Recently Amy of Using Our Words blogged about the travails of grocery shopping with children. The corporate groan arose from parents.
She invited us to share our stories in the comments. I got a little carried away (hard to believe, I know), and wrote nearly a post about my best-worst grocery store excursion with my son. It’s one of my favorite early motherhood memories.
Why pass up the opportunity to post a perfectly good story? That would be like throwing away a perfectly good cereal box when my son can make a turtle house out of it. In the spirit of reduce, reuse, recycle, I’ll share it again here with you.
shell game
The story takes place in the Mexican food aisle of our local grocery store where I looking for a certain brand of taco shells or something, which of course I couldn’t find. My son was still very little. I’m not even sure he could walk yet, but boy, could he move.
He didn’t want to sit in the cart. He didn’t want me to hold him like a normal baby. He wanted to climb up as high as he could on Mt. Momma and cliff jump off my head.
Where are those cotton-picking taco shells?! Must get out of this store…
My son’s gymnastics were commonplace to me. Without thinking, I hoisted him up over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes. I held him firmly by his leg as he dangled down my back cooing with glee.
Finally I could study the shelves of processed Tex-Mex in peace. Ah, there were the shells I needed.
Then I felt it. The pressure of the heavy gaze of judgment.
I turned to see two older women frozen stiff, staring at me in horror. How could I hold my dear, sweet child in such peril?
My blood pressure spiked like a jalapeño’s heat. Without skipping a beat, I pulled my little one back from the brink of imaginary disaster and thrust him out toward the gawkers.
“Would you like to hold him?” I said. “Didn’t think so.” We grabbed our shells and away we went.
Adiós, señoras. Things aren’t always as they appear.
chip on my shoulder
The LORD doesn’t see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart. 1 Samuel 16:7 NLT
After an epic struggle, guest blogger Kristen Anderson Short has reached a decision. A decision women across this country and around the world face.
Pantyhose. The worst invention ever for women. I only wear them out of necessity in really cold weather.
Recently, I noticed a run in my hose. Had a board meeting that day, so at lunch I ran out to get a new pair of name brands in my size.
Back at the office, I tugged and tugged to pull them on. No matter how hard I pulled, I could not get the blasted things all the way up. Had I grown to five feet six inches, the height of my dreams?
Unfortunately, no. The new pantyhose were too short.
light sheer
My board meeting loomed. I had no choice but to go with it. Women, you know how uncomfortable that is. Men, you can guess.
Made it through the day and met some friends after work. But even two glasses of wine didn’t make the pantyhose feel any better.
I was ready to trash them when I had a change of heart. Why not save them as my emergency backup pair?
A few days later when another pair of hose ran, I reached for the emergency backup pair. Sure, they were too short, but I could fix them.
I stepped on their feet. I pulled and pulled and PULLED, stretching them as far as I could. It was a miracle. They went on and up no problem!
patterned & footless
Then I moved, and they ran faster than Flo Jo in the 1988 Olympics.
I’m not talking about a tiny run. My hose looked like I’d been dragged down the street behind a Harley. Like I’d been out all night partying with the band and forgot to go home before work to change.
With no other pair of hose, no tights, and no clean pants, I made the walk of shame into my office. The minute I got the chance, I hightailed it to the store to buy yet another pair of pantyhose.
(This is the fourth pair in the story in case you’ve lost count.)
Gingerly, I pulled them on. They ran before I made it out of the bathroom.
Once bitten, twice shy, I converted to tights that day and never looked back.
There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven. A time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away. Ecclesiastes 3:1 & 6 NIV
Clear the stage for the bad boy hair band that looks remarkably tame by today’s standards. Great White, Once Bitten, Twice Shy.
guest blogger Kristen Anderson Short
The lovely Kristen Anderson Short and I went to high school together.
Kristen works as a housing and foreclosure counselor for a local government agency.
A single mom of two teenagers, she enjoys reading, talking politics, and finding the humor in everyday life—sans hose.
My seven-year-old son loves the water. Swim club seemed like the perfect extracurricular activity.
It was all good until his lesson was over and it was time to change into dry clothes.
He doesn’t want to go into the women’s locker room. He refuses to change in the bleachers while I hold up a towel.
No. He insists on going into the men’s locker room. Alone.
As every ounce of Momma Bear in me protests, I let him go all by himself.
“I’ll wait for you here by the door,” I say. He disappears into the abyss.
I wait. And wait. And wait.
Another pair of MOBs are standing nearby watching their sons’ swimming lessons. They look at me and nod.
“Mine doesn’t even have to change his clothes,” says the first. “He only has to put on his sweatpants over his swimsuit. And it still takes him a half an hour!”
“Well, mine came out telling me about all the friends he made in the locker room,” said the other. “I told him we don’t make friends in the locker room. That was the end of that. Now he changes in the bleachers.”
Friends in the locker room? Oh, dear.
four feet deep
“Honey,” I crack open the door. “You okay in there?”
I wait. No answer. Dare I go in?
Then I hear it. The unmistakable sound of two dozen slippery sea lions smacking the pavement. The high school boys’ swim team has finished their laps, and they’re headed my way.
The rushing stream of soaking wet, teenage boys flows through the locker room door. Panic ensues.
I imagine shouting, “Cover yourselves! Mom on the floor! I’m coming in!”
The thought of seeing a bunch of naked teenage boys is as appealing to me at 41 as it was at 16. I stop short of my raid.
I pace around outside the locker room, scanning the club for a responsible adult male to help. Where are the instructors when I need them?
A clean-cut boy who looks to be about 15 emerges from the locker room wrapped in a towel. Boldly, I approach.
“Excuse me,” I say. He looks at me. Deer in headlights.
my cub
“My little boy’s in the locker room. Yeah, and he’s been in there a long time. Could you go in and check on him? I’d go in myself, but that might be awkward.”
“Okay,” he says.
Towel boy scampers into the locker room. I wait. And wait. And wait.
The door opens and out bounces my cub. Unaided. Unharmed. Happy as a clam. And barefoot.
Where, oh where, are his shoes?
Yep.
“Cover yourselves! Mom on the floor! I’m coming in!”
Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart.
The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away;
may the name of the LORD be praised. Job 1:21 NIV
There’s a field behind our neighborhood. Carpeted with brome in the summer, scruff in the winter. It’s a magical place where my son, the dog and I walk.
in the field
We saw a deer run across the north end the first time we explored the field. We were a few acres south, but we spotted him clear as day. Our eyes followed his white tail and long, bounding strides.
Our part of Kansas is flat. Flatter than Illinois. If there weren’t lines of trees and houses blocking the view, no telling how far you could see.
The field is covered with short, dry grass now. Besides the ground and the wind, there’s nothing but sky. Wide, blue, voluminous sky.
image of La Lune print used with permission from Double Merrick, doublemerrick.myshopify.com
The moon often watches us when we walk the field. Even in sunlight, its bald head nods as we plod along the soft ground.
My son would play there forever if I let him.
In freedom he scampers ahead of me. Kneels. Lifts his arms. Stares down the barrel and through the cross hairs. Imagines sniping enemy troops.
The dog is also at home there. She parts the grass like water and swims. Without warning, she pops straight up and over, jumping like a rabbit. Ears pricked. Her body alert to the possibility of field mice beneath these waves.
Except for the one deer, the only wildlife we’ve seen are small birds. They congregate, hidden in the grass, then spring into flight as we approach. Dozens of tiny, floating kites, cut loose to lift and sail away.
One day, my son called to me from where he crouched. The inflection in his voice danced over the field.
“Mom,” he said. “I found a deer track!”
Sure enough, he’d found one perfect, heart-shaped deer track imprinted in the dried dirt.
far
We could tell—from the shape of the print, the deer that left it there had been walking. Just like us.
These are the moments I wish I could capture. They bound away, impossible to hold. Photographs don’t do them justice.
Must be what it’s like to walk on the moon.
An ordinary action, walking. Elevated here. Beyond measure in its fullness. Silent. Solitary. Surrounded by nothing but God and ground and sky.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. Ephesians 3:20-21 NIV
When I was pregnant with my son, I listened to Beethoven. Relax and savor the tender, magical, masterful strains of Moonlight Sonata.
Double Merrick
The La Lune print featured in today’s post is the work of English designer/illustrator Merrick Angle.
Merrick’s charming prints were a hit when he started selling them on Etsy. One has only to view his art to understand why.
Merrick presently works out of a studio near Limoges in rural France. His online shop, Double Merrick, continues to wow.
Visit his shop to see for yourself and read more of his story. Warning: you may fall in love with what you see.
This is a letter my dearest in the world friend gave me the last time I saw her. Four weeks ago, December 18, 2011.
unopened
There it sits. Pristine. Unopened.
