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Above is a picture of the West Wall of what was once the largest walled prison on the planet: Michigan’s First State Prison (1837-1935). Today it is a residential artists’ community. I live here in a loft apartment created from over 30 prison cells. This is my backyard!

I have received some interesting comments in response to my few and far between writings on this blog. I am still learning the navigations of Internet life. I thought I selected the comments printable, but I am not sure I have done so correctly. Trial and error will bring me there — I hope.

I was writing about this old prison in which I now live. I am passionate about its history, its architecture, the friends I have made here. I give guided tours that last about two hours, for people have so many questions and often their own stories to tell about grandfathers who were guards in the towers here, one whose great-grandfather was a warden.

 It is obvious that this was a prison, for there are bars left on many of the windows, the floor is the original concrete one, there are bars on the artists’ studios windows, and the one-story apartments have the arches in the ceilings that used to each individually be the ceiling of the narrow cells. Going downstairs to the old solitary cells can be somewhat eerie. Vibes just don’t entirely disappear. It is as though the walls are still speaking. Yet this prison has been made into a livable one with apartments created from former prison cells and the Gallery, now a grand room that used to house four levels of cell blocks. However, it is not like Alcatraz or some other old prisons that remain looking as they did minus the inmates.

I sometimes wonder, as I get a phone call from an “old prison buff” what they will think of my tour, chock full of fascinating stories of life behind these walls and inmates with names like Hannibal the Bear and Silver Jack Driscoll, John Blood and “The Crow.” The latter was never found out, just called that. As finally the inamtes settled into sleep, lights out, and the guards could take sighs of relief, “The Crow” would awaken and do just that — crow and crow and crow! His perfect imitation of the bird would resound, echoing through the entire West End cell blocks. The guards knew the sound came from either the second or third tier. However, due to the intense echoes, they could not pinpoint the exact landing or cell. “The Crow” was apparently here for years, and the staff often changed during that time. No one ever knew who he was. Perhaps, somewhere in the world beyond, his “caws” have turned to laughter at the magnificent trick he played in spite of his lack of freedom behind bars.

It is stories like these that compensate, I suppose, for the lack of total prison look that those “old prison buffs” are drawn to. I have been brave enough to ask, “How does this tour compare to the others you have taken?” So far, they all answer that this tour is the most unique, filled with more history and stories. They are amazed at how much the building still rings of its old prison past in ambience and at the same time, has been converted into a resident artists’ community so cleverly.

 ”I would absolutely love to live here,”said a visitor from California. No carpets and chandeliers, for sure, but what utter grandeur there is in being surrounded by such history!”

PROGRESS: HELPFUL OR A HINDRANCE?
© 2008 Judy Gail Krasnow

My goal today is to use the controversy that Rachel Carson’s book “Silent Spring” caused regarding science, industry and the balance between the two to promote thought and discussion on the wise and ethical use of scientific discoveries going on today at an even more rapid rate in this technological world. My premise, as was Carson’s, is that an uneducated public and a silent one endangers life on this planet when it comes to what we call progress. I am sure that those of us here today will have differing viewpoints, just as there were when “Silent Spring” was published. Rachel Carson did not write her book with the thought that everyone would agree with her. She knew well ahead of even beginning to write it that it would arouse discontent and disagreement. But, in all good conscience, she could not remain silent.

Rachel Carson felt that if she could inspire people to think, spread word of consequences, encourage research on how to solve the problems posed by destructive insects without destroying the planet, she would accomplish that which she believed essential. As a tribute to her, to this planet, to our lives upon it, and to the generations to follow us, I will put forth ideas to be expressed here today that will give food for thought and, hopefully, educate. Perhaps these will inspire your voices to speak out about the problems confronting us today, and if we don’t take action now, will continue into the future. I ask what is — or is not — progress? In some instances, as with pesticides, the answers are not black or white. There are shades of gray. How do we deal with these shades of gray?

Many of us recall having to hide under our desks at school when a siren went off for air raid drills during the Cold War. The atomic and hydrogen bombs had been discovered – oh for the brilliance of the human mind! We all lived in fear of a nuclear holocaust: Bombs that could end all life on this planet. Was this progress?

Dr. Jonas Salk discovered a vaccine to prevent the dreaded disease of Polio. What relief this brought to those of us who grew up fearing we’d get the disease and knowing someone who’d died or was now crippled as a result. Was this progress?

President Dwight D. Eisenhower opened up American life to a new form of pioneering and an exciting way of life as he put into action the building of what have come to be known as super highways and the Interstate Highway system. America took to the roads with gas guzzling, environmentally polluting automobiles for recreation and business. Our dependency on oil grew to uncontrollable proportions involving us with countries that supply this oil but are not necessarily friends. Wars have been and continue to be fought over oil and prices at the gas pumps soar. The gasoline companies continue to push it upon us and keep their profits soaring rather than investing these huge profits in genuine research to come up with new technologies to keep us on the roads while caring for the environment. As a recent movie asked, “Who killed the electric car?” Progress?

Daily we are bombarded with advertisements for all sorts of drugs for all sorts of diseases we never even heard of or thought about before or symptoms not publicly discussed in the past – restless leg syndrome, unhappy children, too much cholesterol, too little calcium, sleeplessness, depression, hyperactive behavior, hot flashes, impotence and on and on. Voices that speak so fast we can barely follow what is being said then tell us these wonderful drugs can cause strokes, dizziness, nausea and vomiting, potential suicide in youth, blood clots, heart attacks, and even death. Progress?

Food is being genetically bio-engineered with, for example, pig genes being mixed into cucumbers and eggplants. Cauliflowers, once always white, are now also green. Fewer and fewer varieties of vegetables and fruits are being grown necessitating seeds to be frozen near the North Pole in Scandinavia to preserve the seeds should the world, too late, discover that playing around with Mother Nature in this fashion has left us without the foods we need and enough of them. Progress?

Genetic manipulation to prevent congenital diseases or deformities during pregnancy is becoming more and more possible as genetic codes are broken down and patterns discovered. Progress?

