I read that 40 percent to 45 percent of American adults make one or more New Year’s resolutions each year.
Among the top resolutions are losing weight, increasing exercise and quitting smoking. Next in line are better money management and debt reduction.
Even if people swear on a stack of Bibles that they will stick to their resolutions, their resolve seems to be short-lived.
I did some research on this and according to one study, 75 percent keep their resolutions after the first week, 71 percent after two weeks, 64 percent after one month and only 46 percent of those who make New Year’s resolutions are hanging in there after six months. Eventually, only 7 percent of all resolutions are ever kept.
Television advertisers are most certainly tapping into this apparent soft spot in the American psyche. If I see one more weight loss ad or stop smoking commercial, I am liable to start binge eating or, worse yet, light up.
Am I the only one who thinks making New Year’s resolutions and keeping them has lost its luster?
I remember a time when making resolutions on New Year’s Eve was a central and important year-end tradition. Do you remember the thought and care we used put into it?
I’ve made resolutions to be a better person, to spend more time with my husband and to do a better job of dusting my house.
Unfortunately, part of the problem is that too many New Year’s resolutions do not involve full disclosure. Most of the time, they are kept in a shroud of secrecy, making it easier to slip up.
Another problem when making New Year’s resolutions is that there is no plan or support system to help us tow the line and to hold us accountable.
Nowadays, I just think about what it is I want to improve, stop or start doing and hope for the best.
Once in awhile, I reveal my resolution and then I'm stuck. I have to either to keep it or spend the whole year making excuses for why I failed to keep it.
What is it about this age-old tradition that has fallen by the wayside in our disposable age, where "short-term" is the end of the week and "long-term" means the end of the month?
I am looking for a few sojourners in that 7 percent who have made and kept New Year’s resolutions. Just to know that resolutions aren’t empty promises gives rise to hope and promise.
When it comes right down to it, we probably have more control over our lives than we are willing to admit. Just think how much better the world would be if more people kept their New Year’s resolutions.
People would be healthier and happier. They would be less agitated and more peaceful. At least, I'd like to think so anyway.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
"Together time" is riding shotgun on Christmas vacation
In the early morning hours of Christmas vacation, I would ride shotgun while my father drove our boxy Dodge van, tires crunching through several inches of freshly fallen snow on already frozen highways.
We were on our way to the store – our family-owned paint and hardware business – and this surely counted as "together time."
I was sixteen and old enough to help with odd jobs at the store whenever I had off days off from school. I ran errands and kept the place tidy by organizing and straightening merchandise. From time to time, I even processed bills.
The store was a main character in our family, one that sustained us in a lifelong drama agitated by Dad’s heart disease and Mother's depression.
The commerce that took place under that leaky roof fed, clothed and kept our brood of six children warm and secure in our century-old home.
The store seemed to own my Dad, not the other way around. He worked all the time, always returning home late, long after we were in bed.
Like most kids, I had an affinity for my dad. Because he did not say much to me, I got into the habit of making appeals for his attention with my heart, and sometimes in writing.
Moments like this, just Dad and me floating along wintry roads, expanded the definition of our father-daughter relationship.
While riding in silence, I would romanticize what I knew of his youth, including his WWII service in the Navy. He met Mom before he was deployed to a base in Puerto Rico. They exchanged love letters while he was stationed there for more than a year and were married when the war ended.
My dad was born to sell. During his career, he sold Chevrolet cars, Mary Carter paint, paintbrushes, rollers, adhesive, drop cloths and all the hardware accessories one could imagine.
I was in elementary school when he sold Thomas-built school buses. I rode along then, too, in spanking new buses Dad drove to waiting schools. I remember thinking he was the best salesperson ever with satisfied customers for miles around.
When I think of my dad, I gather those moments on the way to work – just Dad and me, speechless, traveling through sleeping neighborhoods, stopping while traffic lights turned green on empty peaceful street corners.
I treasure those memories like Christmas morning, rich and fulfilled.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
We were on our way to the store – our family-owned paint and hardware business – and this surely counted as "together time."
I was sixteen and old enough to help with odd jobs at the store whenever I had off days off from school. I ran errands and kept the place tidy by organizing and straightening merchandise. From time to time, I even processed bills.
The store was a main character in our family, one that sustained us in a lifelong drama agitated by Dad’s heart disease and Mother's depression.
The commerce that took place under that leaky roof fed, clothed and kept our brood of six children warm and secure in our century-old home.
The store seemed to own my Dad, not the other way around. He worked all the time, always returning home late, long after we were in bed.
Like most kids, I had an affinity for my dad. Because he did not say much to me, I got into the habit of making appeals for his attention with my heart, and sometimes in writing.
Moments like this, just Dad and me floating along wintry roads, expanded the definition of our father-daughter relationship.
While riding in silence, I would romanticize what I knew of his youth, including his WWII service in the Navy. He met Mom before he was deployed to a base in Puerto Rico. They exchanged love letters while he was stationed there for more than a year and were married when the war ended.
My dad was born to sell. During his career, he sold Chevrolet cars, Mary Carter paint, paintbrushes, rollers, adhesive, drop cloths and all the hardware accessories one could imagine.
I was in elementary school when he sold Thomas-built school buses. I rode along then, too, in spanking new buses Dad drove to waiting schools. I remember thinking he was the best salesperson ever with satisfied customers for miles around.
When I think of my dad, I gather those moments on the way to work – just Dad and me, speechless, traveling through sleeping neighborhoods, stopping while traffic lights turned green on empty peaceful street corners.
I treasure those memories like Christmas morning, rich and fulfilled.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Oh, rest beside the weary road...
"And you, beneath life’s crushing load, whose forms are bending low, who toil along the climbing way with painful steps and slow, look now, for glad and golden hours come swiftly on the wing, and ever o’er its babble sounds, the blessed angels sing…Oh rest beside the weary road and hear the angels sing!" – It Came Upon a Midnight Clear by Edmund H. Sears
With admiration and awe, I observe the woman two rows ahead and three seats over from where I am sitting at a holiday concert. Decorated like a spruce, she is adorned from head to toe with bells and bows.
Embodied with Christmas spirit, she flutters about musically as her arms move in airy waves and her head turns with gentle precision as though she is leading a grand chorus of angels.
Knitted into her sweater is a star illuminating a brightly colored manger scene. Her festive red shoes, trimmed in sparkling gold, coordinate with a cherry shoulder purse and a shimmering crimson skirt that flows to her ankles.
She jingles, too, with a bracelet of bells on her wrist, a string of bells around her neck and a cluster of bells dangling from each ear. Even hairpins she has so painstakingly placed make her gray locks dazzle.
It appears that this woman has donned every Christmas item from a vast collection of festive holiday apparel. I imagine there is nothing left in her closet now darkened, save everyday stuff sulking in drab browns, grays and blues.
Her jewelry box, too, has become a velvet-lined wasteland, emptied of every Rudolph pin that flashes and holly berry necklace that glimmers.
This woman reminds me of my one and only Christmas pendant that I have left waiting silently somewhere in a dresser drawer.
She inspires memories of elementary school teachers, who every year on the last day before Christmas vacation applied the same festive merrymaking as this woman, for whom I am so grateful.
She is a walking Christmas card – a moving yuletide carol aglow with 'tis the season joy written in a code understood throughout the ages.
Such holiday spirit, gaudy yet graceful, chases away my gloom brought on by winter’s darkness and embodies a light recognized by generations.
I love this Christmas lady, her glad and golden garb reminds me that Christmas, once again, is calling to set me free.
Her spirit sings to me, "And you, beneath life’s crushing load, whose forms are bending low, who toil along the climbing way with painful steps and slow, look now, for glad and golden hours come swiftly on the wing, and ever o’er its babble sounds. The blessed angels sing…Oh rest beside the weary road and hear the angels sing!"
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
With admiration and awe, I observe the woman two rows ahead and three seats over from where I am sitting at a holiday concert. Decorated like a spruce, she is adorned from head to toe with bells and bows.
Embodied with Christmas spirit, she flutters about musically as her arms move in airy waves and her head turns with gentle precision as though she is leading a grand chorus of angels.
Knitted into her sweater is a star illuminating a brightly colored manger scene. Her festive red shoes, trimmed in sparkling gold, coordinate with a cherry shoulder purse and a shimmering crimson skirt that flows to her ankles.
She jingles, too, with a bracelet of bells on her wrist, a string of bells around her neck and a cluster of bells dangling from each ear. Even hairpins she has so painstakingly placed make her gray locks dazzle.
It appears that this woman has donned every Christmas item from a vast collection of festive holiday apparel. I imagine there is nothing left in her closet now darkened, save everyday stuff sulking in drab browns, grays and blues.
Her jewelry box, too, has become a velvet-lined wasteland, emptied of every Rudolph pin that flashes and holly berry necklace that glimmers.
This woman reminds me of my one and only Christmas pendant that I have left waiting silently somewhere in a dresser drawer.
She inspires memories of elementary school teachers, who every year on the last day before Christmas vacation applied the same festive merrymaking as this woman, for whom I am so grateful.
She is a walking Christmas card – a moving yuletide carol aglow with 'tis the season joy written in a code understood throughout the ages.
Such holiday spirit, gaudy yet graceful, chases away my gloom brought on by winter’s darkness and embodies a light recognized by generations.
I love this Christmas lady, her glad and golden garb reminds me that Christmas, once again, is calling to set me free.
Her spirit sings to me, "And you, beneath life’s crushing load, whose forms are bending low, who toil along the climbing way with painful steps and slow, look now, for glad and golden hours come swiftly on the wing, and ever o’er its babble sounds. The blessed angels sing…Oh rest beside the weary road and hear the angels sing!"
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
I will do someone’s chores, pay more attention, smile more
"Who does not thank for little will not thank for much." - Estonian Proverb
When I noticed the neighbor’s house was unusually dark and their van was curiously missing from the driveway, I knew something wasn't right.
It’s not that we talk everyday or every week, for that matter. It’s just that I had come to count on their presence day in and day out like a wall of security.
Shook up, I asked around and learned that he fell and broke his hip. She doesn't drive, so their son was using the van to transport her back and forth to the hospital for dialysis and to visit her husband.
For nearly 35 years, I had taken these neighbors for granted without even realizing it. My gratitude for them suddenly became inestimable. Nervous over their health issues, I stopped what I was doing and rapped on their door.
That was in March. Since then, I remain startled by the feelings of loss this awakening provoked and find myself calling on the elderly couple more often.
But now that it is Thanksgiving, it's hard to focus on anything other than where to have dinner and who’s coming.
Although, underneath my plans for Turkey Day, a renewed consciousness elbows me to demonstrate more gratitude to my husband, my children and my neighbors. Sometimes it takes courage to outwardly express thanks.
Bonnie Ceban, author of "101 Ways to Say Thank You," offers advice on how to show gratitude.
What I love about Ceban’s instructions is that her ideas are simple; most of them cost nothing except time.
Of course, with my consumerism DNA, I naturally think I have to spend money to show appreciation. However, in reality, there are far more meaningful ways to say "thank you."
Besides the usual verbal affirmation, I am considering putting into practice several of the author's less obvious suggestions.
With a little practice and more courage, I’m going to show my appreciation by doing someone’s chores, paying more attention and smiling more.
Oh, yes, and I'm not going to wait until the lights go out and the car is gone to show how much I care.
[Thank you to my many readers. You are the reason I rise early and stay up late to listen for the soothing and sometimes pained voice of stories untold. For you, I am grateful.]
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
When I noticed the neighbor’s house was unusually dark and their van was curiously missing from the driveway, I knew something wasn't right.
It’s not that we talk everyday or every week, for that matter. It’s just that I had come to count on their presence day in and day out like a wall of security.
Shook up, I asked around and learned that he fell and broke his hip. She doesn't drive, so their son was using the van to transport her back and forth to the hospital for dialysis and to visit her husband.
For nearly 35 years, I had taken these neighbors for granted without even realizing it. My gratitude for them suddenly became inestimable. Nervous over their health issues, I stopped what I was doing and rapped on their door.
That was in March. Since then, I remain startled by the feelings of loss this awakening provoked and find myself calling on the elderly couple more often.
But now that it is Thanksgiving, it's hard to focus on anything other than where to have dinner and who’s coming.
Although, underneath my plans for Turkey Day, a renewed consciousness elbows me to demonstrate more gratitude to my husband, my children and my neighbors. Sometimes it takes courage to outwardly express thanks.
Bonnie Ceban, author of "101 Ways to Say Thank You," offers advice on how to show gratitude.
What I love about Ceban’s instructions is that her ideas are simple; most of them cost nothing except time.
Of course, with my consumerism DNA, I naturally think I have to spend money to show appreciation. However, in reality, there are far more meaningful ways to say "thank you."
Besides the usual verbal affirmation, I am considering putting into practice several of the author's less obvious suggestions.
With a little practice and more courage, I’m going to show my appreciation by doing someone’s chores, paying more attention and smiling more.
Oh, yes, and I'm not going to wait until the lights go out and the car is gone to show how much I care.
[Thank you to my many readers. You are the reason I rise early and stay up late to listen for the soothing and sometimes pained voice of stories untold. For you, I am grateful.]
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Stealth game brings out the Mission Impossible in us
Secret Santa starts this week at work. Just in case you've never participated in this holiday experience, let me explain.
Secret Santa, also known as Kris Kringle, is a five-week gift exchange game. Players’ names are drawn from a hat.You are a Secret Santa for the person whose name you draw, giving gifts anonymously until the very last one. Bestow as many gifts as you’d like, but the total value must not exceed $15.
Be sure to sign gift tags Secret Santa, S.S. for short or leave them blank. To ensure anonymity, some change their handwriting or ask someone else to sign for them. Finally, in the last week, reveal who you are by signing your name on the last gift or by hand-delivering it.
Part of the challenge is figuring out how to deliver gifts in an undercover operation without letting on it's you. If your place of employment is a large complex with multiple buildings, try sending gifts through interoffice mail.
Serious Secret Santas are an unusual breed of undercover givers who make "Mission Impossible" look like child’s play. They devise clandestine plans for gifts to suddenly appear on recipients’ desks without a trace or trail.
With a North Pole twinkle in their eyes, the people at my work are really into Secret Santa and look forward to it all year.
Last year during the fourth week of S.S., I realized the level of seriousness when I stopped by the office of my recipient, a Secret Santa die hard and organizer of the annual event. I wasn't conducting reconnaissance. I had a legitimate reason for being there.
On the windowsill behind her desk were all the gifts I had given her, displayed for everyone to see. With poorly disguised curiosity, I gawked and quickly passed judgment on my Secret Santa efforts. There on the ledge were a Dollar Store box of chocolates, a cheesy Christmas ornament, a blah pair of cotton winter gloves and a gaudy pair of earrings.
Because she was showcasing my Secret Santa acumen for all to see, I thought maybe I’d better step up my game, but quickly settled myself down with a little self-talk. It’s anonymous, silly. You old worrywart, nobody knows it’s you! Whew, I felt better.
This year, I am changing my strategy a bit. For some months now, I have been stockpiling clearance items that were marked down to under $5. I may even drop by my new recipient's office for casual surveillance. Plus, I'm thinking about how to cunningly deliver each gift under the radar just like Saint Nick himself.
If you haven’t been a Secret Santa, you may want to consider tossing your name into the hat. It could be one the most magical holiday games you’ll ever play.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Secret Santa, also known as Kris Kringle, is a five-week gift exchange game. Players’ names are drawn from a hat.You are a Secret Santa for the person whose name you draw, giving gifts anonymously until the very last one. Bestow as many gifts as you’d like, but the total value must not exceed $15.
Be sure to sign gift tags Secret Santa, S.S. for short or leave them blank. To ensure anonymity, some change their handwriting or ask someone else to sign for them. Finally, in the last week, reveal who you are by signing your name on the last gift or by hand-delivering it.
