Marjorie R. Barlow, Ph.D.

Someone asked for my latest reading list. Here are the books Paul and I are studying these days:

1. Prairie Home Companion Pretty Good Joke Book for the laughs.

2. The Living Universe by Duane Elgin, which gets us into cosmic thinking.

3. The Spontaneous Healing of Beliefs by Gregg Braden provokes us to examine our beliefs.

4. The Art of Extreme Self Care by Cheryl Richardson is her latest book on self-care and self-love.

5. The Heavens Declare, The Dove in the Stone, and The Web in the Sea by Alice O. Howell, whose lovely grandmotherly approach to all things of the soul are juicy treasures to read. She is my favorite Jungian writer on Astrology, which I am still studying. After 10 or more years, I know little.

6. In preparation for Laurence Hillman’s workshop at Red Corral Ranch in September, I am reviewing old books on Astrology: The New Way to Learn Astrology by Basil Fearrington and Intuitive Astrology by Elizabeth Rose Campbell. Alignments and Planets at Play by Laurence himself.

7. Living Your Strengths by Winseman and Clifton and How Full Is Your Bucket? By Don Clifton and Tom Rath, and Strengths Leadership by Rath are ongoing books I use in Strengths Coaching for Interface Flor, Inc.  and others.

8. The Dumbest Generation by Mark Bauerlein (How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future) is comfort for parents of the under 20-age group.

9. Excuses Begone! By Wayne Dyer summarizes what I am coming to believe—that our beliefs actually create our life. Another book that lead me to that thinking is The Biology of Belief by Bruce Lipton.

10. Breakthrough by Suzanne Somers enlightens us on the need for bio-identical hormone therapy.

11. If It’s Not Food, Don’t Eat It! Is a no-nonsense guide to an eating-for-health lifestyle, which we are attempting to follow.

That same person who asked about our reading list, wanted to know how we manage the time to read all these books. One of my top five Strengths is “learner” and that makes reading or any kind of knowledge very motivational to me. I hunger to learn and pursue learning like it is candy. So, any trip to a good bookstore is like a trip to a candy store. We have evolved into routines that support reading and study. Just as homework was a part of early school life, so the continual learning cycle is a daily process. Our schedule simply includes books. Some of the above we are literally reading to each other. Some we read in solitude. Our morning looks like this: 6:30 rise and shine, then our daily 7:00 a.m. apple and coffee or tea while we read and journal. Then breakfast and exercise. We both get to our work at around 9 or 10 a.m. Lunch is separate and on our own. Afternoons, Paul works on his Play Therapy project and I take calls. At 5:00 we stop for Happy Hour, which may be a glass of wine or cold water. The day ends with dinner and a walk around the neighborhood. Ideally we play a game of cards at 9 p.m. and go on to bed by 10:30.

So, there you have a day in the life of Paul and Marj Barlow at our new home in Buda, Texas. I would love to read about your day, also. I am so happy when I get to know you better. Thanks for reading this and I am hoping you will respond.

KINSHIP 

I am aware, 

As I go commonly sweeping the stair, 

Doing my part of the every-day care — 

Human and simple my lot and my share —
I am aware of a marvelous thing:
Voices that murmur and ethers that ring
In the far stellar spaces where cherubim sing. 

I am aware of the passion that pours 

Down the channels of fire through Infinity's doors;
Forces terrific, with melody shod.
Music that mates with the pulses of God. 

I am aware of the glory that runs 

From the core of myself to the core of the suns.
Bound to the stars by invisible chains.
Blaze of eternity now in my veins.
Seeing the rush of ethereal rains 

Here in the midst of the every-day air — 

I am aware. 

I am aware,
As I sit quietly here in my chair.
Sewing or reading or braiding my hair — 

Human and simple my lot and my share —
I am aware of the systems that swing 

Through the aisles of creation on heavenly wing,
I am aware of a marvelous thing: 

Trail of the comets in furious flight, 

Thunders of beauty that shatter the night,
Terrible triumph of pageants that march
To the trumpets of time through Eternity's arch. 