Recently, in a wonderful antique mall in the town where I now live, Jackson, Michigan, I found a book that immediately caught my eye: “Science Remaking The World,” by Dr. Otis W. Caldwell, Director of the Lincoln School of Teachers College and Professor of Education at Columbia University and Dr. Edwin E. Slossen, Editor, “Science Service,” Garden City Publishing Company, Inc., NY, 1922, 1923 © Doubleday, NY. In it, I found the following.

Some thirty years ago, Louis Pasteur said: “In our century science is the soul of the prosperity of nations and the living source of all progress. Undoubtedly, the tiring daily discussions of politics that seem to be our guide are empty appearances. What really leads us forward are a few scientific discoveries and their applications.”

From the same book, comes a quote from James R. Angell in 1922 when he was President of the National Academy of Arts and Sciences and Yale University: “…to fall behind other nations in scientific development is to precipitate a trend of events which spells national depression and disaster. In other words, the price of a sound, comprehensive national life is, in these times, widespread and intelligent scientific research.”

These are words that ring as true today as in the 1920s. Today, economic necessity and a high element of corporate greed in a global economy result in people from other lands being employed by American companies in these lands or brought here to attend college and then work in various scientific and technological fields. They take the jobs that Americans, who legitimately demand decent and often higher, wages, would otherwise get. However, America faces a major problem: too few of its own youth are interested in science, technology and industrial research to study these subjects so vital in today’s world. Hence, it is more than paying others lower wages that forces industry and technological companies to hire those from elsewhere. It is also a lack of enough interested, educated Americans to fill these jobs.

Scientific knowledge has, throughout time, most-often been at odds with religion. Ethics can vary from culture to culture. To quote Harlan B. Miller in a paper he wrote for a symposium in 1988, “Science, taken very generally, is concerned with what is … Ethics is concerned with what ought to be.” Copernicus was considered heretical for saying the earth revolved around the sun, for this contrasted with the Bible’s view that man’s world was geocentric – a flat earth with heaven above it and life existing only upon earth with Man as its focus in God’s eyes. Galileo was thrown into prison for observing Copernicus’ theory and proving it as fact through his observations with a scientific invention called the telescope. Columbus was threatened because he insisted the Earth was round. Reason has been in controversy with faith, as knowledge has been in controversy with belief in things unobserved or scrutinized through the scientific method. Philosopher Bertrand Russell, in his search for a universal definition of Ethics that could surpass cultural differences and behavior, stated, “The sort of life that most of us admire is one which is guided by large impersonal desires.” “Large, impersonal desires:” This implies that for the betterment of all, we must and should put our personal gains aside for the betterment of all.

An article in July 1964 in the “British Medical Journal” stated, “Progress without controversy is seldom possible. … Human institutions flourish only in so far as they evolve and adapt to changing circumstances.” Science has brought about much good. Vaccinations against smallpox, rabies, diphtheria, and other deadly and debilitating diseases, along with antibiotics, have saved millions of lives. Yes, these vaccinations and drugs have their inherent dangers, but for the most part, their results have helped humankind to live better, longer, healthier lives. Telephones, computers, electricity, the automobile, airflight – and the list goes on and on – have certainly changed our lives in many ways for the better. They have also brought their downsides, affecting the environment and causing tenuous political relationships between countries. Nuclear power holds two sides: cleaner, cheaper power to light our homes, towns and cities, and the potential to destroy the entire planet.

Today we hear the words “Global Warming” constantly. Controversy reigns at the very mention of them in spite of observations that the polar ice caps are melting, the polar bears are becoming an endangered species, cyclones, tornadoes, and hurricanes are increasing in numbers and virulence, and the levels of oceans are increasing while their temperatures are rising.

Albert Schweitzer, famed doctor and humanitarian said, “Man has lost the capacity to foresee and to forestall. He will end by destroying the earth.” Author and famed editor and writer for “New Yorker Magazine,” E.B. White is quoted in the opening of the book Silent Spring by Rachel Carson. “I am pessimistic about the human race because it is too ingenious for its own good. Our approach to nature is to beat it into submission. We would stand a better chance of survival if we accommodated ourselves to this planet and viewed it appreciatively instead of skeptically and dictatorially.

Here are further words that today ring equally true, written in the 1920s in the book I found in the antique mall: “To live in a scientific age, an age of rapidly accumulating knowledge imposes heavy obligations upon education and upon the resultant social and industrial controls. But the hardest question is yet to come. Has the common appreciation of moral obligations developed to a point where it is socially safe for all science knowledge to become common property? Can the common moral sense be trusted? … Since science deals with progressive truth, it should not omit its obligation toward better common knowledge of useful scientific truth. It dare not omit its due share of the obligation to have modern society develop in moral ideals and controls so that constructive and not destructive use of science shall result.”

Rachel Carson, with her knowledge about the oceans, became concerned with what chemical inventions used during WWII could potentially do to these waters and, hence, our planet, dependent upon the oceans for its life. She questioned what the chemical companies which made such great profits as a result of the War were going to turn to in order to continue obtaining such financial success with the War over. Spraying of chemicals in agriculture did not begin after the WWII, but the new chemicals such as DDT were even more potent than those previously used. Here again, from the book I have been quoting published in 1922, are some relevant views and facts. Entomologists – those who study insects – were doing so as far back as the Civil War with the goal of eradicating those insects that caused illness and damaged vast amounts of crops. Other countries followed the example of the United States in studying insects. With a growing population worldwide, increasing food production and the need to decrease diseases caused by insects to plants, animals and people, spraying and later the dusting of crops made possible by airflight was deemed essential. To quote:

“Indeed spraying is practical both with and without knowledge of its effects. In other cases, the cultural practices are changed in efforts to affect the life of injurious insects. Or, as in the case of California white scale and the Australian ladybird, the entomologist attempts to use the natural enemies of insects in his warfare. … The importation of the Australian ladybird into California in the late ‘eighties to kill off the white scale which threatened the extinction of the orange and lemon growing industries was a great accomplishment in itself and saved the country many millions of dollars. It is of especial significance, however, in that it pointed out the possibility of the utilization of the natural enemies of destructive insects … in a way that has been followed with other successes in this country and elsewhere.”

