Frontier House Application

Frontier House
OFFICIAL APPLICATION
Family Name: Thomson Family

Occupations/Schools: Student/Langley Middle School


Open answer questions (attach additional pages. All questions must be answered.):
What attracted you to this project?
I love the outdoors life. I've been on "survival" trips before in my school's Adventure Education class. The weather of Washington is unpredictable, just like Montana's weather, and I like weather like that. I'd also like an opportunity to see what it was really like back then.

What hobbies and interests do you have?
I like to draw, sing, write, hike, and climb. Hiking and climbing kind of go together, especially on rough trails and in the woods. Writing is a strong point, and so is singing. Drawing is fun when I have enough time to be focused.

What image do you have of pioneer living?
My image of pioneer life is that living in the wilderness was very hard to do. There was always something that needed to be done. If you were a pioneer, you always had a job to do: take care of livestock, plow a field, build a shelter of some kind. You had to build your cabin from the ground.

What's the most challenging thing you and your family (or group) have experienced?
I think that the most challenging thing my family and I have experienced was my father's issues with his family. We aren't very close to any of his family (except my grandmother and aunt) anymore. I miss them, but I never knew them very well in the first place.

If you were chosen what do you think you would most miss about modern life?
I think something that I would miss most about modern life is having my own space. I know that if we are chosen, we'll have to build our own cabin and that it will probably have only one or two rooms. That's okay though, because I'm used to not having my own space. My brother and I slept in a room the size of a medium-sized walk-in closet for seven years.

What qualities do you and your family have that make you suited to this experience?
I think that my family and I are very realistic thinkers. We face each challenge as it comes, and solve the problem logically. I think that my family is also good at working together and fixing things. My father is a carpenter, so he's good at working with wood and metals. My mother is good with numbers, so she would do the shopping (she can build things too), and my brother and I would be able to help them both.

What skills do you have that may help you?
I think a skill that I have that will help me is the skill I have with animals. My family lives on a farm, so there's always a lot to do. Most of the work I do has to do with the house and the animals. I knock challenges out of the way one at a time, and if I can, multiple problems at a time.

What would you hope to get out of the experience?
I hope that my family and I can come out of this experience getting along better. If we can develop some kind of system out there and incorporate it into everyday life in the 21st century, all the better. I also hope that we can come to some kind of understanding on the subject of chores.

What do you think will be the most difficult challenge of pioneer life?
I think that one of the most difficult challenges we would face in pioneer life is building our cabin. Every one of us would have to work together. Cutting hay in the summer would also be a challenge, since that requires some strength and endurance, but I think we would definitely be able to do it.

What skills would you like to learn from the experience?
I would like to learn some skills like carpentry and cooking. I would especially like to learn more cooking and cleaning skills, sine they would be nice to have in the 21st century.

We'd like you to tell us:
What interests you about this project?
I'm interested in this project because I'd like to know what it was like for people back then. Coming to the west had to be hard, but setting up a life here must have been extremely challenging.

Do you have any concerns about your participation?
One of my concerns about participating is illnesses that one could get while on the frontier. They could be very dangerous.

How much do you know about your family history -- do you have pioneer roots?
As far as I know, my father's family doesn't have pioneer roots. However, they had to get to the West Coast somehow. It's the same with my mother's family: we don't know how they got here, just that they did.

How did you hear about Frontier House?
My class watched Frontier House.

Rabbit Show

Lone Birch's Miranda

My rabbit got Best of Breed on Saturday (March 7, 09)! She got Best of Breed Netherland Dwarf in the Open show, which means I beat all the adult breeders. She should get a "leg" from winning.

And before you say I'm crazy, she does have four legs. I mean "leg" as in "leg of Grand Champion." Once we get her registered, she can get a Grand Champion certificate if she gets another "leg" as a senior. She has three "legs" right now, but she needs to win one as a senior in order to be granded.

