Grandparents are being encouraged to create a creative document, that would speak to the younger generations about some of the 'branching point' experiences, which have caused the greatest influence, that have grabbed our focus and determined our life goals. These freewrites are anecdotes speaking to those happenings and memories.

A freewrite, suggests that you write or type without first of all without attempting to edit. You're asked not to try to second guess the direction your ideas might go. Your creative juices need to flow for a period of 30 minutes. The objective of a freewrite is to generate as many ideas as possible. Don't dwell at all on perfect grammar, spelling or punctuation. You'll not be required to share or show it to anyone!

During you freewrite, choose any aspect of your life, including possibly an early childhood memory. Whether or not it's humorous, either would be appropriate.

(1) Jot down one or two memories.

(2) Describe it/them, in as much detail as you can.

(3) Tell how you and others reacted to the experience.

(4) Speculate, if you can, on how or if the experience influenced you as an adult.

Many things happened to each of us for the first time as children. There are once in a life time memories: such as baptisms, christenings, weddings, funerals and religious, seasonal or traditional event. The ideas and images (scenes out of the past) can be expanded later, upon discussing your ideas with others to get their reaction may motivate you to write further related, parallel or totally unrelated topics. Some writing groups develop guidelines, that may also require a longer time period, yet informal two page essay. There will be occasional brief freewrite as well as a longer more detailed experience.

One morning not so very long ago, after having adjusted to the routines of retirement from thirty-one years as an early elementary school teacher, I stood at my kitchen window ready to do those morning dishes.

Peering out over the recently installed window air-conditioner at an old dead tree, which stood ever so stately with its branches lifting upward, yet ever so close together, I saw it was completely bald.

As I pondered the life cycle of this proud tree, three large black crows chose to perch on its branches, as they had so often done many times in the past.

Immediately one of these crows found itself trapped. As it came to rest on one of the lower branches, its right wing lodged between two higher level branches close by.

This crow instinctively lifted his wing, but he could not free his wing.

The crow continuously lifted this trapped wing instinctively ... somewhat rhythmically ... with no real success over a period of some ten minutes. With each attempt to lift its wing out of the tight bind, I found myself becoming more and more depressed.

When the other two black crows flew away, I found myself turning away also. I pondered whether this type of depressing scene was to repeat itself in various ways, now that retirement found me at home.

As I got back to my computer e-mail, I was side tracked by thoughts of how very high up in that tree the bird actually was.

It was too high up for me to help the bird in any way.

I thought of the inevitable rotting crow carcass pinned there for an undetermined length of time. Would a cat climb up that tree in time to have a meal?

Would a hungry black snake find this prize?

How long would I be peering out my kitchen window at this sad scene?

Finally, I could not resist just one more look. So, going back to my e-mail had not changed my mood.

Within a few minutes my curiosity drew me back to the kitchen window.

Two crows were just returning with some nine others. They all perched in a scattered fashion upon the dead tree. Now and then a crow would hop over to a different branch.

Transfixed by what I saw and within a very few minutes, there were three large black crows perched upon the very branch that had been pinning the wing of the one which was trapped. It lowered the branch just ever so slightly.

At that instant the trapped crow was released from its bondage and was able to lift its wing just enough to fly away with his flock.

Could not, we as humans, do as much for one another?

I was meant to see this drama unfold ! ! !

The Post Script: A few weeks later our nephew, Loyd, a farmer, who rents our seven twenty acre fields, put a few calves in a pasture beside our woods to graze before he planted corn there. The tree did provided a slim bit of shade during the day for one persistent calf, who would not budge from that spot near the fence where cows were lingering in the next field. Finally, one night a big storm brewed over head and a great wind blew. Sometime during that storm the calf decided to seek shelter from the wind and moved elsewhere. The old dead tree blew down in the storm. It's branches are rigidly pointed eastward. The large black crows still come to perch on the old dead tree ...

