Overkill?

At Rosewood this month my mother has decorated both a big pumpkin and a little pumpkin. She has made a Halloween pillow. She has competed in the Spook-tacular spelling contest. She has played Halloween bingo and Halloween hangman. Last week they had a ghost scavenger hunt. On Monday the monthly birthday party featured, you guessed it, orange and black cupcakes. Today a local day care center brought costumed children to sing Halloween carols to all the residents. On Friday they will have a costume contest for the residents complete with a magic show. Later Friday Rosewood will sponsor trick-or-treating for residents' grand and great-grandchildren. Every available wall in the building is covered with ghosts and black cats and pumpkins and gravestones. Whew!

Now, the last thing I'd ever do is criticize the nursing home for offering a multitude of interesting activities for the residents. They've had a lot of fun.

I can't help but think, however, about the weirdness of our culture at Halloween. Am I the only one that thinks it's VERY strange to be celebrating all sorts of macabre things with a population that experiences the death of one of their community almost every week? How weird is it that the people who often see someone being taken out in a body bag are not given any opportunity to mourn but, nonetheless, are encouraged to "play" with ghosts and monsters? Is it not strange that a community that is 60% Jewish spends the entire month observing a holiday rooted in Middle Ages Christianity?

On a happy note, however, Kevin informs me that I am safe from vampires. At a routine doctor visit yesterday, the nurse had a terrible time drawing blood from my skinny deep veins. After four needle sticks, she finally filled one of the three required vials and said they'd somehow make due with the limited amount of blood I was able to donate to the cause. Sorry Bela!

Is Santa Part of the Trinity?

On the radio today I heard an author talking about his childhood religious confusions. Santa loves children and knows if they have been bad or good. Therefore Santa must be God! The author ultimately came to think of Jesus as Santa for poor or disabled children since he is often pictured with such young people. Meanwhile the red-suited Santa is for richer children since he's pictured with rosy cheeked healthy kids. Not bad reasoning for a little kid!

This radio conversation made me think of my own ambivalence about Santa when our boys were little. Up to about age three it was easy. We took them to sit on Santa's lap which, incidentally, they hated. We labeled the major toy gift as from Santa. We read Santa stories along with the Baby Jesus stories.

By age three David was in a Christian pre-school and Sunday School and was hearing a lot about Jesus in those places. Meanwhile secular culture was emphasizing Santa. Meanwhile our preschooler asked questions. Lots of questions. About everything. And I became more and more concerned about when he would ask the Santa questions. Sure, the whole Santa thing is fun, but how could I lie to the boy who got detailed, honest answers about everything else?

When David was five, I serendipitously found a wonderful children's book that told the true story of the real St. Nicholas who gave anonymous gifts. I put it aside for the time when the Santa question would come up. Sure enough, as the Christmas frenzy developed that year David started asking questions. Most parents would certainly not want their five year old to stop believing in the magic of Santa, but I was secretly thrilled. I pulled out the St. Nicholas book and told him the truth....and then asked him not to tell his brother! A couple of years later the same scenario played out with Kevin.

Did I steal their childhood? I don't think so...and I would do the same thing again. I do wonder if they missed the joys of childhood magical belief. I also wonder how they will ultimately decide to deal with the Santa questions of their own children.

At least I hope they won't have to un-tangle beliefs that God is somehow a quad-rity made up of Father, Son, Spirit and Santa :-)

On the Way to Ronda

In his Sunday travel column today Rick Steeves writes about Ronda, a fascinating city in southern Spain. It is best known for two things: a stunning ravine that divides the city's Moorish quarter from its newer section and its bullring that was the birthplace of the modern (that is, post 1700's) bullfight. The article brought back lots of memories---many pleasant and one ridiculous!

