(Gran) "Daddy Daycare"

We've had a lot of fun with our grandchildren over the years. This picture from the summer of 1990 (20 years ago!!) shows Grandpa Bud watching over Alyssa in the wading pool at Legion Park near our home in West Des Moines. Katrina is in her purple bathing suit looking to see what her little sister is up to while Zach is in the figured white trunks in the background, merrily splashing away.
I'll always be grateful for days like these spent with my grandchildren as they grew up. I'm so lucky we lived near them.

Now we have great-grandchildren to enjoy. And although we probably won't be as much a part of their lives as we were the grand kids, it will still be fun and memorable to be around them.

In this picture, cousins, Ridge (Brock's son) and Rodney (Katrina's son), are playing at our home last Saturday - looks like they are wrestling.

The subject of day care came up while they were here. I don't know what the statistics are, but I'm sure almost all children now spend at least some time in the care of others while their parents earn a living. My generation was probably the last one to be raised by a mother who did not work outside the home.

I was lucky when Doug was little and I went back to work because my Mom was willing to take care of him. I did not have to worry about him during the day while I was at the office. I knew he was in good hands. He did occasionally stay at Marilyn Mitchell's and Carolyn Dixon's. In both those homes he had other little kids to learn to get along with.

By the time I moved to Mt. Vernon, Iowa, Doug was in kindergarten. I've forgotten the name of the family he stayed with after school, but remember they had a boy his age. And the family that he stayed with the two evenings a week while I took college courses in Cedar Rapids doted on him - they had four girls and were happy to have a little boy around.

Finding reliable day care for Kari and Preston was a little more difficult. I didn't know anyone in West Des Moines. It was a case of picking someone out of the ads. Some of them didn't last too long. When Kari was a toddler, I picked her up after work one day and the woman was so apologetic because her little boy had bitten Kari. O.K. - that can happen. But when it happened again, I looked for someone new to watch her. And got really lucky - the principal at Denny's school had a next door neighbor who wanted to do day care. Shirley was just the opposite of the previous woman - she did too good a job. Kari became a part of the Water's family. I remember the night I went to pick her up after work and she cried because she wanted to stay with Shirley instead of going home with me! Then I cried. I was devastated.

When I had Preston, Shirley didn't want to take care of two, so I was searching again. The woman I picked out - again from an ad in the shopper - was young with two little ones of her own. She didn't have a phone so I couldn't call her during the day to see how things were going. When Kari started talking about going to another house during the day, I began to wonder what was going on. I learned that the day care provider was leaving my children and hers with someone else while she did what?? I never did find out.

Luck was with me again when I found Marianne Bradley in Urbandale. She was a single mother with a son between the ages of Kari & Preston. In order to stay home with him she started a day-care business. She had a large number of kids, but she was organized and set up to care for them. The downstairs of her split level home had a large, well-stocked play room and a separate room with cots for nap time. Her back yard was fenced. Marianne became a friend as well as my kid's day care provider.

I hope Ridge & Rodney's parents are able to find competent and caring providers for them while they are working. It's hard enough having to leave them with someone else. Knowing they are well cared for can make it a little easier to leave them.

"She's A Lady....."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, she's a lady.
She always knows her place -
She's got style, she's got grace..."
(Paul Anka)

I don't know how Grandma would have felt about Tom Jones singing "She's A Lady" to her though I think she would have gotten a kick out of it.
I've always thought of Grandma Bessie Lynam as a 'lady'. Specifically the definition "a woman of refinement and gentle manners" as opposed to the definition "a woman of superior social position".
This picture of her was taken in front of her house at 811 10th Street in Corning. It was her last visit to her home. She had been in the care center for several years but when her house was sold and was going to be torn down, we took her back for a last visit.
I've always loved this picture of my grandmother. Her sweetness and gentleness show through her slight smile. When my hair was long I wore it twisted up in a knot just like she wore hers because I wanted to be like her.
Growing up, we were much closer to Mom's mom than we were to Dad's. I suppose it was natural that we spent more time with Grandma Ridnour. I can remember when I got old enough to reason, I questioned why I thought I liked Grandma Ridnour better when Grandma Lynam was so much "nicer". From reading my diaries I can see I spent much more time at Grandma Lynam's after I started high school - sometimes going to her house for lunch, other times spending the night. Her house was a block from the high school.
Bessie Lucille Duncan was born one hundred nineteen years ago today - July 16, 1891. Her parents were farmers. Her Grandmother Aggie was a 'grass widow'. She raised her little girl alone. (Bessie's mother, Flora.) I doubt any of Grandma's family ever had much money. Had she been born in different circumstances, I'm sure she could have quite easily been a LADY.
Years ago, I had a dream about Grandma and Barbara Graham. Barbara was the wife of the owner of The Graham Group where I was employed in Des Moines. Barbara really was a lady - rich and refined and so very nice. In the dream I walked into the dining room of a fancy country club and there was my Grandmother having lunch with Barbara Graham. When I showed surprise that Grandma was there, Barbara said she didn't know why I was surprised - that my grandmother was a delightful woman. I analyzed that dream pretty easily - two ladies enjoying one another's presence.

