Library Scrabble scramble!

This column was published in the Tri-Valley Times on January 12, 2012.

As a journalist, I often get a close-up look at events around our city and I enjoy recreating those experiences in print so I can bring you along.

Join me now as we attend the first-ever elementary and middle school Scrabble tournament held at the Pleasanton Library. We’ll meet a few people and look over the shoulders of the kids to see some of the cool words the youngsters played.

If you’d arrived with me at the library just after 10 a.m. on January 3, you would have seen some 40 students and their parents checking in for the tournament in the children’s area. Picture a diversity of eager faces and various ages from third to eighth grade.

As the kids were being seated four to a table within their age groups, I asked Megan Slone, age 13, to share what she hoped to get out of the day’s experience.

“I hope to win,” she said, smiling. Megan was attending with her brother Russell, age 9, accompanied by their father Victor.

Similarly, Vivek Palekar shared what prompted him to bring his ten-year-old son to the tournament: “Vishal is an avid reader and a spelling bee champion in his class at Lydiksen Elementary,” said Palekar, “so I knew he would enjoy this event.”

Librarian John Mitchell welcomed the participants and outlined the tournament rules. He explained that no students would be eliminated during the day-long event since the winners would be determined by total points earned. He also noted that the prizes would be gift cards of $25, $15, and $10 to Towne Center Books for first, second, and third place for the two competitions of third through fifth grade and sixth through eighth grade.

Mitchell answered a few questions, and then asked parents to leave the room so the tournament could begin. As the students played, I quietly chatted with Mitchell and Chris Spitzel, another librarian who was helping with the tournament. I learned about other programs offered for children at the library, such as Paws to Read, Friday Story Time, and the Booklegger program. Spitzel is the coordinator for this program and encourages readers to consider volunteering since she could use a few more adults to go into Pleasanton classrooms to promote books and reading.

As the tournament continued, I jotted down many of the words being played. Here are some you would have seen along with me: kitten, ogre, lasso, amulet, skinner, reap, gnome, math, omit, pesky, ablaze, and fever. I was also struck by two simple words that seemed to capture the spirit of the day: fun and hip.

After the tournament, Mitchell announced the winners: Abhat Sawkar, age 14, won first place for his age group with 509 points; and Blake Youngquist, age 10, won first place for his group with 446 points.

As the participants departed, Sandy Silva, who oversees children’s services for the library, glanced through the student feedback forms. “We hoped this would be a fun and educational social outing for students,” she said, “and judging from this feedback, it looks like the day was a success.”

Spitzel added that she was impressed not only with the quality of the words that were played but the positive manner in which the kids competed. “It took some bravery to come and compete today,” she said. “All the students should be proud.”

For more information about youth programs at the library, or to volunteer for the Booklegger program, contact the Pleasanton Library through its website at www.ci.pleasanton.ca.us/services/library.

Local surgeon climbs Mt. Kilimanjaro

This column was published in August 2011 in Bay Area News Group newspapers.

While many of us stayed around town during the dog days of summer, local resident Alexandra Burgar, who goes by Sandi, spent her vacation climbing the tallest mountain on the African continent: Mount Kilimanjaro.

Burgar, who is 39 and practices medicine in Pleasanton as an orthopedic hand and arm surgeon, was away ten days, including seven days of trekking.

“The first day of climbing was through a muddy rainforest,” she said, noting that Kilimanjaro’s geography includes climate zones ranging from rain forest to alpine desert to the snow cap.

Hiking with guides and porters, Burgar and four fellow trekkers (three men from California and a woman from Texas) followed what is known as the Machame Route, or the Whiskey Route, one of six routes to the summit.

On the second day of the climb, the team encountered cold rain as they climbed to 12,500 feet. They also happened upon other groups, including three youngsters from Holland. “Their English was better than mine,” Burgar joked.

Day three took the travelers through a region of cold and wet fog, across shale and rocks. “The vegetation looked like it came from a movie set for Star Trek,” Burgar said.

On the fourth day of climbing, Burgar caught her first glimpse of the summit as the fog cleared for about five minutes. Reaching 13,255 feet of elevation by day’s end, many trekkers fall victim to the extreme altitude and are forced to descend. In fact, online sources note that typically only 30% of climbers reach the summit of Kilimanjaro, and many people die on the mountain each year due to falling, poor preparation, hypothermia, and the effects of altitude.

