Kitty Kitty

Dear Mom,

I know you were never much of a cat fan, but how can you resist these little stinkers? Which kitty do you think is the most adorable?

Myrtle the Turtle

Dear Mom,

Not only does watermelon remind me of you, it is my favorite fruit. I just bought one at Trader Joe’s and I was a little worried it might not be very good since it’s towards the end of the watermelon season. But oh, was it delicious. I think that’s the last one I’ll purchase for the year so as not to ruin the watermelon season for myself.

What does this have to do with Myrtle the Turtle? Hang on, I’m getting to it.

I cut up the watermelon and put the rinds in a bag to carry out to the woods—hoping some critter would find it a tasty treat. And surprise, here’s what I saw…

 Can you see him in the lower left corner?

Here he is!

As soon as I spotted it, it reminded me of my younger years when we’d go to Uncle Harold and Aunt Mary’s farm. Once we got there, you’d let Ruthie roam wherever we wanted and off into the woods we’d go… seemed like we’d always find a turtle. Sometimes you’d let us take the turtle home.

Remember when we found a three-legged turtle that we named Myrtle the Turtle? And Myrtle the Turtle lived in our basement… that is until the day Myrtle was in the wrong spot—where Dad pulled the car in and….

I guess you cleaned up the mashed Myrtle before Ruthie and I got come from school. You never told us what really happened, but that Myrtle must have gotten away. We found out from Dad many, many years later that he ran over Mrytle. I never held it against Dad, after all, it was an accident. But as an immature kid, would I have seen it that way?

Do you think that was the right decision looking back? To protect children from knowing the truth—fearing it’d be too traumatic or that we would’ve resented Dad for not being more careful?

I did the same thing to my daughter, Rita. She was in Kindergarten when I broke the news that her black cat, Spaz ran away. In reality, I drove Spaz to the Humane Society. Trust me, I had a good reason why, and I didn’t feel Rita was mature enough to understand. I too, had protected her from seeing the truth about someone.

I wonder whether I would have acted differently if you had told us the truth about Myrtle?

Courage

Dear Mom,

I had a 40^th grade school reunion about a week ago. A few traveled from out of state: all the way from California and two from Texas. Several drove hours from Illinois and the outskirts of Missouri. It was nice that those who came made the effort.

I personally was impressed with one classmate. One who was bullied—it wasn’t called that back then, but that’s what it was… I feel shame for not being brave enough to have put an end to it. Or for not truly being her friend. I was kind of dumb.

I think about my own kids and how they were brave enough to help the underdog. I thank God that I at least taught them better. I found out years later that my own baby had been picked on in high school… she never told me then. But talk about a heart breaker.

I’m not a poet, so my critique friends gave me a few tips. Thank you.

This poem could be for my daughter too, but I wrote it for my classmate.

Courage

I could never be that brave.

Day after day after day

teased, tormented,

Ugly words slapping her face.

Nearly everyone participated

in some shape or form.

I don’t know how

she held her head high.

“Sticks and stones may break my bones,

but words will never hurt me.”

They hurt me just watching.

I wasn’t brave.

I didn’t stand up and

say, “Stop it. Leave her alone.”

Darkness settled near me, I feared I’d be next.

No, I wasn’t brave.

I wondered when she got home

from school whether she dreamed

of a better life. Did she write in her diary

who she hated, anger filling page after page?

Or were the pages soaked

from tears spilling out, endlessly?

Because sticks and stones…

words do hurt.

There are choices

wallow in self-pity, or pick up

all the pieces and put yourself back together again.

Make a difference in the world.

To be so brave.

I’ve always admired

and will always admire

her beauty, her strength

her courage.

With love,

Lynn

Kale

Dear Mom,
 

You cooked and served a lot of odd things before, but I don’t ever remember kale being one of them. I read somewhere that kale is good for my body type, but I’ve never eaten it. Until…

At one of our critique meetings, Sioux brought us each a little bag with some kale chips that she had made. I devoured the entire bag of the little curly crisp leaves. Then I craved them.

My daughter, Rita and I went to Tower Grove Farmer’s Market one Saturday. Rita thought it opened at 7AM and wanted to get there on time in the event a vendor had fresh milk and butter—since she heard it disappeared fast.

