Song Stories, Quiet Stories

Hello! And welcome! You're listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast episode 23, Earth Mom. I'm your long lost host, Carolyn Murset.  Today is Blue Can Recycling Day in my little town in southwest Utah.  I look forward to this every other Thursday morning event that  began here just a few years ago, so much that I wonder why I haven't had my picture taken beside that royal blue  43 inch high polyethylene hinged bin. Wouldn't it be cool if it were made from recycled materials? My environmentally conscious, almost tree-hugging inclination began with a fire. In 1969, the Taos New Mexico Plaza Movie Theatre caught fire. This was the place where on Saturday afternoons, my dad would drop me and a sibling or two off at the southwest corner of  Taos Plaza, the town square, with enough money to buy a movie ticket to watch scary movies  and to share a bag of popcorn.  This is where we watched Edgar Allen Poe's the Raven, starring Vincent Price and Boris Karloff,  and the Pit and the Pendulum, also starring Vincent Price. Some of my adult issues could be explained by my watching these terrifying classics as an impressionable child.  Anyway. Because of that Thanksgiving Day fire, we Taosenos were deprived of a movie theater experience, unless we drove to Santa Fe or even Albuquerque, but our family only drove there to buy supplies for my dad's plumbing and heating business. So my ambitious dad's solution, as the  leader of our local church congregation, was to rent old films and turn our chapel's cultural hall into a Friday night theater. I'm assuming my dad was the leader then because during his lifetime, he had the responsibility of leading our congregation five different times, either as Branch President, or as Bishop. We're Mormons, members of the Cgurch of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Customarily in the early days of going to the movies, before the featured film began, the audience first watched a short film or a cartoon. During World War 2, the short film was a newsreel to keep the audience up to date on the events of the war. Watching the world events unfold as moving images provided a more reel experience (yeah, that was a pun) than reading about them in the newspaper or listening to them on the radio. Not everyone had a radio, or had access to a newspaper back then. I was a young teen when I attended the church hall movie theater, which had the best concession stand. People attending brought homemade treats for the bake sale to pay for the movie rental?  and I still remember Mrs. Labrum's double decker fudge.Sigh. Again and anyway, my dad also rented short films to project onto the church hall movie screen that hung from the ceiling above the stage, until you somehow grabbed that metal loop and pulled it down.   One film that made such an impression on my 13 year old mind was  of a family (who  were actors trying to prove a point, and with me, they did.) living at an urban landfill. Their home had walls, and window openings but no roof. They lived among the piles and piles of trash. That impression of the disturbing images didn't translate into action until a decade later when I was married and a young mother. My first effort was waddling with my good sport of a husband to a fabric store on Center Street, Provo, Utah (and there were three of those stores, just on that street) to buy diaper flannel. Once home, we folded and zig zagged the edges of the fabric and made an impressive stack of diapers, that we'd later fold into kite shape before placing our clean bottomed baby on top. Then with two large diaper safety pins, we'd fasten the diaper snuggly around our baby's bottom, and then cover the diaper with vinyl diaper covering with elasticized leg openings and waist, and hope the diaper would stay dry longer that a few minutes. Disposable diapers were a new invention in 1979, when our first child was born, and they had no elastic around the legs and  waist.

Hello, and welcome! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories episode 22,  Remember 2020? I’m your host, Carolyn Murset. It’s been a while since my last visit here, in April. The new isolated lock down quarantine period here and throughout most  of the world had been going on for a little over a month  then, and was already feeling old to most of us. Here in the southwestern part of the United States, excluding the west coast, Covid-19 cases weren’t as high in number as they were on the east coast, and in California. Nevertheless, most of us chose to follow the safety guidelines. At my last visit here, I made a plea for help with the local homeless teen population. Thank you for your support. My grandson completed his Eagle Scout Project of gathering supplies for hygiene kits for fifty teenage girls and boys, and donated them to Youth Futures. He was even featured on the local TV news station. Wouldn’t you know it, that after I’d been coordinating a local face mask group of 19 sewers, then sewing 25 sets of pajamas for the homeless shelter, I caught the virus! I had let me guard down once as I volunteered at a venue that wasn’t as safety conscious as they’d claimed and ended up in bed for several weeks.  I was wearing a face covering and gloves when I caught it, but the others that I had to come into contact with throughout the night were not.  They were either pre symptomatic or asymptomatic. Oh well, I feel much better now, and am grateful I didn’t need hospitalization. I’m grateful my husband didn’t contract the virus, and I’m grateful for the showing of love from family and friends. As a good friend of mine and her husband  currently have COVID-19, with her being in the ICU at the local hospital, it amazes me that people equate being considerate of others as living in fear. I acknowledge that we are entitled to our own opinion about the matter, but do not believe we are entitled to endanger other people’s lives because we don’t want to be inconvenienced.  It is sad that because of the high case numbers that precautions have to be taken, which often result in isolation, separation, loneliness and not being able to observe the upcoming holiday traditions as we’ve been accustomed to and as we want to. To me, we can find new ways to celebrate. On social media, I’ve seen many sharing photos of their Christmas decorations already in place. Candy canes appeared on my neighbor’s front lawn last week. 2020 has been an armpit year for me in many ways. It’s been hard on family economics and relationships, and I lost a dear aunt in January. A dear friend’s health took a downward spiral early in the year and our  visits were replaced with phone calls. The last time I saw this friend and his wife in person was March 1st. He passed away in August. I had also begun the year in rehearsal of a local musical with a theatre company I hadn’t yet worked with. Rehearsals came to a screeching halt when the world shut down mid March, which is when I then saw the need to help sew face masks to be sent around the country, because at that point, they weren’t being sold in retail outlets.  I credit Nurse Mendy Stucki for enlisting my help. She lives thirty five minutes away and had her husband and sister in law deliver cut out face masks.   After I’d agreed to help her, the first stack of cut out rectangles was over seven inches tall.  That is when I knew I couldn’t do it myself, so I pleaded for help on social media, and 19 of my friends got involved.  It was exhilarating and exhausting compiling kits and leaving them and then collecting them on the porches of my seamstress friends. After five weeks of doing this, I chose to help with the homeless teen project.  My neighbor who has an online boutique not only donated items for the hygiene kits but also let me buy some of her fabric for the pajamas at a very deep discount.  As I’d made most of my clothes as a teen, and most of my five kid’s clothing and pajamas u...

Hello, and welcome! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories, episode 21, Homeless Teens in Crisis. I am your host, Carolyn Murset. Who would’ve thought as 2019 drew to a close that in a few short months our world as we knew it then would  be turned upside down and almost unrecognizable. Not unrecognizable due to a natural geological or weather related disaster, but unfamiliar due to public buildings, places of worship, national and city parks, schools, and higher institutions of learning  being closed to the public. Unfamiliar with new phrases such as Social Distancing, COVID-19, Stay Home, Stay Safe, CDC, PPE, Wash Your Hands, Don’t Touch Your Face being spoken and heard several times a day.  We now know the difference between a surgical mask and an N95 mask. Having a televised news conference every afternoon from our nation’s capitol and our state capitol. Unemployment rates are skyrocketing. Stock market trading, plummeting As the daily squares on my over-scheduled dry erase calendar, became empty and I began to sigh with the relief of fewer commitments and obligations to fulfill, I became aware of ways to help the mounting numbers of victims of the Corona Virus and the healthcare workers on the front lines striving to save the lives of the patients while trying to preserve their own good health. Little did I know that my days and nights would be filled managing a local group of 17 volunteer seamstresses sewing face mask covers to be sent through one of many .org and .com groups to locations around the country low on supplies but high on serving those in need. My hands ache from feeding several layers of pleated fabric through my not as powerful as I’d like sewing machine. Little did I know that people would be thanking me for giving them an opportunity to serve. I’m not a lifesaver. Through  sewingforlives.com I may be a life helper. Watching others’ willingness to help, even by using their own fabric, and elastic has brightened my days and helped to lift my anxiety. Watching the news mention the plight of the homeless during this pandemic reminded me of my grandson’s Eagle Scout project of providing 50 care kits for homeless teens in our southern Utah communities.  I asked Nathan how he came to know about these teens in our area. He told me that when he was working on the Citizenship in the Community Merit Badge, he was required to interview a government official. His friend’s father, Utah State Representative Walt Brooks talked with Nathan about problems in the community, and one of the problems was homelessness, and homelessness in teens.  We live near St. George, a red hilled desert community with moderate winters and scorching summer weather. Population is 85,000, and with the surrounding smaller communities, you could say a little over 100,000 call this winter snowbird haven their home. When my grandson Nathan told me a few months ago that his approved Eagle Scout project was to gather 50 care and hygiene kits that include pajamas, underwear, socks, a comfort blanket, food and self-care items, I cried, especially when he told me there were 1,000 homeless teens in the area! 1,000. I had no idea. Nathan with much needed help, especially with the sinking economy during this COVID-19 pandemic crisis, will donate these 50 care kits to  Youth Futures which provides safe shelter, collaborative resources, respectful guidance and diverse support to homeless, unaccompanied, runaway and at-risk youth in Northern and Southern Utah. I invited Nathan to tell you a little about his project.  That Eagle Scout project email address again is, ntm.eagle@gmail.com. Go there with any questions you may have. He initially set up an online Sign-up Genius account in which people could choose and sign up for items they wish to donate. Now that folks are staying home and away from stores as long as possible we thought it might be easier to receive monetary donations help,

