Singing the Same Song

The lovely Madelyn Simone and the delightful and determined Elizabeth Holiday recently introduced me to a nursery rhyme courtesy of YouTube, and its call and response is running on a loop in my head. “Johny, Johny, yes Papa. Eating sugar, no Papa. Telling lies, no Papa. Open your mouth, ha-ha-ha (or ah-ah-ah).” Just one of its on-line versions has 276 million hits – how did I ever miss this charming little ditty?

Elizabeth likes to add dramatic flourishes to her songs and stories, so when she assumes the role of Johny, she does her best to act the innocent. In her way of thinking, her lips and tongue may be stained blue by the dye in her ring pop, but no way is she admitting to eating candy. Rumored to be an English nursery rhyme, one blogger suggests that it’s “the worst of the worst, the mother lode of surrealist garbage,” while one of the videos shows a tooth-brushing visit after each “snack.” A few generations ago, an alternate response might have been: open your mouth so I can wash it out with soap for being so sassy. 

Our mouths can get us in trouble, whether through over-eating, lying, inciting trouble, or speaking ill of another. As the Turkish proverb reminds us: “A knife-wound heals, but a tongue wound festers.” I wonder what the proverbial wisdom might say about a twitter-wound?

When someone utters something untrue or malicious about another person, I cringe, aware of the power of words and the damage they cause. When those words come from a one-up position, such as from a parent to a child or from a teacher to a student, they carry an extra wallop of power. Repeated often enough, they begin to seep in, and those within hearing of the words begin to accept their message. Rather than being a mischievous toddler, a child who likes something sweet, Johny is labeled a liar, a bad child. Sing the same song long enough, and whether or not it’s true, it sticks.

That’s the dilemma facing journalists across the country. When the on-going work of journalism is deemed to be “fake news,” and journalists themselves are labeled an “Enemy of the American People,” at least some of those descriptions will stick, and that’s dangerous to us as a community and a country – and potentially to individual journalists as well. 

The brush is broad. When the press is painted as the “Enemy of the American People,” that includes the cub reporter who shows up at the local school board meetings, the editor who loses sleep attempting to keep the presses rolling, and the weekly columnist who does her best to bring insight to current events and community happenings every Saturday morning. I’ve been called a variety of names over the years, but this is a new one for me. 

On Thursday, the Times-Gazette joined newspapers across the country to express concern with the language being used to describe their work by the President of the United States. It was an important and courageous step, but it felt a bit like Johny trying to defend himself. The analogy isn’t perfect, but as long as Papa is painting him as a liar, the seeds of doubt are planted. 

Historical precedence points to the use of the word Lugenpresse (lying press) in the early 1900s, and the embrace of that term in the 1930s by rising German leadership became a blatant – and successful – attempt to silence the press. As a Supreme Court justice in the 1940s as well as the United States’ prosecutor at the Nuremburg trials of Nazi war criminals, Robert H. Jackson warned that “those who begin coercive elimination of dissent soon find themselves exterminating dissenters. . .  the First Amendment to our Constitution was designed to avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings.” 

We can’t avoid these beginnings, as seeds of mistrust and accusation towards journalists of all sorts are already being sown. Are we as a community, as the American people, willing to let those seeds grow unimpeded? Or will we stand together on the foundation of the First Amendment to support the press as essential to a continued democracy? Stay tuned . . . 

A Detour through Newtown

Each year on our annual pilgrimage to Maine, we pass the sign for Newtown, CT on I-84. For many years, it was simply another Connecticut town, east of Danbury and south of the Bent of the River Sanctuary. That changed on December 14, 2012 when Adam Lanza fatally shot his mother, went to the nearby elementary school, and slaughtered twenty young children and six school personnel. 

Prior to the shooting, violent crime was rare in Newtown, a town similar in size to Ashland, with only one homicide in the previous ten years. Within five minutes on a December morning, the lives of twenty-seven families were shattered, and the face of Newtown, CT changed forever. To this day, the motive for Lanza’s actions is unknown. As forensic psychologist James Knoll suggests, his final act conveyed a stark message: “I carry profound hurt – I’ll go ballistic and transfer it onto you.”