Part of the challenge is figuring out how to deliver gifts in an undercover operation without letting on it's you. If your place of employment is a large complex with multiple buildings, try sending gifts through interoffice mail.
Serious Secret Santas are an unusual breed of undercover givers who make "Mission Impossible" look like child’s play. They devise clandestine plans for gifts to suddenly appear on recipients’ desks without a trace or trail.
With a North Pole twinkle in their eyes, the people at my work are really into Secret Santa and look forward to it all year.
Last year during the fourth week of S.S., I realized the level of seriousness when I stopped by the office of my recipient, a Secret Santa die hard and organizer of the annual event. I wasn't conducting reconnaissance. I had a legitimate reason for being there.
On the windowsill behind her desk were all the gifts I had given her, displayed for everyone to see. With poorly disguised curiosity, I gawked and quickly passed judgment on my Secret Santa efforts. There on the ledge were a Dollar Store box of chocolates, a cheesy Christmas ornament, a blah pair of cotton winter gloves and a gaudy pair of earrings.
Because she was showcasing my Secret Santa acumen for all to see, I thought maybe I’d better step up my game, but quickly settled myself down with a little self-talk. It’s anonymous, silly. You old worrywart, nobody knows it’s you! Whew, I felt better.
This year, I am changing my strategy a bit. For some months now, I have been stockpiling clearance items that were marked down to under $5. I may even drop by my new recipient's office for casual surveillance. Plus, I'm thinking about how to cunningly deliver each gift under the radar just like Saint Nick himself.
If you haven’t been a Secret Santa, you may want to consider tossing your name into the hat. It could be one the most magical holiday games you’ll ever play.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Lost my drive, what's his name hasn't helped me
When my drive turned up missing, I panicked and immediately searched every corner, every stack and every drawer. I even shook out my boots, thinking I might find it there.
My flash drive is a life source holding my columns, my book, my plays and the many stories of my life. It is like a best friend, a trusted confidant on good days and bad. It is my tireless laborer, lifting the heavy burdens of my thoughts, carrying them and me from one week to the next.
For more than a week now, I have tried to retrace every step I took, remember each place I touched and recall every move I made.
Out of desperation, I have invoked the aid of Saint Anthony, patron saint of lost things. Mind you, even though I have not officially practiced Catholicism for 37 years, part of me always will be Catholic.
My formative years were ceremoniously shaped by and around the Church. The sanctuary was my second home, the confessional, my safe haven, and the saints, my constant companions.
In my childhood home, Saint Christopher protected my family on road trips. We turned to Saint Jude when in hopeless situations and petitioned Saint Blaise whenever we had sore throats.
Saint Anthony of Padua is the saint Catholics turn to for lost keys, lost books, lost memory, lost people, lost anything and everything. And with the commotion of six kids in my childhood home, we were always losing something.
We even had prayer cards with his image on one side and a petition for finding what was lost on the other. Saint Anthony might as well have had a place at our table; we turned to him that much.
The notion of being able to enlist God's army of saints was and still is nothing less than spectacular. Although I must admit, Saint Anthony has yet to come through this time.
It has been 10 days since I last remember removing the drive from my computer. My faith is waning and I have concluded with crushing disappointment that my beloved memory stick is either hiding in some obscure place or it's in the landfill.
I am not ashamed to admit that I have been bouncing back and forth, ushering appeals not only to Saint Anthony, but to Mother Mary and Father God. Maybe with all three pulling for me my drive will miraculously appear.
After rechecking my desk drawers for the fifth time, my purses for the umpteenth time, my coat pockets a gazillion times, I am starting to question my faith, second-guess my absent-mindedness and worry about my dependence on that little stick of memory.
It is probably time to let go and begin to rebuild my repository of writing on a new flash drive. (No offense, Saint Anthony.)
This whole incident smacks of our pet salamander that turned up missing many years ago. He was in the aquarium one day and gone the next. Vanished. I put Saint Anthony to work on that one, too.
Fifteen years later, when rearranging furniture, I reached behind a heavy dresser to get what I thought was a cobweb. Instead, I grabbed a salamander’s skeletal remains while emoting a primal scream. Startled and then relieved, I uttered, "Thank you, Saint Anthony."
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
My flash drive is a life source holding my columns, my book, my plays and the many stories of my life. It is like a best friend, a trusted confidant on good days and bad. It is my tireless laborer, lifting the heavy burdens of my thoughts, carrying them and me from one week to the next.
For more than a week now, I have tried to retrace every step I took, remember each place I touched and recall every move I made.
Out of desperation, I have invoked the aid of Saint Anthony, patron saint of lost things. Mind you, even though I have not officially practiced Catholicism for 37 years, part of me always will be Catholic.
My formative years were ceremoniously shaped by and around the Church. The sanctuary was my second home, the confessional, my safe haven, and the saints, my constant companions.
In my childhood home, Saint Christopher protected my family on road trips. We turned to Saint Jude when in hopeless situations and petitioned Saint Blaise whenever we had sore throats.
Saint Anthony of Padua is the saint Catholics turn to for lost keys, lost books, lost memory, lost people, lost anything and everything. And with the commotion of six kids in my childhood home, we were always losing something.
We even had prayer cards with his image on one side and a petition for finding what was lost on the other. Saint Anthony might as well have had a place at our table; we turned to him that much.
The notion of being able to enlist God's army of saints was and still is nothing less than spectacular. Although I must admit, Saint Anthony has yet to come through this time.
It has been 10 days since I last remember removing the drive from my computer. My faith is waning and I have concluded with crushing disappointment that my beloved memory stick is either hiding in some obscure place or it's in the landfill.
I am not ashamed to admit that I have been bouncing back and forth, ushering appeals not only to Saint Anthony, but to Mother Mary and Father God. Maybe with all three pulling for me my drive will miraculously appear.
After rechecking my desk drawers for the fifth time, my purses for the umpteenth time, my coat pockets a gazillion times, I am starting to question my faith, second-guess my absent-mindedness and worry about my dependence on that little stick of memory.
It is probably time to let go and begin to rebuild my repository of writing on a new flash drive. (No offense, Saint Anthony.)
This whole incident smacks of our pet salamander that turned up missing many years ago. He was in the aquarium one day and gone the next. Vanished. I put Saint Anthony to work on that one, too.
Fifteen years later, when rearranging furniture, I reached behind a heavy dresser to get what I thought was a cobweb. Instead, I grabbed a salamander’s skeletal remains while emoting a primal scream. Startled and then relieved, I uttered, "Thank you, Saint Anthony."
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Right side, left side, back or front?
Way back on the Epistle side of the sanctuary in the very last pew is where you'll find the Johnsons every Sunday. Since Don uses a walker, he sits near the exit with his wife, daughter and grandchildren at his side.
Up front on the Gospel side are the Andersons, behind them the Swansons. Travel straight back to the center of the church and you’ll find the Larsons, next to the Larsons are the Smiths.
Behind the Smiths, the Bensons and clear in the rear on the Gospel side are the Gibsons.
My attention was first drawn to the territorial nature of where people sit in church some years ago on Good Friday. My congregation was producing a play that I wrote entitled "Marys Crossing." We all hoped the edgy Passion drama, which is written from the female perspective, would bring in a crowd of newcomers, and it did just that.
The night of the performance, dozens upon dozens of unfamiliar faces filed into the church, flushing the Johnsons, the Andersons and others out of their galvanized positions. Even the balcony was filled for the first time in decades.
Bernie, whose spot was taken, was miffed. "Hey, someone took my seat," he whispered to me.
"Yes, isn't that grand," I said, ever so pleased with the turn out. "Looks like you'll have to find to a new place tonight."
As I watched Bernie begrudgingly shuffle his way into the sanctuary, I considered the fixed places we assign ourselves and wondered what would happen if we moved around now and then.
I once knew a woman who left her church all because of the seating chart nature of the place.
"When I saw Linda’s picture in the Obituaries, I felt sad and mad at the same time," she fumed. "Linda always sat on the left side and, of course, I always sat on the right. I knew her face, but I never learned her name, never once spoke to her," she continued with tears welling in a sideways glance, her lips pinching back grief.
"There's something wrong," she blurted mournfully. "We are silently segregating ourselves from one another and nothing is being done about it! That's not what church is supposed to be. It's just not the Christian thing to do, so I quit going."
I first experienced an antidote to such self-segregation at a Latino worship service.
During the "Sharing of the Peace," everyone got out of their seats and greeted each other in two processional circles that moved in opposite directions around the perimeter of the sanctuary.
Conscious of my own fixed place in church, I occasionally force myself to sit on the other side. It is a different experience for me. At first, I feel out of place and a little uncomfortable.
But there in the front corner on the Epistle side far from where I usually sit on Sunday morning, my circle widens. I shake hands with and speak to people for the first time. I hear new voices. I experience a new brand of fellowship without even leaving the building.
So I'm wondering, where do you sit in church?
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com
Up front on the Gospel side are the Andersons, behind them the Swansons. Travel straight back to the center of the church and you’ll find the Larsons, next to the Larsons are the Smiths.
Behind the Smiths, the Bensons and clear in the rear on the Gospel side are the Gibsons.
My attention was first drawn to the territorial nature of where people sit in church some years ago on Good Friday. My congregation was producing a play that I wrote entitled "Marys Crossing." We all hoped the edgy Passion drama, which is written from the female perspective, would bring in a crowd of newcomers, and it did just that.
The night of the performance, dozens upon dozens of unfamiliar faces filed into the church, flushing the Johnsons, the Andersons and others out of their galvanized positions. Even the balcony was filled for the first time in decades.
Bernie, whose spot was taken, was miffed. "Hey, someone took my seat," he whispered to me.
"Yes, isn't that grand," I said, ever so pleased with the turn out. "Looks like you'll have to find to a new place tonight."
As I watched Bernie begrudgingly shuffle his way into the sanctuary, I considered the fixed places we assign ourselves and wondered what would happen if we moved around now and then.
I once knew a woman who left her church all because of the seating chart nature of the place.
"When I saw Linda’s picture in the Obituaries, I felt sad and mad at the same time," she fumed. "Linda always sat on the left side and, of course, I always sat on the right. I knew her face, but I never learned her name, never once spoke to her," she continued with tears welling in a sideways glance, her lips pinching back grief.
"There's something wrong," she blurted mournfully. "We are silently segregating ourselves from one another and nothing is being done about it! That's not what church is supposed to be. It's just not the Christian thing to do, so I quit going."
I first experienced an antidote to such self-segregation at a Latino worship service.
During the "Sharing of the Peace," everyone got out of their seats and greeted each other in two processional circles that moved in opposite directions around the perimeter of the sanctuary.
Conscious of my own fixed place in church, I occasionally force myself to sit on the other side. It is a different experience for me. At first, I feel out of place and a little uncomfortable.
But there in the front corner on the Epistle side far from where I usually sit on Sunday morning, my circle widens. I shake hands with and speak to people for the first time. I hear new voices. I experience a new brand of fellowship without even leaving the building.
So I'm wondering, where do you sit in church?
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com
Monday, December 28, 2009
How to W.R.A.K. up random acts of kindness
When I first learned about the W.R.A.K. Coffee Club, I whined a bit. You see, W.R.A.K., A.K.A.Weekly Random Acts of Kindness, is a ministry of the First Evangelical Lutheran Church that meets weekly at a Nebraska City coffee shop. This made it almost impossible for me to participate in person.
So the innovator of the group, Vanessa Bremer, Director of Youth and Family Ministry at the church, created a Facebook page, so anyone, anywhere can join.
"W.R.A.K.," Bremer explains, "is a flower that sprouted from two church outreach programs: ARK Almighty and Pay It Forward."
She started W.R.A.K. this past fall to provide opportunities to practice kindness, develop faith and create Christian fellowship and community.
Each week, local participants meet at the coffee shop to pick up a new challenge and share their W.R.A.K. stories. Those of us who are at a distance get the challenges on Facebook or by email.
Each new challenge and correlating Bible verse is increasingly more involved, both spiritually and personally. Participants are not required to finish a challenge before delving into the next one.
"Some are easier to complete than others," Bremer admits.
One challenge was based on Proverbs 11:25 "A generous man will prosper; he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed." We were to make an effort to allow others go first through the door, in conversation, while waiting in line and so on.
Another was to treat others when we treating ourselves. We were to buy an extra coffee, candy bar, apple or soda and offer it to someone. else This one was rooted in Hebrews 13:16, which states "And do not forget to do good and to share with others...."
What surprised me the most about W.R.A.K. is that the weekly tasks are becoming more natural and routine in my daily life.
W.R.A.K. now has more than 75 participants from across the U.S. and continues to grow each week.
If you want to "W.R.A.K." up some random acts of kindness, become a friend on Facebook or email Bremer at vanessafelcyouth@yahoo.com to start receiving the weekly challenges by email.
For more information, contact Vanessa Bremer 402.873.5424.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
So the innovator of the group, Vanessa Bremer, Director of Youth and Family Ministry at the church, created a Facebook page, so anyone, anywhere can join.
"W.R.A.K.," Bremer explains, "is a flower that sprouted from two church outreach programs: ARK Almighty and Pay It Forward."
She started W.R.A.K. this past fall to provide opportunities to practice kindness, develop faith and create Christian fellowship and community.
Each week, local participants meet at the coffee shop to pick up a new challenge and share their W.R.A.K. stories. Those of us who are at a distance get the challenges on Facebook or by email.
Each new challenge and correlating Bible verse is increasingly more involved, both spiritually and personally. Participants are not required to finish a challenge before delving into the next one.
"Some are easier to complete than others," Bremer admits.
One challenge was based on Proverbs 11:25 "A generous man will prosper; he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed." We were to make an effort to allow others go first through the door, in conversation, while waiting in line and so on.
Another was to treat others when we treating ourselves. We were to buy an extra coffee, candy bar, apple or soda and offer it to someone. else This one was rooted in Hebrews 13:16, which states "And do not forget to do good and to share with others...."
What surprised me the most about W.R.A.K. is that the weekly tasks are becoming more natural and routine in my daily life.
W.R.A.K. now has more than 75 participants from across the U.S. and continues to grow each week.
If you want to "W.R.A.K." up some random acts of kindness, become a friend on Facebook or email Bremer at vanessafelcyouth@yahoo.com to start receiving the weekly challenges by email.
For more information, contact Vanessa Bremer 402.873.5424.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Friday, December 11, 2009
If there's no room at the inn, where shall they go?
Before I embarked on my first-ever mission experience last weekend, I envisioned homeless adults, not homeless babies. I was on short-term mission trip called Urban Plunge to the gang-ridden, low-income part of Omaha, Nebraska, commonly referred to as North O. There are homeless babies in North Omaha.
Seven out of 10 residents there are considered poor, and this area has one of the highest number of children living in poverty in the U.S. Urban Plunge is an inner city immersion experience in which teams of people volunteer at shelters and missions to feed the hungry, pray for the needy, break bread with the homeless and serve the poor. I encountered homeless men and women who are not really that different from you and me, who have life stories, goals and families of their own.
I discovered numerous ministries operating day and night to make a difference, such as Angels on Wheels, a large team of individuals from a dozen churches, who minister to the physical and spiritual needs of the homeless. Angels on Wheels vans transport people from shelters and darkened streets to a warm welcoming center, where they eat home-cooked food, watch movies, interact with volunteers, receive job training and take GED prep classes.
The Hope Center, a defender of children from neglect and gang violence, serves as a home-away-from-home for inner city youth, ages seven to19. This is an after-school program providing hot meals, recreation, mentoring and help with school work in a safe, nurturing environment. Hope Center volunteers act as surrogate parents, who are involved in children’s lives. They even attend school programs and go to parent-teacher conferences for children whose parents are absent or unavailable. The high school graduation rate in the North Omaha Public School District is approximately 48 percent, while Hope Center youth attending the same schools have a 93 percent high school graduation rate.