Happy 2020!  (Instrumental Guitar music credit: Chris Richter) Today’s the very last day of the year. If you’re familiar with the Christmas song, The Twelve Days of Christmas, according to the original tradition, today would be the seventh day of Christmas. Many, including retailers have taken this 12 day tradition and used it as a countdown before the beloved holiday. Many have used it as a challenge to find 12 people or families to secretly leave gifts for on the doorstep. Every year, including this one, my husband and I have found gifts on our doorstep from givers who identify themselves and from givers who don’t. Thank you all. We appreciate your thoughtfulnes! My mom, Nora Trujillo Chatwin, would be 91 years old a few days from now. She grew up in the 1930’s in the northern New Mexican town of Taos,  where most of the residents were Catholic. Her family, even though they were not Catholic, observed with everyone else El Dia de los Reyes, on January 6th.. In English, it’s called Three Kings Day, or Epiphany. They celebrated with each child leaving an empty shoe with a note inside, under their bed or on the porch on the eve of January 5th ( the twelfth day of Christmas) to be filled with gifts from the three wise men who gave gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh to the Baby Jesus, centuries ago. Typical gifts that my mom and her siblings received were fruit and nuts. I also grew up in Taos but by the 1960’s and 70’s, my brothers and sisters and I hung  hand sewn stockings on our fireplace mantle on Christmas Eve, for Santa to place goodies inside. Most of the homes during my mom’s childhood were heated with a cast iron wood burning stove, which I think heats a room much better than a fireplace does. But you wouldn’t hang a stocking from a wood burning stove for obvious reasons, but an empty shoe under the bed worked well.  Early Christmas morning we’d find an orange in the toe, and nuts and hard ribbon candy filling the rest of the stocking. If we were lucky, our Santa would put chocolate bon bons with cream centers inside too, instead of eating them all himself. Our Santa Claus was a chocoholic, so on some years, I’ll bet Mrs. Claus rode in the sleigh with him and protected the bon bons from the Jolly Elf.  Back to Twelfth Night and the twelve days of Christmas….one common tradition is to place the statues of the three kings in the nativity set, representing the visit to the Christ child. Another fun tradition elsewhere in the world is to bake a pea and a bean inside a cake. When the cake is served, the  man who finds the bean in his slice becomes king for the night, and the woman who finds the pea becomes a queen for the night, no matter their social position. Shakespeare wrote the play, Twelfth Night to be performed as a Twelfth Night entertainment. The first known performance took place in 1602, on the Christian Holy Day of Candlemas,  February 2nd, which celebrates the presentation of the infant Jesus at the Temple.  

Hello, and welcome! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories episode 19, Mary Lee Bland. I’m your host, Carolyn Murset.   Brigham Young and the first group of Mormon pioneers arrived into the Salt Lake Valley of the American West, on July 24, 1847, where the members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints settled after being forced from Nauvoo, Illinois, and other locations in the eastern United States.   Before I continue with Mary Lee’s story, I will first explain: Following the Mexican War which ended in 1848, Utah became an official territory of the United States in 1850, and in 1896 became the 45th state to join the union.   Pioneer Day is an official holiday in Utah commemorating the arrival Brigham Young and that first group of Mormon Pioneers. Celebrations include parades, rodeos, fireworks, dressing in pioneer clothing, and re-enacting a trek.  If you’re a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and live outside of Utah, your local congregation probably observes the holiday, too.   My dad was raised in northern Utah, and his ancestors crossed the plains shortly after Brigham Young did with that first group of saints. There is a monument at the mouth of Emigration Canyon named in honor of Brigham Young’s famous statement, “This is the Place”, honoring the Mormon Pioneers as well as the explorers and settlers of the American West.  One of these explorers, Don Bernardo Miera y Pacheco is my fifth great grandfather from my mom’s Hispanic family, and was the map maker for the Dominguez Escalante Expedition in 1776. This multi talented renaissance man drew the first map of Utah. My next podcast episode will be about him.  Now, today you’ll learn about Mary Lee Bland my well loved Great, great, great grandma. She told her remarkable story  to an unnamed grand daughter who later transcribed and typed it, thus making it easier to read, copy and share. I first enjoyed reading it when I perused the stacks of family records and histories that I inherited a few decades ago. Listen to this story!   1817- I, Mary Lee Bland was born to Sarah Caldwell Lee and John Bland Jr.  in Kentucky  Years after my 3rd great grandma Mary Lee told her story, a well written 40 page history was found which revealed many more details than what I have in my three page account. These are a few of the new details: Mary Lee had blue eyes and blond hair.  Mammy Chloe was wet nurse for Mary Lee at the same time as her own son, Sammy.  William Fletcher Ewell practiced medicine among those who had no money.  Mary’s life sized portrait was in a gold frame and was saved from destruction by her brother; Zachary.    Have you started writing details about your life? Are you making progress. What questions do you wish you’d asked a family member or friend before they passed on. Family historians have encountered road blocks in verifying Mary Lee’s famous relative claims. It’s no doubt she was patriotic, though. How do you show others your patriotism.   Come back next time and I’ll tell you about a family member from my Hispanic mom’s family who ventured across the American Southwest from Santa Fe and back in 1776, while the 13 original colonies on our eastern coast were declaring their independence from Britain.    Until then subscribe to this podcast on your smartphone podcast app; or at iTunes or google play. Please Leave a five star review and a comment. Here at my website; mycarolynmurset.com have a look at my events page and my digital store. Thanks for listening. Thanks for writing. (The writing prompts are in bold lettering.)   I’m your host, Carolyn Murset.  Update: Mary Lee Bland is not a descendant of Richard Henry Lee, signer of the Declaration of Independence. They were third cousins, thrice removed. She was more closely related to Thomas Jefferson, as a second cousin, twice removed.    

