Staying Connected at Christmas Always Worth the Trip

My sibling and I live 5,000 miles apart, away from our childhood home, yet in spite of the distance we remain close. It helped that we were a family born on wheels. In the sixties, at time when most people wouldn’t take four kids five years apart any further than the corner grocery store, my grandparents and parents loaded the station wagon with, nine bags, eight bodies and one big red ice chest and hit the road. Like the Beverly Hillbillies, we cruised the blue highways from sea to shining seas in our beat up old Rambler.

We grew up believing life was an endless road trip. Consequently we continue to spend an inordinate amount of time in our adult lives riding the rail, flying the sky, and pounding the pavement to remain connected.

Just last week over a span of 24 hours, my youngest sister, Karen, drove to my son’s college game in Minnesota, one evening, and dropped our daughter, Nathalie, off at the Minneapolis airport at 6 am the next morning. Then she drove 7 hours to Sterling to support my mom and middle sister, Sue, as my dad recovered from delicate hip reconstruction surgery in Sterling Rock Falls Hospital. Meanwhile my older brother, Doug, and sister in law, Julianne, picked up Nat at the airport in Cleveland and chauffeured her to her residency interview at Rainbow Baby and Children’s Hospital.

In the meantime, Rush Memorial called her for an interview, so my brother-in-law, Cliff in the Chicago suburbs, helped change her ticket and arranged her pick her up 0’Hare Airport. He will drive her to her appointment at Rush; she’ll take the train from there back to the airport to fly to Utah for another interview.

On December 17th, Gerald and I were supposed to fly from Geneva via Amsterdam to Minneapolis. Our son will pick us up in the car he borrows regularly from my brother-in-law Dick. Then after Nathalie arrives from Utah, we will drive back down to Sterling, via our cabin at Summit Lake, to celebrate my dad’s successful surgery.

“And that my dear,” Aunt Mary used to say, “is love in action.”

One wonders what do people do without family?

Every winter, the McKinzie clan will log miles in the air and on land, braving blizzards, airline strikes and flight delays because Christmas happens whenever, wherever and however we can get together.

Be sure to rejoice in the gift of family especially this holiday season. Safe travels to you wherever you gather. May your wheels keep spinning for another year.

Living in Darkness Without Losing Hope

On, December 21st, the earth tilts farthest from the sun in the Northern Hemisphere. Ah, the gloomy gray Winter Solstice, the longest night of the year. No one knows as much about enduring dark days as my Norwegian relatives living on fjords by Narvik, near the North Pole. I, too, have learned how to live with limited light. For the past three years I have lived in darkness as I endure a medical treatment for a multi system, auto immune, inflammatory disease in which my body produces too much Vitamin D. I live in a house with lights off, my skin covered head to toe and hide behind thick black glasses. I lurk in the shadows, coming out at night like Boo Radley in To Kill A Mockingbird.

In one of my greatest moments of despair, I came to terms with the idea that we are all dying. Get over it, girl. As soon as we are born, our cells begin to decay. When I lament that I cannot ski the Alps, run marathons, travel the world as I so hoped after I “retired” from basketball, I focus on what I can do. I can write letters, give pep talks, edit English papers, encourage students, and offer support to family, friends and newcomers to Switzerland.

Right now as I write this, I am flat on my back, listening to my iPod, and typing on a laptop while resting the spine. This is not the life I envisioned. Oh no, I was going to conquer the world straight up. Even though I am often limited to my four dark walls, in a house shuttered closed like Fort Knox, I am amazed at how far the mind can wander. I can brush up on my German or French, strum my guitar, watch Macbeth, (ugh) take an on-line course, and write a blog.

Like a rapper without the bling, I walk to school in my hoody, shades and tennis shoes. Sometimes I lose my footing. But if Stevie Wonder could compose, “ You Are the Sunshine of My Life” and insisted “Don’t You Worry ‘bout a Thing,” in total darkness, I can make it through another day teaching with the lights turned low.

Everyday I gaze at the painting my dad made me of a lighthouse signaling safety from the stormy black sea. I focus on the pale reflection and pray for those struggling in the darkness; for my colleague suffering from depression, for my dad regaining use of his leg, for my buddy recovering from foot surgery, for a friend battling cancer, for all those people who are facing the loss of a limb, a life dream, a loved one, in moments of doubt and darkness.

Even though the blackness of longest night of the year seems interminable, I still have sunshine in my soul. And miraculously, the more I spread my light to others, the greater the hope, glows within me.

Snow Storms Leaves Passengers Stranded in Europe, Including Me!

Well, that was an interesting voyage. Round trip to nowhere. We left the house before daybreak and ten hours later, returned home in the dark again. We never left the airport, yet felt like we’d travelled for weeks. Since most European countries lack heavy snow removal equipment even a couple, little snowflakes creates huge havoc on the entire continent.

