It was a phone booth, painted white and with many panes of glass.
    Mr. Hirota went inside.
    His voice floated out.
        Fumika? It’s your father. I miss you.
                     from:The Phone Booth in Mr. Hirota’s Garden 
                                             written by Heather Smith
                                            Illustrated by Rachel Wada
                                           Orca Book Publishers, 2019

    Even before my girls were teenagers, they wanted, no, make that needed a little privacy. We had a rotary phone attached to the wall and to the landline connecting our phone to every other phone. A curly cord accordioned out several feet from the receiver. The cord was so long that the person talking in our house could stretch it to its outer limit and talk privately, sorta, on the basement step behind a partially closed door. 
    That system worked for a long time. The girls grew up, moved out and got phones of their own. I held fast to that landline, though, even when lots of people were switching to use their mobile phones exclusively, including “the girls.”
    What finally changed my mind was picking up messages from my answering machine after we came home from vacation. Seventeen messages rewarded me with robocalls, requests for donations, a couple of wrong numbers, and a few blank messages full of dead air. I had no calls to return. Not even one. 
    We joined our kids and went landline-free.
    At first, I was undependable. I’d forget my phone when I left the house on errands. I’d inadvertently let the battery run down. I’d leave it somewhere and spend many precious minutes looking for it, only to find it on the shelf next to the cat box where I had purposefully set it down to clean the box.
    The telephone is a remarkable invention. It changes the sound of our voices into electrical impulses and sends them, now mostly wirelessly, to anywhere in the world. And not only sound, but images. Of ourselves, our grandchildren, and friends when we videochat through FaceTime, Zoom, or one of many other platforms. Like the wheel, moveable type, automobiles, and computers, the telephone changed the world.
    The name most associated with the telephone is Alexander Graham Bell. Although he is credited with the invention, his passion was oralism, teaching deaf people to speak using lip-reading and verbal speech, rather than sign language. He studied Visible Speech, a phonetic alphabet devised by his father, Alexander Melville Bell, a British linguist. Melville used symbols to represent the position of the speech organs when articulating sounds. The symbols were cumbersome, though, and after about 10 years they fell into disuse. 
    Alexander learned the alphabet and used money he earned from his invention of the telephone to promote oralism and the Visual Alphabet in the US.
    Telephones were not immediately or overwhelmingly received. When he first viewed the telephone in 1876, President Rutherford B. Hayes was said to have commented to Alexander Graham Bell, “That’s an amazing invention, but who would ever want to use one of them?”
    It’s hard to stop progress, though, and in 1887, the first telephone line was constructed, the first switchboard was created, and the first telephone exchange was in operation. Three years later, almost 49,000 telephones were in use. By 1900, there were nearly 600,000 phones in Bell’s telephone system and 5 years later, more than 2.2 million. After he acquired Western Union, Bell’s company, AT&T, had a near monopoly on electronic transmissions. 
    The 1960s, saw more than 80 million phone hookups in the U.S. and 160 million in the world. That number doubled by 1980.
    A decade later, the first digital cellular network went online in Orlando, Florida and by 1993, 25 million people subscribed to cellular phone service. 
    According to Pew Research, 97% of American adults own some type of cell phone. And while it is true that almost every American adult owns a cell phone, smart or otherwise, less than half of us are solely dependent on them for internet searches. We have laptops, tablets, and reading devices, too.
    And according to Common Sense Media, over half of our children own a smartphone by the age of 11. 
    Small enough and lightweight enough to carry in our pockets, telephones have not only become indispensable, they are sophisticated beyond all measure. Besides allowing us to “ring up” our families and friends, our telephones record important life events, locate mundane answers to mundane questions, provide vital life-saving information, allow us to waste time playing solitaire or any number of other activities, buy gifts, groceries, and garden equipment. We can watch movies, podcasts, and classic TV shows.
    We can text any number of ways. We can email, pay our utility bills and credit card bills. We can keep track of our heartrate, calories we’ve eaten, and miles we’ve walked. We can check out a book from our library or buy a book and have it delivered right to our house.
    I actually can’t think of anything that can’t be done with a smart phone.  
    Our landscape is dotted with cellphone towers, providing all that instant access. But smartphones not only facilitate our conversations, and searches, they listen in. They listen for “wake words” also called “hot words” to activate voice commands like “Hey Siri” or “Alexa.” 
    Here's how to turn off your microphone. You’ll need to scroll down pretty far past the Norton ads. You can still talk into your messages, ask Google to find a website, and transcribe a list in your notes. 
    Since I just turned off Siri this moment, I’m not sure how much less she will hear. I’ll keep you posted!
                                     -—Be curious! (and stay in touch)    

    More and more people wanted their lawns mowed—on the second day I had eight jobs—and the fact was that I was fast approaching my limit.
                                                      from: Lawn Boy
                                                      by Gary Paulsen
    Wendy Lamb Books/Random House Children’s Books, 2007

