Freeze Frame

They squirm to get out of reach. “Not again,” they occasionally roll their eyes , the shutter open-close click-click-click.

“That’s a horrible background.  Move over here,” I direct them, to sighs as they shuffle across the yard.

Yes, they might sometimes complain when the camera comes out AGAIN, but they loved it today when I was updating the slideshow in the digital picture frame.

My kids have changed so much in a few years.  Even in this short timeframe, they laughed at haircuts and clothing; they reminisced about wonderful vacations, celebrations with families and friends, and fun days in the neighborhood. We were amazed at how the same friends kept popping up in photos over the last few years.

Was this really 4 years ago?

So many memories.  They fade in our minds, but the photos are there to spark a smile.  And the kids still enjoy to look at photo albums of their parents when they were young.  We can share our memories with them in a disk, though I admit that people can keep too many BAD pictures to clutter their files, their walls, their albums.  And Grandmom will be happy, since we can still tag the people in the photos, without even turning over the faded, dated photographs.

Little angels. That's me, on the right in our homemade costumes.

So pull out your camera today.  Snap some pictures of those who you surround yourself with.  You won’t regret it.   C

Learning to Trust your Gut

A youth counselor. A pediatrician. A neighbor. A teacher. A priest. A classmate.

Respected elders?  Sometimes.  But several recent conversations, these were the people who tried to take sexual advantage of either me or friends when we were younger.

Last weekend’s conversation reminded me of the importance of teaching our kids to “trust their guts”.   Even as adults, we are so programmed from our youth to respond yes to “authority figures” We should remind ourselves and our children that is perfectly okay to say NO.

If we TEACH our kids to trust their feelings, and to listen to their instincts, it might help them avoid a potentially dangerous situation.  We are animals, and our instincts have evolved over centuries.  We need to teach them to listen to their bodies, which can give them warnings that only they can feel:

•  If a situation feels creepy, it probably is.  Get out, if you can.   It is NOT okay for a young classmate to expose himself to you—one, two, three times—while others smirk in the corners, watching the show created for you.
•  If you suddenly hear the waves in your ears, ocean miles away, your fingers feeling electric with awareness, take a step back.  When someone asks you to “just send them a naked picture” or “wants to take a few sexy pictures with you” know that when it feels uncomfortable, you can say NO!
•  That pit in your stomach, when someone touches you, even on our shoulder, when you want to pull away.  When the doctor asks you to strip down because you have a cold, ask WHY?
•  That shrieking internal voice screaming “THIS ISN’T RIGHT!!”  means “LEAVE ME THE HELL ALONE.  I NEED TO GET OUT OF HERE.”  And do it.  Walk away, run away.

Kids, trust your parents, or an older sibling, or a teacher that you DO feel comfortable with. Try to talk to someone if a person has tried to hurt you, coerce you, threaten you, buy you, or you just know that something isn’t right.

Parents, trust your kids.  When they stammer that they don’t want to be around a specific teacher, doctor, babysitter, neighbor, they are most likely saying it because  their internal warning signals have said not to trust someone they are “supposed” to.  Great for them, that they recognized these feelings.

Sometimes kids—and adults—can’t verbalize WHY they don’t trust someone, don’t want to be around them.  And that is OKAY.

These recent conversations were scary because of how many people I know were preyed upon, fortunately with no success.  But another weakened day, and any of us might have been victims.  A life-lesson for me that “trusting my gut” is still important, sometimes my kids can be wiser than me about certain people, and teaching them to “trust their gut” can be life-saving.

Take tonight to talk to your kids.  Share these words with them, if you wish.  It is that important to me. C

2/8/12–Two updates.  One is the sad fact that an elementary school in LA is replacing their ENTIRE staff after arrests for 2 teachers committing lewd acts, a third one today.  Two is that it is incredible how many people reached out to me on FB today to share their similar stories.  TALK TO YOUR KIDS NOW!!  Have the squirmy conversations now, strengthen your kids–and yourself–for life.

Remembering Tim

The earthquake that rocked the east coast yesterday was far overshadowed in my life by the unexpected death of my high school friend Tim last weekend.