This picture of Grandma Bessie and her first grandchild, my brother Ronald, was taken in April, 1941 on the front porch of our house. Ron was almost a year old. Grandma had seven grandchildren, fourteen great-grandchildren and three great-great grandchildren at the time of her death August 14, 1987 - less than a month after her 96th birthday. I doubt Brock, Zachary or Katrina remember her but we do have pictures of them taken with her.

If I could choose any relative to really know, it would be my Grandma Lynam. She was a rather private person, maybe not much different than others of her generation, but she didn't talk about her past or her feelings.

She was more likely to drink her tea out of a saucer than to hold her teacup with an extended pinkie - she was still a lady in my book.

July Reads I

What good reading I've had the first half of July, mostly thanks to Minette Walters.

When I find a new author I really like, it is hard for me not to read my way through all the books she has written before I read anything else. I almost did so the first two weeks of July beginning with:

"Acid Row" by Ms. Walters.

Acid Row is the nickname given to Bassindale Housing Estate - subsidized housing for low income families. The project is riddled with crime and infested with desperation and fear. Poor design resulted in only two through streets in the area - the balance ending in dead ends. The two main streets looped back upon themselves - confounding anyone trying to find an address in the compound - and adding to the loss of life when the riots broke out. Social workers were trapped along with innocent residents.

But wasn't a social worker responsible for the riots? Hadn't she planted the idea that a pedophile was living in Acid Row? And wasn't there a 10-year-old girl missing? This book differs from the others of hers that I have read in that there is no murder or trying to figure out who the perpetrator is. It is a well written, compelling weave of plot lines building up to a suspenseful ending.

"The Echo" is Minette Walter's fifth novel - my second July read. A destitute man has been found dead in the garage of a wealthy woman. Who is he? Why did he choose her property upon which to die? Why did she pay for his funeral when she claimed not to know him. Could he be her missing husband who absconded with ten million pounds five years previously? Or a career diplomat missing for seven years? Why, when the police rule the man's death suicide by starvation, does the woman agree to an interview with a reporter six months later which will only result in an investigation into the man's identity?

I think it is this author's ability to plot such twisting tales that makes her books so enjoyable to me. She may hint at an attraction between her characters, but there is no "love story" - just plain, good, mysteries - ones that are hard to unravel.

I have read most of Anna Quindlen's novels. The library got her newest, "Every Last One" in May. I had not read any reviews of it. The dust jacket talks only of a woman who has built her life around her family - husband and three children - and the rituals of their everyday lives. Her daughter is a high school senior; twin sons are in middle school; husband is an ophthalmologist.

The blurb mentions one son's deepening depression and a shocking act of violence. The book itself is an easy reading look into the lives of people who could be our next door neighbors. I'm two thirds of the way through before being surprised by the hinted at act of violence. I may not have read it had I known what was coming.

Quindlen puts her readers inside the mind of her character. She shows us how the wife/mother deals with tragedy. She gives hope. She also makes her readers wonder how they would deal with such life-altering events.

Carol Goodman is a new author for me. Her "Arcadia Falls" focuses on a mother/daughter and their strained relationship after the untimely death of the husband/father. The mother is forced to sell their Long Island home, give up their upscale life and find a job after her husband's death because of his poor dealings as a 'prosperous' hedge fund manager.

The job she finds is teaching at a private school in upstate New York. The atmosphere is Gothic. The setting resembles the Hansel & Gretel woods, even their new home looks like the witch's cottage. The book is a fairy tale murder mystery updated with cell phones, i-Pods and a modern day woodsman in sheriff's clothes. I couldn't wait to finish it and get on to:

"The Dark Room" by Minette Walters. What a relief to be reading another intelligent, superbly plotted, English murder mystery. When our heroine, Jinx Kingsley, respected fashion photographer and only daughter of millionaire Adam Kinglsey, is found unconscious in the wreckage of a mysterious car accident on an abandoned airfield, the police suspect a suicide attempt. And why wouldn't they when they learn that her fiance has abandoned her to run off to France with her best friend?

