OCR Text |
Show m m 12 Vernal Express Wednesday, December 20, 1995 RII&ntalHealth , by Dr. Val Farmer, , v ' , Tis the season to be jolly, sort of "SSI JO &a s "T'is the season to be jolly." Well not exactly! Kids and men are having hav-ing fun. Women are under the gun. Mere are some usual theories of when and why the holidays are a difficult season of the year, along with some tips on dealing with the stress. When you are overloaded. Plan and prepare in advance. Do your shopping early. Shop and cook in advance and freeze the dishes. Know your limits. Don't do everything every-thing - delegate and share the responsibility. re-sponsibility. Assign dishes to be brought to big meals. Simplify. Say no to activities you really don't want to do. Monitor your eating and drinking habits. The holidays are not as enjoyable en-joyable when they are filled with hinging, broken promises and regret. re-gret. Use moderation when confronted con-fronted with holiday temptations. When you have family conflict. Lower expectations. Let go of fantasies fan-tasies that can't happen. Some issues is-sues will remain unresolved, at least for now. Try to let your gift be a gift of forgiveness. Treat the offending family member mem-ber as if he and she deserve your most accepting attitude. Open communication com-munication around a small issue and work at it a little at a time. Look for evidence of how good they are instead of focusing on their usual faults. Don't wear your feelings feel-ings on your sleeve. When you are in a new family. Be prepared to negotiate and compromise. compro-mise. Whose traditions do you follow? fol-low? This is a test of your ability to work together and respect each other's oth-er's needs. Start new traditions. Be flexible and figure out solutions that work for both of you. I you are recently divorced or a parent in a stepfamily, you will be missing your children during part of the holidays. Plan on it and fill your time while they are away. Focus on Home and School: Vital Links by LILY ESKELSEN President, Utah Education Association MsisenDtteeiisirmi There is a thief stealing from our children. But what this thief steals is virtually impossible to replace. Some children are safe, but others, he preys upon again and again. The thief is Absenteeism. What he steals is time. Virtually every child will miss some school because of an illness or family emergency. We must always al-ways make allowances for such absences. ab-sences. But what of the family which always puts school attendance atten-dance last. Could the dental appointment ap-pointment be made after school? Must the family vacation take school time? I've had students explain ex-plain to me that their parents let them "sleep in" because they had been to a late party the night before. be-fore. These parents opened the door, and let the thief steal from these children. Oh, yes. The teacher is inevitably 'OVlff'eA I In A HVfi (AIM ts VrtWK ffJMJfJ UUUiXUUUUi I ' -f j ks r r I Wx I . ' ill i ...i. .i i. .i i ...ii........ .111.1. ii. i.i . . I I XWT- I Let Molly Jean Fabrics Custom Wrap NOT FOR MEN Gift boxes, Ribbons, Bows, Hand Decorated Gift Totes what is possible instead of what can't be, Be careful of debt in gift giving as you try to make up the hurt and guilt you feel. When you arc grieving. Reach out to others. Share your grief and loss. Allow others to comfort you. For a special column on holidays and grieving, write me at the address at the bottom of the column. When you are strapped for cash. Don't go overboard on gift giving. You'll have post holiday stress dealing with debt problems. Stress the relational and spiritual aspects of the holidays. Focus on worship and the spiritual reasons for celebrating. cele-brating. Generosity doesn't mean extravagance, extrava-gance, nor does it have to mean material ma-terial gifts. Enjoy your friends and relatives. Plan games and fun times. Get involved in giving service to others. When you are alone. Do for the less fortunate. Invite someone over. Share the holiday with others in your position. Find a way to be needed. Be nice to yourself. Go somewhere special. Take responsibility responsi-bility for meeting your own needs. Go outside your usual routine. Talk on the phone. Have someone with whom you can express your feelings. feel-ings. Develop your own holiday rituals. rit-uals. Lose yourself in a special project. Immerse yourself in it. Figure out what you want to do and do it. Make the holidays a special memory memo-ry so you can look back upon them with satisfaction