Tag Archives: Holidays

Local Author Fair 2017

Cynthia Kraack Posted on by

What could be more fun than holiday gift or winter reading shopping at event featuring 30 local authors chosen by librarians and readers? Please come join us at the Local Author Fair 2017 on Saturday, November 18, noon to 4 p.m. at the Galaxie Library in Apple Valley, MN.

Laurie Hertzel, book journalist and editor at the Minneapolis Star Tribune, is the keynote speaker. The Loft Literary Center will conduct two free workshops.

Books, speakers, networking….a grand afternoon.

Kindle topping pile of books

Kindle topping pile of books

Of What We Remember

Cynthia Kraack Posted on by

In decades past, around ten in the morning on Memorial Day, the veterans of foreign wars marched down Main Street in our small town with the high school band, tractors from the local implement dealer, the mayor in a convertible, the Knights of Columbus and enough other groups to call the gathering a parade. Many came in from the surrounding farms to line the streets then follow the marchers to the fairgrounds for a town picnic.

That’s the belief system I in which grew up. The Vietnam War tested Memorial Day. Vietnam vets weren’t welcome in the feel good ceremonies. VFW posts frequently didn’t allow Vietnam vets membership for all kinds of sad reasons. Vietnam vets changed from their uniforms to street clothes before leaving the airport at discharge, were spat at on the street by anti-war protesters who confused fellow citizens with policy makers, were let go from jobs by ignorant folks who called them wicked names.

One Memorial Day weekend my employer sent me to a national editorial association meeting in New Orleans. I was young and excited about the trip, but also sad about missing our traditional holiday gathering. I asked another attendee why the conference had been scheduled on this weekend. Southern born she gave me a sixty- second history of how her family considered Memorial Day a Yankee holiday to rub defeat in the faces of Confederate states.

There have always been divisions in this large nation. Sometimes the schism is about human rights, sometimes about policies too onerous for one large group of people to accept, often about disparity in the quality of the illusive American Experience. Television was blamed for delivering the Vietnam War to families’ living rooms and for pushing the curtains back on civil injustice. Social media has the praise or curses for changing the tone of political discourse today.

What do we remember on Memorial Day?

When veterans were asked to stand during the St. Paul Saints baseball game yesterday I felt the same quiet tears begin that I’ve experienced since September 11, 2001. Old and young, male and female, they raised a hand. Shoulders were set, chests puffed, heads held proud. Rightfully so.

It would be comforting to believe these brave citizens could continue to protect our country against divisiveness within, sinking respect abroad, and the powerful war weapons of nuclear devices, digital mayhem, and men greedy for their own power.

“Life played a giant joke on those of us living unassuming lifestyles twenty years ago. When the men who played with power ordered those who played with destruction to send out their weapons, billions suffered.” — Minnesota Cold

I say that I write speculative fiction to deal with what I fear about the future. Minnesota Cold was written ten years ago about a time ten years from now.

If only everyone from Washington, D.C. to the people living in our neighborhoods can remember what we hold in common, find our way to shaking hands, and talking about a common future over a plate of picnic foods. On Memorial Day, we could honor the sacrifices of the past by building for a better future.

America’s Kids

Cynthia Kraack Posted on by

Kids are everywhere on the Fourth of July 2013 in the Village of Egg Harbor, Wisconsin. Babies hang in pouches on their parents’ chests, strollers and wagons dot the crowd, the majority walk on their own or run.  Some multiplier swells the regular population of approximately 200 as friends, family, vacationers, and visitors gather for an old-fashion national celebration.

The day is made for kids. There are booths with face painting, glitter tattoos, hot dogs, popcorn, ice cream, flags. The harbor is beautiful and adults are willing to linger on a park bench to watch the activities on Lake Michigan as kids play tag, turn cartwheels, pick on each other. Multiple generation families give kids the opportunity to escape stricter parental expectations for the more gentle indulgence of grandparents.

Some kids wear patriotic clothing. A few have their hair dyed red, white and blue. They might not understand how very fortunate they are to live in this country. Not all of them are from financially stable families, but most have an adult who can spend a buck on a hot dog. Not all of them are from families where English is the primary language, but they have come to share the U.S. birthday party. When candy is thrown from simple floats, every kid is an equal with a plastic bag and grabbing hands. They all squeal, they all jostle for a small Tootsie Roll or Jolly Rancher. They sing with the floats that have music playing, duck when teenagers squirt water from a flatbed. In this small town they can be less encumbered by adults’ concern about security. For the city kid visitors Egg Harbor’s Fourth of July bash and parade may be as unsupervised a day as they’ll ever experience.

Sons and daughters who ran after Tootsie Rolls and Jolly Rangers fifteen or twenty years ago and now serve in the armed services deserve recognition for keeping the United States intact so this day can be celebrated so freely. America’s kids who have returned to danger, frequently carrying physical or emotional damage from prior deployments, are in our hearts on the Fourth of July. To the gentle giant who left the fireworks because it reminded him of the war, and all his peers, may 2014 bring more peaceful times.

 

 

Holiday Ghosts

Cynthia Kraack Posted on by

Writing about holidays is tricky. What do you really remember about childhood holidays? Was the Thanksgiving meal served at noon or maybe in the early evening? Did you realize that somebody had to be in the kitchen by about five in the morning to have a turkey ready to serve at noon? As a kid you didn’t have to think about that side of the holiday. If Grandma or Mom or Auntie Martha wasn’t as silly as the rest of the partying adults at the table, you just made sure to sit deep into the kids’ zone.

Before dishwashers became common, or when a hostess felt she had to use the good china that had to be hand washed, women returned to the kitchen while others watched football or snoozed. Leftovers got divided, little bits of food became nibbles instead of garbage, the last of the wine was poured into juice glasses. Conversation turned more intimate while hot water steamed the kitchen sink window. With female guests involved in the washing up, social pecking orders fell. Aprons appeared and the sounds of water running and women talking drowned football’s constant babble.

Little girls played under the kitchen table and wondered if a child’s gallbladder could go bad or how a mortgage fit into Christmas plans or what carrying low meant. Unfortunately if the discussion was about to get really adult, the under table zone might be relocated to the football room or a hallway.

There are stories that grew into legends—the no-bake pumpkin pie that tasted like jarred baby food, a turkey that slid off its baking rack and melted the kitchen carpet as it hit the floor, the year everyone was ordered out of the house to march around the arboretum for some unknown reason, counting chicken pox spots on an older kid who should have been long past this first grader scourge, the time an adult discovered an empty fudge dish minutes before a little boy threw up.

The holiday ghosts play havoc in creating a fictional family gathering. The oldest daughter isn’t anything like your sibling, but it’s hard to break a tradition of who opens the first gift. Social drinking has different limits in this world than in the celebration you remember. Members of your family never raised an open palm to a child or fellow adult. A baby might fall asleep at the table, but not an adult.

What’s over the top and what’s ho-hum depends on your memory and your readers’ experience. Everyone dances with the ghosts of holidays past. Only the music is different.