Sep 27
Becca MartinUncategorized
To everything
There is a season
And a time to every purpose, under heaven.
Thanks to “the boys in black,” whom some of you remember from my print column, I got a high school “do-over” — and it was everything I wanted the first time to be!
In this incarnation, I was one of the cool kids, hanging out with a rock band in a hip, trendy loft studio. (OK, it was the attic of a threadbare old barn in Avoca, but these are my memories, thank you.) We did theater, took road trips, listened to the roaring thump of metal music and dissected the deeper meaning of the lyrics — yes, there are lyrics; you just can’t understand them without the CliffsNotes — swam in the lake, cooked out, dressed in kilts and swarmed the Kansas City Renaissance Festival.
I can’t remember ever having more fun.
But all good things must end, and eventually my retarded psyche and I grew out of “high school.” The all-night parties and never-fulfilled dreams began to seem a little silly and kind of depressing, and I moved on to the “college” part of my journey and a tiny little brick and cement-block apartment, which I shared with about a million local representatives of the Cockroach Nation.
There I learned to take care of myself, something neither my mother nor my husband ever taught me. I paid the bills, fixed the car, argued with the landlady over broken heaters, air conditioners and toilets. In other words, I ceased to be a spoiled brat and learned to row my own boat (with help from my friends to stay afloat).
Then “college” was over, and I moved across town to my first real apartment and began to enjoy more grown-up pastimes, like gardening, sewing, cooking and peace.
Yes, it is weird that all this started after two decades of marriage, but better late than never, I guess. And now, finally feeling a little like an adult, I am about to start the quest to buy a house for my daughter, a man whom I love and can be loved in return — and me and my stuff! It won’t be the beautiful Queen Anne Victorian Dan and I had, but it will be beautiful to me, and I hope to fill it with peace and love — no cockroaches or metal music allowed.
This grown-up thing feels weird, like your first high heels. But I think I’ll keep practicing until I can walk.
Sep 24
Becca MartinUncategorized
Seen a ghost? The Shiloh Museum of Ozark History, KUAF and Northwest Arkansas Newspapers want to hear your story.
From 2 to 4 p.m. Oct. 17, the museum will host “Ozark Ghost Stories Retold,” a chance for folks from around Northwest Arkansas to share their experiences. The event will be taped for a museum podcast, a KUAF segment and a Halloween story in Northwest Arkansas Newspapers.
“We’re looking for personal experiences,” says Becca Bacon Martin, coordinator of the event and assistant features editor for Northwest Arkansas Newspapers. “We’re not interested in whether the story can somehow be ‘documented,’ just that the teller believes his tale is true.”
Among those who plan to participate are author Abby Burnett and members of Paranormal Ozarks Investigations. Listeners are also welcome.
Find out more by e-mailing bmartin@nwaonline.com.
(BTW: I have heard some of the stories that will be told, and they will raise the hair on the back of your neck!)
Sep 20
Becca MartinUncategorized
Some columns just bear repeating…
Author Robert Heinlein Credited for Life Lessons
Robert Heinlein, the father of science fiction, almost certainly didn’t consider excerpts from the notebooks of his most famous character, Lazarus Long, “resolutions.” He denied they were wisdom, for that matter. But his approach to life has colored so many of my attitudes about so many things, and what he wrote in “Time Enough for Love” (1973) is better advice than anything I could ever think up myself.
So, with hat tipped to the late Mr. Heinlein, who is, I hope, bellied up to a bar somewhere in Boondock, I give you these borrowed words to live by:
— Certainly the game is rigged. Don’t let that stop you; if you don’t bet, you can’t win.
— Always listen to experts. They’ll tell you what can’t be done, and why. Then do it.
— Delusions are often functional. A mother’s opinions about her children’s beauty, intelligence, goodness, etc., ad nauseam, keep her from drowning them at birth.
— If you don’t like yourself, you can’t like other people.
— Avoid making irrevocable decisions while tired or hungry. (Circumstances can force your hand. So think ahead!)
— A woman is not property, and husbands who think otherwise are living in a dreamworld.
— A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
— The more you love, the more you can love — and the more intensely you love. Nor is there any limit on how many you can love.
— You live and learn. Or you don’t live long.
— Do not handicap children by making their lives easy.
— Always tell her she is beautiful, especially if she is not.
— Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget, awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity.
— Another ingredient for a happy marriage: Budget the luxuries first!
— And still another: See to it that she has her own desk — then keep your hands off it!
— And another: In a family argument, if it turns out you are right — apologize at once!
— Sin lies only in hurting other people unnecessarily. All other ‘sins’ are invented nonsense. (Hurting yourself is not sinful — just stupid.)
Amen, brother!
Sep 15
Becca MartinUncategorized
(A column from my first days of apartment living)
Fictional ‘Barefoot in the Park’ Not Far From Fact
As ridiculous as it seems, I have never before lived in an apartment. But I am fascinated by the people who do.
Of course, my views on apartment living were colored by a couple of things: The only apartments in my hometown were A) the ones for senior citizens, in a three-story building we strangely enough called “the high-rise,” and B) odd little cubbyholes tucked away in rambling old houses.
The latter were usually occupied by college students or single women wild enough to move out on their own. Nice girls stayed home until they were married – and so did most of the nice (if apron-string bound) boys.
Oh, but I knew what big-city apartments were like, because one of my favorite movies was the Neil Simon classic, “Barefoot in the Park.” Paul and Corie Bratter (played by the very young Robert Redford and Jane Fonda) lived in a New York walk-up, surrounded by some of the most interesting neighbors:
“Well, like to start with, in apartment 1C are the Boscos — Mr. and Mrs. J. Bosco. Mr. and Mrs. J. Bosco are a lovely young couple who just happen to be of the same sex, and no one knows which one that is.
In apartment 3C live Mr. and Mrs. Gonzales, Mr. and Mrs. Armandariz and Mr. Calhoun — who must be the umpire.
No one knows who lives in apartment 4D. No one has come in or gone out in three years, except every morning there are nine empty cans of tuna fish outside the door… It sounds like a big cat with a can opener!
Oh yes, I forgot. Mr. Velasco. Victor Velasco. He lives in apartment 6A. It’s an attic. He also skis and climbs mountains. He’s 58 years old, and he’s known as ‘The Bluebeard of 48th Street.’ It either means he’s a practicing girl-attacker or else he’s an old man with a blue beard.
It’s not going to be a dull two years.”
Whenever guests came to visit the Bratters, the multi-story climb left them gasping for breath. It snowed through the skylight. The heaters only worked if the knobs were turned backwards. The bedroom was just large enough for a bed – no floor, just a bed. And Mr. Velasco went home via the ledge outside their window, at least when he was behind on his rent.
This, to me, was apartment living in a city. I was not, apparently, too far wrong.
Since most of my friends live in apartments, I’ve gotten the chance to experience the ambiance without the rent. Next to one friend, there’s the multigenerational Confederate family whose décor is all rebel flags. Another neighbor looks like the creepy, bleached-blonde villain in “House of a Thousand Corpses.” And of course there’s the apartment that never lets its occupants move out: We see new people move in, but we never see them leave. We’ve begun to suspect it’s a portal to somewhere … well … unpleasant. (But I have high hopes for the new tenant; he’s got a statue of a saint in the yard.)
Since my exposure has been somewhat limited, I still don’t understand the social rules of apartment living: No one ever raises their blinds – but they leave their doors hanging open. Even if people pass on a 3-foot-wide walkway every day, they don’t say hello. The good trash is deposited outside the Dumpster so other people can shop through it – but it’s considered bad form to take stuff out of the Dumpster. And the boys would never swim in the pool at their Arizona apartment complex because they’d heard people got naked in it – but they grew up swimming in Beaver Lake!
Most of all, I’m amazed by the fact that – at least at one friend’s place – you can hear the people next door sneeze … and you just ignore it. I just don’t want to know strangers that well – and I certainly don’t want to know them any better!
As an only child, I grew up with a weird mix of too much time alone and my mother’s constant presence, so apartment living ought to make perfect sense to me, I guess. It just seems like when the gods created apartments, they were thinking about how entertaining little human pets would be if they lived in Habitrails. More and more, I think they were right.
Sep 08
Becca MartinUncategorized
There couldn't be a more perfect picture of "Pa."
This was a tough story to write and try to even pretend objectivity. This is my father-in-law, and I love him with all my heart.
