Covid Masks Off, We Take Our Chances Now

In March 2020, I was on the way to the Portland, OR airport to fly to San Antonio for the Associated Writers and Writing Programs conference (AWP), the monster gathering to which all the writers, editors, publishers, teachers, and students of writing flock. As I drove, I kept getting disturbing reports. NPR told me that a state of emergency had been declared in San Antonio due to an outbreak of COVID-19. Okay, but we’d be safe in our hotel . . .

People I had been hoping to talk to at the conference sent emails and posted on Facebook that they were no longer coming. Our Antioch University MFA alumni reunion was canceled. My childhood best friend who lives in Texas called to say, “Don’t come.”

The conference went on, but I did not go. Instead, I spent a week visiting places in Oregon that I enjoyed, including The Grotto in Portland and the Oregon Garden outside Silverton. I shopped in Salem and saw the sights in Corvallis, where I joined a friend for lunch at a Chinese buffet. Within a week, everything would be shut down. Grotto, Gardens, stores, restaurants. Even the state parks along the beach where I live were blocked off sawhorses as we began that spooky time when COVID took over our lives, when we were afraid to go out, to touch our mail, or to touch each other.

If we did have to go out, we put on masks. I remember trying to make an old bandanna into a suitable mask and downloading sewing patterns that I never used. My more crafty friends started turning out homemade masks. Soon I had a whole wardrobe of them, including some made for singing with extra breathing space in front. Wherever there were other people, we were required to wear masks.

Women no longer needed to worry about makeup. No one would see most of their faces. We couldn’t tell if someone was smiling, frowning, talking to herself, or yawning. It was difficult to hear what people were saying. But we held onto our masks because people were dying of this disease, people we knew and loved. Even those who didn’t die felt like they might.

The arrival of vaccines in August 2021 gave us hope. One shot, two shots, a booster, another. Death rates went down. People were still getting COVID, but only the ones with other serious health problems died. The rest of us just got sick for a while and recovered. We think. The possibility of long-term effects and “Long COVID” worries us (Is that why I’m so tired?), but by now most of us seem to have experienced this weird disease that manifests in various ways and steals your ability to taste food.

The mask mandate has ended, except for health-care settings, and even that requirement is ending soon. We each get to decide whether we still want to wear a mask.

Do we think about COVID anymore? I do. When I told me doctor at my checkup that I had had it around the holidays, she said, “Me too. You’ll probably get it again.” Like it was no big deal. But it is a big deal. It killed Uncle Peter. It killed Cousin John. My friend’s son was in the hospital on a ventilator for months. It is a big deal. And yet . . .

I returned to AWP this year. It was held in Seattle, which was one of the first cities to report major outbreaks of the disease in 2020. More than 9,000 people attended the conference. We were jammed together in elevators, meeting rooms, and restaurants. We walked elbow to elbow along the crowded sidewalks. We hugged and hugged and hugged. Masks were recommended, but most people didn’t wear them. We touched books that many others had touched and held onto railings smudged with other people’s fingerprints. We took the chance. And yes, AWP was wonderful.

I don’t know who got sick afterward. I was so worn out I didn’t feel well for a few days. I tested myself twice for COVID and prayed while I waited for the results. Negative. I’m lucky. I knew I was taking a chance.

We have always risked illness when we’re among other people. Long before COVID, there were plenty of contagious diseases we could catch. But we didn’t worry about it. Now we do.

I rarely wear a mask anymore unless it’s required. But I keep one handy just in case. The pandemic has gotten easier to live with, but it’s not over.

How about you? Do you still worry about getting COVID in crowds? Have you had it? Do you wear a mask? Do you find you’re the only person wearing one sometimes?

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Can you describe yourself in one word?

If you had a theme song, what would it be? What makes you, you? Authors are forever being preached to about “platform,” that combination of achievements and media attention that makes everybody know who they are—or at least everybody in their chosen field. Stephen King, for example. His brand? Horror fiction. In Catholic music right now, Sarah Hart is known for sweet singable songs for liturgy and beyond. Football? Tom Brady. Hell of a quarterback at an age when most players are retired. Even I know that.