I have been to Ronda three times. The second visit was with friend Marilyn in 1978. On that visit I gawked at the 200 foot wide "new" bridge that spans the 360 foot deep gorge, dined in a picturesque restaurant perched on the edge of the ravine, and thoroughly enjoyed watching the young women walking with their mothers in a clockwise direction around the town plaza during the evening "paseo". The young men walked counter-clockwise and ogled the young women as they repeatedly passed by each other. I also spent time in Ronda reading and re-reading the postcard I had received at the American Express office in Sevilla the previous day. Ken and I had only been dating a month before I took off on this Spain trip but I already felt there was something "big a-brewin" with him. His postcard from home simply said, "Having a great time. Wish you were here. Love, Ken"----the first time he said "love" :-)

(Note to younger readers: WAY BACK in the dark ages circa 1978, traveling without hotel reservations meant that the ONLY way people could get in touch with a wandering tourist was to write a letter to you c/o the American Express office in the city you were visiting. It was up to the tourist to find and visit that office to see if there was any mail for you!)

My third visit to Ronda was with Ken on January 2, 2006. We, as our family tradition dictates, had gotten lost driving in the winding streets late the previous night. We gawked at the bridge over the ravine and ate at the same precariously perched restaurant. We spent a long time at the Bullfight museum and took the requisite pictures of me holding my red jacket as a "muleta" or cape in the center of the sandy old bullring.

In spite of the great Ronda experiences with Marilyn and Ken, my thoughts always return to my first visit to Ronda with Lorraine in 1976....and desperately having to go to the bathroom!

Ronda is one of southern Spain's hill towns, so one has to drive around and around to get to the city on top of the mountain. In 1976, the road was quite narrow and slow-moving. On the right side of the road was a sheer cliff coming right up to the road's edge. On the left side of the road was a precipice. No shoulders on either side. No rest stops. No restaurants. Anywhere.

An hour or so into the three hour drive, morning coffee drinkers Alice and Lorraine were becoming desperate, but there wasn't even a patch of grass where we could stop and crouch--just unending cliffs and precipices. We were absolutely miserable.

Finally, unbelievably, a dilapidated and apparently unoccupied farm building appeared on a sliver of land. No evidence of humanity anywhere. We stopped and, one at a time, went in and took care of our needs alongside the chickens on the straw-strewn floor of this abandoned building. Physically relieved we walked back to the car only to see two people rapidly walking toward the "abandoned" building. We jumped into the car and took off, suddenly remembering that in rural Spain it was common for a family to live on the second floor and keep their animals on the first floor of their home. We had used some people's residence as our own personal toilet!

And they talk about ugly Americans...........

Windows

Our house has a lot of unique features. It was literally built by the first owner in 1950. When we moved in in 1988, we knew there were things we wanted to change....especially the kitchen with its puke green linoleum, bright orange flowered wallpaper, and dark dark Mediterranean style cabinets. Eventually the four layers of kitchen wallpaper (representing the styles of 1950, 1960, 1970, and 1980) were all removed, the rest of kitchen was remodeled, a entry-way was cut between the dining room and kitchen, and the back porch became our family room.

Along the way every appliance has been replaced and a number of exciting electrical and plumbing adventures have been undertaken. Every installer, plumber, and electrician who has entered this house has said something along the lines of "I've never seen a _____ installed QUITE LIKE THIS before."

Maybe we should have asked a few more questions about this home-made house before presenting an offer, but we were buying at the peak of a seller's market. If we hadn't put in an offer on the day BEFORE it officially went on the market, we probably wouldn't have gotten the house. We even presented the owners with a sappy letter about how we saw this as such a wonderful house in which to raise our family. Besides, it was the one house in Northbrook that came relatively close to both our wishes and budget.

Windows have not been a huge concern in this home-made house. They are triple track, so we haven't had to mess with taking storm windows up and down. We've replaced screens and every June we've paid Curt the Window Washer to shine everything up. (We learned in the first year of our marriage that paying someone to wash our windows was much cheaper than paying for marriage counseling.) No big changes to the windows....until this week!

Ken's carpenter brother replaced our kitchen window. Instead of four small windows separated by lots of wood, we now have a HUGE picture window over the sink. It is the coolest thing ever! I have stood transfixed looking at the gorgeous fall foliage in nearby yards. I have done some major moving around in the kitchen now that EVERYTHING in the kitchen is visible from the back porch. I'm about to move all the junk that has accumulated on the porch since EVERYTHING on the porch is visible from the kitchen window. I have plans for hanging Christmas lights out on the porch in a few weeks and maybe heart and egg lights in the new year. I actually went back and forth from the inside to the outside repeatedly this morning, Windex in hand, so that everything would be sparkly. I'm simply in love with my new window.

