I Am. I Do.

A newly recognized goal in life of mine has recently been met. The other day an acquaintance-friend of mine reached out for help after discovering bruises on her children; suspecting abuse. When we spoke on the phone she explained that she didn’t know what I did (for work), but knew I was the right person to ask for help and guidance based on things I post on Facebook. See, I only post things on Facebook that I believe in and support. For the past 13 1/2 years I have been an active member of the Coulee Region Child Abuse Prevention Task Force, even in the years that I was a stay-at-home mom; I believe I was the first “community activist” to be a member. I have four years of volunteer experience at a domestic violence shelter and another five years working as a children’s advocate for another domestic violence shelter. I am now a licensed school counselor who is in her third year working, on paper, as the mental health consultant for Head Start in four counties. To parents and staff alike I changed my title to School Counselor. 

I continue to be active in the fight against child abuse and when she asked me, “What DO you do?” it actually made me smile and it was then that I realized that I would much rather be known for who I AM than what I DO.

Love Wins and Kindness is Warm

On January 28th I replied to the following post on Facebook.

We Are Newtown shared Newtown Pride FC's photo.

January 28 at 10:56am ·

We NEED 26 volunteers to help spread warmth in every community we can touch by helping us give away SCARVES! If you would like to help all you need to do is inbox us or Newtown Pride FC your name and address. We will send you a #newtownpridefc #wearenewtown scarf & you can give it to someone who needs it. Let's spread some warmth. #giveback #spreadwarmth #todayweplayfornewtown

I immediately sent the following message to We Are Newtown:

I grew up in Brookfield and Danbury and would love to help spread warmth here in Wisconsin where winters can be frigid.

You can mail me one at: XXXX and I will make sure it helps keep someone warm who needs it.

Thank you for continuing to spread love and positive experiences in the aftermath of the tragedy.

Yesterday in the mail I received a warm, thick Newtown scarf and with it the following note: “Thank you for volunteering to help us spread love & warmth! Please pass the scarf along with LOVE to someone in need. We really appreciate it! People like you willing to go the extra mile make anything possible! We just ask that you capture a picture with yourself or a loved one holding the scarf or the recipient! Inbox the picture to @WeAreNewtown or @NewtownPrideFC & we will share the gift of warmth!”

Scarf and note.

My son modeling the scarf in case the recipient didn't want their photo taken.

My daughter modeling the scarf in case the recipient didn't want their photo taken.

I knew just how and where to distribute the scarf, but what I didn’t know was how I was only going to hand out ONE scarf. We have a warming center in town that is open from November 1 - April 30 that provides a safe and warm location for local people over 18 who are homeless. This year the warming center moved out of a church where they had room for 15 people to a building downtown that has room for 34 people, a washer and dryer and shower facilities. The center is open from 7:00 pm - 8:00 am. There was no doubt in my mind that this is where I would find the recipient of the Newtown scarf.

I explained to my kids about the tragedy that took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School two years ago. At this point I had not mentioned many details to my children about the event because I did not want to scare them and I wasn’t sure my heart was ready to have the conversation with them without breaking. I explained that the town of Newtown has chosen not to let this tragedy define their town and instead to use this tragedy to spread love and kindness and has adopted the slogan “Love Wins”. 26 lives were lost that December day in 2012 so off we went to Walmart to buy 26 scarfs to give out along with the Newtown scarf.

On the way to the warming center we talked more about the tragedy and at 5:30 with the temperature in the single digits I expected to see a line of people waiting to get inside the warming center. Instead what I saw was an open door welcoming people in out of the cold “early”. My husband, two elementary kids and I walked in and were asked by a volunteer if we were here for the training. I said, “No, we are here to donate scarves.” I was not sure what to expect or how I was going to go about the distribution, the only thing on my mind at that moment was the hope that I had enough scarves. What happened next surprised even me.

