Category: Reflections in General

With the approach of our 64th wedding anniversary (2022), I’m reminded of one of our favorite gifts, one given to us by our three children for our sixtieth anniversary – a heavy, glass candy jar filled with pink, yellow, and blue strips of paper, each containing a memory of our family life as seen from their own perspectives. Some of their thoughts are summarized here, in no particular order.

Deb, using pink paper, wrote several comments about events which had a personal impact on her, ones, which, at the time, seemed to be so common that they are outside of my own memories. “D giving me chocolate for Valentines Day, when I was a lonely, feeling sorry for myself teenager. M being my role model for competence in usually male things: sports, mowing the lawn, fixing things. M [experimenting with] ambrosia and sourdough. D paying bills in front of us so we didn’t take things for granted. D being upset with me for wearing a funky old dress and cowboy boots to the job at the Medical Center. M coming to the last track meet [in high school] and I won my best [time] and she commented on how fast I was. [My] confronting her with being the tooth fairy due to an unconcealed dime in the envelope.”

There were also events which were important to Deb and Karen that are, of course, not part of my lifetime memories. “M loaned me clothes for plays [we had in high school.] M going to NYC [from Amherst] to buy [my] prom dress. M shopping for my wedding dress in Corpus.” There were also memories, which were part of my own interactions with her, that I do recall with mixed delight. “D trying to make spaghetti when Mom was gone. D could not swim in a straight line. D playing card games in Niles where the rules kept changing. D growing a beard while Mom and the boys were on vacation, and I realized I hadn’t looked at him all week. D coming to Syracuse to bring me home at the end of the semester in a snowstorm. D driving me to SA to check out Trinity and getting a flat on the way. Being sent out of his hospital room after gallbladder surgery for making him laugh too much.”

Deb also reported several memories of which I have no recollection, but probably should have. “D taking me to fireworks in Oregon when I was five and falling in a hole. D getting so mad at us for tossing a laundry bag after a trip and breaking the souvenir mug. They asked me to bring them beers outside and I brought them with ice in them and they supposed that it was a good thing I didn’t know beer wasn’t served like that.”

As was the case with Deb, Ken remembered events of a personal nature to him, but they were only of indirect notice to me or other members of the family. He wrote many of his comments in the third person on his strips of yellow paper. “[Mom and Dad] would let us open one present on Christmas Eve, and Ken took it upon himself to open a present of his choosing first thing in the morning on December 24th. Ken spent several hours verifying the accuracy of Dad’s first Texas Instruments desktop calculator. Dad drove Ken to the ER because he couldn’t walk after a fly landed on his scraped knee. Mom would beam at Ken when he would sing but would somehow manage to hear (and point out) all of the mistakes that he already knew he made. Mom laughed out loud as she typed Ken’s Psychology paper about S-E-X. We played the non-competitive Ungame as a family and it turned competitive. Disagreements were handled by sliding notes under the bedroom door.”

It also appeared that Ken was somewhat critical of my attire and, perhaps, of a few of my actions, when he wrote: “Dad would wear a Russian Karakul hat; it was certainly less embarrassing than his blue jean hat with the pocket on top. Dad used to wear turtlenecks and medallions (and had black hair.) Dad would wear a dragon ring. Dad would wear a headband to mow the lawn but would still have a bead of sweat dripping off his nose when he yelled at you. Dad would pull the keys out of the ‘63 Chevy station wagon while we were driving. Dad drove from Syracuse, NY to Niles, OH with the parking brake engaged. Dad would sit down at the kitchen table and explore every nuance when asked to explain the answer to a homework problem.”

Ken, however, was also interested in family outings when he wrote: “We were walking on campus at Cornell, and no one told Ken about the nude female model we had just passed. Dad and Ken walked up and down Bourbon Street [while Ken tried to look into the bars we passed, hoping to see an under-clad waitress.] We would go to the Huntsville prison rodeo. We saw the Harlem Globetrotters. We would go on liquor runs to New Hampshire [from Amherst.] We saw a snow streaker.”

He also remembers other family gatherings when he commented: “We would have to sit at the table until we finished our dinner or suffer the consequences of eating it for breakfast. {I don’t think that part ever happened.} The goal at dinner was to make Mom laugh until she choked or until Debbie had milk come out of her nose. We would eat Mom’s most popular dishes: sweet & sour pork, cubed steak sandwiches, Spanish rice, beef kidney, pot roast, shrimp casserole, Spluck and rice pudding. Mom had her 50th birthday party at Sally G’s house, accompanied by matching, giant, stuffed vultures.”

Ken recalled other events, which I now remember, but try to forget. “A mouse got trapped in the coil springs of the Hide-a-Bed. The cat died in the wall of the laundry room.” {Actually, she died in the ceiling.} Ken included several more positive memories of Karen, such as: “We would throw the football with Mom. Mom only wore clip-on-earrings. {I’m surprised that Ken, an English major who prefers exact wording, did not write: “Mom wore only clip-on-earrings.” On the other hand, the misplacement of “only” is one of my own pet peeves.} Ken, however, did recall the pleasant memory: “Mom would tuck us in for bed and always kiss us twice.”

Our youngest offspring, Christopher Paul, known years ago as “Kip,” had his own set of recollections about my personal foibles. “Dad being such a good sport; everyone would laugh at his lack of photographic expertise when taking pictures.” {I really didn’t take all that long before clicking the shutter!} “Dad’s use of the term Roloflex when talking about expensive watches. Everyone laughing about rolling Dad in sand after his gallbladder surgery. Dad sweating and staring down at me through his sunglasses when I would mess up while trying to help him build the brick patio [in our back yard in Amherst.] Dad trying to teach me to drive a stick shift in the Pinto; not very successful.”

Kip also had interesting reflections about Karen. “Several times at the family kitchen table keeping a story or joke going long enough to get Mom crying with laughter. Mom yelling at me to breathe when I’d cry so hard that I couldn’t catch my breath. Jumping out of our second story window [in Amherst], while I was grounded, and calling Mom from a friend’s house to tell her of my escape. {Kip, at the time, was a literalist. He had been told he could not come downstairs; climbing out the window did not violate the mandate.} Mom and Dad always being Even Stephen during Christmas time, but the three matching, small TVs stick out.”

