PICTURE CREATED WITH PRESSED FLORA
by Mariko Maita
HURRAY! I had both Pfizer vaccinations over a month ago and the four of us at our house are getting out. We are still avoiding public gatherings so car trips is our choice.
Since March of 2020 our household of four and our cousin’s household of four have contained our socialization to our two households. The younger six are on a spring break RV excursion to Idaho. Day before, they drove past Sand Hollow where I grew up. Highway 84 touches a corner of my father’s farm.
Yesterday, I came back from Raymond, WA, after an overnight with Mariko-san. We spent 24 hours of almost non-stop conversation about our lives that includes both of us having lost our spouses in the last decade and what we want for our future.
Research confirms that talking and social support are the best ways to handle “Stress”.
Mariko is an artist known for creating pictures with pressed flora. For example, she looks at a hydrangea petal and it reminds her a bird head and then she layers other flora to complete a picture. One of her most impressive works is a large piece that includes a girl playing her guitar; all parts drawn with pressed flowers.
When she created the “Fish Picture” she says, “It was made by accident. I was making something else, then one petal came to my eyes to tell me ‘tiny goldfish’. One dahlia petal shows the fish’s mouth. I cut some petals for the body, tail and fin. Seaweed are horsetails.
Mariko’s art is available at the South Bend Riverside Gallery on the main road to the ocean on southwest Washington coast highway.
![WRITTEN IN 1927]()
WRITTEN IN 1927
"Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexatious to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love, for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth. Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy."
![“DON’T DO THING...]()
“DON’T DO THINGS FOR CHILDREN THEY CAN DO THEMSELVES”
It’s Easter Weekend! Time to SPRING OUT for a successful rest of the year. Particularly, the girls have time with Spring Break from school.
Today, Mom decided on a session of “OBSTACLE CLEARING” because there is no school next week and the following week a road trip is being planned. Goals for our life need to be clear for the time ahead to avoid nagging and unnecessary problems.
Mom, 11 & 13 as well as Grandma sit at the kitchen table with different colored post-its for each of the four of us. This is a design thinking exercise where you map your goals to the things that are obstacles or annoyances that block your Chi and do not let you get to the flow you’re looking for.
The Pomodoro timer is set for 10 minutes and we all write “things that bug us”; one on each sticky.
Next we take turns reading our post-its and transfer these stickies to sections that make “categories”.—Time Constraints, Household Messiness, Shelter Needs, Thought Blocks, Dog Concerns, Device Overuse, Food Matters, Sister Challenges and Social Needs.
Then we talk about possible solutions. The first one we all think is easy to identify and do something about is the Dog Concerns. The big problem is that Suki is not motivated by food or treats. She wants attention and play. The agreement is to work on teaching Suki to “Whisper”. We like her watch-dog tendencies, but her loud barking is a problem.
Then we take a break, but during the break it occurred to me the 11-yr-old loves dealing with food. She agrees to be in charge of meal planning with our Sunday Family discussion time. She is also criticized for not spending as much time with the dog concerns.
When we come back from break, it becomes clear 11 is willing to free her Mom of the burden of shopping for our food deliveries. 11 has already shown us awareness of cost savings and health needs. The incentive, besides the ability to use the iPad, she says, “13 takes care of the dog so I can help with this.”
WHAT A LEARNING DAY!!
![CHOOSING TO LIVE WELL CLAR...]()
CHOOSING TO LIVE WELL
CLARIFYING OUR AIM IN LIFE
Listening to and reading 12 RULES FOR LIFE and BEYOND ORDER, by Writer, Psychologist/Philosopher Dr. Jordon Peterson, I am led to clarify my identity. Peterson suggests that in playing my game of life, I develop a target or I will have nothing to aim for.
The first game I can remember playing as a 4-yr-old was the game of house. In my last blog post, I told the story of Sand Hollow and how Dickie Randall and I dug in the sand and adjacent cave, playing house.
At recess when I was in first grade, I remember a group of us gathered under an oak tree. We gathered the fall leaves, that had fallen, into the outlines of a house. I remember even creating a toilet in the section we made into a bathroom. There is incongruity in that picture memory of our play, because I was living in a farm house with only an outdoor toilet at that time in my life. But it does indicate what I saw as my future.
Moving on to the first years of playing house with Sam, when our first daughter was born. I remember I couldn't take my eyes off this wonderful gift of humanity. We watched her sleeping, awakening and playing for the whole first year, saying to each other, “Last year she was a nothing."
