Author: Sharron Burnett

Each year for sixty four years I have faced the anniversary of my father’s untimely death in 1957 that so drastically changed life for me and my mother and brothers. I remember that morning as vividly as my wedding day and the birth of my daughters. What should have been a sunny holiday spent at the beach with my cousins turned into a nightmare as soon as I arose from my sleep and heard my mom talking with someone on the phone using the past tense when she spoke of my father. I did not have to hear the horrible news from my aunt when I found her in our kitchen puttering away her nervousness. Even at the age of eight I had an intuitive nature and already understood that an earth shattering event had occurred. 

My mother had always been as steady as a rock and as delightfully happy as anyone I ever knew. On that day she was so bereft that she could hardly pull herself from her bed and she uncharacteristically left the care of me and my brothers to her siblings who quickly began to gather in our living room. As I quietly assessed the situation I somehow realized that I would have to rise to the occasion and muster a strength that I did not know I had to make sure that my mother and brothers would be okay. Psychologically I matured from eight to thirty in a single moment. I set aside the frivolities of childhood and adopted a seriousness that would mark the sense of responsibility that I was feeling. 

I suppose that my mother descended into a state of deep depression and perhaps even hopelessness that left her in a state of mind so unlike the person I had always known. It would be weeks before she would emerge from her tears and faraway looks. To say that it was frightening would be an understatement but somehow I understood how difficult the future looked to her and I felt confident that she would pull herself together, which she ultimately did. 

For the next ten years Mama returned to a revised version of her general optimism and courage. She kept us together and made a life without daddy feel safe and secure. She only had moments here and there when her emotions would spill over the top and feel out of control. Mostly she was our stalwart and source of unconditional love and wisdom. I was in awe of the woman she was and continued quietly being as trouble free for her as possible because I knew that she had more on her plate than most people would ever be able to handle. 

When I was in my first year of college my mother began to behave in ways so unlike herself. She experienced more and more periods of depression that would last for a couple of days and then seemingly go away. Her temper would sometimes flare up unexpectedly and in cruel ways that I had never before seen. She was a kind and loving person and her outbursts frightened me. She also developed irrational fears that I tried to laugh away but when I saw her clinging to them I worried that something was more amiss than just a roller coaster of emotions. 

Eventually Mama would have a complete mental breakdown. She closed the windows tightly, drew the blinds and drapes and locked herself into her darkened bedroom even as the temperature soared in the unairconditioned house. She cried constantly and with eyes darting like an animal running for its life from a predator she would speak of being watched by law enforcement for some unknown crime. She even believed that her sisters who came to help her were attempting to poison her. When she watched television she heard messages from the programs that were not part of the script. I was terrified. 

I learned that my mother had a mental illness that would stalk her for the next forty years. When she was sick, which was several times each year, our roles would reverse. I would be her caretaker and she would be like my confused child. It would take years before we had an accurate diagnosis of her condition which was bipolar disorder. 

With great regularity, usually in March, July and October my mother would travel through a cycle of emotions brought on by her illness. Almost always her symptoms began with sadness that prompted unending tears and isolation from the world. If I was able to convince her to see her doctor quickly enough the worst effects would never happen but when she was adamant that nothing was wrong and refused medical help she would descend into an emotional hell. the next phase was mania and that is when she became most unrecognizable. She talked constantly, often spewing vile anger and insults. She was unable to sleep and her the thoughts that raced through her head were filled with paranoid ideation. Eventually she would experience a psychotic break entirely. 

It was alway painful to see her that way. It felt so unfair that such a brilliant, wise, stalwart, and compassionate woman would be laid so low by some chemical flaw inside her brain. My brothers and I worried constantly that she would get herself into trouble but somehow she was blessed to have neighbors and coworkers who watched over her and alerted us whenever they saw signs of her mental illness rearing its ugly head. 

I always loved the interludes during which my mother was herself again. They were like a precious gift that I knew we had to enjoy with gusto because the never ending cycle of her bipolar disorder would inevitably return again and again to steal away her beautiful soul and replace it with a tortured turn of the mind. 

