Shawn L. Bird

Original poetry, commentary, and fiction. All copyrights reserved.

#101 retro amusements August 20, 2010

Filed under: Commentary — Shawn L. Bird @ 8:01 am
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Apparently this is post #101. There have been over 3000 visits to the blog since I started it in May. Thanks to all of you who pop in to see what new tidbit is here, and especially to those of you who record your presence!

I have just come in from an afternoon spent with my daughter and our exchange student from Denmark. On the way home, we stopped to watch Despicable Me and Eclipse at the Starlight Drive-in in Enderby.

I love the drive in. I love the personal stereo sound. I like reclining in my bug. I like staying up late. I like double features. I like that the concession has the lowest prices in BC! If you haven’t been to our local drive in, and you’re in the area, you really do need to enjoy the nostalgia of it all.

I only wish the line up for the bathroom wasn’t so long!

 

Another amazing Rotary thing… August 19, 2010

Filed under: Commentary,Rotary — Shawn L. Bird @ 12:36 am
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Today I had the pleasure of meeting a quite amazing couple, Huw and Carolyn Thomas of Cornwall, England. Of course, I wouldn’t have met them without Rotary. I went to volunteer some time today at a hot dog sale to promote Carolyn and Huw’s adventure to cycle 10,000 miles in order to promote the Shelter Box program.

If you haven’t heard about this program, it is another phenomenal way Rotary is making an impact in improving life amid horrible circumstances. Individual and/or organizations purchase a big green box (about the volume of a dishwasher). Inside this box is a huge tent, pots and pans, dishes, blankets, school supplies for a family of 10 to 12 to live for a year. The boxes cost $1000 to purchase.  They are warehoused on several continents, ready for disaster. When a disaster strikes, like the earthquake in Haiti or the floods in Pakistan, Shelter Boxes are  immediately dispatched from the closest warehouse, along with a team to ensure they are going where they are needed. Recently the three Rotary Clubs of Salmon Arm (Salmon Arm, Salmon Arm Daybreak, Salmon Arm Shuswap) purchased 22 Shelter Boxes. 

Look closely the next time you see photos from a disaster zone: in the tent city that provides not only shelter, but hope  and dignity, you may see a Rotary logo with the name Salmon Arm underneath it.

Follow Carolyn and Huw’s journey from their blog.

 

anniversaries August 17, 2010

Filed under: Pondering — Shawn L. Bird @ 11:57 pm

Today should have been a wedding anniversary. Sometimes things in our lives don’t work out as planned. It is interesting to imagine what ‘might have been’ but it offers some dangers. Every decision we make changes our course a little, but sometimes they travel us in a circle that leads back to where we’re supposed to be. It does no good to get lost in nostalgic ‘what ifs’ because that can never change what was or what is. We are where we are now,  for better or worse.

However, if we look to the future and our ‘what if’ opens dreams of possibility, then it can be the fuel for wonderful explorations and adventures.

Happy ‘could have been’ anniversary. Joyous ‘this is it’ and Good luck on ‘I wonder what will be?’

 

responsible sun screen use August 16, 2010

Filed under: Commentary — Shawn L. Bird @ 1:19 am

I just noticed my expensive sun screen, the one that we were required to use when we were in Yucatan, Mexico last Christmas.  It is free of harmful chemicals and oils that might damage the sensitive reefs and the aquatic life that depend on them.  I certainly don’t want to contribute to habitat destruction, so I’m willing to shell out the big bucks for reef approved sun screen.

Ironic.

Too bad crude oil doesn’t come in a reef friendly version, eh?

 

greatness August 15, 2010

Filed under: Rotary invocations — Shawn L. Bird @ 9:18 pm

Each of us is called to be the best we can be.  We are not called to mediocrity.  Very few of us can rise to embrace  our call on our own.  It takes commitment, effort, and encouragement to achieve greatness.  Let us remember that while we work toward our own success, it is our responsibility to help guide others to their success as well.  We can achieve great things when we work together.  Let us be thankful for the opportunities we have in Rotary to work together, as well as for the people we meet who inspire us to greatness, and whom we inspire.

 

being an instrument August 14, 2010

Filed under: Commentary — Shawn L. Bird @ 5:27 am

I’m reading a novel called The Blessed by Lisa T. Bergren. I came across a quote, in reference to an Avignon Pope:

“I fear he sees God as his instrument in the heavens, rather than himself as God’s instrument on earth.”

It seems to me that a lot of people these days have this opinion. They imagine the almighty as their own personal Santa, who will dish out whatever they want without regard to circumstance. Football wins. Pay raises. No lines in the grocery store. Ask and you will receive. It seems a little ridiculous to me.   What is the price of service?  Who is the instrument?  What is the higher power being served?  Is it faith or narcisism?

What do you think?

