Sounds of Hope

Last week I had the glorious experience of reconnecting with a childhood friend. She sat with me in Miss O'Shea's class. She stood in line as Miss O'Shea put lipstick on our lips for the May Day Celebration.  The one that led to the consternation of my mother at my being unchristian because I had make-up on... Peering through the black bars of the school fence, she glared as I danced around the May Pole with lipstick.  I loved Miss O'Shea and yet it was the year of such horror . I imagine she was one that I would hope would accompany me to the girls bathroom in the basement of the school.  Always sent in pairs, one would raise their hand and be excused; the other would volunteer to go with you.  That meant a time to chat and giggle.  Later, she and I would walk together to PS 220 John J. Pershing Junior High School.  Of all my childhood school memories, Pershing was the best. It's odd the things you think about when you reconnect. Little tiny snippets o...

It was the first year I walked the three short blocks and one and a half long blocks to PS 94 alone.  My BFF was taking several buses to a new school for smart children.  I missed her.  I wondered why she had to be so smart and leave me.   Everything at PS94 was big.  As I would crouch in the hallway with my head tucked under my arms for the air raid drills, I couldn’t imagine those massive doors collapsing.  In the fourth grade, I had the seat in front of one of those doors.  Mrs. Cedar presided over a corner room, near the staircase.  Rather than opposite the windows, the massive wooden closet that housed our coats and galoshes was in a narrow hallway that led to our room.  I had the first seat in the first row.  Since the door was always open, I had a view of those coming up and down the stairs as well as the slop sink.  Now for those of you who do not know what a slop sink is, it was a deep sink on every floor where you c...

Maybe you've seen this scene from Madmen as the Kodak Carousel is introduced.   If not, go here and watch it and then come back to the blog. In Greek, nostalgia literally means, a pain from an old wound .  In someways, this blog has been about nostalgia.  Even those topics of current inspiration draw life from the past.  You never escape where you came from or who you were.  We change, we grow but somehow the past is always with us beckoning us to remember. I think the pain we feel as we recall the past is cause not by the wound by knowing we can't go back.  We see visions of the past and we want to go back. We want to go back not because we made some horrible mistake and need a do-over.  Rather we want to go back to experience the joy, the wonderment, the excitement, or any of the myriad of human emotions that can explode at anytime.  While a small substitute for time travel back to that moment, a memory can cause us to relive such joy and so...

Saturday morning after cereal out of a box while watching Popeye, Dudley Do-Right, Yogi, Rocky and Bullwinkle, and Bugs Bunny, I’d go to the kitchen.   Under the sink were the dust clothes to be used for my weekly chore of dusting.   I must have been in the First Grade at PS94 when my mother and father told me it was time to work.   I was part of the family and my contribution was necessary.   No more free handouts of money for candy.   I had to earn my money. Every week I would move the white elephant planter, the amber vase, the candy dish with candy for company only, and the furniture scarves to complete my job of dusting.   For my labor, I received 50 ¢ .   Candy bars were only 5 ¢, for that same 5 ¢ I could get three long pretzel rods or a candy necklace, some wax lips or even a box of candy cigarettes.   If I chose the latter I’d have to consume them all before I got home.   Sugary candy cigarettes were forbidden.  I might end up ...

When my kids were little they used to read the Chose Your Own Adventure books, also know as Gamebook .  After reading a few pages, they'd have to make a choice.  The choice involved picking which page to go to next.  Once that choice was made, the story was altered. I've often thought life was like that.  Every so often you have to chose something.  Once you make the choice, it changes your life forever.  In life, unlike the book, you can't go back and alter your choice. I can think of so many pivotal moments of choice, as well as, minor ones.  The minor ones sometimes turned out to be pivotal.  With all the talk of Brooklyn Norwegians and my childhood, it has made me wonder about a lot of the choices. This morning my husband and I were talking about why I didn't go with my father to Norway when I was in the 9th grade.  I've regretted that decision a million times.  It was primarily their decision, I was only 14.  However, I did...

Probably like many of you, you are thinking and praying for the people in the path of Irene.  I have family in her path.  I have friends, new and old, in her path.  I’m praying too.  I’ve been through a few hurricanes in my life; in relative terms, nothing too serious or intense.  Just lots of wind and rain – I’ve been through worse storms with impending tornadoes – although fortunately, never been in the full path of a tornado either. I remember Gloria .  She came up the East Coast slamming Connecticut in 1985.  We’d move to CT the year before.  We had our first little house.  The cracker box two bedroom cape I’ve written about here . We boarded windows.  We waited.  A neighbor came over to keep us company.  I never understood why.  My husband was not happy about this intruder.  I took it in my stride.  I remember we played board games.  Another thing my husband doesn’t care for – he’s not a fun and games s...

                   I'm still thinking about the evils of social dancing .  I had heard on the radio the other day about a teacher in the Philadelphia area who is fighting for her job.  She made the following comments on her blog: They are rude, disengaged, lazy whiners. They curse, discuss drugs, talk back, argue for grades, complain about everything, fancy themselves entitled to whatever they desire, and are just generally annoying.   My students are out of control d isengaged, lazy whiners.  And quoting from Bye Bye Birdie -  Kids! They are disobedient, disrespectful oafs. Noisy, crazy, sloppy, lazy LOAFERS. I am sure this teacher would find it interesting that in rural Tennessee they are worried about their kids and adults social dancing.  But don't kid yourselves - drugs are rampant and often Meth is the drug du jour here in these hills. I remember the sheriff in this county, with tears in his eyes, tal...