Though even experienced porters have died on the mountain, Burgar found these hard-working men to be especially resilient.

“They are all friendly,” she said, adding that a daily occurrence took some getting used to: “Each day as we were hiking, we’d hear hurried footsteps coming from behind.” The porters would rapidly sweep past the trekkers carrying all the gear to set up the next camp. “It was a bit demoralizing at first, but then it became a source of entertainment for us,” she said.

Day five comes just before the final ascent to the summit. This is alpine desert and was covered in cold, miserable fog. To make matters worse, the region provides little opportunity to “use the internet café,” a euphemism Burgar said refers to using an outdoor restroom.

After arriving at camp, the team was treated to Coca Cola and Snickers bars, which Burgar described as "heaven." They were then instructed to have an early dinner and get to bed early because reaching the summit and getting back the next day meant beginning at 11:30 p.m. and hiking through the night.

The final ascent, while not too long, is very steep, Burgar said, and the loose terrain through the skree causes each footstep to backslide. After hours of struggling to breathe and putting one foot in front of the other with no sense of direction, Burgar recalls arriving at Stella Point with temperatures at 17 degrees and probably closer to zero degrees given the wind chill: “We had a few hundred yards to go and about 300 feet in elevation,” she said. “I knew I’d make it.”

Many people consider Stella Point the summit, but Uhuru Peak, which stands at 19,341 feet, is the tallest point in Africa. Telling herself to just keep going, the time became 6:30 a.m., and--as if on cue--the sun inched above the mountain and through the clouds, and Burgar saw the sign that said she’d reached the summit.

Burgar’s fingers were too numb to take pictures and the lack of oxygen made her slighly delirious, so a Maasai guide named Mr. Kim snapped photos. “We didn’t stay long at the summit,” she said, noting that the downhill trek back to camp only took a few hours since the trekkers were able to slide down the skree of the mountain.

Arriving home, Burgar didn’t realize quite what she’d accomplished until she looked at the photos. "Much of the trip consisted of following a guide and not recognizing distances we covered," she said. "It wasn't like running a marathon where you can see what you're accomplishing."

Burgar also said that despite the enormous aerobic effort every day, she didn't heat up as she trekked. "It was surreal," she said. "The altitude and cold kept us from ever getting heated up as we walked."

Burgar is proud to add this trip to her world travels. An avid athlete and runner, she has the distinction of having run on every continent in the world, including the final continent on her list, Antarctica, in March 2011.

To read Burgar's blog and to see photos of the trip, visit http://kilimanjaro2011teamcaltex.shutterfly.com/.

Text saves teen's life

Can a text message save a life? A 16-year-old teenager from Livermore says yes. Here’s the story of Christian, whose last name is being withheld for privacy.

Christian used to live in Sacramento, and because his mother was a drug addict, one day police raided their home to take his mother away.

He remembers her yelling at him, saying the arrest was his fault. She also said if it weren’t for him she would be happy.

Still, just before the police led her away, Christian shouted, “Mommy, I love you!”

Her response continues to haunt him.

“She said she didn’t love me and that if I loved her, I wouldn’t have let this happen,” he said.

This was one of the last times he saw her, and these devastating words changed his life. Although he was placed in a loving foster home, then adopted, and given everything he needed to succeed in life, his birth mother’s words stayed with him.

“I still felt so alone,” he said.

For attention, Christian started acting out in school and in church. He never talked to anyone about what he was going through. “I hid my feelings because I didn’t think anyone would care,” he said. In fact, Christian decided that whenever he had negative thoughts, he would force himself not to think about them. When this didn’t work and he became depressed, he decided to hide this as well.

This led to nightmares in which his mother’s words were repeated over and over.

Finally, he couldn’t take it anymore, so at age 13 he started drinking and using drugs. Finding only temporary relief, he tried to drown himself in a lake while working at a camp one summer. Half drunk, Christian fell into the lake and sank into the water’s darkness. He remembers the moon starting to fade when a senior camp employee jumped in and saved his life.

Several months later in December 2009, he attended a party where a girl he knew asked him what was wrong.

“I froze,” he said. “How did she know? I thought I was able to hide my world from everyone.”