As the youngest, Chris also had different views about our family trips. One of his blue strips states: “Family trips: Washington D.C., Colonial Williamsburg (I think), and some maple syrup mountain where a guy tripped and cracked open his head. Catching hermit crabs in Nantucket and keeping them until they stunk up the place. Several years of seeing the East Coast in reverse, because I was sitting backwards in the station wagon the entire trip to Ohio.”

Although Debbie wrote items as personal memories, her words applied to events all of us recall from those early years. “Hiding Easter baskets, labeling Christmas gifts with secret codes. Making stars and wreaths out of straws and data-punch-cards. Locking keys in the trunk at the beach [in Galveston on a holiday weekend.] All of us [laughing and] sharing a love of words and double meanings. Staying up to watch the first moon landing.”

Yes, several of the recollections of our three offspring are similar to the ones I, myself, remember with fondness and have written about in this legacy in words. Others are held as personal memories by each of the now-aging adults in our family. I’m pleased they, too, will have their own legacies in words for those who follow them: our eleven grandchildren and our current eight, great-grandchildren. Each memory, whether on not it is written on a colored strip of paper, becomes another bit, another stone, of our beautiful, growing edifice, our family.

Most of the time people can readily say what is up and what is down. I know when I’m looking above me, or below me. Except for one marvelous night at the University of Notre Dame.

Karen and I went to the university in South Bend, Indiana, for a week of study, prayer and reflection. We also looked forward to a brief vacation of living in a student dormitory, eating meals with giant football players, and attempting to recall what collegiate life had been like.

This opportunity came, many years ago, when we were deeply involved in spiritual direction. Back then, the University of Notre Dame offered multiple courses relating to this ministry. Classes were held during four, independent weeks each summer. Karen and I were not able to allocate our time for an entire series, but we could dedicate a week to participate in classes we thought we would enjoy; sometimes for the same subject, but usually different ones offered during the three summers we spent in South Bend.

This college town in northern Indiana can become very warm in July for buildings without air-conditioning. A midwestern dormitory room is very stifling in the evening when you really would like to be able to fall asleep. That is why, one evening, I went in search of a cool place to sit before another fruitless attempt to sleep indoors.

I found a bench below a canopy of what might have been poplar trees. I’m not a horticulturist, so I’m not sure of the species, but I do vividly recall the small, rounded leaves above me. Or were they below me?!

I lay peacefully on the bench. There were ornamental light-poles surrounding the miniature plaza I had found. Their illumination reflected on the leaves, turning them into gold coins against a black, velvet background. However, in my reclined position, half on my side and half on my back pressed against the bench, I was unsure if I saw these leaves suspended above me or floating on a quiet pond beneath me. I felt the breeze and, in magnificent comfort, marveled at the sight before my open eyes. It did not matter whether I was really looking toward the darkened heavens or deeply into a pool over which I floated. I’m not sure how long I rested there, not wanting to return to earth and a stuffy, dormitory enclosure. I was mesmerized by the brilliant luster of the coins I beheld. Finally, with deep sighs, I returned to the dorm before midnight, when its doors would be locked for the evening. On the other hand, perhaps there would have been an advantage having a valid reason to remain outside with God’s glory surrounding me.

Fortunately, this was not the only time I had a moving experience at the school dedicated to “Our Lady.”

There was the night of the electrical storm. There are few events more exciting, more awesome, than experiencing a lightening attack in a northern climate in midsummer, especially at night. The electrical power on campus had gone off, because of the fury of the storm, but the energy of the cosmos remained in full display outside our windows facing the golden dome of Notre Dame. It was impossible to count the number of flashes, or to determine the seconds between each illumination and the all-encompassing thunderous vibrations which attacked our ears and body simultaneously. Heavenly searchlights strobed the campus buildings and landscape outside our protective windowpanes. I do not recall how long the spectacle continued, nor how much damage resulted from the wind and downpours adding to the wonders of the storm. The next morning, on the way to the opening prayer service which began each day, there were numerous broken branches covering the walkways. I do not recall the results, but the wondrous recollections of the university’s golden dome bathed in heavenly light is not easily forgotten.

Or course, I also have fond memories of other events occurring at Notre Dame that are not part of the awesome nature of the divine. There are small, peaceful recollections. They include minutes for prayer in the grotto dedicated to, and modeled after, Our Lady of Lourdes in France. I’ve never visited the real one, but the Notre Dame version offered a quiet place for meditation.

Another quiet place was located along the trails high above the lake on the edge of the campus. After all, the complete name of the university is Notre Dame du Lac, so, it would be inappropriate for there not to be a lake. The university, of course, has two: St Joseph’s and St Mary’s. The trail around St Joseph’s passes the Seminary, which offers its own magnificent views of the campus, and an opportunity to visit the ducks which inhabit it.

I also remember Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer gatherings in various chapels and in the Basilica of the Sacred Heart with its huge, standing fans that blew warm air across the congregation, who would have preferred a cooler breeze but had to survive with what was available. A better way to attempt to be cool was the result of discovering the ice cream store hidden in the basement of one of the academic halls on the campus. The afternoon was not complete without having a cone to lick.

The events I remember from our visits to the University of Notre Dame are now aggregated within a mosaic of beautiful pieces. One of the major images I still hold somewhere in my memory is that of the “woman at the well” who sits there, listening to the Jesus across from her. I do not recall to which of the three summers this, or other images, are assigned, but it does not matter. Touchdown Jesus, who guards one exterior wall of the Hesburgh Library, can be seen and remembered every year. The same enduring recollection occurs with Moses, who stands in front of the Library, with unraised arm and finger indicating that those he leads remain “number one,” even if his toes are rubbed to a golden shine by each passing student – unless some wag has applied pink nail polish to them.

My personal, football-related event occurred one summer when I had time to walk to the Stadium and visit the office of Lou Holtz, the then-current coach. Lou and I had been fraternity brothers at Kent State. He was a magnificent comedian even back then; his additional wit and wisdom were honed over the intervening years. We had not seen each other since graduation, except for a few moments after a Texas-Arkansas game held in Houston. When I asked his secretary whether he was in and available, she replied that “coach” is never seen without an appointment, which she would be happy to make for me. Since she admitted Lou was, indeed, in his office, I asked her if she might inform him of my presence. She finally agreed and, a few moments later, returned with a surprised response that Lou would come out to meet me. My fraternity brother and I spent a very happy half-hour reminiscing about our days at KSU. When I finally left, his secretary still had a puzzled expression.

