​For the 35 years we’ve been married, my husband and I have had a visitor come into our house every night after dinner. This person arrived without fail, at exactly the same time to inform us, entertain us, and inspire us.
Of course, the answer to this (appropriately in the form of a question) is:
Who is Alex Trebek?
In those earliest days, my husband worked nights and I’d tape Jeopardy on our Betamax recorder to watch together later. (For the record, I still deny any claims of peeking ahead that might come when I’d manage to get a particularly hard final Jeopardy question). This nightly routine became a subtle part of the foundation being poured for the marriage we were building.
When our first baby was born, the Jeopardy theme music became her favorite song to dance to. She’d pull herself up to our console TV and sway to the music. Perhaps this was the first step in her lifelong love of music.
Throughout the coming years and three more babies, we’d all watch Jeopardy and Alex.
Every night.
Sometimes, we’d know a lot of the answers and feel so smart. Sometimes we wouldn’t know many at all and be mad at the questions. But still, we enjoyed the visit.
Alex Trebek was the perfect visitor at our home. Classy, interesting, smart, handsome, funny, kind. And, as a good guest, he never stayed too long. His thirty-minute visits flew by. But it was okay because we always knew he’d be back the next day.
I know my family is not alone in this.
When we heard Alex had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, it jolted us all. This constant in our lives was now being revealed to be on borrowed time.
And yet, he continued on.
Every night.
Through what we would come to find out was excruciating treatments and therapies, he soldiered on so he could still come into all our homes.
For a little longer.
My son was the first to alert our family group text of the news of the death of Alex Trebek. I don’t think any of us managed to read that text without wiping our eyes.
I found myself crying as if I had lost a friend.
And in a way we all have.
To say that 2020 has been rough is the understatement of understatements. So many things we used to take for granted have been taken away or look completely different. Now, our nights will look different, too.
I hear Alex had taped enough shows to go through Christmas.
Guess that sounds right.
This reassuring voice who stopped by for nightly visits for so very long wouldn’t end his visits without giving us one last precious gift.
And in a year that has left us with so many questions, let’s open that last gift slowly and savor the answers for as long as we can.

​

"Please give this your utmost attention and return.”
Thus began another year of back-to-school forms. And this year, with all four kids in the school system now, I was somewhat overwhelmed when I began to fill out one duplicated enrollment card after another.
Name. Address. Phone number.
The more I filled out the vital information for my children, the more I realized how I wished I could tell the schools what really was vital about each of my kids. Yes, emergency medical forms serve a purpose, but our kids are so much more than the sum total of their allergies.
So, when I am done filling in emergency phone numbers, I want to tell my five-year-old’s kindergarten teacher something really important about my son. I want to tell her that he is more than ready to go to school this year. As the youngest child, he has done nothing but watch the others go and do and live. It is his turn now and he is thrilled. But his shyness might make you think he’s not ready. Please don’t give up on him. He’s an amazing kid.
And after I have filled out all parental release forms, I want to tell my eight-year-old’s teacher about him. I want to tell her that his heart is beautiful. And I know that because he wears it on his sleeve so often. And this breaks my heart because I know that school kids as well as society in general aren’t always kind to little boys who live by their feelings. Please look out for him. He’s an amazing kid.
And once I have written down what my children are to do in the event the school should ever close early, I want to tell my eleven-year-old daughter’s teachers about her. I want to tell them about my daughter’s dramatic flair. I want to tell them about her great sense of humor and how she loves to make people laugh. As a matter of fact, my daughter would do anything to make a friend happy. And as she dives into adolescence, that absolutely terrifies her mother. Please keep an eye on her. She’s an amazing kid.
And upon completing the student directory form, I want to tell my fourteen-year-old daughter’s teachers a few things. I want to tell them that going off to high school this year was hard, even for my most confident child. I want to tell her teachers that she will most likely never let them know she was nervous at all. No, she will most likely be as easy-going as always. It’s just her nature. She will always smile. Please smile back at her. She’s an amazing kid.
I guess when the very last form is filled out and filed away, and our children have filed into class for another year, we parents have one basic request we would make of their teachers. We are turning over to you our children. May you not just see them as part of your classroom. But may you understand they are part of our hearts.
Please give them your utmost attention. And return.
They are amazing kids.

 
 
 
*Excerpt from The Book of Mom: What Parents Know by Heart, by Tammy Bundy,
​published by St. Anthony Messenger Press
 
(The Bundy Bunch circa 2001)

​

​​Walking With Miss Millie tells the story of a friendship between a 10-year-old girl and her 9​2-year-old neighbor. This novel actually sprouted from my own life when my daughter –during her middle school years, was given the chore of walking our elderly neighbor’s dog. But just like feisty Clarence in my novel, the neighbor’s dog refused to walk unless his owner went along. One day led to the next and soon, it was understood that the unlikely threesome would walk and talk on a daily basis.
         I knew I had to tell this precious story. But when I got ready to write it, other parts of my world were demanding to be heard from. I taught at a wonderfully diverse high school and for the most part, the students got along as well as teenagers normally do get along. But during that particular time I had been reading Writer’s Notebooks with a few disturbing issues of race relations. Some wrote about feelings of pent-up anger and hurt, others wrote stereotypes about people whose skin color was different from their own.
         Of course, I want my students to live in a world of acceptance. But reading their honesty, made me think of my own family. Ten years ago, my brother-in-law and sister-in-law began a foster-to-adopt program. Since then, our family has grown to include three beautiful African American boys. So when I hear of injustice, bigotry, and racial tension, it’s personal.
         More than ever, I need the world to be better, to do better.
         And so, as I sat down to tell this story of an elderly lady and a young girl, my students’ struggles and my own hopes for them and my nephews rattled around my head as well as my heart. That’s when I decided to take the story of the unique friendship and set it long ago in the South—making my characters different races.  I wanted the novel to not only celebrate our uniqueness, but to also embrace what we have in common.
         I know it’s tricky to write a story with a message or moral in mind. The word “didactic” is in danger of popping up. But I’m a teacher and that’s a risk I was willing to take. I also soon learned that writers are discouraged to write outside their own race. But by the time I learned this, I was blissfully too far in love with Miss Millie and Alice to abandon them. I had to tell their story. Plus, how boring would the world of art be if we all only stayed in our own lanes?
         And so I continued to write the story and hopefully honor the characters that were planted in my heart several years ago. Now, eight drafts and six years later, it is finally coming into the world.
Do I expect Walking with Miss Millie will enlighten students to be kinder to each other? Do I think it has the power to make a better world for my nephews and all kids everywhere?
         Of course I do.
         That’s why every writer writes, isn’t it? We write to make a difference.  We believe we can affect change or in the very least bring a tear or a smile to a world in need of being reminded of its humanity.
         In my experience, that’s when the magic happens—when we get to tell the story that only we can tell.

     Last night there was something in my school email that really got my attention. Sure there was something about AIR testing continuing this week. AIR (American Institute of Research) is a refreshing acronym for a suffocating set of tests that we have to give our students to determine whether they learned what they needed to learn. These tests will take some of my students out of my classes three days this week alone. And that’s only part of the educational time they will strangle from us.
     But that wasn’t the email that got my attention.
Of course there was another email reminding all of us about OTES (Ohio Teacher Evaluation System) and our SGM (Student Growth Measures) –these are yet more acronyms the powers-that-be have come up with to try to hide the obvious fact that they believe a certain test given on a certain day can accurately deduce whether a teacher is effective. This email was about the final steps involved in this year’s process to determine our success.
But, that wasn’t the email that struck me, either.
     The email that got my attention last night was from a student. She wrote the email early in the morning when she couldn’t sleep. “I had to get this off my chest,” she began. Then she attached the poem she had written. This poem was raw and deep and powerful and painful.
     And yes, I have this young lady in my Creative Writing class, but this poem was not an assignment. She wrote out of her darkness, in an attempt to find light. Her words were about secrets and hurt, but when I read between those pain-filled lines, I saw a plea for help. I wrote her back telling her that her poem was powerful and beautiful –like she is. Then I notified her guidance counselor.
     Today, that young girl was smiling.  I don’t profess that all her problems are gone. But I can confidently claim that she knows she is more than a test score to us. Her worth is not determined by a data point. And there is no acronym invented that can tell me more assuredly what kind of success we are having this year. 

I didn’t know my husband was behind me taking the picture. 
All I knew at that moment was my dad wanted to see the ocean one last time before we left Charleston, South Carolina, and I wanted to make sure he had that chance.
My dad, central Ohio’s retired channel 4 garden guy, Tom McNutt, used to have many opportunities to see the ocean.  For more than 25 years, my parents were afforded the luxury of trading the chill of a Midwest winter for the warmth of the sands of Florida.  But when the spreading symptoms of dad’s inclusion body myositis robbed him of so many of the abilities you and I take for granted, eventually landing him in a wheelchair, mom and dad said “goodbye” to the yearly ocean views and “hello” to the new possibility of never travelling again.
But after a few years of not seeing their beloved ocean, my husband and I agreed it was time for them to say, “Hello, again”.
After searching for beachfront destinations closer than Florida, we found Charleston.  After a few phone calls determining whether handicapped accessibility was indeed, wheelchair accessibility, we had a place, a vision, and a determination.  And soon my husband and I began a journey with my parents, many medical supplies, and a ton of great expectations, all tightly packed into a wheelchair accessible van.
Diseases have a bad reputation for a reason.  They steal bodily functions, making difficult the once most carefree endeavor.  They take away the spontaneity of a moment.  They rob us of the extravagance of the idea of never-ending time.
But what diseases can also do for us is to act as a gentle reminder of the goodness of yesterday and even more, the preciousness of today.
For those reasons, I spent a lot of my beach vacation remembering all the wonderful opportunities my mom and dad provided for us kids over the years.  Sure I remembered the vacations we shared, but more than that, I recalled the day-to-day normal sacrifices they made that formed me into the adult I am today.  
I also spent a lot of my vacation marveling at my mom and dad’s new normal. Their day-to-day life is a physical embodiment of the wedding vows “For better or for worse” being lovingly played out in the simplest, most mundane task. 
But, lastly, I spent a lot of the week realizing that these special moments together end way too soon.  Just when we settle in to a new place, it’s time to say “goodbye” –even if we are painfully not ready to even begin to say that word.
And so, on our last day in Charleston, when I’d run upstairs to grab a cup of coffee, I looked over the balcony and saw my dad in his electric wheelchair trying unsuccessfully to glimpse the ocean over the door of the pool’s fence directly below.
I dropped my coffee and ran.  After all the doors, he’d opened for me over the years, it was the least I could do. 
By the time I got to him, he had left the door of the pool area and had returned to his place in the sun by the edge of the pool. “Let’s go see that ocean,” I offered. 
“I’m okay,” he countered, with his typical grin. 
“I know you’re okay –but let’s go see that ocean.”
Because he knows I am as stubborn as he is, he knew better than to argue.  And so we made it out the door of the pool and onto the dock leading into the sand.  Before that brief excursion was over, my dad even had sand between his toes for the first time in a long time. 
And as we stood there together, taking in the ocean accompanied by a tidal wave of nostalgia, I didn’t know my husband was behind me taking the picture. 

All I knew was that moment was one neither time nor disease could ever steal from either of us.    

 It never fails. A student, long-graduated, stops by my classroom at the end of the school day and asks the same question, “Remember me?”
            I sometimes think this is sweet vengeance for all the pop quizzes I may have given over the years. And truth be told, after getting my education degree more than 30 years ago, I can’t possibly begin to recall all the names of students gone by.
            But that doesn’t mean I don’t remember.    
            And so I want to once and for all say to each and every student I have ever had:
            Yes, I remember you.
            I don’t care if you were the quietest student in class, or the one who competed for attention daily. It doesn’t matter whether your hand shot up with every question I asked, or if your eyes darted to the ground each time, praying you wouldn’t get called on.
            I remember you.
            You see, even as an English teacher, I can do the math. And we spend 180 days together –for close to an hour a day. Together. I realize that the time I spend standing in your presence might be longer than any amount of time you spend with many of the adults in your life who share your last name.
            Trust me, I never forget that. It matters to me. You matter to me. Because you, your story, and your personality are unique and belong only to you.
            Sure, you spend a good portion of your school career trying to fit in, blend in, be in. But what I honestly remember about you is your uniqueness.
            I remember you, my student who got so mad one day about the school lunch. This seemed a petty concern to me until I finally discovered your free lunch was the only meal you’d sometimes get each day. And yet, when I’d offer you food, you’d turn it down unless everyone in the class got food too. I’ll never forget that.
            And I remember you –the one who wouldn’t look me in the eye for the first half of the year. But in one writing assignment, you pulled the veil completely off and showed me who you were. And it was beautiful.
            And of course, I remember you—the student who left class every day announcing, “Thanks for the class –have a great day,” while paying no attention to the rolling eyes of your classmates behind you.
            And I remember you, and you, and you.
            The one who barely talked.
            The one who talked too much.
            Somewhere, in my heart, I remember you all.
            True, I cannot recall your name as often as I used to.  Honestly, I can’t recall the names of my current students all the time.  Maybe it’s a cognitive overload thing; maybe it’s a getting older thing. But don’t for a minute confuse recall with remembering.
            Because, I swear to you, I remember.
            One day, you might understand the difference. And on that day, far from today, you most likely won’t remember the name of the crazy English teacher who got so excited each day when she stood in front of the classroom and introduced a new novel or writing assignment. You may not recall what imagery is and you certainly won’t care about prepositions. And that’s ok. I don’t kid myself into believing you will remember most of the things I taught you. 
            Sure it’d be nice if, after my class, you sounded more intelligent when you spoke or wrote something. And I truly do hope you would have learned that reading is a gift, not a punishment.
            But beyond all that, whether you will remember my name or my curriculum and learning goals, I want the most valuable thing you learned from me during our 180 hours together to be one very important fact that I tried to teach you each and every day:
            You are, indeed, worth remembering.

   

Dear World,


Are you ready for my Evan?
Are you ready for my fourth child who wears a “Coolest Grandpa in America” sweatshirt?
Are you braced for his wild mismatched socks and even wilder sense of humor?
Are you ready for a young man who can quote any sports stat imaginable, who also named his band after a quote from The Great Gatsby?
Can you handle someone who knows as much about the perfect way to grill a hamburger as he knows about the perfect way to perform a song in front of hundreds of people?
Can you completely be ready for someone who, a couple of years ago decided he liked the name Wolfgang, so he asked people to start calling him that?  And, they did. 
Are you ready, world?
Nineteen years ago, when my husband told a co-worker we were expecting our fourth child, the co-worked inquired, “Oh?  Is this your last one?” to which my husband responded, “No, the last one was the last one.  This one is a bonus.”
And that was true.
You see, the dictionary says the word “bonus” means “something welcome and often unexpected that enhances something that is itself good.”
And all these years later, knowing Evan (or Wolfgang) he, indeed, is something welcome and unexpected.  But nineteen years ago, I couldn’t have had a clue as to how much that bonus baby would enrich my life. I didn’t know how his unique perspective or his funny personality would color my life with the richness of a deep hue I’d never known.
And now that bonus baby is about to share his perspective and personality with you, dear world, via Oxford and Miami University. 
And as I get ready to watch him walk away in those mismatched socks, I realize “bonus baby” may not have been the perfect term after all.  Although the word “bonus” means something wonderful, it also implies something that you could have managed to live without.  And my fourth child, whatever you call him, is indeed, someone I needed for my life to be complete.
So, I take a deep breath and watch my last baby, my Evan, my Wolfgang, walk forward into his (undoubtedly colorful) future. 
And I will watch you, dear world, embrace him.
Please be good to him.
Keep him safe.
And of course, laugh with him.  A lot.
I suspect you, dear world, are ready for this last child of mine.
I know for certain, he is ready for you. 