Drama in Real Life

One of our family summer trips with our 3 sons, was planned to return to the Garden of the Gods Camping Ground in Colorado, not far from Pike's Peak. We planned a trail ride through the Park on horseback. It was chilly, when we pulled into the camp site, Carl, Bill and Tim were anxious to relax in a the outdoor pool! So that was our plan for the next morning.

The next morning, after our mini-motor home styled breakfast, we got into bathing suits and headed for the pool! No one was in the pool! So we touched the surface of the water and sat by the pool side, instead!

A couple of men came into the pool area, absorbed in conversation.

A Downs Syndrom boy of about 12, appeared from another direction and approached the pool. He did not test the water, nor notice that no one was in the frigid water. Before anyone a could react, this child stepped up to the diving board and belly flopped at the deep end of the pool, creating big waves with his awkward splash!

This very chunky child dropped straight down like a heavy boulder, coming up slowly. Unable to recover, his arms fluttered briefly and he sunk straight down into the depth of the pool a second time.

I turned to our oldest son, Carl, 6 feet tall and 16 years old and said:

Carl got right down into the frigid water, near the deep end. He bounced through the water on tiptoes; grasping hold of the child by both upper arms, as the child surfaced a 3rd time!

Then Carl walked this floundering kid over to the edge of the pool, hooking the boys fingers [both hands] gently but firmly, onto its tiled edge, .. his own hands cupped over this boys hands!

This drowning boy looked through a cascade of water, which was still pouring down his face from his wet hair, at Carl, in a frazzled daze and grunted some unintelligable sounds in Carl's direction!

As it turned out, one the two men, who arrived ahead of the boy, had missed the whole scene. The boy belonged to one of them!

The people at the pool side were a twitter about the scene and there was some talk about it later in the day around the camp ground!

First thing when your dog is being attacked
Try not to panic.

Second, if owners are no where around,
Try 1st to get your dog away or under control.

Beating the attacker only succeeds in hurting
yourself, your dog, or the other dogs.

You don't want to be sued over maiming strange
dogs, although the other dogs were at fault.

The best you can do, any time anywhere, is to
control your own dog.

Try your best to get away from the other dogs,
and the situation under control.

Control your dog, even if he/she didn't start
something, he/she gets excited about the situation!
That's my best advice.

When I was back from Bogot�, Colombia, South America, and attending Junior High School, one day I was walking our Scottie dog, Meggie, on a leash. She was a 'runt of a litter' neutered female.

Four assorted dogs, one already known for having killed neighborhood pets, came around a house on a corner lot, while we were crossing a street in front of my home. Meggie rushed at them excitedly, knocking me down!

We'd been washing windows in the front yard earlier that day. A hose was lying in our yard near the sidewalk. I dropped Meggie's leash immediately, as I knew Meggie had to get away the best her stubby legs could manage!

I was dragged in close to the middle of a dog fight by my excited pup. I'd lost balance and fell back, hitting my butt hard on the blacktop. I scrambled backwards, in a fast reverse crab walk, scraping the palms of my hands in the process!

I grabbed the hose and turned it on full force. Than I waved the hose back and forth, drenching the yapping angry dogs! It caught them off-guard. They didn't expect the drenching! They paused for a moment, as if frozen in time. They reconsidered and turned away, as if wishing to explore other entertainment !!!

I was shaking for quite a while after that. It dawned on me, that I was lucky to get out of it with a bruised butt and scraped palms. I could have just as easily done something a lot more stupid.

Years ago in 1966, when there was a sudden growth surge in elementary school enrollment. I was begged to begin a seventh section of second grade at Wentzville's only public Elementary School.

So I was excited about getting back into teaching for the 1966 -1967 school term. It had been ten years since I'd taught a first grade class at Franklin Elementary School in St. Charles, Missouri.

I quickly became familiar with the big building filled with many early elementary grade level colleagues (K - 3rd Grade). One dear lady, who will remain unnamed, prone to daily rituals developed the habit of peeking into my room each morning as she went down the hall toward her own classroom. She'd stop by and chat.

As the days wore on, she began to raise questions about whatever it was that I was putting on my chalkboard for that day. Her questions became more specific and inquisitive. She wanted the details.

