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Title
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Cindy Yamada Thomas
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Quote
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"I continue to be curious about all things. My life is so much richer because of the Humanities. Where would we be without the Humanities? Could we even exist? How boring would that be?! I don’t think I want to know. I AM the Humanities!"
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Story
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I am a third generation Japanese American. That means that my grandparents came from Japan, when times were hard. They came to America to find a better life and brought many thoughts and traditions from Japan. My grandfather came to America first and found work on the railroad. His work took him to Pocatello Idaho. The Japanese workers missed food from their homeland and the ways of life in Japan. My grandfather’s idea was to open a boarding house for the workers and bring them a bit of what they missed. He called for my grandmother in Japan to help him run the boarding house. Tradition included the thought that your oldest son is meant to inherit the family home. My grandmother was forced to leave her 4 year old son behind to be raised by grandparents and then by his aunt and uncle.
My grandmother traveled to America and helped run the boarding house. She prepared the Japanese food that the workers missed. The boarding house also offered a bed and hot tubs to soak their tired bones each night.
Eventually, my grandfather was able to raise enough money to lease property and began his farming career. At that time, my mother, at the age of 8 years old, was pulled from school so that my grandmother could work in the fields. Her brother had to teach her how to build a fire in the wood-burning stove, so that she could begin cooking for the family and the hands on the farm. My grandfather had told her that girls do not need an education. They marry a husband who would take care of them.
My mother hated being pulled from school. Whenever she had a break, she would read anything she could get her hands on. She also devoured the fashion magazines in the local library. She would cook, clean and sew for the family and help her siblings with homework. Each morning she was up early to make sure everyone had a hot breakfast so they could work in the field or the kids could catch their bus to school. She learned what she needed to know from the women in the community. She was not able to get her GED until she was married to my father, in her mid-thirties.
Education was extremely important to my mother. Her brother would send us books on the history of the West. We would take drives and have him point out the shores of ancient Lake Bonneville and the difference between the glacier cut Little Cottonwood canyon versus the river cut Big Cottonwood Canyon. He also gave us a subscription to National Geographic. It was an adventure in every issue.
We did not receive toys for our birthdays. I cherished my birthday trips with Mom and Dad. It included private time with them, lunch and one book for our birthday. I still remember choosing “Favorite Poems Old and New Selected for Boys and girls” by Helen Farris. It was a large book. Two inches thick! My mother exclaimed that it was $10! “Will you really read it?”, she said. In fourth grade, my friends and I would get that book, from the library, and take turns reading poems to each other, after lunch. My mother was so proud!
After my grandparents passed, my mother moved to California to follow her dream of designing high-fashion women’s clothing. She was a great artist and taught me how to draw people in correct proportion. With her tutelage, I received straight As in Art and Advanced Sewing. She helped me change a pattern for a fitted A-line dress with long fitted sleeves to make a raglan-sleeved jumper. It hung in the local fabric store until they tired of telling customers that there was no pattern for it.
My mother was always curious about other cultures. She was continually teaching us new recipes, explaining where the food came from and gave us information about the country, the culture and the people.
I AM the Humanities, thanks to my Mother!
When I met my husband, his mother had a library so vast that the neighborhood kids would come there to study. Evenings after dinner, I loved when we retired to the living room for lively discussions on every subject. If someone asked the origins of words, places, ideas, etc., we would grab the dictionary or a book off the shelf and we would all learn something new.
My husband learned to read at an early age with his mother. He was way ahead of the other classmates when he began school. I still remember mentioning the poem, “Jabberwocky”. He recited it from memory and told me that he learned it when he was five years old. The idea that the poem could be made up of nonsense words that could create pictures in your head made him laugh.
I continue to learn from my husband, who tears through books at an incredible pace.
I love to travel with my husband. There is no better place to learn than going to sites. We have been to many countries and historic sites where we have learned from the people, their culture and from the land.
I AM the Humanities, thanks to my husband and his mother!
My husband’s family are all gifted musicians. My sister-in-law played second chair violin in the University of Utah orchestra. I dabbled with learning the trumpet in Jr. High School, only because that was the only instrument available after my brother moved to Tuba. I was pretty shy, so that wasn’t the perfect instrument for me.
After meeting my husband, he felt bad that I only sat and listened to the jam sessions at their house. He bought me my first mandolin. Now we have a trio with other my sister-in-law on up right bass and my husband on guitar. I love how music connects us with so many people from different countries. We have veered from bluegrass to Celtic. Through the Evanston Ceili at the Roundhouse festival and the Seattle Wintergrass Festival, we have met so many musicians from other countries, like Ireland, Scotland, Sweden and Switzerland. One of my favorite workshop discussions was about traditional music versus the music that immigrants brought in their heads and shared, once they reached “the new country’. They may have remembered the title and attached it to a tune/song or perhaps they remembered a tune/song and gave it a new name. In our music books, it says “Traditional” but many of the pieces are not recognized in the country they supposedly came from. Music brings us together and teaches us a bit of history.
I AM the Humanities, thanks to music!
I continue to be curious about all things. My life is so much richer because of the Humanities. Where would we be without The Humanities? Could we even exist? How boring would that be?! I don’t think I want to know.
I AM the Humanities!
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Date
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May 19, 2025
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Profession
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Financial Advisor
