THOUGHTS FOR THE NEW YEAR -- AND BEYOND

 

     

    My name is Simplicity,
guide, guardian, angelic
companion, lost in a shop
of cast-off tools, linens, photos
and cut glass knobs, where I languished
beneath crocheted doilies,
choking on dust and mouse.

 

Not a simple nor straightforward end

for me, the Angel of Simple Things.

For I am a sign of truth and clarity,

 nurturing joy in the good

and the basic. No frills.  No excess.

I harvest the wheat and banish

the chaff to the winds.

 

She found me there on the floor.

A kindred spirit in search of what

I could teach -- sharing wisdom,

 echoing the past, telling stories 

and dreams. I sit on her desk,

 aside books and cats and

whisper that simple truth.

 

Find your true self.

Be that true self.

Let the confusion go.

 

END OF SUMMER... AND INTO FALL

Newfound Lake ~ where we walk from early spring until snowfall.  

This is the last boat at its mooring off the beach 

on a chilly and damp October day.

Phenix Morris Team Revival

    

THE CANTERBURY FAIR  2023

Never let it be said the spirit and the love of a thing can be lost to age!

We danced in the 1970's when we were young and twenty...

Now we dance again in the 2020's when we are aged and seventy.

Hey, ho and "I like to rise when the sun she rises,

Early in the morning..."

THE MOOSE ARE BACK!

EAST INLET during the SUMMER SOLSTICE

 

These are the first hale and hearty bull moose we have seen in many years.  The tick infestations due to recent warm winter temperatures killed off so many of this iconic breed. 

These two males may be the start of tick-resistant genes.  So:  STOP THE ANNUAL MOOSE HUNT and allow them to flourish once again. 

FRIENDS

There are those friends with whom all is said 

in quiet phrases, moments of silence,

years shared through work,

family,  joys and trials.

And as we age, we discover 

a common puzzlement

in life.

 ~

 

OUR FATHERS WERE SOLDIERS

Simon E. Draper, Jr.  Southern France

Signal Corps US Army about 1944

Donald S. Dorrington

Veterans' Day - Westfield, Massachusetts
 US Marines Fifth Division  1943 -1946

MEMORIAL DAY THOUGHTS  2023

Growing up in the 1950’s, many fathers I knew had been soldiers. It was the same for uncles, brothers, grandfathers and women who served in the military.

My grandfather fought in the trenches of France during World War I.  He never spoke of it until he was a very old man.  He’d rather share stories of his father’s farm, where he had driven horse teams for logging and rolling snow.

His references to war were short and grim.  He remembered the waste of farms and fields. After the war, he loved the Maine woods and his camp.  It was isolated— just Gramp and his oldest buddies, those same men who later buried his ashes there.

My father and my father-in-law were young men during World War II.

My father joined the Marines days after graduating from high school.  He turned eighteen on the island of Iwo Jima, one of the worst battles of the Pacific.  He didn’t speak about it until much later in life.  He was of two minds — proud to be a Marine and proud of the men and women of his generation for stepping up to the call for service.

But he also carried the silent grief war leaves — like the men he fought with who didn’t return home.  The desolation he witnessed at Nagasaki.  His uneasy return to civilian life.

Later in life my father spoke with students during Memorial Day ceremonies. He didn’t glamorize war, rather he told them about the need for diplomacy and other ways to manage disputes.  He gave them a glimpse into his life during WWII.  He was rewarded by letters he received from those students and he saved every one.

Finally, my father-in-law was a few years older when he joined the US Army during WWII.  He served in the Signal Corps in southern France.  Although there was danger, he never saw active combat.  His was background work keeping communications open and safe.

When he came home, he started a career with the telephone company.  He shared his photographs of France, yet never really gave details of his wartime life.  He was the kind of man who could find the good in most situations, even war, and move on.

So, I listen to the stories and watch how the storytellers live. They offer me insights and ways to cope no matter what may come my way -- good, tragic and ugly.

