During our Christmas vacations, we always would have Sportsnight practices. Practices that we held at various and sundry schools and churches to get ready for our yearly competitions between the class years. It was a very important thing to us to be the champions. To work hard within our class and vanquish the other years. From Freshman year in 1975, we made our mark as a very competitive class. We had the Freshman Candyland as our theme and came very close to beating the Seniors. We came in second in the whole event. I remember traveling to Sportsnight practice and being the only person on the J train, because it was above ground on the bridge and the train stopped on the Brooklyn bridge and the snow was everywhere. The bridge was swaying and I declare, we were ready to fall into the water. It would have been the conductor the engineer and me on that day. We were the only brave or stupid souls braving the mounds of snow, into Brooklyn. Sportsnight was always the end of January, sometime. Always an excursion for us Queens people to travel there. Our family never had a car that could brave the elements and there was always a story of safety being taken into question and the craziness of my family supporting my scholastic adventure. I do appreciate them for that. The first Sportsnight, when we nearly won the crown. I was flying like a kite on the way home. Dad said let's go the opposite way and see if we can make some time going on the BQE instead of going on the Belt. {What did I know about those things?} Sure DAD, lets. Me and him and Mom traveled around the turn and were under the Fort Hamilton overpass and CABOOM, we hit the first pothole and the lights on the dashboard went bright and then dark. UH OH! We are stuck, it is dark and the snow is up to our kazoo. If we stay in the car, someone will come and hit us. If we get out of the car we have no where to go but up the trestle. We can do it, Dad said. We can? I was still in my volleyball shorts and a coat. We mountain climbed up the trestle to the street above and walked to the subway and took it home. What an adventure it was.
Chapter One – The voyage- The voyage- It was going to be a long summer before my adventure into the unknown. I had won the general excellence medal and no bells or whistles had accompanied this as I had hoped. More responsibility, more children in the home, more conflicts to deflect; still, there was something to look past. It was all a blur when S. Lucy asked me if I would like to take an adventure and travel into the far reaches of outer space and go to school. She may as well have said that. Bay Ridge? Brooklyn? Verrazano Bridge? That was just about as far from home as I could imagine at that ripe old age of 14.
We will leave this decision completely up to you, they said. Would you do something like that and leave your home and go 2 hours everyday both ways for High School? I would, I will. Tony Boy screamed and cried, when we told them. “She’s leaving us.” He said, at 3 years old. I am not leaving Tony, yes you are you are going to that bridge place. No, I am not I will be home everyday. He was more right than I knew. Now, we had the summer to brag and talk about Jayne’s upcoming adventure into the deep! The clear blue sea was the distance that seemed to be between me and the bridge.
The talk of the family, advice was flowing about the subway and how to stay away from strangers and derelicts and bums. I couldn’t imagine what they were talking about at all. I remember trying to picture the masses of people getting into the train like they talked about and I had nothing to compare it to. Stay by the door, follow the groups of people and they will know where the door is so that you can get in and get a seat. You should be able to get a seat because you are going from the first stop on the train to the last stop on the train so, everyday you should have a seat. People will bump and the train lights will go out and all sorts of advice was flowing from people who heard that I was headed for such an adventure.
Somebody should have said that is stupid. Nobody said that in those days, no distance was long enough to send children for the cause of integration. What is integration? What is busing? What is a child? What is the purpose? Are we integrated yet?
I did believe in integration and I believed in all of the civil rights that they told us that we were fighting for and integrating for. What they netted, all toll? I am not sure.
Anyway, S. Lucy had gone to the school and she painted it as a magical and beautiful place and when I visited, I could see myself there. S.Lucy gave me a vision, outside of my life. I don’t know if that was a gift or a nightmare. Some of both, I suppose.
