Revenge of the Pink Bunny

Originally published April 15, 2006

Revenge of the Pink Bunny

It was a chilly but lovely day for the annual Cambria Kiwanis egg hunt at Tarrant Park last Saturday. Watching the kids scamper about scooping up eggs and prizes reminded me of egg hunts I participated in while living in Colorado.
My father worked at an oil shale facility. It was owned by Unocal, who hosted an annual egg hunt for the children of employees. The first one I remember was held at a wayside park on the Colorado River in Debeque Canyon. The egg hunt was moved to Cottonwood Park, just a few blocks from our apartment complex. It was also on the Colorado River, and had both a roller slide and tire swing. I loved to be spun until I was dizzy on the tire swing.
When I grew too old to join the egg hunt, my father “volunteered” my services to help hide eggs for younger kids to find.
Before we moved to Colorado, my family often spent Easter at my aunt’s house in Lansing, Ill. There were always a lot of cousins there, and we’d have fun riding around the block with them. Easter baskets in those years were filled with treats from Fannie May. I over-indulged one year and made myself sick.
My family planned a visit to the Milwaukee Zoo on our return trip to the UP. They had to rent a chair for me, still feeling a bit weak from my Easter binge.
I brought the Easter baskets out of storage this week and boiled eggs for my son and I to color. I love hard-boiled eggs, and am not sure why I don’t make them more often. I guess it’s not as much fun if you’re not going to dye them. Each year, my son and I vie for the coveted “ugly egg” title. We each get one egg and the object is to dye it the ugliest color possible. They stick out like sore thumbs among the rest of the vibrant eggs we color.
This year’s contest was a stand-off. His egg was left in the dye bath for so long it is practically black and my egg is a vile green-brown.
My favorite Easter memory was the year my family spent the holiday at my grandparents’ farmhouse. My sister beat me out of bed and down the stairs to check our Easter baskets. My basket was full of candy and a yellow stuffed bunny toy. My sister had a pink bunny in her basket
I knew, I JUST knew that the pink bunny was supposed to have been mine.
Pink was my favorite color. I had a pink bike and when my mom had a friend of hers make dolls for my sister and me, hers wore yellow and mine wore pink.
The gleam of fiendish delight in my sister’s eyes and her smug smile as she held the pink bunny convinced me that I was right.
I wasn’t going to take this affront lying down. When mom and dad came down the stairs, I pleaded my case.
They confirmed that the pink bunny had been placed in my basket, not hers, and I claimed my prize from my sister’s clutches.
My family has a picture taken of us that morning, in matching pale blue nightgowns with a dark blue trim. My sister was about five and I would have been about 7. We’re holding our Easter goodies. It’s been a few years since I’ve come across the picture, and I can’t remember if it was taken before or after the bunny verdict came in. All I know is that one of us is grinning and holding up the pink bunny in triumph while the other one looked on, pouting.
I still have that pink bunny. It’s tucked away with a few other childhood stuffed animals that I can’t bear to part with.
Have a safe, happy and healthy Easter.

A Windy City Adventure...

Originally published on August 9, 2008

A Windy City adventure

The summer I was 12 going on 13, my parents sent my sister and me from Colorado to Chicago to visit our great aunt and uncle in Evanston, followed by a visit with our aunt and her family at their summer cottage in Lower Michigan.
It was a great trip. Our great aunt and uncle worked as volunteers at the Field Museum, and allowed my sister and I to explore both the museum and the Shedd Aquarium on our own. My sister and I shopped downtown Evanston by ourselves, and probably bought a few pounds of bulk candy during our stay. My mother’s cousin took us to a Lake Michigan beach and then out for deep dish pizza and a visit to Sear’s Tower.
While viewing downtown Chicago from the 103rd floor, we used the phone card our parents had given us to call home and ask “Guess where we are?”
This became a bit of a running family joke, and my father pulled the same stunt on a business trip to Los Angeles, calling from a Dodgers game.

