A Quiz

Courtesy my pal Susie, here's a little Q&A on the recent holiday... Anybody feel free to add YOUR answers in comments section!

What you want(ed) for Christmas (given NO price limit): New throw pillows -- all silk and yet indestructible, four white pillowcases, bookshelves, and an end to all house projects.

What you got for Christmas: Some apricot jam.

...No kidding.

My child bought me jam. And it gets sadly worse from there... But, if I can count gifts for the whole family, my mother-in-law sent me GREAT kitchen towels, plus deep red candles and a completely cool, scroll-y iron candle holder. Oh, and my sister-in-law sent a serving tray I almost bought for myself at Target a few weeks ago -- ye-ha for coincidence!!

What you want for Christmas... in abstract: Time and peace. Succor for all who ache and seek. Good will among men.

Year of the first Christmas you can remember: My second cousin Amy was a crawling baby, and I was about 5. I crawled after Amy all around my great-grandmother's ancient, fire-hazard living room, snagging my green taffeta dress on one of the gas jets in the floor and smudging my white lace pinafore. Pictures were taken and my damp brow and droopy cocker-spaniel hair tell me I was having all kinds of untidy fun.

Ever in a holiday play? When?: I'm pretty sure I was Mary once. I think I've seen the photos. Either I was much milder as a child, or the play organziers were doing a little wishful thinking!

An early Christmas memory? Teaching Shannon how to undo the tape on the sides of packages in order to peek... Seeing an Easy-Bake oven next to our over-stuffed stockings on the log cabin hearth and knowing, for sure, that Santa was REAL... (The Easy-Bake probably came before the snooping, chronologically.)

Favorite holiday ornament (Past and present): I have a rocking horse from Hallmark that says 1976. It's wonderfully outdated.... I also have a red-headed toddler ornament from Hallmark 2002. It's a boy stacking blocks that will unstack themselves when you press a button in the base.

Classic Christmas song you never get tired of: Hark the Herald Angels Sing... Oh, and O Come All Ye Faithful.

Classic Christmas song you loathe: The Holly and the Ivy -- it does not even rhyme, by crimminy!!

Modern Christmas song you never get tired of: What are You Doin' New Year's Eve ("Maybe it's much too early in the game/ Oh, but I thought I'd ask you just the same...")

Modern Christmas song you loathe: Anything that cats sing.

How many languages can you say "Merry Christmas" in? Does Noel count as not English?

Naughty or Nice? The only "naughty" I can lay claim to is decidedly NOT the fun kind, so nice it is!

Favorite Christmas Ghost: Mine? Christmas Future. Ebenezers? Christmas Present.

Favorite Misfit Toy: A soft snowman with a felt carrot nose. Oh, how I wish I had the strength to jettison this cutesy junk. But, alas...

Can you wrap presents well? Oh, yeah, baby!

What tops your tree? A star, a red orb (we have more than one tree) and, close underneath, a tin angel from Fredericksburg.

If you were a Christmas elf, what would your name be? Something with "Peppermint" in it. Peppermint Albemarle, maybe.

Update

The engine-inja's proved too mature for our viewing audience. I checked on Miles about 10 minutes in, and he was looking befuddled... consternated, even.

I asked if he wanted to keep watching or switch to Zaboomafoo. He chose to switch videos. Just before I pressed stop, I heard, "Does the phrase 'go suck a lemon' have any meaning for you?'" Ahh... this must be why I LOVED those Ninja Turtles!

Stardate: Christmas Break

We are watching "M & N-ja Turtles" at my house. Right now! I am awash in memories, since my brother and I watched this same cartoon together in the early 80s. We, of course, called them the "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles," but whatever. Sometimes, these days, they are alternately referred to as "Engine-inja" turtles. Whatever they are (known through other kids' tales and toys, the actual cartoon is being viewed for the first time by young master M.), we are now pretty sure they are "AWESOME, Mom! Cool!"

M. and I just went to the video store to find some afternoon distraction, as it is raining and I have mucho work to do. Here's a fast reenactment of our time in the kid video racks:

Me: Do you want this Captain America cartoon?
Son: No... It looks SCARY! I think it is for teenagers.
Me: How about Clifford?
Son: Uh... I think it might be for babies.
Me: OK, Miles... What about this one?
Son: I will get that video when I am four. Or maybe five. I won't watch the big-boy movies until then, Mommie. I PROMISE!

Suffice it to say, that stop took longer than I hoped, but how could I be upset?

In other business, the ninja mispronunciation reminds me of a cute moment last week -- something that transpired in my car, of course -- on the way home from preschool. Miles says, "Oh! Now I get it! It's the daymu!" I say, "What?! The Daiwoo?" He says, "No! The day... MOO!"
"Again," I say, "I don't understand you."
"Not the one for nighttime, Mom, but the DAY MOON! The one that comes out in daytime."
(I was momentarily thrown, then I began to look up and around. True enough, the huge, perfect orb of a full moon hovered right over our church, its soft white shape fully visible against a pale blue sky.) "It doesn't come out every day, so, so... I figured it out! It is the VERY SPECIAL Day Moon. When I see it, it means it is going to be a GOOD DAY!"
Yes, that must be it! A very special celestial body perfectly matched to the very special days of childhood.

Viva la Day Moo!

Long live M&N-ja's!

...Just two more days until my own Christmas vacation!

Life Bandage

I just put on a Band-Aid. It's a cheap Band-Aid, so I can't even rightly use that name.

It's a bandage. A "flexible fabric bandage." And perhaps one not originally manufactured in the United States, as all its packaging is bi-lingual.

The top of the wrapper says: "Sin Latex."
And the line under that says: "Latex Free."

But the two lines are offset from one another. They would normally be printed in flush, left-centered alignment; instead they make a kind of diagonal pattern. When I try to read from the top line to the bottom line, the words that line up are "Sin Free."

Great! A Sin-Free bandage! Just what I always wanted! :)

Actually, I love the picture of a big life-bandage that could wrap around a soul and keep it Sin Free. (It would probably have to be Latex Free, as well, because I bet a lot of souls are allergic.)

It's like Pat Green sings:
"I heard a voice when I was thirteen
Got baptized and washed up clean
The world has a way -- if you know what I mean --
Of scuffin' you up again...."

Just a passing thought. An image. A soul bandage!

I better get back to work now....

Tech Support, Revisited

"Ved-ry in-der-vest-ink, your cum-pew-tear.... no vun has a probe-limb jheest like theece."

WHAT? That doesn't sound good. And I'm not even sure of all the sounds.

"Oh my gut. Oh my gut. Let me see....
Can you al-vays, al-vays open Outlook fierce. Ho-kay? We vill try for few days, uh, and see if this helpves."

EH?! WHAT, again? I think I get it. I'm pretty sure I do. But what if I don't? What if I open things out of order? Will they not work? Will something in the server room blow up?

Damn! If it weren't for this post, I would have plausible deniability for any explosion. :) As it is, I better al-vays, al-vays open applications in the right order.

Oh-vey!

To Hear The Wizard

I know the Wizard of Oz. His name is Yuriy. And he speaks with marbles in his mouth.

Actually, I don't know what Yuriy holds above the chin, that interferes with the more regular flow of English, but his is far from the average intonation in my neck of the woods. In fact, his sound is unique even among speakers in HIS (admittedly much more cosmopolitan) neck of the woods.

Yuriy networks computers for a living. When he's adding a function or tweaking the system that allows me to work from home, his name can roll off my lips like a curse: "YUR-EEEEEE!! WHY, Yuriy, WHY??"

After his efforts knock me off the network and I come to the end of my limited problem-solving ability, I email and he calls to problem-solve over the phone. When I see the familiar number after the 212 area code, his name can ring in my head like church bells. Sound the celebration! Deliverance is at hand! "Yuriy! Hello! Thanks for calling!"

I'm still a touch disturbed, but overwhelmingly relieved, when Yuriy takes over my screen and begins to move my cursor. Windows flash and muttering ensues ("Uu, mah Gut! Mah Gut! Jhest a mee-net. Jhest, jheest...") He adjusts things I cannot see behind the curtain of my computer.

Yuriy could be chanting incantations and making animal sacrifices for all I know about what he does to keep us in business. It's very much like he's a wizard in a little room, pushing buttons none of us see and altering his voice to make following his directions not for the faint of heart.

Given the differences in our minds and make-ups, I have come to SO like and respect my wizard! Yuriy knows his stuff. He's patient (as he has to be when I can't find the "help" pull-down), and he's diligent. I suspect Yuriy is razor-sharp smart, as well. Today, he solved a problem for me and I asked, spontaneously, something I have never asked him: "What did you DO?" There was an obvious silence; he made some aborted noise in his throat, and then there was no answer. I like to think Yuriy considered -- just for a millisecond -- telling me. Then he knew it was hopeless to try. But it's better this way. Sometimes, our curtains shouldn't be pulled open.

Out of the Blue

PART I: EVENING, 11/29/05

Son: "Did you know that C3PO is RPD2's (sic) dad?"

Father: "Well, not exactly..."

Son, interrupting: "Yeah-huh! It's true! They're a robot family."
Then, muttering to himself, "And C3PO is the tall one! Uh, huh! Uh-huh! Of COURSE he's the daddy!"



PART II: MORNING, 11/30/05

Son: "Isn't red your favorite color, Mom? Christian's fvorite color is brown, but I don't know why, because that is the color of POOP!"

Mother: "Oh, son, what are some nicer things you can think of to say about that color?"

Son: "Well, weeell... it's the part of the tree that holds the leaves on. But green is my favorite color. Because leaves are green, and leaves are so much nicer than poop."

Mother: Muttering to herself: "Whatever, Y-chromosome....."

