Shari Della Penna
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"Small acts of kindness can change and humanise our world."
   Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks 1948-2020
   ​Chief Rabbi of Great Britain, 1991-2020
                         Author, Advocate, Advisor

Halloween, Then and Now

10/29/2019

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     “You’re going to miss all the fun. Just like last year.”
   “Don’t talk like that,” Linus cries. “The Great Pumpkin will come because I am in the most sincere pumpkin patch.”
     “Oh, good grief,” Lucy exclaims.
                        from: It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown    
                         written and illustrated by Charles M. Schulz
                                                    Random House, 1980

    It’s almost Halloween.
    On our way to Florida a couple of weeks ago, we passed a billboard that informed us Halloween is a 6,000 year old holiday. I doubted that, and made a note to look it up later, when we stopped for the night. 
    Everything I found confirmed Halloween had probably evolved from the Celtic harvest holiday, Samhain. The Gaelic word is usually translated as Summer’s End. The holiday, celebrated about 2,000 years ago, was a period of mystical intensity, described in myths as a time when the boundary between the physical and the spiritual world became fluid. Spirits, faeries, and elves walked among mortals. People hollowed out gourds, and carried them, lit, throughout the streets and left gifts along the way to appease the spirits.
    The word “hallow” (not hollow) means to set apart as holy, or consecrate. To the English, trying to reconcile their beliefs with those of the Celts, November 1, became “Feasts of All Saints and Souls,” and the day before became “All Hallow’s Eve.” Similarities between the old Celtic celebration and the “modern” included honoring the dead with food and using candle-lit gourds, carved to allow the light to escape.
    The foods of choice for these early Brits were “soul cakes,” small, pastries baked with expensive ingredients and precious spices. Soul cakes were distributed to beggars who in turn handed them out to wealthier people. The beggars promised to pray for the departed souls of loved ones in exchange for food.
    The ancient Aztecs celebrated Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) around this time, too. Delicious food was part of what amounted to a wonderful family reunion with relatives who had passed into the spirit world, a joyful time for people to celebrate the memories of their ancestors. Candle-lit displays honored the ancestors and allowed them to find their families. 
    When the Spanish arrived in Mexico during the 1500s, they combined elements of Day of the Dead with their own All Souls Day. Dia de los Muertos is still celebrated in many Hispanic communities in Central America and the United States with elaborate displays and delicious food.
    It’s not such a great leap from then to now. We still celebrate with food. We still light pumpkins. We still remember the dead. 
    In 1950s America, when the Great Depression was becoming a foggy memory and WWII was finally over, a new prosperity spilled into growing suburbs. People were looking for ways to meet their neighbors and entertain their children. Pop-corn balls, caramel apples, and seasonal nuts were distributed to kids who joined their neighbors in an evening of fun.
    When I was growing up, we made our own costumes. One year I went as Miss Halloween. I had a tin-foil crown and a sash my mom made from some fabric scraps that I wore over my regular school clothes. Store-bought characters like Superheroes and Disney princesses were not even a twinkle in the eyes of entrepreneurs and merchandizers. Ghosts and skeletons were about as scary as anyone dared to be. Blood and gore were not part of the repertoire. Cats, babies, and storybook characters were popular.
    Candy companies already had Easter and Christmas. Valentine’s Day was also a big money-making holiday. But how about something in the Fall? Of course, Halloween. Candy is big business.     
    Today, Americans spend an estimated $2.6 billion on Halloween candy, according to the National Retail Federation. The day, itself, has become the nation’s second-largest commercial holiday with store-bought costumes and decorations figured into the total. 
    Now, even the littlest kids dress up in really scary and sometimes bloody-looking costumes. Yuck! And I still don’t get the whole idea of asking for candy from strangers. Because who even knows their neighbors anymore? 
    Of course, I’m not Scrooge. We don’t have very many kids in our neighborhood, but I’ll turn on my light and get a roll of quarters from the bank, just in case. 
    Maybe Linus had the best idea. Maybe the Great Pumpkin is still looking for the most sincere pumpkin patch, whatever that really means!