Deep within one impoverished neighborhood, where gang signs abound and the sound of gunfire can be heard, is the Mission for All Nations, another faith-based charitable organization. This program exists for the sole purpose of preventing homelessness and hunger. It represents the largest food pantry in Nebraska, feeding some 22,500 individuals nearly 500,000 meals annually. At this mission, there’s free food, clothing and shelter for people of all ethnic backgrounds who are on the fringes of poverty. Here, Urban Plungers prepared food boxes, sorted used clothing and processed applicants for pantry items. We also contributed blankets and hundreds of personal hygiene necessities donated by our churches.
On the way to Omaha’s Eppley Airfield is the Open Door Mission, a Gospel Rescue Mission that meets the basic needs of the homeless and provides life-changing programs 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. This place never closes, as it serves more than 300 people daily with emergency temporary housing, long-term rehabilitation, recovery programs and transitional housing. At Open Door Mission, we sorted used clothes, stocked a free thrift store and ate lunch with homeless women and children.
We also went to Release Ministries, which resides inside the Douglas County Youth Jail, behind towering fences topped with coiled barbed wire and razorblades. This is where Chaplain Ron reaches out to incarcerated high-risk youth who are in the Juvenile Justice System. Through prayer, Bible study and mentoring, Chaplain Ron, a former inmate himself, ministers to young men and women with the goal of turning their lives around. Before I went on my first-ever mission trip last weekend, I envisioned homeless adults, but not homeless babies. There are homeless babies in North Omaha. I held them, fed them, talked to them, played with them, strolled them and danced with them. I even sang to them....
If you or your church group would like to learn more about Urban Plunge, please call 402-592-8332 or visit www.urbanplunge.net.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email
pauladamon@iw.net and find her on Facebook.
Seven out of 10 residents there are considered poor, and this area has one of the highest number of children living in poverty in the U.S. Urban Plunge is an inner city immersion experience in which teams of people volunteer at shelters and missions to feed the hungry, pray for the needy, break bread with the homeless and serve the poor. I encountered homeless men and women who are not really that different from you and me, who have life stories, goals and families of their own.
I discovered numerous ministries operating day and night to make a difference, such as Angels on Wheels, a large team of individuals from a dozen churches, who minister to the physical and spiritual needs of the homeless. Angels on Wheels vans transport people from shelters and darkened streets to a warm welcoming center, where they eat home-cooked food, watch movies, interact with volunteers, receive job training and take GED prep classes.
The Hope Center, a defender of children from neglect and gang violence, serves as a home-away-from-home for inner city youth, ages seven to19. This is an after-school program providing hot meals, recreation, mentoring and help with school work in a safe, nurturing environment. Hope Center volunteers act as surrogate parents, who are involved in children’s lives. They even attend school programs and go to parent-teacher conferences for children whose parents are absent or unavailable. The high school graduation rate in the North Omaha Public School District is approximately 48 percent, while Hope Center youth attending the same schools have a 93 percent high school graduation rate.
Deep within one impoverished neighborhood, where gang signs abound and the sound of gunfire can be heard, is the Mission for All Nations, another faith-based charitable organization. This program exists for the sole purpose of preventing homelessness and hunger. It represents the largest food pantry in Nebraska, feeding some 22,500 individuals nearly 500,000 meals annually. At this mission, there’s free food, clothing and shelter for people of all ethnic backgrounds who are on the fringes of poverty. Here, Urban Plungers prepared food boxes, sorted used clothing and processed applicants for pantry items. We also contributed blankets and hundreds of personal hygiene necessities donated by our churches.
On the way to Omaha’s Eppley Airfield is the Open Door Mission, a Gospel Rescue Mission that meets the basic needs of the homeless and provides life-changing programs 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. This place never closes, as it serves more than 300 people daily with emergency temporary housing, long-term rehabilitation, recovery programs and transitional housing. At Open Door Mission, we sorted used clothes, stocked a free thrift store and ate lunch with homeless women and children.
We also went to Release Ministries, which resides inside the Douglas County Youth Jail, behind towering fences topped with coiled barbed wire and razorblades. This is where Chaplain Ron reaches out to incarcerated high-risk youth who are in the Juvenile Justice System. Through prayer, Bible study and mentoring, Chaplain Ron, a former inmate himself, ministers to young men and women with the goal of turning their lives around. Before I went on my first-ever mission trip last weekend, I envisioned homeless adults, but not homeless babies. There are homeless babies in North Omaha. I held them, fed them, talked to them, played with them, strolled them and danced with them. I even sang to them....
If you or your church group would like to learn more about Urban Plunge, please call 402-592-8332 or visit www.urbanplunge.net.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email
pauladamon@iw.net and find her on Facebook.
Saturday, October 31, 2009
I'm giving it all away – the rest of the story
The week after I signed up to be an organ donor, a letter came in the mail from the Department of Public Safety.
Fingering the thick envelope, I thought it must be a big thank you with some sort of certificate of appreciation.
Eager to open it, I wondered aloud, "Hm-mm, maybe I am the one-hundredth donor this month and I've won the grand prize."
Since I decided to give away all my organs, I had been floating on a cloud of satisfaction, knowing that I could help as many as 60 people.
When my number is up, maybe, just maybe, one of the 16 who die every day waiting for an organ transplant will live.
Wow, did donating my organs make me a wonderful person or what?
I’m no Mother Theresa, but definitely a qualifier for one of the lesser saints. I could see it in lights: "The deceased Paula Bosco Damon enters candidacy for sainthood." Talk about helping others. It doesn’t get any better than this.
In my usual fashion of exuberance over getting real mail in a real envelope that's glued shut, I ripped that baby open. As I quickly read the header "Department of Public Safety, 118 W. Capitol, Pierre, South Dakota 57501-2000," I totally expected praise for my selfless act of generosity.
The letter reads...
Dear Ms. Damon:
Thank you for sending your Organ and Tissue Donor Registry Form. In checking it, I noticed that you had put your doctor’s name in the "Donor's Name" field.
Therefore, I am returning the Form to you, along with a new Form so that you may enter the correct information and return it to me.
Thank you! If you have any questions, please contact me.
Sincerely,
Geneva Barkley
In disbelief, I flipped to the next page and quickly scanned my completed Form. At the bottom, Geneva marked with a yellow highlighter exactly where I had screwed up. The Form reads "Donor's Name," not "Doctor's Name"!
I could not believe it! I had donated my doctors organs, every last one of them, along with all of his tissue without even knowing it!
I donated his heart and heart valves, his lungs and liver, his kidneys and pancreas, his intestines and corneas, even his skin and bones, and I didn’t even ask him.
As every ounce of pride drained out of me, I felt dejected, deflated and disappointed by my silly mistake. I tried to laugh it off –ha, ha, ha. I laughed some more, ha, ha, ha, but I felt so embarrassed. Way to go, Paula.
I had to quickly blame my mistake on something. My eyestrain! That’s it! My job as a writer and editor made me donate my doctor’s organs. Plus, who in the world could read that teeny-weeny 10-point-size font on the Form.
I couldn’t find one of my gazillion pairs of reading glasses and filled it out in a blur. I was so distracted by CNN that it’s a wonder I didn’t donate Wolf Blitzer’s organs.
Prior to receiving this piece of news, I had been strutting around with an interior glow, and outwardly, I was clipping along with gleeful lilt in my step.
Similar to being baptized, confirmed and married, by agreeing to devote my organs had changed me in an indefinable way.
I have learned in life, and in golf, that a do-over can be healthy for your game. So I put on my reading glasses, got out my 4-inch diameter, 3-X power magnifying glass, filled out the Form and mailed it, again. Now, I thought, this time I hope it's official.
(For more information about organ donation, please call 1-888-5-DONATE or 1-888-5-366-2833, or visit www.organdonor.gov.)
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com
Fingering the thick envelope, I thought it must be a big thank you with some sort of certificate of appreciation.
Eager to open it, I wondered aloud, "Hm-mm, maybe I am the one-hundredth donor this month and I've won the grand prize."
Since I decided to give away all my organs, I had been floating on a cloud of satisfaction, knowing that I could help as many as 60 people.
When my number is up, maybe, just maybe, one of the 16 who die every day waiting for an organ transplant will live.
Wow, did donating my organs make me a wonderful person or what?
I’m no Mother Theresa, but definitely a qualifier for one of the lesser saints. I could see it in lights: "The deceased Paula Bosco Damon enters candidacy for sainthood." Talk about helping others. It doesn’t get any better than this.
In my usual fashion of exuberance over getting real mail in a real envelope that's glued shut, I ripped that baby open. As I quickly read the header "Department of Public Safety, 118 W. Capitol, Pierre, South Dakota 57501-2000," I totally expected praise for my selfless act of generosity.
The letter reads...
Dear Ms. Damon:
Thank you for sending your Organ and Tissue Donor Registry Form. In checking it, I noticed that you had put your doctor’s name in the "Donor's Name" field.
Therefore, I am returning the Form to you, along with a new Form so that you may enter the correct information and return it to me.
Thank you! If you have any questions, please contact me.
Sincerely,
Geneva Barkley
In disbelief, I flipped to the next page and quickly scanned my completed Form. At the bottom, Geneva marked with a yellow highlighter exactly where I had screwed up. The Form reads "Donor's Name," not "Doctor's Name"!
I could not believe it! I had donated my doctors organs, every last one of them, along with all of his tissue without even knowing it!
I donated his heart and heart valves, his lungs and liver, his kidneys and pancreas, his intestines and corneas, even his skin and bones, and I didn’t even ask him.
As every ounce of pride drained out of me, I felt dejected, deflated and disappointed by my silly mistake. I tried to laugh it off –ha, ha, ha. I laughed some more, ha, ha, ha, but I felt so embarrassed. Way to go, Paula.
I had to quickly blame my mistake on something. My eyestrain! That’s it! My job as a writer and editor made me donate my doctor’s organs. Plus, who in the world could read that teeny-weeny 10-point-size font on the Form.
I couldn’t find one of my gazillion pairs of reading glasses and filled it out in a blur. I was so distracted by CNN that it’s a wonder I didn’t donate Wolf Blitzer’s organs.
Prior to receiving this piece of news, I had been strutting around with an interior glow, and outwardly, I was clipping along with gleeful lilt in my step.
Similar to being baptized, confirmed and married, by agreeing to devote my organs had changed me in an indefinable way.
I have learned in life, and in golf, that a do-over can be healthy for your game. So I put on my reading glasses, got out my 4-inch diameter, 3-X power magnifying glass, filled out the Form and mailed it, again. Now, I thought, this time I hope it's official.
(For more information about organ donation, please call 1-888-5-DONATE or 1-888-5-366-2833, or visit www.organdonor.gov.)
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com
Saturday, October 24, 2009
It's going to be a great day because I'm giving it all away
There's a note on my driver's license that says, "Donor." It used to say "Eye Donor," but I have graduated to donating all of my organs to someone in need when I kick the bucket. Nothing to lose. Everything to gain.
I know it might sound a little odd, but I'm excited about being an organ donor. I like the idea of someone else seeing better, feeling better or living better when my time comes.
Now that I'm giving it all away, I have a warm fuzzy feeling knowing others will have my heart, heart valves, lungs, liver, kidneys, pancreas, intestines, corneas, skin, bone and/or connective tissue; although, they may not want my heart with its murmur, leaky valve and aneurismal aorta.
What made me decide? My brother-in-law Tony is alive today because of an organ donor. That convinced me to be a donor, too.
I went online to organdonor.gov and I learned some amazing facts – like donating my organs, bones and tissue could save or improve the lives of as many as 50 to 60 people. Wow, who would have thought I had that much life in me?
I also learned that at any given time nearly 80,000 people are waiting for organs. Every 13 minutes, a new name is added to the national waiting list and 16 people die every day waiting for organs.
On the website organdonor.gov, I registered with my state's donor registry by printing the South Dakota Resident Organ and Tissue Donor Form. I filled it out and mailed it to Department of Public Safety, Driver Licensing Program, 118 West Capitol Avenue, Pierre, SD 57501-2000. It was that simple!
I printed a donor card at www.organdonor.gov, and with Brian as my witness, I signed it and kept it in my wallet.
If you don't have a Brian to be your witness, ask around: a family member, a friend, the mail carrier, the UPS driver, the garbage man, your next door neighbor, a Jehovah’s Witness at your door, the kids playing street football out front, your Avon lady, the meter reader, your Mary Kay representative or the Boy Scout selling popcorn.
Next, I designated my decision on my driver’s license when I renewed it.
Signing this form means when I die, a donation coordinator will obtain my medical history from my family and conduct tests to see if my organs will work in someone else’s body? Then, all my good stuff - organs, bones and tissue - will go to someone in need. (Yee haw!)
The second best part of this gift of life is that it will not cost me a penny, since all organ donation expenses are covered by the transplanting geniuses. I am not cheap, but I like a good bargain.
Every day is a great day, knowing my organ donor status is marked on the bottom right-hand corner of my driver’s license. Is yours?
(For more information about organ donation, please call 1-888-5-DONATE or 1-888-5-366-2833 and follow the prompts.)
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com
I know it might sound a little odd, but I'm excited about being an organ donor. I like the idea of someone else seeing better, feeling better or living better when my time comes.
Now that I'm giving it all away, I have a warm fuzzy feeling knowing others will have my heart, heart valves, lungs, liver, kidneys, pancreas, intestines, corneas, skin, bone and/or connective tissue; although, they may not want my heart with its murmur, leaky valve and aneurismal aorta.
What made me decide? My brother-in-law Tony is alive today because of an organ donor. That convinced me to be a donor, too.
I went online to organdonor.gov and I learned some amazing facts – like donating my organs, bones and tissue could save or improve the lives of as many as 50 to 60 people. Wow, who would have thought I had that much life in me?
I also learned that at any given time nearly 80,000 people are waiting for organs. Every 13 minutes, a new name is added to the national waiting list and 16 people die every day waiting for organs.
On the website organdonor.gov, I registered with my state's donor registry by printing the South Dakota Resident Organ and Tissue Donor Form. I filled it out and mailed it to Department of Public Safety, Driver Licensing Program, 118 West Capitol Avenue, Pierre, SD 57501-2000. It was that simple!
I printed a donor card at www.organdonor.gov, and with Brian as my witness, I signed it and kept it in my wallet.
If you don't have a Brian to be your witness, ask around: a family member, a friend, the mail carrier, the UPS driver, the garbage man, your next door neighbor, a Jehovah’s Witness at your door, the kids playing street football out front, your Avon lady, the meter reader, your Mary Kay representative or the Boy Scout selling popcorn.
Next, I designated my decision on my driver’s license when I renewed it.
Signing this form means when I die, a donation coordinator will obtain my medical history from my family and conduct tests to see if my organs will work in someone else’s body? Then, all my good stuff - organs, bones and tissue - will go to someone in need. (Yee haw!)
The second best part of this gift of life is that it will not cost me a penny, since all organ donation expenses are covered by the transplanting geniuses. I am not cheap, but I like a good bargain.
Every day is a great day, knowing my organ donor status is marked on the bottom right-hand corner of my driver’s license. Is yours?
(For more information about organ donation, please call 1-888-5-DONATE or 1-888-5-366-2833 and follow the prompts.)
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com
Thursday, October 1, 2009
It's gotta hurt so good to be real
Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns. – George Eliot
At the risk of looking tacky, I'm thinking about putting up my Christmas lights in October, while temperatures are pretty close to perfect.
With the mercury rising to about 65 degrees by day and dipping to only 48 or 50 in the evening, I could decorate the whole house in Bermuda shorts and a sleeveless shirt.
Since the sun does not set until 8 p.m. or so, I'd have all day to twist garland, tie bows and string lights, while sipping lemonade and wiping sweat from my brow.
Why not? Retail stores are stocked for Christmas, and I heard holiday music on the radio the other day. I even thought I saw jolly old Saint Nick on TV. No, wait a minute...that was former Senator Tom Delay in his jump suit on Dancing with the Stars.
