Magic time

Right now it is magic time 

Gray sky

Misty dusk

Yellow red orange

Feeling grateful

For this moment

Love this place

I call home

              Chris

A work in progress

I am trying to create family stories that I can self publish and give to my children, nieces, and nephews and have been working on this all summer.  Below is a draft of part of work.  It is part of the story of my grandmother.  I wrestle with what to include and what to leave out.  So here is a bit of it.

Isabella Whitney, our grandmother on the farm, was born in 1895.  She became a teacher when you didn’t need a college education to do that.  One day she and another teacher were having trouble with a class.  They were in the school theater and took one boy aside and asked him to do some acting with them.  They were going to make noises, and he had to scream like he was being whipped.  At the end he needed to rejoin the group with a contrite look on his face.  They smacked their hands, and he screamed in pain before rejoining the group, and the rest of the day went well.  This was a time when women could not be married and be a teacher.  She was not married, but some of her colleagues were.  They had to live far away from where they taught to hide their marriages.  But they did it because they needed the work and money or because they loved working with kids.

She bought a car in the 1920’s, a dodge.  A woman buying her own car.  She said that she remembered test driving it on Kingshighway where there was a hill that could be used to test the brakes. She was in favor of women getting the right to vote.  She had to wait until she was 25 to do that.  She said that she voted in every election that she could once she was given that right. And all her votes were for democrats.  She particularly disliked Richard Nixon and his wife, Pat.

Isabella went to Normal School (later named Southeast Missouri State University) in Cape Girardeau to learn about being a teacher.  There she met Albert Wallach, her future husband.  She would sneak out at night to meet him.  One time they were spotted sitting on some big rocks near what is now the student union, and she had to run.  She was wearing a red sweater, and they started looking for a girl who had a red sweater.  She had to hide that sweater to avoid getting caught.  She snuck out by propping open the window in the basement of her dormitory, Lemming Hall.  There were some steps that led to a closed door and she would sit on those steps outside in her bare feet and peek her head back in through the window when it was noticed that she was missing. She would act like she had been there all along.  She and Albert enjoyed time together in Cape Girardeau, but when the school term was over they did not continue to see each other.  She said that she was a city girl, and he lived in the country.  At the time, that was not for her.  The two of them met again at the end of World War I.  She was sitting in the city and saw him get off a bus in his uniform.  She made contact, their friendship was reignited, and then they were married. 

Isabella always made Christmas cookies. They were “the cookies” and they would arrive in a tin with a piece of apple on the top to keep the cookies fresh and moist.  It didn’t matter how far the cookies had to travel, they arrived with the apple.  Sometimes the apple slice would be moldy, but that didn’t hurt the flavor.  After the cookies were eaten, you had to return her tin.  If you didn’t, you would not get cookies the next year. 

Isabella was the youngest of 7 children.  Her father was a St. Louis police officer and he would walk the beat, carrying a stick that he would hit on the pavement – the beat.  He died when she was two, of pneumonia.  He got it after a shift in the cold rain.  Her mother Bridget supported the family by opening a small store.  They lived upstairs and the store was downstairs.  Her closest sister was Helen, and we got to know her well.  When we would visit the farm in the summer, there was always a Whitney reunion.  The grownups would drink beer and whiskey sours.  Aunt Helen and Grandma Isabella would have a couple of beers and then they would get silly.  One year, they came down in their swimming suits ready to go for a swim, maybe in the pond and pranced around being silly.  They knew how to have fun.  They liked to travel together, organizing trips that their husbands would take them on.  They were sisters and friends. 

There is always one sibling in the family who moves away and in Isabella’s family it was her sister Mary Agnes.  Mary Agnes moved to California with her husband George. This would have happened in the early 1900's.   He was not Catholic.  Helen and Isabella, who were both very devout Catholics, went to visit their sister after children were born so that they could secretly get their nieces and nephews baptized in the Catholic Church.

Throughout her life, Isabella was a very independent woman.  She was the organizer of her family and a bit of a controller.  She sometimes boycotted weddings that were not held “in the church” and expected everyone else to follow her lead.   Isabella was not very happy that her son married a non-Catholic woman.  From time to time, they had a difficult relationship.