The market didn’t open until 8AM, so we sat on the steps and watched the farmers set out their produce. There was honey, coffee, tea, breads, pastry, poultry, beef, gelato, soap, flowers, crafts, and of course, fruits and vegetables—whatever was in season. The Holy Crepe (love that name) served crepes out of this converted short bus that is now a traveling crepe feast. Ten Lives had cats for adoption (another cat-chy name - oh, I couldn't resist). I can’t forget Praise the Lard (who sold pork). Rather clever names for a farmer’s market.

I was on a mission to find kale and had no idea if it was in season or not. I spotted two vendors selling kale. The first bunch of kale I purchased was an oval shaped, flat leaf. It didn’t look anything like Sioux’s kale. The next batch had some weird looking shapes in the bag, but I bought it anyway. Part of me wondered if they were passing off some greenery as kale. As we were leaving, I spotted a craft vender that had some herbs and the curly kind of kale, but I was out of money…

After I got home, I washed, dried and prepped the leaves in olive oil and sea salt, then baked the kale in the oven. I searched in the Internet for kale and found there are different varieties. The following came from Wikipedia.

Kales can be classified by leaf type:

·       Curly leaved (Scots Kale)

·       Plain leaved

·       Rape Kale

·       Leaf and spear (a cross between curly leaved and plain leaved Kale)

·       Cavolo nero (also known as black cabbage, Tuscan Cabbage, Tuscan Kale, Lacinato, and dinosaur Kale)

I’m not sure which variety one particular leaf I bought falls under, but it reminded me of a pin oak leaf (see top photo, middle leaf). Kind of tasted like one too—or at least how I imagined a brown, crunchy fallen pin oak leaf might taste. Forget about eating the stem. You’d need to be a horse or a cow that had plenty of experience chewing hay. The curly leaf was light and crisp and nearly melted in your mouth.

I’m a curly leaf kind of gal, what about you?

Grand Dogs

Dear Mom,

Guess you didn’t know you are a great grandmother… to dogs. Sorry, you never were much of a dog person, at least from what I can remember.

I visited Rita one day at her house on The Hill and she pulled out different crafts that she was working on for her business, EgabragCrafts. She left the room and came back with one of her babies—a pug named Gramma.

  Gramma, "Oh for the love of..."

 Doc looks up, "Where's mine?" 

Gramma: "You'll be sorry..."

She left with Gramma and came back with Computer. I have no idea what kind of dog he is, but if you put Computer in a Star Wars ewok costume, he passes for an ewok hands down. I’m pretty sure he was less than thrilled to be dressed like a skeleton.

"Please, don't ever do that again."

 Their beagle, Goddie cried out...

 "Whoooooo.... stop the madness.”

Happy Birthday Casey!

Dear Mom,

Your grandson is 29 today. Can’t believe it’s been that long since I gave birth to my first born.

Carrying Casey was easy. I loved being pregnant. In one month I had gained nine pounds. Dr. Muschaney said, “Whoa, you can’t be gaining weight like that.” I felt depressed when I had to go on a diet while pregnant. I still ate a lot, but all good, healthy stuff. The next month I didn’t gain anything. Then I was back on track.

I was due September 1^st. Since it was my first pregnancy, Dr. Muschaney didn’t have real concerns when September 1st came and went. I realized the little stinker inside of me had inherited his father’s genes of being late. I joked to my husband, “Maybe I’ll have the baby on your birthday!”

One week went by, then another. By the start of the third week Dr. Muschaney said, “If you don’t have this baby by the 21^st, we’ll induce labor." And so it was, they induced. I thought labor was a breeze when I saw the little meter reaching full capacity. What was all the fuss about labor pain? But the inducing wasn’t working and when they took me off it, that little meter went down to 2 (on a scale of 1 to 10). That 2 was ten times as painful as the original 10. Now I knew what the fuss was about and I also knew that I wouldn’t be giving birth “el-natural” as originally intended. I wished for a gun so I could be shot and put out of my misery before I was allowed to have an epidural.

After 42 ½ hours of labor, I gave birth to Casey on his father’s birthday… I felt like I couldn’t have given him a better gift. All the pain, sweat and tears were worth it. Casey was the most beautiful baby I had ever seen. Yeah, I guess all mothers say that, but I still think so.

 Casey's looking a little stressed in this picture--he didn't want to come out, remember? And Dr. Muschaney said there was no way I could birth a baby over 7 pounds. Casey was 8 lbs 4 oz, so the little stinker had a rough go of it.

