Consider yourself blessed

I've worked in an office environment for nigh onto 3 decades now and I've learned one definite way you can categorize your co-workers. There are those who follow every sneeze within hearing with an immediate "bless you" and those who don't. I don't. I find it hard to participate in an activity that I find, well, ridiculous. I know that today it's more of a courtesy than anything else, but it's really pointless if you think about it. Maybe our ancestors thought they were doing some good with this little exercise, but we modern folks know that your spirit isn't going to escape from you if someone doesn't perform a quick "bless you" to prevent it.

Ok, there's another way to categorize your co-workers. Those that get their feelings hurt if they don't hear "bless you" and those that don't. I receive at least one "bless you" everytime I sneeze at the office. I say "thank you" and go about my business. But then you wonder how those blessers feel when it's them who sneeze and you ignore the opportunity to reciprocate by taking the role of blessor. I'm sorry. I just can't utter a blessing that I find unnecessary and that nobody on the other side is listening to anyway. (Well, I hope not. If there's an abacus in the great office upstairs keeping a running tab on sneeze blessings, I'm in serious trouble.)

Likewise, I find the clinking of wine glasses to be an embarrassing ritual. Again, our ancestors probably had a good reason for sloshing their wine together to ensure that nobody slipped them any poison, but for pity's sake what other good purpose does it serve? Yeah, I do it, but I always feel ridiculous. Like I've been caught skipping cracks for fear of breaking my mother's back.

Do you ever consider how many things we do because ggggg-grandpappy did them for some good reason that vanished several centuries ago? We are products of our raising and we can't escape the influence of several generations of ritual "because that's the way I was taught". In some ways it could be viewed as a comforting thread that runs from generation to generation, passing along the ways of people whose blood runs in your veins. That's the excuse I use when I fall victim to uttering some verbal colloquialism that my co-workers have never heard. But that's another essay for another day.

Thankfully I'm not superstitious. If you believe in these little rituals, more power to you, and I'm sorry if you're offended because I don't acknowledge your sneeze. Just consider yourself blessed and don't feel obligated to bless me the next time hay fever season arrives.

LSW

Stop it Already

Lord, deliver me from copycat piety.

I was out and about yesterday, having been given Good Friday as a holiday. I decided to wander down to the San Marcos outlet malls and do a little shopping. It was really crowded. (I think about half of Mexico heads to San Marcos on holiday weekends. I heard more Spanish than English yesterday.) Anway, I saw a lot of people and a lot of cars.

You know the first of those magnetic ribbons that appeared on cars to show support for the soldiers in Iraq weren't so bad. But it has gotten completely out of hand. Now there is an unlimited variety of magnetic ribbons available - for the soldiers, for breast cancer awareness, and heaven only knows what else. I'm sure someone has already taken the opportunity to market ribbons in support of whichever side of the Terry Schiavo case you happen to support.

Some folks seem to have completely forgotten the original concept of the ribbons and are now compulsively collecting every version they can find and attaching them to the rear of their vehicles. I seldom see one ribbon on any vehicle; there's usually two or three clustered together. One car I saw had at least 2 dozen affixed. Somehow I doubt the sincerity of someone sporting that many of the things. Is quantity supposed to indicate the level of your support or do you think I'm too stupid to get the idea from only one?

I'm also pretty much disgusted at the proliferation of rubber bracelets that have hit Central Texas. What was a fairly unique idea thought up by the Lance Armstrong folks to indicate support for cancer research has been copied and used for everything imaginable, including local sports teams. At this point, when I see someone showing up with one of the bracelets, I tend to roll my eyes and sigh.

Maybe imitation is a form of flattery, but sometimes it screams laziness and greed. You made a mint selling something unique, so why should I come up with my own idea when I can copycat and make a mint off your invention. And in the end the original concept gets stomped into the ground by all the folks racing to make a buck with copycat products. Pathetic.

Nothing new under the sun. Just do me a favor and if you have a magnetic ribbon on your vehicle or a rubber bracelet on your wrist, get rid of them. They don't mean anything anymore.

LSW

Mean Girls

There’s a good blog online called Real Live Preacher at http://blogs.salon.com/0001772/. I learned about it from brother David. I don’t read it as regularly as some, but it’s worth visiting when you’ve got some extra time on your hands. And today’s entry tweaked my memory.

Along about 9th grade I believe it was, a girls’ war broke out in our class. I don’t know why, but teenaged girls sometimes go through a particularly hateful spell when they decide to gang up on a single member of their number and make that poor one’s life miserable. This is called fun. Unless, like I was, you’re that one girl singled out.

What was really odd about this particular period of my life is that we had all been together for many years. Our class was very small and there were only eleven girls. We had grown up together and been friends through thick and thin. It wasn’t like the townies ganging up on the new kid in town.

What it boiled down to, I guess, was a power struggle. I was a straight A student, got along with all my teachers, and got along with most of the boys. (I was a late bloomer in the romance department, so I really wasn’t interested in anything more than friendship from the boys at that stage. Remember this was in the 60s.) I had been the new kid in town at one point, since I moved there in the 4th grade, but had made a place for myself at the head of my class. And therein was the possible problem. The girl who suddenly got it in for me had been the “smart girl” before I came on the scene. She was more aware of the approaching need to make romantic liaisons with the few available boys. And she considered herself to have an edge in all matters of teenage politics because she was a home grown gal.

Well, stupid me, I was totally oblivious to the political jockeying that was going on with the females. I had a couple of goals. Get good grades and keep out of trouble. Ultimately, I knew I would be heading off to college and I had no desire to get into romantic entanglements that could possibly interfere with my future. So I didn’t care at all about the budding competition for the local boys.

But I guess it was my self-confidence that really caused trouble. I pretty much knew who I was and, though something of a social misfit, was comfortable in my role as serious student. I also did not bow to peer pressure and learned early to have my own opinions, regardless of the crowd’s viewpoint. So I generally spoke my mind and moved to the beat of my own drum.

Not a way to get along with other teenaged girls. The leader wannabe didn’t care for my independent ways. Or my ability to cut through the crap and point out logical answers, especially if it went against her line of thought. One day I called her on her bossiness in front of our classmates. Thus began the orchestrated freeze-out that lasted the rest of the school year.

She quickly recruited seven of the girls to support her in her cause. From October through May, I was seldom spoken to by any of them and was frequently subjected to cutting remarks made behind my back but just within my hearing. It was a tough year. No teenager likes to be treated like the class pariah for no good reason.

But, thankfully, two of the girls refused to play the game and proved themselves real friends. They paid a certain price for sticking up for me, but we gave each other support and quality friendship which made up for a lot. And, the boys were either unaware of the situation or were ignoring it. They never took their friendship away from me. And, of course, the teachers were always kind and friendly to a good student. I limped through the school year, bruised but not disabled.

Summer vacation came and went and the next year things went back to normal. Either the girls had given up on breaking me, were tired of the game, or they had matured a little. I had shown I was able to take whatever they dished out. Friendly relations resumed and nobody mentioned it again. Oddly enough, the girl who started the whole thing became a good friend of mine for the rest of our high school years.