Yet, amidst the insect and other problems besetting the nation, responsibility to the public is emphasized. Exact knowledge and faithful interpretations of science in themselves provide large obligations. But the still larger one – without which modern science is dangerous – asks that intellectual and moral ideals and controls shall develop in harmony with growth in possession of scientific knowledge.

Rachel Carson, as early as in 1945, tried to interest the Reader’s Digest in an article about the alarming evidence of the damage the new synthetic chemical, DDT, along with other long-lasting new pesticides, could have on the environment. She fully understood the necessity for preserving crops and increasing their growth and for preventing insect-caused diseases such as malaria caused by mosquitoes, sleeping sickness caused in Africa by the Tsetse Fly, Rocky Mountain Fever caused by tics, and a host of others. However, she could not but help notice some ominous new trends. She said, “Intoxicated with a sense of his own power, mankind seems to be going farther and farther into more experiments for the destruction of himself and his world. Technology is moving on a faster trajectory than mankind’s sense of moral responsibility.”

The scientists in the 1920s had questioned the moral right of both scientists and the government to remain silent and keep the people in ignorance of possible harmful effects as the result of certain scientific discoveries. Rachel Carson questioned the moral right of the same to blatantly expose citizens to toxic chemicals seeping into every element of the environment and potentially destroying the very fabric of life on earth. In “Silent Spring” she wrote, “The average purchaser is completely bewildered by the array of available insecticides, fungicides, and weed killers, and has no way of knowing which are the deadly ones, which reasonably safe. … We should diligently explore the possibilities of non-chemical methods. … Until large-scale conversion to these methods has been made, we shall have little relief from a situation that, by any common-sense standards, is intolerable. As matters stand now, we are in little better position than the guests of the Borgias.”

A major problem in scientific research is that it is funded by industry. Industry hopes to make a profit from the new discoveries and inventions. The scientists working for industry are therefore doing their research with the paradigms that what the companies want as products are to be proven possible and effective. In the case of pesticides, the scientists were to focus on the effect they’d have on killing insects without also researching the effect they could have on the environment: plants, animals, waters, the air, and people. Things have not changed much today. As a result of “Silent Spring,” the Environmental Protection Agency was established, and we have bureaus and organizations such as OSHA – the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

Yet, fighting the big corporations is still not an easy task. The corporations fight for less and less government controls. Remember the film “Erin Brockovich,” in which she takes on the almost impossible task of fighting to clean up the water pollution that is causing cancer in the community. “Silkwood,” was the movie about Karen Silkwood whose mysterious death occurs because the nuclear power plant executives knew that she knew of their violations.

The chemical companies of the 1960s feared “Silent Spring” because they feared it would increase governmental controls and their profits would drop and/or they would no longer be able to market certain of their herbicides, pesticides and other chemicals. The chemical companies argued vociferously that there is no housewife in America who would want to go back to selecting “wormy apples” from the stores as they did prior to the use of pesticides. Some put out pamphlets warning that the world would return to a Dark Ages of insects ruling it with graphic descriptions of maggots squirming their way out of produce pulled from a refrigerator and about to be cooked for dinner. A “New York Times” editorial on July 2, 1962 defended Carson, stating, “Carson does not argue that pesticides should never be used. She simply warns of the dangers of misuse and overuse by a public that has become mesmerized by the notion that chemists are the possessors of divine wisdom and that nothing but benefit can emerge from their test tubes.”

We must ask ourselves today if we have not become a passive and mesmerized public regarding science and many of its offerings that we simply accept such as the bioengineering of our food. No studies have been done as to long-range results of such genetically manipulated produce upon our bodies. We know that hormone treatment was practically pushed upon women over the past decades and when the rate of breast cancer increased in manifold numbers, it was then discovered that the amounts of estrogen in the treatment were the cause. What other medications, foods, environmental chemicals and pollutions are we being exposed to without them first being tested? Are all the imports from China that include lead in toys for children, overdose amounts of the blood thinner heparin that killed some fifteen people, and toxic pet foods progress because companies can make larger profits using cheap labor in China? Have we become a silent nation again? Have we lost our search for the ethics that, as Bertrand Russell said comes from behaving in a manner that puts the good of all above our own selfish needs?

The moon is essential to the tides of the oceans upon the earth. Even the Australian Aborigines observed this and a folktale from their culture reflects this. Parrot Man and Moon man continually argued over foolish things like who was the most beautiful and useful. The argument became so intense that they physically fought. In a tug of war, moon man pulled so hard as parrot man let go, that moon man shot into the sky and has never been able to return. However, the two are still fighting and continuing to tug at one another, and this causes the tides to forever rise and fall in the oceans. Yet, this tug of war keeps the ocean waters in motion, purifying them and keeping them safe and clean for all life that lives in them and all other life that is dependent upon them.

With talk of man, now is capable of going to the moon to mine its ores, what will become of the moon, which is so essential to life on earth? Those of us who were old enough can remember that amazing day on July 29, 1969 when Neil Armstrong set foot upon the moon. Progress? Yet, what will mining upon the moon do to this most necessary satellite of our Earth? Will robbing it of its ores and other minerals be akin to tearing up the Rain Forests of Brazil, which is causing climate change around the Earth? Will it affect that tug of war going on between parrot man and moon man, so to speak – upset the natural balance of nature? Is progress always progress simply because mankind is capable of doing something? Should results of progress be investigated prior to simply stepping in and using new scientific developments?

The Titanic was the largest ship built in its time. It was considered indestructible. Safety precautions were not taken to assure that should something happen a lifeboat and safety vest would be available for each and every passenger. Hence, thousands died when the indestructible was destructed. This is an example of how science so often ploughs ahead without the necessary precautions.

Science brings changes and calls upon us to shake up our ways of thinking and to challenge our own sense of beliefs and what is right or wrong. Controversy reigns as differences in beliefs enter the scene of what is considered scientific progress. Perhaps one of the most controversial scientific advances today is that of stem-cell research. Stem-cell technology can result in many people regaining lost sight, help in the relief and possible cure of dreaded Parkinson’s. More advanced techniques of collecting, or “harvesting,” human stem cells are now used in order to treat leukemia, lymphoma and several inherited blood disorders. The clinical potential of adult stem cells has also been demonstrated in the treatment of other human diseases that include diabetes and advanced kidney cancer. Yet, the thought of using human embryos for such a purpose raises all sorts of moral issues. People are most often thrilled that embryos can be grown in test tubes and implanted into infertile women. As a result of this, however, how many embryos not selected for implantation lie in waste? Should their yet unformed lives be used to give better lives to others?