By Becca Bacon Martin
bmartin@nwaonline.com
Wayne Martin knew his time was limited. He’d been diagnosed with terminal cancer.
He also knew that unless he got busy, much of his hometown’s history would be lost.
Less than six months later, Martin’s book, “Pettigrew, Arkansas: Hardwood Capital of the World,” will debut this weekend at Pioneer Day in St. Paul.
“It had to be done,” he said simply. “There were too many stories to tell — and so many more I didn’t get to.”
Martin and his wife, June, have spent their lives in Pettigrew, now barely a wide spot on Arkansas 16 in southern Madison County. They’ve been involved in the restoration of the schoolhouse, now used frequently as a community building, and the annual Pettigrew Day celebration, part of a continuing partnership with the Shiloh Museum of Ozark History in Springdale. That collaboration has made Pettigrew “the best documented little town in Arkansas,” according to the museum.
Martin and Bob Besom, for many years the director of the museum, met in 1986, when an auction dispersed the contents of the Mooney-Barker Drug Store, a time capsule of the community’s history since 1916. Martin knew all the stories that went with the coffin hardware, Model T parts and medicine bottles, because he was Helen Mooney Barker’s grandson.
Even after the Mooney-Barker Drug Store was gone, Martin kept looking down Pettigrew’s vacant main street, seeing the memories he wanted to share. He knew there was a time at the turn of the 20th century when this tiny town was the terminus of a railroad line that carried hundreds of loads of hardwood out of the Madison County hills. He knew that the street bustled with people, coming and going from hotels, stores and livery stables, the grist mill, the bank and even a silent movie theater. He remembered his great-grandparents, his grandparents and his parents, all of whom played significant roles in the community.
Many of those memories are included in the book, which the Shiloh Museum published.
“He came into the museum within the last year and saw the Tontitown book (a pictorial published by the Tontitown Historical Museum), bought one, looked through it and said, ‘I believe we could do this with Pettigrew,’” remembered Susan Young, the museum’s outreach coordinator. “I told him, ‘Yes, I think we could, and I think you’re the person to do it.’”
Young said they considered “a scholarly study,” but “there was just too much raw information in our collection.” Instead, Martin took some of the hundreds of photos of Pettigrew he’d accumulated and wrote about what he saw.
“When he looks at a photograph, he can go so much further,” Young said. “He can look at a tie yard and tell you what purpose those ties were made for.”
The museum board approved, said Young, not because Martin has been a longtime friend of the museum but “because the book has merit. The photos are stunning, and the story is a slice of everyday history.”
Martin started writing the book in longhand, but his illness got in the way. Linda Wilson, a neighbor, and journalist and author Abby Burnett of Kingston came to assist.
“A lot of people live in an area and don’t care that much about the history,” said Wilson, who retired to Pettigrew with her husband, Harry. “This was such a glorious place in its heyday, and now people can see that through his eyes. Lots of people around here care about this book.”
“He’s a marvelous storyteller,” agreed Burnett. “He has such a way with words, it’s the next best thing to having seen it.
“I think you could look at the book without knowing anything about Pettigrew and it’s still a wonderful window into a vanished way of life,” Burnett added.
“Wayne and June are the best, most genuine people, and from the moment we met, I was indoctrinated in the project to save Pettigrew’s history,” Young said. “It’s been a love affair for me with that community ever since.
“This book is Wayne’s love letter to Pettigrew.”
‘Pettigrew, Arkansas: Hardwood Capital of the World’
Debuts at Pioneer Day
When: Friday evening and Saturday
Where: Downtown St. Paul, 32 miles southeast of Fayetteville on Arkansas 16
Cost: The book will sell for $20
Information: Susan Young at 750-8165
Sep 07
Becca MartinUncategorized
Ben, Antoinette, Becca and Bear gear up for the Buffalo River Canopy Tour.
People jump out of perfectly good planes — or so I’m told.
Last Friday, I stepped off a perfectly good platform into thin air — three times! It was amazing — and I was amazed at myself and at the staff of the Buffalo River Canopy Tour. Together, we proved chickens can fly!
The canopy tour is the first of its kind in Arkansas — seven ziplines running through the trees high above the Buffalo River Outdoor Center in Ponca. Guides help you strap into all the gear you need for a safe “flight” — a lower-body harness, an upper-body harness and a helmet — then there’s a five-minute hike to the first platform. It’s a short bridge to nowhere, and walking out onto it to make the first zip might be one of the scariest and most exhilarating things I’ve ever done.