I’ve never been one for close girlfriends. Somewhere in the back of my mind is still harbored the distrust that was bred by my fellow females that year. I learned that females can be fickle. I learned that a real friend will stand by you even when pressured by society to turn her back on you. I learned to be satisfied with a few quality friends over the shallow friendship of a crowd.

I was lucky. I had enough inner strength to stand my ground and figuratively spit in their eyes. But there’s a lot a kids out there that get similar and worse treatment by their peers and don’t have that inner strength to get them through. Some never recover. They spend their lives in quiet desperation or suffering abusive relationships because they don’t think they’re good enough to demand better treatment. And a few snap and make the evening news when they decide to spray their school with bullets.

So what’s the point? Someone feels a need to be superior and can’t get it any other way than to make others feel inferior. Stupid, stupid, stupid. What they prove is how truly inferior they are themselves. Unfortunately nobody wins.

LSW

Living in the Forest Primeval

This morning I'm reminded what I love about living in a pine forest. When I took the dogs out for their morning - uh, outing, - at the edge of the yard were SEVEN young deer. I cautioned the dogs to let them alone as the deer moved to the opposite side of the street. They blinked at me, not really concerned at all.

About 30 minutes later, I took another stroll outside and they were still there, playing statues. Their intense stare as they watched me move was the only sign they were real. Concerned that the morning traffic on our street would be starting at any time, I decided to shoo them back into the forest. They continued to study me as I got closer and closer to them. Four of them were in the edge of the woods across the street and three were back on my side of the street, grazing along the dirt road that runs alongside my lot. What a time not to have my camera in hand. I was within a few yards when they finally skipped off into the pines. These are the moments that help reduce stress.

We have two birdfeeders hanging from our deck that are in constant business right now. At one time over the weekend I spotted FIVE cardinal couples visiting at the same time. I don't think there's a more beautiful bird than the cardinal and as they flit about the red-tipped photina bordering the decks, they are quite a picture. We also have a steady business from chickadees and various finches. In fact, we are filling those feeders at least three times a week these days. I buy my bird seed in 120 lb. lots now. That will last a couple of months at their current rate of consumption. I've also hung a squirrel feeder in the front yard, which at the moment is being stripped by the birds. Fair enough, I suppose, given the number of times the squirrels have stolen seed from the birds.

We have a demented mockingbird that starts his repertoire at first light and continues until dusk. His constant switching of tunes in mid-song is quite comical, and much more enjoyable than the musical preferences of the teenagers who live down the street.

There are days when I come home from work, pretty much convinced that life sucks. And then I look over the deck into my backyard full of pine trees, yaupon and cedar shrubs; listen to my friendly neighborhood mockingbird; watch the doves and cardinals working on emptying the feeders and remember that life is really about enjoying the simple pleasures that surround us. It helps put things into perspective and I decide that maybe life is worth tackling again tomorrow.

LSW

P.S. The bluebonnets are out, which makes this my favorite time of the year. I'm a couple of weeks away from my birthday and I always think of bluebonnets as my personal gift from nature. Could there be a more perfect flower?

P.P.S. Ok, there's one thing about the forest I'm not particularly crazy about. The pine pollen is filling the air these days, covering everything with a fine yellow powder. I give up washing my car until it's done. But it's a small thing and I can definitely overlook the aggravation in return for the pleasure of living among the green giants.

Score One for Me

I am not obsessive compulsive. At least most of the time. I do like a certain order in things, but I generally don't let others' disorder get to me. But there are things that affect me like fingernails on a chalkboard and bad grammar is one of them.

About two weeks ago a notice was put up at every exit to our office building to advise us of electrical work that was to be performed today (Saturday the 12th). It was a long advisory, and it probably could have made the Guinness Book of World Records for the most grammatical errors in one memo. I stood it as long as I could. (About 2 hours.) On my ride to the 2nd floor after lunch, in the world's slowest elevator, I took it upon myself to correct the grammatical errors on the notice that had been posted inside the elevator. Yeah, I knew it would probably start something, but I couldn't help myself.

There were two primary problems that I addressed. The power was to be out from "approximate 7AM to approximate 5PM". I added "ly" to both. We were all cautioned to take care of electrical equipment and refrigerators that would be "effected" by the outage. That one was repeated later on and made my teeth grind in horror. We won't even talk about the spelling errors. Suffice it to say, the notice was liberally covered with ink by the time I got back to my floor. And no, I didn't sign my name. I'm not stupid.

Having satisfied my obsessive compulsion, I forgot about the thing. Until I left to go home. Then I discovered that my corrections had been "re-corrected" to note that I was in error on all counts except the obvious spelling errors. I reacted like a bull to a waving red cape.

I proceeded to re-correct the re-corrections, and noted the grammatical reasons. "I beg to differ", I wrote, "effect = noun; affect = verb" and the use of the word approximate, I noted, was as an "adverb, and therefore requires ly". I didn't leave a whole lot of blank space for anybody to disagree with me again.

The next morning I was not surprised to see that the paper and ink battlefield had been removed from the elevator. I confessed my actions to several who work with me, who weren't at all surprised that I was the culprit who started the whole thing. I let it go at that point and refrained from correcting any of the other numerous notices that still littered the building exits. I had chosen the most public place to make my stand and I knew that virtually everyone in the building had seen it.

Yesterday afternoon new notices were posted all around to remind us of the electrical work to be done. This one had the same general cautions, but correctly used the words "approximately" and "affected". "Ah, ha varlet", I thought. Then I noticed the tiny print at the bottom of the notice. "Special thanks to the English Teacher who corrected the errors on my previous notice." Followed by a smiley face.

Okay, my grammar isn't always perfect. So if you catch errors, feel free to point them out. (You'd better be right, though, or it's swords at dawn.) I lived with two English majors (my mother and brother), have a former English teacher as an aunt, a professional writer as an uncle, and came within 3 hours of having an English minor myself. I may not have any talent at all on the athletic field (see previous post), but I'm not too shabby when it comes to grammar.

So score one for me. I love it when I win.

LSW

Fouls and Free Throws

There’s a blog I make a point to read every day. The owner of the blog is also a caregiver, and we’ve exchanged commiserating emails from time to time. We also have in common our childhood spent in two far-flung but eerily similar little Texas towns. Rana has a great sense of humor and can draw a mental picture that turns a mundane event into roll on the floor hilarity. So wander on over to www.ranablog.com if you need a little diversion on a dreary day.

Yesterday, thanks to Rana, I began to remember my brief and dismal athletic career. For two years, in 8th and 9th grade, I actually joined the girls’ basketball squad. If you’ve ever seen me attempt any kind of physical coordination, you know that it was a sad time for Smiley. I was truly terrible. But I wasn’t the worst on the team. Oh, no. There were two other girls that were even worse then me. The three of us generally spent the games warming the bench, but in the spirit of letting every player play (who thought that stupid rule up anyway?), there was a torturous period of time in each game when the three of us were sent in to provide comic relief.

