Good News!

Graduating from anything is a big deal, but for my children graduating from college is monumental because they each have a moderate hearing loss. The statistics on graduation from a university for people with hearing loss aren't very good. Like less than 30% of deaf individuals who enroll, graduate from a 4 yr. school. It is no easy feat to pull off, so in honor of the fact I am within mere weeks of celebrating two of my kids graduating from college, Ezra and Hadassah: A Portrait of American Royalty on all ebook platforms is ON SALE for 99 cents!
Let's all celebrate this wonderful academic achievement in the best way possible, by getting our educations on and reading my book.  From now until my kids graduation day on May 16th, 2015, in the ebook platform of your choice, the book is 99 cents!
Yay! Yay! Yay!

Kiss, kiss, love, love and many happy tears from my family to yours. 

Our Gang
(L to R) Ty, Rob, Flat Jennifer,(she wasn't present for photo in person) Heather and Elise

How to Get Your Kids to Eat Vegetables

One of the hard things to deal with is a kid who won't eat good food, formally known as vegetables. Many adults won't eat them either (like Pres. George H.W. Bush who hates broccoli. Do you remember his dust-up with the Broccoli Association? Apparently US presidents are supposed to suck it up and eat their vegetables, no matter what. ) The problem with vegetables is they don't have a good advertising campaign. Kool-aid has the Kool-aid man, Tang used to be "the drink of Astronauts!" and who doesn't love Tony the Tiger and his Frosted Flake cereal? Who is standing up for the lowly Brussels Sprout? Not a soul.

The only vegetable in America that had widespread success in being eaten by children during the 1960's and 70's was spinach. Of course, it wasn't just any old spinach. No one ate it raw on salads back then besides my hippie next door neighbors who were vegetarians. I loved hanging out with the free-range hippie kids, but I rarely stuck around at meal times. I preferred hamburgers to plates of beets, celery and dandelion roots.

I happily ate spinach (only from a can, the way God intended it) because I was an avid watcher of the world's most subversive cartoon ad campaign for that veggie. Popeye the Sailor man ate spinach to give him extra strength before fighting his evil nemesis, Brutus. What scrawny kid looking to protect themselves from older kids, wouldn't investigate the wonders of canned spinach after watching Popeye pop open a can of it, gulp it down and then stop a moving train with his bare hands? I was sold.

Genius. Sheer genius.

I maintain Popeye the Sailor Man still holds up well today as a ringing endorsement of eating your spinach. You can find Popeye spinach (it comes frozen, too)  if you look for it. I have a can in my kitchen cupboard right now. Show your kids the cartoon and let Popeye do his job. He's good at it.

 As Mikey for Life cereal would say, "Try it! You'll like it!" Meanwhile, enjoy the Popeye cartoon  episode, Spinach vs. Hamburgers on me. For the record, just like the children in the cartoon,  I eat both. I am sucker for good advertising

 

 

 

Bedknobs and Broomsticks

When Rex and I left the foster home our clothes were packed in brown paper grocery bags. Nowadays foster kids use black plastic trash bags. Such is progress.

We were allowed to pick two personal belongings from our childhoods to take with us. Imagine permanently leaving your home with only two possessions. Since I was 7 yrs. old and had no understanding of what was happening to us, it was a miracle I picked the two things that actually meant the most to me. I have never regretted my choices.

The only thing I still have in my possession (my beloved Mrs. Beasley doll was taken from me and given to another child, remember?) is the long-playing record and read-a-long storybook from the Disney movie Bedknobs and Broomsticks. I still remember the day Ralph and Claudia took me to the theater to see my first movie,  B & B.  My love of movies and Flicks Chocolates began that day. 

They don't make them like this anymore. 

I think I had nice handwriting as a child, considering my chicken-scratch writing now. 

The funniest part of the story is their bed being fished out of the lake by a bear. Still makes me laugh. 

I can hardly wait to share this story with my granddaughter Eleanor. My own kids preferred watching the movie, but Eleanor is an old soul and she will get it how cool listening to the story and looking at the pictures is. 

