Category Archives: children

The Flow of Life

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Family, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

April 12, 2024- During the course of the day, at least 64 people donated blood, in a small conference suite of Frontier Village, a Prescott shopping center, located 2.1 miles from the center of town. Each person potentially saved the life of a hospitalized individual, a victim of a fire, or of a car crash, or a beating. In the days when assaults on strangers seem to be increasing, sixty-four people chose to help someone they did not know. A few of them told me, the registrar of the Blood Drive, of how someone else had once helped a family member in need.

Across the country, my mother is alert, mildly talkative, still taking minimal nutrients, and pondering the flow of life. She is ninety-five years of age, has seen four children and ten grandchildren grow to adulthood. She is seeing nineteen great-grandchildren grow into solid human beings. Through it all,she has been a stellar example of how to face challenges, head-on. Her life is flowing towards the delta that is the gateway to the ocean of eternity. It has been, by all indications, a grand journey.

Here in Home Base I, increasing numbers of people are facing the reckoning that always comes with ignoring a simple rule of life: Other people matter, every bit as much as oneself does. The person in a crosswalk, the rider of a motorcycle, a bicycle or a skateboard, the person standing in line ahead of you are not objects to be conveniently shoved aside or targets to be struck by a vehicle. Red lights, stop signs and temporary barriers, or detours, are not nuisances to be ignored, out of a desire for convenience. People who hold an opinion that differs from one’s own are not monsters to be slain or idiots to be publicly humiliated. I know that every community faces a similar challenge, in a world that still is plagued by anonymity and self-absorption. That self-absorption, though, is always headed towards a dead end.

The flow of life will ever go, in the direction that the Universe intends, and while that sometimes seems to head in odd tangents, in the end, it will likewise find its way to the Most Great Ocean.

Pure and Simple

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Education, Inspiration, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

April 10, 2024- Pre-algebra has found its way into the upper elementary curriculum. Perhaps it was a logical outgrowth of “Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader?”, the 2000s quiz show, but here we are.

I personally favour upping the game. Science tells us that the human brain has been getting bigger. https://health.ucdavis.edu/news/headlines/human-brains-are-getting-larger-that-may-be-good-news-for-dementia-risk/2024/03. That, plus the increased access to information, from a wide variety of sources, is having a genetic and anatomically adaptive effect on the thinking process.

Today, my work was mostly to help specific students grasp the concepts of simile and metaphor (Fifth grade) then it was on to a few classes (Sixth grade) that were simplifying algebraic sentences, such as 2x +8 -x-6. There was no value given for the variable. That will probably come in the first months of seventh grade. It is enough for the students to get used to the arrangement of numbers and variables. Of course, given the observations above, it may well be that several students are able to get further into basic algebra, before this academic year ends.

I am grateful for the few days that remain in my work semester. As mentioned earlier, every job successfully completed is a solid step forward.

Totally Covered

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Community, Education, impediments, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

April 8, 2024- The Navajo practice a reverence for the solar eclipse. Dineh people stay indoors, as much as possible, cover their windows, fast on the day of the eclipse, and neither work nor play, but pray in the traditional way, with corn pollen. On Dineh lands, schools, businesses and mines are closed.

Even in more cosmopolitan communities, Dineh parents ask their children’s teachers to see that the children do not look at the eclipsed orb, even with “eclipse viewing glasses. So, today, part of my duty was to remind the three or four First Nations students that their parents wanted them in school, while also avoiding even inadvertent contact with the sun, while it was behind the moon. I went further, and minimized even the “well-prepared” children’s observance of the phenomenon. No one had to be sent home for adverse optical reaction to the eclipse, but some became physically ill, from anxiety about the total eclipse, were sent to the Nurse and eventually calmed down.

This is a generation that already has keen knowledge-of astronomical events, of space science and of the old Classical myths. Video gaming has provided a fair amount of information about myths and legends-and about physics. The Alphas are taking the great cosmic events pretty much in stride; they seem to be taking quite a bit in stride, in fact. Given that their formative years haven’t seen much, in the way of peace, I venture that this sanguinity is the Universe’s way of making sure they are up to the challenges that will no doubt face them, when adulthood comes around.

