The Office: Book Review of A Thorn in My Pocket by Eustacia Cutler

From the desk of Cathy Harvey, Administrative Assistant to the Deans of Shepherds College

We were recently blessed with an Amazon.com book and resource shower by some very caring supporters of the college who have had their eye on us for the last few years and shown incredible support in time, talent, and resources.  The faculty have been giddy with delight waiting for all the materials to be catalogued and available for check out, but I have a confession.  I cheated – just a little. Because I am the one assigned to catalogue and shelve all the materials, I already took one book home and read it cover to cover. Small perk of my job! And it was a pager turner!

Because I can be so verbose, I sometimes challenge myself to summarize a book, movie, or character in one word.  For Eustacia Cutler’s biography, A Thorn in My Pocket, Temple Grandin’s family story as told by her mother, I can think of one word; one word to summarize her life as matriarch of the Grandin family and mother to an autistic child before autism had a viable definition:  Gutsy.  Or how about “Courageous?” “Intelligent” also works, as does “Spent” or finally “Rewarding,” although in all honesty that is not the overall thread weaving it’s way through this book.

Gutsy.  I’m not sure what I was expecting when the appeal of learning more about Temple Grandin tempted me to pick out a book written about her family from her mother’s perspective.  Perhaps I was thinking of humorous family anecdotes, neat happily-ever-after vignettes peppered with scientific research that helped solve Temple’s peculiarities.  By contrast, it was more of a “shock and awe” telling. Cutler (her name by a 2^nd marriage) chose raw honesty in portraying the demeaning habits of her first husband and the fear he struck in all of them as he practiced physical and emotional abuse, journalling for years a twist of lies to acuse his wife of insanity.  It’s a page turner as the reader wonders if and how Mrs. Grandin will live through that relationsip in addition to raising four girls, including Temple who regularly battles her undiagnosed autism.  Bullying, screaming, meltdowns, constant care, finding nannies, divorce, and advocacy wear on the mother and the reader. Is there hope this could possibly turn out well?

Courageous.  How does a mother keep her sanity in such exhausting circumstances?  Temple’s mother sought the fine arts, and found respite from abuse and renewed energy successfully auditioning for theatrical poetry readings, Class B jazz bar singing gigs, and acting, until shredded vocal cords forced her voice into silence for at least six weeks for speaking and seven years for singing.  Minus a physical voice, her writing and constant research to figure out her daughter who would not accept a mother’s hug or touch pushed her toward constant and progressive goals.  Not losing her sanity or herself so she could be there for her children and as an example for Temple kept her strong.

Intelligent.  Woven throughout is an intelligent script about the history of medical and psychological thought and practices from the “Leave it to Beaver” era through modern breakthroughs.  As a Harvard graduate, her advanced vocabulary and parallel examples from classic literature create a literary banquet for the mind.  I had to defer to a dictionary numerous times to understand her vocabulary in targeted explanations of philosphy and thought as she tried to understand her husband, herself, and Temple and the family dynamic woven between all of them.

Spent.  I appreciated her raw, gutsy honesty in spelling out this excruciating journey without giving it a syrupy sweet ending with rainbows swathed across the background.  Her transparency about her difficulties offer a bond of understanding to others plodding a similar rocky path of unknowns with their children. Parents might come away from this book feeling more grateful to God that their journey is easy compared to hers, thankful for a support system unlike anything Cutler had, especially in the era in which Temple was born. 

 

Finally, Cutler types a curious bibliography that includes: history, psychology, science, ethics, biographies, Temple’s works, public television programs, research and education, plays and fiction, and a few organizational references.  All of these add to the credibility of her writing, research, and the journey of her thought processes through her nightmare years, but what an ending.

Her daughter went on to create such a successful system of herding cattle that 1/3 of the ranches in the US today use her system. She writes for magazines and books; she tours, speaks, and is quite an amazing overcomer in a man’s world of husbandry and ranching.

I guarantee you will be caught up in this monsoon from page one.  Gutsy.  Courageous. Intelligent. Spent.  And finally—rewarding! 



Shepherds College - Guiding Your Transition to Appropriate Independence. Please visit us at www.shepherdscollege.edu.

Book Review of Love Without Limits

Thank you to Cathy Harvey, Administrative Assistant, for writing today's blog.

As winter crept in, I stole a few hours to soak up a new read, a biography of an amazing man who has lived without arms or legs.  You may have heard of him or seen his unique videos.  Google “Nick Vujicic” and he’ll pop right up.   His name is as unique as his capabilities, but if you can’t remember his name, simply Google “man without arms and legs” and my guess is it will be hard to stop reading his website or hard not to click into numerous photos, videos, and testimonies that he has posted.

His book Love Without Limits is his seventh inspiring book in which he explains “it doesn’t take a perfect person to find a perfect love.”   This native born Australian with a Serbian name is incredibly optimistic and answers hard questions about how he lives, how he overcame depression and bullying, how to live above circumstances and how, as he says, to live a “ridiculously good life” even without limbs.  His books are filled with practical advice and common sense while offering snippets of his world speaking tours, the company and ministry he has started, and godly people he has met along the way.

