Bluebonnet Syrup

Scenario 1

The call: A piano has been acquired. Free. Not a good sign. An old baby grand without a brand name. Not tuned in many years. But the bills must be paid.

The visit: Someone is there to let me in. Brief introductions. Apologies for various matters—of no real importance. I’m anxious to see the piano. Perhaps, just once, it’s not as bad as I assume and expect.

The view: Sigh. Not pretty. Tan, not ebony. Scratched. Nice stool though, recovered carefully. Sheet music has been moved to an electronic keyboard. Not a bad sign.

The beginning: Top to bottom, each key must be touched and assessed. They’re always low, of course—a quarter or even half-tone. That’s just physics. The red felt to dampen the keys not being tuned. The hammer, which is really a lever. I wonder why it’s called that? And my ears—they say “ear” as in “Do you have the ear for this job?” but really both are needed. These days, some of the young ones are using an app. I don’t understand why. A tuning fork at 440hz is required. After that? Nothing.

The method: Begin in the bass. Play the note and compare to its correct pitch as gauged from the 440. Twist to the left, turn, up, up, until it’s right. A perfect match. Then on up the scale, again and again, to the top register. Those notes of the 88 are always a bit thin, just to say.

The proof: A few scales to make sure, then the playing. I favor Chopin. With eyes closed, ears relaxed, I am for a few minutes a performer. No need for an audience other than myself. And the cosmos.

Scenario 2

Setting: The Palau de la Musica, Barcelona’s premiere recital hall. A Wednesday evening in November.

Program: Alba Ventura plays Chopin, and more. She begins with a set of variations on Prelude #7, in A Major by Mompou. Using the music, at least its presence, she turns pages on the iPad with her left foot. Then Scriabin Deux poems (Skriabin in Spain).

Intermission: The piano—a Steinway—is more beautiful than many. The ornate carvings of the stage reflect just lightly on its raised lid. My work begins. How many notes does it take to change a pitch? How much power from a pianist’s hands? Subtleties beyond my poor reckoning. But the artist said, “D2 is a bit off. Will you please fix?” So of course, it’s done. She’d missed the shade of flatness in A6. No need to tell her. I and two in the audience will notice its new perfection.

Done: Yet I cannot play. Not here. My “place” is the wings from which I watch and listen. What will the artist ask? I cannot question. Perhaps I could and never have. Time is so important. Those few minutes while the audience breaks silence, goes to drink, returns. The tuning yields the desired result. And I am indispensable, or so I shall tell myself as I stop for a scoop—or two—of gelato across the street. She will play the 24 preludes without me, or the sheet music. They are under her fingers and flow from her heart. My work is done.

 

[I have for years listened as a piano tuner brings the instrument back. This video shows a complete tuning, about an hour. The resolutions I find very satisfying. Below are links to increase general knowledge or add specificity to the scenarios above.]

These are basic tools.

Here is our pianist, Alba Ventura, playing the Federico Mompou Variations on a Theme by Chopin in July 2024.

This is the Chopin prelude he used.

The composer did not perform in public, but here is a recording of him playing this piece in the mid-1950s, with the sheet music to view.

Scriabin’s Deux poemes, with music

Chopin’s 24 Preludes with music, Arthur Rubenstein, considered a benchmark interpreter

It wouldn’t be accurate to say that Dallas Kindness Week is over. Yes, the dates have come and gone. The Festival on Saturday—full of hundreds of performers, thousands of happy participants—fell silent after the gospel choir One Voice sang “O Happy Day.”

We heard from 600 Dallas ISD students who sang or danced or played instruments or read stories. They were followed by many other students and adults alike—from Duncanville, Richardson, Midlothian, Waxahachie, Frisco, Oak Cliff, Grand Prairie, and DeSoto. So much variety as these performers represented not just professional organizations (Dallas Winds and Dallas Symphony Orchestra Young Strings) but also private and public schools, different genres of music and dance, some by way of Northern Ireland and India. Art by definition shares what it means to be human. That happened Saturday in a rich display of talent and joy.

