October 31, 2020--Happy Halloween! My preferred costume for Halloween is to dress like Nanny McPhee from the movie franchise of the same name. Nanny McPhee is based on the books of Nurse Matilda, by Christianna Brand. Basically, Nanny McPhee's whole schtick is a stick, or rather, a walking cane. When children are ill-behaved, she brandishes it by clapping it to the ground where sparks fly out from it. The movies came out in 2006 and 2010. However, the books of Nurse Matilda, of which there are three, were published between 1964 and 1974. After we saw the first movie, I purchased the first book and read it aloud to my children. After the first book, we subsequently purchased the other two, and I read those aloud as well. I regret that I missed these books as a kid, though, since they were published during my elementary years. I was given an opportunity to read them back in the day. Even so, they were introduced as "kind of like" Mary Poppins. I wish the comparison had never been made because it kept me from reading them back then. No one could possibly be like Mary Poppins. And when I was told they were kind of like Mary Poppins, there was an addendum added--Nurse Matilda was mean. A mean Mary Poppins? No way I would read that. Here is what I would do for my Nanny McPhee Halloween costume. When the little hobgoblins knock on my door, I answer it as Nanny McPhee. I take out my magic cane and tap it to the ground where sparks fly out from it. When the little children run away crying, I shut the door. If they don't run away crying, I just give them my best Nanny McPhee stare and slowly state, "Say... 'please.'" Those who are left standing then get a piece of candy. Those who have run away just leave more candy for me. I love this costume idea. I just gotta think of a way for the stick schtick to work. October 30, 2020--Plan Your Own Funeral Day
I recently had to plan my dad's funeral. He died on May 23, during this pandemic. It wasn't easy doing so at this odd time, and this post is not to garner further sympathy. That is all in the past now. This post is to say what I would like to see at my own memorial service. What I have to offer is plenty of options.
October 29, 2020--National Cat Day
Ratso found his favorite spot at top of the upright antique piano in the den. As he reflected on his homey surroundings, he thought about how much he loved this spot and how often he perched here. It was a place that encouraged his tendency to think. Someone in the distance started to approach him. It was one of his humans. Ratso yawned. He had long ago given up looking at himself in the mirror at the top of the piano. He had just accepted the fact that there was another cat who looked just like him locked inside the piano--or inside another realm. Thinking about things like this made him depressed. He was a selfish, nearly all white, lazy, fat, furry milk drinker with beautiful blue and piercing eyes. "Why are you such a bad cat?" I asked in my sternest voice. "I'm still mad at you." I reached out to pet him. "You're mostly good, but why do you have to tear up toilet paper? Nobody wants to clean that shit up." Ratso looked back, even more stressed and still parked on the piano. "Get out of my house," he said. We looked at each other with surprised feelings. This was a dance we had performed before. He always did something bad. I always told him how unhappy I was with him. And then he always got mad right back at me . Ratso looked at me with serious eyes. He held out his paw. "Let's not fight," he said. "Hmph," I thought. "Come on, please?" purred Ratso with squinting eyes. He nudged his head into my arm. I tried to still look angry, but my hand started massaging his neck in just the right spot, like a clock pendulum oscillating back and forth. He started purring, and that meant he was very sorry for his misdeeds--past, present, and future. Eventually I grew weary of all of it and went to the kitchen. Ratso heard the refrigerator door open and close, then the pouring of a substance into his bowl-- a cold, forgiving drink of milk. October 28, 2020--National I Love You Day
The Tenant of Nebula Heights A Lost Bronte Novel by Charon Brontenland Tristan Wilson is a daring and witty orphan raised by a thoughtless and spiteful uncle. Eventually he gets a job working as a painter for the understanding Lady Nebula of Nebula Heights. The unlikely couple rapidly succumb to a tender passion. On the day of their wedding, a creepy aunt escapes from the attic of Nebula Heights and starts a fire. Believing that Lady Nebula is dead, Tristan flees from the church and wanders the cold moors for days until he is rescued by a generous housekeeper. However, although Lady Nebula is blinded by the fire, she still breathes. Without Tristan she becomes vile and wretched. She turns to alcohol for comfort. The ghost of the aunt from the attic haunts her. Meanwhile, thinking Lady Nebula is dead, Tristan accepts a marriage proposal from his saviour, the housekeeper. However, one night he believes he can hear Lady Nebula calling, "Tristan, where are you? Tristan come home! Tristan, I LOVE YOU!" and he returns to Nebula Heights. On Tristan's return, he finds Lady Nebula drunk and without sight. Mistaking him for the ghost of the creepy aunt, she attacks him with a knife and Tristan Wilson dies. As she attends to the body, Lady Nebula realizes what she has done. Driven mad with guilt, she hatches a plan to destroy the next generation, but there is no next generation and she dies of consumption two weeks later. October 27, 2020--National Tell a Story Day in the United Kingdom
