Upgrades

by Beth Alexander Walsh

    

  I recently cleaned out a cabinet that housed an old CD/cassette player and receiver, along with boxes of cassette tapes that had not been used in decades. Those tapes were an eclectic bunch. Among the artists were Billy Joel, Elton John, The Eagles, The Pretenders, and Fleetwood Mac whose music would now be deemed “classic” or dare I say “oldies”. I’m not sure why I was saving them since most of the music had been replaced by cd or downloaded to an iPod. There were the swing band cassettes that I purchased for my mother’s 65th birthday party and cannot remember if I even used them. The singalong tapes reminded me of trips in the car with my young children, where our ears hung low; wobbled to and fro and the watermelon grew down by the bay. Even older were the compilation tapes I made while still living in my childhood home. That was a time consuming endeavor of taping from a vinyl record or waiting for that favorite song to be played by Casey Kasem on his Top 40 radio show. My brother and I spent many Saturdays recording our “free” music. I fingered through the box of musical memories while my husband patiently waited for me to conclude that I no longer needed cassette tapes. He then whisked the boxes to the recycling bin before I could change my mind.

     This past year I have been saying good bye to a lot of the obsolete in my life. At the end of last summer, I broke down and bought my first smartphone, but not because I wanted Apple’s latest and greatest. Quite the contrary!  I was very happy with my inexpensive “dumb” phone. My frustrated family and friends trying to include me in group texts however were not, so I gave in. Now I emoji and GIF with the best of them. Shortly after the new phone, I purchased a car with Bluetooth capability. I still have not completely figured out how to program key numbers but I can at least answer my phone.

    Christmas brought a brand-new laptop to replace my beloved six- year old bright pink HP with a seventeen-inch screen. It sputtered and rattled to life each time I turned it on, while constantly being tethered to a wall plug as the battery no longer worked. The new laptop sat in its box for weeks until I had time to overcome the learning curve of how to use it.  That same Christmas we said goodbye to our 2002 tubed Sony TV. The new Sony has twice the screen size and one third of the weight along with Wi-Fi capability.

     For me there is a slight fear of getting a new gadget to figure out. What if this time technology has advanced beyond my capacity to learn? At what point will I be unteachable? So far I have been able to manage, although I probably don’t use or even know all the capability of the electronics I own. My children, thank heavens, have been helpful with filling in my gaps of knowledge.

    As for the rest of the obsolete in my life, I still write dates on a large paper calendar on the side my fridge. I still write checks for paying bills (although that may change soon) and I will never give up my music CDs and vinyl. As for those cassettes in recycling, I snatched back three of them. Please don’t tell my husband!

An Old Saw

by Gail Balentine

I really, really want to eat M&Ms right now, a bagful.

It’s hard, trying to cope with some not-so-good-news. Actually, some bad news.

What to do?

M&Ms would taste good right now.

If I repeat the news over and over, will it make it less scary? Hasn’t worked so far.

M&Ms are my friends.

That old saw ‘Every cloud has a silver lining’, is it true?

If so, what’s the good thing here? How do I even find it?

What if I try asking: what good, no matter how small, comes out of this?

Actually, M&Ms are not really my friends. Yes, of course they taste wonderful, but then they stay firmly attached to my waistline – forever.

Yes, there is something small that’s good – I now know what was not seen before.

So, if I had not received this ‘bad news’, then I never would have noticed this ‘good thing’ about the situation. Right? Yes, that’s true.

Maybe the good doesn’t outweigh the bad, but thinking about everything from a different perspective brings up new options. Always good to have options.

M&Ms are great, but better eaten when a few are delightful and can be savored, then when I gulp them down in a frenzy.

Funny how those old sayings, often taken for granted, really were born of experience and hard-won wisdom.

Think I’ll save the M&Ms, mix in a few with nuts and raisins, and have them for a snack later - after I choose an option and follow through on it.

*****

My Italian Uncle

by Lauraine Alberetti Lombara

           I’ll always remember my “Uncle” Ernest.  He’s really my father’s cousin who came from impoverished Italy after WW II to work in our bountiful land.  He lived with my family sporadically for eight years.  I was only five but I can still picture him coming home afternoons with a bag full of fruit, different each time, depending on the season. I would climb onto his lap and with glee, dig my fist into the bag to see if there were bright tangerines, sweet strawberries, firm green grapes  or that bewitching pomegranate which we called an Indian Apple with its maze of cherry red seeds.   As I ate my fruit, I listened, wide-eyed, to stories of his farm in the Taro valley of Emilia-Romagna, with its views of the Apennine Mountains or to humorous anecdotes of the miller’s daughter, my mother, Laura.

           

         I was very proud of my Zio, which is Italian for uncle.  He was tall and stalwart with thick brown hair, tender brown eyes, an aquiline nose and a mouth on which a smile ever played. Zio was always very well dressed. He never scolded me and I always knew in my heart how much he loved me.

