Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, August 7, 1995 TAG: 9508070072
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
There are people in this world who claim their vegetables look like rock stars, dead presidents and creatures from out of space.
O.W. and Leora Phillips of the Floyd County community of Willis are not such people.
"It just looks like a mess to me," O.W. Phillips said when his wife pulled a gnarled, 7-inch-high Kennabeck spud from the ground near the couple's bean crop.
Leora ``came up and said, `Look what I got out of the garden,''' O.W. Phillips said. ``She just kept digging and digging.''
The couple has been gardening for years. This, they say, is one of the strangest fruits - er, tubers - of their labor.
Don't say he can't
It took him 14 years and a lot of aggravation, but Bill Bayes of Roanoke has finally published the story of his exceptional life.
He says he isn't seeking fame or fortune from his book, ``Don't Say I Can't.''
At 74, he just wants people to know what it's like to live with a disability.
Bayes, stricken by cerebral palsy from a birth injury, didn't let it stop him. He graduated from Hampden-Sydney College, served in the Army during World War II, won ribbons for horseback riding, ran successful businesses and raised two children.
Along the way, he put up with a book's worth of anguish - classmates who nicknamed him "Jitters" because of his jerky movements, employers who wouldn't hire him because they thought people would think his speech sounded like a drunk's, and a Roanoke police officer who mistook Bayes' swerving gait for a drunkard's shamble and threw him in jail.
"Don't Say I Can't," published by Bayes, is available at Ram's Head Book Shop, Books-A-Million, Kroger and other stores. It can be ordered for $8.95 from Bayes Publishing, P.O. Box 19043, Roanoke 24019-1005.
A uniform solution?
Some educators say uniforms are an alternative to school dress codes and a way to relieve the peer pressure many students feel in matters of fashion.
Not Doris Ennis.
"Not everybody in the real world wears a uniform," said Ennis, co-principal of Roanoke's summer school for high school students.
"Someone in the office might wear a $125 suit, but you can't afford one. Someone else might have a $200 suit, so what are you going to do?"
Ennis said parents need to teach their children to understand that they can't always have the latest fashions or the most expensive clothes. They need to prepare their children for the adult world, she said.
"It's a parental call to convey a value system to their children," she said. Some parents want the schools to take pressure off them with dress codes and uniforms so they won't have to say no to their children, she said.
The General Assembly has enacted a law that authorizes school systems to require student uniforms.
Some private schools that require uniforms, such as Roanoke Catholic, say they take pressure off children to follow the fashion trends.
Uniforms also eliminate distractions that might be caused by unusual attire or fashions, said Karen Mabry, Roanoke Catholic principal.
The Roanoke School Board is considering a more restrictive code because some parents have complained that Mohawk haircuts, colorfully-dyed hair, nose rings and outlandish dress are out of place in the classroom.
Roanoke School Superintendent Wayne Harris said the schools have to be careful not to infringe on the students' rights.
But he said that purple hair, tattered clothes and nose rings might not be appropriate for students. The school system has no restrictions on hairstyle or color.
by CNB