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I dislike parades. Not a little, a lot!

I don’t care about the pageantry or the spectacle. I just get bored. A.D.D.? Maybe. Every time I’m stuck watching them, I can’t find an ounce of enjoyment – I just think about two dozen other things I could be doing. This couldn’t be truer than when I’m at Disneyworld.

My kids, on the other hand, love parades. So when people start lining the streets, they want to stop riding roller coasters and wait. UGH…

Wait for what? Floats. No thank you! If a float doesn’t contain root beer and ice cream, I don’t want it.

I figure with half of the eligible riders standing along the parade route, the lines to the cool things are shorter. Not my family. We wait – and not for the good stuff.

A funny thing happened on our trip last week. We were headed to a ride at the back of the park while people were lining up for the parade. No one with me suggested we stop to watch (miracle), so I powered into the street. We must have been the last ones let out before they closed the rope because we found ourselves about 20 paces in front of the parade with all of its flags and music.

Maybe it was the fact that I was pushing my daughter’s wheelchair, or possibly because I looked so stately and official, but it became apparent that the spectators thought we were supposed to be the ones leading the parade. We all realized it at the same time as they clapped and waved at us.

My kids became confused.

They grouped together.

“Should we pull off and get out of the way?” they wondered.

The oldest asked, “What do we do?”

Of course they looked to me, the leader, the head honcho, the alpha male for direction and what did they find me doing?

Waving

With a dopey grin on my face, I waved back at all of my adoring fans.

♦

When life puts you at the front of the parade, smile and wave!

♦

The kids laughed at me, but it caught on. All of us began waving to the crowd.

You know what? Everyone waved back. The people didn’t think we looked out of place – they just waved at us. I wonder what they thought when the real parade came and they realized we didn’t belong. Oh well, we were gone by then. We walked over half of the parade route unencumbered by the bustling crowd until we got near the ride we wanted. Then we simply ducked into the masses and became one of them – anonymous once more.

I still hate parades… But for a moment, I was the grand marshal.

In the distance I hear the band warming up – not a single note piercing the air sounds right. Each is singular, isolated, and the sound of them issuing from so many instruments almost hurts the ear. It is not melodious or rich. It sounds a mess.

People young and old run and walk around me, depending on their ability. The youngest citizens are aided by the hands of parents who steady their wobbly steps. The elderly are aided by their children, their children’s children, or a kind neighbor. No one is alone.

Excitement is high. I can see the shopkeepers giving out red, white, and blue buttons, pinwheels, and balloons on sticks to anyone who wants them. Somehow, today isn’t about profit or loss. Those cares will wait until tomorrow. Competition forgotten, today they smile together and serve.

The entire of Main Street is lined with flags – 48 white stars, seven red stripes, and six white. My own native flag boasts the same colors but in a much different configuration. I never saw it displayed so much when my home was there. Of course, as countries go, mine is old and gray while this one is but a newborn. In the latter years, one doesn’t celebrate birthdays with quite as much vigor as a youngster. One hundred and fifty years old today, I’m reminded.

This little town of Portsong is like any other in the country. It boasts nothing outside its borders that make it unique. It is known for nothing, remembered by few, and can’t seem to grow despite the mayor’s efforts. Yet there is something special here. While I cannot put my finger on it or label it properly, there is something that made this old Brit stay and set up shop.

I believe the allure is in the small details.  For instance, I have been asked to join the festivities no less than seventeen times since I came and sat on this bench. Five of those offers came from people I do not know and four more came from people who saw me at a distance and went far out of their way to make their inquiry. I have been here since just after sunrise and it is now nearly eleven o’clock. In that time, I have counted forty-three people of various ages who have passed me. Forty-two of them shared a smile and kind word with me. The only one who did not was little Esther Parsons and being two, she was in the middle of a fit about her bonnet, I believe.

In most places I have been, an old man on a bench can blend in… be anonymous… simply fade away into background. Not here. In this place this old man has been knitted into the fabric of the community so tightly that I believe I would be missed if I left. Yes, I believe there would be a hole in the quilt if I or anyone else took flight. And that is the loveliness of Portsong. Does it exist in other small towns? I am certain to some degree. It is certainly here to stay. As am I.