She also got second in breed in the Youth show, losing to one of our friend's rabbits. They traded places between Open and Youth (he got second in Open). Her rabbits are really nice. In the words of Cindy, that one is "a nationally competitive rabbit."

Yep, so this show was in Yelm. My mom and I almost froze to death. It traded between snow, rain, hail, and the cold sun almost all day. Some of the hail even came through the roof of the arena. All of SanDee's rabbits got wet. And there was absolutely no parking by the time we got there (an hour early).

These rabbit shows might sound miserable, but that depends on the weather. One of the shows in June apparently has an indoor pool, so it's not all bad. No, actually, they're really fun. I've made friends in the rabbit business, particularly the Netherland Dwarf breeders. It's all just friendly competition.

Just wanted to announce that to the world.

That's all for now!

Bye!

~Cassie

Intimate Conversation Poem: Dear Father

I wrote this poem a while ago, when my dad got mad at me for saying something to my brother.

Clarification on the comparisons: "his silver tongue" means he's tricky with words. "Made it crystal clear" as in made it clear as a crystal. "Falsehood will drip from your lips" means what he says is a lie. Those are the metaphors I used. They aren't quite metaphors, but I think they work.



Dear Father,

I meant it when I said it
See, I'd never tell a lie
A dislike strong or intense
You're just too hard-hearted - pitiless
Maybe that's why you don't get it when I cry

There's just something about that boy
The way he teases me
It's like a physical blow
I hate it, but I can't stop smiling

It's just something I do
I don't really mean to
Just another involuntary action
But he uses my sinking smile like it's
His cue

There's nothing I wouldn't do
To get away from him these days
So stay away from me
Until you can see through that dark haze

I'm not afraid of him, no
Only his silver tongue I fear
He can turn anyone against me
Without a single care
It's unbelievable

It's hard enough as it is
Every day is painful
For me, this house isn't worth living in as long as he's here
I hope I've made it crystal clear

You might think I'm better than this
I know I am
And if you ever apologize (I know you won't; you never do)
Don't assume I'll accept
'Cause falsehood will drip from your lips

You'll do it again
Yell, shout, throw a hissy fit
I have more tears to cry
And yet you still won't get it

Writing Contest

I am lost for words. I don't think that's ever happened before.

I won the Whidbey Island Writer's Association's Students Celebrate Writing Contest. It was an all-ages contest (grades 6 - 12), and I was the youngest to win something.

I'm just glad I knew and I didn't have like... a heart attack in class. That would have been bad. Real bad.

Mr. B. asked me to post the story here, so this is it. (It's in italics.)

Never Seen

Darkness fell across a wild land. Brambles reared; tree limbs reached, gnarled, for the indigo sky. In only a few places, green sprouted, though seldom did it share its emerald wealth with the other twisted, blackened weeds surrounding it.

Ruins of old stone buildings and houses protruded from the ground, grey mists lingering around their broken walls, shrouding the ghosts of a once cheery little village. White pillars rose northeast of this small skeleton of a town, rising from the wreckage that circled them. The crawling, withered plants and briars hadn’t flourished near those four marble columns.

A desolate manor house, covered with peeling, white paint, sprawled within the boundaries of the colorless pillars, its windows thrown open. Fog rolled in and out of the windows on the lower floors of the house, where nothing but mold and mildew from the Great Flood lived. Ghostly white curtains hung out of every window on the upper floors of the building, fluttering in a non-existent breeze.

Inside, a young woman sat in a window seat, alone in the house; a miniature harp in her hands. Bright cushions and blankets covered every surface, but the atmosphere was far gloomier than the warm furnishings.

For all the oranges, reds and golds of the fall colors, the woman wore a deep, dull blue; a blue of sadness and pain. Her dress was long and full; folds of it draped themselves over the edge of her seat. For a while, she stared out the window. Losing everything had left no desire to play her harp, even after years of waiting. Her brothers and sisters had been washed out of the house with everything on the bottom floors when the Flood had hit. Her parents had gone missing as well. She was numb.