The first day in the subway after the testdrive. I walked down the stairs and there were lights and arrows and people, who all seemed to know where they were going. I was dressed in my new, new uniform and floundering through the seas of people, in a dreamlike state. I was absolutely unsure where I was going. All I knew was the F train to 4th Ave and the RR to the last stop. That seemed easy enough. Darkness. Every window had lines and levels of darkness passing by, darted with signs of street names that I had never seen before. After a while, they would become as familiar as the faces at home. Not now, now they were darts and images of the dark and unfamiliar. Blackness and grayness and lights and shadows, mixed with signs of street names. All of a sudden light started coming through the windows and I remember the feeling of complete horror at the sight of the sun, the first time, after being underground for over an hour. Am I in the wrong place? How come I don’t remember this? Should I get off? Where am I? Finally the place that I was looking for, 4th Avenue. Whew! This is right. I looked around and everybody still knew where they were going. I forgot. I had done this once with mom, but she talks the whole trip. I didn’t remember anything and nothing looked familiar except the sign 4th Avenue. Where is the RR train? Where is the RR train? I probably would have layed right down there and had a temper tantrum, if I were anyone else but me. I was exhausted and I had all of my books and there were only the sight of over 100 steps to go down to anything and everybody was going that way. Don’t ask and never talk to strangers, of course.
I couldn’t count the steps there that day, I was too tired. It was 8 oclock and I was due at school at 8:45. I could not imagine making it to school in that time. Of course, the thrill of a new school was still ahead and I believe that that was the only thing that kept me from barfing. What was I in for? This? Everyday? It was an adventure and you are on a mission. That was the plan, I suppose? Down, down,down,down… it was 10 after 8 when I got to the RR train platform. It was a small dark platform way under ground. More darkness. More signs and trains and klikety klack. Finally 99th st and the last stop. I may have fallen asleep. There was a sigh that there really was such a thing as 95th st . exit. 7 blocks more. I do remember this part, because it was above ground. I climbed upstairs and started walking. How do the streets go, down here I think it was the 95 st exit and I was going to.
Everyday, no matter what I did my knee socks would be around my feet, by the time I got to the deli. I pulled them up when I was coming up the steps into the sunlight and then when I got to the corner of the deli, they would be around my shoes. I would put all my books down and look inside for the time on the clock and pull up my socks. If they came down between there and class, it was too bad. I was not putting my books down again for something so silly. Dad said every book home every day. Every book home everyday! What a beautiful place! It was like a fairy land. The hedges were always impeccable, later on they would be Ju’s tissue when she sneezed everyday. I couldn’t imagine how fond of the hedges we would become. Then the view of the Bridge. My favorite place in the entire world. It was worth the trip. One look at that immense and beautiful structure, with the sun shining in my eyes made it worth every moment of darkness. I was scared of the people, for sure. But the bridge was just beautiful and peaceful and protective even. I loved it. I looked around at the new class. Nobody looked at me funny. Nobody made fun of my socks. I felt somewhat safe. This was going to be home for a while.
I cannot pen the intimacies of umbilically challenged 49 year old with her mother. I can just note the general theme.
--- I really think that Eve herself gave those Hansts,Bowen,Christie women their knowledge of child development. I don't agree with their tactics, most times, but it is a preservative to our culture to have had them in the world. I do respect the years of experience and the methods of passing those maternal observations to their children. They are like God's secure safe of mothering. Other families may have something like it, but if you learn the combination and can get past the hard exterior there is, seemingly, an infinite wealth of child rearing experience.
I hated them, growing up. I hated all of my business being fodder for the family table. Do you know what she did this week? Do you know what she said to me? Everybody knew everything. All my business? What business. When I was sassy, how I cut myself and almost cut myself... No privacy inside the home and none with the extended family. I didn't realize that I was the eldest grand, the guineapig. Now, I miss the sense of extended family that I ran with diligence to get away from. Now, that I am trying to weave the maternal knowledge into my own potential maternal/child experts, I miss the contributions.
This time, my mom and I observed the connection of nursing and the nursing hormones with the child development. If grief and pain is passed on to the children, what is passed when we work outside of the home and are passing those anxieties to our children? We spoke about that among the other spiritual observations on how God uses pastured Mothers in the world around us. Is our job passe'? Does God want us to hermit ourselves and just pray for the kareening world around us? He plugs Mommies into the kareening world to slow the pace of disaster and inhumaneness and spotlight the importance of the little things that delight. The sparkle and gleam in the baby's eyes when they are full of baby milk. The importance of what you sensitize them to, in their early days. The baby that learns early not to bite mommy, has human sensitivities. The greater distance between mommy and her baby is a recipe for hardening of our souls. What do we want in the next generation? Life-giving practices or life-taking practices? Can a woman forget her own son? Yes they may, But God never forgets.
