gotohealth's Blog

The Fudeko two-day conference was headed by Professor Hana Maruyama. My purpose in attending is because I have gathered stories of our Japanese in the Pacific Northwest stories since 1970 when I was hired by the U of Washington library archives to help start the Japanese Collection of documenting the Japanese experience . I did over 20 taped interviews of the Issei - first generation stories until the funding for the grant ran out. 

 

Twenty years later in 1991, I decided it would be a good idea to create some documents with a writing group. Four of us, Chuck, Margaret Del and me, met in my kitchen once a week to get started; just talking around the table and sharing memories. 

 

Hana has a grant for a national effort to collect stories and the technological staff to record, digitize and store the stories with a national archive. I am agreeing to be an ambassador. I believe there is a short window of time left for recording first person stories of those of us who have lived through WWII and the incarceration of 120,000 Japanese heritage individuals living in the West Coast States.

 

My goal is to see the story as part of the middle school history curriculum in all the USA schools. There are many books with the facts about this history, but personal story telling/sharing/writing is important and I am committed to that purpose for the rest of my life.

 OMOIDE is a program where I love being one of the leaders, since 1991, when Margaret Yasuda, Dell Uchida, Chuck Kato and I started meeting in my kitchen weekly to start.  Janine Brodine is our coach. 

Janine and I met at the Kirkland Book Festival in 2012 when Sheryn Hara was the organizer of the festival in Kirkland. We shared a booth with our published material while Ats Kiuchi, like a Carnival Barker, invited patrons to come and look at our material.

 

Last Saturday was a specially enthusiastic session as 15 of us met and shared our stories. One of the highlights was the sharing of the newly published LP recording by Mako Kikuchi’s music composition in collaboration with our OMOIDE writers about the WWII Japanese In America Incarceration; 2/3rds of us were American citizens. Mako’s music was presented live at the Benaroya in 2023 as well as with our OMOIDE STORY READINGS at the Seattle Rep Theater that year. Our OMOIDE presentations were a sellout at the theater in both 2023 & 2024!

 

Now in 2025, there are still members of OMOIDE who lived through WWII and the 1942 -1943 incarceration of those of us who were as little as 1/16th Japanese Heritage. 120,000 thousand were housed in hastily built barracks when removed from the West Coast states’ restricted zone.  7000 of us were outside the approximately 400 mile zone from the Pacific Ocean.

 

Currently, we are gathering stories for OMOIDE VII, stories of COMPASSION & KINDNESS, of those helping each other during hard times, especially from outside the Japanese American community. This is including memories before, during and after WWII. Our writing participants and stories are now of several Shin-Issei, first generation immigrants from Japan after WWII, and stories of growing up in Japan. In 1924 the immigration law was passed where no more Asians could immigrate to the USA. 

 

Last Saturday’s, specially researched piece, was written by Nancy Hatfield. It was about her Auburn, WA, neighbor growing up, who served on a US submarine. He helped rescue a raft of Japanese enemy soldiers in the Sea of Japan; so soon after the USA/Japan peace agreement that enemy wariness was still an issue. 

As OMOIDE writers continue meeting, we are 4th and fifth generation Americans of Japanese heritage and seek collaboration with our neighbors of all heritages! We have a impactful historical story that needs to be spread with the goal of WINNING WITH STORIES for general human fulfillment!

If my body is like a computer, is it time to buy a new computer? Or, if I am “stuck with me”, what kind of program am I running? Biologically, we are a totally new set of cells every seven to ten years. Now my question is:  “What kind of program am I passing on and can it be changed??? Or do I want to change it?”

 

According to Arthur Brooks, Harvard professor, we are currently; 50% heredity, 25% our first seven to nine years of growing up tape-recordings and 25% the choices we make from memory and social/educational influences. Dr. Jim Doty says our body generates six to ten million energy impulses every second to run all the body functions. We are only conscious of 50 - 100 of these. I am deciding what I can change in my personal world, with being more deliberate with my few manageable thoughts.

 

 

Podcasters suggest the importance of good health, meditation of sorts, gratitude and connection practices. Steven Pinker, at Harvard, and Tyler Cowen, at George Mason U, teach writing as a vital practice for change and the influences we can personally contribute to our world. Starting with conversations about my heritage, verbal sharing and then writing; is highly recommended. 

 

The mantra/prayer I'm sharing for myself and with those whom I’m connecting is: DO IT BADLY!