I don’t think about Sandy Hook very often, just as the Covert Court killings in Ashland have faded from my consciousness. Lanza killed himself, and Grate is behind bars, convicted and sentenced for his crime. It wasn’t our child, our sister, our mother, so we begin to forget. 

But from time to time, we’re forced to remember. Because of heavy traffic, our faithful GPS directed us to leave the interstate and trust her seductive voice on our path to the ocean. As a result, we drove through Newtown, passing the site of Sandy Hook Elementary School, the replacement building for the facility with so many chilling memories. We didn’t stop, but Larry and I were both sickened by the memory of that day, as are Ashland residents who travel past the now empty lots on Covert Place (thanks, Mayor Matt Miller and Simonson Construction, for demolishing the houses).

On another front, radio host Alex Jones is upset this week because Apple, Facebook, Spotify and YouTube have banned his Infowars posts and broadcasts. Facebook believes they are “glorifying violence . . . and using dehumanizing language,” while Spotify notes that Infowars “expressly and principally promotes, advocates, or incites hatred or violence . . .” 

What’s the connection? This conspiracy theorist claims the moon landing was staged, the US government was behind 9-11 and the Oklahoma City bombing, and the Sandy Hook massacre was “completely fake” and a “giant hoax.” He has accused the parents of the children killed at Sandy Hook of being actors and incited threats to many of the families. 

Jones’ Infowars website gets as many as ten million visits a month. Let that sink in for a minute. Twenty families lost their six or seven-year-old children to a vicious murder, and the host of this site has stirred up enough hatred towards these grief-stricken people that they get threats against their own lives, even forced to relocate to keep their remaining family safe. What is wrong with this picture? 

In the days since our detour into Newtown, I’ve thought about friends who have buried a child, lost to cancer, suicide, heart disease, or violence. While loss is present in the lives of all people, those who’ve lost a child suffer deeply, and Jones’ venomous campaign against the Sandy Hook families infuriates me. Surely Jones doesn’t have a right to make up anything he wants about them, does he? The courts will ultimately sort out the legalities, but the moral answer is “no.”  

In “The Message” paraphrase of Romans 14, Paul writes: “. . . don’t get in the way of someone else, making life more difficult than it already is.” It may be a bit out of context for my biblical scholar friends, but it’s a vital rule of thumb for living in community – don’t make life more difficult for each other, especially for those who suffer. Whether motivated by profound hurt or profound hatred, we cannot accept the response, “I’ll go ballistic and transfer it onto you,” from a troubled twenty-year-old, an Ohio drifter, or a self-described “thought criminal against Big Brother.” Jones and his disciples may think they have a right to say what they want, but we don’t have to listen. Enough is enough. 

Ocean Waves and Cinnabon Buns

Today’s column comes to you direct from the shore of the Atlantic Ocean, at the tail end of a family vacation. I’ll begin with a question I’ve often asked myself this week: why did I vacuum out the car before we left Ohio? 

Having traveled to the same resort community for thirty years, we’re creatures of habit in this place, with each year’s vacation identified primarily by the change in rental houses. Salvation Army members have come to Old Orchard Beach, Maine, for summer camp meetings for 130 years, and it seems like there’s been more innovation in those meetings than in our family’s routine (aka tradition) here. We eat at the same restaurant after church on Sunday. We walk down the hill to the beach with great anticipation, and trudge the last few steps back to the house, worn out by the sun and sea breezes. After a couple of beach days, we travel to Two Lights, to climb the rocks and eat at the Lobster Shack. And as can be expected, we manage to get on each other’s last nerve by Wednesday or so. 

Yet new surprises have greeted us this week as well. Thanks to a friend’s social media comment, we discovered amazing cinnamon rolls, their delicate pastry spirals slathered in sticky frosting. Forget those cinnamon rolls at the mall. Ocean Park Subs and Groceries bake the real deal every morning. 

