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 Last night I had an unusual dream,
I thought I was a tree.
How boring! A TREE???
How could this ever be?
Next thing I knew, a little sparrow,
landed right on me.
He sang to me a pretty song,
it made me want to sing along.
Soon, he built his home,
in the very branches of me.
I guess he was happy here,
'Cause soon he had a family.
Several other critters
soon gathered all around.
Chipmunks, squirrels, and tree frogs
With many others on the ground.
The babes tested out their wings,
and found that they could fly.
And away they all soared,
high up in the sky.
I miss my little feathered friends,
I liked their happy songs.
Though I wasn't lonely very long,
before I heard another sound.
Two small boys giggling with glee,
built a house in their "Special" tree.
They schemed and they planned,
with hammer in hand.
They brought all they could find.
Cardboard for their walls,
wooden boards for their signs,
and several toys of many kinds.
For many years they came to play,
but then they too, went away.
It made me sad to see them go,
Didn't think I'd see them any more.
Then one day, one returned.
With him came a pretty miss.
He showed her his "Special" tree,
and then he stole a kiss.
Next thing I knew, I had a heart,
carefully carved into my bark
with initials and an arrow.
I was singing like a sparrow!
I am often taken for granted,
but that's okay with me,
for now I know, God chose me,
to be a very "Special" tree.
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| Author: Christie |
Contributed by Christie on Jul 25th, 2009
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 Gold from street lamps embellish the snow,
shiny eyes and kisses under the mistletoe.
Candle light is dancing in intricate design,
holly and tinsel with garlands entwine.
Children make angels as snowbanks grow,
greeting neighbors with a holiday "hello".
Music, laughter and singing combine,
while the dog and cat by the fire recline.
Stalactites on eaves of shimmering ice.
A bright warm fire, eggnog with spice.
Snowflakes descending, twirling to the ground,
neon colors glowing on snowbanks all around.
Children in the churchyard, happy as can be,
setting up the figures in the nativity.
Mary, Joseph,shepherds and their kin,
A hay-filled manger to lay the baby in.
The scent of pine encircling the tree,
church bells chiming, reverberating free.
A happy game of checkers, grandpa's winning grin,
cookie dough with sprinkles for me to dabble in.
Let Jack Frost through the window peer,
we'll cuddle close with those we hold dear.
We'll listen to Jingle Bells, Silent Night too,
and watch the flames flicker up the flue.
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| Author: Joy Marie Hayes- submitted by Christie |
Contributed by Christie on Jul 25th, 2009
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 Dear Chris-
Where are you?
I think of you so much.
I don't know if you would
like my little book or not
but here it is. Please enjoy.
Dales eyes are not better.
so we can't come to see you-
come see us? You and Ryan
would have a wonderful
time I think. We are a short drive
from San Diego, Balboa Park, the zoo,
the wild animal park, Disneyland, the
beach, the mountains & so much more.
Well it looks like rain, so I'd better
run and get things in. Please write!
Love you, God Bless-Joy
This letter was in her poetry book she
sent to me. I will be submitting some
of her writings under Poetry & Prose.
Please check them out as I know you
will enjoy them!! She was an awesome
author and won many awards for her
writings. She is greatly missed.
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| Author: Christie |
Contributed by Christie on Jul 25th, 2009
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 Note: This poem was written by our aunt Joy,
She won a Golden Poet Award for it, and it is
in the United Nations, on the World Wide Web
Hall Of Fame. And it is buried in the Pegasus
Time Capsule to be opened in 2088.
~Christie
I raise my eyes and say a prayer,
as waves crash hard upon the shore.
Gray mist swirls against the sky,
my heart aches with a remembering cry
war and death again draw nigh,
as young men and women stand to die.
A bitterness grips and claims my soul,
as tears fall steadily in the sand.
Big men talk the time away,
til decisions are made and weapons are manned.
Protected far from the coming fray,
how can they sleep? or face the day.
Thoughts turn about to days gone by,
of young men strong, and full of life.
Pride filled their eyes as they marched on by,
not afraid of the coming strife.
Evading truths that many would die,
all that remained was a loved ones sigh.
I raise my eyes and say a prayer,
to one I know is caring there.
A voice comes back so deep and low,
"man has chosen his way to go-
it's up to him to turn the tide,
and cleanse the earth of his evil side".
"Help the suffering, aid the weak,
guide the blind and kinship seek,
Lift his brothers no matter what race,
and build a new and better place".
"Then I'll be there!"
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| Author: Joy Marie Hayes |
Contributed by Christie on Jul 25th, 2009
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 The night had consumed the ground below as I gazed out the window. I had left the only place I had ever known, oblivious to what awaited me in the city by the bay. My heart was pounding as the illuminating lights gleamed through the casement of the plane; it’s almost as if the lights were a symbol of hope and opportunity. I was a lost, mystified girl whose chains of small town life were being cast off by the endless road of possibilities. As the pilot’s voice bellowed through the plane announcing our arrival, I became aware that life as I knew it would never be the same; I would never be the same.
