3 Egg Nest

These nests were found under an overhang at Hoover Dam in Ohio.
 If you look closely, you can see beaks poking out of most of them.

The nest still holds your indentation.

We three remaining eggs didn’t tumble

And roll to fill your spot.

We haven’t re-configured ourselves from

Square to triangle

Just because you’re off flying on your own now.

We still think of ourselves as a four-egg family

Minus one hatched chick.

Tatemae

Japanese Gardens
Golden Gate Park, San Francisco

There is a Japanese word tatemae that means public face. I can’t think of an English translation. Maybe “professionalism”?  No. “Professionalism” doesn’t convey the masked fury of tatemae. Laura Kriska, author of the memoir The Accidental Office Lady expresses it well when she describes her Japanese co-workers displaying tatemae at work:

“…It was having to eat lunch with her and smile and make small talk for an hour. Tatemae was joyfully calling twenty people to reschedule a meeting because your director had forgotten about the meeting that you had discussed with him that morning. It was keeping quiet when the directors called you kanojo – meaning “Hey you” --  in the executive office because they didn’t know your name even though you had been working there for six years.”

I was stopped in my tracks by this passage. I loved that the Japanese had a word for something that is apparently so universal. I thought about all the times I employ tatemae during my work day. Too many. Too, too many. I wondered whether tatemae is the root word for “tattered”? Does tatemae rhyme with “death of me”?

Until I retire, I am adding tatemae to my dictionary.

Haunted Gettysburg

My husband and I saw the sign for the Ghosts of Gettysburg Candlelight Walking Tour. Since he is something of a history buff and loves a good ghost story, we decided to add this tour to our Gettysburg itinerary. What could be spookier than walking across fields in the most haunted city in America? We decided to find out.

We were to meet at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at dark -- 8:00pm -- on the field where tens of thousands died.

Eight o’clock rolled in, following a thunderstorm that left the skies low and dark. Our tour guide, wielding a lantern, greeted the group of twenty or so adventurers ready to walk across this historical burial site. We were a mix of men and women, young and old, teenagers, couples and families. Some of us were historians, others knew nearly nothing about the Civil War. Our guide introduced himself and gave us a short background on the field where we stood, waiting for ghosts to appear before us.

The Battle of Gettysburg was a three day blood bath on July 1, 2 and 3, 1863. In that short period of time, approximately 40,000 young men died in battle, many of whom were brought to the lawn where we stood. The Lutheran Theological Society, then a Seminary, was turned into a makeshift hospital. Our guide described the weaponry and the bullets, explaining the types of injuries these young men had sustained and why amputations were so numerous.


He pointed to the first floor windows of the building before us. More than a dozen stairs led up to the entrance and he explained that the amputated body parts were stacked against the building, reaching all the way up to the first set of windows. The basement was used to house the more seriously wounded, who had to be rushed out on July 4th as torrential rains began flooding the basement.

When it was all over, the bodies were buried here in the fields surrounding the Seminary until it was later ordered that they be moved to proper burial ground. Officials will claim that every body was removed. It seems an impossible claim to make considering the incredible number of casualties. Surely some soldiers were left to rest here.

Our guide explained that metal detectors are not allowed in most of Gettysburg. A reasonable rule, considering the varieties of metal that must be buried in the earth - rings, watches, bullets, guns, etc. The entire town of Gettysburg would resemble a sinkhole if people were allowed to search and dig.

I found all this fascinating. I'd never been a history buff myself. But now that we were hearing stories and seeing the buildings and fields where battles happened, history was brought to life for me. We didn't encounter any ghosts on our tour, but the stories we heard gave us goosebumps just the same. The walking ghost tour of Gettysburg whet our appetite for more ghost tours like it. It's a wonderful way to learn more about the history, people, and places of any given city. We've since taken ghost tours in Louisville, New Orleans, Salem, and Nashville, but Gettysburg remains our favorite.