It'd long been my practice to start of each school day, focusing the children on some sort of mental exercise or thought focused activity.

I began to realize that I had created some assignments just to pique this women's curiosity. In fact, I began to feel a bit embarrassed by the charade that I was playing with this new colleague in my life!

In the long run it reaped rewards. I've developed higher level thinking "can-you-follow-instructions" strategies that help youngsters focus.

It varies with each class, but it encourages an attentive focus. You win some and you lose some. But all one can do is to try.

At last, filled with anticipation, I had gone to the Francis Howell School District Administration Offices some twenty-nine years ago, in the summer of 1968 to speak with our Superintendent of Schools, Gene Henderson.

I had told him that I had heard Miss Harmon, my oldest son's third grade teacher, had recently had a nervous breakdown. So I had paid Carl's teacher a visit at St. Joseph's Hospital in St. Charles, Missouri, and it didn't seem likely that she would be back to school in the fall.

Mr. Henderson, as he had not yet received his doctoral degree, agreed that there was an opening for a third grade teacher at Daniel Boone Elementary School for the fall term.

Since the age of thirteen I had babysat. I had taken on a family with three kids for several summers in a row .. five days a week through the age of fifteen.

The degree I had earned at Stephens Junior College for Women was in the field of Pre-School Education. Then I had finished my education at the University of Missouri in Columbia, Missouri, with a degree in Early Elementary Education. I had, also, earned my Life-Certificate to Teach.

Immediately after graduation from the University of Missouri, I had taught for one year the following fall at Franklin Elementary School in St. Charles, Missouri. It was the year that they had integrated their school district for the first time in the 1956/1957 school year.

I married in the late summer, August 10, 1957, and raised two boys on our farm four miles west of New Melle.

I submitted my resume' to substitute teach in the summer of 1966 and received an urgent plea, from the Wentzville School District, to start a seventh section of the second grade there.

After that year, I had substituted at Wentzville Elementary, Middle School and even High School, while Carl had been attending the third grade at Daniel Boone Elementary School in New Melle, Missouri.

My youngest son, Bill, was being baby sat, at the time, by his grandparents and Aunt Mabel, who lived nearby. Dr. Henderson told me, that I could consider myself hired for the third grade vacancy. It had taken ten minutes for this interview!

In those early years my mother put a poster on my bedroom wall. It had a young pigtailed girl cradling her doll baby. As I often played with dolls, some stuffed animals, paper dolls, a dollhouse and when playing house with others, I played a care giving role, such as: advisor or go-between ...

So I wish to point out, that what I have learned of my role in nurturing others through the years, stems from:

(1) Preferring the company with those younger than me ...

(2) Developing an early interest in people watching ...

(3) Embracing the possibility of alternatives ...

(4) An early awareness of a multiplicity of realities in a shrinking complex world ...

(living in Bogota', Colombia, South America, in 1944 - 1945).

(5) Background and experience doesn't qualify us as experts, but as a beacon of light ...

(6) There are many stages of growth to go through in some fashion socially, emotionally, intellectually and physically ...

(7) There's "no such thing" as age level or grade level appropriate, when speaking of learning styles ...

(8) Experiences won't parallel across the generations and / or across the many cultures world wide ...

(9) Regardless of trends to label, rank, classify and judge others, there are exceptions to just about everything ...

(10) Our nurturing of the uniqueness and worth of individuals is of greater importance, over and above or beside family or community expectations ...

Actually, my perceptive mother had indicated, that I would enroll in pre-school education, when sending in my application to Stephens Junior College for Women.

As a child I was filled with optimistic effervescence. However, I wasn't encouraged to build up, mold or fashion myself. I was a reflection of parental hopes and dreams. By the time I was a teenager, I felt empty emotionally. I was a squared peg in a round hole. Although, I'm a 1952 high school graduate, I never identified with "Happy Days". I had never "hung out". Activities were planned and organized by our parents. There was for me: Sunday School; Scouting; summer recreation programs, family travel, camping trips, chorus, piano lessons and Spanish Club. Giggling girls drove me up-the-wall. Cliquishness disgusted me. Focusing on movie stars, recordings, celebrities and singers bored me. I did wear white socks as a fad, though! Peer pressure is a strange thing . . .