“Thank you ladies and gentlemen for flying Southwest and welcome to San Francisco.”
My days were spent walking the vertical, diverse streets of the city, meeting bohemian hippies on the corner of Haight-Ashbury, flamboyant characters in the Castro, and sitting on the steps of Union Square watching the men and women in their chic attire pass by, in a hurry to reach their destination. I was introduced to people who I would never have met in the restrictive, culturally deprived farmlands of Kansas. Transvestites, bisexuals, homosexuals, hippies, Filipinos, Tongans; I had the opportunity to meet people whose lifestyles and nationalities were foreign to the Midwest; culture shock at its most extreme.
The faces that looked back at me were ones of numerous ethnic backgrounds and wicked fashions. Each person that walked by had a distinct sense of who they were and where they were going. As I passed through each district curiosity was unleashed inside me, unearthing who I was. The City was the place where I could explore myself; it was my place.
I was no longer in Girard, Kansas where every person was identified by who their parents were, how much they made, and which sport one played. No one walked up and inquired, “Who do you belong to?”
My road to self-discovery led me to a classroom at Terra Nova High School. I walked into the auditorium-like room and sat down on the blue, cushioned seat and told myself to exhale. Students were running into the room, hugging their friends, chit-chatting about their summer escapades and the excitement of being in Mr. Ascara’s class. I sat there looking around, watching the students’ vivacious faces and prayed that my “new girl” demeanor would fade away as the days passed on.
Once the initial excitement wore off, everyone took a seat and awaited the arrival of the much loved teacher, Mr. Ascara. Emily Benson sat next to me, she had pitch black hair that flowed down the small of her back and her skin was an olive color; her garments were an explosion of bright colors and shiny accessories accompanied with the tallest stiletto heels I had ever seen.
“I busted my ass in them a few times, but you have to take the pain with the beauty,” Emily said as she winked at me.
I began to laugh and share my own horrible stories of falling to my demise because the circulation to my feet had been cut off. But the pain was worth the few extra inches of height added to my small 5’1” frame.
Our conversation faded as the teacher walked in the room. His moccasins contrasted with his black slacks and t-shirt that read, “Live outside the box.” His hair was slicked back and plastered on his face was the most animated smile I had ever seen. That smile was infectious and my nervousness quickly diminished; I was anxious to see what the drama class could offer me.
I owe Mr. Ascara a lot for he challenged me to do exactly what the t-shirt read, “Live outside the box.”
“In this room you can say whatever it is you’re feeling and no one will judge you,” Mr. Ascara bellowed to the class. “YOU’RE FREE TO BE YOU!”
When my first assignment came along it was a monologue that I selected myself. Anything that touched me in some way, whether it was in a therapeutic way that released my feelings or to make the audience laugh; I owned the floor. For ten minutes that room was my stage and the attention of thirty or so people was focused on what I had to say.
I was always the outgoing, funny character in class, yet there was a sadness buried in my soul that I hid with a smile and a witty remark. As I rummaged through the endless pages on the internet for a monologue I ran across a young woman’s story of how her sister left a letter to her after she committed suicide. The young woman’s sister had been badly abused by her boyfriend. As the bruises faded away, the words he spoke to her were engraved deep inside her heart and seared into her brain. The woman had been emotionally beaten for so long that she felt she could no longer live.
I wanted to use this monologue as my way of telling another’s story but, at the same time, release my own feeling of entrapment. When my name was called I walked to the front of the room and placed a chair on the center of the “stage”. I had a piece of paper in my hand and began by reading the letter, my voice a low-toned whimper. Then the sister’s voice faded and the young girl began reiterating her own story. I was no longer Courtney Brodbeck, but a young girl telling her story of abuse and the hurt that had been inflicted on her soul. My last words were, “I placed one leg over the third story window of the hospital, and with a tear running down my bruised face, I jumped.”
I went back to the chair and sat down. I lowered my head then looked up to find tears in the eyes of the students while my own tears were streaming down my cheeks and landing on the palm of my hand. It was the most liberating experience I had ever experienced. At that very moment I felt strong, empowered. Room 1302 allowed me to truly be the person I had always wanted to be. I no longer cared about what other people thought about me. I was an artsy geek who was going to leave my imprint on the world. The confines of the box vanished and I could run wild in the world. Soon I was sitting in the seat of the theatre and participating in poetry “slams” or protesting on the sidewalks and chanting of the injustices I felt were being exhibited by an unfeeling world. My spirit had been awakened and there was no looking back.