The Curse of the Tattered Teapot--A Horror Story by Karenlyn Keene Whilst investigating the death of a local lawyer, a modest sleuth called Nancy Clue uncovers a legend about a supernaturally-cursed, tattered teapot circulating throughout London. As soon as anyone uses the teapot, he or she has exactly 3 days left to live. The doomed few appear to be ordinary people during day to day life, but when photographed, they look translucent. A marked person feels like an alley cat to touch. Nancy gets hold of the teapot, refusing to believe the superstition. A collage of images flash into her mind: a sleepy pigeon balancing on a tall ladder, an old newspaper headline about a polo accident, a hooded nurse ranting about war wounds and a drinking well located in a picturesque Staffordshire. When Nancy notices her fingers have cat-like properties, she realizes that the curse of the tattered teapot is true and calls in her boyfriend, a pro football player, called Ned Nicholson, to help. Ned examines the teapot and willingly submits himself to the curse. He finds that the same visions flash before his eyes. He finds the sleepy pigeon balancing on a tall ladder particularly chilling. He joins the queue for a supernatural death. Nancy and Ned pursue a quest to uncover the meaning of the visions, starting with a search for the hooded nurse. Will they be able to undue the curse of the tattered teapot before it is too late? While preparing to interview a volunteer at the public hospital, Ned drops the teapot which shatters into a million pieces. "Ned, how could you?" shouts Nancy. When they examine what remains of the teapot, they notice the bottom piece says, "Made in Staffordshire, England." "To Staffordshire!" they both shout. When they arrive in Staffordshire, the first thing they notice is an exhibit that pays tribute to wartime nurses. They decide to tour through it. At the end of the exhibit, there is a nurse ranting on about tending to war wounds. They decide to follow her at the close of the exhibit that day. The follow her to her home where they are greeted by a step ladder full of drunken pigeons. "Well, I never!" says Nancy. They knock on the door. The nurse answers it. They enter her living room. "I know what happened!" says Nancy. She reaches over and pulls off the hood, mask and wig of the hooded nurse. "The inn keeper!" both Nancy and Ned exclaim. "Yes, it is me," says the inn keeper of the Holiday Inn where Nancy and Ned are staying. "But why?" says Nancy. "Yes, why?" says Ned. "You see, I just wanted to water my pigeons with my grandmother's teapot from the drinking well here in Staffordshire like I did when I was a young lad. When Granny died and the teapot got sold in her estate sale, I had to water them with empty pint bottles. So they all got drunk and couldn't balance on the ladder anymore." "But what about the polo accident?" mused Nancy. "Well, you see years ago, I bribed the newspaper to run that story about me dying while playing polo because my polo career was over when I injured my knee climbing my pigeon ladder. I just couldn't face my fans. So I've lived undercover all these years waiting to inherit Granny's millions and her teapot. However, Granny left all of her money to the Pigeon Conservatory, so all I had hope of ever finding was her teapot." "So, you killed all of those people..." says Ned. "Well, it's what Granny would have wanted." "What a strange little man you are," said Nancy. Ned whips out his cell phone and calls Scotland Yard. Later, Ned and Nancy toast each other over tea laced with Scotch Whisky. October 26, 2020--National Pumpkin Day
Pumpkins and jack-o-lanterns are everywhere in October. They are inhabiting our every day world for this entire month, spying on us through their devious eyes, and giving us false hope through their insincere smiles. If a pumpkin were a politician, who would he be? Furthermore, why do we call our offspring pumpkin? Because they are small and round? In comics and funny photographs, the pumpkin is often compared to someone's butt. I can see why. The orb-like feature and the lines or cracks make the comparison inevitable. One year, my husband won a tiny scarecrow at a Halloween event during the month of October. Standing about twelve inches high, it wasn't exactly tiny, but it also was not big. Made entirely out of cornhusks and wearing a blue suit, it sported a pumpkin head. Dutifully, I pulled it out of my fall décor box every autumn. Each year, I would find a different and unique place for it in our home, but I don't think anyone ever noticed the different vantage points from which Mr. Pumpkin Head rested. Until, last year when I set him next to my husband's recliner. One day we were talking when my husband said, "By the way, why is Pennywise staring at me when I try to read? I don't like him right next to me." Well, that is one way to get someone to notice something. "That's not Pennywise," I laughed. "That's the scarecrow you won at the Halloween street fair ten years ago." "I've never seen that thing in my life," he replied. Excuse me while I go insane now, having recalled this event. How could he not remember winning this item? Of the extremely few things either one of us has ever won, Mr. Pumpkin Head had to be the most unique. Later, this past year, I donated Mr. Pumpkin Head to charity according to the Marie Kondo method. I came to the sad conclusion that I did not really love Mr. Pumpkin Head. Call me fickle. Or chalk it up to the idea that I had grown weary of placing him into our décor each October only to finally, really find out that hardly anyone noticed anyway. October 25, 2020--National Chucky The Notorious Killer Doll Day