There were just two intrepid journalists — my friend Antoinette Grajeda from KUAF and I — and two guides, Bear and Ben, so it’s not like I had time to run away. One guide zipped to the next stop, then it was my turn.
“Becca zipping,” I called out.
“Zip on, Becca,” he answered.
I stepped off.
And it was FUN! I didn’t scream. I didn’t have any kind of accident involving bodily fluids. I didn’t even shut my eyes. It just happened too fast to be terrified!
Let me just say that at 5 feet tall and (mumble) pounds, I looked a lot like Humpty Dumpty flying through the air. (And there’s video to prove it.) Plus, being short and round made the process more difficult — harder to land, harder to push off, because my little feet didn’t touch where they were supposed to. On my first landing, I ended up trussed up like a Christmas goose — but the guides handled it all efficiently, gently and kindly. (The 250 weight limit is less about pounds — the line will hold 10 times that — and more about discouraging couch potatoes like me. Antoinette weighs 100 pounds, maybe, and has played soccer all her life. She had no problems at all.)
I did just two of the seven zips — this time. But my goal is to do them all — the short fast ones, the long slow ones and the second course that should be open by spring. I cannot adequately describe the feeling of soaring through the sky like a flying squirrel spun up on endorphins! And I promised myself I would one day make it to the last platform, where the valley unfolds in front of you like a Tim Ernst photograph.
While I’m really stinkin’ proud of flying, I’m almost equally proud of landing. To get down out of the trees (whether you do it early or do it at the end), you have to let the guides “belay” you to the ground. Imagine standing with your back to the edge of the platform — about 40 feet up in the open air — and then “sitting down” in your harness. And that’s why ropes courses are great for team building exercises!
If you choose not to do the zipline tour, you can follow your friends in a chase vehicle. On Friday, mine was driven by Mark Rose, one of the owners, who does a lot of consulting work on ropes courses — and he’s funny to boot!
“Canopy tours are a fairly exact science,” he told me. “Build it wrong, and people smack into the trees. You don’t get a lot of repeat business that way.”
I guess they built it right, because I can’t wait to go back!
Sep 02
Becca MartinUncategorized
Starting this weekend, the Kansas City Renaissance Festival will celebrate the romance of Cinderella through Oct. 17.
If you know me, you know how much I love the Kansas City Renaissance Festival. I love the jousting, the birds of prey, the shopping — and most of all, I love being part of a medieval village for a day.
Ordinarily, you don’t have to wear period costume to have fun, though. But the weekend of Sept. 11-12 is unique. Check out this story from the Sept. 3 edition of What’s Up:
“Everybody has a story,” says Jim Stamberger, entertainment director for the Kansas City Renaissance Festival. “Our guests are as much characters in our show as any actor on the streets of Canterbury.”
The festival has always been peopled by patrons in period garb, from the authentic outfits worn by members of the Society for Creative Anachronism to the fairy wings and satyr horns favored by youngsters. But this year, for the first time, RenFest will host a live action role playing weekend Sept. 11-12, when patrons will become characters integral to telling the story.
“Someone or some group has made off with a fortune in gold and jewels, and festival guests must find the culprit and the treasure before the king finds out it’s gone,” explains Carrie Shoptaw, general manager of RenFest.
Guests will be able to sign up online to get character assignments and clues, Shoptaw says. As many as 1,000 people are expected to play each day.
The same weekend, Pirate Cove will also be home to the first RENCON, a convention geared to role play gaming and comic books.
Themed weekends are:
Today-Monday — Tales of Scheherazade
Sept. 11-12 — Legend Quest
Sept. 18-19 — Dead Men Tell No Tales
Sept. 25-26 — Romani Adventures
Oct. 2-3 — Myths of the Highlands
Oct. 9-11 — The Hounds of Canterbury
Oct. 16-17 — Scarily Ever After
WHERE — Just west of Kansas City and north of Interstate 70 and Kansas 7 in Bonner Springs, Kan.
COST — $9.95-$18.95
INFO — www.kcrenfest.com
— This story appears Sept. 3 in What’s Up (www.nwaonline.com/whatsup)
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