School Daze

Hello, Kids, Educators, and Families–

Are you happy that school’s back in session once again?

The answer probably depends on who you are!

Kids might be sad that summer is over but thrilled to be back with their friends, meeting their new teachers for a fresh crack at learning in the next higher grade.

Parents and grandparents are likely breathing a sigh of relief! Though perhaps looming are the challenges that their children’s homework, classrooms, classmates, and stringent routines can bring.

Teachers are  probably putting into play what they’ve thought about all summer; namely, working backwards from next June to now, and creating lessons for a successful journey. And there are those bulletin boards to tackle . . .

As a long-time, now retired teacher, I felt like those kids: reluctant to give up the carefree days of summer, but glad to return to children and adults who made me feel happy, rewarded, and grateful. It was the start of another year practicing and honing my craft for which I spent years in college (plus in all grades!) and on the job preparing.

Every year around this time, I can’t help but reminisce about getting ready for school to begin when I was a child. Here in San Diego, California, back in the 1960s, the public schools opened in mid-September. So, in mid-August, my mother would trot my fraternal twin sister and me uptown to the neighborhood J. C. Penney’s store. It was time to load up on five brand new, starched plaid cotton dresses apiece–one for each day, Monday through Friday. Girls weren’t allowed to wear pants or shorts to school until the rules changed in what was then called Junior High (Grades 7 – 9).

My mother insisted that her twin daughters dress alike. (Ugh!) This was often problematic from a practical standpoint: Not only did my sister and I have to find dress styles we both liked, but we also had to find them in our respective sizes. Occasionally, Mom would fudge on her twin dress code and let us get the same style, but in different colors. (Whoohoo! Individuality.)

After hours selecting and trying on dresses, we headed to the checkout counter, often with smiles on our faces, and arms loaded with our new, albeit lookalike, clothes. My mom would take advantage of the store’s “Layaway Plan,” paying half of the bill that day with the balance due when we picked up the dresses one month later on the Saturday before the big day. Oh, the anticipation!

The night before school started, butterflies flitted in my stomach. Would I get the teacher I wanted? Would she or he be nice? Would I be smart enough to be in a new grade? Would my BFF be in my room? What would we have to do on the first day?

And wouldn’t you know it? Some of those were also the reactions and similar questions I had every year as a teacher! Except as the adult, I was the one calling the shots. My indelible nervousness as a child informed how I approached my new students yearly–with empathy, caring, concern, lots of smiles, and a true story about myself. The kids were always surprised and relieved to learn that we teachers were human and had butterflies on the first day, too!

So, get a clue, all Readers. Do you like returning to school? Do you get nervous in the lead up to the first day? How do you prepare for the big day? And how do you cope as you head to school and enter the new classroom? Whatever you do, kids, educators, and families, have a wonderful new school year. Teachers rock! Please appreciate them. And kids, be sure to read every day. Reading makes you smarter.

(Photos from pexels.com)

(Photos from pexels.com)

“Paws” for Pets

Hello, Kids and All Readers,

I have some family news to share! I became a grandmother for the fourth time on July 12. I have two grandchildren, a granddog, and now the newest addition–a grandcat!

Agnes is an all-black cat with enormous amber-orange eyes. Perfect for Halloween, right? (But will she grow into them???)

My daughter, bless her heart, rescued Agnes from a busy street when the cat was almost hit by a car. The neighbors had captured her kittens but couldn’t find her, and no one could identify her owner. Since my daughter held the erstwhile elusive cat in her arms, she bundled tiny, six-pound, scared Agnes into the car, took her to the vet for a good checkup, then home! But not before stopping at a pet store to load up on all the things (and more) that one could need for the care, love, and feeding of a cat.

Agnes wasted no time settling in to her new home. She is now enjoying lots of square meals a day, fresh water, a soft bed, a self-cleaning litter box (you read that correctly), a bling collar, toys, much love, and safety. Who could ask for more?

And everyone loves Agnes, including Dashiell Hammett (aka “Dash”) the dog. I believe that he thinks she’s a toy, or at least a new playmate. He even rolls over for her and lets her drink out of his personal water bowl. What a gentleman! And all the House Humans are over the moon about her.

So, get a clue, Readers. Do you have pets? Do you like to read books where characters have pets? I know that kids tend to like stories with them, so each of my four Botanic Hill detectives have animals roaming around the house. After all, pets can take the edge off a tough day chasing down the bad guys. Welcome to the family and best wishes, Agnes!

(Photos by the author’s daughter)

Welcome, Summer Solstice!

Dear Kids, Teachers, and All Readers,

Happy Summer! The season when children and educators get giddy, and parents wonder what to do with the kids for three months.

However you plan to spend this summer, I hope it’s one of your best.

I get nostalgic this time of year as I reflect back on wonderful childhood summers.

My twin sister and I spent nearly every day with our cousin, who is two years older than us. She lived one block away, so by mid-morning, we met either at her house or ours, ready for another day of fun. As we were on the way out the front door, my grandmother would shout, “Just be back by dinnertime.” Those were the days when kids felt safe to explore without adults hovering, planning their time, or driving them everywhere.