It’s also puzzling to me just how vivid the memories are of those visits to Notre Dame more than thirty years ago. On the other hand, I still have the blue, lightweight jacket I bought back then in the campus store. I’m reluctant, at times, to wear it, since I’m not really a graduate of Notre Dame. However, the three summers, when I was enrolled in classes there, do link me with the school more than some “streetcar” alumni who root for the Irish, but have never been to the campus. At least I ate and slept there. At the same time, like those other extended-alumni, I may not recall what I learned there.

I do not remember what lectures I attended, except for one instance involving a week-long course on the Enneagram, a study of personality types based upon nine different categories associated with ingrained behaviors. At the time, both Karen and I were deeply involved with learning more about ourselves and the ways we interact with other people. The week-long course was offered by “founders” of the technique. Of the nine types, I was a “five” – one with the behavior pattern of an intellectual, solitude-desiring, observer. My symbolic animal was the owl!

I remember that at the end of the week, the members of the class were to gather into nine groups reflective of their common behavior pattern. The half dozen or so of us who had self-identified as being a “five,” gathered on the lawn outside the Library. And there we sat. We quietly looked at one another, not saying a word. Until I finally commented to the effect, “Well, which half of us wants to sit here looking at the other half while they talk. That would show which of us are really ‘fives!’” We all laughed and began our discussion.

Perhaps this is why that night in South Bend, I so greatly enjoyed looking at golden coins suspended against the black, velvet curtain above me as well as those floating on the inky pool beneath me. It’s ok for a “five” to look both up and down, to keep observing the details – in all directions.

There are times when I yearn for the good ol’ days, the truly old ones – real or imaginary. However, the real ones would probably not be to my liking, with their plagues and lack of plumbing, to say nothing of electricity. The imaginary days of the High Middle Ages or early Renaissance of Italy and England are more acceptable for fun when seen through the eyes of visitors to the Texas Renaissance Festival, called in the current age: RenFest.

The first time we passed through the wooden gate to its ancient-looking fields was in the autumn of 1978, a year after our arrival in Texas. Back then, it was a long drive to Plantersville, where the original buildings for the festival had been erected only a few years previously but seemed as if they had been transported to Texas from Europe centuries ago. Four decades later, the drive-time has increased, thanks to the traffic of some hundred-thousand visitors on a normal weekend. Additional buildings have been constructed that now include plumbing, and the lanes between them are less muddy than in the earliest years.

For many of the some twenty-odd times we’ve visited the Festival, we have been greeted by Madrigal singers who quickly set the ambience for all who enter the fairgrounds. Karen, during our faculty years in college towns, enjoyed singing with fellow Madrigals. I equally enjoyed listening to their concerts. On the other hand, it is even more enjoyable standing outdoors, with bright sunshine and a light breeze, while hearing lilting harmonies produced by young men and women in costumes relevant to the time in which they were composed. Yes, music, in general, is an essential part of the RenFest ambience, whether it comes from Madrigals or other performers with drums, lutes, flutes and crumhorns. The sound of a harpist among the trees is a transforming experience. For a different kind of musical interlude, a young man, lightly passing a wet finger around the rim of glasses containing varying volumes of water, can create a sound unmatched by a more formal instrument.

Troubadours, jongleurs, and minnesingers compete for attention as they wander through the wooded fields of RenFest. For nonverbal action, visitors can be fascinated by the antics of jugglers, knife throwers and fire eaters as they perform on stages throughout the festival grounds. These troupers are rivaled only by the mischief of jesters, including Dead Bob, a puppet on the arm of a man who has been entertaining his audiences for several decades.

Visitors, many dressed in authentic or in anachronistic costumes, add to the milieu. We discovered that their interactions within the crowds of people were even more entertaining the year when we brought with us our new associate vicar, Fr. Sunny, who had recently arrived from India. We told him we thought he should experience “wenches” while he was in the States. He was greatly amused by everything and everyone he saw, saying he had no idea Americans could dress so foolishly. He must have taken several rolls of photos during his hours with us at RenFest that year.

Although memories stored in the mind are the real treasures of a day at the festival, it is seldom possible to avoid buying something from the shoppes along the winding lanes of the fairgrounds. Can a passerby really not need another ceramic coffee mug or toothbrush holder? Or silver jewelry: rings, medallions, bracelets, or necklaces, each with or without gaudy gems.

The potential buyer can be readily enticed by many a skilled craftsman to purchase the wares crowding their wooden shelves. One year, I bought a cap made from a frayed pair of jeans positioned so that a hip-pocket is found on the top of it! I’m not sure how, another year, we managed to bring home a large, maple, wooden rocker for the corner of our living room. Yes, like at the real, annual, traveling fair of the 14th century, townspeople can be convinced by an itinerant merchant that a strange item is really a necessity for a happy life.

On the other hand, the real pleasure, albeit for a limited time, is not the trinket you buy but the food you consume in the fresh, open air. It is only under these conditions a person can eat an entire turkey leg. Followed by a funnel-cake weighed down with a quarter inch of confectioner’s sugar, or by an elephant’s ear of equal size and complexity. A more sensible treat might be a scotch-egg, but who eats sensibly at an outdoor fair on a sunny afternoon?

This year of 2020, however, might lead to a more sensible result in what one eats. Part of the pleasure in all previous years of RenFest has been noshing while walking. The fun comes in trying not to miss your mouth while avoiding bumping into the costumed crowds on every side. But, for this year of Covid-19, there is a new requirement. Those who eat must remain in seated and socially distanced sites. No longer can you carry that turkey leg as you move to the next venue.

As in the real Middle Ages, a plague has returned to the town, the countryside and the fairgrounds. No longer may you see the foot-long, pointy mask stuffed with pungent herbs worn by 14th century physicians, but face masks are again visible. They may be plain or decorated like the ones worn by Venetians in the days before Mardi Gras and the beginning of a sober Lent. Merriment has not mutated in a thousand years, even if the pandemic has.

