Marcie

When the first signs of spring appear, she has entered my thoughts for the past six years now.  We became friends on our first day as teachers at a new school.  She was blonde, bubbly, "no bigger than a minute."  As country as they come, she grew up in Red Boiling Springs, Macon County, Tennessee.  Only a year apart in age, we bonded almost instantly and became acclimated to our new surroundings together.  We loved to get together and talk over the happenings of the school day and gossip about our new co-workers.  She had the life I longed for--a lovely home, a devoted husband, and an adorable little boy named Jake. 

She had the life I longed for that is until it was discovered that Marcie had cancer.  One of the things that Marcie and I had in common was that we were both worry warts.  Marcie was so scared yet so brave.  She was always having the doctors and their nurses check her for signs that the cancer had spread or returned.  She carried on though with her playful, self-deprecating sense of humor, trying on different wigs after her hair fell out, getting the larger bra size she always wanted after her double mastectomy.  She continued as the school's computer teacher that year, completing the school yearbook that she was in charge of compiling.

That summer we celebrated.  Marcie was going to be fine.  I introduced Marcie to my favorite restaurants of which there are quite a few.  We would go shopping.  I remember we went for a walk out at Radnor Lake.  We would ride in her red Jeep Cherokee and sometimes Jake, who was three or four would say, "Mama hold hand," and Marcie would reach back for his hand while she was driving with the other one.  We had such a fun time that summer that Marcie bought us shirts that said, "Summer of '04." 

A new school year began, and we started back to work with the reluctance that teachers, like students, feel at the end of the summer.  It wasn't but a couple of months into the school year when it became apparent that something wasn't right with Marcie.  Her back hurt.  Was it that old injury she had from the time her tiny frame had to carry Jake on an icy road when the car broke down?  "No, Marcie.  The doctors all said you were fine.  I'm sure the cancer hasn't returned," we all reassured her.  And yet, not too long after Christmas it was discovered that the unthinkable had happened.  The cancer had returned, and it had spread to her liver or her pancreas, which organ I do not recall for sure.   I didn't know what to say then and still don't know what to say now.   I was so stunned by this news.  "I'm never going to see my little boy grow up," Marcie cried on the phone to me.  I cried with her.  "I'm so sorry, Marcie.  So sorry."

Always a fighter Marcie was soon strong again.  She was going to try alternative therapies.  Her trust in God was always strong and now it was unwavering.  God was going to see her through this.  She went to Tijuana, Mexico to receive alternative treatments.

On a Sunday afternoon in April a co-worker called me to let me know that my friend had passed away.  Where she went I have no doubt.  The angels in heaven made fast friends with a lovely lady full of fun that day.  Why she went I will never know, at least not until my own time has come.  I sure do miss her though, and I find myself thinking of her from time to time all year round but especially when springtime comes.

Bat It Around Some More

One of the many things that I love about Kevin is his ability to get me unstuck when I get stuck, and unfortunately for both of us I get stuck quite often.  What do I mean by stuck?  Those leftovers that have been in the refrigerator too long?  I don't want to move them much less dump the container's contents and clean it.  The stain I don't quite know how to get out of my t-shirt?  Maybe I just won't wash it for a while.  Yeah, that will make it go away.  To my credit, as a stay at home mom I'm forced to confront this tendency of mine a lot, and I am getting better and better at dealing with it, but yet the tendency remains. 

My brother knows about my tendency to get stuck all too well.  I was telling Steve how much I dread potty training Sam and how I don't quite know how to go about it.  Steve's comment?  "Well, just be sure you don't go off and not do it."  Hmmm...I hadn't even thought of that.  (Just kidding)

Unfortunately for little Sam, he seems to have inherited his mother's tendency towards inertia at least when it comes to balloons.  On Sunday night the three of us went out to eat at a restaurant, and Sam received a helium balloon, which he adored.  All the way home he lovingly gazed at it.  He didn't want to go to bed because he didn't want to be separated from his balloon.  We finally got him to sleep by reassuring him that he could play with his balloon in the morning.  I felt a little guilty saying this because I knew in the morning that the balloon would not be quite the same. 

When I picked up Sam to carry him downstairs Monday morning, the first thing he said was "Balloon downstairs."  His balloon of course had sunk to floor.  I explained to Sam what had happened to it, but it was too late.  The balloon, like my stained t-shirt and the rancid leftovers, just couldn't be fixed, and it would just have to remain on the floor maybe forever or at least until nap time.  Sam walked around the floor bound balloon, keeping his distance.  As far as he was concerned, he and the balloon were done, and that was just fine by me, as I now saw the balloon as being kind of creepy just as he did.  

