Scout Moves

When I was growing up, my older sister played Taps for the town Memorial Day ceremonies—she stood off in the distance away from her marching band, and it was a source of family pride. Both of my daughters have played Taps for their 8th-grade classes when they traveled to D.C. and visited Arlington Cemetery, also a source of family pride. So, here is my opinion piece as printed in today's edition of Small Town Newspaper: Taps Every year it’s the same thing—I make my way to the cemetery and stand with the relatively few others who gather for the city’s Memorial Day service. There are the laying of the wreaths, the readings of In Flanders Fields and The Gettysburg Address, a speech or two, a prayer or two, a song or two and a moment of silence. Not that these elements get old or are meaningless, but even when well presented, they can sometimes feel like tradition for tradition’s sake and nothing else. Despite the sameness from year to year, there is one element that never fails to be ...

Yesterday, I was sent on another interesting assignment for Small Town Newspaper, given the simple task of interviewing a high school girl about an accomplishment. But as I've learned, no assignment is ever so simple. I drove out into the country, not too far from the center of town, and I followed the specific instructions given to me by the mother of the girl. I'm one to travel by landmarks more so than by street names, so I appreciated her telling me when to look for an oil tank and a cabin and an ammo shop—I did say I was out in the country, right? I turned into the long gravel driveway as instructed and got out of my car just beside the first house, and a man called from the field to say I was probably in the wrong spot. I needed to go to the end of the driveway and around behind the barn, and be very careful not to smash the eggs, he shouted. I beg your pardon? Eggs? I decided to just drive and thought I'd see what he meant once I got there. I followed the gravel road...

I am now in recovery after a whirlwind of busy days. The orchestra performed one rip-roaring concert this past Saturday to a sell-out crowd. It was a fund-raiser concert in addition to our regular program, a country-meets-symphony event, and it was a hit. I wish I could have just focused on that one event and given it all of my attention, but the following day was weighing on me and was a distraction. My friend, Jane, and I catered a dinner party for eight Sunday evening, also a fund-raiser event for the orchestra. We had entered this dinner as an item in a silent auction, and the winners chose Sunday for their party. They used it as a thank-you gift for two men who founded and help operate our homeless shelter and foodbank. Their wives were there as well, along with Conductor Eric and the pastor of the hosts' church. Jane and I had planned and planned and planned, tested recipes and tested recipes and tested recipes, and organized like pros even though this was our first time cate...

I am no athlete. I don't even come close. When I was in kindergarten, I didn't know how to skip because no one had ever shown me how—it's not an innate act, you know. But my teacher thought it was and suggested to my mother that my inability to skip might be a sign of mental retardation. I think that moment scarred me so that I could never do anything even remotely sports-like ever. With that in mind, here is my opinion piece as it appears in today's edition of Small Town Newspaper: ••• Cleveland sports fans have suffered yet another loss, a big one, apparently; and now there are mumblings of a citywide sports curse. So many of the avid fans I know—whether it’s basketball they love or football or baseball—are now beyond disappointment and have gone as far as anger and bitternress. If they aren’t hanging their heads in shame, they are banging their fists as they shout out the mistakes the coaches and managers and players have made to deliver us all to this pathetic state...

I've been a little busy, and I think I'll just keep going until next Monday. No. 1 is visiting friends in Columbus, so we drove there on Monday to see her. We spent the night there and took our time coming home yesterday. I spent this morning writing next weeks column, and this afternoon cooking tonight's dinner, sort of a belated birthday dinner for Eustacia—we had black beans and rice, sautéed kale, miniature cheese popovers and chocolate molten souffles. Eustacia turned 20 yesterday but was sick most of the day, and since No. 1 was coming home for dinner tonight, we decided to just wait and celebrate when everyone could be home. Tomorrow morning I'll be driving a little south of here to watch a percussion concert a band teacher will conduct with some special education students who are learning to play the drums as a sort of therapy. I'll go from there to the newspaper office to fetch something, and then I'll go to the park because my English class is having t...

I am most definitely a right-brain person, or so I have always thought. But then I took a Right Brain vs. Left Brain Creativity test sponsored by the Art Institute of Vancouver, and it turns out I am 52% right brained and 48% left. That's almost 50/50, as I see it, but then since I don't handle numbers and percentages well, I like to round up. The test results go into detail about how a person with these percentages operates. Here is the general description for someone like me: "You are more right-brained than left-brained. The right side of your brain controls the left side of your body. In addition to being known as right-brained, you are also known as a creative thinker who uses feeling and intuition to gather information. You retain this information through the use of images and patterns. You are able to visualize the "whole" picture first, and then work backwards to put the pieces together to create the "whole" picture. Your thought process can ap...

ARRGGHH—Painting is so hard!! Last week, I was visiting a woman who lives on the edge of town—she had built a modern open-concept house next door to the traditional farmhouse where she had grown up 60 years earlier, and I stood in the driveway between the two houses admiring the farmland and blue skies around me, and I decided to take some pictures of things the woman had displayed around her yard. She collects angels, and among them, I discovered some pots with artificial flowers. I made a sketch based on the photograph: And then I tried to paint it, and the result frustrates me to no end. There are some things I like about the texture of the pots, but I think I see my weakness—a general inability to draw. So, I think before I get anywhere with this painting thing, I'm going to have to figure out that major step. A class, maybe?