I am not sure what this means, but the first "Chucky" movie debuted in 1988, the same year I got married. Fast forward about ten years. My daughter was between one and two years old. Old enough to talk and love baby dolls. I love this age in little girls. They just want to imitate their mommas. My baby girl had a collection of baby dolls and loved every one of them. I would watch her put them to bed. When she ran out of baby beds and blankets, she would create beds on the floor for them with towels and pillows from our sofa. One day in October, we were shopping for Halloween costumes in Target. There was a display of Chucky dolls which she honed in on immediately. Stacked in bright yellow boxes on the corner of an aisle. How could she instinctively know that these boxes held dolls? She could not read, and yet she reached out her small chubby hands, as if ready to receive a new gift. "Mommy, look!" she said. I tried to steer the shopping cart away from the display as quickly as possible. I knew what was coming next. She would want to hold one of the boxes, like she always did if I steered her down the toy aisle. I could not turn the cart around fast enough. If she discovered that there was a doll that contained and promoted evil, all hell would break loose. I started the turn of my overstuffed cart, looking around for something to distract her line of vision. There was nothing but other items of pure evil. Stacks of scary masks, racks of witches' costumes, skeletons, and ghosts. How did I find this aisle? What was I thinking? I only wanted a fairy princess costume for my little girl. As I maneuvered the cart, it became apparent that it was too late. "Mommy, what's wrong with that baby?" she cried. "He just...um...he just...look he's not for us, o.k.? He just got hurt a little bit." She clearly did not like my false and faltering answer. Her cries became screams, starting in the bottom of her stomach, winding their way through her throat until they were freed at last through her ample vocal cords. "What's wrong with that baby?" she screamed. She was becoming hysterical, and I understood why. She clearly comprehended the toy aisle. She was astute at spotting new and loving all baby dolls. What she could not wrap her tiny little head around was the packaging and promotion of a sick and hurt baby. Why? It was her first encounter with evil. And I was a sicko mom who had brought her to it. She was having a nervous breakdown there in the shopping cart. I finally found another, calmer aisle. I took her out of the cart. Held her close, and did all things Mommyish to sooth her pain. We left the store. I think I checked out with all things intact. But my daughter's howls of "What's wrong with that baby?" still haunt me to this day. October 24,2020--National Pit Bull Awareness Day
I have on my hands a full grown baby-man dog. He is an American Staffordshire terrier by breed, which sounds much better than pit bull, which is his category of dog. And he would not hurt a flea. Well, he does like to bark at other dogs. He learned that, however, from his former roommate--our now deceased dachshund. Our dogs have had a secret pact or code, and I believe they passed down knowledge between them since we first had dogs. For example, our oldest dog was a black and gray wire haired terrier, and for some reason, he liked to eat bubbles. He was always fascinated by running water. We had to turn off the sprinkler before the grass was fully watered because he would exhaust himself by running through it. And he would attack the water hose. It just so happened that the day before he died, at twelve years of age in human years, I had played with him in the backyard by blowing bubbles at him. Even in his advanced years, he took the bait, following them and biting at them to watch them pop. The next day, he woke up dead in his dog house. I found him there, and we had our first dog funeral. Not long after that, we brought home our dachshund from the shelter and introduced him to our remaining dog, a German shepherd mix who did not like bubbles, nor care for water. I believe she warned the dachshund to never eat bubbles because it was the last thing the wire haired terrier did. Then she eventually died, bringing us to acquire our fourth dog. So the dachshund went from a German shepherd mix for a roommate to an American Staffordshire terrier as a roommate. They got along great, with the smaller dog taking the role as alpha dog because he was older. He helped raise the pit bull. None of the other dogs after the wire haired terrier has liked bubbles, nor garden hoses, nor sprinklers for that matter. Not even baths. So, I surmise that the older, wiser dogs passed down this bit of helpful information to the younger generation. "Whatever you do, don't eat her bubbles," said the shepherd mix to the dachshund who then repeated it in his turn to the pittie. Who will our current dog tell, as he does not have a roommate, and since he is quite elderly, will probably not get one in this lifetime. My wickedness with bubbles can apparently live again, in the world of dogdom. October 23, 2020--Know Your Classmates Day
And so it came to pass, that some (if not all) of my students did not know each other. I knew this because I would allow them to pass out workbooks and folders with their classmates' names on them. Once in a while, when organizing materials, a kid would come up to me and say, "Miss, who's this?" "Who's this?" I would retort. "You don't know Sam?" "No...?" would come the bewildered reply. "Follow me," I would say. At which point, I would march the supply control guy to Sam's desk, making a big production of it. "Excuse me, Sam," I would continue. Then I would launch into a set routine of formal introductions, the kind that are outlined in outdated etiquette handbooks. Let's pretend the supply guy's name is Brett. "Brett, I would like you meet Sam." Then nodding at each of them when I said their name, I would continue. "Sam--Brett. Brett--Sam." A nicer person would have ended it there. But by then, I usually had the entire class's attention, so I had to continue it. I would then look at Brett. "Brett," I would say, "Sam plays lacrosse and has two sisters. He wants to be a doctor when he grows up." Then I would look at Sam. "Sam, Brett is into anime and art. He hopes to attend college in New York." The last part of the formal introduction would be something I just made up. I had no idea if Sam wanted to become a doctor. I may have seen him in biology class while the teacher was giving an anatomy lesson. I also had no idea if Brett wanted to attend college in New York. I may have noticed him sketching in his notebook during my lecture. I purposefully added my own addendums to the introduction