CoNStANtS iN A SEA oF CHANGE

Iwatched a mother teach her daughter how to tell which glove was for the right and the left hand and I thought of all the things that we teach our children without plan.

I remember so many moments such as how to hold a sippy cup and how to use a fork and spoon. Another was how and when to cross the street. Oh my, that was a difficult one, allowing my precious child to walk across at street, with the danger of traffic always there.

None of these lessons were particularly significant, except for my children as they gathered the necessary knowledge to live in this world.

Other little lessons: How to tell the front from the back of a piece of clothing? What about learning to tie a shoe? Each are tangents to a bigger project, the creation of a person.

These are intimacies that we forget. How important was it, how useful, to teach your little one how to button their coat, use a zipper?

It was Sunday morning after church when, in a very crowded Nojaims, while debating whether to add cottage cheese to my basket, I bumped into a gentleman near the dairy section.

I apologized for being in his way.

He smiled in acknowledgement, but then stopped and told me this tale. Last week he held the door for a woman who asked why he did that. Taking a step and moving his head a bit closer to emphasize his message, he went on to say that his father would have given him a good lashing if he forgot his manners.

“I will always hold the door for a woman,” he concluded.

I smiled and said that I appreciate anyone holding the door for me and that if the occasion occurred, I would hold the door for him.

Yes, there are all those little things that we teach our children, things and ideas that form the basis for our reality - how to behave, how to negotiate commonalities.

I sat with a group of professional women over lunch one afternoon.

The conversation was about meshing motherhood with work. (As if motherhood wasn’t work.)

One brought up the idea of going to church on Sunday, the way she did as a child. She confessed that her children have only been in church when they attended a funeral.

“What I knew, they don’t know” … most of the mothers concluded that their lives were too busy to add something like attending church services every week. There was skiing in winter, soccer practice or something like it on Sundays, sleeping in on Sundays … the list was long.

“I don’t think that church is necessary,” one said. “I teach my children good values and healthy living and that is enough.”

My parents taught me to call adults by their surname, to choose the “good clothes” for church and special occasions, to ask to be excused from the dinner table, and so on. We went to church every Sunday. My children did the same.

And then life happened and, as

Years Ago in History

By CiNDy BEll toBEy

80 years Ago – Feb. 11, 1943

According to the United States Weather Bureau, snowfall for the country as a whole averages 28 inches per winter. It is interesting to note according to records kept by R. Philip Hart that during the calendar year 1940 Cazenovia’s snowfall was 179 inches. That, however, was an exceptional year. Back in 1939 with Cazenovia down 69 inches, we were still 41 inches above the average for the country as a whole. Curiously, 20 inches also represents the average total precipitation, in which rain and snow are lumped together. Since an inch of snow melts down to form one-tenth of an inch of water, this means that on the whole one-tenth of the country’s water supply falls in the form of snow.

60 years Ago – Feb. 7, 1963

Again the calendar has rolled around another year, and the Cazenovia Troop 18, Boy Scouts of America, is set to celebrate its Forty-Fifth Year in the Scouting movement.

FROM THE MAILBAG Class of 1993 holding reunion

To the editor: We will be celebrating our 30th eunion this year and are looking to reach any and all of our classmates. Whether you were in the class of 1993 for one year or 13 years we want you there.

Mark your calendars for July 1 and stay tuned for details of a weekend full of fun!

If you are on Facebook please check or join our group Caz Class 93 Reunion to get some information. If you are not on Facebook please email us at cazclass93@gmail. com so we can be in touch with you. If you are a parent, spouse, family member or friend of a classmate and can help us with contact information we would love that too. Just email us at the above address

Reporter: Jason Klaiber, jklaiber@eaglenewsonline.com

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Display Ads EB: linda Jabbour, ext. 304, ljabbour@eaglenewsonline.com and we will be in touch. We are very much looking forward to gathering to reminisce and catch up with as many classmates as possible. Once a Laker, Always a Laker! See you in July! REuNioN CoMMittEE FoR tHE ClASS oF 1993 Cazenovia

Sound sense

To the editor:

There has been much community discussion about the possibility of the school district taking over the Cazenovia College athletic facilities in lieu of pursuing the 11 million dollar turf field project at the middle/high school site.

While the school district officials have noted why this option might not be feasible (See Republican, week of Jan. 25,) I believe the school district should take the necessary steps to make it

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Creative Director: Gordon Bigelow, ext. 331, art@eaglenewsonline.com time passed, many of those little things changed, leaving us confused, uncomfortable.

What was correct was no longer correct.

There is an underlying discomfort when what you learned, what you believed, is no longer relevant or true.

The me that was made up at least in part of those behaviors that have been rejected is sometimes confused, reticent even, to question the changes.

Some institutions that defined how we lived our lives have been lost, or at least demoted in importance, as are the cultures associated with them.

Change is constant, and in a highly technical world, faster than many can easily manage even though culture is something we create ourselves with our tastes in music, fashion, food, entertainment and what constitutes moral behavior, etc.

The choices and preferences for how we create culture are seen to be out of our hands.

The differences among generations and areas of the country are astoundingly visible when it comes to many of the cultural preferences we don’t share.

But there will always be shoelaces to tie, buttons to button, instructions about crossing the street. The loving warmth of parent and child in those little things is eternal.

Ann Ferro is a mother, a grandmother and a retired social studies teacher. While still figuring out what she wants to be when she grows up, she lives in Marcellus with lots of books, a spouse and a large orange cat.

On Thursday, Feb. 7, the celebration starts with Troop Meeting at its own Louis Loyster Memorial Scout Lodge, which was given in memory of her son by Mrs. J.A. Loyster in 1931. On Friday and Saturday, Good Turns will be the order of the day, a reminder of the First Good Turn which brought Scouting to America in 1910. Sunday, Feb. 10 will be celebrated as Scout Sunday, with all members attending Church in Uniform in a body. Catholic members will attend the 8 a.m. mass at St. James Church with Scoutmaster Walter W. Dancks, and all protestant members will go to the Baptist Church at 10:30 a.m. with Troop Committee Chairman Arthur S. Evans in charge.

40 years Ago – Feb. 9, 1983

Approval of a 15-lot subdivision for single family residences on the 40 acres of the Jephson estate between East Lake and Ridge roads was still up in the air after the Cazenovia Town Planning Board’s lengthy public meeting Thursday night at the Gothic Cottage. The planners will reconvene at 7 p.m. next Thursday to decide whether to accept or reject the proposal of Cazenovia Properties Associates. Still to come, before final subdivision approval, is a formal public hearing. Widely divergent views on History l Page 5 possible. Such a proposition makes sound environmental and economic sense.

Surely the purchase of the college athletic facilities and the rehabilitation of its artificial turf field, which already has lighting, would be a lesser cost option than the expenditure of 11 million dollars for a new project. It would be a benefit to the environment not to lose any more natural ground cover and save the lake from any potential chemical runoff from artificial turf at the Emory Avenue complex.

It is highly unlikely that the college properties will be kept together in one sale. The more reasonable outcome is that the main campus will be kept whole for future use, as the noncontiguous, unique parcels will be sold off.

The district should not be so quick to move ahead with the turf fields project at the middle/ high school site. Given the circumstances of the college closing and its already existing facilities, the State Education Department may very well extend whatever waivers or accommodations may be necessary to make this transfer of ownership occur.

The district will soon be asking the taxpayers to fund a new bus garage and then electric buses. No one is questioning the need for this; but if we are to be truly responsible and protective of our resources, environmental and fiscal, the school should do what is necessary to utilize the facilities at the college when they become available.

HElEN BEAlE Cazenovia