NANCY LOEWEN
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Down and Through

10/18/2022

4 Comments

 
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​A few weeks ago, I dug out my dad’s old paper cutter. I was getting ready for an Everybody Club event and I needed to cut up cardstock into rectangles for kids to turn into popsicle pennants. It was at the bottom of my closet beneath a pair of boots, the blade taped tightly to the base. I’m not sure when I claimed it, but it must have been after my parents had moved off the farm and into a house in town. By then, Alzheimer’s was casting an ever-darkening shadow in my dad’s mind. He would have had no need for the paper cutter.
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I’d last used the cutter with laminated vocabulary words and other visuals when I was working as a preschool tutor for Reading Corps several years ago. I remember feeling a delightful sense of teacherly industriousness as I prepared my lessons. I adored the inexpensive laminator I’d picked up at Aldi’s; I loved watching as my flimsy printouts turned stiff and shiny. And the paper cutter never failed me. Slice. Slice. Slice.
 
My dad passed away shortly after my service with Reading Corps ended. This time, when I brought out the paper cutter, my thoughts went back to my own childhood: my dad in the basement, the paper cutter on top of our small pool table, and that distinctive metallic sound as the blade came down and through, down and through. What did he need to cut? He directed the choir and served on the music committee at church, so most likely it had something to do with music. I knew I wasn’t to touch the paper cutter myself. I might hurt myself. It was dangerous. When I watched him make cut after cut, I was awestruck. My dad could do dangerous things. He was precise, deliberate, as he was in all he did—the careful upkeep of the farm equipment, the expertly trimmed trees in the grove, the ledger books that didn’t miss a single transaction.​
My rectangles piled up. How I wished I could have shared the journey of The Everybody Club with my dad. He would have embraced the message wholeheartedly. He would have been proud of me—not just for making the book, but for helping my friend find a way to celebrate her daughter’s life. For a little while, the paper cutter brought me back to him, and him to me, and we stood there at my kitchen counter, cutting those rectangles together. ​
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4 Comments
Mary Kay Forkell
10/20/2022 01:15:16 am

What a wonderful and amazing memory!!! I am so glad that you are able to use this tool and have it bring back such wonderful childhood memories!!! Linda has been my friend for 51 years (since we met as next door neighbors in the dorm our freshman year of college) and I am so very happy that The Everybody Club came to life for the world to see when the 2 of you collaborated on it!!! The illustrator did a wonderful job!!! I have my own copy and actually cried when I first read it because of my history with Linda! It is a book that I feel should be shared with the world!!

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Nancy Loewen link
10/20/2022 11:50:45 am

I'm glad you liked this post! Thank you for being such a great advocate for The Everybody Club! Linda and I are so grateful. :)

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Karen Henry Clark link
10/20/2022 04:19:53 pm

I met your dad, nearing his end, at one of your author events. He was seated and looking around, not sure why he was there. But he knew it had something to do with you. I pointed you out at the back of room, and he stood, saying he'd check on you. Your dad to the end

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Charlotte Loewen
10/21/2022 06:32:42 am

What a beautiful reflection!

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    Nancy Loewen

    is a children's book author, editor, tutor, mom of two adult children and one feisty cat, and collector of weird things.  
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"Books are the plane, and the train, and the road.
They are the destination, ​and the journey. They are home."
​   ​~ Anna Quindlen
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