upgrading any pursuits or dreams the students may have held for themselves--or didn't even yet know existed. I just thought I would insert something into their heads that they might remember since they did not remember much else. OCTOBER 22, 2020--CAPS LOCK DAY TODAY IS CAPS LOCK DAY, A DAY TO SCREAM AT EVERYONE THROUGH YOUR TEXT MESSAGES. CAPS LOCK DAY IS A PARODY HOLIDAY MEANT TO BRING AWARENESS TO THOSE OF US WHO INSIST ON WRITING MESSAGES IN ALL CAPS, EVEN WHEN NOT WARRANTED. I MUST ADMIT THAT I OCCAISSIONALLY SLIP INTO ALL CAPS DUE TO ARTHRITIC FINGERS, BUT NO ONE UNDERSTANDS THAT. HERE IS A TEXT EXCHANGE BETWEEN MY DAUGHTER AND ME. ME: CAN'T TALK RIGHT NOW B/C I'M WATCHING A TED TALK, BUT I'M GLAD TO KNOW YOU ARE STILL ALIVE. DAUGHTER: WHY ARE YOU TALKING IN ALL CAPS? ME: CAUSE I'M TOO LAZY TO HIT 'SHIFT.' ALSO MY FINGERS FEEL SWOLLEN. DID YOU THINK I WAS YELLING? DAUGHTER: No, I just thought you were a Boomer. ME: :) O.k., Millie. DAUGHTER: I don't think that's a thing. SO IF ALL OF YOU YOUNGSTERS WILL JUST PUT AWAY YOUR ADDING MACHINES FOR A FEW MINUTES AND HAVE A FACE TO FACE CONVERSATION WITH US ELDERS, WE PROMISE NOT TO YELL AT YOU SO MUCH. October 21, 2020--Babbling Day
Today is Babbling Day, the day to just babble on and on about nothing in particular. So, I will give it a shot. Did you know that a person who babbles is called a blatherskite. I have come across a few of them in my life. When you have to work with someone who is a blatherskite, it can get a little tedious. Monotonous. I once went to a teacher workshop at Rice University where I had to sit with a woman who must have been so very lonely. I still feel sorry for her to this day. She probably became a college professor or something because she gave off that vibe. She started our daily workshop with telling the table what she had for breakfast each day, and it went down hill from there, but to this day I can still remember her favorite breakfast--some kind of healthy Kashi cereal that tasted "exactly like Captain Crunch." I hated to tell her this, but no one in their adult mind should like Captain Crunch. And as far as Kashi brand cereal is concerned, I have tried them all. I am not enamored of any Kashi cereals mainly because they are marketed for a health conscious audience. I don't even really like cereal very much anyway, and to have to face a bowl of cereal first thing in the morning as a point of reckoning with the day to come just makes we want to go straight back to bed. I can not face cold heartless cereal first thing in the morning. The most courage I can muster as far as a hearty breakfast is concerned is a bagel or some yogurt, but the yogurt is iffy because it is close to cereal in that it comes out of the refrigerator. I don't aim for anything from the refrigerator first thing in the morning that is more than a small drop of cream or milk for my coffee and a very small glass of orange juice. So, I wanted to tell my new friend to just eat shit and die about her daily announcements to our table of fellow teachers at a workshop at Rice University that no one, I mean most likely, not one of us, cared a whit or one iota of a whit as to what she ate for breakfast that morning. The other thing she told us about was the ducks. The ducks lived in her subdivision and were always doing something very ducklike and rather odd and boring to the rest of us. I mean ducks are entertaining in the wild, and some people actually do hunt them. You can cook them at Thanksgiving and have a turducken for example, but no one else at our table, again, cared to know what the tribe of ducks that lived in her subdivision was doing on any particular morning. Why, I ask you, why? Why was this girl/woman so inclined to garner the attention of our table of four teachers to talk about essentially nothing. Nothing at all. It was madness I tell you. Nothing but pure unadulterated madness that brought her daily accounts, infinitum, to our table. I will tell you why. It is because the other two table mates were fairly young teachers who were not married. The only married ones at my table were myself and the the cereal woman. So, the singletons were barely awake first thing in the morning, having done God knows what the night before in the single haze of existence in the middle of summer. Then there was the other two of us. Both happily married, but I was the only one with kids, so I had basically nothing to talk about with anyone at the table, and because I am nice--mostly--and ceded my time of talking to others who wanted or felt a need to talk, this sham of a woman insisted on telling us her daily intake of breakfast and then about the Goddamn ducks until I tell you I thought I was going to throw up. When I looked around the table at the rest of them, one was still wearing sun glasses to hide her blood shot eyes from the florescent lights of the classroom at Rice University and the other one was hunkered down over a super Grande latte from Starbucks. We were all just trying to wake up and face the day in our own unique way. I could have bothered everyone at the table by interrupting the masochistic maneuverings of the blatherskite who just had nothing at all interesting to say except what I already told you, all about her cereal and the soy milk she told us she drank. Why would anyone drink soy milk and then feel a need to tell others about it? I cannot pass the soy milk section of my supermarket without this woman's face appearing in my mind, and such were the assignations of her ridiculous shell of a life, that I cannot get her out of my mind when I am confronted with a carton of soy milk to the point now that I avoid the soy milk section at all costs, to the point of denying myself even the fundamental right of purchasing a carton of regular milk as that item is often and most likely set next to or in the general vicinity of soy milk products. October 20, 2020--International Day of the Air Traffic Controller
