Lift Up Your Hearts!

It's hard being a long-distance grandmother, whether the distance is 1000 miles or 4800.  Certainly I'd rather our grandchildren live just down the street!  But one compensation for the loss of frequent interaction is the joy of seeing how much the children change between visits.  As we await the time when I'll have baby news to announce, I'll share a few stories of life with Joseph, 18 months old and soon to assume the important role of big brother.

John Ciardi said that a child should be allowed to learn, "at the rate determined by her own happy hunger."  Joseph's current "happy hunger" is for letters and numbers.  He  has a wooden puzzle of the upper case alphabet that is the first toy he takes out in the morning, and again after his nap.  This was supplemented at Christmas by the nicest number puzzle I've seen, which includes the numbers from 0 through 20 and arithmetic operators as well.

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[I know most of you are waiting for Baby News, but as that has not yet been forthcoming, I have to improvise.]

A series of experiments at Notre Dame sheds light on on the perennial "Why did I come into this room?" question.  Here are some excerpts from the Scientific American article, Why Walking through a Doorway Makes You Forget.  Most of the experiments were done in a video-game context, but the same effect was seen in real-life versions as well.

[Participants played a video game in which] they would walk up to a table with a colored geometric solid sitting on it. Their task was to pick up the object and take it to another table, where they would put the object down and pick up a new one. Whichever object they were currently carrying was invisible to them, as if it were in a virtual backpack.  Sometimes, to get to the next object the participant simply walked across the room. Other times, they had to walk the same distance, but through a door into a new room. From time to time, the researchers gave them a pop quiz, asking which object was currently in their backpack.  The quiz was timed so that when they walked through a doorway, they were tested right afterwards.  Their responses were both slower and less accurate when they'd walked through a doorway into a new room than when they'd walked the same distance within the same room.

Usually, returning to the room I started from will remind me of why I left in the first place.  But the researchers did not find that to be the case in their experiments.

[P]articipants sometimes picked up an object, walked through a door, and then walked through a second door that brought them either to a new room or back to the first room.  If matching the context is what counts, then walking back to the old room should boost recall. It did not.

The doorway effect suggests that there's more to the remembering than just what you paid attention to, when it happened, and how hard you tried.  Instead, some forms of memory seem to be optimized to keep information ready-to-hand until its shelf life expires, and then purge that information in favor of new stuff. ... [W]alking through a doorway is a good time to purge your event models because whatever happened in the old room is likely to become less relevant now that you have changed venues. ... Other changes may induce a purge as well:  A friend knocks on the door, you finish the task you were working on, or your computer battery runs down and you have to plug in to recharge.

Why would we have a memory system set up to forget things as soon as we finish one thing and move on to another?  Because we can’t keep everything ready-to-hand, and most of the time the system functions beautifully.

Take heart, distracted mothers!  That which frustrates you so badly was apparently designed to help with the rapid context-switching essential to your vocation.

If I weren't eating so well at the famous Swiss Zum Stücklin, I might be sad at missing the Outstanding in the Field event held at our favorite egg (and more) farm, Lake Meadow Naturals.  Not that I'm in the habit of spending $180/person on meals, not even in Switzerland, not even when we ate at the incomparable restaurant at Les Trois Rois in Basel.  But I'm happy for our local farm to get such national recognition.

We're stocking up on meals, pre-birth, and today made a double batch of our favorite stew.  The recipe calls for a hefty helping of paprika.  Spices should not necessarily be increased in direct proportion, but I like paprika, so I doubled the quantity—and then, as I usually do, threw in a bit more.

Some of Janet's spices are labelled in English, but most in the Swiss triumvirate of German, French, and Italian.  This jar had but a one-word label:  "paprica."  Perhaps paprika is the same in every language.

Or not.  The spice in that jar was decidedly not paprika as I have always known it.  Picture a pot of stew seasoned with a heaping tablespoon of red pepper....