The parade is about to start. As I leave my seat aided by the hand of a beautiful child with golden ringlets, I hear the marching band leading the way. No longer are they clanging individuals striking off on their own notes. Now they play as one group. Their sound gets closer. It is beautiful, melodious, and wonderful. Like this place, it is a collection of people working together in harmony.

I truly love it here.

-Colonel Clarence Birdwhistle

July 4, 1926

The next group to follow,
Was a most marvelous band,
Playing marvelous music,
In this most marvelous land.
~Robert Ball

Bonnie Spring is a Professor of Preventive Medicine, Psychology, and Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Director of Behavioral Medicine, and Co-Program Leader for Cancer Prevention at Northwestern University. A Past President of the Society of Behavioral Medicine, she is board-certified in clinical health psychology. Dr. Spring’s most recent book is Smoking Cessation with Weight Gain Prevention, and in the  original post below, she reflects on her own struggle with giving up cigarettes and maintaining her weight.

“You’ve given me new hope.” So read the e-mail that arrived shortly after Parade Magazine published a story about my research showing that trying to manage weight gain while stopping smoking can help rather than hurt successful quitting. A steady stream of similar messages flowed in, taking my mind back to the days when I first started to study weight gain after quitting smoking. I still flinch at the memories. Faculty colleagues asked when I would switch to studying a real health problem – one with serious medical consequences. The reception was about as chilly at the National Institutes of Health. The words of a usually supportive program officer float back to me, “Oh come on…There’s only an average six to eight pound weight gain after quitting. That’s not a health problem – that’s a cosmetic problem. We’re in the business of studying threats to health – not insults to personal vanity!”

The physicians I spoke with weren’t much more helpful. They said things like, “Look, there’s no question that the much greater health risk comes from the smoking rather than the weight gain. The average person would have to gain about 100 pounds to offset the health benefit of quitting.” Indeed, medical practice guidelines conveyed a similar message. The U.S. Public Health Service Guideline on Tobacco Treatment encouraged physicians to tell patients not to worry about weight gain until they were fully confident and secure as non-smokers. The fear was that trying to manage both things at once – smoking and weight – would be overwhelming and would undermine the success of the quit attempt. Yet even though that guidance seemed right-minded and conservative, I watched it prompt my friends to make a life-threatening decision. Nor did I watch detachedly, because I was one of the many smokers who responded by making the same bad decision. Having to choose between being smoke-free and being slender felt like being crushed between a rock and a hard place. Yes, I cared about my long-term health and wanted very badly to quit. However, maintaining a slender, attractive appearance felt essential to sustain the social reinforcers that were vital to my quality of life. We can call it vain, irrational or disordered till the cows come home, but my priorities were certainly not unusual then or now. I continued to smoke.

Living out the truism that “research is me-search,” I began a series of treatment studies to test different ways to help smokers quit smoking without gaining weight. We already knew that ex-smokers gain weight especially because they eat more, but al

Today is the beginning of the holiday weekend–that official weekend of the BBQ season, that weekend in which the Indy 500 is run and people from all over cheer for their favorite driver/team, that weekend in which families visit the cemeteries to place wreathes on the graves of family members who have gone before them. But first it was the weekend used to pay homage to those who fought and died for the freedoms given to the people of this country.

In small towns across the country parades will march down main streets, bands will play, members of the VFW and American Legion will march and wave or ride and wave to those standing curbside with hands over hearts as  the high school band plays The Star Spangled Banner. There will be laughter, cheering, balloons and memories.

Toddlers will wave their tiny flags on a stick from their parent’s arms. Small children will race among the viewers or stand quietly beside the grown-ups, trying to discover why the parade is happening on this weekend. Teens will watch from the sidelines, some solemn for they have older siblings fighting overseas right now, or they know others who are in a war zone. Other teens understand that these men and women were parading for their great-grandfathers, grandfathers, uncles, or fathers.

Tears flow easily at these small cousins of big city celebrations. Perhaps it is because these citizens feel the loss of even one young person to war as a personal one. Maybe it is because they still remember the reason the holiday was created. Regardless of reason, this small town parade has significance to these citizens.

