Stand Off

"Well, you BOTH have to work it out with each other," I say. There in the kitchen, Jane crosses her arms.

"But HOW?" she says. She prickles, shrugs off sisterly devotion, and stares at me.

"You BOTH have to actually LOVE the other person," I say.

"But Mom, it won't work," she says. "She won't listen." Slouched on the oatmeal bin opposite her, Lucy frowns, hair wisps around her face. Shoulders sagged, she billows irritation.

"You have FIVE minutes," I say, "then you're BOTH in trouble." I bleep-beep the microwave timer to five minutes. "Solve your problem," I say.

A stockpot of chicken soup bubbles on the stove. I pull barley from the fridge. I shovel soup bowls full, then drown them in broth. Cheese and tortilla chips, I gather the lunch fixin's, let anxiety circle them like wolves.

They posture, circle. Emotion courses. Timer counting down, weight firmly on their shoulders, one finally reaches across that line, lets down all rights to winning. It pierces the bubble. Something better than dominance rushes in.

Three minutes, forty-five seconds. Friendship and humility turn newborn faces toward us.

"I bet you want to hug," I say. I watch the gangle of arms for daggers of resentment. They're just arms and elbows. "Good," I say. "Good job, you guys."

The battle dumped in their laps arises as camaraderie. Conflict resurrects as devotion. We carry on gem in hand.

Gratitude:

5536. "God is holding the world with his hands," Myra says. "And the Holy Spirit," Joe says.

5537. "It is cute outside," Joe says. "The wind is cute."

5538. "In heaven you will be a kid," he says to me, "and I think there will be a couch for you to flip off of." He somersaults off the red plaid couch.

5539. Rain. Wildfires ravage though our area. Smoke fills the valleys. Rain finally comes, wipes the air clean.

5540. A couple nuggets of fabric to add to my stash. I plan two or three quilts in my mind.

5541. I get to see my mom.

5542. New jars to ferment vegetables. I do the research and the kids chop the veggies as fast as I can process them.

5543. I finish a sweater and a bonnet for Betsy just before the weather turns. She wears them to church.

5544. I start a new sweater from an old knitting book. It's a vertical knit. I've never done one like that before.

5545. I turn my focus to being a strong but benevolent leader, not mean, not permissive, intentional and immovable.

5546. We come together as a family, each person an irreplaceable piece.

Lucy Date

"Do you think all the people out in cars are just going on a date with one of their kids?" Lucy asks.

We ease right and sigh down an off ramp. A red light at the bottom, another arterial merges full onto the road ahead. Cars flit by. Red, yellow, black, every one a car on a date. I wish it were true. 

We buy cat cookies and a chocolate bar at the local grocery. We open them up on a table set with raspberry steamer and crayons lined up in marching order. We color in cerulean, green, and violet.

She copies me. We smooth wax thick and shiny. Flecks stick to our fingers. Indigo and purple speckle the blonde table. I try to brush them off, and my hands collect more speckles.

"How many kids do you want to have when you grow up?" We cultivate conversation between smooth waxy strokes. We hardly look up, but the words form.

"A hundred." She coaxes green into each corner of a triangle undaunted by the bulbous crayon, blunt, thick, deliberate. I watch, but she doesn't notice.

"Do you think you'll have girls or boys?"

"Just boys." She rotates the crayon, presses more green into that triangle.

"Why do you think that?"

"Just do." She scratches a smudge with her fingernail then captures cerulean.

I sweep purple in stripes. "What's your favorite Bible story?"

She pauses, props an elbow on the table. "Jesus dying on the cross," she says. I rub more purple into my picture, occupy my hands while she weaves her words. "What's your favorite?" she adds.

I copy her elbow, gaze out floor-to-ceiling windows. "Probably Jesus dying on the cross," I agree. "Why is it your favorite?" I follow our liturgy and color while an answer germinates inside her head. 

"'Cause it shows how GOOD God is," she says. I glance up into her eyes. "And how sweet he is doing stuff for us," she says, "even if it hurts really bad." At the word sweet her voice waxes high, and she squints just ever so little. 

How sweet he is. Yes. Four and a half and a perfect silhouette emerges. Sacrifice is sweet. The fragrance of salvation. Sweet.

Gratitude:

4099. "In our little family I think that Daddy is the best at not being prideful," Jane observes.

4100. Jack finds a Bible at the thrift store and chatters on all week. "With my money," he says, "I'm gonna buy gifts and Bibles."

4101. "Daddy works so hard, and he never gets a break," Jane notices.

4102. "How do people in public schools do history without including God at all?" Jane queries.

4103. We make sandals out of cardboard and rafia as we study ancient Egypt. "If Obamacare gets too bad," Jane comments, "we might be making shoes like this and actually wearing them."

4104. "I always say, YES, MOMMA," Myra tries to instill confidence.

4105. Jane knits me a scarf, all 100 rows.

4106. We work the afternoon away, side by side, knitting and sewing.

4107. She helps me make a rubbing of a favorite skirt so I can create a pattern to copy it.

4108. I brown sausage, and she chops celery and onions for lentil stew.

4109. Lucy tries to learn to knit. 

4110. Jack fashions masks out of paper and pastes together a giant scroll.

4111. Joey gobbles up the lentil stew.

4112. Constant Comment tea.

4113. Three summer skirts, whimsical, functional, and tucked away for summer.

4114. Blackberry pie. We make blackberry pie for Craig's birthday. Yup, I married into a farm family so I'm a pie-maker now.