Other ethical questions arise from the scientific advances in invitro fertilization and genetic manipulation. A day will soon come when parents can select the sex and race of their children. The consequences of such scientific advances again could drastically upset the balance of nature as boys are favored in so many societies and racial prejudices still exist around the world. Progress?
Rachel Carson wrote “Silent Spring” out of deep commitment to this planet. Her wealth of knowledge and detailed research informed the public about what toxic chemicals were doing to the planet and the danger of totally destroying life as we know it should rampant, unchecked spraying of such chemicals continue. In the 1960s, the chemical companies took a stand against changing their tactics, for their profits were at stake.
Today it is the oil companies with whom we must do battle. Their influence controls the automobile industry and limits the researchers attempting to develop new sources of fuel or new ways to run our cars. The growth of corn for fuel has caused food prices to skyrocket. As a result, hunger around the world and tables with less food upon them in America are a growing reality. Brazil has found fuel produced by sugarcane a highly successful solution. Hybrid cars and electric ones have been invented and need honing, but they, too, are excellent alternatives. Why, then, is there such resistance and is it taking so long for changes to be made?
Rachel Carson’s book addressed a very real problem: controlling the damage and diseases caused by insects. “Silent Spring” called upon the nation to seek ways other than rampant spraying of toxic chemicals to solve these problems. The chemical companies resisted with all their power and might in order to protect their profits.
Today, we face a similar battle against the oil companies. No one is saying get rid of oil entirely, but its life underground is finite and its pollution to our planet in the form of global warming is growing evermore evident. Many, including the oil companies raking in profits so big as to boggle the mind, wish to deny this, just as the chemical companies wished to deny the dying birds and fish, increased childhood leukemia, and deaths and illnesses of those who dealt directly with the chemicals as they sprayed roadsides, farm fields, and their own home gardens.
Scientific progress can bring blessings. It can also become a Frankenstein without controls to check it. As Jacob Bronowski, mathematician, writer of the BBC series, “The Ascent of Man,” author and Assistant Director of the Salk Institute in the 1960s wrote, “Science doesn’t just suggest an ethical system, it has been an ethical system all along. It is based on the premise that we will take every precaution not to deceive ourselves, and the promise that we will not intentionally deceive others. That is the scientific ethic of truth-telling. What a refreshing possibility as a foundation for all ethics.”
In tribute to Rachel Carson, let us keep “Silent Spring” in our hearts and minds. What one book did to shake up the nation and the world cannot be forgotten. Let us be vigilant so that we know what science is presenting us with and how its progress will affect our Earth, our lives and the lives of future generations to come. Let us raise our voices when necessary to take every precaution to not allow ourselves to be deceived. Let us uphold, as Rachel Carson so courageously did, the scientific ethic of telling the truth.

I think there are moments in our lives when somehow we sense big changes are on the horizon. I sensed this but put thoughts of it aside as I boarded a plane on December 6, 2006 to fly to Belgium. My youngest child and only daughter, Sarah, lives there with her Flemish husband and my granddaughter Ayla. I fly there each Christmas season, but this trip was different. Sarah had not only a slipped disk — the lowest one on her spine — but all fluid was gone between it and the disk above it, which was also showing signs of damage as a result. Her pain and inability to move normally needed the skill of an expert surgeon and a relatively new procedure in which a prosthesis disk with a gel-like substance is inserted to replace the damaged disk. My child was to be cut open through her lower abdomen, have her various organs moved aside in order for the prosthesis to be inserted, and would take a few months to recover. As mothers do, I put aside everything to go mother my daughter and run her house, cleaning, cooking, shopping, entertaining visitors, and, of course, caring for Ayla along with caring for Sarah. Hopefully,the operation would prove successful, and my daughter could live a normal life once again.

I was in the middle of writing my book, “Rudolph, Frosty, And Captain Kangaroo,” and I had a deadline with my publisher. The first week upon my arrival was spent in preparation for the operation. I wondered when I would find time to write – certainly not that week. Then, Tom, Ayla, and I took Sarah to the hospital. Children are allowed to visit their parents in Belgian hospitals, young as they might be, and Ayla was seven. I couldn’t believe the ease with which Sarah was admitted. She simply gave her name and was told by a smiling office worker where to go and that we could all go with her: No questions about, “And what insurance do you have?” No forms to fill out. All had been done, and the government would pay so that my daughter would not become a cripple. This was one moment when I was happy that, in spite of the thousands of miles between us, my daughter had moved to Europe. Even with medical coverage, in the U.S. the costs that still lay upon the insured would have put her into debt for life.

The operation took place a couple of days later. We were asked not to remain at the hospital. We would be called when we could see Sarah and, if God forbid, anything required our presence. All went well. The doctor said the surgery was a success, but only time would tell if her body agreed, the prosthesis would be accepted by her immune system, and if no nerves were permanently affected, as sometimes they were, causing pain in the legs permanently.

The second week, we were at the hospital each and every day. Sarah was having all sorts of reactions to anesthesia, which she’d never responded well to as witnessed in an appendectomy and a cesarean section prior to this operation. Finally, the doctor felt she could be sent home. Her right leg ached, and it would be weeks until we knew for sure that no nerve had been damaged. My massage muscles increased in strength as nightly they worked on that leg.

A few weeks had passed and my publisher’s deadline was nearing — February 1st. I was nearly halfway through, but with less than two months to go, could I possibly complete all that remained to be written? I heard Sarah’s voice calling from the room off of the living room where the government paid for a hospital bed while she recovered. It is a quaint room where Tom’s hundreds of CDs sit upon thin wooden shelves, where a television of modest size and a DVD player stand upon a little tea-cart-looking stand, and where their new sofa allowed me to stretch out and relax as Sarah and I stayed up late each night watching the series “Six Feet Under,” to which we had become addicted. It was our nightly mother/daughter-everyone’s asleep-forget pain-become absorbed activity.