Every year at this time, as each day slips by, I think about how I should be dragging out boxes marked "XMAS."
But then I wonder how will I get into the spirit of Christmas if I have to douse myself with bug repellent before venturing outside.
It's just that stringing holiday lights in the warmth of long harvest days seems way too painless for me.
In my opinion, it has to hurt to be genuine holiday decorating.
When is the right time to decorate, you ask? Well, let me count the ways.
You know it’s time to put up outdoor decorations when...
You anticipate spending four hours or more fumbling around in cheerless darkness searching for every gosh darn plastic wreath and all those little hooks to hang lights from the eaves.
You put on three or four layers of thermal clothing, you can hardly walk, fall down, can't get back up and cry for help.
Your Christmas cards shatter when you accidentally drop them.
Your nose is running and it takes four blocks to catch it.
A glacier begins to pass by your house.
Your grandmother's dentures chatter all by themselves.
You actually don't mind spilling your cup of coffee all over you lap.
And you immediately regret waiting until the cold dark reaches of December to decorate.
Even after all of this, you know for certain it’s time to put up your outdoor decorations when you have an unexplainable feeling of peace as you string lights, tie bows, hang wreaths and so on....
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
At the risk of looking tacky, I'm thinking about putting up my Christmas lights in October, while temperatures are pretty close to perfect.
With the mercury rising to about 65 degrees by day and dipping to only 48 or 50 in the evening, I could decorate the whole house in Bermuda shorts and a sleeveless shirt.
Since the sun does not set until 8 p.m. or so, I'd have all day to twist garland, tie bows and string lights, while sipping lemonade and wiping sweat from my brow.
Why not? Retail stores are stocked for Christmas, and I heard holiday music on the radio the other day. I even thought I saw jolly old Saint Nick on TV. No, wait a minute...that was former Senator Tom Delay in his jump suit on Dancing with the Stars.
Every year at this time, as each day slips by, I think about how I should be dragging out boxes marked "XMAS."
But then I wonder how will I get into the spirit of Christmas if I have to douse myself with bug repellent before venturing outside.
It's just that stringing holiday lights in the warmth of long harvest days seems way too painless for me.
In my opinion, it has to hurt to be genuine holiday decorating.
When is the right time to decorate, you ask? Well, let me count the ways.
You know it’s time to put up outdoor decorations when...
You anticipate spending four hours or more fumbling around in cheerless darkness searching for every gosh darn plastic wreath and all those little hooks to hang lights from the eaves.
You put on three or four layers of thermal clothing, you can hardly walk, fall down, can't get back up and cry for help.
Your Christmas cards shatter when you accidentally drop them.
Your nose is running and it takes four blocks to catch it.
A glacier begins to pass by your house.
Your grandmother's dentures chatter all by themselves.
You actually don't mind spilling your cup of coffee all over you lap.
And you immediately regret waiting until the cold dark reaches of December to decorate.
Even after all of this, you know for certain it’s time to put up your outdoor decorations when you have an unexplainable feeling of peace as you string lights, tie bows, hang wreaths and so on....
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Finding my way to Saint Eusebius
MapQuest takes me along I-80 from Indiana, east past Youngstown, Ohio, and then onto Pennsylvania Highway 38. I turn right on Emlenton Clintonville Road, left on Main Street and onto Main Hill Road, which becomes Queenstown Road. I veer left onto PA 68, which becomes Clarion Street and left again on East 2nd Street.
I am trying to find Saint Eusebius Cemetery in East Brady, Pennsylvania, where my parents are buried.
On my way through the Allegheny Mountains, I experience recurring bouts of grief. This is the closest physically I will be to my parents since their ashes were transported here from California a little more than a year ago. This is my first visit.
East Brady is an unassuming little town in Western Pennsylvania, hidden away down several winding roads. It possess all the amenities of not-so-remote places. Quick shops, pizza places, bars and beauty salons busily line Main Street, which skirts a mountain ridge along the broad and meandering Allegheny River.
Not far from here, my dad and mom were born: Dad in Rimersburg, Pennsylvania, Mom in Punxsutawney. It is in this area they went to school, married, started our family, and this is where they wanted to be buried.
As I look for signs for the cemetery, I imagine every adult child at one time or another doing this: searching for that final resting place of their parents.
After getting lost, backtracking, stopping for directions and calling my uncle for the exact location, I finally arrive at Saint Eusebius Cemetery, a medium-sized stretch perched on a hillside with pastoral views below.
Once inside the iron gates, and finally locating their plot, I slowly read their names, dates of birth, dates of death and cannot imagine how 85 years of life passed through them so quickly.
I kneel as close as I can get to their headstones, stroking their names, running my fingers along the rough edges of the granite marker. It is now clear that this is where they had been journeying to all along and I am overwhelmed.
I have traveled to this place more than 1,000 miles from my home in South Dakota.
I want them to see me, a dutiful middle child of six, paying homage to all their work in bringing me life.
I want them to see me here, missing them while honoring their wishes to be placed side-by-side near where they started life. I am here.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
I am trying to find Saint Eusebius Cemetery in East Brady, Pennsylvania, where my parents are buried.
On my way through the Allegheny Mountains, I experience recurring bouts of grief. This is the closest physically I will be to my parents since their ashes were transported here from California a little more than a year ago. This is my first visit.
East Brady is an unassuming little town in Western Pennsylvania, hidden away down several winding roads. It possess all the amenities of not-so-remote places. Quick shops, pizza places, bars and beauty salons busily line Main Street, which skirts a mountain ridge along the broad and meandering Allegheny River.
Not far from here, my dad and mom were born: Dad in Rimersburg, Pennsylvania, Mom in Punxsutawney. It is in this area they went to school, married, started our family, and this is where they wanted to be buried.
As I look for signs for the cemetery, I imagine every adult child at one time or another doing this: searching for that final resting place of their parents.
After getting lost, backtracking, stopping for directions and calling my uncle for the exact location, I finally arrive at Saint Eusebius Cemetery, a medium-sized stretch perched on a hillside with pastoral views below.
Once inside the iron gates, and finally locating their plot, I slowly read their names, dates of birth, dates of death and cannot imagine how 85 years of life passed through them so quickly.
I kneel as close as I can get to their headstones, stroking their names, running my fingers along the rough edges of the granite marker. It is now clear that this is where they had been journeying to all along and I am overwhelmed.
I have traveled to this place more than 1,000 miles from my home in South Dakota.
I want them to see me, a dutiful middle child of six, paying homage to all their work in bringing me life.
I want them to see me here, missing them while honoring their wishes to be placed side-by-side near where they started life. I am here.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Hobo signs reveal character and more
"Still your children wander homeless; still the hungry cry for bread…." - Albert Bayly
"My house has a hobo sign that says, 'Generous man lives here,'" my soft-spoken friend Michael uttered at church one day. We were discussing demonstrating acts of charity among strangers in our adult Sunday school class.
"Well, they actually haven't painted a sign on my house, but word has spread among the hobo community that I'll give them a hot cup of soup if they’re hungry and a shirt if they need it," Michael continued with a humble twinkle in his eyes. "I don't give them money, though. And no booze. Just the basics."
Hoboes passing through Sioux City, Iowa, have been known to congregate in Cook Park and in a wooded area along railroad tracks parallel to Interstate 29 North, explained Michael, himself a Sioux City resident.
As I listened to him speak about hoboes, I was captivated. I learned that hobo signs are an essential way a dispersed group of people stay connected.
They have no phones, no email, no way to communicate, except for word-of-mouth and cryptic symbols left behind on fences, walls, houses and barns.
Simply put, hobo signs are instructions on where to go for food and shelter, how to stay out of trouble, how to navigate through life.
A piece of string tied to a tree or a fence stands for "asked for and received."
A plastic bag filled with rocks means you will come away with more than you need. The rocks symbolize material goods instead of money. Others leave behind arrows made of sticks, leading to a hot meal or a safe place to stay the night.
A squiggly horizontal line stands for, "Poor man lives here." A top hat next to a large triangle means just the opposite, "A wealthy man lives here."
A vertical line with three perpendicular lines diminishing in size with the smallest at the top symbolizes "officer." A smiley face tells others "Can sleep here."
Five circles mean "good chance to get money." A simple table means sit-down food. A cross? "Talk religion and get food." A "T" stands for "food for work."
Two circles, one on top of the other with three small triangles beside the circles are the sign for "kind woman." My favorite is a horizontal rectangle with a jagged line inside, which means "Bad-tempered owner."
According to hobo historian Fran DeLorenzo, author of The Hobo Minstrel, one or more signs can have the same message, and there can be slightly different meanings for a sign used in different parts of the U.S.
You may have noticed hobo signs and only dismissed them as litter caught up by the wind or child's play.
As I delved into hobo signs, I grew enamored by their simplicity and power and wondered what sign hoboes would place outside my house or yours.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
"My house has a hobo sign that says, 'Generous man lives here,'" my soft-spoken friend Michael uttered at church one day. We were discussing demonstrating acts of charity among strangers in our adult Sunday school class.
"Well, they actually haven't painted a sign on my house, but word has spread among the hobo community that I'll give them a hot cup of soup if they’re hungry and a shirt if they need it," Michael continued with a humble twinkle in his eyes. "I don't give them money, though. And no booze. Just the basics."
Hoboes passing through Sioux City, Iowa, have been known to congregate in Cook Park and in a wooded area along railroad tracks parallel to Interstate 29 North, explained Michael, himself a Sioux City resident.
As I listened to him speak about hoboes, I was captivated. I learned that hobo signs are an essential way a dispersed group of people stay connected.
They have no phones, no email, no way to communicate, except for word-of-mouth and cryptic symbols left behind on fences, walls, houses and barns.
Simply put, hobo signs are instructions on where to go for food and shelter, how to stay out of trouble, how to navigate through life.
A piece of string tied to a tree or a fence stands for "asked for and received."
A plastic bag filled with rocks means you will come away with more than you need. The rocks symbolize material goods instead of money. Others leave behind arrows made of sticks, leading to a hot meal or a safe place to stay the night.
A squiggly horizontal line stands for, "Poor man lives here." A top hat next to a large triangle means just the opposite, "A wealthy man lives here."
A vertical line with three perpendicular lines diminishing in size with the smallest at the top symbolizes "officer." A smiley face tells others "Can sleep here."
Five circles mean "good chance to get money." A simple table means sit-down food. A cross? "Talk religion and get food." A "T" stands for "food for work."
Two circles, one on top of the other with three small triangles beside the circles are the sign for "kind woman." My favorite is a horizontal rectangle with a jagged line inside, which means "Bad-tempered owner."
According to hobo historian Fran DeLorenzo, author of The Hobo Minstrel, one or more signs can have the same message, and there can be slightly different meanings for a sign used in different parts of the U.S.
You may have noticed hobo signs and only dismissed them as litter caught up by the wind or child's play.
As I delved into hobo signs, I grew enamored by their simplicity and power and wondered what sign hoboes would place outside my house or yours.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Saturday, September 19, 2009
It’s not pretty where my heart still resides…
It's not pretty. Stripped of all of its former beauty and grace, my childhood home, now abandoned, stands gaunt – a total wreck. Once a gorgeous century-old house, decorated with soft lights and lovely draperies, blooming rhododendron skirting the foundation, it stands ravaged from total neglect.
When we return to the place from which we came, we long to see our memories in tact. This was not my experience when visiting 33 Pennsylvania Avenue in Lakewood, New York just a few weeks ago.
I’ve been back several times over the last 37 years to find the house in disrepair, contrary to my parents’ attentive care. However, this was the worst.
Sitting idle for years with only telltale signs of renovation, the place stares back at me like an unpreserved corpse with its hollow eyes, boney physique, deteriorating lines and decomposing flesh.
Windows broken out, rotting sideboards, swaying eaves, boarded up doorways, it has been purged of anything recognizable. It has no pulse.
My home, where as a child I imagined my future, is gone, save its idle skeleton, which stands weary from disuse.
Peering through the oversized French picture windows into my living room, I behold a place that once contained my dreams, held my hopes, along with disappointments, that now is stripped to only bones: walls with plaster missing, floors splintered and cracked, ceilings that are water stained.
Everywhere I look, I witness the decay and degradation. This once triumphant abode – a Victorian queen – now defeated with unimaginable damage.
Straining hard to remember sights and sounds of its formidable years, I am staring deep into a grave, which has entombed frolicking innocence – dancing, singing, playing, sharing, being.
My heart grows larcenous with a sudden urge to pick up a stone, a brick, a piece of clapboard – even a chip of glass – and steal it away. My soul thunders with anger over reckless, neglectors who have left it bare.
I silently watch for any signs of life preserved, above the fray, as though squinting through a thick, slowly lifting fog. Secretly desiring this corpse to rise, I summon its former beauty and grace.
As I pass through my backyard, I step over the broken glass, make my way around the side yard, through overgrown grass and back again, to the front. I am in a funeral procession, pacing slowly to the dead beat of despair.
As I depart, sadness besieges me. I solemnly wave goodbye, as with a therible of incense, blessing this house as once mine, while smoke from burning embers of yesterday rise and float away – forever gone.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
When we return to the place from which we came, we long to see our memories in tact. This was not my experience when visiting 33 Pennsylvania Avenue in Lakewood, New York just a few weeks ago.
I’ve been back several times over the last 37 years to find the house in disrepair, contrary to my parents’ attentive care. However, this was the worst.
Sitting idle for years with only telltale signs of renovation, the place stares back at me like an unpreserved corpse with its hollow eyes, boney physique, deteriorating lines and decomposing flesh.
Windows broken out, rotting sideboards, swaying eaves, boarded up doorways, it has been purged of anything recognizable. It has no pulse.
My home, where as a child I imagined my future, is gone, save its idle skeleton, which stands weary from disuse.
Peering through the oversized French picture windows into my living room, I behold a place that once contained my dreams, held my hopes, along with disappointments, that now is stripped to only bones: walls with plaster missing, floors splintered and cracked, ceilings that are water stained.
Everywhere I look, I witness the decay and degradation. This once triumphant abode – a Victorian queen – now defeated with unimaginable damage.
Straining hard to remember sights and sounds of its formidable years, I am staring deep into a grave, which has entombed frolicking innocence – dancing, singing, playing, sharing, being.
My heart grows larcenous with a sudden urge to pick up a stone, a brick, a piece of clapboard – even a chip of glass – and steal it away. My soul thunders with anger over reckless, neglectors who have left it bare.
I silently watch for any signs of life preserved, above the fray, as though squinting through a thick, slowly lifting fog. Secretly desiring this corpse to rise, I summon its former beauty and grace.
As I pass through my backyard, I step over the broken glass, make my way around the side yard, through overgrown grass and back again, to the front. I am in a funeral procession, pacing slowly to the dead beat of despair.
As I depart, sadness besieges me. I solemnly wave goodbye, as with a therible of incense, blessing this house as once mine, while smoke from burning embers of yesterday rise and float away – forever gone.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Dishing up little bit of sugar at the Leavenworth
Her name is Saundra. I first met her at the Leavenworth, a throwback diner in Omaha, where she waits tables.
Her attire was that of a classic waitress. She wore a dress-uniform, complete with a white chiffon apron tied in a neat bow around her waist. The only thing missing was a cap-like band on her head.
"How ya’all doin'?’ she greeted my family, while handing each of us an over-sized plastic-coated menu. After we ordered and she began serving our meals, Saundra paused at our table, head bowed while our son Joel finished the table grace.
"AMEN!" she exclaimed. "Here’s your ketchup, Preacher Man," she said, offering him a full bottle of Heinz.
During the course of our time at the Leavenworth, Saundra’s weathered beauty and velvety deep voice spoke phrases, as if sweet sonnets, that drew me in, like root command calling me to a place I wanted to remain.
"Do you have enough to eat, Sweetheart? Do you want more to drink, Baby? Honey, can I get you any dessert? Ready for your check, Sugar?"
The way Saundra addressed each of us was so endearing that a powerful spirit of agape love produced a sort of giving circle that she embodied.
