Thank You

Suppose you got up early and made a special breakfast for someone you loved.  You went all out--pancakes with homemade maple syrup, or eggs and bacon.  Fresh-squeezed orange juice, even, perhaps.  And as you watched your loved one devour your offering of effort and love, all she said was, "I'm glad I could eat."  Or, "I was sure hungry."  Or even, "I'm grateful for this yummy breakfast."

Telling you she is grateful would be one thing.  But, now, imagine she didn't say any of those things, but turned to you and looked you right in the eyes and said, "Thank you for doing this for me."  

Wouldn't that feel a whole lot nicer than just hearing indirectly about her appreciation, even if the words were spoken right to you?

Suppose you scrimped on your own personal comfort in order to purchase a smartphone for your teenager.  Even, "Yay!  I have an iPhone!" would not be as validating of your sacrifice as if he said, "Thank you for giving me this."  

If you stepped up and took an extra turn filling the dishwasher for your partner, would you hope to hear, "I'm glad the dishes are clean"?

We don't necessarily provide gifts and service to others in order to be thanked, but being thanked directly certainly validates us better than just hearing that the person liked it, does it not?

Saying you're grateful is an expression of appreciation, but not a direct thank you. If you heard someone to whom you gave a gift say, "I'm grateful I have this," wouldn't you kind of look around to see who they were talking to, besides you?

And yet, more and more, here is what I here people say when they pray: "We're grateful for this beautiful day.  We're grateful we could meet.  We're grateful for the moisture.  We're grateful for the gospel.  We're thankful for our families."  

We aren't talking to each other, telling each other what we are grateful for, like we would as an exercise around the Thanksgiving table, are we?  If we believe when we're saying a prayer that we are talking to Heavenly Father, should we not talk to Him directly?  Praying is our chance to say whatever we would like to say to Him!  Should we just mention in passing that we like His gifts? Would it not be a lot better say, "I thank Thee" to Him directly? 

"Be Not Deceived"

A long time ago, when I was looking for a spouse, I went to a dance and I met a good dancer.

We danced a few dances, and we had fun.  He knew what he was doing.  We talked a little, on the sidelines, too, and we discussed some projects we were each working on that seemed interesting to each other.  I gave him my phone number.

My only concern was that, a couple of times while we were dancing, he told me what to do.  It struck me as a little bit bossy, but I rationalized that maybe he was just trying to make sure we were able to execute the moves together without any hitches and maybe I didn't know what I was doing as well as he did.

Well, he called me, and we talked on the phone.

Once.

As we shared our ideas and our histories to the extent that we did, I became uncomfortable when he said that he would have to interpret the scriptures and the messages of our church leaders for his wife.  I asked a clarifying question--did he mean his ex-wife, or a future wife?

He meant both.

He made it clear that he considered his ex-wife to be abnormally stupid.

He also went on to say that women cannot understand the scriptures or the gospel without the help of their husbands.  "It says that in the Bible," he said, smugly.

"Where?"

"Excuse me?"

"Where does it say that in the Bible?"

"Uh, I don't know exactly, but it's in there."  Just as smug.

I was astounded.  "Have you read the Bible?" I asked.

"Well, no, I haven't actually read it, but I know it's in there."

"How can you know it's in there if you haven't read it?" I asked, probably wasting logic on him.  "I've read the entire Bible six times," I informed him, "and it's not there."  Maybe I sounded smug, too.  I don't know. I was on my side of the line.

"It's there.  Women cannot interpret the gospel correctly without priesthood help."

Exasperated, I allowed myself one of the very, very few bad words I've ever said.  "Just because you're a man doesn't mean you have to be a jackass."  Honestly, I thought it fitting.  "I understand the gospel better than you seem to."

Not surprisingly, he ended the conversation quite quickly.  And never called again.

Which was perfectly fine with me.

One thing that it does say in the Bible is that, in the last days, many of the "very elect" will be deceived by people teaching falsehoods as if they were gospel.  (See Matthew 24:24 and Mark 13:22.)

One great blessing of living in modern times is the availability of scripture to practically anyone who wants to read it.  Unlike times in the past, scriptures have been translated into our native languages, almost regardless of what those are.  John Wycliffe, John Hus, William Tyndale, and others gave up their lives trying to give access to the scriptures to commonfolk in their own language. Why did they do that?  Because they understood how very important it is for people to be able to search out the truth for themselves, and not have to rely solely on what someone--anyone--else says.

Not only does this give us each personal access to writings of faith and history, stories and testimony, poetry and song that we can peruse at our leisure and absorb into our minds and spirits for later sustenance, we each have the opportunity to avoid being deceived.