We walked into a crowded room of about 25 - 30 people sitting around tables and in a loud voice I said that I was looking for the coldest person in the room. See, I was hoping that the recipient of the Newtown scarf would “jump out” at me, but nobody did. A few people laughed and pointed to a guy. With a lump in my throat I explained about Sandy Hook ES and that we were chosen to share the warmth and love of the scarf and that we brought an additional 26 scarves in honor of those who died at the school. One man asked if he could have the scarf. People were grateful and excited to choose which scarf they wanted. I tossed them across the room like I was throwing t-shirts into the stands at a baseball game. 

Some of the 26 scarves we bought and donated.
People were excited to choose a print or color that suited them.

He wanted to show all of his green (hat).
He also put the flimsy scarf he already owned on top of his head. 

He was hamming it up for the camera; almost like doing "jazz hands".

I asked the man I gave the Newtown scarf to if I could take his picture and he said yes and hammed it up for the camera. He wrapped himself in the love and I could see how much he had needed it and how it brightened his day. He said that all the guns should be taken away, no one should have guns; instead we should give everyone chocolate he said. A man after my own heart. He asked my quiet husband to say something and told him, with a tear in his eye, that he was a good dad. He could tell because he was there. He shared with us that he has two daughters and that he isn’t there for him and thanked us for bringing the kids because it reminded him of his own kids. I told him sometimes you have to take care of yourself before you can be there for your kids and I offered him a hug and he gratefully accepted it. I held his hand which was much warmer than mine and smiled and announced that the warming center works! 

Another man sitting near me said it wasn’t about the guns, but the need for mental health services, I also agreed with him and we talked for a few minutes. He was a grateful man who eventually handed us back the fleece scarf, saying that he was allergic to polyester. He was dressed in a black hooded sweatshirt and black leather jacket, with gray hair both on his head and face. I jokingly apologized that we didn’t have a silk scarf for him and it brought a smile to his face and he laughed and said it was ok and once again thanked us for bringing the scarves. 

I enlisted my kids to hand out scarves to people. When we left there were still a few scarves left to find necks and hearts to warm. I was so thankful that we had enough scarves to share and two more people said that they were willing to have their photo taken, after I asked. Laughs, smiles and hugs were shared as we left the building.

When the man on the right said he would have his picture taken he modeled the scarf and got a laugh from me and others because I thought he was going to cover his entire face. The man standing in the background under the clock is the one allergic to polyester.

What was the hardest part about this experience? Leaving. Not so much because we had a warm home and comfortable bed to go to; but because I was sincerely enjoying spending time with these people and visiting with them. I could have spent hours there talking with them, but I also felt the need to leave them with their scarves. I hope to return to spread more love…

Thank you Newtown for sparking my family to purchase 26 scarves and donate to those who were in need of feeling loved (and warm). Thank you families of those 26 people whose lives were lost for finding a way to spread kindness and love in their memory. I  have shed tears for each of those whose lives were lost and yesterday I honored them the best I could. Love wins and kindness is contagious! 

The Untapped Girl Scout Cookie Customer

It all started when I read this article (http://www.kare11.com/story/life/2015/02/18/girl-scout-cookies-ice-fishermen-chisago/23654355/) about a girl in Minnesota who found a new customer base for Girl Scout cookies in ice fisherman  I told my daughter and she was super excited to venture out to find ice fisherman in our area (of which there are quite a few). So, Saturday morning that’s just what we did. Just two miles down the road from our house I was certain we would find some fishing close to shore, but alas, there were none there. So, further along the Great River Road we traveled. A few miles south we found a few men fishing near shore, but we opted to go further south yet. When we came upon a few dozen fisherman I could not figure out how or where they parked to walk/drive halfway across the main channel of the Mississippi River. This, I told my daughter was out of the question. I was much too nervous to walk that far on the frozen river to sell cookies.