Book seven, however, tackles yet another astounding aspect of his life—his marriage to a beautiful Mexican-Japanese woman named Kanae!  This is a page turner from page one.  Even without reading his previous books, the reader still learns much about his life and how he came to Christ.  As one can imagine, he did not think he would ever find someone who would ever feel compelled to marry him, a man without arms and legs.  There was no medical reason for his unusual birth, and he has only met less than 30 other people like himself in the world.  BUT GOD, in His sovereign plan, wove his life with another’s even though they lived an ocean apart. He is very clear from the beginning, that even without arms and legs he had a desire to find love, give love, and be loved just like everyone else.  He is candid about what a romantic comedy his dating years made!

Page after page he answers all the questions that pop into one’s head about how he functions in day to day needs.  The book toggles between telling his life story and hearing the love story from his and his wife’s perspectives.  Both Mr. & Mrs. add practical Biblical wisdom to the pitfalls and temptation of dating, loving, marrying, and having children. As the tagline to the book reads, this is certainly “a remarkable story of true love conquering all”!

I do not want to give too much away or steal the awe you will feel as you read their amazing story and see how they conquered one challenge after another.  Even if you’ve been too busy to read lately, I highly recommend you check out Love Without Limits at your local library, and be encouraged by someone who had every reason to be discouraged, but is not!

Life Without Limits

Nick Vujicic with Kanae Vujicic

Published by WaterBrook Press, 2014

ISBN:  978-1-60142-617-8

 

 
Shepherds College - Guiding Your Transition to Appropriate Independence. Please visit us at www.shepherdscollege.edu.

The Office: Of Banana Slicers & Other Small Things

Thank you to Cathy Harvey, Administrative Assistant, for writing today's blog.

My three sisters and I recently got together to swap stories and catch up on family news. It is always a great time filled with lots of love and laughter that ends too quickly, food and fellowship, and usually a gift exchange as we celebrate the colors and delights of each special occasion.

For this visit, a couple of my sisters couldn’t resist treating us to homemade delights and the odd and eccentric just for fun. One such oddity that brought howls of laughter as my sister read the reviews was a banana slicer—yes, a banana slicer.  My initial impression tagged it a ridiculous invention. How hard is it to simply grab a knife and slice a banana?  It takes all of 30 seconds, if that.  Prompt delivery to the Goodwill store came to mind.  I would rather clean a simple butter knife than all the slots in this piece of plastic. We were bent over in laughter, however, as my sister read rave reviews of the “marriage saving” device and critical complaints that it was curved in the wrong direction!

My youngest sister, who is editor of an inspirational quarterly for her church, wondered if there was a hidden lesson in there somewhere that she could springboard off of to use the hilarious reviews for a heart-tugging lesson. As we pondered what we could possibly glean from the silly slicer, we dared to come up with some positive characteristic of the little tool, and I began to think of the value of small things. 

For someone with arthritis, or recovering from a stroke and struggling with the use of their hands, it could, honestly, simplify their cutting effort. For children, it was 100% safe, eliminating the need to use a knife to slice a banana for morning cereal or an ice cream sundae dessert. It was dishwasher safe making it very easy to clean.  It had no sharp corners or edges. It was sized for any banana, large or small. And so on. I wouldn’t go so far as to claim it was a “marriage saver” as one viewer claimed, but it did have a place of usefulness, small and limited as its purpose was.

Life in the office has a number of seemingly small tasks and purposes too—none-the-less, important to the whole process of the running of a school. Things like keeping the office vacuumed, dumping the recycle bins, filling the copier with paper, shredding documents. 

What if…no one filled the copier with paper? We don’t have textbooks for our students; our instructors often write original material tailored to our students and make hundreds of copies a week for classes. What if no one ordered copier paper? What if no one emptied the recycle bins? What if no one ever vacuumed the dust, toner, staples and the hole punches off the carpet? What a mess we would have, and a dirty office to work in!  No day passes without such important tasks.

So, here’s to small things, small tasks, small tools—all pieces of the bigger picture for a greater good filling in the puzzle of what makes Shepherds College complete. Thanks to all our workers, residents, and student volunteers who take on little tasks that make a big difference in this small gem of a ministry in Union Grove, Wisconsin. So, yes, here’s to small things:  banana slicers, paper recyclers, and all!

“And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones because he is my disciple, I tell you the truth, he will certainly not lose his reward.”              ~ Matthew 10:42


Shepherds College - Guiding Your Transition to Appropriate Independence. Please visit us at www.shepherdscollege.edu.

America, I Love You

Thank you to Cathy Harvey, Administrative Assistant to Shepherds College, for writing today's blog.