My Boy, My Boy...

Time to do some documentation. Primary resources, as we all know, are the lifeblood of history. :) In the interest of documenting the references and interests of a turn-of-the-twenty-first-century child, here are several Miles anecdotes of late....



MANNA FROM HEAVEN?
Sometime yesterday afternoon, I overheard this monologue from small son. (Yes, he narrates most of what he does... It's kinda like the Truman Show: All Miles, All of the Time.)

"I want a Pop Tart!" (rumble, rustle, sound of scraping chair and opening cabinet.) But we have no Pop Tarts. (DEEP sigh.) I guess they were out of 'em at the store. I guess the whole store had NONE of Pop Tarts, so no other boys and girls could buy them. ...OH NO! But don't worry, God will make more Pop Tarts."



COMMERCIAL CONNOISSEUR
Over the weekend, I receive this small sign that I have been TOO LAX with my monitoring of Miles' TV time. (And strong evidence that he is the one changing the channel from PBS to the much more commercial Playhouse Disney.)

M: Mommie: Can I have a giant knight castle with a real dragon for my birthday?
Me: Well, honey, you can have one BIG toy for your birthday, whichever one you want when your birthday is closer. Let's wait and see what you want later, OK?
M: OK. But Can I also get toys for Christmas?
Me: Yes, hon. I think you will get plenty of toys. What else do you want?
M: Oh! One of those big machine toys for big boys that fights like THIS (pause for demonstration). And two more light savers for when my friends come over to play. And some of those turtle things -- those really cool nin- nin-ley turtles, with the green and red light-up things. Oh! And one of those flowers that spins around and around and shoots the little person out... but, Mom, (in a clear and instructive voice) BATTERIES ARE NOT INCLUDED with these products.

Geez!



I DON'T KNOW, BUT I THINK HIS SPIDEY SENSES ARE TINGLING!
My grandmother, whom Miles calls GiGi, is fixated with just-add-water products. She has given us two washclothes and several of those tiny capsule sponges that grow in water. This week, she hit the moterlode! She found a tiny, keychain Spiderman that will balloon to 6 times his original size in water, can then be dried out, shrunk down and will grow again. We find this fascinating. We now have a fish bowl in the bathroom, so we can submerge Spidey and track his growth. This was the conversation when the superhero first went in the drink:
M: Oh! Oh! I think he is growing already!
Me: Well, maybe.
M: I see his little leg moving. Yes! It is moving!
Me: Well, he does have bubbles coming off of him. Look, Miles! Really close to where his arm meets his leg. Do you see the bubbles?
M: Yeah. (distracted.) But what is JEST a little worrying me.... I hope he can swim!

Memoirs, Week 2

(Disclaimer: Though it wasn't, this SHOULD have been posted on Nov. 18, as I MEANT to do it just after my second memoir class. I won't even tell you how much later than that I am, but I will admit to playing omnipotent and changing the date so it appears on 11-18-05. My three regular readers will, then, miss seeing it, but it'll be saved for posterity. :))


Class Writing: Object Lesson.

(After some guided note taking, we got 5 minutes to explain/ decribe/ illuminate a significant object from our pasts.)


Junk. Jettisoned junk. It looks like nothing more than flea-market fodder, the short wooden chair that perches at an angle in the corner of my carport. But it makes me smile -- if not laugh out loud -- with the memory of a near-perfect family outing every time I stop to wipe dust off it.

The chair came to me from the Baker Hotel in Mineral Wells, Texas. Decades ago, the Baker was a destination for the infirmed but well-to-do, a place to soak up the famous healing spring water of the city.

I never saw the Baker -- or the chair -- in their heyday. In fact, both were in serious disrepair by the time my grandparents, parents and I pulled up in Dot's Honda Accord one bright August morning in the early '90s. A low chain sagged across one of the wide, broken concrete drives and overgrowth shaded the hulking hole of the main pool. It seemed a good spot for birds or at least squirrels, but no fauna of any sort seemed to interrupt the entropy-in-progress. All was quiet, still and solemn and mausoleum-like, until the pilfering began.

Dreams & Memoirs

I was hanging at RealLivePreacher this morning (a regular tactic for work-avoidance), where I read the Preach's post and a fairly deep discussion following, about dreams.

I wasn't sure my own recent, vivid dream was serious enough to be thrown into the hat there, but I decided I should record it somewhere. (Oh, my lucky blog! Home to the flotsam and jetsom of my mind....)

So I dreamed that I owned an ice rink. A REAL ice rink. With frozen water and hockey nets and the free use of scarves with skate rental. Kids and adults came and went, all chilled fingers and happy faces, while I puttered happily away at my rink, working while on skates. I took money and did paperwork behind a counter, then slipped onto the ice to illustrate some move to a class of kids. I heard a song I liked and made someone turn it up. And we frolicked and played in my winter wonderland.

I'm pretty sure this mythical ice rink was in East Texas, because of the huge well of pride and contentment I felt in the dream. It was like I knew my venture was already a success, and that I'd planted something out of place here and had made it at home.

My ice rink also had a coffee shop. With bakery snacks! This seemed a perfect innovation, because who can resist hot liquids and hearty muffins? And what worldly perks do I like more than winter accessories and lattes? Oh, not much!
(Now WHY did the ice rinks I used in Colorado not have coffee shops attached? Silly people -- completely missing the boat!)

I woke up certain that we should build an ice rink. "Build it and they will come," you know... But I am not Kevin Costner. Nor am I Sahsa Cohen. And I don't even like being cold. My nose runs.

So, what does it mean? I do not know. It was, after all, just a dream...




In other news, I have started a memoir class. Yep, me and 8 old people! (No disrespect. I LIKE old people.) We'll meet once a week at my church, with the most marvelous teacher, for six weeks. Each week we'll learn a little more about what defines a memoir, how to craft one, how to hold it together. So far, we read from books and made lists. And then we get a writing assignment (all in one hour, too!). This week's assignment was "tell me something about your name." And this is what I wrote.


Two Kathleens bequeathed my middle name, each a monument to strength, both bold and steely sorts. I might never have escaped the long shadows cast, except that my normally meek mother pulled off a 4th-quarter conversion. She's the one who, just before delivery, introduced something new to the name mix.

Before she spoke, back when I was the unknown, unshaped first-born on-the-way, the name chosen for a girl was Savannah. Pleasant. Southern. Savannah Kathleen. Then my sweet Mom, Kay -- as clear of heart as short of name -- decided I would be called Ginger.

She couldn't know then how many poodles and miniature Dachshunds would later share the name. That Ginger is shorthand for "red-haired" in Britain. She had no foreglimpse of the fifth-grade me standing in class, crossing my arms, and loudly pouting, "The only people who share my name are dogs and hookers!"

But I like to think Kay knew her girl might not fit the Savannah profile. That she suspected, early on, the wee little me needed something that could become all my own. Certainly, she started something with that name. A certain breaking free....

Car Talk

I swear I need a recorder in the car! Some pretty weirdly funny things are said, and it's SO hard for me to retain them from errand A to Z and back again. Today's partial recap, between school and Hobby Lobby and home:


Son: Do you know why Darth Vader's light saver (sic) is red?

Mom: Um, no...

Son: Because he loves the color red, jeest a little bit. That's why!
Do you know why Darth Vader's skin is all black?

Mom: Umm, why?

Son: Because he loves the color black MOST!

Mom: Actually, hon, I don't know if his skin IS black. I think his COSTUME is what's black. Have you noticed he wears gloves and long clothes and a mask, and you haven't ever seen his skin?

Son: That's right!
...I KNOW WHO IT IS! Who's in there! It is... SPIDERMAN!!

Mom: Are you saying Spiderman is inside the Darth Vader costume?

Son: Yeah! Yeah! Do you know why? It's because he is JEST a little concerned that arm-pincher guy is going to dis-, dis-, dis-TURB him, or bother him some.
So he is inside the Darth Vader costume, because Darth Vader is scary!

Lists, Schmists

I need to make a list, so, hey, why not make it here?

TO DO TODAY
1. mail 2 baby presents & 2 belated birthday presents
2. mail swatch card & brochure to two accounts
3. record receipts in checkbook (need new register)
4. meeting 6 p.m.
5. SEND GROUP EMAIL REMINDER for Bible study

THIS WEEK
1. FINISH painting entryway shelves
2. make felt/ burlap Jesse tree by Friday lunch
3. find car repair shop
4. make candies/ baked goods for church bazaar -- must shop for packaging
5. lunch meet on Friday
6. 4 p.m. Friday bazaar set-up
7. Sunday food delivery

STILL TO DO
1. mail in boarding passes for frequent flyer credit -- find acct #!
2. book dentist appt for crown work (ugh!)
Oh, let's stop here. To dos suck!

Serendipitously, however, quite another list comes to my mind. I'm listening to 80s and 90s hits via iTunes, and checking a thread about favorite quotes on my industry bulletin board, while I compile today's blog entry. The combination of activities (who says hypertasking is bad?) leads me to a newer, happier list called "Things I used to love, had temporarily forgotten, but am selectively reliving:"
* "Make it so, Number 1."
* country music
* OMD, erasure, Sugar and James
* A "run for the border" -- or Whataburger taquitos with sausage and cheese, oh my!
* accessorizing, especially in winter
* novels at night
* a cat in the house
* short hair (so far, not brave enough to go back)
* vodka martinis (OK, no good martinis on the horizon at the kind of restuarants I frequent, but I can recall, can't I?)

Gotta get to work. It's a bittersweet symphony, that's life. You try to make ends meet; you're a slave to the money then you die...
(I'm still listening to iTunes. Might better stop before I answer the phone with an inappropriate song playing. "I can give you what you want but you got to come home with me. I got some good old lovin' and I got some honest dough..." Yeah. No.)