Hello, and welcome! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories, episode 18, Silver Curls. I’m your host, Carolyn Murset. Every night for years, Tom, my father in law sat at the head of the dinner table. And every night after eating the last bite, he scraped the plate with a fork. And scraped. And scraped, until his wife Mary, who wore the pants in the family exclaimed, “Thomas! That’s enough!” Even though one doctor had told him he was diabetic, he managed to eat a quart of vanilla ice cream every night at bedtime. He scraped and scraped that bowl clean, too. It was one of the few little things he did to..  delight her. We often wondered how this diabetic could eat all of that without affecting his blood sugar. It never occurred to me that he never checked his blood sugar like my diabetic mom had to a couple of times a day. When I’d visit her, she’d insist on checking mine, too, just for fun. But was it fun, for me? No. I digress. Then one day, his doctor retired or died, and Tom went to another physician, who after examining him declared, “You don’t have diabetes!” Miracles happen. And so does malpractice? And Tom continued with his nightly quart of vanilla. He needed those extra calories because he worked so hard during the day maintaining his Sherman Oaks, California apartment complexes on Woodman and  Moorpark. He had a tan on his face and his arms and if you didn’t know that his parents were Swiss and Irish, you’d think he was from somewhere more mysterious and exotic, like the middle east. His wavy hair was completely silver by the time he was twenty six. My husband inherited the waves and the gray tresses and started graying the day after we got married. He was twenty two. Hmmm. At the beach at Santa Monica, or boating with the old Glaspar at the lake near our house, Tom wore a buttoned white terry cloth short jacket over his full set of clothing. Bath towels are made of terry cloth. He didn’t mind the heat. In the late 1990’s his brain function began to decline. The Alzheimer’s disease frustrated him when the mental clarity came through on occasion. He’d often say, “I just don’t know what to do! I don’t know!” Mary did all she could to take care of him herself. In 2002, she was determined to get away to Denver for five days to attend her granddaughter’s wedding, so my husband went to California and took care of his dad. Mary was already so run down from the 24 hour a day caretaking, that while in Denver, she came down with pneumonia and was in the hospital in very serious condition for three weeks. She missed the wedding, but the granddaughter, Dana and her new husband, Ryan came to the hospital afterwards in their wedding gown and tuxedo so that Mary wouldn’t miss out on everything. Once Rich and I saw that his mom wasn’t going to be coming home soon, he brought his dad home to live with us in southern Utah until he died nine months later. It took all five of us who were at home to watch Tom 24 hours a day. I don’t know how Mary did it on her own and can easily see how she ended up so close to dying for so long. After three months of being in our home, Tom’s insurance transferred and we took him to daycare at the rest home a few blocks away from us.  He’d eat a couple of meals there, make friends with the residents and staff and then we’d come and bring him home for the night. Our youngest child, Megan was eight years old, and  very bashful. She’d memorized the entire musical soundtrack of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and entertained her grandpa by singing it and acting it out for him. We were so happy to watch her make her grandpa happy that we encouraged her by buying  an Egyptian Pharaoh hat, a Carmen Miranda fruit hat and a camel mask. She gathered other costumes from our stash in the basement. Once Mary recovered from the pneumonia and returned home to California, she’d come and visit Tom every few weeks.

  Memorial Day Chrysanthemums are  now on sale at my local grocery store. It seems like the day after Mother’s Day, retailers stock their shelves with potted plants or, silk and plastic flowers and wreaths suitable for placing on the graves of loved ones. But the original meaning of the holiday, to honor those American men and women who died during combat.has become somewhat lost over the years. The holiday, was established in 1866 following the Civil War, when General John A. Logan, commander in chief of the Grand Army of the Republic,  called for a holiday commemorating fallen soldiers to be observed every May 30. It was first known as Decoration Day and was set aside to remember both Union and Confederate soldiers alike. Soldiers would decorate the graves of their fallen comrades with flowers, flags and wreaths. Memorial Day became the official title in the 1880’s, but didn’t legally become Memorial Day until 1967, when Lyndon B. Johnson was President of the United States.   In 1971,  Memorial Day was moved to the last Monday of May, so that we could have a long weekend. The Uniform Monday Holiday Act since then has also applied to our national observances of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, President’s Day, Labor Day and Columbus Day, but not Veteran’s Day, which will always be observed on November 11th. As a side note, it was originally called Armistice Day and honored the official end of World War 1 in 1918.   After World War I, Memorial Day commemorations honored not just the Civil War dead but soldiers who had died in all American conflicts. At the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington, Virginia, the President or Vice President of the United States gives a speech honoring the contributions of the dead and lay a wreath. Each year the 3rd U.S. Infantry places a small American flag before the gravestones and niches of service members buried at Arlington National Cemetary (and the U.S. Soldier’s and Airmen’s Home National Cemetery) just before Memorial Day weekend. The soldiers put flags in front of more than 260,000 gravestones and about 7,300 niches at Arlington. (Another 13,500 flags are placed at the Soldier’s and Airmen’s Cemetery.) It takes them about three hours to place them all, and then they stay at Arlington during the Memorial Day weekend to make sure the flags remain at each gravestone. I admire this  respectful and honorable practice. When I was a kid growing up in the northern New Mexico community of Taos, I attended Taos Elementary School. Physical Education, PE  Day came once a week, and since the school didn’t have it’s own gymnasium, my class would walk to the Bataan National Guard Armory and use the gym there. The enormous olive green army vehicles parked in the connecting garage  fascinated me. It would be several decades later while interviewing my mom  about her childhood and extended family that I learned about our two cousins who died while serving during World War 2. She mentioned that  cousin Moises Miera died as a prisoner during the Bataan Death march, and that another cousin, Manuel Jaime Garcia had died a few weeks after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and was listed as missing in action. My interview with her was more than 20 years ago. It took me a few more years to make the connection that the National Guard Armory, which later was sold to the town of Taos and made into a convention center, was named after the soldiers of the 200th Coast Artillery Battery H of the New Mexico National Guard who were deployed to the Phillipines in 1941 a few months before the Japanese bombs flew into the Pearl Harbor naval base on the Hawaiian island of Oahu. They were among the first Americans to engage in combat with the Japanese armed forces. I hadn’t studied the inscriptions below the memorial cross that had stood in the middle of the Taos Plaza since 1960, made possible by private donations through the War Mothers organization.

A granddaughter of mine recently celebrated her birthday. My husband and I emailed her an animated Amazon gift card. Our daughter sat her soon to be six year old in front of the computer and told her “Pick out some things you’d like with the gift card that Grandma and Grandpa sent you.” Forty-three pink and purple items totaling $1800  later, our daughter luckily caught her little one’s excitement before that “Buy Now” button was clicked on, and trimmed the shopping cart down to three sparkly choices within our gift card amount. Phew! If I have to buy something, I enjoy shopping for it online. I’m a homebody, and would buy groceries online, but my supermarket is only five blocks away from my house, so…….except for the six years I lived in a larger college city, I’ve lived in a small town for most of my life. Before the advent of  computers and online shopping, I poured over catalog pages of merchandise, picked out my kid’s birthday or Christmas presents,  filled out the paper order form, folded and stuffed it and a check inside the included envelope, attached a postage stamp to the upper right hand corner, and mailed it in.  If I was in a hurry and feeling bold, I’d actually call the 1-800 phone number and place my order with a customer service rep. I’m bashful, and had to drum up a lot of courage to speak to a complete stranger. Calling people on the phone is still hard for me, whether I know the person or not.  What can I say. (Homebody Song) I was seven years old when my family moved from the California San Fernando Valley to Taos, New Mexico, where my Hispanic mom was raised and most of her side of the family was living.   Taos was home to about 2500 residents, one stoplight, two grocery stores, a lot of art galleries, and a gas station on each corner at the intersection of north and south pueblo roads,  Kit Carson road on the east, and the road circling the plaza on the west. If you couldn’t find what you needed at JC Penney where my cousin, Bernie Garcia assistant managed, you’d go to the Montgomery Wards catalog store and place an order. (See? I learned how to shop from my parents!) Bernie’s daughter, Bernadine, was my age and I was lucky enough to be in the same second grade class with her and our cousins, Jeanie and Sharon.  Bernadine and I were also in the same Girl Scout Brownie Troop, which met in the cafeteria of the Catholic School across the fence from our elementary school. After our troop meetings, I’d walk with her to JC Penney which was just around the corner from the plaza, and wait for my dad to come and get me.     Her dad, Bernie was always friendly, and didn’t mind my roaming the shoe and clothing aisles. And, my dad was always so busy and most of the time didn’t come for me right away, so…. It was really nice of Bernie to let his eight year old relative linger. After working there for thirteen years, the company wanted to transfer him to Texas, and he and his wife, Connie were just about to do that, when they decided they didn’t want to raise their three kids there and that they’d open their own store.  So, they did, fifty years ago. Connie had grown up living close to the plaza with her family, and for five years had managed a store there, called Fry’s. She sold my mom some beautiful heavy ceramic dinnerware called Frankoma, that I didn’t inherit when mom passed away, come to think of it. Which one of you five siblings got the Frankoma?... Where am I going with this? On April 30th of this year, 2019, the Taos Plaza experienced the end of an era. The store that Bernie and Connie Garcia opened  decades ago at 110 North Plaza, which they named the Village Shop closed its doors. But the plaza wasn’t the first location of their family business. They first  rented from (the late) Rumaldo Garcia, next to Michael's Kitchen, a very popular restaurant owned by another cousin of ours. The Garcia’s sold, at their first store, The Pueblo Shop, dry goods, clothing,