 It’s not easy, and I fail a lot. I’m listening to trial attorney, Jeffrey Fisher’s podcast: HOW TO STAY CALM WHEN YOU’RE DISRESPECTED. 

 

With my Japanese heritage, it’s given me kind of a head start on learning to not say too much. I like being in the USA. My ancestors chose to immigrate here and stay here because we are more free to make choices and express our feelings. 

 

With 4th and 5th generations now living with me I am getting a lot of practice. Fisher suggests: “The first rule is to understand that with most of the disrespect, I am not the target”. 

 

The second rule Fisher advises, especially for court, is to be silent for a few seconds before talking/answering and use your breath, with a sigh, for one’s first word. When speaking to say it with confidence and control. Two words can change the conversation.”  Luckily, I’m a slow talker and use few words. My girls have always said, “Spit it out Mom!”

 

When I heard “Make taking a breath your first words…”, I was excited to go out to the kitchen and compliment my 15-yr-old granddaughter because she is good at this.

 

She was impressed! When she was as little as two-years-old, I remember how she would get upset and start to cry. Then she ran to her room and shut the door. We could hear her crying. After about 5 minutes she came out as if nothing happened. She did this regularly until a couple years ago. She is a quiet leader in her teen world!!

 

Fisher’s third rule is to not try to win an argument and work to make one’s “next conversation” to “CONNECT”. Connecting starts with getting curious about the other person, conveying honestly about how I’m feeling. It can even be said with just body language.

 

This has nothing to do with crisis communication but is related to connecting. Yesterday, after lunch with this friend for planning an event; on the way home, my daughter said, “She never asked me one question about what or how I’m thinking.” 

 

I’m with Thumper in our world of tinderbox happenings. It works for me to learn and practice keeping my mouth shut.  I THINK ABOUT IT and breath a deep sigh!!

My older daughter’s husband got laid off today from Disney. Our immediate reaction is “Oh No!” Next, the thoughts are that we are in this uncertain climate of life.

 

It seems they have prepared for this with planning because the movie industry climate has been volatile. On top of that he can’t work for another company for several months as part of this severance package. That means a few months of paid vacation!

 

Listening to Steven Bartlet interview Morgan Housel, financial journalist and author, the byline is “THE SAVINGS EXPERT” Housel goes on to say, “If food, clothing & shelter is all that is needed to be happy, the whole world would be happy right now, but we keep going because we want to be ‘seen’. We want a better house, car, clothes. Also we have different wants and experiences for different parts of our life.” He includes aspects of reaching “happy”, but understands getting to “contentment” like his grandma in her little house.

 

Raymond Cattell is credited with identifying and naming Fluid and Crystallized Intelligence, “Fluid intelligence is your ability to process new information, learn, and solve problems. Crystallized intelligence is your stored knowledge, accumulated over the years. The two types work together and are equally important. They both increase through childhood and appreciated in old age.”

 

Having gotten to my 86th year, I am finding contentment in my little room.  I leave the rest of my house to be managed by my younger daughter and her two girls as they remodel, bring home boyfriends, learn from mistakes and try again.

 

Like water springs on and around Mount Rainier in Washington State, where we live, they are a consistent temperature. They are cool and refreshing in summer and warm for nature in the winter.

 

 

Seventy years ago I thought I was strong in science and math so I chose nursing. Girls, in the 1950s, became teachers, nurses or secretaries.  I loved Lewis and Clark College, but I hated the practical nurses training at Good Samaritan Hospital in Portland, Oregon.  I didn't like following procedures and having to follow doctor’s orders. But, I also completed and finished anything I had started. 

 

One day, I accidentally found Dale Carnegie’s book HOW TO WIN FRIENDS AND INFLUENCE PEOPLE and was excited to change the world. I bought 3 copies, although I was really poor. I sent them to Frank Walters, the Administrator of Good Samaritan Hospital; Hazel Hinds, Director of Nursing for the hospital; and Lloydena Grimes, Director of the School of Nursing. Years later, my roommate, Sandy Byers, became a nursing school instructor there and told them who had sent the books.

 

Today, I’m listening to Joe Hart interview Guy Frieri on a Dale Carnegie Podcast. They are raving about the principles of “showing genuine interest in others, giving honest appreciation and avoiding criticism and complaints”; in business and in life. Frieri adds, seeing the world in me and not being afraid to fail. 

 

Since 1991, I’ve been committed to OMOIDE (memories) writing group-connections, using the Dale Carnegie principles of speaking, teaching & writing. 