All parents are air traffic controllers, especially moms. Parenting is greatly a logistics type job, and the cargo is children. When our children were younger, my husband and I did a daily dance of who's dropping off whom and who's picking them up. The picking up was especially hard. It was the unplanned weather conditions that I imagine an air-traffic controller must face daily. My husband and I would exchange emails and later, texts--when they came into vogue. The messages went something like this-- "You picking up the kids today?" "I can't. I just found out about a parent meeting after school." "I have tutoring until 5:00." "Can't you dismiss early?" "No can do. The buses won't be there, and I'll get in trouble." "I'll make something up. Skip the meeting." "Can't you just leave early." "Too awkward." "I can make it there by 5:30." "Never mind. Just found out meeting's been canceled." In my mind, I imagined our little bundles of love getting tossed across a great runway, kind of like when a baby is about a year or so old and Dad has discovered how to gently rough house with it. I've never seen a dad who didn't like to lift his little one near to the ceiling and then gently drop him down into his arms, all the while careful that the child is only in perceived danger. Picking up and delivering children is kind of like that, except between two parents playing catch with them. If there is only one child, it's fairly easy. Each parent just needs to make sure they are open for the catch, but it's expected and the parent can assume the catch in a straight forward position. Two children make the game more difficult, but still manageable. Each parent may have one child, and every so often, one parent may have both of them, but not for long. Add in a third child, and oy vey. The air traffic controller parents are constantly juggling one or the other while one or more of them are in the air. Coming in for a landing is when they finally, at last, pull up into the drive way of the home--safe at last. Thank God, Almighty, they are safe at last. October 19, 2020--Evaluate Your Life Day Today is Evaluate Your Life Day, invented by Thomas and Ruth Roy of Wellcat Holidays and Herbs. Following are some questions you can ask yourself to find out if you are headed to where you want to go in life. And as an example, I have answered them myself. Here we go:
October 18, 2020--Hard Boiled Guy/B Girl Day Generous Gum-shoe McDoo A Short Story by K. Schwablood Gum-shoe McDoo looked at the ivory piano keys underneath his hands and felt lonely. He walked over to the window and reflected on his hock shop surroundings. He had always hated gas house China Town with its noisy, numerous nooks. It was a place that encouraged his tendency to feel isolated. Then he saw something in the distance, or rather someone. It was the figure of Pam La Gam. Pam was a cold-blooded ice queen with curvy legs and flowing locks. Gum-shoe gulped. He glanced at his own reflection. He was a generous, controlling, brandy drinker with ginger hair and long arms. His friends saw him as a vigorous, violet vicar. Once, he had even revived a dying puppy. But not even a generous person who had once revived a dying, puppy, was prepared for what Pam had in store today. As Gum-shoe stepped outside and Pam came closer, he could see the steely glint in her eye. "Look Gum-shoe," growled Pam, with an admirable glare that reminded Gum-shoe of cold-blooded rats. "It's not that I don't love you, but I don't want love. You owe me 4,748 dollars ." Gum-shoe looked back, even more shocked and fingered the silver gun in the pocket of his trench coat. "Pam, I still love you," he replied. They looked at each other with concerned feelings, like two poised, puny pigeons begging for a crumb at a park bench, with blues music playing in the background. Gum-shoe studied Pam's curvy legs and flowing locks. Eventually, he took a deep breath. "I'm afraid I declared myself bankrupt," explained Gum-shoe. "You will never get your money." "No!" objected Pam. "You lie!" "I do not!" retorted Gum-shoe. "Now dust your curvy legs out of here before I bump you off with my heat." Pam looked jumpy, her eyes raw like a bloody, broken window. Gum-shoe could actually hear Pam's heart shatter into 4,748 pieces. Then the cold-blooded queen hurried away into the distance. Not even a glass of brandy would calm Gum-shoe's nerves tonight. THE END October 17,2020--Black Poetry Day
The first African American poet to publish poetry in the United States was Jupiter Hammon. Known as the founder of African American literature, his first poem was published in 1761. Today is Black Poetry Day, and I am sharing one of my favorite poems by an African American, followed by my own lame attempt at a similar poem. Gwendolyn Brooks was the poet laureate in 1960. She wrote one of my favorite poems (below). We Real Cool Gwendolyn Brooks - 1917-2000 THE POOL PLAYERS. SEVEN AT THE GOLDEN SHOVEL. We real cool. We Left school. We Lurk late. We Strike straight. We Sing sin. We Thin gin. We Jazz June. We Die soon. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- We Care Free Not Gwendolyn Brooks THE RULE SLAYERS FOUR ON THE SHORE We care free. We On spree. We Swim sea. We Sport capris. We Vitamin D. We Wine/brie. We All she. We Girl's jubilee. October 16, 2020--Dictionary Day