I have been attending an online workshop called The Writers Bridge. Leader Allison K. Williams preaches that a platform is where someone stands and yells while a bridge is where you make a connection. She and her co-host Sharla Yates offer useful information for writers and other creatives trying to be heard over the noise. We’ve talked about websites, newsletters, Instagram, tiktok, Twitter, Facebook, etc. and so much more. The monthly sessions, which are recorded, are free and open to all.

What am I doing with all this information? I’m looking for a way to blend the different types of books I have written and the ones that are coming into one distinctive brand. People always ask, “What do you write?” Saying, “Oh, lots of things” doesn’t get me anywhere. I have published fiction, nonfiction, and poetry, journalistic articles, blogs, and social media posts, written about Portuguese Americans, living in Oregon, being childless, being a dog mom, and being a widow. But what seems to tie it all together is being a childless widow. What makes me stand out in every story is that I am solo in a world of families and likely to stay that way. In fact, we could boil it down to one word: Alone. Theme song: “All by Myself.”

Twenty years ago, in grad school, one of our professors asked each of us to name our “theme.” At that time, I had no idea. Now I would say “Alone.” It shows in my books, whether it’s the narrator of Childless by Marriage, my protagonist PD Soares in Up Beaver Creek or the church pianist in my poetry chapbook Widow at the Piano. Did you know 27 percent of American households are occupied by just one person? Calling out the theme helps us loners find each other.

So what is your brand, your theme? Even if you’re not selling anything, can you describe yourself in one word or phrase? What’s your song? I’d like to hear it.

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Keyboard vs. Cursive: The Debates Rages On

Our country is divided. No, not the red/blue thing, although that’s happening, too. I mean cursive vs keyboard.

Photo shows a handwritten recipe for Apple Loaf Cake mounted on a piece of polished wood. From the early 1900s.
Grandma Anne Avina’s hand-written recipe

I’m a writer, but I don’t write as much as I used to. I type. I text. I tap images on screens. Then I wonder why my handwriting is going to hell. A beautiful teacherly script never flowed from my pen, possibly because I’m a lefty and the letters are designed for right-handers, but it used to be legible. I didn’t used to get stuck on n’s and r’s or finish “ing” words with just a line. But I’m in a hurry. See the chicken scratch in the photo. My printing is neater, but it’s too slow.

Many American schools have stopped teaching cursive, defined by Wikipedia as “any style of penmanship in which characters are written joined in a flowing manner, generally for the purpose of making writing faster, in contrast to block letters.” The Common Core State Standards encourage schools to teach typing on computerized devices, as well as printing in upper and lower case letters. But with limited hours in a day, they no longer require that cursive be taught.

In a casual survey of school practices, I found a mix of writing by hand and on machines, particularly school-issued Google Chrome laptops, but a definite leaning toward digital devices. Side note: how much do all those computers cost???

Photo shows the author's handwriting in her journal about the 2023 Super Bowl. The writing is slanted slightly left and includes a crossed out word and correction.
Sue’s handwriting is like a secret code

In our grandparents’ day, students spent hours developing their handwriting, often adding beautiful swirls to the ends of capital letters. My own grandparents, who went to school in the early 1900s, only made it through eighth grade, but their handwriting was beautiful and legible.

Now, people say we don’t need it. Who writes by hand anymore, aside from signatures? We don’t write letters. Or checks (I do), or take notes by hand (I do). We grab our phone, tablet, or laptop and type. It’s faster. It’s neater. It can be saved and shared. It’s the way the world is going.

Did you know that Queen Elizabeth kept a handwritten journal? One theory is that no one could hack into it to share her private thoughts in the media.

Me, I used up all the ink in another pen writing a poem yesterday. Eventually I typed it into Google Docs so I could share it with my poet friends on Zoom, but that first blast was on paper. Many poetry teachers insist students draft their poems by hand. Studies show the brain functions differently with handwriting vs. typing, that there is value in the hand-brain connection. They also show that students who take notes by hand are more likely to remember what the teacher says because they have to select what’s important to write down rather than simply recording every word on their laptops.  

Some argue that if kids don’t learn to write cursive, they won’t be able to read it, whether it’s the Declaration of Independence or a letter from their grandmother. But, say the anti-cursives, everything can be scanned and translated into computer-speak these days.