Yes, Sarah called to me as I was in the adjoining living room and said, “You better start writing that book, Mom. Here’s what I suggest. Tom will take Ayla to school. When she leaves, you can bring me breakfast, you eat, get dressed and sit down in your room or up in the living room and write. We’ll take a lunch break, and then you write until you have to pick Ayla up.”

I had gotten an international license and once again drove a stick shift car, and being directionally challenged or directionally dyslexic or both, I managed to find my way to Ayla’s school and a few other places around town, scooting in and out of cobblestone, narrow roads and wondering just where to go on these roads as the bus turned onto the street and appeared to be aimed directly at the car’s front end. Amidst this, shopping in Delhaize, their supermarket which I love but must find things in and then figure out the Euros to pay with, and generally becoming a full-time mom after years of an empty nest, I thought of Sarah’s words: “You better start writing that book, Mom.” And so I took my daughter’s advice. She is great at organizing.

About one week after I’d sprawled my papers, father’s collections, hand-written notes, books and laptop plugged into a transformer, Sarah perked up. Her leg still needed daily massages, but she actually showered and shampooed her own hair again, and she said she would now like some visitors. With the table in the dining area of the living room filled with my book paraphernalia, people began to come over. In Belgium, one serves coffee and cake always. I managed to make room on the coffee table for the array of people eager to see Sarah. As her and Tom’s friends have become friends or like family to me, it was very hard not to socialize along with serving the delectable Belgian cakes and, of course, chocolates; delicious because the government regulates the ratio of the amount of sugar to cocoa, and the latter wins out. Hence, nothing is sickeningly sweet, and Belgians, for all the goodies they eat, are not fat.

It took time, but I finally said my hellos and explained that I had to get back to writing. Growing up in a household bustling with conversation and activities, I’d learned how to concentrate with noise and commotion around me, so I sat at the table and wrote while the guests and Sarah chatted, and I’d get up periodically to make another pot of coffee. The dash of cinnamon that I added to the percolator seemed to do the trick, and my coffee was much appreciated.

Ayla came into my room each morning and asked, “How many chapters have you written, Ami?” The “Ami” came from the time she was 14 months old and in my arms in the pool in Miami. The moon could be seen in the daytime sky, and she kept pointing and saying “Mewn, Mewn,” and I sang her the song “Moon Over Miami.” Her response was to say, “Ami’s Mewn. My Ami has Mewn.” So Ami I am, and each morning my granddaughter asked which chapter I would write today or how many days would it take me to finish a chapter. When I picked her up at school, she would ask before anything else, “Did you finish that chapter, Ami?” If I didn’t, I would be told that I had better finish it the next day. Tom, too, would check up on me, and I was touched and grateful for his insistence upon washing the dishes many a night, or doing the shopping if I gave him a list. He is a journalist, and he respects the art of writing. Between the three of them, I began to believe I would make the publisher’s deadline. I remember crying out to Sarah when I’d edited and re-edited the last chapter several times and now, called the book finished. By then she was mobile, even going out of the house once again. She came over and hugged me, and I cried like a baby. I had ten days left before returning to Miami and sending off the manuscript, and I intended to put all signs of the writing gear away and have a little holiday.

Remember, in the beginning of this tale, I said that there are times in life when we sense big changes are about to happen. While in Belgium, I felt a bit like Moses: like I’d gone up to the top of the mountain, and a message was coming through from somewhere loud and clear. The message was that when I returned, I was going to have to look seriously at how I could manage to remain the owner of a lovely townhouse in a beautifully kept Association in Miami, Florida.

The Home Equity loan I had taken out initially to supplement performance income so I could write my book had been to the tune of $20,000 at 2.3% interest. Prior to my leaving for Belgium, the interest had soared to 9.5%. I knew I needed more cash to pay the bills, and I knew that nearly $10,000 of my annual income had abruptly ended when the Florida state government, under Jeb Bush, cut funding drastically to the Arts. The Humanities Council and the State Touring Roster, sources of decent pay for me, were now at half-mast, and the Humanities Council soon became no-mast as the Speakers Bureau ended. So, before leaving for Belgium, I luckily found a partial mortgage at 6.3% interest, leaving me with $811 per month to pay. I knew, upon my mountaintop in Belgium, that the only way I might even be able to keep my house was if there were no payments upon it but maintenance, or if I took Social Security to pay the monthly mortgage. That would work, but I’d have to work full-time for the rest of my life unless my book became a best seller: not likely. Callings are callings. What they bring is satisfaction, “following your bliss,” to quote Joseph Campbell.

I enjoyed my ten day holiday with a growing sense of anxiety at the thought of leaving the haven of the loving home of my daughter, the charming country of Belgium, the ivory tower of writing each day, and returning to stare reality right in the face. The morning after I’d come home having experienced a six hour plane delay in New York, the phone rang at 9:03 AM. It was State Farm Insurance with whom I’d done business for 25 years. I had paid over $1,000 prior to leaving the country, paid three months worth of insurance ahead of time. Yet, I was told that, “If you don’t come in today and give us $850, we will cancel your insurance. You can’t have a mortgage without insurance, so the bank will take over your house, and you will be out on the street!” Welcome home!

Katrina and Wilma, those witches of hurricanes, had caused the rates to triple while I was away and I owed up what I didn’t even know was coming before I had left. My monthly payment would now be $547 per month for homeowners insurance. A storyteller and author whose funding has dried up to the tune of $10,000 per year and who didn’t earn even $40,000 when it was a bit more moist, can’t survive paying $547 per month for homeowner’s insurance, then $95 per month for auto insurance on a six-year old car. Hello reality! I already had no medical coverage. But back to homeowner’s insurance.

I had a $500 deductible. In order to bring the monthly rate down a bit — to $426 per month, I had to raise the deductible to $5,000. No sooner had I done this than my roof sprung leaks in four places for under $5,000. My roofer, a kind, trustworthy man who had put an entirely new roof on after Hurricane Andrew in 1992, informed me that he gave my roof maybe two, at most three years until it would need total replacement. I walked out on the wooden terrace off the kitchen, and the boards were rotting. My foot fell through one of them, and another nearly hit a friend in the head when she stepped on one end of it, sort of like a seesaw flying upward while only one person sits on one end.