Over the next six months, Christian told his friend about his boyhood. It felt good to talk about it, he said. When she learned about his use of drugs and alcohol, she told him to stop. Christian tried, but couldn’t stop. So again he saw only one solution: suicide. In June 2010, as he cut into his arm and the blood began to flow in his sink, he heard a buzz in his room from his cell phone.

“It was a text from my friend,” he said. She had typed “Sup,” short for “What’s up?”

“That text stopped me from killing myself,” Christian said. He decided to respond, and that was enough to distract him “from one of the stupidest decisions of my life,” he said.

Christian opened up even more to his friend. Again she wanted him to stop his substance abuse, but this time she asked him instead of telling him.

“I realized it was my choice now,” he said.

So Christian stopped. He started to focus on what matters in life. He grew closer to his parents. He stayed in touch with his friend.

“I was learning how to die and she taught me how to live,” he said.

Christian knows that life will be hard for him. “I will run into problems and I will stumble,” he said, “but as long I have my God, my family, and my friends, I will make it through.”

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Young man revisits mother’s death

This column was published by Bay Area News Group in February 2011

When Brian Walker was ten years old, he came upon a scene he had never seen before.

“I found my mom smoking,” he said. “I didn’t know she smoked.”

Still, it wasn’t the smoking that sent a chill through the young boy.

“It was her face. She seemed numb,” he said.

Walker, who is 22 and lives in Pleasanton, said his mother died the next day from a fall from a second story window onto a concrete surface in the backyard. Exactly how she managed to fall remains a mystery. Perhaps an accident, perhaps suicide, whatever happened quietly haunted Walker for many years.

“I was the only one in my family to see my mom alive on her last day,” said Walker, his brown eyes softening.

Walker explained that his parents were divorced, and he and his brothers had spent the night at his father’s house.

“By some fate, I’d forgotten a project at my mom’s house,” Walker said. “So she brought it to my school.”

Standing in front of Walker’s friends that October morning minutes before the bell rang, Nancy Walker bid her son farewell for the last time.

“Have a great day today,” she said, “I love you.”

At age ten, his friends surrounding him, Walker wordlessly raised a hand in a curt farewell. What he did not do was say three simple words to his mother he wishes he said that morning.

“Words are not meaningless,” Walker said. “They have power and can create things both wonderful and monstrous.”

The three most magical words are I love you, he said.

After the death, Walker’s world was different. His friends seemed afraid of saying the wrong thing around him. He watched his older brother struggle with the loss of their mother, while the youngest brother grew up not remembering her.

“Through it all and for many years I told everyone I was fine,” Walker said. “I wanted to be stable, someone I thought my mom would be proud of.”

But, of course, Walker was not fine.

“The hero always manages to utter those three words right before their loved one quietly fades from this world,” Walker said. “But I was no hero.”

Walker had watched his mother spiral into depression, yet did nothing to help her. If he could turn back time, he would put out that cigarette and ask if she was okay.

“I would have sat down with her, hugged her, and told her I loved her,” he said.

After graduating from high school, Walker felt many pressures build in his life. As his sense of guilt finally began to emerge, he began to act recklessly, and in desperation he turned to his father.

“A lot was happening in my life,” Walker said. “I asked my dad to tell me what he knew about my mom’s death.”

His father reassured his son that she had not killed herself, that the fall was just an accident. These words, along with hearing from others that there are easier ways to kill oneself than jumping from a window just two stories high, allowed Walker to realize he had been needlessly blaming himself for a role he did not have in his mother’s death.

Since then Walker has found a purpose and stability in his life.

“The universe is not kind and we cannot rescind our mistakes,” he said. “But we can learn from them, make peace with them, and live our lives.”

Nancy Walker’s death was twelve years ago. Since then her son has learned much about life.

“I think she would be proud of me,” he said.

A puppet, a little girl, and a magical memory

This column was published in the Bay Area News Group newspapers in November 2010.

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We are thankful for many blessings at Thanksgiving.

Most of our thanks are for big moments, such as the safe return home of a loved one from Iraq or the birth of a healthy baby. But sometimes we give thanks for little things, like a memory of mine I’ll share in a moment.

Whatever the blessing, everything we’re thankful for has an element of joy in it, and because we know that not everyone is as fortunate as we are, we feel a sense of wonder and magic in the gifts of our lives.