My father was born during the Roaring Twenties era of our young American history.  His mother, my Nona, sailed here from northern Italy, checked in through Ellis Island, and settled in Chicago where my dad and his siblings grew up.  Somehow, they made it through the Depression.  My dad started driving when he was 12 so he could take his sister, my Aunt Gloria, to her many doctor appointments.  She had Cerebral Palsy—she was lucky, the doctor said; she had the “good type,” because the part of her brain that was affected only disengaged her legs from working properly and did not affect her mind skills. 

World War II arrived and with all the loyalty and patriotism of the time, my dad joined the Navy at 17, faithfully lying that he was 18 in order to enlist. Perhaps after Pearl Harbor was bombed the Navy was in too much of a hurry to check such details, or perhaps my immigrant grandmother had no birth papers to disprove his age.

I learned patriotism from my Dad.  He never lectured about it; he simply lived it.  He was a hard working family man with a devoted spirit of service.  He and a friend ran a car dealership together in Kenosha and then Lake Geneva, Wisconsin.  His friend ran the front end sales and my dad managed the body shop.  He was not a mechanic, but a good leader and his shop was spotless.  More than once we heard customers say, “I could eat my lunch off that floor!”  It was true.  He sealed and polished the concrete floors.  He ran a clean, tight ship and no car left the body shop without a car wash and cleaning.  When one lazy, young employee complained that he could only get three cars a day washed, my dad showed him what an honest day’s work was by washing twenty cars in his suit!

I have a memory of my dad’s personal Saturday morning routine.  Every summer weekend, without fail, unless it was raining, he would hoist an American flag at the front of our property.  After setting it in place, he would pause and stand for a moment of silence.  If we were to visit his business partner’s home for a cookout, they would perform the same silent ceremony together at the start of their visit.  They never invited anyone to join them, I never saw them speak about it, they just did it—out of love for America and in joint camaraderie having served in the same war together.  I watched from a distance and learned respect for our flag and our country by his unassuming practice.

In 1977, after the 60’s decade of hippie rebellion, my father felt compelled to pen his feelings for our country which was being bombarded with criticism.  This is how a local Wisconsin magazine, “Exclusively Yours” prefaced his personal essay, with the article following.

A middle-aged American,

of sound mind—

A local businessman. . .

A family man not a professional commentator,

liberator or agitator—

states some observations and personal

feeling you might care to share.

“AMERICA, I LOVE YOU!” 

by Emo Desideri

            How long has it been since you heard someone make that remark?  As it happens, I’ve heard quite a few people say it.  But then, they were people who had just returned from overseas.  After having been out of the country for a while, and seeing the rest of the world, they’re unanimous in stating “America looks pretty good to me.  We may have troubles, but we have fewer problems than any other country I’ve seen.  I’m really happy to be back in the good old United Sates.”

            Perhaps we should stop being so super-critical of everything American, and start looking at the positive side of this wonderful country of ours.  We’ve some serious problems, but then no country is perfect, and in America the common man has risen farther and faster than in any other civilization the world has ever known.

            Just for starters, let’s give a hand to some of the fine, dedicated politicians and government workers (including the police) who make our country, our state, and our cities run.  Let’s also acknowledge that there are many ordinary citizens in business and industry doing their jobs in a quiet, dignified, upstanding manner, and they, too, make America run.  These people, all of them, are the backbone of our country.  They’re our unsung heroes.

            In reality we’re one big family.  From time to time most families have differences of opinion, but they’re usually ironed out, and then they learn to live together.  That’s what we’re learning now.

            This country has a fantastic future.  So let’s learn to be a bit more objective about our demands on ourselves.  Let’s make our voices a bit less strident.  Self-improvement is always to be sought, but let’s not expect perfection among men or nations.  I am very tired of our apparent national inferiority complex . . . constantly nourished by an often negative press.

            I remember being in a foreign country during World War II, and watching our flag being raised over a new base.  There wasn’t a dry eye among the Americans present.  America could stand a little of that patriotic feeling right now.

            We could also stand some happy songs like George M. Cohan’s “Grand Old Flag.”  I’ve heard enough wailing and crying songs.  I’d like to hear some happy songs about the good things in our national life—and there are quite a few good things.  I’m convinced that the large percentage of American people is smarter and more perceptive than given credit for.  Americans may temporarily be led down the wrong road, but eventually they return to the right one.

            This is the greatest country in the world, and will be greater.  So let’s stop demanding instant perfection.  Let’s all work harder at our jobs and try a little harder to get along with each other.  Then we can all realize and share in the full potential of America’s great future.  AMERICA, I LOVE YOU!

(Vol. 30, Issue 5, March 12, 1977, pp. 23, 35, published by the Pattern Company, Inc. 161 West Wisconsin Avenue, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 53203.)  This article was also repeated in the local Lake Geneva paper, date unknown.

            And with that, I’m off to the fantastic Union Grove 4^th of July day parade, with a street-side breakfast being hosted by our own Shepherds LPN, Melba Wright!  Happy 4^th of July and have a great family summer of fun and relaxation!

 



Shepherds College - Guiding Your Transition to Appropriate Independence. Please visit us at www.shepherdscollege.edu.