“Voices”

By

Gerry Niskern

What do you think about the new friends we all have acquired in the past few years?  You know the ones. They’re voices. That’s all, just firm voices.

At first it was a little disconcerting having someone I can’t see and didn’t know giving me authoritative orders. I remember years ago when we were waiting in the car for a real estate lady who ran into her bank for a quick minute. Suddenly, a woman said real loud, “Your engine is running and your seat belt is not fastened!”  I don’t know who went straight up first, my spouse or me. That was just the beginning the invasion of the voices.

Now days at the airport, when we are finally relaxing a little on the moving sidewalk, in one of many repetitious commands a voice instructs us over and over to “stand to the right and walk on the left, please”.

Then, there is our new robotic buddy at the supermarket. Actually, I like him. I get finished checking out faster and he’s never sniffing from a fresh cold.  He invites me to “press start here, scan the first item and put it in the bag.”Of course, he does get a little cranky sometimes. If I have a large item, like a twelve pack of cola, and decide to put it directly into the cart, he repeats “put the item in the bag, put the item in the bag! PUT THE ITEM IN THE BAG!!! By this time the courtesy clerk is scurrying over to see just how retarded I really am and the customers behind me are snickering.

Of course, his R2D2 chum at the gas pump doesn’t talk to me at all. He doesn’t have to, as long as I need him more than he needs me. I quietly slip him that little credit card and he delivers. Gas. Nothing else. No oil checks clean windshield or “have a nice day”.

On the other hand, there’s another voice we can be sure we’ll never hear. When we call the doctor’s office and get their menu with more choices than you care to use, there’s one option we don’t have to worry about receiving. Press # 5 and you can speak to the doctor himself.  Forget that one!

The voice in the box at the fast food drive- in offers a different challenge. Now, we know there is actually a live person on the other end of this form of communication. The problem is, they can never quite hear you and you sure can’t understand them. Come to think of it, maybe they could get lessons on how to speak clearly and distinctly from Mr. Robot.

Today’s children are different. They’re accustomed to taking orders from the voices in their toys. One little toddler I know pushes her pink fire engine along and is delighted when a voice tells her “Look both ways when you cross the street…In case of emergency, call 911….or Don’t talk to strangers!” The older kids take their instructions from their video game voice of authority before beginning a game. Maybe that’s better than the arguments we used to have as kids on the rules for Monopoly.  .

As time goes on, we’ll all continue to be introduced to more and more new voices in our lives

I have just one request. Could somebody please put a microchip in the take- home box in the restaurants? He could yell, ”Hey lady, you’re forgetting your doggie bag!”

“The Inner-child Wants to Play”

By

Gerry Niskern

There are bunnies, chicks, beautiful eggs and jelley beans everywhere we go in the valley these days. That only means one thing. Easter is coming and the family is making plans.

Easter is a special time, a time for family gatherings; in other words, knock down, drag out quarrels and fights. Or to put it another way, family games! You remember board games, don’t you?  Those were the games everyone, young and old played in the days before it became the norm to shuttle the kids off into the other room with their solitary Nintendo and computer games.

It’s time to start checking out the new games for fun at the Easter get together and for summer vacation time. There are loads of new ones out there.

Of course you can’t beat our family’s old stand by, Gestures, a different form of Charades that’s good for all ages. Even the tiniest player can try to guess the secret movements of his team. (Just make sure the men’s team doesn’t use their zoom lens on the video to see the answer cards across the room. Trust me, I speak from experience on this issue!)

As children, everyone played games. Old Maid, Tiddly Winks, Go Fish and puzzles to name a few. How about Monopoly, Parcheesi, or Aggravation? Those childish amusements helped us develop skills and knowledge. We learned about planning, strategy and reasoning. And if we’ve been lucky, we have been able to remain enough of a child to still enjoy the challenge of a game.

How does your family compete? You know, when you think about it, it’s all about competition. My sly old grandma knew about that human trait.   She used her grandchildren’s competitiveness to her advantage as we gathered in her kitchen on cold winter evenings. First she dumped a stack of corncobs out in the middle of the floor; then all the little cousins were given a large pan and told to see who could shuck the most corn. I don’t remember what the prize was, if indeed there was one.  But she always had dry corn for her chickens throughout the winter.

I remember when I introduced our oldest grandson to his first board game,  Hi-Ho Cheery’os. He was three. He was so taken with the idea that I was awakened the next morning at dawn with a little face peering down at me and saying, “ Hey, Grandma, do you remember that game?

There’s an old saying that goes something like this, “ You can learn more about a person’s character after an hour of game playing than you can in a lifetime of conversation.”

Easter also brings new boyfriends and girlfriends to meet the clan. The young people in our family don’t worry about their friends passing inspection with Mom and Dad. The important question is “Are they game players?”