Halloween Rocks!

Oh, the sweetness of kids and candy! (Seven days & counting, and I'm still hoarding tiny containers of Junior Mints and Milk Duds.)

This Halloween, Miles went trick-or-treating for the first time, using his Darth Vader "light saver" as a flashlight. He learned the rules and now fervently believes that you only go to houses with the lights on, "also with decorations or nice people in the windows." He participated almost un-shyly and sometimes even said thanks to strangers! Meanwhile, it was cold enough for a scarf. But not so cold I was cursing under my breath before the treating ended. (In Colorado once, on a half-hour loop with a co-workers' children, there was cursing.) It drizzled. But not so much my outer fleece got soggy, and just enough to curl my hair. We got to hang out in a wonderful friend's garage, in a wonderfully friendly neighborhood, and meet a few new people. I ate a chili dog. ...It was all good!

With lots of similar garages open, and many grills or fire pits attended by neighborhood moms and dads, the night had a Norman Rockwell feel. It made me think about Halloween when I was a kid, and I started a little (yet unfinished) essay on that topic.

Now, it's a whole week after Halloween and I'm not sure where the time went. We still have lots of pumpkins, uncarved, so we are contemplating making Indian- and Pilgrim-o-Lanterns for the next holiday. (Exactly how would one do this? I cannot say, except that construction paper is probably involved.) Miles was talking to me about carving the pumpkins earlier today, and he said "it is sometimes better to use paper, because cutting is very messy! And you haffa use SHARP knives, also. And that is dangerous." (This he learned from his class unit on pumpkins, in which they cut one open and made art with the seeds. Smelly, smelly seed art.)

In other news, Miles is looking forward to his next birthday, and being 5. I reminded him that he will only be 4 and he said, "yeah, I know. But I will be five AFTER four. And six after that!" And, as he just told me while I type, "when I am 20, I will be bigger than EVERYBODY! We'll prob-bla-ly get a new house, a bigger one, when I am 20, because my head will prob-bla-ly be pokin' out this roof!"

Prob-bla-ly.

Office visit

I am sitting at my desk, well into the rhythm of a busy workday. Untidy piles of "to dos" mound under each elbow, a sheath of sent faxes spills across the floor and unfinished coffee goes cold (with expensive, organic half and half in it, no less!).

A microwave break crosses my mind but I feel I can't stop. I am pressured, as there's much to remember -- if I don't stay on it today, the little things won't get done! -- and it's the last day of a week, besides. To so many people I have promised calls, but I still don't know all the answers they require. I haven't had this many small tasks, piling up and pulling sideways at my mind, in weeks.

I know I want a break.... But then, I often want to sit around and feel sorry for myself, too. Neither course of action seems completely wise today! I will not stand up. I cannot stop, until more work is done.

And then I realize I am humming. And then I realize I am singing. And I realize a break has found me where I sit.

Here's what came to me, a small window of sweetness in an ordinary, busy day.

"...It is you
We adore
It is you
Praises are for
Only you
The heaven's declare...

Holy, holy is our God Almighty
Holy, holy is his name alone
Holy, holy is our God Almighty
Holy, holy is his name alone

...As we lift up our hands
Will you meet us here?
As we call on your name
Will you meet us here?
We have come to this place
To worship you
God of mercy and grace

It is you...

As we lift up our hands
As we call on your name
Will you visit this place?
By your mercy and grace....

It is you...."

The pressure is less. The workload hasn't grown. And I feel better.

Though, gotta say, my coffee is still cold.... ;)

Tidying up. Leaving traces.

I'm cleaning my desk (not by any strict neatnik's definition) and I just came across a scrap of paper with what looks like Miles malaprops I've jotted down.

I hate to forget the sweet childhood moments that gave rise to the scribbled words, so I'm going to quickly document their usage.

* Watching me try to assemble a piece of furniture, he says, "Mom! Use the CON-structions!"

* Trying to relay his order at the donut shop, he wants "the one with sparkles on top."

* Asking for the book "Stellaluna," in which a fruit bat ties to land on limbs like birds, he asks, "Let's read the one about the acrobat!"

I once said, in this blog, I love this little boy "To Infinity and Beyond." Never more than this week. If infinity has a beyond, we've made the turn. And Jer and I are more devoted to this family than ever before.

Getting better.

I was holding steady until John 16. I was hanging w/ the fam, snug in my row, swallowing the words one jagged little pill at a time. Then someone used John 16:33. In an anecdote, maybe. Not even as a main point. But the words were spoken. And the words went:

"In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world."

Then I knew I would never make it to the end of church without big ol' crocodile tears coursing down my cheeks. Just give it up, girlie, 'cause you aren't that strong!

It was a good cry, really. The reason I came, probably. To sit in a place where all the words ring true, where other ragged pilgrims who have nursed hurts much deeper than mine come together. Where we sing a few songs and spot a few typos and hear at least one football analogy, all while straining to retune our hearts to the vibration of the Divine.

It was good worship. Good for me to hear truths that especially touched my heart. To know other women were sharing the hurt of my week and rooting for me to feel better.

I was crying before communion, though, and I knew I needed a little intervention if I was gonna stand and step forward and be presentable and such. (It's a Southern demon, this bent toward presentation. I know; I know! But I really can't stand to fall apart in public.)

I did regain composure, and the way truly was mysterious. :) (This next part is especially for NPT, a small laugh between two girls in the know.) The congregation began to stand and some "canned" music was cued as a background for the taking of communion. The first phrase I heard was, "God, your love is extravagant."

Now, that's not nearly amusing in and of itself, but when you are -- as I am -- conditioned to pronouce that word "extragavant," the phrase somehow becomes ROTFL funny. (Stop and say it with me, now: "God, your love is ex-TRAG-a-vant!") In the inappropriate twitter I suddenly had to suppress, I found the strength to step up and hear a blessing with my name inserted in the middle.

It was good worship. I came; I carried a burden; I cried. Oh, but, truly! I came into the house of the Lord, and I did not go away empty.

My mother-in-law asked if it was too much, being in church yesterday, but it wasn't. Somehow, it was just enough.

Also, while there, I learned about two more women I know who lost babies in early or mid-pregnancy. And I decided to start a list. A short list of blessed assurance -- children I know who arrived on earth after their mothers suffered loss for the right to be moms. So far, the list includes:
Josh and Gabe
Taylor and Jameson
Joshua
Caden Seiferth
Olivia Smith
Micah Sheets
two Johnson cherubs
Lee
Noah
and baby Thomas (appearing April 2006!)

...And these are just the kids I can think of right away; in two small circles of acquaintance.

Since I know there are many more out there, I'm going to keep the list active for a while. Then, when I see any of the faces on the list, I will be reminded of how God is faithful. How his ways are above our ways, but his plans are always for our good. How nothing is impossible with God.

When I see these children, I will worship.

And now we are three.

For a little while, we were four.

Our young family, that is. We who used to number three had grown to four. And we were so delighted. Secretly delighted.

We were going to have a baby. A brand-spankin' new little person! Finally, our second child. (To me, a mysterious and mostly mythical creature not unlike the unicorn. Glimpses were rare and knowledge was sketchy. A second child? I've heard of them. Not sure about that breed, though. How does one arrive at two, when the first required a complete life makeover and is still such a full-time job?)

But we arrived. And we were finally a complete family. For about 12 weeks. Seven that we knew about.

The baby's heart stopped beating sometime around week 8. But my body didn't want to let go. So, yesterday, I woke up at 4 a.m., checked into a hospital at 5, and had my insides scraped out to salvage my suffering womb.

It sounds very dramatic, doesn't it?

Actually, it's completely common and far from the end of the world. Women lose babies in about 15 to 20 percent of all pregnancies. Women have more babies later, with no complications. I'll be one of those women. I have faith.

It just hurts.

Because we all lost something.

And, I suspect, what we lost would have been so very dear.

Today, it feels kind of like my heart had a D&C, too. It's all raw and scraped on the inside.

I am the luckiest girl I know, to have what I have and whom I have in my life. I am not alone. We are three, remember? ...But I so wanted us to be four!


Dear God,
Please mend my wounded places. Heal my hurts and hide my family in the shadow of your wings. Thank you for being my God. Thank you for this day and for every ragged breath.

I've always loved this Newsboys song. Today, it's all I can do to repeat the words. But I want them to speak for me.

Blessed be Your name
In the land that is plentiful
Where your streams of abundance flow
Blessed be Your name

And blessed be Your name
When I'm found in the desert place
Though I walk through the wilderness
Blessed be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I'll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

And blessed be Your name
When the sun's shining down on me
When the world's 'all as it should be'
Blessed be Your name

And blessed be Your name
On the road marked with suffering
Though there's pain in the offering
Blessed be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I'll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord blessed be Your name


My heart chooses to bless and not curse. To hurt and not grow bitter. To press on. And my heart knows that I will be given more than is ever taken away....

Silly Thomas!

So we're watching some Thomas on the tube (me mostly lulled by George Carlin's narration; Miles engrossed in the finer points of plot...).

First I hear this on screen: "Thomas kept the other engines awake late at night in the roundhouse. 'I don't want to shuttle freight cars!' he said. 'I want to see the world!'"

And then I hear this from the recliner: "Pshaw! Silly Thomas. Trains can't see ANYTHING in the dark. That's why, right now, he needs his sleep."

To see the world, but only in the daytime. I think this is a rational child goal. We parental types will try to make it happen. With ample pauses for his sleep. :)

Table Games

Last night at dinner we played a game. A little grammar game. It started like this:

Boy said: "I like suckers that are sour.

...But I like ice cream that is cold."

So I said: "I like brownies that are soft, and I like chocolate sauce that is warm."

