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Carol Bossard

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  1. Carol Bossard

    From The Heart

    By Carol Bossard,

    What a variety of weather February is bringing us.   Shortly after Valentine’s Day, environmentalists on social media began encouraging us to leave garden debris for a few weeks at the beginning of the “season”, and “don’t pull dandelions.”  I’m thinking, “Umm.….there are still patches of snow beneath my shrubs, plus what we just got, and dandelions haven’t dared show a glimmer of green.  There’ll be no debris-removal until mud season is over and my fingers won’t freeze.”
    Regardless of yoyo weather, I am appreciative of each morning; my heart has continued beating all night, and I’m up and relatively mobile.    Cardinals and nuthatches on the feeder make me smile, and I enjoy figuring out which creatures have been passing through during the night.  The ears of corn are nibbled away, indicating deer, and the large water bowl is empty, so I’m assuming skunks and possums are awake.  I’m glad to be awake myself.  I don’t take these privileges for granted anymore!   And, spring is working its way north, dandelions and all!
    Yesterday, we entered the Season of Lent. Mardi Gras is over.  For Fat Tuesday, I had planned to make some raised-dough delectables from my Grandpa Dusett’s recipe.  The events of the day decided otherwise.  An appointment with the acupuncturist for shoulder pain seemed more important that the sugary wonders ---- definitely an all-day project.    I do enjoy carrying on traditions when possible and making family recipes is always a pleasure.  In addition to the doughnuts, I also have My grandfather’s recipe for oatmeal cookies – soft and chewy with raisins and just a touch of molasses.   I might make those soon, but the doughnuts will have to wait now, until we celebrate Easter.
    Back to the Lenten season which is, for Christians, a preparation time, similar to Advent but without the hanging of the greens and stringing of lights.  It is the six weeks prior to Easter and marks the 40 days of Christ’s sojourn in the desert.  It is a time of less exuberance and more stirring of the heart; a time to recognize how far we fall short of who we could be, but also to rejoice and be glad in the possibilities of change and growth.
    In the early centuries, AD, the Season of Lent was a period of severe personal sacrifice, and the custom lingers --- in a milder way.  Fewer and fewer people are tied to church liturgy, but even non-church people still ask “What are you giving up for Lent?”  Common responses are: “Candy” or “Lunch” or “Ice Cream” --- a far cry from medieval fasting and flagellation.    I suppose forbidding something appetizing does have a certain value in reminding us of what Lent is all about and if that works for you, it is good.  But more recently, I’ve felt that my offering should be more pro-active, something to create peace and joy.   I suppose this would differ immensely for various people, for how we live our faith is very individual.  Some possibilities might be to read more Scripture every day, or perhaps to spend time in praying and visualization of unity and understanding, or volunteering in a soup kitchen/food cupboard or being a friendly visitor in a nursing home.  We, who observe Lent, would do well to use the time in a way that gives us six weeks of soul-building and spiritual delight.
    Jumping to a bit of back-story, you may recall that last October, along with my granddaughter, I attended a writer’s workshop in Vermont.  One of the speakers that day, was John DeDakis*, former CNN Senior Copy Editor.  In retirement, besides teaching, coaching writers and editing, he is creating mystery novels.   I have one of his books, and while it took me a couple of chapters to get into it --- possibly because I hadn’t read the preceding book and so didn’t know the characters ---- by the third chapter, I really wanted to see how this situation would resolve itself.  “Who did it??  Oh NO, Lark is in jail……!” Only a compelling story would keep me up after my bedtime and Bluff did that.   More important (to me) than the good read, however, were Mr. DeDakis’ thoughts regarding the art of writing ----and communicating.  His words do not apply only to writers, but to how we relate, people to people.
    In his workshop, he began by asking us to jot down all the words we would use to describe “grief.”  He then spoke of his own deep grief at losing a son and went on to say that if we want our writing to connect with others, our pens must pull words from the depth of our own experiences; write from our hearts.  Stories should spring from what we know and feel.  I seldom write fiction; it’s not my forte, though I spun out some “Jonathan” stories for our boys when they were young.  Nor do I feel skilled at devising complicated, interwoven plots.  I am far more comfortable writing about life --- my life, the lives around me; my perspective on the world, especially my own small portion of it.   I can describe our snow-covered pergola, bright with three crimson cardinals.   I know about retrieving cows that have wandered onto the NYS Thruway, about catching polliwogs in vernal pools and the aroma of fresh hay bales on the wagon. I can describe mediating a contest of wills between a county legislature and a state human services agency, and am able to reflect on surviving a life with family, job and chronic depression.  I can share moments of delight, and urge a better understanding of history for its importance to our survival. My gardens, the singing birds, our feral cats, black bear visits, and the small homey bits of each day beg to be shared.  I try to send out sparks of hope, create moments of awareness and mete out a quiet kind of joy.  So, John Dedakis’s philosophy made sense to me for both writing and for conversation.
    Personal stories connect us as humans.  We find healing as we share our lives, whether via fiction or non-fiction; whether written or spoken.   Our stories bring us connection and free others to tell theirs.   The Friday AM Women’s Study group that I help facilitate, is a fine example.  When we first came together, we really didn’t know each other all that well and were a bit cautious.  Now we know each other in ways that are, perhaps, different from, and in some ways, deeper, than we know many of our friends ---there is a soul-connection that is affirming and supportive.  Confidentiality is how we respect each other, and how we can trust in the sharing.
    Families, too, need more awareness of each other.  Choosing a time that works ----after school with a snack, or around the dinner table, or just before bed along with reading stories --- is crucial.  Family members need to talk with each other about their day ---- and no reprimanding or preaching.  It doesn’t take much --- a little careless laughter, a pushing aside of an art project, a small scold --- to make a child think no one wants to hear from him.  Of course, parents get busy, worried, frustrated and tired, but if they want kids to talk openly with them when they are teens, the rapport and freedom to do so must begin when they are small children.    Being really heard is key to believing we are worthy of life.
    A “Question Journal” works especially well with tweens and teens.  Parent and young person share a journal.  The parent writes a question in it, gives it to their kid, who then has the day to write an answer.  After they’ve found time to talk about the answer, the young person writes his or her question and hands it back to the parent to answer.  Honesty and consistency are crucial.  It is also honest to quietly say “I’d rather not talk about that now Let me think about it.”
    When Kerm and I participated in Marriage Encounter there was a similar procedure.  Each person wrote on the question of choice for 20 minutes, then silently read the other person’s thoughts.  After writing and reading, there was 20 minutes of discussion.  This non-threatening kind of dialog assists in keeping up with each other’s thoughts and feelings.   How many people, after years of being together, don’t have a clue about what their partner is wanting or feeling? Communication skills need mending everywhere --- in families, in schools, certainly in Congress, and all over the world.  This, as well as other great movements, is a grassroots change that begins at home.
    Here at my home, February is drawing to a close.   I saw a red-winged blackbird on my feeder; probably a scout sent ahead to assess the situation.  Yesterday, after the snow, the feeder was inundated with black birds of all genres.  There were also wild turkeys, coming off the hill, liberally scattering seed and scratching some in.   Sunflowers will be popping up everywhere!  But that won’t be happening for a while; both dandelions and sunflowers have the innate wisdom to lie low.   Finger Lakes weather can be capricious during February and March. “First gray skies, and then blue, Snow blows in on great gusts of wind while the next day is mellow with sunshine and aromas of coming spring.  Red-winged blackbirds come swooping home in spite of unfriendly weather….” **is descriptive of late winter/early spring here.    I try not to be impatient, but my heart is ready to be lifted by the sight --- and smell ---- of hyacinths and daffodils.
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    *---John DeDakis – novelist and writing coach.  Former CNN Senior Editor for “The Situation Room With Wolf Blitzer”.  He is the author of five novels and is a manuscript editor ---- and, from my own experience, a really nice person.
    **- portion of a poem from “A Safe Life” by CWB.
  2. Carol Bossard

    February Love

    By Carol Bossard,

    February in the Finger Lakes is like a mild case of the flu. Instead of sneezing and coughing, however, our symptoms are less patience with and more grumbles about cold, snow, graupel, ice and slush.  We will assuredly survive, but we are ready for more sun and a few signs of spring.  Yesterday was a good start!   I try to look at winter as a performance and I’m interested to see how the scenes play out.  Will Acts I & II (mid-December- Mid February) bring cold and blizzards, or will it be an open winter with occasional snow squalls and mild temperatures?  The 8 below zero last weekend was  a mean twist in the plot!  After mid-February, we hope Act 3 brings more blue-sky days, occasional signs of swelling buds and a tinge of green in the swamps.   Perhaps the play will conclude early with Mendelssohn’s Spring Song.
    This is a month of celebrations - Valentine’s Day, President’s Day, Mardi Gras (AKA: Fat Tuesday/Doughnut Day/ Pancake Day), the season of Lent and family birthdays.  In January, one granddaughter turned sixteen, and now, in February, the other will turn nineteen.   Both daughters-in-law, another family member and a couple of long-time friends also celebrate this month.  So, bake the cakes, light the candles, open the cards and be glad for another year of adventures.
    Businesses that sell cards, red construction paper, lacy doilies, candy and flowers, rejoice.  According to legend, this holiday exists because of a clergyman, Valentine, who continued to marry young couples in Rome against the wishes of Emperor Claudius II. Claudius thought young men made better soldiers if undistracted by marriage.  So, he threw Valentine into jail.  From his cell the priest sent notes to friends, signing them “Your Valentine”.  Another bit of lore is that he fell in love with the jailer’s daughter, and sent his “your Valentine” notes to her.  Whichever is true, his name came to be associated with love prevailing against all odds.  Sadly, he was executed for his persistence, becoming a Christian martyr who was then elevated to sainthood by the church and given a feast day in his memory ----- St. Valentine’s Day.
    Of course, there are many kinds of love.  In the Greek language, there are at least three options; eros --- the sort of love that leads one into an intimate relationship with another person, phileo --- brotherly love and kindness for a family member or friend, and agape – the sacrificial, all-caring love for all individuals --- for humanity; God’s sort of love.   Tara Shannon’s *Rabbit asked Bear about love: “How do you know when you love someone?” and Bear answers: “When you feel like you’re home no matter where you are.” Bear’s  definition is good for all three kinds of love.
    Movies, TV shows and fairy tales often depict love in ways that are mostly unrealistic.  How many girls have waited for their “prince” to come and found that instead of the glass slipper and castle, real love requires patience, accepting differences, balancing a budget, possibly changing diapers for a baby and picking up sneakers from the kitchen floor before scrubbing that same floor.  Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and several other princesses of lore have set up impossible scenarios for young girls --- and young men too.  What sixteen-year-old boy feels like Prince Charming?    
    And how many adults have felt stuck in their roles because of sitcoms?  According to TV, “Perfect” wives vacuum in their best clothes, after which they prepare a gourmet dinner.   “Perfect” husbands sweep their well-dressed wives into their arms when they return home (after having made oodles of money), they mow the lawn regularly and solve everyone’s problems before bedtime.   More recent sitcoms, unfortunately, depict eros as social recreation for the boudoir instead of a commitment to another beloved person.  Feeling comfortable with ourselves and encouraging our loved ones to be who they are ---- that is a more real love than the ephemeral feelings of fairy tale love or the banal and graceless philosophy of free love.
    I expect all of us have, when we are young, felt what is called puppy love --- being noticed by the cool guy or girl and, hopefully, being asked out!  It is the glamor of dressing for the prom, the excitement of holding hands at the movies, the quality of a school day that depends on whether “he” or “she” is in class that day.  Those developing, delightful, yo-yo emotions need time to mature.  Pat Boone sang about “April Love,” but I’d call this early attraction “February Love.”   Maybe that’s why there are so many June weddings?  Metaphorically speaking, love needs time and wisdom to mature from springtime to summer.  Happiness does include romance but no lasting relationship is all moonlight and roses.   It is also work, sharing the same values and -- very important ---- finding similar things funny.    Kindness, shared interests, laughter, and a bit of moonlight and roses, smooth the twisty path through life. HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY!!
    As I’d planned, I’ve been using this winter to go through boxes and baskets of papers; papers of all sorts and genres.  Some of what I’ve unearthed is family memorabilia.  I’ve found myself wishing once more, that I’d asked more questions when there was still someone alive to provide information.  It takes a few years of living to realize that one’s roots can be exceedingly interesting.   Their importance does NOT necessarily lie in discovering a coat of arms, eligibility for the DAR or even being related to Pocahontas or King Henry VIII.  We each contribute our own value to this world.   But knowing about my forebearers gives me a sense of belonging, and I am grateful.  One of my favorite quotations explains this:  “Suddenly all my ancestors are behind me.  Be still they say.  Watch.  Listen.  You are the result of the love of thousands.**” Every time I read this, I feel loved, connected, and grateful that I am part of a special group of people.
    We do know a little, for one of my brothers explored some of our genealogy.  We knew that my maternal ancestors came from France, but we’ve recently learned that they probably made the hard trek from there to Canada, and then to the United States ---- ten or twenty years before the Revolutionary War.  We believe they were part of the sad exodus from Canada, when the British took control from the French, as mentioned in Longfellow’s poem, Evangeline.  My father’s paternal ancestors were Highland Scots who probably came to this country either after the Jacobite Rebellion (1747) or when the lairds selfishly uprooted families and threw them off the land to make room for more sheep (1810-1820).  I’d have to check on dates, but there is usually an economic or life-threatening reason for leaving one’s land of birth.   Along the way, I acquired a Dutch great- grandmother and a German grandmother.  This makes me quite a mixture, and gives me a better sense of who I am.   But I’d still like to know more ---- about “Uncle Abner Dusett” who I’ve heard, grew fields of carrots on his farm. I’d like my mother’s perspective on the 19th Amendment; she was 22 when it became law.   Was “Grandma Allen” really related to Ethan Allen?  And how did my paternal grandmother survive being widowed, with two very small sons, in a day when there were few jobs for women?  You, who still have older members of your family, take note, and ask questions!  History will come alive with stories.
    My gardening gene is definitely an inherited trait although I wouldn’t have thought so when I was nine and sent out to pick green beans.  My mother’s gardens were amazing; I wrote an article about them that was published in Flower and Garden Magazine some years ago.  She moved from a veggie garden (after most of her children grew up) to transforming swaths of land around her home with herbs, flowers and shrubbery.  Working in the garden was her joy, and even though, in her later years she was legally blind, she gardened until the snows came in her 94th year.  When she died the following February, we found her flower orders ready to be sent.   
    One of the fun things ---- for me ---- about gardening, is planning, and I think that may have been true for her too.  After her death, I found several detailed garden plans drawn and labeled in her fine script.  Visualizing color combinations brightens my January and February.  My garden plans tend to change a time or two before planting season.  Then, about mid-June, they are altered again, depending on what didn’t germinate, what the rabbits ate and what cool plants I’ve discovered at Early Bird, Baker’s Acres or Iron Kettle. This year, will be a whole new exercise in creative cutting back.   
    Hal Borland*** said: “Spring advances northward at approximately 16 miles per day; roughly 100 miles per week.  This applies only to even ground though.  When one begins to climb, then northward pace slackens, since Spring moves uphill only about 100 feet per day.”   An enthusiastic mathematician could visit Washington D.C. during cherry blossom time and then ascertain when trees might be blossoming in Albany, New York.  I think I’ll just watch the cats.  When they begin racing around the lawn and dancing on the picket fence, I’ll be quite sure spring is coming closer.  Meanwhile, February gives us time to make valentines, fry doughnuts and plan gardens as the snow filters down outside the windows and the cold winds blow.  It is good to let people know we love them via valentines.  It is a pleasure to use my grandpa’s doughnut recipe (for Doughnut Day, of course) as a once/year treat.  And there is great satisfaction in visualizing a garden by the fireside.  No bugs, no weeds and beautiful blooms!
     
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    *Tara Shannnon ---American writer, poet and artist.    
    **Linda Hogan -----American writer and TV personality.
    ***Hal Borland ----American naturalist, writer and journalist.  1900-1978.
     
