X is for the X in the Margins—Those Bookish Breadcrumbs

Okay, I’ll admit I’m fudging a little by claiming I put X’s in the margins next to passages in books that speak to me. I’m more of a highlighter‑underliner and occasional‑pencil‑circler. But X is a stingy letter in the A to Z Challenge, so here we are. And apologies to longtime readers if you recognize a few of these quotes. I warned you on Day One that I’m old and starting to repeat myself both on and offline.

The first passage I can remember metaphorically put an X beside comes from John Steinbeck’s East of Eden. Decades ago I would have said he was my favorite author, though I eventually outgrew him. Still, I’ve kept my battered copy for one circled paragraph. It appears halfway through the book, when three characters debate how a single translated word in Genesis shaped entire branches of religious thought. The Hebrew timshel — “thou mayest” — struck me hard when I first read it. I was in a state of flux about religion back then—even after taking several classes on world religions both at a secular and a Catholic colleges—and the idea that we are given a choice, not a commandment depending on that translation, fit perfectly with an issue I’d been wrestling with.

My second quote to share is from Dean Koontz’s Seize the Night. I’ve always been overly sentimental about objects, and this passage explains why: “…we remember best those that are linked to places and things; memory embeds in the form and weight and texture of real objects…” In other words, it’s not the value of objects that keeps us attached, they are anchors helping us hold on to our memories. I’ve often wished I could play that on a loop whenever someone dismisses sentimentality. Being sentimental turned the Hall family (of Hallmark fame) into billionaires, so clearly I’m not alone.

Next is a quote from Stephen King’s Different Seasons, a book with many invisible X’s in the margins. I’m not a huge fan of his scare‑you fiction, but I adore his nonfiction. (Give me his writing advice and his reflections on childhood and keep the clowns and haunted hotels.) This line has stayed with me for years: “The most important things are the hardest to say… words shrink things that seemed limitless when they were in your head.” If you’ve ever tried to explain something tender and been met with a blank stare, you know exactly what he means.

King’s book On Writing is practically a forest of metaphorical X’s. Another one of my favorites: “Come to the act of writing any way but lightly… you must not come lightly to the blank page.” I’ve carried that with me through every blog post, every essay, every attempt to tell the truth without flinching. He's also been influential in helping me develop a style of writing where I hold nothing back.

Moving on. Somewhere along the way someone told me my writing style was like Erma Bombeck’s, which sent me on a mission to read everything she ever wrote. Her self‑defeating humor and sharp observations nudged me deeper into my slice‑of‑life memoir style writing, while King reminded me to be honest — even when it’s uncomfortable. Over the years I’ve exposed all my foibles and quirks, the good, the bad and the ugly, because Bombeck was right: “There is a thin line that separates laughter and pain, comedy and tragedy, humor and hurt.”

“If I’ve done my job as a blogger, somewhere in this long, April trail of posts there’s a line you’ve marked in your own mind—a little mental X beside something that made you laugh or cry or feel less alone. I can only hope. ©

W is for War Music---From Bugle Boys to Buffalo Springfield

 

Even before I knew about the A to Z Bloggers Challenge, I’d planned to write about the music born from wars and protests. The idea came from a Facebook Short Reel I stumbled on—filmed in Minnesota during the ‘ICE invasion.’ It sent chills down my back, not just because of what was happening there, but because the soundtrack was Buffalo Springfield singing those Vietnam‑era lyrics. Suddenly I was right back in those days, when so many of us made the painful shift from supporting the war to realizing it was a pointless conflict that cost countless innocent lives— not unlike the dog‑and‑pony show unfolding in the Middle East now.

“There's something happening here
What it is ain't exactly clear
There's a man with a gun over there
A-telling me I got to beware

I think it's time we stop
Children, what's that sound?
Everybody look what's going down.”

I did what I always do: a deeper dive. Stephen Stills wrote that song in 1967, and it’s widely considered one of the most iconic protest songs of all time. While it became an anthem of the anti‑Vietnam movement, it was actually inspired by the Sunset Strip Riots of 1966. You can even download it as a ringtone. For a hot minute, I considered doing just that, but I decided that if it went off here on my continuum‑care campus, it would either send my MAGA neighbors into a pantie‑twist or make the heads‑in‑the‑sand crowd wet theirs.

I cut my teeth on war music, but it was a different breed than the Vietnam soundtracks. Mom had a large collection of WWII records that she played over and over. The Andrews Sisters singing Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy is tattooed inside my head. I can’t hear a gung‑ho WWII song without remembering the day Dad and I cleaned out the basement—decades after we’d had a working record player—and we took her vinyl collection to the dump. We had a great time sailing those 33s across the trash and garbage field like Frisbees. She hadn’t played them in years, but when she found out what we did, she didn’t speak to either of us for a week. She was the queen of giving the cold shoulder.

Her favorites were The White Cliffs of Dover, I’ll Be Seeing You, and I’ll Be Home for Christmas. If memory serves me right, I once read that the U.S. government actually commissioned some of those nostalgic songs and films designed to boost the morale for soldiers and their families. Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition was one I could sing before I could tie my shoes—which isn’t saying much, come to think about it, considering my dyslexic and being left-handed battle with learning that skill from my right‑handed mother. Oops.