And Boy said: "I like carrots that are crispy."

And I said: "I like noodles that are hot."

And Husband said: "I like chips that are spicy and drinks that are fizzy."

Boy dissolved into giggles at the word fizzy, then composed himself enough to shout: "I LIKE CHIPS THAT ARE SPICY, TOO! And, also, sandwiches with no lettuce."

Then he bugged his eyes out and looked at both of us, eager for a reaction. He didn't know the name of the game, exactly, but he knew that just as suddenly as we had created it, he had violated its order "with no lettuce."

We all laughed. It was a good game. And then it was over.

I think we're going to have a lot fun with this parenting thing.... Nerdy fun, perhaps. But family fun.

The Sea-Farin' Life

Today I awoke to the sweet strains of my son's most cheerful Good-Morning voice. "Mom?! Is that you? Are you up? Guess what? I am going poop now!"

(Let's just keep moving....)

Shortly after I awoke, Miles appeared in the living room and began to sing: "Make him walk the plank! Make him walk the plank! ...What do ya' do with a scurvy pirate? Make him walk the PLANK!"

This is a strangely regurgitated memory from a cartoon we watched together months ago, The Backyardigans "Pirate Treasure."

Why the words should come to him NOW, today, this morning, is the stuff of serendipity. You see, just last night, as my own two scurvy pirates slept soundly in their bunks, I first discovered RealLivePirate.com. And of course, of course, I LOVE the site!

I committed to heart pirate etiquette (perhaps not what you think) and found a new pirate name and everything! (I briefly considered an official surname change to "Rackham," but I don't want to be disloyal to the family B. flag.)

I guess Miles' interests coinciding with mine are not that strange, given that he has some new Lego... or maybe Playmobile (the difference is?)... toys from his Mama Kay, all within the pirate theme.

In fact, truth be told, Miles was first on board the pirate boat. He played for a whole weekend with two little peg-leg figurines, a crocodile, a shark and a treasure chest. (Oh, how he LOVES the diamonds! Bling, bling!) Then he got a pirate boat with skull and cross-bones flag and a tiny red scorpion.

I was actually a bit disturbed by the pirate toys at first, but now that I am (see below) AKA Capt. Anne Rackham, I'm fine with it! :) Actually, I just find it neat, and appropriate, somehow, that soon after I discovered some of the coolest kids I know have formed a pirate web site, I realized my own kid is among the cool.

What choice have I, the laggardly cool, but to don a coat, tuck in a hand, grab a hook and play along?

My pirate name is:

Captain Anne Rackham

Even though there's no legal rank on a pirate ship, everyone recognizes you're the one in charge. You have the good fortune of having a good name, since Rackham (pronounced RACKem, not rack-ham) is one of the coolest sounding surnames for a pirate. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from fidius.org.

PS: I am guessing there aren't that many names/ descriptions total, as my friend Susie was first recognized "as the one in charge." Ah, well, we pirates aren't like Indians. We can have more than one chief! Especially if all in charge are groovy girls who like craft projects! I can see it now: Pirates with booty cozies! (For stolen treasures, you gutter-thinkers. Geez!)

Blue, Glue, Glee!

(A quick aside: If I hadn't known a true bipolar person before, I'd think I'm a prime candidate. Low and then high. High and then low. Low and then... I seriously give myself a headache. And I don't know what that title means, either.)

But what I came to say is that I've sublimated.

Successfully redirected.

Ah, the power of lunch!

I ate Thai food today with two great people, and my discontent and bitterness has somehow folded itself into possibility. I learned about some new volunteer opportunities in new places within my church. Dear and Rational Spouse may have a heart attack when he reads this, but I have big plans for myself! BIG plans! (Don't roll your eyes. I'm SERIOUS.) I am on a long-range mission to free myself from things I don't have passion for and the other volunteers who make me crazy, while adding work in places that challenge or grow my soul. I will know and speak the Truth! And the truth (while potentially taking up more of my time) will also set me free!

Just thinking about it, I'm light as a feather!

Now, I'm STILL supposed to show up for lunch w/the old ladies tomorrow, to get fired up for Quadrennial (yes, that's the name of the conference. and, no, no one knows what that means. How about a THEME, ladies?) Just between you and me, I won't be attending this big-time, big-expense, big-commitment event. But it'll just be our little secret. :)
And, I still have 8 board meetings at which to take minutes, a new committee for praise & worship service, the possibility of becoming a "liturgist" -- whatever the hell that is, and Jeremy, hon, you maybe should have stopped reading by now -- plus a women's Bible study to find a substitute teacher and a nursery worker for. But all in all, I am racheting down my commitments.

No Pumpkin Patch. No more kid's church. The list goes on....

Light as a feather, I tell ya'. A Forrest freakin' Gump feather.

And now I have to go buy fax ink. Hope I can press the gas pedal, as light as I feel.



(Upon a quick re-read, I imagine some bipolar tendancies could actually be documented. For the second time today, let's keep something our little secret.)

Bleh, Blah, Blues...

"...Just make sure I'm around when you've finally got something to say..."

I don't know why this song by Toad the Wet Spocket sticks, but it won't leave my mind today.

I think it's because I might, indeed, have something to say, but I have no way of knowing when it will come out, in any way more thoughtful or readable than a projectile jumble, so I couldn't ask anyone to be sure & stick around for that.

I'm having a hard time. I am in the midst of hard times. Well, writerly hard times. Not so much will-I-survive hard times.

I'm just having a lot of trouble expressing myself.

And this is bad news for such an emotive, emotional sort as me.

Bad, bad news.

It's kind of like being Gregor in Kafka's "Metamorphosis." I woke up feeling recognizable "me" feelings, but I suddenly can't communicate them because no one understands my insect-speech.

I think I am supressing (oh, perhaps? suppressing? what a psychological breakthrough!) some discontent with people who are very much part of my church and life routine, so my routine is all out of whack.

What are my options? Confrontation or sublimination. Sigh. I guess I'll go with B. I'm pretty much a B kind of girl.

But one day -- SOME DAY, and I'm SERIOUS here! -- I want very much to learn to confront in Christian love. To admonish without the inner knowledge that I am being a judgmental jerk. To speak the Word instead of twisting it to cover my perceived hurts and slights.

Some day. Some day.

And to carry on until that day.....

The Next Thing

Wow. Is summer really over?

Quick date check: Monday, Sept. 19. Ugh. I guess so.

With all the continuing heat and consistent busyness, the trauma of weather and human suffering, a change of season hasn't actually registered with me. Until today, actually. While reading this blog.

I've done some sucky writing -- or some sucky not writing, or both as the case may be -- over the summer. Don't I have more, well, output to show for myself? Something better AND something bigger?

I was teetering toward rank self-disappointment, but, honestly, I have no grounds. The good ol' college try was all I committed to in the beginning. Just making the effort was the whole idea behind silly little me starting a blog. (It sure wasn't snappy politcal commentary or insider juice, a la wonkette or gawker!)

To commit to (semi-public) view some (semi-consistent) writing, and not be able to delete it all when my mood turns blue. That's all I set out to do. (Baby steps! Baby steps!) It wasn't supposed to be about outcome, but process. Process and simply presence. Here, as imperfectly as I represent myself, I'm still in. Sometimes all in. Or at least on the record. And, in beginning the record, I knew I'd commit myself to keep recording. (If for no other reason than to make the sub-par posts move further down!) Here, in this space, I WILL do the next thing.

That's the challenge of my whole adult life, really. To "do the next thing." It sounds so simple. But not at all for me. Sometimes I can't decided what, of so many things, should come next. Sometimes I lack the passion to start. The patience to finish. Sometimes, more than I like, I am completely stymied by my own life.

Luckily I am not a finished product just yet. Like my blog, I'm still more about process than outcome a lot of the time. So we'll just soldier on together, me and my little project, my Jiminy Cricket for the writing self. And we'll see what we become, as time and space and every next thing stake their claims.

Not Angry

Doesn't it feel like a long time since Katrina? A long time in a short-minded world.... And yet, a wound still festering fresh.

Like a lot of people, I've tucked into WAY too much written and broadcast news since August 27. I just needed to know, in all the horrific detail, what was happening next door to home.

I've been teary and rageful and nauseous and depressed and sort-of catatonic over it all. As, again, lots of people have.

All I can say is I don't think it's my right to be angry.

God is good. As the little ditty goes, "all the time."

..."God is good. All the time. Through the darkest night His light will shine."

I can't deny this knowledge, and so I must confess it. In the face of rotting human corpses and toxic black water, God is still God. And God is good.

That's all.

Follow-Up

So, I completed a post. I guess this means.... NewAnglican: TAG! you're it!

Alright, Suse... I GET your Message!

:) A big shout out to my friend NPT, who is known in these circles as SusieDerk. She has been gently encouraging me to post more often, for a while now. Failing in that effort, she's gone a step further. She has issued a challenge via the world wide web... It's like an electronic double-dog dare, and it must be met.

OK, so, in answer to the survey:

1. Number of books owned:
Not so many as before the move to Texas, actually. I've been trying to thin the novel collection every subsequent move because, as my husband patiently explained, "They have these things called libraries, you know. And they will let you have books for free. All sorts of books! All you have to do is return them."

2. Last book bought:
"Praying God's Word" by Beth Moore. (Honesty disclaimer: Not sure I would get through the whole thing on my own, but I'm starting a women's bible study and we're reading it together.)

3. Last book(s) completed:
"Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince." (Ging heart JK Rowling. And it seems, now that the end is near, the characters have seeped into my subconscious like Scout and Gem or Peter and Susan and Edmund and Lucy, and it must be true I've always, always loved that -- very bad English accent approaching -- 'ER-ree Paw-tuh.)
Just after Harry, looking for a change of pace, I read "The Anglophile," by Laurie Gwen Shapiro. Summer fun with a sassy Jewish girl. How could I go wrong? Now I need to tackle "The Matzo Ball Heiress."