Meet my guest and friend, Lauretta Swansborough. We met almost 20 years ago, when she and I were cast in A Man Who Came to Dinner. In this 2001 community theatrical production, I played the nerdy resident nurse, and she played the neighbor with the jar of pickled pigs feet. She had one line, and I had two lines, “Yes, sir!” and “No Sir!”, repeated at least twenty one times. I  got to wear comfortable nurse shoes and stuff a Whitman’s chocolate bon bon in my mouth before my character’s final exit. She got to wear a fur coat.   As Lauretta and I  spent more time off stage than on, we became good friends and learned about  the musical interests we had in common: songwriting, and singing….we continued acting, and her husband and their young son joined her on occasion. She started directing plays. I’d stopped doing that a decade earlier. She convinced me to join the band that she and her husband, Pat and another friend were forming, because they needed a mandolin player. She played the bass guitar, Pat played rhythm guitar and their friend, Wayne played lead guitar. In addition to mandolin, I also played percussion with the cajon because I don’t own or play a drum kit. We called ourselves Evening Sunrise, because none of us are spring chickens.   When the band disbanded after a couple of years, Lauretta talked me into joining John Houston’s Gospel Choir. She was a founding member and I joined the choir after the first concert. I stayed for six years and left last year to pursue and prepare for the  premier of my original one-woman musical, Tales of Tila. Take a wild guess as to who I had direct me?   She did a fantastic job of it, and hope she’ll be able to resume that role when I revive my play at the venue, Brigham’s Playhouse this September  2019. I use the word “Hope” for various reasons: Lauretta stage managed a local production of “the King and I” earlier this year, and is currently directing The Pajama Game, all while continuing with the gospel choir, doing standup comedy, dabbling in oil painting and managing a serious health concern that almost took her life a year ago. She isn’t one to sit at home and twiddle her thumbs while waiting to get on that list for that major operation.  When the health issue she’d been dealing with was identified, she wrote a beautiful and poignant letter for her family, and read it to me. It’s because of this touching prose in which she paints a picture of her love for them, that I’ve felt compelled to feature my friend, Lauretta Swansborough.

Do you have fond memories as a school child bringing a shoe box to school in mid February, covering it in red or pink paper, then gluing  on heart shaped paper doilies, or cut out paper hearts, then having your teacher or parents cutting a rectangular slit on top of the box for your school mates to insert their mini Valentine envelope treasures? I do.   And, if I was lucky, a conversation candy heart would be tucked inside, saying, “Be mine”, or “You’re far out.” Is it obvious I grew up during the 1960’s and 70's?   That was a few decades ago. My own kids did the same thing in the 1980’s, 90’s and on, and their kids probably ask their parents for an empty shoe box to take to school at the beginning of February.   According to Encyclopedia Britannica, Valentine’s Day, February 14th, when lovers show their affection with greeting cards and gifts  is very popular in the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, and in many other countries where English is not the official language. Speaking of chocolate candy, listen to this story of my husband’s parents, Tom and Mary met the first day they attended Los Angeles City College. They sat next to each other in their English class where they were filling out papers. Mary glanced over to see what the name of this good-looking, dark-haired man was . . . and saw it was Irwin Thomas Murset. She said to him, “What name do you go by?” He said, “Irwin.” Mary answered, “I will call you Tom!” He said that he never did like the name Irwin, but he never thought of changing it. After that, everyone called him Tom. After seven years of courting, they were at a family gathering at Mary’s parent’s home on Valentine’s Day. Tom, after having informed everyone but Mary of his intentions, placed an engagement ring inside a box of chocolate candy and passed it around the room. She was the last person in the circle to choose her chocolate, but…. chose the diamond ring instead.  They married August 22nd 1942 in her parent’s home in North Hollywood, California. Tom was a soft spoken, quiet man, which could explain why he courted Mary for seven years before popping the question. (Tongue Tied) This next Valentine's Day story is from my side of the family: Ida Dayton and Sylvan Chatwin, my paternal grandparents, were born in Utah, United States, in 1905. Sylvan was born in the town of Santaquin, where his Mormon Pioneer grandfather William Chatwin had settled in 1875 and had become a school teacher. In 1851 he’d  emigrated from Lancashire, England to the United States and crossed the plains with other pioneer companies. By 1920, Sylvan was 14 years old and living with his parents and brothers and sister in Provo, Utah. He was the youngest of five children, four who lived to adulthood. His brother, Wallace Wayne lived to the age of 17 and died in November of 1918, during the height of the Spanish Flu epidemic, and as World War 1 was ending. Sylvan was attending Provo High School, during the early 1920’s when lovely young Ida Dayton convinced her parents to allow her to leave their home in Vernal, Utah to go and live in Provo with her Aunt Kate, her mother’s sister. I imagine Ida was a great help to her Aunt who lost one child at birth in 1923, and another in 1924. Ida was the sixth of eleven children. Only five of them lived beyond the age of three! It was at high school where Sylvan and Ida met and fell in love, courted a few years, and a couple of years after graduation married on Valentine’s Day. This choice of a wedding date doesn’t surprise me. Grandma was a romantic.  Most of the inside of her home was painted her favorite color, a bright pink. All of the sheet music tucked inside her piano bench was romantic music of the 1930’s and 1940’s. I tried playing one of those pieces for her before she passed away in 1986.  I don’t sight read music well, and after playing a sorry rendition of “Let Me Call You Sweetheart”, she pathetically said,

Come with me, back to the year 1973. I was fifteen years old, and my older sister and brother had just spent the past decade listening to the Beatles and Simon and Garfunkel on vinyl record LP’s. I wore bell-bottom pants, and parted my long, straight hair in the middle.  I liked to sing, so all this 1970’s teen needed was a guitar to accompany herself. Paul Simon’s guitar playing spoke to me, and as for George Harrison?....Something in the way he played moved me… So, guess what I wanted for Christmas? It just so happened that my band teacher, (I played percussion, and took band in order to avoid taking Algebra 2) was about to order some classical guitars from the same company who made our band instruments, and was wondering who in the class wanted one.  I was the first to raise my hand. All my dad needed was $110 and the faith that his algebra avoiding daughter would actually play the guitar. I couldn’t pay for it. The only job I’d had up to that point other than babysitting (for 50 cents an hour) was at the Rancho Park Laundromat that my dad built.  I was an attendant, and he paid me $1.40 per hour to clean out the washing machines, scrub floors, collect dryer lint, etc. and I had to wear that red bolero and sash at the grand opening.  So, I deserved this guitar. I was delighted to find it under the  tree on Christmas morning. I named her “Peaches” because when I strummed the six nylon strings, she sounded as sweet as a ripened peach, my favorite fruit. The brand name, “Conn” was printed on the headstock, and her middle name became, “Connie”. Giving it the name, “Connor” didn’t occur to me until now,  45 years later. If you've listened to this episode:  What are some theories that you’ve had? Have any proved true? Which ones are you still... waiting... on?

  Hello and welcome!! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories. This is podcast episode 12, My Trujillo, the third bonus episode of my one-woman original musical play, Tales of Tila, which premiered at the Electric Theater, St. George, Utah in October, 2018. I am your host, Carolyn Murset.       Grandma Tila is sitting right next to me. I invited her to visit us one more time. If you’ll remember, she wasn’t here for the last episode when, I told you some of my own Christmas stories, including a couple with my other Grandma, and let you listen to some of my songs and arrangements. I asked Grandma Tila to think of some nice things to say about my Grandpa Trujillo, because his birthday is very soon, on the first day of the year. Grandma, tell them what you’ve told me.  Hello! This is Tila Miera Trujillo. You may not have expected to hear from me again. I didn’t know if I’d return with more stories after I last talked to you. Well, here I am, back for a little while. First of all, let me tell you a little more about the man I married many, many years ago: as people say, it seems like it was only yesterday.     For a Trujillo, his hair was much lighter than you’d expect. He had a lot more of it in his early years,  than he does now, so he covers his baldness with the Stetson, and tells people he wears it so he won’t get sunburned. Whether that’s true or not, it’s a good excuse. It was nice to visit with you once again. If la Carolina doesn’t beat the bushes and get on the phone, to get some more stories out of you family members, she’s going to start making up things about all of us. Are you curious to hear what she’d say about you? Here now are some things for you to write about….Have you ever saved a life? Were you as frightened as I was? Are you a noisy eater? Be honest, now. Do you eat more candy and sweets than you should? Why? I knew it.    I have no idea what la Carolina is going to talk about next time. Come back anyway and listen and be surprised. I have to go now and bake a birthday cake for my viejo. A big enough one to hold 126 candles. Hasta Luego. Happy New Year! You’ve just listened to Song Stories, Quiet Stories, Episode 12- My Trujillo. Subscribe now at iTunes or Google Play, or at mycarolynmurset.com, where you can also find the writing prompts for this episode and the others. Check out my store, and see if I