Those were the days when girls played half-court basketball. The three court jesters would be sent in to play defense some time in the 3rd quarter. (While I could shoot free throws fairly consistently, I couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn when in motion. I guess the coach figured we couldn’t do too much irreparable harm if we just chased the opposing team’s forwards around for a few minutes.) On one frightening and forgettable occasion, the poor coach had a brain freeze and sent the three of us in to play offense at the tail end of the last quarter. Good Lord, were we ever offensive. I think the only reason we weren’t laughed off the court is that the game ended before the shock of our ineptitude wore off.

Thankfully, we seemed to play mostly out of town, so I didn’t lose too much respect on the local level. I guess we played plenty of games at home, but I only seem to remember the away games. With one exception.

I was not an aggressive player by any stretch of the imagination. I was not into physical confrontations. (I bruise easily.) At one home game, however, I couldn’t seem to do anything without fouling or being fouled. As I recall, I actually sank a free throw at one point. That was the good news. The bad news was that my parents were in attendance and my father took the opportunity to embarrass me royally by clapping, whistling and hollering approval every time I committed a foul. Unfortunately I did not foul out, which would have ended my misery. The crowd (thankfully small) and my coach seemed to appreciate the few light moments provided by the antics of the Wilcoxen Comedy Troupe in an otherwise dull game.

Two years was all I could take. Actually, in a perverse way, I almost enjoyed my basketball days. But I took pity on the coaching staff after two years and retired my gym trunks. (Speaking of which, man were they butt-ugly.) I managed to avoid team sports for the most part after that, except for a semester of tennis in college. I was lousy at that, too, but I had a good time and the best part was that I never embarrassed myself with more than three other people at any one match.

Girls basketball is much more exciting these days, since they now play full court. But thank heaven that they didn’t start that until years after my participation. I shudder to think what I could have done to humiliate myself playing the entire court.

I always sympathize with the physically inept. I was the kid who was picked last when choosing up baseball teams in grade school. But I was the first chosen for spelling bees, so I guess it all evened out. Looking back, it just seems like there were a lot more baseball games than spelling bees. The moral of the story is, don’t force your kids into athletics if they’d rather be reading a book. And if they decide to play a sport, go to their games but keep your mouth shut.

LSW

A Proud Texan by Birth

March 2nd. Texas’ Independence Day. Long live the Lone Star State.

I am a 5th generation Texan. My great-great-great Grandfather Lentz moved his family to Texas in 1832, four years before the War for Texas Independence. I am the 4th generation not only to be native Texas born, but to be born in Bastrop County. So you’ll have to forgive me if I think of myself first as a Texan and second as an American. I’m a deeply patriotic American. I’m a rabidly patriotic Texan. “Don’t mess with Texas” is the perfect motto in my opinion.

My Lentz ancestors settled on a league of land in southern Bastrop County, a grant from the Mexican government. I suspect they may have temporarily fled their home as part of the Runaway Scrape, a few steps ahead of Santa Anna’s army. A few years after the Texans won their independence, my aforementioned forefather Jacob Lentz and one of his sons were killed by Indians near their home. Jacob’s wife Sarah remained on the home place with her children. A portion of that original land grant remains in the hands of some of their descendants.

My Texas citizenship means a lot to me. True Texans are independent, self-reliant, rugged folks. Our ancestors moved into a wild, untamed land and carved out new lives for themselves. They had to be hardy stock to have survived.

Real Texans are becoming harder to find these days. Our unique culture is beginning to get fuzzy around the edges from the influx of non-Texans who have discovered our warm winters and our freedom from a state income tax. Where once we all dropped our “g”s and sprinkled our conversations with “y’alls” and “ain’ts”, now the younger generation is beginning to look askance at those of us who still let the traditional Texan drawl and lingo slip out of our mouths. “How uncouth,” you can read in their eyes. Phooey. I’d much rather stand out as a true Texan than be taken for a poor-imitation Noo Yarker.

Texans are unique. We feel a special pride in the fact that Texas existed as an independent nation for nine years before throwing in with the United States of America. If we’re honest, we’ll admit that we think we could do just fine on our own again should the opportunity present itself. Our loss of national independence was the USA’s gain. If you have a Texan in your corner, you’ve got backbone that won’t quit.

By the way:
No Texan refers to one person as “y’all”.
George W. Bush ain’t no Texan. He adopted us. It wasn’t our idea.
When a Texan hits the back roads, he waves at everybody. It’s polite.
Texan males still hold the door open for their women. (And we don’t mind at all.)
No matter how far a Texan roams, he’ll always be a Texan at heart.

Long may the Lone Star wave. Y’all come back now, you hear?

LSW

Day - O

Today is Belafonte's 78th birthday. Today I pay a small tribute to a great singer. One who I maligned unjustly when I was a toddler.

This morning I've been listening to eklektikos with John Aielli on KUT-FM. John is one of the few people I know whose musical taste is more varied than mine. One of his strong points as a program host is he makes an effort to honor folks on their birthday and to provide appropriate music on various days of note. Just as I switched on the radio today, he started Belafonte's Sylvie and played about 4 more of Belafonte's best known songs in a row. Started my day off right.

My mother tells this story on me and I'm sure it's the truth, but I have no personal memory of the occasion. She was a fan of Belafonte's in his hey-day and had purchased a copy of the record Day-O or Banana Boat Song, which she played over and over and over. My musical discernment apparently started early and came the day I had had enough of that particular song. She happened into the room just as I had finished stomping the vinyl record into smithereens, and overheard my pleased comment "Won't have to listen to that no more". I'm sure the consequences are responsible for my selective amnesia about the incident. My mother was never one to tolerate willful destruction of property and I'm sure I paid for my sins.

The weird thing is, now I own several CDs of Belafonte's music and I thoroughly enjoy Day-O. Though I'm sure if I had to listen to it non-stop, I would probably haul out the clod-hoppers and again dispatch it to the trashbin with my proven methodology.

But anyway, Happy Birthday, Mr. Belafonte. Many happy returns of the day.

LSW

When in Rome, February XXII, MMV

I have an obscure talent with absolutely no market value. I am highly proficient at deciphering Roman numerals. As you can imagine, my abilities in this area are seldom required. Aside from the odd clock face and the numbering of document outlines, about the only time I use this talent is to decipher the copyright dates that flash by at the end of television programs.

I acquired this claim to fame during a 6-week period in the fourth grade, courtesy of the high school football coach. Attending a small school had some interesting aspects. In Smiley, the entire 12 grades shared the same campus. Teachers had multiple duties they performed and our fourth grade teacher was also the faculty sponsor of the high school drill team. During football season, she spent one period every day working with the girls on their next Friday night performance. In her absence, our math classes were conducted by the high school football coach.