Casey grew up to be an artist. He inherited that gene from his father too. Recently I decided to take a beginner drawing class to see if I was capable of drawing more than stick figures. Casey asked me to post my sketches on my blog… so for his birthday, here they are:

 First class, very first drawing (we were practicing seeing simple shapes)

 First class

First class, close up of hammer

 

First class, final (a bone)

 Practice at home

 Second class, warming up with simple shapes 

 Second class, blind contour (pad of paper under the table and we followed the outline of the shape - then we did the same thing looking at it - as you can see the one on the top I had my eyes open, but it almost looks just like when I had my eyes closed)

 

Second class, my (frustrated) drawings

Second class, final

 

When the artist, Adam Long sketches examples in class, he makes it look so easy… just like my son makes it look easy when I watch him draw.

I remember the first picture Casey drew when he was being evaluated to go into kindergarten. It was a person… a stick figure that five-year-old's draw, only the teacher pointed out all the detail that most kids that age do not include: fingers on the hands, toes on the feet, ears, hair (crazy hair). The drawing was so funny I wanted to bust out laughing, but I stifled it. I remembered sitting across from the teacher with a huge smile on my face. I never dreamed Casey would be an artist based on that drawing, but I do recall the teacher being impressed. It showed what I knew about art.

My memory is a bit foggy, but I’d bet money (and I’m not a gambler) that you’d always find Casey drawing something throughout the years. I couldn’t tell you whether he always knew, or whether he decided when he entered high school that art was his calling. I think he always knew.

I received a call from the high school principal one day that Casey was being evaluated… but not in a good way. He had drawn a picture with blood, guns, and head’s being blown off. Casey’s attention to detail made the drawing rather graphic. A random teacher saw it and had concerns that something was wrong with him—worried that he may be a troubled, psycho kid. They assured me I had nothing to worry about. They told me all of this after the fact. I could have saved them a lot of time had they talked to me first, but I’m sure they figured any mother would defend their child. The art teachers that encouraged Casey thought the whole ordeal was ridiculous. They knew Casey’s inner essence.

Casey went on to earn “Artist of the Year” in his graduating class. Naturally, I was proud and wondered what the teacher, who turned him in that day, thought about this psycho kid. I guess you couldn’t blame the teacher really. Better safe than sorry.

Psycho, Casey is not. A talented creative artist, he is and one who is using his abilities to follow his dream.

Happy Birthday Casey! I love you.

Blackbirds

Dear Mom,

The other day I was looking out at the pond, I noticed all these black birds. I’m not sure if they are called black birds. They look black from a distance, but when you look close, you can see they have a shiny blue head. One, two, three… twenty-one, twenty-two… and then I stopped counting and became just slightly freaked out.

Remember… oh, I’m not sure if Warren ever told you. He was babysitting Ruthie and me when you and dad went out one evening. He wanted to party with his friends, but needed to get Ruthie and me to bed somehow, but it was too early. We were watching TV when the movie, The Birds by Alfred Hitchcock came on.

We were just getting into it when Warren stepped in front of the TV. “You’re not watching this.”

Ruth and I wailed. “Get out of the way! We want to watch it!”

“No! It’s too scary.”

We did more whining. “We won’t be scared. Let us watch it.” We both continued to whine until he spoke.

"All right, all right. I’ll let you watch it on one condition.” Since he was the older brother, and in charge at this point, we didn’t have much choice.

“Okay.”

“If you get scared, you have to go to bed.”

We agreed, he stepped aside, and we totally got into it. Ruthie and I were shoulder-to-shoulder, eyes glued to the TV. Warren watched us, just waiting for the right moment to…

Jump out and yell, “BOO!”

Ruthie and I screamed at the top of our lungs, grabbed one another. Warren threw his shoulders back, “That’s it, time for bed.” He turned off the TV and shoo’d us up the stairs to our bedroom.

We mumbled, “That was no fair. YOU scared us, not the movie.”

“You were still scared. I said if you were scared, you’d have to go to bed.”

Ruthie and I weren’t the saltiest crackers in the package and didn’t argue. Off to bed we went.

I watched The Birds when I was older and I’m pretty sure it was a good thing we only saw a small part of it back then. When I see a swarm of black birds gathering, I think of The Birds and my heart races a little.

I got brave and stepped outside to snap some photos of the black birds with their shiny blue heads. They flew off, one by one or in groups. There had to be hundreds. Really. And out of all of them, I only caught one on film. You can barely see him, but if you look right in the middle of the photo, you might spot its shiny blue head, just above the grassy plant and in the shadow of the bushes. If the birds had started gathering one by one on the deck, you can bet I would’ve ran inside and boarded up the windows!