My Fifth Career....And What It is Not

As one of the very first baby boomer children (38 days into the era to be exact), I've always been among the first to experience all those boomerish events. One boomerism that is even more true for the children of boomers is having many careers over the course of one's working life. I'm into my fifth. (Not the one you think, I'll open that fifth at dinner.)

Career #1 was teaching in Des Plaines. Incredibly naive, I thought I knew everything about teaching, but fell on my face over and over again in the classroom. I did receive incredible mentoring, developed life-long friendships, began presenting at conferences, and began my writing career.

Career #2 doesn't fit neatly into a time frame but began way back in 1968 when my mentor asked me to contribute my classroom applications to the theory she was writing about on teaching Spanish phonics to children. That led to further collaboration with her, then to solo writing ventures. That came to a halt when Career #3 began, but has been resurrected during Career's #4 and #5. And, miraculously, the royalty checks keep on coming!

Career #3 was my most important career...that of full-time mom. Besides having the privilege of being the one with my babies and preschoolers all day, this job came with other sub-careers such as den mother, church president, PTA health and safety chair, Sunday school teacher, and Kindergarten story teller. For better or worse, those years shaped my children and taught me the most.

Career #4 came unexpectedly when Kevin was in first grade. We both started school full time that year....he with a wonderful teacher and me with an incredibly difficult groups of 7th and 8th graders. By the grace of my kind principal, I returned the following year to much nicer students and by the end of career #4 had developed a few more lifelong friends, had greatly expanded the conference giving gigs, and, contrary to what I thought I knew at the beginning of career #1, left career #4 realizing there was still a lot to learn about learning!

Now I'm three years into Career #5 and I'm still trying to figure out what it is. I know what it is not. It's certainly not playing golf or going to the Senior Center. After spending this afternoon planting bulbs and unsuccessfully trying to dig up and separate irises, I know it's not gardening. Unfortunately for Ken, it's not being a gourmet chef....or even a moderately good cook. It's not - perish the thought - substitute teaching.

What it is is a lot of neat surprises.

This sounds like I'm writing an autobiography. That really wasn't my intention, but traveling to Wisconsin this morning for breakfast (something I sure couldn't do in Careers 1-4!) just got me thinking about the inter-twining of all the life experiences.

I met "H" in Kenosha for breakfast. I first met her when I attended a BER seminar she gave back in the early 90's. Later on, she did some consulting in my school district and we became friends. She went on to do foreign language consulting all over the world, wrote the major methods text on the market, and we ran into each other once every few years at a conference. Recently we re-connected - where else? - online. Now I'm the BER presenter and she's likely to mentor me some more. What fun it was to chat this morning with someone who shares my passion for working with foreign language teachers and what fun to see how life experiences intertwine when you least expect it.

My sons both seem to have an incredible grasp on what they want to do with their lives and both are doing all the necessary things to make those goals happen. They both know how important it is to make contacts with people in their fields and to pursue every opportunity, no matter how minor it may seem at the beginning. I hope they will have as much fun with careers #2,3,4,5.....as I have and will someday in the distant future have many "breakfasts in Wisconsin" with people who helped them along the way!

Today's News from the Family Blogs

The family bloggers now include one son, one sister-in-law, one niece and one nephew. For people who live all over the country but hate to make phone calls, it's just delightful to keep in touch via cyberspace. Today I laughed through my sister-in-law's disgusting but funny experience with a pre-school student, then chuckled through my niece's vignettes of life with two little boys, then grinned at my son's funny photographs and commentary, then smiled as my nephew beautifully expressed his love through poetry. Then I thought, "What humorous or beautiful tidbit can I add to the family tales today?" Here goes.