 

Rotary is amazing August 12, 2010

Filed under: Commentary,Rotary — Shawn L. Bird @ 12:01 am
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Once again at our weekly Rotary meeting, I was struck by how this organization is amazing in the scope of its vision and in the power of its members to make the vision reality.  We had two guests, a Rotarian from Calgary, and a pop in visit by a Past District Governer from Kenya.  How cool is that?  Kenya.  A few weeks ago we had Rotarian guests from Finland and from the Philippines.  It is astonishing how wide our world is, and how interesting Rotarians are all over the place!

We had a typical summer meeting.  About half the club was away and our guest speaker had canceled on us a couple days before.    A few quick calls had been made to our outbound exchange student and a former exchange student to Malaysia who was in town from university.  Both of them gave us some time, and our meeting was quite delightful and inspiring.  It is a shame that only 11 of us got to experience the inspiration!

Many clubs sponsor the Youth Exchange program and believe in its power to improve the world, one young person at a time.  Last night that was very powerfully illustrated to me, and I think our outbound Maddie (who is off to Argentina this weekend) and her father were quite amazed by the possibilities of the journey she is embarking upon when they heard Chad Shipmaker speak.

Chad remarked to me at dinner that Rotary owns him.  It is certainly no doubt that this organization changed his life, though he is an impressive young man in his own right, and would have found a way to change the world without us, I’m sure.  I am just really glad that we have been involved, because we get to have some familial pride in his accomplishments.  After  his time as  a Rotary Youth Exchange student in Malaysia, Chad returned home to do a Bachelor’s degree at University of Victoria.  He worked in Africa for awhile in development work.  He was home working here when Rotary came into his life again.

Although many clubs participate in Youth Exchange, many fewer sponsor Group Study Exchange candidates.  Due in no small part to the efforts of Lynda Wilson, our current club president who was formerly on the GSE District committee while she was Dean of Okanagan College, our club regularly sponsors GSE applicants, and quite frequently our applicants are chosen by the district to join the team.  Chad Shipmaker was chosen as a member on a team that went to Chile.  Back on our radar, we started keeping a closer eye on him.

Soon after, he decided to do his master’s degree and applied to be a Peace scholar.  Our club proposed him.  The district agreed with our nomination and forwarded his application to Rotary International.  Rotary International was as impressed as we have been, and so this last year Chad has been studying at the Duke Centre for International Development in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina.  He is “Fellow, Master of International Development Policy” and “Rotary World Peace Fellow.”  Even the titles sound impressive.  Just wait until you find out what he’s learning! 

As I listened to Chad’s awe over the people he’s meeting, the speakers he’s hearing, and the work he’s been doing at the World Food Agency in DC, I can’t help but be inspired.  Chad is just one amazing alumni of our Rotary Youth Exchange program.  Not all RYE students are going to end up doing things quite as amazing as Chad, but we are in good company when we support the organization that gives us all the opportunities to change the world through the skills honed and polished through involvement with Rotary. 

Vision and the power to make it so.  Wow. 

 Rotary is awesome.

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PS. Stay tuned for another blog on the amazing accomplishments of Chad Shipmaker, coming soon to this space!

 

revenge is sweet August 11, 2010

Filed under: poodles — Shawn L. Bird @ 12:28 am

I’m sporting quite a pretty purple bruise on my ankle today. It hurts, but I have to say it’s probably payback, and so I’m not grumbling too loudly.

OJ is really ticklish.  I tease him by tickling him between the pads of his toes.  He twitches and mutters at me while I giggle fiendishly at him.  Technically this is supposed to be de-sensitizing him to having his feet touched to make it easier to groom him.   Apparently, it’s not working.

Yesterday he was lying on the floor and I was sitting beside him clipping his feet.  I was working between the pads of one of his back legs when he gave a mighty twitch.  One might even be inclined to call it a kick.  Whatever it was, it was powerful.

He connected with the clippers, which apparently I was not holding quite firmly enough.  Heavy professional clippers.  Propelled by the force of OJ’s kick, the energy transferred like a physics lesson. They went flying out of my hand and nailed me on the ankle bone.

I grabbed the humming machine and muttered something very lady-like.

OJ gave the slightest smirk, and settled his head back onto the floor. 

Today I am branded with a letter on my ankle.  I can’t quite decide what it is.  Perhaps G for “Gotcha” or perhaps L for “Loser!”

One for OJ.

 

Cleo the Dane August 9, 2010

Filed under: Commentary,poodles — Shawn L. Bird @ 9:35 am
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Before we had poodles, we had Cleo. Cleopatra was a tan Great Dane and she and her famous cousin Marmaduke had a lot in common. I was a baby when Cleo lived with us, and I know her only from the family stories and the images of the two of us on the fading family films. I am a tiny well dressed child with big brown eyes, and Cleo’s head was larger than I was. We putter around the yard together, she letting me haul myself up, and supporting me as I practiced my steps firmly gripping her. One famous film segment shows Cleo busily gnawing on a huge ham bone, as tiny Shawn toddles unsteadily up to her, and steals it from her. She could have opened her jaws and swallowed me whole, but Cleo just watched her bone get carried off and glanced up to the camera with a resigned expression.

