Today I’d like to explain what was wrong with what we did.
Few people took tornadoes as seriously as they should have. ALWAYS TAKE A TORNADO SERIOUSLY; IF YOU WANT TO CHASE OR WATCH THEM, GET THE TRAINING, FIRST.
There were very few sirens and they were not systematic in their sounds. LEARN WHAT THE VARIOUS TONES AND PATTERNS OF YOUR EARLY WARNING SYSTEM MEAN. ALSO, DEMAND THAT YOUR AREA SOUND SIRENS ONLY FOR EMERGENCIES AND PRESCRIBED TESTING, NOT FOR SETTING CLOCKS OR CELEBRATING.
It was against some law or policy to issue tornado warnings over radio, although a Mr. Audsley did so, that night in 1957, risking his job to save lives. ALWAYS LISTEN TO RADIO, OR BETTER YET, TO A DOPPLER-BASED WEATHER RADIO STATION. HAVE A RADIO THAT WORKS DURING BLACKOUTS.
Few people knew what to do. Our hiding under a table was as futile as our running across lawns was dangerous. KNOW HOW TO BE SAFE, WHICH PORTIONS OF ANY BUILDING ARE GENERALLY SAFER IN A TORNADO, AND HOW YOU CAN BE SAFER IF CAUGHT OUTDOORS.
We were barefoot or nearly barefoot. WHEN YOU REALIZE A TORNADO MAY BE ON ITS WAY, PUT ON YOUR MOST STURDY SHOES AND SOME SOCKS, STURDY JEANS, AND A STURDY SHIRT. MAKE YOUR CHILDREN DO THE SAME.
Although helmets for children were not available over 50 years ago, today we also should store helmets in the basement or safe place during tornado weather, one for each family member.
Many people were caught bathing. NEVER BATHE DURING LIGHTNING OR TORNADOES.
Although Kansas and Missouri are notorious, worldwide, for hosting tornadoes, few people were ready with a plan and supplies. WE HAVE LEARNED HOW TO FACE TORNADOES WITH PREPAREDNESS. RENEW YOUR PREPAREDNESS PLAN AND SUPPLIES AT LEAST EVERY SPRING.
We were shocked at the far-reaching effects. DEBRIS CAN LAND ANYWHERE. WATCH OUT FOR FALLING DOORS, TRICYCLES, ETC.
People were injured by the aftermath. DO NOT TOUCH DOWNED WIRES OR GO NEAR THEM—ELECTRICITY CAN JUMP. IF YOU SMELL GAS, EVACUATE IMMEDIATELY AND DO NOT LIGHT OR START ANYTHING OR CAUSE ANY SPARKS, EVEN ELECTRIC SPARKS. DO NOT GO INTO WRECKED BUILDINGS WITHOUT HEADGEAR. ETC.
Although phones were different back then and most were down, today we must: MAKE ONLY ONE PHONE CALL TO AN OUTSIDE FRIEND OR RELATIVE AND ASK HIM OR HER TO FORWARD YOUR STATUS. LEAVE THE LINES OPEN FOR THOSE WHO NEED EMERGENCY CARE.
I remember my mother’s voice that evening: It warbled.
And though I was only six years old, I knew the warble came from utter terror. We were running as fast as a heavily pregnant woman with three children ages 2-6 could run. She was watching the sky more than the path to the gate, carrying my sister, holding my brother’s hand, and sort of warbling to me, “Oh, run, hurry, RUN!”
I dug my toes into my flip-flops and ran.
I knew it was a tornado up there, whatever a tornado was. I looked up, too, and stumbled.
Mom scolded me sharply. “Don’t look up! Don’t look up! Don’t look up!” She seldom scolded sharply. It hurt my feelings but I knew it was no time for hurt feelings. Her words were like a mantra, a warbled charm against bad omens . . . don’t look up, don’t look up . . .
But, when I had looked up I was puzzled. It looked just like clouds.
Then I had seen a door. And when, disobeying, I looked up again, I saw a tricycle.
We were headed to our neighbor’s house. My mom screamed for them to let us in. We cowered under their huge oaken table, in the dark, with our mother’s arms encircling us. I heard my mom praying, so I prayed too. We cried and pleaded with God to protect us. I did not know what to be scared about, but my mom’s fear was plenty for us both.
The neighbor calmly stood on his front porch and watched the sky. His wife wrung her hands and paced through the house. I remember her shoes and feeling sort of dumb lying on the floor under her table while she walked by. I thought of a Little Rascals episode in which the children hid under furniture.
Then it was over. We went home. My mom talked for days about the foolishness of standing on the front porch to watch a tornado go by, summoning new terror at each telling.
It was over, yes, for us, but for the victims it still goes on. The forty-four dead would be burried. The over 500 injured would tell their stories.