I am aware of the splendor that ties 

All the things of the earth with the things of the
skies,
Here in my body the heavenly heat.
Here in my flesh the melodious beat
Of the planets that circle Divinity's feet. 

As I sit silently here in my chair, 

I am aware.

June 12, 2009 was a wonderful day in the life of our family.  Our first great-grandson was born.  Paul was been moved to tears when he was told that this new baby would have his name.  Lawson is the middle name of Garold Brooks, the other great-grandfather He is the first cousin to Reilly Morgan Aguilar, our first great-granddaughter.  What a terrific world we live in, where families get to know each other from the early beginnings.  Reilly has been a source of great joy and comfort, especially watching her Mother Melissa as she patiently guides and teaches her.  Ricky seems to be always cheerful and happy as her father.  He, too, is very loving and wonderfully encouraging.   Grandmother Janice is the pivot around which it all turns.  She is a magnificent Mother and Grandmother to these young ones.  And, the granddad, Mike, is an anchor for the whole family.  He has been that for most of his life.   I wish he could know how much he is loved and treasured.

This writing is to record the message asked for by Lee Michael Robinson, who is father to Lawson Paul Robinson.  Eran is the incredible Mother with maturity and wisdom as only a person of her family and profession can be  So this little boy arrives to the golden life and world of Eran and Lee Robinson’s home.

His first Great-grandfather might have wanted him to hear the message in these words.  They have been written by me as I imagine he would want Lawson to hear them.  Maybe, the words will mean more when Lawson is Lee’s age.  For now, here they are for our family to read:

“I am the voice of James Monroe Robinson, Jr.

To Lawson Paul Robinson,

This is one of your great grandfathers.  I came to Earth September 7, 1922 in Kingsville, TX and I left on July 15, 1962 in Corpus Christi, TX.  I had a stroke (aneurism in my brain) and never recovered, so that means that I never met you, Lawson.  I wish I could have lived until you were born and since I did not, I want you to know about my life, so that you will know some of your history from the Robinson side of the family.

My childhood was spent in Kingsville, Texas.  I was born on a farm in a home-birth, the third of three children.  My father was James Monroe Robinson (born in 1889) and they called him Monroe.   My mother was Annie Lou Cox (born in 1887).  She was born to George Cox, a Primitive Baptist preacher.  The Primitive Baptists were also referred to as Hardshell Baptists.  They were known for their practice of “footwashing”.

Annie Lou was one of six or more children in George Cox’ first family.  Their mother died and he re-married the local school- teacher, Miss Annie, and she bore him six more children so it was a very large family.   You can see that my Mother, Annie Lou Cox had a step-mother named Annie.  The first six children didn’t think fondly of Miss Annie.  They would try to please her, like scrubbing the kitchen floor and Miss Annie would say, “It’s no more than you should do.”  The children of the first family bonded together.  They loved and visited all their half brothers and sisters but there was something special in the way the first children banded together emotionally.

Annie was very fond of her 3 sisters.  They were Sally (Meers); Emma (Harris); and Mary (Robinson).  Mary married my father’s brother, Dan.  Their three daughters, Daphna (married Jesse Gunn); Nellie; and Verna Joyce (married Edgar Glasscock).  There is a Glasscock drive in Georgetown, named for Edgar.

So, Annie and Monroe, my parents, first had Helen (m. Joe Jiral), then Ruby Nell (m.  Joe Boring), and last was me, James.  Mother called me “Jamebosie”.   I was the baby and loved very much.  We were typical kids and I fought with my sisters, especially Helen.  I loved to tell the story of how she threw an ice pick at me one time when she lost her temper.  She missed and the ice pick stuck in the door.