I am half done pruning my butterfly bush. I still have alot of cutting to do. Butterfly Bush had gotten so very large and plumulous, {if that is a word}. I was cutting and cutting and imagining myself, had I the time to make baskets out of the precious many stalks that delighted me so, in the summertime. I want to keep them for ever, for the many butterfly and moth visitors that they attracted. It is Autumn, now. Time to bring it down so that it can grow more attractive in the next season. I had intentions of moving it to the backyard, but that would be too large a chore. I'll be happy, if I can take it down another half before snow fall. I may need a stronger pruning instrument. We'll see.
The okra is growing its last few beautiful veggies and my beets and beans are just popping their heads above the ground. Not really a garden, or a fruitful garden, but I learned alot and loved looking at my few plants in my veggie patch. Certain plants do very well and eggplants are not one of them. I didn't get one eggplant. I got a bunch of okra, but no eggplants. I will try again next season on my patch. The temperatures are still medium and I keep thinking that I can just throw the seeds out there and they'll do alright. But it is freezing at night and that is a problem. Well, Next year I may try broccoli.
Although he is a figment of AA Milne's imagination he is always calculating and always growing something. I keep getting distracted by the calculations of things when it comes to gardening. I have so much else to distract me. The other day I was admiring the handiwork of God in the persperation glands. The coiling and imaginitive way that those glands sit under the surface of the skin and do what they are intended to do. Were they always intended to look so confusing?
Sweat, persperation was a result of the fall. The sweat glands seem to look like that, {a confused afterthought of the fall}. As I was walking through Lowes, some brown eyed susans looked exactly like the sweat glands to me. They were coiling. I said I must have them. They are just what the sweatglands look like under the skin. I must see why they came up that way. The expensive flowers were straight and nice, these were in the bargain bin because they were, coiled up. I didn't get to put them into the ground until today and they were nearly dead, once I got them into the ground. My hypothesis is that our bodies were cooler, before the fall and heated up as a result of the eating of the forbidden fruit. There was something about those brown eyed susans that made me look again at my pictures of the sweat glands. I plant flowers and God planted sweat glands. That is my small contribution to beating my swords to PLOWSHEARS.
I do love my pear trees. I love the little fruit that they are both touting with pride today. The birdies love them too. This morning was about getting the weeds out of the front yard and cooking for the using of stuff that was going bad. I found 2 maple trees trying to bogard my red fern. I will not have it! I pulled them out and will pot them, until I find the right place for them. I really don't get over to spend time with my lamb's ears, like I wanted to this season. This evening will be time for the lamb's ears and Diva and Prima, who are crying for want of attention. For now it is time to clean the inside of the house in the heat of the day. Thank God for Central Air!
It is amazing, in a large family, how we learn to defer or intimidate one another. When we are cleaning up, what we discard and what we carry to its rightful posessor(if not owner). Nothing is owned, but everybody has something that is special to them. I found a coloring book under the oven, while cleaning. Yuck! I was about to toss it, it wasn't too skuzzy. It wasn't greasy or anything. Ezra yanked that book from me and held it close, figuring what pages were still left to complete. "One man's junk...", I said to myself. I never would have thought that the book would mean so much to him. But, glasses, when they are lost are valuable to the posessor and to the family. Our season of entering into one person's loss and joy, is the tie that binds our hearts in Christian love. Halleluia for glasses found and for the ability to go to church with one praise report, for our whole family. The glasses were found and Ethan can see again. whew!
I was flying down the highway here in NC, doing 45 mph(that is fast down here) Freedom from sound and silly laughing voices, makes me a little melancholic for the days when my entire being was consumed with the infantile thoughts of my younguns. I do miss it. Now that they are all grown or trying to act grown. The last months of my 6 year old are melting into oblivion. My dreams of writing the when we were six for my Christopher Robin sons is now a real missed opportunity. I have slips of poems and funny thoughts around the house to dart the efforts. I have AA Milne's book laying around assisting my mental motivation and 7 is running up on me like a prowler. I will get to compile the thoughts for my precious boys. I do admire AA Milne and EB White and CS Lewis for condescending their thoughts to the miniscule, for our entertainment. I gave my Ezra a job to do. I told him, in my thought it was a clear command. "Go outside and pull the weeds out of my garden. I only have a 2'x2' Okra and Eggplant patch. He said "no!" and the hair on the back of my neck stood up. Self control not to knock him down. I controlled myself and said Sweetiepie, You will do what Mommy said, right now. He slowly understood my eye glare and quickly got his sneakers on. "There is too much grass in the yard to pull it all out." He, thought I was telling him to pull the grass out of the front yard, for some reason. These generation communication gaps happen all of the time now. They didn't happen as often when I was a 30 year old mother or a 35 year old mother, but now that I am "pushing 50", It happens every day. When we were 6 helps me remember that I am no longer 6, or 16 or 26 or 36 or...well, you know. I will finish it and I will figure out how to communicate with my children, even the "baby". Thank God for numerous "translators".