Have you ever noticed that one of the first questions a man will ask about someone else is “What does he/she do?”  My husband asked me that at breakfast this morning about someone from my past.  I’m still digging up people from my past.  I guess it will never stop.  I just like doing it and am a “connector.” Recently, a good Facebook friend started a Facebook group, Brooklyn Norwegians.  It took off like lightening.  I like this guy.  He’s a writer.  We seem to think alike about things.  We went to the same “grammar” school, PS 94, then the same Jr. High School, John J. Pershing Jr. High School – I left Brooklyn during High School and he was smart, he went on to what was then Boy’s Tech.  I imagine at some point in our childhoods our paths crossed. However, neither of us remembers that time. All this Brooklyn Norwegian talk – we talked about food, the closing of the last Norwegian bakery, we talked about the neighborhood, churches, peo...

Yesterday, I made connections with two childhood friends.   I am prone to looking up people from the past.   Their names and faces pop in my head.   All my senses come alive with a memory.   Are they on Facebook?   Can I Google and find them?   How much I learn and benefit from the gifts of the internet! I was an early comer to AOL and all things internet.    I’d browse and push buttons.   I had no fear.   I found one friend, then two.   With Facebook, I’ve found most of the friends whose memories flood my heart.   Yesterday, thanks to a new feature on Facebook, I saw that a year ago yesterday I had posted about the death and home going of my mother’s oldest and dearest friend.   As children, they had played under a streetlight until the persistence of their mother’s voice called them inside.   Her friend brought her to Jesus.   Long before BFF, they were BFF’s… and now forever they are in heaven under the lig...

We are in the midst of birthday season.  In May we celebrate lots of family birthdays!  We had birthdays on the 3 rd , 4 th , 5 th , 6 th , 7 th , 10 th , and one to come on the 15 th .  It used to be we’d eat birthday cake for days.  When the children were still home we tried to get each one of them their own cake.  This year, I didn’t get any birthday cake.  We only bought a cake for our son and he took it home with him.  It was chocolate too.  Oh well, I don’t need cake. Near the end of these birthdays are two other birthdays that I always remember.  One is my Tante Bitta’s oldest daughter's birthday.  She was my childhood playmate.  She was the one who came faithfully every day to visit me when I spent weeks in the hospital in the seventh grade.  I had rheumatic fever.  Every day, Grace would walk from school to the Norwegian Lutheran Medical Center.  She would keep me company for the afternoon.  After we sh...

I certainly had no shortage of good preaching when I was a kid.  I heard great sermons from many of the giants of the faith.  I was blessed.  I heard a sermon today by one of my childhood pastors, Rev. Ben Crandall.  Back then we called him "Brother Crandall."  While I write much about my beloved first church, Salem Gospel Tabernacle, there is no doubt our shift to Calvary Tabernacle made a huge impact on me. He seemed so visionary.  It seems he was ahead of his time with everything.  He brought all sorts of people to his pulpit, David Wilkerson was a frequent guest, Demos Shakarian came and many others.  He saw the leadership potential in my parents. My mother was graduated to teach adults at Calvary.  My father served on the rotating board for a short time.  I remember the pride I would feel that my dad was able to serve communion. Brother Crandall was never afraid to see what God was doing next and follow it.  He was a change...

I think every child loves Saturday.  Saturday is that day when you don’t have school.  It is the day to sleep late and play.  It was on a Saturday that my father would take me on excursions of delight.  Holding his hand, we’d place our token in the turnstile to ride the 4 th Avenue local.  However, there was one part of Saturday that I did not like. Saturday night meant a soak in the tub.  Ours was an old tall claw bathtub.  We had no shower.  While we each had our own bathwater, one by one, we’d make the trip into the tub to be clean for Sunday.  I often entertained myself in the tub with boats sent to me from my relatives in Norway.  I enjoy the tub.  What I didn’t enjoy was the shampoo.  I’d cover my eyes with a washcloth as the cups of water were poured over my head.  Usually some got in my eyes and I’d wince or cry.  My ears, between my toes, and my neck were all checked to see if they were clean.  There w...

Every Sunday morning my mother would put a few pennies, sometimes a dime, rarely a quarter, in my hand for offering for Sunday School.  At the appropriate time, my mother now on the small platform of the church basement would wait for the appropriate chord from the piano and she would start to sing, Dropping, Dropping, Dropping, Dropping Hear the Pennies Fall Everyone for Jesus, He will get them all One by one we would march to the front and drop our offerings for Jesus.  Often I would wonder if Jesus really needed my pennies.  I would much rather go to the candy store next to the church between Sunday School and church to get something to tied me over until church was over. Brooklyn Day Sunday School Parade My mother is the teacher.  I'm in the 2nd row on the left I've been counting change this morning.  I had a plastic bag full of it that we brought back from South Dakota.  I thought it was time to cash it in.  There was over $50 in that ba...

Heavy snow is coming down today.  It is reminding me of a Christmas in Brooklyn. One of my favorite people when I was a child was my “Tante Bitta.”  She was actually not my Aunt or Tante, she was my cousin.  However, like all of my first cousins on my father’s side, she was an adult when I was born and had children my age.  Out of respect, I called her Tante.  When I was little I couldn’t say her name Birgit; in my childish pronunciation she became Bitta.  We saw her and her family only occasionally until they moved within walking distance.  What a happy day that was!  Her eldest daughter and I became best friends. So many things I could write about her daughter and I.  After putting 75 cents in the cigarette machine, we’d puff away for a few hours.   Believing we’d rather “fight that switch” after a brief usage of Marlboros we became Tareyton smokers.  Doused in perfume, with gum in our mouths we'd try to cover ...