This week I must devote entirely to several speaking chores. So I thought you would enjoy viewing the introductions to my presentations. Here they are in their approximate final draft. Enjoy!
RNLI at Boat Race 2012 (Photo credit: Annie Mole)
Raising children is like a boat race:
You never feel ready
You always feel watched
It’s hard to change your mind
Disasters can happen
Too often, a bad beginning can cause a disastrous ending.
What can we do to ensure we are even in the right boat?
Since we are SO FAR from the shore, what are some boat safety rules?
A. We can examine our attitudes. Many begin this race badly, with a bad attitude when they board the good ship homeschool.
Sometimes people begin home schooling because of a bad teacher experience. Often these parents are angry and the thrust of their actions is intended as a javelin thrust into some teacher or educational system.
They just want to rock the boat . . . .
We all need to get used to the fact that the State Institutions are failing everywhere. It is not personal. It just is a cosmic failure, such as comes every time we build a cosmic house of cards.
Those who begin for this reason, alone, often stop just as dramatically as they began, when they, for some reason, decide putting their child in a State Institution is not really such a bad idea, after all.
Some parents begin because the child is failing. Whether he is unable to learn, or simply untaught where he is, the parent decides to take the plunge because of embarrassment or natural protective instincts toward the child. This reason also fails the parent quickly, because soon as the child homeschools, he does better.
Amazing!
The parents allow this progress to lull them into a false sense of security. They opt for State Institutionalization for their beloved child, after all, thinking the problems were a false alarm.
They change boats in the middle of the race, and slow the progress of both methods.
The third reason is more stable. These people do not become quitters as easily.
They are the ones who begin because they see the rightness, the necessity of it. They see God’s commands to teach our own children. They see the State Institutions growing constantly more hostile to morality.
They see ketchup as a vegetable and “two mommies” as a norm, or even a goal.
These frightening observations rivet them and they realize homeschooling as a part of being a family,
homeschooling as a part of the decision to have children,
homeschooling even as a part of the decision to marry.
It’s just the natural, normal result, for them, of being alive and desiring to succeed.
This week I must devote entirely to several speaking chores. So I thought you would enjoy viewing the introductions to my presentations. Here they are in their approximate final draft. Enjoy!
Managing Your Money
“Sharecropping”
About sixty years ago, two sharecroppers laid their baby boy in a box that was really a dresser drawer, his first cradle. Nursed and blanketed carefully, he was as secure and warm in that box as in the finest crib.
They pumped all water by hand and heated it on a kitchen stove. Dishwater never went to waste. Once that water was hot, it did dishes, the stove, the countertops, the cabinet fronts, the tabletop, the chairs, and last, but not least, it did the floor.
Bathing happened once a week with “washing up” in cold water for other days.
Clothing, being almost all homemade, was divided and washed by use: undies, being all whites, went first, while the water was hot, with colored clothing next, followed by jeans and work clothing, all washed in the same water. Making soap, heating water, and hauling it away took too much time to waste a drop, so when all was done, the water proceeded to the garden, via siphon hose.
The soap was real, homemade, back then and not toxic.
And all had to dry on a line.
The baby boy grew and acquired a little sister. The two children played in the dirt at one end of the rows in a huge bean field, while the dad and mom walked the fields, pulling weeds for their living.
In time, their finances improved and they bought a farm. Almost all food for the next forty years came from the garden. Most was canned or pickled. Seldom was anything thrown away. Scraps went to the chickens. Children who did not like the food offered at the table still had to eat it. And no one got dessert until the plate was clean. The children grew up adaptable to almost any food.
Meanwhile, a city girl grew up only a bit more affluent, dressed in home-made clothing that was washed all in the same water and hung to dry. Climbing trees and building cities in the dust under them, she also had to clean her plate, no matter what, and it was garden food. Scraps went to her chickens, too.
Both families owned only one car, one small black and white T.V., and no computers. Both families mowed their own lawns with reel type mowers. The girls in both families went to bed in curlers and there was no hair dryer in either home, no beater bars on the vacuums, and no A.C.
When visitors came, someone slept on the floor. Soda pop happened once or twice a year.
The children grew up and wanted brand new store-bought clothing, so they got jobs and bought them. Only–the girls did the math and often bought patterns and fabric, instead.
When they went to college, the boy and the girl each recognized something about the other; he, her homemade clothing, and she, his homemade chessboard. They married and made two decisions:
Mom would stay home, and,
Everything would be homemade.
It was a simple step to move to home schooling.
That was about 28 years ago, and the little tree-climbing girl stands before you today to say:
This week I must devote entirely to several speaking chores. So I thought you would enjoy viewing the introductions to my presentations. Here they are in their approximate final draft. Enjoy!