Tim was the guy in high school who was larger than life, ready with a hug, an infectious laugh, a true smile, welcoming all into his circle…unless you were against him on the opposing football team. Then be afraid.  His friendships extended the clique boundaries,  as he spoke his mind, celebrated life since I have known him.

Tim was instrumental in keeping our friendships alive since high school days, as he planned mini-reunions and holiday gatherings for us. Still there with his hug, a toast, asking about our lives, joyous about his family, his children, memories of high school coming forth.

Facebook expanded his circle further, reconnecting him with fellow alumni who he might not have known very well during high school.  His political views were opposite mine, but it was fun to bait him after his 50th political cartoon of the day. He posted well wishes to many people I knew.

Monday morning I logged into Facebook and began to see a trickle of comments about Tim’s shocking death last weekend, which became a pouring of well-wishes  and memories as the word so quickly spread around the internet.  There were phone calls and internet hugs and a vicious bike ride as I let this horrible, stunning news sink in, followed by tears in the shower, salt mixing with water and shampoo sluicing down the drain.

Tim: father, husband, son, friend, brother, neighbor was clearly loved by many people, based on the outpouring of emails I have seen this week.  We lost a great person, an honest man, a social leader for our group.  Heaven became a happier place this week, as  Tim joined some of our other friends there: Bill and Scott coming to mind first.

I feel the most loss for his wife and children, trying to accept their new reality. We will connect with our high school friends this week at his wake, his funeral–tears and hugs abound.  Not the annual social outing we look forward to repeating again in the near future.

Friends, hug your children today and tell them each day how special they are, how loved, how important. Tell your friends how they bring joy into your lives, don’t let your spouse stand forgotten. Sadly, Tim’s death is a reminder of the brevity of life, and how we need to live and love each day to the fullest.

Tim, rest in peace.  We wil celebrate your life and miss you greatly.  More tears as I write this.  We miss you already. C

RIP Aunt Lorene

My Aunt Lorene passed away this week, her final months spent in home-care hospice.  It seems a cliché of being sad, but also being a blessing to let her go.  It  is also ironic that this now Midwestern girl was just several states south of her New Jersey, vacationing along the NC southern Outer Banks in Emerald Isle, NC when she passed away.

 

Mixed within the joy of our trip, a tinge of unexpected sorrows as many memories of my childhood at the Jersey shore summers with she and my family were refreshed in my mind.  With thirty-plus cousins and aunts and uncles and grandparents we vacationed at the shore many years running.

 

What simple yet incredible times we had with extended family dining outdoors with her husband (my Uncle Walt), my father and other uncles playing horseshoes and spitting watermelon seeds in an epic battle, card games, riding waves, catching crabs from a boat and flounder from the shoreline, her sons  Paul and Mike trying to teach us to surf,  her daughter Margie our summer girl several years running, shell seeking with Nana and the aunts.

 

As we grew older, my family’s trips to the Jersey shore became less frequent, but I have different memories of Elaine’s birthday with us wearing tacky paper hats for long after the cake disappeared, happy hours, my father and his siblings louder than those of us who rented the house, beach umbrellas, more crabbing and boil,  dancing with Diane,  sandy naps, and a myriad of cousins, spouses, kids descending upon our house.

 

I have not seen my aunt in several years, since another family trip to the Seven Springs resort in PA.  But my rememberances are strong, as I now create beach memories with my own children.  What they remember some twenty, thirty years later, I cannot tell, but I hope they remember the fun, the positive, the challenging, the hopeful.

 

Rest in peace, Aunt Lorene, with the family gone before. You deserve it. C

Passing Moments

We are so many people inside, so many faces, so many hearts.  Some see our joy, others our fear, our anger, our complacency, our uncertainty, our hope, our sadness, our surprise. As adults, we know that our views of people from childhood are yellowed with age–from our friend’s parents to teachers to the high schoolers who bumped us in the hall to the counter girls at the ice cream counter to our sports coaches.

Our point of view can be so different from others’ opinions.  I attended a funeral of my childhood friend’s mother this week.  I remembered her as the tough, single mom of four rambunctious children who tried to keep them safe, clothed and educated.  I met so many people who knew her other lives. Her financial planner, old friends, past co-workers, caretakers, her ex-husband, her children– I mingled and chatted with many of them, learning so much of her other personalities that I rarely saw.

