream that probably wasn't very realistic.

Julia Child was the bored young wife of a diplomat in Paris in the late 40's. She loved, loved, loved French food but the idea of an American WOMAN studying at the Cordon Bleu was absurd. The idea of an American woman writing an English language cookbook focusing on complicated French cooking was also absurd. She persevered and did both.

Julie was a frustrated employee trying to help people post 9/11 but instead, spent most of her day being verbally abused on the phone. Taking on this cooking/blogging challenge saw her through emotionally draining work days and noisy nights living above a pizzeria.

The point is not that both women eventually succeeded in their ventures. It is that they had the guts to just go ahead and try!

Many of my friends are now retired, but I can't think of a one who hasn't since pursued some dream. The one who loved her Siberian Husky dogs is now into raising, breeding and showing them in a major way. Another has taken her compassionate skills to a new level being her church's presence in local nursing homes (and regularly visiting MY mom, too!). Another uses her administrative skills on myriad community based service organizations. An artistic friend sells her art but also knits and gives away prayer shawls. My Michigan friend with the gift for hospitality rarely is without guests in her home---mostly humans but also dependent feline visitors that she cares for like children. Our friends with daughter and grand-baby in Paris have embraced a whole new culture and language via frequent visits. The list goes on!

I wonder which role Meryl Streep will play when the next block-buster movie titled "Annie, Pat Max, Gina, Bonnie, Susan and Others" comes out?

It's Just Not Fair!

I did water aerobics four days this week. On Wednesday the instructor challenged us with 45 minutes of extra-fast aerobics followed by weight training. Others complained that it was too much while I thanked the teacher for pushing us. Today I walked briskly for an hour. I felt really good about doing good things for my body.

Until tonight.

Tonight I read the new Time magazine. The cover story is that exercise does nothing to help people lose weight, in fact it often makes us gain weight because it makes us so ravenously hungry. To add insult to injury, a lean body is less prone to disease than a less lean but fit body.

It's going to take a lot of ice cream to get over this revolting turn of events!

Mrs. P. and Me

Last night I had dinner with my 7th grade teacher.

Six of the "girls" from my 8th grade graduating class got together for what will probably become an annual summer dinner event now that we've reconnected after fifty years. We were joined by Mrs. P. who is now an extremely active and delightful 80-something woman. Mrs. P. said she "so enjoyed being with "young people" who didn't spend the evening moaning and groaning about body parts." We loved being referred to as "young people".

As much as I enjoyed Mrs. P's company last night, I only have two distinct memories of her class.

One was that Mrs. P was pregnant. I was so naive, however, that I was probably the last kid in the entire class to figure out that she wore the same over-sized plaid jacket every day for a reason other than that she liked it. Looking back, Mrs. P. was quite the modern woman. She was a working mother in the late 50's, leaving her older son in some sort of day care and continuing to teach while expecting son number two. In those days, women teachers in the Chicago Public Schools were not allowed to work after their first trimester. She probably wore that over-sized plaid jacket because she couldn't publicly be visibly pregnant as a teacher. Hard to think of the petite, white haired lady I ate with last night as a 50's rabble rouser.

The other memory is very strong. As typical 7th graders, my friends and I loved to talk and to pass notes. One day Diane, Donna and I were passing notes prior to leaving our classroom to go to the music room. Mrs. P. threatened that anyone who talked or passed notes in music class would "have to write the history of the 48 states". Soon after we arrived in the music room, I passed a note and whispered to Diane and Donna. I wasn't caught but Diane and Donna were assigned the horrible writing assignment. For a couple of weeks I slunk around feeling terribly guilty for bringing this punishment down on my best friends. It was horrible. Every so often I'd get up the courage to ask one of them how the writing was going. They would answer, "We're on Illinois."

Many weeks later my friends finally told me that they actually didn't have to write the history of the 48 states. They said that Mrs. P. swore them to secrecy about not having to do the punishment. "We're on Illinois." was their way of not lying...because they were, in fact, standing on Illinois.

I was greatly relieved for my friends, but was personally crushed. A respected teacher resorting to a meaningless threat followed by deceit was really traumatic to me. It changed my whole view of Mrs. P.

I long ago forgave the young, pregnant, frustrated teacher but the message of that event has stayed with me. Yes, I tried really, really hard to not fall into a Mrs. P- like trap, but, yes, I sometimes gave idle threats to my children and, yes, I occasionally gave idle threats to my students. But oh how I regretted it each time it happened!

What a reminder that parents and teachers don't always realize the power of their actions and words!

(An aside to my younger readers: Yes, I actually lived in a time when there were only 48 states! Alaska and Hawaii joining the union was actually the topic for one of the speeches at my 8th grade graduation!)

Summer Reads

BOTH of my seminar handbooks have been shipped off to Seattle AND the editor at the publishing company tells me that the downloadable Spanish projects have been corrected and proofed and are ready for the world to see...and hopefully buy! While proud of all that writing, none of the above are things I would recommend for good summer reads! The following,however, come highly recommended by this panel of one.