    Two of my grandsons mow lawns for some of their neighbors. It might be a family tradition.
    My brother supplemented the income he earned from his daily paper route by mowing lawns for some of our neighbors. An old family photo shows him as a probably four-year-old walking beside our dad. Both of Dad’s hands are on the mower handle, and my brother is holding on as high as he can reach beside my dad’s. In those days it must have been a “boy thing.” My sister and I never got a turn to help Dad mow.
    We lived in a neighborhood with driveways leading to a detached garage between each house. The lawns were average size for a city lot. We had a front lawn and a back lawn, too. Dad was proud of the soft green grass, evenly trimmed and meticulously edged. Not weed-free, but close.
    The whole neighborhood looked like that. No one skimped on the weed-killer or fertilizer. It was the 1950s.
    According to a 2019 New York Times article, when the colonists settled here in the 1600s and 1700s, their livestock ate up all the native grass. They imported seed from Europe and parts of North Africa to prevent their livestock from starving. And shortly after independence was declared, George Washington wrote to his estate manager in England for landscaping plans for Mt. Vernon. 
    Large expanses of grassy lawns had no agricultural value. Even so, the wealthy new Americans copied Washington’s and Jefferson’s ideal of beautiful European landscape architecture. The first lawnmower was patented in 1830. 
    After the Civil War, suburbs began to proliferate. Grassy lawns, inspired by public parks with their own sprawling lawns, became more common. In 1871, Joseph Lessler received a patent for the first lawn sprinkler that connected to a garden hose. By this time, city and suburban water systems were becoming more widely available. Watering lawns and flower gardens became much easier with Lessler’s invention. 
    By the time of Teddy Roosevelt's administration, around 1914, yard work was touted as a relaxing pastime and good exercise. Golf became a popular sport after WWII. More and more companies began developing strains of sturdy, soft grass suitable for golf courses.
    Then after WWII, when it became easier for some but not all veterans to get home loans, especially in the new suburbs, well-groomed lawns became more popular. 
    And here we are, fighting dandelions, yanking clover, and poisoning little wildflowers that dare to bloom in our soft, suburban, or city landscape.
    Begun in the UK in 2019 by citizen scientists, No Mow May promotes allowing those wildflowers to bloom and attract pollinators like bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds. It’s catching on in the US, too. Appleton, Wisconsin, about 200 miles north of Chicago, Illinois, was the first city to legalize the practice. Cleveland Heights, right here in Ohio no longer mows the median strips in their roads. Citizens are encouraged to participate by allowing their yards to bloom.
    The movement has its detractors, though. Some people are concerned about rodents, snakes, and ticks. And once “weeds” gain a foothold, they are not easy to discourage. Tamson Yeh, turf specialist with the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County in New York is someone who voices these concerns. She says allowing a lawn to flourish then ruthlessly cutting it back on June 1, is counterproductive. Pollinators communicate to each other. They return time and again, year after year, to use (what they think is) a recurring food source. 
    And the most horrible thing: you may inadvertently discover a bunny nest the first time you mow!
    Her solution is several fold. Use your space as a wildflower garden. Plant a variety of perennials to encourage pollinators, beautify your personal space, and eliminate the need for a mower. No need for gasoline to power it. No need to find something to do with the clippings. No noise. You’ll enjoy chirping crickets and grasshoppers, and trills and tweets of songbirds. At least, Yeh recommends, allow a patch as large as you can, for wildflowers native to your neighborhood. Enlarge it each year.
    In the meantime, wear long sleeves and long pants if you plan to traipse around in the beauty and check for ticks before you return indoors.
    If you must mow due to complaining neighbors, local ordinances, … keep your grass as high as you can. Four to six inches will promote healthy roots and still allow the very short flowers to bloom.
    My baba, Dad’s mother, did not have a lawn. Her spacious backyard was a fruit and vegetable haven. Tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, horseradish, beans, peas, you name it, she grew it. Her front yard was on fire every season with marigolds, snapdragons, pansies, peonies, irises. And low-growing portulacas grew in the median between two narrow strips of gravel on the driveway. She had no need of No Mow May, but I bet she would have loved the idea!

I’m re-reading (listening to) Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert. She talks about her theory of creativity. Ideas are sentient beings, she says, and only become manifest through a human collaborator. Ideas are always on the lookout for a human to bring them into the world. By being always open to new ideas, Big Magic will happen. Ms. Gilbert is sure of it. She made me a believer, too.
                               Be curious! (and listen for the birds)

After many months and 
many crumpled sheets of paper, 
Ramon put his pencil down. 
“I’m done.”
                                                             from ish
                                               by Peter H. Reynolds
                                           Candlewick Press, 2004
                                        accessed on Libby 5/8/23
                                (first electronic with audio edition
                                      Weston Woods Studios, 2013)