A couple of weeks ago I was at my wits end about the fate of my coffee maker, a DeLonghi Gran Dama that had broken and was in repair-shop limbo. I won't recount the whole story here, but when I first told my coffee maker saga to Blogville, I swore that as soon as I had the Gran Dama back in my possession, I would name the repair shop that was causing so much trouble, and I would shout their offenses for all the world to hear. But then my fully functioning coffee maker arrived, and I sat down with a demitasse cup full of frothy espresso, and all was forgiven. Yes, the repairmen were irresponsible with the machine they've had since February. Yes, they were hapless and patronizing each time I called for an update. Yes, they made me angry enough to leave a steaming pile of dog poo on their front porch, light it on fire, and ring the door bell. Angry enough to stow a stinking bluegill in the bottom drawer of their filing cabinet. Angry enough to, oh, I don't know, tell the world...

My orchestra performed the last concert of our 74th season over the weekend—with a tag-on country-meets-classical concert in a couple of weeks. This season has been all about exploring the universe, so this year we have performed Holst's The Planets and other space-age things. On Saturday, we played the themes to Star Trek, Star Wars and Apollo 13, all heavy on the horn parts. And we spent most of the first half on Stravinsky's Firebird Suite. What a killer. There were moments I could feel my heart pounding in my ears, I was so on edge and afraid of making huge mistakes—I didn't, just a lot of little ones. In the middle of it all, we performed a new piece composed by Conductor Eric, a short piece that featured the tune Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. The ethereal feel was added by an orchestra member who plays a theramin—yes, people do plays theramins—and the horns added some weight with chords and dynamics. There were more people in the audience than I think I've seen in...

Here is my opinion column in today's edition of Small Newspaper. I've included this link as well, in case someone leaves an online comment calling me names or something. I don't expect much feedback today, but you can never tell what gets people riled. Mother’s Day is celebrated all over the world on days significant to particular cultures, but in the United States, it’s held on the second Sunday in May because of the tireless passion of one woman, Anna Jarvis, who was driven by the direct influence of her mother. Jarvis was the daughter of an outspoken pacifist and social activist, Anna Reeves Jarvis, who organized women during the Civil War. Her group worked with local churches to combat poverty and poor sanitation, and they served as nurses to both Union and Confederate soldiers. As a popular speaker and lecturer, the elder Jarvis encouraged audiences to acknowledge a special day honoring mothers as a way to bring divided families together after the war. When she died ...

One day last week, I was having a quiet lunch at a coffee shop in the next town over—not to abandon the usual place, but this was close to my English class, and I had just an hour between sessions. It's one of those funky places with intentionally mis-matched furniture pulled from who knows where—odd chairs paired with odd tables, mostly formica-stainless furniture from the 50s. In fact, one table is positioned inside a scene straight from I Love Lucy with the old metal cabinets and sink with vintage canisters and appliances. Anyway, my table was one of those old ones in the window. The top was yellow, and the walls beside it were bright red, and I was impressed with how the colors reflected on the stainless table legs. I happened to have my camera with me, so I took this shot along with several others: I went home and sketched it out with pencil and paper to see if it was something I could recreate with the proper shadows. Hmm, maybe: With the photo and sketch in front of me, I dr...

Start the clocks, blogville, because I'm about to step off with the starter gun and head toward the finish line. References to a race are actually a joke where I'm concerned because I do not run. I did run one race once when I was in school but only because my teacher made me for track and field day. I lost. This morning, I'll start by rushing to the store to buy a giant, plastic storage container that will come in handy a little later. Then I'll head to the usual Thursday-morning English class where we'll work on some knitting and take a spelling test and continue in the American history book, chapter 3. That ends at 11:30, at which time I'll hop in my car and drive an hour and a half to Eustacia's college. She takes her last final exam this morning, and then she has to pack up her dorm room and clear out. We'll haul all of her stuff either to the curb or to my car, which we'll cram as full as possible, including the new plastic tub, and then we...

...or maybe this post should be titled One Shiny Fingernail. Here's why: I spent the weekend with Eustacia because her film studies group presented a documentary, and her concert band performed their final concert of the school year. We also had to start the process of moving her out of her dorm room, so it made sense to just stay in town instead of driving back and forth. On Saturday, we went to the auditorium to watch an opera performance from the conservatory and a couple of short plays from the theater department. Then Eustacia and her group showed their film, "Gang Violence in Cleveland." It was very good, and I was so proud of the editing she did on the project. Later that night, we had dinner and went to her concert. The band pulls from the general school population with just a few conservatory students, and it's the cleanest, most solid concert band I've ever heard. They were wonderful. Now, for the shopping. On Sunday, Eustacia had a thing for a few hours...

This story came across my line of sight last week, and I felt I had to address it in today's edition of Small Town Newspaper. The 13th district is about an hour from Small Town, just for your reference. Someone has commented online with a long list of sexist remarks made about conservative female politicians and asked why haven't spoken out about those, but I'd like to point out that not one of those remarks was made by an official political party—every single one came from an opinion writer or comedian. I believe party officials should be held to a higher standard. My opinion piece for the week : Democratic Rep. Betty Sutton of Ohio’s 13th district is an accomplished individual. As a freshman in the House, she has received awards from groups ranging from veterans to health care advocates to senior citizens to farmers to educators. Before being elected to Congress, she served in the Ohio State House for eight years and was a labor lawyer before that. So, you can imagine her...