Hooray! She has become so beautiful. Her blooms are fuschia colored and bountiful. I think that I will bring some inside to beautify our home. The table would look nice with a bunch of Crepe Myrtle alive and decorating it at dinner. The butterflies and bees are enjoying my butterfly bush and Sunday afternoon I found a very large cricket sitting in the center of my dying sunflower. She took shade and some food in my delightful flower. I tried to take her picture and she posed beautifully, but her expressions of enjoyment could not be caught by a photo.
After this I found a red buzzing visitor. I don't know what it was. I did catch it on photo, after fighting it and chasing it. She didn't like having her photo taken, so she lunged at me first, as though I was the butterfly bush. I had to play hide and seek with her on Sunday, before catching her buzzing around my blooms. I need a sign on my butterfly bush for the visiting butterflies, that says Expect to get your photo taken, if you are enjoying the flora here. This big red insect, that looked somewhat like a hummingbird, made Ethy and I chase her for her photo. It was like an Easter egg hunt for us and we had fun.:)
What will we do? We have put coupons away to buy our daddy a special gift, for Father's day. The family organizer has the coupons in her files. She has the day picked out to go shopping and we are chomping at the bit to do what we can to make it a special day. The meal is my responsibility. For some reason, I thought we would have home grown eggplant by this time. But, not yet, is there a bloom on our little eggplant. We do hope that he is pleased and excited by our planned celebrations. We will see!
He told me, that he started with telling me little things to fetch for him. He started with single items and then a list of 5 or ten things when I was too young to remember him doing this. Then, it was phone numbers. I was his phone book. He would offer a prize to the person who could remember Aunt Iva's phone number from home to Brooklyn, where she lived. He never, ever carried a phone book, wherever we were, he would say Jayne, what is Aunt Iva's phone number. I can't remember anything now. I am old. But at that age, I had them all in my mind. The only problem is that, I think that because he force fed all that informational stuff into my mind, like a computer, it forced out memory for regular stuff, like shutting off of the water in the tub and shutting off the iron. Those memory items, forgotten, had most serious consequenses, usually a bop in the head, or something like that. The other were a game. I gravitated to remember the phone numbers and my timestables and stuff like that. "Jayne, what is Aunt Iva's phone number?"
You girls are always designing shirts, cartoons, cards and other creative things, dollies and such. I am always amazed that there are so many ways to design a room or put it together. Clean is better than, well designed, I say. Clean first and then pick up your pen. Clean first and then pull out the sewing machine. Clean first and then entertain your friends and family. A beautiful raincoat and what did God send us? RAIN! Thank you Lord!
Prima’s leaves are getting messed up by aphids. She was crying this morning and still, the show must go on. She pirouetted, with pride and beauty, so I watered her. I never get to water the plants in the morning. This morning, I planted all of my seedlings, I thinned out my eggplant patch, I put Mr. Strawberry in his place and then watered the duet, Prima and the Diva were, in their glory. Of course, it rained. It seemed the angels were sympathizing with Prima, as I was. Let’s hope that is the end of the aphids.I will have to stake Prima, after all, if she doesn’t perk up.Blue, found a wonderful perch on Prima and I tried to take a picture, but she wasn’t in the mood. Of all of the mornings to play shy. She just wanted me to chase her. I wouldn’t do it. I have my pride, also and I had no time.For the love of Prima, I want to get a tape of Patti Labelle for her, so she can see what she reminds me of—“New Attitude”.
Ms. Robin knows all about a bumper crop of strawberries. She and Ms Bluejay met me outside this morning. It was delightful to see how they laugh at me trying to develop a green thumb. You were getting so excited about the flower seeds, like you've never seen a strawberry before or a seed come from a flower. I hope you know, I mean it all in fun. I am laughing with you and not at you.