  3. Carol Bossard
    Snow, snow and more snow!  Winter snows and winds have impacted several of our trees, especially our lilacs.  The oldest one, probably at least 60+ years old, had three large broken branches that we removed from its center.  Now it looks like two champagne flutes with space in the middle.  Kerm taped another newer lilac back together, hoping it will reattach.  Butternut and tulip trees have shed limbs all over the lawn, and one crab apple tree is split right down the middle.   The deer have been nibbling one rhododendron whose burlap cage was too low.  Winter can be a relentless pruner.
    I’ve been indulging in garden dreams (catalogs); White Flower Farm, Jung, Bluestone, Pinetree, etc.  I particularly enjoyed this thought by Rumi*: “And don’t think the garden loses its ecstasy in winter.  It is quiet, but the roots are down there riotous!”  Our 2022 gardening clarified some gardening choices for 2023.  We no longer wish to weed endlessly, to cultivate new spaces or even to process bushels of food come harvest time. I enjoy carrots and beets from my garden, but fresh produce from the local store or Farmers’ Market will provide adequately.  This year we will need more mulch, and we’ll be growing only what I won’t be without; potatoes, tomatoes, lettuce, basil and lots of flowers.  Well ---- maybe some pumpkins!  I believe that working in the soil is so healthy for the body and mind, that unless I’m confined to bed, I’ll be out there with trowel doing something.  Just not quite as much!
    Remember our pinochle group? Ten or twelve of us around the table playing with three decks of cards?  We even played by the light of many candles one night when the power went out.  This group hasn’t met for three years because of COVID and other obstacles.  We happily got together a couple of weeks ago.  It isn’t that we are super-serious about pinochle ---- which is fortunate---- because some of us were a bit hazy about a double run, what was trump, who led, and one of us (who shall certainly remain nameless!) even played an entire hand leaving meld on the table.  But, as we played, we caught up with each other’s lives, nibbled on delicious snacks and laughed quite a lot.  We are a diverse group; there’s a retired teacher turned life coach, a retired music teacher who continues to direct choirs and draws wonderful music from pipe organs of the region, a retired Head of Maintenance in a large company and retired dental hygienist, two retired human services administrators, and an entrepreneur currently running a book store.  We were missing the Bee Master and the retired University forester.  Pinochle is one of our vehicles for having fun and feeling better about life.  We are good for each other!  Everyone needs friends like this, not necessarily for cards, but to add affirmation, humor and understanding to life.
    Anne LaMott** says that “Laughter is carbonated holiness.”  I like that because laughter lightens the heaviness that we all feel and it often improves perspective.  A sense of humor is a curious thing.  I’m not sure whether we are gifted with it, or whether one can develop it.  It is the old argument regarding nature and nurture.   My mother didn’t have the same sense of humor that I had.  She would laugh at a duly labeled comic strip and the antics of small children, but puns and small bits of coincidental humor never registered with her.  Fortunately, she managed to be light-hearted without this gift, but both she and I wondered why we didn’t always find humor in the same places.  Some people view life as super-serious.  To the too-focused (fanatical), laughter seems frivolous, and they find little humor in the surrounding world.  Some TV examples would be Temperance Brennan, forensic specialist on “Bones”, and the annoying young scientific geniuses in “Big Bang Theory”.  These characters are intelligent, inner-directed, and very, very serious with nary a gleam of humor entering their consciousness.  Laughing at themselves wouldn’t be possible!   My high school English teacher wrote in my year book, (with slight exasperation, I thought): “you made me laugh even when I didn’t want to.”  Maybe that was good --- a high school English teacher probably needs to laugh more.  I do know that seeing the humorous bits in most situations has been a boon and blessing for me.  Without laughter I’d be mired in the deepest despair for the world.
    And because there’s currently so much world-wide anxiety, I would like to share a poem by Mary Oliver.***  In spite of fun and humor, I am a chronic worrier, though I’m also chronically trying to reform from undue worrying.  So, I keep this poem where I can see it regularly.
    “I worry a lot.  Will the garden grow, will the rivers flow in the right direction, will the earth turn as it was taught, and if not, how shall I correct it?
    Was I right, was I wrong, will I be forgiven, can I do better?
    Will I ever be able to sing, even the sparrows can do it and I am, well, hopeless.
    Is my eyesight fading or am I just imagining it, am I going to get rheumatism, lockjaw, dementia?
    Finally, I saw that worrying had come to nothing.  And I gave it up.  And took my old body and went out into the morning, and sang.”
    ‘Tis a fine line between contemplating--- being prepared ---- and worrying.  I hope to step over that line less as I go along.  However, having made only small improvements in 80 years, I have to accept that I’m a slow learner!
    One thing that would probably create less worry and more understanding universally, would be a better awareness of past events.  After all, “There is no such thing as the past; there is only someone else’s present!”****  Which means the same things keep happening.   The lack of historic awareness among the general population, is abysmal and frightening.  For example -- every one of us who lives in these United States (unless one is a Native American, and even then…) stems from immigrants who came from somewhere else.  Our forebearers were usually desperately escaping poverty or tyranny.   Those who know history, know that every time a new wave of immigrants enters the picture, there has been bigotry and tension with claims of losing jobs and rising crime to stoke the fires of fear. During the gold rush, the Chinese were scorned as heathens, fit only to launder the miners’ clothes.   When the Irish came, there were “No Irish need apply” signs in shop windows, and you’d never want your daughter to marry an Irishman!   When the Italians came, they were disdained and relegated to “Little Italys”.  The United States shamefully disregarded the danger to Jewish people at the beginning of WWII and refused them entrance.   Arrogance combined with ignorance, is scary.
    There are many other examples of historic forgetfulness; The witch mania in New England,  two centuries of minimal educational opportunities for any except the elite, “blue laws” that trespass on the neutral zone between church and state, lack of labor laws for the welfare of children and other workers, the institution of slavery, the mistaken idea that during the “wonderful fifties”, there was little violence or unrest.  Ignorance of history allows us to judge the rest of the world by our own experiences and to think no one ever before had problems like ours today.  We are so busy despairing of each “new” issue that comes along, that we throw up our hands, and make little effort to solve the problems in a sensible and equitable manner.  The back story might actually help us see what works and what does not.   By the time situations are so bad that we must do something, we usually over-react and make laws that ignore common sense.
    Most frighteningly, ignorance of history allows us to be easily duped by those who wish to manipulate us, using fear, our lack of knowledge and glib words.   Spending less time memorizing dates for the War of Roses, and putting more emphasis on what has changed mankind’s journey in the last two-hundred years, including the difficult parts, would be useful.  Our children are leaders of the next generation. They need to know about Barbara Fritchie’s flag and Nathan Hale – but they also need to know what conditions necessitated an inspired Jane Addams, Rosa Parks, Nellie Blye and Martin Luther King Jr.  Delighting in our heroic past needs to include honesty about where we’ve erred and how we can be better. History shouldn’t be boring; it should be enlightening!
    There are only five more days before January is “history.”  We can feel joy because we are closer to spring, or be equally as happy that we have plenty of winter to go.  I hope we each find something that pleases us in every day, even the stormy ones.  Blue jays vs. cats with the cat food make me laugh.  In the stillness of a winter night, with flakes of snow filtering down I am grateful for living here.  It is often the little things in life that bring delight.  January is just the cusp of the new year, so as 2023 progresses, I wish that:
    “God gives you blessings for this new year --- stars for your darkness, sun for your day, light    on your path as you search for the way, and a mountain to climb.”*****  And laughter --- may there always be laughter!
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
     
    ***********************
    *Rumi –Poet and writer from the Islamic Golden Age.  His works have been translated into many languages.  1207-1273
    **Anne LaMott ---American novelist and non-fiction writer, speaker, activist and writing teacher.  Her base is Marin County, CA.
    ***Mary Oliver –American Pulitzer-winning poet.  1935-2019
    ****-- David McCullough –American popular historian and two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize.  1933-2022.
    *****Myra Scovel –American nurse and missionary for the United Presbyterian church, and writer.  She wrote “Chinese Ginger Jars” among other books.  1905-1994.
  4. Carol Bossard
    Happy New Year again, now that we are actually in 2023.  I have so appreciated the holiday season that is just past, and wish some of the benefits could go on and on, as this says: “Blessed is the season which engages the whole world in a conspiracy of love.”*   New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day were both busy and engaged because our granddaughters were here all week, and then our adult kids were here and life was lively.  There wasn’t a lot of time for year-end introspection, but in the back of my head was a little voice saying, “live this coming year well; so much can change and challenges may come, so treat each day like the jewel that it is.”
    The Christmas tree, dropped needles liberally so was taken out before Twelfth Night, where it resides behind the bird feeders for the winter.  In the spring, we’ll remove it to the hill, adding it to the escape piles for small creatures.   The snow babies will, by this weekend, be tenderly packed away in bubble wrap and tissue.  The evergreen wreath, made by FFA kids, remains on the door and the outside lights will be part of our landscape until March or April.  A Christmas gift was an iron welcome sign featuring bears.  We will hang it on the porch, but we’re hoping the bears can’t read, because --- unfortunately -- they feel far too welcome already.  We are mixing the old (driveway lights) with the new (bear signage) to take us through the winter.
    There are always two edges to newness.  Will the new things create discomfort?  Will I know what to do in new situations?  It usually takes some wearing before new shoes are really comfortable.  It takes a while for new acquaintances to become friends, if they are ever going to be.  A new house doesn’t really become home until it has been lived in for a bit, collecting memories.  But the other edge is vitality; without new experiences, life becomes dull, boring and tasteless, leaving us in a rut of non-growth.  Rainer Maria Rilke** said, about his new year, “And now we welcome the new year, full of things that have never been.”  It is a matter of perspective; do we believe the universe is basically friendly --- or hostile?  Whichever we believe deep inside, will color how we regard those “things that have never been”.  It could be wonderful – it could be scary - it might be uncomfortable!  Even when I’m flailing against change, or find a change disturbing, I am still glad that I’m able to experience it; still able to awake, get out of bed, make decisions, move around, fix my own tea and connect with friends.
    Mornings are especially good now that there’s generally no need to rush off somewhere.  As I sit in my living room, a crackling fire in the wood stove, the day ahead of me, I feel happy and contented.  The finches, and an occasional cardinal, are socializing in a viburnum shrub outside the window, the day is quiet except for the usual traffic going by.  Because there are so many places in this world that are filled with the chaos of over-crowded streets, fear of bombings, tension and poverty, this quiet is a gift.  I am warm, not hungry and I don’t tremble in fear of armies or mobs.  Gratitude fills me up, and there is a feeling that if I am this privileged, I am surely meant, in some way, to share this plentitude.

    And speaking of sharing, I am always amazed that with so many groups and individuals creating programs to help those who need assistance, that help seems to be a proverbial drop in the bucket.  I think my difficulty comes because my mind doesn’t grasp huge numbers; they simply don’t compute. So, when someone says “two billion people,” my mind has no parameters for such a crowd.  But, accepting that we reach only a small percentage of people in need, even in our own small community, we continue to make sure the food cupboard is available, contribute to those organizations that mean most to us, and make an effort to be available for people around us.  If God cares for each sparrow (as the old hymn goes) then we surely can do our bit for individuals in our arenas of life.  I think if each of us who are able, devoted a portion of time to helping, in some way, that maybe the percentage would change from a drop in the bucket to buckets-full of helped people.
    The holidays are over and we are now in January, “ordinary time” on the church calendar --- with 31 days of potentially yucky weather.  I have thought about how my perspective on snow and cold has changed.  As a child and even a teenager, I liked winter.  There were snowmen and snow forts, parties with sledding and hot chocolate, dances and roller skating --- even occasional ice skating.  I remember riding in the car when I was very young, watching the snow coming at the windshield like the end of a witch’s broom --- and I thought that was really cool. Apparently, ignorance of potential danger really can be bliss!    Now I try to not go out on the roads at all when snow is coming down.  And those heavy boots, bulky coats, scarves and gloves or mittens?  As a kid, donning those things was no problem; now they weigh me down, making it difficult to be mobile.  A ski pole accompanies me on my snowy rounds outside, for balance has become uncertain!  Fortunately, we can count on fairly rapid weather changes.  There’s an up-state NY saying that if you don’t like the weather, wait a minute and it will change.  The 60-degree temperatures after Christmas while a bit weird, were pleasant though at the same time, I am aware that such outlandishly mild temps signal unhealthy iceberg melting, increasing allergies and danger to habitats for penguins and polar bears.
    I don’t actually make New Year’s resolutions, but there are some changes I hope for this year.  I have, for many years, lived with a bad habit (common among humans, especially women) of neglecting things that may improve my life, but take time.  “Me time” has seemed irrelevant and a bit self-indulgent.  I think this attitude begins with having children and the need to put their welfare first.  After children, it has become a fixed habit to get over-busy with details of the house, or other activities, and the hours fly by.  I didn’t do much introspection on New Year’s Day, but I’ve determined to make space for this in tiny chunks of time every day; more quiet time for myself, to consider the state of my soul.  I’m not speaking of meditating or actively deep-breathing or planning menus; I’ll just be pondering whether or not my day has been satisfying and if it’s not, why? Am I feeling part of the universe around me, or am I bogged down in my own concerns?   If the dishes and laundry have to wait a couple more hours, life will still go on.   Then there is my flute, poor neglected instrument that it has been for several years now since my neck and fingers became more arthritic.  It was reconditioned just before Christmas; all its little key pads refreshed, and so I will work on playing again, enough to make music in my heart even if it isn’t good enough to make music in an orchestra.  And finally, along with a challenge from The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin, I’ll be spending more time outside than the usual quick tour from bird feeder to bird feeder.  Fresh air is good for my lungs and walking good for the entire body, even when it isn’t comfortable.  These things may seem miniscule, but I think they will have large impact on both my body and my attitudes.  Of course, your small changes might be way different form mine, but we all probably need one or two uplifting, happiness-engendering adjustments to our lives for 2023.  We mustn’t allow ourselves to become jaded and world-weary, nor should we be set-in-concrete with habitual ways.
    As we look to the months ahead, all of us hope for good days and loving relationships.  I thought the following was good advice: 1) Do the things you love more often.  2) Let go of people or situations that drain you.  3) Sometimes you need to get uncomfortable to get comfortable.  4) Where your attention goes, your energy flows.  5) If you change your mindset, you will change your life.”*** These seem, to me, to be basic for making little changes that mean a lot; that may well improve all 365 of our days this year..
    Rainer Maria Rilke may have been rosily optimistic about what his year of “things that have never been” would hold, or maybe he simply made a resolution to adjust his perspective when challenges came along.  Perhaps frequent adjusting (being flexible) is the secret to finding what we long for, and what we hope for at the beginning of each new year.  Perspective lies within us!  We are each here for a purpose, or so I believe.  So --- may we welcome in this new year, with things that have never been, and trust that whatever is new in our lives, will be right for us.
    Coming next ----“What’s trump and who led?”
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    *********
    *Hamilton Wright Mabie---American writer, essayist, editor, critic and lecturer.  He wrote books like: “Norse mythology and “Fairy Tales Every Child Should Know”.  1875-1926.
    **Rainer Maria Rilke --- Austrian poet and novelist.  He was born in 1875 and died in 1926.
    ***quotation from Inner Growth Reset --- not just sure what this group is, but they seem to have a lab for research, and opportunities for therapy.
  5. Carol Bossard
    We’ve decorated, baked, caroled and the Season of Noel is approaching its end.  We do have until January 6th ---- 12th Night ---- before we must pack the shiny ornaments away and we head into true winter.  It has been two weeks of being together with friends and family, good church services and special music.  One of our remaining tasks would be sending out  Christmas cards.  We have more time now, to write notes.
    New Year’s Eve is coming and it is, for many, a time of merriment and partying.  I somehow managed to escape the “coming of age” inebriation experience.  This wasn’t through any particular virtue of mine, although truthfully, I can’t comprehend why people would want to suffer again and again after once experiencing a hangover.  Simply, there was no alcohol in the house during my growing-up years, and a little glass of wine or a can of beer was never part of my culture.  Most of my friends didn’t drink either.    And after trying a sip or two in college, I realized very soon that I didn’t like the taste; fermentation tasted like something I’d throw away.  However, in a spirit of helpfulness, for those who indulge in a bit too much bubbly on New Year’s Eve, I offer this nutritional advice.  DO NOT drink coffee as a cure.  Two major effects of excessive alcohol consumption are dehydration and stomach irritation, which will also interfere with eating.  Coffee, which acts as a diuretic can cause more fluid loss and possibly more stomach upsets, thereby delaying recovery.  (This is also why, when urged to drink more liquids by one’s doctor, coffee doesn’t count!!)  Instead, you need to drink about a quart of fluid upon waking, and another quart over the next 24 hours.  Water and fruit juices are good choices.  Also, take a Vitamin B tablet.  And rest!  Hopefully, though, you won’t need this recipe as you leave 2022 behind and enter 2023.
    Winter, with its varying moods, will be with us now until the spring Equinox in March, as well as several weeks thereafter. I view this as a sort of hibernation time --- why should bears have all the perks?  This thought from Serendipity Corner* concurs: “The winter is a friend if you make it one.  I look forward to the gray, quiet time for solitude, contemplation, leading long conversations with friends.  Colors are softer, sounds have more depth, the pace is gentler.  Instead of resentment at the lack of sun, snuggle into the gray velvet quilt and make yourself a cup of tea.”  I would, as an aside, disagree about the sun; anyone living in our region, needs a sunshine light; our brains need sunlight to function well, in addition to determined good cheer!

     
     
     
    Kerm and I don’t cease our coming and going, but we cut down.  I find it soothing, to not always be getting ready for something.  I enjoy reading new books, and re-reading favorites.  Two of the books in which I indulge annually are: The Nocturnal Naturalist by Cathy Johnson** and Wandering Through Winter by Edwin Way Teale.***  It somehow makes my winter brighter to remind myself of what the creatures around us are doing.  According to bird experts, owls are currently mating and laying eggs.  Brr!  A frigid nursery for the owlets!  But isn’t it reassuring that owls are sure enough about spring coming to mate and lay eggs, despite chilly winds and falling snow?
    We can soon open fresh calendars and maybe --- possibly ---- even decide to acquire a fresh point of view or two.  For many years I constructed a calendar “from scratch” for ourselves, then for our sons and then for sons and their families.  I’d buy a large drawing tablet and start laying out lines for days of the month.  Then I’d add pertinent stickers or hand-drawn sketches, and the dates of family birthdays and anniversaries.  I finished with a lovely picture for each month.  Arthritis in my hands has made this process difficult, so now I purchase a calendar that I think is appropriate and fill in the dates, along with a few fun stickers.  This isn’t as personally satisfying --- but happily, I don’t need hand therapy afterward.  I like calendars in spite of the current propensity for keeping dates in a phone.  I like seeing a picture that illustrates the kind of month we hope it will be --- and I like turning the pages when the months change.  I’m a visual person and storage of my daily life in a mechanical device just doesn’t do it for me!
    How do your days run?  Or maybe I should ask if your days race by, or are there periods of slow sauntering and maybe even stopping to enjoy the view?   How do you decide to fill your days?  I think most of us glance at our calendars, be they electronic or on the wall, and if there is an empty slot, we agree to do whatever it is we are being asked to do.  Our days fill up quickly, and suddenly, we need roller skates!  Growing up in 4-H, the accepted mantra, when asked to do something, was “I’ll be glad to!”**** I believe in volunteering and being helpful, but is it possible that we need to moderate this philosophy, giving our lives  more thought before we jump into someone else’s agenda?  We tell ourselves we just want to help, but is that all?  Is there a self-serving bit of wanting everyone to appreciate us, that makes us say “Yes”?  Several friends were recently talking together, and the question was: “What if we took the time for some spiritual guidance to determine our calendar activities?  How would that change our attitudes and our days?”  Interesting question!  Might wisdom possibly come filtering through quiet time and into our souls?  I happen to believe strongly in spiritual nudging but even so, I seldom think to ask for clarity about using my time well.    Do I need more time to rest?  Am I saying “yes” to prove I have the stamina for anything?  Should I, instead, be spending time in ways that stretch my mind and spirit?  Am I cheating anyone else by giving my time away?  And, perhaps most crucial, what impact will this have on my inner self?  Will it lift my spirits or depress them?  I’m certainly not suggesting we do not volunteer, but time, especially as we increase in years, is a precious commodity.  Giving more in-depth thinking to how we spend our time, before we scatter our hours abroad, seems like a useful New Year’s resolution.
    “New” years don’t, universally, always start on January 1st; they begin at different times for different cultures.  In ancient Ireland, the new year began at the end of the harvest season --- bringing us Samhain, which led to our Halloween. The new year for Orthodox Jews is Yom Kippur, after the atonement time of Rosh Hashana.  For the Christian church, Advent, four Sundays before Christmas, begins the new church year.  Tet is the Vietnamese new year and it depends on the lunar calendar, but usually comes in January or February, as does the Chinese New Year.  Anyone with children may consider the beginning of school their actual new year.   Beginnings are exciting and maybe a little scary; there’s gratitude for the past year, gladness that life is moving along with us, and hope for the future, along with a bit of trepidation about possible changes.   I have a few regrets for this past year; the loss of friends through death and/or misunderstanding.  I regret the times I’ve been so focused on my worries that I’ve been oblivious to the wonders around me.  I wish I had used my time better.  Mostly, though, I’m filled with gratitude for family, for friends and for all the opportunities available to me.  I have concerns, of course, about the violence so prevalent now and the unrelenting “me first,” greed and desire for power that is somehow viewed, by many, as acceptable.  I regret the fear that drives people to reject, to the point of persecution, life-styles and philosophies not their own.   But I’m also hopeful that eventually, bit by bit, good sense and kindness will prevail.
    This year could be much like last year.  Spring will come, we will garden and mow the lawn, celebrate holidays and continue what we normally do.  But one never knows how life may veer in a new direction.  I note changes in my own life.  Suddenly a good friend dies.  With no warning, my favorite destination store closes.  It is no joyful thing that my eyes continue to deteriorate and that arthritis sneakily bends my fingers further and stiffens my neck.  These are painful little reminders of change that demands more thoughtful coping skills.  Other changes are  more welcome; I have the joy of seeing our granddaughters maturing into creative and talented adults, of enjoying times with friends who are kindred spirits and of seeing glimpses here and there of new and good things happening world-wide.  So – for this next year I liked this little quotation that I found on Face Book --- I don’t know its author ----and will share it with you.