Over the last year (2021), much has been written about returning to “normal” or accommodating to a “new normal.” Many people long for a return to a time before COVID-19 and its growing effects. Before 2020, who thought about social distancing except in terms of crossing the street to avoid a particular person you did not want to meet – a former friend with whom you had a bitter argument, a thuggish-looking man, or even a panhandler. Fist bumping was confined to teenagers, perhaps those bordering on delinquency. A person entering a bank while wearing a mask was a threat to everyone present. Waiting in a doctor’s office with only a few patients sitting on the other side of the room meant that the physician probably was not really one you wanted to see.

There was a time when one driver could express annoyance with another driver and not fear being shot as a result of their different opinions on the validity of an action. In fact, many claim there was a time when someone with a different opinion on either politics or other social issues was not automatically thought to be a demon, deserving imprisonment in an everlasting Hell.

There was also a time when children walked or were bussed to school every day. Afterwards, they might mess around at the local mall before going home to watch a current TV broadcast. According to many observers, that was the era which existed before our “new normal.” On the other hand, I now wonder if there ever was a time when events were truly “normal.”

Was it normal when our own parents were young and were concerned about the Spanish flu? Was their response with the Charleston a normal one along with the other events of the Roaring Twenties to which they wanted to return when the Great Depression arrived? Perhaps the growth of food lines and the dust bowl of the Midwest was the new normal. It was unlikely, however, that many people wanted to return to the Hoover years when FDR became president and the new normal of war in Europe and Asia occupied everyone’s lives.

Following D-Day and, shortly thereafter, in August 1945, with the dropping of an atomic bomb on Hiroshima and on Nagasaki, we entered years of a new normal, the silent generation, a time when students trained to hide under their school desks, while their parents dug shelters in backyards across America. Were the years of the Cold War, the construction of the Berlin wall, and Nikita Khrushchev’s shoe-banging more normal than the new normal after Michael Gorbachev, Boris Yeltsin or Vladimir Putin came into power? Did Americans prefer the normal events during the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the First and Second Gulf Wars, the Afghanistan War or the invasions of Cuba or of Granada? Was the time of the Cuban Missel Crisis, albeit brief, a time for a new normal? Should incursions into Ukraine or rocket launches of North Korea become the new normal?

How many adapted to the spread of polio viruses in the new normal of the mid-forties and were reluctant, in the mid-fifties, to have either themselves or their children be injected with the Salk vaccine or require them to consume sugar cubes laced with the Sabin vaccine? In fact, when did the routine vaccination for smallpox, whooping cough, chicken pox, rubella and mumps, as well as for measles, become the new normal for children entering school? Were the years of HIV and AIDS to be longed for when the new normal of vaccines and other treatments became available?

On the social front, did the march from Selma to Montgomery Alabama usher in a new normal? Or did the assignation of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the riots in Washington, D.C. in 1968 initiate a new normal in the civil rights movement until the assignation of George Floyd began another new normal? What kind of a new normal has arisen because of the latest riot or insurrection in Washington, D.C. on January 6, 2021?

How does a new normal differ from a change, a significant change, in our social life? Do we attempt to change the present without really knowing what we truly want for the future and directing our efforts toward this desire?

Most humans have a tendency to fear change; they desire to maintain the status quo. They seek the normal. The problem is that the current normal may never have been normal! Although it might appear that in the Middle Ages there were decades when little really changed, when the life of one’s grandparents mirrored the life of most living peasants, this was not really the case. The Renaissance did not arrive out of nothingness. The Age of Enlightenment was preceded by another new normal when sailing ships circumnavigated the globe. The Industrial Age of steam power was the new normal until replaced by electric power. Coal was the new normal before gas, solar and wind became the latest resources desired by that Industry, an Industry of machines which has become an Industry of Service.

Change may bring about either destruction or production. Change may be for either the better or for the worse. Change can be thwarted or promoted. Change and a new normal are inevitable. There is an ancient motto: Non progredi est regredi … not to go forward is to go backward. This may be the only conclusion that never changes!

Every English manor house comes with its own reading room, which is my favorite site in movies about the Brits, whether they are cozy mysteries or variations of Downton Abbey. We, of course, never lived in a place with a separate library, although we came close during our first year in Corvallis, Oregon, a town not like any thatched-roof village in the mid-lands. Nevertheless, our rental home did include a formal study with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves along three walls and a large window with its own built-in bench. Although those English films might have the hero, or especially the heroine, reading while lounging in that nook, I never cozied up in ours, with a book in hand. I preferred a more comfortable chair. The ideal one would have a soft, wing-back on which I could rest my head while traveling to far-off times and places.

I actually found such a chair and a special location during the four years I lived in Ithaca, New York and attended Cornell University. Being a graduate student, who was suppose to be either experimenting in the biochemistry laboratory or studying in a cramped corral in the library, I enjoyed escaping, several time a week, to the library in Willard Straight Hall. This Student Center, designed as an English collegiate hall, had a magnificent two-story library with its own quiet nooks and comfortable wing-back chairs. With great guilt, I occupied one of them to become engrossed with science-fiction stories in lieu of the biochemical facts I should have been examining, elsewhere. After all, reading was the only way in which to separate a beleaguered mind from the surrounding reality. Now, there are computer games and social-media to benumb the overactive brain. Back then, there were only books.

I became addicted to them at an early age, although I cannot recall where I consumed them. I remember how much I enjoyed fairy-tales when I was in elementary school. There were the classic offerings of the Grimm Brothers and Hans Christian Anderson. At the time, I did not realize that they were actually psychological texts designed for educating the minds of children about the world to come. Later in life, I realized that mythology from Greece, Rome, Scandinavia, Japan and the American tribal nations had the same mission.

I probably engaged in these adventures while tucked away in my bedroom, although I do not recall any special furniture I required for my fictional travels. No doubt my bed was the locale, since I do recall piles of books piled on the night-stand beside it. I seldom confined myself to finishing one book before starting another. Science-fiction and mysteries written under the name of Ellery Queen could be readily intermingled. The Roman Hat Mystery and The Greek Coffin Mystery mixed well with stories by Ray Bradbury and Isaac Asimov. Most of them were read in daily, noon-hour sessions in the Niles McKinley library, a block away from my high school, where I spent most of the time allotted for the mid-day lunch, carried there in brown-bags which the librarian must have ignored. A site near the front door had comfortable chairs and plenty of fiction books for spontaneous reading during rainy weather or cold, wintery, slush-filled days. However, most of my reading-for-fun was undertaken during the summer months and in outdoor settings.