Vietnam‑era music was a different animal entirely—more protest, more rage, more longing to go home. Besides the Buffalo Springfield classic, there was Creedence Clearwater Revival’s Fortunate Son, a blistering critique of the draft that favored the wealthy, and Country Joe & the Fish’s I Feel Like I’m Fixin’ to Die Rag, with its dark humor about the war’s purpose. Other anthems included We Gotta Get Out of This Place and Leaving on a Jet Plane.

And now it’s happening again. Songwriters are once more putting into words what so many people are thinking. Bruce Springsteen’s Streets of Minneapolis and Jesse Welles’ No Kings are destine to be the new anti‑authoritarian anthems for the times we’re living through.

My theme for this A to Z Challenge is “the humans, habits, hidden joys, and heartaches that shaped my world.” Long‑time readers know I’ve followed politics my entire adult life, but I try to limit my politically driven posts to one in every thirteen. So I surprised myself that I hadn’t revealed my flaming‑liberal side earlier in this challenge. But this post isn’t one of my typical political rants—just a piece of the mosaic. A part of me I needed to include to round out the picture.

Before I leave the letter W behind, I should say this: these songs didn’t just mark the times, they helped me navigate them. War music doesn’t just soundtrack the world around us; it teaches us how to listen, how to cope and how to remember we’re not alone. ©

V is for Volunteering---From Phone Banks to Mahjong Tables

 

Volunteering seems like a no‑brainer for the A to Z Challenge. I wouldn’t be surprised if a few others pick it too. After all, opportunities to volunteer outnumber the do‑gooder types willing to work hard for no money. I'm not sure if I’ve done my share over the years, but I know I’m nowhere near the level of a certain cousin who has always been the Angel of Good Deeds in our family. Her church and the local election board are lucky to have her lifelong devotion. There may be more than one angel lurking on my mother’s side of the family tree. I just don’t know. But my oldest niece may be close contender in the field of education. 

But we do have a very famous volunteer in the family tree. If you like American Revolutionary War history, you might recognize her name: Mercy Otis Warren, the first person to write a history of that war. She was also a ghostwriter for several key men who ended up signing the Declaration of Independence. She knew people in high places, and their correspondence is well preserved. Not so well preserved are the pamphlets she wrote—the ones handed out in the streets to whip up sentiment against the King of England.

My volunteering is a drop in the proverbial bucket compared to my cousin and niece, let alone Mercy. Still, I like to think the political posts I’ve written over the years may have inspired or educated someone. And there were those years in the ’50s when I was a teenager working the phone banks for the Democratic Party on election day. My dad got me into that gig through his union.

My next stint came when I joined a sorority, Beta Sigma Phi. It wasn’t the kind of sorority people picture—no frat houses, no keg parties. It was service‑oriented. Our parties involved tea cups, finger sandwiches and brainstorming ways to serve the community. Back in the ’60s, BSP was a big deal, known for its philanthropy. According to their archives, they “created their own International Funds that donate millions of dollars to health research groups, hunger projects, and other worthwhile causes.” My most vivid memories are of the secret pledge ceremonies, where you were likely to get your fingers burned by hot wax dripping from the candle you held.

In the early ’70s, I volunteered at Planned Parenthood. Mostly I helped with monthly mailings — probably fundraising and updates on the long road to Roe v. Wade. It’s hard to believe those rights are being eroded after all these years. I had known a girl who died days after getting a coat‑hanger abortion, at her father’s insistence—he was also the father of her baby. It was all in her diary. Back then, and even more so now, I believe that abortions should be safe, legal, and rare.

I’ve never claimed to be an altruist selflessly bounding from one good cause to the next, and the ’80s and ’90s proved it. But shortly after the turn of the century, I made up for lost time when I started working for a large website for stroke survivors and caregivers. I mentioned this in an earlier post, so I won’t repeat the details, except to say I worked long hours—many in the middle of the night. My boss was a paraplegic who typed with a forehead pointer and he had worked for NASA before his stroke. But he was demanding, and no matter how many hours I put in, he wanted to pile on more and more responsibilities onto my shoulders. I finally had to quit for my own well‑being. 

A few months later he tried to stop me from writing caregiver articles elsewhere, claiming he had taught me everything I knew. But my caregiving knowledge came from caring for Don and being present at every single one of his therapies and treatments. My x-boss didn’t win the cease‑and‑desist order. Still, it was a sad ending for a relationship that lasted almost six years. 

 Next came a 3-4 year run with a Red Hat Society Chapter that myself and other woman started and we all tried our hands had entertaining at Assisted Living facilities, helping them do arts-and-craft projects at holidays. The chapter grew and so did the length of their fun outings and I had to drop out because I couldn't leave Don alone more than two hours. 

I didn’t volunteer again until after Don died. I answered a call for help at a small‑town museum. I was lonely and thought it might help me make friends. But everyone there had grown up together, and while they were nice, I always got the jobs that required working alone. At the anniversary of my first year, I quit and I didn't try volunteering again until I took over the mahjong group in the Independent Living building where I live now. I taught classes and built the group up and two years ago I organized our first tournament with our sister campus. So no, I’m not the family’s Angels of Good Deeds (both of whom I greatly admire, by the way). But I do keep the Mahjong group running, and around here, that counts for something. ©