The stew was delicious.  Even Joseph liked it.  (Then again, he asks for "spices" on almost everything.)  Hot pepper worked.  But it's a good lesson in taking care when cooking in another country.  What if "paprica" had actually meant "ginger"?

At this time last year I reflected on the results of my 2010 January resolution:  Read More Books.  It was an unqualified success:  In 2010 I had read 65 books of great variety:  print and audio, fiction and non-fiction, from children's lit to an 800-page survey of ancient history.  I felt quite good about it.

I'm not feeling so encouraged now.  For 2011, my total of 33 books was but half the previous year's.  Without doubt, even an avid bookworm like me needs to be vigilant and deliberate in making time for reading.

What happened?  I can think of a few factors, none negative in itself. (More)

So, Orlando finally gets a Wawa!  Nowhere near us yet, but there's hope.

I'm still waiting for a Trader Joe's....

Several months ago, Porter signed us up for a pre-anniversary present of tickets to the Orlando performance of The Screwtape Letters.  I tucked them carefully away in my Tickler file, and last week they popped up.  I'm very grateful for the Tickler and for Google Calendar—when you book things so far in advance it's all too easy to forget, especially in a season of other big events.  It was a delightful post-Christmas outing.

The location, the Plaza Live theater, was initially disappointing, as it looks—and smells—like the converted movie theater it is.  But that was easy to forget once the show started.

Not so easy to ignore was the excessive volume of the music and sound effects.  I did not want to resort to my earplugs, because the speaking part was of a reasonable volume, but after several assaults I gave up, and was still able to hear the monologue.  Yes, it's a monologue, though not a one-man show.  But the other character, Screwtape's secretary, Toadpipe, is a mime.  And played by a woman, so maybe it is a one-man show after all.

How do you adapt a book, consisting entirely of a series of letters, to the stage?  With difficulty, but they did a commendable job.  The stage setting is in Hell, where Screwtape is dictating his letters.  Toadpipe's acrobatics and the sound effects provide enough action to keep the show moving.  For what it is, the show is very well done, and should have large audience appeal.  It received a very positive review from the Orlando Sentinel.  Even I enjoyed it, no doubt because the script was so faithful to the original.  I know the book well enough to recognize that large sections were performed verbatim.  Much was, of necessity, left out—I had wondered how they would handle the part where Screwtape turns into a cockroach; they didn't—and there were one or two places where I thought there might have been just a little modernization.  But it's hard to beat C.S. Lewis for writing, so I'm glad they didn't try.  Best of all, the show stays true to the character of the book.

No show could replace the book itself.  But for an introduction to the book, it's a good performance.  If only they had turned the volume down!

A Boy's War by David Michell (OMF International, 1988)

In 2010, revelations of unspeakable abuse of missionary children at not one but two West African boarding schools only confirmed my intense belief that missions organizations sinned greatly against the very families that gave everything to serve with them, by expecting—often requiring—parents to send their children away to boarding school at a very young age.  After all, isn't one of the (multiple) lessons of the Old Testament story of Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son Isaac, the counter-cultural message that God does not ask parents to sacrifice their children, but himself provides the sacrifice?  How did the organizations dare preach Jesus Christ while demanding sacrifices to Moloch?  I'm not talking about high school-aged children who chose to go to boarding school for the sake of a better education and preparation for college, but little ones, as young as six, whose education would have been better accomplished at home with their parents.  I daresay the parents' missionary work would have benefitted as well, as the native peoples would have more easily accepted them as fellow human beings as they watched them interacting as families.

Granted, there are many excellent boarding schools.  My quarrel is not with families who choose this as the best educational option for their children, but with the missions that mandated the practice.  Why did the organizations rip children away from their parents in the name of God, and why did their parents put up with it?  It was a long time before I came up with a theory:  it may be because so many missions organizations have their roots in England, and other countries where sending small children off to boarding school was standard practice, a historical and cultural given. (More)

Why do Jehovah's Witnesses bring out the worst in me?  They're only doing what they think is best.