Since reading during the school year was required mainly for course work, June through August would be set aside for reading other books. The best place was on the swing, either on the porch of the house we rented, or the one hidden by a tall, pine tree in front of my grandmother’s farm-house. Reading for pleasure became part of a slow, back-and-fourth movement. Later, this pleasure could be derived from the swing, itself, while contemplating the thoughts in my mind coming from sources other than printed words on a page.

Several years ago, I discovered it is possible to read while engaged in another form of movement. It is not difficult to read from an e-book while pedaling a stationary bike in the gym at Eagle’s Trace. While I’m quite willing to read from an electronic book, I am still partial to the one with hand-turned pages. I also admit that some books are so heavy that they can be wearisome to hold and difficult to prop up on one’s stomach. When reading fiction, I am reluctant to sit at a table or desk, as I once had to do in order to pursue the contents of a science text.

Many people claim to enjoy reading while sitting in an open café and sipping a cup; I prefer to watch people passing by, rather than confine my sight to mere letters. There are multiple forms of isolation; in some, the observer can see more of the immediate world than the one held in the mind, itself.

Outdoor reading and observing can be compatible. Indoor reading is usually devoid of an opportunity for observation of the world around us. I do, however, enjoy sitting in a comfortable lounge chair with my feet up, while engaging in reading current novels, mysteries, science-fiction, history or philosophy. There is a time when I found multi-tasking to be possible – watching TV and reading during the commercials. Concentration is now more difficult. The same is true for reading in bed.

There were years, not too long ago, when I did a lot of reading while reclining on a day-bed couch in my study. Late at night, I may still spend twenty or thirty minutes propped up in my bed, which can be adjusted to various positions for comfortable reading. However, when reclining, my tendency is to close my eyes much sooner than I once did.

During my early years, reading fiction or even non-fiction was required in order to move away from the surrounding world. My thoughts were made from the words of other people. Now, in recent years, I have found that contemplation and meditation do not depend upon the written word. I am content to confine my reading room to the space within my own mind. It abides within me no matter where I roam.

A recent issue of the Houston Chronicle (July 2022) had an essay by Chris Vognar entitled: Bookstores Offer a Sacred Space to Find Comfort. His premise captured me, although he had little to say, specifically, about the sacredness of bookstores he has known. Rather, his focus was on the demise of independent bookstores, especially during the economic collapse associated with the COVID epidemic, when so many small businesses could no longer sustain themselves. His words, however, led me to my own reflection on bookstores, which, at times in my life, I have found to be, indeed, sacred places dedicated to a spiritual existence beyond the mundane. There have been many chapels, many oratorios, in my academic life. A college town cannot exist without at least one place to congregate with others or to isolate oneself for meditation in a hidden alcove.

Of course, there is also the opposite, warehouse-like space for the sale of required textbooks. In these cathedrals, the seeker’s quest is to locate the desired course number on the small card taped to metal racks holding all of the books the professor wants students to purchase before their class begins. The only true decision is whether to buy a new copy or one which, like Harry Potter’s potions manual, has been underlined and annotated by someone who may have added either helpful guidelines or markers toward erroneous bypaths. Being enrolled in science courses, I chose new editions in which to preserve my own personal notes to be kept for reference years later.

I seldom sold my texts back to the bookstore at the end of the term. In fact, the basic biochemistry book I used during graduate school may still be found tucked away in the bottom of my cabinet of collegiate relics. Yes, the storage of old books is a significant problem when they are treated like Jewish scripture which cannot be destroyed, but only buried for discovery centuries later.

Over the years, I’ve tried to reduce the number of bookcases containing editions purchased long ago and seldom reread. Moving has been helpful, since old, un-reread books have been the first items for disposal. All else becomes easier to eliminate, once the decision has been made to downsize my library.

When I began my academic life, my books were shelved on wooden boards supported by red bricks which could be reassembled to conform to the height of their content. When we lived in Oregon, our old house had a study with build-in bookshelves lining three walls. They were completely occupied by books, not with any extraneous do-dads.

Most college towns have at least two sacred spaces dedicated to quiet contemplation of the written word. There is the on-campus bookstore devoted mainly to orthodox studies. In the town, itself, there may be a small shrine for solitude among the hard- and soft-backs gathered for perusal. In most of them, the icons are arranged in denominational order, fiction or nonfiction, with subcategories of romance or action, sci-fi or reality, novels or poetry as well as biological or physical sciences, politics or economics, and mathematics or astrology.

However, my favorite bookstore had its unique method for alluring consumers. The Odyssey Bookstore in South Hadley Massachusetts, the site of Mount Holyoke College, organized its shelves according to the names of the publishing houses. If the exploring customer did not know the name of the publisher of the sought-after book, the first stop was made at the desk holding copies of the Latest Books in Print. Having consulted this oracle, the supplicant would move on to the underground cavern of books in search of the section housing all of the works of the given publisher. Within each publishing house section, the books, themselves, were arranged according to authors.

On the surface, this may seem to be an inefficient way to organize books. However, for the store it was a magnificent way to sell them! Instead of being held captive in a section called, for example, Medieval History, the reader would be confronted by books on every imaginable topic. The Odyssey’s goal was for the explorer to pass through strange lands and, perhaps, spot an exotic species which would entice a purchase that would never have been made if he had been on a routine quest for a previously identified creature. Although I was frequently enthralled by this strategy, I usually did not succumb to it, because of another condition I had, “Option Glut.”

I enjoy wandering through bookstores, spotting titles of editions I would enjoy reading. There are few areas of knowledge that do not intrigue my interest. Every offering I see in a bookstore appears to have potential for becoming a favorite way to spend several hours of my life. The mere size of the collection of books surrounding me leads to this condition of “glut.” Having too many choices, I’m unable to make any choice at all! I look. I am enticed. I walk away. I may not even buy the book which I had planned to purchase when I came into the shop.

However, this condition of “Option Glut” has not significantly reduced the number of books I have bought over the last six decades! Even with downsizing, our current apartment has five large bookcases, two in my room and one each in Karen’s room, in our bedroom and in our living room.