One such gift is my vivid memory of an evening when my now 18-year-old daughter, Melissa, was four years old and I was putting her to bed and preparing to tell a bedtime story.

Picture a little girl’s bedroom. In one corner among several dolls is the odd presence of 24-inch ventriloquist dummy in a red jacket and black bowtie. His head and hands are plastic, and his eyebrows and hair are painted on, just like the eternal twinkle in his eye.

This dummy was a toy Santa brought me when I was a little boy. While some readers will remember ventriloquist puppets such as Charlie McCarthy, Danny O’ Day, and Mortimer Snerd, this was a Jerry Mahoney puppet produced in the 1960s by the Juro Novelty Company.

As a kid, I loved this little fellow. He became my companion, keeping me company as I drew pictures or did homework. He always smiled and listened without interrupting. I learned to become a ventriloquist listening to Jimmy Nelson's Instant Ventriloquism record that taught me how, with a little practice, the letter d could become a b-sound and how the letter n could mimic the sound of the letter m. I even entered school talent shows and entertained my friends.

As I grew into adulthood, I kept Jerry stored away in closets, occasionally bringing him out at family get-togethers. He attended my parent’s 50th wedding anniversary, and one Christmas morning Jerry ended up being passed around the living room as my siblings and other family members took turns pulling his string and making him say a few words. We laughed as each of us came up with something funny for him to say.

After my daughter was born and started to play with dolls, I introduced her to Jerry and I would make him talk for her. He started hanging around her room, no doubt pleased to be an active toy again.

So on this particular evening, my daughter climbed into bed and spotted Jerry.

“Daddy,” she said, “make Jerry talk.”

I pulled him onto my lap and he started to ask Melissa about her day. In his typical high voice, he asked about her friends and what games she liked to play.

I watched her blue eyes, fixed on the puppet, enchanted as she answered his questions.

And then she stopped and looked at me and asked in her sweet, four-year-old voice, “You’re making him talk, right?”

At that moment I realized the power of performance and art to transport us. Even when we know we’re watching an act, sometimes the magic feels so real. This is why the English poet and philosopher Coleridge wrote that poetry and art come alive when we willingly suspend our disbelief.

That’s what Melissa was doing, even as I answered yes, I was making Jerry talk.

For such memories and all our blessings this Thanksgiving season, let’s be thankful.

Looking for a new pet? Think chickens.

This column was published in the Bay Area News Group papers on October 14, 2010.

Many people have dogs and cats as pets. Some have chickens.

“We think of them as low maintenance pets,” said Sondra Perry, who with her husband bought three baby chicks eight months ago after removing the grass from their San Ramon backyard to create a garden.

“We got the chickens to help with the bugs and to improve the soil,” she said. “We also liked the idea of having fresh eggs.”

The couple, who grew up around horses but not chickens, kept the chicks indoors for 90 days before moving them outside into a yellow hen house.

Named Mother, Raven and Braveheart, the chickens recently began laying eggs and produce about three eggs every day, one from each chicken.

“The chickens were my husband’s idea,” Perry said. “He likes them and they follow him into the garden waiting for him to overturn something so they can get fresh bugs.”

While the San Ramon couple’s children are grown, Perry said chickens are great for kids.
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Susan Case agrees. “Our four-year-old daughter calls our chickens chirpies,” said Case, who lives in Pleasanton. “She helps feed them and checks their water.”

Purchased in March, three of the five chickens are named Ming-Ming, Jello, and Rudolph.

“It’s not that we don't want to name the other two,” Case said, “but their personalities haven't shown yet.”
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Case said when the chickens were younger, Ming-Ming, who resembles a cartoon character with the same name, would sit on the handlebars of her daughter’s tricycle as she rode around.

“Surprisingly, that poor chicken held on,” said Case, although Ming-Ming had a “deer-in-the-headlight look” during such excursions.

Along with teaching pet care, Case said the chickens offer an opportunity to teach math and counting.

“My daughter counts the eggs and if they’re in different nesting boxes, we ask her to explain how they add together,” Case said.

While the Case family owns five chickens, six is the limit in Pleasanton, and that’s the number owed by Jana Halle, another Pleasanton resident who teaches middle school and has owned chickens for several years. Her chickens are named Trudy (actually, Trudy-With-An-Attitudy, she explains,) Dottie, Deedee, Dori, Sunny and Shady.