And in just over a month they will come together again for another parade. This one will commemorate the founding of this country and the reason why Memorial Day’s creation was allowed. The Fourth of July has also become a holiday of BBQ’s, picnics, swimming parties, and let’s not forget fireworks. Those fireworks symbolize the rocket’s red glare referenced in The Star Spangled Banner performed a month earlier during that Memorial Day parade in a small town in the USA.

And what are your plans for this weekend?

Claudsy

This is a Hidden Picture illustration done for Highlights for Children. It was the cover art on one of their calendars from several years ago.

This is an illustration I had done some time ago, kids would find the pictures below in the illustration. It was fun. 

One of my illustrations from Grandma Drove the Garbage Truck by Katie Clark, Down East books 2006

I took part of yesterday off to enjoy some of the Canada Day activities that were within walking or cycling distance of where I live. First I had a late breakfast at the Beaconsfield Yacht Club, where I leisurely sketched the aftermath of my meal while drinking hot tea. I also sketched a few of [...]

I’m not sure what this is about exactly, but the dogs are celebrating something!

Here is a photo teen librarian, Chrissie Morrison, posted of me as I drove past her at the St. Patrick's Day parade:



Behind me is the New York State Education Department building. It's the longest row of columns in the world. Really. It's massive and very cool to look at. Perhaps one of these days I'll give you all a photo tour of Albany. Okay, I promise to do that once the weather imrpoves. I'll show you all my favorite places and tell you all the fun trivia I know about the city in which I live.

Cool, right?

“Leila-sama! We got another e-mail question from my super-neat Jessie’s Letters page!”

“It is a question with profound meaning?”

“Uh uh.”

“It is a question that seeks the deepest mysteries of the universe?”

“Nope.”

“It is a question that will challenge our understanding of our existence?”

“It’s a question about being a drummer in marching band.”

“Oh, that’s easy.”

“Sometimes Leila frightens me.”

“Heheee… okay. The question says ‘In your story you said the drummers play a cadence. What’s a cadence?’”

“Cake question.”

“Cadence is when the drum section plays a rythym so the rest of the formation can keep time with their steps. We have four cadences in the Lions Band. The first two are full cadences.”

“That’s the one you start!”

“Yeah. Full Cadence Green starts with a roto-tom solo.”

“The other one is our ‘good morning’ cadence.”

“Full Cadence Gold starts with a full section downbeat and cymbal crash.”

“Good morning cadence?”

“We like to play Full Cadence Gold on Collins Circle over behind the school so if anyone in the neighborhood across the street didn’t hear their alarm clock we help them wake up.”

“Yay! Ohayo minna! It’s a bright sunshiney day!”

“Well, except for that one guy who stood in his driveway yelling at us that one day last year.”

“I think he thought we were trying to annoy everyone. Until we marched past his house in parade formation and played ‘National Emblem’ during after-school practice. His wife baked cookies for all of us the next day and brought them to the band room. She said he was so proud to have a parade in front of his house he almost cried. What a nice old couple too.”

“That’s cool. What are the other two cadences?”

“We have one called a ‘Silent Cadence’ if we’re marching up to a performance area at parades. There’s a couple hundred yards where bands aren’t allowed to make a lot of noise because it disrupts the bands in the performance area, so we play that cadence on the rims of our drums.”

“That’s the tick-tock cadence. All drum rims, traps and glockenspiels.”

“That’s the one that sounds like a carnival! I like the tick-tock cadence best.”

“The fourth one is a simple corps cadence. One snare plays the measure downbeats. We use that for starting formations on the field.”

“Now which one do we play in the tunnel at Brown Stadium?”

“Full Cadence Gold, baby.”

“Yeah!”

“Maximum volume. Maximum power.”

“Yay! Arigato minna-san! If you got a question or a comment or just wanna say ‘hi!’ you can send me e-mail on my Jessie’s Letters page and we might even get to answer your question right here on our site! Ja ne!”

I'm typing this on the Windows version of Safari. It seems fast and friendly so far, and much like the Mac version (which truth to tell I rarely use, preferring Camino), although it seems to play better with Blogger.