People have been writing by hand for thousands of years. Do we really want to make it obsolete? On the other hand, if people can’t read cursive anymore, my handwriting is like a secret code that no one can read unless I choose to translate it.

What do you think? Do you print or write in cursive? Do you write by hand at all these days? What should the kiddos be learning?

If I haven’t put you to sleep by now, let me recommend this book:

The Missing Ink: The Disappearing Art of Handwriting by Philip Hensher, Faber & Faber, Inc., 2012. The Missing Ink is a deep dive into the history and culture of writing by hand with pen and ink. Hensher interviews people about their handwriting, takes us on a shopping trip for the finest fountain pen in London, takes a look at Hitler’s handwriting, tells us how ink is made and describes how the Bic pen took over the world from the 1950s on. He pleads for the preservation of the art of handwriting and offers situations where writing by hand is referable to keyboarding. Fascinating stuff for word nerds like me.

Full disclosure: This blog post was entirely written on a computer.

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Pajamas or Nightgowns? Dressing for Our Trips to Dreamland

Photo shows you woman, bearded man, and little girl about three years old, all in white pajamas, the adults holding up toothbrushes in their right hands. The background is gray wooden boards.

Can we talk about pajamas?

I hadn’t worn them except for pajama parties for decades, but the other day I put some on, and I slept better than usual. Is there a connection?

Like most kids, I grew up in PJs. My memory is fuzzy, but I think graduating to nightgowns was presented as a rite of passage to womanhood. Big girls wear nightgowns. My dirty mind is yelling “that’s so it’s easier to have sex.” I suspect that’s part of it, even though my parents were of the DO NOT HAVE SEX IF YOU’RE NOT MARRIED crowd.

Anyway, I grew up in PJs, moved on to nightgowns, and then, when I married my first husband, who was a big fan of nudity, I didn’t wear anything to bed. It was San Jose, rarely cold, and we kept each other warm.

After the marriage ended, I went back to my nightgowns.

Years passed. I married Fred. A shy guy, he slept in pajama bottoms and T-shirts. I wore my nightgowns and nightshirts, even after we moved to Oregon, where it was cold. Pajamas were hot and confining, especially before, during, and after menopause. But I kept getting pajamas for Christmas. Nice ones. Cute, soft, warm. I gave some away and stashed the rest in the bottom drawer of my dresser, the drawer that’s hard to open.

A couple weeks ago, the weather got crazy cold. The fireplace was working hard, but it was still chilly in the house. I dug out the wooliest PJs to watch TV. They were so comfortable I thought why not wear them to bed?

This insomniac slept like a rock. Over the week, as our temperatures outside hovered in the 20s and 30s, I tried the other pjs. Same thing. What is this? A return to childhood? Or am I just getting old?

The weather has warmed up. We’re back to rain and wind on the Oregon coast, and I’m back to my nightshirts. The one I’m wearing is pink with pictures of books all over it and lettering that says, “My weekend is all booked.” I love it. But I’m keeping the pajamas for those cold nights when I need a little flannel love.

How about you? What do you wear to bed? Why? Gents can weigh in, too. Pajamas, underwear, a striped nightshirt with a little hat, or skin?

We could do a whole chat about people who wear pajamas in public, but let’s stick to bedtime. Pajamas, nightgowns, or . . . ?

BTW, there’s a band called Pajamas. Here they are on YouTube. Not too bad.

Photo by Pavel Danilyuk on Pexels.com

***

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Instead of Sea Shells and Agates, I Find . . . Plastic

It was getting late, but it was the first dry day on the Oregon coast after weeks of hard rain and king tides, and the beach was calling.

A dead sea lion lay at the bottom of the steep ramp from Don Davis Park to Nye Beach. It was already starting to disintegrate, its face gone, guts exposed, tufts of brown fur here and there. Sad.

But I was more upset by the litter. I had been reading a long essay about plastic waste titled “Moby-Duck.” First published in Harper’s Magazine in 2007 and in the Best Creative Nonfiction in 2008, it was later expanded into a book, also titled Moby-Duck.