The idea was that we were to learn long division. For reasons known only to Coach, we tackled the subject of Roman numerals. Rome may not have been built in a day but anyway you look at it, Roman numerals don’t take six weeks to conquer. But we were drilled day in and day out on the various components and how to use them to construct the Roman numeral representation of any number.

None of us knew any better, so we were perfectly happy to while away our math lessons for that six weeks. But sooner or later the piper will always demand his due. When our teacher returned to our math class, she expected us to know long division. What followed was a crash course to bring us up to speed. (As I recall, she wasn’t at all impressed by our ability to handle Roman numerals.)

Thanks to the general lack of teaching I had received in the previous year at another school, I had a much harder time catching on to the requirements for long division than did my classmates. It nearly killed my soul to be kept in at recess to practice math. I don’t remember how many of those sessions it took before my brain finally comprehended the necessary concepts.

That year probably marked me. I was never comfortable in math classes for the rest of my educational career. I managed to maintain my generally “A” average through college (with one unfortunate lapse to a “B-” during a miserable 6-week period in Algebra II), but it was only when I began to work with computers on the job that I came to enjoy and appreciate the mysteries of mathematics. Now I sometimes wish I could go back and take all those upper math classes again without the “fear factor”.

Be that as it may, my Sunday School teacher warned us about hiding our lights under a bushel. I may be lousy at Algebra and Trigonometry, but I can show you some fancy footwork when it comes time to translate a copyright date. Now if I could just figure out a way to get paid for it.

LSW

Memory Snippets

The land where my grandparents lived when I was a child recently came on the market. There are a lot of good memories tied up in that acreage. I went so far as to contact the realtor for the details and briefly pondered the possibility of bringing the old home place back into the family. However, after several days’ consideration, I decided the negatives outweighed the positives and I dropped the idea. But not before a jumble of memory clips made their way through my thoughts. To mention a few:

1) Hot summer days during the watermelon harvest. There was always a pile of perfect watermelons under a tree in the side yard. I don’t think I’ll ever again have access to watermelons as sweet as those grown by my grandfather. We would gather under the tree with a knife and salt shaker and split watermelons, eat the sweet hearts while juice ran down our arms and dripped off our elbows, then toss the rest into the pig pen. Now when I see puny watermelons in the grocery store, priced at $5 each, I just can’t bring myself to buy them.

2) Spending winter nights in the country in a house where the fireplace in the front room was the primary heat source. It got mighty cold in the bedrooms and we would pile my grandmother’s handmade quilts on top of us until we were weighted down, barely able to move. It would be so cold that the sheets would feel wet, and once you got a spot warm you tried to stay put. Then in the morning, heading for the fireplace to warm up. My grandfather would always have it started and would be on his second cup of coffee by the time we dragged ourselves out of bed.

3) The cow pens where my grandmother went everyday to milk. I even tried milking once upon a time. It ain’t easy and it feels weird until you get used to it. After the milking I would watch her run the milk through the cream separator that was mounted to the kitchen cabinet. She made great homemade cottage cheese (or curd) and regularly churned butter. I took a turn at churning, too. I doubt I ever contributed much to the process, but I can truthfully say I’ve milked and I’ve churned.

4) One summer my aunt and I whiled away a good bit of time constructing a dirt town in the field back of the house. We piled dirt up into a small “mountain”, constructed roads, and made up stories about the folks that lived there. As we created our town, we sang a song of our own creation:
A little bit of white and a little bit of brown
All go together in a little dirt town.
We had a lot of fun with our imaginary town. It was a little disappointing when my grandfather plowed it under later in the season.

5) Another time my aunt and I were hanging out at the tank. (That’s a small body of water, kids.) We watched as a large cloud of black insects settled on top of the water. My aunt cracked me up by observing that it was undoubtedly a Billy Bug Crusade.

6) One day I was walking backward on the dirt road, talking to my aunt who was riding a gentle mare. I just happened to turn around, seconds before I would have fallen over an armadillo that was shuffling across the road behind me. My aunt found it humorous. If I had actually come into contact with the thing, we probably would have had to go home so I could change my clothes.

7) My grandmother would usually have a huge platter of chicken fried steak ready when we got there. One of the side dishes would be Ranch Style beans. It was many years later before my brother realized that those beans weren’t a special recipe of hers. She also would make a roasting pan full of cake doughnuts, coated in sugar. I’ve learned to cook a decent chicken fried steak and I make doughnuts using her recipe, but they never taste as good as my memories. (It might have something to do with her use of lard. That was before we knew to watch our cholesterol.)

8) Since there were witnesses, I’ll confess to getting in trouble one time in her kitchen. I’m not sure what artistic impulses caused me to park myself in the middle of the kitchen table, where there was a big bowl of newly made curd, and to proceed to fling handfuls against the far wall. For some reason, no one else appreciated my creative efforts.

That’s it for this round of memory vignettes. No wait, one more. Whenever I think of my grandfather, I can hear him call me an “old hen”. Maybe he used that peculiar term of affection with all his grand-daughters, but I prefer to believe it was just for me. He seemed to find me amusing. I know I found him to be a standard by which I’ve always judged the men in my life. My grandparents were good people. I hope I measure up to their example.

LSW

Eewwww

So the Prince and his ladyfriend are going to get married. At this point in time you have to wonder what on earth for. I guess this is an example to give an exception to that old saw that you shouldn't expect a man to buy the cow when he's getting the milk for free.

Actually I can't think of two people who are more ideally matched. Prince Ick and Lady Ugh. Too bad they didn't get together back 30 years ago and make it legal. Instead they messed up the lives of two innocent (maybe) bystanders.

It really boggles the mind that in all likelihood he's going to be sitting on the throne one of these days. Maybe the Queen should hold an "Apprentice" competition. Maybe some fresh blood in the monarchy is what is needed. Badly. I have nothing against the Queen, but I feel her country will someday understand well how devastating the past election was for those of us who still think for ourselves and haven't become passive little sheep being led to the slaughter. Incompetent leadership is a real downer. At least we get to try again in 4 years to rectify our mistakes. Those poor folks are stuck.

Oh, well. This sudden decision to act like moral, upstanding members of the community doesn't change a darned thing. History will play out just the same. I just hope that any televised episodes of the nuptials will happen in the middle of the night. There's enough dreck on television in prime time.

Ok, I'm stepping off my soapbox. For now.
LSW

Good Medicine

When you're feeling punky and the weather is the miserable wet/cold mixture we suffered through yesterday, a good place to head for lunch is Las Palomas Restaurant on Bee Caves Road. Anything you order will be delicious, but when you're sick, try the Caldo Tlalpeno. It is better than Chicken Soup for what ails you. Come to think of it, it is chicken soup, Mexican style.

Imagine if you will a delicious chicken broth to which is added shredded chicken, rice, onion, fresh tomato chunks, cilantro and avocado with an underlying chipotle pepper flavoring. It is mmm, mmm good.

Then drop by next door at the Great Harvest Bread Company for dessert. Their cookies and sweet rolls are a nice little booster to the medicinal effects of the Caldo Tlalpeno. (Too bad I was dieting yesterday. Had to skip that stop.)