My mother, Annie, made sugar cookies during the Great Depression.  She sold them for 1 penny apiece to the women of Kingsville for their parties—teas, bridge clubs, and special celebrations.  She was very clever and could fashion a cookie cutter out of the metal strip that came from around a coffee can.  She could make any shape, diamonds, clubs, or animals and Christmas trees.  She used the money from her cookie income to give us music lessons.  Helen took violin, Ruby Nell took piano, and I took clarinet lessons.  I was in the band and I also played football all the way through high school and college.  I was a good tennis player and a pretty good athlete.  I sang in the church choir.  By the way, your Grandfather Michael can make those sugar cookies.  They are very difficult to make.

Our family didn’t have much money and times were hard.  When my parents, Monroe and Annie, first married they got jobs at the state asylum for insane people in Austin.  Then Uncle Allie Robinson and his wife Rudy moved to Kingsville.  Monroe and Annie moved down there, too.  The whole family farmed for a long time.  The man who owned the farm we rented wanted us to buy it, but my Daddy was afraid to go into debt.  He was a man of his word and feared being unable to make his payments, so we left the farm and lived in a house at 311 E. Fordyce St., in Kingsville and my Daddy went to work in the shop at the Missouri Pacific Railroad.  That was good, because my Mother was “melancholic” in my early childhood.  She was depressed and old Dr. Jones would tell my Daddy to take her back to Austin to see her family.  It was really nice for her to have a Railroad pass and ride free to visit Mary and Emma and Sally (Sally lived in Brady but her daughter would bring her to Austin whenever Annie came).

One thing I did to earn money was to run a paper route.  I kept that job all through high school and college.  I rode my bicycle at 4 a.m. every day, delivering the Corpus Christi Caller Times.

I loved math and science, so I majored in Chemical Engineering at Texas College of Arts and Industries in Kingsville.  Graduated in May of 1941 and the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7 that year, so I joined the U.S. Army Air Corps.  Since I had a degree, I went in as a second Lieutenant.  Came out a second Lieutenant four years later when the war was over.  I learned to be a Navigator on the large bombers (B-25s) and spent the war years teaching Air Force Navigators.  I was stationed at San Marcos, TX.  So I didn’t go overseas and never saw combat.

When I returned home to Kingsville from World War II. I was very trim and people said that I looked very good. I had lost a lot of weight, and was in great physical condition.  I had an optimistic feeling about all that was ahead.  Chemistry was the new frontier and everybody was talking about plastics.  That was what I knew and could see myself succeeding in that field.

I went to the First Baptist Church, which is where my family all went to church, and Sunday night during the summer of 1945, I was at “Fellowship” in the church basement.  All the young people met there after church.   There was a girl playing the piano. Her name was Margie McNeely. I watched her play, and I sang, kind of hanging onto the piano with my good friend, Clyde Joiner, and I said to Clyde later, “That’s the girl I’m going to marry.”   The church ladies gossiped about it because Margie was just 16 years old (even though she was a junior in college).  They talked about me “robbing the cradle.”   They said it would never last—that we didn’t know what we were doing.

Now I had told my family I would never, ever marry, that I hated women, and I wanted no part of marriage, and was going to be a bachelor the rest of my life. So when I took Margie in about a year later, with a ring on her finger, and she showed it to my Daddy, he laughed and thought it was really funny. This was Margie’s introduction to the family. She went into the kitchen to show the ring to my mother, Annie, and Annie said, “Well, I’m going to have to talk to James about this.” That sort of set the tone for how Margie went into the family.

At that time, Ruby Nell was married to Joe Boring, and they had 2 children, Johnny was 2 1/2 or 3, and the little girl was Sharon Anne, and they lived with the Robinsons. So, Granny and Joe weren’t getting along real well most of the time. We called my mother Granny.  She usually had critical things to say and that was kind of the situation.   Monroe, my father, died that year.  He had a heart attack.  They had bought a house in Austin and he was retiring from the Railroad, planning to start a new life.  It was a huge turning point for Annie became very dependent on all of us.  Losing my Daddy at such a young age (56) was really hard for all of us.  My Mother relied on me to help her.  She moved in with Margie and me right after we got married.