Lechault’s snowed in at home

First bad omen: our taxi got stuck at the stoplight at the corner of our street. While our wheels spun on a patch of ice, a Renault Scenic smashed into the back of a Volkswagen Passat at the adjacent stoplight. Fifty yards further, a Mercedes slammed into the stoplight on the overpass knocking out the traffic signals.

In bumper-to-bumper traffic, we crept toward the airport. As soon as we arrived at the check in gate, a voice announced on the public address system, “Due to inclement weather, the Geneva airport will be closed until further notice.”

Ever optimistic, KLM personnel insisted we check our bags and pass controls to wait at the gate, just in case. But as soon as the Geneva airport reopened, the Amsterdam airport closed. We counted as one after the other flights across Europe to London, Paris, Frankfurt, Stockholm, Madrid, and Moscow were cancelled on the departure board. Our flight was rescheduled for noon; fifteen minutest later the red sign popped up, “cancelled.”

Luckily, Geneva is a small airport, so I felt at home in what turned into a mini reunion of the international school. All morning, I chatted with a colleague whose flight to London was delayed. In the afternoon, I caught up with a couple of 12th grade students who were booked on that same ill-fated, KLM flight. We waited for rerouting in a line that crawled forward a foot every fifty minutes. After four hours, we finally reached the rebooking counter, and I offered hopefully. “We could fly to Chicago instead of Minneapolis.”

Fat chance flying anywhere. During the Christmas holidays, flights worldwide were over booked. Forty-five minutes later the airline agent suggested, “Sunday, we have space on a flight to Paris with a stop over in Washington, then Minneapolis.” I collapsed on the counter!

“Pleeeaaasssee, I have health problems, can you recheck for a more direct flight?”

By then, I looked like I rolled under a cement truck, so she searched the computer screen again. A half hour later, she found a Continental flight to Newark then on to Minneapolis.

Last leg, flag down a taxi and head back to our own bed. Passengers across Europe slept the night in the airports. Since snow is a natural phenomenon, the airlines aren’t responsible for providing meals or overnight accommodations. It could be worse. In light of everything else that could go wrong in life, it is ONLY a cancelled flight. And when it snows, it is best to be stranded at home.

After the taxi dropped us in front our snow covered house, I discovered students had left a bag of homemade chocolates and a bottle of wine on my doorstep. There is a God, after all.

Bonne nuit. But will I sleep? Yikes, in 48 hours, I am flying over the Atlantic again!

Escalade Celebrating The Pot of Soup that Saved Geneva

Sounds crazy, but the Genevians go gaga over L’Escalade, a tradition commemorating Madame Royaume’s famous soup that saved the city from the Savoyard invasion in early hours on December 12, 1602.

Genevians held off the Duke of Savoy’s invading forces with a little help from a housewife. According to legend the night guard, Isaac Mercier, rang the church bells alerting the local militia. But the real hero was Madame Royaume, mother of fourteen, living above the La Monnaie town gate. She poured a pot of scalding vegetable broth over the ramparts. The heavy cauldron hit a Savoyard’s head, killing him as he was scaling the wall. The commotion spurred the residents to action. Tables, chairs and other pieces of furniture flew over the wall that night as the Genevians fought to maintain their freedom from Savoyard rule.

Every mid December, the quiet Calvin city comes alive in a carnival atmosphere like a giant street party. The event entails various activities, street artists and vendors serving mulled wine and soup at outdoor stands. Shop windows, decorated in Geneva’s colors of red and gold, are filled with chocolate cauldrons, symbolizing Madame Royaume’s marmite, filled with candy vegetables made of marizipan.

On December 4, the festivities kicked off with the 33rd annual Escalade Race where over 22,000 participants ran or walked four miles up and down Geneva’s snow covered, cobblestone streets.

During the weekend of Dec. 10-12, the prestigious Companie de 1602, the society founded in 1926, organizes one of the most beautiful historic events in Europe attended by 80,000 visitors. The highlight of the fight for independence over 400 years ago is three-hour torch lit parade led where 800 members in period costume re-inact the scene in Geneva’s Old Town. Musketeers, pipers, horsemen, drummers are accompanied by fire crackers and gun salutes.

Though I have smashed open a chocolate pot or two as tradition demands, we never fully joined the festivity of throngs of people crowding Geneva’s streets. Yet, I can’t help but savor the moral of that little Swiss story. Supermom, Mom saves the day again.

Sad Day For Switzerland When Foreigners Go Home

Switzerland the neutral, landlocked country at the heart of Europe is associated with chocolate, cheese, and cozy chalets but underneath this image of paradise, lurks an evil, ugly undertone.