I couldn’t open it the last evening we were together with our families in St. Louis because I would cry. We both knew it would be a long time before we’d see each other again. So I saved the letter to open it later.
“We’ve been here almost a month, and you’re handling this move really well,” said my husband last week. “You’re not crying.”
No, I’m adopting the Midwestern attitude. Putting my head down to forge a life on the prairie. Onward and upward. Just. Work. Harder.
If I open that letter, I’ll disintegrate.
I’ll cry big tears when I think of all that’s been lost. At the same time, in front of me stands so much that’s been gained. The gains hold the tears at bay in a bittersweet tension.
Before we moved, parents from our son’s class at school had a going away party for us. My son asked why they were having it.
“Is it a birthday party?” said my seven-year-old.
His friend, whose family was hosting the event, was with us that day. “No,” he said. “It’s a you’re-going-away-forever party.”
Female Orpheus Fountain Figure by Carl Milles as seen at Missouri Botanical Garden
I intervened. “We’re not dying. We’re only moving.”
But moving is a sort of dying. All changes are. A beloved Bible teacher of my past used to say we first experience change as loss.
We held it together, as did most of our friends, through our goodbyes. Then there was that moment the day I rushed to the groomer’s to pick up the dog.
We wanted to have Ella groomed one last time before we moved. As I paid the sweet shop owner, told her goodbye and thank you for all her years of service to us, she began to sob.
“We’re really going to miss you and Ella,” she said.
Fear shot through the muscles in my face. Confusion billowed up in my brain. Not the groomer. She just couldn’t lose it. No, no, no.
“There’s something about those terriers,” she said and boohooed some more.
“We’ll miss you too,” I said helplessly. “I don’t know how we’ll ever replace you.”
And we won’t. We’ll find another groomer. We’ll find another salon, dry cleaner, church, and circle of friends.
moving truck
Another, but not a replacement.
That’s what I tell myself to keep from opening that letter. At least for now.
The LORD is close to the brokenhearted;
He rescues those whose spirits are crushed. Psalm 34:18 NLT
Me, I’m a part of your Circle of friends. By Edie Brickell.
Had fun with Reader’s Choice 2011. Hope you did too. Thought it was all wrapped up until I received a comment from my friend Chef Nusy.
Nusy is a friend I would not know except for this blog. We’ve never met in person, but we converse in the comments and her story inspires me.
Nusy was born and raised in Hungary. She immigrated to the United States alone at the ripe old age of 20. Did it for love.
Nusy married and now lives with her husband in California. She coaches fencing, teaches bread making, studies, and writes a blog called And Cuisine For All.
What impresses me about Nusy is her heart of freedom.
Communism anticlimactically fell in her homeland, but not much has changed for her people. So Nusy embraces life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness we Yankee Doodle Dandies sometimes take for granted.
When Nusy’s request reached me, I was moved. Here’s what she wrote:
If there’s still a spot on Reader’s Choice… this is mine. While I enjoyed Milk Wars and I Like My Bike, this was the post that hit me the deepest this year; not just here—all around the blogosphere.
The impact of history on a generation of people… and the lack of impact on those born after the tragedy. As Tolkien would put it, “the sorrow of the Firstborn.” That we have seen and experienced something that no words can ever describe to those who weren’t there to see it; we stand monument to the greatest tragedy of modern times.
It was the post that launched a thousand hits. And then some.
Quite by surprise, WordPress Freshly Pressed this simple story about a bike named Cindy on the last day of August 2011. A deluge of clicks and comments rolled in, making it the most read everyday epistle post to date.
Cheryl and Greg Brewer at a castle in Switzerland
Interestingly, it was last to be picked for Reader’s Choice. My classy, continent-hopping friend Cheryl Brewer came through at the eleventh hour with her unprompted selection.
Seems fitting to make it the Reader’s Choice post on this, the last day of 2011.
But before that, when her favorite post was first published back in June, Katie spread the story far and wide.
Her network helped make this the second most read everyday epistle post to date. My stats show it has been shared 295 times and counting on Facebook and 51 on Twitter.
Alicia Norton keeps me in stitches. The woman needs to be on stage.
Alicia loves involving the audience, as any good entertainer does. Perhaps that explains her Reader’s Choice selection. The audience comments on this one are as funny as the post itself.
Her pick also marked a milestone as the 100th entry on everyday epistle.
Leave it to a fun, significant person to choose a fun, significant post.
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