Well, Margie and I married the week after she got her degree in Business.  The date was May 25, 1947.  She got a Bachelor’s of Business Degree when she was 18, and we got married the next Sunday in the First Baptist Church of Weslaco, TX, where her parents lived.  We were very happy, full of hope and high expectations.   Our marriage was 15-years long. During that time, we had 4 children—5 if you count the premature baby that died.

The first one was Anna…Anna Kathleen. She was born on Granny Robinson’s birthday—August 4 (1950). Anna went on to marry Jay Brown, and then they divorced. They have a son named John Newton Brown IV.

Then there was your grandfather, James Michael Robinson, born on September 20, 1953.   He was the sweetest little boy when he was born, a lot like you.  I remember how happy we were that he slept through the night the very first month.  He was a smiling, cheerful baby with a deep belly laugh.  I was so proud of him and loved to play catch with him when he got old enough.  He followed me around when we were building all those houses, helping me with errands.

Three years after Mike was born, Victoria Kaye was born August 30, 1956, in Austin.  Then came Edward McNeely Robinson born May 19, 1959 in Kingsville.

I told you there was another baby that was born right after Anna Kathleen, on December 26, 1951, and that baby lived only 3 days.

We named her Margie Lee.  We had no money, so I took her little body and placed it tenderly in a shoe box, took it to the Chamberlain cemetery in Kingsville, dug a little grave at the foot of my father’s plot, and I buried her.  Margie and I cried a lot over that.

Monroe, my father, died in 1945.  He was just 56 years old.  His sister, Lillie Robinson had married Napoleon Bonaparte Tanner and they moved to Kingsville.  They had 4 children, N.B. Tanner, Lillian (Garrett), Naomi (married Walter Wesley, and Laverne (married Harold Wesson).  I tell you this because Aunt Lily also died when she was 56.  We seemed to have cardio-vascular problems, but we didn’t really know that at the time.

Margie and I built a lot of houses.  I read Theo Audel’s books on carpentry, plumbing, and wiring, and Margie drew the floor plans.  We built one before we married—built it for Annie my Mother, but she ran out of money and we bought it from her.  Then we built her a little one-bedroom house behind the 3 BR one at 310 W. Yoakum in Kingsville.   We also built a garage apartment on that same lot just before your grandfather Michael was born.  Moved Granny’s little house off in 1959, expanded it to a duplex and Margie sold it after I died.

We took jobs at Celanese in 1947.  I was working as a Chemical Engineer and Margie was in Accounts Payable.  Then I decided I wanted to return to teaching school.  I had taught after the war at Texas A&I.  They had a lot of veterans coming back to school and there were not enough teachers, so Dr. Neirman hired me as a lab Instructor.  He was a large, shuffling man that had the nickname, “Bear Tracks”.  I was large and shuffled, too.  So they called me Cub-Tracks.  Anyway, I liked teaching.  I had the reputation of being able to teach Math and Physics in such a way that people could understand them.  I loved teaching and coaching and my students often came to our house to eat or just talk.

We left Kingsville to go to Mercedes and teach school in 1948.  Both of us resigned our jobs at Celanese.  I was tennis coach, asst. football coach, math, physics, and chemistry teacher in Mercedes High School.  Margie taught 4th grade.  We set about to build us another house.  Bought a half acre of land on Baseline Road and built a little one bedroom house out of pumite blocks.  That is where we took our first baby, Anna Kathleen after one night for her birth in the Mercedes hospital.  I led the singing at the First Baptist Church and Margie was sometimes the pianist.  We were very busy with the house, the church, the school, and the community.  When Kathy came, we got a lot of help from Odie and Victoria McNeely, her grandparents.  They lived 3 miles away in Weslaco.  Odie really loved me and looked to me as a friend.  He and I built houses together.  He worked at the Pike Lumber Company and Victoria taught school at South Palm Gardens and later in Progresso.  She was always the organist at the Baptist church.  She played for churches from the time she was a twelve-year-old girl until she died at age 98.  She was still playing the piano for sing-alongs at the home.  They really grieved and missed me after I died.  My death was seen as a great tragedy by the family, as well as the community.  They said I died in the prime of my life.  They also spoke of the loss of a father to four little children.  They compared Margie to Jacqueline Kennedy after her husband was assassinated.

But, back to my story:
Kathy was just 2 years old when I decided I wanted to get a Master’s degree, so we returned to Kingsville and I taught at the High School while earning a Masters in Physics.  Then I thought I would go on to the Ph.D., so I got into the University of Texas and went summers until I could get a Teaching Assistantship and start the Ph.D. for real.  We moved into student housing in 1954.  At that time, our little family consisted of your grandfather Mike (one year old), Anna Kathleen (she was 4) and Margie and me.  Granny Robinson was around a lot as she had little money and needed a place to live.  Helen was divorced from her husband she married overseas during the war, so she and Annie teamed up to get Helen a business course in Austin.  Then Helen went back to Kingsville and Annie went with her.

I got the Ph.D. in Quantum Mechanics in 1957, the year after Kaye was born.  She was our little funny girl who liked to laugh and be very, very busy.  Kathy had started school in Austin.  We bought the house on Linda Lane and all was well.  I taught a year at UT after being appointed as an Assistant Professor, working for Dr. Matson.  Those were the days of Sputnik and the National Science Foundation was giving out lots of money for scientific research.  I had several graduate students and with Dr. Matson, we published papers in the Journals of Physics and Chemistry.

Then came the first offer to go to Texas Tech.  I accepted and Margie was making plans to return to her home territory near Lubbock.  Before we moved, I was visited by the president, Dr. E. H. Poteet and dean, Dr. James Jernigan from Texas A&I.  They made a special trip to Austin, talking me into going back to Kingsville.  So we did.  We moved our family from Linda Lane back to 310 W. Yoakum and began a new life.

We had another baby.  Ed was born May 19, 1959.  We built another house.  This was the yellow brick at 1220 W. Henrietta in Kingsville. We had our four children, I was a full Professor of Physics, we had built a nice home in a good section of town. Our children were well and happy. You might think we were satisfied and settled.  But, again the urge to move came.

My friend Bill Sandlin had taken the appointment to Texas Tech—the one I rescinded before.  He persuaded me to come help him with the creation of a first class department of Physics.  I once more signed a contract to teach and do research at Texas Tech, helping Bill create a doctoral program in Physics.

This was in May of 1962.  Dr. Jim Jernigan was now the President of Texas A&I and he and I thought alike.  I was a deacon in the First Baptist Church and my conservative ideas suited Dr. Jernigan.   So I agreed to stay in Kingsville after he talked with me about becoming academic dean of the University.  This was the final dream of my career.  I had reached the best place in a professional life in my home-town of Kingsville.  I was ecstatic.  Margie was happy and glad that I felt optimistic about what I could do for my graduate students and the whole university.  I was doing research and had several young physicists who were studying with me.  I was planning to continue mentoring them even after I became dean.  My new salary was very great by the standards of that time ($8,500 per year).  Dr. Jernigan was grooming me to be the next president after he retired.  So the excitement was enough to cause me to turn Texas Tech down a second time.  This was a great strain for me.  Remember, Robinsons do what they say they will do!

We had sold the house on Henrietta, preparing to move to Lubbock.  I followed my Daddy’s belief that I couldn’t go back on my word, so that meant, even though we were not moving, we had to leave the house so the new owner could move in.  So Margie and I found a rent house at 722 Santa Barbara, packed up the four kids and moved. I began to think about being the dean of my home-town university.  Life was very exhilarating and happy.  We purchased a lot on Henrietta Street and Margie began making plans for the new house we would build there.

That’s when I had the stroke.  I had brain surgery and never came out of the coma.  I left the Earth plane on July 15, 1962.  Margie and I had been married 15 years; we had met our goals of having 4 children; building homes and getting my doctorate.  I suppose I completed my mission.