4. Five or more books that mean a lot to me:
Hard! How about authors who always move me? Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Barbara Kingsolver. Zora Neale Hurston (skip the Oprah movie and READ THE BOOK!). Erik Larson (strange, because he writes nonfiction). Jane Smiley (always, but especially "At Paradise Gate"). Sandra Dallas. And, just like SusieD, Jan Karon.
A list of my 3-year-old's books that mean a lot to me include "Giraffes Can't Dance" ("everything makes music, if you really want it to."); "Click Clack Moo: Cows That Type" (beware the duck!); "Sherman Crunchley" ("but I don't want to be the chief of slow geese!") and the Sandra Boynton classics, "But Not the Hippopotamus"/"The Going to Bed Book."
Next, books that I could (and have) read again and again include the "Lucia" series by E.F. Benson; "Out to Pasture" and "Over What Hill?" -- little old-folk gems from Effie Leland Wilder; "The Chronicles of Narnia"; "Little Women" (of course! I'm a nerdy girl who grew up loving books); and anything Agatha Christie.
Finally, since I'm skirting this topic already, a list of childhood books I have re-read in adulthood and liked maybe even more include "Bambi" (very old original; strikingly NOT Disney); "Where the Red Fern Grows" (better than "Old Yeller"!) and the Bronte sisters. (Who the hell let me read those as a kid, anyway?!)

5. Four bloggers I am passing this on to...
Skipping this part, actually, because my bagel is ready. Seriously. Miles is yelling this over and over from the kitchen. Rather than grasping that I am occupied, I believe he thinks I am deaf. He just asked, appearing at my side, "Do you where the special cream is, that I put on this knife for the bagel?" Good Lord! But I also hear he set the breakfast table, forks included, so how can I dawdle any longer? The feast of life awaits!

About Feet

I've been thinkin', lately, about feet. And not in the unsmelly abstract, either.
I don't mean feet as in 'hallmark of bipedal locomotion.' I'm talking actual, real-life, sometimes-they-stank FEET. Those funny sprouts at the bottom of our legs, where we keep our bumps and lumps, bones and bulges. They kind of gross me out, feet do, and yet I have made a study of them for days....

1. On Sunday, I went to a funeral and sat by a lady with untended toes.

At first, I was bothered by the chipped red toenail paint. Seriously bothered. Obsessively bothered. Why could I even see her toes, I wondered. "Isn't there a dress code for these things? Surely this is disrespectful." But, then, later, either sweating through a song or straining to hear a prayer from the un-airconditioned outer foyer, I just stopped caring. In fact, it occured to me to be pleased that my seat-mate hadn't stayed home just because she had chipped paint. Even with better polish, those were gonna be ugly, those toes. But their owner sure put them to good purpose that day.

2. On Wednesday, I went to pick up my son and walked into a shoe swap-meet, little barefoot kids trying on each other's sweaty sandals and the dress-up shoes.

One boy named Seth, in particular, was working the floor in a construction T-shirt, red shorts and pink glittery mules.

My first thought was, "EEEWW!" Then, "What about that Seth?" As jarring as the image first was -- Seth also had two handbags and a crown -- I also liked the kid's bold choice. I felt very bad, momentarily, that boys are not given glitter as a shoe adornment. (Come to find out, Seth had hidden his white K-Swisses in order not to put them back on, so I guess he was bummed, too.) Later, I was struck by how easily little kids will shed their shoes, expose their feet, and slip into someone else's. How personal is that? Of all the clothes sharing I did in high school and college, I don't know that I ever wore another girl's shoes.
How naturally children discard the carefully chosen coverings we parents place on their feet. Grown-ups hardly ever even bare their feet. Swap their shoes. ...Or hide them in favor of pink glittery mules.



3. On Thursday, I lay in a pool and thought nice thoughts about my own feet.

I hardly ever lounge in pools -- and certainly not on weekdays -- but I did, just this once, to mark the advent of a new school year. I was with three friends, each of us reclined on full-length floaties in the still water so that we formed 4 islands of relative flatland save for the plastic margarita tumblers attached to our hands or balanced on our bellies. I lay there for the longest, enjoying the peace and staring straight ahead at my own two feet. I was feeling so charitable towards them. (And the margarita had NOTHING to do with it!) Instead of noticing my own wayward pedicure, or my flip-flop callouses, or my dropped-paint-can scar, I thought they looked like nice feet. Honest feet. Good little soldier feet! They're nicely sturdy, and not THAT big. Like James Cromwell in Babe, I was thinking, "That'll do, piggies. That'll do."


You know, it SEEMS awfully random, this foot silliness. But I have found, when small details lodge in my mind and there group with like items, it's usually a God thing. Some bit of wisdom or deeper peace He is patiently, painstakingly, repeatedly trying to give me, in that awesome, Spirit-of-wind-and-fire-and-quiet-stillness way God speaks to us all. Lately, He is speaking to me through feet.


"He got up from the meal, took of his outer clothing and wrapped a towel around his waist. After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples' feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, 'Lord, are you going to wash my feet?"

'You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand.' "
--John 13:4-7 (NIV)

VBS

The following is a little canned item, a preserved fruit in light syrup, from my pantry of past writing. I wanted to talk about this year's Vacation Bible School -- which sucked the life out of me for 5 days in June -- but I honestly don't have the composure to create a new post right now. So I found this old diatribe on last year's VBS and decided, eh, well, it'll do. Isands. Safaris. Themes come and go, but VBS remains very much the same....


JULY 2004
I look down at the edge of the registration table, and there's a pageboyed, pink-jacketed girl of indiscriminate age. She won't make eye contact and she doesn't seem to belong to the group in front of me. "Is this one of yours," I ask the mom? "Nope."
"Hey, honey, what's your name and I'll get you a name tag?"
"[very small voice] reagan."
OK, how do you spell that? R-e-a-g-a-n?"
"No! No, no."
"OK, how do you spell it?"
"R...... E...... A.......
........
........
GAN."
Well, of course.
Welcome to Vacation Bible School, R-E-A-----G-A-N.


It's DAY ONE of Lava Lava Island ("where God's love flows"), and I've been conscripted into registration duty, where life is trial by chaos. Or death by details. Will and Griffin must stick together. Ryan IS preregistered, but will be found on a different page because his last name isn't the same as his two siblings. Nathan will help me spell the first and last names of Ethan, Joey and the fourth amigo from social services somewhere-or-other. Two are twins. Three are related. All are precious, the oldest a little eager for positive or negative attention. (Meanwhile, their supervising adult asks, "Now what's your age limit? I'll be bringing four more later.")
Adults on the other side of the double glass doors grow restless as the table bottlenecks with parents, forms, malfunctioning pens, luau decor and name tags. A quick glance at the watch shows it's 10 after 8. Two thoughts: "YIKES! Already 10 after 8!!" Then, "Ugh. ONLY 10 after 8?" Yes, 10 after 8. 3 hours, 50 minutes to go. Mahalo.


Small, pigtailed Julia sits with her granddad before the welcome, swinging her legs and eyeing everyone with a palpable need for a connection. I ask her how she's doing, and she says, "I'm the new girl."
Oh, sweetheart. Don't I relate?
"Well," I say, "I was the new girl last year. I think you'll be just fine."


Two cute, round-faced kids on the front row are already making the song motions along with the warm-up CD. They've been to this Bible school before and want to shout out requests... kind of like a piano bar.
Two girls in the row just behind them (one razor thin in a tropical sundress, the other pixie-faced and brunette) are also singing along. Later, one tells me, "Y'all copied this Bible school from Pollard. We went there first, and it was really good. Maybe better than this." Hmm... Well... all I can do is try not to suck.


At 8:15, a mom grabs me and says Elizabeth was so nervous, she couldn't pee at home. Now she has to go, even though we're 15 minutes late starting already. I take them both to the Ladies Room, telling Elizabeth that my little boy has red hair just like hers. Elizabeth's first smile of the day is barely breaking before I have to leave her, a poor Nervous Nelly whose mom is headed back to grownupland post-haste.


In the middle of my second lesson, I notice a girl in a blue knit track suit with dirty knees, curled into a fetal position on a chair. It's Grace, who wants to be in the same group as her cousin and isn't. I promise we'll work something out, even though she's barely verbal and doesn't remember all her cousin's names. "Her name is Emer... [something I can't understand], but she likes to be called Cheney. I forget her other names."
The name thing only SEEMS like a hurdle. Actually, my big problem is the time-space continuum. As in, too much space to cover & not nearly enough time. But, after three rounds of the building (to seek out an offical roster), two conversations with two different teen counselors, and one chaotic search through Snackland to find Cheney (whose last name was misprinted on the list, anyway!), Grace is smiling HUGELY. And it was NO PROBLEM. No problem at all.


I think the cutest, cutest girls in the world must be three and four years old. Honestly, every female child I've met in this age group is a cherub to behold! As I begin my lesson in semi-darkness, I have about one minute to register how darling these little people look before Natalie and Madison are trying to sit on my lap and monopolize my attention. (My little friend Kelsey is staying outside, because she is afraid of the dark and angels.) The other two aren't actually less fearful than Kelsey... I think they just have "sucker radar" that indicates I will allow them to manhandle me, and this will make them feel better. Soon, Natalie is wearing my tinsel halo over her blond bangs and Madison is whispering that my angel wings "are really for fairies. Angels don't have pink wings, you know."