After my brief interaction with Saundra during lunch that day, I found myself in the firm hold of her infectious kindness. I wanted to know more about her and asked if she would be willing to share her story with me.
"Honey, I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell my story for years."
In our follow-up phone conversation, I learned more about Saundra – the person. She is no longer married and lives with her aging parents.
Her ex-husband was alcoholic, and Saundra, now 54, was a frequent target of his rage. "One night," she recounted, "he nearly killed me with a tire iron." She reported the attack to the police; her husband was arrested, sent to jail, where he died.
Saundra breathed a deep sorrowful sigh of relief that day, but her son, who was 10 at the time, took it hard.
"If you just would have let him walk away, I’d still have a father," her son carried on.
"What kind of woman would I have been if I had stayed?" Saundra told me. "He hit me on my ankle, on my knee, on my thigh and on my head. I fell, but he would not let go. He had the devil in his eyes, and I thought, ‘My god, he’s going to kill me.’ I tried to protect myself. I called out the name of Jesus."
This is only a small part of Saundra’s back-story. There is much more to her life growing up in America’s heartland, where she confronted racial discrimination.
"I’ve had a lot of unfair things happen to me," Saundra concluded after relaying several personal instances. "But don’t get me wrong – I am truly and richly blessed."
"Saundra, before we hang up, I just want to say that you have the gift of exhortation. You lift people up. You make them feel so good!"
"You know," she replied, "I didn’t think I had any gifts. I have been searching and praying, asking God to show me what they are. Now, my prayer has been answered."
As we concluded our talk, Saundra said, "I only have one request of you," continuing with graceful charm. "If anyone asks you who I am, please tell them that I am a child of God."
Saundra is the embodiment of all that is determined and hopeful – in this world.
So, the next time you are on Omaha’s South Side, you might want to pay a visit to the Leavenworth Diner and ask to be seated Saundra’s section.
Whatever you go by – Sweetheart, Baby, Honey, or even Sugar – you will not be disappointed.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Her attire was that of a classic waitress. She wore a dress-uniform, complete with a white chiffon apron tied in a neat bow around her waist. The only thing missing was a cap-like band on her head.
"How ya’all doin'?’ she greeted my family, while handing each of us an over-sized plastic-coated menu. After we ordered and she began serving our meals, Saundra paused at our table, head bowed while our son Joel finished the table grace.
"AMEN!" she exclaimed. "Here’s your ketchup, Preacher Man," she said, offering him a full bottle of Heinz.
During the course of our time at the Leavenworth, Saundra’s weathered beauty and velvety deep voice spoke phrases, as if sweet sonnets, that drew me in, like root command calling me to a place I wanted to remain.
"Do you have enough to eat, Sweetheart? Do you want more to drink, Baby? Honey, can I get you any dessert? Ready for your check, Sugar?"
The way Saundra addressed each of us was so endearing that a powerful spirit of agape love produced a sort of giving circle that she embodied.
After my brief interaction with Saundra during lunch that day, I found myself in the firm hold of her infectious kindness. I wanted to know more about her and asked if she would be willing to share her story with me.
"Honey, I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell my story for years."
In our follow-up phone conversation, I learned more about Saundra – the person. She is no longer married and lives with her aging parents.
Her ex-husband was alcoholic, and Saundra, now 54, was a frequent target of his rage. "One night," she recounted, "he nearly killed me with a tire iron." She reported the attack to the police; her husband was arrested, sent to jail, where he died.
Saundra breathed a deep sorrowful sigh of relief that day, but her son, who was 10 at the time, took it hard.
"If you just would have let him walk away, I’d still have a father," her son carried on.
"What kind of woman would I have been if I had stayed?" Saundra told me. "He hit me on my ankle, on my knee, on my thigh and on my head. I fell, but he would not let go. He had the devil in his eyes, and I thought, ‘My god, he’s going to kill me.’ I tried to protect myself. I called out the name of Jesus."
This is only a small part of Saundra’s back-story. There is much more to her life growing up in America’s heartland, where she confronted racial discrimination.
"I’ve had a lot of unfair things happen to me," Saundra concluded after relaying several personal instances. "But don’t get me wrong – I am truly and richly blessed."
"Saundra, before we hang up, I just want to say that you have the gift of exhortation. You lift people up. You make them feel so good!"
"You know," she replied, "I didn’t think I had any gifts. I have been searching and praying, asking God to show me what they are. Now, my prayer has been answered."
As we concluded our talk, Saundra said, "I only have one request of you," continuing with graceful charm. "If anyone asks you who I am, please tell them that I am a child of God."
Saundra is the embodiment of all that is determined and hopeful – in this world.
So, the next time you are on Omaha’s South Side, you might want to pay a visit to the Leavenworth Diner and ask to be seated Saundra’s section.
Whatever you go by – Sweetheart, Baby, Honey, or even Sugar – you will not be disappointed.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at www.my-story-your-story.blogspot.com and find her on Facebook.
Friday, August 14, 2009
Reflections on being pastoral, treading holy ground
While going through my notes from my Clinical Pastoral Training, I found these forgotten entries in my journal...
CPE Journal – December 2, 2005... First time visiting patients.
Walking into patients’ rooms at the hospital, I feel as if I am walking on holy ground. The reverence with which I approach the name, the room number, the condition, the age weighs heavily on me.
The walls, too, are heavy, carrying their concerns about family, children, job, home, pets, friends, illness, hope, despair, pain, anger, guilt, exhaustion.
As a new chaplain, I wonder where to start, what to say, how to pray.
Patients ask...Why is this happening? What could I have done differently? Where have I been? Where am I going? How will I get from there to here?
When people become ill, life as we know it ceases to exist - for some, momentarily, for others, permanently. When illness strikes, we can no longer push away the inevitable – the cancer, the dementia, the pneumonia, the lesion, the infection.
Everything but the pain of illness and life has stopped to make room in this room.
Words come gently, slowly – like a waltz that dips and sways, moving to and fro with hands clasped, hearts engaged, eyes locked in heartache and hope. There’s a sparkle – a light – behind those tears.
In some patients, I see stubborn will fighting back in their tightly compressed lips. In others, I observe resignation in the way shoulders slump. I see heads bow and nod in either agreement or disagreement.
And in some, I see hope and ask, "Where does your hope come from?"
"I am but a sparrow," one patient chirped. "He will take care of me – always has – always will."
"How do you cope?" I ask another.
"I pray. I say my rosary. I cry. I blow my top."
I hear strength. "Where does that strength come from?"
"I’ve had so many kids and grandkids – they keep me going," a patient heralds.
Another commends, "I am being cared for so well. The nurses and doctors – I trust them."
Inside these hospital walls resides the pressure of illness, the hard work of searching for hope and the fear of the unknown. There is spiritual tension between patient and chaplain as to where they will go in pastoral conversation.
Perhaps this strange and unfamiliar land – this uncharted territory of being a chaplain is where one finds the greatest meaning in relationship with oneself, with loved ones, with friends and with God.
Perhaps here in the isolation of illness one is walking on the most holy ground.
Being pastoral is letting go of your intent and going with the patient’s need.
Being pastoral is being with the person in the moment: accept the status, be patient with unanswered questions, bear the burden of the loneliness of the situation, acknowledge and embrace the direction even though it seems an aimless one, remain with hope and faith.
How have you been pastoral today?
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on Facebook.
CPE Journal – December 2, 2005... First time visiting patients.
Walking into patients’ rooms at the hospital, I feel as if I am walking on holy ground. The reverence with which I approach the name, the room number, the condition, the age weighs heavily on me.
The walls, too, are heavy, carrying their concerns about family, children, job, home, pets, friends, illness, hope, despair, pain, anger, guilt, exhaustion.
As a new chaplain, I wonder where to start, what to say, how to pray.
Patients ask...Why is this happening? What could I have done differently? Where have I been? Where am I going? How will I get from there to here?
When people become ill, life as we know it ceases to exist - for some, momentarily, for others, permanently. When illness strikes, we can no longer push away the inevitable – the cancer, the dementia, the pneumonia, the lesion, the infection.
Everything but the pain of illness and life has stopped to make room in this room.
Words come gently, slowly – like a waltz that dips and sways, moving to and fro with hands clasped, hearts engaged, eyes locked in heartache and hope. There’s a sparkle – a light – behind those tears.
In some patients, I see stubborn will fighting back in their tightly compressed lips. In others, I observe resignation in the way shoulders slump. I see heads bow and nod in either agreement or disagreement.
And in some, I see hope and ask, "Where does your hope come from?"
"I am but a sparrow," one patient chirped. "He will take care of me – always has – always will."
"How do you cope?" I ask another.
"I pray. I say my rosary. I cry. I blow my top."
I hear strength. "Where does that strength come from?"
"I’ve had so many kids and grandkids – they keep me going," a patient heralds.
Another commends, "I am being cared for so well. The nurses and doctors – I trust them."
Inside these hospital walls resides the pressure of illness, the hard work of searching for hope and the fear of the unknown. There is spiritual tension between patient and chaplain as to where they will go in pastoral conversation.
Perhaps this strange and unfamiliar land – this uncharted territory of being a chaplain is where one finds the greatest meaning in relationship with oneself, with loved ones, with friends and with God.
Perhaps here in the isolation of illness one is walking on the most holy ground.
Being pastoral is letting go of your intent and going with the patient’s need.
Being pastoral is being with the person in the moment: accept the status, be patient with unanswered questions, bear the burden of the loneliness of the situation, acknowledge and embrace the direction even though it seems an aimless one, remain with hope and faith.
How have you been pastoral today?
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on Facebook.
Find out who needs God – a book review
For those who are looking for or who have turned away from God…
The issues and content in the book Who Needs God by Harold Kushner are rooted in the author’s personal frustration. He tells his readers that he wrote this book because he had to.
Kushner, a rabbi, says that people look away from God to find identity and meaning in work, family and retirement. His frustration comes from having spent nearly 30 years attempting to show his congregants "how much more fulfilled they would be if they made room for [God and] their religious tradition in their lives…."
With frustration in tow, the author sets out to marry his to two loves: his love for religious tradition and love for his congregation. In doing so, Kushner sets out to subtly and serendipitously answer the rhetorical question that the title of this work poses – Who Needs God.
Kushner takes all nine chapters to argue everyone's need for God. He contends that our souls crave spiritual nourishment. Without it, he says, we become spiritually "stunted and underdeveloped."
To receive spiritual fulfillment, Kushner contends, we need to enter into a kind of communion. This communion is often not accessible because "the world is so noisy and full of distractions, we are so dazzled by our power and success or religion in the late twentieth century is often badly packaged or presented by people we cannot trust or admire."
Throughout the book, he consistently and systematically takes to task our post-modern insatiable appetites for more power and more things in light of God’s covenantal relationship.
Creating a tension between sacred tradition and lack thereof, Kushner points his finger at modernization as the culprit to our inability to realize our need for God.
In Who Needs God the author presents an important debate about this need for God, a debate that often appears to be non-existent in today's world.
Who talks about this need? Where do you go to learn more about it? How do you even know if you need God?
This book evokes larger questions about how we approach this need for God in congregations.Is the absence of talk about needing God contributing to the declining rolls in mainline Protestant churches?
Kushner writes, "In a century which encourages us to use computers and makes it so hard for us to write or read poetry, it is so easy to put out the sacred fires which have been tended to for a hundred generations."
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
The issues and content in the book Who Needs God by Harold Kushner are rooted in the author’s personal frustration. He tells his readers that he wrote this book because he had to.
Kushner, a rabbi, says that people look away from God to find identity and meaning in work, family and retirement. His frustration comes from having spent nearly 30 years attempting to show his congregants "how much more fulfilled they would be if they made room for [God and] their religious tradition in their lives…."
With frustration in tow, the author sets out to marry his to two loves: his love for religious tradition and love for his congregation. In doing so, Kushner sets out to subtly and serendipitously answer the rhetorical question that the title of this work poses – Who Needs God.
Kushner takes all nine chapters to argue everyone's need for God. He contends that our souls crave spiritual nourishment. Without it, he says, we become spiritually "stunted and underdeveloped."
To receive spiritual fulfillment, Kushner contends, we need to enter into a kind of communion. This communion is often not accessible because "the world is so noisy and full of distractions, we are so dazzled by our power and success or religion in the late twentieth century is often badly packaged or presented by people we cannot trust or admire."
Throughout the book, he consistently and systematically takes to task our post-modern insatiable appetites for more power and more things in light of God’s covenantal relationship.
Creating a tension between sacred tradition and lack thereof, Kushner points his finger at modernization as the culprit to our inability to realize our need for God.
In Who Needs God the author presents an important debate about this need for God, a debate that often appears to be non-existent in today's world.
Who talks about this need? Where do you go to learn more about it? How do you even know if you need God?
This book evokes larger questions about how we approach this need for God in congregations.Is the absence of talk about needing God contributing to the declining rolls in mainline Protestant churches?
Kushner writes, "In a century which encourages us to use computers and makes it so hard for us to write or read poetry, it is so easy to put out the sacred fires which have been tended to for a hundred generations."
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
HTML – carrots and all – brings out geek in me
My husband warned me not to write about this. He said it is the most boring subject, ever.
"Don’t do it," he cautioned. "It’s a real yawner."
"Well, people who know about html will really appreciate it," I countered.
"And how many people know hmlt?"
"You mean html?"
"Yeah, hplm, whatever!"
I am silent, and then heave a deep sigh.
"You just don’t understand," I argued. "It's just so interesting. I love working with it." I struggled to contain my enthusiasm as I settled at my desk and proceeded to write about the most "boring" subject, ever.
I must tell you that, in my well-thumbed attempts to be a part of the twenty-first century, I have found this new language to be enthralling and terrifying at the same time. It's a web language called html.
I can't say whether it's the mathematical nature of html, with its perfectly balanced equations of numbers, letters and symbols, or its complex simplicity that holds my attention.
All I know is that I love html almost as much as I love Duct Tape and jump at the chance to code.
When encountering html, it can be intimidating. At first glance, it looks like a whole lot of gibberish – line after line of rambling codes and spaces all the way down your computer monitor.
Not to mention a type of carrot that in no way resembles the carrots in your grandmother’s garden.
Add to this, forward slashes and phrases in between that look like this: href=http://www.my_story_your_story.blogspot.com.aspx" class=homelink.
There are nonsensical-looking table equations, such as table cellspacing="0" style="font-weight:bold;".
Html coding looks excessively difficult to understand with funny words like href, aspx, http, span, cellspacing and homelink.
I am not your typical computer geek. Everything about me spews old school. My reminiscent "days gone by" sensibilities, my propensity to document the way it used to be, my hopelessly romantic search for simple details that go unnoticed.
In fact, I resisted learning html for years. When I was offered training, I let others learn it for me. After all, if I needed something posted to the web, my co-workers could do it.
However, there came a time when I had to learn it for myself.
I am very proud to report that I have graduated to studying coding without the help of tutorials. Like a modern-day miner in search of gold in crystal-clear mountain streams, I confidently scan line after line of coding, panning patterns for nuggets to reproduce styles, correct mistakes and fix broken links.
In sharing this with you, I must admit this has been an out-of-body experience. I pinch myself, realizing that it is I – Paula "not-a-computer-geek" Damon, born shortly after the end of WWII, raised during the Cold War, cut my teeth on black and white television, saw the first moon landing live on TV in 1969 – encouraging you to enter the world of HTML. Who would have thought?
"It will never fly," my husband piped from the next room.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on Facebook.
"Don’t do it," he cautioned. "It’s a real yawner."
"Well, people who know about html will really appreciate it," I countered.
"And how many people know hmlt?"
"You mean html?"
"Yeah, hplm, whatever!"
I am silent, and then heave a deep sigh.
"You just don’t understand," I argued. "It's just so interesting. I love working with it." I struggled to contain my enthusiasm as I settled at my desk and proceeded to write about the most "boring" subject, ever.