Hello and welcome!! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories. This is podcast episode 11, Winter Brown Noel.  I am your host, Carolyn Murset.      In  previous episodes, I’ve always had, or pretended to have a special guest with me. That isn’t the case today. The Christmas stories and the songs you’ll hear will be my own. As I write this, the month of December is half over. Thanksgiving came earlier this year, and many folks put their Christmas decorations up the day after that, or even a few days before then. My husband and I have been married quite a while now, and through the years have accumulated several containers full of strings of lights, garlands, and ornaments, some of which the kids and I made when they were younger. Our nest is empty now. Our three daughters who decorated the house very joyfully and festively when they lived at home have  married and moved away now. My husband and I just recently took the bins and boxes down from the shelves in the garage, where they then sat in the dining room for a few days while I summoned up the courage to open them. May the remarkable gift of the birth of our Saviour, Jesus Christ and the wondrous gift of His atonement three decades later, shine on your everything and make you feel alright. You’ve just listened to Song Stories, Quiet Stories episode 11, Winter Brown Noel. Grandma Tila will be here next time with more stories. Stories about Grandpa Trujillo. Stories about saving lives. Please make the time to write about your holiday traditions, for whichever ones you may observe, and find new ways to CELEBRATE them.  You won’t always be in this current stage of your life. Please subscribe now at mycarolynmurset.com or at iTunes or Google Play. I am your host Carolyn Murset.

Hello and welcome! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories. This is podcast episode 10, Christmas in Taos. I am your host, Carolyn Murset. This is the second bonus episode of the new original one-woman musical, Tales of Tila, which premiered at the Electric Theater in St. George, Utah, in October 2018.   I promised you earlier in this episode that I would tell you how to make biscochitos, our traditional Christmas cookie which is one of the things I gave to the children who came around to our house that morning.  Do you like the taste of black licorice?  If you don’t you may not like this cookie. I guess you could omit the anise seed, but then it wouldn’t be a biscochito, but that’s up to you.   Here goes: Don’t turn on your oven to 350 degrees just yet, because the dough might need to chill for a little while before you roll it out. Are you ready? 6 cups flour. If you’re picky, sift it. If you’re lazy, don’t. 3 teaspoons baking powder. Use an official measuring spoon, not the one you eat your posole with. 1 teaspoon salt. If you forget to add this, you’ll know it when you take the first bite. Don’t try to be healthy. You need salt to improve the flavor. Even the Bible says it’s necessary. A pound of butter or lard. You’ll only eat these cookies once a year, so go for the lard. Do you want these  to melt in your mouth, or don’t you? 1 ½ cups sugar and brush your teeth afterwards. 2 teaspoons anise seed, which tastes like black licorice and makes your cookies look like  bugs crawled into your flour sack. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. 2 eggs, be sure to thank the hens, and bring an extra one in from the coop just in case there’s an animal inside one of them. ½ cup liquid of your choice, some use milk, some use orange juice or lemonade. I don’t have experience with liquor, but I’m sure if you used it, you wouldn’t get drunk, but you might develop a taste for it. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Mix the flour and the baking powder and the salt together in one bowl, and in another bowl, with your hand mixer, cream the lard or the butter with the sugar and the anise seed on medium speed. In yet another bowl, (make one of the kids wash all of these bowls, because so far, you’ve  gotten three bowls dirty), beat the two eggs until they are frothy with bubbles and add them to the sugar mixture. Add the flour mixture and enough liquid to form a stiff dough.  You may not need the full amount of liquid that I mentioned earlier, but that doesn’t mean I lied to you. It depends on the weather, and the amount of humidity in the air.  Really, it does. Ask Betty Crocker. If you live in Taos, where it is drier than the Sahara desert, you’ll need all of that liquid. You’ve been warned! Knead the dough a little bit and roll it out to about ¼ inch thick. Cut out in your favorite shape. The traditional shape around here doesn’t require a cookie cutter.  You just need a glass to cut the circle, then a knife to cut the slits to form the arms of a crab. I don’t know where this tradition came from, because there’s no ocean around here. But the holidays sometime bring out the worst in people and their behavior sometimes resembles a….. Bake your cookies now. Oh, I forgot. You should’ve started heating your oven around the time that you started rolling the dough.  If you are rolling in the dough, then you can hire someone to do all of this for you. Before you bake them, dip each cookie in cinnamon sugar. Or just sprinkle it on if you’re lazy. Then bake for 10 minutes.  This recipe makes 5 dozen. Store them in a metal tin. A big one. Hide them from the kids and from your viejo, your old man, and…. remember where you put them.  Or have him... hide them from you. I’ve got to go now, and put my cookies in my oven, and then wrap the slippers that I crocheted for the grandkids. What are you giving away for presents this year?

Hello and welcome!! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories. This is podcast episode 9, Relatively Speaking. I am your host, Carolyn Murset. This is the first bonus episode of the new original one-woman musical, Tales of Tila, which premiered at the Electric Theater in St. George, Utah, in October 2018. My special guest, Grandma Tila will arrive any minute now. Episodes 1-7 go in order chronologically. so if you haven’t yet listened to those episodes in this series, it might be a good idea to do that now, then come back. That would give her more time to get here. This bonus episode stands alone, though. Many thanks to those of you who have  sent me your story contributions. Don’t be surprised if you hear them in a minute or two! Are you listeners ready to get your Spanglish on?    Hola!  This is Tila Miera Trujillo.  Not really, it’s her granddaughter, la Carolina pretending to be me. I don’t mind. Don’t you think it’s time for her to  be brave enough to be herself and use her own voice. Because of her, some of you have listened to my other stories and said to yourself, “Why in the heck would she do something like that?” She must really love me. Listeners, what are some of the ways that you communicate with your family and friends when you are not standing right in front of of them?  I’m not talking about yelling at each other from across the room, or the yard. And don’t tell me you have one of those crop duster airplanes and write your messages in the sky.  Don’t be silly. I’ve heard that your telephones nowadays are NOT connected to the wall, and that you can use them to type and read the messages? That’s too easy! Get a pen and paper, an envelope and a postage stamp! Listen now and find out  how my young niece, Simonita and her suitor, Fred courted each other. Find out who their matchmaker was.  Believe it or not, it wasn’t me. Find out how her parents felt about it when he proposed and the surprising thing her father did.  If you have ever been married, and are happy about it, how long was your engagement?  How did both sets of parents feel about It? Where was the very first place you lived? If you haven’t  married, and wish that you could someday, how would you like it all to happen? Closing Tag: You’ve just listened to the first bonus episode of  the new musical, Tales of Tila. Don’t be sad! La Carolina is gathering more stories and tales from my grandchildren and other relatives, and we’ll be back to tell and sing them to you. I hope they’re saying nice things about me.   Do you want to hear my earlier musical stories? Maybe you’ve missed a few episodes of this podcast? La Carolina would be so grateful if you’d listen to them. Contact me and let me know how you’re doing with the writing prompts. You can find them in bold lettering in the notes for this episode and the others here  at “mycarolynmurset.com”. You can also subscribe to this podcast, and check out my events page. Thanks for listening. Thanks for writing. This is your host, Carolyn Murset, aka, la Carolina.

