Wordsworth! Stop the Bulldozer! Reviewed By Nancy Arcayna

Wordsworth and I made the Hawaii newspaper today:

Honolulu Star/Advertiser

February 9, 2013

“Wordsworth! Stop the Bulldozer!” by Frances H. Kakugawa (Watermark Publishing, $10.95), tells the tale of Wordsworth, a small Hawaii mouse, and a few of his friends who use poetry in their attempts save a koa tree grove.

Wordsworth is troubled when he finds a load of fallen trees on a truck bed and a bulldozer ready to plow down the last remaining tree, the one where he and his best friend, Emily, had carved their initials. As the tiny friends struggle to make a difference and preserve the forest, one of Wordsworth’s poems becomes a rallying point as two groups of adult mice debate the trees’ importance.

The friends find their “Save This Tree” poems taped to pine, mango and coconut trees. Young children might get lost in the words, but the message is endearing.

Tree in a Box kits, which can be purchased at www.bookshawaii.net for $14, include seeds to start a milo tree (a type of tree from the hibiscus family, similar to hau) along with a “Wordsworth” book.The activity of planting a tree may make the environmentally friendly message clearer for younger readers.

Colorful illustrations by Andrew J. Catanzariti bring the tale to life.

Write an ode to your favorite tree . Have a favorite tree that inspires you to write poetry? Watermark Publishing and Hawaii-born author Frances Kakugawa invite keiki in grades K-12 to participate in the “Wordsworth the Poet Poe-TREE Contest.” To enter the contest, kids are invited to follow the example of Wordsworth and write a poem that celebrates their favorite tree. Six prize packages — two per grade division: K-5, 6-8 and 9-12 — will be awarded. Each package includes a copy of the three Wordsworth series books, a child’s gardening tool kit and Koa Legacy Tree from the Hawaiian Legacy Reforestation Initiative donated by Hawaiian Legacy Hardwoods. Download the entry form at bookshawaii.net and click on News and Events. By March 1, send entries marked “ATTN: Wordsworth’s Poe-TREE Contest” via email to wordsworth@bookshawaii.net or to Watermark Publishing, 1088 Bishop St. Suite 310, Hono?lulu, HI?96813. Winners will be notified April 15.

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A Set of Red Suitcases

Broken Promises

A friend once gave me  a magnet for  my refrigerator door  that said: Three things  you must never do and one of them was: Never break a promise to a child.

During my last visit to a school in Hawaii, a teacher approached me with, “I’m a friend of your niece Ann. You must be her Aunty Fran who bought her a set of red suitcases when she graduated from high school.”

I recently heard two stories of  promises  made to children.

Jane ( name changed) received all A’s in elementary school because her grandfather promised  her a new bicycle if she took home an all A report card. She worked hard, thinking of that bicycle throughout those years.  Her grandfather never did buy her that bicycle and something worse than a promise was left broken.

Another woman I will call Susan, was on the honor roll list throughout high school because her father promised her a car for her graduation. It wasn’t a one announcement promise; he reminded her throughout the years of that car. She thought of all the car models she would be driving at graduation. He never did keep that promise and once again, something  irreparable was broken.

These women are now adults and those broken promises are part of their childhood memories.

I was in my early twenties when my niece Ann attended Kindergarten. I told her ” When you graduate from high school, I’m buying you a set of red suitcases.”  Red was always my color of romance ever since I read of that red wagon in the Dick and Jane reading  series in first grade and I wanted to add red to Ann’s life. Ann graduated with honors and I did give her a set of red suitcases which took her away to college. They must be worth something at the antique shop today.

Had I broken that promise, her  friend  would have told me,
“You must be her Aunty Fran who didn’t get the red suitcases you had  promised her when she was five.”

If there’s a run on bicycles and cars tomorrow, some promises are being  glued back again. For Jane and Susan, it’s too late.

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The Unadoptable Child

A.K.A. The Invisible Child

Every year, during my teaching years, I played a little mind game  and selected one child  I would  consider  “adopting.” He or she was that child who entered the classroom like a ray of sunshine and never lost that sparkle in the eyes. That child would be easy and loving and laughed a lot and didn’t know what it meant to be unkind to other kids.  That child soaked up everything I said or taught and thought I was a genius. Often, I would think of adopting more than one.

I know what you’re all thinking, that you  would have been that child if you  were in my class.  I always thought I, too, was that incredible child who impressed my teachers so much,  had they played my mental game, they would have chosen me.

Wrong! OMG. I came across my old report cards from grade school through high school.

My grades are C’s and B’s with a few insignificant A’s.

Grade 6: Final grades: all B’s and C’s :

Grade 7: I’m a little smarter with 2 A’s in Eng and Soc Studies but C in Math.

Grade 8: B’s and C’s and a male teacher’s comment:  Frances is a good student and needs only to   participate in class activities.