Be Nice to the Little People

My hair was my attempt at fashion, cira 1985

1985 was a good year to graduate high school. I was slightly amazed I made it. On my first day at Maryvale High I was sure that I would never finish because 4 years was forever long and the world would surely end before I was done serving my high school sentence. Good thing I decided to hedge my bets and act like the world would carry on past the '80's.

During the first weeks of high school I attended a mandatory freshman class assembly that was supposed to get us excited about our next 4 years. The inspirational speaker told us that our years at Maryvale could be the best ever, if we chose to get involved and make our marks. I am a sucker for inspiration, so I decided to start off with a bang. I convinced my best friend, Stephanie Hauger that we should run for Freshman Class Presidency. I would be president and she would be vice president. We could be popular and involved from the very beginning, thereby guaranteeing we wouldn't "waste a moment of this precious time of your lives!" as the inspirational speaker exhorted.

Yeah...that didn't go so well. It turns out in a freshman class of over 800 students (Maryvale was an urban high school with over 3,000 students in total. Crazy big.) where kids came from at least 3 junior high schools, there was no way a freaky girl with weird hair, bad skin, a gap between her front teeth and thrift store clothes was going anywhere but straight to ridicule. My biggest regret about that disaster is that I dragged Stephanie along for a ride on the Public Humiliation Train. She had no interest in making her mark or being the center of attention.  She only agreed to the stupid campaign because she was my friend. Trust me, it never happened again.

Anyway, all that to say I started off my high school career off in a spectacular spectacle of shame. I learned to keep to my lowly station in the social order and didn't run for any popularity contests again. The people had spoken and they yelled quite loudly.

Everything was quiet on the "making my mark" front until the last weeks of school my senior year.
At the beginning of the school year, our class voted on the Senior Mosts. You know, like Most Likely to Succeed, Cutest Couple, etc. The voting happened well before fall holiday season because the winners pictures were going to be immortalized in our final yearbook and that had to be wrapped up so it could go to the printers. I felt a twinge of sadness when I not only wasn't a Senior Most, I wasn't even in the yearbook for anything besides being an inmate at the asylum. I hadn't made my mark. I hadn't made ANY mark. High school was another nothing experience in my life. That inspirational speaker my freshman year was full of crap. Graduation couldn't come soon enough for me.

I held those bitter thoughts until May 24, 1985. That was the day my attitude towards Maryvale High completely changed. I was reading the weekly school newspaper before English class when I saw it. I reread it at least 10 times before I reacted. How Could This Be?  I didn't know anything about it. No one told me it was even going on. Maryvale High was big enough that stuff was always going on that I didn't know about, but how did I miss this? I completely missed it. Right there, on page 3, I made my mark without even knowing about it.

The day never to be forgotten

It turns out the headline for this fabulousness isn't quite true. The Senior Mosts that were voted on in the fall, for the yearbook were tabulated from only seniors votes. I didn't have a chance in Hades of being in the yearbook because everyone in my class knew I was goober. But the Spring Senior Favorites were voted on from students in the whole school.  And that is where I made my mark.

Unlike other seniors, I was nice to the underclassmen. I didn't close doors in their faces, I didn't trip anyone and more importantly, I talked to them. I don't know if it was an organized thing by a few students or what, but the underclass students propelled me to my moment of greatness. I actually was voted Most Likely to be President! Can you believe it? Kelly Cantele certainly couldn't. She said to me, "I don't know how you won. I expected competition from Judy Milam because she is so smart and pretty, but not you." I nodded, knowing exactly what she meant. How could I be deserving of such attention? I was in only one honors class (unlike her), didn't hang out with the popular kids (unlike her) or drive a nice car (unlike her). I had nothing, except I had friends in the freshman, sophomore and junior classes.

That is the life lesson for you, my friend. Always, always, be nice to the little people. You never know when they will rise up and vote for you.