Follow @mursetcarolyn Hello, and welcome! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories. This is podcast Episode number 8, Ghost Stories by Gary Payne. I am your host, Carolyn Murset. We interrupt  our regular programming  because it will soon be Halloween. It’s nothing to be afraid of, unless you’ve tried to move to a different location in order to retire and your respite lasts all of a couple of weeks. You may not have seen Gary Payne onstage here  in southern Utah. For the past decade and a half, practically every time I’ve attended or volunteered at a cultural event, Mr. Payne, the unsung hero of the local theater scene  has been there, too, sometimes ushering, or taking tickets. But most of the time he’s served before the play even opens, building sets or gathering props. I’ve watched him herd large performing groups at  important fundraisers, too. Frightening? Absolutely. His fearless life focuses on God First, Family 2nd and  supporting the community he lives in, 3rd. At the young age of eight, Gary began collecting music and was a Disk Jockey for an Ice Arena, school and church dances and private parties. Around music all of his life, he doesn’t play an instrument or sing a note. Scary? You decide. This gentleman hikes, travels, serves others in his church congregation, enjoys photography and the theater. So why his fascination with ghosts, none other than the previous inhabitants of wherever and whatever the living now occupy? Shy and reserved, and getting sick to his stomach at a young age if he had to be on stage, preferring behind the scenes to the spotlight, Gary now finds solace and strength putting pen to paper. Follow me now, to The Apple Tree, and then listen to The Golden Shovel. You’ve just listened and  perhaps, shivered, to Song Stories,  Quiet Stories Episode eight, Ghost Stories, by Gary Payne.  Come back next time for the first bonus episode of the new musical. Tales of Tila. Before you do, answer and write about these questions: “What things have you borrowed that you couldn’t return? What kind of treasures do you search for?” You haven’t found any yet?  Look in front of you. You might be surprised to find something wonderful that’s been there all along.” Grandma Tila will join me soon and tell of more mischief she accomplished as a child, and as an adult. Are you surprised? Subscribe to this podcast here my website, mycarolynmurset.com, or at iTunes or Google Play, so you don’t miss a thing. Check out my events  and my store page, and keep those earbuds in your pocket more often. Go and talk to someone. In person. Face to face. Volunteer for a worthy cause and tell Gary Payne “hello” for me. Find his name in the playbill or program for whatever local theatrical or musical production or fundraiser you’re attending.  This is your host, Carolyn Murset.

Follow @mursetcarolyn Hello, and welcome! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories. This podcast Episode, The Temple and the Ledger, is number seven in the series from the new musical, Tales of Tila. I am your host, Carolyn Murset.     My special guest, Grandma Tila will arrive any minute now, so if you haven’t yet listened to the earlier episodes in this series, it might be a good idea to do that now, then come back. No worries if you don’t listen in order.  The stories might make more sense if you did though. Many thanks to those of you who have  already sent me your story contributions.  Don’t be surprised if they show up in a later episode! Are you listeners ready to get your Spanglish on?  Hola!  This is Tila Miera Trujillo.  What are some of the ways that you communicate with your family and friends when you are not standing right in front of of them?  I’m not talking about yelling at each other from across the room, or the yard. And don’t tell me you write messages on paper airplanes and fly them  to each other. Don’t be silly. I’ve heard that your telephones nowadays are really fancy and are NOT connected to the wall? I…. don’t believe everything I hear. Listen now and find out  how Trujillo and I left messages for each other. Find out who drove me and the kids who were still living at home  the eleven hour journey to Mesa, Arizona, and how long it took my stubborn viejo to change his mind about going there with me. What is the longest you’ve had to wait for a loved one or friend to change their mind about something worthwhile that you really wanted them to do. What?  You’re still waiting? Don’t lose hope.                     Closing Tag: You’ve just listened to the last scene of Tales of Tila.  Don’t be sad! La Carolina is gathering more stories and tales from my grandchildren and other relatives, and we’ll be back to tell and sing them to you. I hope they’re true and flattering, though.  Do you want to hear my earlier musical stories? Maybe you’ve missed a few episodes of this, what is this thing that you’re listening to called? A podcast? La Carolina would be so grateful if you’d listen to them! This is what you should do- she wants you to subscribe, either here, or at iTunes or Google Play. (Sometimes I feel like I’m speaking a foreign language.) That little square photo of me on the store page is a good one,  isn’t it? That was taken when Nora was a baby. My hair is combed, nicely, and I’m pretending she isn’t screaming her head off while my mother bounces her, off to the side of that backdrop, because six year old Lula took away her rattle. I tell you, these kids.  Hasta luego. Until later!   You've just listened to Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast, Episode 7, The Temple and the Ledger, from the new musical, Tales of Tila. Contact me and let me know how you’re doing with the writing prompts. You can find them in bold lettering in the notes for this episode and the others here at “mycarolynmurset.com”. Subscribe to this podcast, and check out my events page. Thanks for listening. Thanks for writing. This is your host, Carolyn Murset, aka, la Carolina.    

Hello, and welcome!  This podcast Episode, The Secret City, is number six in the series from the new musical, Tales of Tila. I am your host, Carolyn Murset.   If you haven’t yet listened to the earlier episodes in this series, it might be a good idea to do that now, then come back.  The stories might make more sense if you listened in order. Many thanks to those of you who have  already sent me your story contributions. It would be wonderful if more of you family members sent me stories. I’m waiting for your memories of Christmastime at Grandma Tila’s house. Remember the wall to wall kids sleeping on the floor in the living room next to the Christmas tree? The biscochito cookies?  Hola!  This is Tila Miera Trujillo.  Not really, it’s her granddaughter, la Carolina pretending to be me. I don’t mind. I keep waiting for her to  be brave enough to be herself and use her own voice. But because of her, some of you have listened to my other stories and said to yourself, “Why in the heck would she do something like that?” I imagine she has a little free time now and then? Listen now and find out where Trujillo and I went during our spare time on the weekends, and who came with us. Learn about the next  devastating worldwide event and how it affected our family. Learn how my Trujillo, our older sons and nephews became involved. Which family members or friends of yours have served in the armed forces?  When and where did they serve? Find out what my husband might have had to repair because of my, uhhh, inexperience with uhh,  well, just listen! Closing: Come back next time to learn one of the ways Trujillo and I communicated with each other. Find out who drove me and the kids who were still living at home  the eleven hour journey to Mesa, Arizona, and how long it took my husband to change his mind about going there with me. Do you want to hear my other musical stories?  La Carolina would be so grateful if you’d listen to them!  She wants you to subscribe, either there, or at iTunes or Google Play. (I’m still learning about all of these new inventions, because  I’ve been gone since 1971, and have only used the radio, the telephone, the camera and what was that other thing…. Oh, We got a TV right before my Trujillo left. Black and white picture.  Someone told me there would be televisions with a color picture someday. I also heard that you could get phone calls from your wristwatch. I think who ever told me about that last thing was making it up. Mentiroso!  I get so distracted! Now. Then, look for the little brown square with my picture on it, with the words, Tales of Tila.    You’ll know what to do from there. From what I hear lately, a three year old could show you how. That little square photo of me is a good one,  isn’t it? That was taken when Nora was a baby, in 1930. My hair is combed, nicely, and I’m pretending she isn’t screaming her head off while my mother bounces her, off to the side of that backdrop, because six year old Lula is making faces at her.  Hasta luego. Until later!   You've just listened to Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast, Episode 6, The Secret City, from the new musical, Tales of Tila. Contact me and let me know how you’re doing with the writing prompts. You can find them in bold lettering in the notes for this episode and the others here, at “mycarolynmurset.com”. You can also subscribe to this podcast, and check out my events page. Thanks for listening. Thanks for writing. This is your host, Carolyn Murset, aka, la Carolina. 