Oh dear! I am in love again. I met these two trees, in the farm and they were personalities that I couldn't get away from. They were gifts and obviously, very loved. We walked through the farm and I wished hard looking at Prima and looking at Diva. I couldn't hope to have her. One of them was above my budget. I had just gone window shopping. My friend had blessed me! What a blessing! Prima was a beautiful ballerina pose. I was told, she will straighten out, with a stake or two taken to her. NOooo! I would never stake her. That is her personality! She was a gift. As her pirouette, so is she. She is not crooked, she is a dancer. She is in a spin and she is beautiful. We took them in the truck and the personality of Diva came alive as well. She was obviously, a Diva. How could you? She sighed, when we unwrapped her from the plastic. I thought that she was, just a weeping cherry tree. She was whining about her treatment. Her leaves, which were perfect, at the farm had been wind whipped and crinkled from the ride. I could hear Madeline Kahn's voice from her, when I look at her, in young Frankenstein. "Don't touch me." "I, simply do not know, if I will ever recuperate from that long ride in the back of a truck. They never treated me like that, at the farm." My leaves, my beautiful leaves..." I was weeping with her, by the time we got her into the ground. You will be all right, Maybe, she said. Prima reminds me of Patti Labelle, she dances and is singing about a new attitude. She was, a little less delicate. She enjoys being in the spotlight most of the day, now. She is talking to the little flowers beneath her and telling them what to do. I love seeing them get acclimated to my yard. I could kiss them, they are so full of personality. "She's feeling good from her leaves to her roots, knows where she's planted and she knows she's a beaut-She's got a new attitude." (I know they are trees.)
1. Walk onto the court and don't run on, "willy, nilly!" 2. Close the gate behind you! 3. Do not make loud noises on, or near the courts. 4. Do not walk past someone else's court, if the ball is in play... 5. Never touch the net!!!
The wind was contrary, as I practiced my serve this morning. My twist was, at least 2-3 inches out, on account of the wind. I was working on the calculations and the precise combination to get it in and I was thinking how much my children are just like that tennis ball. The winds are always contrary and the spins are missing the line on every point, more often than not. They have their own specific spin. I know that I didn't put the spin on them. God, or their father did that. I just have to adjust and move the ball in the direction of the court. My contribution seems to be the contact and the direction to the children. Volleys, serves, occasionally, one of them comes along that is a floater and you get to hit it right to get a winner. Most of the time they are just ralleys. The fun is in the interaction and how many times you get to hit them over the net. When they change courts and you are no longer in their sphere of influence, though you may love them. The match is over. It may be a short match or a long match. You have just a few minutes on earth to make an influence on them. Sometimes the lighter you hit them the more they float, as I have seen in my inlaws case. The eldest child they always seem to hit so hard they pop the ball into smitherenes. If I could do it again. I would treat the eldest like the youngest and the youngest like the eldest. No attention is better than too much.
I got some fertilizer and topsoil and started some flowers and some greenery in my front yard. I felt, a little like, "This Old House". Trying to renew the front yard of my new and precious home. My camera woman documented everything that I did. What I am thinking about doing and how we placed the first 4 green ground cover, in their place. She was fastidious to include my every word of design desires and to put the camera right in my throat as I thought out my plan. I want a small path of cement blocks leading from the side to the front patio. I want a simulation botanical garden in the backyard, with a path to nowhere. Elephant ears and shady areas to make preparation for the possibility of young couples being established and place for them to sneak away and show eachother secret affections. I hope that they will establish their nests, in my yard. Both, my children and young birds. Maybe, I will be able to establish an aviary and grow my own finches and such. I do want puppies and bunnies, in a little cage, out my back door. Ginger and snap are doing well, but peachypoo, seems to have succumbed to a fever from the cold and snowfall, unexpected that we had. I do miss her. She was so beautiful and ostentatious. She had no inhibitions to show her plumes in or outdoors. I am glad we photographed her, but, I will attempt to do CPR on her, in the yard in the Springtime. They had strawberry plants and blueberry trees, at Lowes, which I was eyeballing, desirously. Maybe, I will be able to include them in my investments to my yard. I needn't write it down, because, my understudies are listening and taping my everyword, those girls. My Evvy has the camera, in my mouth, even when there is no camera. What a great reminder that this is to me, that what I do, they will imitate. Grandma Ruth used to say "Pete and repeat". That meant, a child is in the room and they are sure to hear and reiterate the sentence in the wrong context. We were so often Pete and we were certainly repeat. Lord, help me to say and do good things for them to imitate. I am so often forgetful of my young understudies. Amen.
