Jim's House

 

Jim's House

We know we have arrived when we see the bumper sticker on the car in front of us on the ferry line that says, 'keep Vashon weird'. We are making one of our several trips this year to visit our Washington family members who live on this island in Puget Sound. Vashon is about ten miles long and a few miles wide. Going there is a step back in time. There are maybe three traffic lights on the whole island.

For the last several years, when we have visited, we have stayed in Jim's house. We know where the key is stashed and we know that the hot tub will be up and running. Jim is married to my sister. He's wonderfully handsome in a craggy sort of way with a dour sense of humor you have to get used to. Jim married my sister, the stellar and famous tile artist, thirteen years ago. He took on my sister's two youngest kids as his own and became a partner not only in raising the kids but also in my sister's tile business.

My sister met Jim as he was working as a master carpenter on her dream house. Jim had a house of his own. As a very young man, he'd had the vision of building a wonderful house in the woods. I can only imagine the incredible energy and drive he must have had as he built it. This house was never finished and now it stands proud in a glade surrounded with evergreen trees. It is an idiosyncratic mix of height and wood and peaks and gables. Everyone who sets foot in this house immediately is charmed and then embarks on a 'what if' odyssey. It has such style and potential. The bedroom where we sleep looks out on fir trees, full moons, rainbows at 5 a.m., deer browsing on the ornamental shrubs, swallows coming and going to the boxes Jim has installed on the sides of his house.

But the house still needs drywall, trim, some plumbing and a lot of everything else to be anything more than a lovely place to 'camp out'

Jim and my sister, Irene, live in their 'real' house a few miles away where they raise the kids, have the business, keep the dogs, and where Jim has created the most beautiful gardens I have ever seen in the whole world. But for all these years Jim has kept his own house as a place of refuge. Until very lately, Jim and Irene and the kids would retreat to Jim's house on some weekends. There is no phone, t.v. washer and dryer or internet there. It was a chance to connect with family.

For years, no one except the immediate family was even allowed to see Jim's house. And then it became sort of a family guest house. Jim could see how much we all loved being there instead of hanging out in one of the island's bed and breakfasts.

Just the odor of it makes me happy! It smells like old wood, a bit of mold, the tangy odor of the plants ringing the outside. The kitchen is basic and one must rummage around to find anything. The furniture from the local thrift store is rump sprung and oddly decorative.

But I look up at the amazingly constructed walls (still devoid of the drywall covering), and I marvel at the workmanship that has gone into this house. This was something quite like a master's thesis, or a PhD unfinished.

I do not know what will happen with Jim's house. He may sell it. Obviously it is very valuable (and there are his two soon to be college age kids). In my own life I have sold property I have loved, and breathed a sigh of relief and never looked back. Whatever Jim decides to do with his house is far from mine to say.

I have loved being a short time lodger in Jim's house. I have loved the enveloping warm light from the big windows overlooking the meadow, the space, the smell of raw wood, all the stairs beckoning me to fascinating small high spaces. Most of all I have loved the sense of youthful creativity and possibilities. And I understand that Jim has moved on as we all do.

Rain Magic

All day yesterday it was overcast, promising rain. It didn't happen, and not only was it still crispy dry for weeks with the whiff of smoke from the Green Swamp burning, the sun didn't shine. It made us all crabby and we scanned the sky for the rain clouds. "Looks like rain", we said mindlessly again and again.

And then, last night it began to rain, sometimes in torrents that drummed on our tin roof and sometimes it enveloped us in a fine mist. The frogs began their harsh and raucous calls. The rain has lasted into today, intermittently. We awoke in a frenzy of relief, eager to go out and see what the rain had wrought. It has rained pretty much all day.

Something about rain is just magical fertilizer. Of course everything looks green and full- the resurrection ferns and green fly orchids on the trees, the pastures,and everything else in god's wild yonder- all plumped up. When I inspected the vegetable garden during a sun break, I could see an enormous eggplant, several peppers, some cucumbers, lots of tomatoes,the climbing Malabar spinach, and the ever new crop of green beans. I can't believe that we have all these vegetables ready in early June! Usually, everything is gone and dried up by this time of the summer. It has been only four days since I trapped and dispatched the armadillo who ravaged the garden each night. It almost seems as if those plants that were left, heaved a sigh of relief not to be dug up every night. They decided to make a comeback.

Living in the country is a leap of faith. You have to think about the creatures out there- cows, deer, pigs, coyotes, tortoises, foxes, turkeys, and so much else. Who does what for whom? I have become humble about the way subtle ecosystems work. We think about what the 'experts' tell us about how to manage exotic invasive plants. We spend a lot of energy getting rid of the invasive soda apples in the pastures. We think about managing the invasive feral pig population, but so far have done nothing. We are becoming familiar with the different kinds of grasses we have on our land, some great,some invasive. (Andy and I are actually non-native invasives..)

I find this life fascinating. I love my forays out into the woods and swamp to examine things or to pick blackberries with my little grandson, Quincy, in the big patch in the pine island field.

And I love having the time to catch up on my life-time deficit of artistic creativity. Wonderful to be free to write, paint, sew, pot, garden, whatever.

Thunder is rumbling again. Perhaps more magical rain is in the offing.

Book Club

When I was in my twenties I participated in a women's consciousness raising group. We sat around in a candle-lit room in a circle on an avocado colored shag rug and talked about our mothers and griped about the men in our lives. Gradually I lost interest and I left the group. I hadn't had much real connection with my mother for years and I was pretty satisfied with the man in my life (who actually did the laundry). I didn't want to sit on the floor anymore. Those women were so dissatisfied with everything. I loved that regular connection with women,and I supported women's lib in every way, but I craved more substance from an organized happening.

I can't exactly remember how it began, but a number of women who had loose connections to the newspaper, got together to form a book club. I was asked to join in the very early days. Now there are ten of us. There were never more than twelve. The membership has undergone subtle changes. A few people moved away, some just couldn't put in the time to read a book a month, and some left for unclear reasons. Other people joined. We have never explicitly thought of it as a womens' thing. It just happened that way. The core group has been very steady.

We have been doing the book club for twenty-five years, the last Tuesday of each month. The deal was, and still is, the book club host of the month selects the book, sends out notices, prepares a dinner,leads the discussion, and cleans up afterwards. We all gather at 7:30 p.m., chat over a glass of wine, eat dinner, and then begin the discussion. Suzanne is the unofficial secretary who reminds us of who is to be the next host. She also keeps a list of all the books we have read.

We were all working women and we all have kids. In the early days of book club it was so hard to host a meeting. We persuaded our husbands to mind the children, take them out (anywhere!) and get them out of our hair for just an evening. I do not remember at any time that small children screamed or dashed in to our meetings, wanting their mom. A few times we would see well-behaved kids coming through the room,toting violin cases or soccer balls, and all of us knew that it was a pretty hard deal for families to let mom alone to have an adult evening at home without them. I knew I dreaded the punishment I got when it was my turn to be the book club host. Even today, when all our children are grown, I might see the host's husband lurking around looking uncomfortable.

I look at the four pages of single spaced, double columns of books we have read in these twenty-five years. I am amazed! We have read lots of novels, of course, a lot of non-fiction, classics, biography, sociology. There are some books on the list I can barely remember, others are as clear to me as if I read them last month. I hated some of them. We learned to love some authors and we compared their works. Many choices opened up wonderful far ranging discussions. There were evenings when our meeting lasted far into the night.

But what could account for this incredible longevity of a book club? We all love to read, and all of us are thoughtful and smart. Our group has never dissolved into just talking about the purely personal. Our mission is to read and discuss the book. Several members are good friends with others, but as a group we are never mired in the personal tellings of our lives. We don't know each other's birthdays, we never discuss health issues, we don't send each other holiday cards. Book club is the most socially 'free' thing we do. And we treasure it. You can come to book club in the clothes you were wearing at work, or in sweats or shorts. Costume is not important. Each month almost everyone comes.

And yet, each of us knows that we could call on any member if we needed to in time of trouble. Over the life of the group, there have been divorces, the agonizing launching of our children, life threatening health issues, work problems and the whole spectrum of human failures. There have been triumphs as well.

Several of our members are known to be wonderful cooks. We all look forward to going to book club THAT night! Often, the host cooks up something with a theme that refers to our month's book. (but how many Italian themed books have we read?) Others of us just scrape up something and hope for the best. But whatever it is, we relish it. A few years ago we thought it would be better if we only did dessert and coffee. That lasted for one month; we wanted that dinner, whatever it was!

Next month it is my turn. I have selected the book, sent out the notices by e-mail and postcard. Fortunately, the book has an Italian theme. My husband (the family chef) will be out of town, the kids are grown and gone, the dog is small, and hopefully, the contractor will not be replacing the living room windows. Ravioli?

End of the Day

After supper, when the long shadows stretched dark fingers across the green pastures, we drove out in the golf cart with the dog to see if we could pick any blackberries in the patch in the Pine Island Field. The patch has millions of berries, but few were ripe. The trick is to get them before the birds do. Considering that we ate a good number, we picked enough for a cobbler tomorrow night when we will have guests.

It is the end of the academic year; teachers are packing up their classrooms,tears are shed, young people are graduating, and everyone is heaving sighs of relief at having made it so far. I remember those days, not so long ago, when I knew school was over, but I had all those lengthy evaluations to do. Immediately, I'd spread everything out and get started. Summer really never began until I had carefully written each family about their child. It always took at least an hour for each student. And, now, I don't have to do that!