    Delaying work, projects, or promises that need attention is something I’m not proud of being good at. I’m finally getting to the nuts and bolts of this post on procrastination.
    Rory Baden’s book Procrastinate on Purpose that I mentioned last week turned out to be a motivational exercise in time management, although, in his words, time can’t be managed. You can only manage yourself. Niké summed it up in three words: Just Do It! My mom had a longer version: First you do what you have to do, then you do what you want to do. Both phrases are useful ways to conquer procrastination. 
    Business Insider describes four kinds of procrastinators: The Performer, The Self-Deprecator, The Overbooker, and The Novelty Seeker. Ali Schiller and Marissa Boisvert, authors of the article, claim that if you find out which one you are, you can overcome the tendency to procrastinate and become more productive. 
    My procrastination feels like a rebellion against my mom’s wise but nagging words. And that sounds rebellious to me.        
    So I procrastinated by taking a test on the Psychology Today website. I answered 10 questions and got this message: “According to your results, you are somewhat of a procrastinator. Your score indicates that you either procrastinate significantly in a specific area (or areas) of your life, or are a moderate procrastinator overall.” 
    My specific area flares when I don’t want to do a task, job, favor, report…so that part’s true. But none of those four BI types address the rebel piece of my personality.    
    Back to Business Insider's procrastinator types. (Distraction can also be a problem!)
    Performers claim to work best under tight deadlines. BI says this is a cop-out for perfectionism. If you only have a little time, you can’t produce a perfect “fill in the blank.” The biggest challenge, the authors say, is getting started. Their solution: commit to a start date, not a completion date. Once you get started, you’re on your way to finishing.
    Self-Deprecators claim laziness is their problem. Since laziness is a personality trait, they’re stuck with it. Not so, says BI. These procrastinators are the opposite of lazy. They work hard and need a break. They need time to rest and recharge. When they’re rested, the work will flow. I’m skeptical, but then again, I’m a procrastinator.
    Overbookers are mostly overwhelmed. Saying “yes” to everything makes setting priorities difficult. It’s easier to blame being late or not getting a job done at all on something or someone else that’s maybe more important. Chaos makes it difficult to know what should come next. The best way to avoid feeling overwhelmed, they say, is to understand why it’s so hard to say “no.” The problem is not so much the ability to prioritize, but to know what is really important.
    Novelty Seekers are a little like a cross between a squirrel and mad inventor. They no more get started on a great new project when their attention swings to the next new idea. It’s hard to see results when focus shifts so quickly. Completion becomes illusory. BI's solution sounds easier-said-than-done. The authors suggest jotting down the new idea and saving it for when the job at hand is finished. 
    According to social scientists, most people procrastinate. Procrastination is a habit and we do it for many reasons. Habits are formed when we get pleasure or relief from doing (or putting off) an action. Over time, this tactic is rewarded because it makes us feel good, and through repetition, a habit is formed. But the habit is a short-term solution. When it begins to bother us or even interfere with our lives, we want to change that habit.
    One of the best ways we can eliminate a bad habit is first to recognize we are doing it. Habits, by their very nature, are what we do without thinking. Discovering the reasons why we procrastinate can also help us get on task. Sometimes it helps to “Just Do It!” Sometimes it helps to promise ourselves a small reward. Sometimes external motivation (set a clock to chime at completion) helps. Putting off something unpleasant only works for a little while. Focusing on the benefits of completion sometimes helps get me going.
    I grew up on my mom’s phrasebook and sometimes her words of wisdom conflicted with each other. Don’t put off for tomorrow what you can do today bumped into Look before you leap. 
    I know I do more looking than leaping. 
    Spending time to figure out the why of my procrastination seems like a good? productive? helpful? way to put off the unpleasant task of cleaning my refrigerator. 
    I’ll just put the fridge on tomorrow’s Do List, again!
        
I read The Last Mapmaker by Christina Soontornvat (Candlewick Press, 2022) winner of a 2023 Newbery Honor. I enjoy fantasy if it feels “real” and this one does. The main character, Sodsai Mudawan, is a twelve-year-old girl with a big secret. Her future depends on whether she can hide the truth of her low-life father and her past of poverty. She strives for her independence by winning an apprenticeship to a mapmaker. He takes Sai with him on a journey to look for a continent that is the subject of a popular myth. As Sai sails farther from home, she has to decide whom to trust and what sacrifices she is willing to make for her future. 
    While written for kids (ages 9-12) food for adult thought includes colonization, ecology, and racism. Recommended.
                                     —-stay curious! (and Just Do It!)

    I decided to find out more about procrastination for this week’s post. I found the definition in Dictionary.com: The act of delaying especially something requiring immediate attention, a familiar phrase: Procrastination is the thief of time, and a book from 2015: Procrastinate on Purpose by Rory Baden, a self-discipline strategist. After a busy week and a busier weekend, that’s as far as I got.
    I hope I’m not procrastinating! but I’ll have more next week!

    nearer my freedom: The Interesting Life of Olaudah Equiano by Himself is the first person account of a young African boy who was kidnapped and caught up in the slave trade. It was made especially accessible by its modern interpreters Monica Edinger and Lesley Younge (Zest Books/Lerner Publishing Group, 2023) through their found poems. The form and the content are interesting and inspiring. 

    It was hard to decide what to do, so I left it up to the Magic 8 Ball. I walked up to each door where the different clubs meet and gave the 8 Ball a shake to see which one I should join. I got a lot of “No’s” and a few “Ask Again Laters,” but I finally got a “Yes, Definitely” when I was in front of the Yearbook Club door.
                     from Diary of a Wimpy Kid #8: Hard Luck
                            written and illustrated by Jeff Kinney
                                        Abrams/Amulet Books, 2014
                                        accessed on Libby 4/30/23