At Two Lights, a bit of exploring led to a tiny cove near the Lobster Shack, where the girls gathered sea shells with much determination. Had we missed this all these years, or was it fenced off before? Surely our inquisitive sons would have discovered this part of the Two Lights experience.

A chance comment by one of the locals took us to the Portland Headlight, where Cape Elizabeth’s municipal park offers a glorious view of the ocean and an up-close-and-personal look at the lighthouse and its museum. Now fully automated, it had been staffed by lighthouse keepers from 1791 to 1989. It was a lonely job for most of those countless hours, but the keeper and his family had quite the exciting Christmas Eve in 1886, when they rescued the crew from the Annie C. Maguire that ran aground. As recently as World War II, they kept watch for a German invasion. The park is also home to the decommissioned Fort Williams, whose Battery Keys can still be seen along the rugged shoreline.

The week away has provided quality time with both the lovely Madelyn Simone and the delightful and determined Elizabeth Holiday. I’m impressed with a three-year-old’s ability to do the same thing over and over again without getting tired. We’ve sung “O Do You Know the Muffin Man” at least a hundred times, and Elizabeth spent a solid hour picking up pieces of broken shells and returning them to their natural habitat, the ocean waters, with an exuberant scream every time a wave tickled her feet. She also snuck into our bed around 3 a.m. each night without waking us up. I’m not impressed with that feat.

Madelyn and I managed to take a long walk on the beach without her sister, and enjoyed a production of Godspell and an ice cream cone on the way home. I love these little ones, and being together in this place has been good for us, at least in the daytime hours!

Yet there has also been a sense of melancholy for me in these days, a pensive sadness, not pervasive, but lurking somehow in the shadows. As the little girls bury my feet in the sand, I remember three little boys who splashed in the waves, dug in the sand, and bought fake tattoos at Gregory’s Supermarket. It seems like only yesterday, and when I turned around, they were gone to the shores of adulthood, job responsibilities, and vacations with in-laws. 

That melancholy is present in the contrast between the timelessness of the ocean’s currents and the ordered days of human life. I’m grateful that the melancholy has been offset by the joys found in tradition and new experiences, as well as the healing power of the rhythmic ocean waves and fresh-baked cinnamon buns!

The Creators Among Us

When Joan Kroc left most of her formidable estate to The Salvation Army, used in part to build and endow Ashland’s Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Center, she required the organization to add a three-pronged approach to their traditional ministry, with access for the underserved to recreation, education, and the arts. With a symphony orchestra, a strong jazz presence, the university art gallery, the Ashland Regional Ballet, the summer concert series at the Myers Band Shell, and Ashland Chautauqua, we recognized Ashland’s deep roots in the arts, excited to soak in this rich cultural heritage and to supplement it through programming at the Kroc.

I’ve long ascribed to the truth, “garbage in, garbage out,” or as Jac Vanek explains: “You are the books you read, the films you watch, the music you listen to, the people you spend time with, the conversation you engage in. Choose wisely what you feed your mind.” I’m glad for the many ways we can be well-fed in the Ashland area in ways that don’t impact our waistline.

For many of us, it’s about appreciation. We receive music, art, drama and words with gratitude, but are not inclined to sing, compose, paint, act, or write ourselves. Joan Chittister illustrates this sense of appreciation from her early convent days: “Sister Marie Claire, steadfastly opposed to the suppression of joy in the name of holiness, went to her music room every Sunday afternoon to listen to records of symphonies, scores of operas, collections of piano performances . . . She would sit in her rocking chair all afternoon and simply listen. I remember being very moved by the model of such bold and wanton delight in the face of such institutionalized negation of it.” Love that image!

Yet creators live among us. Some have the luxury of an art studio, steady work in theater, or a quiet study with no interruptions. But for most creators, the work of creation is jumbled up with caring for kids, grandkids, or aging parents. Many creators have full-time jobs that relegate the art-making to a “catch as catch can” proposition. Some become discouraged, frazzled, or overwhelmed with the world around us, yet somehow continue to create. Meet some of our Ashland creatives.