I must tell you that, in my well-thumbed attempts to be a part of the twenty-first century, I have found this new language to be enthralling and terrifying at the same time. It's a web language called html.
I can't say whether it's the mathematical nature of html, with its perfectly balanced equations of numbers, letters and symbols, or its complex simplicity that holds my attention.
All I know is that I love html almost as much as I love Duct Tape and jump at the chance to code.
When encountering html, it can be intimidating. At first glance, it looks like a whole lot of gibberish – line after line of rambling codes and spaces all the way down your computer monitor.
Not to mention a type of carrot that in no way resembles the carrots in your grandmother’s garden.
Add to this, forward slashes and phrases in between that look like this: href=http://www.my_story_your_story.blogspot.com.aspx" class=homelink.
There are nonsensical-looking table equations, such as table cellspacing="0" style="font-weight:bold;".
Html coding looks excessively difficult to understand with funny words like href, aspx, http, span, cellspacing and homelink.
I am not your typical computer geek. Everything about me spews old school. My reminiscent "days gone by" sensibilities, my propensity to document the way it used to be, my hopelessly romantic search for simple details that go unnoticed.
In fact, I resisted learning html for years. When I was offered training, I let others learn it for me. After all, if I needed something posted to the web, my co-workers could do it.
However, there came a time when I had to learn it for myself.
I am very proud to report that I have graduated to studying coding without the help of tutorials. Like a modern-day miner in search of gold in crystal-clear mountain streams, I confidently scan line after line of coding, panning patterns for nuggets to reproduce styles, correct mistakes and fix broken links.
In sharing this with you, I must admit this has been an out-of-body experience. I pinch myself, realizing that it is I – Paula "not-a-computer-geek" Damon, born shortly after the end of WWII, raised during the Cold War, cut my teeth on black and white television, saw the first moon landing live on TV in 1969 – encouraging you to enter the world of HTML. Who would have thought?
"It will never fly," my husband piped from the next room.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on Facebook.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Wait with me on the Writing Bench ...
A writer is a person for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people. –Thomas Mann
I affectionately call this place the Writing Bench. Nestled deep within the largest cottonwood stand in the State of South Dakota, the Writing Bench is situated at the Adams Homestead and Nature preserve – a 1,500-acre state recreation area.
To me, the Writing Bench is an endearing spot, where I sit perched like a mother hen, waiting for stories to hatch.
Previously on the writing bench, which is constructed with four two by sixes bolted to iron legs, I have written articles about Mom, Dad, the kids and God.
I travel here by bike each spring, summer and fall; and by foot in winter. Coming here in winter takes true dedication, trodding through snow-covered trails against sometimes bitter South Dakota wind to reach this hallowed place.
It is worth the effort because this is one of the few places where I retreat and wait for sometimes soothing, other times troubling stories to whisper softly or shout loudly, commanding a presence on my page. Such is the writer’s life.
I come prepared with a piece of scratch paper and pen so as not to lose these word gifts in time and space.
Most often, any hope of being supercharged with inspiration by simply being on or near the Writing Bench is competitively disadvantaged. Warblers, cardinals, woodpeckers and squirrels all vie for attention, distracting my train of thought.
Along comes a dad, his two boys, all on bikes with the family dog running alongside.
Kids chattering; Father playfully shouting, "Hi ho, Silver," as they fly by, heading down the winding trail, west toward the river.
Quickly out of sight, their conversing voices carry in crisp indiscernible sounds from deep within the cottonwood stand. Growing fainter and fainter still, their chattering is quickly silenced by distance.
A strong northerly breeze unexpectedly washes over me, as I wonder and wait for thoughts and memories to descend.
Sitting confidently in quiet stillness, I anticipate that my sheer presence on the Writing Bench will impart words, phrases, story ideas for my next article.
I raise my eyes prayerfully to an azure sky, hoping that I myself will be a conduit – or a convenient target – for such inspiration. I beckon the heavens to rain ideas down upon me from the cloudless ceiling above.
Tweeting, chirping, squeaking – more bird calls than I am able to name continue to encircle me.
Sunlight illuminates emerald green canopies of deciduous, scrub pine and cypress trees. Grape vines, poison oak and ivy lace this place with an intricately woven cover.
I sit quietly while five, 10, 15 minutes pass. Nothing comes to mind. No new discernible thoughts; only the fruitless, uninterrupted noise of nature clouding my thoughts.
[At 2 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 8, Paula will give a prose reading from her collection "Look. Don’t Look." in the Lamont Country School, not far from where the Writing Bench is located at the Adams Homestead and Nature Preserve, McCook Lake, S.D. This free event is open to the public. Come!]
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
I affectionately call this place the Writing Bench. Nestled deep within the largest cottonwood stand in the State of South Dakota, the Writing Bench is situated at the Adams Homestead and Nature preserve – a 1,500-acre state recreation area.
To me, the Writing Bench is an endearing spot, where I sit perched like a mother hen, waiting for stories to hatch.
Previously on the writing bench, which is constructed with four two by sixes bolted to iron legs, I have written articles about Mom, Dad, the kids and God.
I travel here by bike each spring, summer and fall; and by foot in winter. Coming here in winter takes true dedication, trodding through snow-covered trails against sometimes bitter South Dakota wind to reach this hallowed place.
It is worth the effort because this is one of the few places where I retreat and wait for sometimes soothing, other times troubling stories to whisper softly or shout loudly, commanding a presence on my page. Such is the writer’s life.
I come prepared with a piece of scratch paper and pen so as not to lose these word gifts in time and space.
Most often, any hope of being supercharged with inspiration by simply being on or near the Writing Bench is competitively disadvantaged. Warblers, cardinals, woodpeckers and squirrels all vie for attention, distracting my train of thought.
Along comes a dad, his two boys, all on bikes with the family dog running alongside.
Kids chattering; Father playfully shouting, "Hi ho, Silver," as they fly by, heading down the winding trail, west toward the river.
Quickly out of sight, their conversing voices carry in crisp indiscernible sounds from deep within the cottonwood stand. Growing fainter and fainter still, their chattering is quickly silenced by distance.
A strong northerly breeze unexpectedly washes over me, as I wonder and wait for thoughts and memories to descend.
Sitting confidently in quiet stillness, I anticipate that my sheer presence on the Writing Bench will impart words, phrases, story ideas for my next article.
I raise my eyes prayerfully to an azure sky, hoping that I myself will be a conduit – or a convenient target – for such inspiration. I beckon the heavens to rain ideas down upon me from the cloudless ceiling above.
Tweeting, chirping, squeaking – more bird calls than I am able to name continue to encircle me.
Sunlight illuminates emerald green canopies of deciduous, scrub pine and cypress trees. Grape vines, poison oak and ivy lace this place with an intricately woven cover.
I sit quietly while five, 10, 15 minutes pass. Nothing comes to mind. No new discernible thoughts; only the fruitless, uninterrupted noise of nature clouding my thoughts.
[At 2 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 8, Paula will give a prose reading from her collection "Look. Don’t Look." in the Lamont Country School, not far from where the Writing Bench is located at the Adams Homestead and Nature Preserve, McCook Lake, S.D. This free event is open to the public. Come!]
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Sea shells, cockleshells … she only says the words
When I overheard my 12-year-old granddaughter chanting jump-rope rhymes, my heart leapt with a sudden and reminiscent joy.
Three, six, nine. The goose drank wine. The monkey chewed gum on the telephone line.
As the singsong rhythm of her voice floated throughout the kitchen, memories flooded with the many summertime hours my girlfriends and I spent hopping and skipping over and under a swaying rope.
The line, it broke. The goose got choked. And they all went to heaven in a little rowboat.
"What jump-rope games do you do with those rhymes," I asked her, expecting a beautifully long-winded explanation of a half-dozen or so.
"A" my name is ALICE, my husband's name is AL, we live in ALABAMA and we bring back APPLES.
I mused to myself; maybe we could play some together. I keep a jump rope on hand for just such an occasion. With a little time and a lot of patience, I think it might all come back to me.
"None," she replied, matter-of-factly.
Raspberry, strawberry, apple jam tart. Tell me the name of your sweetheart.
"Not one?" I asked, not wanting to accept her first answer.
Cinderella, dressed in yellow. Went upstairs to kiss a 'fella…
"No. I just do the words."
Fudge, fudge, call the judge. Mama had a baby…
"Just the words?"
Mama called the doctor. The doctor called the nurse.
"Yes, Grandma, just the words."
Down by the river, down by the sea, Johnny broke a bottle and blamed it on me. I told ma, ma told pa…
I thought, how could this be? Jump-rope rhymes have been in all cultures where skipping is a form of play, dating back at least to the seventeenth century.
Sea shells, cockleshells, Evvie Ivy Over. My dog’s name is Rover…
"I can show you some jump-rope games," I offered with a deep reverential love for teaching her this new way to play.
Engine, engine, Number 9, on the New York transit line. If my train jumps the track, pick it up, pick it up, pick it up!
"No, that’s o.k., Grandma; I just like to say them."
A horse, a flea and three blind mice sat on a curbstone shooting dice. The horse, he slipped and fell on the flea. He said, "Whoops, there’s a flea on me!"
"Really, it’s a lot of fun," I tried again, wanting to impart such knowledge so that it would not be lost on future generations. She allowed me to indulge.
Down in the valley where the green grass grows, there sat Suzie, sweet as a pea…
"Jump rope games are all about getting into the rhythm of the rope," I explained.
Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear turn around. Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, touch the ground.
"You need two people to be the turners."
Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear tie your shoe. Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, how old are you?
"Then you stand by the rope and tell the turners to throw the rope over your head."
Bobbi and Sally sitting in a tree k-i-s-s-i-n-g.
"When it reaches your feet, hop over it."
First comes love, then comes marriage. Then comes a baby in a baby carriage.
"Pretend you're jogging or skipping."
One potato, two potato, three potato, four.
"Want to give it a try?"
Five potato, six potato, seven potato more.
"No thanks, Grandma. I just want to say the words."
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
.
Three, six, nine. The goose drank wine. The monkey chewed gum on the telephone line.
As the singsong rhythm of her voice floated throughout the kitchen, memories flooded with the many summertime hours my girlfriends and I spent hopping and skipping over and under a swaying rope.
The line, it broke. The goose got choked. And they all went to heaven in a little rowboat.
"What jump-rope games do you do with those rhymes," I asked her, expecting a beautifully long-winded explanation of a half-dozen or so.
"A" my name is ALICE, my husband's name is AL, we live in ALABAMA and we bring back APPLES.
I mused to myself; maybe we could play some together. I keep a jump rope on hand for just such an occasion. With a little time and a lot of patience, I think it might all come back to me.
"None," she replied, matter-of-factly.
Raspberry, strawberry, apple jam tart. Tell me the name of your sweetheart.
"Not one?" I asked, not wanting to accept her first answer.
Cinderella, dressed in yellow. Went upstairs to kiss a 'fella…
"No. I just do the words."
Fudge, fudge, call the judge. Mama had a baby…
"Just the words?"
Mama called the doctor. The doctor called the nurse.
"Yes, Grandma, just the words."
Down by the river, down by the sea, Johnny broke a bottle and blamed it on me. I told ma, ma told pa…
I thought, how could this be? Jump-rope rhymes have been in all cultures where skipping is a form of play, dating back at least to the seventeenth century.
Sea shells, cockleshells, Evvie Ivy Over. My dog’s name is Rover…
"I can show you some jump-rope games," I offered with a deep reverential love for teaching her this new way to play.
Engine, engine, Number 9, on the New York transit line. If my train jumps the track, pick it up, pick it up, pick it up!
"No, that’s o.k., Grandma; I just like to say them."
A horse, a flea and three blind mice sat on a curbstone shooting dice. The horse, he slipped and fell on the flea. He said, "Whoops, there’s a flea on me!"
"Really, it’s a lot of fun," I tried again, wanting to impart such knowledge so that it would not be lost on future generations. She allowed me to indulge.
Down in the valley where the green grass grows, there sat Suzie, sweet as a pea…
"Jump rope games are all about getting into the rhythm of the rope," I explained.
Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear turn around. Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, touch the ground.
"You need two people to be the turners."
Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear tie your shoe. Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, how old are you?
"Then you stand by the rope and tell the turners to throw the rope over your head."
Bobbi and Sally sitting in a tree k-i-s-s-i-n-g.
"When it reaches your feet, hop over it."
First comes love, then comes marriage. Then comes a baby in a baby carriage.
"Pretend you're jogging or skipping."
One potato, two potato, three potato, four.
"Want to give it a try?"
Five potato, six potato, seven potato more.
"No thanks, Grandma. I just want to say the words."
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
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Saturday, July 18, 2009
Bling, bling – hip or not – you be the judge
All speech, written or spoken, is a dead language until it finds a willing and prepared hearer. – Robert Louis Stevenson
Today more than ever, we find ourselves up against a language barrier.
It seems no matter how hard we try to look young, sound hip and remain contemporary, our use of the language seriously dates us.
Do you still say you'll wind or roll up the window in your car? Your age is showing. Most car windows today don't wind-up or roll-down. We simply push a button to open and close them.
When our guests are invited to have a seat on the davenport (couch), they have no idea what a davenport is and just stand and stare.
The term "Look it up in Funk & Wagnalls" (dictionary) registers a zero in the minds of most people under the age of 50.
We no longer use a hair dryer; we use a blow dryer. When you ask for a lift, you are requesting a ride or plastic surgery.
Try telling someone to place a chair kitty-corner (diagonally) in the room and see what happens.
The Frigidaire is the fridge. We have vents instead of radiators to conduct heat.
To zap or nuke it in the microwave is to warm up food. A hooded sweatshirt is a hoody.
Fifty years from now, will anyone understand that "Don’t beat around the bush" means "Get to the point"? Who will really know the meaning of "Don't let the cat out of the bag" (keep it secret) or "Go back to square one" (start all over again)?
Our language continues to evolve. We no longer pollute the environment; we leave a carbon footprint. When we decarbonize the planet, we are kinder to it.
Today's phrases sometimes stray into street rap. Another name for wearing a lot of shiny jewelry is "bling-bling." Some casually refer to the people in their departments or organizations as "my peeps."
So will you know what to do if you're told to roll up the window, look it up in Funk & Wagnalls, use a hair dryer, place it kitty-corner, get a cold drink in the Frigidaire, warm up by the radiator, zap it or nuke it in the microwave, wear a hoody, get a lift, don't let the cat out of the bag, go back to square one, reduce your carbon footprint, decarbonize the planet, wear less bling-bling and go tell your peeps?
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
Today more than ever, we find ourselves up against a language barrier.
It seems no matter how hard we try to look young, sound hip and remain contemporary, our use of the language seriously dates us.
Do you still say you'll wind or roll up the window in your car? Your age is showing. Most car windows today don't wind-up or roll-down. We simply push a button to open and close them.
When our guests are invited to have a seat on the davenport (couch), they have no idea what a davenport is and just stand and stare.
The term "Look it up in Funk & Wagnalls" (dictionary) registers a zero in the minds of most people under the age of 50.
We no longer use a hair dryer; we use a blow dryer. When you ask for a lift, you are requesting a ride or plastic surgery.
Try telling someone to place a chair kitty-corner (diagonally) in the room and see what happens.
The Frigidaire is the fridge. We have vents instead of radiators to conduct heat.
To zap or nuke it in the microwave is to warm up food. A hooded sweatshirt is a hoody.
Fifty years from now, will anyone understand that "Don’t beat around the bush" means "Get to the point"? Who will really know the meaning of "Don't let the cat out of the bag" (keep it secret) or "Go back to square one" (start all over again)?
Our language continues to evolve. We no longer pollute the environment; we leave a carbon footprint. When we decarbonize the planet, we are kinder to it.
Today's phrases sometimes stray into street rap. Another name for wearing a lot of shiny jewelry is "bling-bling." Some casually refer to the people in their departments or organizations as "my peeps."