I continue to believe we truly live in paradise. Despite the armadillo wars, I love to garden and spend hours each day tweaking the many flower beds,watching the butterflies and birds and picking beans and tomatoes and whatever else is ready. I have a plan for growing my vegetables despite the armadillos. Having time to paint, write, sew and make pottery in my studio pleases me immensely. It is interesting to begin having a new social life here in the hinterlands.

We continue to feel socially responsible so we are activists in several things. Andy works hard as chair of the Florida Nature Conservancy, and I am on the board of Pathfinder. And there are all the kids who are in our lives one way and another. No golf, no spa life, no bingo for us. We are slowly learning to identify much of the flora and fauna around us, much more fun than a cruise. We love the hard and constant work it takes to run a ranch.

Thousands of fireflies are twinkling at the edge of the woods, mirroring the stars above. Something is rustling in the palmettos and the barred owls have begun their nocturnal hooting and cackling. Soon I will hear the coyotes singing their evening song. We go to bed in a screened room open to the outdoors. The frogs and chuck-wills-widows sing us to sleep.

Armadillo Wars, part 2

I don't understand armadillo culture. They do what they do. Every single night they come into my garden, though the security is high. They breach the perimeter through the fence, stones, logs, old tractor parts, and chicken wire. They dig deep, those insurgents, and they are bent on destruction. I certainly do not understand their religion. I cannot reason with them and they have no clue about fairness and democracy. I do not really think they are out to get me. I JUST THINK THEY HAVE THEIR OWN AGENDA. Perhaps they want their women in veils, and certainly they want the tasty worms and grubs they find in the soil. But now I will do it differently.

So, I have declared victory for the armadillos. I still want to grow vegetables (democratically). I will have raised beds, well out of reach of those armadillos. I will take an old cow watering trough with the rusted out bottom and install it in the garden. I will also have Andy make a few raised garden boxes. I am not defeated. I think that the armadillos and I can maybe live in harmony. Shooting them or axing them, like Lizzie Borden, is not an option.

It is always interesting, living in the country. Not only are you aware of all the critters, you see the wildflowers that bloom in their season, the changeable sky, and you feel the strange winds. You hear the dawn chorus of birds and you follow their songs throughout the day. I am so blessed, even with armadillos.

Last Day at Lacoochee

Tomorrow is the last day of school for the kids in Pasco County. I arrived this morning at Lacoochee School with my dog, Lola, and a cooler full of home made ice cream and blueberries to top it off. I could tell right off that this was the end game, no one was teaching the pitiful scripted lessons and the rubber band had gone slack. The kids were thrilled to see my little dog and get a chance to pet her. Some of them asked if she had mange or fleas (no, and no). These kids have dogs in their families but they don't know about a well cared for and well behaved dog. (This dog is probably better cared for than they are!) Lola went about her business of caring for kids (she was raised in a classroom.) When I read a story to the children, Lola was cuddled up between the kids, everyone happy.

Then it was time to go to the awards assembly in the cafeteria. We told Lola to go into her kennel and guard the classroom. Ms. Yager's kids hunkered down on the bleacher seats to await the awards. I sat among them, and these good and patient children really thought they would get an award. They duly applauded each child who got an award, but really, they were awaiting their turn. The principal and the vice principal looked spiffy and beautiful in their pointy shoes and amazingly voluminous hairdos. They smiled a lot, and clearly, they were enjoying this time when kids were being affirmed. There were a lot of grand awards for just being there. And we all know that 90 percent of success is being there. And there were other awards in art and music and reading (NOT math, or history, or, or..) The kids next to me were getting more and more itchy as the ceremony went on. Most of the kids getting awards were Anglos, and a few black kids. For the most part, the Hispanic kids were left in the dust.

The kids near me started to lean all over me.They whispered things to me. One child started to cry. I snaked my arm around behind him and stroked his neck. At this moment I could envision some kind of magical realism in which, strangely enough, an angel would appear to each child bearing a huge trophy of affirmation.
Except for one child, who got a two foot trophy for perfect attendance, none of CareyAnne's kids got an award. I would have loved to see this whole class get an award for 'heart'. This was a very hard class, and it would be difficult for anyone to deal with these kids every day. But CareyAnne did, so magnificently, with such love and creativity. In my mind she gets a ten foot trophy.

I have learned so much this year, volunteering in a title one school. I am humbled and awed to think I know so little about the hardships of these good and patient parents and their children. I am dismayed to see the mediocrity of leadership and the teachers (who can't often speak grammatically, nor read!) And yet, these people are out there, working hard, trying their best in a joyless situation.

I think that I may have burned my bridges at Lacoochee, (Surely, someone from there may have read this blog?) Certainly, for the whole year, no one in the administration at Lacoochee has ever spoken to me, ever thanked me for volunteering, or ever thanked me for providing funds for field trips. Just seems odd. And, there is a big part of me that thinks that I should not expect any thanks for anything.

So, Happy Times, Lacoochee Elementary School. I am interested in you, I love the kids, I want to be there, but it is really hard to be a volunteer without any affirmation whatsoever.

Picnic at Lacoochee

The kids knew we were going to have a picnic today. The cafeteria was to be closed because the fifth graders were having their graduation lunch, so all the other kids would have boxed lunches (crud) sent to the classrooms. But Ms. Yager's class was having a picnic!

I was excited today because I love to give presents. And I love those kids. First, I sent Ms. Yager out of the class for five minutes and the kids gathered on the green rug so they could see what was in the BIG BAG. It was the quilt I had put together from the squares the children had made last week on the theme of 'If I could Fly', from the story, "Tar Beach" by Faith Ringold, the incredible quilt maker. The kids were enthralled and excited to be able to give their teacher this gift they had made. They lifted up the edge and haltingly read: 'For CareyAnne, a gifted teacher, from Miss Molly and the students.' They marveled to see their very own squares displayed on a royal blue background.bCareyAnne came in and the kids were so excited to give her this gift they had made. They told her that she could wrap up in this quilt on cool days in Arizona - where she is going to be next year.

Next, I distributed book gifts to each student. I told them ahead of time that each book was different because each student was different and unique. Each book was wrapped and labeled and we opened them one by one. These needy kids were just great. They appreciated each other's books and waited patiently for theirs. And for the next half hour everyone was reading their books, sharing with others. It was magical humming as kids read, leaned on each other, sat on laps, and exclaimed about their delight. They could not believe that these books were theirs forever and they could take them home. I had chosen several books in Spanish or in both Spanish and English so that families could read the books together. And, indeed, several of the kids came to me to say that their moms would read this with them.

The picnic was wonderful! We spread out on a king size sheet under an old oak tree. The kids sat around the edge. Many helpers put out the plates, cutlery and food items. All the kids waited until everyone was served, and then they dug in to a picnic of fried chicken, pasta salad, raw vegetables with yogurt dip, pickles, French bread, watermelon and brownies. No one complained and everyone ate. Many wanted seconds. Lots of these needy kids wanted seconds before the firsts were finished! The bottled water in an iced cooler was a hit, as my husband had predicted. There was nothing left! The whole thing was fun, sweaty, and dirty from the black sand of the Florida dry season and the energy of children.

When we went inside, grubby, satisfied, and full of love for each other, being cool in that air conditioned no-windows classroom, it seemed it was O.K for the moment. We spent the next hour playing a version of 'school store'. At the beginning of the day (after the mice sang the National Anthem), CareyAnne had given each child five dollars in play money. For each time a student tattled or argued he/she would deduct 50 cents. We were relentless about recording these transgressions! At the end of the day each child would have whatever money left to spend at the class sticker store (a math activity in which the kids had to make change). Every child had a chance to step a time or two to purchase stickers of his/he upr choice

After the kids 'got it' about the tattling and arguing, it was incredibly pleasant and communal. They began to pay attention to each other and they tried to understand that some things that happen, just happen by mistake. No big deal. You don't have to tattle or report on it. Each child bought many stickers at the 'store'. Only one child, a problem one, tried to steal money. I am saddened to think I can see into his future- a young man out of control, manipulating the truth, probably violent.

This school has taught me so much. This is a Title One school, one of the poorest. It is out in Nowhere, East Overshoe, actually Lacoochee, FL. (close to where I live.) I have a vision for such schools as this. It is here that we need the VERY BEST in the way of principals and teachers. But that is not the case here, and I imagine this is true everywhere. There is no joy at Lacoochee Elementary School as far as I can see from being there for two years. I have never gotten the slightest indication that anyone teaching here goes home energized. It is difficult even on the most wonderful mornings to get anyone to respond to my cheery "Good Morning!" Their heads are down, they are determined to get through the day. There is no excited talk of pedagogical issues,no interest in kids (other than to complain about them),they don't read and they have no close feeling of being a team with a mission.

Except in the classroom, no one has ever either met my eyes in friendliness, or sent me a thank you. Many of the teachers I have met there do not speak grammatical English, and I am not talking about Hispanics. But I do not think that these teachers are dim. They don't have leadership!

What if you got an energetic and intelligent principal for such poor schools as Lacoochee? Someone with energy and creativity and the desire to create a crackerjack team of teachers? Someone who could recruit teachers with idealism. Someone who could lead and energize? Someone who could inspire teachers and students? Someone who could get down and dirty with students on their level, leave the pointy toed high heels in the dust, and be just human? What if such a principal could attract the best and brightest teachers? What if the principal could let the current teachers know IF THEY HAD A JOB FOR THE UPCOMING YEAR? What are we thinking? And actually, how can we expect our children to be good readers if the PARENTS AND TEACHERS DON'T READ?

