Lynn M. Dixon's Blog, page 2

Summer Work!

We always hear the phrase ‘give back to the community.” I have certainly given back to the communities that helped me gain my bearings in life. And, as I gave back, I earned some dollars along the way. Thus, the stories of my summer work begin.

For five summers in Chicago and during the 70’s, I worked with the Mayor’s Summer Youth Employment programs across the city. My first summer, I worked in Dearborn Homes as I supervised a clean-up program of the neighborhood. The teens were paid to beautify their own spaces while learning how to earn an honest paycheck.

 The next summer, I went on to work in the downtown YMCA office in the Loop as a payroll clerk.  Our goal was to get the teens their checks on time by entering the correct number of hours that they worked doing a variety of jobs. Outside of business, we (the staff) spent special lunches shopping at a new store called Pollyanna‘s or ate at the new Wendy’s around the corner. We also spent lunches listening to free on-the-plaza concerts to artists like Herbie Mann (flutist).

I moved up to the position called area-coordinator for the third and fourth summers. There were four of us in that position and we spent our summers driving around to different sites that were a part of the program. We did walk-throughs and made certain that everybody was performing at the top of their games whether they were lifeguards, day camp supervisors or whatever.  The fifth summer, I was a payroll supervisor!

Again, the youth were learning that if you work, you get paid. A simple, but powerful lesson. These were neighborhood kids that were also being exposed to the beauty of the city and we had many tickets to take them to museums and other cultural events. We even saw James Brown on stage, though he had slowed down quite a bit by then.

In 1980, I spent the summer in Delaware, Ohio after finding a job as an Education Coordinator for an Upward Bound program. The whole concept of Upward Bound is to give inner city youth exposure to college life. It was the first of two such stints for me. The youth came from the Columbus, Ohio area and we were housed at Ohio Wesleyan University. 

It was a rich experience all around.  I remember finding my first Maya Angelou book of poems and my first Writer Magazine that summer. When I felt boxed in by being in a small college town, I drove to Columbus for weekend getaways. Again, there is a plethora of special memories from that summer.

During other summers in the 80’s, while living in Memphis, I worked as a day camp supervisor. Our major goal was to keep the children entertained and safe. We were housed at a community center which was within walking distance from my apartment. We organized softball games, played box hockey (a Memphis tradition), and took field trips to museums like The Pink Palace, to Mud Island, on nature trails and we had end-of-the-summer talent shows. I have many fond memories of those two summers as well.

Lastly, I did another Upward Bound stint in 1993 as an English Teacher. The students came from the Chicago area and we were housed at Wheaton College. Again, we taught them the seriousness of campus life. In both UB situations, television was banned as students learned to focus on their studies. One day, I was somewhere where a television was playing and I saw that there was serious flooding going on in downstate Illinois. So, being tuned out can be good; but, sometimes, it is good to be in the know.

I could go on and on, and I am certain that I am forgetting something. Oh yeah, there is the summer I worked with youth in Atlanta for a student journalism program. That experience could be a book within itself.  So, yes, I have given back as I tried to open the eyes and ears of our youth by showing them that there is a better way. 

When I see little children lined up in matching tee-shirts for some summer program and I see adults walking a short distance behind, I am often tempted to roll down my car window and shout, “May the force be with you!” Or, “Been there, done that!”

Lynn M.
July 12, 2025

Keep Reading!

It amazes me that whenever I am reading some random-choice book, there is a line or character that speaks volumes. As if almost magical, some dialogue or action answers some question I have buried deep inside. That is the beauty of reading whether a print copy or an ebook. It also does not matter which genre it is, but the universality of life experiences is always there.

Every book is a teacher, regardless of the simplicity of the plot. The characters are still in the throes of everyday life and somehow, someway, I often relate to some situation that I have either had or seen while traveling down the road of life.  Each book adds a tick mark on my ladder of spiritual growth. In a silent way, reading has put me way down the path of understanding. It is something that can not be verbally explained to others. It is just so.

In these tumultuous times and with the heightened use of social media, reading is my way of shutting down the loud, visceral voices and regaining my inner peace. It calmly puts me into a zone that is impenetrable while a good book helps me to disengage from the noise and the maddening crowd.

Summer reading is just as important  to adults as it is to children. It allows us to “keep our heads when everyone else is losing theirs and blaming it on you.” (Kipling). I can tune out to the junk in the universe and tune in to another place, space and time.

Everytime, I finish reading a book, I leave with a new perspective and sometimes with the answer to a private question. I breathe deeply  after gaining new  insight and say to myself, “I know just what to do.” Rather than being caught up in the mix of others’ stuff, it is best to go alone and read a book.

Reading is  a quiet, singular experience and most people respect the privacy of those connected and engaged in a book. Granted, some books are harder to get through than others. But sometimes, when I make myself stay with  the more difficult text, invariably, there is some life lesson tucked deep inside. Voila!  

Charles W. Eliot wrote,“Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accessible and wisest of counselors, and the most patient of teachers.”  Try picking up a good book or some reading material and see the peace that saturates your being!

Lynn M.
July 5, 2025

Divine Order!

The other day while sitting by a duck pond, several geese suddenly started to fly haphazardly overhead. It appeared to be utter chaos and their direction seemed to be unclear for quite a few moments. Their disorder caught my attention. Then, in a puff, they landed on the lawn; maybe to have a pow-wow. Who knows? But afterwards, each found its place and they flew away in a synchronized manner.

I thought that it was a quick and succinct life lesson. Life can sometimes be quite like this dance of the geese. In the heat of a moment, when a swirl of negative forces have us up-in-arms, we too can regain our composure after finding our direction. There may initially be utter confusion and heightened emotions. That is when we have to take a step back and breathe.

 Then we should assess the situation and see what is happening. This may require some alone time so we can accept the current conditions and make some decisions. After breathing and accepting , we should mindfully lace up our reinforcement boots, formulate a plan of action and march forward from there.

 Adam Clayton Powell, Jr, once asked,” What’s in your hand?” He meant that we should ask ourselves what gift or talent do we have to contribute or give in order to help bring order out of chaos. Once we have received that answer, we then should get busy, step up and fill the void and assist in easing the anguish.

Just as the geese got themselves together, we too can do our part as others do theirs. And  before we know it, a sweet orderly, harmony will fill the air as all sing Stevie Wonder’s, “Happier Than the Morning Sun!”

Lynn M.
June 28, 2025

The Materialists: A Movie

I saw The Materialists today at the cinema where Dakota Johnson (Lucy) is a professional matchmaker that works for a high-end agency in New York City.  She is snazzy and good at her game. Her agency awards her with a cake to congratulate her for matching nine couples that made it to the altar.

This movie gives the audience a window into a little-known world for everyday working people. Most of  her clients are rich or at least wealthy and they fill out an order like a menu stating their preferences in a mate. They specify the age, race, income bracket, height and other details and they obviously pay a high price. Lucy continually sets up dates until there is either a match or the disgruntled client quits the agency and ends the search.

But then, Lucy has her own life. As she sits at the singles table at one of the lucky weddings, she is approached by Harry (Pedro Pascal) and he does not back down. He is not only rich, but he was born rich and works in finance. He is in hot pursuit of her as he wines and dines her at several fancy restaurants.

She finally ends up in his $12 million penthouse and gets a taste of what her clients’ lives are like on a daily basis. While she is out on one date, her ex-boyfriend John (Chris Evans) , a struggling actor, happens to be the server. It is quite obvious that whatever they had is not entirely over.

The Materialists is listed as a rom-com (romantic comedy), but there is no comedy in the plot. Actually, there are a few subplots that I will not give away here. It starts off great, but somewhere along the way, the plot falls flat. There are no real sparks flying between the couples and due to the lack of chemistry, it makes the story hard to believe. There is a great premise but the lack of plot development makes it fall into a thin, flat line.

In the beginning of the movie, Lucy’s outfits were sharp, but later she wears a couple of wigs that look like they were wet. She looks desperate and forlorn. And, interestingly, she chain smokes which is rarely seen in 2025 films. Many things went wrong with this production, but it was good to see how the wealthy dine in NYC as compared to those who simply enjoy a hot lunch from a parked food truck.

Lucy has a choice to make. Will she go on her dream trip to Iceland with rich Harry or will she stay behind and work things out with actor John?  I will not tell. Check it out and see!

Lynn M.
June 21, 2025

Jazzy June: A Poem

Leave us not too soon, Jazzy June.
Just had a full strawberry moon!