 It was the end of September when I saw my cousin at my dad’s 80th birthday celebration. As we had both just started wandering through the complicated maze of our new school years, burdened by the new teacher evaluation procedures, that topic monopolized our conversation.
      We had become teachers at the same time, close to thirty years earlier and had seen proposed changes and complications come and go to the teaching system; but this new system packed with tests after tests for students and task after task for teachers, was agreed to be the most concerning yet. And so we spent our time together discussing this evaluation system and how this year was destined to be our toughest year yet.
      A few days later, she would find out she had cancer.
      A few months later, she would be gone.
      Looking back, I think of so many more worthwhile topics we could have spent our last big conversation on. Maybe we could have remembered summer weeks spent together at grandma and grandpa’s house picking beans and then snapping them on the front porch while listening for the sound of the noon whistle that alerted us to grandpa and his white truck coming home for lunch from the mill.
       Perhaps we could have laughed at how we would race up the gravel driveway, arriving breathless to the end of the apple orchard to wait for grandpa to pull in, lower the truck’s gate and take us on a ride around the orchard while we bopped up and down, certain one of us would bounce out, if we didn’t hold on to each other.
      We might have spent our precious time that day discussing shared secrets, whispered dreams and girlish giggles that filled our youth. We could have reminisced about our weddings, our children, our shared hobby of crocheting which grandma had taught us both during those summer vacations spent together.
     But instead, we spent one of our last moments together lamenting on the dark shadow of the new teacher evaluation looming before us.
      These few months later, I am less a fan of the teacher evaluation system than ever, and I’m sure, had she been here, my cousin and I would have more to complain about today.
     But she’s not here.
     And that fact is enough to wake me up to what is really important in my life.
    This teacher evaluation and all the hoopla that accompanies it is here. It will do what it needs to do and then move on for something else to eventually take its place and sooner-or-later, concern us as well. But I am going to try not to dwell in that shadow of its darkness anymore. There are far more wonderful things to discuss with the people in my life. There are infinitely more precious memories to share as well as make today.
     I guess we all need to be reminded from time to time that we never know when the last conversation we have with someone might truly be the last conversation we have.
    One day I believe there will be a worthwhile evaluation of my life and it will have nothing to do with scales and tests and data. And today, I better understand how I want to spend the precious time I have between now and that ultimate Judgment Day.  

Central Ohio has known Tom McNutt as their Gardening expert for the last 23 years. But, I’ve had the pleasure of knowing him by an even better title: dad. And today, as my dad hangs up his television microphone and his gardening tools, I want to share a very private detail of this very public man.
        Perhaps his viewers have noticed the fact that many of my dad’s latest televisions appearances have been done sitting down. If you see him in public, he is usually on his scooter, or walking with a cane or walker. The reason behind this is a muscle weakness. 
This muscle weakness had been slowly affecting my dad for years before he was finally told a name for his condition. The diagnosis was Inclusion Body Myositis, but the easier to remember name is the acronym, IBM. This diagnosis was a mixed blessing. After such a long process of seemingly endless doctor visits, there is definitely something good about getting answers. But there is admittedly something bad when the answer comes back as a chronic condition for which there is no cure. He was told by his doctor that his quad muscles would weaken with time, most likely landing him in a wheelchair within a few years. That was many years ago.
Over the years he has reluctantly given in to using a cane, a walker, or that scooter, to keep himself from falling as much.
Now, to say his falls are unpredictable may seem odd, since most falls, indeed, are not predicted; but it seems all the more true when talking about my dad. My dad always walked with a purpose. He walked with a destination in mind. Full speed ahead. His walk always said so much about him. He is strong, determined and heading somewhere.
I remember, as a little one, having to run two steps for every one step of his just to keep up. And somehow, I usually would manage. In more than one way, it has frequently been a goal of mine to keep up with my dad.
Today, my own kids beg me to slow down as I shop with them or even just walk around the neighborhood. I have to smile when they complain about my rapid pace, because I know where it came from: the man who taught me to walk with a purpose.
He vows he won't go willingly into a wheelchair. And with the determination that is my dad, I don't doubt for a minute that he will do all he can to avoid it. After all, he is the man who, after his first "retirement," took on the career that brought him into the gardens and lives of all of Central Ohio for the last 23 years.
But no matter what happens in the future, there's one important fact Tom McNutt, the beloved gardening expert, needs to understand, especially today. Whether he falls, walks unaided, with a cane, or even one day ends up in that wheelchair, to me, no man will ever walk as tall as my dad.