The alarm went off in the pitch-black darkness of 6:00 a.m. and by 6:40 I was off in the freezing October weather to see school friends at our first birthday breakfast of the year. Although it is always great to see these special people, our conversation seemed to dwell on illnesses, surgeries, and difficult parents. I briefly stopped at home and was treated to a one-sided conversation by my cleaning lady about her recently deceased client. By 8:45 when I left for church for my day of manning (womaning?) the phones for the vacationing office manager it was not just cold, but raining. The day was pretty quiet but did involve phone calls about death and illness. Another volunteer came in and described her recent painful condition and resultant surgery. During quiet moments I read a totally depressing novel about the Holocaust and Arab-Israel conflict. When my phone "womaning" day was finished, I went to the nursing home and felt the continuing sadness over the recent loss of dear but illegal immigrant employees.

Then tonight I find out that Tempe is dating Booth's boss rather than Booth who really loves her. Then, unbelievably, Izzie Stevens got fired from Seattle Grace. How can they fire her right after her miraculous recovery from horrible cancer? Then Violet still has no feeling for her baby, the only available kidney for a dying woman is from her HIV-infected sister, and the "bubble boy" goes to a school dance and collapses from infection.

OK, the last paragraph is about TV and I guess that's not real.

The paragraph about my day is true but.....there were many laughs at breakfast, the church day included welcoming our new pastor and a lunch with a good friend. The nursing home visit included pleasant conversation with my mom. And TV watching was a nice guilty pleasure.

It was just a pretty ordinary, not very exciting day....and it's very hard to compete with today's funny, joyful, and silly news from the family blogs. :-)

Strange Things I've Learned This Week

After several years of wearing athletic shoes that were so wide that I felt like I was wearing rowboats on my feet, I went to a REAL shoe store where they have employees who actually measure your foot and bring you shoes in your size! I learned that my left foot is a half size larger than my right foot (not to be confused with my right leg which is a half inch longer than my left leg). I learned that, yes, my feet are still narrow in spite of the rest of me being definitely not narrow. I learned that only 5% of the populace has narrow feet and that shoe manufacturers (except for the wonderful New Balance brand I bought) are not willing to make shoes that only fit 5% of the world. I learned that sale shoes at a real shoe store are not really more expensive than they are at DSW. Most importantly, I learned that, if I wear shoes that actually fit, my ankles do not have to hurt after walking.

Now I have to learn if anyone sells skinny non-athletic shoes to my minority group.

While listening to a talk radio segment about the I-Phone, I learned that the most popular "ap" for the I-Phone is the I-Fart. Yes, you can set your phone to make long, short, wet, or bubbly fart sounds. Yes, you can set this "ap" to go off if someone else touches your phone. Yes, you can set the timer so your fart sound goes off in the middle of your parent teacher conference. Of course, now that I think of it, I've been at a few parent teacher conferences where that would have broken the ice....as it were.

Speaking of parent teacher conferences, Kevin taught his first private percussion lessons at a local high school this week. He learned that it feels mighty strange to be called "Mr. Kosnik" in a non-pejorative setting.

I've learned that the Chicago Tribune no longer has proof-readers. Colonel McCormick must be rolling over in his grave since his venerable newspaper has fallen to the depths of spelling hell. It's bad enough when people confuse "then" and "than", but this week the FRONT PAGE said that "X" is better THEN "Y".

Of course, why should the Tribune be better than foreign language teachers who, in theory, have gone to college. On listserv messages this week, one teacher spoke of "alters" her students were going to make to observe the Day of the Dead while another was going to teach her students some "site" words.

So, I've learned that my feet are too skinny, that I have no sense of humor about I-farts after thirty years of hearing "Hey, Who cut the cheese?" in middle school classrooms, that I'm too young to have a son called "Mr.", and that I guess it's better to ALTER my SITES THEN not to.

And, yes, a preposition is what I ended this entry with.

La Migra - Day Two

Fifty people are no longer at Rosewood: kitchen and laundry workers as well as CNAs.

I don't know if these people were "just" fired, were fore-warned and didn't come to work yesterday, or have been deported. What I do know is that the sweet CNA who put my mother to bed each night with a caress to her cheek and a gentle "Good night, mama" is not there. Lupe who always has a smile for everyone and who has learned a tremendous amount of English in a few months is not there. Aldo, father of a young boy who sometimes came to work with his dad, is not there. It's very sad.