Ashlander Barbara Nell Morejon is a fiber artist whose work is exquisite. Collaborating with Marlene Gruetter, they entered Wearable Arts Mandurah with a piece entitled “Captivated.” It’s now on display at the US Consulate in Perth, Australia! Working with felt, her creations of hats, jackets, animals and more are worlds away from my childhood felt art featuring googly eyes and Elmer’s glue  

For those whose dramatic talents exceed their artistic abilities, John Moser is the point person for the recently-formed Uniontown Players. The group provides the opportunity to participate in quality theatrical productions. Next on tap – “A Wedding to Die For.” It’s too late to audition for this comedy murder mystery, but there’ll be more chances in the future to get involved, and familiar faces in the cast.

On the literary side of things, Ashland’s contributions to the world of reading have been enhanced this month by Sarah Wells and Jody Thomae. Sarah has written “The Family Bible Devotional,” whose subtitle explains its purpose as stories from the Bible to help kids and parents engage and love scripture. Tested out on her three kids and husband Brandon (the voice of AU basketball), the chapters include conversation starters, prayer prompts, and practical activities.

Jody uses the image of Kintsugi, a Japanese art form which repairs broken pottery with a lacquer mixed with powdered gold, in “The Creator’s Healing Power: Restoring the Broken to Beautiful.” Like Sarah, she supplements her chapters with interactive activities including music, poems, and coloring pages, integrating visual art and music into her work. Powerful work.

Maxine Hong Kingston understands that creation isn’t limited to formal art forms, suggesting that even in difficult times, we can still create something: “a poem, a parade, a community, a school, a vow, a moral principle; one peaceful moment.” Barbara, John, Sarah and Jody are only a sampling of many who take her words to heart. Are you next?

The Corn is Ready!

On the hunt for good news this week, I came across the best news ever in a Facebook post from Honey Haven Farm: “Farmer John is excited to announce that his sweet corn is ready!” Only days ago, the corn was “knee high by the Fourth of July,” and now it’s ready to douse with butter and enjoy. Woohoo!

One of the benefits of living in Ohio is the availability of fresh summer produce, and one of the best places to access that produce is through farmer’s markets at the weekly Saturday morning gathering at Christ United Methodist Church and downtown on Wednesday afternoon in the municipal parking lot. Fresh local produce is also available at Honey Haven, Mitchell’s Orchard and Farm Market, and Local Roots, as well as at roadside stands and some of our local grocery stores. 

I’ve been spoiled for sure, growing up near the best farmer’s market in North Tonawanda, New York, and accessing the many options in Ashland. Now that we’re living in North Canton, I’ve been on the lookout for farmers’ markets, and visited my first one last Wednesday. With signs all around the community, a parking lot filled with cars, and at least thirty multi-colored tents and canopies, I was excited to sample the produce available for purchase. But many of the vendors didn’t have fresh fruit or vegetables. Lots of homemade breads, dog biscuits, and spices, but only four or five produce stands. 

As I was whining about the low number of real farmers there, I read about a more serious struggle facing many farmer’s markets across the country. I’m not sure how many of Ohio’s markets are impacted, so check with your local vendors to see. What’s happening is that a company providing the technology to process EBT cards at some farmer’s markets is closing, thus threatening the ability of farmers to accept that form of payment through the SNAP program (formerly food stamps). Apparently the most recent USDA contract was awarded to a company who chose not to use the Novo Dia software, effectively putting them out of business. 

What’s going on? As is often the case with government contracts, it’s complicated. As I understand, the coalition that previously had the contract wasn’t allowed to bid because they were a non-profit, and so another vendor was selected for the 1.3 million-dollar job, a brand-new company with only one employee at the time of the contract award. They won’t be ready to provide the needed services for at least a few months, and so the farmers will have no way to accept EBT cards. 