There are almost as many opinions as there are people in the world.  Some of those expounding their own beliefs are charismatic and convincing.  Some are popular, passionate, and persuasive.  If we don't know what is in the scriptures--and what is not--we can easily be converted to the opinions of people instead of the gospel of Christ.

Unlike that man of my brief acquaintance, I never want to be in the position of defending a belief that I'm not sure where it came from.

Anyone with any exposure to the scriptures may know many things contained therein, but the only way I know of to be sure that something is NOT in the scriptures is to read them in their entirety, cover to cover.

I encourage all believers, and those who want to believe, to do so. A niece reminded me yesterday that it only takes 4-5 chapters a day to read the entire standard works in a year.  Two or three chapters a day will get you through the Bible in a year.

Then, when someone says, "This is true," or "that is true," or that something false is in the scriptures, you will know whether it is there or not.

You may, as I did, escape being led astray by someone lacking concern for your best interests.

No Dog Lobe Here

That part of the brain that makes people want dogs?  I don't have that.

I know many of you must see this as a tragic birth defect, and, I guess it is.  But, I cope.  You know, some people can't get higher math, or can't read social cues.  Some are not cut out to be parents.  Sociopaths do not feel guilt or experience normal human emotions.  I do not get dogs.

Part of it, I'm sure, is that we didn't ever have a dog when I was growing up.  I don't miss it, and I don't see the need.

Part of it is the stories I hear from the people who LOVE their dogs.

A former coworker used to tell us practically every day about a shelter dog she had adopted.  She loved that animal!  She loved it so much she let it sleep with her.  Even though it threw up in her bed.  Every night.  And snored so much she couldn't sleep!  She loved it even though it made wet and muddy messes.  On her white carpet.  Every day.  She would complain about all that it put her through and express her love for it in the same sentence.  I would stare at her, probably with my mouth hanging open, and Just. Not. Get. It.

I would think to myself, "If I had a roommate like that, that would be its last day in my house."

Whatever that dog gave back to her that made it worth it to her was totally invisible to me.  I tell you, I am missing that lobe.

My brothers have accepted dogs into their houses.  That's cool, I guess.  Even though one of them has to get a team of people with ropes to pull that huge animal back whenever someone crosses the unforgivable line of ringing their doorbell.  I listen to the struggle on the other side of the door, and I just don't understand why anyone would want to go through that.

Really.  I don't get it.

And then there are more stories.  Stories about dogs coming out into the living room with used tampons in their mouths when there is company.  Stories about dogs needing surgery that costs thousands of dollars.  Stories about dogs chewing up valued belongings.  Stories about dogs getting out and getting lost, people having to drive around looking for dogs.  Stories about dogs eating one's dinner.  Stories about dogs getting into the garbage.  Stories about being in trouble with the law because one's dog bit/scared/decimated someone.

Honest.  I have never.  Never never ever heard a story about someone's dog that made me want one.

Not even a little.

Dogs just don't do it for me.

I guess I just don't get it.  And I'm fine with that.

Even if I could overcome my fear of dogs, which seems, you know, hopeless, I still wouldn't want one.  When I invite people to my home, I want them to feel welcome, not terrified.  I try not to let my children jump up on top of them, let alone an animal.  I know something must be wrong with me, but getting pounced on by someone's animal just does not do it for me.  I would rather leave than sit down.

And I already know without trying that I would absolutely fail at a job as a dog catcher.  I could possibly see myself driving up to the area where the loose dog was.  You know, within the safety of the vehicle.  Maybe, I could even step out of the truck.  But I know that the moment I laid eyes on the dog, I would be all, "That's fine, you just say there.  Good doggie.  No, don't come over here.  I'm leaving now."  I would back up to the truck, get in like the boogie man was after me, and drive away.  And then, I suppose, turn in my badge.

I know that people can be (inexplicably) very, very fond of their dogs.  Just because I don't understand it doesn't mean it isn't real.  So, I try to be polite and seem interested, the same way people do for me when there is a new picture of my granddaughter.

The other day, I had a conversation with a dog lover that it seemed might be a turning point for me.  She was so trusting of my sympathy, so candid with me about how she saw things, that I really hoped that I could begin to gain some ground, some insight, into what makes people love dogs.  I listened hopefully.  Maybe I could begin to see things from the other point of view.

It was partly my fault that she turned unsuspectingly to me, I guess.  A month or two ago, she had a dog who was dying, so, of course, I listened sympathetically then.  To be fair to myself, I really was sympathetic to her mourning. She had no idea that I'm a dog sociopath.  I should have warned her, before this conversation, I guess, that my capacity for sympathy was limited, but I honestly did think maybe, listening to such a detailed description of what it was like to be a dog owner and lover would help me.