When COVID 19 changed our life patterns, I made the decision to reduce the size of my personal collection. Although, upon moving to Eagle’s Trace, I gave a bookcase of theological writings to the library at St Mary’s Seminary, and Karen made similar donations of her spirituality books to The Cenacle and to Eagle’s Trace, we still have books overflowing our storage capabilities. However, my current protocol requires that I read, or at least scan, every book before I retire it.

I must admit there may be a deep psychological problem associated with a reduction of my personal library. Many years ago, I told myself that, before I died, I’d read every book I own. This self-vow may have led to my not finishing a number of books I’ve started to read! At the same time, I may fear that reducing the number of books I own may decrease the number of years left in my life. I also believe a comfortable recliner in my apartment is even a better place for contemplation than a bookshop with its own soft chair. Thus, I remain a bibliophile and eschew becoming a bibliophobe, regardless of the vow I made long ago!

“When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.’ ’The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things.’ ’The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master — that’s all.”

Members of today’s culture seem to be close followers of Mr. Dumpty. They employ words I have a great difficulty in understanding. One of them is “Woke Generation.” According to some sources, this phrase originated as part of African-American Vernacular English. I seem to recall hearing about Black Speech, or nonstandard English, many years ago, although I lost track of it when “rapping” became popular. I am unaware of when such words were formalized as AAVE.

Nevertheless, the Woke Generation became evident more than ten years ago. The phrase identified those who were alert to the conditions leading to racial prejudice and discrimination. The term became broadened to include awareness of other social inequalities, such as sexism. Its focus was enlarged from an interest limited to the effects of white privilege on Blacks and of reparations for descendants of formerly enslaved people to a focus that would include all issues relating to social justice. Activists in the Black Lives Matter movement began to use the term to include those who urge awareness of police abuses. At the same time, the words “woke generation” were employed by Conservatives as a pejorative to include those who follow an intolerant and moralizing ideology in which political correctness has gone too far.

This, of course, brings us to the term, Political Correctness. Originally, the words were used to identify and avoid any language, policies, or actions that might give offense, or result in a disadvantage, to members of particular groups in society, especially minorities or those considered to be “disadvantaged.” Again, the phrase became a pejorative with an implication that any inclusions, relating to these referenced policies, are excessive or unwarranted.

Humpty Dumpty was alive and well. He became the subject of academic investigations labeled: Critical Race Theory. Discussion of the topic originally was limited to a cross-disciplinary intellectual and social movement of civil-rights scholars and activists who examined the intersection of race and law as applied to racial justice. They studied whether racism is the result of complex changing social and institutional dynamics rather than from the explicit and intentional prejudices of individuals. Are the interests of white people, in relationship with those of people of color, due to governmental laws that are not neutral, but play significant roles in maintaining racially unjust social order? Accordingly, CRT would maintain that race is not “biologically grounded,” but is a social construct used by a white society to oppress and exploit people of color.

In the last few years, this advanced academic study has moved into the general population, who questions whether it should be taught at elementary and secondary educational levels in public schools. As a result, Conservative lawmakers have sought to ban or restrict the instruction of CRT, along with other anti-racism education, so that the predominate white society will not feel shamed for its former actions.

Part of the problem involves the use of “narrative” in describing the history of people. In one narrative, people of color, considered outsiders in mainstream US culture, are portrayed in media and law through stereotypes and stock characters that have been adapted over time to shield the dominant culture from discomfort and guilt. One narrative begins with slaves in the 18th-century Southern States depicted as childlike and docile. Harriet Beecher Stowe adapted this stereotype, through her character Uncle Tom, rendering him as a gentle, long-suffering, pious Christian. Following the Civil War, the African-American woman was depicted as a wise, care-giving “Mammy” figure. During the Reconstruction period, African-American men were stereotyped as brutish and bestial, a danger to white women; the epic film The Birth of a Nation, celebrating the actions of the Ku Klux Klan, was an example of this narrative. During the Harlem Renaissance, African-Americans were depicted as “musically talented” and “entertaining.” Al Jolson, a white minstrel-man, preserved this image. Following World War II, African Americans were portrayed as cocky and street-smart or as a safe, comforting, cardigan-wearing, TV-sitcom character.

Very recently, the narrative for race has been expanded as a result of comments by Whoopie Goldberg, a successful Black entertainer, who said that the Holocaust was an example of man’s inhumanity against man, in which both the master and the victim were white people. She has been criticized for an erroneous interpretation, since it was the Jewish race that was the victim of the Nazis who, as the Aryan race, sought to exterminate what they called the inferior Jewish race. As a result, her appearance on a daily TV show was cancelled for three weeks, even though she recanted her error.

This event calls to mind another phrase, Cancel Culture, which is a modern form of ostracism more often used in debates on free speech and censorship rather than for a television program. With this term, Conservatives refer to those who are perceived to have suffered disproportionate reactions as a result of politically incorrect speech. In these instances, support is withdrawn, or cancelled, for public figures who have done or said something considered objectionable or offensive. According to them, cancel culture resembles vigilante justice employed to punish and shame dissenters.

Yes, Humpty Dumpty appears to be alive and well, using words according to his own definitions. On the other hand, Lewis Carroll, penned another short rhyme, one which may have future relevance: ”Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall/ Humpty Dumpty had a great fall/ All the king’s horses and all the king’s men/ Couldn’t put Humpty together again.”

Is “thanksgiving” a day or a condition? During much of my younger life, it was merely the fourth Thursday of November, when I would be forced to endure a visit “up-the-hill,” the site where my father’s family lived. We always went there for this annual event.

My grandparents and their unmarried children lived in the old homestead. In other reflections, I have described this place. However, for memories of Thanksgiving meals consumed there, I need mention only the first floor which held two kitchens – one for eating and one for cooking and storing everything else needed for the family’s existence.

As for the Thanksgiving dinner, itself, there were always two meats: some sort of beef and some form of chicken. Occasionally, they might be replaced with pork chops or sausage. I cannot remember ever having a turkey on that table. Of course, there would be spaghetti, served in a bowl approximately the size of one used for bathing a small child. The salad bowl was almost as large. There must have been cooked vegetables as well, but they are not part of my recollection. It’s likely they were string beans or beets, since these were the only readily available canned crops from my grandfather’s large garden. After all, it was November, long after fresh produce would be available. Dessert would usually be apple pie and pumpkin pie. A real treat would be mincemeat pie, but it was not served nearly as often as I would have liked.