Things get worse:

Grade 9: B’s and C’s and 1 D in Algebra

Grade 10: B’s and C’s with one A in Biology

Grade 11: All B’s except A in Chorus and Short Hand.

College material? Definitely not!

Now get this: My character traits are worse. I received 1 which is Good, only in neatness and reliability. I guess I combed my hair and my nails were clean. And you could depend on me to run errands.

I got a 4 which is Poor in Initiative and Leadership. Most of my character traits are 3′s. What kind of a kid was I?  Surely not adoptable!

I had no character! I was lazy and showed no effort in my studies. I have one line in my Kapoho: Memoir of a Modern Pompeii that reads: ..I was never really there; I was daydreaming, designing life somewhere else, in New York City, or Hollywood.

You would think I would have day-dreamed with a little more character.

My mother’s signature is on each report card. I guess for as long as she saw 1 for neatness, it was all right.  I didn’t get pregnant and got suspended from class only once which they didn’t know about, so I guess 1 in Neatness made up for that kid that I was…a barely average child with such character flaws.

                                

In all fairness to that kid, Mr. McClellan was the PE teacher who taught Algebra and knew as much Algebra as I did. And he definitely wasn’t as neat as I was…and had

worse handwriting than I did.

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Why We Teach

July 22, 2012

Dear Miss Kakugawa,

It has been 46 years since I was your student in the first grade at Waiakea Elementary School.   I was 6 then and I am 52 now.  Before the half-century mark comes to pass,  I think it is time that I said hello and thanked you for teaching me to read and inspiring in me a love of words.

I have thought of you so many times in my life but perhaps at no time more powerfully than when I heard the Nobel Prize acceptance speech in 2010 of novelist Mario Vargas Llosa.  It began, “I learned to read at the age of five…. It is the most important thing that has ever happened to me.”  (Here’s a link to his very moving and beautiful speech:  http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/2010/vargas_llosa-lecture_en.html)

While I obviously cannot claim to have reached the heights of Mario Vargas Llosa (!!), I can say that being an avid reader has enhanced my life in so many important ways, from launching me into an academic career to giving me refuge from the mundane and hectic features of everyday life.

I have such clear memories of you as my teacher in the first grade.   I remember learning to read and how exhilarating I found it!   I recall also when one of your poetry books came out a few years later.  I think it may have been your first.  My father and I went to a book signing you did at a small shop in downtown Hilo.  It made quite an impression on me!   I still have that book, as well as another one of yours, in my parents’ home in New York.  I have gone back to the poems they contain from time to time.  Doing so transports me back to a past that I have such fond memories of.    Yet it is also a past full of people with whom I have long fallen out of touch, somewhat regrettably.   I have been back to Hilo only once since we left in 1972.   My parents have never returned.

Ann Kakugawa has given me an important emotional bridge back to the Hawaii days.  After a three-decade lapse in communication, I am in contact with her again.  Although I have yet to see her in person, it almost feels like we never lost touch.  I will probably go to Alaska next summer and am so looking forward to seeing her in person. In addition to providing me with your e-mail address, Ann has brought me up to date on your writings.  I can’t wait to read Kapoho.   My family, along with the Kakugawa clan (your brother, Ann, Jill, and Lynn), went out to visit you and your mother there once.   I have the clearest memory of that day.  It was the first of several times that I was around your mother, who had such a nice way about her: calm, gentle, and very Japanese.

Hawaii holds a very special place in my heart.   Its emotional meaning is no doubt heightened by the fact that it was the last place where we lived as a whole family.   As you probably know, soon after my family moved to New York (in 1972) my brother Danny died.   My parents and I have grieved his loss and cherished his memory ever since.   Despite the enormous hole his death left, we have led good lives.

I went off to Cornell University as an undergraduate (I started in 1978), then onto Berkeley for a Ph.D. in political science.   I am now a professor at the University of Texas, and my area is Latin American politics.   My country specialty is Brazil.  Here’s my professional link:  http://www.utexas.edu/cola/insts/llilas/faculty/hunterw1

I love my work – both the teaching and the research/writing aspects — and I feel enormously privileged to hold a tenured position in a university that supports my aspirations and interests in both spheres.
I am married to Kurt Weyland, who is also in my department.   I met him in Brazil, but he is a German national (who went to Stanford while I was at Berkeley).  We have two wonderful sons, Nikolas and Andreas.   Niko is now 14.   He is the one posing in front of a store called Niko in Berlin!  Niko “has the magic” when it comes to language and literature.   My other guy is Andi (12) and he is in the photo with my parents.   He is very straightforward, funny and lively.  As you might discern, Niko got a big dose of the Japanese genes and Andi is more European.  Kurt, myself, and my parents (both still alive) are insanely in love with them.

Just writing you brings back so many wonderful memories!   It feels good to finally express my gratitude – however overdue — for the lessons you taught me long ago and for the example you provided of being a writer.
Warmest regards,
Wendy Hunter

(printed with permission from Wendy.)

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