Ripples - Pass On Your Family Values In A Short Story & Craft

(The following blog was originally posted at the internet website of the The News Tribune, a daily newspaper in Tacoma, WA in a reader-generated section on 9/11/07 entitled "In Your Neighborhood". The version below was re-edited for improved readability and content.)

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From the time when I was very young, the adage “He’s a man of few words” could be liberally applied a wide swathe of the men in my family. When compared with people outside our ethnic community, a great many of the women as well are on the less verbose share-it-all side. And the family I married into? Not really a surprise!

There are times I think the whole clan is as spare with the English language as Ebeneezer Scrooge was with money. As far as a rich heritage of fondly told and much-repeated stories and anecdotes, you can imagine in a family such as mine that there would only be the smallest handfull.

Fortunately, one of the few we have provided some positive inspiration for a cute little make & take art project that I designed for an event at the Wing Luke Asian Museum (WLAM) which took place last spring on Saturday, April 21, at the Pan-Asian American community site in Seattle, WA.

It is part of a wonderful on-going series of monthly events for parents and kids called “Family Day At The Wing” at the museum located south of downtown in the heart of the International District. So how did I get involved?

Artist Mizu Sugimura (center) provides encouragement to guests during Family Day at the Wing.(Photo courtesy of the Wing Luke Asian Museum)

The backstory is that there's a number of parents out there like myself raised in the 60’s by folks who relied on offerings through resources like the Seattle Parks Department to give their children an affordable well-rounded introduction to reading, organized sports and the arts. My resourceful mom took advantage of programming at Beacon Hill's Jefferson Park Community Center. When I became a mother myselk years later, she made it a point to tell me to look around my locale to see what was offered.

That was fifteen years ago. To find the variety I wanted then, it became necessary for me to look beyond my area. I saw a blurb in a regional ethnic community newspaper about offerings for kids at the WLAM. I took my son and we had some fun. So it's with particular pleasure that I was finally able to return the favor!

Back in April, a story my dad’s mother told the kids which I’ve titled “The Ripple Effect” provided a perfect frame for the overall theme. The ripple effect is basically about responsibility and taking care that the consequences of the actions you take are the sort of which you intend. The story points out that each time a choice is made, it is like dropping a pebble into the waters of a still pond.

When the stone pierces the surface of the water, the impact of the descending rock causes ripples to form. The ripples continue to spread in an outward manner long after the initial pebble has disappeared or long after the initial event has been forgotten.

I especially enjoy this story because it is a beautiful way to gently reinforce the concept that no matter how young we are or no matter how old we are, that each of us is responsible for our choices and what we do all eventually matters.

A group of children and parents who came to make & take a handmade book at the WLAM.(Photo courtesy of Wing Luke Asian Museum)

The day’s project ? A small handmade book with a pre-stamped cover. A few ideas for possible cover decoration were shared after the story was told and then guests were invited to decorate their own covers using art supplies on hand. By the end of a two-hour period about twenty to thirty children and adults started a book.

Coincidentally, the following month of May was Asian-American History Month. Saluting the upcoming celebration as well, participants were reminded that each of us also participates in the history of our communities as ordinary citizens especially through the choices we make. Great communities don't just happen. They evolve piece by piece from the choices made by the good people who come to live and work there.

In the greater world beyond the familiar boundries of our homes, families, schools, businesses and communities you can just imagine the invisible ripples of the “pebbles” we drop daily into the waters of life are furiously crossing and re-crossing by the minute. As an example, if the water in your area is really choppy out there it might be that way for a good reason.

Kid's should know a bully’s ripples radiate as swiftly as the would-be keepers of the peace. Telling someone to go to a colorful place may be honest, but exactly what kind of ripples are you actually launching? It's certainly something to think about.

The children and their parents at WLAM were encouraged to write down in their finished books examples of those actions they had taken which may have resulted in the kind of positive outcomes of which they could be proud. For example, t was noted that in the can of food donated to the food bank and the tree planted at school can really make a difference in the life of another and this is how each of us can make similiar positive contributions to history.

Reflecting the longstanding draw and appeal of past programs at the museum, partipants were not limited to traditional audiences of Asian-American ancestry. Special thanks are also in order to the WLAM for permission to use a few photos of the event taken by a member of their staff and to program coordinator Vivian Chan and her great helpers who made the program such a success! For more details about programming at WLAM go to: http://www.wingluke.org/

I have no doubt many of you readers have some equally wonderful stories of your very own to share that beautifully illustrate those beliefs and values that your family endeavored to pass on. Whether they're generations old or were only recently created, it would be SUPER to hear those short stories you would like to share.

So feel welcome to post your stories and comments at the end of this blog! You never know, one day we could have so many, they could fill an entire book! Let's just wait and see what will happen....

Making A Memory & A New Friend At The Movies

Last week I was invited by a female acquaintance of mine to accompany her to the University of Washington's Tacoma campus for an evening screening of two films on the forced relocation and internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.

This topic had a special interest for me because both my American-born mother and father and their families were part of this unique and unprecedented chapter of history. With a stroke of a pen when then President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed into law Executive Order #9066 on February 19, 1942. Mom turned 17 years old the month before. Dad was all of 14 years. Their lives would be changed forever.

E.O. #9066 made it possible for local military commanders to designate areas of the United States military areas as exclusion zones from which "any or all persons may be excluded". When this was applied to American's of Jpanaese ancestry in a fifty-sixty mile deep area from Washington State to California some 112,000 persons living up and down the West Coast were forcibly removed from their homes and communities by military authorities acting on behalf of the federal government.

Shown that night were the films: "Take Me Home" a dramatization which depicted the evacuation of families from the viewpoint of a small child, and a documentary entitled "Resettlement to Redress" directed at older audiences which which followed the story from the dispursement of all camp residents at the end of the war to the eventual hard fought but successful drive during the 80's and 90's for a governmental apology and monetary redress.

Several segments of videotaped footage from the Seattle, WA hearings held by the US Congressional Commission on the Wartime Internment and Relocation of Civilians at Seattle Central Community College in 1981 were featured in the second film.

The screening in turn is part of a larger series of films on Asia Pacific Cultures sponsored as a result of a partnership between the Tacoma's Asia Pacific Cultural Center (APCC) and the Urban Studies Program at University of Washington Tacoma, with suppport from the Cultural Diversity Resource Center.

As it turned out, I got far more than I originally bargained for that evening. As a young woman in my twenties, I had the pleasure of serving as a representative for the Lake Washington chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League on a ongoing redress committee which met a number of times prior to the Congressional hearings stop in Seattle.
But until recently I had never seen any footage from this event. So it was a complete and delightful surprise!

Memories of having a bird's eye view of some of the proceedings and sitting next to some of the principals shown in the film including Washington State's former son Gordon Hirabayashi, born & raised in Thomas, Washington at other meetings came drifting back as the picures on the movie screen flashed by.

Hirabayashi, whose Supreme Court challenge from that era now forms one an important trio of cases whose impact has had more far-reaching consequences than one merely and ostensibly temporary decision affecting a small minority in a war rapidly fading from our view, was a personal hero of mine for years prior to the hearings. So meeting him in person back then had been a real thrill and it still is.

As a result, the invite to the movies became a truly unexpected treat. My hostess is rapidly making the transition between an acquaintance and a good friend. We started out with a shared interest in art. Now I have proof she has excellent taste in film. If I am lucky, the day will come when I can make a similiar impression in return.

In the meantime, the two of us have made ourselves one good memory...