Years passed, and nothing remarkable happened. She watched as ivy crept up the marble pillars, and then up the walls of her house. She never slept; never ate. How could she, when they might all appear when she was asleep? Hope kept her hanging on; grief fed her hunger, quenched her thirst, and kept her eyes open.

She felt every day like a stab of a knife cutting at her threads of hope. Every day, another string was hacked in half. She wouldn’t give up though. Never would she lose faith in her family.

Her fingers became weak after half a decade of holding the harp in the same place. It dropped to the tiled floor, falling as if in slow motion. When it hit, the sound of the mixed up chords broke the spell of silence. Carefully picking up her harp, she put it back on the window seat, and avoided looking at it for as long as she could stand.

She went about her business: eating and sleeping again, dusting her room and cleaning it. She wondered where her family was, but never longed for them. Her six brothers and sisters; her mother and father were distant memories. She never stepped outside her room, though, for fear the she should be reminded that they had walked down those hallways in the morning to wake her up with their music.

She plucked at the harp strings for the first time in ages; the first music in the house was the haunting melodies of her harp, expertly played. As she played the last song she could think of, a loud boom! was heard from below.

The noise had come from the first story, where she never went.

She knew she had to find out what was going on. The thought of the hallway terrified her, but what would the ground floor bring?

Slowly, she tiptoed across the cold floor tile, aware of every shadow and flaw as her feet stepped on them. Her harp was clutched in one hand. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes, placed her hand on the iron door handle, and pulled it open.

Ten seconds later, she opened her eyes. Looking up and down the corridor, she reassured herself that nothing was lying in wait for her, and let out her breath. Focusing on placing one foot in front of the other, her shoes sinking into the rich, red plush carpet, she made it to the stairs in minutes.

The stairs seemed to have been shorter since the last time she’d seen them; she’d grown. She hugged the harp against her chest, and closed her eyes. Remembering how many steps there were was easy; she’d counted them as she’d gone down them every day when she was small. Closing her eyes, hand on the rail, she counted down the number of steps until she reached the bottom floor. Her heartbeat sped up every time she took a step, making her breathing uneven. Even so, she pressed on.

At forty-eight steps, she heard her shoes click on the tile, and opened her eyes. A surprisingly bright beam of sunlight shone in her eyes.

The mold and mildew she’d thought would be there was utterly gone. The doors had been opened to the sunlight; fresh air milled about inside the great hall. The land beyond the open doors was fertile and lush, no longer flooded by salt water. Children and adults alike screamed and laughed with joy, their home brought back and houses rebuilt.

To the young woman though, the greatest miracle of all was the eight silhouettes in the doorway, each holding a string instrument. The smallest figure, the one holding a violin, said, “We came back, Adele. We’re all home now.”

And finally, for the first time in six years, Adele allowed herself to cry. Her family crowded around her, and every sorrow she felt was gone, except for one. It was a short-lived grievance, though, because when she looked up, her auburn hair sticking to the tears on her cheeks, the shape of another person appeared in the entry. The sun lit his hair like a halo from behind, a golden ring glimmering on his left ring finger.

Adele just stared at him; there was no way he could possibly be alive. Here he stood though, in the flesh, looking at her like she was the only light left in the world.

Her husband had returned to her, there to stay at last.

That story won me the writing contest.

I almost fell over when my mom told me. At least I didn't faint.

That's all for right now... But I'll post a new poem when I get home.

Bye!

~Cassie

This is Just to Say Poem: Little Star Snowflakes

I'm sorry,
When you told me to put my coat on,
I left it in the house:
It really wasn't that cold to me.

I went outside,
When you told me not to,
But it was too hard to resist:
The snowflakes fell like stars dropping from the sky.

They sparkled in the glaring sunlight,
A thousand different colors.
Dropping into a sea of moonlight,
Those little stars melted away when I touched them.

I'm sorry,
But the little stars called to me.
I danced with them as they floated down,
Serene, surreal, soft, and whispering...