How would I ever do justice to my beautiful townhouse? I paid the roofer with the money from the mortgage, paid the insurance company the $850 with the same, and saw that time was running out. I loved my home, but what good is it to sit in beauty that is fading with no hope of financing the plastic surgery needed to perk up the facade? My beautiful townhouse was feeling like the weight of the world upon my shoulders. Gas prices were rising, and I wasn’t driving anywhere I didn’t have to — performances yes, pleasure no.

I saw the writing on the wall. I knew big changes were in order, but what, where, how?

The answers came in a strange way, as answers to life’s big changes most often do. Tune in for the next episode.

That’s right. I haven’t been moving on this blog for months. But I have sure been moving. Most folks look forward to retiring somewhere around age 65, and that retirement often means from a cold climate to the warmth and adult communities of sunny Florida. Well, I have looked to my years heading on towards 70 with a totally different slant.

After 26 years in the sunshine state, I have moved to Michigan, and I did so in the dead of what Michiganders have called “the most brutal winter they’ve seen in at least ten years.” I can’t believe I made it through to the sun shining through my window today as spring attempts in mid-April to push its lovely head through the cold. I made it through scraping ice off of my van’s windows to get to the bank, grocery store or wherever else I have had to go. I even made it home one night though I hadn’t driven in snow for over 30 years, not since my children were small and we lived first in New York City and then in Nyack on the Hudson.

I was, some 40 miles away from Jackson, my home, enjoying the town of Ann Arbor, home to the University of Michigan. A storm blew up, and did it ever blow. My usually tan and now whitening cheeks grew cherry red as the icy snow beat against them as I fought the wind to get back to my car. The traffic was horrid on the one lane in each direction road that would normally take me to I-94 in ten minutes. Instead, I sat, bumper-to-bumper — an experience I hadn’t experienced in any part of Michigan I’d driven in so far. I was used to bumper-to-bumper from Miami where it becomes like another limb upon one’s body. But this night’s bumper-to-bumper was like none I’d ever experienced. My large, made for ice and snow windshield wipers were struggling against the icy flakes falling evermore rapidly upon the front window. As I sat wondering what I would do, namely how I would get back to Jackson, the gauge on the gas tank, which sometimes swings back and forth, went to near empty, and the light came on. Oh, my God! What if I ran out of gas just sitting in this snow growing ever wilder and thicker. I looked left and right. On this one-lane road there was nothing — no restaurant, no gas station, no house to knock on the door and plead for both a phone and a bathroom, as nerves were filling my bladder rapidly.

I knew there was a gas station on top of the hill, but the hill was growing farther and farther into the distance, actually disappearing like a ghost as the visibility grew whiter with clouds of snow filling the air. I prayed my blood pressure would not rise to panic levels and took deep breaths as I tried to remember where the gas tank had read prior to this sudden swing downwards and when I’d last filled the tank and how many long drives I’d taken since then. Not only was the visibility now getting clouded with blowing snow, but the sun was fast setting and night’s darkness casting its net over the snow making white flakes grow at first gray, then blacker by the minute.

Creep a few feet forward … turn the heat down so as not to use up gas … fingers feeling numb … turn the heat up once again just to defrost myself and the windshield that was laden with a growing layer of ice that the wipers couldn’t scrape off … creep, creep, creep … I could feel the car beginning to go up an incline … can it be … I’m starting up the hill, the long hill at the top of which is a gas station … Please, please God or whatever, however, wherever, let me just get to the gas station to fill the tank and empty my own — a bladder about to burst … creep, creep, creep … I can feel the hill getting steeper … creep, creep, creep … I see something that looks vaguely like a gas station in the distance … creep, creep, creep, creep, creep — stop — sit, sit, sit, no motion … creep again … sit, creep, sit, creep … YES! It is the gas station!

Another thirty minutes go by. The tank must be fuller than the light indicated, or else my guardian angel is sitting on my shoulder. At last! The gas station is truly visible and maybe 50 feet away. The road widens here into three big lanes. I can’t see, as my mirror is caked with nature’s precipitation. I open my window to a blast of cold air and snow, look out and my glasses quickly ice. I take them off and my eyelashes are now snowy white as it is snowing into my van, but I can at least see to get into the first left lane, then the second, then the turn lane as people are driving very slowly. I make it into the gas station. Hallelujah! First, I run in to empty my tank. Then I run out to fill up the van. It turns out the meter is totally whacked out. I had at least 6 more gallons. Well, thanks, is all I can say and feel.

Traffic is now at a standstill in each direction of this suddenly huge four-way intersection. I have no idea how I can get out to get back onto the road that will take me to I-94. I contemplate finding a motel for the night, but the prediction repeated on my car radio over and over is that the snow is expected to get worse, leaving perhaps 16 inches by morning, and I don’t relish the thought of living in a motel for two to three nights, and I don’t have my blood pressure medicine with me, and I don’t want to roam around looking for a pharmacy if the weather will be even worse than this. No, I will get onto I-94. The Michiganders have told me that snowplows tend to the roads quickly, that snow melts as all the cars driving home from work serve as a plow of sorts themselves. I can do it. I used to do it. What is 30 years in the scheme of things? It will be like riding a bicycle I tell myself — you never forget, it becomes part of the cellular memory.