Author Donovan Hohn’s story begins with a 1992 spill of bath toys from a container ship traveling from Hong Kong to Tacoma, Washington. Little plastic ducks, beavers, turtles, and frogs started turning up on beaches far from the spill. The author became fascinated and met with experts who study the things that drift up onto the beach.  He researched the evolution of plastic products, particularly toy ducks, and the effects of plastic breaking down in the sea. He explored the working conditions in Chinese factories where workers were expected to turn out thousands of these things an hour for less than $4 a day.

What starts as an amusing story about toys quickly becomes alarming. Our ocean is so full of plastic we will never get rid of it. It breaks down over time into pieces, then shards, then dust, but it never disappears. Sea animals are eating it, and we’re eating the sea animals. It’s getting inside of everything, including us, and the ingredients are toxic.

Plastic was considered a godsend when it was invented in 1907. Now, that innocent toy bobbing in your child’s bathtub could be a death bomb for your great-grandchildren.

I was reading this essay at the hospital while waiting for my annual exam, getting more and more steamed about long waits and Medicare limitations. I flashed on those plastic gloves that hospital workers wear. Sitting at my father’s bedside when he was dying, I watched the nurses put on a new pair and throw them away every time they changed patients. How many thousands of pairs of gloves did they use in just one day? Where would we put all this waste?

Back to the beach. Instead of shells and rocks, I found trash. Just past the sea lion carcass, where the waves had washed up near the cliffs, blue, white, red, and green plastic litter sparkled in the sun. Embedded in grass and seaweed, most of it was too small to pick up.

The beach wasn’t crowded, but most of the people walking the wave-compacted sand brought their dogs. Those dogs would surely be drawn to the trash. I know mine would. I have caught her eating pens, rubber balls, Frisbees, and paper clips. I find the brightly colored pieces in her feces. I try to keep such things away from her, but people toss them along the roadsides where we walk, and sometimes she swallows the plastic before I can stop her. I worry that one of these thingswill kill her.

In his essay, Hohn tells of albatrosses who eat plastic items and shit them out. Dead birds have been found with cigarette lighters, bottle caps, toys, and other plastic items in their guts. He writes, “Albatross chicks have been known to starve to death on the plastic their parents regurgitate into their mouths, and the intestines of the adult birds can handle only so much before a fatal case of indigestion sets in.”

In the future, will we be able to find water or food that doesn’t sparkle with bits of plastic? Will this invention destroy its creators in the end?

The sky and the ocean were gorgeous, beautiful shades of pale blue. The sand, rocks, and Easter egg-colored buildings along the shore were beautiful. It felt good to get out on the beach and walk, to hear the seagulls laugh and watch a young father run toward the surf with his two-year-old son. But what about all that plastic?

I want to discard every piece of plastic in my house, but I use so much of it, including this computer, every day. Besides, we can’t get rid of it. It will not biodegrade, and most of it is not recyclable.

The plastics industry stresses the usefulness of its products AND their recyclability. Yes, there are those numbers stamped on the bottom which in theory mean they can be recycled. But where I live, the garbage company says no to plastic bags, styrofoam, plastic cutlery, toys, large plastic items, and anything stamped numbers 3 through 7 because they have nowhere to take them. We are instructed to throw them in the regular trash. I’m sure the same is true in many places.

Even with the plastic that can be recycled—mostly bottles—the quantity being discarded far outpaces the ability to remake them into something else. All we can do is try not to buy any more plastic. What we need is a magic wand to make it disappear. It would probably be made of plastic.

More reading:

https://thisisplastics.com/plastics-101/155-years-of-plastic/  (pro-plastic)

https://plasticoceans.org/7-types-of-plastic/ (anti-plastic)

“What are Plastics and Rubbers?”

“Plastic Pollution: Facts and Figures”

“Tops Items from Beach Cleanups: Plastics, Plastics, and More Plastics”

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The Volunteer Job Nobody Ever Wants

Who wants to be treasurer? Silence.

Right? In every organization I have belonged to, the one position nobody wants is treasurer. Secretary, sure. Vice president? Easy. President? I’m so flattered. But treasurer? Nope, not me. Okay, occasionally a miracle happens and someone says, “Hey, I’ll do it,” but usually there’s some arm-twisting and hyperventilating involved.

I’m no good with numbers. Spreadsheets scare me. You don’t want me handling the books.