    “I hope there are days when your coffee {tea for me} tastes like magic, your playlist makes you dance, strangers make you smile, and the night sky touches your soul.  I hope you will fall in love with being alive again.”  And remember that each of us has the power to add to the light or darkness of the world ---- a bit daunting, but also a wonderful responsibility.  Happy New Year!
    *******************
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
     
    *--Serendipity Corner –New Age & Metaphysical shop in Kentucky.
    **Cathy Johnson –An American writer, artist and naturalist.
    ***Edwin Way Teale---American conservationist, photographer and writer.  He documented environmental conditions all across the United States.  1899-1980.
    ****Dorothy Emerson coined the phrase “I’ll be glad to” as she spoke to 4-Hers all over the country.  She was my first “inspirational speaker” and had a huge impact.
  6. Carol Bossard
    Starry skies --- crisp nights ----- occasional snow feathering down ----sleds, sleighs and church bells.  That is what all the beautiful winter cards depict.  In real life, we often have what the meteorologists call “graupel” plus sleet and freezing rain, with a little mud underfoot, making slush, rather like what we’re getting here today ---and tomorrow.   The cards keep us looking for that bit of winter magic.  I wish that I could find a better use for the many beautiful cards, especially hand-made ones, with the lovely photographs or art-work; I save the prettiest ones, occasionally take them out to enjoy and sometimes put them into a collage.
    When real snow does come, I am reminded of moon-lit sledding on my brother’s farm.  He had a nicely sloping hill with plenty of flat, empty space at the bottom.  We’d bring out sleds and saucers for a couple of hours of fun, illuminated by moon and car lights.  Occasionally, instead of trudging, we’d get a ride back up the hill.  In times of no snow, between Halloween and Christmas, we might have a hayride party where we’d snuggle into some loosened hay bales in a wagon pulled by the farm tractor, entertaining ourselves with singing and laughter.  Fun didn’t end with summer weather. A change in seasons only offers us new ways to enjoy life.  We need to look for fun things to do --- it is good for our mental health.
    It has been a lovely Advent season.  We do what we can to buffer ourselves against the nightly servings of bad news around the world; news from places and people suffering, with no peace on earth.  The stories, legends and music around this particular holiday help and encourage us, for neither was there peace on earth 2000+ years ago.   Some people I know bury themselves in Hallmark movies; I have trouble sitting still for those, so I’ve been reading stories from “Tales Told Under the Christmas Tree”, short stories and poetry from some of the old “Ideals” magazines, and thoughts for the season from an Advent Daybook.  The aroma of baking cookies sometimes fills the air and, if not cookies, then spicy-scented candles.  The morning wood fire keeps the living room toasty and I can drift away to some other place and time for an hour or so, forgetting war, confusion, and dishes to be washed.
    As our cold temperatures increase, the numbers of birds around feeders grow.  The chickadees are so friendly that I soon expect them to perch on my seed pail.   They seem positive that we are bearing goodies just for them.  The cardinals, with their bright crimson sit further away, and the blue jays, greedy and obnoxious as always, are a nice contrast in blue and white.  The omnivore blue jays have taken to stealing cat food as soon as the cats turn their backs.  Perhaps it is a game --- “Hey, Buddy ---How much can we get away with before Fluffy sees us?”    There’s other winter wild life around too; we sometimes hear the coyotes calling across the valley, their voices echoing through the night.  Others have seen a fisher (also called fisher-cat) in our neighborhood, but I have not.  And that’s OK.  They are rather vicious, quite-large, members of the weasel family and I’d rather they prowled elsewhere.  I look when I’m up at 2 AM, to see what critters we do have.  A couple of weeks ago, I opened the back door and faced two chubby raccoon youngsters about to climb onto the table where I’d put the cat food.  They were fluffy and cute, but they are also destructive, so I sent them away and moved the cat food.  I mentioned to them they’d make great muffs!  They left, but didn’t hurry, so I’m assuming they weren’t overly terrified by my implied threat.
    Thinking of “middle of the night” experiences ----- in eighth or ninth grade, I hosted a slumber party.  “Slumber” is inaccurate, for there was little sleeping.  I have some photos of the occasion indicating that we played games, sang, and talked endlessly.  I remember, that at 3 AM, we rang cow bells outside, and sang “It’s Three O’Clock In The Morning”*.  Fortunately, we had no really close neighbors to be disturbed by the hullabaloo.  Thinking back, I’m astounded that my father didn’t object rather vociferously; his tolerance for middle-of-the-night noise would, ordinarily, have been zero.   My mother must have miraculously convinced him we should be allowed our mild rioting for one night.
    Wakeful nights and not enough sleep are now major problems, for us and for many people we know.  It is as though we are stuck in the “waiting up for Santa” stage. Among our friends, we’ve joked about arranging a face-time party at 2 AM.  With “pillow hair” and eyes at half-mast, that’s probably not a great idea.  There are podcasts about sleeplessness, for, according to doctors, it is a serious problem hindering healing, impacting the immune system and aging mechanisms, and adding to a possibility of depression and anxiety.   Most remedies I’ve tried, worked briefly, and then ceased being effective. The scent of lavender is supposed to ease one into slumber, various herbs may assist (chamomile, valerian, hops), and a good bedtime routine is a sensible place to start.  But none of these, so far, have prevented those wee, sma’ hours when I lie there with eyes wide open to the night. If I discover any sure-fire assists for good sleeping, I’ll share.  Meanwhile, the next time we are all up at 3:00 in the morning ---Joyce, Judy, Bonnie, Janet, Diane, Pat, Barbara……..…….!
    The tree is up and decorated and these last days before Christmas are usually filled with baking --- though less now than when everyone was home.  Having several kinds of cookies is surely a genetic pass-along from my mother.  She always had three or four cookie boxes awaiting drop-in guests.  Sitting around her kitchen table with a cup of Constant Comment tea and a cookie, looking out at the pond and bird feeder, made any day a good day.  With less baking though, there is more time to contemplate the Christmas season.  Some of our cards will go out this week, but many for family and far-away friends, will wait.  No one has time to read the lengthy letter that goes along with the card until later anyway.  It is, hopefully, an a-typical Christmas letter.  I never want to make it just a list of what we did, nor do I want it to be bubbling over with manufactured merriment.  Since we and many of the recipients don’t get to see each other often, it is our visit via snail-mail.  These Home, Garden and Other Wonders essays that go out to you, are also visits, in a sense.  Depending on what I’m writing, I frequently feel that I’m talking to one or more of you, in describing experiences that we hold in common or to which we can all relate.
    Next week, the Solstice arrives.  That always brightens my perspective (pun absolutely intended!).  I know it will be a while before we really notice increasing light, but my inner being senses the darkness is diminishing, and I am cheered.  This very important earth-to-sun occasion often gets lost amid the bells and holiday music but it is a natural event for which we should be giving fervent thanks.   So, on December 21st, give a cheer for the earth’s minuet with the sun.
    In this month of multiple holidays, amid our happy times, we need to remember those individuals who are not celebrating; whose lives are impacted by loneliness, grief or pain.  Not everyone can embrace holly and jolly with open arms.  Life circumstances can leave one feeling out of sync with the surrounding merriment-filled world.  We could all be more sensitive and aware ---- offering the gift of understanding; being a friend who quietly listens.  And we should stop worrying about whether someone says “Merry Christmas” or “Happy Holidays”.  Both work and it is surely not the season for insisting on one’s own way!  Consider offering wishes for “Peace”---something we all need ---- inner and outer.  Albert Schweitzer** was a wise and compassionate man, and he said: “At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person.  Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us.”  Giving the best in ourselves at this season is better than the most expensive gift.  And we don’t have to wrap ourselves in sparkly paper or satin ribbons to do so.  Being a light-bearer, in our own personal ways, is a gift to the world if it helps just one person.
    There are so many opportunities for joy and kindness, and restoration of our spirits.  Chanukah begins Sunday.  The Solstice is the 21st.  Christmas is December 25th.  Kwanzaa begins on the 26th as does Boxing Day in England, a time to share with those who need help.  New Year’s Eve and Day come along with fresh, new calendar pages, and finally, 12th Night --- January 6th --- the official end of the Christmas season.  This comment by Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks*** seems most appropriate just now: “For though my faith may not be yours and your faith my not be mine, if we are each free to light our own flame, then together we can banish some of the darkness of the world.”   Blessings to you in this season of light and love.
     
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    *”It’s Three O’Clock In The Morning ---Song from the early 20th century, performed by a variety of musicians.
    **Albert Schweitzer---Born in Alsace in 1875, becoming a French citizen after WWI.  He was a theologian, an organist, philosopher, humanitarian and Lutheran pastor.  He died in 1965 at age 90.
    ***Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks ---A Baron---  English Orthodox Rabbi, philosopher, theologian and author.  1948-2020.
  7. Carol Bossard
    Turkeys can now relax; their season is over while we humans have stepped from November (Thanksgiving) into December (Christmas) with hardly a moment of transition.  We are one week into Advent; hanging of the greens at church occurred this past Sunday.  For nearly all faiths, this is the Season of Lights.  Pagan holidays emphasized light because December brings the longest nights of the year, and asking the gods to send the sun’s light again seemed a survival necessity.  The Jewish Chanukah celebrates the story of lights (oil lamps) burning way past their expiration time, saving an entire branch of humanity from tyranny, briefly anyway.  And, of course, Christmas begins with a very bright star leading to a Light that fills the lives of those who follow.  It is the season of trimmed trees, lighted candles and outdoor displays.  Peter, Paul and Mary sang a soul-stirring song, probably for Chanukah, but it works for all of us.   “Don’t Let The Light Go Out……….Let it shine through our love and our teas….. Oh no don’t let the Light go out, It’s lasted for so many years; don’t let the light go out…..DON’T Let The Light Go OUT!!”  In a time when there is so much darkness in the world, we need to be carrying lights for those who can’t ------ or won’t.
    As temperatures drop here in the northeast and snow comes and goes, we can no longer put off the season of boots, mittens and heavier coats.  (Is that snickering I’m hearing from those of you in Florida, Arizona, New Mexico, So. Carolina and California?)  Mornings here are frosty but energizing, and a cup of tea begins my day well.  Hopefully our intrusive black bears are all sleeping cozily some place distant from our back yard.  We’ve finally put out the suet as well as bird seed and would prefer no destroyed feeders.  Kerm has mended them multiple times this summer and fall; bears, raccoons and squirrels damage them, sometimes more than once/season.  I understand that they, too, are hungry, but they have absolutely NO manners!   Chickadees, nuthatches tufted titmice are all bouncing around the feeders with their usual quick energy.  They, and the woodpeckers, seem grateful for the added suet.
    It is time to transfer pumpkins from the porch to the lawn, for benefit of turkeys and deer.  We’ll be replacing them on the porch, with snowmen and wraths.  Our holiday preparations are less strenuous than they were a decade or so ago.  We’ve simplified and pared, and use only the things most important to us and that we really enjoy.  We’ve ordered our evergreen wreath from the school FFA group, also a poinsettia.  We cleaned out our tubs of decorations a couple of years ago, giving away things we didn’t find useful anymore.  There was a time when all the exhaustive preparation for Christmas was fun.  Now we’d just be exhausted, which seems both irreverent and foolish.  We have grown to find the small, happy things around us enough.  Of course, we keep the decorations that have meaning; the stable that Kerm constructed, layering the roof carefully with full-length straws gleaned from an Amish oat field, the ceramic Christmas tree given to us by a 4-H leader who made it herself, the wreath our granddaughter created for us a few years ago.  Our tree ornaments range from the Shiny Brites my mother and dad had on our tree at home to ones we’ve collected and lovely ones given to us by family and friends.  Less stress and more warm  times would be our current motto.
    This coming weekend we’ll be enjoying the community chorus from a neighboring village.  They will come to our church to present their music and also do a and carol-sing; a fine way to begin December.  At 7:00, on Sunday evening, we gather to hear music that they’ve been preparing for weeks and in between their songs, we get to sing Christmas carols.  We are a singing community!  Afterward (probably why the group is glad to come here) we have a magnificent spread of cookies and other finger foods.   

    Music at Christmas time is one of my special joys.  I play seasonal CDs during the day, as well as in the evening.  We have a stash of the usual Christmas carols that everyone knows, but we also enjoy some English madrigals, some classical music like Handel’s Messiah, and Christmas folk songs that aren’t so familiar.  One of my favorites is “The Huron Carol” written as a Native American version of the Christmas story.  Music is such a mood-changer.  I can put on a CD and be immediately brightened --- or elated ---- or relaxed ---- all depending on the music.   I’ve even begun practicing a bit on my flute.  When arthritis began stiffening my neck, flute-playing became painful, but I’ve missed it, so am working on it a bit at a time.
    Learning to relax, especially in a busy season, continues to be a work in progress.  I think our attitudes toward busyness may begin way back in childhood.  Tutu Mora** says that “Feeling the need to be busy all the time is a trauma response and fear-based distraction from what we’d be forced to acknowledge and feel if we slowed down.”  Perhaps!  I also think there is a fine line between teaching one’s children to work up to their abilities and forge ahead ---- and over-emphasizing the work ethic to the point where relaxation and leisure sound like dirty words.  I think those of us who grew up on farms or in some other family business, have been impressed with the immediacy of tasks and have difficulty in slowing our pace even when there’s no longer a need for pushing.  As a result, we often end up (as we age) with tense and painful necks and shoulders, with a feeling of dis-ease when we sit doing nothing and with a monkey-mind that skitters and whirls when we are attempting a quiet time.  Whatever the source, we too often cross that line where being busy has become a way of life for us; a morally good way to live.  And we have forgotten the benefits of time spent in just being.
    I recently listened to a series of podcasts on Aging --- which I may share more in depth in another essay.  But one thing, offered by a Harvard professor, particularly impressed me.  He said that as one ages, life can be better and quite wonderful, but for that to happen, we must change our perspective on what we should be doing.  His advice was, every day to include a time for walking (in whatever sense our body allows that -- might be Chair Yoga or stretching if actual walking is impossible), a time for learning something new----reading, a podcast or a class, and a time of holding the wider world up for our conscious concern ---- praying or at least thoughtful consideration.  In short, live in such a balanced way that our health and well-being is as important to us as our accomplishments.
    As we look ahead to the next few weeks, instead of allowing ourselves to become hassled, over-worked and exhausted, perhaps we could try this little formula.  Maybe start out by doing each of those things for ½ hour.  That is only one and a half hours out of the twenty-four we have, to work on easing and enriching our lives.   That would be a fine way to fill December with the peace, radiance and love suggested by the occasions we celebrate.   
    I found this poem by Brother David Steindl-Rast***.  I had read one of his books (Music of Silence) and enjoyed it in small bites at a time.  This poem speaks to us about quiet --- about conscious awareness of the world around us ----- about finding peace in small things.
    “May I grow still enough to hear the small noises the earth makes in preparing for the long sleep of winter. So that you, yourself, may grow calm and grounded deep within.
    May you grow still enough to hear the trickling of water seeping into the ground, so that your soul may be softened and healed, and guided in its flow.
    May you grow still enough to hear the splintering of starlight in the winter sky and the roar at earth’s fiery core.
    May you grow still enough to hear the stir of a single snowflake in the air, so that your inner silence may turn into hushed expectation.”
    It takes conscious awareness and determination to keep our inner lights glowing, especially in such a complicated time. Whenever I hear “Don’t Let The Light Go Out” I realize the song hold as much relevance today as it was whenever Peter, Paul and Mary recorded it.  This dark world needs all the light and LIGHT it can get.  If we allow ourselves to be nourished by the creation around us, by time spent in good relationships and caring, we will be Light-Bearers for whatever part of the world is ours.  It is good for us and good for whatever part of the world is in our venue, to make the darkness less.
     
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    *Peter, Paul and Mary” --- a folk and activist trio from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s-
    **Tutu Mora –Tutu (Dorothy) Mora is a breath-work facilitator and also a certified instructor in Qigong and Pilates.
    ***Brother David Steindl-Rast --- Born in Austria in 1926.  He became a Benedictine brother who has degrees in theology, philosophy and fine arts.  He is known for his work with interfaith dialogue and connecting spirituality and science.
  8. Carol Bossard

    Give Thanks!