I used to teach dictionary skills to kids. I favored a good set of classroom dictionaries. The problem was that teachers had to share dictionaries between classrooms. So there never seemed to be a complete set of the same dictionaries in a classroom. I had to work around this fact, but kids would be lazy when writing back then. They had to look up misspelled words in the dictionary, a tedious, yet time honored tradition. I can't tell you how many times a kid would come up to me, giant dictionary in hand, and say the word they were trying to find was not in said dictionary. I would take the book from them, look up the word myself, and say, "Yep, it's in there." Then quickly close the book and hand it back to them. It didn't take long for them to realize they were going to have to do the hard work of looking up words themselves. The last thing I looked up in a dictionary while reading a book was "suffragette white." I had forgotten about the state of the union address in 2019 when female members of congress opted to wear all white as a statement of the hard work of those who came before them. I was reading Melania and Me by Stephanie Winston Wolkoff and the author describes what Hillary Clinton wore to President Trump's inauguration. Apparently her outfit was white from head to toe--and designed by Ralph Lauren--by the way, one of my favorite designers. And suffragette white simply means wearing all white as the suffragettes did at the turn of last century as a means of identifying themselves. That is about as political as this blog will ever get. I like reading books like this one strictly for the insider's view of things. I love me a good tell-all story. And a dictionary. Got to have a dictionary. September 15, 2020--International Day of Rural Women "Rural women and girls contribute to agricultural development and are often responsible for improving food security." I reckon my Granny was a rural woman. She and Grandpa lived on a farm, and of course she had a garden. A garden, with its rows of vegetables, is laid out like a suburban subdivision. I used to love to walk up and down the rows of her garden. While doing so, my mind was full of rich scenarios and imaginings.
All of the plants were fairy houses. The cabbages were where the rich people lived. The lettuces were also for rich people, but were newer builds. They were for the nouveau riche. Tomato plants were shade trees. Potato plants, carrots, and green beans were uncleared land. Squash plants were old homes with wings and additions added. This game continued with every visit to Granny's garden. I was a real estate agent driving my clients through the neighborhood, making up stories about each family of fairies that lived within. Perhaps this is where my love of real estate began. It's hard to say. I just know that each home was different and valued. You could tell how much effort went into the home owner's yard by the way the dirt was arranged around the plant. A giant human foot print near a home meant no effort at all. Shady, towering nearby tomato plants meant the family had lived in the home for a great while and were community leaders. Today, in hobby supply shops, you can purchase fairy home statuettes and yard furnishings--such as miniature chairs and swings and gates. What I would have given for something like that. As it was, however, my imagination was allowed to run freely and wild. The only thing that would tear me from my garden wanderings were yellow jackets and honey bees. Frequently seen around the flowering squash plants, some of the oldest homes in the area. However, Mr. and Mrs. Squash made plenty of mistakes as the tenants of that home. One of them was adding an addition to the back for their grandson to live. He kept a wild bunch of friends who could be frequently seen ridding off into the sunset on their flying motorcycles. A bunch of angry young men, looking for a fight. October 14, 2020-lower case day once when i was teaching, i explained to the class how important it is to proofread their work. then i went over some basic rules about writing and grammar. one young turk raised his hand. "yes?" i asked. "what about that poet guy?" he asked. "which poet guy?" "you know, the one who doesn't use any capital letters." "you must mean e.e. cummings," i said. "yeah. what about him?" "so...what about him?" "well, he didn't follow any of these rules." "no, he didn't," "then why should we?" "e.e. cummings held both a bachelor's and a master's degree from havard university." "so, what are you saying then?" "no one advances that far in their education without knowing and practicing the rules." "so, what you're saying then, is that we have to know the rules before we can break them." ": )" October 13, 2020--International Day for Disaster Reduction When my husband or I go the grocery store, we make sure we are dressed appropriately for it. For example, any trip to a flagship grocery store requires dressing as if going to work or church. The same can be said for trips to Target. I don't think I need to tell anyone that dressing to go to Walmart is an anything goes choice. Going to Whole Foods Market requires nicer clothing. Going to the Aldi, not so much. There is an unspoken dress code for every grocery store. The cheaper their prices, the more underdressed you should appear. The reason for this code is to reduce disaster. If you run into someone you know in one of the higher end grocery stores, you will want to make a good impression. On the other hand, if you run into someone at a dollar store or Walmart, for example, you won't care about impressions so much because you will both know that you are only there to save a buck. And this fact will make you share something in common; therefore, you will have bypassed all laws about impressions. Disaster averted. Once my husband and I ran into a dear friend of mine at Walmart. At 7:00 in the evening, we were on our way home from somewhere and stopped by our local Walmart to pick up a prescription and some milk. We met my friend at the door and chatted. She and I share a similar sense of humor, so she looked at me and said, "Is this date night?" You have to laugh with me. Maybe it was. Maybe date night involved going to Walmart. Anyways, I hope so. I hope I get pushed around Walmart in my wheel chair someday. Who's to say I don't have a secret crush on a certain greeter or stock boy? Who's to say I won't need to be pushed around in my wheel chair to continue such fantasies? And for that, I will need to dressed provocatively in order to reduce disaster. October 12, 2020--Moment of Frustration/Scream Day After my dad moved with my stepmom to their house in the country, he kept bringing me things that they no longer wanted or needed. My step mother obviously