So will you know what to do if you're told to roll up the window, look it up in Funk & Wagnalls, use a hair dryer, place it kitty-corner, get a cold drink in the Frigidaire, warm up by the radiator, zap it or nuke it in the microwave, wear a hoody, get a lift, don't let the cat out of the bag, go back to square one, reduce your carbon footprint, decarbonize the planet, wear less bling-bling and go tell your peeps?
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Her front, her back, her insides transmit hope
"La esperanza muere ultima – hope never dies." – Studs Terkel
The smooth texture of the paper between my fingers, the nurturing aroma of newsprint, the blessed assurance of holding the paper in my hands has a calming effect on news junkies like me.
It was no different with the New York Times, which inaugurated my Sundays as a kid growing up in New York State. A tradition that predated me, stopping at the local newsstand after church was a religious ritual as natural as crossing my head, my chest and my shoulders with holy water when entering sacred places.
Then and now, the Sunday Times is a newspaper as thick as a novel and as wide as a seat cushion. Lugging it home took some doing.
Even though my parents were not self-described news junkies, they were more than casual readers. And when sharing the Sunday paper, I had to wait in line.
With subdued excitement, I hung out in the background of their mysteriously silent weekend interactions, while Mom carefully unfolded Section 1A and Dad pulled out the Sports and Business sections.
After they quietly settled into their places at the kitchen table, each gripping a coffee cup in one hand and the paper in the other, I carefully flipped through the bundle of newsprint and pulled out the Fashion, Arts and Classified sections.
Finding a place to sprawl on the living room floor in our spacious two-story century-old home, I spread the paper out before me and escaped to New York City.
Using the Times as a compass for my dreams, I virtually traveled down Broadway, up 72nd Street, across Time Square, through Central Park and over the Hudson to Long Island.
Ironically, when I lived in New York State from ages 9 to 19, I never did go to the Big Apple. It wasn’t until 1978, three years after I moved to South Dakota, that I traveled to the City on a business trip.
Therefore, the Times expanded my world to a larger world, a place that I could only imagine through dozens upon dozens of articles, photographs and artists’ renderings of glamorous people, famous places and important things.
For me, the Sunday Times was a map that simultaneously summoned and guided me. I camped in it and charted distances between where I was in the world and where the world was in me.
It was my classroom where editors, reporters and columnists were my teachers from whom I learned much.
On many characteristically dreary Sunday afternoons in Southwestern New York State, where annually there are more cloudy days than sunny ones, I slowly, methodically thumbed my way over the smooth and rough terrains of those back sections and was enlightened.
The presence of the newspaper in our home – her front, her back, her insides – transmitted the power of information and, therefore, hope.
With newspaper closings, some as old as 150 years, I shutter at the thought of them going away all together.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
The smooth texture of the paper between my fingers, the nurturing aroma of newsprint, the blessed assurance of holding the paper in my hands has a calming effect on news junkies like me.
It was no different with the New York Times, which inaugurated my Sundays as a kid growing up in New York State. A tradition that predated me, stopping at the local newsstand after church was a religious ritual as natural as crossing my head, my chest and my shoulders with holy water when entering sacred places.
Then and now, the Sunday Times is a newspaper as thick as a novel and as wide as a seat cushion. Lugging it home took some doing.
Even though my parents were not self-described news junkies, they were more than casual readers. And when sharing the Sunday paper, I had to wait in line.
With subdued excitement, I hung out in the background of their mysteriously silent weekend interactions, while Mom carefully unfolded Section 1A and Dad pulled out the Sports and Business sections.
After they quietly settled into their places at the kitchen table, each gripping a coffee cup in one hand and the paper in the other, I carefully flipped through the bundle of newsprint and pulled out the Fashion, Arts and Classified sections.
Finding a place to sprawl on the living room floor in our spacious two-story century-old home, I spread the paper out before me and escaped to New York City.
Using the Times as a compass for my dreams, I virtually traveled down Broadway, up 72nd Street, across Time Square, through Central Park and over the Hudson to Long Island.
Ironically, when I lived in New York State from ages 9 to 19, I never did go to the Big Apple. It wasn’t until 1978, three years after I moved to South Dakota, that I traveled to the City on a business trip.
Therefore, the Times expanded my world to a larger world, a place that I could only imagine through dozens upon dozens of articles, photographs and artists’ renderings of glamorous people, famous places and important things.
For me, the Sunday Times was a map that simultaneously summoned and guided me. I camped in it and charted distances between where I was in the world and where the world was in me.
It was my classroom where editors, reporters and columnists were my teachers from whom I learned much.
On many characteristically dreary Sunday afternoons in Southwestern New York State, where annually there are more cloudy days than sunny ones, I slowly, methodically thumbed my way over the smooth and rough terrains of those back sections and was enlightened.
The presence of the newspaper in our home – her front, her back, her insides – transmitted the power of information and, therefore, hope.
With newspaper closings, some as old as 150 years, I shutter at the thought of them going away all together.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Writer comes out about secret love
To call me a fan of Duct Tape is clearly an understatement. I am not just a fan. I am a diehard, Type "A" Duct Tape fanatic.
If I could keep only one thing in my toolbox, it would be two rolls of Duct Tape.
Not that I would disregard my Phillips and slotted screwdrivers, forget about my pliers and socket wrenches or abandon my glue gun and wood putty. It’s just that my sweet, ever-loving Duct Tape is irresistible. Wonderfully waterproof and fabulously flexible, it is the most amazingly adhesive super power tool ever created. I am in love....
If anything needs a repair, the first tool I think of is Duct Tape.
You know, I don’t always get the praise I deserve for my passionate resourcefulness. Recently, after repairing the hinges on our folding closet door, my husband cringed and said, "Oh no! You didn’t use Duct Tape, did you?"
"Yes, I did," I shot back. "I doctored that baby up with a little Duct Tape and, voila, it opens and closes just fine. And, you can’t even see the Duct Tape."
I love Duct Tape so much that I’ve been known to drop hints about my dream toolbox, which would include every color of Duct Tape ever made.
Fluorescent yellow and tangerine orange, navy blue and army green, hot pink and cool turquoise. Goodness! I'm getting hot and sweaty just thinking about them.
When I’m not planning what to cook or what to write, I am dreaming of the many ways I could use Duct Tape.
I've repaired skirt hems with it, recovered seat cushions, restored light shades, reconnected cupboard doors and reinforced storage boxes.
One Sunday awhile back, when I was on a road trip in Southern Nebraska, I used it to repair the undercover for my engine, which had come loose and was dragging beneath my car.
I stopped at a convenience store in the next town to pick up a roll of Duct Tape. While lying on my back underneath the car, people came and went, not stopping except one.
After Duct Taping my car back together, I stood up to see a silver-haired woman in church clothes waiting for me, looking bewildered.
"Hello," I said, dusting myself off.
"Well, I was wondering who that was down there," the woman replied without greeting me first.
"It’s me," I said. "How do you do?"
"Just fine, thank you. Lovely day isn’t it," she commented, raising her eyebrows.
"Yes, it is a lovely day to have car trouble and to be able to fix it with Duct Tape," I replied cheerily. "I love this stuff," I bolstered, holding up the roll with prideful resolve. "And this was the last roll in the store. Can you believe that? It must be my lucky day." Silence. "Well," I continued, "I’d better be on my way. I have a bit of a drive." We parted ways, and I could tell she just did not get it.
Yes, I definitely am more than a Duct Tape fan. I am head over heels in love. Duct Tape rocks!
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
If I could keep only one thing in my toolbox, it would be two rolls of Duct Tape.
Not that I would disregard my Phillips and slotted screwdrivers, forget about my pliers and socket wrenches or abandon my glue gun and wood putty. It’s just that my sweet, ever-loving Duct Tape is irresistible. Wonderfully waterproof and fabulously flexible, it is the most amazingly adhesive super power tool ever created. I am in love....
If anything needs a repair, the first tool I think of is Duct Tape.
You know, I don’t always get the praise I deserve for my passionate resourcefulness. Recently, after repairing the hinges on our folding closet door, my husband cringed and said, "Oh no! You didn’t use Duct Tape, did you?"
"Yes, I did," I shot back. "I doctored that baby up with a little Duct Tape and, voila, it opens and closes just fine. And, you can’t even see the Duct Tape."
I love Duct Tape so much that I’ve been known to drop hints about my dream toolbox, which would include every color of Duct Tape ever made.
Fluorescent yellow and tangerine orange, navy blue and army green, hot pink and cool turquoise. Goodness! I'm getting hot and sweaty just thinking about them.
When I’m not planning what to cook or what to write, I am dreaming of the many ways I could use Duct Tape.
I've repaired skirt hems with it, recovered seat cushions, restored light shades, reconnected cupboard doors and reinforced storage boxes.
One Sunday awhile back, when I was on a road trip in Southern Nebraska, I used it to repair the undercover for my engine, which had come loose and was dragging beneath my car.
I stopped at a convenience store in the next town to pick up a roll of Duct Tape. While lying on my back underneath the car, people came and went, not stopping except one.
After Duct Taping my car back together, I stood up to see a silver-haired woman in church clothes waiting for me, looking bewildered.
"Hello," I said, dusting myself off.
"Well, I was wondering who that was down there," the woman replied without greeting me first.
"It’s me," I said. "How do you do?"
"Just fine, thank you. Lovely day isn’t it," she commented, raising her eyebrows.
"Yes, it is a lovely day to have car trouble and to be able to fix it with Duct Tape," I replied cheerily. "I love this stuff," I bolstered, holding up the roll with prideful resolve. "And this was the last roll in the store. Can you believe that? It must be my lucky day." Silence. "Well," I continued, "I’d better be on my way. I have a bit of a drive." We parted ways, and I could tell she just did not get it.
Yes, I definitely am more than a Duct Tape fan. I am head over heels in love. Duct Tape rocks!
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Writer’s lack of strength sends her back to where she began
Growing up, I lusted to be a good fence climber, like my playmates Leslie and Christine. Those girls had it down. With such ease, they ran to greet fences, encountering them with all the skill and stamina of well-trained athletes.
One at a time, Leslie and Christine climbed fences with caterpillar-like moves inching higher and higher along straight, unforgiving planes of sometimes splintering wood.
Winging their way up and over, their arms and legs bulged, their necks bent skyward, their hearts fixed on making it.
How do they do that? I pondered, watching my friends with hope in my eyes, wanting to be like them. Where did they learn to climb fences like that?
I was not a climber, so fence lines always stopped me. Romping around town in those early days my childhood summers, I did my best to avoid them.
However, to no avail, after hours in the afternoon sun, chasing through woods, down sidewalks, over bridges, under railroad trestles, through creeks, around bends, fences certainly presented themselves as monsters preventing my passage.
Even though, I summoned every ounce of courage in an attempt to face down those barriers, ultimately my short stubby legs just would not go there.
I observed with frustration and a sense of failure as my friends scaled over the top. I saw how they grunted and groped with arrested energy. I listened as their feet landed victoriously on the other side.
I wished for a miracle, some sort of Pentecostal healing of my inability. But no such luck or blessing was bestowed upon me.
"Come on, Paula," Christine and Leslie hollered breathlessly. "What’s the hold up? Let’s keep going!"
"I can’t," I yelled back dejectedly. "I just can’t do it," I repeated with my feet firmly planted on the ground.
Although on the quiet when no one was around, I swallowed hard and tested my climbing ability. Gripping tall fence posts with my quivering fingers, positioning my toes as insufficient adhesives, I moaned under the weight of my own weakness.
On those occasions, even though I made it up a foot or two, my lack of physical strength sent me falling back down to where I began.
As June faded into July, I secretly wondered what qualified Leslie and Christine. With such ease, they greeted fences with all the skill and stamina of well-trained athletes. Yes, I do admit, I wanted what they had.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
One at a time, Leslie and Christine climbed fences with caterpillar-like moves inching higher and higher along straight, unforgiving planes of sometimes splintering wood.
Winging their way up and over, their arms and legs bulged, their necks bent skyward, their hearts fixed on making it.
How do they do that? I pondered, watching my friends with hope in my eyes, wanting to be like them. Where did they learn to climb fences like that?
I was not a climber, so fence lines always stopped me. Romping around town in those early days my childhood summers, I did my best to avoid them.
However, to no avail, after hours in the afternoon sun, chasing through woods, down sidewalks, over bridges, under railroad trestles, through creeks, around bends, fences certainly presented themselves as monsters preventing my passage.
Even though, I summoned every ounce of courage in an attempt to face down those barriers, ultimately my short stubby legs just would not go there.
I observed with frustration and a sense of failure as my friends scaled over the top. I saw how they grunted and groped with arrested energy. I listened as their feet landed victoriously on the other side.
I wished for a miracle, some sort of Pentecostal healing of my inability. But no such luck or blessing was bestowed upon me.
"Come on, Paula," Christine and Leslie hollered breathlessly. "What’s the hold up? Let’s keep going!"
"I can’t," I yelled back dejectedly. "I just can’t do it," I repeated with my feet firmly planted on the ground.
Although on the quiet when no one was around, I swallowed hard and tested my climbing ability. Gripping tall fence posts with my quivering fingers, positioning my toes as insufficient adhesives, I moaned under the weight of my own weakness.
On those occasions, even though I made it up a foot or two, my lack of physical strength sent me falling back down to where I began.
As June faded into July, I secretly wondered what qualified Leslie and Christine. With such ease, they greeted fences with all the skill and stamina of well-trained athletes. Yes, I do admit, I wanted what they had.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Cow-pooling and other ways to save and share
A new term for splitting a hog or a side of beef with your family and friends is "cow pooling."
Like car-pooling, cow-pooling allows people to share their resources, save money and connect with others.
Although I have no personal need for cow-pooling, because I don’t eat red meat, I like the idea.
Before convenience stores and 24-hour super centers, people more freely shared what they had by obliging neighbors and even strangers with a cup of coffee, a hot meal or a night's stay.
Back then, if you were smack-dab in the middle of baking a cake from scratch and found that you were out of vanilla extract or eggs, you would simply dial your neighbor or rap on her back door to borrow the missing ingredients.
Then, after the baked the cake, you would share some with your generous neighbor as a show of appreciation for her generosity.
Now, if you are out of something, you run to the store.
I miss the idea of borrowing a cup of flour or a teaspoon of cream of tartar. Most of all, I long for the sense of closeness and community such interdependence fosters.
Could the concept of cow-pooling extend to what’s in our cupboards? Could we cupboard-pool to save, share and connect?
Take, for example, my two cans of baking powder. Both are open and hardly used. I probably have two open cans because I couldn’t find the one and drove to the store to purchase the other.
Not being much of a baker, I will probably not use this amount of baking powder in my lifetime. Instead of it going to waste, I could cupboard-pool with my neighbors so that they could use my baking powder.
Consider the savings with cupboard-pooling. Fewer trips to the store to buy what neighbors already have and are not using. We would reduce gasoline consumption, which is good for the environment and lessens our dependence on foreign oil. We would save on the wear and tear on our vehicles.
Cupboard-pooling could be a co-op of sorts with goods such as sugar, flour, bread, milk, baking powder, cinnamon, sage, salt, cream of tartar, vanilla extract, allspice, black pepper, ginger, cinnamon sticks, chili powder, oregano, sweet basil, and ground mace.
This borrowing and lending would foster acts of giving and receiving. Cupboard-pooling would enlarge our relationships and diminish our self-absorbent independence.
Sharing resources would help us to connect with the people who are living out their lives in virtual isolation right next door or down the street – people we may hardly know or with whom we seldom converse.
Consider your neighbors. Look inside your kitchen cupboards. Think of the ways you can share your resources. You’ll probably see that my story is your story. Cupboard-pooling, anyone?
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
Like car-pooling, cow-pooling allows people to share their resources, save money and connect with others.
Although I have no personal need for cow-pooling, because I don’t eat red meat, I like the idea.
