Coccocypselum hirsutum Bartl. ex DC. Yerba de guava Rubiaceae

Bet you can't pronounce the name of this beautiful spring flower! Let's hear you try: Coccocypselum hirsutum Bartl. ex DC. Yerba de guava Rubiaceae!

Photo by MarashGirl©2022

Newton Flags Its Support For Ukraine!

Photo by MarashGirl©2022

The Old Claflin School . . .

And speaking of Miss Forsythe (see yesterday's blogpost) brings to mind the way in which kids at Claflin (Elementary) School responded to taunts from their classmates, insults which were always only a moment away . . .  One such example follows.

When a kid heard the words, "You're a jerk!" . . . her answer, accompanied by a grin, would be as follows:

                        "A jerk is a pull, a pull is a yank, and a Yank is a good American!"

But an easier reply would have been, (and often was), "It takes one to know one!"

FOLLOW THE BUDDHA'S EXAMPLE!

WEAR YOUR MASK!!!!

Photo by MarashGirl©2022

Peace On Earth, Good Will To All!

Photo by MarashGirl©2021 Marash Girl Wishes A Blessed Christmas To All!

Santa Sends Greetings From "The Lake"!

Christmas Display at Coletti-Magni Park

Photo by MarashGirl©2021

Flowers Fearless In The Face Of The Coming Frost!

Photo by MarashGirl©2021

PLEASE!!! NO GUNS IN NEWTON!!!!

Dear Mayor Fuller: I am not a resident of Newton. I don't even live in Massachusetts. I am the daughter and granddaughter of a Newtonian family that made its home on Lowell Avenue after the Great Depression. Every summer, my parents would fly our whole family to Logan where we were met by my grandparents, Peter and Jennie. We spent whole summers playing in their yard, mixing it up across the street in an open lot, and walking to Bullough's Pond. As a special treat, we'd take the T to Fenway and root for the Red Sox! The house was down the road from Newton High (now Newton North) - go Tigers! I'm writing about these events because my Newtonville-dwelling aunt informed me of a gun shop - one of many, apparently - that is in process of hanging up its shingle. I can't imagine the Newton/Newtonville of my youth with a gun shop in it. And this is why: We walked as kids, unaccompanied down the streets without fear. We passed Newton North all the time, without fear. We walked to the T and entered Fenway without fear. We ran back and forth from the library to check out books and movies without fear. I understand that there are many people who regard gun ownership as a sacred right. I understand the need of some to possess firearms (the ranchers in my community all have rifles, and often use them against pests to their hens and cattle). But I'm wondering what use a gun shop would be in suburban Newton/Newtonville? As I recall, my lovely childhood summers were spent in a town home to families; schools; civic, cultural, and community centers. We now have three living generations among my Newtonian family. I ask that you and your governmental colleagues do your best to protect against the gun violence that is raging throughout our country. Step one in that battle is disarming the perpetrators. No one can shoot without an easily accessible firearm. Please say no to gun violence; say no to gun shops in Newton! Thank you for heeding my letter, Mayor Fuller. Sincerely, Alison Sykes Graeagle, CA

Marash Girl Paused For The Cows To Cross Waltham Street

"One day left from the old days?" So Marash Girl thought as she would stop during her commute from suburban Newton to Lexington High School . . . stop to let the farmer and his cows cross from the field on the eastern side of Waltham Street to the field on the western side of Waltham Street. As her father would be commenting, were he still here with us, "Those days are gone . . . forever!"

No "Trick or Treat" for Marash Girl!

Marash Girl's dad grew up as one of the "starving Armenians" in Marash, Ottoman Empire, early in the 20th Century. Even so, her dad and his family never went completely hungry because their uncle had taught Yepros and Mary (his mother and her sister) to weave cloth, and even though the cloth they wove was not perfect, their Muslim neighbors would take that cloth to the countryside and exchange the cloth for grains, fruits and vegetables. Thus, the family was able to survive during the most difficult of times. However, despite the tough times, Grandma Yepros forbid her children to "beg", no matter how hungry they becamse. Hence, in the United States of America, Marash Girl's dad saw the custom of "Trick or Treating" as begging. Thus, though allowed to dress in costumes on Halloween, and to distribute candy to the costumed children that came knocking at their door, Marash Girl and her siblings were never allowed to "celebrate" Halloween by practicing the United States custom of "Trick or Treat"!

TO MAYOR OF NEWTON RUTHANN FULLER: Please Use An Alternative Approach to Protect Historic Bullough's Pond Dam and the Laundry Brook Forest

          Dear Mayor Fuller, 

          I am writing to you as a long time resident of Newton, Massachusetts.  

As a little girl, I learned to skate on Bullough’s Pond.  

As an adult, I learned to appreciate the beauty of Bullough’s Pond and the Laundry Brook Forest. 

As a former voting member of Newton Parks and Recreation, I am writing to ask the powers that be to consider using an alternative approach that will protect Bullough’s Pond Dam and the Laundry Brook Forest. 

PLEASE DO NOT clear cut the banks of Bullough’s Pond  and put in gravel on the side of Dexter Road!!! '

          Sincerely,

          Bethel Bilezikian Charkoudian 

Mugsy and the 5&10

When Marash Girl first arrived in 7th Grade, she sat (in homeroom) to the right of Mugsy, a tall, muscular boy with flaming red hair combed into a D/A, a boy who was 16 years old in a classroom of students who had just turned 13. Every day, in order to win the approval of his classmates, Mugsy would carry into homeroom a small trove of treasures that he had stolen from the 5&10, treasures which he would proceed to pass out to the kids in homeroom. When he attempted to foist his loot on Marash Girl, she would politely refused the stolen items. Apparently embarrassed by her refusal, Mugsy would gesticulate and loudly proclaim to all the students around him that Marash Girl felt that she was too good to accept his "treasures"! Marash Girl had no response. She just sat quietly in her seat, awaiting the bell that would signal peermission for her to escape to her first class.