                                            -—stay curious! (and celebrate!)
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Fact, Fiction, or Fake…How Can You Tell?

10/22/2019

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    Together Ivy and Bean had written the exciting story about the fire at Trevor and Ruby’s. In fact, they made it a little more exciting that it really had been. They said the entire backyard burst into flames. They also said that Ruby had saved Trevor’s life by running over flames to get the hose. “People like to read exciting stories,” Bean said.
                                from: Ivy + Bean: No News is Good News
                                                 written by Annie Barrows
                                               illustrated by Sophie Blackall
                                                       Chronicle Books, 2011

    Before I decided on my undergrad major, I took a basic class in journalism. One of my first assignments was to interview someone and write up my discoveries as a public interest piece. Being naturally shy, and less confident than I needed to be, I (foolishly) decided to write a fiction piece instead. I created an interviewee and wrote the public interest piece based on the information I (supposedly) gathered.
    I did not get a good grade on that assignment. I already knew the assignment needed to based on truth. Now I had a (bad) grade to prove it.
    Journalism is based on facts. Journalists collects facts and create readable and informative true stories.    
    Since 2017 (around January 20), we as a citizenry learned about “alternate truth” which is just another word for “fake news.” So what’s the difference between that and a lie? or many lies? Oh. Nothing. Right.
    We have libel laws to protect us against people who would do us harm by printing lies. We have slander laws to protect us against people who would do us harm through verbal abuse. 
    But political speech falls under the protection of the First Amendment, protecting free speech. Candidates can (and do) take comments of their opponents out of context, mislead us through manipulation of data, and even outright lie. And that is allowed. It’s political speech.             
    Political speech includes not just speech by the government or candidates for office, but also any discussion of social issues. And remember, political speech is protected by the First Amendment.

    There’s a thing called the illusory truth effect. Science is validating Joseph Goebbel’s statement that if a lie is repeated often enough, people will believe it to be true. Until recently, marketing was the primary user of the illusory truth effect. 
    Lisa Fazio, a psychologist at Vanderbilt University, explains that after the second or third time hearing some information, our brains misinterpret the repetition as a signal for truth. It is our brain’s efficiency at work. For example, we don’t need to hear that plants need water to thrive. We see a droopy plant and give it water. 
     But, mis-information, can trigger the illusory truth effect and influence people’s entire outlook on the truth, which is already subjective. 
    And, we’re all subject to confirmation bias. We believe what we already know is true and we seek out information that is consistent with our own beliefs. 
    Enter the Internet and social networking.
    Although Facebook is surely not the only platform Americans use, here are some interesting facts from a recent Pew Research poll: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/05/16/facts-about-americans-and-facebook/ 
  • Almost 7 in 10 Americans use Facebook (69%) and 74% of those users check it at least once a day.
  • Facebook is dominant among all demographic groups, but a few more women use it than men. (75% to 63%)
  • 40% of older Americans (age 65+) use Facebook, while 79% of those age 18 to 29 do.
  • About half of American teens use Facebook.
  • 43% of American adults get their news from Facebook.
  • About half the American adult users don’t know how Facebook’s newsfeed works, that is, why some items are included in their feed and others not.
  • A little over half of American users have altered their privacy settings, especially since it was disclosed that the former Cambridge Anaylitica collected data on users without their knowledge.
  • 74% of adult Facebook users in the U.S. were not aware that the site collects ad preferences information about them until they were directed to that page.
  • A little over half of the American adult Facebook users said they were uncomfortable with Facebook keeping those records, even though most admitted the information about them was accurate. 
   
    Facebook has a policy against fact-checking politicians’ ads and political speech. Mark Zuckerberg claims he is protecting free speech with this policy. Remember, political speech is protected by the First Amendment.