    It may not have been Gregg Heffley’s destiny to be part of the staff on his Yearbook, but Queen Elizabeth II’s firstborn, Charles Mountbatten-Winsor, was destined (or fated?) to become King Charles III.
    His coronation will take place this Saturday, May 6, 2023, amidst a throng of thousands in person and on-line. The ceremony will be photographed by serious journalists, tabloid artists, and regular folks with smartphones. 
    Majestic is probably the best word to describe the reverential, religious, and regal festivities. The prescribed procession includes religious leaders of all faiths, including Jewish, Muslim, and Hindu leaders. The King will be formally greeted. After a moment of silent prayer and collective singing, the five main elements included in the coronation itself will begin. 
    First is Recognition. Its formality harkens to the Anglo-Saxons. Charles will receive a red leather-bound Bible. The presentation dates back to the joint Coronation of William III and Mary II in 1689.
    Part II is The Oath. The Coronation Oath Act of 1688 requires the King to declare that he will maintain the established Anglican Protestant Church, rule according to laws agreed in Parliament, and cause law, justice, and mercy to be executed in his judgment. This year, for the first time, the Archbishop of the Church of England will preface the oath with the promise that the King “will seek to foster an environment where people of all faiths and beliefs may live freely.” The Oath includes prayers, hymns, and a sermon. 
    The Anointing, Part III, is the most important facet of the religious ceremony and is performed in private.
    The Investiture and Crowning comes next. The King is presented with Golden Spurs representing knighthood and chivalry, the Jewelled Sword of Offering symbolizing royal power and the King’s acceptance of his duties, the Armills known as the “bracelets of sincerity and wisdom,”  the royal robe, stole, orb, and ring, glove, scepter, and finally comes the crowning itself. The crown weighs almost 5 US pounds and is worth about $4,500,000.00. The bells in Westminster Abbey will ring for 2 full minutes in the Fanfare. Leaders of all the religious denominations will invoke a blessing for love, protection, grace, and wisdom over the newly-crowned King Charles III.
    Finally, the King is seated on his throne, above the Stone of Destiny Homage is pledged to him by the Archbishop, his family, and the people. 
    But will anyone but me focus on the Stone of Destiny? I only learned of it a few days ago.
    The origin of the stone has been lost to history, but its earliest mention places it in Scotland. Although unable to be fact-checked, Scottish Kings were said to have been crowned using the Stone since Kenneth MacAlpin received his crown in 843. In 1296, King Edward I of England seized the stone from the Scots. Edward I had a throne built in Westminster Abbey to house the sacred stone. It was first used it in a coronation for his son, Edward II in 1308. 
    For a long time it was thought to be the stone that Jacob rested his head on in Genesis. That night he dreamed of angels and when he woke, he consecrated the stone to Gd. 
    In 1998, though, geologists from the British Geological Survey performed detailed examinations of fragments of the stone and determined its origin was not Middle Eastern at all. It was identified as being hewn from the same type of sandstone found in the Scone (pronounce skoon) Sandstone Formation, an outcrop in the area around Scone Palace, in Scotland. 
    Its name, whether the Stone of Scone, the Coronation Stone, or the Stone of Destiny, begs the question of its power. Some suggest that when King Edward I captured the Stone, it had been switched out so he took the wrong one. The original may have borne the inscription translated to, “If the Destiny proves true, then the Scots are known to have been Kings wherever men find this stone.”    
    Also unsubstantiated, is the claim that even before that, the Stone was blessed by St. Patrick to be used as a coronation stone for the kings of Ireland. Anyway, no engraving can be seen on the stone now.
    Unlike our representative democracy, monarchies pass power from King or Queen to an heir in a structured hierarchy. Does Destiny play a role? Does Fate? Or is it a function of genetics?
    Fate and destiny both hold connotations of pre-determination. Ancient Greeks said our paths are chosen by the three Fates and lead us where they will. Fate is the darker side of destiny. Coming from the Latin “that which has been spoken,” fate is what happens when we are not active participants in our own lives. Our fate is sealed when we don’t take responsibility for ourselves.
    Destiny also comes from the Latin, but involves more personal action and responsibility. The phrase translates to “that which has been firmly established.” When we fulfill our destiny, we connect to our life-path. We know where we must go and take responsibility for our lives. An element of choice allows us to actively shape our destiny.
    So while Charles’s fate was cast from birth to become a king, he can choose to forge his destiny by ruling capably, courageously, and  kindly.
    Rather than fate or destiny, in today’s quote Gregg’s Heffley based his decisions on his 8 Ball. They are pure chance. 

I just started reading nearer my freedom: The Interesting Life of Olaudah Equiano by Himself interpreted by Monica Edinger and Lesley Younge. (Zest Books/Lerner Publishing Group, 2023)
The authors used Equiano’s autobiography as their source to write a “novel-length series of found-verse poems.” (from the Back Matter) 
    The poems were created by carefully selecting words, phrases, and quotes from Equiano’s text to tell his story of being enslaved, buying his own freedom and his work as an abolitionist. The authors use lyricism and an economy of words. More next week. 
                                   -—stay curious! (and take charge)

I went from a sweet grape to a bitter grape…
Finally, I became a sour grape. I scowled so much that my face got all squishy.
                                             from The Sour Grape
                                              written by Jory John
                                         illustrated by Pete Oswald
                                    HarperCollins Publishers, 2022
                                   accessed on YouTube 4/23/23