What is this about? We were all forced to take math in school. We all somehow manage to handle our personal finances. We can figure out a recipe. Some of us can do the calculations to build things, and some of us can do music math—eighth notes, whole notes, triplets, 4/4, 6/8, 2/2, etc. But when it comes to being the money person, it’s nuh-uh, not me, I need to get some coffee, go to the restroom, make a call . . .

Nobody wants to be treasurer. I am currently president of a writing organization where our treasurer, who took the job reluctantly last fall, has resigned. This is not the first time this has happened. Other treasurers in other groups have quit, and the books landed on my desk. Why? Because everyone else says “not me.” Do I have any special financial gifts? No. But my bills are paid, and I’m no longer afraid of spreadsheets. In fact, I use them a lot in my writing/publishing business. Think graph paper on a computer screen.

While talking to my brother about this on the phone last night, he noted that we both end up being president of every organization we join. That’s true. Our parents raised to be uber organized and to take charge. Or maybe we just can’t stand anyone else being in charge. Something to discuss in therapy.

Mike has experienced the “not me” for treasurer syndrome, too. Working in the legal field, he also has tales of treasurers deciding to borrow a little money for themselves. Yikes. We not only have to find someone who is willing but someone who is honest.

What is this fear of treasurer jobs? It’s not just writers, who claim they’re all right brain, the creative side, with not much going on in the left brain. But hey, they can calculate word counts, syllables and stanzas. If they can write a villanelle poem with its complex pattern, they can be a treasurer.

It’s money in, money out, pay the bills. You can use a calculator. Yet this article from the BBC tells us that 93 percent of American adults say they’re anxious about math. I think that’s a miscalculation, but that explains why almost nobody wants to be treasurer. When you throw in spreadsheets, it’s all over.

It almost feels uncool to say you like math, bookkeeping, money management, etc. But what about all those people who work in banks, credit unions, tax offices, and well, every big and little business that needs someone to do the accounting? We can do math, my friends. Don’t be afraid.

We will find our new treasurer poet and treat them like royalty. It won’t be me. I already have too many jobs. But I could do it if I wanted to.

How about you? Do you feel numerically challenged? Do spreadsheets terrify you? Have you ever been a treasurer? Would you take it on if asked?

A little extra reading:

https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/22545-arithmophobia-fear-of-numbers: Some people are so afraid of numbers, or of certain numbers such as 13, that they have panic attacks. Not good for a potential treasurer.

https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20200506-how-to-tackle-your-anxiety-about-maths: “You’re not destined to be bad at maths. You just may need to tackle your ‘mathephobia.’”

https://medium.com/@wpecharsky/i-have-ptss-post-traumatic-spreadsheet-syndrome-97d7c20fbc1a “Why I Hate Spreadsheets”

Photo by Nataliya Vaitkevich on Pexels.com

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Mother Nature Joins Us on Our Walk

The picture that inspired the poem that follows: seven female elk in a field with trees and a tan-colored house behind them. 
Boxing Day Visitors

Almost home, we turn the corner
and skid to a sudden startled stop.
Elk. Seven cows staring at us
from the field beside our house.

Neighbors reported sightings,
we saw black-marble droppings,
but here in the coastal forest,
we thought we were in charge.

The dog frozen, it’s up to me.
Advance or retreat, act tough
or cajole them like puppies?
God, they keep staring at us.

Seven hundred pounds times seven–
Oh Lord, more leap out of the bushes.
I raise my phone to take pictures
to share if we get home alive.

One of them crosses the road
to where the women with cats live.
Run Millie, run Frosty! Hey Kathy!
A glance. The scout rejoins the herd.

It’s December. My bum knee aches.
“Come on, Pup.” Timid steps,
nervous chatter. They look alike,
small heads, thick brown bodies.

As we pass the mailboxes, the elk
turn as one and whoosh through
an opening in the trees and vines.
Could they have been afraid of us?


--Sue Fagalde Lick, Dec. 26, 2022

Happy New Year, everyone! Thank you for reading Unleashed in Oregon. These elk were quite docile, but if elk feel threatened, they might charge. I used the zoom function on my camera to photograph them. Always give wild animals the right-of-way. https://www.travel-experience-live.com/elk-safety-how-safely-observe-wild-elk/

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Merry Christmas from Sue and Annie

I shared this video two years ago, but I’m offering it again as I recover from COVID and gently exercise my voice back to normal.



