The Kids I Remember

The children want me to write about them, but I don’t remember much. Between feeding, burping, diaper changing, and general housekeeping, how could I? I was a mother who stayed home, because after three kids it’s no longer cost effective to work. Who would pay me what I’m worth, anyway? Would you spend more than ten years changing diapers hourly? It’s true, the kids weren’t all in diapers at the same time, but as soon as one child was out of diapers, a new one came along to up the numbers. In the pre-Pampers and Huggies days I could ram a safety-pin through a cloth diaper single handed leaving baby unscathed, while immobilizing the squirming infant’s leg between my knees. Yes, I won every baby shower diapering game.

no diapering contests anymore, we suck baby bottles now

 To prevent damage, I soon added chasing a dust ball around the house (my little dust ball never crawled, she rolled everywhere). Curious newbies of a family aim to experience everything. Between plugging guitar wires into a wall socket (someone has now invented plug covers), or hiding surfboards in Opa’s camper bathroom, I became so distracted I’d leave kids behind at restaurants (St. Petersburg) and uncles homes (La Puente). No wonder I tossed out Dr. Benjamin Spock’s baby book early on. The children’s explorations demanded discipline.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Spock

And boy did I learn discipline! It included growing eyes in the back of my head so I could see what a four year old was doing behind my back, growing an extra lobe in the brain to outguess the smart toddler hiding in the closet, and becoming a six armed Hindu god so I could catch one trouble maker, hold on to another, and tweak the ear of a third.

The first child was a quiet boy. In fact he was so quiet I kept checking under the blankets to make sure he wasn’t cold (dead). He was every mothers dream, sleeping through the night and sleeping through the day. He only woke for feedings, and then it was for an all you can eat repast. Today, I’d be hauled off for child endangerment because I fed the tyke solid food before he was a month old. I mean, he was screaming at the top of his lungs even after he’d finished his milk. I figured he was still hungry. Rice cereal (Asian like his dad?) stopped his screams, but not his adventures. Before he could walk, he climbed out of his cage. Nothing could keep him in after that.

Inch (nickname, she’s not an inchworm) didn’t have to climb out of her crib. She rocked on her knees with wild abandon until her mattress fell though the bottom onto the floor.  The boy whose feast we celebrated yesterday was a heavyweight. After one try and his accompanying crash to the floor, he never attempted to climb out of his jail again . . . now that’s self-discipline.

A certain rapport builds between siblings when there are more than two. They start to gang up on parents and all discipline deteriorates. I’d be racing to beat my baby stripper to the door (I was running a daycare and the Mc Martin trial loomed in my brain).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMartin_preschool_trial

Meanwhile, her sister would be busy smearing toothpaste on bathroom mirrors counters and walls, embellishing all with toilet water. She was knee deep by the time I got to her. Arsen (nickname for our surfer) would be lighting matches in the garage by the furnace (thank goodness they didn’t sell flame throwers to kids), while even bigger brother would waste dad’s tools to build his robot.

Still cramming surfboards into small spaces

Hence the kids’ ability to cooperate with friends and employers today is a credit to the cohesiveness they learned from conspiring against their elders.

At least two of the children were easy going. The braniac, who probably daydreamed numbers (he’s an actuary now), and the pianist who spent most of her days hammering out new tunes she’d invented by the time she was two.

Did I forget anyone?

Don’t think so.

From Kanon, the Life of Composer Ara Sevanian

Hedjaz

“When I was child, I put glasses with different measure water.  I play little melody on glasses, because every musician start with instrument.  For some, voice is instrument, for some, piano.  My family has piano in house, but I think to myself, everybody plays piano. When my father bought his kanon, I want to play it.  I like sound it makes.  In Armenia, where I come from, people crazy ’bout that instrument . . .”

* * *

The kanon is an ancient Middle-Eastern harp.  It’s similar to a German zither, because it lies across a performer’s knees.  It’s different because it is larger and uses gut strings instead of wires. The kanon has a broader range than some modern counterparts, since it has more strings.  It also has a fish skin sounding board for added resonance.

My father ordered his kanon from Turkey.  I remember the day the package arrived from the post.  He took it out of its case and showed it to me.  I wanted to play it, but Mother locked it in the bedroom.  She thought I might harm the instrument.  Since I had a deep love of music, I watched where Mother hid the key. I sneaked into the bedroom and plucked the strings quietly, trying to produce melodies.  I practiced for about a month, and nobody knew what I was doing.

One night there was a big party at our house.  Lots of family and friends came.  I played with the children.  People drank, they sang, they had a good time.  After a while, my father brought out his kanon to entertain his friends.  When I saw that, I left the other children and ran to sit at my father’s knee.  I watched him and listened.  When he was done, I begged, “If you give me the kanon, I’ll play.”

He said, “No, no. Go play with the children.”

“But I can play! I can play!” I insisted.

He refused a couple of times, and the guests started to complain, “Give it to your child.”  So he gave me the instrument and I started to play.

My father was surprised. “How can you play?  You play well!  Where did you learn?  How did you learn?”

“If I tell, you won’t spank me?”

“No, I won’t spank,” he promised.  So I told him how I found the key and practiced in the bedroom. 

I was only about five or six years old, but that day my parents decided to look for a music teacher. 