    Mainstream news sources, CNN, FOX, NPR, and major newspapers and magazines have people on staff dedicated to making sure what is reported, verbally or in print, is accurate. That’s fact-checking. 
    But Facebook does not fact-check. And political speech is protected by the First Amendment. Try FactCheck.org to see if the ads targeted to you or that you see on TV are true:
https://www.factcheck.org/fake-news/
    You can find recent articles that tell you in clear language what was said, by whom, and whether or not it is true. Look under the “articles” tab.
    Click the “ask a question” tab and type away. I didn’t try this, so I don’t know how long it takes for a response. If you try this one, let me know!
    And finally, two good articles on how and why you can do your own fact-checking:
https://www.dailydot.com/layer8/best-fact-checking-websites/
https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2014/aug/20/7-steps-better-fact-checking/ 
                                            -—stay curious! (and seek truth)  
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Where Do We Go From Here?

10/15/2019

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    A lush green island was there in the morning, and our three ships approached it carefully, maneuvering through the breakers and a threatening barrier reef. We could see clear down to the reef in the sparkling blue waters as we sailed through. And, ah, it is truly land, truly earth, here so far from Spain.
                                                     from Pedro’s Journal: A Voyage with Christopher Columbus, August 3, 1492 - February 14, 1493
                                                      written by Pam Conrad
                                                illustrated by Peter Koeppen
                                     Caroline House/Boyds Mills Press, 1991

    When we were young, my mom liked to “go exploring.” She’d find a road that looked pretty, or maybe she liked the sound of its name, and off we’d go, looking for the end of that road. Or an interesting crossroad. I’m not sure she ever was lost. My dad had a wonderful sense of direction that my brother inherited. I did not.

    My biggest challenge in going to a new place is always finding my way there. With a road map, some verbal directions from a friend or my husband, and my GPS, I am successful most of the time. 
    I’ve been lost more than once, though. I couldn’t find playgrounds that should have appeared at the end of my trip. I’ve gone miles (and miles) out of my way because I wasn’t paying attention, or I missed a road sign, or turned left when I should have turned right.
    Travel by car is my most common mode of transportation. I’ve been on busses, a train, and airplanes. My husband and I once owned a small, but seaworthy, sailboat and traveled to Canada more than once. We had an early form of GPS, but mostly relied on a compass and nautical charts. I never really got the hang of them, though. 
    Once we took a cruise from San Diego to Ft. Lauderdale through the Panama Canal. We could watch our progress on a TV screen in one of the main lobbies. We were out of sight of land for several days, but not in a row. That was a pretty incredible journey. We always knew where we were, and at the end, we were not surprised to find ourselves in Ft. Lauderdale at exactly the appointed time.
    But imagine going somewhere and ending up somewhere else entirely. There are no maps, no nautical charts, no GPS. Just stars, only at night, and only on clear nights, at that. And trusting that land was at the other end of the journey. And finding people after weeks and weeks and days of being out of sight of land. People who look different, act different, talk different than you.
    Let’s jump back to 1453. The Ottoman Turks have taken control of Constantinople and the surrounding areas. The overland trade route between Europe and Asia is closed. Silk and spices are unavailable.
    Common stories say Christopher Columbus sailed for the King and Queen of Spain, Ferdinand and Isabella, in search of an ocean route to India. Columbus was looking for gold, spices (especially pepper), and silk. Some say he sailed for Spain because the Spanish crown was competing for the riches. 
    Most people say Columbus was Italian by birth and the Spaniards hired him. But according to an article in the Times of Israel https://www.timesofisrael.com/christopher-columbus-the-hidden-jew/ there is little evidence of where Columbus was born. There is no documentation that he was from Genoa, Italy. Given his fluency with the written language, some say he may have been Spanish.
    An interesting theory is proposed by eminent scholar, Simon Wiesenthal (December 31, 1908 – September 20, 2005) in his book Sails of Hope (Macmillan, 1973). Christopher Columbus may have been Jewish, born Cristobal Colon in Pontevedra, a large Galician port in northern Spain.    
    At any rate, the Spanish Inquisition was in full swing by 1492. Ferdinand and Isabella set August 3 as the day of the last expulsion of Jews from Spain. Columbus, at around age 40, set sail that same day, August 3, 1492, from Spain. There is no evidence that says he was not a secret Jew. Or that he and his crew were not fleeing for their lives.
    Simon Wiesenthal makes a good argument, but the 500+ year-old-records are murky.
    What we do know is the land he sighted was not Asia or India. He traveled far afield in uncharted water and found lands unknown to the Europeans.
    He survived the return to Spain and set out for the “new world” three more times. He captured native people and brought them back to Spain with him as slaves. He may have mistreated his crew, but he almost certainly cheated the people he met, trading worthless trinkets and glass for gold and spices. 
    Controversies rage about Columbus, but this are facts:
        He claimed land for Spain that was already settled by native people.
        He (unwittingly) brought deadly diseases that wiped out whole populations. 
        He opened the slave trade.
    Many people now judge his actions as nationalistic in the most prejudicial sense of the word, but Christopher Columbus was a man of his day. Whether fleeing for his life or questing for gold and other luxuries for a King and Queen, he was undoubtably adventurous, courageous, and self-confident.   
    In our day, even those qualities cannot excuse the atrocities he committed.
                                                     -—stay curious! (and kind) 
    