But, I'm afraid, as she told me the sad story about how her neighbor, that she's known for years and years, screamed when her dog ran up to her, barking, my sympathies lay mainly with the neighbor.  She told me that she had asked this woman while she was in the very act of being bitten, "Why are you screaming?"  And that the screaming was why her dog bit the woman.  Everyone knows that it's this dog's "way" to come up to people barking, and that after she sniffs them out, she's fine.

I'm thinking, 'Yay.  Nothing like being sniffed by a dog to make me feel more tolerant of it."

If the woman only wouldn't have made that high-pitched, of all things, scream, then her dog wouldn't have bit her.  All her neighbors know that she and her husband never have their dogs out when they are not outside with them.

I'm thinking about the one, two, three, four times in my life that a dog's owner has told me--WHILE their dog was running up to bite me--"Oh, s/he won't hurt you."  They were wrong.  And I wasn't even screaming.  Not even in a low-pitched way.

I honestly did try to listen with an open mind.  I am sure there is plenty for me to learn about, well, the rest of the world.  I could tell her sadness was real now that her new, huge, vicious (it sounds like) "puppy" is in quarantine.  (Personally, I think I would feel relieved.  "Yes, please, keep him for a few days--as long as you like!")

She just can't understand why her neighbors have turned on her like this.  "We never let our dogs bark more than twice," she told me.  That was interesting.  I wanted to know how.  "We bring them back in or else sit out there with them, you know, correcting them as they bark."

I am the first to admit that I know nothing about how to train a dog, so I can't judge.  But I do appreciate a trained dog.  There have been one or two I've met in my lifetime that I have not been afraid of at all, they were so well trained.

I suppose if all dogs were taught not to bark, not to charge, and could be not just trusted, but trust-WORTHY, not to bite, I wouldn't have a problem with them at all.

Not that I, even still, would want one in my house.  Or, come to think of it, my yard.

Lost Grandmothers

The first funeral I attended was that of my grandmother.  I was twelve.  Because of my tender age and relative inexperience with such things, I was shocked that she had died, but I felt I should be sadder.  I knew that something had changed in my life, but my grandmother and I did not share a close relationship, so, I realize now, there was nothing vital for me to miss.

I knew her, sure, on the surface.  Throughout my childhood, we went to visit her and my grandfather at their tiny house on the west side every Sunday evening.  My siblings and I crowded each other on the couches and chairs around their living room while my parents struggled to make small talk with them over the sounds of voices and the green flickering lights of their colored TV.

When we were lucky, we were allowed to go into the small kitchen adjoining the small living room and play with the two or three toys she had saved for amusing her grandchildren.  She would get the toy down, put it on the table, and leave the room.

I cannot recall my grandmother ever saying one single word directly to me.

I remember feeling strange at the viewing prior to her funeral.  Hers was the first lifeless body I had viewed.  I felt unsure of what to do and how to behave and watched others for clues as we stood and sat around.  I felt strange because it was new to me, and because I knew that it was a solemn occasion, that something had been forever altered in my universe, as, indeed, it had.  We continued to faithfully visit my grandfather every week, sitting around in his dim, green living room, as my mother and dad struggled more than ever to keep up small talk with a most taciturn man.  I also felt strange because I knew I should be sadder than I was.

I have two recollections from her funeral.  The first was the sound of my aunts weeping during the talks.  They felt sad.  Of course, this was their mother, I reasoned.  I would be devastated, lost, beyond crushed if my mother ever died.  It was something I had gravely pondered throughout my young life and still could not begin to comprehend the depths of sorrow I would feel at the loss of her.

The other thing I recall is something that was said about my grandmother.  Someone remarked that she was a woman who, without fail, got up and got dressed each day.  Indeed, I had never seen her not wearing a dress and nylon stockings, even at the annual fourth of July parties in her back yard.  Still, it seemed a curious thing for someone to say--a strange sort of legacy to be known for--and my mind has returned to that comment many times. 

My grandmother had lived to the age of seventy-two.  As shocked as I was at her sudden death, I realized that she had lived as long as many people in that day could expect to live.  At six times my own age, she seemed old enough, at the time, to die.  Her children had all long since married, had all completed their own families.  Her life had settled, it seemed to me, into the simple rhythms of a daily life unchallenged with important work.