I have wised up after the frightened toddler episode and am now asking each group if they'll be OK in the dark for the first half of our lesson. Precious, precocious Taylor (four going on 14) is quick to say, "I'm afwaid of the dark!" -- spurring four or five other children to say, "ME, too!" The teen leader then says, "OK, everyone who's afraid stays out here with me," and Taylor sees the small hitch in her confession. "Oh, just kidding," she says, "Let's go on IN now!"


Sweet-faced, obviously overweight Hunter says he likes it in my room. "This is my favorite of all," he says. "I'll come here every day." Even though he's a tad too old to think this is cool, he hugs me on the way out. I hug back and feel a little tear in my heart as I hope puberty and peers are kind to Hunter.


On the way back from my extra-short snack time (gotta set up the story campfire for the next group), I see three-year-old Rob escaping. I've seen him before, because I checked him in and noticed his HUGE backpack. Rob is confidently zig-zagging past adults and toward the exit when I catch up. He tells me he wants to see his daddy.
...I hear ya, little guy! I just want to see my coffee maker and my couch! "Soon..." I tell myself. It's 10:35; only 90 mintes to go!


Wild, wiry, bright-eyed Isaiah is talking during the lesson. Again. He wants to know about "the other God -- the evil one."
"He's orange and strong and has, like, some super-powers and I think he beat up Jesus, until Jesus kicked him out of Heaven." I briefly pretend to be unclear on what he's saying, until Robby interjects (moving his head in closer for emphasis), "He MEANS Satan. You know, Satan, right?" And Isaiah –– who is probably no more than 5 and doesn't recognize the letters of his own name –– literally SHOUTS, "It's true! It's true! I read all about Satan in the Bible."
I refrain from asking "Just what Bible DOES your family read?" and come up with something in reply. ...You know, I'd been picturing skits and songs and a double portion of cookies for the grown-up help. (Sigh.) And I didn't even get ONE cookie at snack time. A quick time check tells me it's 10:53.


A little later, a girl whose name I cannot remember says, "I'm so tired. I just want a nap." I tell her we're almost done for the day so she can go home soon, and she says, " Nope. not me. After this I haffa go to Taylor's house for a 'play date.'" I look at her droopy brown eyes and give her a little back rub in sympathy. I for one know how it feels to be completely PLAYED OUT. And it's only 11:15.

45 minutes and 4 days to go.... God bless them all, and have mercy on my exhausted adult soul. Amen.

Witticim. Truth. Good writing.

"A bared soul is the new accessory, the midriff of the Internet age." -- Stacy Schiff in a New York Times column, published June 8, 2005

She was writing so wittily about (among other things) blogging. And don'tcha love that? As sincere as this medium can be, Ms. Way With Words is RIGHT. A lot of soul-baring online is just for effect.

As for me, only a dilettante (OK, OK, "part-timer" sounds less snotty) in the journaling world, I can but HOPE to sincerely bare something so deep as a soul. (I'm not even down with the midriff, really, so you can imagine my discomfort at flashing the flab INSIDE...)

As I try to restart a blogging routine, I do hope to be brave enough to lift a corner on things true and real about Ginger, attractive or ugly as they may turn out to be.

I'll work on some down-home, grassroots soul-baring before the summer is out. Until then, I'll probably skip trendy accessorizing all together.

Viva Labor Day and the end of swimsuit season!

Dinnertime

"Look! My boobies are poking out!"

Full stop mid-dinner. Did my small, innocent, boy child just say what I think he said?

"Look, Mommie, look! [He gestures toward his bowed-out chest, bare at the table for some reason I have yet to hear and don't remember approving.] My boobies are getting bigger!"

There's a pause, as neither parent quite knows what to say. I flinch first.

"Honey, little kids don't have those. And boys don't really grow... um... boobies. You have a chest. That's what we call it. Only grown-up girls have chests that stick out, and we try not to use that other word, remember?"

"But I do have them! Look!" [He pinches a tiny boy nipple.] "Little kids have boobies that stick out when they fill them up with food. Look at mine! They're poking out!
Yum, yum! I am SOOO full!"

OH. MY. And what could we have said to that? As best I recall (this was last night, but the old gray brain just ain't what it used to be...), we nodded and resumed adult conversation. There might have been a brief tittering before we pulled it together, but no out and out laughter. (I CANNOT, in good faith, laugh at anything that encourages a 3-year-old to use the word "boobie.")

Do the parents of infants have ANY idea what they're getting into? The parents of boy infants, especially? Maybe other people do -- but we simply didn't know. We did not.

...And thank God for surprises! (It WAS funny, the whole posturing to best show off the after-eating "boobies"....)

We're switching to a shirt-mandatory policy for mealtimes at Sherry Lane. It won't keep Miles from showing off some OTHER bit of body or vocabulary we'd rather he not take public, but it will help me not crack up every time I see him rub his chest and hear him say, "Yum! Yum! I am SOOO full!"

Splash Day

I've discovered my child has a love-hate relationship with water.

I am quickly developing a love-hate relationship with Splash Day.

But, hey, we all have our issues....

While Miles can't wait to drench his clothes, body and shoes in our own front yard sprinklers, he refuses to try his friends' Slip-N-Slide. He must be forcibly removed from swimming pools once he's in, but he says he "hates the water" when asked to swim in a plastic pool with (again, same friends) Luke and Lee. He regularly spends 25 minutes in the bathtub, trying to generate tsuanmi waves and displacing gallons of water in the process, but he cries when I get his hair wet.

Today, his preschool is having "Splash Day" to celebrate the end of the year -- just as Miles has developed serious, new reservations about water. Getting ready this morning was less than a joy, as Miles refused to get dressed, then needed to go to the bathroom. Then brush his teeth. Then wash his hands. Then get some juice. Then brush his teeth....

He also lost the mates to TWO pairs of shoes and, though he engaged a parent and two grandparents in the search, was unable to recover even one complete pair.

Then, as we were ALMOST ready for the front door, I realized he has misplaced two pairs of sunglasses and his only remaining hat that fits. We arrived late at Splash Day because Mommie and Miles went to the store on the way to purchase a bright orange (ladies!) Nike baseball cap.

With all the delays and the dragging of heels, I almost, almost gave up... by my Sixth Sense tells me this troublesome little boy will be so happy when he sees a sprinkler set up in the sunshine, and all his friends available to play in it. I am holding out hope for this crummy morning to become a shiny, happy, straight-to-memory day.

I read this great book last year, simply because my husband brought it to me from the library. Later, I learned that the book won a Pulitzer Prize. (Jeremy has a knack for good choices.) It's called "Gilead," by Marilynne Robinson. And it includes a marvelous, marvelous description of how "wet" and "kids" should best combine. I wrote it out and saved it, I liked it so much:

“The sprinkler is a magnificent invention because it exposes raindrops to sunshine. (I'm watching as) you two are dancing in your iridescent little downpour, whooping and stomping as all sane people ought to do when they encounter a thing so miraculous as water.”

Here's to Splash Dasy... big pain in the ass that it has been! :) Let me always make the extra effort to receive the miraculous!

Honey, We're Home

So I picked Miles up at 2:15 -- 15 full minutes ahead of deadline -- and headed out of the parking lot in a new direction.
"Are we going to share Elaine?" he asked.
Hmmm.... "Say again?"
"Share-e-lane," he repeated.
Oh! My. Without being told, simply by listening to us harried grown-ups coordinate the big move, Miles had learned the name of our new street. And now he was trying to use it properly in a sentence -- "are we going to Sherry Lane?"
"Yes, baby, we are going to Sherry Lane. Because that's where our home is."
"Good. Mom, I really like my new house."

...After 60 hours of muscle-straining, bone-aching, mind-draining labor, as we face weeks of unpacking, months of penny-pinching and a mountain of home improvements... that conversation is why we moved.

Exhaustion Approaching

Here on Day Two of our L-O-N-G week (moving countdown: minus 70 hours), Miles and I are wasting valuable afternoon time looking at pictures instead of packing. When I found this one and Miles said, "It's me with my favorite wet Silkie! I LOVE it!" ...well, it just had to be posted. I imagine Jer and I will look much like this (only less cute and Silkie free) by Saturday night. Wish us a smooth move!  

Mouthes of Babes

Another little funny, just uttered as I use a cook's tool, in the kitchen, in the service of our family's evening meal. (But I know what Miles means. And he's right about which parent has the real culinary talent...)

Mom: "What did you do at school today?"
Son: "Played with kids."
Mom: "Which kids?"
Son: "Bronwyn. I played with Bronwyn. Sometimes we play house, and sometimes we play cook."
Mom: "You do what?"
Son: "We pretend like we are cooks... with food. You know, cooks -- like Daddy!"

Live & Let Die

So the Whirling Dervish is spinning about the den, eating pretzels and jumping up and down between karate moves. He says he is being a vacuum cleaner. (That delivers punches and shin kicks? Quentin Tarrantino's vacuum cleaner, maybe...)

But I'm already off track. I mean to be documenting a 3-year-old's growing understanding of BIG TOPICS.

We were packing the kitchen last week, using old newspapers to wrap things. Miles saw a picture of the pope's massive funeral and asked me what it was. I tried to fudge a little because I didn't want to get into the conversation of death; I told him it was a kind of parade and kept packing. But he just kept asking questions! He wore me down, man! He wore me down, and I cracked under the pressure.

"That was a man who died, baby. A good man, who was kind of a preacher, and who died. Lots of people are in this picture because they liked this man who died. They were sad to see him go. So they came to say goodbye. This is his funeral."

OK, everything on the table now. I was hoping for information overload, which often sends Miles back to his toy trucks and nonsensical conversations with the Fisher Price Little People. But, instead.... "Oh," says Miles. "Like the dinosaurs."