Seems to be working, too. The hip is gradually improving. Today's lunch will probably be Tortilla Soup from Central Market and a stop by the bookstore. I know how to treat my bruised little body. Tomorrow...maybe Cheese Soup from The Kitchen Door. Mmmmm. I think I've found the silver lining to being sick.

LSW

You're only as old as you feel

Maybe so. Today I feel all of my 50 years. You can be bouncing right along, your internal age hovering somewhere around 35, when it happens. You bend over to pick something up and you can't make it back to a standing position. The pain that grabbed my back was swift and intense. It was all I could do to shift around and sit down, and I didn't accomplish that quietly.

But I'm tough, I said. After a few minutes I managed to make it back to my feet, gritted my teeth and went on to work. I lasted until 2:00 and headed home, my back twisted into a painful pretzel. Tuesday I stayed in bed. Every time I got up, my hip clicked audibly with each step. It may have been a pinched nerve and it may have been a slight dislocation of my hip joint. Whatever it was, it hurt like hell. Nature's way of reminding you that you're not a spring chicken anymore.

Wednesday, the third day after, my main complaint is an arthritic ache in my hip. By the end of the week I may be back to more or less normal. For a 50-year-old.

This aging thing sneaks up on you. I don't mind the "50" part. I've never had a problem with admitting my age. In ways, I’m actually enjoying the feeling of achieving middle age. Throughout my 20s, 30s and 40s, I seemed to constantly battle for acceptance and recognition in my work. Despite the achievements of women during the last 30 years, it is still an ongoing struggle to maintain a semblance of equality in a male-dominated workplace in the private sector. At this point in my life I’ve decided that I’ve either got respect or I’m never going to get it. It’s a big relief to sit back and enjoy the fruits of my past accomplishments and watch the younger folks scrabbling for a toehold in that rickety ladder of success. If they knew what I knew, they would stop battering their heads against brick walls and take up yoga. Unfortunately, you have to nurse a lot of bruises before you realize that life’s short and time lost flinging yourself against a brick wall is never going to be regained.

I can remember when I was about 9 years old calculating what my age would be when Halley’s comet came back around in 1986. At the time 32 seemed old beyond belief. For someone in the third grade, it seemed unfathomable that when Halley’s arrived I would be (a) done with school, (b) probably married with a passel of kids and (c) wrinkled with old age. I would never have guessed that I would hit 50 with school a distant memory, no marriage or kids in my past, a few wrinkles here and there but still holding up fairly well despite it all. The odd spell of back trouble notwithstanding. My inner 9-year-old would reel in disbelief, but I may very well decide to go back to school one of these days since I think I’ve finally figured out what my major should be. And it’s not Business Administration.

That’s one of the pleasures of hitting middle age. You finally begin to get a handle on who you are. And you make no apologies to anyone for who that person is. If you want to accept me as is, swell. Otherwise, the door’s thataway and don’t slam it behind you.

So, even with the creaky knee and hip joints, the eyes that won't focus on the small print, the extra 10 pounds around my middle, my thermostat that has gone completely haywire, and my sudden inability to eat spicy foods after 5PM without serious repercussions, I really don't have any desire to be 20 or even 30 again. I prefer the wisdom that comes with my present stage of life.

But I think I will try to be a little more careful of how I bend over to pick things up from now on.

LSW

Doomsday

Well, here's a fun way to start a dreary Saturday.

www.deathclock.com

Find out how much time you have left.

LSW

Endless Loop

Don't you hate it when you can't get a song out of your head? I've been bugged by one for the last couple of months. I finally get through a few days without it floating in from left field and then whammo, there it is again.

A couple of months ago, brother David steered me to a singer, new to me, named Cheryl Wheeler. She reminds me a lot of Mary Chapin-Carpenter (who seems to have forgotten how to write good songs since she got a husband). Cheryl Wheeler writes moving ballads and she writes comedic songs. One of the latter is the culprit. It's called Potato, set to the tune of the Mexican Hat Dance, and the chorus consists entirely of the word "potato". The whole point of the chorus is to have each line end on a different syllable of the word and the last line ending properly on "to(e)". I can sing along with the CD with no problem. But let me try to sing it by myself and I cannot get the darned lines to come out on the right syllable. It sticks in my head and I endlessly try to start and end in the right place. Something of a tongue, or in this case a mind, twister.

Do you ever consider how many of our brain cells are tied up with this kind of pointless junk? I can't remember what I had to eat yesterday for lunch, but I can remember all the words to a stupid kid song, 40 years afterwards.

Great big gobs of greasy, grimey gopher guts,
Mutilated monkey meat,
Tiny little birdies' feet.
Eyeballs, eyeballs rolling all around the sink,
And me without my spoon!

Real valuable stuff taking up the memory circuits.

Do you ever think as the hearse goes by
That you could be the next to die?
They wrap you up in a clean, white sheet
And put you under about six feet.
The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out,
The worms play pinochle on your snout...

And let's not even go anywhere near I Found a Peanut.

Back in the dark ages, a.k.a. my childhood, we had a 45 rpm record that had a collection of great kid songs. How I wish I could find a mint condition copy of that record. One of my favorites was The School Cafeteria:

I've eaten in all of the diners, in hamburger places as well.
I've eaten in restaurants and drugstores alike
And some were the best in the town.
The last one's our school cafeteria; so nice, so clean, so neat.
But you'll wonder that we are still living
When you hear what they give us to eat:
On Monday we have bread and gravy,
On Tuesday it's gravy and bread.
On Wednesday and Thursday it's gravy and toast,
Which is nothing but gravy and bread.
On that day we went to the principal
and asked for something instead.
So on Friday, for lunch, and by way of a change.....
We had gravy without any bread!

Somebody stop me. I can do this all day. And come to think of it, maybe if I start remembering those old kid songs I can push Potato to the background and out of mind. At least for awhile.

There's a hole, there's a hole, there's a hole at the bottom of the sea....

LSW

Time Travel

I am a recent convert to audiobooks. My daily commute to work is almost an hour each way and I’ve been making that round trip for 28 years. I cannot abide the glop that passes for commercial radio these days and even though I really enjoy the folks on National Public Radio, you can get tired of them from time to time. I have an extensive collection of music, ranging from classical to new age to bluegrass which has sustained me in the past, but when I’m stressed any flavor of music can grate on my nerves. And this has been a stressful year.

Awhile back I found a bargain on EBAY when a seller listed a complete set of the Harry Potter books on CD. The fifth book was due to come out during that summer and I thought it would be nice to refresh my memory of where the story had left off before I read the new one. The Harry Potter audiobooks are particularly well done and I enjoyed listening to them very much, for 2 hours a day for several weeks. But audiobooks are expensive, so I considered it a special case and didn’t think about buying more.