I still advocate for the mentally ill but realize that they are often relegated to neglect in favor of other more understandable problems in our world. There is still so much to be learned about how the brain works and why is sometimes goes awry. The suffering that good people endure along with their families leaves them misunderstood and sidelined from the roles that they might otherwise have enjoyed. We have such a long way to go in our knowledge and compassion and investment in time and money for mental illness. I truly believe that if we were to pour as much effort into understanding why a beautiful mind can become so infected we would actually solve many of the world’s problems. I suspect that much of the negative behavior that we witness is actually the result of a mental defect that might easily be repaired just as we do with hearts. Helping people who struggle with psychological issues will be my goal as long as I have breath to spread the word about their needs. A mind really is a terrible thing to waste and right now we condemn far too many to the dumpster. It’s long past time for finding real and lasting solutions for diseases of the brain.

I have a wonderful memory from my childhood. It is the sound of one of our neighbors practicing on her clarinet. Back then few people had air conditioning so everyone kept their windows open allowing the noises of life in each household to reverberate through the neighborhood. The young lady was a several years older than I was and a member of her high school marching band at the local public school. She was rather good and I looked forward to hearing the melodious tones of her instrument each evening as she became more and more adept in her performances over time. I can almost still hear her even as more than sixty years have passed.

I went to wonderful parochial schools were I received a top notch education but music was sadly rather lacking. In junior high I was a member of a choir and we learned the rudiments of reading music, but mostly we just sang from a rote memorization of our parts. In high school I was placed on a track that precluded artistic electives. Instead my schedule was filled with extra languages, sciences, and mathematics. While I appreciate all of the knowledge that I gained in those years my one regret is that I did not have the opportunity to learn how to play an instrument. In fact the school did not have either a band or an orchestra. 

Creating bands and orchestras is an expensive venture even if the students rent their instruments. It involves a major investment in teachers, assistants, sound systems, music, acoustically designed rooms. My school had to choose between state of the art science rooms and what the powers that be saw as the frivolousness of music equipment. I suppose they wisely chose science but to this very day I wish that I had received an opportunity to learn how to play a clarinet or a piano or maybe a cello or violin. 

Some of my classmates took private music lessons but I was a “scholarship” student who earned my tuition by excelling in my classes. I was a kind of investment in the future for my school and music was not on the menu. Thus I only dreamed of having the skills to create lovely sounds like my neighbor did.

When I was studying to be a teacher I had to take a basic music class. We all had to purchase a recorder and learn how to play a few songs. I became quite adept at performing “Go Tell Aunt Rhody” and other ditties but that did not satisfy my longing to be a real musician. In the same class we had to master “Three Blind Mice” on a keyboard but my short stubby fingers struggled to reach between the keys. I would later learn that a truly talented music teacher knows how to find just the right instrument for each person. 

My eldest daughter signed up for band classes in intermediate school. She wanted to play the flute but was never able to get a single sound from that instrument. Instead she had a knack with the oboe and worked to master that instrument for three years. Because I had such a longing to play I invested in private lessons for her and hundreds of dollars in replacing broken reeds. The oboe was a difficult instrument but she slowly progressed and then found that if she continued with it in high school she would have to play with the percussion students during marching seasons. Because she was a talented dancer she chose instead to join the dance team and left her music behind. 

I became obsessed with the fact that nobody in my direct family actually played an instrument. My husband did bit on the guitar and my mother-in-law was somewhat accomplished on the piano but nobody actually excelled like that neighbor of my long ago. I longed to hear real talent from one of my own. I had a paternal cousin who made the keys on a piano sing like angels so I felt certain that somewhere in the complexities of genetics there had to be some DNA that would lead to great musical talent in my offspring and their descendents. 

Soon I had grandchildren and one by one they all chose to join the band in middle school with varying interest in continuing through high school. From those seven four became somewhat accomplished. Grandson Jack played multiple instruments from his time in band including brass, piano and guitar but he, like his mother, chose to follow a different artistic route in high school. Benjamin became a tuba player and enjoyed it so much that he stayed for the full band experience in high school where he ultimately became the Drum Major. Ian chose the cello and with each passing year he became more and more adept. He has a passion for music that shows in his incredible performances. He plays like an archangel. William is a violinist but he does not share the enthusiasm of Jack, Ben and Ian. Nonetheless I am overjoyed that some of my fold have so beautifully mastered the art of music. Finally the kind of beautiful sounds of my youth are being reproduced by my grandsons. 

If I had the opportunity to learn one more thing it would be to master an instrument. It would not matter to me what that might be. It would simply be wonderful to be able to sing to the heavens with my skill. As an educator I believe in providing all students regardless of income with a chance to play an instrument. I don’t really believe that an education is complete without at least a rudimentary introduction to such a competency We should all experience moments of rising heavenward with our music like my neighbor did with her clarinet. It is perhaps the most gloriously creative act that humans may do. The sound of music raises us all from the commonplace into the domain of angels.