    When my sister was in high school, she took a course in shorthand. The top of her homework book was spiral-bound. and the cardboard cover flipped up and over to uncover neatly arranged squiggles on all the pages. A secret language, a code I thought. I taught myself some of the simpler words, and used them when I took notes in my own classes, even when I went to college. I made up some symbols of my own, too. Saying a lot in a little bit of space was not only practical, it was fun. Like poetry, kinda. At least it was for me.
    I love words, but a picture really is worth a thousand of them. Maybe that’s why I love emoji (the plural s is optional). The different tilts of an eyebrow suggest confusion, anger, or surprise. A smile can be just a hint or a wild guffaw shown by those laughing tears flowing from a tilted head. They are all easy-to-read shortcuts to communicate everything from our emotions, to our travel plans. 
    Remember the smiley face? It was designed by Harvey Ball to boost employee morale of the State Mutual Life Assurance Company. Harvey said he dashed out a “…a circle with a smile for a mouth on yellow paper, because it was sunshiny and bright.” In 1963, the company paid him $45.00. They distributed thousands of buttons and signs. 
    Mr. Ball’s simple design became ubiquitous. By the 1970s, his slogan “Have a happy day” had evolved into “Have a nice day” which has also become ubiquitous.
    A French journalist, Franklin Loufrani, also claims to have designed the Smiley face. In 1971, he launched the Smiley Company, which in 2017, earned $419.9 million. After surviving for over 50 years, the Smiley is here to stay. You can find Smiley faces on everything from tea cups to T-shirts.
    It’s a short leap from a Smiley to an emoticon like ;-) or <3 or even (^_^). And another short leap to emoji. The word emoji comes from the Japanese and combines two words, picture and character. 
    It is said that the modern emoji was invented by Shigetaka Kurita in 1999. Their popularity grew, especially with the invention and mushrooming growth of smartphones. While emoticons can be “written” with any keyboard, or even dashed out by hand emoji are embedded in smartphones and available with the tap of a finger. Even some laptops have an emoji bank.
    According to Paul D. Hunt who writes a blog for Adobe here, empathy is the most important aspect of communication. And the results of a survey of 7,000 people from all around the world show that [using] emoji compels them to feel more empathy towards others.
    Emoji live and are managed by a nonprofit called Unicode. Begun in 1988, Unicode characters allow all devices (laptops, smartphones, tablets, cloud computers) to share or exchange text written in any language or with symbols. Even though emoji are what most people know about Unicode, they make up only a small part of what it provides. 
    Digital Information World has tallied up emoji usage across the globe. They tell us that the “laughing face with crying tears is the most commonly seen in at least 75 nations.” ​
    Emoji have really transformed the way we express ourselves on the internet and according to Emojipedia.com, new emojis will be released to major platforms throughout 2023. 
    Bark is an app that monitors texts, email, YouTube, and over 30 apps and social media platforms for issues like cyberbullying, adult content, sexual predators, profanity, suicidal ideation, threats of violence, and more. In addition, they provide a dictionary, updated frequently, of emoji slang used by teens, mostly. It’s a list of what you would expect kids  are “talking” about when they don’t want their parents to know, but can be used as a bullying tactic. Here's the link.
    If you love emoji as much as I do, you might want one of your own. You can adopt a character that describes you or your company or even give one as a gift. On Unicode's website, select your sponsorship level, select your character and make your donation. You can adopt as many characters as you want for $100.00 each. Donations help the Unicode Consortium reach its goal to support all the world’s languages.
    World emoji day is July 17 each year. That is the day that the founder of Emojipedia created the calendar emoji in 2014. 

I really enjoyed Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus (Knopf/Doubleday, 2022). The book is necessary. It’s a lesson in what happens when a society that suppresses half its population begins to realize its own potential. It’s feminism at its best: a lesson in self-awareness, equanimity, and positive role models. And it’s laugh-out-loud funny.
                              -—be curious! (and express yourself)

    On a sticky and sunny Sunday in the summer of 1969, the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland did something rivers should never do.
                                   KABOOM!
    No one was surprised, surprisingly. It’s burned before, people said. It’ll burn again.
    Which was true. Since 1886, it happened thirteen times. In 1912, five people lost their lives. And the 1952 fire caused over a million dollars in damage.
                              from The Day the River Caught Fire
                                       written by Barry Wittenstein
                                       illustrated by Jessie Haartland
                          Paula Wiseman/Simon & Schuster Books
                                            for Young Readers, 2023

    According to my interpretation of Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, who kind of said we’ll need a little magic to make the world right, I disagree. We don’t. We need information. We need encouragement. And we need determination. That combination makes magic.
    When William Shakespeare was born (April 23, 1564) the Thames River was so polluted that you could smell its stink for miles. In 1969, the Cuyahoga River was so polluted that it caught fire and became the impetus for a movement. The 1969 fire was not the Cuyahoga’s first fire. It was not even the worst one. (See quote above)    
    After the 1969 fire was put out, people went back to work or home or school, but the times, they were a-changin’. A movement had begun. On April 22, 1970, under the leadership of Congressman Gaylord Nelson and Denis Hayes, his aide and an environmental activist, we celebrated the first Earth Day.
    In December, 1970, the Cuyahoga River fire was highlighted in a cover story in National Geographic titled “Our Ecological Crisis.” Time Magazine published an article about the fire in March, 1970. Congress established the Environmental Protection Agency in January 1970, to strengthen the Federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1948, to pass the Clean Water Act of 1972.
    The Clean Water Act has been amended several times since then. Through tighter restrictions, our water (and air) have become cleaner. 
    In 2019, fish caught in the Cuyahoga River were deemed “fit to eat,” but after rollbacks in the previous administration, on August 25, 2020, the river caught fire again. Storm drains allowed sewage, toxins, and fertilizer to flow into the river during heavy rains. The 2020 fire started when a fuel tanker spilled its flaming contents into the river after a traffic accident. 
    We need our governmental leaders to make and enforce laws to protect us and the environment.
    And, we need our environmental scientists, our climatologists, and our geneticists. They ask questions they think they know answers to, just to discover if they actually could be wrong. After all, it’s really effective to learn from our mistakes. Scientists have shown us that we continue to make many, and many dangerous mistakes. They show us that we human beings have had a profound affect on our environment, especially in the days and years since the Industrial Revolution.
    So why is it so hard to convince people of that profound affect? 
    Something called denial. The concept of denial is well-understood, well-documented, and much written about. We can be in denial about our own mortality or that of a loved one. We can be in denial about how the hot-fudge sundae we ate last night really affects our weight-control efforts. We can be in denial about a drinking or drug habit. According to psychological research, the enormity of the problem does not allow our brains to process its reality. 
    Now imagine that the earth will suffocate/drown/blow away or burn up if we don’t acknowledge climate change and start working diligently toward solutions.
    The fact of climate change is easy to deny. It is just too big to wrap our heads around and millions of people are climate change deniers.
    So what is the solution? Just like any huge problem or project, we must break it into smaller, more achievable goals. We need to tell our government officials that we are concerned about the problem. We need to make collective decisions that will benefit all of humanity and all of our shared earth. We all need to be involved on whatever level we can be.
    Mother Nature is nothing if not fair. She responds harshly to abuse, but is abundantly forgiving when treated with love and generosity.
    Let’s promise her we’ll be more cautious, more care-full, and more grateful for her gifts.