Off the three of us went, usually walking about a mile to Balboa Park, the jewel of our city. Back then, the San Diego Zoo, part of the park, was free for kids, so that’s where we often started. My cousin used to enjoy the Reptile House. Not I, but we would go with her, anyway, because she always made it fun. She shared interesting things about the snakes or whatever animals we encountered. We would stop and say hello to the elephants, giraffes, and lions, ending up at the Children’s Zoo–a zoo within the zoo–and watch the little white rodents in the Mouse House, a large loaf of bread where they ate their fill. Then, we’d go to the petting paddock and rub down the goats and donkeys and feed them carrot and celery sticks stuffed into ice cream cones (minus the ice cream). But watch out! Those goats loved to nibble on clothing.

Sometimes if we had money from our allowances, we would buy hamburgers, French fries, and cokes at the zoo. While eating our lunch, we would listen to the park’s enormous bell tower chime all four quarters of the hour but keep an eye out for swooping seagulls. They were master food thieves, stealing goodies right out of our hands! Good-bye lunch.

Once our cousin learned to drive, we would pile into her family’s car with our own homemade picnic lunches and head for the beach. Our favorite was La Jolla Shores. We took rafts and rode the waves into shore, built sandcastles surrounded by moats, which we filled with seaweed “dragons,” slathered ourselves with baby oil, and sunbathed for golden tans. (No one knew about skin cancer yet.) Often, we waded out into the ocean, waist high, and dove into towering waves before they crashed. We were fearless. Sharks? What sharks? On the way home, we always stopped at the drugstore for ice cream cones. Chocolate with fudge swirls for me, always. My sister liked vanilla or strawberry while our cousin favored pistachio or rocky road.

Other days, we would stick closer to home and take our lunch and a blanket to “The Green,” a small park three blocks south of my house, for a picnic. I would pack either a peanut butter and grape- jelly sandwich or a cheese sandwich, a small bag of Fritos, a brownie from the morning bakery truck, and plums or peaches, but mostly peaches. I remember eating way too many for a kid some days–maybe four!–because my mom would buy them by the lug. I still recall those comforting peach scents perfuming the back porch, smelling of summer.

On days when it was too hot, we would hang out at my cousin’s house. She would make us tuna sandwiches, full of chopped onions, and serve ice-cold lemonade. Afterwards. we would have popcorn while plunked down in front of her big-box television set, hoping to catch an afternoon monster movie. We were seldom disappointed. But if we were, there was always Monopoly or Clue! And speaking of “clue” . . .

Get a clue, kids and all readers. I hope you get out and have a blast under the summer sun. May you create some fabulous memories to sustain yourselves in the years ahead. Eat lots of peaches, but not too many. And don’t forget to use sunscreen.

 

Happy Birthday, Flock!

Happy Fourth Birthday, Blackbird Writers!

Hello, Dear Readers! This is an invitation to join the celebration:

My fellow “four and twenty” Birds and I are celebrating four years flying together to “bring mystery and mayhem to the world,” one book at a time.

Our flock of supportive mystery writers took flight in May 2020, thanks to founder and thriller author, Tracey S. Phillips, who was concerned about writers’ isolation during the Pandemic.

I was welcomed into the group in October of that year and am one of three children’s authors though the only one writing Middle Grade mysteries (ages 9-12). Other genres include romance thrillers, police procedurals, cozy mysteries, international intrigue, crime thrillers, YA suspense, paranormal mysteries, and more.

Please check out each of us Birds and our books HERE, or go to https://blackbirdwriters.com. If you purchase a few of our books, we would be very grateful. Thanks for your support!

So, get a clue, Readers! Never be afraid to celebrate a birthday. It beats the alternative!

(Ad Credits: Colorful ad by Sherrill Joseph; black-and-white ad by Blackbird Writers)

Filing on the Prison Bars

Dear Readers,

We’ve probably all seen movies or read stories where someone, somehow sneaked a large file into a jail cell to help a prisoner have at the metal bars to enable an escape.

I’ve been a “prisoner” in a kind of “jail” for a few years now–the jail of clutter! And the kind of “file” I’m talking about is my file cabinet, bursting at its metal seams with folders of stuff that go back to my childhood. I had more recent files stacked on a table next to the cabinet because I couldn’t get another piece of paper inside it with the proverbial shoehorn!

I was inspired to start decluttering my file cabinet for two additional reasons: 1. Spring Cleaning; and 2. A free paper-shredding community event at a local school last Saturday. I started purging my files, one folder at a time, A to Z, about a month ago during my evening downtime. I got pretty good at zipping through a stack each night.

But one folder that took an entire evening was “Favorite Articles.” It’s the folder where I threw (and continue to throw) special greeting cards, media clippings, letters, and other sentimental, Romantic-Era-type treasures saved over the decades. I pondered to read many of them, and I discovered that my curation has remained quite consistent over the years.

