Storytime Tapestry Newsletter

The newsletter devoted to spreading love and cultural awareness around the world.

October 18, 2006

Today’s announcements

 A very special happy anniversary wish goes out to our chief writer, Sharon, and her wonderful hubby Jody Bryant: 1946@bellsouth.net

Now onto the good stuff!

Today’s Queue Stories

~**~**~

My Mind Wandered (and it never came back)

by

Leeuna Foster

Mama is ninety-three years old. She often scolds me for being forgetful. "Lord-a-mercy, Young'un," she'll say, shaking her head at me. "I'll declare if you wouldn't forget your rear end and leave it in the chair if it wasn't already in your pants."

I don't get angry at her for scolding me. For one thing, at my age, it's nice to be called a "young'un" and in the second place she's right. I can't remember my own phone number some days.

Like the other day when I wrote a check at the store and the cashier asked to see my driver's license.

" ...or, just give me your driver's license number if know it. I need to write it on your check."

After I got up off the floor and stopped laughing, I handed her my driver's license. She must have been kidding. Right?

According to an article I read from The American Academy of Family Physicians.

"Beginning when you're in your 20s, you begin to lose brain cells a few at a time. Your body also starts to make less of the chemicals your brain cells need to work. The older you are, the more these changes can affect your memory. Aging may affect memory by changing the way your brain stores information and by making it harder to recall stored information. "

Could this be sort of like when your computer's hard disk needs defragmenting? I think something happens to our memory files after we pass the forty year/five million mile marker, whichever comes first. I always say mine is neither age nor mileage. It's all those sudden stops that have worn me down. Too bad we can't just run scan disk, defrag, then reboot our brains.

I miss my mind. I really do. I miss the old days when I could remember everything I needed to buy at the market without making a list. Now I even have to take a pencil with me and mark off each item as I place it in my shopping cart, otherwise I come home with ten jars of peanut butter.

I bumped into an old school-mate of mine the other day while at the grocery store. (thank goodness she wasn't injured.) We were exclaiming over how long it had been since we had seen one another. All the while I kept thinking 'Who in heaven's name IS this person?'

I should have remembered her, but for the life of me I could not remember her name. We chatted for a few minutes and promised to keep in touch. I thought this would be the perfect way to get her name, so I said, "oh, you'll need to give me your phone number." She smiled and waved it away as she rounded the pork 'n' bean aisle. "I'm in the phone book. "

Some people are good with dates. I'm not. The only date I can remember is the one my sister set me up with. Boy was he a...oops, wrong kind of date. Now where was I?

Oh yes...

My birth year is about the only date I can remember. Sometimes I have to count backward to figure out my age

.

And don't you hate it when someone asks, "What was the name of that song, movie, book, person..." or whatever they are trying to remember? This makes me crazy. If they had not asked me, I probably would've remembered it. But since they put me on the spot, my brain keeps getting a 404 page-not-found error. Then I spend the entire night in sleepless anguish, trying to remember it. And then it comes to me all of a sudden when I'm least expecting it, like in the middle of a church service or while I'm waiting in line at the bank. Then I get all these funny looks from strangers when I jump up and down and yell out the answer.

My doctor's office started a new service a few months ago. Now they call the day before and confirm the appointments for the following morning. I'm really glad of this for it helps me remember to not forget to show up. However, it may not be a service at all. Maybe I'm the only one they call?

Mega Memory, a new product on the market developed by a gentleman named Kevin Trudeau claims to teach techniques that stimulate neurotransmitters in your brain to instantly increase your memory and mental capacity. There are also a gazillion different pills and potions and oceans of lotions that claim to aid in memory enhancement.

I keep buying them...

Now, if I could only remember where I put them...

copyright (c) Leeuna Foster, 2006

leeuna@earthlink.net

~**~**~

ValueSpeak

A Weekly Column

By Joseph Walker

valuespeak@msn.com

IT TAKES ALL KINDS

            Steve and I worked for the same company but our jobs were decidedly different.

            He was blue collar; my collar was white (or, occasionally, pale yellow).  He was union; I was management.  He worked with molten steel; I slaved over a hot word processor.  He worked different shifts at different times – days, swings, graveyards.  My job was strictly 9-to-5.

            Still, we were friends.  We lived in the same neighborhood, and we went to the same church.  I knew his family, and he knew mine.  We could talk openly with each other, and we usually did (except during labor negotiations, when we found there were some things that we were better off not to discuss).

            One day I was taking some VIPs on a tour of the steel mill at which we were both employed and I saw him out by the blast furnace.  He was covered with sweat and soot as he worked confidently just a few feet from metal so hot a miscue would melt him, me and the tour van as I was driving – in an instant.

            “I don’t know how you do that,” I told him when I saw him at church the following Sunday.   “It’s so hot up there, even in the dead of winter.  And if you make a mistake people die – painfully.  How do you handle the pressure?”

            He scoffed at my question.  “It’s no big deal,” he said.  “I’ve been doing this for years.  The furnace pretty much runs itself.  I’m just there for the ride.”

            “Well, I’m glad it’s you and not me,” I said.  “I couldn’t do what you do.”

            A few weeks later Steve and his crew came into the office to pick up some tickets for a football game the company was sponsoring.  I was on a tight deadline to deliver some advertising copy, so after I greeted Steve I returned to my computer to continue working while my staff took care of the tickets. After a few minutes of tip-tip-tapping on my keyboard (interrupted, as usual, by phone calls from the CEO, a newspaper reporter and the radio station that was waiting for my copy) I had that funny, awkward feeling that I had an audience.  I glanced up and saw Steve leaning against the wall, watching me.