One trait that this family nurtured was stubbornness. “You can’t tell a Wallach what to do.” We were all allowed to do our own thing. Her son did his own thing and married someone out of the faith.  She did her thing and made sure we knew how to be Catholic.  When we visited we said our nightly prayers before bed, stayed after mass to light candles, and learned how to say the rosary.

A Pebble in the Pond

Mark shared this poem with me.  I shared it with my poem a week email list.  Someone from that list shared it with their husband who shared it when his band played at the Whitaker Music Festival at the Botanical Garden.  Mark tossed a pebble in a pond and the ripples of that pebble traveled far. 

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, outside his City Lights Bookstore in North Beach, San Francisco.

“PITY THE NATION"
(After Khalil Gibran)

By Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Pity the nation whose people are sheep
And whose shepherds mislead them
Pity the nation whose leaders are liars
Whose sages are silenced
And whose bigots haunt the airwaves
Pity the nation that raises not its voice
Except to praise conquerers
And acclaim the bully as hero
And aims to rule the world
By force and by torture
Pity the nation that knows
No other language but its own
And no other culture but its own
Pity the nation whose breath is money
And sleeps the sleep of the too well fed
Pity the nation oh pity the people
who allow their rights to erode
and their freedoms to be washed away

My country, tears of thee
Sweet land of liberty!

On hot summer days, my girls need my presence.  My bees beard the outside of their hive, waiting outside for the humidity and temperature to fall.   I bring my chickens watermelon so they have watery snacks.  They have names - Red. Rhoda, Stella, Goldie, Daisy, America, Hawkeye... I have to change out of my red shoes now.   I wait for the sun to set and then watch for predators.  Raccoons come at dusk and I close the door of the chickens' shelter as darkness arrives.  They break the silence of living alone and I am grateful for the opportunity to get to know them.

The queen has a yellow dot.  Can you find her?

A Day of Mindfulness

Taking time to be truly present for one another, we nourish mutual understanding and happiness.
                                 At Home in the World by Thich Nhat Hanh

On Sunday a group gathered to share a day of mindfulness.  The theme of the day was Ancestors: Familial and Spiritual.  We sat together in meditation; then reading from Thich Nhat Hanh The Five Earth Touchings, we shared stories and reflected on the role of our ancestors.  May we be their continuation.

We mindfully watched the ruby throated humming birds coming to the feeder. We walked in silent meditation along the gravel road, feeling the coolness of the shade and listening to the call of the flickers resting in the trees.  We were present to each other in the beauty of my family farm.  With gratitude to my parents, grandparents, and great grandparents.  May their love of the earth flow through me.

We were nourished by the delightfulness of Erin's grandmother's favorite dish.  Her recipe for bow tie pasta and chick peas was mindfully prepared. We were led by Erin and shared the chopping, cutting, stirring.  The most delicious food ever, eating in silence enjoying the flavor, texture, and sensation of every bite.

This food is the gift of the whole universe; the earth, the sky, numerous living beings and much hard and loving work.

With the first taste, I offer joy.  With the second, I help relieve the suffering of others.  With the third, I see others' joy as my own.  With the fourth, I learn the way of letting go.  

My grandmother, Isabella's cookies for dessert.

Trees have their roots and water has its source.  We know that you, our ancestors, are our roots and we are your continuation.  We are determined to receive your cultural and spiritual heritage, to conserve and to develop what is good, beautiful and true in it.  We are also determined to realize aspirations which you have handed on to us, transforming your suffering and opening up for future generations the way to a peaceful, unburdened and meaningful life.  We are determined to help build a society in which people are not always busy, where little is consumed, and there is plenty of time to live with nature, look after nature, and bring happiness to, care for, and smile to each other.

We promise to let go of all our anger, sadness, and resentment, and to forgive, love, and accept each other.  We know that only by doing this do we really express our feeling of gratitude and loyalty towards you.

May our children and grandchildren be protected.  May we be safe and protected so that we have enough health, faith, and joy to be able to continue your work.  

                                                          Thich Nhat Hanh

                         
                             

First grade letter from Gramps

One of the reasons why I love being a teacher