How shall I ever get out of this gas station. There isn’t a space to drive out of any side of it. I decide to head for the road perpendicular to the one onto which I have to turn left. Some polite driver who can see through the blowing snow lets me into the right lane. There is no way I can get to the left to make that left turn. I will go straight until I find a place to turn around so I can drive back to make a right turn. I-94, bless you, I know you are not too far away, and my bladder is now empty and my gas tank full. Straight it is I go, and as I come upon it, I see a place demarcated for a U-turn. Slowly I enter it and sit, sit, sit, sit until some slow drivers are at enough of a distance for me to make my way into the crowded street with more bumper-to-bumper cars. I am lucky to wind my way to the most far right lane. It is one of the few times, perhaps the only one, that I am thrilled to be on the far right. I make it there just in time to make that longed-for right turn back onto the road that will take me to I-94. I can barely see, and the road that leads to the highway looks like it leads into a big motel whose name is covered with snow. I follow a pickup truck that made the turn onto this road that has a sign, “I-94 West.” I figure if it leads me into the motel, maybe I should take that as writing on the wall, a message to stay where a wrong turn has taken me. But no, the turn leads me onto a snow-covered I-94 where my fear of the tales of skidding on black ice overwhelm me. Again I breathe deeply telling my blood pressure not to hit the jackpot. I stay in the right lane at first in order to be an old-fart slow driver, the opposite of my usual heavy-foot on gas pedal driving learned for survival in Miami. However, the right lane has more ice and snow than the left lane which has defined car tracks, so I switch and put a half-heavy foot on the gas pedal to keep up with the also half-heavy feet on the gas pedals of the cars in front of me. Soon, the road widens to three lanes. An 18-wheeler is in the middle lane and I get into this lane to and follow this huge truck as it is going slow, flattening the snow as it drives. I stay behind it at a car’s length and trust that the truck driver knows what he is doing. Again, after a few miles, the road becomes two lanes. The truck moves into the right one, and I follow. I have a friend now, a guide, a snow plow of sorts, and my highly tense muscles relax just a smidgen. Then, the truck leaves I-94 at Exit 148. I have nine more exits to go without my friend. I stay at the speed the truck was going, but now change lanes according to how much snow I see in each lane at given points. It seems an eternity, but finally, I see the sign for Exit 139 and Cooper Street. I reach it, wind my way off of it, sigh with intense relief, turn left and am thrilled for the first time that the speed limit on this little road leading into downtown Jackson has a speed limit of 25mph.

Five minute later, I pull into the parking lot of Armory Arts Village to enter the renovated historic Jackson Prison that is now my home.  Coming Home to Prison has never felt so good. Prison, you ask? That’s another story.

Tune in for more. I’m settled in now, a Michigander myself, so Blog, I have returned to you.

Performers all have their stories of great shows, nightmare ones, so-so programs, and experiences with audience at hand. In all of my years of performing, I experienced a first on October 24, 2007.

In the past, like every performance artist I know, a dusty stage, an oncoming or existing cold, a passing mosquito which happens to fly into your mouth just as you are breathing in, and other such causes can elicit a coughing fit. Your voice raises several octaves or disappears into an ethereal realm as you turn for the water bottle you have cleverly hidden under a prop. Your stage partner, a seasoned actor, takes over your lines. This has happened to me. It has happened to those with whom I perform. It makes the audience a bit uncomfortable, but the show goes on as you and your colleague have experienced this before and know how to handle it smoothly.

On the 24^th, however, it wasn’t a cough that crept upon me suddenly. Carrie Sue Ayvar and I were telling a tandem tale about Brother Monday, the Great Florida Alligator Conjure Man. There he was, marching across the Blue Sink Lake toward Old Judy, the medicine woman, whose lying, bragging tongue forced Brother Monday to teach her a lesson.

“Old Judy, one bad word against one conjurer is a bad word against all and harms the good we try so hard to do.”

The rhythm on the paddle drum in my hand inspired the audience to clap along as I continued, “And he was followed by a hoard of alligators, following him like an army follows its leader. And they were bellowing.”

Carrie and I began chanting, “Alli Alli Alli Alli Alli Alli Alli WAH!”

My nose began to twitch like a rabbit nearing the cabbage patch. I knew my facial expressions, which at first matched the import of the words coming out of my mouth, now were at odds with these words and this chant. As I chanted, my mind said to my body, “Wait! WAIT! Wait until the scene is over. As soon as Carrie says her next line, turn away. Sneeze then.” However, the brewing sneeze caused my nose to now twitch as though it were not only a cabbage patch, but also a carrot patch this rabbit was nearing. Right at the climax of the story, drum resounding loudly as Brother Monday turns himself into an alligator right before the terrified eyes of Old Judy, the sneeze overtook the power of my mind.

“AHHHHHHHHCHOOOOOOOOOOOO!” crashed like thunder through the wireless microphone clasped upon my shirt and poured torrentially through our powerful Mackie speakers. The audience of 300 third, fourth, and fifth graders laughed uproariously. I, too, was on the verge of a giggling fit as was Carrie who piped through the noise, “I guess Old Judy was allergic to alligators!”

Carrie and I have been known to spur each other on into giggle fits. Neither of us could look at the other right at a point in the story where we usually have an intense rapport. We continued, my nose no longer twitching, the sneeze out in the open, the cabbage and carrot patches gone. However, underlying our lines were muffled guffaws. For the rest of the story, I knew my facial expressions did not match the words pouring out of my mouth. I tried, and in a few isolated moments, I pulled myself back into the story. But an involuntary smile bordering on laughter now took over where before it had been a twitching nose; and a smile and laughter did not properly accent talking about Old Judy swearing that “What she said happened at Blue Sink Lake that night happened exactly as she said it did,” or that “When she could stand on her own two feet again, she knew it was Brother Monday himself that had put her back on those two feet.”

Perhaps this will inspire another story, a creative new journey that Brother Monday conjures through a sneeze. Under the circumstances of that moment upon the stage of Sandpiper Elementary, the clock ticking away at the far end of the cafetorium reminding us that we had four minutes to finish, say thank you and goodbye before the first lunch shift at 10:15 A.M. would begin, there was no choice but to continue the story as is and hope that its powerful impact was not totally destroyed by a powerful sneeze. Judging from the children’s applause and, as they filed out, their questions about Brother Monday and whether or not “he was a real man who really lived and could really turn himself into an alligator,” I think not.

When I was in the process of writing my memoir, Rudolph, Frosty, And Captain Kangaroo: The Musical Life of Hecky Krasnow – Producer of the World’s Most Beloved Children’s Songs, it was akin to being pregnant. This new creation that would eventually emerge into the world grew within me daily and absorbed me completely. I did other things: socialized, shopped, gave performances, and took care of family. Yet, every moment the book was in the writing process, I could feel the stirrings of its creation.