I feel at home, talking with both Generation Z and Gen Alpha. I do not feel the anxiety that came with being a parent, during the Millennial ascendancy. My role is more avuncular, or of a grandparent, or just an older, wiser friend. So, my admonitions about the eclipse were quietly heeded, and I suspect a good many were prepped by their parents, or they prepped themselves, as to what the right approach to this rare occurrence (next up, in 2044) should be. They will be 30-1, by then, and I, if God wills, will be 93.

By mid-afternoon, winter had thrown in its two cents. Cold air and thick clouds ruled the end of the school day, as if to add Mother Nature’s assent to the admonitions of the First Nations people. Nothing really happens in a vacuum, or without cause.

Happy Places

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Community, Education, Hiking and Nature, Historical, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal goals, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving, Travel

April 6, 2024- As I drove into the parking lot of Mayer Fire Department’s central station, a day-glo sign on a house above the road proclaimed “This is My Happy Place”. A similar notice, “Welcome to Our Happy Place”, greets visitors to the Wildflower Bakery, on the edge of Prescott’s Pine Ridge Marketplace. This led me to once more reflect on my own happy places.

The list starts with Home Base I, the cozy one-bedroom apartment where I’ve lived for the past ten years, and by extension includes Prescott as a whole. Within its confines, the city offers other happy places: Raven Cafe, Peregrine Book Store, Yavapai College’s Sculpture Garden, Wild Iris Coffee House, County Seat Restaurant, Prescott College,Lazy G Brewhouse (I stick to their Non-alcoholic IPA), Lifeways Book Store, any one of four Mom and Pop pizzerias, which I visit sparingly, these days and any one of several Baha’i and other friends’ homes. In the periphery are Zeke’s Eatin’ Place, Highlands Nature Center, Thumb Butte, Watson Lake and the Granite Dells, Willow and Goldwater Lakes, Dharma Farm and Granite Mountain.

Once outside HB I, there are the Happy Places on the road-and over the ocean: Samesun Hostel and Ocean Beach; Copper Sands Motel and Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument; Macy’s European Coffee House and Bakery-and the San Francisco Peaks; Brewed Awakenings Coffee House and Grand Canyon’s South Rim; Jacob Lake Inn (coming back in June, my friends) and the North Rim; every last one of the First Nations Pueblos; any number of Orange County beach towns; Santa Fe, with The Pantry and Henry & The Fish; Taos; Cuba (NM) and Ghost Ranch; Manitou Springs; Monument Valley; Tucson’s Old Town; High Desert Bakery and Coronado National Monument.

There are the Baha’i House of Worship and Wilmette Village’s center; Mishawaka and the Crisenberry Family Farm, in nearby Goshen; all of Massachusetts’ North Shore-and downtown Boston; Boothbay Harbor, Green Acre Baha’i School- and the entire coast of Maine; Cape Breton Island; Newfoundland; Vancouver Island; Amarillo, with the Fun Zone and Palo Duro Canyon; Gram’s Place-and all of Tampa Bay; Tonopah and Beans & Brew; Carson City and the Tahoe Region; Portlandia; the Olympic Peninsula; Crossville and the Cumberland Plateau; Aiken and Full Moon Coffee House; Osceola Tiger and Big Cypress; Philly’s Old City, and the Museum of Art in Wood; the ‘burbs west of Philadelphia and Glick’s Greenhouse.

There are Vannes and Daily Gourmand, in Bretagne; Makati, and Manila’s Rizal Park; Daet’s Bagasbas Beach; Luxembourg’s Old City; Frankfurt-am-Main’s Dom; anywhere on Jeju-do; Busan’s Gold King Coffee House.

Happiness, though, is in the mind and heart. The people in the above-mentioned places are what make each of them special. A few would call themselves acquaintances, most would count me as a friend and one has my heart, as no other person save my late wife, Penny, had it. Each of them, and their surroundings, bring me solace. Their list will, no doubt, grow.

Each substitute teaching job that did at least one child or teen some good, each volunteer shift that produced some good, each errand of mercy to needful friends accomplished, each hike done safely and each trip that was not a waste of time is also a happy place.