What do we choose to share?  How will we be remembered?  I felt I learned more sides of  Roberta in a few hours after her passing than I saw for over thirty years.  And they were so positive.  C

Rising Floodwaters: Writing Assignment #1

For the new year, my friend and I are going to attempt 2 writing assignments a month.  I hope to write other than that as well, but life has been increasingly busy at work.  Time for work, family, house and horses.  That’s about it these days.

Assignment #1: classic exercise: Begin with the line “I remember” (or “I don’t remember”), and write for fifteen minutes.  Here goes…

I remember the summer before college, when the non-ending rains flooded the banks of the lake and creek  two houses from us, first overtaking the grass then creeping across the streets, ignoring the needle-point rain that hammered our bodies as we packed and hauled sandbags around the cul-de-sac, snaking into our driveways then pouring in torrents into the basement.

Our family of six moved quickly before the water breached our home, moving items upstairs and in from the garage as fast as we could: TV, games, laundry, photos, shoes, sporting equipment, tables, lamps, a telephone, chairs.  My sister Sharon and my collections of foreign dolls and glass animals remained on their glass covered shelves, watching us helplessly.

Our neighbors were out of town, so when done with our home we went to their home and moved similar items up from their basement.  Tired, so tired, but when we walked home we realized the waters were not going to stop at the basement in our home.  They slowly cascaded to the first floor of our house, as we rushed to carry everything yet again up another level.  We grabbed more furniture, collectibles, kitchen items, winter coats from the first floor and filled the bedrooms so they looked like a grandmother’s forgotten attic.

When would the rain stop?  Would the floodwaters top our roof?

We simply could not stay in our home.  We could not pull the cars from the garage, as they were both three-quarters filled with water.  We filled plastic bags with clothing and important phone numbers. We forced our petrified cat into a pillow case, and put everything in laundry baskets on our heads. We then walked/swam up the street to our neighbor’s house, the waterby our home over my head.

At the M’s house, the force of the water was so strong that SLAM—it bent the metal door to their basement after hovering outside, gathering force.  Twisted steel, we were so lucky that no one was in their basement as the water poured in.  Water licked the top step of their stairs, but miraculously it did not enter their first floor—where several families now gathered.

Another neighbor Nancy R. , who lived on the lake, lamented that she would lose several fur coats on her first floor. My brother Dave and I gave one look at each other and volunteered to go move them upstairs.

“What?” my mom screeched. “You can’t go back out there.”

“Mom,” I replied “I can’t stay here and do nothing.  Dave and I will just swim back and move Nancy’s coats upstairs.”

“Besides,” Dave chimed in,” someone else might need help. We can’t just sit here.”

My dad knew we would not change our minds, so he reluctantly agreed to let us go.  We promised to be smart.

We swam back to Nancy’s house, unlocked the door and moved her valuable coats upstairs, the bottoms already soggy with water.  Our darkened house was the same, but we then heard the call “HELP! Someone please help us!”

The calls were coming from the neighbors whose backyard abutted ours, a tall wooden fence between them.  We quickly swam to the fence, trying to avoid debris and lawn furniture floating in the yard.  (ok—my 15 minutes are up here, but I’m going to finish my story…)

“What’s wrong?” Dave yelled into their yard.

“We can’t get out of our home,” the owner Mike replied.  “We have two small children and the water is too deep for us to take them up the street.”

“Give us a few minutes,” Dave called back.  “We’ll get a boat from Nancy R’s house.”

Nancy’s family always had a dingy tied up to the shore.  We swam quickly to the boat, and we were forced to dive down to the boat since it was underwater.  Dave, always the prepared one, had a knife so we could cut the rope that tied it down.  On the R’s patio we were able to flip the boat over, climb in, and we found two floating boards to use as paddles.

We paddled first to Mike’s house, and we put he and his family in the boat.  Dave and I then climbed in the water and pushed them to another friend’s house closer to the main road. On the road next to her we could actually see rescue vehicles driving.

As we were headed there, we heard another family calling for help up a tiny cul de sac.  We detoured slightly to tell them we would come back for them shortly.

Mrs. B opened her door, shocked.

“Can we bring some families here,” I asked.  “They can’t get out of their homes.  Your house is perfect, since cars can get by here.  Kind of like a mini- Red Cross station?”