From its earliest planning stages, Thanks-Giving Foundation President and CEO Kyle Ogden has called the week “First Annual.”  One focus was kindness in the classroom. Over a million stickers and buttons with a QR code to the Kindness Pledge flooded Dallas ISD and other area schools. Students found ways not only to act kind but also to observe kindness in others. Resources of all kinds were made available to businesses and community centers. Cards with a quotation on the front and a challenge for fulfillment on the back were popular: Plato wrote, “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” Challenge: Write a letter of appreciation to a family member.

Isn’t love important? Remember the 1965 Hal Leonard-Burt Bacharach hit “What the World Needs Now”? Love, sweet love—for everyone…True enough. But love is a feeling. Kindness is an action, a reaction, a gift. You can’t love someone who has cut you off in traffic or said something disagreeable. Or worse. You can take a breath and respond with kindness.

People think in pictures, so an image helps us understand a principle. Kyle Ogden often writes about common ground, a great unifier. Kindness—the decision, the action—needs motion. In recent articles, he has used a different approach: “Acts of kindness ripple outward—turning small gestures into cultural change. Our goal is to position Dallas as a national leader in compassion and inclusion.”

On a personal level, I have felt changed by the Pledge. It’s more solemn than a promise, certainly weightier than those pages-long agreements we sign without reading. Yes, sometimes it’s easy enough to give a compliment to a friend. It’s not always as easy to wait a few seconds before making a snappy comeback to a rude stranger. Those few sentences beginning with “I will” are making a difference in my life.

Most people are warm and friendly. That goodness can go to the next level with a little time and attention. The ripple has a center. And that center can be your kind words or quiet actions. Let’s watch as others catch the vision, too!

The Kindness Pledge (if you don’t want to go to the link)

This is Dallas Kindness Week. Kyle Ogden, President and CEO of The Thanks-Giving Foundation, caught the vision for this commemoration in February 2025. Thirty years ago, Dee Silverstein and Jackie Waldman recruited Jim McCormick (of the famous spice company) to help change Dallas’ image after seeing Schindler’s List (1993). Dallas Acts Kind was a week of luminaries—Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King III, and W. Deen Mohammad came to town.

Kyle thought we needed to do this again. And do it he has. A million “kindness stickers” for local schoolchildren—one every day for every child in Dallas ISD. Thousands of buttons. “Challenge Cards” with 25 quotations and a fulfillment suggestion: Maya Angelou~~ “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” Compliment a stranger’s smile. Visit the website for resources.

There’s a kindness festival on Saturday, November 15, 10 am-6 pm at the AT&T Performing Arts Center in the Dallas Arts District. Dallas ISD is bringing 15 buses of performers! For the afternoon, we’ve scheduled almost 2 dozen performances of all kinds—choirs, soloists, the Desperados, ballet folklorico, classical Indian dance, comedians. A premier trio from the Dallas Winds! A bagpiper! The schedule will be on the website soon.

Kyle’s excellent editorial in the Dallas Morning News describes the practical side of kindness. Simply put, it’s good for business. Here’s a favorite paragraph:

“Google’s Project Aristotle demonstrated over a decade ago that teams work best with high social sensitivity and empathetic communication. Strong teams that practice kindness find room to recover together rather than retreat apart. A culture steeped in kindness doesn’t deny challenge; it meets it with courage, patience, and humanity.”

My story is simpler. On Saturday, I represented TGS at the 5^th Annual Kindness Event, Third Church of Christ, Scientist. I staffed a table but visited others—Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, for example—and received a temporary tattoo.

The woman asked a question I never would have thought of: “Do you want it so you can read it or so other people can?” What? There were two possibilities? The “right” way—so other people could read it. But think of the implications. I’m not a billboard advertising kindness; I am kindness. I shouldn’t just display the phrase; I should be it.

Upside down attacks my OCD. Yet—It’s easier to be snarky, snarly, or mean. And momentarily, it feels better. “Ha! Showed you!” The Golden Rule is clear: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. But wait, “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” We usually take that as the basis of charity. But it goes the other way, too. If you are unkind to someone, guess who you’re mistreating? Yes. The One who is Kindness. So, be kind to everyone, especially when you don’t feel like it. Kindness isn’t weak.

Used to (copyrighted phrase, remember), I would have a writing student say, “I have nothing to write about.” My response was, “Yes, you do. You just named it.”  (I can be irritating—life-long gift). I would get the look of, “You poor, unintelligent thing. I just told you I have nothing to write about. That means, duh, I can’t write something that I don’t have.

