"Rekindling A Love"

 

San Antonio Zoo 1981

            We moved from College Station, Texas to San Antonio in December of 1979, without jobs and on an extremely tight budget. Our finances allowed few luxuries during those first years as an old Honda Civic needed constant repairs, and I still had school loans to repay. We purchased bikes that provided many hours of entertainment. We found a few parks and preserves that offered escapes, all free, from our small apartment. Our favorite splurge, though, became a day at the San Antonio Zoo.

1985

            Eventually, parenthood meant even more frequent trips that included train rides and sky rides.  The zoo provided rides on elephants and camels during the 1980s as well as a petting zoo that our son grew to love dearly. Our traditions over the years included photographs with the lion sculpture. If family or friends came along, they struck poses, too.

1988

            Life took us along different paths that led us away from trips to the zoo as we spent weekends at the family cabin and discovered our love of Renaissance Fairs. Music lessons, art classes along with more demanding careers and aging parents shifted the zoo into an extremely fond memory.

            Then in December 2023, my son started wanting to visit this treasured place once again.  For our 45^th anniversary gift, we decided to purchase new zoo memberships as we found ourselves falling in love once more with all of the changes entwined with our special traditions.

1990

1990

2023

IOUNIO's "Time Traveler" taps into my longing to rekindle parts of my past within my persent. 

I'd love it if you'd listen to this song. 

Then go the next step: LIKE, COMMENT, REPOST and SUBSCRIBE

Copyright 2024 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

"On The Edge"

         The working poor live on the edge of poverty, where every little thing can impact their lives tremendously. Emergencies that many people absorb by dipping into a savings account, or using a credit card, hit hard because there is no reserve stash of cash. If your extended family survives on a month-by-month budget, turning to them for help adds to a layer of embarrassment and failure to the problem.

         On Thanksgiving, when we arrived at my brother’s home, a pool of water on the front porch greeted us. We immediately suspected a water leak and sniffed out the problem before we even put our bags into the spare bedroom. The water line going to his refrigerator hissed. Cutting open the wall, we found a nasty spray of water. The plumber my brother uses was out of town for the holiday and wouldn’t be able to check out the problem until the following Tuesday. We headed to Walmart (the only place open) and bought a variety of patch options, which we Frankensteined over the whole as a temporary fix. The hissing leak slowed to a sighing trickle.

         As the plumber did his repair, my brother called with the news. First, he was extremely lucky. The water hadn’t backed into his kitchen. His kitchen cabinets and the sheetrock along that wall remained dry. All of the water had flowed forward and had seeped out to the front of the house along the exterior foundation. We worriedly asked about the plumber’s fee. If he only did the repair and didn’t patch the sheetrock, the bill would run about $400.00—a huge chunk of money out of the fund our family maintains for my brother’s home and car emergencies. We decided that we could run down to my brother’s house in a few weeks to fix the wall. The hole hid behind the refrigerator, so it wasn’t an eyesore.

         As usual, events in our own lives kept shifting back the trip to repair the wall. Then horrendous rain storms pushed back the date even further. The hideous gap remained for over four months. Although it didn’t take long to cut a patch, float and tape and texture the area (plus add a new coat of paint to the wall), that repair would’ve added a huge dollar amount to the plumber’s bill if he’d used his supplies and time fixing the wall.

         My brother’s gratitude for our help always reminds us of how difficult it is for someone working full-time, but not at a livable wage, to absorb setbacks. When he stated optimistically, “If you have to have something go wrong, just hope it goes wrong in the right way,” I had to smile.

Copyright 2018 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

“My Vote”

         As political leaders play their games on television and over other media, I pull back and worry. I worry about my siblings and myself, and our fifty-fifty chance of inheriting the mutated gene that causes Huntington’s disease. Our genetic code may switch on soon, and our cognitive and emotional well-being becomes endangered. This disease will compromise our ability to work, drive, or walk, think and talk. Both my sister and I retired from education within the last couple of years, and so we have small retirement incomes. Both of us have husbands who earn their own incomes.

         My brother stands alone.

         So as the political pandering continues, I feel angry and frustrated by the portrayal of low income people as not having good character. The words “lazy” and “irresponsible” keep being thrown around with imperial disregard to the life events that lead someone into a low paying, “dead end” occupation.

         My brother has learning disabilities. He attended school at a time when our educational system could identify learning differences, but our teachers didn’t know how to address these problems. I remember spending hour after hour each evening and on the weekends drilling my brother on letter sounds, basic phonics, and sight words. He learned to read because he has a remarkable memory. Eventually, we discovered that his visual disability actually distorted letters and shapes. His eyes perceived images, but his brain processed what he saw into contorted versions. My brother’s school struggles led him to want to work with other children who faced problems. He attended a junior college to study Early Childhood Development, received certification to work with young children, and became a teacher for Head Start.

         His low salary at Head Start meant that he eventually left the work he loved and took a job as a custodian, first with a school district and later with a local hospital. He felt comfortable with this highly physical and repetitious work. Over the years, I’ve watched my brother work harder than anyone I know. He volunteers to work holidays, does extra shifts if someone call in sick, and stays through hurricanes to be the first to clean up after storm damage. My brother’s always works forty hours a week, or more. His income stays under $18,000 a year. He represents the working poor in this country.

         My brother lives a modest life. He budgets every penny to break even each month. He has no cell phone. During the last hurricane, we had to call the local police and beg that someone drive by his home to make certain of his safety. My brother doesn’t own a computer, and he obviously doesn’t have internet. This year his vacation consisted of staying at home and going to see two new releases at his local movie theatre. He has no IRA, or a pension plan from his employer. Even if his income allowed it, his learning disabilities make it difficult for him to understand the financial nuances required to make retirement decisions.

         If my brother carries the Huntington’s disease gene, he eventually will depend upon governmental programs—for everything. I cannot be my brother’s keeper. My own finances won’t stretch enough to cover his entire salary if HD forces him out of work. My sister cannot be my brother’s keeper. She and her husband’s retirement incomes won’t bare the weight of a second household.

         When I hear and see mindless people thoughtlessly and cruelly making judgments about those who have less, anger floods through me. These heartless people, who often have so much, don’t want to understand that Life isn’t fair, and so we must have social structures, provided by our government, to care for those who cannot care for themselves. I don’t mind that some people manage to manipulate the “system” and get more than they “deserve” because that won’t be the case with my brother, or my sister, or even myself if we succumb to Huntington’s downward spiral.

         I am not a statistic.

         My sister is not a statistic.

         My brother is not a statistic.

         So when I cast my vote in November, I’ll select the politicians that err on the side of humanity.       

Copyright 2012 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman