First grade for me started in 1959. One of the pieces of news that teachers shared with us during the first three years of school were the recent addition of Hawaii and Alaska to the United States of America. These are the only states that are not connected to the continental mainland. By the third year of school or earlier, new flags had arrived. The flags with 48 stars were retired, and the flags with fifty stars were raised.  These have been our official national flag for over fifty years now. Long past are our first Betsy Ross flags with thirteen stars for the original thirteen colonies that shaped our newborn country in 1776.

playful architecture

Architecture, it seems to me, is far more playful than it was half a century ago. The shapes and shadows of windows and roofs, the arrangement and types of light fixtures sometimes bring to mind good-humored robots and kids' funny faces, and cheerful goblins. I'm not sure that all of it is an intentional trend. Perhaps there is an undercurrent in the minds of contractors and architects that comes through after years of playing Mario games on Nintendo and such. We translate what we see or plan into digital images now.  Perhaps these images, and the digital nature of computers used to design buildings, automatically self-adjust into something different than in the past, leading to a kind of complex perfection with a living, playful spirit.

seaweed

seaweed
bends and furls
in the currents
deep below
never on the attack
never loses footing
never on the run
never leaves
but senses the barracuda
and senses the squid
seaweed senses
when to bend and furl

Plastics became a common product in packaging and container design during the 1950s and 1960s. Materials such as wax paper, cellophane, wood, ceramics and foils stepped aside a bit to make room for the extraordinary popularity of plastic products, which are made from petroleum. One object that gradually disappeared was the wooden spool that held sewing thread.

Many kids during that era had relatives who sewed, and saved the wooden spools for various uses. You could tie a string to a spool and tease the household cat into chasing and pouncing. People painted wooden spools with bright primary colors and created toys. The bright spools could be stacked like blocks. Very young children were given thick shoestrings that were easy for small hands to manipulate, and they threaded the spools onto the shoestrings to create play necklaces.

Speaking of young children and early hand coordination, another popular plaything was the sewing card. Cards (around 5 by 8 inches) made of heavy colorfully illustrated cardboard had holes about a quarter inch in diameter punched in them. The child would be given a long shoestring with a knot in one end, and then 'sew' the string to the card by threading it in and out through the holes.

squirrel

'Squirrel feeding habits often benefit the forest. Buried nuts, if not recovered, may grow into trees and help restore the forest. Squirrels also aid tree growth by digging up, eating, and dispersing certain underground fungi, which form beneficial associations, called "mycorrhizae", with roots. The fungi absorb water and minerals from the soil and pass them on to the plant, receiving energy from the plant in return. Squirrels spread the indigestible spores of these fungi by releasing droppings in areas with young trees.'

quoted from the article 'Squirrel'
by Peter D. Weigl
within The World Book Encyclopedia
2015 edition
Volume 18 So-Sz

pinwheel

whisper into
the handheld pinwheel
lightweight and shiny.
the turbine spins slowly and whirs.
hold it outside the window
as the car now travels swiftly
down the road.
faster it turns
light flickering
from its curved colorful blades.
the dog has her head
outside the window too
tongue dangling
fur plastered back
her face poised in delight
facing the wind.

bread

Bread and butter was once the backbone of the American diet. Not quite so popular now, fifty years ago, a stack of sliced white bread or a basket of rolls appeared at almost every supper. Even the traditional food of convicts in prison - as the saying went - was bread and water. Bread sustained the body and soul.