During dinner, there would be Italian conversation, which is everyone shouting simultaneously in Italian without anyone really listening to what was proclaimed. At least, this is what I assumed to be the case. Since neither my mother nor I understood Italian, I’m really not sure what information was ever exchanged during mealtime.

After the meal was finished, there was an opportunity for card-playing. No evening, and especially Thanksgiving evening, would be complete without a friendly exchange of insults over a hand of Hearts. The alternative would be a game of Canasta, which was accompanied by complaints of too much “freezing the pile.” The game would end when the number of angry players exceeded the number of non-angry relatives or when Uncle Joe would take his nap – whichever came first.

During the years when I lived in Niles, I spent Thanksgiving according to this unchanging pattern. When I left Niles for my four years at Kent State, I was able to avoid going home for the Holiday, even though almost every other student in this commuter college did vacate its dorms and fraternity houses. I, personally, enjoyed a quiet dinner at the Robin Hood, the main restaurant on the edge of the campus.

For the first four years of our marriage, it was expected that Karen and I would split Thanksgiving Day between our two families. At the time, we were living in Ithaca, New York. We went, first, to Sandusky to spend Wednesday and half of Thursday with Karen’s parents and brother. Her sister, Tami, lived in another state, but it was not required that she and her husband return to her hometown for family dinners on the holidays.

We always went to Sandusky before going to Niles, in eastern Ohio, where we could “stop” on our way back to New York. It was expected that there would be a full Thanksgiving meal for lunch in Sandusky and another one for dinner in Niles, with my parents. Actually, this procedure did not go according to plan for our first post-wedding Thanksgiving. An extensive snowstorm in northern Ohio prevented our drive from Sandusky to Niles on Thursday afternoon. We enjoyed an overnight stay in Cleveland, as described in another recollection, The Honeymoon. Our second Thanksgiving dinner was on Friday in Niles.

When we moved farther East, to New Hampshire, our attendance at a Thanksgiving celebration in Ohio was cancelled. Our move to Oregon resulted in the discontinuation of Christmas in Ohio, as well. By then, we were building our own nuclear family, and it was acceptable for holidays to be focused on our own children. Thanksgiving dinner for the five of us consisted of the traditional turkey and stuffing, which had to be made from Pepperidge Farm bread cubes, sausage and turkey liver! Of course, lime Jell-O with fruit cocktail was also mandatary, even if the Pilgrims never had it.

As the years passed, we added other relatives to our Thanksgiving dinner. When we retired and moved to Eagle’s Trace, changes occurred. Our children and grandchildren became responsible for providing the gathering site. Sometimes, Karen and I would join with either Deb and her husband or with Chris, Kelly and their girls at a local hotel buffet. In recent years, with the growth of the independent families of our children and grandchildren, Karen and I have begun to participate with our own friends in the Thanksgiving dinner provided by our retirement community.

After our marriage and the beginning of a new family, the appearances of a Norman Rockwell dinner were there, but the feelings of the true meaning of the day came much later, when our daughter and two sons would gather with us and their extended families for a special meal. It was then that I began to realize what family gratitude really meant.

On the side wall in the kitchen “up-the-hill,” there was a picture of an old man praying over a bowl of porridge and a loaf of bread on his own table, which also held a bible and a pair of reading glasses. Many years later, Uncle Joe gave me this illustration, knowing how much it had been my favorite. It now hangs on our own kitchen wall.

So, yes, I am very thankful for the hours we spent talking and laughing as we consumed our Thanksgiving dinner. I am grateful for the presence of all of us gathered around a table in different parts of our country where we lived at the time. On the other hand, maybe the image of an old man praying over a loaf of bread, a bowl of porridge and a bible is what Thanksgiving really should mean for all of us.

The Christmas season is supposed to be “the happiest time of the year.” That may be true for secular carols heard on radio and seen on TV for the weeks between Thanksgiving and December 25, but in real life, at least my real life, this has not always been my perception. When I was very young, I did have hope and happiness, but they disappeared as the years dragged on.

I do recall with nostalgic fondness a few Christmas Eves of my very early childhood, that time before I recognized what family life actually held for me. The evening of December 24 was celebrated with a gathering at the Moransky farm in Mineral Ridge, the place where my mother had lived and where I was born.

The evening began with a dinner in the family dining room; a second dining room, the formal dining room, was seldom used, even if it held a table and chairs that would accommodate a medium sized gathering for a meal. That formal dining room was used only during a wake or for very special occasions. The real dinners were served in an informal, slightly larger room between the front parlor and the kitchen. This was more of a “commons” room, one where relatives gathered for coffee and conversations, or if a sewing or other craft project was underway.

For holiday meals, my aunts would bring casseroles from home. The main course would be prepared by my grandmother in her own kitchen. For Christmas eve, there was, of course, no meat to be served. Well before the modifications of the Second Vatican Council, December 24 was a major day for fast and abstinence. The fasting obligation ended with the Christmas Eve dinner, but the abstinence from all meat products remained firmly in place. Thus, my grandmother would prepare something with fish, but there were usually sufficient alternatives so I could always find something that was edible.

I do remember the straw. In commemoration of the stable origin of Christmas, a Polish dinner table always had bits of straw tucked under the tablecloth. A few pieces always stuck out as a visual reminder of the event. We were a very happy group of relatives smashed together around the one table. Unlike at other events during the rest of the year, there was no separate eating location for children. Somehow, chairs brought from every room in the house could be placed around the dinner table, thanks to the two new “leaves” added to increase its length.

The meal would end with the sharing of the oplatek (pronounced: opwatek) which was a wafer-thin bread that looked like a large communion host. It would be passed around the table and each person would break off a piece to be consumed together as a blessing prayer was recited by all of us. And then, for some mysterious reason, my Uncle Chuck would ask for his shaving mug; it seemed he had a sudden urge to shave! As I grew older, I recognized that the shaving mug looked a lot like a handbell.

While Uncle Chuck shaved, the rest of us continued to nibble on cookies and sip coffee or milk. Then we heard Santa ring his handbell from the second parlor, the one next to the formal parlor used only for wakes and special occasions (like that other dining room!) This was the signal that we could leave the dinner table and enter that second parlor where the decorated Christmas tree was located. Now there were presents under it. Santa had left his early gifts, one for each of us. The night ended with carols and sleepy kids packed off in cars for their trips home.