Are you using your noodle?

"Are you using your noodle?" asked the fellow who was treading water in the indoor swimming pool of the YMCA yesterday,  a question that startled Marash Girl.  How rude, she thought  . . . speaking to a stranger like that!  Pausing a moment, she realized that the fellow was asking about the long yellow float (or swimming pool noodle) that she was carrying for exercising in the YMCA swimming pool . . . not her noodle (brain) of Newton grammar school fame!

Borrowed Landscape

Borrowed Landscape.  Have you ever come across the term?  After many years of gazing out of her kitchen window, Marash Girl heard a visitor comment, after peering out of the same kitchen window, "borrowed landscape, ey?"

Certainly the house being built butt up against the fence at the Y takes advantage of a "borrowed landscape", wouldn't you say? (See photo below and yesterday's blog post.)

Cincinnati Ed meets Newton Corner

Heading for her morning walk at the Y, Marash Girl saw the man that she thought was the builder for the new duplex growing up next to the Y track.  "Are those garages at the front of the house?" she asked the man that she thought was the builder.  "Yes, I suppose so.  I was just walking around looking at this structure.  I'm a builder staying over there at the hotel, just taking a walk, and I saw this going up.  I was surprised.  All the lumber is helter skelter. In Cincinnati, I make sure that when my men are building a house, they put the lumber in neat stacks."

Ed from Cincinnati grew up on a 100 acre farm where they raised cattle, hay and corn.  His father, now 93, gifted him 5 acres where he and his wife built a house and brought up their kids who are now in college.  After eyeing the lumber from the construction of the new house going up on Richardson Street (see Marash Girl --http://marashgirl.blogspot.com/2013/05/through-chain-link-fence.html),   Marash Girl took Ed for a tour of the Newton Corner mansions during which Ed pointed out many a detail (matching slate, non-matching grout, etc.) that would help date the structures.  An instructive morning, and all before 7 AM.

GRANDMA JENNIE & LILACS: MOTHER'S DAY 2012

Lilacs for Mother's Day

Marash Girl had always wanted lilac bushes -- her mother had loved lilacs -- they were the first sign of spring for the house on Lowell Avenue in Newtonville.  They grew to the right of the little front porch. All Grandma Jennie had to do was to reach over the porch and cut armfuls of lilacs which she would lovingly carry into the house, filling pitchers with water and lilacs and placing the bouquets throughout the living room and the dining room.  The whole house was soon redolent with the scent of lilacs.  And there was no guilt in the picking because she knew that the more lilacs you gather, the more grow the next year.  If you never pick your lilacs, Grandpa Peter told us, you may end up with a lilac-less bush.  So lilacs were guilt free, free for the picking, free for the loving.  And now Marash Girl will have her very own lilacs in the front yard, lilacs that will remind her of her mother whenever she sees them in bloom in early spring, whenever she reaches over the porch banister to gather those blooms into her arms, whenever she fills her pitchers with water and lilacs and places the bouquets throughout her living room and dining room, whenever her house is redolent with the scent of lilacs.

Just resting . . .

One of Dad's favorite jokes is the following.  It was brought to mind this morning when the phone rang and my husband asked if it had wakened me; No, I  answered. I'm just westing.


Here goes:


A woman opened the door of her new refrigerator and found a rabbit sitting on the top shelf.  Surprised (to say the least), the woman asked the rabbit, What are you doing in my new refrigerator?


The rabbit answered:  This is a Westinghouse, right?  Well, I'm Westing.


(Peter and Paul Bilezikian as Newtonville Electrical Co., Inc., in Newtonville, Massachusetts, were one of the first purveyors of Westinghouse goods in the New England area, in the days when rabbits talked like 'wabbits'.)

Obama, Medvedev, a Hot Mike, and Big Brother Bob Emery

Driving to WBUR at 6 AM on Tuesday morning, on her way to volunteer at the WBUR fundraiser, Marash Girl heard tell of Obama's comments to Medvedev, unintentionally aired over a mike that was still live.  It brought Marash Girl back to the 1950's and early television with Big Brother Bob Emery and his show, Family Fun, a locally broadcast program meant for young families.  Big Brother Bob Emery, a native of Newton, Massachusetts, always ended his show toasting the President of the United States  (who was then Eisenhower) with a glass of milk, "Big Brother's Favorite Drink".  "A toast to the President," he would say, as he raised his glass of milk to the picture of President Eisenhower, and sipped.  The show always ended there.  But one day, soon after his toast to the President, Big Brother Bob Emery was seen by families all over the Boston area pouring himself a "drink" (of something other than milk) and cursing at "the little bastards" (or some such nefarious phrase)!  Needless to say, not only was the mike hot, but the camera was hot as well, and Big Brother Bob Emery was never heard from again on Boston area television.

Pambook Jack and Uncle Khosrof

Another tale Peter delighted in telling featured two of his favorite Newtonville relatives.

One day, Khosrof's son was complaining to the owner of the local Armenian spa.  "The problem with my father is that he doesn't hang out with people more educated than himself."  (The young man's father, Khosrof, was a self-styled intellectual who read French novels in his barber shop and would not put the novel down until he had reached the end of the chapter, if even to cut the hair of a waiting customer. Khosrof's best friend was Pambook Jack, an unread shoe repair man who never wrote anything down, but knew whose shoes belonged to whom and could look at a long row of figures and tell you the total in less than 3 seconds.)

When the spa owner told Pambook Jack of the conversation he had had with Khosrof's son, Pambook Jack, without pause, answered, "You tell the dumruk that I tried what he's suggesting, and it never helped me any."