“Sure,” Mrs. B. said, as they carried the children inside.

“Can we bring over a few more families?” Dave asked. “We heard at least one other family needs help.”

“Of course,” Mrs. B replied.

“Do you need them to bring food or anything else?” I asked.

“Some food would be great, so we don’t run out,” Mrs. B replied as we shoved off.

We first used our makeshift paddles to stop at the M house where our parents were, to let them know we were safe and what we were doing.

“Are you sure you aren’t tired or hungry or too cold?” my mom asked us.

Our adrenaline was slowing, and we could not imagine stopping now.  She might have made a quick sandwich, but I don’t remember eating anything.

We paddled the boat first to a house on the cul-de-sac and transported  the C. family with their two girls to the B house.  They did grab some clothes and a bag of snacks, fruit and large bottles of soda to contribute to the B. larder.  A neighbor two doors down from their house yelled to us.  They had a grandfather in their home on a ventilator.  They were already running on battery back up, and they were concerned about his health.

When we dropped the C. family off at the B. house,  someone had already gone to the main road and flagged down a police car, explaining that we were bringing people to the B. house.  Dave and I asked if there were any paramedics nearby, so we could take them to the house with the ventilated man.  In a short while, an ambulance slowly drove up and stopped on the main road. We offered to take them in our boat to the house, since they clearly could not drive up the street.

One of the three looked at me, as they piled equipment in the boat.

“Do you want me to swim, and you can ride in the boat?” he asked.

“I’m already soaking and my brother and I already have a system.  We can do this. Just climb in” I saucily replied. And he did.

Scared, Ventilator Man would NOT get in the boat no matter how much coaxing he was given.  The young couple who lived there ran out of reasons, as did the fireman.

“Do you want to die?” I finally asked him, exastperated, getting tired of treading water while holding onto the boat.  My sweater was soaked through and heavy.

“No,” he replied, shocked.

“Well then get in the boat.  Otherwise you won’t be able to breathe when your battery goes out.  Who knows when the electricity will be back on. You couldn’t be safer, with paramedics in the boat with you,” I stated. Only  a sassy high schooler could get away with that line of questioning.

He finally agreed, then gingerly climbed into the boat, ventilator and all.

After we dropped off the family, ventilator, food, and the paramedics at the B. house, Dave and I agreed it was time to head back to our family, at the M. house.

It was dark, cold, and still raining when we rowed up to the M. house.  Warm showers, dry clothes and full stomachs later, we were so happy that we had been able to help some people.  Pacing in that house would have been torture for Dave and me.

The next morning, the water started to recede, but still filled our lower level, and our lovely doll cases now face down in the muddy waters. The cars forever useless.

The cleanup is a story for another day: of strangers coming by to help, of the National Guard protecting our property from looters at night with no electricity, tables in the yard of food from the church and others, throwing out dumpsters of things, piles of garbage 8-10 feet tall in front of our home, crying while pulling apart destroyed photos in our shed to salvage a few childhood memories, shuttling around to different houses until our became liveable, wondering if my parents could still afford college for me.

And yes, this is a true story, though the actual conversations might not be accurate. C

Hot Chocolate and Pudding

As I peeled the foil top off a large can of Swiss Miss hot chocolate, I was immediately transported back to childhood.  The chocolate scent that rose from the can was of the boxes of Jello chocolate pudding, a favorite dessert from my youth.

We sometimes prepared the cooked version on the stove, stirring and stirring in a silver-colored pot with black handle.  We put plastic wrap on the top as it cooled, then slowly peeled it off to see the chocolate craters on the surface.  And no one ever wanted the hard crusty part when it was just a day old. Sometimes we used the yellow and white Tupperware shaker, with a plastic spoke in the middle to stir it up.  We could then immediately take turns dipping spoons into the shaker, slurping down the chocolate jelloey pudding.  Yum!

The final time I remember eating homemade pudding I was just driving, home from a visit to a friend’s house with a severe case of the munchies.  I dove into the bowl of freshly-made chocolate pudding on the counter and starting inhaling spoonfuls into my mouth, all the while yakking on the phone.  Yum!

An unexpected trip to the past, just from opening a can.  Weird. C