We are failing our children if we don't get it together better. Our teachers and especially our principals need to be the best! What are we thinking to let the mediocre and worse teach our kids? Our kids spend the majority of their daily lives in school. It is of the highest priority that their time there is quality time. I believe that teachers should be paid as the highest ranks of workers and that we should, in turn, expect the highest quality from them.

Our children are our future, as all of you know.

Kids on the Ranch

Today we had nine kids, seven of them boys, from my old school, come up to our ranch for a long day. In previous years we have had as many as fifteen kids for three or four days, but this time it was not to be. They arrived in the late morning, vans full of excited kids. Three of the kids would stay overnight with their parents in the guest house, and all the rest would leave at eight in the evening.

Going to Molly's ranch has been an annual tradition, some say maybe the best field trip of all. Here they have the freedom to be outdoors, choose what they want to do from the cornucopia of physical, social, and artistic offerings. Today, many kids wanted to make sculptures from found materials. We had many glue guns available and an entire set of drawers of very old 'stuff', sort of hardware and nuts and bolts and odd metal things. We had small pieces of wood for bases. The kids pulled out the drawers and discovered many things and shapes and textures. Their creations are worthy of a museum exhibition.

We went on a truck ride around the property, the kids bouncing around in the truck bed and dodging overhanging branches and screaming with delight at every pothole. We stopped to pump a pitcher pump that barely worked. (we needed to come back for that since the cows had knocked over the priming water can.) We stopped at the mulberry trees so the kids could pick the ripe ones . Their faces were stained red with delight.

We had lunch of 'build your own sandwiches', and then it was on to volleyball and archeology-digging in a distant very hot and sweaty mound of lime rock to find Indian artifacts. The kids found amazing spear points, chert shards, and hand axes. They persevered and were focused way past what I would have thought. We had to make them stop! I was worried that they would get sunstroke.

Some kids were enthralled with being in the fabric studio and both boys and girls made pillows and other things. From time to time, I checked in on them and helped them sew up seams on the sewing machine. Other kids were still making their sculptures. Life was humming. Up at the main house Andy was preparing pizzas for supper with a few kids who wanted to participate. He is great at helping kids learn the ropes of cooking. I can't look; he lets kids use incredibly sharp knives and cut onions. He speaks to them as if they were just reasonable people and perfectly competent. They love this and respond.

We spend an hour or so with everyone in the swimming pool leaping from the jacuzzi into the pool, howling with delight. Many of the kids come and whisper to tell me often how much they love being here, and of course, it is music to my ears.

These kids are my heart's delight! I have known them since they were toddlers, and they know I am still interested in them. They are the last group I have known, so it is indeed bittersweet. But I also know that I am no longer interested in or able to deal with ten year olds on a daily basis; I need my own space and time after teaching for so many years. My energy is now going to other things.

These kids who were here today know that they will always be welcome here. They thanked Andy and me over and over for their day here. ( aw shucks..) Many others, older, come back here and keep in touch by email. They know they are always welcome here. They know we will always be supportive and helpful as they begin their adult lives.

This will not be true for my Lacoochee kids! However much I love them and care what happens in their lives, however bright some child might be, their parents will not be able to respond. Of course I would love to have them be a part of the line of many kids who have been my students and then become young adults we have mentored and funded and cared for. But I fear that the gulf is too wide and deep. Few of their parents will touch in to ask anything of their teacher, let alone to thank me, a volunteer, for the interesting activities I have given their kids, or just to say, "Hi". They have no clue. Public school teaching, generally, is a hard scrabble life.

Garden Invasion

The vegetable garden looks like triplets have been jumping on the bed. Everything is rumpled and dug up: there are holes under my tomatoes, excavations under the leeks, the beans are teetering and the onions have fallen over. Lettuces are covered in dirt, and the cheddar cauliflower I carefully grew from seed are limp from the abrupt airing. Three of the romanesco broccoli lie dead.

This is ALL OUT WAR! The armadillos have attacked! The perimeter has been breached. For all of this gardening season, there were no deer, no squirrels, no pigs, and no armadillos. We have had produce constantly all winter and spring from a garden protected by a seven foot fence and dug six inches into the soil. We have had lovely lettuces, broccoli, kale, collards and onions all winter. Now we have beans and peas, and peppers, tomatoes, squash and cucumbers coming. Before the night forays of the armadillos we had ten rare fingerling potato plants, just up and starting to produce those wonderful long blue potatoes you can't get unless you grow them yourself. All gone.

I spend several hours replacing the plants I could save, filling in the holes, plumping up the mulch. I hear the dull thump of the gopher tortoise who lives just outside the fence. He's benign, my friend. But since he's a protected species, I can't extend the garden. As I replace mulch the dapper head of a black racer rises up out of the mulch. He swirls around for a few minutes before exiting.

I look carefully at the garden perimeter, trying to figure out where the critters come in. I think I have found out several places of entry. I am ready with old tent stakes, rocks, (try to find rocks in Florida!) logs, strange pieces of junk, and the HAVE-A-HEART traps! By now the outside edges of the garden are kin to Watts Towers with their strange mix of wood, logs, rocks, and things I found in the barn that were meant for other purposes. I can't believe that I, a normal elderly person would be doing all this. If all this fails, I will get my friend, Warren, to stake out the garden and shoot them. I'm serious.

This is the first full year I have had vegetable and flower gardens that I could really observe and take care of. I am thrilled to see the flowers I planted bloom. I look at them several times a day and I have carefully monitored the progress of things I thought were weeds, but turned out to have lovely blooms. I check out the vegetable garden, more serious than flowers because we need to eat them. I am always looking up plants and flowers in my books and on-line. I am learning stuff. I am captivated. In the dry season I need to water every garden every day, but keep in mind to conserve water.

Last night we had a good rain. It was gift. The pastures look so green, the resurrection ferns on the trees are plumping out, and for this one day I did not have to water the gardens. It was so moist that I went out with the rake and hoe to plant some wild flowers in memory of an old friend who died today. She'd be glad to think of wild phlox, calendula, and poppies growing somewhere in rural Florida in her name.

FCAT, again!

The news in the paper and on my computer was that the FCAT scores were down. My little school, Lacoochee, was significantly down, worse, in some ways than the others.

I read the sample reading question and I wonder how we can judge kids (and whole schools) on such questions as these. Remember that the kids I see each week have no idea what a green bean is, nor a pea, nor a bat. They have no experiences in either English or Spanish. How can we expect that they will do well on a reading comprehension test that assumes they are all familiar with the usual Anglo body of information?

Last night we had our two year old grandson visiting us. After his bath and supper we went upstairs, brushed teeth, and settled down on the bed to read a story. I chose one from our shelf of kids' books, "Tikki Tikki Tembo No Sa Rembo". This was way far from his experience. But he loved the cadence of the repetition, and he loved the pictures of China. So. He'll grow up with this little piece of knowledge about China, myths, and how they name children.

Kids in poverty do not have regular routines of sweet smelling baths and supper and bookshelves full of bedtime stories, and kisses from grandpa. But then, they are expected to perform on FCAT tests! What are we thinking?

There are some children who despite all odds are flourishing. Marisol comes to mind. (She is clearly the most able child in the class, though one of the youngest). I think that Marisol's parents, whom I have never met, and who have many children, try really hard. I think they must know that their children are bright and somehow they must give them sustenance for the mind. We must try and find out what such parents as Marisol's do to foster achieving and creative children. There is a language barrier here, but we must figure out why they are so successful.

This week at Lacoochee, the teachers were having a workshop on writing. The kids from Kindergarten on up had to write a sample for, what else, the FCAT. I looked at some of the writing, from my group, from a "prompt" about 'what made my teacher proud.' What the kids wrote was absolute crap. Of course the spelling, grammar, and exposition was seat of the pants basic. I wonder what they would have written from a more emotionally true prompt from a single word such as "violence" or "kisses" or "roaches"? And they could write from their hearts and experiences, not from a formula? I wonder if these teachers and administrators and legislators have ever had the chance to write from their interests and hearts. I wonder if they have ever heard of Sylvia Ashton Warner?

I wish these good and patient children and their teachers could have a leader with energy, creativity and vision who could show them that achievement of students is not measured in FCAT scores, but in the content of their characters, their creativity, and their interest in everything about this planet.

The News from Lacoochee

I find that I want to write about this little elementary school miles from nowhere way out amidst the fields of purple phlox and far away from my usual world of soccer moms and multitasking. I have learned so much this year about what America is right now. I have come to know these sixteen good and patient children. I know which of them whines, which one sulks, which one is a "handful", which one never takes a bath, which ones have parents who care about them. I see how the school works. I love Annette in the office who is so kind and helpful to all parents, and the cafeteria ladies who run lunch with an iron hand in a velvet glove. I love the ladies who run the impoverished media center to the best of their abilities.

Today I brought my tote bag full of just-picked beans and pea pods from our garden and a dip made of non-fat organic yogurt with just a dab of mayonnaise and ketchup. I saved this for later because we had a 'science' project to do in which the kids put cut out photos of various animals and placed them on large pieces of construction paper according to whether they were reptiles, mammals, fish, and so on. They had never heard of arachnids. But it was fun for all. In some of the National Geographic magazines we perused there were pictures of naked people, and that made quite a stir. Nasty! Some of the little girls sashayed slowly around, carefully placing their photos. Other kids went right to business. Finally, we had all the pictures placed in their correct categories. Then each child had a chance to glue down photos of a phylum of their choice. A lot of kids wanted to put photos of the great white shark, tarantulas, and panthers in one category (scary things?). But we persevered in the scientific mode, though the emotional classification might be more important.