had made the determination to get rid of said items, but since my dad could not bare to part with anything, he thought that giving the items to me would be an acceptable way of parting with them. Nothing he gave me during this time period was of any value. NOTHING. I would have kept something of value. For example, he brought me a bag full of items one day that included--a used spice rack, a few old mismatched coffee mugs, and some chipped drinking glasses. Anyway, this final bag of stuff was just going too far. It was the third bag of this type he had given me. I stupidly got a little excited when he presented me with the third bag, thinking that maybe this time it would have something--anything--good. I could have just put all items in the trash after Dad left, but instead I just set the bag in the garage where it waited for an appropriate burial. One day, with no one else home, I made my move. The garbage can was on my driveway between the car and the garage, where no one could see it or me. I looked at the hard cement driveway and had a single devious thought. I slowly and methodically took an item out of that bag, threw it to the ground and watched it shatter. It felt good to destroy something for once. I had grown weary of holding so much together. My parents dissolved union--Bam! My dad's filing for divorce, leaving my mom untethered--Wham! The miscarriages of justice to my reproduction attempts--Blam! And furthermore, when did I become the parent in this situation with my dad?--Pow! Weren't grown children supposed to be the ones leaving crap at their parents house?--Bang! All manner of wrongs done against me since day one--Kablooie! Each smash was a measured and thought out act. When I was done, and at last the dreaded bag was empty, I calmly swept it all up and put it in the trash. The only things I had to apologize to were my two dogs, who looked at me through the fenced yard like they were worried about me. I am sure they were, but I made up with them. It was a cheap form of therapy and until now was one of my deepest, darkest secrets. October 11, 2020--Day of the Girl Child I have never been to a gender reveal party, although I would like to attend one. You have to know someone who's having one to be invited, I think. Is it too late for me? Can I hold my own gender reveal party, even though my children are grown? When I was expecting my daughter, I had a plastic bag full of waxy discs that I held under my tongue each day for the first trimester of my pregnancy. They were progesterone tablets that helped me hang on to the pregnancy. I read once that they were made from the urine of a bunch of nuns, but I don't know how is true that is. Whatever the origin, I am eternally grateful for them. Today is day of the Girl Child, and it gives one pause. Why do we need a day of the girl child, anyway? Probably because in parts of the world, girls are still underrated and undervalued. Even in my own part of the world, this idea has been true. If I had a dollar for every time my brother was allowed to do something because "he was a boy," I would be a rich woman. I wish my parents had not used this word trickery, however. I wish they had told the truth. My brother was allowed to drive across town late at night, have no curfew, go to the beach alone, and many other things due to the fact of his maleness. I, on the other hand, had to inform my parents of my whereabouts at all times of the day, and even then, my explanations would sometimes be met with disapproval. In a perfect world, there would be no need for these arbitrary rules. In short, there are ways in which a young girl can get herself in trouble, and I don't just mean pregnant. An unescorted girl can fall prey to nefarious people. Even today. Just google "human trafficking." Some boys also can fall into the wrong hands, but the majority of bad guys look for naïve girls. And my parents knew this fact. They just didn't bother to tell the rest of us, or at least, not me. Instead, they made me feel undervalued. Less than. In their short sightedness, they ultimately left me vulnerable. I had to find these things out on my own. I think I will throw myself a gender reveal party, and it will be awesome. I will reveal that I was a girl child and am now a girl woman. We will eat cherry pie and drink pink lemonade. We will dance to Cyndi Lauper music and sing Gloria Gaynor songs. We will revel in the privilege of getting to be born a girl because you know what they say about the hand that rocks the cradle... October 10, 2020--Handbag Day
I love the style of Queen Elizabeth because of her iconic handbag. It is always the right size, the right color, and most importantly--with her. She never leaves home without it, and if the television series, The Crown, is correct, also walks around home with it. I would look silly walking around my house with a handbag over my arm, but I have worked in buildings as big as the palace where it would have served me well to walk around with one. You never knew when, for example, you might need to reapply lipstick or blow your nose. I watched a documentary once about Queen Elizabeth's wardrobe. She keeps it all in a separate room (of course) where each event and what she wore is cataloged. What's more interesting, however, is how often things get re-worn or re-made. Only truly close royal watchers are aware of when we are looking at a previously worn outfit. And all those handbags are certainly recycled. Dressing to that degree everyday must be exhausting. And walking through the palace--just going from room to room--looks like walking the length of a shopping mall. Perhaps, it's not that big, but on television, it looks like it is. Jotting around the inside perimeter of Walmart twice wears me out. If I lived in a palace, I would have secret passages made or I would use a scooter that had carpet treads. And someday, when I actually get a scooter, I am going to make sure it has a designated spot for a handbag to hang because that is the one thing about