Who was FTM and its CEO Angela Sparrow, this one-person small business? My minimal detective skills couldn’t figure that out, even with Google’s help. I remember the struggle I had when attempting to complete an application to provide summer lunches through the USDA program at the Kroc Center. I felt I needed to promise the government my first-born child in return for reimbursement for a few peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. How does a new, one-person company get this award? Reminds me of the two-employee Whitefish Energy Holding group selected to restore the Puerto Rico power grid. 

New York governor Andrew Cuomo isn’t happy, and pointedly told the secretary of agriculture, “USDA’s failure to maintain an EBT system for SNAP benefits is the worst of government ineptitude and is a rejection of your agency’s core principles.” Should Cuomo be encouraged because Ms. Sparrow promises “to work with my partners with a maniacal focus on executing in a manner that will quickly resolve this . . . problem”? 

On vacation, the lovely Madelyn Simone had a ten-dollar bill she wanted to use to purchase a snack from the hotel’s vending machine. Without the technology to accept her payment, she was out of luck. SNAP benefits provide badly-needed food to those with minimal resources, and being able to use the EBT card at the markets has been a tremendous help to its users. Here’s hoping solutions can be found so the most vulnerable among us aren’t “out of luck,” but instead, can enjoy the bounty our land produces. Including juicy tomatoes and Farmer John’s corn.

Slime Volcanos

aI was four when my aunts took me to my first Vacation Bible School at the white clapboard church in Tonawanda, NY. With a toddler at home, my attendance provided respite for my mother and an exciting expedition for me. My memory of those days is vague, but does include singing, “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands” and eating pink-frosted animal crackers. Amazingly, nearly sixty years later, VBS is still alive and well, and making its presence known in neighborhoods across Ohio this summer.

Writing for Time Magazine in 1999, columnist Amy Dickinson remembered her own experience at VBS: “Kids would gather in the musty sanctuary for songs featuring hand gestures that seemed, for our brand of Methodism, dangerously close to dancing. We played Bible tag, memorized the books of the Old Testament and drank gallons of KoolAid out of waxy paper cups. Our teachers entertained us so well that we scarcely noticed that with every Popsicle stick ark they helped us build, they were molding our little souls.” 

As a teen of about sixteen, I volunteered for VBS with The Salvation Army in my home town. With limited classroom space in that old building, I ended up with a table in the parking lot behind the building, assigned as the teacher of a class full of eight to ten-year-old boys. It’s a miracle I wasn’t frightened away from VBS forever, especially when two brothers ran away. 

I wasn’t alone in the struggle. Harry Emerson Fosdick, also a native of Buffalo, would one day lead Riverside Church in NYC, but began his ministry less auspiciously, teaching at a summer Bible school for children in 1901. He reflected, “I was thankful that no one could visualize what went on that first summer. The experience probably taught me more than it did the children; I am sure that it did not do them the harm it did me.”

Can a program more than one hundred years old still be viable? VBS creators have kept their eyes on the baby (the spiritual formation of children) even as they’ve changed the bathwater, trading in flannelgraph boards and filmstrip projectors for interactive videos. New songs encourage the children to jump around (as though they need any encouragement!). Themes for each year, chosen long before events in Thailand and Hawaii cast a pall on Cave Quest and Lava Lava Island, encourage congregations to decorate for Surf Shack, Pets Unleashed, Cowabunga Farm, Shipwrecked, and Polar Blast. 

When my father died more than a decade ago, his church had transformed their sanctuary into a massive circus tent for “Under the Big Top” VBS. Our family had to find an alternate venue for his memorial service, painful at the time, but I believe my dad would have been glad that children were being welcomed into the church he loved.

Fast forward to VBS 2018. I’m pleased to report that I survived my most recent VBS experience with no run-aways. My week of fun with seven precious three, four and five-year-old children, including the youngest in our group, the delightful and determined Elizabeth Holiday, was a grand adventure. Since only two of the children had been in a structured educational program before, by day two I gave up on circle time and any prolonged story-telling, and ditched the idea of making slime volcanos. Whose idea was that, anyway? However, they did love their play dough and snacks! 