Thoreau went to Walden Pond to escape the world as it was and create the world of his mind. Arthur C. Clarke dreamed of an incredible future and then went to an island to make it come true, at least for him. It is in our natures as humans to muse upon utopian worlds, Garden of Eden style societies in which conflict and want are no more. Unfortunately one man’s utopia is another’s prison. It’s unlikely that we would ever be able to agree on what constitutes heaven on earth much less actually build it. Adam and Eve proved that as have countless groups like the pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock. 

Somehow it is in our natures to disagree. From a religious standpoint we hark back to the first man and woman to see how temptations even in the presence of what should be perfect contentment sway us to stray from the path of perfection. From a strictly psychological and genetic point of view we see that our upbringings, cultures, backgrounds have a profound effect on our perspectives and thus make it almost impossible to find a universal common ground. Not even cults last forever and sometimes they lead to even more destruction than existed before. 

If I were to describe my own utopia it would be quite personal and much like Thoreau’s isolated existence far from most of society. It would be a temporary form of solace because I am realistic enough to know that I would still have to venture out into the world as it is. My utopia would be a haven, a retreat, but not a transformation of all of the world.

In my utopia nature would hold a commanding place. Trees, flowers, birds and all sorts of creatures would live in peaceful coexistence with me and those who choose to go with me. Our setting would be tranquil and free of noise and irritations. Our lifestyle would be simple, quiet, deliberate. There would be no rushing from one appointment to another, no sitting in traffic. I would not be consumed with worrisome thoughts or anxieties about how to get things done. There would be no need for such attitudes because the pace of life would allow us to continually pause to feel our connections with each other and the universe. 

Of course there would have to be access to books and learning. I would spend a great deal of time increasing my knowledge and best of all having Socratic-like discussions without rancor or preconceived arguments with my fellow utopians. We would feed on each other’s ideas, parsing them for truth and understanding. There would be no competitions, only the pure joy of expanding our minds and our tolerance for differences. Ours would be a peaceful place devoid of jealousies. There would be an easy going harmony with each other and with nature.

My utopia would bring good health to everyone who lives there. Our doctors would find ways to eliminate horrific diseases and pain. We would exercise our bodies as well as our minds and eat the healthy bounty of unprocessed foods. Caring for our lovely surroundings as well as ourselves would be a community project and another avenue for bringing us together. More importantly there would be peace and joy and equality. Each person would be a treasure and know that he/she is loved unconditionally. There would be no want going unmet or unjust treatment being accepted. 

Of course I sound naive just describing my utopia. I may as well suggest that there will be rainbows everyday, ice cream covered mountains, and unicorns roaming on our lawns. There is a reason why humans dream of a perfect society but never achieve it. Indeed we are flawed and those flaws lead us to bickering and anger and turn us into green eyed monsters begrudging the good fortune of others. Trying to bring all of our points of view together has never been accomplished and taming the dark side of human nature has never been fully achieved. I suppose that many would not even like my ideas for a utopia. To them my perfect world would be a kind of hell. Thus it is and thus it has always been. 

We have managed to tame our wild spirits with education, peaceful philosophies and certain forms of government but we have yet to be fully successful. A true utopia would not need guns or police or soldiers because we would not fight with one another nor hurt one another. We would be as loving as Jesus was and we would not have hung him on a cross for having ideas that frightened us. 

I dream about a perfect world because I think that it is possible to improve the one we have bit by bit. It’s somewhat difficult to see that right now because of the sickness, divisiveness, injustice, suffering, wars and evil that seem to surround us throughout the world. Still, I find places where it feels pretty darn close to heaven right here on earth. I still believe that when all is said and done most of us are very very good. We are moving in the right direction and I think I can see a slice of utopia way up ahead. 

I’ve never studied the history of human hair but I am sure that there is one and that it is fascinating. I suppose that there was a time when people had no real alternative but to let Mother Nature take her course with the growth of that fuzzy stuff that ends up on everyone’s head and on the faces of men. I imagine that at some point the darn stuff grew so long that it became unmanageable. I laugh at the thought of some guy tripping over his beard. I imagine that hair became the victim of the first cutting tools invented by creative souls. 