handbags that we all share in common. If you do not know where they are at all times, they get lost or left behind. Leaving behind a handbag is life changing event, a true plot twist that you never counted on. I have left mine behind several times in my life, and whenever this happened, it changed the outcome of my trip or wherever I was going. It is not the same for men. Even if they carry a backpack or an attaché case, most men keep their wallets in their pockets, except for the very few men who use the man purse--a trend I would be happy to see take off fully. However, I am extremely fortunate that I never have had my handbag stolen. I think that would be a plot twist that would take a long time to recover from. September 9, 2020--National Haunted House Day All was fun and games until the train nearly ran us down. In 1987, early October, my husband and I were dating. I got the idea that we should visit a "Haunted House" that I had driven past. The concept of a pop-up Haunted House was rather new. One had appeared at a nearby closed and empty Walgreens. On a Friday night, we appeared at the establishment. The concept was so new that we were the only customers there that night. We went into a totally pitch black store. It was impossible to see five inches in front of your own face. I forced my husband (then boyfriend) forward as I hovered behind him. At first it was kind of novel. He kept tossing what felt like dead hanging bodies in my direction. In the dead silence of the darkness, out of no where, what looked like a life-sized locomotive engine came roaring at us. I was already on edge, but this just completely did me in. I have never since been startled to that degree. What I thought would be people dressed up as monsters trying to scare us turned out to be a life threatening situation. Looking back, it was probably some kind of movie prop. I mean there is no way a life size locomotive could have even fit inside a closed down Walgreen's store. However, my adrenaline was charged up and not going to quiet. We fumbled around some more. Husband thought it was great. The second time the locomotive charged at us, I started to have a complete panic attack and I am not one prone to panic attacks. As a matter of fact, that one may be the only one I have ever had. What became apparent was that we had been walking around in circles. And I started the faulty thinking that we were never going to get out of there. Eventually we would die a grisly locomotive death or we would be murdered like the other hanging bodies that we kept running into. I hugged the only living, breathing thing in the place--my one day husband. I was a mess of tears and confusion. Secretly glad for the darkness at that moment so he couldn't see my" ugly" cry, I told him I had to get out of there. He had sensed my panic, I guess, because he led me a little farther. There was some kind of wall. He pressed his hand against it, and suddenly, the whole charade came falling down. He had knocked down a complete wall. The back of the empty Walgreens was completely visible in bright florescent light. I quickly stepped through the opening. A fake zombie man appeared before us. "Are you alright?" it said. "I gotta get out." "Is this the end of the haunted house?" said my husband. "There's another room," said the zombie. "Come on, let's finish it," said husband. "I gotta get out," I repeated. "You go ahead without me." I looked at the zombie. "Can I wait here?" "No, but I can lead you to the front," he said. I bid my husband good-bye. When he met me at the front about thirty minutes later, he told me it had been fantastic. There were two guys who had chased after him with chain saws. I didn't see the fun of it, anymore, but I was glad he liked it, and thankful that he knocked down a wall for me. That night, I began to think I was on to something with this man. October 8, 2020--World Sight Day You can find me on any given Saturday, perusing Barnes and Noble, one pair of glasses on my head, the other one on my face. I have refused bifocals for sometime now. Instead, I just keep an old pair of glasses that I wear when I am doing close-up work, such as typing, reading, or sewing. However for tasks such as reading tiny print material and threading a needle, it is all pure naked eye. For driving or watching television, I wear my latest pair of glasses. This method only backfires for me when I am in the grocery store and need to read a label. How I get around this dilemma, however, is to just not read labels until I get home. If I know I am going to a bookstore, I bring both pairs of glasses--one to read the book jackets and the other to see the shelves and stare across the store. What is mystifying, however, is how when I am there, I tend to forget where my second pair of glasses is. I search frantically in my purse. I think I mislaid them somewhere in the store. I return to all of the places I have been. I try to remember every single book I picked up to review. I get out my phone and call my daughter who has accompanied me. She meets me near the best sellers. "I can't find my other pair of glasses," I frantically say, trying to hide my shame. "How many pairs did you bring with you?" "Two. The pair I'm wearing, and my driving pair. I think I laid them down somewhere." "Have you checked your head?" "What?" "You have a pair on top of your head." I reach up to the top of my head. "Oh, there you are!" I say. She turns on her heel and walks away, but not before I notice her rolling her eyes. I am not blind enough to not see that. This scenario tends to keep repeating itself. To the point now that when I call her in the bookstore, she doesn't even say hello. When she answers her phone, she just says, "On top of your head."
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AuthorKaren Schwabenland--Keeper of a daily blog of written matter, reporter of events large and small, and charlatan extraordinaire Archives
September 2022
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