Indivisible Under God

 

 

 

A friend recently mentioned she doesn't understand why I am religiously still a Mormon. She knows I don't fit into the straight-laced, ultra-conservative Mormon stereotypes that she thinks of when she considers what a Mormon is.

I thought about it and replied that because of my brother, I have a different perspective on religion. She accepted that and we went back to discussing more interesting topics, like what we were eating for lunch. Of course, like all deep questions in life, there is more than a one sentence answer to the topic. As I considered the question of why I am a Mormon more deeply, I came up with a few more answers.

I think I am still (because lots of people are raised in a religion and chose to leave the faith of their childhood when they are adults) a Mormon because I have found my people there. Let's face it, Mormons are not main-stream Christians. Although we profess to worship Christ, lots and lots of other religions argue we aren't Christian because we do things a bit differently. I don't care. It doesn't bother me to stand with a group of people that others consider odd. I've never had the luxury of fitting in with the norm, so I am fine with being thought of as different. Maybe if I had an ideal childhood with a perfect family I would have more trouble with being Mormon, but I didn't, so there you go.

Since Rex and I were introduced to a full menu of religions as children in foster care, I appreciate the variety of religiousness that colors our world. I don't get hung up on which way of worship that God prefers. I think God likes them all, otherwise he would have tattooed his will on our bottoms to begin with.

 I do believe in God. I have dear friends that don't and I understand that too. It is hard to believe in something that you can't touch or see with your own eyes. I think of it like New York City. I know NYC exists because millions of people live there. I've seen pictures of it and read lots of words written about it. I believe people when they tell me about it, although I've never seen it myself. I haven't walked the streets, smelled the air or touched the ground. I am fine with believing that New York City exists based on the testimonies of others who have experienced it first hand. Same with God. I haven't seen angels or talked to God face to face, but I believe my brother Rex did. I believe that what Rex testified of, that God exists and is aware of us, is true. I have no reason to doubt my brother's  knowledge because I experienced the results of his belief. I believe in judging things by the fruits of their work and Rex's understanding of  God was sweet, wonderful and life changing.

Rather than focusing my limited energy on which religion is true, right and proper to the exclusion of all others, I prefer taking the inclusive road. I acknowledge all belief systems that help people survive this troubled world and promote peace, charity and love, are good. I respect our right to chose for ourselves what to worship. Some worship money or physical attributes. Others worship pleasure or recreation. I worship easing suffering, lifting burdens and not adding more grief to an already messed up world.
I think that we are created by God and that we will return to God when our time on earth is over. I think that we are indivisible from God because we carry his spark of creation within ourselves. Just as my love for my family keeps me connected to them, I am also connected to you by virtue of our shared human experience. We are family, indivisible under God.

Good Things Are Happening!

It has been a gratifying week for me. First, this wonderful two part book review of Ezra and Hadassah came out:

Part one: http://mamamem.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-review-ezra-and-hadassah-part-1.html

Part two: http://mamamem.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-review-ezra-and-hadassah-part-2.html

I appreciated both parts of the author's reviews because she dissected the book and commented on so many of the points I wanted to make to the reader. I am thrilled she understood.

Second, my book is currently being reviewed for publication by the US subsidiary of the Oxford University Press. I know it is a long process for them to make a decision and that is completely fine with me. Heck, it is an honor to be considered!

Third, I have been asked to speak at a symposium this summer about foster care. I don't have the official details yet, but unlike my husband (who believes nothing is official until it is official) I believe in celebrating even a whiff of good news. So YAY!

and lastly, I have been reminded how danged good my life has turned out. The above book review talked about my brother and I having resiliency - the ability to bounce back from adversity. I take that as a compliment. I also know that I had whole teams of loving human beings who carried me every step of the way through the rough parts of my life. For them, I am eternally grateful. Just to drive home the point that my brother and I beat ALL the statistics for kids in foster care, here are the most current stats: (warning - they will break your heart.)

 

 

We WERE lucky, even if it didn't start out that way. In the end, we found our way out and I am so happy for us.