When all the glued and cut out animals were done and hung on the board, we made a circle on the rug. I showed them the green beans. Not one of them had ever seen such a thing before. We looked at the pea pods and split a few open. I popped them into the mouths of the nearest kids. Then the kids went to their seats and I distributed handfuls of beans and pea pods and tomatoes along with the dip. The kids were entranced, loved the vegetables, but not the tomato skins. Nothing was left! "Miss Molly, can I have the recipe?" So I wrote it out and copied it for any child who wanted it.

When we go to lunch, both my hands are held by kids who want to tell me about their grandmother or their brother, or want me to help them check for spiders who may be lurking in the corridor. They know they should be totally quiet but this is impossible for these good and patient children.

In the teachers' lunch room where I had taken the pitiful lunch provided to volunteers, I am always surprised that the staff there never engages in any serious pedagogical conversation. This day was no different. One woman, a kindergarten aide, as usual, launches her monologue about her health and the problems with the Veterans Administration of her husband, a Viet Nam Vet. There are maybe six of us there. The woman goes on about what are terrible problems not being addressed. I try to steer the conversation to the more global concerns of our American failure to deal with wounded veterans of wars and how this issue is becoming so much more intense now with Iraq. I remark that we have lately come to know that the facilities at Walter Reed and others are barely adequate. Everyone continues trying to eat the dried carrots and they do not comment. I say that I believe it is particularly hard now since we have an all volunteer fighting force. I ask the woman if her husband had been drafted into the Viet Nam war. He was a volunteer, as it turns out.

One teacher there looks up and asks, "Aren't our troops drafted?" My jaw drops. Where have you been, woman? This woman teaches our kids. What is she thinking or reading? I try to explain. Again, I have bitten off more than I can chew. Aargh!

Your Fifteen Minutes of Fame

Collectively we have such a short memory. In the last few years we refer to this as the fifteen minutes of fame. Today in our issue of the paper we saw a photo of a man who now does fairs and flea markets, but who once was impaled on a sharp point. He is pictured with his shirt held up revealing the scar, his belly button obscured. This is his fifteen minutes of fame.

Most of us do not have anything so graphic to mark our fifteen minutes. We worked hard over many years, and indeed, may have influenced many lives and made a big impact. Veterans of wars used to call my husband because they had a story to tell about their experiences. But no one wants to hear these because the fifteen minutes are up.

As a retired person, I am getting comfortable with this. You did what you did, and you hope it was useful. You go on to other things if you have the energy, but you don't ever expect to have that fifteen minutes again. It's liberating. Occasionally, you have dreams and wishes about what you left. In some moments, you think you could do it better than those you left in charge. And even if you could, you are now gone. Whatever it is to be, your successors must manage.

I am on the board of a small non-profit I believe in. There have been problems with the successor of the retired founder, an executive director who may not be the person needed to do the job. It is so hard for the founder to step back and let it happen. No one wants her to back off, yet we know she must.

For me, as a retired founder of an institution, it took some heart rending ugliness to make me understand that my fifteen minutes were up. I thought my heart was broken. I still think I know best. But, my fifteen minutes are up. And my heart is not broken after all. I wish them well and continue to be interested. I think my spouse could say the same.

Gardening!

My passion is gardening. I am outdoors most of any day I can, tweaking my flower beds and examining my vegetables. After reading the paper in the morning, I walk out to inspect the beds of petunias, soon to be overrun with the native dune sunflowers. But for now, this bed is a riot of colors. I have sown zinnias, nasturtiums and cosmos in their midst and I see that they are soon to produce flowers. I pull off the dead flowers and cut back the blackberries that always encroach in this bed.

The two raised flower beds my husband put in a few years ago to contain roses (the deer ate every one of them!), now have a huge variety of native plants, deer and rabbit proof. This year when I now have enough time here I can monitor what grows well. A number of strange and beautiful lobed leafed plants grew up like weeds, but I thought they were so beautiful I let them grow on, wondering what they would be. My mystery plants turned out to be native blanket flowers and they are now blooming profusely with cheerful red and yellow blossoms.

I look at all the shrubs and trees and plants that were given me by friends. Here is the citrus tree and the two red crepe myrtles given to me by Marie, here is the native shrimp plant (now gone wild and everywhere) given to me by another friend. Here is the blue porter weed that miraculously survived two freezes this year, given to me by Susie. And there is the wisteria vine Maria gave me and it is now twining along the fence. There is the blousy Japanese jasmine from my sister, now ready to bloom outside our back porch shower. Everywhere I look there are the gardening tracks of friends.

When I went out to water today there was a bright green anole on the red hose. "Wrong color!" I said to him, but he paid no attention. If you're not a gardener, you won't get this entry. I am, as they say, elderly (grandma molly). When I was in my twenties I barely knew the difference between a tulip and a daffodil. And now I have the interest to know the different types of wild sage. You never know what passions will envelop you!

Down by the grape arbor and the asparagus bed there was a place where there was a gopher tortoise burrow and we couldn't touch it. So I began to plant stuff nearby, some grasses and some wildflowers I got in the mail. One day I noticed some lovely things blooming. I watered it along with the asparagus and grapes and now it is a feast for my eyes. I don't know what any of the flowers are, nothing I have ever seen before. They are ethereal, many colors and shapes. This is a true gift to me.

The water garden with its lotus and water lettuce is looking good. The water lilies are coming along. I pause to examine the mosquito fish darting around in this very small pond, and a couple of leopard frogs jump into the water. I water the iris growing nearby and I see that there are bloom stalks ready to happen. I notice that the flapjack plants which suffered so in the winter frost are now growing well. Hummingbirds buzz by my head, as happy as I am to be here.

In front of the screen porch the crepe myrtle trees are leafing out and soon they will be a cloud of ethereal white blossoms. But for now, the cardinals and wrens own the territory with their loud and burbling calls. The hummingbirds buzz into the native shrimp plants and red sage.

This is the first year I have been able to see all this unfold. I am amazed and humbled. All year we have eaten vegetables from our garden. It is an exquisite pleasure to go out each evening and pick what's there to eat. We have salad almost year round (July and August are too hot), and there is always something else. Right now we have an excess of peas and beans, so I give them away to my neighbors, and I see that cucumbers, spinach, tomatoes and eggplant are not far behind. This was the first year that I have grown everything from seed. My grandson Quincy, helped me plant the tomato seeds in the flat and he wasn't very methodical, so the varieties are still a mystery to me. I've got to get him to help me pick the worms off the cukes!

Growing a garden is a lot of work! Every day one must examine what grows, deadhead the flowers, pick the vegetables, water, dig new planting holes, fertilize, weed, mulch, look at stuff, bend over, lift, pick off worms, walk many steps, turn over the compost pile. But, all in all, it's a kind of meditation, beautiful for the soul and mind. I feel that I am caring for the earth and for my family. What could be a better gift than a basket of fresh lovely greens from the garden?

Lacoochee, again

On Tuesday I went into Lacoochee elementary school with a huge box of fired and glazed clay pieces the kids had made. I really would have liked to have the principal look at these colorful and delightful bas reliefs, maybe ooh and ah. But no.

As is usual, a number of parents and kids helped carry the bags into the classroom. We spread out the clay artworks on the tables, and I got the activities of the day ready to go. Today we were were going to make butter by shaking heavy cream. Then we would spread this on the homemade bread I had made early that morning. I also had some organic fruit spread to add to the bread. And there was the pyramid of beautiful organic apples!

After the pledge, we got down to business. First the kids had to fill in some scripted and dreary science sheets. They whipped through this, eying the apples and the mysterious containers of cream. Then, they and CareyAnne, their spectacular teacher, gathered on the rug and we began to make the butter. We put the cream into a shaker and everyone took turns shaking. CareyAnne got right into it, asking the kids to count their shakes by ones, then twos, then threes. She asked them questions about turning a liquid into a solid, where did cream come from, and many other things. She sang a ditty to make it happen. It seemed easy! The kids were totally engaged with the physicality of it. We passed out the paper plates with a slice of bread on each one, Giovanna passed out the butter and Danielle administered the jam. It was heaven!

We go to lunch and two kids hold my hands. I think of Laura, one of my all time favorite students (who is now a sophomore at Harvard) who held my hand every day for a year. When you hold the hand of a trusted adult, what you say is noted. Laura talked about her dog, Curley. These Lacoochee kids tell me about their little brother who is getting ear tubes. What's this? I try to explain. They tell me about their mom who will have surgery tomorrow. I wish our trip to the lunch room was longer because they have so many issues to discuss. Maybe Laura had some other issues beyond her dog, but it didn't matter. She knew her teacher would understand everything. And so it is with these Lacoochee kids.

The big buzz in the teacher lunchroom was that kindergartners were being tested on writing: they had a "prompt" and then were supposed to write expository writing from this. They had forty-five minutes to do this! Are we all crazy? Has no one ever read the literature on child development, maybe Piaget? (One teacher called this "suppository" writing.)

I think that this principal of this school (who tries to look like Dolly Parton with her amazing hair and nails and high heeled shoes) does not get it. For openers, why would someone in a rural school, not want to look available to the land and to kids? Get real! Wear clothes you can bend and run and stretch in, can get dirty! And then, a principal should galvanize the staff to be a real team, full of creative energy, and instead of back-biting each other, come together to make this school a model for the nation. It could happen. This staff is as good as any!

This is heresy, I know. Probably, if anyone at the school reads this I would be out of there for sure. I am reasonably certain that no one (except CareyAnne) at Lacoochee cares.

We need to energize public school teachers! They are the best!

The Saddest Week, What Can We Do?