“Ah, but you do. What does it feel like to have nothing to say, to write? That is your topic!” Because they had long known they were in the company of a teacher who was a bit askew (if they knew that word), they would dutifully go about the task of writing about what is was like to have nothing to write about.

And that is where I find myself tonight. During writers’ group I read an excerpt from an old short, set in Paris near a giant sculpture called Le Pouce (The Thumb). The article in the link is on a site called Atlas Obscura. Like a regular atlas, it details places in the world, but it highlights obscure places, foods, trips, and stories—but bad pop-ups.

Randomly (or…was it?), I looked into one of Barcelona’s hidden sites, a fountain that pumps mercury instead of water. An American sculptor, Alexander Calder, was commissioned to build it to commemorate the centuries of quicksilver mining in Almadén. The metal, liquid at room temperature, is both extremely toxic and extremely beautiful.

And there, finally, is my topic. When I was a child, we lived in a shabby old house with some high cabinets above the ones where the melamine plates and jelly glasses were stored. For reasons unknown to me, there was a pint of mercury in a pint jar stored in one of them. I would occasionally stand on a chair and hoist my little middle-school self on to the faded Formica countertop and open the cabinet, take out the jar, and open the lid. Mercury weighs a lot—that pint would have been about 14 pounds. An equal amount of water, about one. The density, the weight, the oddly swirled surface—it was all fascinating. I’m sure we were told never to touch it, which I took as a suggestion.

We knew it was used in thermometers, the kind your mother would reset with a few snaps of her wrist. If one broke, that mercury slithered out and immediately formed into little balls that had to be captured because, yes, poison. Ironic, that toxin silver contained in fragile glass, slipped under a tongue, then dipped in alcohol for the next foray. Which is how fever “used to” be calculated.

The mercury disappeared one day, sold, I assume. The oddity of its heft and mystery lingers. And that is also how things go when you think you have nothing to write about.

 

In Spanish, casa means “home” or “house.”  Hundreds of restaurants in Texas use the name Casa this or that. Casa Mañana in Fort Worth is likely the most famous theater in the state. Its history devolves on the rivalry between Dallas and Fort Worth, typified by the Centennial State Fair in 1936. A friend wrote a fascinating scholarly paper on the matter.

CASA, or Court Appointed Special Advocates, is something quite different. In 1977, a Seattle upper court judge felt that children in foster care needed more attention than a caseworker could provide. He appointed community volunteers to help the children and to provide the court with information. Dallas CASA was among the first three local nonprofits established in 1979 and has over 1000 volunteers serving more than 2000 foster children. These amazing people learn about children not only from their extensive case files but also from personal meetings. When I worked all those years for Children’s Protective Services, I saw how judges listened and appreciated their non-biased opinions on the needs of children in their caseloads.

This holiday season, Light the World Giving Machines in the metroplex are including CASA for Kids of East Texas. This video shows the reveal.

Saturday, I went to the First Methodist United Methodist Church Duncanville for their fundraising arts and crafts fair. I thought I might spend a little personal money, and I did. But more importantly, I met several women who make quilts and crocheted throws for CASA. They were taking donations for the work on display—no prices posted. I saw a fresh $100 bill in the jar.

Three women had work at the table—Joyce Gregory, Diane Baxter, and Susan Watts. A fourth, Sue the crocheter, came along later. I’ve known Sue Clark through PIP Days, the twice-yearly house rehab program at First UMC; she was lovely, all dressed up and not in work clothes.

Joyce explained the beginnings of the CASA Quilters, dating back to 2011 when a child preparing to go to court was comforted and calmed by the gift of a homemade quilt. As she shared that story, women from her church wanted to help. Others, like Diane, heard about their work and joined. Diane was an educational instructor at the Dallas Zoo in this photo with an African painted dog. Sue, a former weightlifter with a combined three lift total of over 600 pounds. That puts her in the elite category.

The numbers are astonishing: 5000 plus quilts and throws since the Quilters group started. And of course those quilts took work–hours getting fabric, planning, cutting, piecing, sewing borders and sashing, sandwiching, and, finally, quilting—that’s a lot.