Boys, my peers, were such lesser-brains . . except, of course, for the boyfriend I went steady with. I enjoyed the of "going steady." I became more outgoing as Jim's steady. Of course, when he "dumped" me, that didn't help my self-esteem at all!

My birth-father, Maurice James Wilsie, was to be kicked out of my life by our mother's divorce. He was kicked out of the state of Michigan due to his card carrying membership in a communist college student movement on campus. Dad, Charles Neff Staubach (who adopted my brother and me) remained busy with his teaching career. He didn't really develop a close relationship with me. What I know of my Dad's background, I had gleaned through conversations with my mother or what I heard from his brothers, sister and sisters-in-laws. My brother had a large group of friends. He would have been the central core figure in a sociogram. Karl didn't strive to include me in his circle of friends and acquaintances. I was the little sister. My folks were always focused on some concern which revolved around Karl. I managed to emulate and embrace some of those that my folks attempted to drill into Karl. Though, I succeeded in embracing a few of those kinds of lessons aimed to enhance my brother, I was always a minor player in our family circle. My mother spent her entire life focusing on my brother. I stepped to the back burner at some point along the way. My favorite uncle, Uncle Karl Robert Mysen, died in a test pilot accident around the time of Pearl Harbor. But that was prior to when airplanes were fitted with weather and radar equipment

At Stephens Junior College for Women, a private girl's school, I managed to fit comfortably into the mold of an "independent". I was puzzled at the naivete of my college peers, until I learned that many of them had attended private schools and were away from home throughout their entire schooling. But I was raised at a time when girls and boys were taught different roles. It amazes me that it took so long for society to change that focus to an uplifting, healthier gender-free society. It is important to develop one's sense of personhood.

I've been so pleased when the parents of primary school girls spend time helping them develop their full potential. Because, throughout my life-time, I've simply been thought of as someone's great-granddaughter, or as someone's granddaughter, or only just a daughter, or merely Karl's sister, or as someone's a grand- niece, or .. perhaps, the only niece and was dubbed by my dentist a "delicate child".

Yes! I've toughened up considerably because of life's blend of realities. A college entrance exam showed me to have the broadest (-) and (+) score ever to be recorded on the emotional quotient portion of the vocational placement test as of 1952. The testing counselor asked me, in all earnestness, if I had ever considered the possibility of becoming a "nun". I told her that, as a matter of fact, I never would have considered it nor would I be likely to anytime in the future !!!

On a weekend not so many years ago my youngest son, Timothy, showed me a packet of really neat portrait photos belonging to his good friend, Tiffany. This friend was short and plumpish. She had a thick head of long light orange naturally wavy hair. She was a freckle-faced rather plain looking young lady.

She had made herself an appointment with Glamour Shots for an exciting series of creative and inspiring portrait poses. These sessions included a series of make-over moments, which in turn would be photographed and made into a spicy pricey photo packet.

The hair saloon, make up sessions and fabric drapes used to bring out her natural beauty had been especially flattering, so much so that I had asked if I might have one of her photos and surprisingly, Timothy allowed me to pick one very flattering pose.

Just a few weeks later, nearing the approaching winter holiday season, Timothy had asked me if he were to buy me a gift certificate to Glamour Shots, would I make an appointment and use the coupons! Well, naturally, I just laughed it off and quickly changed the conversation.

But that very night, I had spent a really restless time tossing and turning throughout the whole night.

Very early in the still darkness of the next morning, I'd woke up in a most uncomfortable lather. I felt as though I was in some sort of an anxious dither.

As, I'd just before waking, dreamed that I'd been the only person ever in its entire history to be REJECTED by Glamour Shots!

My family, colleagues and friends still love to remind me of this late-in-life rejection from time to time.

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Last updated, 25 March, 2005

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