My other grandmother had only lived to forty-seven.  She had died decades before my birth, leaving my mother a bereaved small child, the youngest of eight unmarried children.  In contrast, her death seemed to me to be the greatest tragedy I had ever heard of.  As she lay wasting away in bed during the last months of her life, I am sure it was painfully clear to her and her family that she was, against her will, leaving her great work unfinished.  I do not doubt that her heart yearned to take care of her children as much as her children's hearts yearned toward her.  But it was not to be.

I have heard stories about this grandmother I never knew--how she had the best garden in her neighborhood, how her children were known for their kindness to each other, how she forged a loving and strong bond with her husband and they were never known to quarrel.  I learned that she was one of the first women in her ward to drive and would give others rides to women's meetings.  I know she was tall and capable and quiet.  I know she sewed her own clothing, put up her own food, made do and did without what was beyond her means to create.  From the characteristics I got to know in my aunts, uncles, and mother, I glimpsed her fine qualities.  In the goodness of my siblings and cousins--all the grandchildren she never met--I see her legacy.

The grandmother I knew had a pastime of crocheting.  She made doilies and various other objects as she sat in her tidy house with my taciturn grandfather.  After her death, I was the recipient of a couple of these.  She once made me a pillowcase with my name on it.  With fabric paint pens, she had drawn a lamb on the white broadcloth and written my name in cursive on the pillow case's edge.

To my recollection, that is the only present I received from her in her lifetime, and the only time she had ever spelled my name right.  My birthday cards had invariably come addressed to "Jeannine."

"Why don't we tell Grandma how to spell my name?" I asked my mother once.  My ever diplomatic mother's soft response had left my grandmother exonerated of both ignorance of my name and willful bad intentions, yet failed to explain to me the mystery of the distance between us.

My education, my reading, my associations, all the stories I seek out to increase my learning and understanding inform me of the great acts of people.  I am inspired by the great things done by myriads who left something important behind them as they left this life.  I wonder sometimes if they meant to do something great, if it was hard for them, if they knew that was their calling in life, what sacrifices they made to accomplish what they did, whether greatness ever came from just pursuing the things they loved to do.

I remember many times as a child feeling like, "Here we all are, but what now are we supposed to do?"

The thought of leaving my life without doing anything important haunts me, yet I find my days are often filled to the brim with the mundane--washing the same table, sorting the same clothes into the same piles of laundry, tucking the same few children into beds with the same tired lullaby that was sung to me.  And, with that, another day is gone.

The needs of life press on us, daily.  We have to spend our days preparing food again, going to work again, getting dressed, getting undressed, even many times having the same conversations over and over again.  We have to do these things in order to survive and maintain a certain quality of life.

The opportunities to make something greater out of our lives than just surviving all our 26,300 days sometimes seem fleeting.  Frankly, we lose some of them by hesitating to step up, by failing to lift our eyes above our own kneading and mending.

But, could it be that there could be meaning, even great meaning, in doing our repetitive daily tasks?  Surely there is something to be said in what is forged by attending church every week, reading the same scriptures yet again, folding the same clothes into our children's drawers.  We know that thinking the same thoughts makes our neural pathways to that information stronger, and that the road in the brain to a detail not searched for in many years can disappear.

She got up and got dressed every day.

As little as I know about my grandmother even though I met her on at least seven hundred occasions, I know that she lived her quiet life honorably, doing what that life called upon her to do. And, I have heard since, she had some constraints on her not of her choosing that limited her choices.

Is it possible that doing the same mundane things our lives call upon us to do could be sanding grooves into some great work of art?  Could they be weaving threads into a piece of a tapestry larger than our world and with a greater design than we can comprehend?  Are all these little tasks really meaningless?  Surely, at least, good habits form a good character, and that is worth something.

And yet, how much richer would my life be if my grandmother had, just once, spoken my name, looked into my face, asked me what I thought about. . .anything?  And taught me something about herself?

That is what I finally grieve about her death.

Kaleidoscope Shifting

I am typing this from a new computer.  The old computer suffered some kind of mental or medical crisis.  When I asked it to open my email, it did so, sort of.  The page was open, but it wouldn't let me read any of my emails.  The next day, I tried to help my son write a talk to give in church.  Halfway through the first sentence, the computer just gave up the ghost.

I tried to resuscitate it, to no avail.  Shock therapy just resulted in putting me into disbelief, or, well, shock.

I am glad to have a new computer, because I still have things to say.  And I've been thinking about how, not just in this instance, but, in many, we remake our lives all the time.

Remember the kaleidoscopes we played with as children?  The shapes and colors that were prominent in one view would thin out, slink back, as soon as we turned the dial.  A scene with big, bold, shapely blues could, with a tiny turn of the wrist, become a scene with long lines of gold.  It seems more and more possible to me all the time that, in five years' time, my life might not resemble my current life much at all, in some aspects.