I was 16-years-old and felt that I had lived more life in one year than my 15 years of existence in Kansas. My mother once told me, “Don’t measure yourself by any standards other than your own.” Finally I comprehended what she was saying and embraced all the wisdom the world had to give.
In San Francisco I no longer felt like the “black sheep” and I was no longer the daughter of an engineer and a nurse who made x amount of dollars and came from old farm money. I was Courtney Brodbeck, a young woman, an individual, and a fierce warrior. I guess they were right,
“We’re not in Kansas anymore.”
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| Author: Courtney Brodbeck |
Contributed by admin on Jul 25th, 2009
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 The orange Dolphins soar through the skies in Southeast Texas and Western Louisiana. When danger strikes the U.S. Coast Guard Air Station Houston is prepared to respond.
The inscribed red, white, and blue badge-shaped emblem on the wall at the air station represents strength, dexterity, and compassion. It means making tough calls at times. The four-person crew may have to save one life over another. One must have a thick skin so that the emotional and psychological wrench may be overcome and the tough decisions can be made.
The U.S. Coast Guard Air Station is on call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. The crew consists of four members - two pilots, an engineer and a rescue swimmer. All four crew members board the HH-65 Dolphin helicopter flying the skies and patrolling the waters.
Lt. Michael Cagle has been involved in government service for over 10 years. He has been a part of the U.S. Coast Guard Air Station Houston for three months and was with the Coast Guard in Corpus Christi for five years. Before he joined the Coast Guard, Lieutenant Cagle was in the Army and flew an OH-58D Kiowa Warrior, an observation helicopter.
He joined the Coast Guard so he could be more family-oriented. “The grass was greener,” expressed Cagle. “In the Army you’re gone for so long that I joke around with my wife that I have to get to know her all over again.” He also has his hands full with a 9-month-old daughter. Yet, with all his duties at home, he has still managed to fulfill his dreams.
“I’ve always wanted to fly. I thought I’d be an airline pilot, but when I found out all the cool things a helicopter can do I decided to join the army,” said Cagle. “When we pick up a family in distress and see the tears of joy on their faces from being rescued, no jet or airline plane can give you that.”
Lt. Cagle participated in a search and rescue mission where a family of four’s fishing trip in Port O’Connor became life-threatening after the weather turned severe.
“It was a situation where it was a nice day and the weather got bad, high winds, nasty weather. We started getting phone calls like crazy, they ended up launching us and the off coming crew, so we had two crews that were flying basically in the same area, but there were four or five different locations,” said Lt. Cagle.
“Our initial call was to pick-up a man, his wife and their two young daughters, a capsized vessel. But there were so many people that were in distress that we just started picking up people that we saw. I think we ended up hoisting nine other people and the other aircraft picked up five people. It was a situation where we never found the original case and we kept thinking maybe this was it, the information might have been wrong. Well we ended up going back out. It was close to sunset and we were just about out of gas and we were flying in a really remote area and we finally saw someone waving their arms. I turned around and pulled into a hover. As I started getting closer I saw that there was a piece of cardboard or a tarp or something that blew up and I could see the mom with the two girls and she was spooning them. The father was waving me to get back, so I pulled back and lowered the rescue swimmer. We pulled up one parent and child at a time, both of the girls were severely hypothermic, so we rushed them to a nearby boat station where an ambulance was waiting. They said probably 15 to 20 minutes longer and the girls wouldn’t have survived,” relates Cagle as he recalls his most memorable mission.
“The cool thing was that the whole family ended up coming out to the air station to thank us,” said Lt. Cagle with a big smile.
The 44-foot aircraft reaches speeds of up to 135 miles per hour and can make it to the Galveston coastline from its base at Ellington Field in about 15 minutes or less. During Hurricane Ike, the Coast Guard rescued numerous people, even before the storm hit.
Lt. j.g. Dakata Brodie and another pilot were the first aircraft that actually got back on scene after Hurricane Ike hit. He remembers a mission that involved rescuing eight people on the Bolivar Peninsula the Thursday before Ike slammed the Gulf of Mexico.
“The Bolivar Peninsula was an area we really focused in on because it was pretty much becoming cut off and turned into an island before the storm even hit,” said Lt. j.g. Brodie. “After that it became an island; it was steadily shrinking down and forcing people into little isolated pockets.”
One family in the Bolivar Peninsula was trying to evacuate but the roads were already washed out and their car flipped over. A man in a pickup truck tried to help the family, but his vehicle stalled out. When the Coast Guard arrived the two sets of families were all in the back of the pickup truck while waves crashed against it.
“We hoisted all the survivors out, it ended up being eight people in the back of that truck,” said LTJG Brodie.
The cabin shrank as the four crew members pulled the eight survivors into the helicopter, but no one was to be left behind.