We wish you a season of peace and joy and a new year as fresh and full of possibilities as a just-fallen blanket of snow.

Coming up on Dec. 21, noon PST: another virtual fireside chat with the “nomo crones”/aka childless elderwomen, hosted by Jody Day. Our topic this time is “Renewal.” Our panelists are childless by choice and by chance and are Zooming in from all over the world. Register at bit.ly/gw-renewal to receive the link. The session will be recorded, so if you can’t watch it at the scheduled time, no worries, watch it later.

Stuck for a gift? Books are nonfattening and easy to mail. Start the kids off young with classic stories or poems from your favorite bookstore.

Cheers to one and all.

Sue and Annie

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Look! Santa Brought Me Groceries! Loving that Pickup Service

I’m a do-it-yourself kind of girl. This morning, coughing and feeling like multiple blades were slicing through my head, I was out in the dark before dawn in my bathrobe loading my garbage cart and pulling it to the curb. I’m not about to whine “I’m sick and can’t do it myself.”

Why not put it out the night before? Bears. We’ve got bears who love to snack on our trash.

But COVID put a real crimp in my schedule, and I needed groceries. If I wore my mask and stayed sealed in the isolation chamber of my car, couldn’t I use their pickup service? Stores have been offering drive-through groceries since the pandemic started, but I insisted on picking out my own food, squeezing the grapefruit, grabbing whatever appealed from the sale racks, and buying those things I forgot to put on the list. Now that I was Typhoid Susie, that was not an option.

I ordered my groceries from Fred Meyer on Friday night, clicking the picture of each item as the price added up on the side. Would I accept substitutions if needed? Yes. I paid with my debit card and chose an 11 a.m. Saturday pickup time. All I had to do was go get my stuff—or ask someone else to get it for me.

The Fred Meyer app on my phone had a box to click when I was on my way. Sort of like when you tell a loved one you’re on your way home or to their house. Like someone cares, you know.

The pickup parking spaces are near the garden department at the far end of the parking lot. Ten numbered spaces. You park behind a blue sign, click “I’m here” and tell them what number you’re at. Then you wait.

How would the food come? Would there be fancy bags? Would a team arrive to heft them into my car? Would I need to come out and show them my debit card? It was a little like waiting for Santa Claus. Or a blind date. 

A young woman with a blue FM vest came pulling a flatbed cart loaded with blue bins full of brown paper bags. It must be terribly heavy, I thought. But she was all smiles as she transferred bags into one car after another until she got to me. I got out. She didn’t need my card, or me. So many bags! She said there was just one substitution, bigger grapefruit than I’d ordered, a two-cent difference.

I felt guilty just standing there while she loaded, but I didn’t want to get in her way or share any germs that might escape my N-95 mask. When I retested on Sunday, the result was negative so maybe I wasn’t contagious anymore anyway.

In a few minutes, I was loaded and on my way home, feeling elated. I got my groceries, didn’t have to beg anyone or do without, didn’t have to fight the crowds or stand in line to check out. Plus all my choices were pre-made and I could not be tempted by the goodies in the pastry section or grossed out by the dead animal smell in the meat section. 

I forgot a couple things, but I had bread and mayonnaise again. I got all the things I ordered. Well, the chicken was huge, and they gave me far more mushrooms than I expected, but boy, Santa Claus/Fred Meyer delivered. I even got light bulbs and printer paper for the office. 

This system is brilliant. It feels like having a personal shopper. Is it lazy? I don’t know. Maybe it’s more like the olden days when you took your list to the counter and the grocer got your stuff for you. 

Even if there were no COVID, think about people who are sick, who can’t walk, who have bad backs, who suffer from social anxiety, or parents wrangling a herd of kids. It could even help middle-aged people taking their elderly parents shopping. My father was horrible to shop with, blocking the aisles while we debated every little thing. Imagine if we could have picked everything out at home and then arrived to have it placed in the trunk, wow.

I feel empowered. Look at me taking care of myself. And God bless the blue-vested elves grabbing my goodies off the shelves.

Fred Meyer is not the only local store offering this service. Walmart and Safeway do it, too. Ray’s in Waldport has curbside pickup. I hope they keep it up when COVID is just a distant memory. It’s a big help for many people and kind of fun, too.