And then sometime last year I impulsively bought a Nero Wolfe mystery book on CD. And thoroughly enjoyed my commute time that week. The light finally dawned. I could relieve the boredom of 2 hours in the car every day and get some fiction in my literary diet as well. My reading time lately has been restricted to research, history and genealogy. I really missed reading the occasional mystery or best-selling novel. And that’s how it started.

Audiobooks are still expensive, but where there’s EBAY there’s a way. I have steadily built up a collection of audiobooks and have “read” books that have been sitting unread on my shelves in printed form for a year or more. I now routinely stop by Half-Price Books to check for used audiobooks and check the discount bookstores at the outlet mall in San Marcos. I’ve discovered some new authors that I like because their audiobooks were discounted to a few dollars at these stores.

And I’ve rediscovered some old friends. Yesterday I finished A Wrinkle In Time by Madeline L’Engle, one of my favorite books as a child. How nice to discover that the writing was every bit as good as I remembered. I’ve finally “read” the Winnie the Pooh books that somehow slipped by me in my early days. I’ve refreshed my love of the Nero Wolfe mysteries by Rex Stout, the dysfunctional family novels of Anne Tyler and the Navajo detective stories of Tony Hillerman. I’m thinking of tackling some classics that I never got around to.

Commute time is no longer boring. The time is passing quickly these days. I find myself sitting a few more minutes in the car to hear the end of a chapter and having to restrain myself from taking the CDs in over the weekend to finish listening to a particularly exciting story. To escape the stresses of my life by traveling for a few minutes every day to another time and place has been wonderful.

My next airplane trip (coming up in April) will include my new Walkman and a long book on tape. I don’t like flying and I’m hoping a good mystery will take my mind off my fears and speed up that 3 hours. I’m even thinking of taking a book along with me for that weekly trip to the grocery store that I dread so much. Books of fiction were always my escape and I’ve missed them. How wonderful to have good stories to look forward to again.

Audiobooks are like printed books. There’s good ones and bad ones. A lot of books on tape are abridged. Avoid them like poison because you miss a lot of good stuff. A good narrator is a delight. Jim Dale has a hundred different voices for the characters in the Harry Potter stories and makes them come alive in your mind. Likewise George Guidall who reads most of the Tony Hillerman novels. One of the best books I’ve heard is The Red Tent, narrated by Carol Bilger, and I highly recommend it (in print or audio) to any woman. Garrison Keillor narrates his own novels and is always enjoyable. Romance novels are hard to take. If you think the flowery, erotic prose is somewhat comical to read, wait until you hear it spoken. It’s hard not to burst out laughing.

I certainly hope more people discover audiobooks. The major drawback at this point is the elevated price when compared to their printed counterparts. Perhaps if the volume sold increases, the cost may fall. When I can buy the audio book for the same price as the printed version, I will feel a little less taken advantage of. Which reminds me; it’s time to go check EBAY for today’s new listings.

LSW

Shorthand

While idly cruising around EBAY yesterday, for some reason I tried the keyword “shorthand”. It was quite a surprise just how many items involving shorthand were listed for sale, including a rare copy of Alice in Wonderland, published entirely in Gregg Shorthand. I pondered whether I would remember enough of my shorthand to be able to read the book.

Somewhere in the dusty annals of the University of Texas Interscholastic League, there is recorded a time in 1972 when I was State Champion in the disappearing art of shorthand. Granted I was State Champion in Class B competition, but my score rivaled and even bested the scores of many of the first place contestants from larger school districts, so I make no apologies. It was the first time a student at Smiley High School had placed first in State competition. Of course, thirty years later, I may be the only one who remembers that.

How times have changed. Many nights I sit working on a laptop computer, propped up in bed, connected wirelessly to my main computer downstairs. At the office everyone works on a computer now. There may be one electric typewriter left on site, tucked away in some remote corner. When I took my first typing course in 1970, I learned on a manual Underwood executive typewriter. Many of the kids I work with now have probably never touched a manual typewriter in their lives. Heck, they may not have even used an electric typewriter. I doubt they would be able to comprehend the need to monitor the right edge of the page in order to throw the carriage back to the left to start the next line.

Poor kids. I think they’ve missed something. I enjoyed those old typewriters. I didn’t enjoy the carbon packs and the necessity of correcting an error through multiple copies. But the rhythm you developed learning to type without jamming the keys was quite satisfying. My best speed on a five minute test on that old Underwood was 72 words per minute. Believe me, that’s nothing to sneeze at. We still hire folks who can barely type 50 words per minute on a computer keyboard with no reason to worry about where the words are going to fall on the page and where common typographical errors are automatically corrected as you type. (As long as I’m patting myself on the back, I once clocked 128 words per minute on a computer keyboard. Take that, you young whippersnappers!)

I think I knew then that I would be spending my working years at a desk pushing paper. I planned to get my business degree, work a couple of years as a secretary to get something on my resume and then decide where to head from there. With that plan in mind, I and a few other Senior girls talked the school into offering a shorthand class. There had been little interest in the subject and it had been dropped from the curriculum for several years. But our business teacher/principal, was agreeable and about nine of us signed up. I took to shorthand like a duck to water.

It was fun knowing a language that few others in school could comprehend. We could write notes to each other and blithely inform our teachers that we were taking notes from their lectures and practicing our shorthand at the same time. Who would know otherwise? One of the girls did get caught in her lie once. I think the giggling gave her away. She had been writing some kind of sappy observations about the cute young history teacher. When he challenged her, she airily informed him she was taking notes. He casually lifted her tablet and then stated his intention of checking with the business teacher to see if her story was on the level. She turned about 8 shades of red and nearly died on the spot. He took pity on her and gave the tablet back. I don’t think she tried that again.

It was not my intention to compete in shorthand at the U.I.L. meet, but since I was such an over-achiever I’m sure it was easy to talk me into it. Our teacher had taken another girl to State competition many years before, and he thought I had a good chance of winning. I was more interested in the Ready Writing composition category, but the two competitions did not conflict, so I was game. I had no problem taking first place in the District competition, and also placed in Ready Writing. Next stop was the Regional Meet.

Now I had a problem. I had qualified to compete in both events at Regional. But they were conflicting events, so I had to choose which one to pursue. I decided that Ready Writing was such a subjective competition that I would have a better chance to place in Shorthand. Plus I had a real feeling that my teacher would be crushed if I decided otherwise. So the decision was made and we headed to Blinn College in Brenham.

I expected to place, but I truly was surprised to take first at Regional. Holy cow, I was going to have to compete on the State level. That was not something I had really wanted to do. But now there was no avoiding it.

I was a Senior at a very, very small school in south central Texas. State competition was held on the University of Texas campus in Austin. Light years removed from my natural environment. I knew for a fact that I was in the wrong place when I sat down with the other girls for the dictation portion of the contest. I was competing on the Class B level, but the winners from all classes were taking the same test at the same time. We Class B girls felt like hicks alongside the girls from the larger schools.

The competition was a blur and I was relieved when it was over. I knew I had lost, but that was okay. I just wanted it over. My only regret was that my teacher would be disappointed in my failure.