Halle said families with backyard chickens should avoid roosters, which can disturb neighbors when they crow in the early morning. Pet chickens should be hens, and it’s important to pay attention to breed, she said. Bantams are smaller chickens and suitable for a backyard. Bantams include several types, and Halle owns four Wyandottes and two English Game hens.

Halle said some people assume hens can’t lay eggs without a rooster in the house. This isn’t true. The eggs won’t hatch into chicks, but hens still lay eggs, she said.

Because it’s difficult to tell the difference between baby hens and roosters, Halle tells a funny story about watching one of two young Wyandottes develop a prominent comb, what she called a kind of Elvis Presley look.

“I thought maybe I’d purchased a rooster by accident,” she said.

Because she would never kill a chicken, she researched chicken sanctuaries and was ready to drop off her rooster. But before she did, she separated the two maturing Wyandottes overnight and requested they each lay an egg to prove they were hens. In the morning, Halle was relieved to find an egg under each chicken.

Halle, like Perry and Case, recommends chickens as pets, as long as families do their homework and understand the commitment required to properly care for and clean up after the animals.

“I love my chickens,” said Halle.

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Sometimes life comes out of left field

A version of this column appeared in the Bay Area News Group papers on September 2, 2010

Early in 2009, our family learned that our daughter Kelsey, then 13, was experiencing rapid kidney failure.

This is the girl who at age 10 had titanium rods inserted along her spine to correct scoliosis.

The same girl whose heart doctors opened at age 3 to repair a leaky valve.

As if these challenges weren’t enough, Kelsey was born with a genetic condition called Jeune Syndrome that makes her small for her age and restricts her lung capacity. Unlike her dad, she’ll likely never run marathons.

So last summer Kelsey went on dialysis at Stanford’s Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital. And thanks to the incredible generosity of her aunt Theresa, Kelsey received a new kidney just one month later in July 2009.

Today Kelsey is doing well and feeling healthy, so when she was invited by the hospital to the August 21 Oakland A’s baseball game with her family, she said she’d love to go.

In the days before the game, we learned more details. This wasn’t just any baseball outing. In fact, Kelsey had a special task to complete just before the game.

Enter Rob Combi of Lafayette, whose son Cole has received two kidney transplants. Combi connected with Oakland A’s vice president Jim Leahey with the idea of having the A’s promote organ donation. They enlisted the support of A’s catcher Landon Powell, who will one day need a liver transplant. Called Donate Life Night, the theme for the evening was organ donation, with $4 of each ticket donated to Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital.

To kick off the game, Combi and Leahy arranged for five children who’d received transplants to run onto the field to a designated player.

So after enjoying an afternoon barbecue and spending time with doctors and medical staff who had also been invited to the game, the kids donned A’s shirts and were given a pen and baseball to be signed by their player. Cole Combi was selected to throw out the first pitch.

From Kelsey’s blog, here’s what happened next: “Finally, we were at the edge of the field. I asked many questions because I did not want to run to the wrong place. And so, when we were told to run, I ran to left field.”

Kelsey explains that for some reason her player wasn’t there, so she was directed to run to center field. She continues, “I got to the player I was assigned to. I didn't know much about the A's, but afterward I realized I was standing next to Rajai Davis during the National Anthem. He signed my baseball, and I ran back.”

After we got to our seats, Kelsey expressed concern she’d run to the wrong place on the field. But soon she realized that many kids would love to say they ran from left field to center field in the Oakland Coliseum.

Needless to say, Kelsey has learned to keep life in perspective.

In her blog, she reminds us to be thankful for our health. She writes about kids who are waiting for livers, kidneys, and hearts. “And yes, even intestines,” she writes. “I know of a little boy who was in need of intestines.”

Also needless to say, our family now has a favorite team: the Oakland A’s.

And Kelsey’s story, along with the stories of those kids who ran onto the field that late afternoon, are why we all need to sign up to become organ donors.

“Most adults complain,” Kelsey writes. “Please, next time you run out of gas, your cell phone runs out of battery, or you get called for jury duty, remember: while you're getting called for jury duty, some kids are getting called for chemotherapy.”

To be ready to save someone’s life, visit www.ctdn.org.