Cows at Dawn

I saw these cows when I rounded the corner heading for work in the morning. They freaked me out a little with their ghostly white faces staring at me in unison. There are actually about a dozen all together; all spread out but all lying in the field, facing the road with their blank white faces.The sight of them nearly made me run into a ditch.

The Children's Birthday Party Industry

I'm completely guessing here, but the children's birthday party industry must be a multi-billion dollar business. In suburban areas such as mine, children's birthday parties easily cost parents upward of $150. There are very popular inflatable play places springing up all over the place. Those start at $125 for 15 kids/80 minutes on a weekday, and go up to $269 for the "Classic Party" which includes 2 hours of jumping fun for 25 kids (which usually means you've invited the entire class).

These parties have gotten extremely competitive. When the inflatables place first opened, every child in our school district seemed to have their birthday party there. My daughter was going every week. Then other places opened up, offering their own gimmicks: paint-your-own-pottery, play on gigantic playground equipment, learn to cook and make your own cupcakes, bowling parties, hotel swim parties, etc.. All costs hundreds of dollars, and all the kids made the rounds of every one.

I was flabbergasted and decided not to have my daughter's party at one of these pricey establishments. She would have a party at home. The kids could swim, we'd get pizza, it would be fun. Just like birthday parties when I was young. Except it wasn't.

By the time we bought decorations, pizza for a crowd, cake (which we made), ice cream, a pinata, and goody bags to give as gifts for each guest, the party cost us close to $150. That didn't include our daughter's presents. We could have booked a party at one of the entertainment places that specialized in children's parties. It would have cost about the same and we wouldn't have had to clean the house before and after the party. Something to consider.

I guess the days of cake and ice cream in the backyard are over. At least for now. There's too much money to be made in guilting parents into holding extravagant birthday parties for their children. Chuck E. Cheese has morphed into a mega-industry. The really smart parents will buy their children stock in these inflatable places before their next birthday. I wish I had.

Give Thanks For Sarah Hale



Plymouth Rock is smaller than I thought it would be.


Writers are often tasked with finding a new angle on a story. Laurie Halse Anderson, author of Speak, did just that with her informative children's book, Thank You, Sarah: The Woman Who Saved Thanksgiving. While other authors play with different spins on turkey stories, Thanksgiving traditions, and pilgrims, Anderson took us instead to the root of making Thanksgiving a national holiday. I applaud Anderson's ingenuity. It's something I would have never given much thought.

Anderson credits writer / editor Sarah Hale for getting Thanksgiving declared a national holiday. Sarah Hale launched a massive letter-writing campaign that spanned 38 years before President Lincoln declared the fourth Thursday in November as Thanksgiving. Up until that point, it was more a northeastern holiday that wasn't always celebrated on the same day. Some regions of the United States barely celebrated Thanksgiving at all. But Sarah Hale, herself a writer looking for fresh angles, convinced Lincoln that having all the states celebrate Thanksgiving on the same day would help unify the nation.

In the "Feast of Facts" at the end of the book, Anderson includes this interesting tidbit: Franklin Delano Roosevelt decided to change Thanksgiving to the third Thursday of November in 1939 and 1940. He thought this would help the economy by stretching the holiday shopping season. People were outraged. Twenty-three states refused to comply with what was being termed "Franksgiving." So in 1941, FDR decided the experiment was a failure and changed it back to the fourth Thursday.

The whole book is full of interesting facts. I could go on, but I don't want to give them all away here. Read the book!

Movember

If the men around you seem hairier than usual this November, perhaps they're growing their Movember mustaches. Movember is a month-long event starting November 1st wherein men across the world grow a mustache to raise money for prostate cancer research. They start clean-shaven, then "grow a mo."

Men all over the world participate. There's even a Movember Foundation where men can register, raise money, and find celebration parties all across the United States. Some men pay into a pool of money at their workplaces, thereby entering themselves into a mustache growing contest. Other men get pledged donations and raise a certain dollar amount before they can shave their mustaches. Some just collect as much money as they can until November 30th.

However they grow their mo's, I wish them well. Curing cancer is a hairy business.