We have heard and seen so much about the carnage at Virginia Tech this week, maybe too much. The kids there have been spectacular and articulate in the midst of such a terrible event. Everyone weeps to think of losing a part of our best and brightest. And we weep to think about the unspeakable end of life for that troubled young man, Cho.

It is understandable to want to fix the blame on this somewhere. Do we need to have more accountability from gun dealers? Could campus security have been better? And on and on.

What I wonder is where were adults when this troubled child didn't speak? Cho came to the U.S.A. when he was eight. When he was 23 he killed 32 people. I have not read or heard anywhere about his life in elementary school. Was he speaking then? According to an article in the New York Times today, at least a few relatives in South Korea were worried about him. Where were neighbors and friends and teachers in the U.S.A as this child struggled in a new place, trying to learn a new language and culture?

As a teacher for many years, I must ask those teachers who had Cho in their classes, "Didn't you notice anything? Did you wonder why this child did not speak? Did you talk to his parents? Did you engage the other children in a plan to help him? Did you get psychiatric help for an obviously troubled child? Did you try to love and understand him? Why didn't you act?" None of the media stories help me on this.

When Lorenzo came to Lacoochee School with a gun a month ago, there was some hesitation, but fairly soon the event was given the weight it deserved. Bringing a gun to school was obviously a cry for help.(Not to mention threatening!). Lorenzo was put into the hands of a counselor every morning. His cry for help was noted, even in this poor rural school.

We live in such a populous world! We must train our children to take care of each other and be aware of our fellows. (The Catholic church and the British have good reason to think that seven or eight is a good age for kids to have their first communion or begin school.) I am sometimes exasperated with those kids who 'tattle' on others. I should rejoice! These kids have got it about the way they think they and others should behave. They are positively not going to become shooters of dozens. At eight they already have the basics of knowing right from wrong. The kids I am concerned about never 'tattle'. Did anyone ever see this about Cho?

One thing I think we could do for our young people in college is to let them know during their orientation that they really are responsible for each other, and that means having to do hard things sometimes. There could be an anonymous hot line for a student to speak of his/her concerns about a fellow student. Of course this assumes that the student's concerns would be followed up.

During my sophomore year in college, I was in a triple room. One of my roommates clearly had some major issues, not homicidal, but troubling. In that easier world, we were able to get help for her. The college was helpful like kind of distant and concerned parents.

In our time now, we send our kids off and they are totally free agents. That is good in a way. Maybe our institutions of higher learning now need to take the time to help these young people wend their way in a hugely more populous world. Young people today aren't magically more mature than I was at that age. But I do know they are a part of a much more complicated world.

We need to try everything under the sun to make people of whatever age and station understand the necessity of being responsible for each other. We need to start early!

The Harris Burdick Stories

Last night we went into St. Petersburg to hear a chamber concert at our wunderful local theater only a two minute walk from our apartment. Six musicians from our orchestra were to play strings and bassoon, mostly twentieth century compositions and a new world premiere presentation by the bassoonist.

As we approached the theater we were bumping up behind several old ladies, bent over in their sensible outfits and shoes, also on their way to the concert. In that warm evening I could smell that peculiar musty odor of the aged, a combination of old clothes, mothballs, and desperation. As we milled about in the lobby waiting in the 'will call' line to get our tickets, I saw a sea of white heads, but a few young people as well.

Our seats were in the very front of the theater, almost at the center. I could anticipate looking up the pants' legs of the performers. I sat next to a very old woman who wore an enormous hat, sneakers, and a flowery dress. We chatted some, as seat mates do. She seemed quite normal to me but when the concert began she was wild! She loved it! She waved her arms and clapped excessively after every piece. Hey, this wasn't my mother, so I was not in the least bothered or embarrassed.

One of the last pieces was presented by the cellist, a composition by James Stephenson. This was a piece inspired by "The Harris Burdick Stories". My ears pricked up. This book by Chris Van Arlsburg has been my favorite for years. As the story goes, a mysterious author brings a set of drawings with captions to an editor. The author says he'll be back the next day with the stories that accompany the pictures. But he never does! So the pictures are a mystery.

Over the years when I have been a teacher of writing we have used this book of illustrations as jumping off point for some great creative writing. I would copy the illustrations on good paper and let the kids choose which one they wanted to write about. The Harris Burdick pictures produced some of the best writing I have ever seen from ten and eleven year olds. Even years later I can remember some of the stories those children wrote. For some strange reason these illustrations truly made the students stretch. I can still remember the plots devised by Laura, Alex, Cody,Katie, Naren, Arielle, and so many others. I always wanted to see what could be done with this amazing text by musicians or dancers.

James Stephenson did not disappoint me. He chose the illustration, 'Another time, another place', a picture I know by heart. He really got it- the children working a hand cart on the railroad tracks and headed toward what seemed to me to be Mt. St. Michel. I wish he could have come to our classroom to expand those young minds.

Earlier in the day I had been doing my gig as a volunteer at Lacoochee elementary, the poorest school in Pasco County. No fifth graders there were engaged in the delicious possibilities of a really juicy writing assignment. You can only write the FCAT way, in five steps.

CareyAnne, my group teacher was going to spend the day in teacher meetings, and to my dismay, she had a substitute, Ms. C, with whom I had worked before. CareyAnne told her just to let Miss Molly do her thing, but also here are a few things you should also do. Ms.C had her coffee cup on hand and it was clear she wanted to be the "disciplinarian" for the day. O.K. by me. All kids were there, as it was Tuesday. Lorenzo was more than usually odoriferous as he gave me a fierce hug.

Today, our food activity was pasta. I had put a kettle of water on to boil on the hot plate, Andy provided homemade red sauce , and cheese to grate. I had ten different kinds of pasta (including squid ink angel hair) for the kids to look at and handle. BUT FIRST, we had to do the pledge and sing a dispirited version of the national anthem (which can only be sung by mice at the top register).

Also, I had brought in the fired clay items from the week before. Today they were to glaze them. Ms. C. felt responsible to her "lesson plan" and duly trotted out a science lesson. This entire thing was a worksheet about stars. She read the introduction in the most amazingly sing-song voice I have ever heard. "Stars. Are. In. The. Sky." You get the idea. My eyes rolled back and I saw a number of kids looking at me, getting it. The worksheet gave the kids a totally wrong idea about astronomy. Very bad science. But never mind, the kids were paying no attention to it anyway. Hey, it didn't take more than ten minutes so we were on to doing the glazing and the pasta.

I wanted the kids to spend some time comparing the weight of things- pasta, beans, corn, rice, so I arranged a station with the scales. There are sixteen kids doing cooking and clay glazing and I am dancing as fast as I can. I ask Ms. C. to take on the weighing station. She says she can't do this because she doesn't know how. With sixteen kids knocking on my hip, a pot of boiling pasta, Marisol and Kelbie grating cheese, glazes needing attention, I give her a three second tutorial, and we go on from there.

The glazed pieces are wonderful, everyone LOVED the pasta. Some stuff got weighed and there was no homicide. After lunch we even had enough time to read a book. The kids were looking forward to going outside for a fifteen minute recess. These good and patient children! I am sorry to say that I think none of these kids will have the exquisite opportunity to think of the Harris Burdick stories, let alone write about them. Neither their parents nor their teachers have ever heard of Harris Burdick/ Chris Van Alsburg. And so, I keep on reading to these kids.

The "Expert"

Sometimes after I have spent my time as a volunteer in my local public school classroom, I think I have come on too strong. After thirty years of inventing and nurturing a school, constantly shaping and adjusting, trying new ideas and letting go of those that weren't working, I have some expertise. I can't help seeing that if I were a young and idealistic teacher right now, and I had the opportunity, I would leave this broken system and do exactly what I did thirty years ago; start something new! This public school system is beyond me in its ponderous drive towards the next educational panacea. Not much has changed in thirty years (though there are some notable exceptions dotted across the country.)

I go every week to volunteer because I love teaching, I love the affirmation of kids, and I feel the responsibility to make even a small difference in the lives of children. And I even fantasize that I could effect a few changes!

Yesterday I went in with notably heavy baggage- 25 pounds of red clay, the fixings for a huge fruit salad, ideas for stories and activities. After unloading my baggage to the bench in front of the office, I parked my car and returned to check in and receive my' pervert-free clearance' from the office. None of the regular bunch was out front but I did spy one of the kindergarten teachers walking by. I have never known his name because these teachers never introduce themselves (or maybe they don't care to.) I have seen this man in the teachers' lunch room and I have always thought him to be especially grumpy.

This day it is cold and spitting blessed rain. "Good morning!", I crow in my best Sally Sunshine voice. "You are looking so handsome and brawny. Would you mind helping me with these things?"

He makes a few disparaging remarks about how he knows I just said that to get him to help. But he does smile and take the clay to the classroom. When we get there I tell him that his reward is to get the first pick of the magazines I always bring. He audibly snorts. "This intellectual stuff! No way!" But he shuffles through the New Yorkers, the Science News, Audubon, Harvard and Brown magazines, and finally settles on The New York Review of Books. "This will impress people," he mutters and wanders off to his classroom. Later, I send him a Dixie cup of the fruit salad we made in our classroom. I find out that his name is Dan. I am relentless today.

My idea today is to have the kids make clay bas relief heads using no tools but their fingers and old dull pencils. After the dispirited rendition of the pledge and the national anthem, we all ignore all the announcements and pronouncements. Seventeen kids doing at least two things takes a lot of energy. Marisol and Johnny are at the food station cutting up the fruit. CareyAnne, the teacher, is overseeing the cutting up of strawberries, bananas, melons and the rest.