Assuming there would be a good chance I would live to see great grandchildren, I asked myself, "What do I need to do as a mother to ensure, self-reliant, responsible, generous and well-adjusted great grandchildren.”
Much of my circumstances have recently changed at age 82 and I am choosing to paint a target that enhances my original pictures. Peterson says, “The best way is to "write" and begin by choosing a problem that you can help to solve.”
My choice is to identify and clarify my target. This is not easy for me. I have a hard time saying that I am a writer. As described by Peterson, “God created us all equal.” We are all filled with voices both good and bad or evil. It’s up to us to take responsibility and choose. The problem is: The voices minute by minute distract me from my target.
Breaking my words down to implementable behavior, I choose to play “WRITER”. I am choosing playmates - mentors as well as learners I can help - that will help me stay on track. When I hit the target, I will have published a novel on the Japanese in America Experience.
!["...a desert so rugged, so dre...]()
"...a desert so rugged, so dreary..."
To be a Pioneer, didn’t I have to head West in a Covered Wagon pulled by horses? It occurs to me now, 2021AD, that my own family similarly pioneered new territory in Eastern Oregon and Western Idaho, from the early 1900s moving East. I was born in 1939 in Bully Creek on the Oregon side of the Snake River that forms the Idaho/Oregon border. Therefore, at the age of 82, I write my own Little House on the Prairie.
One of the 300,000 pioneer’s passing through this area wrote in her diary: “…desert so rugged, so dreary and…changes of thousand and thousands of years won’t yield anything worthy of consideration to the support of human life”.
In the 1920s the Black Canyon Dam on the Payette river, near Emmett, Idaho, created new farming opportunities, even before the Owyhee Dam created water for irrigation in the 1930s on the Oregon side. The Snake River rises in western Wyoming, then flows through the Snake River Plains of southern Idaho, the rugged Hells Canyon on the Oregon–Idaho border and the rolling Palouse Hills of Washington, emptying into the Columbia River at the Tri-Cities, Washington. It marks the Idaho Oregon border in what we call “The Treasure Valley” west of Boise, the capital of Idaho.
When I was 4-years-old, spring of 1943, Dad rented the Gilman farm next to the Randall family farm. Dickie Randall was my first playmate. The place is called Sand Hollow because the whole area is filled with “sand-draws”— a pond of sand, like a huge sand-box. Dickie and I played for hours digging in the sand draw below his house and next to our driveway. The sand had fallen or was blown out with wind and rain from the hillside, leaving the more compact soil, which became a cave-dwelling like place. We played house in the cave and I called myself “Yvonne” pronounced “Why-vonne”. Dickie had an older married sister named Yvonne that came to visit from Nebraska and I thought that was the prettiest name I had ever heard so I used it for “pretend”.
I did a lot of hanging-out at the Randall place. Their house was a square cinder block house with a flat roof. One day, I got too close to their German Shepherd when he was eating. They fed him out in their back yard next to the chicken coop where they collected eggs. The dog probably had almost my whole head in his mouth as he guarded his food. Dickie’s mother picked me up and carried me home, crying herself, along with me crying and bleeding all over my face, “I’m so sorry!! I’m so sorry!! What can I do?!”
All the men folk were out in the fields with their horses so Mom drove and Mrs. Randall held me as they got into our tan, one-seat Chevrolet Coupe. I think they left Dickie to fend for himself as he was a year or two older than me. Rushing to the doctor meant a couple miles out to Highway 30 on the graveled Sand Hollow road and twelve miles southeast to Caldwell - the main highway to Boise - for the stitches.
It’s surprising Mom knew where to go, but she was pregnant and had established a relationship with a family doctor. No one could afford much. I was born at home with a midwife and so were most others my age of that era.
My parents assured Mrs. Randall it was equally my fault and my memory is my feeling it my fault too. Maybe I had been warned not to mess with the dog when it was eating. After that incident our families became very close friends. We became part of the community, helping each other with harvesting and celebrations, being invited to Sunday dinners with friends after church, My mom and Mrs. Randall began exchanging recipes and almost daily chatted across their WWII Victory Gardens. Of course that made me wary of dogs. I can still feel the scar across the bridge of my nose.
![HOW DAD CHOSE WHERE TO D...]()
HOW DAD CHOSE WHERE TO DRILL FOR WATER
Having blogged about the metaphysics in the “Wave” in my last blog, I’m remembering a time when I was four years old and participated in Water Dowsing or Water Witching.