I salute everyone who offers their home or business in like manner.

Me, and THAT army

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Community, Education, Historical, Inspiration, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

April 3, 2024- Taking my place on lunchroom duty, this afternoon, I was greeted by two young men who I hadn’t seen since the Fall of 2015. Although my work with their class lasted only three months or so, before the charter school hired a community member who was in need, the kids remember that time as being one of security and helpful instruction. I was still just getting back on my feet, emotionally, at that time, so it felt good to know that my work was beneficial.

Several people, from Grades 5 on up, have said they are glad when I am in their classroom. I share that sentiment, so maybe that’s why. It is equally a matter of sound financial practice, and the satisfaction that I get from helping children and teens build a strong future for themselves, that leads me to continue working in the area schools.

People have been wonderful to me for many years now, by and large, so any difficulties tend to get resolved and put in the rear view mirror, in rather short order. This smoothness in my personal life makes for more time to devote to the considerable tests and difficulties faced by so many other people. These range from something as simple as a lack of transportation, locally, to helping with Baha’i or Red Cross activities in areas farther afield.

Today was mostly spent giving six repetitions of a slide-based lecture, about the history and legacy of colonialism in Africa. It surprised me, as much as it did the students, as to how much I remember of that subject, from my own high school World History class (Thank you, Mr. Musgrave, for your attention to detail, back then) and subsequent independent reading. It was all good. They mostly took good notes, though, so maybe 40 years from now, someone will share this with scholars of the future.

“From whom much is given, much is expected.” My “army” of friends and benefactors makes those expectations easier to meet.

The Hermit Shares Space

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Hiking and Nature, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving, Travel

March 29, 2024- The three-year-old girl wrapped her arm around a pole, while standing just above the stairs at the rear door of the shuttle bus. It was a crowded bus, and even with her watchful grandmother standing between her and the door, she was taking no chances.

Hermit’s Rest is the site of the westernmost of Mary Colter’s eight buildings that grace Grand Canyon’s South Rim. It is in an otherwise nondescript section of the Rim Trail, set away from the stunning overlooks that are signature to the canyon’s edge. Louis Boucher would have preferred it that way. He was a prospector for gold, and probably uranium, in the days before the national park was established. His trail, now called Hermit Trail, leads down to the Colorado River, some 8.7 miles one way. (If I were to hike to the river, it’d involve a camp out at Hermit Camp-not far from where Louis made his home.)

The gateway to the end of one line.
Mary Colter’s Beehive Oven, resembling a Hopi outdoor oven
South side of Hermit’s Rest store.

Neither man-made nor nondescript last long at the Canyon, though. A short walk through the trees reminds the visitor of why the trip was made, in the first place.

The Inner Basin, from Hermit’s Rest.

I began the visit at Hopi Point, where the last trip was cut short, owing to a flash flood in Tusayan, which necessitated most of the visitors having to go back to Grand Canyon Village and tend to their lodging. I was able to make the journey around the eastern route, to Cameron, and then back to Prescott, via Flagstaff. Not everyone was so fortunate, and many ended up spending the night in one of the lobbies of hotels within the park.

Today, there was wind, but no water, so all of us were able to go clear to Hermit’s Rest, or to one of the other viewpoints. I walked from Hopi Point to Mohave Point, taking in the following scene, among others.

The Colorado River has a demure presence, beyond The Battleship, from Hopi Point.
If you think that living on the South Rim is easy, this juniper pine begs to differ.
A view from The Abyss.
The Abyss also shows the effect of weathering, on the topmost layer of limestone.
Here is a view of Monument Creek, flowing into the Colorado River.
From Pima Point, a zoom lens affords a close-up of the Colorado River, without a long hike!

Finally, just when you think you’re done with the Canyon, here’s the next big thing:

The first question says it all.
If your answer is “Yes”, happy hiking-and camping!

I am not beyond that sort of adventure yet, but for today, it was time to head back, so onto the shuttle buses I went, including from the Village to the Visitors Center, which was the bus where the little girl and her family crowded on. We all got to go where we had planned, today. No rain, just wind.