Dynasty, the fifth grade helper, has made a model for what we are going to do and now she is using a wire cutter to create slabs for everyone as the base for their bas relief head. She can only spend half an hour in this class. (No one is absent on Miss Molly's day.) We have done a number of clay projects throughout the year. The kids are now used to the process of making it, firing it, glazing it, and then firing it again. The hardest thing for kids is learning how to attach clay pieces to each other. It is April and now most of them know how to score each piece, add slurry, press firmly. They have had experience knowing what happens when you don't! They now know that I will not fire anything without a readable name on it.

I look at these eighteen pieces now drying in my studio and I think of what a long way we have gone this year. These artworks are amazing and lovely. I envision them hanging on the wall outside the Lacoochee office, adorning the lives of children.

After the clay pieces are finished and hands are washed I read two stories to the kids. I used to be so tender about bringing/doing everything I did at Lacoochee. But today I just asked the librarian, Michelle, "Hey, I need two or three good books to read aloud right now." Without missing a beat, she suggests and finds three books for me - and she doesn't even check them out! She knows I'll bring them back. It seems so normal and fine. She made good choices; the kids are interested. I am really good at reading out loud to kids. (Lots of experience!) I ask them to fill in the next words, and they do. "See! Reading is about the experience you have! You really know lots about how to read!" They preen. And they are eager.

CareyAnne, the teacher, is such an inclusive, intelligent and loving person. The kids know this. I know this. I think that I was incredibly lucky to have wound up in her classroom. I am not the best with younger kids but it has been a great experience for me.

This teacher is very good, the best. She has a group of hard kids., socioeconomically at the bottom rung. She sees each one with possibilities and a future. She respects her students and loves each one. I have never heard her gripe. She is open to new ideas. Her students may not do the best on the FCAT, and not because of her best efforts. She will not be nominated as teacher of the year because this little school is close to nothing in the system. These people are working hard!

The principal of Lacoochee has never made much contact with me and I do not know her at all. I kind of expected that she would have thanked me for making possible the field trip to MOSI for the whole primary group. I really would have liked her to come into our classroom and say, "Oh wow! What wonderful clay items the kids have made!" , or even, "Thanks for funding a school field trip". Oh, well, I said that I wanted to be anonymous.. and I am.

Our Adult Children

No one told us how much time we had to devote to our adult kids. We educated them, drove endless miles to piano lessons, swim meets, soccer. Then they left home for college or far away places, and we kept on paying tuition, a small price to pay for the blessedly empty nest.

The leaving of our own nest was somewhat ragged, but nothing like what so many of my friends have had to endure. One of our kids spent time in three different colleges: not that he failed out. He was a seeker of the perfect place. He never did graduate, but he had his life in balance. Our middle child started out as perfectly as a parent can want, in a highly selective college. Then he took off for a semester in the woods while we worried. He finished college and went on to graduate school. He was his way, had a mission to change the world through urban studies. And this he is doing.

Our youngest, we thought the most dicey, (and surely the most vivid!), came back to our community after college and graduate school. We had given up on thinking that any of our children would live nearby. But here she is, with her wonderful partner and their small son.
They are entrepreneurs and have started a catering business - so far quite successful. Our daughter has the energy of ten. Not only does she run the business aspect of the catering gig, she works as the reference librarian at our local university and does a lot of tutoring. And raises a wonderful kid.

A few evenings ago, we went to look at the catering kitchen. I was blown away! This is a huge commercial kitchen and when we saw it there was a stocky young man, Pinky, who was using the kitchen to produce trays and trays of highly decorated sweets. When the catering does not need the kitchen they rent it out to people who need to make chocolate fountains and other stuff. I guess it is always in action. I could not believe that this commercial kitchen did not exist until the end on November!

My daughter-in-law, the brawn of this operation, is a fantastic chef, incredibly efficient, and cuts no corners with her food creations. The pair of them, and their third person who does p.r, seem to have a real winner. I am glad to have been an investor. What a thrill to be here to see this business evolve..

You never know what life will bring you. Sometimes your kids are a terrible disappointment for a time. I have friends whose adult kids are struggling with depression and angst, drug addiction, or are in a relationship with an abusive partner, or they just are strangers to their parents. Some of my friends have adult children who have pretty much abandoned their parents. Mostly these things will pass with time. Or they won't. This is why we have a strong network of our own friends, those who can always be counted on when family fails.

I believe that we are in charge of our lives, not some god out there. It puts more responsibility on us. No praying. No one is going to do it for us. We are in charge, responsible. We should do good because it is good, not to get to heaven. Just be good and generous. Our kids will see and understand, and eventually come back to us with love and caring.

As it is now,I love my adult children and the adult children of my friends. As I say, the outcome is still ragged but I know, with time, everything will be fine. (Says Sally Sunshine)

Gifts

When Nancy and Neville pulled up in their car, they had bags and bundles and the dog. Immediately, Nancy began unwrapping the gifts she had for us: clothes she found at an upscale thrift shop for grandson Quincy, a pop-up tent for him and the dead racquet balls in a wonderful cylindrical container. She gave me a new tote bag, perfect and emblazoned with my initials, and a cooking doo-dad for Andy. She never comes empty-handed. In exchange, there was the wedging table Andy had made for her at my suggestion. I am thinking that we are very like some primitive emissaries from neighboring tribes, honoring each other with potlatch.

Later, Marie and Jim arrive. Marie has a huge impatience plant for me. She knows how much I love flowers and my yard is full of things she has given me over the years. There is now a huge orange tree, ("Marie"), that reliably produces huge quantities of fruit. There are many crepe myrtle trees she has given me, now about to leaf out. My yard is full of gifts.

We stroll down to the studio where I have the finished quilt for Marie, something I have been working on for a few weeks, a celebration of the many trips we have taken together. By the door is a large rosemary tree Marie gave me a couple of months ago.

For my daughter I have a small tee shirt I think she'll like, and she gives Nancy a shirt as well. She has a bundle of magazines for Marie. We women are constantly giving each other things. The men are talking, giving bits of their personal lives, giving opinions.

Have you ever noticed that it is mostly women who give gifts? Everyone knows that if women boycotted Christmas shopping our economy would collapse. Men are generous creatures in their own way(they give time and money, mostly) but they do not give many gifts. They know it is expected that they should give their partners gifts on birthdays and Christmas. Andy is the most generous person I know; he gives away money in such thoughtful ways, he gives his time for great causes, he shows people how to do things, which is the best gift of all. He gives the gift of cooking wonderful food for all our friends. But he agonizes about what to give me for my birthday.

Women often do not have a lot of money to give. Instead, they give of themselves whether it is the product of specialized shopping, or of their own hands. They enable others. My friend Virginia comes to us with a basket of key limes or a bowl of perfectly sectioned oranges. My friend, Nancy D. provides us with interesting jig saw puzzles, and gives me the most wonderful nightgowns. Lucy gives such amazingly funny items that we find ourselves using every day. This Lucy hand knitted dozens of fluffy scarves to give to all the women at a banquet last year. This may have been the high water mark of gift-giving! We women are always giving each other books. We never go empty handed. We save magazines and clippings for each other, we pass along gently used items to each other.

Never a week passes when I do not send someone something. I love to get those cards and those boxes from my sisters who think of me with hand-made necklaces or the kind of candles she knows I like. I love sending odd items off to my grandchildren: new spiderman underpants, a funny dress, a string of 'car' lights. This gift giving makes us feel connected! Is it something on the X chromosome?

Gift giving is such a fundamental aspect of being female. Things are not everything, however. Generosity in both the male and female models go together. We just all have to keep giving wherever and whenever we see the need to celebrate each other or help in the community.

Weekend Grandchild

My hands smell clean like fresh baby and just washed strawberry blond hair. I arrive down at the barn/studio complex and see the Christmas lights twinkling. Quincy turned them on earlier. The yard is littered with balls and bats and sandbox toys. After his bath, I have just put Quincy, now two and a half, to bed in his big boy youth crib.Quincy is spending the weekend with his grandparents, two of many who love and adore him.

He has kissed his grandpa goodnight and gathered up his things ( eight dead racquet balls, two 'loveys', a toy airplane, and a tiny bed with a very teeny girl doll in it, and a large stuffed rabbit. This guy needs his gear.) He sits cuddled on my lap in the rocking chair that once held his mother and we read "Goodnight Moon". His eyes begin to close. It is a moment of incredible sweetness and possibility. I breathe a sigh of relief. Finally, I can have some time of my own.

Quincy is the fifth of six grandchildren, the youngest boy. All of them are wonderful, blessed to be healthy and bright. They come to visit and we are thrilled. We try to visit the faraway places the other five live as often as we can. The three oldest grandchildren lived near us when they were very small, so we have some sense of them. They have come back regularly to visit and we look forward to those long summer visits.

But Quincy lives nearby and never a week goes by when we do not see him. We see all those incremental milestones of development. Quincy started out premature, a tiny thing, so skinny, and now he is huge for his age! We hear all the verbal development going on, and we note his amazing gifts for figuring out how everything works. Tonight I asked him to help me set the table for dinner. He got out a huge ugly plastic pitcher and proceeded to fill it with water from the fridge. I put a candle out, he got forks, and we were all set.

We have spent the day doing this and that-grocery shopping, checking out a local business cen ter, visiting a wonderful local playground, and calling on neighbors who have a new orphaned calf who must be bottle fed. Quincy toted his racquet balls- looking like a person struggling to carry a water heater- to all of these things, and was interested in everything.