Mostly, I had squirreled away magazine pictures of curving staircases, a lifelong obsession. And my favorite kind of writing, namely, descriptive: atmospheric verses, especially from Halloween greeting cards; the poem “Ithaca,” Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis’s favorite, which was read at her funeral in 1994; a Parade Magazine article from 1982 entitled “Our Family Ghost,” written by the nephew of William Faulkner about their haunted family mansion in Oxford, Mississippi; a recent addition from the New York Times about Lord Byron; a list of my favorite childhood books; and essays I wrote about the gorgeous houses south of me that, as a child, I loved to pretend were my castles (and still do!).

Two items that brought me to tears were a musical program guide from Van Cliburn’s 1994 visit to San Diego. My dad played classical piano, and Van Cliburn was his hero. So, I saved my money and surprised him with tickets to the performance, as well as the pre-concert dinner, and after-concert dessert in a tent where my dad got to meet his favorite pianist. I am so glad I shared that evening with my all-gussied-up father, who died three years later. The other beautiful item was a four-page biography about me written by my daughter in 1996 when she was in high school. Oh, the joys and sorrows of our lives, so eloquently and lovingly penned by her.

Needless to say, not much was purged from that folder! But what a joy to reread some of those treasures that now fit in my file cabinet with lots of space for the next decades’ worth of collecting.

So, get a clue, dear Readers. Decluttering is so freeing! I hope you’ll break out of your “clutter jail” if you have one, with or without files.

(Photo by Anete Lusina on pexels.com)

Do You Enjoy Easter Eggs?

Dear Kids and All Readers,

Who hasn’t sought those delicious chocolate-covered, candy-speckled, and rainbow-dyed eggs left by the E.B. in pretty baskets and springtime flowerbeds?

For now, however, please try not to think about chocolate as we shift to the nonedible, nondenominational types of Easter eggs—those scattered in literature and movies.

The formal name for a literary or cinematic Easter egg is an allusion. You’ve probably laughed out loud when finding one of those hidden treasures, tucked into a book or film, that was designed to call something to mind without mentioning it explicitly.

These indirect references—Easter eggs—can be an inside joke that a writer’s or movie’s fan base understands immediately, thereby creating a special bond, as if finders are suddenly part of “The In-Crowd.” Easter eggs can have a broad appeal or be subtle. They are usually somehow significant to the author or filmmaker, which is why they are included.

In addition to inside jokes, sweet Easter eggs can name an author, character, book or movie title, setting or place from another work or time, or a piece of music or work or art, thus linking one to the other; an object or symbol that foreshadows an action in the work or a character trait; a bit of dialogue; a pop culture element; an action that harks to something seemingly and momentarily unrelated; an epigraph; and, an epigram, anagram, puzzle, or set of runes that requires the brainiest of fans to decipher their surprising and often cleverly hidden messages. Sneaky, sometimes snarky, often unexpected—magical!

Sometimes, Easter eggs reveal their hiding places and messages only when we reread a work or rewatch a movie. Those can bring extraordinary ah-ha moments.

One of the most famous and prolific literary E.B.s is Stephen King. Each of his books has a single connection, one to the other. Those of us of a certain age might immediately understand the movie’s Easter egg when in The Shining, a crazed Jack Nicholson peeks through the crack in the door, as he tries to get at his terrified wife, and says, “Here’s Johnny!” Note: That phrase is not in the book, but it duplicates King’s predilection for literary Easter eggs. A “double-yolk” Easter egg, perhaps?

Such revelations of understanding can elicit comic relief, a smile, nod, wink, OMG, or outright guffaw because an E.B. has scattered the eggs successfully.

Disney’s animated movies are replete with hidden egg treasures. Eagle-eye fans have fun hunting and finding them, which are often objects or characters from previous films. In Tangled (2010), there is a wild scene at the Snuggly Duckling Pub. Perched high above the fray in the shadows is Pinocchio (1940)! And Mickeys abound. To see all forty-one Disney Easter eggs, google “Easter eggs in Disney movies,” and check out the Good Housekeeping article from 2020.

According to Samantha Knoerzer’s “The Best Easter Eggs in Literature,” in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass, “the book has an acrostic poem that spells out ‘Alice Pleasance Liddell,’ which was the actual name of the real existing girl who inspired the fictional Alice character.” In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, “the beginning of the book contains an epigraph . . . quoted by a man named Thomas Parke D’Invilliers. True fans should recognize the name as a fictional character in Fitzgerald’s third novel, This Side of Paradise.”

My Book 6, Upas Street: Shocking Specter, releasing in Fall 2024, will have Easter eggs of a haunted nature. Maybe that’s where I got the idea for this blog—hmmm.

But writers, be warned! Don’t be a profligate E.B. (or Wild Hare) and scatter eggs too often within a single work. By cracking too many eggs—ha, ha—you will likely lose the element of surprise and perhaps a few of your fans along the way. Wise E.B.s hide effective Easter eggs carefully so they are neither too obvious nor a stumbling block (of broken egg shells).

So, please remember: Too many Easter eggs, hidden willy-nilly, may go undiscovered. Those will turn smelly! And no one wants to read a rotten book.

(Photo Credit: Cottonbro Studio on pexels.com)