Christmas Day, itself, would begin with an early Mass for my mother and me. In the afternoon, we would head “up-the-hill” for Christmas dinner with my father’s family. It would be followed, as usual, with card-playing. There was no difference in a Christmas gathering and the one for Thanksgiving.

Shortly after I turned seven, the Moransky gathering was no longer held. Until I left for college, my parents and I continued to “go-up-the hill” on Christmas Day. During those remaining years before college, Christmas, itself, was a dreary time. A few days before Christmas, my mother would give me her annual present, usually clothing of some sort. I would give her another bottle of Evening in Paris cologne. For my sophomore year of high school, I received a desk for my bedroom. For my first year in college, I received a reel-to-reel tape recorder.

My Christmas season was not a time for happy exchanges among relatives. There would usually be a family argument about putting up and taking down the tree a few days before and after December 25. It was also the annual time for other blowup, as my father would pronounce there would be major changes for the new year, with the implication that there would be less money for anything except absolute necessities.

Later in life, with great effort, I introduced significant changes in my personal celebration of Christmas with my own family. Over the years, the Day became a major time for a newly formed family gathering. I looked forward with pleasure, and not with dread and anxiety, to happy hours with all of our offspring.

Later, as the family expanded into another generation, I truly enjoyed our rooms filled with active kids in our home on Christmas day. There were times I would have preferred those gifts be unwrapped with some sense of order, but no matter how sedately they started, the event usually ended with everyone tearing open packages at the same time.

The days prior to the twenty-fifth we tried to keep guesses about packages under the tree to a minimum. Each year, there was a different coding system devised to lessen the chances of knowing who was receiving which package(s). Our bright youngsters usually deciphered the code within a few hours of the presents being placed in view under the tree.

Over the decades the sequence of events has varied. The Christmas Eve mass, once attended by all of the adults, now has a limited gathering. Often Karen and I have gone, after an early mass, to Chris’ home for dinner.

The Chinese lunch on Christmas Day has disappeared. (Strangely, we found that only Chinese restaurants were open on December 25.) However, attempts have been made to hold a Christmas lunch for as many as may be able to attend sometime the week before, or a few days after, Christmas Day. The venue has varied between Oriental Gardens and the Brookwood Cafe.

In these last retirement years, our apartment can no longer accommodate three children, their spouses, our eleven grandchildren and our eight great-grandchildren. Since they have their own families and a need for their own celebrations, our expanded family now assembles at Ken’s home, with his large clan, a few days after December 25 for the exchange of gifts. Yes, now the Twelve Days of Christmas are, indeed, the “happiest time of the year.”

Tradition says that January First begins a new year, one with joyful expectations. Not quite true in reality, at least for me. As I’ve written in other reflections, my own “new” year, for many years, began with September and the start of the academic year. When I was a young boy, the evening of December 31 did mean I could, officially, stay up late to listen to the events happening in New York City, a wonder-world away from me, both in time and in space.

That last day of December was spent doing a little bit of everything, I would like to do in the following twelve months. My own tradition maintained that what you did on the last day of the year was a portent of every day of the future. In the evening, while listening to the radio, I created a personal calendar for the coming year. With a booklet format, I made numbered boxes and, on the top of each page, drew a picture to illustrate the month. I’m not sure I actually used the finished project during the next months. By the time I was in junior high school, I was committed to my daily journal entries and had no need for a separate calendar.

The actual celebration of New Year’s Eve never occurred in my house. New Year’s Day was merely another day, except my father would usually become angry and reiterate how we were not to take any funds he put in the kitchen cup unless it was used to buy food for the family. While growing up, New Year’s Day was not one for joyful celebrations.

I had hoped that this past could be set aside once Karen and I began our own family. I seem to remember we did get to a dance at Idora Park in Youngstown for our first New Year’s Eve together. In the following years, we may have met with neighbors in Hanover or in Amherst for some drinks to welcome in the New Year. I do not recall going out to any special place to celebrate. In general, the holiday was rather humdrum, better than during my growing-up years, but still not what one sees portrayed in the media.

When we moved to Houston, our boys discovered fireworks. Along the Gulf Coast, the explosion of strings of crackers and the twirling of sparklers was part of the traditional celebration for this holiday. Karen and I would sit on the balcony of our New Orleans colonial house in Ponderosa and caution Ken and Chris to be careful where they tossed their firecrackers in the front street, a safe place away from the surrounding pine trees. We never did venture to a commercial site to see a display for New Year’s, although when we lived in the Longwood development in Cypress, which encompassed the Old Tin Hall, we did hear the explosions and see the lights of those set off by this Texas dance hall for its customers.

Moving to the retirement community of Eagle’s Trace did provide an opportunity to return to the ambience of a neighborhood. For the first two years living here, we attended the New Year’s Eve Dance held in the Garden Room, one of the dining areas for the community. However, staying awake and active after midnight, local time, became a challenge. In later years, we moved our venue back to our apartment and shared a glass of champaign or other sparkling wine, as we watched the televised gathering in Times Square at eleven o’clock, Houston time. The new year, itself, was to be seen with closed eyes.

There were also years when we decided we would like to see the transition from one year to the next in a different kind of celebration. We found it pleasant, and with its own unique joy, to join others for a special service at the Cenacle, the nearby retreat center where Karen donated much of her time as a spiritual director. It was an opportunity for prayer and reflection. At midnight, the retreatants gathered for fellowship and munchies.

From a religious viewpoint, during my earliest years as a Roman Catholic in Niles, New Year’s Day was associated with the Circumcision of Jesus, a week after his birth. Attendance at mass was obligatory. Later, the focus for this holy day was changed from a Jewish-Christian tradition to one, for Roman Catholics, emphasizing the Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God. Attendance at mass was still obligatory, but there were fewer who attend this liturgy than that of Christmas Eve. To encourage attendance, the mass for New Year’s Eve was often held at 6:00 p.m. so that worshipers could still transfer from a church to a ballroom for the secular events of the evening.

On the other hand, Karen and I have found that participation in reflection and prayer, along with the fellowship gathering that came afterwards, was a rewarding way to enjoy New Year’s Eve, which marks the ending of old experiences and the beginning of new expectations. After all, if holy days can become holidays, it’s possible for a holiday to be celebrated as a holy day.