Discretion

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Family, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

March 10, 2024- The talk show host listened, incredulously, as a woman insisted that her son should be treated by a veterinarian, because he identifies as a cat. I would recommend a different type of medical professional-for the mother. Children engage in imaginary play and fantasy-all the time. When an adult buys into the child’s mental exercises and verifies the imaginary as real-the child is, naturally, confused.

Just because one can do something, even under the law, doesn’t mean one should engage the whim. I have heard that a man is insisting on his right to use the woman’s restroom, at a place I visit frequently. This establishment has two restrooms-one for each sex. The clientele is older, and more traditional in their view of such matters. In other establishments, most transgender people I know are perfectly okay with using a “Unisex” restroom. In fact, there are several places where ALL the restrooms are unisex. They have stalls, and there are provisions for parents with children, disabled people and their caretakers, and other special cases. Common sense is not on vacation.

At a Women’s March, yesterday, a trio of men showed up and counter-protested. There is no problem there, but the men decided that the March itself deserved to be broken up. I seem to recall this happened fifty-nine years ago, in Alabama, with deadly results. A woman, who was with the counter-protesters, decided to use a bullhorn, to keep the Marchers from speaking their peace. The March had official sanction. The woman with the bullhorn did not. This matter will be taken up by the proper officials. There was no one injured today, but as Justice Barrett said the other day, the temperature needs to be lowered. Just because one can do something, doesn’t mean one should.

Common sense is not on vacation.

In large and small cities across the country, people have indulged themselves with ignoring traffic rules, weaving in and out of the traffic pattern, in small electric vehicles. Others have ignored the rules of commerce, and helped themselves to significant quantities of clothing, jewelry and other items, with the understanding that, as long as the value of the pilfered items is less than $1000, it will not matter. Just because one can do something, doesn’t mean one should.

Common sense is not on vacation.

Leaping Upward

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Education, impediments, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal goals, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

February 29, 2024- There were several kids who either said they wished I were around more often or greeted me with a solid dap handshake (fingers clasped, followed by a fist bump), making this Leap Day a fulfilling one. It was incomplete, as I stumbled on a bullying victim-whose case was made to the regular staff-so hopefully there will be some resolution.

The work of anyone who is involved in social justice is getting more intense and variegated, by the day. Someone mentioned, this evening, that she was trying to figure a way to make a better world, but without being drawn into the turmoil that seems to confuse humanity. I do not see any way that can happen. Turmoil will find us, and the principles that guide a decent soul’s life will help that person to offer solutions to the presently incomprehensible issues of environmental, physiological, social and spiritual degradation that hit us from all sides.

Those who hold on to memories of a simpler time seem to think that a strong, almost dictatorial, government, rooted in the evolved religious philosophy that was prevalent in the 1950s and early ’60s, will bring about a calming of the current apparent chaos.

Conversely, there are those who see a rigid, unyielding forced march towards unbridled acceptance of even the most deviant behaviour, victims be damned and a total casting off of logic and of even human biology itself, as an extension of the reasonable treatment of those who are victims of chemically-induced hormonal imbalance. The same people give off an air of rejecting anyone, past or present, who was, or is, not letter perfect.

Neither group will bring human society where it needs to go, because inherent in each of their arguments is a false elitism, rooted in fear of the “Other”. The lesson of every experience that I’ve had this week is that there is no solution, or even a viable trade-off, without involving all sides, in the discussion, and being, as Jesus the Christ said, “alert, to discern” the roots of a holistic peace. There is strength in some time-honoured practices and there is merit in changing the way we do other things. Only giving “the Other” a bona fide hearing, with both ears open and an engaged mind, can help in sifting the psycho-social wheat, from its chaff.

It is time for us to leap upward, together.

The Beads

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Entertainment, impediments, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Service Activities, Slow Food, Social, Spiritual, Striving

February 13, 2024- “Laissez les bin temps rouler”. The good times are no doubt rolling, in New Orleans, in Mobile and way down south, in places like Rio de Janeiro and Port of Spain. In the Big Easy, there’s a lot of tossing beads at those lining the parade route, but that’s just the throwaway part, and there are those whose first concern is the content of the stringed glossies.