We watch movies of historical times and often forget that the means of grooming were often quite limited for most folks, including royalty, for a very long time. Powdered wigs became the rage among those wealthy enough to afford them because the pate underneath them was probably a rather nasty mess. At some point in time men used blades of some sort to achieve a clean shaven look, perhaps to rid themselves of one more spot on the body that might house uninvited guests like insects. The measures of hygiene that we enjoy today were not always available to the average person even as late as the early twentieth century. 

My grandfather often spoke of his boyhood and the lack of basics like running water and gentle soaps that we take for granted. He laughed about the once a week baths that his grandmother gave him with a scrub down of lye soap that burned his skin. He claimed that nobody really noticed the general lack of cleanliness because it was a given for everyone in his little circle of country folk but he admitted that they must have been a rather foul smelling group.

Today our bodies are pampered with daily showers, baths, soaps, creams. We seek out professionals to style our hair and, for men, to shape our mustaches and beards. People can cut their locks and shave their faces or let them grow long and lush. Styles come and go but in the present time our tastes appear to be open to just about any way of dealing with that stuff that grows from our scalps and chins. In particular there is a kind of resurgence of beards of all kinds among the males. 

I think that a nicely shaped and controlled beard can be quite attractive. It works particularly well on men who have chins that are not particularly commanding. I personally prefer closely cropped versions of beards and goatees rather than big busy styles and I definitely dislike the long straggly versions that look at though no effort has been made to give the hair some character. Sean Connery wore beards rather well but some men can’t seem to get enough thickness to their facial hair to make it attractive. 

On the whole I prefer the clean shaven look on most men but I am not against facial hair when all of the factors come together to create a good look. I’ve learned that the art of the beard is time consuming and expensive, requiring just the right implements for training the hair and keeping it looking healthy with cleansing agents and pomades. The best beards require a great deal of work. 

I’ve visited men’s shaving shops with my husband and we browse the many products for beards even though he does not have one. He has stuck with the clean look for most of his life because his attempts to grow a beard or mustache have failed miserably. The beard is not problem for him but his mustache tends to be thin and of a different color than the hairs on his chin and head. He ends up looking unkempt and not nearly as attractive as he actually is. I’ve had to give him a thumbs down more than once when he tried to join the bearded set. Still, he is fascinated with the art of shaving and I see him longingly studying the implements and products designed for growing and managing a beautiful beard. 

Our friend Bill had a trademark goatee that served him well. He always looked rather dashing with the look that he adopted and kept for most of his adult life. My brother grew a beard during the pandemic that is a very good style for him. He now cuts his thinning pate close to his head and sports a closely cropped beard that draws attention to his twinkling eyes in an effect that serves him well. When done right a beard can be a nice way to enhance a man’s looks but those long straggly out of control bushes are just downright horrible to me. The men from Duck Dynasty might actually be handsome underneath all of the growth but for now they just look ridiculous. 

I suppose that I have a bit of a fetish about hair of any kind since I struggle so with mine. I have spent a lifetime attempting to find a style that works for me with very little success. I might look great in the salon after the work of a professional but I can’t reproduce the effect at home. A woman’s hair makes all the difference in how the world perceives her and mine sadly all too often looks boring and sometimes even as awful as a man with an out of control beard. I imagine that facial hair can be just as tricky for the guys as a head of bad hair can be for a woman. 

We humans are a funny lot. We’ve created an obsession with our looks that probably did not need to happen. We spend untold amounts of money each year on products and styling in the hopes of stumbling upon the ultimate look that will transform us from ordinary to incredibly attractive. How we ultimately decided what constitutes beauty is a mystery but they say that even tiny babies respond more positively to individuals with certain physical features. So we continue on our quest to be viewed a looking nice with emphasis on the aspect of our bodies that we always see first, our faces. For men that includes the hairs that pop out of their chins with daily regularity. To beard or not to beard is a very personal choice and brings a bit of variety into our lives that can be fun. I’m all for anything that makes someone feel good.

Back when we were still young and adventurous my husband purchased a pickup truck with a standard transmission. I had to learn how to shift those gears and at first there was no hiding my inexperience as they would grind with an horrific noise that announced my lack of skill to the world. With practice I drove the beast with a confidence that was as smooth as silk but I’ll never forget how annoying and even embarrassing my first efforts were. I was proud to learn something new and I often think about how much more willing to try new things we seem to be in our youth. As we grow older we often become more reticent to consider novel ideas. I suppose that if I were to be honest I would admit that we older folk are all too often totally set in our ways and that attitude grinds my gears as badly as I did with our old truck.