Hazy skies from Canada’s woes.
Yet, those nice, cool temps help us doze.

Folks cruising into summer days,
On sailboats, jet skis – other ways.

Lazily soaking up the fun,
Looking for that elusive sun.

Catching up on some good reading,
Or cooking, painting or beading.

Yes, those relaxing  days are here,
Let’s all shout a resounding cheer!

Lynn M.
June 14, 2025

Coins!

I rang the cash register during my senior high school and college years for High-Low Foods and A&P Foods in Chicago. I collected a few special coins over the years and I was always fascinated by rare coins. I held on to some really old quarters and dimes until I lost them in a storage bin as I moved around.

I have also seen and handled $2 bills, $3 bills and silver dollars. I remember the Ben Franklin silver dollar and the Eisenhower silver dollar when they were in circulation. I also remember the JFK half-dollar. The one thing that I recall is that when cashing one, I had to make sure that the recipient understood that the coin was not a quarter worth 25 cents; but worth 100 cents or 50 cents, respectively. That was the one drawback when dealing with those special coins.

And this brings me to the recent conversations about getting rid of the penny. Wow! There is so much to unpack there. At least for me. Perhaps that is why many retailers are asking customers to round up as they pay for purchases, to eliminate the whole need to make change.

Incidentally, when I rang the register in high school and college, we did not have cash registers that told us how much change to give back to the customer. We had to do our own math, and if we made a mistake and our cash drawer came up short, it came out of our weekly pay. So, yes, I can count quite well, thank you.

Back to the poor penny. With no penny around, what will we do with all the witty sayings like: ‘A penny saved is a penny earned?’ Or, the saying that something ‘may cost a pretty penny’- which means that it is expensive. Another one states, ‘that’s when the penny dropped,’ which is comparable to having an aha moment. Lastly, there is this one. ‘A bad penny always turns up twice.’ Go figure.

In 2000, I briefly worked in an office in Manhattan in NYC as a temp worker. Each time I caught the subway and made change, the machine gave me a host of special coins. They were the bronze dollar coin with Sacajewea and her child on the front. Every time the dispenser rained down the dollar coins, I felt as if I was opening a pirate’s chest of gold. For some reason, the Sacajewea coins did not stay in circulation for long, but I managed to hold on to a couple of them. Perhaps, they will be of great value one day. 

With the beloved penny about to make its exit, it might be smart to hold on to those pennies in the piggy bank or coin jar. In a few years, they will be cherished keepsakes and even conversation pieces for the young people coming along. Imagine. They won’t even know what a penny is. That’s amazing!

Lynn M.
June 7, 2025

Lilo & Stitch: A Movie

This weekend, I saw Lilo & Stitch in 3D. Yes, 3D! I wore my special glasses and saw the objects actually coming towards me. I was taken to Oahu, Hawaii where I met Lilo (Maia Kealoha) and her older sister Nani (Sydney Agudong).

They had recently lost their parents and Nani is trying to be both the older sister and mother to young Lilo. But she has her own troubles with a beat-up car and waitress jobs that come and go. She tries to hold it all together while social services monitor her failing parenting skills and threaten to take Lilo away from her.

Lilo, in the meantime, continually gets into trouble and ‘acts out’ because she is lonely and feels misunderstood. She prays in the privacy of her room for the angels to send her someone that understands her. Enter Stitch (Chris Sanders’ voice), a blue extraterrestrial that has escaped from his planet. He lands in the dog pound, though he is not a dog. He talks!

He is an experiment and he has a host of aliens in hot pursuit who plan to recapture him and take him back. He and Lilo meet at the dog pound where she regularly visits and they immediately bond. They have one thing in common – being mischievous.

Thus, the adventures begin. As they fall into a series of mishaps, Bruno Mars’ Uptown Funk plays in the background along with other Hawaiian musicians, as they run and play along the landscape. We (the audience) see Hawaii’s tourist strip, its beautiful beaches and cliff-top views, but we also see the terrain of the everyday people off the beaten paths. We have a window into how the regular working people live as we enter Nani and Lilo’s home. It exudes familial warmth and at night, the porch is surrounded by soft lights.