The lobby is filled today with people filling out applications for employment. Most of the CNA's have trainees shadowing them as they learn the job. Office people continue serving meals. Staff members look frazzled and dejected. Residents are feeling the strain of being assisted by inexperienced people. It's very sad.

I admit to some surprise that proper papers were not a requirement for employment, but also wonder if the home is faced with great difficulty in finding "legal" people willing to do the work. All I know is that I just keep seeing the faces of Lupe, Aldo and others and I'm very sad.

La Migra

There was a quarterly "care conference" for my mother this morning so I arrived at Rosewood earlier than usual. Upon entering her room, Mom asked me if I had noted unusual activity in the lobby. I had noticed that Dulce wasn't in her usual place at the desk and that there were a lot of hospice people around, but nothing strange had jumped out at me.

Mom then said that she didn't get breakfast until after 9:00 and that they were served by the administrators, social workers and other "bosses". She said that there had been a raid by immigration and kitchen workers either were taken or had not shown up at work. I thought this might be another case of my mother's imagination gone awry, but nuanced statements during the care conference did fit her story. I probably will never know what, if anything, actually occurred this morning, but it did awaken strong feelings in me.

My first reaction was actually a feeling of horror in the pit of my stomach. "La Migra" (The Immigration Police) is the cry of terror shouted in places where undocumented people work. As irrational as it sounds, I felt like someone was coming for me. Maybe I've seen too many movies about undocumented people living in fear of La Migra. Maybe I've read too many stories of families torn apart. Maybe I've just put faces and personalities on possible "illegals".

I was hugely relieved to see Dulce and many of the CNAs who take such good care of the residents doing their normal tasks today. I didn't see Lupe, the dear housekeeper who deeply touched me last Valentine's Day when she gave my mom a big stuffed bear. I don't know if this morning's event involved her. I so hope it didn't.

The whole illegal immigration issue, obviously, is extremely complex and difficult. I don't pretend to have the answers, but I can't stop seeing the human faces of these undocumented people. These are people who have come to the U.S. because helping old people use the toilet here is so much better than the opportunities they have in their home village. Some of these are people who have shared their stories with me in Spanish. These are people who work very hard and show so much love for the residents in spite of their low wages. These are people who are trying desperately to make things better for their families.

These are people who are doing something illegal...but are they really wrong?

I Want One of Those

Chicago didn't get the Olympics.

The well-known Cuban pediatrician husband of my college mentor passed away---a fact that has brought back a plethora of memories of the huge influence his wife had on my career and life.

Kevin had a bike accident on Wednesday and is nursing a very badly scraped and cut arm which, fortunately, is expected to heal just fine.

But, what is really sticking in my brain today is a request from Gloria.

Gloria is a very pleasant and "with it" resident at Rosewood. At the end of my visit with my mother a little while ago, I wheeled her into the dining room to be ready for the "Quizmo" game which was about to begin. As I pushed Mom into place next to Gloria, I turned to Gloria and teasingly asked her to keep Mom in line during the game. Then I gave Mom a hug and stood up to leave. Before I could move, however, Gloria said to me, "I want one of those." Of course, I hugged her, and now I can't get her simple and poignant request out of my head.

Many Chicagoans, the pediatrician's family, Kevin and millions of others probably all want "one of those"today, but like most adults, would never ask. What a shame that most of us have to be under five or over eighty to simply say, "I want one of those." What a shame that most of us never think to give "one of those" without being asked.

A "Bog" by Any Other Name

My mother asked me "What's that thing Nancy writes? A bog?"

I said, "It's a blog."

"OK," She said. "I wrote a blog in my head this morning. It goes like this.

I'm sitting on the toilet and the CNA asks me 'Are you finished?'
I answer, 'No, I'm Swedish.'
She then asks, 'Am I rushing you?'
I answer, 'No, I told you, I'm Swedish, not Russian.
She says, 'You're quite frank about this.'
I say, 'If you want to see Frank, he's on the other John.' "

Please, God, let my brain be as intact as hers when I'm 87!