What about you? Have you done drive-through/curbside pickup shopping for groceries or other things? Did it work out all right?

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Housecleaning Find Marks the Beginnings of a Poet

Little Boy Blue
By Mother Goose

Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn;
The sheep’s in the meadow, the cow’s in the corn.
Where’s the boy that looks after the sheep?
He’s under the haystack, fast asleep.”
Will you wake him? “No, Not I!
For if I do, he’s sure to cry.”

How did I become a poet? What made me scribble singsong verse as early as third grade? Cleaning out some drawers I rarely open, I found at least part of the answer. Buried among the hair ornaments I no longer have enough hair to use, I found a stack of books from way back in my childhood. Most are pretty beat up from frequent fondling by children. Among them were:

I also found a collection of nature books for kids and Writer’s Digest magazines from the 1960s when Grandma Rachel was grooming me to be a writer. A poet herself, she kept feeding me poetry books, among them the poems of Edna St. Vincent Millay, Robert Browning, Marianne Moore and The Viking Book of Poetry of the English-Speaking World. Being the odd teenager that I was, I read them all and wrote poems of my own. Sixty years later, I’m still at it. 

Tucked inside One Hundred Best Poems for Boys and Girls, I found a poem of my own. Written in pencil, the words are barely visible. Great art? Lord no, although I might have had a successful career writing greeting cards. 

Don’t Forget to Think of Me

Summer is coming very fast.
Soon it will be here at last.

It’s a time to your hobbies pursue,
A time to find the real you.

A time to let your thoughts go free,
A time, I hope, to think of me.

Summer is a time of fun.
I wish no sadness to anyone,

A time to go to brand new places,
A time to see old and new faces.

I’m wishing now, a lot of fun
And joy and peace to everyone.

When summer days are gay and free,
Don’t forget to think of me.

It’s doggerel, yes, but this is what some of us were reading in the 1950s and early 1960s. We shared Ogden Nash’s humorous verses, Rod McKuen’s sentimental offerings, and the plain-spoken poems of Robert Frost. Poetry progressed from rhyme and rhythm into free verse, rap, and slam poetry. We might roll our eyes as the singsong verse of my childhood, but it got me started.

From One Hundred Best Poems:

Barefoot Days
By Rachel Field

In the morning, very early,
  That’s the time I love to go
Barefoot where the fern grows curly
  And grass is cool between each toe,
     On a summer morning-O!
     On a summer morning!

That is when the birds go by
  Up the sunny slopes of air,
And each rose has a butterfly
  Or a golden bee to wear;
And I am glad in every toe–
       Such a summer morning-O!
       Such a summer morning!

The stuff I grew up on, that my mother read to my brother and me every night, and Grandma Rachel bestowed for every Christmas and birthday, exposed me to the joys of playing with words and sharing them out loud. It was a valuable gift that resonates today as I sit down to write a new poem on my laptop in Google docs. We no longer use fountain pens or fat pencils, but the goal is still the same: to capture what we see and experience in a compact collection of words using imagery, rhythm, word play, and yes, sometimes rhyme. 

When I meet people who don’t read, it saddens me. My brother and I were lucky that our mother read to us, and she took us to the library every two weeks to pick up another stack of books. If parents don’t read to their kids and set an example of reading for pleasure, how will their children pick up the habit? Will they ever be exposed to poems and stories that don’t appear on a screen? 

When they hear “hickory dickory dock, the mouse ran up the clock” or “Jack and Jill went up the hill,” will they know the lines that come next or shrug and go back to their phones? 

We have an obligation to pass our poems and stories to the next generation. That’s how writers and readers are born. This Christmas, buy a child a book. They’re easy to wrap, easy to mail, and might stay with them all their lives.  

PS: You can find my adult poems in my chapbooks Gravel Road Ahead and The Widow at the Piano: Poems by a Distracted Catholic. 

PPS: Oregon Poetry Association is hosting a “Holiday/Anti-Holiday” poetry open mic on Zoom on Dec. 13 at 7 p.m. PST. You don’t have to live in Oregon to join in. Click here to register. (Click to December on the calendar, click on the event, and you’ll see the registration screen).

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