Sooner or later, after the baked ham and strawberry pie, someone will suggest a game of spoons. That’s played by passing and collecting sets of cards and then everyone grabbing for a diminishing supply of spoons.  If the new girlfriend hangs in until the end, even after breaking a nail or two, Grandpa can be heard to whisper, “She’s a keeper, get that girl an engagement ring.”

I found our old Mr. Mouth game the other day. On one Easter day I introduced my little two-year old great-grandson to the trick of flipping the small disks into the opening and shutting frog’s mouth. I’m not sure how much I learned about his character, but I was playing Mr. Mouth the next day as the sun came up over Piestawa Peak.

I wrote this column for the Arizona Republic a few years back, but it still applies!

“The Snowbird Club”

By

Gerry Niskern

. Have you ever complained about or made fun of the hundreds of motorhomes that arrive in our valley each winter? Come on, I know some of you have.

Actually, those Snowbirds in their RVs are tougher than you think.  They deserve a lot of credit for surviving in their tiny little home for six months each year.

Last weekend on our anniversary we took our “new” previously owned motorhome on a shakedown cruise.  “Don’t worry” we told our kids, “Nothing to it”.

I was cautioned, “Don’t over load the storage space. We’ll eat out most of the time.  ”  So I took, four eggs, a half loaf of bread (no toaster) and 4 hot dogs .  I was receiving plenty of instructions from the guy who has taken the universal male oath to never follow instructions.

The first evening, we couldn’t drive to dinner because we were tethered. We had already plugged into the RV Park’s power source for water, electricity and sewer, put out our awning, and set up our outdoor chairs; hot dogs for our anniversary dinner.

We wondered why the overhead air conditioning wasn’t working when we tried to stay cool that first afternoon; the  next morning we realized we were plugged in, all right, but the park hookup breaker wasn’t on. . The refrigerator had been off on all night

I took my shower with explicit instructions of “how to shower in a motorhome on two gallons of water” Sounds easy till you try it; especially with someone yelling through the door, ‘Don’t use too much water!’ Instead of a two gallon, I’m guessing I had a two-pint shower.

The large coveys of Quail we had enjoyed watching all day suddenly disappeared about 5 o’clock. When we tried to sleep with the one lightweight blanket we had packed  we knew why the Quails hunkered down early. Nights in the Arizona desert are freezing.

In the morning the tub had three inches of grey water.  We tried a plunger and then searched for Drano.  Finally we read the instruction manual. Guess what? There is a control panel to check everything!  There are three water tanks in a motorhome. The clean water tank, the grey water from showers and sinks, and the black water tank (you don’t even want to know!)

The furnace went on unexpectedly the next evening. We worried it might be malfunctioning so we shut off the propane and flipped the circuit breakers inside. That worked. That is until the next morning we couldn’t get the coffeepot to brew, the micro to work and then we realized the frig had once again been off all night.

On the way home we agreed: Maybe we’re not tough enough to be Snowbirds.

Easter Traditions

By

Gerry Niskern

. Expensive spring vacations and pricey brunches are not in the plans for many Arizona families.

Easter egg hunts have been scaled down and new family traditions are in the making. In fact, many of  the new celebrations might resemble the desert picnics our family had when our children and their cousins were growing up here in the valley. The kids thought the Easter bunny hid his eggs out on the desert. That’s because Grandpa had scouted out a pristine site shaded by Palo Verde and Mesquite trees the week before. Then on Easter day he and Grandma hid dozens of dyed eggs among the desert poppies and blue lupine.

Did you know that the tradition of dyeing eggs in bright colors and giving them to family and friends goes back centuries.  The Egyptians and Persians practiced this tradition long before Christ was  born. In the Middle Ages, it was forbidden to eat eggs during the 40 days of Lent. However, no one told the chickens. The hens kept laying and out of the resulting glut, the Easter Egg tradition was born.

Each baby’s first creative experience was usually at Easter when our family dyed their eggs. The kids typically started out with wax cryons, delicate designs to follow and great expectations. After a few eggs were colored and the first container of red dye hit the kitchen floor, the job became a little rushed and it was all downhill from there.

It didn’t really matter, because the eggs my kids valued most were the ones they found on the desert that the giant Arizona Jackrabbit left among the desert rocks and flowers.

For years our extended family gathered on the desert North of Thunderbird Road in the area where the Moon Valley Country club now stands. When that area filled with houses, we met for our picnic on the land just East of Scottsdale Road and Bell, where the Great Indoors was built.

Finally, we moved our Easter picnic among the smooth, round rocks of the Carefree area. The kid’s baskets full of candy were forgotten as they scrambled over the round rocks hunting for the mysterious eggs hidden among the boulders. And, of course, the Boulders Resort commands that old picnic site now.

So remember. The huge rabbit with the really big ears is coming again. And remind Grandma that it’s not fair to walk ahead of everyone showing the baby where the eggs are hidden.

A word of caution: Leave real early. You’ll have to drive out a long, long way past the houses to find a pristine desert site for your Easter picnic.