      

         I remember the many excursions we took. On a sunny spring Sunday, he would bring me to the Boston Common where the full-bloomed tulips transformed the gardens into a picture print of Holland. The thrill of riding beside him on the fairyland Swan Boats under the romantic bridges, around the miniature island, feeding the scrawny  ducks and scaring off the fat-bellied pigeons is revived when I walk through now.  In autumn, we would visit the Franklin Park Zoo and spend a delightful time shuffling through crackling leaves from one mysterious cage to another, with one of my hands clutching his and the other balancing peanuts, ice cream or Cracker Jacks. Finally, we would reach the monkey cage where Zio would pick me up and raise me higher than anyone so I could easily watch their antics.

        

       Whenever we have minestrone soup, the homemade aroma brings back his memory for it was a standard ritual for he and my mother to fuss over the thickness of the broth.

        

       Whenever I see a man flinch and squirm from being tickled, I think of him and how I wouldstealthily steal in back of him, then quickly run my small fingers up his side and escape, helter-skelter so he couldn’t catch me, but he invariably did and I would roll with gales of laughter and scream many “I give ups”.

           

       The years passed quickly for my beloved Zio and the sad words my mother told me about his need to return to his family caused me much heartbreak. I recall not believing her and trying to convince myself that he would never go. One of the saddest times in my life was the night he left South Station for New York, there to board the ship. The memory is so lucid, it seems as if I just returned from the crowded, noisy station with milling people, pushing porters and steaming trains. Zio said his good-byes to friends and then to my family. Lastly, he took me, sobbing from my father’s arms. I tried, incoherently, to make him promise to return one day. Not until the train started chugging did he painfully say he would. He knew then that he would not, but I lived on that kind answer for many years.

         

      Now, it would be up to me to visit him as he was getting old and could not return. Every time he wrote, my mother  would read his letters to me and I would go back to the days which my Zio made into a treasury of memories. Sadly, I was not able to visit him before he died but the joy he brought me lives on.

I wrote this story in 1959. Fifty-seven years later, the memory of my Zio still abides with me.

Charter Schools vs Public Schools

by Charlotte Savage

“Please hurry Mom; we want to get to school early.” These were the pleas I heard from my two grandsons when visiting their home in the 1990’s.   

My younger grandson attended an elementary charter School and the elder was enrolled in a charter high school.   The schools were half an hour from each other and equal distance from their home. I was extremely proud of their parents for making the commitment to drive their children to schools in the opposite direction from where they worked.  The parents also made the commitment to be active in the committees overseeing these schools.

It was the same for my friend’s granddaughter. The child did poorly in public school but excelled in a charter school.  

Prior to my elder grandson entering a charter high school his parents literally pulled him out of bed each morning and forced him to go to school. However, once enrolled in the charter school, he was awake and ready to leave for school without a wake-up call. His charter high school years were happy ones and made a big difference in his demeanor both in and out of school. 

My younger grandson, enrolled in an elementary charter school, was just as enthusiastic about his classes. Invited to attend my grandson’s recital, I arrived promptly at noon. At first I drove past the building.  It had torn window shades and looked in disrepair.  The interior of the school was even more shocking; it was literally falling apart. This charter school occupied an old elementary school the city deemed beyond refurbishing. Instead the city had built a new elementary school elsewhere. 

 In spite of the condition of this school, I observed happy, smiling, enthusiastic children who appeared to enjoy every moment of the time they spent there.

After visits to these charter schools, I questioned my son about the teaching differences between public school and charter schools. “What makes a charter school so special?” 

My son explained that the rules for public schools are dictated by each state. The schools have to follow a particular curriculum, which is sometimes modified by the local School Committee. While these public schools have advanced placement classes for the very bright student, those children that march to a different drummer are easily left behind-- even though their IQ might be on a similar or higher level than the advanced children in public schools.

I also learned that a charter school focuses on a particular forum such as music, technology, trade skills, etc. Each charter school is very different from the other and if the student is fortunate to find a school that specializes in his/her interests, it becomes a perfect match. 

After observing children of different ages participating in these schools, I saw that charter schools give their instructors free reign to challenge their students to excel in all subjects-- not just the subject that the student has a sincere interest in. It is a far superior method of teaching children. I am bewildered as to why state reps and school committees are not working diligently to change the way they operate the present public school system. We would not be voting on a referendum on charter schools if the school committees were doing their job and hiring principals from charter schools to assist them in revamping our present public school system.    

Unfortunately, it appears that bureaucracy is the culprit.    We probably wouldn’t have a need for charter schools if public schools were more progressive.   It seems the duplication of education is the fault of people who are managing the money of public schools; it is not the fault of the charter schools.  Until the red tape is resolved there is definitely a need for charter schools.  The first charter school to open in the United States was in 1992.  You would think in the twenty-four years that charter schools have been successful that school committees and teacher’s unions would have had their wake up call. It isn’t fancier schools children desire, but innovative teachers who are given the freedom to make learning so much fun.    I will vote for more charter schools in November because I found it amazing that my grandchildren woke their parents up, urging them to leave for school early, so that not one moment of their school day was wasted. 

© 2016 Charlotte Savage all rights reserved