    By Carol Bossard,

    What a rapid run through November we are making.  Days are flitting along like leaves blown by November winds.  Thanksgiving is a week away.  Am I prepared for the holiday season that follows?  No, I am not!  But somehow, we always manage to celebrate royally, ready or not.  I enjoy Thanksgiving because it is about family and gratitude.  There are fewer dizzying activities like wrapping gifts, running hither and yon, and all the hullabaloo that goes with Christmas.  The weather is usually better too.  I do, however, remember one snowy Thanksgiving, in our family annals, when we lived in central Pennsylvania.  The snow began the Sunday we were to return from Victor to Lewisburg.  By the time we hit Rt. 15, only one lane was plowed and traffic was moving at the speed of a sloth.  I remember visualizing, in my mind, a long line of traffic, running from Buffalo to Washington DC, going 35 mph.  After that trip, we decided to never again be on the road, the Sunday following Thanksgiving.  If the boys missed a day of school, OH Well!
    One other really different Thanksgiving, occurred the year our first child was born.  The due date was close enough to the holiday that the doctor said: “No travel!”  So, we celebrated sans family.  I think our dinner might have been pizza; it is certain that I didn’t roast a turkey!  The weather was so mild that we went walking on the very quiet rural roads near Lewisburg --- no one was out --- everyone was inside, having dinner.    It was a quiet and quite lovely day.  We probably could have gone home to NYS and returned with no trouble since our eldest didn’t decide to arrive until several days after Thanksgiving.  But that year, we learned that even when conditions are not as one would like them to be, Thanksgiving is still a good day.  Realizing our blessings can happen no matter what.
    The fruitcakes for December will soon be marinating happily in their occasional sprinklings of B&B Liqueur.  Upon reading this, both of our sons will roll their eyes; I’m sorry to say they have “bad fruit cake attitudes”!  I didn’t make fruitcakes during their childhood; so ---my bad!!; They don’t like the candied citron, pineapple and cherries that go into the cakes.  But for those of us who do, these cakes are nutty, rich and moist ---- not at all like the fruitcakes of modern parody that one might use for hockey pucks ---- or weapons against intruders.  Taking advantage of nice weather, we’ve put the white lights on our crabapple trees lining the driveway.  This task has been getting more difficult as the trees grow taller and taller.  But we --- and our neighbors --- all look forward to seeing them lighted.  As the darkness grows and the temperatures fall, the lights comfort us; they say “HOME!”  One of our friends had a daily drive through a long sparsely-inhabited area on her way back from work, and she said that when she saw our lighted trees, she relaxed and felt secure once more.  From our very first apartment to our current home, we’ve “left the lights on for you”.   Friends regularly made comments about how dreadful our electric bills must be (they aren’t), and for a while, Kerm would go around turning off lights as I left the room ---- but now --- after 58 years, he has given up.  (Now he goes around blowing out the candles after guests leave.)   Not only do I like the bright lights for myself, but I hope we are a beacon to passers-by.   Emerson said that “the ornament of a house is the friends who frequent it.”* I want family and friends to find us with open doors and lights of welcome.

     
    Using a pole to drape lights from branch to twig reminds us that we aren’t as agile as we’d like to be.  While there are definitely some benefits to getting older, agility generally isn’t one of them.  There’s a good reason that someone quipped: “aging isn’t for sissies!”  Our bodies are less accommodating to our desire to run, climb, twirl, skip.  My mind tells me that I could just run up the lawn to chase our neighbor’s flock of chickens back home.  Fortunately, a louder voice of reality breaks into my thinking saying: “Are you nuts??!!  You’ll fall on your face. The chickens will laugh! ”  Having experienced this very thing one winter with a hawk (a story for another time), I know that overly-positive thinking can only bring, at the very least, chagrin and bruises, and-- at the most – injury!
    We sometimes have even more trouble accepting the culture around us, which is also changing and bringing some unwelcome challenges.  Note how popular are the postings of “Do you remember?”  They usually feature dial telephones, candy cigarettes, moderately unsafe playgrounds, riding in the back of a pick-up truck, etc.  Even if what we remember wasn’t all that safe an activity, we are comfortable with it because it was within our experiences, and we survived (not much mention of those who didn’t!). It is a human tendency to look backward with pleasure, then observing the generations coming up with a raised eyebrow.   In fact, at least as far back as Plato, there are writings indicating mild to strong disapproval of the next generation.  Psychologically speaking, we question the new because it makes us uncomfortable and/or afraid.  Younger and more tech-savvy people talk about new technology in a way that leaves us feeling stupid.  Contemporary safety regulations to protect everyone from toddlers to seniors, seem inconvenient to those of us who didn’t have them.   We see social behavior that would have been deemed quite inappropriate 50 years ago now being acceptable to many.  We may feel out of touch, unseen and unheard in all the fast-moving, glitzy world around us.
    Remember that song from “Bye, Bye Birdie”**------ “What’s The Matter With Kids Today?”  When our community group, presented that musicale, most of the adult cast were parents, and we sang this with enthusiasm.   Unfortunately (or not), all our attempts to stall or prevent change, will not stop change!   As Leo Buscaglia*** said: “The only thing certain is change.  To battle change is to waste our time; the battle can never be won.  To become the willing ally of change is to assure ourselves of life.”  Some changes truly aren’t good ones --- like being glued to an electronic device to the point where one drives a car into the other lane or ignores the people sitting next to them.  And yet, if we are honest, neither is change always a bad thing.  If I hit a deer while driving, I can call for help.  My community is no longer isolated simply because it is rural, and I’ll learn right here, to understand different ways of living.  Those who resist every change that comes along, stand in danger of becoming rigid and stodgy, and I don’t believe that we were created to be either.  If we actually make the effort to balance changes with comforting tradition and try to understand, something wonderful often happens.  Artists do this all the time.  I hope that this kind of discernment is possible for you and me as we look at life today and tomorrow.
    There have been studies (Yale, Cornell, Harvard and Berkeley) about how living a life filled, not with complaining, but with gratitude, affects one’s health.  Apparently, people who consistently feel gratitude for their days, are measurably healthier than those who don’t.  These studies began around 1995 and have been published, so they can be googled.  A few years ago, when our granddaughters were younger, I gave them a book called: The Secret of Saying Thanks.  The author, Douglas Wood,**** helps young readers appreciate what is around them ---- “the sunrise, that silent stone that’s been waiting age upon age for someone to come and just say ‘thanks’.”  The book concludes with what these more recent studies have also found; “we don’t give thanks because we are happy.  We are happy because we give thanks.”
    Some days, admittedly, my attitude isn’t stellar.  There are days when I allow myself to be critical and pessimistic about the world.  I mean --- just look at this planet and the bottomless pit of bad behavior!!  And those days seem to go from bad mornings to worse afternoons, and on to depressing evenings.  Then I need what a former teacher told his difficult students, “It’s time for an attitude adjustment!”  We would surely be happier if we breathed out prayers of thanksgiving as we go through our days.  As the year moves into winter perhaps instead of complaining about heavy boots and jackets, we could be glad we are sufficiently clothed.  Perhaps we could admire the first snowfall (we had a chance just last night) for the beauty it brings instead of the inconvenience.  As we do this, our eyes may be opened to see all the small wonderful moments in a day --- and how they outnumber the negative bits and pieces that intrude on our happiness.  They say it takes 6 weeks to form a new habit.  This might be a really good time to test that out.   And while I’m being thankful, I must mention my gratitude to all of you who take the time to read what emerges from my brain and fingers.   And, I enjoy when you respond.    It makes me feel connected and stirs up new ideas!  ‘Tis the season for thanks!  Happy Thanksgiving to each of you.
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
     
    *Emerson --- Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American philosopher, poet, essayist, abolitionist and leader in the Transcendentalist movement.
    **”What’s The Matter With Kids Today?” – from Bye, Bye Birdie ---sung in original Broadway Production by Paul Lynde and Dick Van Dyke --- 1960.
    ***Leo Buscaglia --- Italian-American author and motivational speaker, professor of Special Education at the University of Southern California.  1924-1998.
    ****Douglas Wood --- American author of kids’ books, singer, song-writer and speaker.
  9. Carol Bossard
    November, the month of golden topaz gem stones and heaps of topaz leaves fallen from trees. November is a month of birthdays; my husband’s is today and one son’s is at the end of the month, with several family members in between.  Kerm’s birthday means strawberry shortcake tonight. That is his choice over any cake I could bake.   My eldest brother shared my husband’s November 3d birthday.  Kerm was born about the time Frank went to war in WWII but regardless of their age difference, they both agreed that strawberry shortcake with large dollops of real whipped cream (preferably Guernsey) was a gourmet gift.
    Speaking of yummies, we just gathered with Kerm’s family for a Saturday afternoon --- and, of course--- dinner.   There were 13 around the table and so our house was filled to the brim with conversation, good food and laughter.  Some cousins, nieces and nephews were missing for various reasons, so we hope to see them the next time around.  I know that not everyone feels “at home” with the families they marry into and that is sad.  I am fortunate; my husband’s family members were welcoming and caring and I’ve always been glad to be a part of them.  We’ve shared a lot of stories and good times over the years, and are comfortable together.  And now that my siblings have passed on, I’m happy to have siblings via marriage.
    We also had opportunity to visit our son and family in their new Vermont home.  Vermont in the fall, is picture-book perfect.  It was a lovely drive through the farmland of NYS’s Washington County and then over the border amid Vermont’s hills, covered in autumn leaves at their colorful peak.  It was a short trip due to Monday appointments, but now we can visualize them driving to town, enjoying their view of the hills and attempts to keep their dogs within bounds.    Those same dogs, early in the move, met a new and painful foe in Vermont ---- a porcupine.  The results were quite dreadful for the dogs, and expensive for their owners.  Hopefully, the silly canines will remember and not be tempted to aggressively face the prickly one again.  Joey, the elder dog is pretty smart, but Henry…not so much!  Or perhaps the temptation is always just more than Hanry can resist.

    Woodstock, Vermont ( image courtesy Pixabay )
    November is usually a fine late fall month, not too cold with only occasional snow flurries.  Of course, with our recent weird weather patterns, anything could happen, from balmy to blizzards. Thanksgiving is just ahead, and even though recent history has removed much of the romanticism around the Pilgrim stories, our own family’s history of Thanksgivings makes the day very special.   Both my family, and Kerm’s used to gather with a large group of siblings, nieces and nephews, for dinner and good times.  Now, we are too many and too scattered, but the warm memories linger.  We recall the youngster whose preferred dinner one year was a black olive on each of his ten fingers and a plate of pumpkin pie.  We remember the chorus of teens singing “Bless This House”.  We remember the euchre games (my family) and pinochle games (Kerm’s family) entertaining us after dinner ---- some by playing and some by listening to the players.  We sigh over the remembrance of Nickie’s scalloped potatoes, Betty’s rolls, Ken’s molasses cake and Tootie’s wonderful salads.  Kerm’s mom excelled in heavenly hash and scalloped oysters.  These many blessings from our past, encourage us to gratefully continue celebrating with whoever can come, and wherever we can be together.
    November, especially in New York and Pennsylvania, brings deer-hunting season for those seeking quiet time in the woods and/or venison for their freezers.  In Pennsylvania, the opening days of hunting season are so important that in some districts, schools are closed.  With hunting season comes a tension for humans caught between enjoying the graceful and picturesque deer, and enjoying venison stew while knowing that without hunting, the deer would take over our gardens, streets and roads.  Life just keeps presenting ethical dilemmas!
    Then there’s the time issue!  Daylight- Savings Time ends on November 5th, bringing earlier darkness to those of us who pine for more light in the evening.  But for people who enjoy earlier sunrises, the autumn change is welcome.  It would be easier for everyone if there was an absolute decision made to go one way or the other all year, but even now, not all states are the same.  So, we’ll probably go blundering along, trying to remember if we’re falling back or marching forward each spring and fall.
    Perhaps most important, this is the month when we vote to elect persons for various jobs of service and leadership --- a privilege not all the world owns. In the process, we need to somehow remind those elected that they are there for service and good leadership, not profit and prestige.   We --- and they ---- need to remember that “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”*  So, exercise your voting rights and get to the polls on November 8th; only the irresponsible or foolish refuse to vote.  Look searchingly at the candidates for integrity, for kindness, and for intelligence --- not bombastic, self-centered ridiculous promises or those running on one issue.  Winston Churchill** has been quoted as saying: “Americans will always do the right thing --- after they’ve exhausted every other possibility.”  That is amusing, if slightly cynical, but neither cynicism nor gullibility are acceptable mind-sets for anyone who cares about their country.    We need integrity and practical intelligence!
    Veterans’ Day (formerly Armistice Day) is November 11th. It was first established for the celebration of WWI’s ending.The armistice was signed and bells (from cow bells to church bells) rang out from every city and hamlet, all across the continent. It has since become a day to render respect and gratitude to veterans who have been part of our country’s defense at any time. 

     
    Whether or not we agree with all of the conflicts in which this nation has participated, we should honor those who go when called; who place their lives on front lines. Defending one’s country, whether by voting, by human services, education or by armed services, is our responsibility; a responsibility to fulfill, each as our conscience leads us.
    As we come closer to the end of the calendar year, we all tend to hope that life may be better in a new year.  As I count the increasing years in my own life, I appreciate this comment from Dr. Seuss:*** “Life is too short to wake up in the morning with regrets.  So, love the people who treat you right, forgive those who don’t, and believe that everything happens for a reason.  If you get the chance, take it.  If it changes your life, let it.  Nobody said it would be easy, they just promised it would be worth it.”  Perhaps, this doesn’t go as far as we are Biblically directed regarding forgiveness and love, but it is a good place to begin.  We all need a starting place from which to grow.  At no age should we allow ourselves to become stodgy and encased in a rut, thinking we can now sit back and vegetate.  We need to continue growing in love and world-building until our last breath.
    And speaking of last breaths, most want to put this off as long as possible.  But we also, either naively or lazily, expect our doctors to keep us healthy, and we blame them when we aren’t. They may do their best, but unless we are open to changes in our daily lives, they are handicapped.   Not all health comes out of a pill bottle.  Doctors often give advice that doesn’t require scans, salves, creams or pills, but does require our listening and our participation. All physicians recommend getting outside for some kind of exercise and fresh air.  I learned how quickly muscle strength and tone could be lost when I spent part of a year on the couch at the onset of fibromyalgia.  I’d spent my life lifting young children, I had tossed bales of hay and I moved furniture regularly ---- and suddenly, I couldn’t pick up a bag of cat food.  Ever since that time, I’ve been attempting, sometimes with more diligence than other times, to retrieve muscle tone and strength--- and as one ages it gets harder.  I do my best to keep moving even on difficult days.   As the temperatures drop, climbing the hill behind our house isn’t quite so attractive an activity.  And weeding loses its charms, as the soil grows damp and cold.  But once outside, my mood lifts appreciably.  And just walking around on our uneven, uphill lawn is exercise of a sort.  So, I’ll keep on getting out and putting one foot ahead of the other!  My body – my daily health ---my responsibility!
    Right now, I need to turn my feet toward the kitchen where I will use my mother’s recipe for baking powder biscuits.  They are the preferred base for those strawberries and the whipped cream with which we will quietly celebrate Kerm’s birthday.    As November begins, I hope we all take time to celebrate the seasonal changes and patterns around us ---- the tracery of tree branches against the sky, the seed pods, the tawny grasses, the daily movements in the world outside our windows.  We can note the return of winter birds, the frostiness of mornings and the slow descent of nature into winter’s quiet.  Hopefully, awareness will spark the imagination and open us to absorb the late fall wonders.
    *********
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    *Quotation written in a letter from Lord Acton to Bishop Mandell Creighton in 1887.
    **Winston Churchill ---British politician, soldier and statesman who was Prime Minister from 1940-1945, during WWII.
    ***Dr. Seuss---Theodore Seuss Geisel was an American author of over 60 books and is known for his illustrations and catchy rhyming, under the pen name of Dr. Seuss.  1904-1991.
     