Now that I’m a parent, I can’t fathom turning my 12-year-old son loose to run around a Chicago museum or suburb by himself. He and I had a chance to experience Chicago last weekend when we visited my good friend Lynn, who was my college roommate and is one of my son’s godmothers.
On the drive down we stopped at a toll oasis and I invested in an I-pass, which made the rest of the drive a lot easier.
Lynn and her family recently moved to a new house. Their new home was nearly as simple to find as the old one, and it was nice to spend time with them. Their daughter is nearly 3, and it was lovely to get to know her better once she warmed up to us.
They treated us to deep dish pizza and accompanied us to downtown Chicago. We took the El and visited Chinatown for some shopping and lunch. My son was brave and tried dim sum, and I tried a fruit smoothie with tapioca pearls.
After Chinatown, we rode the El again and went to Sears Tower. The view was just as incredible as it was more than 20 years ago, and I had to call my parents and sister to say “Guess where we are?”

Great educators inspire students

Originally published on August 13, 2016

Great educators inspire students

I started college while still in high school.

While many students wisely take advantage of this opportunity now, few students knew their rights when I was in high school. 

My family moved from Colorado back to Michigan during my senior year, and my new school’s graduation requirements were less demanding than those of my Colorado high school. I only needed one credit to graduate but was expected to be a full-time student.

Unfortunately, while a much larger school (I went from a class of 25 to a class of 136), Luther L. Wright High School did not offer many of the classes I had been taking in Colorado. No psychology, no A.P. literature and no journalism. So, my day started with the required course for graduation — government and economics — followed by an enlightening sociology class during second hour, and then padded with choir, serving as a library aide, study hall, and an English class identical to one I’d taken my junior year.

My mother went to bat for me.

She fought the school administration and school board until I was allowed to enroll in a few classes at Gogebic Community College. The school district paid the tuition but would not provide any transportation.

During the second semester of my senior year, I left the high school after lunch and walked a mile to college, unless my parents had allowed me to take a car to school that day. There may have been a few times when I bummed a ride/hitchhiked. (Sorry, Mom. What can I say? One is not wise at 17.)

On Monday, Wednesday and Friday, I took Freshman Composition 101, and Tuesdays and Thursdays offered desktop publishing.

Why am I sharing this?

My very first college professor, Kenneth Bowman, taught the freshman comp class. He passed away this week at the age of 80.

I learned so much from Mr. Bowman. I still have the textbooks from that class, and many of the papers I wrote. I aced his first test and found myself both mortified and pleased when he announced to the rest of the class that a student still in high school earned the top grade.

I continued as a student at GCC for two years after high school. Mr. Bowman served as my advisor and as my director. As a secondary education major with an English emphasis, I took several of his English literature courses, public speaking and his philosophy classes. In addition to his teaching and advisor duties, he also played an active role in the college’s drama department. He served as the director of GCC’s 1994 production of “Pride and Prejudice.”

I auditioned hoping to play Elizabeth Bennet.

He cast me as her mother.

After Liz and Darcy, Mrs. Bennet had the most lines in the play. I value the faith he showed in offering me a lead role, and how he helped me gain confidence in myself.

GCC’s new student orientation included presentations of all the college had to offer, and in 1993, Bowman spoke about the drama opportunities. He recruited several of his drama students to “heckle” him during his presentation to help showcase the program. We loved filling that role.

Teaching was his second career. He served in the U.S. Air Force from 1955 to 1977 with a focus on communications. He served as the non-commissioned officer in charge of the White House Communications Center in Washington D.C. and accompanied the president, vice-president and secretary of state on trips around the world.

After leaving the Air Force, he followed the same education path my maternal grandmother did, attending Gogebic, Northland College in Ashland, Wis., and Northern Michigan University. He taught English in the Ironwood Area School District before beginning his career at GCC.

My father often called GCC the gem of Ironwood, and he was right. GCC offered a great education at an affordable price and its English department included three instructors who remain among my favorites: Mr. Bowman, Patrick O’Neill* and Jeannie Milakovich.

William Arthur Ward, known for his inspirational maxims, wrote, “The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.”

Ken Bowman inspired and challenged me in my writing, speaking and leadership skills, and self-confidence. He helped me find my voice as a writer.

Friends and former students shared links to his obituary on Facebook, and the comments mourning his loss made his legacy as an educator apparent.

As students return to school this month, I hope they share my good fortune and meet a teacher like Ken Bowman.

Thank you, Mr. Bowman. For everything.

*Mr. O'Neill passed away in 2017. He challenged me to think critically, helped improve my writing skills, and taught some great classes. I especially liked his Saturday morning classes, even if I often turned up still a bit tipsy or hungover. Mr. O'Neill had his quirks, and could wax eloquently about the many ways to use the word "Fuck". Grateful that I ran into him about 10 years ago,  to thank him for what he taught me.