Today is Respect of the Aged Day in Japan. It was established as a national holiday in 1966 to recognize and thank the elders in the community for their contributions and celebrate their lives. What do you do to recognize your older family members or neighbors?
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Yakira – photo by Lisa Thompson
We got some not so good news on Yakira recently. Her handler has decided to return Yakira to Guide Dogs for the Blind. They ended up not being a very good match. Diane loves to talk long walks and hike in the mountains and along the beach. While Yakira did great guiding in stores and malls and her house behaviors were great, she just didn’t do well with the long walks on the bike trail. Plus she didn’t deal well with puddles and mud and ddebris from trees so she never dared take her on trails for to the beach.
We have been concerned for their partnership for several months but hoped that we were just not reading between the lines correctly. We are very grateful that Diane made this decision soon enough that there is a chance that Yakira might be reissued to another handler. She will be evaluated when she gets back to campus and they will decided if she will be career changed or partnered with a new blind person.
Yakira gets on a puppy truck headed to San Rafael tomorrow. When she gets there, someone from their Oregon campus will meet her and take her back to where she was originally trained. While we hope and pray that Yakira still wants to be a guide dog, we realize that may not be the case. Whatever her future brings, I’m sure that she will do something wonderful with it. If not as a guide dog than maybe as another kind of service dog. We hope to have an update on Yakira in a couple of weeks.
Clifford – photo by Karen Fuller
This morning a beloved dog named Clifford passed away. He was raised in hopes that he would grow up to be a guide dog but when he went back to Guide Dogs for the Blind for training they discovered he had cataracts. Though a miraculous series of events Clifford was adopted by my sister’s family. From the first day Clifford brought so much happiness and peace to their household. He instinctively knew just what to do. Clifford had the right mix of fun-loving and being laid back.
Shortly after his fourth birthday Clifford developed an autoimmune disorder that attached first his joints and then his blood and other organs. Despite treatment, his platelets were so low that his body just gave out. Though Clifford’s time was short his impact was huge. He will be sorely missed by not only his family but the many others he crossed paths with along the way.
StoryCorps has several programs designed to help educators. Stories are powerful way to teach not only history but also help student learning interviewing methods and the value of listening. Here are some of StoryCorps educational programs:
- StoryCorpsU has developed a dynamic College Readiness Curriculum as well as resources to help educators use StoryCorps content and interviewing techniques in their classrooms. Read more.
- StoryCorps’ National Teachers Initiative will collect, preserve, and share stories that celebrate the profound impact of great educators on all of our lives. Read more.
- The “Introduction to StoryCorps Lesson Plan” is a customizable lesson plan for students in grades 8-12 that is designed to teach students interviewing and storytelling skills using StoryCorps content. In the 2 activities, students are asked to participate effectively in a variety of interactions (one-on-one and in groups), exchanging information to advance a discussion and to build on the input of others. This lesson plan also includes a list of recommended recordings, organized by themes of relevance and interest to young people.
StoryCorps has lots of great resources for anyone working on a story project. Take some time to explore their website.
Here is StoryCorps‘ purpose in their own words:
Our mission is to provide people of all backgrounds and beliefs with the opportunity to record, share, and preserve the stories of our lives.
Since 2003 they have recorded more than 45,000 stories. That is a lot of stories! Wow. Here is one that seems particularly appropriate today.
Constance Labetti remembers her boss, Ron Fazio, who died in the World Trade Center attacks on September 11, 2001.
StoryCorps sponsors a national day of listening each year. This year’s day is November 29th. They have put together a how-to video for a successful recording session. Here are the key points from the video.
One of the things that StoryCorps has done is make animated shorts from some of the favorite stories. Here is one of them. Below is a link to all their animated shorts.
On January 28, 1986, NASA Challenger mission STS-51-L ended in tragedy when the shuttle exploded 73 seconds after takeoff. On board was physicist Ronald E. McNair, who was the second African American to enter space. But first, he was a kid with big dreams in Lake City, South Carolina.
I would love to try doing a short animated video someday. I don’t really know what it takes but it looks like lots of fun. What about you, do you have a story that would be great as an short animated video?
Bill getting Emma off the puppy truck
We picked up our eighth puppy this afternoon from the Guide Dogs for the Blind puppy truck and her name is Emma. Such a great name! There is always this little bit of worry that your pups name will be something awful, but Emma is wonderful. She is super cute, super tired, and super sweet. She just had her first meal at our house, peed outside (yeah) and then fell asleep in the x-pen. I’m looking forward to getting to know her. So far she has been wonderfully easy but I think when she gets rested and adjusted we will get to know her real personality.
I’ll post pictures as soon as I can.
I’ve been putting a lot of time into my candy window the last week or so, trying to reach my goal of getting the structure done before Pup “E” gets here tomorrow. I’ve made good progress too! We just finished up Snoopy (minus his ears). The doghouse is finished. The tree is shaped. It still needs the trunk and support structure put together but we have all the supplies. The snow and on the top of the doghouse is shaped but it needs some more work. I also made the large star for the top of the doghouse and a dog bowl.
I need to get some of the super thick pellon for Snoopy’s ears, his hat, the ribbon etc. I still need to build the whirligig. Once I have the actual box that the window will go in I’ll need to build the base snow and the background snow structure. But I’m really pleased with the progress this week. Hopefully Pup “E” settles in quickly and I’ll be able to get a few things done next week.
Watch Dave Isay as he explains the StoryCorps experience while on the Listening Is an Act of Love book tour. From StoryCorps.org
telling family tales 