  10. Carol Bossard
    “I like the fall --- the mist and all.  I like the night owl’s lonely call --- and wailing sound of wind around….”*
    Especially do I like those things if we have a cozy fire in the wood stove and a c up of hot chocolate in hand.  We are well into October and Halloween is approaching.  If you don’t like Halloween, how about “All-Soul’s Night” and “All- Saint’s Day” instead?  Festivals marking the end of the growing season seemed also to have evoked the memory of those who’ve gone on.  Our Halloween comes from the Celtic Samhain (pronounced Sa-ween); a spooky harvest tribute and time when the veil between this world and the afterworld was thought to be very thin, so thin there was passage between.  Both All Soul’s Night and All Saint’s Day are Christian holidays, designed to transform those pre-Christian festivals from spooky to holy.
    Youngsters (and adults too) have fun pretending and dressing up in costumes.  We’ve always had a dress-up hamper available for kids.  Just a few weeks ago, I received fun photos from a long-time friend; the two of us, at around age 11 or 12, were dressed up in way-too-old-for-us clothing, and looking as sophisticated as only an 11 or 12-year-old can, which isn’t very!  I don’t, however, recall going out for Halloween.  We lived three miles from town and walking up and down my road at night wouldn’t have been permitted.  When our boys were young, I sewed fun costumes that later became pajamas or were put into the costume box for another time, and we had Halloween parties in place of trick or treating.  I remember making a Super Man outfit, complete with cape, and another time, something out of silver velveteen --- maybe the Tin Man?  Our home in Livingston Manor was perfect for Halloween parties.  Its split-level attic, with gables, became a wonderfully eerie, but fun, Halloween maze.   In my late years, though, I probably prefer the idea of All-Soul’s Night and All-Saint’s Day.   These have a mystique that connects me with past generations; the many people who came before.  There is a hymn entitled, “For All The Saints”.: “….from earth’s wide bounds, from ocean’s furthest coast, through gates of pearl, streams in the countless host, singing……”**  I like that visual and I’m grateful for all those who have helped me become me.
    And speaking of people in my life, we recently lost a very good friend.  Sally had been dealing with one or another variety of cancer for decades.  She met this challenge with courage, trust in the physician who treated her and the surety that she would be on earth, with us and with her family as long as she needed to be.  We collaborated in teaching Sunday school for many years.  She was active in the community --- organizing a pre-school before one was available, starting the community soccer program ---- working in the school library and being available to kids as a listening ear. For much of this last year, she would have agreed with this statement by Agatha Christie: “I like living.  I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable, raked with worry, but through it all I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing.”  But in the last few weeks, she also felt quite ready to be called out of this life to living in life eternal.   She was a shining example for how to uncomplainingly and courageously face unwelcome changes without fear, with humor and with trust in God.  It will take time, though, before we, her friends, stop expecting her to walk in the door with her knitting and cheery smile.
    Not all of us find “cheery” to be an easy emotion to maintain.  In autumn, as the darkness grows and the temperatures fall, for some people, a tendency to depression also grows and spirits fall.  Unfortunately, there is no one diagnosable cause for depression and while there are practices and medications that may lessen depression, there is no guaranteed cure.  Doctors are unable to totally agree on either cause or treatment and both can be very personal/individual.  Having dealt with this malady myself, I know well how debilitating it can be, even though my experiences were nowhere as severe as those of many others.  Depression can run the gamut from being a glob of gloom, to isolation, to being suicidal.  I found this thought by Gabrielle Roth*** to be something to consider. “In many shamanic societies, if you came to a medicine person complaining of being disheartened, dispirited or depressed, they would ask one of four questions:  When did you stop dancing?  When did you stop singing?  When did you stop being enchanted by stories?  When did you stop finding comfort in the sweet territory of silence?”  Good questions!  When did I begin feeling this way?  What was going on in my life then?  What would it take to find joy in my day?  I have found therapy to be very useful but it also helps to do a little personal sleuthing within.  What I read, the music I’m listening to, how much TV news I watch and whether or not I’m getting out and about, all can impact my moods when despondency and depression sneak in.  This may only be good advice for moderate depression or maybe only applicable to me.   We all respond differently and certainly those in deep, unrelenting darkness and despair need intervention and help from professionals NOW, just as one would with a heart attack or stroke.
    I try to plan ahead for possibilities.  This is not necessarily a virtue since it also means I like to be in firm control of my life, which of course, I’m not, nor should be.  But we are as we are!  So, just as we rural-dwellers get wood cut for our stoves before cold weather comes, knowing the probability for low spirits also demands a plan prior to the need.  For this reason, I have what is called a “sunshine” light.  I have books at hand that take me to faraway places, tell me stories of people so compelling that I am diverted from my own troubles, re-route my mind to gardens and cozy kitchens.  Some will be new books and some will be well-read oldies.  I also sort my CDs for music that fits my moods; uplifting music (Sandi Patti, Celtic Thunder or Josh Groban), dancing music (Andre Rieu) and music that makes me laugh like the Chad Mitchell Trio’s rendition of “Lizzie Borden” or Priscilla Herdman’s “Waltzing With Bears.”  It is also good to keep moving.  Bone-Builders may return after a long COVID hiatus.  Exercise alone is boring!   But exercising with a group is kind of fun, and it does provide socialization.   Fresh air is another tonic; being in it, for any reason at all, energizes the whole person.  So, daily chores like feeding birds and outside cats are a blessing that I don’t always appreciate, but that generally works wonders for my psyche.
    Growing things has a dual benefit; watching plants blossom and hands in the soil.  This nearly always helps lift my low spirits.  Even though the gardens are ready for winter I still find excuses for walking around them and thinking of spring.  Bulbs of daffodils and tulips are tucked in for blooming in April ---- something to anticipate.  Planted in with the bulbs are moth balls to discourage the nasty, voracious voles.  A three-dollar tulip bulb is a 5-star dessert as far as they are concerned, so the thought of a vole biting down on a moth ball makes me smile.  By January the memories of this past, dry, uninspired summer will have faded and I’ll be as susceptible as usual to the plant and seed catalogs bringing an hour or so of delight.  It is one of the healing qualities of the human spirit --- to find joy after discouragement and disappointment.  And meanwhile, let’s absorb October, before the weather report says----- instead of lake-effect rain showers, there’ll be “lake-effect snow showers”.   We did get a frost last night, so…………….!!
    There are many stories floating around Halloween, in the history of different cultures.  There was one Celtic custom of rolling lighted wheels down-hill to frighten away evil spirits.   Also, early Celtic Jack-o-Lanterns were actually turnips and rutabagas, hollowed out and filled with lighted tallow --- to protect one from evil spirits (not to mention wandering thieves) if out and about at night.   In many Asian countries there is The Hungry Ghost Festival among the Buddhist-Taoist people.  In Romania, there’s Dracula Day.  Nepal celebrates with a parade for Gai Jatra --- a festival for those who have lost loved ones that year.  And in Mexico, there is the Day of the Dead.  Humans seem to need these occasions to mark transitions wherever they live.  It is a way of turning difficult times into holy ones.  So, lighten up this Halloween and allow a shiver or two at moving shadows in the Halloween landscape.  And be grateful for that long line of saints from the past, who made you who you are.
    “Tonight is the night when dead leaves fly like witches on switches across the sky, when elf and sprite flit through the night on a moony sheen.  Tonight is the night when leaves make a sound like a gnome in his home under the ground, when spooks and trolls creep out of holes mossy and green.  Tonight is the night when pumpkins stare through leaves and eaves everywhere, wien ghoul and ghost and goblin host dance round their queen.  It’s Halloween!  Harry Behn****
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
     
    *Dixie Willson’s poem “The Mist And All”.   Dixie Willson was an American screen-writer, author of children’s book and short stories as well as a poet.  1890-1974.
    **”For All The Saints” ---words by William W. How, 1823-1897.
    ***Gabrielle Roth--- American dancer, musician and author.  1941-2012.
    ****Harry Behn---American screen writer and children’s author, poet.    1898-1973
  11. Carol Bossard

    The Glowing Season

    By Carol Bossard,

    We are in the last quarter of the year; October, whose birth stone is the fire opal and flower is the marigold, takes us into mid-fall.  My flowers still in bloom are chocolate eupatorium and monkshood/wolfbane/aconite (ref. Harry Potter).  Leaves on trees are turning, days are crisper and darkness comes too soon.  It is the season of glowing.  We were recently away for a few days on Cape Cod.  Our sons and their families joined us to de-stress and find a change of scenery.  We went on a whale watch, out of Provincetown --- always a magnificent experience if only for the vastness of the sea.  Then there is something stunning/amazing/spiritual about seeing a whale up close.  This time there were many, and they kept us in awe as they emerged around us, roiling the waters with their tails and, with huge mouths open, pulling in the fish.  We probably saw 29 or 30 different whales, mostly hump-backs but also finbacks and minkes.  This was quite the most awe-inspiring whale venture I’ve been on.  The Cape is a lovely place to be in the fall.  The salt and fresh-water pond grasses gleam golden and the sea breezes seem to cleanse the lungs.
    If you’ve read much of my writing, you’ve noted that in addition to experiences, I enjoy things, from flowers in the garden to tea pots on the shelf.  It is true; I’m a “things” person ---- a visual person.  If I come upon Pink Tower Spode porcelain, or pink or green Depression glass, I can immediately “see” it on my table.  But --- at the same time I’ve been trying to accept the Biblical directive to hold things lightly.  (A friend recently wrote about this too; see Linda Roorda’s “Poetic Devotions” blog back in late August or early Sept.)  Over these many years of living, I’ve come to a place where I actually am able to hold lightly most of my possessions.   There are a few things that I might find difficult to hand over to someone, but most things, if they were needed/wanted by someone else, I’d be glad to share them.  Then I found his amazing story that really defines holding things lightly.
    A wise woman who was traveling in the mountains found a precious stone in a stream.  The next day she met another traveler who was hungry, and the wise woman opened her bag to share her food.  The hungry traveler saw the stone and asked the woman to give it to him.  She did, without hesitation.  The traveler left, rejoicing in his good fortune.  He knew the stone was worth enough to give him security for a lifetime.  But a few days later, he came back to return the stone to the wise woman.  “I’ve been thinking” he said, “I know how valuable the stone is, but I give it back in the hope that you can give me something even more precious.  Give me what you have within you that enabled you to give me the stone.”*
    I don’t think I’m there yet!  But I can clearly see that this is the antithesis to today’s materialism.  In our current culture, we are bound, hand, foot and mind by the need for things.  Face Book is riddled with ads as are U-Tube videos.  Commercial TV spends more time showing ads than programming.  Remember last year when stores (and customers) were all in a panic because the ships full of commercial goods --- mostly manufactured in Asia ----were still at sea?   What would happen to Christmas?  Really?  Christmas is the celebration of the birth of a man who held no possessions except the clothes on his back.  If our Christmases rely on the “perfect” commercial gift, then we need to reconsider Christmas, and maybe think about the hold possessions have on our lives.
    After my mother died, we had to empty her house.  Thankfully, she had marked many things with names of those to whom they were to go.  But there was considerable stuff left unmarked.  And while there were no serious disagreements, there was a smidgeon of sighing and discontent. I remember a comment from one family member when she got back home with her treasures.  She said: “I found that Grandma’s things weren’t what I really wanted; I wanted Grandma!”  That comment helped me to give my sister-in-law something she wanted that I had.  We all clutch at precious items, hoping that they will bring security or happiness; that they will bring back the days we want to remember; the people we cherish.  And briefly, they do.  I like using dishes my mother used and seeing items that she painted.  But those fine memories would still be mine without the mementoes.  Once love is planted it continues to grow.  And memories of good times can be recalled at will.
    Turning back the clock to days of simpler amusements and fewer “things” is quite unlikely.  People will not give up their phones-in-hand or the electronic games that currently mesmerize both kids and adults.  Nor will we slow the progress of technology that keeps inventing new and glitzy wonders.  And we shouldn’t!   But hopefully, in a generation or two, their “magic” will become less addictive.  Meanwhile, we all need to take responsibility for promoting experiences that speak to the mind, spirit and heart.   I consider our whale watch one of those, though, admittedly, there were many phones out taking photos.   But when was the last time you went walking with a friend, scuffing in the falling leaves?   In what winter did you last go sledding?  Have you ever read aloud on Christmas Eve --- “In those days, a decree went out from Caeser Augustus…..”** or “Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before!…Maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store.  Maybe Christmas – perhaps – means a little bit more.”?***  Have you picnicked beside a stream or lake, just enjoying the sounds and sights?  Have you laid out a puzzle for family fun?  Sat around a campfire? Started projects together?  Star-watched late at night?    Attitudes are taught and if the teaching “takes” people will eventually come full circle to recognize the really fine things of life.
    October can be a month with marvelous weather -- blue skies, cool temperatures and autumn aromas.  Of course, I can also recall occasional sleet and gusty winds.  Sweaters and socks come out for daily wear.  Garden salad season is over and I’m thinking of soups for dinner.  The Mock Turtle warbles: “Soup --- beautiful soup…..”*****  for good reason; soups are comforting.  They can be elaborate or simple.  French Onion soup has many steps.  I have made a gourmet potato soup that is nectar in a bowl, but it is labor-intensive.  For daily use, I tend to go for “refrigerator soup” ---- a good broth and whatever is in the refrigerator needing to be used.  My soups generally have a meat base or at least, broth, but if pushed, I can do a pretty good vegetarian concoction.    To reassure the Mock Turtle, whose meat was a delicacy a century ago, I have no turtle soup recipes.   
    Our gardens are looking better.  Our compost heap is now enriched by heaps and piles of decaying green, weeds.  I do wish we still had rabbit or chicken manure to help the composting along.   Perhaps I could train the wild turkeys to walk through the compost, depositing their droppings on their way back up the hill.  😊   
    Working in the garden is (in decent weather) a refreshing at-home activity for my head-clearing.   Our recent mini-vacation was great at getting away from the every-day-ness but gardening requires no travel and provides fresh air and exercise.  We need both kinds of breaks for healthy living.  We humans tend to think we can’t --- or even shouldn’t --- get off the treadmill.  What sense of “we’re not enough” makes us resist taking care of ourselves? Our bodies and minds are our most precious possessions.  Gratitude for our existence should inspire good care.  And, as Anne Lamott**** said: “Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes--- including you.”  Because it is difficult to stop running, I thought this daily practice, suggested by Deepak Chopra was excellent.
    “Take five minutes every day and just sit in silence.  In that time put these questions to your attention and heart:  Who am I?  What do I want from my life?  What do I want from my life today?  Then let go, and let your stream of consciousness, your quiet inner voice, supply the answers.  Then after five minutes, write them down.  Do this every day and you’ll be surprised at how situations, circumstances, events and people will orchestrate themselves around the answers.
    And at the same time, we can take pleasure in the wonders of autumn ---- intangibles ---- glowing leaves and rime of frost----- things we perhaps are accustomed to seeing and smelling every October ---- but things which still qualify as annual miracles.
    ************************************
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    .  *The Wise Woman’s Stone” ---- author unknown
    **The Bible from the Book of Luke, Chapter 2.
    ***How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss --- actually Theodore Seuss Geisel, an American cartoonist and author of wonderful children’s books that adults enjoy reading out loud.  1904-1991.
    **Michel de Montaigne -- one of the most significant philosophers of the French Renaissance.  He popularized essays as an accepted literary genre, and had great influence on later great writers.  1533-1502.
    ***’Alice In Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass, by Lewis Carroll.  If you have never read these classics, you should do it now, no matter what your age.  Lewis Carroll was a British author, poet and mathematician.  He was well-known for his facility with word play, logic and fantasy.  His poems --- “Jabberwocky” and “The Hunting of the Snark” are gems of literary nonsense.  1832-1898.
    **** Anne Lamott --- American writer of both fiction and non-fiction; writing teacher and political activist as well as religious philosopher.
    *****Deepak Chopra is an Indian-American author and alternative medicine advocate.
  12. Carol Bossard

    Autumn Impulses

    By Carol Bossard,

    The Equinox has come and we are now truly in autumn.  Seasons are flashing past in double-time.  Sooner than seems possible, we’ll be contemplating Thanksgiving dinner and then Christmas cards.  But even now, there is this strange pull to prepare for winter ---- though most winter days here are navigable and fairly easy to manage.  We are seldom snowed/iced in for more than two days.  But, still, something inside ---- maybe all those years of helping put in hay bales or canning tomatoes, or perhaps ---- survival genes from eons ago ---- makes me want to be sure we are snug and ready for anything winter can bring.   
    “….She was covered from head to foot with stove blacking.  On the floor all around the stove were dribbles and splotches of blacking……That was the worst day.  On Friday the house was almost in order and they worried lest Ma come home too soon….”*
      “Little Town On The Prairie”, quoted above, has Laura and Carrie trying to do the house-cleaning while their parents are gone.  Everything that could go wrong, does.  That also describes my comprehensive cleaning dilemma; I begin one thing and that leads to something else and suddenly I’m over my head in too much to do and where on earth will I put things?  The traditional housewifely practice of the 19th and early 20th centuries demanded deep-cleaning, spring and fall.  Of course, then, there were no vacuum cleaners, no carpet shampoos, Scrubbing Bubbles or Windex for regular maintenance.  My seasonal efforts are, admittedly, minimal.  I bring out the quilts and pillows, change the wreath on the door and add pumpkins and chrysanthemums to the porch.  But I don’t take the carpets outside for beating, nor wash the walls.   Some windows may be cleaned as we remove the ACs but my efforts are more cosmetic than seriously cleansing.
    My college major {then called “Home Economics;” now called “Human Ecology!”} was because a) I wanted to be a 4-H agent and b) I’ve believed that making a home where people feel comfortable and loved is both a fine art and necessary skill for happy living.  Even an aero-space designer or nuclear physicist --- of either gender ---- needs this. That opinion wasn’t popular in the 1960s when women were trying to escape the rigidity of society’s assigned roles.  I agreed about need for change in societal expectations, but if one is free to develop a career outside the home, then one should also be free to make home a career without feeling like a betrayer of womankind.   
    Of course, there is far more to home-making than the house itself, but most of us do tend to focus on our houses, since they are the basic structures within which and around which, we create a living environment.   Kerm and I lived in three apartments and one half-house before, we moved to a large, square Pennsylvania farm house; 4 rooms upstairs and 4 rooms downstairs with an attached summer kitchen.  We and our then-toddlers moved in to face high ceilings, big windows and empty walls.  I was staying home with the children, so one salary had to stretch for all things.  My mother, always good at re-purposing, kindly offered me a pile of white sheets she no longer needed, and I made cottage curtains for six big windows, from those muslin sheets, and trimmed them with ball fringe.  The living room walls were soon brightened with fabric hangings upon which I appliqued patterns and quotations.  It took me about 3 days per hanging, to cut out letters and shapes, hand-sew them on and fringe the burlap, this being before the advent of digital sewing machines that do everything but fix dinner and wash the dishes.  We also discovered a new hobby; household auctions.   We found large, round overhead lights from the county building that, tipped over, turned into ultra-modern table lamps ---- industrial meets Star Trek.   We found gold-framed paintings we both liked and occasional pieces of furniture.  I bought an entire bolt of orange corduroy and covered floor pillows, slip-covered a chair and couch cushions.  We purchased a good couch and bed, but the rest of our house was put together with very little effect on the budget.  It e slowly evolved into an eclectic décor that was pleasing, at least to our eyes.     
    I have always enjoyed seeing the unique ways in which people create their living spaces.  Karen, whose casual house-keeping style is similar to mine, and who also enjoys vintage things, arranges pleasing vignettes on her table.  I remember one that featured a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles, some interesting stones and a charming little bowl.  It was a conversation-starter.  Jan fills her walls with original paintings --- not Van Gogh or Rembrandt--- but artists from her community. They may never be famous (or they might) but the art is attractive and unique, and it inspired me to go and do likewise.   Pat has her own amazing paintings on the wall and makes beautiful quilts.  Ellie keeps a neat and tidy abode without clutter, but adorned with African carvings, flowering plants and a comfy porch where one can watch hummingbirds.  Her home breathes out restfulness and peace.  Another Ellie’s home always has a touch of elegance whether she is living in an old house, a new house or an apartment.  Her elegance comes from within and is expressed via good taste, not thousands of dollars.  And Joette’s rooms could be in the pages of “Country Living,” a magazine that we both enjoyed some years ago.  All of these houses have a unique ambiance that just fits those who live there.
    Our preferences have altered some over the years; I currently surround myself with what makes me happy.  Books!  Music!  Photographs!  Art from people we know!  The top of a high bookcase has a painting of the Campfire Girl’s Creed (done by my mother) and various items suggesting camping and the outdoors.  It is a dust-collector but every time I look at it, I think of the fun (and crises) we’ve had camping, and I remember the stories my mother told, about growing up in the early 20th century.  I have framed photographs on tables and walls, surrounding myself with people I love.  My living room curtains are still white with ball fringe, though not the originals.  Our orange decor has changed to rose, blue and green. None of our rooms are “show rooms” in any sense, but they are comfortable. I believe that if we listened closely enough, we’d undoubtedly hear echoes of music and laughter --- of dinner parties and rehearsals, of D&D games and graduation parties---- of adding up the pinochle score ---- all caught in our walls.  What happens in a house, over many years, must be absorbed, becoming part of the very air.    A home that exudes warmth, welcome and happy times --- in one’s very personal style ---- is one of life’s blessings.  And considering how many homes have been recently lost in floods, earthquakes and fires, not to mention bombings --- having four walls and a roof, is definitely something for which to be deeply grateful.
    We turn to the outside, tucking our gardens in with cover crops.  We no longer have livestock (chickens or rabbits), but we do have outside cats who believe they own us, and wild birds with expectations involving suet and seeds.   We make a shelter in an ell of our house for the cats, enclosing a table with sheet foam, lined baskets beneath.  Some of the warmth from inside seeps out to them and they are protected from the wind.   There’s also a double-walled dog house that, with the demise of Freckles, is open to cats.  (Freckles would be appalled!) And cats grow thick coats of fur, soon resembling walking muffs.   There are shelters for birds to use on cold nights, and we try to provide fresh water for whoever might need it.  Concern for the creatures around us is part of being grateful for our life and theirs.
    This doesn’t mean romanticizing them to the point where they become more important than humans.  Here I’m thinking of the cows in India that walk wherever they choose, of the deer in Ithaca that do the same and the people who are all warm and squishy about deer, whales and manatees, but forget about starving or abused children.  We need to be compassionate toward whomever or whatever we met on our individual paths, but we should develop well-informed common sense so that our compassion doesn’t morph into gooey sentimentality.
    A home’s most important quality is probably that of acceptance.  Carl Larsson**, an artist of all things homey, says: “A home is not dead but living, and like all living things, obeys the law of nature by constantly changing.”   And “The nourished spirit is essentially what we pass on to others whether family, friends, coworkers or strangers.”***  Home should soothe us, inspire us and take us in, that we might be renewed to face a not-always-friendly world.
    Meanwhile, autumn has come --- today!  Golden rod is blooming everywhere.   The crickets sing their autumn songs while trying to sneak into the house.   We all, with some dread and some relief, await the first hard frost.  There is an aroma ---- perhaps a combination of composting leaves, flowers blooming for one last time, a tinge of woodsmoke on crisp mornings and a long, fragrant sigh from the earth as the season turns.  Whatever the source, the bouquet for our noses triggers an impulse of urgency deep within us, to prepare for the colder days ahead.  So. bring out the quilts, polish the windows and view, with gratitude, the changing life around us wherever we live.
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    *Little Town On The Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder----American writer.  1867-1957.  If you haven’t read these books, or if it has been years since you did, now is a good time to re-read them.  Excellent reads!
     