This lovely boy, so young, is getting so many experiences, as such children do. (I carefully show him a green anole lizard and also a Florida fence lizard. We check out the differences. And who knows if he pays attention at his age?) But it is mulch for the mind! My neighbor's grandson, a four year old, was helping his granddad get ready to raise an orphan calf.

So many of those good and patient children at Lacoochee Elementary School have never had these everyday experiences that mulch their minds. Go places, talk about what you see and what you think. Read a book, stroke a tree frog, pick vegetables, feed an orphan calf, and maybe see a real city. They have no parents or mentors who could be interested.

Andy and I and Quincy, squinched up tight in the golf cart, rode back down the road from seeing the new calf. Quincy was blowing bubbles from his little bottle as we went and the breeze from the motion of the golf cart made many bubbles trail out behind us. We looked at each other, delighted in the day.

Collards and Curleques

There was hardly any room in the Lacoochee School parking lot today. A huge fancy bus emblazoned with Ronald MacDonald was idling there, surging with the impressive groans of major air conditioning. At first I thought it was the lunch coming. Nothing about the diet these kids get surprises me anymore. But, no, it was the health bus from Tampa General Hospital that comes several times a month to attend to the health and dental needs of these good and patient children. I found the last parking spot next to one of those mud bogging, giant wheeled pickups. (Whose parent has this? Or, what teacher?)

My coterie of helpers, Melissa and her family, Dynasty, the patrol girl from fifth grade and all the rest were there to help me dislodge my bags and boxes from the car. Then I go into the office to get my stick-on badge that lets everyone know I am not a felon or a pervert. I'd be dead meat if they asked about religion or politics. I am pleased to see my photographs of kids prominently displayed in the office.

In the classroom, more dank than usual considering the glorious Florida morning outside, Dynasty helps me unload and prepare. Today I have many enormous collard leaves picked this morning from the garden. We're going to have collards Brazilian style, cut in thin ribbons and stir fried with garlic. I set up the electric burner, get out the skillet and all the other fixings. Our teacher, CareyAnne, looks weary today. She is looking forward to spring break which happens in three days. "They're all yours today," she says. Of course I am delighted to have free reign with these fifteen kids. Dynasty helps me make an art station where the kids will get their supplies to paint and construct giant curleques out of paper plates and we will hang these from the ceiling in celebration of spring.

After the T.V. Pledge, there is a new patriotic song, actually our National Anthem. This is a totally unsingable thing, unless you can sing high like a mouse and then suddenly descend to a walrus-like bass. The kids don't even try and look longingly at the 'projects' awaiting them.

Lorenzo still has not bathed since the field trip. His shoes must be part of the problem. I see why he is seated in the far reaches of the classroom. He keeps darting around, pushing the boundaries.

We get down to business. The classroom is quiet and humming as we prepare the collards. None of these southern children have ever seen anything like this. (??) They think it is lettuce. But they are eager to try anything. I have brought in a few radishes for them to try. I tell them that I do not like them: too bitter. But it is a new vegetable they have never seen and a few courageous souls try them.

As the first batch of collards comes off the burner and is served up, Adrian loudly announces that it smells stinky. Since it is so calm today, I can do a small etiquette thing about how you must behave if you don't like a food; don't shove it in a drawer, don't call attention to the fact that you hate it, just quietly take it to the trash and let it die there. But, please, just taste a little bit. Maybe five kids really liked it. The rest were polite, with coaching. CareyAnne says it takes five to seven tries on a new food before kids accept it. This was try #1 on collards.

We began the painting, a big success. I love how these kids are so eager to help, and today, they are actually very cooperative with each other. They share paints and change the paint water without being asked. By now they have some competence with paints. They can follow the simple directions pretty well. There are even a few moments when no child was knocking on my hips ("Miss Molly!, Miss Molly!") CareyAnne put some classical music on to play, and I had the peaceful feeling that school was a real respite for these children who have to deal with such extreme issues in their lives. Right now, in this small snatch of time, they could think about what colors to use, what designs to make, and think about how it would all look as it twirled in the zephyrs of the classroom. They also liked having Miss Molly stand on the tables and attach their twirlygigs to the ceiling. (No one here thinks of me as an old lady!)

One by one, they finish, and many of them are eager helpers in cleaning up the tables. After lunch, when their creations are dry, we will hang them over their tables. We had time to read a story. The kids helped me select one, Margaret Brown's "The Little House", and everyone settled down on the carpet in rapt attention. I got just a little glimpse of kids just being regular kids, focused and interested. They have never seen a city, and they do not think about issues of encroaching development, nor do they have parents who do. But I look at them, so young and trusting, and I want to enable them to be the persons they can be. Lorenzo is beyond all the help the school or anyone else has to offer. Marisol will go to college and leave Lacoochee in the dust.

After lunch, CareyAnne takes them outside as she does every day. (Her personal recess; she knows those kids need to run and play.) I take the big pieces of sidewalk chalk and start to draw the outlines of kids lying down on the pavement. When we are finished there are so many wonderful chalk drawings of kids in strange crime scene positions.

It has been an easy day with lots of things the kids can remember. CareyAnne has coaxed the girls to be assertive, not be the shy and non-verbal creatures they were at the start of the year. When I ask her how she has done this she answers with one word, "Love!" When recess is over, she gathers them to her, on to the next thing, and it is clear that her relationship with these good and patient children is the best thing in their lives.

When I leave, I have many helpers to carry my bags and boxes back to my car.

The Field trip gift from Hell

We have been prosperous people, but careful and lucky. We have everything we need; decent housing, basic cars that work, three pairs of jeans each, no debt. We can help our kids financially, and we live on the most wonderful piece of space in the entire world. We try to make our footprint on this earth as small as possible, but yet it is huge. So we give away as much as possible of our time and money and products and ideas.

This year, as I began working in a primary class at Lacoochee elementary school, I started small. Each week I brought in something interesting to do, to make,to explore, to cook, and to read. This has been great, and I have come to know these kids quite well. The kids come out to greet me each Tuesday and help me trundle in with my voluminous bags of supplies.

The group teacher really wanted to take these kids OUT to see some things they had never discovered. I was open to funding a field trip to wherever. Turned out that the whole primary department had to go on whatever trip, a hundred kids! O.K., a hundred kids.. I went to the principal to propose this and immediately the school went into action, they got the busses, signed up for the Museum of Science and Industry in Tampa (an hour away). I signed the check with the proviso that this contribution must be anonymous. My group teacher really wanted me to come, and she really wanted me to be the keeper of a couple of really wild kids. O.K.

When I arrived in the classroom today many children told me they had awakened in the night thinking about the day to come. Some of them were excited to think that for this special occasion they had a lunch packed from home! Most of the others relied on the lunches packed by the school (more than 90% free lunches). No one was absent this day. They each picked up their identification badges to be worn on lanyards on their necks. They are good and patient children.

We had two busses. Our group was on a bubble gum pink bus, ready and waiting, belching fumes. The various classes moved promptly into the busses, and I worked to make sure that every child was seat belted in (clearly not a priority for these kids nor their teachers!) My seatmate was Lorenzo, the little guy who made the papers last week for bringing a gun to school. Lorenzo, tiny and adorably cute, must not have had a bath in weeks. The odors emanating from him almost made me gag.

I am thinking of the last busses I have been on; lovely soft seats, coolers of fresh cold water, seat belts arranged so that one could actually use them. But, I am here in the trenches, nothing but basic, lots of directives telling us that there is positively NO EATING OR DRINKING ON THIS BUS!! Fortunately, the trip to MOSI is less than an hour long.

Lorenzo is so small he can barely see out the window, pinned like a moth to wax by the tightened seatbelt. I get out a piece of paper from my purse and start folding an origami creation. He is entranced as this becomes a cat. Completed, I give this to him and for the rest of the trip he grips this with his fingers, making the whiskers jump.

When we arrive, we have to wait in the bus for way too long. (a hundred kids have to be processed!) The lunches are put into bins and then we go stand in more lines waiting to be processed like hogs. Then we can be free to visit the hurricane exhibit - way cool!!. Now it's time to have lunch, more lines. The kids gulp their lunches so we can go see the monsters of the deep exhibit before the IMAX show. The kids, at first, just run around the exhibit hall, yelling and pushing all the buttons. They cannot focus on anything. I see out of the corners of my eyes, regular families with kids who stop in front of the explanatory signs and discuss these with their kids. These families look alarmed as they see this swarm of Lacoochee killer bees spending seconds, wreaking havoc, moving on with absolutely no understanding. Two or three kids in my group come to me to ask what's this or that. But they don't really want to know, at least not yet.

My group teacher, CareyAnne, says, nevermind, this is their first experience. One has to begin somewhere, and this is fine. She's right.

At the IMAX presentation, I know I am in Hell. Lorenzo, stinking to high heaven from old shoes and who knows how many bath free days, sits beside me screaming in anticipation, saying he is scared, dizzy, needs a drink, has to use the restroom, and kicks the seat in front of him. On my other side sits Brittany who also wants to use the restroom and otherwise whines and tattles about this and that. This is really an interesting movie! But I am thinking about how in the world can such a movie make any sense to these kids? There is this Oh! Wow! component, the hugeness of the IMAX format.

Where do you start? On the way back, Lorenzo soon conks out and takes a nap on the seat beside me. Marisol, across the aisle, is chatty. Marisol is the brightest kid in the group. She has big dark eyes that take in everything. She starts out by telling me that she can read anything on this bus. Which of course she can: "No eating or drinking on this bus!" "Pull cord in case of emergency" and all the rest. Turns out that this child is one of the youngest in the group and had her seventh birthday in January. She is big for seven, and by now a really competent reader. I tell her that I have thought her to be older. She grins, showing me the tell-tale tooth loss of an early seven-year-old. I also notice the cavities in her mouth. Marisol has two devoted parents, many siblings, too. Her parents speak only Spanish but they have many books at home. Her dad works 'in farming', which I interpret to mean that he is a picker of produce.