Also, during the movie, there is a lot of Elvis music. Hawaiians have never forgotten Elvis’ 1973 Honolulu concert which was played by satellite around the world. Nor have they forgotten his movie, Blue Hawaii which was partially filmed in Oahu in 1961.

We see Lilo consoling herself before Stitch’s arrival by playing her mother’s Elvis vinyl records in her room. We hear Heartbreak Hotel, Hound Dog, Stuck on You and Suspicious Minds, along with other titles. At the end, Stitch even dresses up as Elvis in full costume with a guitar. Hilarious.

It was a fun movie though some of the extraterrestrials were a tad scary. But maybe we look scary to them. Who knows?

Lynn M.
June 1, 2025

Mission: Impossible-The Final Reckoning (A Movie Review)

I saw Mission: Impossible -The Final Reckoning over the Memorial Day weekend. I trusted Tom Cruise to take me to other places than the present now. He did! For almost three hours, I forgot about everything on the news and my personal concerns. During his adventures, he and his crew took me places that I have never been and will not likely visit during this lifetime.

The scenery and the portals into unknown places and situations were quite intriguing. I know very little about espionage and military operations. Many of the details were a bit over my head, but I did understand that they were fighting an AI force called The Entity that wanted to wipe out humanity.

Through it all, I was able to vicariously see what life is like inside of a submarine filled with working officers. They also took us to St. Matthew Island in the Bering Sea. The arctic conditions were amazing as we saw a real dog sleigh and the warmth of a loving home in those frigid conditions lined with candles for warmth.

In spite of the constant fight against the dark forces, the locales were great eye-openers for those of us with limited world travel. We (the audience) were even taken inside a bunker in South Africa as the warring continued to rage on.

As Tom Cruise (Ethan Hunt) worked to fulfill his mission of saving mankind, he corresponded with the female President of the United States (Angela Bassett) to coordinate the mission’s success. Of course, seeing her in that position was wonderful in itself.

We see him go inside a wrecked submarine to retrieve a needed module. He saw the corpses of those who did not survive as he wore a decompression suit to make it back safely. His movement caused the wrecked submarine to shift and he barely escaped after having to discard the decompression suit to fit inside of the escape hatch. This was not a job for the claustrophobic nor the faint of heart.

The most harrowing scene was when Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) was trying to catch his arch enemy, Gabriel. They were in small open-air airplanes. After Ethan’s plane was destroyed, we see him hanging on to Gabriel’s airplane wing as Gabriel did all he could to knock him off. He flipped the plane around in all directions as he diabolically laughed. Whew! (Tom Cruise did most of his own stunts himself.)

At the end of the movie, the surviving team members all met in London’s Trafalgar Square. They simply gave each other a silent nod of acknowledgement. The mission was accomplished!

Lynn M.
May 26, 2025

Life’s Carousels!

Have you ever been on a proverbial adult carousel where you feel yourself going round and round and up and down at the same time? Yes. Multiple motions at the same time and you wonder why you feel dizzy and discombobulated from the dual motions.

As in life, you just have to shout, “Stop! Let me off!” or you may scream, “Enough already!” After you have climbed down off the merry-go-round, you take the bull by the horns and place both feet firmly on solid ground. You’ve finally realized that the repetitive motion or same old cycles are of no benefit to your well-being.

You sit for a while on the bench and look back at the carousel from a distance. You then see that you had been drawn into the madness long enough. Now that you have escaped, you can plainly see as you can reflect from the sidelines.

You can steadily and sometimes slowly regain your equilibrium. That depends on how much of a toll it all has taken on you and your life. But eventually as you start feeling like the real you, you can let out a big sigh of relief. You quietly give thanks that you had the inner guidance and the wherewithal to get off the circuitous movement.

You now understand that life changes, just like the seasons. What was once good, is just not good enough anymore. It’s called growth. As you put the motion sickness and the past behind you, you simply trot on into the glorious now!

Lynn M.
May 17, 2025

Glorious May!

May birds wake us up with a sweet song,
They help us rise and move right along.

Gorgeous trees show up in colors bright,
Inspiring us to make things right.

As they preen in all of their glory.
Each one subtly tells its own story.

Nature, too, evolves from highs and lows,
Lifting its head after slumps and slows.

Stylin’ and profilin’ -street lingo,
In beautiful May, we shout, “Bingo!”

Lynn M.
May 10, 2025