    **Carl Larsson---Swedish painter who exemplified the Arts & Crafts Movement.  1853-1919.
     
    ***Alexandra Stoddard--- American decorator and writer; philosopher of contemporary living.
  13. Carol Bossard

    Transitions

    By Carol Bossard,

    My favorite time of the year is drifting in with these late summer days leading into fall.  Perhaps it is due to so many years of school beginnings, but now has always seemed to me, a more appropriate onset for a new year than January.  Many cultures back in history have agreed; as harvests ended, a new year began.  Instead of snow and ice, we could look forward to weeks of blue skies and pleasant weather with, hopefully, a few more rainy days than this summer provided.  It’s time for being outside, watching birds, cats and usually a few turkeys who venture beneath the feeders in spite of those two humans in the back yard.  The rose-breasted grosbeaks are gone and the other summer birds are gathering to discuss travel plans.  Kerm did see a red poll, probably stopping on its way further south.  We seldom see migrating warblers although, with my eyesight, they could be lurking in the lilacs and I’d never know.  But even when I could see, I seldom glimpsed any.  They are fast-moving, elusive little birds who would probably rather fly a few more miles to safe Sapsucker Woods at Cornell, than to linger in our back yard patrolled by four cats.
    One bird that I enjoy --- although my husband does not ---- is the crow.  Kerm’s feelings are almost certainly biased having grown up protecting corn fields, where crows and corn are not a good combination --- for the farmer.   Too, they are often annoyingly loud ---- especially when they become adolescents.  I think teenage crows have all-day parties on our hill while their parents are out scrounging for road kill.  They are intelligent birds --- and prone to pranks. They bother other birds as well as farmers, for they’ve been known to eat eggs of their avian cousins.  Sometimes one sees a whole bevy of smaller birds harassing a crow that has ventured into their territory.  But they do have their own place in the family of creatures --- as the song says, “All God’s creatures got a place in the choir, some sing low and some sing higher; some sing out loud on the telephone wire; some just clap their hands --- their paws --- or anything they got!!”*
    And speaking of choirs, musical groups have suffered over the past three years.  I think ours isn’t the only one diminished in both numbers of singers and quality of voice.  I’m not saying any of us quite sound like crows, but vocal cords, like all body parts, need to be exercised to function well, and there were very few choir rehearsals during the pandemic.  After experiencing COVID, nearly a year ago, my voice has become unreliable and far more prone to “throat frogs.”  Yes, it could be age-related but if so, the virus double-timed the process.  Depth and quality are sporadic.  It is tempting to give up and just not try, but my world would be less joyful without singing.  Spencer Singers (our sextet) has been rehearsing, hoping to renew the strength and reliability of our voices.  We shall see!!  But even if we have acquired permanent disability, singing still lifts our spirits as does just being together.  It is reassuring to have kindred spirits who harmonize well, both in music and in thoughts.   And as for church choir, singing is not just for us; it is a gift to our fellow-worshipers; an expression of our faith and a shared blessing. A few vocal glitches shouldn’t stop us -------as long as we stay on key and don’t quite sound like crows!
    Back to school ------- remember that new notebook with those blank pages, the new pencils with unused erasers and the aromas as you walked into school on that first day?  It was a potpourri of cafeteria food mixed with floor wax and chalk dust.  And there were those breathless few moments before everyone felt comfortable with each other again.  Currently there has been nation-wide discussion about the lack of teachers for our schools.  The reasons are complex but one thing is true.  We do need to offer teachers more respect and attentive ears.  These are trained educating professionals not convenient babysitters!  Of course, if issues arise, there should be parent-teacher discussions about what is best for one’s child, but I think most teachers truly care for the kids and are doing their best to steer them toward becoming knowledgeable and confident adults.  With the current potential for violence in schools, security in the class room is shaky.  We all need to work together for solutions.  Dads and moms who habitually ignore parent/teacher conferences, who do not become involved in their schools and who degrade good pay for teachers, are definitely one contributing part of our teacher-shortage problem.   I wish that parents, teachers and students of all ages would apply a wider perspective to education: “Every morning you rise………… there are amazing things to be a part of, and fight for, and feel, because the world will unlock hundreds of doors when you give this day all the courage, love, and intensity you can.”  **
    September also offers a significant dose of nostalgia and thoughts about endings, as our calendar year wanes.  We humans generally resist endings unless we are in the midst of something we don’t like.   I was always glad when the bell rang in a math or chemistry class and I was happy to end three challenging years in one of our abodes.  Mostly I like beginnings.  However, having reached the Biblical “Four Score” years, I do feel rather as though I am living on gifted time.  Each day is to be cherished as a new beginning that runs awfully close to an ending.  And while I have no real desire to exit this life on earth (except maybe after listening to a particularly dire news broadcast 😊), I do contemplate this human surety now and then.   My personal theology doesn’t really include streets of gold or harp-strumming on a comfy pink cloud.  But if one believes at all in a Creator of all things, a universal power of GOOD, it follows that good things are never wasted including human development, imagination and love.  Humans have potential for wonderful possibilities including an immense capacity for loving.  So, I totally believe that what we call death is a transition, not an end.   JRR Tolkien*** said it well: “Still ‘round the corner there may wait, a new road or a secret gate…”   That’s good to remember at the end of an experience, end of a year, and the end of a life. Endings often lead to new beginnings.
    Believing this, however, doesn’t stop the pain when I lose family or friends to this life-change.  I desperately want them with me --- touchable ---- huggable---- able to talk on the phone ---- and stop by for tea.  I intensely miss those who have gone beyond my sight, and I’d give almost anything to keep them with me.  But, when it happens, there’s this tiny shard of comfort, knowing that they are somewhere --- and maybe not all that far away.  C.S. Lewis.*** one of my theological mentors, wrote this in The Last Battle, regarding eternal life. The wonderful land of Narnia has come to an end and the inhabitants find themselves in a new place ----the unicorn looks around and says: “I have come home at last!  This is my real country.  I belong here.  This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it till now.  The reason why we loved the old Narnia is that it sometimes looked a little like this……Come further up; come further in!”
    Meanwhile, life here is pretty interesting.  There are friends, music, more books than I can ever read, birds, flowers, family and a daily, new ideas and possibilities.  I think we all, over a lifetime, catch glimpses of our Edens, and mine come more often when September brings autumn.   Soon the leaves will be turning rich tints that light up our wooded hills.  A change in the tilt of the sun brings darkness earlier (which I regret), nights are cooler and here, in the northeast, we get more morning fogs and heavy dews. Those fogs make our valley appear to be filled with marshmallow crème and the dew sparkles like glitter on the grass.  The chickadees again come to the feeders.  The school bus awakens me at 7:55 and kids walk by the house to and from school.  Transitions!   I like this observation from a poem by a British poet, Bliss Carman:*****
    “There is something in the autumn that is native to my blood ---- Touch of manner; hint of mood; And my heart is like a rhyme, with the yellow and the purple and the crimson keeping time.  The scarlet of the maples can shake me like a cry of bugles going by.  And my lonely spirit thrills to see the frosty asters like smoke upon the hills.”****
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
     
    *Song: “A Place In the Choir” written by Bill Staines and sung by many groups including Peter, Paul and Mary and, most recently, Celtic Thunder.  Bill Staines was born in England but lived most of his life in New Hampshire.  He was a composer and singer.  If you want your spirits raised, go to YouTube for any one of the renditions of this song.
    **Victoria Erickson from “Edge of Wonder.”    An American writer, poet, dreamer.
    ***JRR Tolkien ---English poet, writer, philologist and academic.  Best known for his “Lord of the Rings” series and “The Hobbit”.  1892-1973.
    ****C.S. Lewis --- British scholar, writer and Anglican lay theologian; a Don at Oxford University.  He has written the “Chronicles of Narnia”, “The Great Divorce”, “Mere Christianity”, “Out of a Silent Planet”, “The Reluctant Convert” and many others.  1898-1963.
    *****Bliss Carman --- Quoted are the first two stanzas of A Vagabond Song.  Bliss Carman was a British subject, born in Canada, who lived much of his life in Connecticut.  He was, late in life, honored a Poet Laureate of Canada.  1861-1929.
  14. Carol Bossard
    It’s mid-August and the stores are blatantly advertising school supplies and autumn clothing, not to mention Halloween decorations ---- this, in spite of the humidity and 80-90 degree temperatures.  August is still summer!!--- and days continue to be good for picnics, sun tans, and nights fine for star-gazing.  Hal Borland* describes August well……….”Dog Days ….Dragon flies and Damsel flies follow the boat when I go out on the river……little spotted turtles sun themselves on old logs and slip into the water when I come too close…………..barn swallows begin to leave and so do the chimney swifts……golden rod comes into bloom everywhere……milkweeds have formed their pods, still green and tightly closed………..wild blackberries ripen.” I remember, as a child, trudging down the lane, to our back pasture, where blackberries grew in the hedgerow.  They were harvested with considerable effort, while garnering mosquito bites, scratches from the impressive thorns and purple fingers and mouths.  Inside that hedge row, was a wild, unexplored and slightly enchanted world of vegetation, birds and bugs, ripe for the exploring.

    Our granddaughters will, in the fall, be exploring a different uncharted territory.  One will be entering public school classes for the first time in many years, after having been home-schooled.  And the other will begin her college/further education years.  I’ve been thinking back to my move from home to college.  My freshman roommate visited me this summer, and as she looked at some photos from our year together, she said: “We were so young!”  We definitely were --- though I’m sure we felt quite adult and competent.  I had some really good experiences that first and only year at Plattsburg (including the roommate).  There were some fine teachers and classes.   Once or twice, we biked out into the country; my first experience with a bike that had gears. Despite the frigid winter winds, we blithely skated on Lake Champlain --- having no clue about dangerous things like air pockets in the ice.  I think our guardian angels might have been overworked that year!  Probably needed to work in shifts!    We played tennis, sighed over a tall and good-looking baritone, and – somehow --managed to glean considerable growth in the process of being on our own for the first time.     
    Growing up always includes some angst about fitting in.   How long was it before I felt confident enough to be me --- with everyone?  Honesty forces me to say that the process went on into adult-hood learning experiences.   If only I’d subscribed earlier to the adage often attributed to Dr. Seuss:**  “Be yourself!  Those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.”  It takes a few years of living to trust the truth in that.  We are all born with gifts unique to each of us, and we need to share that which is ours alone to share --- without fear and without worrying about who will like us and who won’t.  Just as there will always be someone to criticize, there will always be someone to appreciate the persons we are.  Our own uniqueness is how we give back to a world that needs what we have.  And those who criticize should really look more deeply at themselves ---- and mind their own business.
    I am about to experience a personal “turning of the year;” into a new decade.  One up-side to aging is finding I’m able to be more objective about things that might have sent me into a tizzy earlier. My current life-span is just too short to waste meaningless anxiety on people and events about which I can do nothing.  If I’m going to be anxious, it will be for something that I consider important --- like whether Friendly’s will continue making butter crunch ice cream even though they are closing restaurants, or whether one of our sons is again on busy super-highways, driving in the wee, small hours.  Actually, I can’t do anything about those either, but having an excellent imagination, I am capable of creating amazing scenarios for worrying.  I’m trying to learn to divert my thought processes when this happens, but that is a continuing life-lesson in trust.
    Birthdays are a time for thinking; about looking back to see how the year has been, and looking forward with gladness to the unexplored territory that is the year ahead.  Some people get grumpy about birthdays after a certain age, but I feel that celebrating them is good for the psyche.  Having fun times and remaining alert to the world around is a key to enjoying life --- and birthdays.  I will admit that it has been a bit startling to think of myself as “senior” or “elderly.”  My body agrees that I certainly am, but most days, my mind feels no special age.    Regardless of increasing lines and wrinkles, I’m sure that I’ll find this year just as full of challenges, fun, sadness and delight as the last year, when I was only 79.

    It is Spencer Picnic week, a community festival of long-standing tradition of 111 years.  It is a celebration of community; a way to maintain the ties that bind.  There’s good food, carnival rides, a “Miss Spencer Picnic” and a talent show.  There is the parade on Saturday and excellent fireworks.  Kerm and I have always chosen to live in small communities for this very kind of connection, and we find small town positives are far more outstanding than the negatives.  One’s experiences and views, wherever one lives, can be as wide as reading and travel make them.  We have found the Spencer-Van Etten area a good place to live.  When someone is in need people step in as soon as they know.  There are fund-raisers for local children who are in the hospital, fun-raisers for the Ukraine, people who will help new-comers find plumbers, electricians, and play groups for their kiddies.  When one’s large, fawn-colored dog runs away during hunting season, the hunters are careful not to shoot it.  We have personally experienced neighborly kindnesses --- often. I have noticed that people can be adversarial in theory but wonderful in reality.  If the discussion is about politics or local issues --- people can disagree vociferously.  Voices are raised and hostility creeps in.  But if a neighbor needs help, that same person who yelled at the last town meeting will be right there with a casserole and comfort. Therein lies hope for the world.
    For my childhood years, he road on which my home dairy farm stood was a dirt road --- rural!   While growing up, I’d visit up and down that road; there was the elderly couple who I adopted as surrogate grandparents and where I played with a beautiful, old porcelain doll and washed my hands in a dry sink.   There were neighbors who had a TV, which we did not.  They also had a pool table and a slot machine.  So, after school, I watched the Mickey Mouse Club, learned to keep the white ball out of the billiard pockets and tried to avoid putting the slot machine into TILT mode.  I learned to ride on a neighbor’s horse.  Another neighbor came to help us with haying.  So, while we were mostly autonomous, we also relied on each other to be in community.
    Hal Borland* (quoted above) also wrote about community.  He lived on a dirt road, had good neighbors, and observed wild life very similar to that around here.  Of course, when he wrote, 40 years ago, none of us had bears, fishers or coyotes all of which now make themselves very much at home in our back yards.  This summer the creatures that share our outdoor spaces are both annoying and amusing.  As I sat here typing, I noticed the tall weeds waving back and forth at the end of a garden bed (yes – I do have weeds; LOTS of them!) --- but there was no wind.  A slanted brown head poked out --- a woodchuck was gobbling down the lambs’ quarters that had grown up there.  I probably should have let him eat the weeds, but I was so startled to have him dining eight feet away, right in my garden bed, that I spoke rather firmly ---and loudly.  He took off for the wood shed.  Something (Bear? Raccoons? Possums? Skunks?) have also drained the water bowls every night during the dry weather.   I’m thinking we should have a “creature patio” where each one has his/her own little table and cup ala Rabbit Hill by Robert Lawson,***a book much loved by our boys when they were small and by me as well.
    Now that we are in August, it is time to store up good things; to preserve summer, whether it is blackberries, herbs or memories.  We’ll be canning tomatoes and probably freezing some peaches.  I’ve already dried mullein – in case of respiratory problems.  I’ll also be drying tansy to discourage pantry moths and lemon balm simply to smell wonderful.  And I’m trying to store up mental photos and feelings to pull out when the outside weather is less enjoyable.   There is something in the mellow air of mid-August, alerting us that summer though it is, we are subtly moving toward fall.  So, we need to luxuriate in balmy weather now.  “Buttercup nodded and said goodbye, clover and daisy went off together, but the fragrant water lilies lie yet moored in the golden August weather…….”. ****
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
     
    *Hal Borland ---- American journalist, writer, naturalist.  1900-1978
    **Dr. Seuss --- Pen name for Theodore Seuss Geisel, an American writer of mostly children’s books well-known for their unique rhyming style of prose.  His perceptions of humanity did change over the years and he was a strong proponent of good ecological practices and caring for even the smallest person.  1904-1991.
    ***Robert Lawson --- American writer and illustrator of children’s books.  1892-1957.
    ****Celia Thaxter --- this was the first stanza of her poem, “August”.  She is an American writer and poet who lived in New England and on the islands off the coast of Maine.  1835-1894.
  15. Carol Bossard
    The birds aren’t singing as enthusiastically as they had two months ago, but they are still happily visiting the feeders and chirping away contentedly.  A very small hummingbird – probably this year’s baby —- zips in for the sweet fluid and hesitates when he sees me sitting on the porch.  The fireflies have begun lighting up the grassy parts of the back yard, especially on warm humid nights. The second cutting of hay is nearly done for local farmers.  The garden is growing but not ready to harvest.  Mid-July is a fine time for picnics, for just sitting outside in a shady spot and for thinking about many things —-“Cabbages and Kings………..”* — except that I’ve observed the weeds moved in and took over when I wasn’t looking, so there’s that to do.   But still, there’s a somnolent feeling about mid-summer; a contented quiet; a magic that seems ready to go on forever.