My parents and I left for awhile to give me a break. We visited a brand new shopping mall in town called Highland Mall (now one of the oldest malls in town). I would have been glad to just head back to Smiley, but we were obligated to go back and find out the test results. I can remember getting back just before the awards were scheduled to be given. My teacher was standing in the hall waiting for us, with a glum expression on his face. Well I wasn’t surprised. But a few minutes later I was floored. My stern, unflappable, distant teacher had grabbed me in a crushing bear hug. It took awhile for it to sink in, I was so stunned at his behavior. I had pulled it off after all. The first State Champion from Smiley High School.

In my closet, high on the wall, hangs a plaque in the shape of a shield. It’s my proof that once upon a time, I was at the top of the heap. I actually got to use my Shorthand skills for a few years. As a Senior in college, I took a refresher course to prepare me for my upcoming job hunt. I even managed to push my speed up a few notches. As I began work as a secretary, I used it daily for about three years, even though some of the secretaries were beginning to rely on the dictaphone. By the time I moved out of secretarial work, the dictaphone was an accepted tool and shorthand was no longer a requirement for a secretarial applicant. Shorthand has since virtually disappeared from use. Only we old-timers still take an odd note here and there in those funny little squiggles that only a select few can read. I still use it occasionally at boring meetings to entertain myself by making disparaging observations about the proceedings. I’m pretty sure that no one else there will know what I’m really thinking.

LSW

Feeling Peevish Again

I made the mistake of hitting the grocery store near my office at lunch. I should have my head examined. Or I should just go down to the parking garage and beat my head against the brick wall for awhile. It would be less frustrating.

The Northwest Hills section of Austin has its own particular weirdness on display. This is not the kind of weird that we aging hippie types promote with our "Keep Austin Weird" T-shirts and bumperstickers. Northwest Hills is full of well-to-do (usually old money) types. This means teenagers driving Mercedes and little old grey-haired ladies behind the wheels of their block-long Cadillacs. And in between are the 2nd generation Northwest Hills citizens who are in their 30s and 40s driving SUVs and the occasional Hummer. This whole segment of the Austin populace is moving in its own little fogged sense of reality. And this reality is called "I'm entitled". Or maybe "Just call me Sun, because I'm the center of the universe."

It is really strange. Every last one of them thinks that nothing is more important in the entire world than whatever it is that they are doing at this precise minute. They are totally oblivious to the possibility that anyone else may not recognize their manifest destiny to be numero uno. If you can keep your sense of humor and restrain yourself from snatching them bald-headed, it's pretty funny.

A couple of weeks ago I ran up the hill to a local bakery to pick up a sandwich and cup of soup for my lunch. Should have been a 10 minute errand. But this is Northwest Hills. Mrs. Society Mom was ahead of me in line. First she gave her initial order. Then she proceeded to taste all of the samples on display, chewing slowly to savor each bite. Then she added more to her order already in progress. Meanwhile the line was building behind me. Of course she had questions about some of the items she was tasting. Which, by the way, she didn't buy. At long last, she moved on to the checkout register and allowed someone else, namely me, to place an order. Two minutes later and I was headed to the register myself. There she was, still adding more to her order. And then she had to root through her purse for her credit cards, spreading most of the contents of her purse out on the counter. Meanwhile, in an effort to speed things along, one of the clerks starting taking drink orders from those poor souls standing behind her shifting from one foot to the other. Finally she actually signed the credit slip and spent another few minutes putting everything back into its correct spot in her purse. At this point, you figure there's not much more she can do to stall. Ha. She begins to pick up cutlery, lemons, condiments, etc., asked for a sack to put all of this stuff in and spends more time getting all the stuff put into the bag. You would think she would move over a little and let someone check out while she's fussing with her stuff, but that would be against the rules of Northwest Hills CenteroftheUniversitis. She did finally make it out the door, with the rest of the line moving at a fast clip behind her. Yay, we escaped! Surely you jest. It took her another eternity to get her danged car backed out and moved enough that anyone else could leave. This is how a fast lunch plan becomes your entire lunch hour. This is life in Northwest Hills.

Today's trip to the grocery store was not unusual. The aisles were full of grey-haired folks visiting like they are at the country club. They are so wrapped up in their conversations that most do not notice (nor would they care if they did) that they have blocked traffic to everyone in the aisle and everyone attempting to enter or exit the aisle. If they are really good at CenteroftheUniversitis, they will manage to block the cross aisle, too. They finish their conversation or one dies of old age before they will move on. You can just stand there and watch your cart rust, for all they care. You learn to play demolition grocery carts to survive a shopping expedition. "Oops, sorry. Can I help you up?"

I managed to grab my 2 boxes of cereal and quart of milk and make it to the express line marked "10 items or less". Directly ahead of me in line was Mrs. Society Mom's best friend. I stopped counting her items on the belt when I hit 25. As tempted as I was to inquire whether she had a reading disability or if she had some reason to believe that the sign didn't apply to her , I kept my mouth shut. Another case of NWH CenteroftheUniversitis. It's epidemic in that area bounded by RR 2222, Spicewood Springs, Balcones Drive and Mesa Drive.

You probably think I'm making this up. I invite you to come see for yourself. Just be sure you get your shots before you do.

LSW

Advertising works!

Companies I will never do business with because of their advertising campaigns:

1. Geico Insurance. Sure the little gecko ads were cute at first. But enough, already. They now serve the purpose of exercising my willpower limits. Someday I’m going to lose and there will be a shoe inside my television set.

2. Progressive Insurance. Face it. These ads are just downright annoying as hell. My whole body goes into a massive cringe every time I hear that guy go “NOOOOO!”.

3. Texan Eye Mart. For some time now they’ve run an ad in the Sunday newspaper that employs an extra half sheet attached to the color comics section. They’ve finally made this a perforated sheet that can be easily torn off, but many years of removing the thing weekly have built up an tremendous level of ill feeling toward the company.

4. Likewise, the Stanley Steamer carpet cleaning service that for some time ran an ad on a half-sheet wrap around on the Sunday TV magazine.

5. Sylvan Learning Centers. Now granted I don’t have kids, so it’s not a company I would be doing business with anyway. But the level of schmaltz that gets forced down your throat when you’re too lazy to reach for the remote is as effective as a dose of ipecac. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is also guilty of this technique, but I cut them some slack because of the tremendous contributions they make to genealogists. (I’m not above making concessions when it’s to my advantage.)

I know the theory is that we will remember the name and forget the ads when we are out there shopping around. That’s probably true to some extent. (I’m sure I’ve voted for politicians I would have no use for if I knew anything other than I had heard their name before when I had never heard of their opponent.) However, sometimes advertising works to make me remember who I’m never going to call, simply because they’ve annoyed me to the point of seeking vengeance in any small way I can manage.

One positive aspect of these ads is that my right hand dexterity is in pretty good shape – at least the finger that operates the surf button on my remote and my ability to rip the flaps off the newspaper and score 2 points when I throw them at the trashcan.