To make the story a little shorter we traveled back north to where the few fisherman were parked along the road. Down a set of stairs, across the railroad tracks and onto the ice all while carrying a large bag of Girl Scout cookies we went. All four fisherman fishing near shore not only bought cookies, but one took a picture of us with our cookies, and us of them, another burst out laughing as he unzipped his ice shanty window and said, “I have friends emailing me and friends calling me [asking to buy cookies], but I told them that I had to see a girl scout.” Alas, there he was on the ice seeing a girl scout. We were directed to travel south and was told how to get to the few dozen fisherman in the middle of the river……find Mike! Mike, works at the bait shop/motel and he gives roundtrip rides to fisherman on his four wheeler for $5. We set out to find Mike and see if he would give us a ride to the fisherman further out, not for $5, but for a box of cookies. By the time we found Mike he had already heard about the girl scout selling cookies on the ice. He said he would give us a ride, not for cookies, but for free and he would buy cookies. My daughter and I giggled as we rode in the trailer of his four wheeler across the bumpy icy covered in a few inches of snow and off we went!

This is how far out on the ice we walked before hooking up with Mike.

Fisherman from Indiana with their purchased cookies
(standing in front of their beer cans, they didn't want them to show up in the picture :)
These are the guys who told us about Mike.

In the middle of the river he took a picture of us and dropped us off with his business card, instructed me to call him when we were ready for a ride back, and his sled loaded with boxes of cookies.

Riding in the four wheeler pulling a sled.

Mississippi River, here we come!

With Mike being dropped off. Next stop, that red ice shanty in the background.

Nearly every fisherman bought a box (or more!) and many even told my little Brownie to keep the change! One man told us the ice was thicker than my daughter, which made me feel safe. Even though there were pickup trucks parked all along the ice, I still couldn’t believe we were walking across the frozen Mississippi! There was even an old golden retriever out there who we got to love on. A few told us what a great idea this was and disappointingly told us that if the fish were biting there would have been many, many more fisherman for her to sell cookies.

Off she goes!

It's windy out on the open ice. We learned that fisherman don't fish near each other unless they know each other. 

"Any fish down there want to buy Girl Scout cookies?!"

Making a sale.

After Mike picked us up he took another picture, one with our cheeks pink and our load lighter and asked to post it on Facebook. He asked Laura’s name and mine and I said he could just put “Laura and her mom” I then told him my name and he smiled and said, “OK, Laura and her mom”. Mike bought three boxes of cookies and said she could come any time and he’d give us another free ride out.

Three hours and 60+ boxes of cookies later we were home cold and tired from our trek.

I got home and looked up Water’s Edge Marina and Motel on Facebook and there we were! I had fun reading people’s comments and was proud of my Brownie entrepreneur. On Sunday, the wind chill was -20° and she was ready to find more icefisherman, but I directed her instead toward her loyal neighborhood customer base.   

The fish weren’t biting that morning, but many people caught girl scout cookies that day! I have a feeling that next year on opening cookie selling weekend you’ll be able to find us back on the river selling…

Love Story

Twenty years ago on January 28 I met my husband, I was a nineteen year old college sophomore. Twenty years ago on Valentine’s Day I had my first Valentine. I wasn’t sure what to expect with our relationship being so new so I had low expectations. He gave me a card and we took a walk, he on his crutches with a sprained ankle, around the pond behind my dorm. My room overlooked that pond and every spring ducklings were born and raised on that pond. I loved that pond. I vividly recall spending time alone mourning the death of my maternal grandfather while sitting aside that pond when he passed away in March of my freshman year after a short battle with stomach cancer.

Twenty years ago in late March of that year I went home for Spring Break and was told by my dentist that I needed to have my wisdom teeth removed after returning to school. I was crushed, not only because I had never had surgery of any kind, but because I felt lonely. College was 1,000 miles away and I had no car and zero knowledge of oral surgeons in my college town. 

I had no choice but to ask him, after he insisted, to drive me home post surgery. The days following the removal of my wisdom, a little over two months from meeting my first Valentine I decided I wanted to marry someone like him. Our relationship was new and I was 19 years old so I didn’t think it would be him! The moment I fell in love with him was the night I asked him to bring me a banana, my first solid food following my surgery, from the dining hall. After dinner he hadn’t come. I was disappointed and annoyed. Why ask if he could bring me anything from dinner if he wasn’t go to?! Then an hour or so later after the dining hall closed he rang the bell to my room from downstairs. I went down to open the door only to see him holding an entire bunch of bananas! There were none in the dining hall that night, he said, so he went to Walmart, at least a 15 minute drive from campus and bought me an entire bunch! What a guy!! Up until this point in my life I’m not sure I knew his “type” existed, at least it hadn’t in my life, not in the form of a boyfriend anyway.