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Freedom's Just Another Word . . .

10/8/2019

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Razia Jan . . . knew Aziz was the one to convince.
    “. . . Please consider, if men are the backbone of Afghanistan, then women are the eyes of our country. Without an education, we will all be blind.”
          from Razia’s Ray of Hope: One Girl’s Dream of an Education
​                                                 written by Elizabeth Suneby
​                                                 
illustrated by Suana Verelst
                                                         Kids Can Press, 2013

    I surprised myself when I realized I don’t know anything about my great-grandmother’s education. Yes, it was a looong time ago. But we were raised with lots of family lore. Gram was fluent in Russian, Yiddish, and English and could read, write, and sing in Russian and Yiddish. I think she only knew one English song, “Springtime in the Rockies.”
    I don’t know if she studied in a school or if she learned at home, maybe even from her mother. Did she study math? Geography? Science? 
    Probably not.
    Gram fled Russia in 1906, under the harshest conditions. Why else would you leave what you know for the strangeness of a new country, new customs, strange food. Today we’d call her an asylum seeker. Then she was an immigrant. One in a flood of immigrants from all parts of the world.
    As soon as my grandmother was old enough, Gram sent her to school. My grandma was 6 years old in 1909. Public kindergartens were not common in Ohio until 1935, when the School Foundation Program Law provided guaranteed funding for public kindergartens.
    Until she was 6, my grandmother’s name was Stisha. Her first grade teacher “helped” my grandmother assimilate by giving her a more American-sounding name. I don’t think anyone ever called her Stisha anymore, only Tilly. Not Matilda. Tilly. Could the teacher not pronounce Stisha? Was there another Stisha in the class already? Did her teacher just like the name Tilly? The answers to those questions are lost to history.
    My mother went to school. Her father did not think it was necessary for her to go to college even though she wanted to. Mom found a job after high school, and went to night school, too. She studied psychology, of all things! and enjoyed it and was proud.
    I was the first one in my family to attend college. Back in 1971, I didn’t have a very wide world view. I believed that I could be a teacher or a nurse. But I knew I could NOT be a nurse. I have great admiration for nurses. They do work I could never picture myself doing. And being a nurse is practically synonymous with patience. Well, I am not always so patient.
    So, teacher, then. Turns out I was not cut out for that, either. But I had choices. My world-view was wider. I went back to school. 
    I wanted to and I could.
    In some parts of the world, school is not a given for girls. Sometimes, it is not even an option. 
    Kabul, Afghanistan, is one such place. 
    Although Afghanistan became an independent nation in 1921, the United States didn’t recognize its sovereignty until 1934. 
    In 1957, under pro-Soviet Gen. Mohammed Daoud Khan, universities were open to women, and women were accepted in the workforce. In the 1960s, the communist party began to form in secret. At the end of the 1970s, Afghanistan aligned itself with communist USSR, only to unite against Soviet invaders and the USSR-backed Afghan Army ten years later.
    By 1986, the United States, Britain, and China were giving aid to Afghanistan and in 1989, peace accords signed in Geneva guaranteed Afghan independence and the withdrawal of 100,000 Soviet troops. 
    Exhausted by almost continuous conflict, draught, and famine since its beginning in 1921, the Afghan people were ready for peace. In 1995, the newly formed Islamic militia, the Taliban, promised it.    
    But peace came with a huge price. The Taliban insisted on upholding their view of traditional Islamic law where women were required to be fully veiled and not allowed outside alone. Women were no longer allowed an education or employment. The Taliban enforced their Islamic law by public executions and amputations. 
    The United States refused to recognize the authority of the Taliban and its leader, Osama bin Laden. 
    We all know what happened on September 11, 2001. 
    Almost ten years later, on May 2, 2011, U.S. forces overtook a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and killed Osama bin Laden.
    Although the war officially ended in 2014, over 10,000 American troops stayed there.             
    The recent presidential election did not produce a clear winner. It may be months before a new president is announced.
    The Afghan government continues to negotiate peace with a fractured Taliban, who continue to murder Afghan citizens. Today, the country is as far from peace as ever.