Now back to our program, already in progress.
LSW

Shades of Light & Dark

Previously, on Woolgathering. The year 1963 was a dark grey splotch on my personal history. The summer events of 1963 were covered in the previous essay. The later part of 1963 saw the first defining moment of my generation – the assassination of President Kennedy. (Yes, I remember very well where I was when the news came. Our 4th grade class had just received our new Weekly Reader and I was reading an article on the Pennsylvania Dutch.)

Now let us explore some of the events leading up to the summer of 1963.

We moved frequently from the time I was born until I was nine-years-old, as my father received calls from various churches through south and central Texas. We were living in Sutherland Springs when I was born, but I only called it home for a short while. From there we spent some time living in the back yard apartment belonging to my great-aunt Fay on Springdale Road in Austin while my father ministered to a mission church in north Austin. Our next move was to Manchaca, just south of Austin and from there we went to San Gabriel in Milam County. After San Gabriel we lived for a couple of years in Oak Hill on the outskirts of Austin, where I spent the first two years of my school career. After Oak Hill, we lived for 13 months in Victoria. Smiley came next and we stayed put for the longest period of time in my father’s career—9 years. Until then we had averaged about two and a half years at each church.

Victoria has the dubious distinction of being the shortest period of time we spent anywhere. The church was a fledgling congregation just trying to get its collective feet off the ground. It did not take long to see that it was a losing battle and that we needed to seek greener pastures quickly. The church just wasn’t able to support a minister’s family and on occasion we were literally digging pennies out of the furniture to meet expenses.

The year we spent in Victoria I was in third grade. I had had a good start to my education in the first grade with Mrs. Tillman in Oak Hill. I didn’t have a decent teacher after that until we reached Smiley and I started fourth grade. My third grade experiences at William Offer Elementary in Victoria were, for the most part, unmemorable.

My teacher had an unusual teaching style. She divided the class into 3 levels and worked with one group at a time on reading while the remaining students worked lessons written on the blackboard. I honestly cannot remember one thing I learned from that woman. Any ground I gained that year in anything but reading was self-taught. We never learned one thing about cursive writing the entire year, which was a standard skill to be mastered by third graders across the State. (I ended up teaching myself when I got to fourth grade, since that subject had been covered thoroughly by my fellow students in Smiley the previous year.) I was fortunate to be a self-learner since we spent most of the year performing work on what was essentially second-grade level, which put me at something of a disadvantage all the way around the next year in a new school.

I was a smart kid and I guess I knew I was getting a lousy third grade education. To add insult to injury, the woman consistently pronounced my name wrong. Hearing “Lucindy” made me cringe every time and I was too in awe of authority figures to correct her. Fortunately at the first PTA meeting, my mother was able to set her straight and relieve at least one of my many stresses that year.

I normally have a great internal sense of direction, but there are times when I get a mental block about particular locations. The entire William Offer elementary school was in my blind spot. Every morning the kids were expected to line up in their classroom groups on the covered walkway and wait for a signal to go to class. I was never able to find my group and mornings became pure torture as I would arrive and helplessly cast about for my proper place. Eventually I found that I could arrive just a little late and go directly to my classroom. That I could find. Something about that faceless crowd out front had me stymied.

Once I gave myself an anxiety attack and ended up being sent home. I had suddenly realized that I had no idea which locker in the back of the room I had put my things in that morning. The more I thought about it, the worse I felt and ultimately I became genuinely sick with worry. A nine-year-old budding control freak can’t rationalize that all one had to do was go back and start opening lockers until you stumbled across the right one.

I was probably one of the few students that year that got an unscheduled visit with the cafeteria workers. Of course it was a major embarrassment, hardly an honor. I had perched on the edge of the slide, talking with a group of girl friends. It had rained the night before and there was a nice little puddle in the bottom part of the slide, so no one was able to play on it. Some boy, probably trying to get my attention, ran past and pushed me into the puddle, soaking the front of my dress. I spent the next hour sitting in the kitchen with my dress spread across an oven door to dry. I, who loathed bringing attention to myself. What a nightmare.

Even Christmas brought misery. We had little money that year, but we had managed a teacher gift of a set of sachets. I was quite happy to put my package under the tree, but when time came for the teacher to open her presents my gift was nowhere to be found. I was very upset, but by that time I was beginning to accept that things were just not going to go my way at this school. (No one ever figured out what exactly happened, but sometime during the spring that package mysteriously turned up in the teacher’s desk drawer. Perhaps someone’s guilty conscience or maybe it had fallen under a piece of furniture and the cleaning people finally found it.)

One thing that didn’t upset me would have had I any idea what was going on. The Cuban Missile Crisis played out during that school year. We third-graders didn’t have a clue how serious world affairs had become. My only memories of that period involve a couple of drills that involved the students walking home in the middle of the day. Shoot, anything that got me out of that school was cause for celebration. Thankfully, I was totally oblivious to the reasons why.

While things at school were pretty much awful, there are some pleasant memories from that year. We lived in a rental house on a tree-shaded street and most of the houses on that street had children. The street had little traffic except for the kids playing up and down, visiting each other’s yards. I was especially close to the girl next door who was one year behind me in school. We shifted back and forth between yards and houses and had a grand time. Her father had installed a true playground quality swing set in their backyard for his two girls and we spent many an hour swaying to and fro.

I learned to ride a bicycle thanks to Beverly’s mother. My mother spent that year fighting a chronic strep infection and was not the most athletic type at her best times. My father was seldom home. My friend’s mother wanted me to be able to ride like the other kids on the street and spent one afternoon trotting behind me on Beverly’s bike while I mastered the necessary balance to ride on my own. I’ll never forget that she gave me her time to teach me something I came to love for many years afterward. She also fed me many grilled cheese sandwiches and made me feel welcome in her home. That meant a lot to a shy kid who generally felt out of place wherever she went.

Beverly’s older sister Glenda introduced me to the Trixie Belden girl detective books, providing me with hours of blissful reading. She also owned the first Barbie doll I had ever seen. We were sometimes granted the privilege of playing with her dolls and her array of doll-sized appliances, which probably began my love of miniatures and dollhouses.

On frequent occasions all the kids on the block would gather in one yard and take turns presenting entertainments for the others. We sang, we danced, we performed tricks, we repeated half-remembered scraps of the television shows we had seen. We were truly awful, but we had marvelous fun and we never admitted those performances were anything but wonderful.

Our time in Victoria was short and stressful. We made our escape to Smiley after 13 months. Sometimes I wonder how different our lives might have been if we had not answered that call to Victoria. Perhaps those 13 months were necessary in order for us to find our way to Smiley and relative happiness for 9 years. I think fondly of my time playing on Alcoa Drive and try hard to forget the rest.

My world was generally a gray place in Victoria. But I learned that even in the dark times, you occasionally find a ray of sunshine to enjoy, however briefly. I learned to ride a bike. I made a good friend. I discovered some new interests that stayed with me. After awhile the rest didn’t matter so much.