 

WHO WERE OUR MOTHERS?

Who were our mothers before they were mothers? 

 
Do you know if your mother worked before she had children?  Was she a teacher, a nurse, a secretary.  Did she clerk in a store or style hair in a beauty shop?

Did she do a job considered “men’s work” back in the day when things like that were thought important.  Maybe she farmed and did chores.  Maybe she milked cows or organized and fed farm workers during harvest.

She could have been a cook or worked in local schools.  She may have been a lawyer or doctor and continued a profession throughout her life.

Women have held jobs in factories, mills, insurance offices and banks. They could be police or EMTs.  They’ve driven trucks and big machinery and owned their own businesses.  They cleaned others’ houses, ironed and laundered clothes and became caregivers throughout time.

Our mothers were also artists and quilters, writers and musicians, potters and weavers.  Women have always been artisans, stitching, knitting, dreaming and creating.

So much has depended on when our mothers were born and what kind of work was available.  What were her choices?  And, who encouraged her.

What else did our mothers do before they became mothers?

Did they love to dance?  Play sports.  Paint or write poems.  Did they hike and swim.  Who had horses and special pets?  Who were friends?  Who was family — and what was the good as well as the sadness in their lives.

Shirley J. Alger - Springfield Hospital School of Nursing Class of 1946

 

Before my mother Shirley became my mother, she was a nursing student.  Her high school class of 1943 graduated into the thick of World War II.  She joined the Cadet Nursing Corps and graduated as a registered nurse just as the war ended.

Before that she worked at an airport canteen where men flew to the war in Europe.  Her dream job was to be an airline stewardess after the war.  Never happened.

Her mother Lina was born in 1901 and adopted into a prosperous farm family.  She grew up with horses and dogs, books and music, two years of college and a job as a Kindergarten teacher.  She played piano.  But Lina never made peace with her adoption and it was the shadow of her life — before and after she became a mother herself.

Lina K. Belden - Circa 1920

Everyone has a story to tell, full of riches and surprises.  Be sure to ask, then listen carefully.                       

TIMELINES

 How We Become Activists

 

There is a big interest in genealogy and writing life stories these days.  After all, we know things no one else knows.  We have memories of families, traditions and places.  We’ve lived through good times and bad.  We’ve been alive during historical events and hold our own thoughts on what happened and how we felt.

Our stories get set down in scrapbooks and journals.  We share photographs. We visit cemeteries or take road trips to places we once loved well. In the telling, our reminiscences are a moment in Time.  Someone asks, “When did it happen?  What time of year? Who was there?”

Recently Barry and I talked about life events with high school students. We hoped to show that what happens in life can change us in unexpected ways.  To do this, we created panels in a Timeline.  Each panel represented one decade and important things about that particular time.

We started with the 1950’s when we were both three years old.  We lived in a small town during the post-World War II days.  We linked facts and questions about world events, personal events, politics, news and everyday happenings to our memories.

In the 1950’s, it was the Cold War.  As second graders we hid under our desks during air raid drills.  Polio was an epidemic in the US.  “No swimming and no parties.”   Life Magazine showed rows of children and adults in machines called Iron Lungs that kept them breathing.  Then Jonas Salk developed a vaccine for polio and we lined up at school for our shots.  Everyone received the vaccinations.

October 1957 the Russians launched Sputnik, the first artificial Earth satellite.  It shocked the world and especially because the Russians were first in the big race to space.  We students started studying more math and science and got something new in our lives — homework.

The 1950’s timeline covered Civil Rights, Elvis Presley and our individual passions:  rivers, streams, snakes and critters (Barry) and books, libraries, stories and the outside (Gretchen).  

And so the Timeline continued, decade by decade. The high school students identified problems we still puzzle over, still worry about today.  Clean air and water.  Education.  How to solve conflicts.  Bullies and cheats.  What is good for all people?

It’s time to listen even more carefully to our stories and memories and decide which ones are best to live by.

~ NEVER TOO OLD ~