I regret not being around to meet you.  I have been busy in other worlds and I will look after you from that distant spiritual place.  If you look up at the stars, you can think of me as one of those heavenly lights protecting you and loving you on your life journey.  My four children have become fine adults and our Robinson family has continued through Michael and Lee and you.
Welcome to this world, Lawson Paul Robinson.  Your Life will unfold in marvelous ways.  You are adored and loved and you are the continuation of our life.  I send my blessing to you.

From James M. Robinson, Jr., Ph.D. as imagined by Marjorie R. Barlow.

How is your portfolio doing?  If your 401K looks like mine, it has been severely reduced in the last few weeks.  I am looking at a different kind of portfolio.  This one is suggested in a brilliant new book, POSITIVITY, by Barbara Fredericks, Ph.D., who deals in research into positive psychology.  That is right down my alley, since I am totally convinced that the Strengths-Based approach is the best way to go through life.

The Economic Portfolio can be very different from an Emotional Portfolio.  What if you also kept files on your emotions?  And, especially on your positive emotions?  Fredericks shows us how to do that in her book.  So, I am today setting up an Emotional 401K, with shares that are named Joy, Gratitude, Serenity, Interest, Hope, Pride, Amusement, Inspiration, Awe, and Love.  Out of that will come more expansion in my mind and my imagination.  It will also bring forth more creativity, not to mention better feeling tones.  The charts can plot my experience on a daily, minute-by-minute flow.  Gratitude is easy to keep in the upper levels.  Amusement is a great emotional stock for everything tragic can also be quite comical.  Serenity can be purchased with meditative thinking….  You get the gist of this, I hope.

Make your own chart of emotions and remember, you can choose the positive ones.  All it takes is to change your thinking and your believing!  Yes, that’s hard to do, but in this day of worry and stress, it is worth the doing.

I am so excited!  This morning, I got our Civic Hybrid up to 40.1 mpg.  And, I did it with my right foot.  Just easing up on the gas pedal has brought us up from 38.0 mpg to 40.1.  That’s right!  The right foot is the culprit and the hero.  Both Paul and I have been deliberately driving slightly below the speed limit, not accelerating on hills or when the light turns green.  Just easy does it and we made a 2 mpg improvement.  Turns out to be a lot of fun, watching the display that shows when we are getting 100 mpg or less, watching it change as we guide the gas pedal.  I drove 55 mph this morning and felt very good about it.  The car ahead of me, also driving 55, was a Prius.  We were being passed by pickups and suburbans, but I just drove on and enjoyed the ride.  Turns out to be a beautiful day.

Maybe there is a connection between driving slower and the book I am reading, recommended by Sheri Shumacher.  The book is “In Praise of Slowness” and it is full of common sense ideas for relief from the stress of our multi-tracking high speed life.  The author is evocative as a philosopher.  I became aware that even though we are now 80 years old and counting, we can stress ourselves just as we did years ago when life was really, really crowded.

More about Sheri:  She is a wonderful woman, a professor at Auburn University, a designer and artist.  She and her husband are on twin sabbaticals from Auburn and they chose Austin for their time away to replenish their creative storehouses.  I am so glad she has come this way, for we have become good friends and are enjoying places like the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center.  She has been delightful!!

Back to going green.  We are moving into our greenbuilt cottage soon.  Yes, we have a tankless water heater, all energy saving appliances, wired for solar (later), xerascaped yard, and have a great wine cask barrel to catch the rain, if it ever rains again here in Austin.  I am pleased and happy that we chose this area and we are working hard going through all our “stuff” with a new goal of living simply and lightly.  Paul and I tell people that we will be here 10 years and then we will move to “the Home” where they will cook for us.  Meanwhile, I am looking for the right clothesline and finding sustainable ways to fight the fire ants who think they have “eminent domain” rights.  Our Neighbors are young and helpful, with great ideas to share.  So, 2009 promises to be a great new beginning here in Elm Grove, on Clear Springs Hollow, in Buda, TX.  We will be completely moved by our 45th wedding anniversary, June 8.