    In a recent NPR clip, a university student in Kabul was asked how she saw the current conditions in her country. She is still allowed to go to university, but the Taliban continues to threaten the safety and freedoms her people so recently won. 
    If faced with the choice of freedom or peace, she said she would choose peace. Peace would mean no university. No work. Peace would mean burqas and chaperones. 
    But she would choose peace. 
                                   -—stay curious! (and choose thoughtfully) 
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Looking for Oz

10/1/2019

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    “It was easy to make the Scarecrow and the Lion and the Woodman happy, because they imagined I could do anything. But it will take more than imagination to carry Dorothy back to Kansas, and I’m sure I don’t know how it can be done.”
                                 from:  The [Wonderful] Wizard of Oz
                                                written by L. Frank Baum
                                           illustrated by Lisbeth Zwerger
                                                            NorthSouth, 1996
    (first illustrated by W.W. Denslow, and published by George M. Hill
                                                              Company, 1900) 


    I heard a comment the other day that started me thinking along a path I had not been on before. The topic was, of course, the Climate Catastrophe, and the comment went something like this: We’d maybe be better off if we could start over.
    My answer: Well, it wouldn’t actually be us. We’d be gone.
    That pretty much ended the conversation. But it gave me a “what if,” and I remembered a poem by Robert Frost.

         Fire and Ice

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
                  Robert Frost, 1923 
    
    Robert Frost’s poem appeared in his his Pulitzer Prize winning anthology, New Hampshire. His inspiration could have been a conversation he had with an astronomer of his day, Harlow Shapley, who said he answered Frost’s question about how he thought the world would end. Others say his inspiration was Dante’s Inferno. 
    Although it doesn’t really have to do with fire or ice, our own emotions manifest themselves as one or the other. Frost’s poem is as relevant today as it was in the 1920s. 
    It’s hard not to fall into that downward, swirling vortex of negativity. 
    It’s just as hard not to run, scrambling for my rose-colored glasses. In my world, the Emerald City is more ruby-colored.
    Oz seems like the ultimate utopia all four major characters are looking for. All are threatened by the Wicked Witch of the West, who actually has a legitimate gripe. Dorothy killed her sister, after all. 
    Outwardly, each of the characters traveled to a place far away. The journey was fraught with dangers, physical and emotional. Each was on his or her own inner journey, too, and came to realize the quality missing from their lives was actually there all along. They only had to find it within themselves.
    Just like the lion, the scarecrow, the tin man, and Dorothy, whether I’m looking for confidence, intelligence, love (giving and receiving), or a way into my own inner self, I imagine I’ll find it in Oz. 
    As I begin a new year during this Rosh HaShanah season, I realize I need to continually re-balance my own “fire” and “ice.” The things and qualities I want and need are within my reach. The things I want and need to change are also mine to work on.
    Really, I probably don’t need a wizard to tell me to open my own eyes and look around. I have everything I need to be happy and fulfilled.

                                             -—stay curious! (and realistic)     
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         I'm a children's writer and poet intent on observing the world and nurturing those I find in my small space .

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