VBS 2018 proved to me that while my next career move won’t involve a pre-school classroom, I can help small children learn to sit “criss-cross applesauce,” even our little Lizzie. I can welcome a little one into my arms as he sobs for his mother, and can affirm children as they are kind to each another. Seemingly so simple –  providing direction, comfort, and affirmation – yet gifts we are all privileged to give to the little ones in our families and neighborhoods. 

Since I can’t imagine a summer without Vacation Bible School, I’m already looking forward to Roar! VBS in 2019, because even though life can be wild, he’s still got the whole world in his hands. Now to stock up on safari gear, play dough, and pink-frosted animal crackers. 

Every Child Matters?

In my early Salvation Army ministry, each year brought a new slogan focusing on evangelism and service. While most are long forgotten, one has resonated with me since its introduction forty-plus years ago: Every Child Matters. Specially designed pins were distributed (still available on E-Bay) and its own catchy theme song established the simple theological underpinnings for its work: “if they [children] mattered to Him [Jesus] they must matter to me.” 

Most religions and cultures accept the premise that every child matters, as evidenced in the news of the last few weeks, especially as we’ve heard reports on the soccer coach and twelve young team members trapped within a cave system in Thailand. At first, authorities were unable to locate them, but finally successfully made contact on day nine. Now, attention is focused on how to get them out. Engineers ask, can enough water be pumped out before the deluge comes again? Thailand’s Navy Seals wonder, can the boys be taught to use diving equipment to escape, a dangerous proposal since most can’t swim? Tesla’s Elon Musk even offered his assistance, as the world echoes: every child matters. 

Their dilemma reminds me of baby Jessica, who captured the nation’s attention more than thirty years ago when trapped in a well. First responders determined she was still alive by hearing her sing “Winnie the Pooh.” Broadcast nationally on CNN, the toddler was rescued after an agonizing fifty-eight hours, and the nation breathed a sigh of relief. Every child matters. 

On Canada’s Arctic Archipelago, Aaron Gibbons was mauled to death on July 3 as he put himself between his children and a polar bear. The children were unharmed (although traumatized). 

In other images, our national commitment to “every child matters” has been sorely tested as we’ve watched children torn apart from their parents at the southwest border of our country. Their reunification has been slow and problematic. Yeni Gonzalez was held in an immigration detention center in Arizona while her three children, ages eleven, nine and six, were shipped to New York City. Caring Americans, strangers to Yeni, arranged to post her bond and drive her across the country, and she was finally able to see her children after forty-five days. Her daughter gave her a blue and white lollipop. The children, however, were not released to their mother. Every child matters? 

Even those children who have been able to stay with a parent face steep challenges. Former Ashland resident Rev. Adam Baker visited the border, where he helped Kristen eat her hot soup while her mother, Vivianne, sat across the table in a Catholic Charities respite center. They fled violence and gangs in Guatemala, hoping to travel to a family member’s home in Phoenix. They traveled for fifteen days, seeking asylum in the U.S. Now to wait and to pray.

Washington Post reporter Eli Saslow traveled to Norwalk, Ohio, the community Ashlanders drive through on Rt. 58, heading to Lake Erie or Cedar Point. He met twelve-year-old Alex Galvez, whose mother Nora was lured to the break room with a promise of donuts, only to be taken into custody in an ICE raid at a Sandusky garden center. Now Alex lives with his eighteen-year-old sister, afraid to leave his home in the Norwalk trailer park.  

First responders don’t base their rescue response on whether the Thai boys are rich or poor, or whether they were reckless. They didn’t ask who was watching baby Jessica or how she happened to fall into the well. They responded because a child was in danger.

Dads don’t question their own chances of survival when faced with the attack of a polar bear. And desperate parents who fear for their children’s safety will do what they believe can protect their kids. I would do the same.

I understand the desperation experienced by Vivianne, Yeni, and Nora, and the fear in the faces of their children. And I wonder why the greatest country on earth cannot care as much about Alex, Kristen, and a little girl holding a blue and white lollipop in Harlem as we do about twelve boys in a cave in Thailand.