Marisol has a spark, no doubt. I want to save these kids, give them a vision of what they could be. What can be done for Lorenzo?

To understand poverty in our country one has to have some of the experiences of knowing it. It's not enough to just know the numbers. I am trying to get even a little understanding of all this. Today, more than ever, I realize that the gulf is so huge between the poor and the middle class in America, I don't know how we can bridge it. What I do know is that all our kids are worthy lof the best attention we can give them.

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

It has been a worst and best scenario this weekend. The best is that it was spring and all the leaves are light tiny green, the sky cloudless and bright blue, the birds nesting with delighted calls. The hummingbirds are back and the garden is in full harvest mode. We had some of the BEST weekend guests and Andy made a great dinner with lots of vegetables from the garden enjoyed by all. I love my nephew, Dan, and his partner, Inia. We took a long walk with the dogs to the river. The dogs loved wallowing in the mud and came up with water weeds clinging to their faces, then shaking diamond drops into the crystal air. I love this family!

We kept very busy. Andy was in his workshop all Sunday making a piece of furniture for a friend, and I am working on the last tedious part of making a big quilt for my friend, Marie. I have loved this project, an homage to Kandinsky, but now I am trying to make the batting even with all the layers, and it stretches, so I constantly have to reposition the pins.

And all the while I am thinking those horrid thoughts. Do I have breast cancer? The biopsy was done on Thursday. I am bruised and sore, trying not to lift anything heavy. They promise they will let me know asap. But I have had to endure a long weekend of not knowing. In my mind I have many scenarios. If the biopsy is positive my life will change for the immediate future. Radiation? Chemo? Will I feel awful? Will I lose my beautiful curly hair? (The only physical feature I can count on.)

I have told only a few close people because I don't want to alarm anyone if this is a big nothing. All during the weekend I am thinking of the friends and family I know who have had the bad diagnosis - and survived. I think also of all the people I know who have had to endure such travails and continue on with their interesting and energetic lives. I think of those people with terrible diagnoses of disease who continue on. Who am I to be anxious? My husband conquered prostate cancer.

I am sixty six years old. I have always been in perfect health, energetic and fit. I do not have to dance on one leg or blow into a computer to communicate. At night, looking up at the stars, I have rejoiced in my good fortune, my good life full of children, friends, good work and happy times. At my age (though I think of myself still as the person I was at ten), I have come to realize that I have certainly had a good run for my money, and if I were to die tomorrow, it would be maybe o.k.

But now, with the scare of the possibility of something life threatening, I realize that I don't want to die soon. I am curious about what will happen in the world. I want to see how my grandchildren turn out, I want to finish my book and know who will be the next president, and how it will be to spend some retirement years with my interesting spouse. I have quilts to make and gardens to grow and community work to address. I have so much stuff to do!

In my younger years, when things were in the balance, I made deals with some sort of god. But now I am making no bargains. What will be will be and I shall deal.


IT WAS A BIG NOTHING! I am o.k. (not counting the colorful after effects of a biopsy.) So I went outdoors and put in another flower garden and watched the hummingbirds whiz by.

Jobs well done - and not!

It has been a very long week. On Monday the guy, Steve, from Culligan, came by to change the filters on our water system. I remembered him from last year. This was the guy who spends hours tinkering with the system which makes clear water out of iron laden pump water. And when he leaves, nothing works! It was the same this year as last. He left his van running. I asked him to turn the motor off because I didn't want the fumes, the noise, and the wasting of energy. He left, after I had paid him, and as usual, the water pressure was so low it couldn't have watered an anemic chicken. So he had to return to fix it. This, after repeated calls and many minutes on those dreadful 'holds' to surly service department people. We insisted that it be fixed today. Apparently he had installed the wrong filter. This took five days! No one ever said "Sorry, we'll fix it, we'll make it right." This company made me feel that it was our mistake.

Earlier in the week I had to undergo a biopsy (don't worry, nothing life threatening). I dreaded this procedure. When I went to have it done, I had to wait a bit, not long, but then there was this wonderful technician who scooted her chair up to me, eyeball to eyeball, and explained everything - probably more than I wanted to know-and took me in tow for the whole ordeal (which wasn't actually very hard). She rubbed my back and after it was over brought me a warm blanket. She included me, showed me the computer images, and recognized me as a real person who was anxious at the time. The next day she called to see how I was doing, and she explained the process of getting results from the pathology lab. This person hasn't forgotten that she is doing business with real people.

On the other hand, my regular doctor never called me, never returned my calls.

Wouldn't it be great if the Culligan people would call the next day and ask, "How's your water system after the servicing?"

Often, I watch how people deal with their clients. In the Dade City Post Office, the people behind the desk are wonderfully quick, efficient, and friendly. I never mind going there to mail stuff. They seem to care about their customers.

I hope I never have left people hanging out and wondering. It's so easy to give a call or make an announcement about what's either happening or not. Seems to me that it is such a mean petty bureaucratic mindset to control people by not letting them know what's up.

What do you think?

Flags

We have always flown the American flag on our flagpole at the barn next to my studio. This latest one was given to us by our representative, Bill Young. It is a good quality one and at one time, we were given to believe, it was flown over the Capitol. Whatever! I love flags and I have many of them - flowers, birds, even tractors, different holidays-riffling in the breeze on our porch. When they become faded I replace them so they are always bright and colorful.

But my favorite is Old Glory, really a magnificent flag as flags go. I love the symbolism of the stars and stripes, the evolution of it as we gained states. Whipping in the wind or hanging flaccid, it is always there as I come and go. It somehow keeps me grounded about our country, now in such turmoil.

Each day as I pass our flag I can't help thinking about the tiny American flags on the uniforms of our troops in Iraq. One day, after hearing on the radio of the latest dreadful bombing in Bagdad, I stood looking at the flag, now drooping in the light of late afternoon. I stood there with tears flowing at the thought of so many people, men, women and children, dead and maimed in the name of this flag. I think of the troops ('Support our troops') who are so different from the troops we sent to VietNam. In this Iraq war the troops are not draftees. They come from all the small towns of America, wanting somehow to get away and out of dead end lives.

In the Viet Nam war era when there was a draft, troops came from all walks of life. Ivy league or farm worker, they were all in the same pool. Our brightest and best were at risk. It made us sit up and take notice. Now, in the all volunteer forces, our leaders seem not to value the troops who come mainly from the lower class. (Does any child from the affluent or middle class that you know volunteer to fight in Iraq?) These young people, so incredibly valuable as are all our children, must shoulder the burden, even without knowing exactly what they were getting in for.

Then, as they exit this horrendous war, maimed and traumatized and needing strong support, it seems no one cares for them. Yes, we have those plastic things on our cars (Support our troops). Our president has never asked us to support our troops in any meaningful way. He has never asked for any sacrifices beyond our peace of mind. What has happened in Iraq is a beyond terrible thing, and we think we should continue going to the malls and buying stuff.

WHAT ARE WE THINKING?

May- September

It has been a particularly hard week for me, lots to do and many trips back and forth between Dade City and St. Pete. I hate that commute with ever more cars on the road no matter what time of day it is. With each trip I see more developments happening, gobbling up the ranches and cypress domes. I came back home today early after a late night of seeing the opera "Madam Butterfly".

When we were in New york a few weeks ago, I had wanted to take my friend to an opera in the big city. Unfortunately all that was happening was a really inaccessible oriental one, not something to present as a first time opera. So last night it was Pucini, at his sentimental best, and here in our fair city. We loved it!

I had to get back to welcome our weekend guests. This was to be a wedding present for them- a weekend in our guest house which overlooks a lovely pond and is within shouting distance of owls, cows and other nocturnal critters. We promised them a gourmet dinner and leisurely walks. The man is almost sixty and his bride is twenty-three. I had no idea because I had not gone to their wedding. I knew she was recently arrived from Ukrania, did not speak English. I was imagining someone over forty at least. I stocked the guest house with tea and imagined doing pantomimes of things I wanted to say.

This young woman is wonderful looking with that careless lithe affect of youth in our times. I did not see a tattoo on her lower back, the trademark of young American women, but I imagine it will happen soon. She does not speak English perfectly yet, but she listens and speaks copiously. She is a firecracker, playful, curious and greedy for life. Why has she married this older person, I wonder? (I know why my older friend has married her!) She does not drive and rarely goes out of their apartment alone. She has only been in the USA for a month and waits for her green card so she can resume her studies in business. Meantime, she watches T.V. and cooks meals for her new husband. But! This is a young woman who will have a meteoric rise I know not where

We were charmed. I want to take her under my wing, and not because she is needy. Right after dinner I gave her the key to the golf cart, gave her a brief tutorial, and she was off and away, giggling with glee. She's almost young enough to be our grandchild, and I think she'd get along with them just fine!

I am here to show her that life is grand and full of interesting and attainable goals. We'll start by taking walks around the downtown, learn to drive, maybe get a part time job where she can practice her English. Where will she be in five years?

My older friend is protective of her and seems to keep her like a private and exquisite painting on the wall. Unlike paintings, people are not static. He is on edge already. At dinner he was so careful about what and how much he ate; his bride was chomping down with strong young white teeth and asking for seconds.

I sat back with a smile, loving every minute.