Living Saints--Paul, the Apostle

The Catholic Church offers its adherents living examples of Christian conduct. However no saint acts in isolation. As last Tuesday’s story shows, Pater Rösch received assistance from those who likewise jeopardized their personal safety to help. Such mutual faithfulness began as early as the year 33 AD (ACE, in current nomenclature).  

Tomorrow the Church celebrates the feast of the Conversion of St. Paul. This fictional account of his conversion concerns itself with the idea that Paul was not an evildoer from God’s perspective. His misguided attack on Christians flowed from the personal conviction of a man of prayer seeking truth. Scripture offers a biography of Paul in the Acts of the Apostles and also scattered throughout many Pauline epistles.See the following link for more information.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_the_Apostle#Prior_to_conversion

He Is Praying

Saul’s prayer had become his life. After all the studies, all the searching of books, all the questions, he understood that the only important thing was prayer. With a passion, he poured his heart into it, because he’d fallen in love with God. His prayer directed all his actions. It was zeal for his One God that brought him to Damascus. He had been told to bring the neo-pagans to trial, because they were disrupting the community of believers. Why is it, he thought, that every time somebody comes up with a new god, a new idea, even the best of men fall prey to their pernicious heresies? He wished people weren’t so fickle.

Riding toward the city gates, he tried to put aside thoughts of the dissenters. It was the noon hour and his heart turned to the payer other Pharisees like himself would be reciting. “The Lord is king, let the earth rejoice, the many coast-lands be glad  . . .” he raised his strong voice in song. Those who rode with him joined in the chant.

The thought of the fools who wanted more than the One God of Israel distracted him. To help his prayer, he refocused on his plan to round up the misfits and take them to Jerusalem for trial. Eager to bring the heretics to justice, he continued Psalm 97 because it matched his righteous anger, “A fire prepares his path, it burn up his foes on every side . . .” He spurred his horse on, in a hurry to put an end to these enemies of God and Temple.

His men sang the response, “His lightnings light up the world. . .”

A blinding light flashed. His horse reared, and he fell to the ground.

*                      *                      *

“Ananias,” a familiar voice whispered in the holy disciple’s psyche.

“Here I am, Lord,” said Ananias, recognizing Jesus.

“Go to the house of Judas and ask for Saul of Tarsus; he is there praying.”

Notes from the Dome--Boat People

As an immigrant, I inhabited places that brought many bright memories other than our current domicile adventures. A case in point was my “cruise”, complete with sea-sickness, to the United States from Germany. No wonder when the kids asked us parents to go on a cruise to Alaska, I complained, “No! I don’t like boats. They make me sick.”

“But Mom,” they answered, “Today’s big liners are so stable you won’t feel a thing!”

But I did, horribly!

Besides, the new cruise ships don’t do the streamers . . .

http://www.dfparty.co.uk/categories.php?cat=7

The movie Titanic lost its credibility for me in its opening scenes. I kept waiting for the streamers, but there were none, only champagne, cheers and the sound of the horn. You see, I’m a boat person and I clearly remember the sendoff included paper streamers, the sole connection between the people on the dock and the folks on the boat. The boat people would toss them down to the land lubbers. Everyone would strain to catch an end of the streamer (it didn't matter whose), the single link between one another. When the boat pulled away from shore, the streamers would stretch, and stretch, and stretch till the connections broke, leaving us weeping our farewells.

 

Our family wasn’t alone in throwing those streamers. This link comes complete with photo several pages down on the link:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=480683&page=212

Paper streamers

---

Here's a scene sure to raise sentimental memories for mid-twentieth-century transatlantic travelers: S.S. Constitution pulls away from the dock in New York, 23 August 1965, as passengers toss paper streamers to shore!
Those paper streamers were wonderfully symbolic, especially if you had a friend on the dock who caught the far end. You are setting off on a festive journey across the ocean, excited and joyful at the outset of this adventure, yet a part of your heart remains ashore, with the people and places you love. For a few moments, these beautiful, colorful streamers form a last fragile link to shore, then the momentum of the ship and the power of your Wanderlust break the ties, and you are truly at sea!
I fully understand the wisdom of reducing waste and pollution, but we sure gained a lot of pleasure from those streamers at very little expense!

My journey wasn’t as festive. I was leaving my war torn homeland, Munich, Germany

Munich 1948

The X and XX marks where my brother and I stand.

This other link also speaks of the streamers as I remember them.

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~kerkham/wak02.htm

It was a normal pastime to go down to the docks to see the mailship leave, and this practice continued well into the twentieth century. As boys we often went down after school on Friday afternoon to see the ship leave. Thousands of paper streamers were thrown from passengers to those on shore – it did not matter if you had never met the other person – and as the ship edged out with the band playing, the streamers would break.

  

Although I came to the US in 1952, those streamers, along with my eleven days on the Greek liner Neptunia, are as clear as yesterday. On her decks I learned to play shuffleboard and hide and seek in the ship’s vents. My brother disappeared during departure sending a wave of fear through Mother. Her frantic search ended at the feet of the orchestra playing Muss i denn, muss i denn zum Städtele hinaus – Wikipedia Mother wanted to cry over the song but couldn’t; her terror at loosing her boy prevented it--and  there he was sitting among the musicians.

1952 SS Neptunia