Our neighborhood church had a talent show recently.  I was sort of one of the people in charge of it.  What I was mostly in charge of was calling a few people to find out what it was that they were going to do for the show--how much time they needed and how they wanted to be introduced.

One little girl was going to play an instrument she'd been taking lessons on.  Her one song soon turned into four songs.  I have known this little girl since she was too shy to even get on a stage in a group, just to sit there.  She did perform at the talent show, but called it quits after one song, which was perfectly adequate.  I was impressed with her growth.

I encouraged one of my own children to sing a song.  His pitch is great.  His imitation of accents, voices, and rhythms, right on.  He has some real talent.  Unfortunately, the front he usually displays hides those talents, like certain kaleidoscope pieces, behind behaviors that most people find objectionable.  I thought it would be good for him--and everyone else--to see a different side of him.  So, I more or less told him he would be displaying his singing and memorization talents, and he was fine with that.  He is also not at all shy.

I had him sing certain songs, picked the one he seemed best at, obtained the music so I could accompany him, and we practiced several times.  Then, I put him right up there on the stage for everyone to watch as the angry reds he usually displays on his kaleidoscope screen slid back behind some emerging soft and curly greens and lovely blues.  So to speak.  

Unbeknownst to me, another child had volunteered to play an instrument she has learned at school.  The night before the show, she came to me and asked me if it would be all right for her to leave some parts of the song out.  "What do you mean?" I asked her, and had her bring me the music.  The parts she wanted to cut turned out to be a measure here or there.  Measures that seemed too hard to play.  She also admitted that she had never yet played through the entire song, even once.  I smiled and suggested, only because she had less than 24 hours left, that she cut the piece short rather than just chop out certain measures.  We found a good stopping place, and I marked it.

Several children, as well as adults, put themselves on the line to perform the night of the show.  I was proud of every one of them.  I have begun to think that knowing you can do something hard just may be the most important thing a person can learn.  Ever.

Think about it.  There will always be challenges in life.  Several of them things that could not have been predicted.  We try to teach our children sports, reading, math, music, social graces--everything they may need in life.  But even we cannot predict everything.  When I was a child, needing computer skills was not even something being talked about in science fiction.  Yet, Kindergarten teachers are sending home computer homework these days. 

Try as we may, we cannot predict and teach every single skill our children will need in life. 

But, once a person knows that she or he can master something difficult, s/he can draw on that knowledge time and time again.  I did that, so maybe I can do this.

What could be more important to know?  What could be more precious and instructive, supportive and valuable, than self-efficacy?  That I can do it that determines, when it comes right down to it, whether or not you actually can do it.

Life changes, all the time.  Try keeping a particularly spectacular kaleidoscope picture in place while you hand it to someone else to see.  Invariably, it will shift in the transfer, and the person will shrug, unable to see what was so remarkable to you.  As life shifts things around, knowing that great scenes will come again, that we can weather challenges, can do hard things, is going to serve us better and in more ways than any one small, specific skill.

Persist.  Wait it out.  Big, chunky purples might fade away and be replaced by flowering pinks.  You never know.  Just stay and watch the show.

The Miracle

At 4:00 a.m. Sunday morning, my bedroom door opened.  Not the bedroom door right across the hall from my little boy's bedroom door, but the other one.  My little boy came into my room and told me he'd had a nightmare.

I hugged him to me for a few minutes, then asked, "Was your nightmare that a little boy had left a green crayon in his pocket when he put his jeans in the laundry?"

He looked up at me.  "No."

"Oh," I said.  "That's the nightmare I'm living right now."  Green crayon had been smeared across every piece of my brand new cream towel set, and had left a big blob of Oobleck on the expensive bath mat.

He continued to cling to me.  I rubbed and patted his back some.

"Why did you go all the way around the house when you could have just crossed the hall?" I asked him.

"I didn't want to wake Daddy."

I didn't comment on his lack of hesitation in waking me. That's what moms are for, and a mom is what I have always wanted to be.

I could have asked him to tell me about his nightmare, but I was afraid we would both wake up too much.  I'm an early riser, but 4:00 a.m. on a Sunday is a bit much.  Especially on a Sunday morning when I experienced a devastating laundry disaster at 11:00 the night before.

Then, he asked me if I would sing him his favorite hymn.  I've been singing this hymn to him all of his life.  I remember well the first time I did so, when he was just a few months old.  He was lying on the couch, probably following a feeding or a diaper change, and I had sung the lilting, comforting hymn to him, watching his eyes grow round in wonder as I did so.  My husband, who doesn't think I sing well at all (compared to himself, and it's true), graciously said, "He thinks you're miraculous."