Hello, and welcome! This is Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast episode, La Familia,  number five in the series from the new musical, Tales of Tila. This is your host, Carolyn Murset. If you haven’t yet listened to Episodes Zero, and One through Four in this series, it might be a good idea to do that now, then come back. No worries if you don’t listen in order.  The stories might make more sense if you did, though.  Thank you, Carlos, Lynn, Irene, Sam and  Mary for sending me your story contributions. Don’t be surprised if they show up in a later episode! I’m now also looking for Christmas stories at Grandma Tila’s house. Remember the wall to wall kids sleeping on the floor in the living room? The empanaditas?  Are you ready to get your Spanglish on?  Hola!  This is Tila Miera Trujillo.  Not really, it’s her granddaughter, la Carolina pretending to be me. I don’t mind. One of these days, she’s going to  be brave enough to be herself and use her own voice. But because of her, some of you have listened to my other stories and wondered, “Why in the heck would she do something like that?” I was only seventeen years old when I married, and eighteen when I had my first baby. Nothing prepares you for the loss of a child.  Those of you who have had that happen to you, will know what I’m talking about. Have any of you lost more than one? More than two? It doesn’t get any easier, does it?  If you haven’t written about it yet, you might want to give it a try.  No matter how long it’s been since it happened, writing about it could help ease the pain. So, listen now and learn how Trujillo and I kept the kids, even the little ones, occupied inside and outside of the house.  Learn which child the kids thought was their father’s favorite, and what he brought home from work for that child. When your parents came home from work, or from a trip away from home, what special things did they bring you?   They didn’t bring you anything?? Not even a penny candy? Think harder, while, you listen… Closing tag: Thank you, Señor Strang for playing the conga once again. Me gusta mucho. I’m afraid you were born a few decades late. I would have enjoyed listening to you while I chopped all of those cabbages.   Oye, listeners, do you like my soundtrack? I do, too. It would have been wonderful to have musicians like these ones you’re now listening to while I talk and sing,  playing outside my window all the time. Yes, my Trujillo was a musician too, but he had other things to do besides serenading his vieja all the time. If you could have a soundtrack for your life, what kinds of musical instruments would you want? Violin? Guitar? Conga? Mandolin? Accordian? De veras? Really.  Well, I’m not surprised. I like it too!   Come back next time to listen and find out where Trujillo and I went on the weekends. Learn about the next  devastating worldwide event and how it affected our family. Learn how my Trujillo, our older sons and nephews became involved. Do you want to hear my other musical stories?  La Carolina would be so grateful if you’d listen to them!  She wants you to subscribe, either here at this website, or at iTunes or Google Play.     (Somebody, please write to me and tell me about all of these new inventions.  I’ve been gone since 1971, and I have only used the radio, the telephone, the camera and what was that other thing…. Oh, We got a TV right before my Trujillo left. Black and white picture.  Someone told me there would be televisions with a color picture someday. Is that true?) That little square photo of meon the store page is a good one,  isn’t it? That was taken when Nora was a baby, in 1930. My hair is combed, nicely, and I’m pretending she isn’t screaming her head off while my mother bounces her, off to the side of that backdrop.   Hasta luego. Until later! You've just listened to Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast, Episode 5, La familia, from the new musical, Tales of Tila.

Hello, and welcome! You’re listening to Song Stories, Quiet Stories. This podcast Episode, El Presidente Trujillo, is number four in the series from the new musical, Tales of Tila. This is your host, Carolyn Murset. If you haven’t yet listened to Episodes Zero, One, Two and Three, please do so now, then come back.  Thank you, Carlos, Lynn, Irene, Sam and  Mary for sending me your contributions. Don’t be surprised if they show up in a later episode! Are you ready to get your Spanglish on? Hola!  This is Tila Miera Trujillo.  Not really, it’s her granddaughter, la Carolina pretending to be me. I don’t mind. One of these days, she’ll be brave enough to be herself and use her own voice.   But because of her, some of you have listened to my stories and wondered, “Why in the heck would she do something like that?” I was only seventeen years old when I married, and by that time, I made pretty good tortillas and chile. Even good enough for my widowed mother in law, who lived  nearby. Her son, my new and stubborn husband was  away from home much of the time. He got to cook for himself as shepherds often do,  because I stayed home and took care of his mother. His stubborn mother. Can I say that? More power to those of you listeners who get along with your inlaws. But may I say, “Must we eat lamb every day? Must I sweep the dirt floor every day? The windows are clean!” I would hide her glasses if she owned a pair, but unfortunately, her vision is so good, she doesn’t need them. Well, she says she doesn’t. So, listen now and learn what a patient and long suffering wife I had to be from the start of my life as Mrs. JM Trujillo. Learn what church activities kept me and my viejo (my old man) occupied. Find out which important guests I had the priveledge to hostess. Find out whether or not... I accomplished any more, um, mischief.  I’m assuming you’ve gotten away with committing a prank or two when you were younger. What kinds of things have you been able to pull off, not that I’m encouraging you to be a mischief maker? Really?  Just last week, huh?  Hmm!….Listen. Closing tag: Thank you, Señor Strang for the conga solo. Me gusta mucho. I’m afraid you were born a few decades late. We would have enjoyed listening to you while we ran of tortillas at that last bake sale and had to hurry and make more on the spot while the disappointed customers watched. And waited. Not so patently. It would have cheered up all of us. And I  might not have accidentally, oh, never mind. Oye, listeners, What kinds of worthwhile and wholesome fundraising activities have you participated in.  How close to your goal did you get? What did you run out of? Come back next time to listen and find out how many more children my husband and I had.  Learn who my kids thought was their father’s favorite child, and who was a really fast runner.   Do you want to hear my other musical stories? La Carolina would be so grateful if you’d listen to them, and  subscribe to this podcast, either here at this website or at iTunes or Google Play. (Somebody, please write to me and tell me about all these new inventions.  I’ve been gone since 1971, and I only know the radio, the telephone, and…. Oh, We got a TV right before my Trujillo left. Black and white picture.  What other kind is there?) Then, look for the little brown square with my picture on it, with the words, Tales of Tila. You’ll know what to do from there. From what I hear lately, a three year old could show you how. That little square photo of meon this website store page is a good one,  isn’t it? That was taken when Nora was a baby, in 1930. My hair is combed, nicely, and I’m pretending she isn’t in desperate need of a diaper change while my mother bounces her, off to the side of that backdrop.   Hasta luego. Until later!   You've just listened to Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast, Episode 4, El Presidente Trujillo, from the new musical, Tales of Tila.

Hello, and welcome! This is Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast Episode Three, The Great War, from the new musical, Tales of Tila.  If you haven’t yet listened to Episodes Zero, One and Two, please do it now, then come back. By that time our special guest might be here. She’s promised to visit us during the next four episodes, and I’d love for her to come for more than that, but that will only happen if more of you family members send me stories. Thank you, Carlos, Lynn, Irene, Sam and  Mary for sending me yours. Don’t be surprised if they show up in a later episode! Are you ready to get your Spanglish on? Oh!  She just walked in. I didn’t hear her knock. Let’s see if she closes the door behind her. Nope! Hola!  This is Tila Miera Trujillo.  Not really, it’s her granddaughter, la Carolina pretending to be me. I don’t mind. One of these days, she’ll be brave enough to use her own voice, and be herself.  But, because of her, some of you have listened to my stories and my tales and wondered, “Why in the heck would she do something like that?” I only went to high school for one year. The boarding school in Santa Fe was a two days journey by wagon and by train. Letters to and from familia took forever to arrive, and by the time you read them, any news was old news. LIsten now and find out why I wanted to stay home, and didn’t return. It’s a good thing that I didn’t, for all kinds of reasons, bad and good. Before you listen to the story, let me ask you: Have you ever made hurtful comments to, or had hurtful thoughts about someone who died soon after?  What did you say? How have you dealt with your regret? And now, the story: Come back next time to listen and find out what my husband did for a living when we first got married. Learn what church activities kept us busy, and the best way to raise money for an important project.   Do you want to hear my other musical stories? La Carolina would be so grateful if you’d listen to them!   La Carolina  wants you to subscribe, either there, or at iTunes or Google Play. (I have no idea what this means!  I’m telling you, I’ve been gone since 1971, and I only know the radio, the telephone, and…. the light bulb!)  From what I hear lately, a three year old could show you how. That little square photo of me on the STORE page is a good one,  isn’t it? That was taken when Nora was a baby, in 1930. My hair is combed, nicely, and I’m pretending I can’t hear or see her crying while my mother bounces her, off to the side of that backdrop.  And did you see the photo of the three soldiers and the paper moon at the website? Juan Manuel is the one on the left. He had lot more hair back then, but don’t tell him he’s bald. Hasta luego. Until later! You've just listened to Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast, Episode 3, The Great War, from the new musical, Tales of Tila. Contact me and let me know how you’re doing with the writing prompts. You can find them in bold lettering above in the notes for this episode. Check out my events page. Thanks for listening. Thanks for writing. This is your host, Carolyn Murset, aka, la Carolina. 