Before convenience stores and 24-hour super centers, people more freely shared what they had by obliging neighbors and even strangers with a cup of coffee, a hot meal or a night's stay.
Back then, if you were smack-dab in the middle of baking a cake from scratch and found that you were out of vanilla extract or eggs, you would simply dial your neighbor or rap on her back door to borrow the missing ingredients.
Then, after the baked the cake, you would share some with your generous neighbor as a show of appreciation for her generosity.
Now, if you are out of something, you run to the store.
I miss the idea of borrowing a cup of flour or a teaspoon of cream of tartar. Most of all, I long for the sense of closeness and community such interdependence fosters.
Could the concept of cow-pooling extend to what’s in our cupboards? Could we cupboard-pool to save, share and connect?
Take, for example, my two cans of baking powder. Both are open and hardly used. I probably have two open cans because I couldn’t find the one and drove to the store to purchase the other.
Not being much of a baker, I will probably not use this amount of baking powder in my lifetime. Instead of it going to waste, I could cupboard-pool with my neighbors so that they could use my baking powder.
Consider the savings with cupboard-pooling. Fewer trips to the store to buy what neighbors already have and are not using. We would reduce gasoline consumption, which is good for the environment and lessens our dependence on foreign oil. We would save on the wear and tear on our vehicles.
Cupboard-pooling could be a co-op of sorts with goods such as sugar, flour, bread, milk, baking powder, cinnamon, sage, salt, cream of tartar, vanilla extract, allspice, black pepper, ginger, cinnamon sticks, chili powder, oregano, sweet basil, and ground mace.
This borrowing and lending would foster acts of giving and receiving. Cupboard-pooling would enlarge our relationships and diminish our self-absorbent independence.
Sharing resources would help us to connect with the people who are living out their lives in virtual isolation right next door or down the street – people we may hardly know or with whom we seldom converse.
Consider your neighbors. Look inside your kitchen cupboards. Think of the ways you can share your resources. You’ll probably see that my story is your story. Cupboard-pooling, anyone?
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
Garage door revelation reveals fine line separates giving up, giving in, letting go
Some 40 years ago, my husband and I faced a good share of adversity. In the years leading up to our marriage in 1972, Brian’s mother died of cancer at the age of 47. Two years and one month later, his father died of a massive heart attack just weeks after turning 50.
Somewhere in between, his grandfather died.
We were young and probably in shock over so much loss in such a short span. Even so, we stayed with our plans to marry and move from our hometown of Jamestown, N.Y., to Iowa.
The day after we said, "I do," we loaded up the 1971 bumblebee yellow Chevy Vega station wagon with all of our belongings, including Brian’s childhood beagle "Princy," and headed down that long road to Iowa. Brian was finishing his undergraduate degree at Wartburg College in Waverly. We did not have jobs or a place to live.
Then, a few months after we were married his grandmother passed on.
We were sad but not defeated by our losses. We had hope, love, and each other, which seemed to suffice our every need.
Now, 37 years later, it came as somewhat of a surprise when Brian suggested that we cancel our annual vacation Out West after our automatic garage door closed on the very tip of the bumper of our car.
I had backed the car into the garage but, as I quickly learned by a loud grinding, crunching sound, I did not back it far enough to clear the door.
"Well, do you think we should go on vacation tomorrow?" Brian questioned while wrestling with the slightly mangled garage door.
"Why wouldn’t we?" I asked back.
"For a lot of reasons," he replied.
"What reasons?" I persisted, not wanting to let go of our treasured time away.
"This is a heck of a way to start a vacation," Brian debated, with a subtle tone of exhaustion.
"Yes," I reluctantly agreed, "But why would we let something like this stop us from doing what we love to do?"
Brian was silent while continuing to work on the door.
"Whether we stay or go, what difference will it make?" I added, pushing my perspective even further. "What happened to the garage door is past tense. It’s not still happening to us."
As the evening wore on and after Brian and I repaired the door, we talked it over some more; then decided to continue as planned, packed the car and left on vacation early the next morning.
On our long drive westward, I pondered what had changed. Over the years, we have shifted from possessing blind faith to being easily discouraged.
"Why so?" I asked Brian.
"You just get tired," he answered.
"Do you give up," I asked, not liking his answer.
"You just give in," he replied.
"So do you let go," I puzzled, not backing down.
"Sort of," he slightly agreed.
"What’s the difference between giving up, giving in and letting go?" I quizzed forlornly, resisting his side of the matter.
"Not a lot. You either accept your circumstances, quit trying to change them or you just get tired," Brian sighed. "Either way, you back down."
I kept quiet, holding tightly to the memory of our free-spirited start, not wanting to have anything to do with his reality.
"It’s really about not allowing adversity stop us, isn’t it?" I entreated with a sense of loss. "Isn’t it?"
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
Somewhere in between, his grandfather died.
We were young and probably in shock over so much loss in such a short span. Even so, we stayed with our plans to marry and move from our hometown of Jamestown, N.Y., to Iowa.
The day after we said, "I do," we loaded up the 1971 bumblebee yellow Chevy Vega station wagon with all of our belongings, including Brian’s childhood beagle "Princy," and headed down that long road to Iowa. Brian was finishing his undergraduate degree at Wartburg College in Waverly. We did not have jobs or a place to live.
Then, a few months after we were married his grandmother passed on.
We were sad but not defeated by our losses. We had hope, love, and each other, which seemed to suffice our every need.
Now, 37 years later, it came as somewhat of a surprise when Brian suggested that we cancel our annual vacation Out West after our automatic garage door closed on the very tip of the bumper of our car.
I had backed the car into the garage but, as I quickly learned by a loud grinding, crunching sound, I did not back it far enough to clear the door.
"Well, do you think we should go on vacation tomorrow?" Brian questioned while wrestling with the slightly mangled garage door.
"Why wouldn’t we?" I asked back.
"For a lot of reasons," he replied.
"What reasons?" I persisted, not wanting to let go of our treasured time away.
"This is a heck of a way to start a vacation," Brian debated, with a subtle tone of exhaustion.
"Yes," I reluctantly agreed, "But why would we let something like this stop us from doing what we love to do?"
Brian was silent while continuing to work on the door.
"Whether we stay or go, what difference will it make?" I added, pushing my perspective even further. "What happened to the garage door is past tense. It’s not still happening to us."
As the evening wore on and after Brian and I repaired the door, we talked it over some more; then decided to continue as planned, packed the car and left on vacation early the next morning.
On our long drive westward, I pondered what had changed. Over the years, we have shifted from possessing blind faith to being easily discouraged.
"Why so?" I asked Brian.
"You just get tired," he answered.
"Do you give up," I asked, not liking his answer.
"You just give in," he replied.
"So do you let go," I puzzled, not backing down.
"Sort of," he slightly agreed.
"What’s the difference between giving up, giving in and letting go?" I quizzed forlornly, resisting his side of the matter.
"Not a lot. You either accept your circumstances, quit trying to change them or you just get tired," Brian sighed. "Either way, you back down."
I kept quiet, holding tightly to the memory of our free-spirited start, not wanting to have anything to do with his reality.
"It’s really about not allowing adversity stop us, isn’t it?" I entreated with a sense of loss. "Isn’t it?"
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
Writer reveals pet peeves. Is she talking about you?
"What are your other pet peeves?" my son-in-law asked me with a detectable cautionary tone. "I want to know so that I can be sure to not commit any of them when I am in your presence," he explained.
His question came just after I had been ranting about how the table server had rested the water pitcher on each glass as she refilled them. "That’s one of my pet peeves!" I grumbled.
What are my other pet peeves? I drew a blank. Later I asked my husband, "Do I have a lot of pet peeves? For some reason, I can’t think of one, other than table waiters contaminating my water glass."
"Yes, you have a lot of pet peeves," my husband reassured. "For example, you can’t stand the sound of people chewing food."
He’s right. That drives me nuts.
"And you start to twitch at the sight of people eating while they are driving," he continued.
At that point, I wanted him to quit reminding me of my all my pet peeves, but he continued.
"Come to think of it, you have another pet peeve centered on food."
"What’s that?" I said, even though I wanted him to stop.
"You despise it when people talk with food in their mouths."
Right again. That makes me crazy.
"Okay. Okay." I get the point," I cut him off.
Nonetheless, more of my pet peeves came to mind.
It drives me bonkers when people chitchat when they’re supposed to be working.
I squirm when people use clichés, such as "Get a bigger bang for the buck," which has seedy roots in the business of prostitution; and "Close but no cigar," which refers to women in labor during childbirth. Don’t people realize what they are saying?
My list extends to cars and driving. It kills me when people park their cars on the other side of the street right at the end of my driveway.
People who drive too near the centerline really irk me, too.
And what is with people who compulsively forward junk email stories and poems to all their friends and family. Don’t they know that no one reads that stuff?
Anytime I see someone spitting chewing tobacco I get nauseous. Watching that slimy yellowish brown drool dribble down the chin makes me want to throw up.
It gets under my skin when people use the word "insure" instead of "ensure," as in "I ensure you that I really don’t have too many pet peeves."
It holds true for when people use the verb "loan" when they should use the verb "lend."
What really puts me over the edge is...is...No, I had better stop. At this rate, I will scare away my son-in-law and I don't want to do that.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
His question came just after I had been ranting about how the table server had rested the water pitcher on each glass as she refilled them. "That’s one of my pet peeves!" I grumbled.
What are my other pet peeves? I drew a blank. Later I asked my husband, "Do I have a lot of pet peeves? For some reason, I can’t think of one, other than table waiters contaminating my water glass."
"Yes, you have a lot of pet peeves," my husband reassured. "For example, you can’t stand the sound of people chewing food."
He’s right. That drives me nuts.
"And you start to twitch at the sight of people eating while they are driving," he continued.
At that point, I wanted him to quit reminding me of my all my pet peeves, but he continued.
"Come to think of it, you have another pet peeve centered on food."
"What’s that?" I said, even though I wanted him to stop.
"You despise it when people talk with food in their mouths."
Right again. That makes me crazy.
"Okay. Okay." I get the point," I cut him off.
Nonetheless, more of my pet peeves came to mind.
It drives me bonkers when people chitchat when they’re supposed to be working.
I squirm when people use clichés, such as "Get a bigger bang for the buck," which has seedy roots in the business of prostitution; and "Close but no cigar," which refers to women in labor during childbirth. Don’t people realize what they are saying?
My list extends to cars and driving. It kills me when people park their cars on the other side of the street right at the end of my driveway.
People who drive too near the centerline really irk me, too.
And what is with people who compulsively forward junk email stories and poems to all their friends and family. Don’t they know that no one reads that stuff?
Anytime I see someone spitting chewing tobacco I get nauseous. Watching that slimy yellowish brown drool dribble down the chin makes me want to throw up.
It gets under my skin when people use the word "insure" instead of "ensure," as in "I ensure you that I really don’t have too many pet peeves."
It holds true for when people use the verb "loan" when they should use the verb "lend."
What really puts me over the edge is...is...No, I had better stop. At this rate, I will scare away my son-in-law and I don't want to do that.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
She dyes her hair purple, he goes into Victoria Secret
I am prone to overhearing conversations. It’s not that I am eavesdropping. It’s just that what I overhear can be much more interesting than what people say directly.
I am intrigued by these conversations at the mall, in the neighborhood or at the store.
What follows is my diary of sorts of those snippets of dialogue. There are many back-stories here, but you have to listen closely....
A short trim man with salt and pepper hair was talking on his cell phone: "It may prolong my drinking a little bit today."
A middle-school boy revealed squeamishly, "I’ve been in Victoria Secret."
His friend countered in a competitive tone, "I have, too, but not without my mom."
A woman exclaimed, "She dyed her hair purple!"
A grandmother emphatically shouted into her cell phone, "He’ll help you dig it out. I’m telling you he’ll help you dig it out," she stressed while trying to catch her breath.
A young man in his 30s shuffled along while talking on his cell phone: "My heart is broken. But I’m going to keep moving forward." Silence. "Yeah, she wants all of my stuff out by the weekend."
Two teenaged girls were filling out entry forms for a "Win This Car" contest. "You’ll win it if you fold it like this," one girl said to the other while folding and then crinkling the form.
One guy to another, "I’m going to keep the car until she gets it paid off."
An elderly woman insisted, "I told him that I’m not going to send a card until I see it in the paper."
A woman said under her breath, "She’s probably cheating on him."
One hurried shopper to another, "I think it’s over here on the right side."
Two teenaged boys hanging out. "I’m texting her that we’re going to be out at the mall for awhile," the taller boy said. "How do you spell awhile?"
"It’s two words, a while," his friend instructed.
"No it’s not. It’s one word a-w-h-i-l-e," the other debated.
"No, it’s not!" The argument continued.
Recently, while on a walk in my neighborhood, I overheard a man speaking in a singsong "Once upon a time" voice. He was sitting on a porch bench reading a book to a young girl who was situated beside him. The sound of his voice fell on my ears like beautiful ancient music.
On Mother’s Day many years ago, when I was on a late afternoon walk, I heard the voice of an angry elderly woman come barrelling through the front door of a modest little cottage. "Get out!" the woman shouted. "Get out, you [expletive] son of a [expletive]!" I dared glance sideways to see the poor soul she was chasing down her front walkway. He was a tall lanky man with scraggily gray hair and a long white beard. She continued to fire away, hollering and waving her arms at him while he stiffly made his way to the street. "And don’t ever come back! You hear me! Never!"
It’s just that what I overhear can be much more interesting than what people say directly.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
I am intrigued by these conversations at the mall, in the neighborhood or at the store.
What follows is my diary of sorts of those snippets of dialogue. There are many back-stories here, but you have to listen closely....
A short trim man with salt and pepper hair was talking on his cell phone: "It may prolong my drinking a little bit today."
A middle-school boy revealed squeamishly, "I’ve been in Victoria Secret."
His friend countered in a competitive tone, "I have, too, but not without my mom."
A woman exclaimed, "She dyed her hair purple!"
A grandmother emphatically shouted into her cell phone, "He’ll help you dig it out. I’m telling you he’ll help you dig it out," she stressed while trying to catch her breath.
A young man in his 30s shuffled along while talking on his cell phone: "My heart is broken. But I’m going to keep moving forward." Silence. "Yeah, she wants all of my stuff out by the weekend."
Two teenaged girls were filling out entry forms for a "Win This Car" contest. "You’ll win it if you fold it like this," one girl said to the other while folding and then crinkling the form.
One guy to another, "I’m going to keep the car until she gets it paid off."
An elderly woman insisted, "I told him that I’m not going to send a card until I see it in the paper."
A woman said under her breath, "She’s probably cheating on him."
One hurried shopper to another, "I think it’s over here on the right side."
Two teenaged boys hanging out. "I’m texting her that we’re going to be out at the mall for awhile," the taller boy said. "How do you spell awhile?"
"It’s two words, a while," his friend instructed.
"No it’s not. It’s one word a-w-h-i-l-e," the other debated.
"No, it’s not!" The argument continued.
Recently, while on a walk in my neighborhood, I overheard a man speaking in a singsong "Once upon a time" voice. He was sitting on a porch bench reading a book to a young girl who was situated beside him. The sound of his voice fell on my ears like beautiful ancient music.
On Mother’s Day many years ago, when I was on a late afternoon walk, I heard the voice of an angry elderly woman come barrelling through the front door of a modest little cottage. "Get out!" the woman shouted. "Get out, you [expletive] son of a [expletive]!" I dared glance sideways to see the poor soul she was chasing down her front walkway. He was a tall lanky man with scraggily gray hair and a long white beard. She continued to fire away, hollering and waving her arms at him while he stiffly made his way to the street. "And don’t ever come back! You hear me! Never!"
It’s just that what I overhear can be much more interesting than what people say directly.
2009 © Copyright Paula Damon. A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her columns have won first-place in National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women Communications Contests. In the 2009 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula's columns took three first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, blog with her at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on FaceBook.
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