I'm not good with any form of un-asked-for solicitation, be it door-to-door, phone, e-mail, blog comment, junk mail, or any other form of spam.  I don't like being rude, but I've found that a quick, "No, thank you; I'm not interested," followed immediately by hanging up the phone or closing the door, to be the solution that wastes the least amount of time—not only mine, but theirs.  Why let them go on and on when I know I'm not going to give in to whatever they're selling?  I did know someone who would, on occasion, invite them in, and let them go on and on, thinking they were about to make a sale, until the whole evening was used up.  He figured he was saving several dozen other folks from having their evenings interrupted, and he found it somewhat amusing.  (Reality TV hadn't been invented yet.)  But that's not me.

When it comes to JWs, I also know people who will invite them in, serve them coffee, and spend the evening preaching the gospel to them.  I admire those who can do that, but it's definitely not me. (More)

It's not polite to think about items you didn't get for Christmas while we're still in the Christmas season.  But hey—at least no one thinks I'm hinting for a gift as I ponder things.

Those who know me will be shocked at what I am about to reveal, almost as shocked as when I admitted that I might actually want to own a Wii.  Oops, I haven't actually confessed that here yet.  But I had such a blast with the Wii Fit over Thanksgiving....

I am a book-lover.  That is, a lover of real, paper, take-'em anywhere, you-own-it-and-Amazon (or whoever)-can't take it away kinds of books.  Books that smell like books.  I dislike reading on a computer screen.  Back in the Dark Ages of last century, I tried reading a book on my then-leading-edge Palm handheld device.  Yuck.

However, the thought of owning an e-reader (Kindle, Nook, etc.) is slowly breaching my event horizon.  For one thing, the price is coming down.  I had dismissed Kindle early on, at the mere thought of holding a $300 "book" that would likely to break if dropped.  But $100 is a little less scary.  More than 2/3 less scary, for some reason.

Then this morning I was struck by two prods in the e-book direction.  First, an e-mail from Janet inquiring about a certain book, which opened my eyes to the idea that one can give e-reader books instantly, without worrying about delivery time or overseas shipping charges.

Shortly thereafter I read Conversion Diary's 7 Quick Takes Friday, from which I quote: (More)

(Continued from Pre-Christmas Fun.)

You wouldn't think that with just the two of us it would still take all day to open presents, but it very nearly did.

We slept a little late, due to yesterday's exhaustion, but we can never sleep in much, even without the pleasure of being awakened to Christmas carols on the clarinet.  (Yes, that is a pleasure!  We missed that this year.)  I finished the few preparations that I'd negelected last night, and we sat down to open our stockings.

Mothers—sometimes fathers, but more commonly mothers—often develop the bad habit of filling their own stockings.  For one thing, and this is unavoidable, if you have a gift that everyone gets (in our house this includes Toblerone, Mentos, citrus fruit, a coin) it makes sense to drop one into each stocking.  It would look very strange for one person to be left out.  But beyond that, it's just a bad habit.  One parent takes on the role of chief stocking-filler, and the other is content to let that stand.  In our case, when we had guests, this was almost a necessity, as so many moms were contributing to stockings that they overflowed without the dads having a chance.  But this year, I resisted.  There were only two of us, and why should I deprive Porter of the joy of finally having a chance to be Santa Claus with more than his traditional dollar coin?  So when I picked up a set of combs for each of us, I wrapped Porter's but put mine in the drawer.  When I bought tape, I wrapped some for Porter's stocking, but did not put any in my own.  Etc.

What a good decision!  Porter is a great Santa Claus!  So here is a word to all moms caught in my trap:  Share the joy!  Even if it means prodding your man a bit to get him started.  Why should moms do all the work have all the fun?