"Dazed, confused, and suffering from post-traumatic amnesia, Jinx is placed in an exclusive private clinic, where she struggles to regain her memory." I know; sounds just like any other run of the mill mystery, doesn't it? Trust me. It's not. Trust me. Read any one of Minette Walters' novels books and tell me you're not hooked. This was the first time I was pretty certain of who the murderer was before the end of the book. It's an amazing author that can wrap up the book, deliver the guilty party, but still leave you wondering.

Have I mentioned how much I like Minette Walters books? To quote Publishers Weekly: "Minette Walters has continually worked outside the boundaries of crime drama. She simply won't walk the line - and she's confoundingly good".

"Just Like Riding A Bicycle"

First day of school, 1949


What I should have done for Ron's 70th Birthday was find an aviator cap to give him - one like he is wearing in this picture. Would I remember riding to school perched behind him on his bike without the visual image? I doubt it. What I do remember is teaching myself to ride his bicycle.

I wanted to be able to ride a bike just like my big brother but I couldn't even reach the pedals! So I took a bucket out to the road, upended it to stand on so I could get on his bike, then pushed off to coast down the little hill toward the other place. Did I tip over many times? Yes. (Luckily the road wasn't graveled then.) Did I learn to balance the bike eventually? Yes. So when I was tall enough to reach the pedals, I was ready to ride any time I could find his bike unused.

I wanted my own bike so badly. But that wouldn't happen until July 10, 1957 when we purchased Carol Vogel's bicycle. I had made a deal with Mom to clean out the brooder house and get it ready for the chicks that spring in exchange for a bike. I don't remember if we had already talked to Vogel's about buying Carol's and it just took three months to close the deal and get the bike. I just remember how happy I was to have wheels! And such nice ones on a pretty blue and white frame.

I started riding the bike everywhere - even down the lane to the pasture to get the cows. I felt so free being able to take off on that bike and go anywhere. Well, at least over to the neighbors. I had a special place to park my bike - leaning against the elm tree right outside the back door - ready to hop on for adventure in a minute's notice.



My multiple speed touring bike. Picture taken at "The Little House", 1981.

"The bicycle will accomplish more for women's sensible dress than all the reform movements that have ever been waged." (From Demerarest's Family Magazine, 1895 - Author unknown)


I didn't have another bike for another twenty years. We were living on the acreage outside Urbandale when I bought this bike at Montgomery Ward. I had already learned all about gears and the dangers of hand brakes from riding the bicycle Doug had purchased from a friend of mine. (Lois Campbell) I was riding his bike down to the corner east of "Our House" when I tried to brake to turn around and start back. By the time I remembered the brakes were on the handle bars, it was too late; I wiped out. You can still see the scars on my left elbow - no scars, just pain, in my left hip.

That bike was left behind when we moved back to Des Moines in '84. Eventually, I bought a used, brown, three-speed when we lived on 4th Street in West Des Moines. I think that one rusted after being in the flood of '93 and got put on the curb during clean-up week.




I always wondered what happened to my first bicycle. Then I found this picture (June, 1966) of my little brother and remembered - he made it into his "Bat Mobile". Or was it Bat Bike? Now I wonder what happened to it after that?


"The hardest part of raising a child is teaching them to ride bicycles. A shaky child on a bicycle for the first time needs both support and freedom. The realization that this is what the child will always need can hit hard. (Sloan Wilson)

I was talking about riding a bike with some of my grandchildren last week. They began lamenting how their mom had taught them to ride by putting them on a bike and pushing them down a hill. I told them that was the same way I had taught Doug to ride - by putting him on the new red bike he got for his sixth birthday and pushing him down a hill in MacRae Park near our apartment off SW 9th in Des Moines.

I think Kari pretty much taught herself to ride. Her first bike was a pretty green, just like her birthstone. I bought it used for her sixth birthday. Preston taught himself to ride her bike before he was six. But I think he still had to wait for his birthday before getting a bike - a citrusy lime green one if I remember right, also a used one. It was easier to find pre-owned bikes in the city. (Plus I couldn't afford new ones for them.)

Last year Bud & I each bought a new coaster bike. I have to admit I haven't ridden mine as much as I thought I would. It's quite a bit harder pedaling up those hills than it was 53 years ago. But this morning I got it out, ready to pump up the tires and go for a spin. There's nothing like riding a bike to make you feel young again.


"When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race." (H.G. Wells)

First Grandson; First Great Grandson

There are many firsts in a person's life. Few are more memorable than your first child - unless it is your first grandchild. I blogged about Brock's birth on May 23 this year. This tandem picture of Brock and me on the left and Brock and his son on the right really shows how much they look alike.