“When we pulled in the seventh person, it was bingo the seventh person. We had one person left in the truck and the truck was getting sucked out towards the Gulf; the current and the surge was actually moving the truck away. There was nobody else who could come and get the last individual because the aircraft wouldn’t have made it. So we dumped a portion of our reserve; the swimmer had one chance to get the last guy out.”
They hoisted the last guy out and flew the survivors to Ellington Field. That was Lt. j.g. Dakata Brodie’s most memorable mission.
President George W. Bush paid a special visit on Sept. 15 to survey the damage left in the wake of the storm and thanked all crew members for their dedication before, during and after Hurricane Ike.
Before he joined the Coast Guard, Lt. j.g. Brodie was in the army and flew an AH-60 Black Hawk, an attack helicopter. He attended Morgan State University in Baltimore; it was after the school loans began to accumulate that induced him to join the army.
He has been in the Coast Guard for about two years now and enjoys the extra time he gets to spend with his wife and daughter and looks forward to the future time with his unborn child, “You are able to do your day to day job and then go home.”
As the two men are preparing to take flight patrolling the Houston Ship Channel, they recall a former mission that had them and two other crew members laughing. A man’s bird had flown into a tree and he chased it up there, only to get stuck in the branches. The Coast Guard had to hover over the tree while the rescue swimmer retrieved the man and the bird. This rescue swimmer is now affectionately referred to as “The Birdman” by his comrades.
However, the Coast Guard’s core roles are to protect the public, the environment, and U.S. economic and security interests in any maritime region in which those interests may be at risk.
They live by the banner that hangs in the hangar: Pride-Professionalism-Progress. Their latest mission is a prime example of the exemplary efforts of the Coast Guard. The crew picked up three people from a boat that had run aground northeast of Galveston close to the Ship Channel. The temperature was around 58 degrees so the crew hoisted them into the helicopter and brought them back to Ellington Field so that EMS could check them out.
The Coast Guard Air Station in Houston acts as a “lending hand” and is symbolic of never-ceasing watchfulness, steadfast endurance in every exposure, and of widespread helpfulness. In the words of Lt. Cagle, “I can’t think of anything more satisfying than saving people’s lives.”
* This is an interview my daughter, Courtney Brodbeck, did of the U.S. Coast Guard. She was so proud and honored to sit down and talk with these "unsung heroes" and then write up this interview.
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| Author: Courtney Brodbeck |
Contributed by admin on Jul 25th, 2009
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 It was a cold blustery wind he rode in on,
Dressed in an elegant suit of white.
I'm not sure what time he got here,
But it was some time late in the night.
It wasn't hard to see where he'd been
For he blanketed the ground with white cotton,
And the trees were all sprinkled with glitter
No 'ere you looked, nary a spot he'd forgotten.
Old Man Winter brought two friends
That was obviously clear
One was his ol' pal Jack Frost,
The other, Mother Nature, the dear.
They must have had a party
As they joined the Old Man in play
For Jack had frosted all the panes,
And Mother has asked The Old Man to stay.
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| Author: Christie |
Contributed by Christie on Jul 24th, 2009
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 Waves gently caressed the shore
As the sun was setting low
It was just you and I then
As we watched the embers glow.
The fire was slowly dying
While we whispered of our sweet love
Our bodies became mere shadows
From the moon's glow up above.
We danced to our own music
With a rhythm all it's own
Never fully realizing
It'd be the best we'd ever known.
But like the dying embers...
Our love was soon to be
For it wasn't long to you became
Just another faded memory.
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| Author: Christie |
Contributed by Christie on Jul 24th, 2009
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 My mother, Donna Hayes, wrote this poem titled "To Elmer", January 13, 1944, while he was over seas fighting in the war. Their love was strong and true. They were married 60 beautiful years!
Comes a moment when day
is ending
And I sit alone with my
thoughts.
A feeling o'er me comes
stealing
A feeling that lightens my
heart.
For there in the darkness I
see you.
And I hear you calling my
name.
Tho' there's many a mile
between us,
To me, it's a sweet refrain.
I hear you speak so
gently
And then you hold me tight
Next moment my arms are
empty
You are gone again in the
night.
Still I know that I've not
lost you
For tomorrow's another day,
Each night I will be waiting
For my name to hear you say.
Written by Donna M. Hayes
(January 13, 1944)
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| Author: Donna (Stubbs) Hayes |
Contributed by Christie on Jul 24th, 2009
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 The following poem was written by my mother, to my father 2 1/2 months before they were married. She was just 15 years old.
To You...
To you I give joys of
worlds unknown
Of forests and gardens
where love is sown.
To you with all your
beauty fair,
I give the sea, the land
the air.
I give you, too, the sun
that beams
I give you reality of
golden dreams
I give you love forever
true,
All this and more I give
to you.
Written by: Donna Stubbs
July 3, 1940
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| Author: Donna Stubbs |
Contributed by Christie on Jul 24th, 2009
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Diary / Journal Entry