Sending the manuscript to the publisher had all the pangs of labor. I had to let this life of words that had spent nearly two years gestating come out of me and have a life of its own. Suddenly, I didn’t want to let it go, just like I’d wanted to keep my first-born child within me in a womb of a lifetime of dreams about what a child of mine would be like. In actually giving birth, imagination would become reality and responsibility. The pain of letting go was both harsh and a relief.

As with that first-born child and the three who followed, though my attentiveness and nurturing continued and does so to this day, adults that they may now be, I put my manuscript out there. As with my children who have turned out well, so has the manuscript, which is now a book advertised and sold on the Internet and soon to be in the stores. Having given birth to my memoir, I now have to parent it with nurture, attending to its development through book talks and signings. As with my children whom I hoped would bring home good report cards when they were in school, I now await reviews of my book and hope the reviews are good.

Once a parent, we are always a parent. Our children are our children: Likewise with a book. We do not relinquish our concern over it and must continue to nurture what we have written if we want the effort put into what we wanted to say through all those words to have its effect upon the readers whom our words reach. We must do so by taking it to activities – readings, signings, interviews and more just as we chauffeured our children to dance lessons, Little League, friends’ homes and more.

Caring for a child can be overwhelming, yet we go on and get pregnant and give birth to more: Likewise with a book. The next one lurks, waiting for the right moment for conception, and the whole cycle begins again.

As I stood before the couple of hundred students from grades 1-5 in the packed cafetorium, I mustered every ounce of energy I could draw upon. The vigor of these 200 plus youngsters bounced through the air like an electrical charge. My colleague, storyteller Carrie Sue Ayvar and I were there to present our program, Florida’s Past: True and Tall Tales. In today’s fast-paced and rapidly changing world, history is not a sought-after subject for students, and it becomes an increasingly difficult one for teachers to tackle. Carrie and I have used our talents as storytellers to make history jump off the page. Our efforts have brought much reward. Just look at the word “history.” Hyphenate it and you have “Hi Story!!” What is history, after all? – the stories of humankind throughout the ages.

There we stood, opening with a song I wrote, a kind of chant and cheer,

Way down south in sunny Florida/You might find an alligator in your yarida/Ghosts and pirates in the Everglades/And a “cracker” from Jacksonville down to Dade/Give me an F–F, L–L, ORIDA HOORAY–ORIDA HOORAY!

After warming up the audience with this participatory song, we went into our tales of Ponce De Leon searching for gold, silver, and the Fountain of Youth; Jonathan Dickinson and the amazing stories from his detailed Journal about shipwreck, the Spanish, “Nickaleers,” and old Florida; pirates whose constant raids upon Florida’s coasts ultimately caused Spain to sell Florida to the U.S. — cheap; readings of a mosquito attack while herding cattle written by Patrick D. Smith in his book, A Land Remembered;the so-called eighth wonder of the world: the building of the Key West Railroad by Henry Flagler; an intriguing folktale of Angelina and the Little Magic Man in which the children ultimately save Angelina by telling her the answers to three questions about Florida; the inspirational tale of how Mary McLeod Bethune warded of raiding Klansmen by having her students sing hymns in the dark as the Klan brandished their torches; and ending with the story of Brother Monday, ”The Great Florida Alligator Conjure Man.” In between, a kazoo announcing them, we offered some fascinating facts as “Florida Fun Facts,” such tidbits as: In 1958 a first and only college of its kind was established in St. Petersburg, Florida — a Clown College! Or “Do you know what Mosquito County’s name was changed to? — Orange County because of all the scrumptilitious, healthy, juicy Florida oranges growing there by then (not to mention that Orange County might draw more tourists than Mosquito County.)

The stories and readings of segments of books are interspersed with songs I wrote such as the pirate song: From Estero to The Keys/Marco Island to St. Pete/Boca Grande to Tarpon Springs/Florida’s pirate history sings. And, after asking the audience who knows how many counties there are in Florida today, the “Florida Counties Rap” reveals the names of all 67 counties: There’s Jackson, and Jefferson, named after presidents/And Lafayette, French pirate, whose life at sea was spent…

The children sit, mouths agape, as we tell our tales, and they heartily join in when asked to do so. Comments from teachers and evaluation sheets sent to us by students and teachers alike, tell us that we are succeeding in making history what it truly is — stories: and stories are something we all remember.

I firmly believe that humankind cannot build a humane future without understanding the past. We must excite our youth – and the teachers who teach them – about history. There is no doubt that drama, storytelling and all the Arts play a major role in accomplishing this.

I stood upon that stage today, the Florida humidity and heat plus the spotlights causing me to sweat uncomfortably. We had our high quality PA system for amplification. Still, we had to compete with the din of pots and pans in the kitchen as lunch was prepared for the 10:30 first shift and, on top of that, the racket made everytime the air conditioner kicked in. Momentarily thoughts entered my mind of roadies, limousines, dressing rooms (versus hiding behind the curtains or going to the Teachers Lounge to get into costume), and not having to arise at 4:30 in the morning in order to leave before the onslaught of major traffic. “Oh, to be famous. Oh, to make mega bucks, not what the school budget provides…”

And then I looked at the faces in the audience. I thought of these youngsters, plagued with so much empty-headed junk offered in the media today. Here Carrie and I stood upon the stage offering genuine history through our true and tall tales: tales that make children’s jaws hang open in wonder, their eyes widen in amazement, their hands clap along, their questions inspired by the show boil over and make them want to hear and see more.

What the Hecky? Hecky was my father’s name, and his story is told in my memoir about him, Rudolph, Frosty, And Captain Kangaroo: The Musical Life of Hecky Krasnow — Producer of the World’s Most Beloved Children’s Songs. When he was Director of Children’s Records at Columbia in the Golden Age of kid-disks, he offered quality educational entertainment to youth when records were the primary form of entertainment for youth. I have followed in his footsteps, just presenting my offerings in different venues that include noisy cafetoriums filled with the scent of years of overcooked broccoli permeating the air while mingling with the smell of McDonald’s fries. It makes me feel good to do what I do – a mitzvah (good deed that is its own reward) done and done well. History has come alive, and the children love it!

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