A year after voting to ban the minaret, the symbol of Muslim worship, Switzerland voted for automatic expulsion of foreign criminals. After spending millions on racist posters promoting fear, the right wing SVP party won the campaign. 52.9% of vote and 20 cantons endorsed the proposal. Only six cantons voted against it and they were the French speaking ones, which many Swiss consider a separate country. Instead of hope, foreigners live in fear. Ironically, about 20% of Switzerland is composed of foreigners making up a work force predominately fueled by immigrants.

With illegal alien status in the past, I remember living in fear in someone else’s country. I have always been a black sheep. Pioneers live on the fringes of society struggling for acceptance in new roles. In 1980, as a 23-year-old, I emigrated to Europe for an opportunity then denied in my homeland, to play professional basketball. Since then, I have been at the mercy of foreign – French, German, Swiss – governments as an auslander.

Before marrying a Frenchman, I waited in long lines at city hall to renew my residency permit. I spent sleepless night worrying about obtaining a work permit, and then anguished over renewing it every three, six, twelve months depending on the laws of the country. Not allowed to sit on the bench, I instructed my French team from the stands when denied a coaching permit before legal matrimony. For years without work papers, I was paid “au noir” under the table for odd jobs.

Even today working and living in an international environment, not a day goes by where I forget that I am a guest in someone else’s country. As a white skinned foreigner, I no longer worry about keeping a low profile, afraid of being apprehended in Paris without the proper paperwork proving my legitimacy. In airports and train stations, I still feel anxious that I may be stopped and detained for some infraction.

But my fear is far greater for my darker skinned brother whose differences are more visible. Without steady employment, without family network, and without a Francophone spouse who can interpret the legalities and help fight for one’s rights and dignity, assimilation as a foreigner is difficult even in the best of circumstances. I chose to leave my homeland during a time when a career as a profession female athlete seemed like a frivolous pursuit, but even then, I never doubted, should my venture fail, I would always be welcomed back home. What about those who flee to survive, like political refugees and asylum seekers escaping from totalitarian governments and war torn societies? Or others like my grandfather who came to America in pursuit of a better life?

In the picture-perfect, postcard image of Switzerland, cows graze in green valleys where tidy villages spill out of a backdrop of spectacular white-peaked mountains. But underneath this placid scene, a storm is brewing. Is Switzerland as tranquil and tolerant as it appears?

Giving Thanks for Basketball

This Thanksgiving along with family, friends, and health, I am giving thanks for basketball. Thanks to Sterling High School, Illinois State University, UW-Stevens Point, the first women’s pro league WBL, International Basketball Association FIBA , and all the other high school, colleges, international clubs and federations that granted women permission to play basketball. Because it wasn’t so long along that girls were confined to the sideline.

Sterling Daily Gazette 1977

I am thankful for Jim McKinzie, the first man convinced I had the right to play. He taught me how to dribble and shoot before a time when dads and daughters playing ball together was apropos. In 1977, he coached my younger classmates and sister, Karen, to Illinois’ First Girls State Championship as co-coach of the Sterling Golden Girls. That first tournament was played at my alma mater Illinois State University where I earned the first college basketball scholarship, playing for the woman who first proved that a women’s heart wouldn’t explode by running fullcourt. God bless Coach Jill Hutchinson. And Shirley Egner, once a rival of mine graduating from UW-LaCrosse, making her mark as DIII national championship coach, who thirty years later shaped my daughter as an athlete at University Wisconsin Stevens Point.

Coach Hutchinson, Coach Egner & Nat

I’ve never been back for an ISU alumni game nor experienced the thrill of playing at my college alma mater in the Redbird Area in front of 10,000 fans. I’ve never even had the honor of racing down that polished wooden floor on my own highschool gym. In my day when girls were finally granted permission to play, we were relegated to the junior high gym.

I spent the first decade of childhood fighting to get on the court, the second decade playing the game, the third coaching competitively abroad, the fourth writing about the sport and the fifth feeling grateful that one day forty some years ago, somebody under my roof in my community, at my college, in my country gave me – a girl – a chance to play a man’s game. To gain that opportunity at that time was a battle; many people fought it every step of our way.

This Thanksgiving weekend, Sterling High School celebrates its first alumni basketball game. I wish I could be there, not to hit jumpers – my playing days ended long ago – but to give thanks. Over a century ago, James Naismith invented the game to bring people together and sent it traveling round the world with the missionaries he trained. I did my own small bit coaching internationally uniting high school players from all four corners of the globe. From starting the first girl’s basketball camp in Sauk Valley to initiating the first alumni game at the International School of Geneva, my life has been about taking the opportunity people gave me and passing it on, so that nobody grew up feeling second best.

This T-Day, no one thinks twice about girls getting sweaty, knocking down treys and going coast to coast. Nowadays, women would never consider blessing the gift of the game along with the bird. Equal opportunity in sport and education is a given. But today at my table, I’m taking time to thank the people who paved the way. Hallelujah, the chance to play ball is a birthright. Even for the female gender. Amen.