(Who are dead, he meant.) "Yes, I guess so. Like the dinosaurs"

"Yeah" says Miles, pointing to the pope body in state, "This guy's extinct, Mom. He's ex-TINCT!"

Like the dinosaurs. :)

*


On a related note, today in the car, Miles retold me the Tale of Squirrel Woe that he gathered through Papa Jim this weekend and first told me last night. It got better in its second telling -- more vivid detail -- and it goes almost like this (I've decided to quote even though I may be a little off here and there):
"And, and, last night, when I was with Papa Jim, and the school was out on our walk, we saw a flat squirrel. He bumped into a car. Yeah, he was in the road and a car bumped him and he fell right on the concrete and all his fur fell out on the concrete. And he couldn't get up because he was stuck there, on the concrete. He was not paying pu-ttention, Mom. No, he was not...."

(Yes, it's a cautionary tale, much like Aesop's fables.)

So, our little guy is already processing the concepts of death and dying. Thus far, he seems completely unfazed. But, then again, he's still surprised when one of his punches impacts a parent's face and causes an outcry. He's not much into the reality of pain and suffering; he just hasn't had any yet. (Sigh.) I'm grateful he's made it this far in life unscathed... but he's got a lot to learn, doesn't he?

Poor, sweet little fella.

Five Future Home Shots

I have some time on my hands, so I thought I'd try this photo publishing thing again.
(I still stink at it, BTW.)

DISCLAIMER: There's NOTHING to see here unless you are a relative or an especially indulgent friend. No one else cares about "before" shots of our soon-to-be home... Go ahead and look, but don't say I didn't warn ya!



red-rum, red-rum (not actually scary in person; just the front hallway, paneling below painted grasscloth) 

the breakfast nook 

this mirror speaks. it says, "hello, las vegas!" 

future fireman room 

living room #1 

Clean-Up in Aisle Mine

"Your poop looks like frosting!"

This is an actual quote, folks. To save some shred of anonymity for all involved, I can offer few further details. But it's factual. The words issued forth from Miles' lips, at a time when both parents were home to hear/ appreciate/ recoil in horror.

...With these kinds of conversations so uniquely entwined in my everyday life, is it any wonder I am a near-raving lunatic with fading social skills and not very cute outfits?

I am truly losing my mind as we continue potty training. Monday, I said OUT LOUD to my beloved child, "I tell you the truth. I will walk out of this house and leave you if you don't stop doing this." ("This" being our daily routine of accidents Miles doesn't notice or acknowledge.)

I have touched so much fecal matter in the last month -- more than any parent of any average newborn, I would confidently wager. (Infants wear diapers. Diapers are disposable. And diapers are designed to contain poop. Toddlers wear SuperHero underwear. Super Hero underwear are both prized and overpriced and not, as a rule, thrown away. Also, they don't contain sh*&! Sorry. So rarely does as expletive fit into a sentence literally, that I had to use it.)

I really am near the precipice. I've been just rational enough to think through what I'll do when I go over, and those of you with a soft spot for the little redhead will be pleased to hear I'm not going to take Miles with me. (The very idea is nonesense! Not only do I not want to harm him, I don't want to smell him on my way down!)

Really, our house is beginning to reek. And sometimes the smell is the best proof of what has gone awry. I recently walked into our kitchen and thought -- no lie! -- "there's so much water on the floor! A dishwasher supply pipe must have burst." I bent closer. Nope, but Mommie's Little Kitchen Helper sure sprang a leak!

I'd wised up a bit by the time I found a slick spot in the bathroom this week. "Is that pee?!" I asked/ shrieked. "Uh, yeah. I missed," shruged the boy. I think that was the episode during which I noticed a rash on my knuckles, a brand new outbreak of dish-pan hand no doubt caused by all the scalding hot washings I undergo daily.

In a nice bit of serendipitous timing, I'm headed to the dermatologist tomorrow, where I can address my flaky, irritable skin. Had I the time, I would also head to the liquor store so I could address my flaky, irritable mind.

Once this is over -- assuming this, too, shall pass -- and I am asked for advice on potty training, I'm not sure I can ever muster a (printable) reply. I'm thinking of anything, anything I can say that will not cause another woman to shudder with revulsion or fear.

Lysol. Clorox. The brand names are your best friends. Those, and a gross of latex gloves.

Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da

Miles is puttering around, hammering random objects and singing "Bob the Builder" to himself. It's somehow very sweet.

A low rumbling on the street interrupts him. I hear a rush of small feet on the way to the window. (Is he a single child or a fleet of them? Hard to tell without a visual.)

"BYE, TRASHMAN! See ya' next time! Thanks for coming!"

Ah, these moments of domestic bliss. They're the "ob-la-di's" that lift me above the everyday blahs.

Even now I'm humming as I type: "Desmond has a barrow in the marketplace...."

Well, Of Course He Did... The Windows Were Locked

I think scientists will soon isolate a smart-aleck gene. I believe it's out there, and I'm pretty sure it runs dominant among males in my family.

The other day, Miles came running into the den with this excited cry: "Mom! Mom! I found a spider! In my room! Come look at him!"

I go in and find, sure enough, a rather healthy eight-legged specimen under the play table. All play had been suspended for the find; the sitting stools were knocked out of the way and a complete backpack of gear was disemboweled on the carpet, as M. had clearly been looking for bug-wrangling gear. He chose his binoculars (around the neck), his magnifying glass (in one hand) and most frigteningly, his giant tweezers.

As my child was playing Nearsighted Entomologist, it occured to me that we hadn't had a spider of this size in the house in a while. And it wasn't a rainy day, which often drives bugs indoors. I said out loud, "I wonder how that spider got in here?" And immediately, Miles wheeled around, binoculars still trained and tweezers held aloft. Without missing a beat, he said,

"Uh, well, I'm pretty sure he came through the door, Mom."

A Visual Treat!

We have found our new house! With few worries but overflowing miracles ("a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over"), we sold a house in 1 day and then found another to call home.
...And this is it! Witness the pleasant but unassuming facade that will soon hold two parents and a Boy Wonder.

(Geez! That was WAY more time-consuming to post than it should have been. I envisioned a mini photo gallery of home shots, but seriously, it's getting late and I can NOT be bothered to stay up and gather steam as I try to work out why my Mozilla window doesn't function the way Internet Explorer does. More photos later, perhaps, when armed with a beer and a bigger reserve of patience...)


.

Our Little Oddity

M: "Do you have water in your ears, Mom?"
G: "Umm... maybe a little."
M: "OK, well... You should use a toothpick!"
(Long pause while I visualize, shiver, and reexamine what the child might be saying.)
G: "OH! You mean a Q-tip?"
M: "Yeah, a Quuue-tip. They're little sticks that are very scratchy on the ends. You just stick 'em in there and ... (he wrinkles his brow, scrunches his nose, then dramatically turns his wrist) ... TWIST!"
So my day began, straight out of the shower with a slightly violent take on routine personal hygiene.

Other gems, from today and recently:

M: "We need a new house because our house is old, right? And too little, right?"
G: "Yes, honey."
M: "And when we get a new one, some other people will move into our house.
...And I guess they'll just throw away their old house."
G: "What?" (I've noticed I say this a lot.)
M: "Yep. They will. In a VERY BIG trash can."


As Jer and I are talking, I'm try to parlay exhaustion into permissiveness. Miles keenly observes.
G: "So... if you're just agreeing with everything, can we get a kitten when we move into our new house?"
J: "Uuhngh."
G: "OK. How about TWO kittens!?"
M: "OH! OH! I haf a idea! How about double-you kittens!"
G: "Double-you kittens? Like, the letter W?"
M: "Yeah! See?" (Holds up his middle three fingers, with thumb and pinky tucked, and looks intently at them.) "One, two, DUB - EL - YOU!"


I shake my head. I shrug. He's weird, but Lord, he's ours! Cheers to Miles and all the little kids whose minds keep time with their own different drummers.

An Excellent Faller

Miles has a new Spiderman scooter. It's very snazzy -- silver, blue and red with a holographic foot board and a Spiderman "shield" between the handlebars. He got it from his Mama Kay, as a present for his 3rd birthday.

Kudos to the scooter engineers, because this dangerous-looking toy is actually well-designed for toddler use. It's very stable, and it steers with little pressure. This, of course, makes Miles think he is Evel Keinevel. He zips around the back patio (more truthfully described as " big concrete patch") and circles the garage like he's headed for the X Games.

The other day, as I was standing in the back doorframe, I caught sight of him cruising along, one foot firmly planted, one foot pumping for locomotion. "Buddy! Look at you!," I said. "You are an excellent rider." Just then, he jerked the handlebars (to look at me?) and the whole apparatus tipped. Miles' wrist went out to break his fall (an act which gave me flashes of exposed bone and the ER). Then -- almost in slow motion, as a Star Trek special effect missing only the transporter hum -- the boy and the scooter which were a vertical line reconstituted themselves into a horizontal pile. Without a pause, Miles stepped out from under the bars, pulled himself up and righted the scooter. "Yeah, I am!" he said back. "And I am also an excellent faller!"


Dear God: May we all fall as well as this little boy. May we count our skills many; may we see our every stumble as part of a greater victory. May we quickly stand after every fall, and may we always rejoin the race before us. "Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal...."
Amen.

Grandpa Stories

This post is for Jim and Di, as a little break from tax season.
May the stories only grow and multiply, the grandparent lore to be told and retold...


NO SHARKS AT GRANDPA'S
We have a new book called "Commotion in the Ocean." We (Miles and I, because Daddy falls asleep reading at night) love it! I mean: Love it, love it, love it! We are learning lots from it, including a phrase which Miles often repeats: "Sharks are the most dangerous by far."
I was concerned that the kid might be getting a fear complex from all the shark talk, but fear of God's creatures doesn't seem to be much in him.

