Time Marches On

Bill on left, George on the right

While working on The Brass Bell project I have met so many wonderful people who were once upon a time students at Cherry Road School when Marion Parsons was principal. Now in their 70s, 80s, and 90s, they still love to share stories about those days.

Two charming men who have been friends since childhood, Bill Eriksson and George Kinder, met with me one afternoon and had me in stitches and in tears, telling me about the olden days, about Miss Parsons. There was a story about how she had excused them from school to go see the opening day of the Chiefs. Others who had skipped school wound up in detention. Their idea about confronting her with the truth paid off. Bill told me several stories about how Miss Parsons had made it possible for him to participate in paying events by hiring him to work around the nieghborhood. She trusted him so much, she would go to him and ask him to ride a sick child home on his bike. The two friends were always up to something, but it seemed as though they would somehow make the right decisions. One time they asked Miss Parsons to take them over to Solvay so they could buy a squirt gun.  Bill said, "She probably took it away from us the next day, but she took us nevertheless."

The sad part about this project is that some of those who have contributed to the book will not be around to enjoy it. We lost my beloved Betty Jerome recently. Yesterday I found out that we've lost Bill last December. There will be a memorial get-together for Bill on April 27, 1:00 p.m., at the Amber Congregational Church. A luncheon will follow at the South Onondage Fire Department where Bill was a long-time member and fire-fighter.

Bill will be missed but the excellent stories he shared for The Brass Bell will live on in the book.

"Women's stories have not been told. And without stories
there is no articulation of experience. Without stories a woman
is lost when she comes to make the important decisions
of her life. She does not learn to value her struggles, to
celebrate her strengths, to comprehend her pain. Without
stories she is alienated from those deeper experiences of self
and world that have been called spiritual or religious. She is
closed in silence. The expression of women's spiritual quest
is integrally related to the telling of women's stories. If women's
stories are not told, the depth of women's souls will not
be known." ~ Carol Christ, Diving Deep and Surfacing.

A local writing teacher, Jennifer Lauck, posted this quote on her newsletter this morning. My thought upon reading it was that often, if we've lived a life worth telling, someone else will write our story. Hopefully we leave enough clues behind for the story to be told. Hopefully we've made a big enough impact on the world that others will want to read about it, will gain insight and inspiration and understanding about their own lives. I hope The Brass Bell is a story such as that.   The manuscript is with the copy editor. Soon the book will be in production.   Thanks to all for your support and encouragement.   ~Camille

Excerpts from the Parsons Family Association Newsletter