It may or may not be miraculous for a mother to sing a certain hymn to her child throughout his childhood, but hearing that certainly did not discourage me from continuing.

One Sunday when this child was about four years old, his hymn was selected as the opening song in church.  As the introduction was played, I turned and watched him to see recognition spark in him.  And it did.  He turned his head sharply toward me, and we smiled at each other across various siblings of his who were sitting between us.

As I've said before, I'm not much of a singer, though I wish I were, and a request to sing a hymn at 4:00 a.m. is a temptation to decline, but I knew I could not deny this child that favor, and I told myself that I would only sing the first verse.

So, I did.  My son continued to cling to me, and I continued to pat and rub his back.  I paused after the first verse, then launched into the second.  When I was done, he was ready to face his demons and go back to bed.

Later that day, as the sacrament portion of our church meeting was starting, this little boy, sitting on the other side of his sister, caught my attention.  He whispered, "I'm sorry I left a crayon in my pocket."

I smiled at him.  Here was the miracle.

This child, if caught doing something wrong, struggles mightily with admitting it.  He has trouble not attaching himself to things he sees which are not his but that he likes.  He has trouble being where he is supposed to be and doing what he is supposed to do.  He is often in more trouble for lying than for whatever the original offense was that he is lying about.

I whispered back words of forgiveness, and we both took the sacrament.

Something Fishy

I opened the newspaper the other day and saw the obituary of one of my former classmates.  I didn't recognize him--not because decades have passed, but because, in the photo, he was standing back, with a hat on, behind a large fish.  I did recognize his name, though, and felt bad to learn his life had been short.

 

The next day, I opened the newspaper to find two obituaries, side by side, of my classmate and another man, both standing back, with hats on, behind large fish.  The images of both the men and of the fish were almost identical.  I had never seen anything like that before in my life!  And I started to wonder--maybe these are the obituaries for fish?

 

I have seen people pictured with their beloved dogs.  One time, an obit picture showed a man holding a black hen.  It had not occurred to me at the time that the hen may also have been dead, and its loved ones in need of notification.

 

Are the pets dying along with their masters, like some kind of ancient Egyptian ritual?

 

Obviously, the fish pictured have probably been dead for some time, by now.

 

I wonder if my obituary picture should include all of the insects and spiders I've killed in my lifetime.  To be honest, it has never occurred to me before now to save them, photograph them, or even give them another thought.  But maybe I'm really missing out on something here.  Imagine if everyone's obituary showed the impact that person's life had had on the animal world.  Like some kind of carbon footprint, on display as a testimony of the lethality of their life to other lives.

 

We may be on to something.

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March First

Every year, I look forward to March first.

Winter is my least favorite season, and spring is my favorite, so I can't help it.

Through the long, bleak winter weeks, I count down.  I give winter one hundred days, no more.  No matter when I start counting wintery days, when I get to March first, I feel I'm running the last lap, on home stretch, nearly to the finish line.

Yes, it still snows here in March, and snow is an ordeal, but snow in March is not likely to stick around long.  I can handle it.  We also see crocuses and violets struggling free from the earth and hear birds singing again.  It's a mixed bag, I admit, but at least it's mixed.

The worst winter weeks for me are when it snows heavily and often, when the temperature never even climbs up to freezing for days (or weeks) on end, or when some other trial presents itself.  Some weeks that I shudder to remember featured all three.

Even though we did have a couple of frozen wasteland weeks early on this year--as soon as December hit, actually, I am happy to report that this winter turned out to be not bad at all.  It's been raining.  Yes, raining.  In February.  Not something I ever remembering growing up with.  But who am I to complain?  I've never shoveled rain yet.  It's been weeks since I had to apply gargantuan force to ice sheets on my windshield in order to drive to the gym or shovel any amount of snow that tired my back.  Weeks!

Honestly, I confess that I thought I was due an easy winter--after the last one.  It snowed so much one night last year that it seemed I'd walked out onto another planet.  Everything was eerily still.  It was as if an ocean of white had come right up to my door, and nothing but white lay between me and the horizon.  The snow was over a foot tall everywhere, and it was still snowing.

Clearly, I would get a whole workout before I could even think of driving to the gym.  I'd grabbed the shovel and worked until my arms and legs were quaking, and I'd barely made it down the sidewalk.  Having seen my neighbor lying gray and still across his doorstep a couple of months before that, I just couldn't stop shoveling at the property line.  By the time I'd reached his driveway, two-and-a-half hours had passed.  Not only would there be no gym time, it was looking like I would be late for work.