There were other people there, too—a Ukrainian woman who does exquisite beading, a man who learned watercolor during COVID, and, of course, Jerry Bair. I also talked to the bakers and the book sellers. And Eddy who sells “vinyl” out of his house. Some grandkid may want to go visit. All in all, a lovely Saturday…sweeter than staying home where I had less productive tasks to do (ironing!).

Susan Watts

 

Minutes after deplaning in Los Angeles, I had this week’s title: “Stop Bashing California.” I was getting on a parking elevator when two young women complained about the impending doom of driving in LA traffic: “Yeah, those Houston drivers are mean, but in LA, they’re crazy!”  My brother wince-laughed. They were being obnoxious, considering they were guests in his town.

My visit was for an anniversary party—10 years! Congratulations! —but coincidentally, my son and daughter-in-law were closing on their first house the same day. Yes, California house prices are high. According to this report, 5 of the highest housing markets in the country are in California.

So, everyone I talked to about the purchase gasped, “What!?! They can afford a house in California?” The kids were lucky to find something affordable though it’s true the purchase price is far above the $420,000 average house price in Dallas. And no, the kids are not millionaires, not even close. It’s a small 2/1 that was built decades ago. A dirt backyard, a massive tree six inches from the foundation. It has its charms: new appliances, a lovely front yard with established roses, other interesting plants, and a lovely, beveled glass window.

But are the drivers crazy? No. For every car trip I took but one, we were honked at, usually for staying too long on a green light. The other one involved a white Tesla crossing two lanes to grab a parking spot—uncanny, really—and we honked at that. My first thought wasn’t about crazy California drivers. It was How Texas Is That!?

At this point, I might share lots of juicy statistics, quotations from popular figures, images of homeless encampments, and more. I’m not going to. My thesis was simply not to complain. California has great beauty. It was my first (well, second) impression out of the airport. There are banks of fuchsia bougainvillea, orange birds of paradise, blue plumbago—still in full bloom. Our trees are beginning to lose their leaves not out of magnificent photosynthesis fading into golds and crimsons: The poor things are just tired and fall off. I saw the sea in Hermosa Beach, a deep deep blue that was almost black. Galveston Bay might be light blue or even gray. I drive over rivers that are various shades of brown. The weather can approach perfection 300 days a year. We have 5 or 6.

Don’t get me wrong: I wouldn’t live there. I cannot afford it and do not desire it. Why live anywhere but Texas? Bashing is rude, and lazy. If the people are happy there, let them be. Bashing won’t change minds. Lots of other factors might, so be consistent if they move here. You can welcome them without bitterness.

Among the several conditions from which I suffer is “Egg Cup Brain.” One task, one message, and I’m done. You’d think I might be able to anticipate such a thing but no. It’s probably not just me—conditions rarely are—but I’ve named it.

In British films, one does see the occasional egg cup. I own one from my grandmother’s everyday pattern but have never used it. The skill of tapping a knife on the shell and then prying off the top seems just beyond me. Plus, the idea of eating a soft-boiled egg without chopping it up and having some nice, buttered toast to scrape up the yolk is not appetizing.

I chatted this over with ChatGPT to see how it’s going over there. It took the endeavor a bit too seriously. Sadly, I learned it considered this condition a symptom of mental fragility. I disagreed. It changed the subject and introduced me to a source called Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. Who could not like that title? The poetic definition provided in that style (a made-up word with real Latin roots) is here:

“solucence n. — from Latin solus (alone) + lucere (to shine): the state of mind in which your attention contracts to a single point of light — one thought, one task, one narrow beam of purpose — and all else fades into the dark periphery. You forget where you were headed, what you meant to do next, who might be waiting. Yet in that small circle of focus, something glows with rare clarity, as if your whole being were distilled into a moment’s work.

You come back later, blinking, the world rushing in again — and realize you have been elsewhere, incandescently alone inside your own solucence.”

That doesn’t really catch the vision of standing at the door to the garage in my swimsuit, about to leave for the gym, with the thought, “Wait. What am I missing?”

That said, egg cup brain is better than its opposite, egg drop soup brain. Too much scrambling around, too many factors, oddly cooking in a salty brother, with a nice sprinkle of green onion. Tasty. However, it’s the equivalent of meeting someone who you’ve met before, somewhere, now out of context, but too fragmented to ask the gracious,  “Have we met?”