I just started reading Lessons in Chemistry (I’m only 14% in) by Bonnie Garmus. It’s historical fiction! (1960s) about “a gifted research chemist…who becomes the unlikely star of a beloved TV cooking show.” (Washington Post) and “the Catch-22 of early feminism.” (Steven King, via Twitter) I’ll give you my take next week.
                           
                         Be curious! (and celebrate Mother Earth)

    When we got to the edge of the garden where the zinnias are planted, there was Great-great-aunt Florentine, flat out on the ground next to a basket of crowder peas, with her garden dress poofed around her like a big, soft cloud and her head resting on a mound of marigolds.
                                    from Each Little Bird That Sings 
                                             written by Deborah Wiles
                                                   Clarion Books, 2006

    To be sure, Great-great-aunt Florentine was dead. She was not buried in her beloved garden, but she could have been.
    I’ve been considering a blog post on Green Burials for a long time, but I hesitated. Death is an uncomfortable topic for many of us. What happens afterward is a great mystery we who are alive cannot solve. We can imagine. We can believe. We can avoid the subject altogether, but it really is a mystery. 
    Lest anyone jumps to a wrong conclusion, I am not harboring a secret, unthinkable, frightening diagnosis. I also don’t know anyone who is. And I am not harboring a death-wish. To be clear, the topic is timely, practical, and more and more people are considering all their options while they are still above-ground to do so. 
    Some people are happy-go-lucky. They roll with life’s punches, perils, and predicaments taking good news, bad news, even no news in stride. Not necessarily averse to planning, some people just don’t do it. Others of us plan everything from breakfast to dinner and each moment between. Most of us fall somewhere in the middle of all that.
    Pre-planning your own funeral, though, is not for everyone. I get that. So if you’re one who prefers to stop reading now, I understand.

    Before the Civil War (1861 - 1865) it was uncommon to embalm bodies for burial. Great advances during that War allowed the unrefrigerated bodies of tens of thousands of soldiers to be returned to their families for burial. The same process was used to preserve the body of Abraham Lincoln as he was viewed by thousands of grief-stricken Americans on the famous train ride that took him almost 1,700 miles from Washington DC to Springfield, Illinois, his final resting place. After Lincoln’s funeral, embalming became more fashionable. 
    Even though only five percent of burials are natural, 74% of funeral homes reported an increased interest. One main reason is the prohibitive cost of a traditional burial; $8,000 is average in Ohio right now and the trend is upward.
    Natural burial is also known as Green Burial. A body is allowed to decompose naturally in the ground. No embalming (with its toxic chemicals) is necessary. A biodegradable casket or a natural-fiber shroud assures nothing interferes with the process. Both will reduce the final cost.
    Another obvious advantage to a Green Burial is being able to work hand-in-hand with Mother Nature. All the body’s minerals are absorbed into the earth, making a grave the perfect place for a shade-giving tree, a comfortable rock to serve as a backrest, or a patch of daffodils. 
    Along with providing positive ecological aspects, negative aspects of a traditional burial can be avoided. 
    Almost five and a half million gallons of embalming fluid is used by funeral homes in the United States each year. Embalming fluid contains formaldehyde, harmful to the people preparing the body and toxic to the ground once it begins to biodegrade into the soil.
    Over one and a half million tons of reinforced concrete, one to two tons per vault, are used each year. 
    Made into coffins, US cemeteries bury over 30 million board feet of hardwoods and softwoods each year. Some are pine, some are oak, and some are made from exotic woods from rainforests in South America.
    The Green Burial Council provides a list of negative consequences to the earth caused by traditional burial on its website. Their site also provides a comprehensive FAQ page. It’s a great place to start looking for more info.
    The physical advantages of Green Burial speak for themselves. But humans are emotional beings. Like Elizabeth Berg’s lovable character, Arthur Truluv, who took his lunch to the cemetery every day to visit his wife, we all want to know we can visit our loved ones even when they can no longer walk next to us or share our lunch. 
    Most cemeteries and burial sites that provide natural burial allow some type of marker, whether it be an engraved field stone set flush to the earth, a patch of perennials, or a tree or shrub. The GPS coordinates of a  gravesite are usually provided to the family, so even if the spot is not marked, it’s still accessible.
    A particular place provides an important feeling of connection that ties us to our past, to the DNA that we share with family members, close and distant. 
    We like a remembrance, too, a token, something tangible to remind us of our loved ones. Call it a memento, but these solid objects are so much more. I have my grandmother’s rocking chair. It’s old, but I wouldn’t call it an antique. It has no value to anyone but me. I like to sit in the kitchen and imagine I’m sitting in her lap, even though she was mostly not that kind of grandma.
    While Green Burial is legal in every state, some communities, and some cemeteries may have a policy prohibiting the practice so it’s important to check.
    Lots of people are making the decision for Green Burial, mostly for ecological reasons, but financial, too. I’m sure no one is surprised to find out it’s a decision I’ve been considering for a long time. After I’m finished with the body I’ve used and misused, I like to think I could nourish a tree or a bush. Something flowering would be nice. Maybe a Rose of Sharon?

