Morning Notes: Wednesday is Hump Day

One in an occasional and uninteresting series which shows you notes I left for my younger daughter each morning during her senior year of high school.  In the midst of my seemingly perpetual writer’s block.  Notes in no particular order.  Complete sentences not even happening.

Happy Hump Day!

Don’t forget to take your note.

                 Feb 22

Happy Windsday, Pooh.

Happy Windsday, Piglet

March 1^st

On this date in 1781 the Articles of Confederation were ratified.  That’s what we had before we had the Constitution.

(This is an expert drawing of articles, confederated)

On this date in 1872 Yellowstone Park was established.

(This is an expert drawing of a geyser.  I have never seen one in real life.)

March 15 

No morning note today - See Actual Mother

(I must have been driving her to school that day.)

April 26, 2017  A note for Wednesday

This is a note.  It is a note for Wednesday.  Some people call it Hump Day because it is the middle of the week.  But I shall call it “I don’t know what to make for dinner” day.  Perhaps that what every day is called in this household!

P.S. Please find out if the limo is bringing you back from the prom, and to where and roughly when.    And where IS the prom?

Love,

Mom

Oct 26, 2016 Trees go wandering

A quote for today:

Trees go wandering forth in all directions with every wind, going and coming like ourselves, traveling with us around the sun two million miles a day, and through space heaven knows how fast and far!   - John Muir

I hope your travels go well today.  – Mom

A note from sometime in the fall of 2016

Hello, all you happy campers!

It’s mighty chilly out there this morning.  Time to pull out yer mittens and hats, I guess.  See you at the ranch at 4 PM!

-->

- Camp Matron

The Sound of Silencers

I invite you to read my friend's post, on the PA12 For Progress blog: 

When I was a student at Carolina, I was walking across the tree-lined quad adjacent to our main drag, Franklin Street. When I was about halfway across, I heard popping sounds from the street. I didn’t realize at first what was going on but then saw people running and screaming to take cover.

Click here if you wish to read more.


And here is a post I wrote for PA12 For Progress....

Birds chirping, insects humming, squirrels chattering.  These are some of the sounds I heard during my morning walk in the park.  And also this:  gunshots.  

Click here if you wish to read more.

The Talk

Sunday, August 20, 2017   8:30 AM

The outside world is enveloped in fog.  At the mailbox, I notice cobwebs I didn’t see before.  The neighborhood is silent.  Last night’s storm has felled a large tree limb, which lies dead in the side yard.  My Black Lives Matter sign is there but less visible from the street because of the fog.

On this morning, it seems like the world has become a haunted house, or perhaps an abandoned museum exhibit. Is this just a suburban housewife’s imagination, or is it a metaphor for American democracy? (Because these days, every suburban housewife has American democracy on her mind, all the time, right?) Have we put our democratic ideals in the museum now?  Is any challenge to injustice visible from the street on a tiny cul-de-sac in suburbia?

* * * * * * * *

Several days before that foggy morning I sit my younger daughter down to have a talk with her.  I was hoping to avoid this talk, but the events of Aug 12^th in Charlottesville, Virginia make it necessary.  In this talk I must tell my daughter that there are people out there, more people than I thought possible, who wish her harm for being herself, for being something she cannot change.  There are people out there who now are unashamed to say out loud that they wish to throw Jews in the ovens. And our country’s leaders, in the highest offices of the land, equivocate and call these haters “some fine people.”

God help us. 

I know that this talk I am having with her is not unlike the very real, very scary talk that people of color must have with their children, at a much earlier age than 18.

For years my husband has said, occasionally, that it would be entirely possible for Nazi ideology to become prevalent in the United States.  In the past, I would toss away this idea as a groundless fear.  We can call this my WASP privilege, if you like.  Woven into Jewish identity is a strong sense of transience borne out of the historical truth that Jews have always been despised by someone, simply for being Jews.  My husband, a Jew, expects threats to his existence.  Here is a conversation we had back in January, shortly after the presidential inauguration:

Me:  The president is a pathological liar, and very insecure.  He keeps telling lies.

Husband (making a natural Jewish leap in thought from insecure pathological liar to Hitler*):  You know, the first people that Hitler got rid of were the intellectuals.  But it’s okay.  I’m Jewish.  We’ve been through this before.  We’ll wander around.  We’ll carry our Torah with us.

Younger Daughter:  It’s the end of the American empire.  It’s inevitable – every great empire in history collapses.  The Roman empire didn’t last, but we still have Rome.  The British empire doesn’t exist any more.  But Britain is still there.