On to breakfast!  As usual for Christmas day, the clementines from the toes of our stockings were the only part of breakfast we could consider healthful.  But mmmmm!  Raspberry kringle (thanks, NMKB!), Dutch banket (pastry filled with almond paste), almond raisin bread ... you get the picture.  When our children were young Christmas breakfast was primarily Lucky Charms, as Christmas and birthdays were the only occasions sugary cereals were allowed in the house.  We adults prefer our sugar in different forms, but Christmas morning at our house is traditionally overwhelmingly sweet.  Traditional for our family, that is.  Growing up in my own family, I don't remember any particular Christmas breakfast traditions besides a stocking tangerine, and an "eat faster so we can get to the Christmas tree!" attitude.  My parents graciously, but with a show of reluctance, conceded to drink their after-breakfast coffee in the living room.

Neither of us drinks coffee, but I would have brought my tea into the living room if we had had time.  But it was then time to get ready for church. (More)

The Zen of Fish: The Story of Sushi, from Samurai to Supermarket by Trevor Corson (HarperCollins, 2007)

Eating sushi is like rearing children:  there's always someone happy to point out that you're doing it all wrong.

Not that I care much.  So what if many of the rolls I love are American inventions?  If the Japanese consider them to be inside-out rolls?  If adding more seasoning to your roll is an insult to the chef?  (Well, I suppose I care a bit more about the last.  I don't like insulting people, especially not those who are providing my dinner.  Then again, I'm the one eating it.)  I like Japanese sushi; I like American sushi; and I don't mind being too unsophisticated to enjoy the sea urchin and raw quail egg combo that Porter ordered in Boston.

However, I was happy to learn that sushi is meant to be eaten with the fingers, not chopsticks.  And eaten in one bite—though I'm not sure how.  Do the Japanese have larger mouths than Americans?  Seems unlikely.

The Zen of Fish weaves the history, science, and culture of America's unexpected food craze together with the adventures of students at the California Sushi Academy.  It's well-written, highly informative, fun to read, and will make you very hungry—when it's not causing you to rethink consuming fish in any form.  My only complaint is that the author apparently considered his target audience to be largely made up of adolescent boys.  I could have done without most of the sexual references and innuendo—although it was quite cool to learn about the shrimp that start out male, then after a few years become female.  The timing of the change assures a gender-balanced population, suggesting perhaps that shrimp are smarter than people.

Okay, even writing about sushi makes me hungry.

This post was going to include Christmas Day, but it turned out to be pretty long, so I've divided it into two parts.

Last Sunday we enjoyed the Festival of Nine Christmas Lessons and Carols at the Cathedral Church of St. Luke, featuring the Boy Choir and Girls Choir.  I'm tired of hearing that today's kids only want to sing pop songs!  If that's all they hear, of course that's what they'll want to sing.  But these boys and girls sing excellent music from several centuries, and with beautiful, pure voices.  The singers included a couple of friends of ours:  one boy man, now a college graduate (alumni are invited to sing with the choirs), whom we knew as a very young Suzuki violinist, and a second-generation Girl's Choir singer whose mother we knew when she was in high school.  Perhaps my favorite part of the service, however, was the instructions, printed in the bulletin, to the congregation.  No slackers allowed:  "Please stand and sing the entire hymn in harmony."  (Emphasis mine.)  That and seeing several long-time friends (I've reached the age when "old friends" is not the preferred term) at the excellent reception afterwards.

Friday night we took a break and returned to the Morse Museum for our third time in a month: they showcase music as well as art during this season.  We didn't stay long, however, and spent most of the time talking to some friends we unexpectedly met.  We would like to have returned Saturday, when the Raintree Chamber Players were to be featured, but that was Christmas Eve, and we had a few other plans.... (More)

Here's one reason why it's more fun to be Episcopalian/Anglican/Catholic/Orthodox or anyone else for whom Christmas lasts a full twelve days.

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Don't forget NORAD Tracks Santa!  (I see they have some new videos this year.)  As I write this, Santa is at the International Space Station.  I'd love to see what a reindeer wears for a space suit.

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This is for our children, who never considered themselves Disney fans as the world knows Disney, but who grew up in Mickey's backyard.  Happy memories! (H/T Richard S. and the GGGAMB)

Happy Christmas to all, and to all a Good Night!