It is rare when we can coordinate the time and distance between a dozen careers, three states and two countries to share a few moments as family. Christmas happens whenever we can get together.
When I first moved to Europe, I missed being home for the holidays and before my baby’s first birthday, I bundled her in my arms and flew back from Paris. That baby, now a doctor in St. Paul, will drive to Chicago with her “little” brother. My folks will pop in from Sterling. The car wheels will crunch on an icy driveway when my brother’s family arrives from Cleveland and my sister’s brood pulls in from Minneapolis. After traveling 4,000 miles we’ll reunite at the midway point, my sister and brother-in-law’s home in Yorkville, for an old fashioned Midwestern Christmas.
The house will be filled with the imperfect details that created the perfect memories of our happy childhood. Tabletops will be buried under a disarray of cards from friends and loved ones. Tupperware will overflow with cut out cookies of reindeer, candles and Santas that are eaten before even frosted. The walls will be covered with handmade gifts of the heart and the tree adorned with a collection of decorations commemorating each new birth in the family.Read more→
When I first moved abroad and told Europeans I was from outside of Chicago, the first thing they did was point a finger, pull an imaginary trigger and say, « Bang, bang Al Capone…America so dangerous. »
Thirty years ago the first time my Frenchman and I took a road trip in the USA into the wilderness of Wisconsin, no less, he insisted on carrying a baseball bat in the car. With each new senseless mass murder, our ruthless image as the Wild West grows more prevalent abroad.
I have lived overseas more years than in my homeland, yet remain a proud American. The values we hold so true – freedom, equality, and democracy shaped the person I became. But as tragedy strikes again in the horrific shooting in an elementary school in Newtown Connecticut, and our most innocent victims are massacred, I am filled with questions. As movie goers in an Aurora Colorado theater on opening night of a Batman movie and bystanders in a mall in Oregon are killed by a madman, I question our “liberties”. At what point does the individual right infringe upon the rights of others to live peacefully in society?Read more→
Shaker Heights – only place in the USA where as many fans come to see the high school marching band as well as the football team
Football was my first love, but I’ll be the first to admit America can be a bit over the top when it comes to ball games. It’s nice to know there is one place on the planet where the drawing card is not just the football team itself, but the band playing in the halftime performance.
The Shaker Heights school system in the Greater Cleveland area emphasizes the arts and education, and is the rare place where spectators attend the ritual fall weekend game to admire both the band and the ball club.Read more→
On Thanksgiving Day, I dragged through the work feeling sad, wondering why bother to connect kids and cultures in my job as an international schoolteacher and ex pat blogger. I suffered from writer’s angst about my upcoming memoir publication. I missed my homeland, friends, and family, including both Big Kids now living in the States. Like the November weather outside my window, a dense fog settled in my soul. Then I received an unexpected gift – the Written Acts of Kindness Award – from a friend I have never met personally.
Kathy and I took Dan Blank’s Build Your Author Platform Course in 2011. Now we follow each other all over cyberspace! Kathy is a grandma on the go, retired family nurse practitioner, cancer survivor and inspiring writer, whose strong faith and sense of purpose comes through admirably on her blog site, Memoir Writer’s Journey. She is working on a memoir about the power of hope through her faith in God.Read more→
Ever since I moved to Europe thirty years ago, I have been hunting for Thanksgiving a l’américaine. My first year abroad I invited French teammates and they ate the food in courses, one dish at a time. The next year in Germany, the team turnout was so great, there was standing room only; we never sat down to dine. Another year French relatives replaced the turkey with chicken. Tom Turkey seemed gluttonous even for the hearty-eating French.
Thanksgiving in Normandy, 1984
When I was living in Dijon, I invited a Franco American family for what turned into another Thanksgiving fiasco starting with the great turkey hunt. Local merchants explained that whole turkeys are obsolete until the official slaughtering date on December 8th. I finally found a black market butcher, who ordered me a clandestine turkey, smuggled from abroad. I was stuffing the bird when the family that I had invited called to cancel as their child had the flu. We postponed Thanksgiving until Tuesday night since French children have no school Wednesdays.Read more→
I am up before dawn to see my chiropractor for the early bird special. With a 7 a.m. appointment, there is no wait; we beat the city traffic, and best of all Le Frenchman can chauffeur me there. For as long as I can remember I have suffered from chronic back pain. The decline began in college when a Big Mama landed on my back on a rebound in a basketball game. After that I walked so crooked that my college roomies tilted the pictures in our apartment to make me feel better. I have tried every treatment that exists, except surgery, and have become resigned to the fact that, okay, my back hurts, but life goes on.
Take one spine; add two herniated lumbar disks, three compressed dorsal vertebrae, four whiplashes and five concussions, and what do you get? One heck of a backache! My bod has undergone a lifetime of trauma. Bad back is an understatement. Yet if you look at me, you’d never know, because I keep on keeping on.
Here is how I cope with a full-time job, cross Atlantic travel and a semi active life.
laying down in Central Park, 1980s
Take mini breaks. I have a yoga mat in my office at school; I lay down and stretch in the middle of the day.
Wear tennis shoes with orthopedic soles. If your feet are imbalanced, your spine will misalign. Heels are a big no-no !
Use both sides of the body equally especially when lifting.
Invest in a good recliner and firm mattress to sleep on and a great pillow.
Alternate heat and cold. Sometimes only an anti inflammatory medicine can help the healing process begin as the muscles will become inflamed to protect the injured area.
Find a good chiropractor!
Try a combination of alternative medicine – physical therapy, massage, relaxation and meditation techniques.
Maintain mobility by staying fit – sometimes it is too painful to sit, but usually I can walk without too much discomfort.
If you have acute pain, limit riding in a car. If you do have to travel, stop, get out, and stretch every half hour.
If it hurts to sit, stand, or walk–then crawl. My Swiss chiropractor recommends getting down on « quatre pattes » as the crawling movement is natural before we became upright, back breaking bipeds.
Swim – there is no pressure on the joints and the water soothes the soul.
Find a good partner even if it means going halfway across the world.
… and above Mürren, Switzerland, 2012
When I get discouraged from the pain, I try to focus on someone else’s troubles. There is always a student, a colleague or a friend that is facing challenges far greater than a bad back. Anyway, I won’t be upright forever in my next life, I’ll be a fish.