4115. Coral sweatshirt, teal sweatshirt, don't ya love sweatshirts?

4116. Easter outfits continue to take shape: green button-down shirts for the boys.

4117. My mother surrounds me with conversation. The easy lull waxes and wanes like the ocean.

4118. Craig's mom stops by. We visit. I memorize the happy blue of her eyes.

4119. Myra sirens from the bathroom. I wipe her backside. "Don't get any on the RUG, Momma," she warns.

4120. She suits up in jammies. "Jesus made these for me," she says and tugs her sleeve.

4121. We have another party for Craig and for sis-in-law Rosie, a party of pies. A round-robin of exhortation, I feel full and happy just listening. At the end we pray for Rockie's up coming surgery. The Lord surrounds us with his presence.

4122. Myra rushes in from outside. "I don't need to go pee," she says. "I just wiggle-wiggle-wiggle if I need to go pee." 

4123. Another birthday party, this one for a sweet nephew, the season of celebration continues.

4124. "I have unders in my pants," Myra announces. "And ya don't eat poopy, Momma," she adds. "That is YUCKY." The other golden rule.

Eight Dollars

Photo from  Urban Rose.

"That's at least eight dollars." Jack arches his brow, pokes at a lump in my hand.

There, like a freshly hatched egg, a tangle of coins and bills, a snarl, curled, rumpled, pressed and softened, the money, he had hunted it out of the four corners of his drawer.

"That's at least eight dollars," he says again, voice resplendent. I unfurl my fingers, count it with my eyes: a five, two ones, change. Lucy peeks around Jack's shoulder. "For Lucy's pants," he adds, "that she wrecked." She gazes at my face. He holds his eyebrows in that perfect arc.

Photo from  Urban Rose.

I trace the crumpled bills, the linen-y green crushed around dimes and nickels, a penny, a quarter. I pull my eyes from the small heap in my palm, and there, Jack, face radiant, eyes splendorous blue.

In that split second of lucent blue, I see it. And then again in the shrug of his weightless shoulders when I say, "But don't you want to buy something with this?" Hope, hope unbending, the confidence of a man, all his boyish features hung on blink-less sacrifice. Love.

And so I look into his azure eyes and nod before he scampers off, Lucy in tow, adventure wild around their ankles. What could I do? I took the money. I tucked it away and memorized the resplendent resolve of his sacrifice.

Photo from  Urban Rose.

Gratitude:

3834. "Mom," Lucy trills, "can alligators run faster than people?"

3835. "I want to jump into your arms, Daddy," she chimes.

3836. Craig finally solves the mystery: our dishwasher is leaking.

Photo from  Urban Rose.

3837. He rearranges the kitchen, tears up floor boards, peels back linoleum, opens the bowels of the dishwasher and does triage on the leak.

3838. He rearranges our world to hopefully salvage the soggy subfloor.

3839. "I tooted, big one toot," Myra reports. "I want to SEE big one toot."

3840. "Thank-you that Daddy's tall enough to put the star on the tree," Jane prays after we dress the tree.

3841. "I really like that one star," Myra narrates.

Photo from  Urban Rose.

3842. We snuff out all the lights and then illuminate the tree. "OOooooooh. Do it again, ok?" she says.


3843. "I taked this off my foot," she hands me a small brown bead. "It's a mole," she asseses.

3844. Picture, printed pictures, yay! Thanks, Rosie.

3845. Strawberry, raspberry tart.

3846. "It might be illegal for Myra to be a pirate," Jane oversees, "because you never hear about pirates in America. I mean it might have been ok a long time ago when Indians lived here, but not now."

Photo from  Urban Rose.

3847. "Where's HOLA?" Myra queries. "I want to do HOLA." Spanish. "When you're four you can do Spanish," I answer. "I'm FOUR," she says. "Mommy, I'm FOUR."

3848. Books, glorious book-finds. A whole stack of art and history, literature, science.

3849. When the kitchen goes sideways, Craig takes a day off and I end up getting to see my mom.

3850. "Mommy, make me safe," Lucy calls as she gallops into the kitchen and interrupts a game of tag to hug my legs.

Photo from  Urban Rose.

3851. Craig's mom drops by with pears for the kids.

3852. We carol at a nursing home in town. Amid the ancient tunes and well worn faces, Christmas becomes real.

3853. I gift shop with Jane. She gives strong opinions about what people will like. We take up the art of gift giving.

3854. Joey gobbles up leftover sweet-taders, lunges at the spoon for more.

Photo from  Urban Rose.

3855. I ask Myra to listen carefully, "I want you to go find some --," I pause. "CANDY," she nods. "Socks," I say.

3856. "Jane, can I scrub my hair myself?" Myra asks as we suit up for baths. "Yeeeessss," Jane concedes. "Your breath stinks," she adds.

3857. When I tuck Lucy in I find a length of toilet paper folded in to a kleenex in her bed. "I got toilet paper too," Myra calls from the bottom bunk, "in my tummy."

3858. A Christmas card, a family Christmas card.

Photo from  Urban Rose.

3859. The kids and I arrive on time to two events this week and almost on time to a third.

3860. Craig continues to anchor our family in confidence and character. I rest easy that he makes our burdens light.

Photo from  Urban Rose.