One night, after reading the ocean book, he said to me: "Sharks don't live in Biddy's lake." ("Biddy" is our great friend and the benefactor of many lakeside weekends. His name is Billy, but it's cuter the other way.) "Nope, and they don't live in Grandpa's lake, either."
I was wondering how Miles knew about Grandpa's lake, as I didn't think we'd taken him out on the boat, but I never put anything past him. I said, "You mean, the lake where Grandpa drives his boat?"
"Nope. His little lake. Only frogs live in his little lake. Because they are small, and so is it. Sharks are big, and so they can't fit in there."
Ohhhh, of course! Get it? The waterfall on the patio behind the house. And, sure enough, it includes a small frog statue on one of the rocks.
Miles wrapped up his night's discourse: "So DON'T WORRY, Mama. There are NO sharks at Grandpa's!"


THAT'S WHY HE ASKED ME....
One day we were noticing trucks that passed our car, and Miles said something to the effect of "that one's like Grandpa's." So we talked about how many Grandpas he knows who drive white trucks (3! isn't that crazy?). But only one is the "hugest truck,"and that one belongs to Grandpa Va Voom. That memory somehow triggered a story in Miles' mind. And the story went something very much like this:
"And one day Grandpa found a nail in his truck. In his BIG white truck. It was a LONG nail. And it wouldn't go anymore. And that's why he asked me to help him fix it!"
"Really," I said. "Why did he ask you again?"
"Because I am a good helper! And I work with tools. I can fix things. So we fixed the truck. We took out the nail and put new air in it. And we used the tools. And we did it!"
And there you go. Just as Bob the Builder says: Can we fix it?
... Yes, yes we can!

When Worker Bees Go Bad

My printer won't print, and I crave chocolate.

(Really, I have bigger issues, but these two are mosquitos burrowing into my skin. )

You know, I give the devices a good home; I shelter them from toddler attacks; I feed them electricity. And THIS is how they repay me! Talk about biting the hand....

WHAT IS WRONG WITH MY PRINTER?! (Somehow, it actually helps to type rhetorical sentences in all caps. Very cathartic.) If only I could get it to work, then I could accomplish something and justify a long break whereby I scour the kitchen for stray chocolate baking chunks or leftover Valentine candy.

But, oh! My printer won't print. And, again, I crave chocloate. (Hmm.... This actually has quite a ring to it. Want to repeat aloud? "My printer won't print, and I crave choc-o-late. My printer won't print, and I crave....")

Yes, I'm a little punch-drunk at the desk.

I am living in "Office Space" this morning. I can't get my peripheals to work, and I'll never get those TCP reports in on time! "PC Load Letter? Paper jam?!" (Rent the movie if this makes no sense.)

Anyway, back to the salt mines...

Memory Scraps

Today, I have no point.

"Nothing to see here, citizens. Back to your lives..."

I have no reason for posting, save the sheer self-indulgence of rounding up and hording a few more thoughts.

I generate so many mental fragments day to day -- memories, observations, wants, to-dos. Like fallen leaves, they litter the ground around me. (I mean this literally, as I have a habit of writing things on Post-It notes. My memory-joggers make perfect sense at the time, but they soon become cryptic little squares of sticky. I stick them to the facing of the shelf above my computer, where they hang until humidity overcomes them. They tend to flutter, one by one, down to the Alpha Pile on my desk, where they get pushed aside in favor of spreadhseets and email printouts. Slowly but surely, they collect in corners or in front of the desk organzier, only to get knocked aside by coffee mugs or file folders and float to the floor... from which they get picked up, puzzled over, and piled once again.

Right now, I am throwing out the notes! ...But not before I transcribe a few.

* Miles thought the crochet snowflakes on our Christmas tree were spiderwebs. His words: "We haf stars and spider webs... All right!"
* I think I could get a good parenting essay out of the day I started talking to Miles' toys. (To remember: Big Bear in the dryer.)
* Miles' first made-up word was "potote."
* Why don't more bloggers write about their spouses? Is is a topic too sacred to parse online?
* To detail later: why food is better in bar format!
* Praying in public: pro or con?
* pay off medical bills
find new insurance policy & pediatrician
make check-up appt. for M. & dematologist appt. for me
(Ophs! Those last few shouldn't have been in the "random" pile. Maybe this helps explain why they never got done.)

All that's all she wrote... for a few days, anyway.

A Proverb

Wow! Look what I just read...

"My son, if you accept my words and store up my commands within you, turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding, and if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding, and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. " Proverbs 2:1-5

Wow...

That must be a very big thing, "the knowledge of God."

I think what I want is not "God's knowledge," but "to know of God." I hope that's how Soloman meant it. (You never can tell about those Chosen ones! They can be very sure of themselves. :))

Today and this weekend and next week, I will do my best to call out and cry aloud. I have a feeling an Answer already awaits.

No Worries....

(Alternate title: Hakuna Matada, My Ass!)

I've noticed something: Every time M. says, "don't worry!" I start to worry.

Wednesday's Examples:
"This shirt has two tags that are bothering me, Mommie! They BAA-ther me! But, but... ah... don't worry! I will get the scissors!"

"Don't worry! I will make your coffee for you!"

Q: "Miles! What are you doing in there with the water running?"
A: "Uh, don't worry! I am using soap!"

Talking to his toys, while playing in his room: "Don't worry, mens! I am coming! I will rescue you!" (CRASH!) "I SAID, Don't worry! ...I'M COMING!"

Thursday's Examples:
Q: "What are you doing on that stool, Miles?"
A: "I am getting medicine. For my cough. I haffa take it every day. Don't worry! I won't forget, Mommie."

Exclamation: "Miles! GET OFF THE TRASH CAN!"
Response: "Don't worry, Mom. I am being safe!"

Life with a boy-child is the best proof I have that women really are from Venus, and men are from Mars. We are like different species co-existing in this house. Would it ever occur to me to drag a step-stool over and climb atop the lidded trash can? Nope.

I swear, this child can break rules we could never think to make! And, yet, at every turn, he tells me, "don't worry." Maybe this is providence, his endless repitition of the phrase so that one day it will sink in. Until then, I'm not exactly humming Hakuna Matada every mornin', you know?

...But I am working on my own trouble-free philosophy. A little visualization I call The Year of Our Lord 2034. In this year, Miles will be as old as I am now. He'll be grown and perhaps married and perhaps with a little red-headed firecracker of his own.

If so, I imagaine that I will meet my daughter-in-law over coffee, and she will exclaim about her child's proclivities. I will offer a sympathetic smile and squeeze her shoulder. I will nod my head. And in solidarity I will say, "Yes, I know. It really IS this hard.
... But you'll never regret it."

The One With The Nail In It

We are going to buy a new house. Not this week or this month, exactly, but soon. Soon enough that I take any detour I can to check out a previously unknown neighborhood. I watch the cable channel with homes for sale, and I run Internet searches for new listings, like clockwork, every two days. I slow the car to a crawl on streets I like, so I won't miss any "For Sale By Owner" signs.

I'm obsessive, yes! But I'm on a mission. I am looking for just the right place. A diamond in the rough, maybe. A "hot property." Our family's perfect worldly home. I have prayed that my eyes will be open, that my ears will be tuned so that I may see and hear God's guidance to just the right house. And I believe that knowledge will come to me. But for now, I mostly just drive. And down every detour, around every cul-de-sac, I carry a 3-year-old passenger.

After about a hundred questions, Miles has come to quite like these detours of ours. He's really caught the spirit of the "search for a new house" game. (Part of what's happening is that we're preparing him for our house to be in on-the-market condition, for our packing up entire rooms and for a move to an unfamiliar home. He has some real OCD tendencies, and we've found that PLENTY of advance warning -- plus lots of ongoing explanantion -- minimizes his inflexibility.)

Miles sees himself as an equal participant in our home search. He's on a mission, too. Today, as I turned off the road to home, he said to me, "Are we looking for other people's houses with the signs on them? The ones for sale to new families?"

I said yes and he kept talking. Miles has been very chatty in his car seat of late, so he manages entire conversations with my only occasional input. "We just need ONE house," I heard him say. "And we will look and look and look until we find just the right one -- the one with the nail in it."

Now this caught my ear. "What, honey? What do you mean?"

"Our new house will be the one with the nail in it. Inside. In my room, we will find one nail in the wall so I can hang my fireman hat."

Is this thought not sweet enough to bust an entire heart wide open?

Once, many many weeks ago, Miles wanted to erect a fireman's pole in his room. I had to tell him no. But, I said, maybe in our next house, we could make a special place to store his fireman gear. "GREAT!" he said -- as he so often says, about everything from toothpaste to turkey dogs -- and I soon forgot. But not Miles. He didn't forget. He held the picture of what he wanted -- not "4 bedrooms/ 2 baths," "side-entry garage" or " new heat & air" -- but what he REALLY wanted, and he maintains utter faith he will find it.

And all the kid really wants is a place to hang his black "Fire Chief" helmet. He will know he has found his home when he finds, literally, a place to hang his hat.

My God Above, we should all be so blessed in this life! May we want no more than a place to hang our hats. May we look, expectantly, for our rightful homes, with eyes open to recognize the spaces. And may our most deeply moving places always have nails in them.

Since it is Lent, the connection must be made plain. I'm sure most readers can follow the dots on their own. And, truthfully, I prefer a lingering implication over a hammered point. But it is Lent, the season of repentance and recognition. A time to solemnly wrestle with what it is to need and receive a Savior. Today, my very small and very precious child reminded me that the best home, the most perfect place with a nail already in it, is in the palm of a hand once pierced for a cross.