            “I don’t know how you do that,” he said.  “There’s so much stuff going on up here.  I don’t know how you keep track of everything.  And if you make a mistake millions of people are going to hear it on the radio.  How do you handle the pressure?”

            I scoffed at his question (even though it sounded eerily familiar).  “It’s no big deal,” I said.  “I’ve been doing this for years.  Most of this stuff just writes itself.  I’m just here to make sure it all gets to the right places on time.”

            “Well, I’m glad it’s you and not me,” Steve said.  “I couldn’t do what you do.”

            It wasn’t until Steve left the office that I realized we had pretty much had the exact same conversation twice – once with regards to his work and once with regards to mine.  Without even trying Steve and I had stumbled on a simple fact of life in the workplace: it takes all kinds.

            Thankfully, we live in a world in which there are all kinds of people to do all kinds of work.  And Labor Day provides us with the perfect opportunity to pause for a moment to consider all of the people who make such a difference in the quality of our lives by doing work that we would rather not do.  So while that burger is sizzling on your grill, think about all the people who helped to get it there: the rancher, the farmer, the veterinarian, the broker, the trucker, the butcher, the distributor, the grocer – and all of the people who provide goods and services to them to help them do their work.  It’s an incredible, industrial-strength chain of workers that we honor and celebrate on Labor Day.  Thank God for all of them.

            Regardless of the color of their collars.

~**~**~

Army, Killing Machine?

Bill Walker

missourisage@yahoo.com

Army, killing machine?  You know I never thought of it said that way.. maybe it is,  maybe it isn't.  Is a military school only a school of how to kill?  Is a military school a training ground for win the war and hold the peace?   I think the latter might be the case.

This can be taken for many people in different walks of life.  You have to study things to know how to deal with them.  A doctor studies sickness and death.. the cause of such,, so he can fight against such.  That is a far out thing to think about,, but I think it is a case of got to know what your up against.

It is the same about the army,  fight to win, but then your the guard against loosing the peace.  Most soldiers has no love for war, those knows the cost of gaining an inch on a battlefield.  It is better to hold the peace, then to be holding onto an inch of ground on some battlefield.

We can take the police force also.. These are trained now days to fight war against crime.  Some of that training is how to use a weapon that may kill.  Should we label them as a killing machine?

I still remember seeing pictures of the American G.I. handing the kid a good old American candy bar.  I have heard of returning G.I. telling about handing and sharing things with the people in some war torn land.  We see that today, ever once in a while there is a picture of an American G.I. giving some kid in Iraq something.

Let me ask the people who make such remarks this.  Who rushed medical supplies, doctors and so on in to aid the people of a country just taken by the American G.I.?  Who rushed in water, and food? 

No the American G.I. may well be a killing machine,, but he or she would much like better to be the keeper of peace.  The American G.I. knows full well the cost of war, these are the real peace keepers.  Just like the cop on the street. 

Tinker and Poo; The Boys Write

http://www.iuniverse.com/bookstore/book_detail.asp?&isbn=0-595-35741-5

~**~**~

Readers Feedback

It’s Mrs. Mills to You! - LOVE THIS CAROL!

Carol, It’s Mrs. Mills To You! -  That was a beautiful sharing.  You have a way of capturing the lives and hearts of others in your writing.  It was like we were right there with you
visiting this wonderful couple.  Keep up the great work.  Wishing you every
joy, Joe

Ref The Glory Train.     Beautiful,  What a way to go!  Perhaps I will sit on the ---caboose.  I think that’s the one where you can wave goodby to all life’s problems.       Louise

Senior Writers

Chief writer: Sharon Bryant

Chief researcher/historian: Hartson Dowd

Agee, Vance; Apted, Violet; Baker, Kathy; Batt, Al; Berry, Nell; Blaine, Pamela; Boda, Ginger; Booher, Paula; Buhagiar, Victor; Cassady, B.J.; Costner, Joan Clifton; Cavalera, Robyn; Crider, Mark; Dees, Mary; Deming, Barb; Doherty, Maria;  Dowd, Hartson; Dowd, Helen; Gilbert, Robert, Jr.; Gold, Ron; Goodier, Steve; Grisham, Mary-Ellen; Braun-Haley, Ellie; Harris, Kathy Anne; Henry, Linda Ann; Hunt, Sharlett; Hymes, Christina; Jacobson, Gary; Kiser, Roger Dean; Kerens, Claudia; Kevin, Tim; Jenkins, Pamela; Liles, Norma; Lily Jodi Flesberg; Lock, Joyce; Marlor, Janice Bumbalough; Mazzella, Joe; Meeks, Carol; Mizrany, Mary Carter; Morris, Deepak; Ojeibge, Georgewaters; Petry, Dianna Doles; Roberts, Susan; Shiveley, Debra; Shaw, Bob; Sims, Richard; Smith; Michael; Streidel, Saskia; Swarner, Ken; Vaknin, Sam; Verhoeff, Jan; Walker, Bill; Walker, Joe; Warner, Gordon, K; Walsh, Sue; Weymouth, Barbara J.; Whirity, Kathy;

Wainland, David; Westerfer, Clara; White Robert;

Storytime Tapestry Staff

Carol Roach - Founder/publisher

Thelma Hartselle - Co-Founder, Moderator

Clara Westerfer – moderator

Bob Johnston - moderator