Ridge is one year old today. He is my first great-grandchild. I have yet to meet him, but through the magic of facebook, I do see pictures of him.

Happy first birthday, Ridge William.

"The Twelfth" aka "Glorious Twelfth"

My Irish great-great grandparents, William and Catherine McDonnough Lynam with their six surviving children. (Five others died in infancy.) My great-grandfather, Barney Lynam is on the left in back. His brothers were John, Joseph and James; sisters were Anna and Katherine. This picture was taken sometime after William died in 1898. His picture was inserted - what we would call photo-shopped today. William was born in County Westmeath, Ireland in 1832 and Catherine was born in County Antrim in 1832. They met and married in Ripon, WI in 1856 living there and then in Somerset, Ohio before moving to a farm near Brooks, Adams Co., Iowa in 1878.


When I first became interested in family history and could trace some of my great-great grandparents back to Ireland, I became fascinated with that country and all things Irish. One of the first things I learned about my great-great grandfather and grandmother was that they were both Catholic. Interesting....my parents were Protestant as were theirs. Even Great-grandpa Barney was Protestant. I learned that both he and his brother James had married non-Catholic women which is the reason I was not raised a Catholic.

But reading all the Irish history put me directly on the side of Catholic Ireland. Which is why I became so incensed the first time I saw tv coverage of Orangemen marching on the "Glorious Twelfth" in Northern Ireland. I don't remember how many years ago that was. Certainly before the 1998 peace agreement which largely ended thirty years of violence between the predominately Catholic groups who want a united Ireland and the mainly Protestant unionists who want Northern Ireland to remain a part of Great Britain.

"The Twelth" also known as "Orangemen's Day" celebrates the victory of Protestant King William of Orange over Catholic King James II at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. At the time I saw the tv coverage, "The Troubles" between nationalists and unionists was at its peak. Instead of parading in their own areas, the Orangemen paraded through the predominately nationalist areas, taunting with fifes and Lambeg drums, flaunting unionist dominance in Northern Ireland. It was obvious to me they wanted to provoke trouble. Why couldn't they just stay in their own part of town?


After several relatively peaceful years, today's "Glorious Twelfth" began with overnight riots in Belfast. Three police officers were shot and another two dozen injured as they tried to control the rioters - mainly pro-British Protestant groups burning Irish flags and photos of the politicians in favour of a United Ireland. Why the renewed violence now? Perhaps because it is the 320th anniversary of the Battle of the Boyne?


I could never side with the Protestant Orangemen. I'm glad my Catholic great-great grandparents left Ireland when they did.

Catkins

Alder Catkin


"Whenever the wind drops
an alder catkin into my palm,
or a cuckoo calls merrily,
with trains screaming by,
I fall to reflecting,
and struggle to grasp life's meaning,
and, as usual arrive,
at the place where it slips from my grasp.
Reducing oneself
to a speck of dust in a starry nebula
is an old way out,
but wiser than trumped-up grandeur.
and it's no degradation
to realize one's own insignificance,
for in it we realize sadly,
the implicit grandeur of life.
(From Yevgeny Yevtushenk's Alder Catkin)

Somewhere in my reading this morning I ran across the word catkins. It nudged a memory from my childhood - nudged but did not summon. Was it in a children's book Mom read to us? Or was it a verse from a poem? Is there a nursery rhyme about catkins?

Catkins are those slim, worm-like flower clusters that hang from many types of trees in spring. The word is from the Dutch katje which means 'kitten'. Maybe what I'm remembering is Mom identifying the pussy willow catkins for us. I thought she called them catkins because they were gray and furry and soft, like kittens.

But the memory that was nudged was of this type of willow catkin - not the pussy willow type. So maybe I'm remembering the catkins from the willows around the pond? Mom was my teacher when it came to identifying every kind of plant. She knew all the trees, flowers, bushes and weeds. Recently when I was with Ron and asked about identifying a particular plant, I said, "Didn't you learn all the species from Mom when you were little?" For some reason, he did not. Which means either he wasn't interested in a botany lesson or Mom didn't identify plants and trees for him. I believe it was the former.

I've also speculated that as a daughter, I remember plants just as I remember familial relationships because of some inherited gene. From the beginning of time, it has been the females who learned what plants were safe to eat and passed the knowledge to their daughters. Just as they remembered the family relationships so clan lineage was kept distant enough to result in healthy descendants.

I'm almost certain I'm remembering the catkins of the willows. They are the one tree I can always identify by smell as well as sight. The aroma of Salix evokes many memories. Catkins are but one of them.