Disorganization vs. Order
We lingered over lunch, one day, with dear old friends, while they shared stories of life on their farm. They had owned a crazy bull, and some weird goats, and we enjoyed some great laughs at their antics. The story of the turkey, though, weakened us with laughter to the point of tears.
They say turkeys are stupid. Their turkey was a full-grown tom, and accustomed to life on the farm. It was so accustomed (and so stupid) that they had been able for two whole YEARS to keep it fully contained using only half a fence.
I do NOT mean just the bottom half, but just two adjoining fence panels, just the corner they made.
This poor, stupid creature did not know that it could escape by going past the fence. It had learned that the fence (at one time) was perpetual, like a circle with corners, and that was the only reality it could grasp: the fence never ends, is impossible to escape.
It had worn an L-shaped path in the pasture, walking back and forth from one end of the fence, around the inside corner, to the other end, and back.
Before we laugh too hard, though, we need to look at ourselves a bit.
Many of us resolve to make major changes in our organizational skills. Why do we do that? What is so important about it that it has become such a rut for us that it is a lucrative business?
One thing that motivates each of us, whether we believe it or not, whether we care to admit it or not, is that God has placed the desire inside each of us. Even those who do not know Him have this God-given love for the inviting beauty that comes from being organized.
We know it is true. But it takes so much mental energy to keep everything going, to remember everything, to think every thought necessary for progress . . . Rational thought breaks down. We gripe. And increasing voice volume does NOT increase productivity. We become unpleasant to live with. We retrace steps, going back and forth.
Like that turkey.
When we organize, though, daily chores run smoothly. Adding extra challenges is only slightly challenging. Our thoughts are only of adding a new emphasis or a special touch; of how best to bless someone; of what God wants from us. Instead of scowls of anxiety, we wear smiles of excitement.
Stress taxes our health. It causes illness, accidents, and waste. When we learn to flow more naturally within our daily activities, we add to our health, safety, and even our savings account. We become better stewards of the gifts God has given us.
Parents who home educate their children must have someone at home. We may quibble about which parent must stay, but no doubt someone simply must.
Lots of people think keeping a parent at home precludes being a two income family, but it does not. The act of staying home saves so much, one wonders how that second wage-earner makes any money at all. Let’s look at how it adds up. (Note: These are 2011 prices.):
Clothing. Stay-home clothes, timely bought (on sale) cost far less than suits or uniforms bought under duress. The same is true for shoes, bags, coats, etc.
Transportation. If only one parent is going out to work, only one car is necessary. Same for gas.
Work. Someone has to do it. Either you clean the house or someone else gets about $1000 per year to do it. You can do your own laundry, yard work, repairs, etc., and save the high price of hiring it done.
Cooking. A rib-eye steak costs about $5 on sale at the grocery, about $12 at a restaurant. Spaghetti dinner for six costs the same at home as for one at a restaurant. Maybe less. A homemade birthday cake costs about $5, compared to $15 from the store, and you know which tastes better! Hearty, homemade bread is half or less of insipid store-bought.
However, if you make these yummy foods to sell, you get the store price, or above.
Shopping. What? Isn’t shopping how we lose money? No, that’s random spending. Shopping is comparing prices, waiting for sales, and squeezing all the value you can from every penny. It is sticking to your list, buying in bulk, and always being ready for the surprise bargain for someone’s gift for the future.
It is what you don’t have time for if you’re on your way home from the office.
Sewing. While it is true, fabric has gone up, it is also true you can make new, lovely curtains with hardly any sewing instructions, covering that window in sale fabric for about $25 instead of $125. With only a bit more knowledge, you could make yourself a skirt or cape. Learn a tiny bit more and make simple dresses for your girls. All with the same savings rate.
But if you sell, it . . .
Gardening. A pint of home-canned green beans costs about ten cents for the lid and bit more for energy to run the stove. There is an initial investment, but you can re-coup the cost once you’ve canned for a year or two. And store-bought vegetables are nearly $1 per can.
And sometimes you can find used pressure canners and jars for nearly free.
Crafts. A bit of yarn, a drop of glue, how surprising the fun and savings in making gifts! And the savings is phenomenal. You could develop a reputation for a certain type of gift and become known as “the afghan lady” or the “soap lady”, turning it into a business.
Last, but not least, Child Care! It’s about $18 per day per child.
That does not factor in the cost of medical care for all the diseases they will pick up.
This list could go on forever, but you get the idea. If, when you are at home, you actually WORK, you are a working mom. You add greatly to the family wealth. You add income by stopping the outgo.
Stop just wishing. You CAN go home. And this is how.
DEBRIS CAN LAND ANYWHERE. WATCH OUT FOR FALLING DOORS, TRICYCLES, ETC.
I remember my mother’s voice that evening: It warbled.
Home's Cool! 