Sometimes I wonder if I’ve ever really done anything worth reporting. Don’t worry about talking me out of it. It’s Monday. I wouldn’t believe you today anyway.

Post Script: The dictionary is fun, and more clever than ChatGPT. Here is a little delight that is short and, I think, quite sweet:

Funkenzwangsvorstellung: n.—the primal trance of watching a campfire in the dark.

German Funken, spark + Zwangsvorstellung, obsession. Pronounced “foon-ken-tsvang-svohr-stel- oong.”

You can’t see a person’s talent by looking at them. You can’t see someone’s heart either, though, and that’s where talent lives. Yes, Jerry Bair looks like a Regular Guy, but his art is exquisite.

Today, for example, he finished some hardware on a gate his PIP crew didn’t finish on Saturday. (Here’s an article on the Property Improvement Program and its founder, Betty Dunn, scrolling to the end. It’s where I met Jerry.) It was a good act by a good guy.

Born in southeast Kansas, Jerry’s adventurous parents moved to the Oregon coast when he was 4—without jobs waiting. His younger brother was born there before the family moved to Las Vegas and then to Ozona, Texas, following oilfield work. His dad wanted to become an auto mechanic, which brought them to Dallas and Lincoln Tech when he was about 10.

Jerry served in the Air Force after Skyline High School. At Plattsburgh AFB, he was close enough to the Lake Placid Winter Olympics to watch Eric Heiden set a speed skating record and win 5 gold medals. He retired from SEW-Eurodrive after 26 years. He now does home inspections. He met his lovely wife Julie in Duncanville, where they attend First United Methodist Church.

His history will seem familiar—taking apart broken appliances and building one working bicycle out of 8. He bought a cheap scroll saw and learned how to use it on YouTube. First, he made small ornaments–until he saw the intarsia “Sailing Home” in 2009 and bought the pattern. Weeks later, he finished this satisfying project.

Jerry learned that he can see how things should be sculpted, not just cut and glued. It takes a long time—and the results are unique and set his work apart. Three blue ribbons in 2025!!

Jerry loves intarsia work. It takes hundreds of hours. He has to find or design a pattern, choose woods—often cherry, walnut, and maple—cut out the pattern and then the wood, place them together on a backer board, shift them around until his eye says it’s right, shaping, compensating for blade width, and much more. Gluing can be nerve-wracking, he explained. Danish oil brings out the woods’ colors, as no stain is used, then a spray of lacquer and a buff with a brown paper sack.

Most proceeds from any sales go to Jerry’s church. He’ll watch a bidding war if he has donated a piece to an auction—sometimes amazed at the prices—then do a second piece for the loser, thereby doubling the donation. Once that meant $6400!

Some parts of his story are surprising. Jerry isn’t good at drawing, for example. He makes his own designs using a computer. And he has a spectacular gift for giving back. When his mother was dying of cancer, he was always with her, showing her his art day after day.

Jerry has small wooden “Heart Hugs” that he shares with strangers. Each has a caring message, and he asks only that the recipient share them again. This can bring unexpected reactions. He was having lunch at Love Field once when he saw two tearful women. He went over and gave each two Heart Hugs. One began sobbing, which was startling, but she came over later and gave him a big hug.

This is a lot of words about Jerry Bair. Inadequate words at that. Look at his art, love it, and hope for one of his Heart Hugs, even though you’ll have to give it away.

Jerry’s Etsy shop–

http://www.etsy.com/shop/DediWoodworks

Have you ever been sitting in an audience listening happily to a speaker you already admire when they say something to which you silently respond, “Uh oh”? Last Wednesday, Sharon Eubank was in Dallas. I hesitate to say “promoting her new book Doing Small Things with Great Love” because that’s not entirely accurate. She was co-speaker with Azhar Azeez for the DFW World Affairs Council’s Bill and Barbara Benac Human Dignity and Fairness for All Lecture.