Husband:  Britain is still there?

Younger Daughter:  Oh. My. God.  Why do you count as an intellectual?

So, a few days before I send my daughter off on the uncharted path which is freshman year of college, I tell her that there are people who are out to get her.   It is white privilege that I have been able to postpone this talk until now.  My yard sign in white suburbia saying Black Lives Matter is more a wish for the future than a truth, in our foggy abandoned museum exhibit.

 

Staged photo, showing both the big tree
limb and Black Lives Matter sign.
Yes, I dragged the tree limb around the yard
in the dark, to get both of them in the frame.
I did it for you, Dear Reader.

Obeying the prime rule of parenting, which is to remain calm in all situations, my daughter and I discuss the events in Charlottesville in measured tones. I make sure she understands that some of these people live near us.  That there are few of them but they are powerful and violent.  That these people would be of far less consequence if they were not receiving thinly veiled encouragement from the Divider-in-Chief. Then she asks me:

“How will we know when it is time to be afraid?”

How does a parent answer that question?

*Update:  Please note that this post is not meant to imply in any way that our President and Hitler are like each other.  One of them is not shrewd enough.

Conversations

My writing dry spell continues.  So I must impose upon my dear readers this preservation of what my husband calls The Family Anals, that is, various conversations recorded for Common Household Posterity. 

* * * * * *

I was impressed when Younger Daughter effortlessly used the word “epistolary” in reference to an English paper she wrote about an epistolary novel.  But my husband hadn’t heard it yet, and I wanted her to impress him, so I prompted her.

Me, to Younger Daughter:  Use the word “epistolary” in a sentence.

YD, taken off guard: Um, “The novel was written in epistolary format.”

Husband, solemnly: “He carried an epistolary on each hip as he strode into battle. He was ready….

YD:  Ready to write letters!

Husband: He fired off six words before anyone could blink an eye!  “It was the best of times.”

YD:  “It was the worst of times,” they fired back!

Husband:  The bullets were filled with wit.

* * * * * *

Me:  I think YD is dissecting a pig today.  A fetal pig.

Husband:  It’s going to be a cutting edge day.

Me: I think you can save the Dad jokes for when the kids are here.

* * * * * *

Husband, trying to impress the kids with how hard it was for us in our college days:  We had to write before writing was even invented.  I had to use a typewriter that didn’t even plug in.

* * * * * *

Husband, reading the newspaper:  Here’s one thing I find difficult to believe.

Me, bursting out laughing:  Just one thing?

* * * * * *

YD: What if there was a service to help super-villains get vengeance?

Husband: What if Superman could hire a hit man?

Me:  You are NOT helping to restore my faith in the universe.

* * * * * *

September 8^th, in the morning, we are getting ready for work.  In the past ten days the United States has endured several massive hurricanes in the south and horrendous wildfires in the west.

Me:  In addition to all the other crap going on, there has been a large earthquake in Mexico this morning.   It’s time to start wondering if Armageddon is coming.

Husband:  Well, at least Son finished his college education before it gets here.

Me, looking in my underwear drawer:  At least I got all my bras washed in time.

Husband:  Yes.  So you can stand before the Angel Gabriel in a clean bra.

* * * * * *

Me, reading The Jewish Chronicle weekly newspaper:  The ceremony of redemption of the firstborn donkey will be performed at the Hillel Academy.

Husband:  They better leave my ass alone.

* * * * * *

Husband is hunting through the newspaper for news about the state going broke.   He says, “I don’t see anything in here about the state budget… unless you count the obituaries.”

* * * * * *

That last one just about says it all.  The state budget is dead, once again. Our main empty-nest activity is reading the newspaper aloud to each other. The civilized world itself seems to be hurtling downhill.   We’d better be praying hard to redeem our asses. 

The Field

In memory.

The September 11th memorial in Somerset County, Pennsylvania.

Recognition of Flight 77 at  Pentagon

The field

Recognition of Flight 175 at 2 World Trade Center

In memory of two precious children
Dana Falkenberg and Zoe Falkenberg
and their father Charlie Falkenberg,
husband of Leslie Whittington
who all gave their lives that day
on Flight 77 at the Pentagon.
All friends of my brother.

In memory of Leslie Whittington,
wife of Charlie Falkenberg and
mother of Dana Falkenberg and Zoe Falkenberg

Love must prevail, somehow.

Photos taken in April 2017.