and say, "That was great!" When you are "blue." Accept some sadness, emptiness and loneliness loneli-ness as normal. Expect a letdown and don't judge your moods. Accept what is happening and understand un-derstand it and then it will be OK. You're human. That's OK. Change your self-talk to more positive, hopeful messages. Write in a jour- asked to allow the child to "make up" the missed time. And teachers will try to come up with the pages to read or the worksheet to do or the exercise to complete. But the discussions are gone. The questions asked which clarified the lessons aren't repeated. The hands-on activities ac-tivities have been put away. It would not be reasonable to expect a teacher to reenact an entire missed day for one child, and so, with all the best intentions, most teachers will tell you that a child cannot really re-ally make up a missed day. Studies show that students with a history of high absenteeism have an extremely high drop-out rate. Habitual absenteeism leads to academic aca-demic frustration, loss of self-esteem and failure. Parents must be depended upon to keep absenteeism to an absolute minimum. Protect your children. Don't let the thief get a foot in the door. r6th Bl HDAY Open House For Dan Price 638 West 1100 South December 29, 1995 7:30-9:30 p.m. All are invited so please cornel No Gifts Please For You! ONLY! f 76,n BIRTHDAY A r w m m H I x nal and put your thoughts and feelings feel-ings on paper. It will provide you with a needed emotional outlet and clarify your perspective. Don't compare yourself to what you think the rest of the world is experiencing. Comparisons get people peo-ple in trouble. Don't drown in the media hype about warm, fuzzy holidays. holi-days. If you really knew what is going go-ing on in other people's lives you wouldn't be so hard on yourself. When it comes to misery, we want company. Find a way of helping help-ing someone less fortunate than yourself. Be more realistic about the world and where you fit in it. Don't expect the holidays to be as delightful and joyous as when you were a child full of bright-eyed innocence, in-nocence, excitement and expectation. expecta-tion. It is hard to duplicate that feeling feel-ing except vicariously when we are around children. Try to be around children and share in their delight. When the holidays are over. Holiday emotions run the gamut from joy and warmth to anxiety, sadness and depression. A post holiday hol-iday letdown is normal. Most of us will be glad when they are over. We can't sustain the high intensity of emotion and activity for too long. We may not even be conscious of how much stress we are under until it is over. When we are at the mountain peak, the next step is down. That is also normal. Thanks to psychologists Larry Kubiak at the Psychiatric Center in Tallahassee, Fla., Peter Sheras at the University of Virginia at Charlottesville and Edna Herrmann in private practice at Los Angeles, for their insights shared in this column. col-umn. For past columns on "Holiday Blues," and "Holidays and Grieving," send a self-addressed, stamped envelope to Holidays, The Preston Connection, PO Box 1209, Rapid City, SD 57709. How to keep poinsettias alive Jerry Goodspeed, Utah State University Extension Horticulturist Poinsettias are native Mexican plants. They love the holiday season sea-son because they are short-day plants that require long nights to launch their color change. They are relatively easy to care for. Protect them from freezing temperatures, tem-peratures, especially when transporting. trans-porting. Place them in light-filled rooms and away from drafts. They do best in rooms between 55 and 65 degrees at night. Water poinsettias when the soil is dry to the touch. They are very sensitive to over watering and will develop root rot quickly if kept too wet. Water the pot thoroughly, letting let-ting excess water drain out of the bottom. Apply an all-purpose, water-soluble fertilizer once a week during the holiday season. The colorful bracts of these plants are leaves, not flowers. The flower of the poinsettia is generally yellow and inconspicuous. The most common bract color is red, though recently developed varieties include pink, white, yellow and marbled combinations. Healthy poinsettias have dark green leaves below the bracts and foliage all the way to the base. The best plants are the ones with the least amount of true flowers present. pre-sent. The flower buds are the red or green buttons in the center of the bracts that open to a small yellow flower. Time Tn Sav "Merry Christmas and Thanks"! It's been our pleasure to serve you. , Thanks, i ' I., ill ,i V k ' irv t ! , -"tJMiliWM iiiiiii 1 1 mmmmmmmmmmmJmmmmmm . Igor Vassiliev, Alexei Kosarin and Dmitri Shved offer various styles of music during concerts performed at Vernal elementary schools. Vernal elementary schools host Russian Troubadours byVicklFeldt Staff Writer Three of Russia's finest musicians musi-cians came to Davis, Naples, and Maeser Elementary schools. On Dec. 15, the Vernal area school children were captivated by the many moods of Russian and American music. Among the performers were Igor Vassiliev, a professor of music at Nishni Novgorod University. Vassiliev is an accomplished flutist, and plays over 25 different flutes. He is also an accomplished saxophone saxo-phone player. This, in itself, is a rare gift as saxophones were illegal in Russia when Vassiliev's father was a young man. Vassiliev entertained enter-tained the students with Renaissance, classical, jazz, an4 Russian Folk music. He also introduced intro-duced the students to the sight and sound of a few stringed Russian folk instruments. Alexei Kosarin took the stage and mesmerized his audience with many violin compositions. He played classical, jazz, and folk music mu-sic from many different countries. The school children swayed with the rhythm of his bow, and clapped along in time with the various folk songs. Kosarin was then joined on stage by one of Russia's popular night club performers, Dmitri Shved. Shved, dressed in elaborate Russian Cavalry uniform, sang traditional Russian ballads and Russian Cavalry songs. He played a guitar, while Kosarin accompanied him on the violin. The school children sang along as Shved sang a few American songs' such as "God Bless the USA" and "Love Me Tender." Kosarin and Shved have toured together in Russia for the past year. They have a night club act which they perform on a Volga River cruise. During the winter, they perform per-form separately in Moscow concert halls. Kosarin began to play the violin when he was five years of age. He is a graduate of Violin at a Moscow musical university, named Gnesins, now known as Russian Academy of Music. He performs mostly Jewish melodies, including American, Russian, and Israeli Jewish music. Shved started his musical career learning to play an accordion when he was 10 years old. When he entered en-tered the ninth grade, he began to study the guitar. Shved graduated Out... Kathv & Staff w rtonzons vmvei 1180 N. Vernal Ave. Vernal '789-8252 II toe 1 uj jiliL " Alexei Kosarin and Dmitri Shved during their concert tour in Utah. from Academy of Theatre and Movie Art in 1982, and is an actor of movies and theatre. He worked in the Moscow Theatre for five years, and is now a soloist with Moscow Philharmonic. Shved and Vassiliev met four years ago. Now Vassiliev and his eleven year old daughter Anya, perform per-form for and lecture tourists aboard a Volga cruise ship during the summer sum-mer months. Vassiliev's daughter Anya will be performing with her father during the next month. The four talented musicians will perform and lecture at many different differ-ent cities in California, Utah, Idaho, and Florida. On Dec. 29, they will perform at the Provo Tabernacle at 7:30 p.m. The Russian troubadours will be playing in various cities throughout Utah during the first and third weeks of January. On Jan. The Fisherman and his Wife January 8-13 Auctions: Jan. 8, 4 p.m. Vcrnsl V.liile School Autftortum Credos K through O Performances Saturday January B 3 p.m. and 7 p.m. $6 adults under 12 $4 At the Door, Davis IGA and Bittercreek Books Uintah flrt& Council Centennial Concert Series perform Russian Cavalry songs 5, they will perform in Roosevelt at the UBATC at 7 p.m. They are being be-ing sponsored by the "Duchesne County Arts Council. After their tour of Utah, they will go back to Los Angeles to perform, before leaving for Russia on Jan. 24. Shved tells of the places they have been during their tour of the United States, and exclaims, "Utah has clean air and clean water. I like Utah very much." Shved goes on to say, "Russia and America are very different, but the people are the same. I hope to come back next year. I like Vernal very much." The Russian performers are guests of the AmeriRuss Company. Performances at the schools were arranged by Leonard Sullivan in cooperation with Dr. Kline and Lyle Southam. ISSOI II A Ihildren's HEATRE Delivery available open 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Vernal 781-0347 22 West Main |