    Life is not all summer, though.  One of the difficult adjustments to make as one gets older is the loss of strength and energy.  With fibromyalgia, I experienced this loss at a younger age than I would have expected — or desired.  My mother could outwalk me when she was in her early 80s and I in my 50s, so when I visibly slowed down in my 60s, I was annoyed — very annoyed —- still annoyed!  But this bit of writing caught my attention and gave me a metaphoric slap on the back of the head —- Gibbs**-style.
                            “Can’t clean up the whole room?
                                    Clean a corner of it.
                          Can’t do all the dishes? Do one dish!
                                     Can’t get into the shower?
                                         Wash your face.
                           Always look for the thing you CAN do 
                              With the energy and focus you Do have.
                            Little wins pave the way for bigger wins.
                                     1% beats 0%.”  Dr. Glenn Doyle***
    Sometimes, what we want our lives to be like, just isn’t!  I can growl about what I can’t do —- or actually do what I can.  I have friends who are able to do less than I can even, and while this doesn’t make me any happier, it does put things into perspective.  So did a comment by Marc Middleton:****  “The key to aging well is to not mourn what is lost  but to celebrate what remains.”  I’m quite sure that must mean more parties!
    As a kid and 4-H member, mid-July was county fair time.  The Ontario County Fair was a big deal then; a party for lots of people.    There was not only lots to see and do, with 4-Hers from the entire county, but it also was the free pass to the NYS Fair if a person was fortunate enough to be a Grand Champion in some exhibit.  And there was the unique Fair smells; the aromatic potpourri of hot sausages, cotton candy, cinnamon apples, saw dust, and barns full of horses, cows, pigs, chickens and rabbits.  It is good to watch a young exhibitor scrubbing his/her calf and fluffing its tail —- calmly endured by the calf who is as tame as a puppy.  If the animal was a beef steer or lamb, there were often tears at sale time, but — economics is an important part of education.   I only showed an animal once — a Berkshire pig that I’d fed and coddled.  Obviously, I hadn’t spent enough time training this pig because once in the show ring with other pigs, it lost what few manners it may have had at home.  With a cow, a showman has a halter and lead.  With a pig, there is a cane to guide one’s pig in the direction you’d like him/her to go and an oddly-shaped, hand-held board to stuff between two warring animals and that is all.  Not nearly as useful as a halter around the nose and neck!  This is because pigs have no necks.  After the pig experience, my Fair exhibits were sewing projects, baking and garden produce.  I know that county fairs have suffered during COVID, along with concerts and many other crowd-gathering events.  But truly, they were diminishing in attendance even before that, and I wonder why.  I hope we haven’t become so sophisticated —- so blasé — so enchanted by glitz and expensive glamor that we do not know how to have fun together in our own communities.

    As well as being over-grown with weeds, my garden is in its mid-summer slump.  The day lilies are in bloom but the annuals haven’t blossomed yet.  I’m waiting for the marigolds, nasturtiums and zinnias to burst into color.  The roadsides are colorful, though.  The brassy gold, slightly tarnished now, of the wild parsnip continues to stand tall along with white clouds of sweet clover, and the periwinkle chicory is sided by tall Queen Anne’s Lace.  There’s a garden outside our car windows as we drive along.  Of course, some limited people consider these roadside weed patches.  But wild and untethered as the plants are, they help the pollinators, they hold the soil in place and I consider them a way to beautify the country.  Those who experience breathing difficulties with pollen may not be so enthusiastic, because there are also allergens, but one could argue that there are both upsides and downsides to almost everything.
    One of our granddaughters enjoys debating and I hope she will find a debating team in her new school where she can put that agile mind to work.  I don’t enjoy it all that much, though I’ve participated in one or two debates.  However, I’ve noticed that there are people who not only do not debate, they close in upon themselves if their opinions are questioned.  They don’t want to defend or even discuss their views nor do they wish to hear anything that opposes them.  These people tend to make pronouncements and want immediate affirmation.  I have three friends of that ilk — good and caring people who I like immensely—– but, whose thinking is so structured that they simply can’t believe everyone doesn’t agree with how they see the world.  It probablyfeels like a safer way to exist, for there is comfort in being absolutely sure about everything.  But there’s little adventure and little growth in such rigidity.  I think this attitude must come from an innate fear of being wrong.  One of our professors in college, who was well-acquainted with both Kerm and me because she (“Scotty”) was an advisor to the Cornell Recreation Team of which we were a part, was absolutely sure that we were making a grave error in getting married.  She mistakenly thought that our lively discussions indicated major disagreements.  She mentioned this to us a time or two.  Obviously, she was wrong and her vision of marriage a bit skewed; we’ve managed to survive our differences in opinion and stay together for nearly 60 years.  This is because our disagreements were and are generally not about basic principles but more about how one goes about implementing the principles we have in common. 
    One principle that we hold in common is the importance of family.  In two weeks, my clan will have a gathering for a summer picnic.  People may be coming from California, Massachusetts, Virginia, Connecticut, NYC, and around central NYS.  We older ones all grew up more or less together, in the Rochester area.  And whether our surnames are now Smith, Bossard, Landry, Romeiser, Buda or Ross, we all either emanate from or married into, the Wiley clan; beginning with Leo and Marguerite Wiley.  As adults, we’ve scattered ourselves to the wind; we have grown in different directions and are the holders of many and varied spiritual philosophies and political leanings.  But more important than any of these is that the original perpetrators of this sprawling family expected us to stay connected.  When help is needed, those who are able respond.  A few of us make sure, when there is distress or joy, that we pass the news on to the rest.  A friend once commiserated with the host of this coming family reunion: “Why do you do this?  Isn’t it deadly boring?”  The host simply said” “Well, we happen to like each other.”  And we do!  One thing I do to help maintain the connections is to send out a family quiz each summer before the party.  “Who is 1/4 on her way to being an MD?  Who bought the same unpleasant pastry twice while in Iceland?  Who just graduated from kindergarten?”  We may not remember all these things about our relatives further than that day, but it gives us a glimpse into the lives of our kin for a moment or two.
    The lovely weather that so encourages summer parties, seems endless now, but later will appear to have flown by in a moment or two.  I feel as though I should be harvesting summer senses, as we do tomatoes, for a time of cold breezes and icy paths.  I found this little poem that speaks to our good months of plenty:  “First April, she with mellow showers opens the way for early flowers; then after her comes smiling May, in more rich and sweet array; next enters June, and brings us more gems than those two, that went before; then, lastly July comes, and she more wealth brings than all those three.” ***** Enjoy the continuing magic of summer.
    ********************
    Carol Bossard writes from her home in Spencer.
    *”…of cabbages and kings” is taken from a 1904 collection of interlinked short stories by O. Henry.  He, in turn, took the title from Lewis Carroll’s poem, “The Walrus and the Carpenter” from “Alice’s Through the Looking Glass”.
    **Gibbs-style refers to the well-known call to attention administered by Jethro Gibbs of NCIS.
    ***Dr. Glenn Doyle —- Plastic surgeon in Raleigh, NC — obviously a sensible advisor.
    ****Marc Middleton of NW Facets —American television journalist, author and media entrepreneur who is the CEO of Growing Bolder — a wellness and health business.
    Robert Herrick—— “July: the Succession of the Four Sweet Months.”  Robert Herrick was an English lyric poet and Anglican cleric (which I find amusing considering some of his poetry!)  He was baptized 1591 and died 1574.
  16. Carol Bossard
    “Outside the open window the morning air is all awash with angels.  Love calls us to things of this world.”* This totally describes a morning in June with its singing birds, dewy grasses and long hours of light.  Besides the beauty of the world around us there are all the people who give love and those who need love. June —— when graduating seniors get a bad case of “senioritis” and grade-schoolers gaze longingly out the windows of their classrooms ——when birds who flew north in March have fledglings just growing their feathers —– when gardens are showing little green rows where lettuce and spinach have been planted. To quote a line from “Oklahoma” — “June is bustin’ out all over!” It is a symphony in green and gold.

    Speaking of symphonies and other lovely things, I was reminded recently about our high school days, when Jan and I cut arms-full of garden flowers for an event at school called “Moving Up Day” at just about this time of the year.  I’m quite sure schools no longer have this sort of event with queens and courts (although they still do have prom queens).  For this annual occasion there were two attendants chosen from each class, 8-12, plus the queen, who was always a senior.  The attendants were voted on by their classes except for the attendants from the senior class and the queen.  They were voted on by the entire high school plus 8th grade., and those chosen were a closely guarded secret until The Day!  There was great pomp and ceremony as the girls moved slowly down the aisle to the tempo of “A Pretty Girl Is Like A Melody”, to take places on that flower-decked stage.  The slow beat was necessitated by the hoops beneath the skirts.  It is incredibly difficult to move in hoops, especially with the hesitation step.   Those hoops sway back and forth, and soon the wearer also begins to sway and without care, there is every possibility of falling headlong.  My respect for the agility of all those southern belles, with their big skirts, has increased since then.  For this event, there was music, there were speeches and it was the VCS attempt to make moving to the next class special; mini-graduations.  Because our mothers had large perennial gardens, Jan and I cut a large swath through their peonies, daisies, lupines and mock orange to decorate the stage. The whole concept might feel a bit outmoded now, but we, who were there, remember both the music and the much ado, with pleasure.

    With June comes Father’s Day, this year on June 19th.  I’m not sure why we separate mothers’ and father’s celebrations; parenting is supposed to be a joint venture.  Of course, what is supposed to be often isn’t.  And good parents probably do deserve at least two days of recognition.  Father-honoring has been done for many years, in eastern Europe, on March 19th — St. Joseph’s Day.  A church in W. Virginia celebrated it in 1908.  Then, in 1910, it was officially designated to be on the third Sunday in June.  It doesn’t get quite the press of Mother’s Day —- perhaps because June is such an event-filled month.
    My father was probably somewhat unusual among the fathers of my contemporaries.  For one thing, he was older than most of them.  I was a late-in-life child and my father was 47 when I came along.  My grandfather (Dad’s father) died when Dad was two years old, from typhoid fever and pneumonia.  An uncle provided a male presence in his life until his mother married again, to my kindly step-grandpa.  Dad’s Uncle Fred was a kind and generous man but an exceedingly proper individual who had some very firm standards that he instilled in my father.  There was no alcohol in our house — ever.  Dad mildly disapproved of coffee too, but my mother was a Universalist of French descent, who although she cheerfully became a Presbyterian, needed her coffee.  So, there was coffee!    Dad worked hard, expected his children to be respectful, obedient and to always meet their responsibilities with their best efforts.  I imagine that, in this regard, he was occasionally disappointed.  But he never gave up trying.  He also — unfortunately for me — had no comprehension for anyone who couldn’t understand —–nay —- couldn’t take delight in algebra, geometry and trig!!
    I have mentioned in prior essays that my father was a bit autocratic, highly irritable (which trait he may have passed on to me), very caring about his land and his community and a Scottish Presbyterian to his core.  So, you might guess that over the years, especially when I was a young teen, he and I might have had some disagreements and tension.  There was never any estrangement between us, but we weren’t always the best of comrades during my adolescence.  We did have some very good interaction when I became an adult, and had we lived closer, I’m sure there would have been more.  He took much delight in his grandchildren — all 16 of them.  I certainly respected my father and I know he took his responsibility as a parent very seriously and really loved his family.  When I see this quotation, I think of him — and my mother too:  “Quality — in the classic Greek sense — how to live with grace and intelligence, with bravery and mercy.”** I wish we’d had a little more time.  He died at age 72 — too early.  