Water witching or dowsing has never been scientifically proven, but farmers all over have used this method when they drill for water. In 1943 Dad bought a 30-acre piece of property for farming onions and built a house. After the building was completed he brought Mom and me to the place to determine where he should dig a well for water.
I remember walking in the weeds of the front yard on the new farm, as our house was set back from the main graveled Sand Hollow Road in Canyon County Idaho. We walked around “witching” for where the water pump should be drilled. Mom was good at it. I could also feel the gravitational pull as I walked around the area with the willow branch. But even as a four-year-old, I can remember being somewhat skeptical. I think it was because old man Mr. Craig, who lived across the road was there too and made fun of Dad taking it so seriously.
There was a Willow tree near the irrigation canal, and Dad cut off a branch at the “Y”. With my two hands holding the two branches, I pointed the bottom of the “Y” straight up and forward. As I walked around our plot of land, where the water was closer to the surface, there was a gravitational pull and the bottom of the “Y” pointed to the spot where Dad dug and placed the pump.
I don’t remember having any problems with getting water. At first we hauled the water in buckets, but after we moved into the house Dad fixed it so there was running water to the kitchen sink. Eventually, he fixed a cold shower out the side door in the attached shed.
Today, I am less skeptical regardless of the fact that science can’t prove it. This is a good example of the energy beyond our five senses. It’s my feeling that this is an energy one can use for good or bad. But we have more control than we think with practicing positive thinking and positive prayers.
![GET A LIFE! YOU LEARN THE...]()
GET A LIFE!
YOU LEARN THE MOST...
WHEN THINGS ARE DOWN!
EXACTLY!
That last week between Christmas and New Years 2017, before my husband,Sam, died, his nephew Dave asked if he could bring his friend, “Shaman” Bob to help Uncle Sam pass comfortably.
We decided it would be fine as Sam and I had always been open to persons who believe they can communicate with both the living and the dead to alleviate unrest, unsettled issues, and to deliver gifts to the spirits.
The night before Sam passed, 6’2” Shaman Bob showed up. First, he sat with us in the living room and told us about his semi-pro basketball years before his religious studies in the Far East. Then he went into the room where Sam was. After 10 or 20 minutes, Bob came back out to the living room saying, “I don’t know about all of you, but Sam is fine. What is it about a picture of a wave that I see Sam is thinking?”
Our daughter, Kelly, answered, “The last project Sam was planning was a National Geographic Tsunami story that he was asked to illustrate and he copied the Hokusai wave with his own variation as a cover picture. There is a framed picture of the original Hokusai Wave hanging in the bathroom. I would show it to you, but my girls are in there, taking a bath.”
Shaman Bob said, “That’s okay.” Then after more light hearted conversation, he left without seeing the picture.
The next morning Sam passed as his10-yr-old granddaughter, came into our room and sang ONCE UPON A DECEMBER at the bedside.
Dancing bears, painted wings
Things I almost remember
And a song someone sings
Once upon a December
As we thought about Shaman Bob’s words, we kept looking at the wave picture along with all of the rest of Sam’s witty sayings and drawings covering the walls of our bathroom. We finally noticed the little paper cut-out figure of “Healthy Cell”, which Sam created as a business mascot, was no longer surfing under the crest of the Hokusai wave. Sam had cut out and attached the paper figure to the glass with scotch-tape years ago. The little rolled up piece of tape was still on the glass, but the cartoon character wasn’t there. We looked all over the bathroom floor because we assumed it had fallen off.
Between letting relatives and friends know about Sam, midst New Years activities, there were many phone calls. New Years morning Sam’s brother Andy and wife Beryl were having coffee at Starbucks in Magnolia district. A picture of the Hokusai Wave showed up on their cell phone impromptu.
We all have thoughts about what this might mean??
Three years later, we still have not found the paper cutout “Healthy Cell” character. The Healthy Cell’s word balloon with Sam’s hand-printed words, “GET A LIFE” is still scotched taped to the picture.
ps. "Healthy Cell" is the Goto-Health mascot up in the upper right corner of this page.
![Illustration drawn by 13-yr-old]()
Illustration drawn by 13-yr-old
My initial thought was to write about the positive and negative outcomes of “GOSSIP” and how that shaped many of my choices in life. I asked my granddaughter to draw me an illustration to add.