Everything around us is constantly changing. The world of today is so different from the one into which I emerged as an infant. Heck, it had changed significantly by the time I was in my twenties. The strain between my age group and our parents came to be forever known as the generation gap. Our intentions were often misunderstood by our elders who wanted desperately to cling to older ways of thinking and doing things. History shows us that the dichotomy between the young and the old has often been this way. In our youth we are focused on the future and infinite possibilities. As we grow older we simply want to enjoy the world in peace just as it is. it’s feels more difficult to keep learning new things and we are sometimes too tired to bother.  

In another time most of my generation would already have departed this world. Modern medicine and a higher standard of living has increased the lifespan of most societies in remarkable ways but all too often the older folk cling to the past tenaciously and resist the newer ways of the young. Of late we have even tended to hold onto the reins of power far longer than ever before, creating a kind of lopsided command of businesses, wealth and even countries. The flow of opportunity to the younger adults is not as certain as it once was. 

Longings for the old ways are not innately bad but they do have the effect of sometimes stifling new ideas. They have the potential of slowing down progress in favor of just staying the same or even going back to a time that actually no longer exists. The tension between the old and the new stretches us to the max and creates frustrations in both camps. Meanwhile pressing issues remain on hold with no reasonable solutions in sight. 

I grew up with exceedingly wise elders. My grandfather was a fan of change because he had seen the fastest proliferation of it during his lifetime. He understood how difficult life was for most people during his youth at the end of the nineteenth century. By the time of his death in the nineteen eighties he had witnessed the birth of electricity, running water and plumbing inside homes, the invention of the automobile, the plane, the telephone, moving pictures, televisions, space travel, Medicare, Social Security. This list seems almost infinite and my grandpa praised everything that had happened while often saying that “the good old days” were in the present, not the past.

My mother often quoted the Bible in urging me to remember that there is a time and a season for everyone. She criticized my generation for holding onto our power so tenaciously. She felt that we should step aside and allow the next generation to try their hand at leading. Shortly before she died she reiterated her concern that we demand too much control without providing our young a way to have a say in how things should be done. She disliked that we all too often criticize their efforts instead of attempting to learn more about the rationale for their thinking. She urged us to respect our children and grandchildren and even pointed to the fact that most of the founders of the United States who rebelled against King George were in their twenties and thirties at the time of the revolution. She saw great irony in the fact that we so often point to those founders to keep things the same.

I understand the desire to just be left alone with the way things have always been. i don’t want to learn how to use new machines or learn difficult concepts. It takes me longer to do those kind of things than it did when I was in my prime. My seventy two year old brain struggles in ways that it never did when I was young. Nonetheless I consider stretching it to be as important to my health as keeping my body moving. I don’t want to become a dinosaur, so like my grandfather and mother I choose to be open to thinking that challenges my own. I spend a great deal of time reading and researching even controversial ideas and philosophies. 

A current idea that at times sound absurd and even unfair is to provide free college tuition to anyone who wants a higher education. Like many in my age group I think of how hard I had to work to pay my way through both an undergraduate and graduate degree. Later my husband and I took out loans to send our two daughters to college. It took us many years to repay those debts. It took great sacrifice and it does indeed seem a bit unfair to suddenly give everyone a “free ride” as some call it. Nonetheless I also see how the inflation of college costs has been exponential. I paid under a thousand dollars a year to attend a university. By the time my daughters were in college that cost had increased to seven thousand a year. Now the average cost for a year of college “is almost thirteen thousand dollars and year and that amount keeps rising. 

It is estimated that those who earn degrees often leave college owing in excess of one hundred thousand to two hundred fifty thousand dollars. At the same time salaries have not kept pace so that many young adults are dying under the strain of being upside down with debt that far exceeds their incomes. Perhaps it is time to consider this issue without thinking of it as a handout to “lazy” individuals who are “unwilling to work as hard as we did”. Somewhere along the way the cost of education seems to have run away from us and we need to do something to help rather than simply asking our young to just deal with it. We won’t resolve this and other issues until we earnestly talk about how to do so with good intentions and outcomes for everyone. 

Progress and change is difficult sometimes but it is also the way the world moves forward. All of us need to be more open and flexible and willing to compromise to keep our world looking into the future rather than being stuck in the past. One we practice this those gears will begin to move without grinding. The smooth functioning of the human journey has always demanded a willingness to think out of the box and a need to honestly communicate with one another with respect. Only when we open our minds will things operate as they should.