    Fathers come in all varieties with many diverse ideas about how to live and how to raise children.  Some do not accept responsibility at all and are absentee fathers — which is their disgrace.  Some do not know how to love and cherish.  But so many fathers are amazing; most of my friends’ fathers were fine people.  Kerm and I were fortunate that our parenting ways complimented each other.  I wasn’t the most patient mom when our boys were toddlers, but Kerm could blocks with them and endure the splashing of their nightly baths.  When they were teens, the bedlam of the house and their highly energetic and articulate games sometimes tired him, so I was the one who stayed up, made cookies and sometimes corrected the D&D philosophies.  He endured their car engines hanging from trees and their casual attitude about his tools.  I waited up for them and kept their baseballs out of my gardens.  Together we worked well.  
    Now, as we watch our sons interact with the children in their lives, we are pleased and proud that they have become adept, caring and wise in helping young people to grow up. And we empathize with their occasional discouragements.  I admire the many fathers who quietly assume responsibility and often stretch themselves thin to provide both the material, social and spiritual needs of their children and often the children of others.  So —— Happy Father’s Day!!!
    June brings high school graduations, weddings, reunions; there is so much crammed into the month of June that it flies by far too fast, and suddenly it is July!  As veggies are popping up — and so are the weeds.  We have mulched the potatoes and tomatoes so that we need not weed those garden beds.  Mulching the little seedlings is harder and we haven’t been as successful with that.  But grubbing in the garden for weeds is not a bad way to spend some time.  There is something about handling the soil that works wonders on my psyche.  It provides bodily exercise, reaches the senses of smell, touch and sight, and cheers me up.  There is a whole movement now called “grounding” that encourages contact with the earth for good health.  I remember that some years ago, when I’d take the time to lie on the lawn for 15 minutes or so, my back felt quite a lot better.  I probably wouldn’t buy the available “grounding” equipment for my bed, but will ground myself outside while good weather is with us.   Being outdoors is also an antidote to the closed-in-ness of the time we spend on phones or computers.  That hunched-forward position leads to back pain, headaches and probably clogged thinking (I could comment further on the epidemic of clogged thinking!); anything we do — from gardening to walking opens up the shoulders, stretches the legs and clears the head.
    Daylight is still extending itself in early June; night moves slowly from Atlantic to Pacific over a three-hour span.  There is little lovelier than a June twilight sliding into a just cool night.  I am remembering days when, at home, we brought in bales of hay all day and then sat outside when night came, enjoying the fragrance of the new hay along with a sky full of stars.   And since we had a pond close by, there was the hypnotic chunking of frogs.   The world is full of clamor and distress and yet at the same time, the world is full of quiet and beauty if we are only aware.   As one wise person said: “The gloom of the world is but ashadow; behind it yet in our reach, is joy. Take joy!”*** A happy June to you and may you find it more full of blessings than problems.
    Carol writes from her home in Spencer. She may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net 
    *Richard Wilbur—American poet and literary translator.  Associated with Amherst College and Harvard University.  1921-2017.
    **Theodore H. White —American political journalist known for his reporting from China during WWII.  Also known for his “Making of a President” series.  1915-1986
    ***Fra Giovanni—Belonged to the Order of Friars Minor.  Was an Italian friar, architect, antiquary, archaeologist and classical scholar.  1433-1515.
  17. Carol Bossard
    Ahhhh….. It’s March!  Daylight savings time (this coming Sunday) and the Vernal Equinox (March 20) all in the same month.  And yes, we will lose an hour, but it will be delightfully light longer in the day.  We can feel the new life of Easter approaching, for the season of Lent began last Wednesday with a community service and luncheon.   It is a time of introspection as well as awakening activity.
    My process of cleaning out is continuing; it might continue on into infinity!  “Yet occasionally we discover in the folds of an old handkerchief, a shell or insignificant stone that had once embodied our happiest of afternoons.”* I did find some items that brought back good memories.  And I found an old essay from 2014.  Considering the current controversy around books, I think this is an appropriate time to re-share my thoughts.   
    There is a tired, old saying; “Sure, I approve of censorship ---- as long as I can be the censor.”  Censorship has cropped up regularly though out history, usually at the behest of an autocratic ruler who fears anything that might make people think.  The first thing an autocrat does is to imprison or execute professors, artists, librarians and writers; they are dangerous thinkers and distributors of materials that make others think. Currently, Putin has shut off the internet and declared independent reporting a “war crime”!
    To censor or not has always been a problem for parents who are reluctant for their kiddies to process what their parents might consider alien to their thoughts or beliefs ---- or maybe even just because it’s not quite nice.  Many of us have tried to shield our sons and daughters from anything disagreeable, frightening or crass.  There’s a fine line between what is sensible precaution and what just keeps us, the parents, comfy.
    Through-out history, people have been killed for their beliefs and teachings (Jesus, Socrates, Martin Luther King, Robert Kennedy…….).  And this continues today.  There are those who think eliminating the person, will make the issue will go away.    The problem is that neither killing people nor burning books will erase the ideas.  Other people will continue to think.  And kids will find a way to learn about all sorts of things that their parents wish they had not.  There was no TV in our house for several years as our children were growing up.  They, however, managed to know all the characters on kids’ programming even without TV, and wanted the latest Scooby Doo or Spider Man lunch boxes.    A parent may try to hide The Hulk or Harry Potter, but it just won’t work.
    Of course, there’s my very own personal book burning!  Those of you who know us, and who are aware that we have hundreds of books of all genres, may find it hard to believe that I burned a book.  But it is true.  One of our sons was home at the time and was visibly astounded, annoyed and also, I think, a bit amused.   “Mom’s Book-Burning” might be a story to go down in family history.  I didn’t burn the book because I thought it was inappropriate reading for the general public; or even for my kids.   I had realized ---- after reading a few chapters --- that it was not a good reading for me.  And I knew if I disposed of it in the usual way (library book sale), I’d finish reading it. It was a well-written, compelling story.  But the violence was exceedingly graphic and was going to give my mind a severe  case of memory indigestion.  That’s the down-side of the way our brains are designed; they store things away forever.  And memories may crop up at 2 AM, that we’d rather not have in our heads.
     We each have different tolerance levels.  I’ve absorbed a wide variety of writing, from novels to non-fiction; from fantasy to historical fiction; from philosophy to nature and from biography to poetry.  In fact, slipping into an alternate universe via a good book is often a blessing.  But some things etch themselves so deeply into my brain that the aftermath is damaging to my peace of mind.  There are a couple of books that I read in my younger years ---- classics they were too ---- that I shouldn’t have cracked open.  The depth of evil described in those stories has haunted me forever after.  The same is true of some TV programs and movies.  In addition, there is no end to the perverted, smutty, crass materials available if one looks.  Would I like to see them gone forever? Definitely!  But where does the censorship stop?  Who decides?
    I have never repeated my book-burning escapade, but for sensible self-care, I think that we all should be a little careful about what we put into our minds.  Just as we try to limit salt, sugar and poly-unsaturated fats, we should try to avoid things that might give us disturbed or calloused emotions.  This includes frequent watching of certain movies, TV programs or reading, that dulls our senses or leaves us with a creepy feeling that we’ve been invaded by evil.
    Having said that --- how do I feel about the recent book-burnings in the news and the attempts to censor school libraries?  Who do I think I am --- or you are ---- to decide what books should be in a library??!!  Yes --- a parent does have a responsibility and a right to speak for the welfare of their child.  Not all children are ready to read the same material at the same time.  There should definitely be alternative books for those parents who don’t think their 8th-grader is ready for the horrors of Nazi-ism or the adolescent muckiness of Catcher In The Rye.  A parent should know their child and what that child would find palatable.  But no parent has the right to censor the entire library, making that judgment for all kids.  Too, I think some parents are over-ready to shield their kiddies from anything distasteful or hard to hear.   Covering up events or issues enhances the crime.  Kids are incredibly alert to spot parental shading of the truth or hypocrisy.  Parents need to be honest and open with their kids and discuss difficult things.  Ignorance is seldom bliss!
    I am constantly amazed at how frightened some adults are of education hat treads beyond the borders of their own experiences.  The philosophy seems to be “If I don’t know about it, it must be bad and I don’t want my kid to be exposed to all that weird stuff.” When Kerm and I taught Sunday school back in our Pennsylvania years, one of the things we told the teens we had in class was “God has no grandchildren.” It actually was a poster available in a Christian bookstore.   Basically, we were telling them that just because their parents believed in God and had brought them up in the faith, that didn’t make them God’s children by inheritance.  They needed to think on their own and find their own faith.   WELL --- such a hullabaloo we created!  Parents went clamoring to the pastor ---- who wisely asked us to meet with the parents and explain ourselves.  And we did.  And eventually, all was well.  But fear drove the initial reaction as fear often does, and, in this case, perhaps just a little indignation that their parental faith wasn’t enough to cover their children forever.
    The bottom line is: we all need to stop trying to censor other people’s choices!   If one of our kids had wanted to read a book that we thought inappropriate, we would have read it along with them and talked about it.  If it was a book that I actually thought would be detrimental for them, I’d have explained why I felt that way and asked them to trust us and put it off a couple of years.  We often loan books to our granddaughters.  We’d like to contribute to their education and enjoyment, not to their disillusionment, so we are careful about what we offer.  We have a couple of series that are well-written stories but would be inappropriate for their current ages and life-experiences.  Maybe when they are forty … 😊!   They are good readers and mature thinkers, and have read and discussed things widely --- with no discernable harm.
    Censorship nearly always creates more trouble than any protection it might give.
    “Some like to drink in a pint pot. Some like to think.  Some not.  Strong Dutch cheese, Old Kentucky Rye, Some like these, Not I.  Some like Poe, and others like Scott.  Some like Mrs. Stowe.  Some not.  Some like to laugh, some like to cry, some like to chaff.  Not I.”  RLS
    Meanwhile, regardless of all our human foibles, we are in March and life is looking up.  We can, and probably will, get snow and mud and gusty winds.***  But--- the daylight hours are longer, more days are sunny, and the geese are flying north.  I even think I can hear some stirring in the garden; of course, it could be the weeds we didn’t pull last fall but maybe it’s the daffodil bulbs.   I expect to see purple-green skunk cabbage popping up in the swamps any day now.  The cats are walking the fence pickets, showing off and pouncing on anything that moves.   My spring memories, among the “happiest of afternoons” memories, are   watching pollywogs in vernal pools, and the shining gold of marsh marigolds at the edge of small streams.   I’m wishing I could be walking down the lane toward the wooded acres on the farm where I grew up, experiencing those very things soon.   Happy Spring --- and pleasant journeys to you this week!
                                                                                                                                                        *******************
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    *Patti Smith ---- American rock poet laureate at age 75.  Quotation is from her first book of prose, a memoir: “Just Kids”.
    **Robert Louis Stevenson --- Scottish writer, poet, novelist and travel writer.
    ***--- See the weather for this Saturday!!
  18. Carol Bossard
    We are currently living amid the most ebullient, lush time of the year.  Greenery grows inches every night.   The cinnamon ferns in my shade garden are unrolling like so many bright green scrolls.  Soon they will be high enough that I must peer through them to see the bird feeders.  And baby raccoons and skunks will be out and about.  We have an interesting variety of creatures in this region; opossums, raccoons, foxes, bobcats, black bears, skunks, fishers, coyotes, turkey vultures (four of which landed in our back yard some days ago; they are big birds!) and there have been sightings of a puma on and off over the years.   Our school’s mascot is the black panther, so I guess having one in the area would make sense.  There is little danger from any of these animals if good sense and caution are used.   Of course, those two qualities seem to be in short supply with much of the world.  But wild animals, unless they are starving, ill or injured, generally avoid humans if at all possible.
    May brings us frequent celebratory events as the academic year comes to a close, and possibly some pensive memories as Memorial Day approaches.  Here we remember to avoid Ithaca this next weekend (Ithaca College graduation) and Memorial Day weekend (Cornell graduation).   The month’s name comes from the Greek goddess, Maia, who oversaw the growth of plants.  The Romans celebrated “Floralia” --- a five-day festival to honor the goddess Flora --- basically same goddess, different name.  And May is the month of the Full Flower moon for many Native Americans.  May could be considered the bridge month between spring and summer.  On the Liturgical calendar, the Easter season ends next Sunday with Pentecost.
    My high school always held the Junior Prom in May.  Thinking of those proms sends me to my Year Books or albums to check out memories there.  Old programs, candid photos of prom nights, of decorating the gym and of after-prom parties at someone’s home all bring smiles.  No renting the Holiday Inn for us --- actually, I’m not sure the Holiday Inn existed back then.  What all this memorabilia offers besides bringing back some fun memories, is a reminder of how valuable friendships are.  I’ve been so glad I could maintain/renew friendships with former classmates and wish I could see them more often.  My class of 1960 put some very cool people out into the world.  Old friends are good; we share a connective past.  And the new friends made as we’ve moved from Maryland to Pennsylvania to the Catskills and to Spencer have also been wonderful.
    Memorial Day comes, and even as we regret the necessity for it, it has become something of a gala event with its BBQs, parades and fanfare.  At home, when I was growing up, we celebrated quite simply.  We took flowers to family graves; not florist-created bouquets but flowers straight from my mother’s gardens ----fragrant peonies, roses and sprays of mock orange.  At that time, it was still possible to plant flowers and shrubs around the grave-stones ---- which we did.  In the process, my mother would tell me about the people whose names were engraved on the granite markers, giving vivid personalities to family members I had never met.
    Recently I attended a funeral via YouTube.  It is, perhaps, a sign of the times --- the pandemic times --- but I’m thinking that this particular practice might continue because of convenience.  The service was quite lovely and because I couldn’t actually drive the two hours to get there, I was grateful for a way to “be there” for a farewell to someone who had been a part of my life as I was growing up.  I hope though, that this new convenience never takes the place of being together in person.  It is always better when family stories and community support can comfort us in our grief.  That should never go out of style.
    A festive Memorial Day memory is the parade down Victor’s main street.  Those of us in the high school band would wear our sapphire-blue wool uniforms and hats, our polished white sneakers stepping to the rhythms of John Philip Sousa.  Why more kids didn’t pass out in late May heat, I don’t know; I guess we were a sturdy group.  When marching, I’d generally play the piccolo instead of the flute, but one year, for some reason, I played the bell lyre.  That hefty instrument fits into a leather sling around the neck and waist and weighs about a ton and a half.  Finding the right notes to hit as we stepped along the uneven street was no easy matter either.  But I remember those parades with affection.
    Memorial Day is different for us now.  Our family graves are some distance from where we live and we don’t visit them often.  Truly, I don’t need to visit graves to visualize all of the people I have loved who are no longer with us.  Currently we celebrate Memorial Day by watching the special on PBS; not exciting, but usually satisfying.  Even as we memorialize our men and women in uniform, I personally think that humans should have, by now, found some way to settle differences that doesn’t require killing each other via war.  It indicates limited intelligence (or possibly a major and wide-spread mental health issue) that we use the same old methods and expect different results.
    But I do appreciate and am grateful for those who have fought for our so infrequently lived-out ideals.  My father and uncle were in WWI, two of my brothers in WWII, a brother-in-law in the Korean conflict, friends in Viet Nam, the son of a friend in the Gulf War and a nephew in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Thus, in addition to the BBQs and enthusiastic flag-waving occurring this special weekend, I will be taking a quiet moment to remember ---- and give thanks for those who have in the past answered the nation’s call and for those who continue to do so when necessary.   Even more, I appreciate and pray for those who continue working to find better solutions to conflict than shooting and/or blowing each other up.  Perhaps world-wide anger management classes from kindergarten on up?
    While we may sneak a few seeds into soil earlier than recommended, a firm May tradition for us is planting the garden around Memorial Day.  (I must admit that this year Kerm couldn’t resist planting potatoes on one of those warm April days, so we’ll hope for the best.)   We occasionally look back to our gardening years in central Pennsylvania a bit wistfully; we could plant nearly 3 or 4 weeks earlier, and there, our soil wasn’t stubborn clay dotted with rocks.  By late-April, Pennsylvania’s gardens would have experienced the “onion snow”, the “peepers snow” and would have peas sending up little green leaves with tendrils. Ah well………the Finger Lakes is a beautiful region.  And gardening here, or anywhere, surely has its rewards. And here we don’t take thriving plants at all for granted; considering our soil and weather patterns, they are a miracle!
    Our gardens evolve in much the same way that I write.  There’s a basic plan which for us   would be four raised beds.  How I arrange the seeds/plants in those beds gets edited often, as do essays.  We no longer grow sweet corn, which grieves me, but there are several farms in the area that sell sweet corn, so it is more practical to not use up our small garden space with it. And, we don’t have to worry about the omnipresent raccoons getting to the ears before we do.  Several times I’ve tried to eliminate the vine crops --- pumpkins especially.  But every year, the thought of no Cinderella pumpkins or Long Island Cheese pumpkins or Jack Be Little pumpkins just depresses me.  They look so decorative from September through Thanksgiving, and then they provide food for deer and turkeys from Christmas on ---- so ---- they refuse to be edited out and continue to sprawl over a large area.
    Our best and most useful crops are probably lettuce, tomatoes and broccoli ---- plus herbs.  And this year, I have a new mini-herb garden.  We had a super-deluxe sandbox with stone walls and a cover, but no one has played in that delightful sand box for several years.  So ----- this spring we removed the cover, removed the sand-covered toys, tilled in some good soil, and planted herbs. It is a very tiny space for a garden, but I’m looking forward to seeing it mature with all the fragrance and textures of basil, rue, Clary sage, lemon grass, parsley, etc.  All those goodies will bask in the sun and dance in the breeze, spreading fragrance.  Then too, there are all the side benefits of gardening: strengthening muscles, aerobic breathing as we go up and down our hilly yard, Vitamin D from the sunshine and mellowing of one’s mood from working in the soil.
    May offers so many reasons to celebrate and be grateful, from Mother’s Day to Memorial Day and all the delightful days in between.  It is the time of year that inspires dancing whether around a May Pole, at the Prom or out on the back lawn.  Even if our feet don’t dance so well anymore, surely our hearts can.   “The gloom of the world is but a shadow; behind it yet within our reach is joy.  Take joy!”*
    ************************************************
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    *Fra Giovanni – Was in the Order of Friars Minor.  He was an Italian friar, an architect, an archaeologist, and classical scholar.  1433-1515.                   
  19. Carol Bossard
    Today is Earth Day ---- an occasion for taking time to appreciate the very ground beneath our feet and all that grows thereon.  It is a day to notice the bees (dwindling in numbers) on dandelions, the white of shadblow on the hills and to appreciate the rain (although maybe not so much that mixed precipitation!).  We (human-kind) have been careless and lacking in gratitude for the amazing connections and interconnections in our world from the depths of the seas to the starry endlessness of space.   Earth Day, even on a too-frosty morning, is a perfect time to think about how each one of us is important in making the world continue to go ‘round in a healthy way.
    Easter Sunday is past, but I’m still feeling in the Easter season (and it is still Easter on the liturgical calendar).  This holiday, in the past days when wearing hats was still the custom, was when ladies got new, sometimes quite elaborate, hats --- “In your Easter bonnet, with all the frills upon it, you’ll be the grandest lady in the Easter Parade* ----“.  I was given a lovely white, wool hat this year that I simply forgot to wear on Easter.  (It was a busy morning!)  But it did trigger memories of past hats ---- mine and those of others.
    My first Easter bonnet (that I remember) was a pale ivory straw trimmed with black velvet ribbon and white daisies.  I also remember a pink straw cloche when I was a bit older.  That was the year my father took me shopping for an Easter dress, and I came home with two dresses instead of one.  (Note to my 11-year-old-self; “shop with Dad more often!”)   The very last hat that I purchased for wearing to church was in 1966; a pale, yellow straw cloche trimmed with yellow velvet ribbon, from a hat shop in Lewisburg, PA.  I wore it until I joined the choir; in that role, hats were just unnecessary.
    My mother wore hats as did most women in the 1940s and 50s; a red velvet pillbox with a rhinestone clip, a sparkly brocade pillbox with a tiny veil, a powder-blue halo with tulle and a dark blue straw cloche with red, white and blue trim, just to remember a few.  I hoarded her hats in their hat boxes for some years before finally making them available for the dress-up box.  I don’t know what happened to my father’s hats.  Men also wore hats in the fifties ---- when doffing one’s hat was good manners.   Dad seldom went anywhere without his felt fedora or straw Stetson, creased just right.  I expect my mother gave them to someone who could use them after he needed them no more.
    I really do love hats, and will eventually wear the white felt that I forgot to wear on Easter but, in general, people are not wearing hats as much unless they are sun hats or baseball caps in their many and varied forms.  My husband and our sons say those baseball hats are to shade their eyes, but I think it’s a genetic thing passed down from fathers and grandfathers; bare heads make them feel vulnerable.
    Our attic and the dress-up box have always had a stash of hats --- for costumes, skits and who knows what.  There’s a magenta satin top hat with a plume that could have been worn by one of the Musketeers.  There are several varieties of men’s straw hats, a velvet coachman’s hat and any number of ski hats knitted by my mother.  Kerm has a mad bomber’s hat for terrible winter weather and I have a tall fur hat of the sort one sees in “Dr. Zhivago”.  Then there is the multi-colored bubble wig that a fashionable clown would be glad to acquire.  One just never knows when a certain style of head-covering will be necessary.  When we lived in central Pennsylvania, I became accustomed to the little white caps that Mennonite women wore on the backs of their heads, usually covering a braid or bun.  The little cap was both a sign of worldly modesty and of submission to God. I admire the willingness to wear a visible sign of one’s beliefs and the little caps were pretty too. I’m looking forward to summertime when I can once more wear my wide-brimmed, flower-trimmed straw hat that signifies nothing at all but a love of hats.
    And speaking of summer, if these multiple viral variants do not create continued need for isolation, perhaps we can be freer to see friends and family during the coming days.  Some events I was hoping for have already been cancelled (my 61st class reunion and Alumni banquet) but hopefully, smaller gatherings will be possible.  I’m surely looking forward to seeing people I haven’t seen in two summers.  I am anticipating sunny picnics with friends and hoping for family campfires, singing and marshmallow toasts as fireflies light up the nights.
    One of the blogs I recently read spoke of on-going research into gratitude and what this emotion actually does in the brain.  William Arthur Ward says: “Gratitude can transform common days into thanksgivings, turn routine jobs into joy and change ordinary opportunities into blessings.”** It turns out that thinking thankfully actually changes how the brain thinks; they apparently can measure this on some kind of scan.  This is also true in my own experience, for in spite of all we couldn’t do for the past year, there have been many things for which I am truly grateful.  My moody perspectives can create some pretty dark days, but equally small things can bring back the light.   I’ve found that it actually is possible to extricate one’s self from gloom by remembering blessings and allowing a feeling of thankfulness to fill me up.  Henry Ward Beecher was a pastor and Civil Rights advocate back in Civil War times, so he had plenty to be unsettled and gloomy about.  But he said this:  “….If you can eat today, enjoy the sunlight today, mix good cheer with friends today, enjoy it and bless God for it.  Do not look back on happiness nor dream of it in the future.  You are only sure of today; do not let yourself be cheated out of it.”***
    It’s fun to think back to former Easters with the frilly hats and patent leather shoes.  But as our pastor pointed out to us the first Sunday past Easter, for those who believe, “Every morning is Easter morning from now on…..”****.  Each day offers us a chance for new beginnings.  Today, this moment, is where we should be focused.  What is out there for me to do today?  How can I be using my time well today?  In what can I take delight today?  Ruing yesterday has little value.  A certain amount of planning ahead is useful, but worrying ahead usually creates stress which can easily become gloom and doom.  Today is when we can live with intention.  It helps to dispel the angst brought on by the world around us to take special note of the small things that brighten each day.  I must admit that I don’t always practice this; I do worry behind and ahead --- too often.  But when I write about this, I am reminding myself too, and that’s progress!
    I’m hoping that last night’s dip in temperatures didn’t freeze my tulips, but in spite of  spring ups and downs, I believe that soon we’ll be out mowing lawns and planting rows of lettuce, cosmos and basil.  The finches are beginning to show their brighter colors; house finches are rosier and goldfinches are little bits of sunshine.  I’ve seen several birds checking out nesting sites; one right by our picture window, so it’s time to put out dryer fluff and yarn pieces.  The flowering cherries were in bloom in Montour Falls last week, and the spring rains have made the waterfalls there and in Watkins Glen really worth seeing.  In whatever way spring comes to your region, I hope that you grab your favorite bonnet and enter into the greening newness with enthusiasm and gratitude.  And Happy Earth Day!!
    “For lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.”*****
    ******************************************************************
    Carol may be reached at: carol42wilde@htva.net.
    *-“Easter Parade” by Irving Berlin---- American composer born in Imperial Russia.  Prolific composer and lyricist and considered one of America’s greatest composers.  1888-1989
    **-William Arthur Ward--- American motivational writer; poems, essays and meditations published in many American magazines.  1921-1994
    ***-Henry Ward Beecher ---- American Congregationalist clergyman.  He was deeply into spreading the Word of God’s love via social reforms and the abolition of slavery.  1813-1887
    ****-Easter Song by Richard Avery and Donald Marsh.  Richard Avery was a Presbyterian pastor and Donald Marsh was the choir director in the same church.  They collaborated on music for 40 years.  Donald Marsh died in 2010 and Richard Avery in 2020.
    *****- The Song of Solomon --- The Bible
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