I have been on the periphery of Mardi Gras, twice. The first time, the bus I was riding rolled into NOLA, early on the morning of Ash Wednesday, 1987. Piles of stringed beads, leftover jambalaya and crawfish pila were all over downtown, but I was told the French Quarter was already clean as a hound’s entire mouth-never mind a single tooth. The second time was on the little sister of Mardi: Lundi Gras, in 2015, as good an excuse as any to extend les bon temps to four days. Things were already red hot in the French Quarter and a woman tossed a string of beads to me, from one of those balconies that could easily have featured a t-shirted Marlon Brando calling for Stella, at the top of his lungs. I think I made do with a large slice of pizza for lunch, and had my jambalaya later, in the evening, at a nice spot in Lake Charles.

Getting back to the beads, I gave mine to a granddaughter of the heart, that summer. Now we hear that the beads themselves may contain varying amounts of lead. By now, she has probably long since tossed the cheapo stringed glossies. What appeals to a four-year-old is an eye roller, when she reaches the age of twelve. Needless to say, if I have it to do over again, I’d graciously accept the beads, and find that algae pond that an intrepid high school freshman in, I believe, Missouri, said he’s using to break down the lead-infused beads.

My Mardi Gras today consisted of a spirit walk, checking out the end of downtown Prescott’s easternmost north-south street. Cortez Street goes up a short hill, and ends as a cul-de-sac, where there is an apartment complex. Things didn’t get much more rapid fire after that- A Mexican chocolate latte, a walk past the Granite Creek mural (will video that rather charming masterpiece, on Thursday) and a workout at Planet Fitness, rounded out the good times. My Mardi Gras meal was four small Buffalo Chicken empanadas. The times, though, are good enough. I learned a lot, this evening, from a community activist’s presentation on urban gardening. There is much good afoot, in Columbus, OH.

Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day. It is also the beginning of Lent, for Christians. I guess that means I should not eat chocolates, when walking by a church that’s letting out. Since Mom taught us not to eat while walking outside, I’m good. Valentine’s Day, this year, feels different. More on that, tomorrow. For now, here’s Ric Ocasek, with another take on Les Bon Temps.

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=let+the+good+times+roll#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:b2a6648a,vid:Zj-b3fWrY3w,st:0

Simply Put

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Education, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Personal goals, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

February 6, 2024- “Do not tell me ‘No’.”, the precocious five-year-old stated. So, I did what any sensible adult would do. ”No”, was all I said- and he wasn’t asking where a man might find a bed. He got the point and went off to engage in an activity that was within the bounds of the class’s purview.  I had not worked with Pre-schoolers, in eight years. The instructional day hasn’t changed much: 3-year-olds in the morning and 4-5 year-olds in the afternoon. There are 5 adults working in the morning, and 3 in the afternoon. We locked the doors to the closet, to the cleaning supply cabinet and to the hallway. A couple of kids cried, when they didn’t get their way, and I showed one of them how to resolve the triggering issue, without melting down. At day’s end, it was still raining, so we walked the bus riders through a completely enclosed route and to their designated vehicles-keeping very sharp eyes on our little charges, all the way. Yes, school has been in session for six months, but small children are small children, and I retain too many anecdotes, from over the years, of kids wandering off, going to the rest room without telling an adult or even falling asleep-on the wrong bus, and being left there, because the driver had checked off all his “regular” riders, and hadn’t checked the actual seats. The angry father all but made the Superintendent go to the bus yard, when his little girl didn’t come home, as expected.

Simply put, no stone is left unturned, anymore, when it comes to child safety, and parental nerves.

California was pummeled, again today, and will be, into tomorrow, as another Atmospheric River soaks the region, from Ensenada to the Lost Coast and from Los Angeles to the Colorado River. This, of course, means Arizona and Nevada are getting their share of wet. It rained all day, here, and now it is snowing, briskly, with six inches on the ground,as I write this, and lots more to come, overnight. I pray that friends and family in California and Nevada are safe-and that we, here, also keep clear of harm’s way.

Simply put, Mother Nature is scolding us, for the self-centeredness of all too many, who disregard her warnings.