Click on the player's triangle above to listen. Hello, and welcome! This is Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast Episode Two, Boarding School for Girls, from the new musical, Tales of Tila. This is your host, Carolyn Murset. If you haven’t yet listened to Episode Zero and Episode One, please, do it now, then come back. By that time our special guest might be here. She’s promised to visit us during the next five episodes, and I’d love for her to come for more than that, but that will only happen if you family members send me stories.  Hola!  This is Tila Miera Trujillo.  Not really, it’s her granddaughter, la Carolina pretending to be me. One of these days, she’ll be brave enough to use her own voice, and just be herself.  But, because of her, some of you have listened to my stories and my tales and wondered, “Why in the heck would she do something like that?” I was a mashishi, a mischief maker. You’ve been one, too? Oh.  Then you’ll know what it’s like to battle with your conscience. Who wins the arguments between you and that little voice inside your head?                 I’ve often wondered,  if there had been a high school in Taos in 1916, would my parents have sent me away to the boarding school for girls in Santa Fe? If I had stayed at home, would I have had to keep making the tortillas, day in and day out? How long would it have been until I tasted peanut butter, or ridden in a train? And what about  algebra? What was your favorite subject in school? And who was your best, your favorite teacher? Did you understand algebra? I never did get how an ‘a’ plus a ‘b’ could possibly equal a ‘c’  ! Today’s story begins very early in the day.  I think my parents and I woke the rooster! I just wanted to climb in the wagon with my father, pick up my friend, travel the forty miles and catch the train to the school! Who wants to eat breakfast, and have tidy hair and nails and teeth on a day like this one !? Listen the the episode by using the player at the top. In Closing: Come back next time to listen and find out why, after my first year at the school in Santa Fe, I came back home and didn’t return. I’ll tell you about the terrible world events and the wonderful things that changed my life, too.  Do you want to hear my other musical stories?  One of the places is on iTunes. (Don’t ask me what that is.  I don’t know. I’m telling you, I’ve been gone 47 years and all I know is the radio, the telephone, and…. the light bulb!) Search for Carolyn Murset. Then, look for the little brown square with my picture on it, with the words, Tales of Tila.    You’ll know what to do from there. From what I hear lately, a three year old could show you how.  Whether you have an Apple or an Android device la Carolina says you can find the stories at the Store page on this website.  By the way,....That’s a good photo of me, in that little brown square, isn’t it? That was taken when Nora was a baby, in 1930. My hair is combed, nicely, and I’ve washed the peanut butter off my hands! Ha ha. Hasta luego. Until later! You've just listened to Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast, Episode 2, Boarding School for Girls, from the new musical, Tales of Tila. Contact me and let me know how you’re doing with the writing prompts. You can find them in bold lettering in the notes for this episode and the others on the Home Page on this website.  Once there, you can also subscribe to this podcast, and check out my events page. Thanks for listening. Thanks for writing. This is your host, Carolyn Murset, aka, la Carolina. 

Hello, and Welcome! This is Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast, Episode 1, Tortilla Tale, from the brand new musical, Tales of Tila.   We’ll have a special guest with us, these next seven episodes. I wish she could stay with us longer, but that could only happen if you relatives out there sent me more stories…Are you ready to get your Spanglish on?  Here she is! Hola. This is Tila Miera Trujillo.  Actually, it’s her granddaughter, la Carolina pretending to be me. She’s too shy to use her own voice, to just be herself. But, because of her, some of you have listened to my stories and my tales, and wondered, “Why the heck would she do something like that?”  My life was ordinary. My first batches of tortillas were crispy, until I prayed for help. I argued with my mother, and when they sent me away to boarding school in Santa Fe in 1916 to make something of my life, I stole peanut butter from the cafeteria. I didn’t learn to drive, and never traveled further away than California, and most of the houses I lived in were made of mud, adobe. Nowadays in New Mexico, you pay more money for the kind of house I lived in. I left in 1971.   My husband, Juan Manuel had already been gone three years. I was diabetic, and my heart was failing. Carolina was 13 years old. She let me have her bedroom for a few months, so her mother, my daughter Nora, could take care of me before I spent my last days in the hospital. My heart eventually stopped. If you’ve listened to my musical story, Tales of Tila, you might remember that I wrote things down before I left. It’s harder to get things down on paper after you leave. You can whisper and talk into someone’s ear all you want,  but the living always wonder whether it really is you speaking to them, or just their imagination! So here, you have it. The story behind my stories. Carolina was always interested in our past and inherited the family history records.  She found my personal history that I wrote when I was 57, which included my ‘crispy tortilla tale’, which you have to admit, is a pretty good story to begin a story with. Somewhere out there in my family’s possession is an old, blurry, unflattering black and white photo of me as a teen, holding a shovel, working in the garden. It’s in that garden  where my first tale begins! Listen!  In closing, let me ask you, What did other kids tease you about when you were growing up? Did you ever pray for help? If so, what kind of answers did you get? What were your household duties when you were a child? Come back next time to listen to  me battle with my conscience at the school. Find out who wins the battle. Do you want to hear the other musical stories, too?  Take a look at the store page. You can buy all seven of my Tales separately, but save your money!  Get the whole thing together. By the way,....That’s a good photo of me, on the CD cover, isn’t it? That was taken when Nora was a baby, in 1930. My hair is combed, nicely, and I’m not holding a shovel ! Oh, one last thing: la Carolina asked me to tell you to subscribe to this podcast.  I’m guessing you know what that means? Is that like when you order a magazine or a newspaper? Anyway, it’s been nice talking to you.  I’ll come back in a couple of weeks. You’ve just listened to Song Stories podcast, Episode 1, Tortilla Tale, from the musical, Tales of Tila, with your host, Carolyn Murset, aka, la Carolina.

Follow @mursetcarolyn Hello, and welcome!  This is Song Stories, Quiet Stories podcast, Episode Zero!  I live a quiet life as many of you do, out of the spotlight.  I'm a friendly, half-Hispanic grandma, singer/songwriter tortilla maker. I obsess about a few things, and one of my passions,.... Is keeping a journal and writing a personal history.     I have volumes and volumes of handwritten, type-written, digital, and photo journals. I want you to keep one, too, if you don’t already.  You don’t have to obsess about it, and you can call it whatever you want. Just write something about the everyday quiet, or noisy things you do.  Your life is probably more interesting than you think it is.      In my upcoming episodes, I’m going to tell you stories with songs, about people I know or have known who lead quiet, influential lives.      And then, I’m going to give you one or two writing prompts from the theme you’ll hear in the song story. You’ll have a couple of weeks to toss around ideas of what to write, and then I’ll be back with another song story, and more writing prompts.  No pressure. But, if you choose to write, you’ll be glad you did. People you care about will be glad you did. I will be glad you did, and I would love for you to let me know how you’re doing with it.     I grew up in the 1960’s in Taos, New Mexico. I learned to play the guitar and wrote my first song while I was in high school during the 1970’s. Listen to hear how my Dad repaired my first guitar.     I listened along with my older brother and sister to the Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, and Credence Clearwater Revival.  When they left home, I added Linda Ronstadt, and Fleetwood Mac to the stack of LP’s my siblings left behind, and the tunes wafting through the wooden record player console eventually evolved through the decades into my iTunes playlist, with a little Allison Kraus, Chris Proctor,  and Maisy & Lennon thrown in with the predecessors. What genres of music do you listen to?     Because of these musical influences, I consider myself to be a folksy / bluegrassy singer who can’t write a song without inserting a flat 7 chord here and there. If you were a songwriter, what style of song would you write?   My remarkable five children and their incredible spouses have given me and my husband, Rich, thirteen grandchildren!  Some of these youngsters jam with me in my music studio, and some of them dance with me.     So that you don’t envy my life, I want you to know that I don’t sleep enough at night, I scrub the toilet and shower, and make the beds for my AirBnB. I just changed my cat’s disgusting litter box (and I’m allergic to cats!) and I can only eat carrots, broccoli, and chicken without breaking out.  Sometimes I eat the broccoli first.         Did  you listen to my procrastination song, Somethin’ Else?  I’m really good at putting things off. I think I might be addicted to FaceBook and not keeping house, as you’ll hear in the song after that, Domestic Desperation.  What unpleasant tasks do you put off? Do you have any avoidance behaviors?     So come back next time for episode #1.  Subscribe now, here, at mycarolynmurset.com or iTunes, so you don’t miss it.     Awhile back, my siblings  appointed me as the family historian, probably because I’d kept a journal for years and had shown interest in our family ancestry.  Soon after they piled the family records onto my lap, I came across my Grandma Tila’s personal history.          In it, she tells how at age ten she was the family bread maker, and when her older brothers would come home from working in the fields, they’d grab her tortillas  from off the table, eat them, and call them crackers.     So she goes into the garden and in between the rows of corn, prays for help.  I knew as soon as I read this story that I had to do something with it. So, por favor,  come back for episode one and hear the rest of the Tortilla T...