I was a soaking wet mess by then--three parts snow, four parts sweat, and five parts tears.

I burst into the house with what felt like my last breath and apologized for waking my husband.  "I need your help, though," I sobbed at him.  I had not even begun to clear off the cars.  The snow on the cars reached up to heaven right along with my prayers, and I just didn't see how I could do anymore.

He stumbled out, my hero, to rescue me, and I pulled myself together to shower and dress.  Though he worked hard, too, I still got stuck in the driveway, yet another ordeal before getting to work.

And it kept snowing.  My husband shoveled another huge mess off the sidewalks that afternoon.  He got stuck going up the hill to take the kids to school.  Yes, in my city, we still have school, no matter how disastrous the snowfall.  The teachers are not going to give up the snow day that falls on Memorial Day weekend for anything.  He spent the day battling car problems with the "new" van we had just bought, and later had to abandon it (temporarily) in a left turn lane in the middle of the street when it died again.

That was the situation I came home to.  I found out about it after getting stuck in the driveway again, this time, going in.

It was the biggest natural disaster I had ever seen with my own eyes.

That snowstorm and its aftermath resulted in us having to do home repairs on the front of our house.  I  developed tendonitis from all that shoveling and the shoveling I had had to do later on that week.

And, thinking back, that was only the fourth worst winter of my life.

So, now you can see why I thought an easy winter would be nice.  And, fortunately, for me, at least, my prayers were answered.

Last year, I'd decided that there were way too many people praying for "moisture."  And I hope and guess they learned their lesson.

Now that I've thoroughly depressed all of us, let me get back to talking about March.

I don't only love spring because it's not winter.  Although, I admit, that is a lot of it.

I love the whole renewal thing.  Flowers, babies, rebirth, growth, warmth, sun, light, resurrection, lambs and bunnies, blue and green everywhere you look.  I love the message from nature that we get a do-over, because it seems that most all of us usually need one.  Here's a new year: try again. 

March is when I first agreed to be someone's wife.

March is when I got married.

March is when my long-lost friend reclaimed me.

March is when I once shrugged off my old life and started my life over, for reals.

March is when my grandparents got married.  And when my other grandparents got married.  So, it seems to me to have engendered my very beginnings.  

March is when I get out my spring green dress and try to wear it.  It's when I put away my brown, bulky sweaters that look so comforting in November but that I cannot stand to wear one more time by then.

March is often Easter. 

March is hope.  Faith.  Life.

Welcome, March.  Thank you for coming back.

Welcome, life.

Spectacular!

"How are you?"

 

"Fine."

 

Eighty-five percent of the time, this is how this exchange goes.  It's a formality, a cliche.  Honestly, no one usually really wants to hear a recital of symptoms or problems as a result of asking that question.  Well, it could depend.  But, generally speaking, it's just an acknowledgement of the other person's existence, a conversation opener. 

 

I noticed after my father died that my mother always responded to that question with "Okay."  Formerly, she had always said, "Fine."  I couldn't really blame her.  It was her way of acknowledging the change in her well-being that my father's absence made in her life after fifty-three years of near-constant companionship.

 

My recently widowed mother-in-law responded bravely the other day with, "I'm fine--enough." 

 

I totally respect where they are coming from.  This posting is not about them.

 

It's about something else that recently came to my attention whichI have been thinking about.  I have found that a new acquaintance always responds with, "Spectacular!"  Not just once, in a really good moment, but, consistently.  How great is that?

 

She is young and pretty, and seems like a nice person.  I don't doubt that she is spectacular.  But, obviously, I've been around long enough to know that no one feels spectacular all the time. 

 

But how would it be to be in the habit of saying so?

 

Is she lying, some of the time?  Trying to impress?  I don't think so.  Here's what I think.

 

Our feelings are often preceeded by our thoughts.  Our experiences are often informed by our expectations.  What if we thought of ourselves as spectacular?  What if we expected our day to be spectacular?  How would that impact our actual feelings and experiences?  I started wanting to say, "Spectacular!" back to her.  Not out of envy, or just to compete, but in order to improve my own day.

 

I tried it a few times.  I didn't really observe people's reactions, but felt my own.  Is my life not really spectacular?  I live in a great place, I have a job, many people love me. I have the freedom to do so many things I want to do.  I am well.  I have pretty much all I need.  What is not spectacular about that?

 

As Viktor Frankl taught us, even the rare person in a concentration camp could control his feelings and find gratitude for small things through managing his thoughts.  How much more, then, is there an onus on me to do so?