Come to think of it, the family should probably not been filming that encounter, they should have be racing to save me from the jaws of death! Good thing Cleo thought through the logical consequences!

My father remembers his first date with my mother. He rang the bell, and mom came to the door with Cleo at her side. Cleo stood on her hind legs, put her front paws on his shoulders and looked him in the eyes. This evening at dinner he pondered, “I wonder what she thought of me?” and mom shrugged and remarked, “Well, she let you in, didn’t she?” She did indeed, and he’s been around for almost fifty years!

Cleo didn’t steal food from the counters like OJ does, but that didn’t mean she was perfect. She loved dish towels. She’d sneak into the kitchen, nab the towel off the counter and disappear down to the basement with it. When mom ran out of towels, she’d stop at Cleo’s bed on the way to the laundry and gather up a whole nest full of dish towels.

Unlike OJ, who is devoted to home and wouldn’t think of exploring the world, Cleo was seized with wanderlust every now and then. She liked to inspect the garbage cans all down the back alley. One day she came home with a prize. She was called and when they went out to see where she was, she was prancing down the alley toward home wearing antlers. A second glance showed that she had the skull in her mouth, and the antlers rose up on either side of her head. She was justifiably proud of herself for scoring such an amazing prize, and she tossed her head and whipped her tail in joy as the family just about collapsed from the sight. She’s lucky no one called the Conservation officer when they saw her heading down the alley! They never did figure out where those antlers had come from.

Cleo has been gone for forty years, but her memory lives on like all good dogs. My brother Wayne was inspired to get his own Great Dane, but his wasn’t quite as smart as Cleo. I’ll tell his story another time.

 

Guest contributor Cheryl writes about Binky August 7, 2010

Filed under: poodles — Shawn L. Bird @ 3:01 am

Today’s blog is an article by Cheryl Zuccaro originally published on Poodle-L.  I think there is an important message here about compassion and respect.  Thanks Cheryl for allowing me to reprint this.
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In Memory of Binky

Have I ever told you about Binky my first poodle? Binky came into my life as a High School graduation present shortly before I moved away from Bakersfield CA. My Mama bought her from an ignorant backyard breeder as a teacup poodle. Binky fulfilled every bad, small dog stereotype. She yapped, she bit (including me), her legs were too long (resulting in six leg surgeries in her lifetime) her eyes bulged, and she really hated being groomed. She was also brilliant, funny, loving and guarded me through my turbulent twenties.

We shared a little apartment in Lennox CA for the last five years of her life. Let me tell you about Lennox: My home was very close to the LA Airport, so close that all conversation just stopped when the jets flew over. It was a rough, gang neighborhood, Black gangs above Lennox Blvd; Hispanic gangs below Lennox Blvd. The Rodney King riots started in Lennox. There was so much graffiti in Lenox that even the chain link fences were graffitied!

I lived there because I could afford the rent, could have a dog and had a small fenced yard all to myself. Since I was clearly not part of the gang community, (blonde curly hair, little white poodle, no visible tats) I was fairly safe – aside from the occasional, stray bullets. Binky and I walked through the neighborhood every day -rain or shine.

When Binky was 13 years old, she had a stroke and I had to let her go. It was the first time I every had to make that dreaded decision. I was devastated. I was a mess, the grief seemed unbearable.

I can clearly recall walking to the corner liquor store for some ‘medicine’ a few days after she died; when a scary guy – big guy, wife beater T-shirt, multiple gang tattoos – scar-a-ree, walked up to me and said ”Hey man, where is your little dog? I have not seen you walking your little dog.” Tearfully I told him that she died. His response was “Hey man, I’m really sorry, that was a cute little dog.” That day, compassion from such an unexpected source really helped me; it helps me still.

I have worked in law enforcement for over 13 years mostly as a 9-1-1 dispatcher. In law enforcement it is easy to view people as good or bad, worthy or unworthy. It is easy to stop caring at all. Seeing to the heart of all people is so much more rewarding. As a dispatcher I had many great opportunities to help people, to make a difference in their lives. They don’t know who I am; they may not remember me at all. But I remember, I get to keep the warm fuzzies.

Binky died on May 29, 1991, my eyes still blur when I think of her. But part of her heart beats within mine, and I will always be grateful for her guidance and love. I will also, always be grateful for that chance encounter, that compassion from a stranger which helps me to find compassion for all.

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Thanks for sharing Binky with us, Cheryl!