Each gave a brief statement (hers with pictures because she said she can’t talk without them) and then sat for an interview on global issues before taking questions from the audience. It’s been a challenging time for NGOs and nonprofits. Funds have been cut, sometimes suddenly, and everyday humanitarians and religious organizations are having to step up their efforts. It was all fascinating until—and I can’t remember the question or the context—Sharon said something like, “I haven’t watched any programs that depict murder for about 10 years, and it’s made a difference.” She explained that believing in human dignity must include valuing human life.

And that was my awakening. Who knows what you think I watch. Other than the airplane movies I report on and good sci-fi (limited selection)—I like thrillers. I’ve read all of Tony Hillerman’s detective novels set on the Navajo Nation. I’ve seen the Mission Impossible movies and the Apple TV series Slow Horses. Lots more. My saving grace has been VidAngel. The link includes its history and transition to a limited streaming service. “The company provides customizable filters for removing scenes containing profanity, nudity, sexual situations, or graphic violence.”

I have good reasons for not watching the named offenders. Weekly, I work in a place where sacred ordinances are performed, having the authority to do so. I can participate as a proxy. The sacred and profane cannot be mixed. That which is holy will simply walk away. VidAngel, or so I thought, let me watch content that would otherwise be offensive and cause the walking.

Sharon Eubank didn’t say I “should” do what she does, but I know she’s right. The Oxford Learner’s Dictionary defines hypocrisy this way: “behaviour that does not meet the moral standards or match the opinions that somebody claims to have.” Check. The etymology offers an interesting twist: built on Greek roots for acting, it means to play a part. More simply, to be fake.

Someone I know living in Europe offered relevant commentary. He said American violence in film puzzles European viewers. The parallel is Americans watching pornography. There’s discomfort, for most. We don’t have (many) public displays of nudity; they don’t express themselves with violence, usually.

The Latin word excelsior comes to mind. It just means “higher” but has many other uses, some quite fascinating. But I believe it’s where I must go. It shouldn’t be with sadness but with gratitude. Once you know you’ve been a fake, there is really just one higher choice: Don’t.

Sunday, September 21, was International Day of Peace. There is not a proclamation per se, but you can read ideas from the UN here. I attended a Peace Festival on Saturday, marked by children and youth mostly, with singing, dances, and poems. An enthusiastic audience supported every group. The root of “peace” is pag, which means “fasten.” Applause and appreciation unite us with a shared response that is hard to resist.

The irony is double. First, we truly are bound together by the space we occupy. My brief lyric is, again, below. We cannot escape it. Yet, we don’t agree with each other on multiple topics, even the ones that should be obvious—peace, love, family, truth.

Second, those who seek to destroy our peace are not typically those who surround us, even in disagreement. They will come for us regardless of our desire for peace. Examples available on request. Rather than our pursuing peace, then, we must be peace.

The same is true for kindness—almost. As I will discuss more closer to the time, Dallas Kindness Week happens November 9-15. The 15^th is a culmination festival, filled with performers, booths, food trucks, face painting, and much more. We will feel the uniting goals.

If in your group, your silo, your tribe you say mean and hateful things about people with whom you disagree, then you are not kind and need a sticker or button to remind you that the vast majority of people are not evil. You can say they are, give examples on request, but their actions are limited to speech. Guess what? They are doing the same thing to you.

Running late, and it probably shows, but I want to make the point as plain as possible. You are probably kind. If you aren’t, it doesn’t show. Take the Kindness Pledge anyway. If you are kind and know someone who isn’t, send it to them, too. You can include them in a broader share perhaps.

Listening to a young woman from the Anti-Defamation League, I realized I want the really unkind people to hear the message. I don’t know how to find the fringes, but I intend to look. And send a sticker or 50 so they can’t say they don’t know…

Kindness Week Pledge

I choose kindness.
I will notice who needs a smile.
I will listen with respect.
I will connect with compassion.
I will help when I can, even in small ways.
I will treat others the way I want to be treated.
And I will remember:

Kindness is a decision.
Kindness is strength.
Kindness is action.
Kindness starts with me.

 

Bless the Space Between Us

Bless the space between us

That there may be hope within us.

Bless the space between us—

Fill our hearts with peace.

 

Bless the space between us

That there may be love within us.

Bless the space between us—

Fill our hearts with peace.

 

Bless the space between us

That it shall disappear.

Let us seek now and always

The path to peace, to peace.

©Mary Ann Taylor

©2024