REMEMBERING CHILDHOOD DAYS

 by Danna Shirley

I saw a magazine titled “Good*Old*Days” and it reminded me of my own good-old-days childhood. I thought I would rack my 76-year-old brain to recall some of those precious memories of:

·          Drawing a hop scotch with chalk in the driveway and playing with my “taw” made up of chains hooked together.

·       Playing tether ball in the backyard where Dad had poured cement into a tire to hold the pole up.

·       Playing jacks on the kitchen floor and trying to go “around the world” before catching the ball. I had them in a leather pouch I bought on one of our many family trips from CA to AR and OK, stopping at an Indian Trading Post on Route 66. No interstates in the 50s and 60s. I still have that pouch but the ball doesn’t bounce anymore. 😊

·       Lying out on the hot pavement in the summertime looking at the stars and trying to figure out shapes and animals.

·       Making mudpies in the backyard.

·       Running through the sprinkler on hot days.

·       Jumping rope.

·       Riding my bike.

·       Sliding down the grassy hill on a piece of cardboard at the top of my street.

·       Dolls: paper dolls, drawing my own fashionable outfits, coloring them, cutting them out.

·       Dolls: playing house, dressing up my dolls; Barbie came along much later for my own daughter

·       Paint-by-number pictures.

·       Learning to embroider. My first efforts didn’t turn out so well.

·       Playing “Go Fish” and “War” and as I got older, “Canasta” with my sisters.

·       My favorite toy was a monkey

·       Playing school down in the basement where my dad had lined one wall of the garage with blackboards.

·       Watching cartoons: Bugs Bunny, Popeye, Road Runner, etc.

·       Westerns: my favorite was Roy Rogers, Dale Evans, and the Sons of the Pioneers

·       The early sitcoms: Dobie Gillis, Ozzie & Harriet, Gilligan’s Island, Hazel (I wished we had a Hazel in our lives)

·       We had milk delivered to our house and he had a key to get in and put it right in the refrigerator.

·       Helping my dad do chores around the house. I was his little helper.

·       We got new dresses, hats, gloves, purse, and frilly socks to wear to church every Easter.

·       Making chocolate chip cookies and eating more of the dough that the cookies.

·       Cheerios is still my favorite cereal.

·       Vacations: my mom was a school teacher so she always incorporated educational trips to various places: Grand Canyon, Painted Desert, Carlsbad Caverns, Meteor Crater, Niagara Falls, Smithsonian, Independence Hall, Plymouth Rock, the Liberty Bell, and many more over my years of living at home.

I guess I did a good job of racking my brain. What are your childhood memories? Why don’t you plan a trip or two for your family to enjoy America right in your own backyard? 

Why Antisemitism?

By Danna Shirley ~ January 2024

 The internet defines Antisemitism as: 

"Hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious or racial group."

I was born after WWII. We said the Pledge of Allegiance every morning in school. Although there were no Jewish kids in class (that I knew of), I never heard of anyone being hostile or discriminating against Jews in my little world of Pinole, California. 

I was raised a Methodist but didn't become a Christian until I was 32 years old in Montgomery, Alabama. As a Christian, I learned I was engrafted into the vine of God's chosen people...the Jews.

"This mystery is that through the Gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus." (Eph 3:6 NIV)

So why antisemitism? I don't understand why anyone can hate a group of people and not know any individuals in that group. I've heard some say it was the Jews who killed Jesus and therefore, they are to blame for killing our Lord. Don't they understand that WE ALL are to blame for killing our Lord . . . because WE ALL have sinned and put Him on the cross. 

I've also heard it said that the Jews denied Jesus as Messiah but WE ALL were born into denial of Jesus before accepting Him as our Lord and Savior. We are all on level ground at the foot of the cross. No one can claim any higher calling or lower plane because Jesus died for us all.

So why antisemitism? Why hate and discriminate against any group of people? After seeing my results from ancestry.com, I believe WE ALL have a little bit of everything in our blood line. I am . . .

Great Britain 68% (England, Wales, Northwestern Europe)

Ireland, Scotland 11%

Sweden 9%

Native American 5% (I know I’m Choctaw as my grandmother was an original enrollee in the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma)

Eastern Europe 2% (Russia, Czech Republic, Poland~Warsaw, my great-grandmother came from Poland and married a mix of Choctaw Indian and unknown, Hungary, Romania, Moldova, Croatia, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Belarus, Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Kosovo, and Macedonia) 

Nigeria 2%

Indigenous Americas 1% (Mexico)

Indigenous Americas 1% (Yucatan Peninsula)

Finland 1%

SO WHY ANTISEMITISM???