 

Amazing to continue to learn from Dale Carnegie and to value our connections as he suggests!  LOVE IS CONNECTION!

The word is “becoming”. It’s an ongoing process. Five best friends that I had for over 50 years left me last year. My soulmate best friend left this world seven years ago. For those last seven years, I have spend hours listening to YouTube videos to assuage my loneliness, avoiding daily news and choosing movies and conversations that make me “feel better”.

 

This morning, I’m listening to Rick Archer give the analogy of “The sun is always shining”. A practice of meditation for him blows the clouds of life away. Therefore, he has had enough practice so he is able to find more moments of “bliss” regularly in his day. He is also clear that he is not “there”. It is an ongoing practice.

 

Archer and I have another example in common. Over 10 years ago I read Malcolm Gladwell’s book OUTLIERS. Gladwell, explains the concept of 10,000 hours of practice to master a skill, citing examples of people like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs putting in their hours to get to the successes they accomplished in our world.

 

Fifty seven  years ago in 1968, I had the privilege of learning about the Suzuki Method of learning to play a musical instrument. Dr. Suzuki’s method of starting at the age of three, was to get in ten years of practice before the child get’s busy with high school activities. With this skill, the child is ready to tackle other goals in life for which they have the practice to accomplish.

 

Back to becoming my own best friend. It’s clear that seven years of listening to various mentors and choosing which podcasts I resonate with, has brought me to a place that I am not feeling the loneliness as much of losing my soul mate. I am learning a lot about myself.

 

I have learned that Sam and my goal to pass on our Japanese heritage values is being fulfilled. I like blogging to keep writing. 

 

Thank you to those who read my blog!

 Floyd Wilfred Schmoe (September 21, 1895 – April 20, 2001) was a Quaker, pacifist, author, college professor, marine biologist, and park ranger living in the Seattle, Washington, area for most of his life. He earned Japan's highest civilian honor for his peace activism and was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize three times.

 

As part of my job of collecting documentation for the U of WA Suzzallo Library Special Collections, I had contacted Floyd Schmoe and Reverend Emery Andrews because of their major roles in helping with the Japanese community experience in the Pacific Northwest.

 

I was excited to be invited to lunch with Andrews by  Schmoe and his second wife Tomiko in their Juanita, WA, home. Floyd and Tomiko had met during his work with “Houses for Hiroshima”. His wife, Ruth Schmoe, died on March 15, 1969.

 

It was a usual busy 1970 morning with getting a baby sitter for my three-yr-old, who to be there when our kindergartener came back from school to Sam and my Seattle Capitol Hill home on 23rd Avenue East. 

 

Driving our white 1967 Chevy Malibu the 10 minutes to the Japanese Baptist Church on Seattle’s First Hill, where he was still the active pastor, I picked up Reverend Andrews. Then we headed down Boren and Rainier Avenues to I-90 and the Morrow Floating Bridge. Halfway across the bridge, I ran out of gas! By good fortune, there was a police car right behind me! In those days they carried a gallon container with gas in the trunk of their black squad car. He gave me some gas and I was able to fill up at the Mizuta owned station on Mercer Island. We were not late for our Gyoza & Tempura Bento lunch.

 

Most of the lunch conversation centered around Schmoe’s son-in-law, Gordon Hirabayashi and Gordon’s wife Esther, who was Schmoe’s daughter. That’s when I learned about Gordon’s activities and how Gordon hitch-hiked to his prison detentions for breaking the law with his defiant protest of EO9066 curfew. I was able to share with Schmoe that my mother told me, Gordon was her 5th grade classmate at the Thomas School in Auburn, WA, in 1928.

 

Reverend Andrews is remembered for his “Blue Box” that made several trips from Seattle to Idaho’s Minidoka with needed items from the storage items in the church gymnasium. He also moved his family to Twin Falls to serve his parishioners. According to Emery’s son Brooks, “We would always travel in what was called the “Blue Box.” The Blue Box was an old, I think it was a Ford truck body with a, with a, just a box on the back of it, and it looked like a bus. A very square–shaped bus. And it was blue and it was affectionately known as the Blue Box, because everywhere you went, you rode, rode in the Blue Box.” Someone must have a picture?

 

Schmoe and Andrews contributed far more than simple Compassion and Kindness to the Japanese people in America. They dedicated their lives to our community. The last time I visited Floyd Schmoe was in 2000 when he was105-years-old, and still sharp, at the Ida Culver House on 65th Avenue in north Seattle. He passed the following year.