    Deborah Wiles’ book Each Little Bird That Sings (Clarion Books, 2006) tells the story of Comfort Snowberger whose family owns the only funeral home in town. After the back to back deaths of both her uncle and her great-great aunt, tragedy strikes. Comfort’s naïveté combines with her optimism. She concludes that “it’s not how you die that makes the important impression, it’s how you live.” Try this one for a quick read that goes right to the mind and heart of a smart eleven-year-old. 
                                     -—be curious! (and celebrate life)

    Eric opened his eyes. “It’s no use,” he said. “I’ll never have a memory like yours.”
    “You have to keep practicing,” Cam told him. “Now try me.”
    Cam looked straight ahead. She said, “Click,” and then closed her eyes. Cam always said “Click,” when she wanted to remember something. She said it was the sound her mental camera made when it took a picture.
     from Cam Jansen and the Mystery of the Stolen Diamonds
                                                                (Book I)
                                             written by David A. Adler
                                          illustrated by Susanna Natti
                                   Viking Press/Puffin/Penguin, 1980

    I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, on the banks of Lake Erie. Besides memorizing spelling words, arithmetic facts, and song lyrics, we learned the names of all the Great Lakes. I can name them now with a memory aide, a mnemonic device. When put together, the first letter of each lake spells the word HOMES: Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior. 
    Mnemonics help me a lot when I want to remember the items on my grocery list, the ages of my grandkids, and the correct spellings for difficult words. Here’s an example you probably know: A rat in the house might eat the ice cream spells arithmetic if you use the initial letter of each word. 
    In musical notation, name the notes on the treble staff by using the initial letters in the sentence Every good boy does fine for the lines. The spaces spell the word FACE.  
    Songs can also be memory aids. I can name (sing) the first 22 Presidents of the US by singing their names to “Rock a Bye Baby.” Use the number of syllables in the number of terms they served to correspond to their names. (George Washington gets only Wash-y and John Adams gets Ad. Thomas Jefferson gets Jeff-y and so on.) 
    My granddaughter can list the first 100 digits of pi by singing the pi song. It goes to the tune of “Hall of the Mountain King” by Edvard Greig. It’s on YouTube. Search “Hall of the Mountain King pi” (Can I ever get past pi!?)
    Like Cam Jansen in today’s quote, associating one word or idea with another is sometimes a good way to remember a thought. The other day, I was talking to a friend about music. He mentioned the word tonic in relation to chords. I asked him “like gin and tonic?” The answer was no, but a qualified yes. I remembered the word long enough to look it up and found out while it has nothing to do with alcohol, the word is spelled the same way. It refers to the first notes of a musical selection and is the basis for the rest of the melody and harmonies.
    Here’s a mnemonic spelling rhyme you probably know: I before E except after C and when sounded like A as in neighbor and weigh.
    Mnemosyne, (pronounce n’ MAH sah nee) the Greek goddess of memory, is associated with creativity, knowledge, history, and art. Her symbol is a fountain. Her name translates in English to memory. While the ability to remember is one of her gifts to us humans, she also gave birth to the muses, her creative spirit-children that allow us to create beautiful songs, art, and humor/amusement.
    In the days when ancient Greeks worshipped Mnemosyne, before writing was wide-spread, the whole society depended on her. Laws needed to be consistent over time. Passing judgement based on those rules needed to be fair. History was passed from generation to generation by storytellers. They all depended on memory. 
    Memory research began in 1957, when Brenda Milner described a patient, known as H. M., to have suffered profound amnesia after brain surgery to alleviate symptoms of epilepsy. Medical science quickly learned about the various structures of our brains. The surgery was refined and perfected. Specialized images pinpointed the lesions involved in a particular patient’s epilepsy, allowing doctors to greatly minimize poor outcomes and maximize beneficial results. Some peoples’ memories have even improved because they are no longer impaired by their seizures.
    Most scientists describe several types of memory. Our experiences and actions may begin with a sensory image, say pulling out a musty-smelling box of wooden blocks. Unless there is reason to remember the image, it will be forgotten. Since I associated the musty smell with the fun I had playing and the love lavished on me by my grandparents, the memory was important. It still influences my feelings about musty smells, the importance of childhood play, and even how much I like to play with blocks with my own grandchildren.  
    Short-term memory helps me grocery-shop without a list. I can hold about seven items until I pick each off the shelf. I arrange the items in one of several ways, alphabetically, according to the geography of the store, or by categories. All those mnemonics are helpful in the short term. Don’t ask me for last week’s list, or even yesterday’s!
    Working memory serves us a little differently. When we pay attention, say to a particular birdcall on a walk, we’ll be able to identify that same call later, even if we don’t see the bird. We can add numbers in our heads. We can make a familiar dish for dinner without a written recipe.
    Long-term memories can be called back at will from hours or even years ago. But memory is tricky. Even if several people share an experience, each one will remember it slightly (or profoundly) differently. 
    And memories can change over time. A horribly embarrassing event can become raucously funny and harsh memories can soften. 
    The Mayo Clinic lists some ways we can improve our memory functions.
        Be physically active. Blood flow helps our hearts and our brains.
        Stay mentally active. Play word games. Read. Learn a new skill.
        Spend time with others. Exchange ideas. Make plans. Laugh together.
        Stay organized. Designate places for things. Keep a calendar. Limit distractions.
        Sleep well. Most adults need between seven and nine hours.
        Eat a healthy diet. Limit alcohol.
     