"He PUNCHED me!"

We were at a reunion with our adopted dad's family. It was a hot summer day in Washington state and all us cousins were running around outside like puppies with rabies, sweating and foaming at the mouth but having the time of our lives. The adults lounged on the back porch overseeing the charcoal grill and in the family room, enjoying the iced baskets of beer and other adult beverages. My adoptive parents were the only adults sipping Pepsi and  non-alcoholic lemonade.

For us kids, the drink of choice at the day-long reunion was Hawaiian Punch. It was a rarely given party treat since Kool-aid at 5 cents a packet was the day-to-day drink of childhood.  After one particularly challenging game of Hide and Seek, I was red-faced and panting, bent forward while trying to catch my breath. My brother Rex, who uncharacteristically found a couple of unknown cousins willing to play with him, was joyous as he bounded over to me.
"Hey! You look hot. Do you want a Hawaiian Punch?" he asked me, a strange question to ask since we were not in habit of treating each other with kindness and civility. I should have been suspicious, but I wasn't.
"Sure!" I replied.
Rex grinned and drew back his fist in a dramatic wind- up and proceeded to sock me in the nose. Not only was I not prepared to get punched in the face, it was so out character for Rex that I couldn't believe he actually did it. He stood there, smiling like the Cheshire Cat while I yelped, "Whadya do that for?" while holding my throbbing nose.
He said, "Well, you said you wanted a Hawaiian Punch and I gave you one." like somehow that excused his felonious assault on me.
Then I got hopping mad. I did the most evil thing I could think of to get back at him.
I ran and told Harley and Virginia what Rex did to me, punctuated with tears and wailing and pointed fingers in Rex's direction. Harley and Virginia glanced at each other and at the adults standing around, listening to my pitiful story.
"Go tell Rex to come here." said Harley in a rare show of fatherly authority. At home it was Virginia that dealt with disciplinary infractions, with Harley as the henchmen who followed her orders.
Rex appeared at my side in front of the now fully assembled Adult Court of the Spencer Family Reunion.
"So what happened?" Harley asked Rex.
"I asked her if she wanted a Hawaiian Punch and when she said yes, I gave her one." He replied, fully confident in his logic.
"But he PUNCHED me in the nose!"I sobbed, rubbing my nose red with my hand.
The slightly-tipsy crowd of adults roared with laughter. They slapped their knees and hoisted their beer cans in Rex's direction.
 "You gotta give the boy credit, he asked her permission." someone from the back piped up. "Yep, she said she wanted a Hawaiian Punch, so what can you do?"
Harley and Virginia looked at Rex laughing with the crowd, and at me, with a sore but otherwise unhurt nose.
"Alright. That's enough. Go play, and Rex - don't give anyone anymore Hawaiian Punches." Harley waved us away and the royal court disbanded, wandering away to get seconds of Grandma Spencer's cold potato salad and a fresh beer. I knew that if we were at home (where we never had Hawaiian Punch to drink) Rex would have gotten the dickens beat out him, but I could see how that response wouldn't have flown very well at the reunion. Rex got very, very lucky that day.

We went back to playing and the afternoon wore on. I played a game of  "Double Dog Dare You" that was really just an excuse to show off my tree climbing skills and that also gave me an opportunity to kiss a cute cousin in the name of never backing down from a dare.

Hours later the reunion busted up when the cops were called because one of the now very drunk uncles brandished a kitchen knife at his equally drunk wife and was threatening to stab her if she didn't quit whining to the other women about how little their house was.

As our station wagon pulled away from the curb, Virginia turned to Harley and said, "It's ok with me if we never do that again." and he agreed. In the way-way back of the station wagon I watched the drunk uncle being handcuffed and led to the backseat of the police car while the rest of the family gathered around in the dusky light of evening. When we turned the corner and the extended Spencer family clan disappeared from view,  I realized that was the most fun day I'd ever had in my whole life.

Hawaiian Punch, indeed. Good one, Rex, good one.