Thank goodness for Kevin who always helps mother and son see things in a different way.  Within five minutes of coming downstairs, Kevin had ingeniously hung the shunned balloon upside down in an empty door frame.  Sam and I now had a balloon tether ball game which was great fun.  Of course, when Kevin went to the kitchen to fix himself a bagel,  Sam and I started staring at the balloon a little too long again.  Sam commented that it looked like an upside down egg.  "Yes, it does,"  I replied.  Before you knew it, we had stopped playing. "Oh no, Kevin, he's getting creeped out again, "  I called.  "Bat it around some more," he replied.  Oh, yes, that is just the thing.  That will do the trick.

Here Comes the Noise

I have been reading Kathryn Stockett's The Help, a book that I would highly recommend to anyone who enjoys a good novel.  Set in 1960's Jackson, Mississippi, the title The Help refers to the African American maids that many of the families hired to help with the cooking, cleaning, and children.  In many instances these ladies were forced to endure much lingering racial prejudice. 

While reading this novel, I can't help but remember a lady who was very dear to me growing up.  It was 1970's Tennessee rather than 1960's Mississippi so thankfully a lot of those previously mentioned racial tensions had dissipated.  Her name is Rebecca.  My mother would hire her about once a week to help with cleaning our house and ironing.  Sometimes she would stay with us while my mother ran short errands.  My brother and I loved her.

Rebecca lived in a tiny run down house that has long since been torn down.  She worked as a custodian at the local high school.  She was the first African American that I really knew, and also, the first truly poor person I knew as well.  Rebecca could not be descibed as poor in spirit, however, or lacking in love.

She always wore the same clothes when she came over to our house, and we would pick her up and take her back home because she didn't have a car. I remember her white socks with her dark worn out loafers.  Rebecca may be the only person I have ever known who dipped snuff.  As a young child, I, of course, was fascinated with her spitting and with the small round metal cannister she carried.  Rebecca would always eat lunch with us, and I remember how much she appreciated and enjoyed her food whether it was a bologna sandwich with potato chips or a hamburger. She loved a Coca-Cola with that meal, too. She was very thoughtful, not wanting to disturb my eight, nine, or ten year old self from whatever "important" thing I was doing.  When she got to the point in her work where it was time to vacuum, she'd proclaim, "Here comes the noise!" before she switched on the vacuum. 

She thought my brother and I hung the moon.  According to her, I was as pretty as Miss America.  Not only did Rebecca think I was beautiful, but she thought I could sing.  Really sing.   One time, when she heard me singing along with my Carpenters record she told me I sang so well she couldn't tell the difference between my voice and Karen Carpenter's.  

It has probably been twenty years now since I've seen Rebecca.  Close to ninety years old now, she lives in a nursing home, and my parents tell me that she no longer knows people she once knew.  It is funny how someone can be a part of your life for so long, and you think they always will be, but then, of course things change.  I guess they are changing all the time.  I sing with my Ipod now instead of my record albums.  It doesn't seem like anyone irons much anymore.  My days of knowing Rebecca are over, but my appreciation of her remains.

Broken

"It's broken."  I've been thinking about how Sam, just over two and a half, confronts this reality on an almost daily basis.  His little musical table needs new batteries, some of his "reusable" stickers just won't stick anymore, his remote control train won't work, and he is getting a cold.  "Broken" is a part of his ordinary everyday life almost as routinely most days as watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and having pretzels for a snack.

And yet as an adult I don't like "broken."  I want to be in control.  I want things to go as I plan.  I want everything to be "perfect," whatever perfect is according to me.  Having Sam has helped me a great deal with this seemingly endless quest for "perfection."  My days with him may begin with me having a plan, but they turn into just unfolding and living.  Our days together are anything but perfect.   Sure, we have our tender moments when a little voice says, "I need a big hug," and then, "I need a bigger hug, " but there is a lot of "broken," too.  A lot of less than perfect and even ridiculous, too, like yesterday when I found myself angrily telling Sam that he wasn't getting any popcorn for his snack because he wouldn't take a nap.

I couldn't love him more though, and I don't know that I've ever enjoyed my life more than I do now.