You only have one daddy! You girls are blessed with a merciful and kind daddy. Please don't miss this time, when God hasn't snatched you away to another man, to be kind to your daddy. The gleam in my fathers eyes when he opened a card that had a dollar in it, was priceless. He could put on that glance in a moment. It was addictive to hear him say, this is a good cup of coffee, or this is a great meal. "Indian burns!" was my absolute favorite. You are learning skills of love that are best groomed, nowhere else. Natural affections of real tolerance, overlooking faults and love are brewed in the kettle of the family. Learning to make his favorite, biscuits and grits or mac and cheese, is real love. Don't miss this.
A woman of wisdom and honor and truth was Sojourner. A Black effective abolitionist and a woman. Using her godly and god honoring influence to effect policy in America.Wikipedia article...
reading and thinking cannot be abolished, The impossible dream of being a woman and a writer, in a day when it was against the law for slaves to be taught or to read. Amazing accomplishments, for that day,were hers.
Lessons of femininity from the women of the 1930’s and 40’s. Last night’s movie was replete with convictions of the role of women and how it has changed the world. We are in 2010 and there are so many freedoms that we enjoy, but do we allow the freedoms that we enjoy take precedence over the simplicity of relating to one another. The thought that complete strangers would talk through an entire train ride about nothing, is completely gone from our culture. Cell phones and video contraptions keep us mesmerized on such trips and we do not talk to one another or get to know one another unless absolutely necessary. What kind of community is built upon the iPod and the cell phone. We choose who to speak to on the buses and trains. The beauty and the simplicity of admiring the creation of God in the people around us and with us as we travel outside our sphere is lost. I never see the whole movie, because it hurts to see the decline of communication. It hurts to see the decline of human consideration. It hurts to see the decrease in the skills that make it possible to go the long haul with one another. Instructing and injecting those skills of tolerance and compromise into our young people is a job and a trust. How can I learn what I have not seen? How can I instruct what I have not practiced? Lessons in the stories in the old days are helpful. Perhaps the mans’ job of preaching and teaching is paralleled in the job of the woman to protect and preserve human graces that lead to peace and peace loving. Are we learning to be Daughters of Eve or daughters of the serpent?
I remember my mommy being able to work that old Singer sewing machine and making the coats that we wore for Easter, at Aunt Jackie's house. We didn't go to see Aunt Jackie, there in those days, she played second fiddle to "The Matriarch". We went to see "Mu". Mu, lived in the apartment behind Aunt Jackie and Uncle Charles. It was a family obligation to visit her, as often as possible. We did too. Easter meant that we would get a basket from her and a bat and ball. These were more looked forward to than the egg hunt, in Aunt Jackie's back yard. We had an amazing time as little people. Us and Lisa and Rene and Brian and Glenn (Lauren and David were already too grown to play with us) (It is my guess that they hid the eggs). We fought over the candy and who got the biggest basket. We all knew that Glen got the biggest basket, because he was a grandchild and we were greats. Still, that was always noticed. Grandma Hanst did alot of watching the Dodgers when we were over there and Pop was always seated in the chair in the room. We were little and the big people filled the apartment so much that, if we got a good peak at her and a peck on the cheek we were happy. Why were they all hovering around her so? Why was wherever she was 106? Love. She represented love, to all of those people. Every once in a while she yelled and there was silence. All of these people bowed to her every command and then they were gone. They bowed to love. I guess that that is the Christie Legacy in America. We may have little of anything else, but I always say that we have a monopoly on "the mothers' intuition". Everything that Eve said to her daughters was passed on to Mu! I remember the last day. I remember late in the night being put in the car for the last time to see Mu. She fell and broke her hip. They took her from the back of Uncle Charles' house. We never saw her again. No more baskets, lovingly prepared, with names on them. No more "Mommy made" coats. The era of Mu had changed swiftly and there was much weeping over her. Everytime the door opened by a gust of wind, Mommy would say, here comes Mu. Thank you for visiting us, Mu. We came to look forward to such occurrences and laugh. But I remember Mu, when she was really there. Beautiful and wrinkled and mine. The commander of a host of children and Grands and Greats (we were the greats).