 

My new acquaintance came up to me today and shyly made a confession.  Her usually curled hair was in a pony-tail.  She was wearing glasses, unlike before.  "Today," she said, "I'm not spectacular." 

 

We laughed.  She had given herself permission to have a down day, and I reinforced that by giving her mine. 

 

Such is life.

 

But I'm still impressed enough to give her a shout-out in my blog.

Homophone Contest

One night, the children and I pulled something new out of the oven.  It looked like a casserole with bread crumbs on top.  It turned out to be somewhat soupy. 

My children know that there will always be new foods to try--their father has an insatiable need for variety.  One of them will eat and relish anything put in front of her.  Some of the others are wary. 

A discussion ensued about what was in the new dish.  White beans were discovered, and chard.

"Chard Soup," I proclaimed.  It was actually quite tasty, which I have come to expect.

"Chard Vegetable Soup," a child who takes after his father said, to improve upon my title.  Paul is very good at improving upon the clever things I try to say.

"Well, since chard is a vegetable. . ." the editor in me started.

"Oh!" he said.  I thought you meant "Charred Soup."  Even though it wasn't at all burned.

We had a good laugh.

And I was reminded all over again of the homophone contest I never entered.  Charred and chard would have been a pair I probably would not have come up with in fourth grade.  But, it's a goodie!

I blogged about the homophone contest a year-and-a-half ago.  (See "That Hole in Your Soul.)  I still hadn't made a list.  And I still hadn't bought myself a king-sized candy bar.  I supposed I should make a bucket list and put those two things on there.

Better yet, since that would involve making a list, anyway, I might as well just make the darned homophones list.  So, the next night at dinner, I invited my children to join me.  They were all excited, not just about the prospect of a king-sized candy bar, but about competing at completing a homophones list.  Who wants to bet that charred and chard end up at the top of each list?

We spent the next week carefully not talking about the homophones we came up with for our lists.  "I have six!" my baby would beam.  The oldest boy kept a careful list on his iPad.  We did talk about some rules.  Proper names were out, as were foreign words, unless they have been adopted into our language--like taco, which, of course, doesn't have a homophone.  We discussed that words that just have variant spellings are not homophones, nor are different meanings of words spelled the same.  

Because two of my children had access to the Internet, and the others didn't, I made a rule that we couldn't "cheat" by looking at reference materials that would help us.  The homophones had to spring from our own minds. 

My husband weighed in on rules he thought should exist for the contest, but, since he wasn't playing (his choice) and no one had appointed him judge (my choice), those may or may not have stuck.  I reminded him a couple of times that he was not in charge.

Because there is a large diversity of ages among my children (and because I totally intended to win this contest like I didn't before), I decided that we would all be winners--anyone who made an effort would be rewarded.  As the week progressed, my baby bragged that he had thought of seventeen pairs of homophones in the exact same voice that my teenaged son bragged about having over one hundred.

My most anxious child asked me several times how many I had.  "I'm on my tenth," I would say vaguely.  He didn't know I meant tenth column.  I didn't want anyone to get discouraged.

At the end of the week, all the lists were presented.  

And, as everyone had done her or his best, each received a king-sized candy bar for effort.  

I was proud of my kids but also dismayed to learn that they had thought up sixty-two homophone pairs that I had not thought of.  How could I have forgotten flour and flower?  Those were so. . .fourth grade!  In fact, I'm pretty sure they were on my fourth grade list that never got completed. 

My husband came home from work at that point and reminded me that weather and whether are not pronounced the same way.  I had taken all my "wh" words off my list when he'd said that earlier in the week, but then I had found an official list of English homophones, and those "wh" and "w" pairs were on it.  So, I put them back.  

The official list had words paired as homophones that I would never say the same way, such as "aren't" and "aunt."  I took those off the official count.  We would never have come up with those!  

I told my husband about the official list and its sometimes strange pairings.  "I decided to go with my own dialect," I told him. 

"I go by the standard pronunciation," my last-worder said, as though one English dialect could be standard and all the rest not.  

My husband grew up in another state, and we just simply say "laurel" and "peony" differently.  As both pronunciations can be found in the dictionary, I choose to consider them both right but just different.  He chooses to consider his way to be correct.

As judge for my contest, I decided that if I--or the kids--pronounce two words the same way, they could be considered homophones.  And we all won. 

I had come up with 284 pairs of homophones.  My kids each had somewhere between 21 and 188 pairs by the end. Together, they came up with 62 pairs I had not thought of.  So, collectively, we came up with 346, which was 86% of the standard list.  And, yes, charred and chard were on all of our lists.

Not bad at all, and that hole in my soul is now filled.  Not to mention my belly.