So, here we are twenty years later with two respectful, compassionate and empathetic kids, going strong and I woke up sick as a dog on Valentine’s Day! (I never really met a sick dog, but for a lack of a more descriptive phrase I’ll use that one). My daughter wanted to bring me breakfast in bed with a get well card, as she had when her dad was sick the weekend before. I had no appetite and the idea of toast, as my husband suggested, sounded like swallowing sandpaper on my already sore throat. I told him, however, that bananas and strawberries sounded good. A few minutes later this amazing daughter of ours carried in a tray with sliced bananas her dad, my amazing husband, cut into hearts and strawberries she cut to look like hearts. 

This Valentine’s Day marks the year I have exceeded the years of having a Valentine versus not having one. 

That pond, humorously named Palmer “Lake” is now filled in and more University buildings sit atop it. My husband and I’s love has lasted longer than that pond. Twenty years later he is still my Valentine and has blessed me with two little loving Valentines, leaving me never to be Valentine-less again.

Ruby Bridges: Then and Now

Things I hope to always remember about what Ruby Bridges shared tonight.

1. When she was six years old after learning that she passed the test (to be integrated into an all white school) everyone was so excited that she honestly thought she was going straight from first grade to college.
2. When she walked into the white school, that was supposed to be separate but equal, she saw her reflection in the floor it was so clean and she thought; this must be college, because it was so different from her black school.
   
3. Evil comes in all races and religions, do not decide if you can trust a person based on what they look like. Give yourself the time to get to know them before deciding if you can trust them.
   
4. When she was driven to school by the US Marshals her neighbors “walked” her to school by following the car every day. They were a community and it takes a community to raise a child.

The one thing I hope my children forget about the night, but I worry that they never will.

1. I brought the wrong camera lens and therefore was not able to get a family photo with Ruby Bridges after she signed her books for us, even though we tried.
2. We stood back in line with their first grade teachers (their Mrs. Henrys) at 9:30 pm so I could take a photo of them with Ruby Bridges….and their teachers….and a retired first grade teacher I did not know. And they got home and went to bed at 10:00 at night.

In hindsight I should have been less selfish and just tried to take the photo of the kids with Ruby Bridges myself rather than handing my camera off to someone so that I, too, and my husband could be in the photo. At 10:15 pm I am afraid that the last 30 minutes of our night overshadowed her message; which is what we really went there for, not a photo, that was just a bonus. I’m hoping that in the morning my stomach doesn’t still feel like it’s in my throat.

MLK - 2015

Yesterday, Martin Luther King, Jr. would have turned 86 years old. A number that seems young to me. Young in the sense that he should still be alive and enjoying grandchildren and the changes that have been made in the country he tried to bring together. 

Last night I learned that Ruby Bridges, THE Ruby Bridges http://www.biography.com/people/ruby-bridges-475426, is scheduled to be the keynote speaker at our community’s MLK celebration on Monday night. I have yet to attend this event in years past merely because it doesn’t start until 7:00 pm and I am a stickler to sticking as close to my kids’ bedtimes as possible. This year, however, my husband, myself, and our 11- and 8-year old will be there by 6:00 and stay long after the last word is spoken. There are other events planned for that evening, but I most look forward to listening for a pin to drop while Ms. Bridges is speaking.

Last night my daughter read two books to me that I was proud to have had on our bookshelf for years, both children’s books; one was Ruby’s story and one was Martin’s story. When I told my daughter that I wonder what Martin would think about President Obama she wasn’t quite sure what I meant. When I explained that he was our country’s first African-American president her jaw dropped and she couldn’t believe it. Then it occurred to me, there may still be racism and discrimination in our country but I AM RAISING CHILDREN IN A WORLD WHERE AN AFRICAN-AMERICAN PRESIDENT IS “NORMAL” AND SO IS A MARRIAGE BETWEEN TWO WOMEN (OR MEN) WHO LOVE EACH OTHER! On New Year’s Eve we attended the vow renewal/government sanctioned marriage of two women I have known and admired professionally for many years. Their three children stood at the altar with them as about 100 people witnessed the love their family holds.