Now I’m listening to parts of the Impeachment trial. There are emotional pictures spoken on both sides. I am moved as I listen.
Subsequently, it is up to me to analyze how I might write a blog and or talk to my social networks. So, I harken back to the dictionary definition of “gossip” first: "casual or unconstrained conversation or reports about other people, typically involving details that are not confirmed as being true.”
My first reaction was to not listen because it’s all political. Now that I have listened to both sides, I am excited that the democratic process is working!
Democracy means freedom of speech and we learn the most because there are varying opinions. Fortunately, I live where I don't have to agree with one side to pursue my learning and fulfillment activities. One of my favorites is BOOK TV where there is strong research as authors express their findings.
Fun to keep researching and writing to leave a legacy!
![SAM GOTO BEHIND Fraser Fos...]()
SAM GOTO BEHIND Fraser Foster
RUNNING TRACK FOR NAMPA HIGH, IDAHO IN 1949
We found an error in identifying the people in the picture with more research. It is even more interesting to look into the life of Fraser Foster as part of the Nampa High team. The story about RC Owens and Sam Goto is still true.
My late husband Sam and I are third generation American’s of Japanese Heritage. We lived and grew up east of the 400 mile restricted zone and were not incarcerated with Executive Order 9066. We had our own WWII issues, but we also integrated into that farming community of Eastern Oregon and Western Idaho.
As I Covid-Isolate I am looking at this picture we blew up for my husband’s memorial 3 years ago.
I like this picture, I call BRUSHES WITH FAME because what I want to remember is our American stories of how we all come from multiple heritages and are connected.
First, let me tell you about Nampa and Caldwell, ID, where Sam and I grew up and Sam’s first brush with fame. Sam did some sign painting for one of first Albertson’s stores in Boise and Nampa, Idaho. Sam said, “One time Joe Alberson grabbed some sliced bologna and bread. We sat in the back storage room on the wooden coke bottle crates, had boloney sandwiches for lunch and talked.”
This picture was taken when Sam was at College of Idaho in Caldwell, ID a little over five miles from the Goto Onion Farm. The college was called Albertson College from 1991-2007. Sam also knew Joe Alberson’s daughter, Barbara Jean “Bobbi”, who was at College of Idaho at the same time.
That’s not RC Owens in front of Sam as I assumed when first writing this blog. As I look at how they are a relay team, closely holding the baton and smiling, my tears become smiles as well.
It is still true that on Sept. 23, 1952 the team went to Oregon State for a track meet. Sam said, “That night at the motel, we watched.Rocky Marciano knocked out Jersey Joe Walcott in 13 rounds.”
Back at the College of Idaho Elgin Baylor was RC Owen’s roommate. We know the name “Baylor” here in Seattle because he brought fame to Seattle University playing basketball. He went on to play 14 seasons with the NBA, ending with the LA Lakers.
RC later played NFL football from 1957 - 1964 with SanF 49ers.
This picture symbolizes a “relaying” of participants from east to west, and with the vintage car in the background signifies almost a 100 year legacy.
Famous people, with their God-given talents, heritages and incredible work ethics, bring out the best in themselves.
Let us similarly motivate OURSELVES into “relaying” our skills past things like the 9066 Incarceration and the Covid Pandemic into the next 100 years.
![Christmas Zoom Joined by Jap...]()
Christmas Zoom Joined by Japan Cousins
It’s a privilege to be part of the Goto Clan and participate in this “TIME” here on earth.
As I listen on BOOK TV to Professor Greene, who made world-renowned groundbreaking discoveries in the field of superstring theory and writer, Janna Levin, who researches black holes, I WONDER WHERE WE FIT??
"The best that most of us can hope to achieve in physics is simply to misunderstand at a deeper level."--Wolfgang Pauli,
Most of us look at these theories and assume we are almost insignificant. Today, I look at the link we provide in this universe and realize that life cannot go on without our contributions. Sam’s reading, audio tapes and discussions fill a whole bookcase in our home!!
We are as important as the BIG BANG - assuming that it had it’s moments.
On this third anniversary of remembering Sam and my 56 years plus together, I treasure these memories. As I isolate Christmas Week 2020 and in the words of the song: “I’ve got my love to keep me warm.”
I have a screenshot image of our "zoom" participation, but it won't load. Will keep trying.
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PICTURE CREATED WITH PRESSED FLORA