     Some people say it’s the power of Mnemosyne’s gifts, memory and creativity, that distinguish us from other animals. I’m not so sure. Spider webs, birdsong, and communication-dances of bees all seem inspired to me.

I’m reading Tracy Kidder’s new book Rough Sleepers (Random House, 2023) about Dr. Jim O’Connell’s urgent mission to bring healing to homeless people in Boston. It’s heartbreaking and heartwarming, current and timeless.
                                       -—stay curious! (and creative)

On Saturday he ate through 
1 piece of chocolate cake
1 ice cream cone
1 pickle
1 slice of Swiss cheese
1 slice of salami
1 lollipop
1 piece of cherry pie
1 sausage
1 cupcake
1 slice of watermelon
                                from The Very Hungry Caterpillar
                              written and illustrated by Eric Carle
                                    World Publishing Company, 1969
           (accessed on YouTube 3/27/23, read by the author)

    It is fair to say that even though I’ve read about hunger in the United States and elsewhere, even though I educated myself (a little) about food deserts in my own community and try to spread the word about food waste, I’ve never experienced hunger. I am grateful, extremely grateful for that. Even though our quote today is from a classic, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, it is fair to say that the caterpillar was not really hungry either.
    People have been hungry in the United States since our beginning as a colonial possession of Great Britain. Whether hard-scrabble Puritans learning to be farmers, or hearty pioneers looking to eke out a living on the prairie while learning about the Native population whose land the pioneers believed was their own, or city-dwellers displaced by gentrification and freeways, hunger has been part of the American landscape.
    Beginning in the 1930s, hundreds of thousands of real Americans, like John Steinbeck’s fictional Joad family in The Grapes of Wrath, moved west to look for work. While their poor farming practices over the course of years depleted the soil, a years-long severe drought exacerbated the problem and resulted in the Dust Bowl. Acres and acres of farmland were devastated. Families were in financial ruin.
    In an attempt to give people, especially farmers, a leg up during the Great Depression (1929-1939) and the Dust Bowl (~1930-1940) Congress passed the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 as part of the New Deal. 
    It included crop insurance, training to support sustainable farming practices, and money for people who needed to buy healthy food for their families.
       The farm bill, as it is usually referred to, is tweaked and renewed every five or so years. Price controls that allowed farmers to earn a living wage were a major part of the first farm bill. In 1938, the Soil Conservation Act was renewed. According to History of the United States Farm Bill “[f]armers were compensated for planting soil-supporting crops like soybeans and reducing production of crops that contributed to soil erosion.”  
    Since 1973, the farm bill has included re-authorization of funding for food assistance programs. In 1977, Congress changed eligibility requirements, and in 2008, Food Stamps were renamed the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP. Less than 2% of our Federal budget is allocated for SNAP and according to the latest statistics from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 12% of our population benefits from SNAP. That’s about 1 in every 8 Americans.    
    Through the years farm bills have addressed climate change, conservation, and energy use. Discussions of the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018 are already underway for the 2023 bill.
    Besides crop insurance allotments, subsidies for specific crops (grown or not grown), conservation issues, and the amount a farmer can borrow, Congress is discussing nutrition benefits (SNAP, WIC, and the school lunch program).
    Also part of the bill are rural development, foreign trade, energy, forestry, and research. 
    In the 2023 discussion, Nutrition programs will again account for about 85% of the farm bill. Eligibility depends on the amount of money people in the household earn (or don’t), how many people live in the home, if anyone is disabled … The form is long, but if the past is a predictor of the future, SNAP will provide on average, $6.00/per day per person. That’s not much, especially when healthy food is more expensive and harder to find in some urban neighborhoods and in rural areas, too.
    The question the farm bill committee members must address and answer is how to meet the needs of so many varied constituents. Because the Nutrition portion is such a large percentage of the total package, and because it is used by people who can’t afford food, especially nutritious food in their times of difficulty, it has become the object of debate, sometimes intense debate. 
    The farm bill was passed to ensure a safe and abundant food supply, to help feed the hungry, invigorate rural communities, and help farmers take care of the environment as they provide food, feed, fuel, and fiber to the United States and the world. 
    If you want more details, here's a great article from the Farm Bureau.
    Hearings on the 2023 farm bill have already begun.
    It’s a tricky balance to be sure, especially in this time of deep partisan divides, to create policy that is fair to hungry babies, folks trying to save their family farms, and the taxpayers funding it all. 
    You can write or call members of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry and members of the  House Committee on Agriculture.

Elizabeth Berg did not disappoint with her book Earth's the Right Place for Love (Random House, 2023). I learned Arthur Truluv’s backstory and in the reading, learned something about how to be kind. Just like we all thought, it’s a combination of how we are and our reactions to everything (good and bad and challenging) we experience. Thank you Ms. Berg!
                                        -—be curious! (and generous)