Out of nowhere these 4 very large men defended me from the bad man. They beat him up and he had no bruises. I felt loved and comforted and there was no more threat. When I woke up, I thought about the dream that it could have been Daniel, Mishael, Hananiah and Azariah. I never thought about them being big, even though the scriptures say that their eating had made them fatter and plumper than the other slaves that had gone through the initiation with them. Whoever these men were, they came out of nowhere and they were bigger than any man that I had seen and very, very fat. A healthy kind of fat and they beat up that threatening man, like nothing that I had ever seen. I am familiar with that kind of fear, but, I must say that I had never felt that kind of defense before. I had given that kind of defense over my sisters and brothers, but I can't say that I ever felt that quite like that before. I am sure that it was just a dream and I know that the Hebrew boys and Daniel were some of the most peaceful men who ever lived, but it was very comforting to sense that they could be close enough friends to defend me like that. What an imagination, I have. An interesting dream
Aunt Dorothy was so patient with me. I was fearful of water, since infancy. I was destined, never to wash my face. Never to stick my face in the water. Then, we went to Atlanta. I got on the plane with mommy and Ju and baby Jackie. I had no fear of the plane and even if I did, I couldn't cry because I had to be the big girl. They were both crying. Mom couldn't handle 3 of us screaming on the plane? Aunt Dorothy took us into her home and taught me to stick my face in the water. Maybe 3 times I stuck my face into the facebowl, after sudsing it up. She spent time and attention with me and Patti, together. I learned to travel past my fear and to see the water as an opportunity, instead of a dreaded fearsome grave. Thank you Aunt Dorothy.
A Shepherd? That is the question. How are you leading me, Lord, in this dark veil of tears? So many times, in these sadnesses, I have collapsed and fallen on the ground and hid my eyes. I know, only, that He has had to carry me most of the way from that point on. He sent Evvy to show me how I am. Evvy had a blackboard fall on her leg when she was 18 months old and she didn't walk for a month or so. The doctor said nothing is broken, she is just afraid. I do that, with God. I can't walk, Lord. I will fall again. I am fallen. I am blind. I say. He takes my hands from my eyes and lifts me from my pallet and shows me how to walk. I am grateful for His mercies. Bearing one another's burdens means that we love one another through these dark times of incapability. Carrying the paralytic ones to Jesus, in prayer and in our love. I need love, Lord. You are love. I need strength, Lord, You are strong. God has given family and church and community and learning to enjoy Him in and with these good gifts in purity, is the goal. When I sin, I have an advocate with the Father. I don't expect my brethren to be the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, but tools in His hands to give me the grace to be able to stand against the evil day. Having done all, to stand. Having embraced all of the good gifts that God has given richly to enjoy, I stand in obedience to Him and in repentance for my sins. Help me, Lord. Thank you for my brothers and sisters in Christ The richest gift of all, on earth.
I stand ever in gratitude for every one of those 21 days of blessed remembrance which are etched indelibly on my mind, through grief. They hurt worse than tongue can say. I am often angry, but also grateful, if someone can understand that. God has let me grieve and talk lucidly to Him in my grief. He is the only one who can understand the pain that the memory brings and the pain that the heart and mind try to reach for in comfort for the loss. There is a comfort that comes, from His mighty hand and the going through the grief process is the only way to enter into that comforting relationship with God. I didn't know that then. God and the precious sense of His love in the beauty and loving hugs of family and friends are sometimes the only comfort the soul can find. There is no stable ground inside of your soul. Everything seems to be shaken, only God's comfort is constant. The hymnwriter said, when all around my soul gives way. That is what he was talking about. I would wish that no one would feel all around their soul give way. Mind and heart and flesh to fail, but if they do, God is still constant. Where shall I go from your spirit? said the Psalmist. There is nowhere on this earth that is truly God forsaken, only hell is God forsaken. When mind and heart are lost, even in distress and pain there is still the light of the sun and the colors of the rainbow that are constant, even if you cannot see them for the craze. God is everywhere.
I was in the best shape of my life. 28 years old and had everything that I ever wanted. A wonderful happy christian family. A husband, who loved Jesus, a daughter, who reminded me of myself and now, a son. We were determined to run, with energy to please God on every point. We read through the scriptures as a family. We put away the tv. We did whatever we felt would draw us closer to this God who had given us all that we ever, ever wanted. Job and struggles with the job were a constant. But they seemed nothing, with the beauty of this family that we had asked God for.