Run, don't walk, to your local library for a copy of "Broken for You" by Kallos. Having recently been in Seattle I enjoyed the fact that the book is set in that city but, more importantly, this is an improbable book that teaches a whole lot about relationships, family, love, life and death, the Holocaust, and bowling....yes, the Holocaust and bowling...in a well-written, often humorous fashion.

A totally different but equally amazing book is "Escape" by Carolyn Jessop. This book reads like fiction but unbelievably, is true. The author tells of her young life in an ultra-conservative polygamos sect of the Mormon church and of her eventual escape with her many young children. We hear about the horrors of the Taliban and other regimes hostile to women around the world but I, for one, was not aware of the horrors that very recently occurred in our own country. If you are like me, you will inhale this great read.

There have recently been a glut of great novels about China and Afghanistan. "Broken Paradise" by Cecilia Samartin takes us to a totally different part of the world, Cuba in the pre- and post-Castro years. We follow a wealthy young Cuban girl and her cousin from the wonderful life they lead in the late 50's to the trials they face post-Castro. Nora migrates to the U.S., Alicia stays in Havanna and we track their lives through their letters. It's a great read even if you don't know anything about Cuba, but I found myself back in my senior year independent study of Latin American literature with Sra. P. Sra. P, like the heroines Nora and Alicia, grew up among Havana's privileged class. Like Nora she fled soon after Castro. Even though Sra. P. had a good life in Chicago, it took nothing for her to break down in tears as we read Cuban poetry together. For me, a naive 20 year old Chicagoan, a semester of talking and sometimes crying together profoundly opened my eyes to what it is like to have to leave your beloved home.

The next book spoke to me in a different way. "Bridge of Sighs" by Richard Russo is on the long side, but it needs its length to tell its story. The hero is a sixty year old man who has spent his entire life in a small town in upstate New York. His childhood friend left for Italy as a young adult and never looked back. Both of their stories and the multiple inter-twinings of their lives are told in fascinating detail. Even though I am female, grew up in Chicago, and have had totally different life experiences, I felt like I relived my life as I read. I know any sixty-something person would have the same reaction and I suspect, any twenty- or thirty something may better understand the world in which their parents grew up by reading this book.

My final read on this list is "Girl Meets God" by Lauren Winner. This unusual book, an autobiography, tells of the child of a Jewish father and a lapsed Southern Baptist mother who chose to become an Orthodox Jew...with a vengeance. As a super-observant, Orthodox woman she became increasingly drawn to Christianity. The book's focus is on the first year of Lauren's life as a Christian. All I can say is that, as a life-long Christian, I found her observations and faith statements profound and, in spite of the "quirkiness" of the heroine, her message was deep and inspiring. I rarely re-read books, but there are parts of this I want to look at again.

So, now that I've read my summer books and have even written my book reports, I guess I'm ready to go back to school except I DON'T HAVE TO!

Lies and Truths

As part of our "Social Emotional Literacy" curriculum at the junior high we used to play "two truths and a lie". (Or maybe it was "two lies and a truth".)

Anyway, presuming it was two truths and a lie, everyone would write down two true things and one lie about themselves and others would guess which was the lie. It was actually a pretty entertaining way to find out things we never knew about each other.

So, adapting that format, I'm going to write about two remarkable things and one annoyance. You'll have to guess which are the remarkable things and which is the annoyance!

This morning it was in the upper 60's and very ominously cloudy. Nonetheless, eight women, average age about 68, showed up for outside water aerobics. These are the same women who have showed up on many a day in the lower 60's this summer. People who think water aerobics is a bunch of old ladies standing in warm water occasionally delicately moving an ankle are wrong, wrong, wrong. These ladies work their bodies hard and are not put off by the vagaries of Chicago weather! Today we only gave up when it began to pour.

Last week there was a second death at our church. Marilyn came to our church when her first husband died about six years ago and she had no church home for his funeral. She subsequently joined and became active in absolutely everything and, two years ago, began a storybook marriage to another member of the congregation. Everyone enjoyed watching these senior citizen lovebirds. The church family has been greatly saddened by these two unexpected deaths in less than a week but life goes on and yesterday we celebrated the five year anniversary of our two ministers of music. The choir surprised them with an anthem in their honor. Singing with the choir was the newly widowed man! Playing the piano for the anthem was the newly widowed woman!

This afternoon I went to the drive-up window of the bank to cash a check. As I'm retrieving the money from the drawer, the teller starts "yammering" (Ken's favorite word) about some wonderful new feature available to me. Between the amplification and street noise and her slight accent, I couldn't begin to follow what she was saying. When I said, "Sorry, I really can't understand what you are saying.", she looked irritated and handed the mike to another teller who then began the whole lecture all over again... and I still couldn't understand. After 30+ years in the classroom, I know my hearing isn't what it used to be but, tell me, do people really make decisions about changes to accounts while they are in the drive-in lane....especially since they are probably in the drive-up lane because they want to save time?

Faithful readers, I suspect you can figure out which of the above are the remarkable things and which is the annoyance, but feel free to contact me if you are not sure!