I feel shy talking about matters of faith even though if you are reading this you are probably someone dear to me to whom I have given this link.  I feel that God is teaching me how to live through my daily experiences as a mother to my little boy.  I know what it is like now to let the day unfold because most days I'm just forced to let the day happen.  I don't care if things don't always go perfectly anymore because this experience of growing, living, and loving with my little boy is much better anyway.  This experience must be similar to what it feels like to let God be in control and to let His will be done.  I may have to relearn it again tomorrow, but at least I have these moments where I let go of my need to control and desire God's plan for my days.  Just as my days are so much better when I let go and just let them happen, God's will is so much better than any plan for myself that I could ever contrive.

Yes, it's broken, Sam, and here is something I want you to know.  That's okay.  Everything is going to be okay.

When Less Was More

Anyone who knows me these days knows that I have too much stuff.  Too many books, too many clothes, too many gadgets in my kitchen, and the list goes on and on.  Yesterday I was at my parents' old house going through some of my stuff that I haven't seen in at least twenty years.  Some of my stuff that I'd all but forgotten about, but oh, how special it was!  Much more special than many of the things I find myself picking up at Target or Kohl's when I'm shopping.

What particularly caught my eye were my pins.  They were just pins that a girl might stick on the lapel of her Sunday coat, but as I was looking at them, I remembered each of them so clearly.  There's the snowman with the pink hat that had lip gloss inside of it, and there's the little bird in a cage that wiggled a little when you shook it.  There's the pilgrim man and woman that I'd usually wear at Thanksgiving.  And of course a jack-o-lantern for Halloween and a Santa Claus for Christmas.  These pins are made of plastic, but I kept them in my little musical jewelry box with the twirling wind up ballerina inside of it.  I looked at them so, so many times and looked forward to wearing them as the holidays and seasons came around or as the mood presented itself.  There were a few pins from when I was a little older, too.  These were painted metal.  Miss Piggy wearing black fishnet tights and dancing like she was in a Broadway musical revue.  A little ordinary pig, too. I'm not sure what was up with the pigs.   It never would stay latched so I had to be careful to make sure that it didn't fall off my clothing.  I remembered this defect without even examining it.  These pins were among my treasures.

I was suddenly filled with tenderness for the girl that I was.  I treasured the things I had and was not always seeking more.  I always had lots of toys and things growing up, but at some point I accumulated so much "stuff" that it has sometimes become difficult to remember what is really important.    I want to be this girl again.  I want to buy less and purge more.  I want the opportunity to treasure the things that actually mean something to me. 

Not a Spring Chicken Anymore

My parents, ages 67 and 71, were recently paid a visit from a representative of the university where they both graduated.  I also graduated from this same university.  I felt suspicious of this visit.  "Ah," I thought knowingly, "this is the kind of thing I've heard others talk about.  This person is going to try to talk my parents into leaving our former college a sizable sum in their wills."  I felt bewildered in the way I have often been feeling lately and a little protective, too.  How did my mother and father get to be 67 and 71?  Where is the time going?  I must warn them about these money snatchers.

The visit my parents received from their former college's representative was thoroughly pleasant and anything but sinister.  In fact, my parents were graciously thanked for giving to the university for twenty years and presented with a commemorative coin. 

A few days ago, however, I received an e-mail from my former college's "Legacy" department.  Its purpose was to let me know that this year marks an "excellent time" to plan "to provide for the most important people" in my life.  The Legacy department hopes that I will keep my alma mater "at heart and consider a gift that will strengthen" its "long-term future." Sigh. While I've been lamenting the fact that my parents are getting older, I completely forgot to remember that I'm getting older, too. It is time I start realizing that I'm not a spring chicken myself anymore. 

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Super Dada and Wonder Mommy

Kevin and I have lately acquired powers that we did not know we possessed.  Sam woke up the other morning with a painful stuffy nose and told me to "get my nose better, Mama."  Suddenly I seem to possess special healing and/or comforting powers as the case requires.  Kevin, who has always been handy around the house when it comes to assembling toys or furniture, super-gluing broken objects, and making minor repairs, is finally getting the credit he deserves. "Da-da will fix it," a little voice will confidently proclaim whenever a cheaply made car comes apart or a clumsily handled sticker tears. This is the phase that I suppose I will be wistful for when teenage Sam someday finds me to be backward and uncool.  These phases are fleeting and fascinating.  I'm trying not to be sad about their passing especially since an equally interesting phase takes its place or is on its way.  For today I will just enjoy being Wonder Mommy.