After my daughter read to me I began reading another book to her; this one of the story of Rosa Parks. I was proud that her teacher had talked about Rosa at school that day. 

I am hoping with all my might that Ruby will be available to meet with when the evening is done. I will bring the book we have, just in case. To have her adult signature in the book about the day her six year old self walked into the white Louisiana school surrounded by U.S. Marshals would mean as much to me as the several Holocaust survivors’ signed memoirs that sit on my shelf.

Hanukkah Thoughts

Tonight as I mixed latkes, finally, on the fifth night of Hanukkah I had these thoughts:

Born to two Jewish parents I was raised celebrating Hanukkah and the commercial Christmas. For 14 years now I have been married to my Catholic husband. We share the same spiritual beliefs and are raising our children to be compassionate and respectful human beings. This time of year we light the Hanukkah candles, string the Christmas lights around our house and on our tree. For eight nights they open gifts from us and on Christmas morning they revel in gifts from their grandparents and Santa. We live in a town that at last check was 46% Catholic and 46% Lutheran. There is a church on every corner, some across the street from each other and there is one Jewish Synagogue that I/we have visited on rare occasions. 

I’m invited into my kids’ classrooms, sometimes by them and sometimes by their teachers to share about Hanukkah and our traditions. I thoroughly enjoy these occasions but it also leads me to deep reflection. Growing up we only exchanged Hanukkah gifts if we couldn’t wait until Christmas to give a specific present to a family member. I attended Hebrew School from first grade until mid-year in 7th grade, at which point I became a Hebrew School drop out before my bat mitzvah. I don’t recall much from Hebrew School other than that one of my classmates’, Rachel’s, mom’s was our 2nd grade teacher and that in 4th grade we did a few big art projects. I wonder if my teacher was an art teacher by day. The strongest feeling I remember though was that I did not belong. I felt stupid and that everyone else, except Jacob, were more Jewish than me. Whatever that meant. I remember once going to Rachel’s house for a Hanukkah party and having fun. During the day at school I was the only Jew, other than Aaron, who did not attend Hebrew School with me, that I was aware of.

My oldest child turns 11 next week and I have worked very hard these past 11 years to create traditions for 

Ruggelach made last week by ME!

my family. I do not recall many memories from my childhood, but the ones centering around Hanukkah are fewer than most. A few (or maybe many) Passovers were spent at my aunt’s house with long sedars, always beginning with delicious matzo ball soup.

Ironically, to me, I felt the “most Jewish” when I was in college in Alabama. Life pointed me toward enrolling in Judaism 101 and like Hebrew School many years before I dropped the class. But I did later fulfill my foreign language requirement by enrolling in Hebrew 101 and 102 (or was it 201? - the numbers are irrelevant). My teacher was an Israeli grad student and I enjoyed the class and remember studying hard and feeling successful. I attended services at the Hillel House on several Fridays and felt a sense of belonging that I had never felt at any synagogue I was a member of as a child.

So, here I am tonight making latkes and wondering why I have chosen to give my children a gift a night for Hanukkah. Hanukkah, I keep reading, is the least significant Jewish holiday, yet it’s the only one my children know. Which leaves me thinking, “Am I celebrating the commercial Hanukkah?” 

I love that Hanukkah is about the miracle of the oil burning for seven nights longer than expected, but most of all my spirit loves that the underdogs, the Macabees, won the war against the Greeks to continue practicing their religion. America is about freedom, freedom of religion included so I am also left wondering tonight if I am simply American? I have felt a deep connection with my Jewish heritage for many years; but as a culture rather than a religion.

One of our basic needs as humans is the sense of belonging and I guess I continue to search for this, even after I think I have found it externally, I search within.