We had the baby at the "Childbirth Center". One healthy natural birth down, there was little to worry about, except that I was 2 weeks late. I remember that the pain was so much that only a shower could help it. I was in the shower at the center and trying to do my breathing exercises. Ben said do you need me, to help. I said I am in a contraction, don't talk. I felt a hand on my shoulder. I said how did you reach that far over the shower door to touch my shoulder. He said I can't reach over the shower door. I said you didn't touch my shoulder, who did then? When we found out in a few minutes that it was a boy, it was the most precious gift there had ever been. A boy. I was first again. "Jack" had the first grandchild, but I had the first grandson. Wow, like Christmas. I was pleased as punch and he was beautiful, too. Even the umbilical cord was white as snow, I remember. I said I didn't know the cord could be light or dark. The midwife said it is the color of the skin of the baby. I was in awe of this. I had my wits about me somewhat, because it wasn't my first birth, I could look around at stuff and note the differences. This would never happen again and I would never have my wits about me at birth again. I didn't know that.
It looks like somebody put their paint brush in the gray and in the pink and speckled the paper somewhat haphazardly. It is beautiful. I am usually so enamored with the other side of the paper where the sun is rising that I forget to turn the paper over and look at the dark side of the morning sky. Awesome beauty was there, when I accidentally peered up at the other side of the morning.
I can remember everyday of that poor baby's life. Daily, it seems that my mind will try to retrace the steps and look for how I could have changed the outcome of that circumstance. It is awefully sad to look back so often, but it is impossible to do anything else when you are a mother. I see why God marked history with the griefs of mothers. His heart is clearly with us in these griefs. Can't get away from it. I can't yet write the daily steps I trod, it breaks me down. I know that God is there with me, even when I am struggling with His providences. That is all that I can say about that. The Ark came back after Ichabod, but the hearts of those women were the clock for the people of the griefs that they had seen.
We walked and talked together, just the two of us. We traversed back and forth down the streets of this new city for us both. For her, it was home, all she knew. For me it was a barren distant world, away and apart from my common surroundings. My own, little town was left for, the burbs. Would I survive? My Elyse and now this little one jumping around inside me would keep me focused. I cast my cares upon God, everyday. Lord, I prayed, make me like the Shunnamite, I meant Shulamite woman, to give to the men of God. I wanted to pray with my heart opened before the Lord. I told you, Lord, I would go anywhere, but these surroundings are entirely too different for me. People are too into themselves and their stuff. I could get into that too, if that is what Christianity is about. God had called me from nothing and I was trying to figure out what real Christianity was about. Ambition and wanting and other things also. I couldn't get into that. That kind of coveting is not my remaining sin. I started to imbibe some of the covetous mindset. We discussed the possibility of this being our last child. No more. 2 is enough. I said that at one of the family functions and was rebuked sharply. You young people think that you can tell God what to do. I was rebuked and I did see the changes that were happening to us, living in the burbs and worshiping with people who drove nice cars and had big houses. We wanted to serve the Lord. I said, Lord, if you would give me a son, should I pray like Hannah. You know that I will give him to you? I wouldn't dare even utter such a greedy request. Here I was with everything that I couldn't even imagine to have wanted and asking for more. What a greedy girl. God had delivered me from terror, into a loving and accepting family and I was looking for, a son? Well, I was late to deliver. Everybody else's son was born or seemed to be born before mine. I went to visit Francine in the hospital and there was the verse outside her door. To everything there is a season. Okay Lord, I will try to be patient. The baby was due in late February, but on March 4, 1989. There he was. I was laying on the bed and I said, honey, I think you need to take authority over this baby. I think you ought to tell the baby to come out. He cleaned up the house and said, everything is ready now and put his hand on my stomach and said Baby come out! and one hour later I was in labor. I said honey, this is one obedient baby. He was.
Birth of a son. A second pregnancy, was a joyful time. In those days we didn't want to know what it was. Sonograms were still somewhat new procedures and you could choose to have one or not. We were naturalists and chose to be surprised. Everybody who was pregnant with me with the first one was with me on the second go round. We were consecutively reading through the scriptures with our one and only child. We were listening to series' everywhere and by everybody on molding the character of the child. No disobediences were tolerated or accepted. Every infraction of the child was met with immediate and severe instruction and challenge to better behavior. Catechism was stressed and practiced answers to the questions were repeated and explained. It was wonderful how many good questions came out of the interaction with a toddler. I was so lonely in NJ. I felt like a fish out of water. I was so out of my element. I had absolutely none of the homemaking skills of these ladies. I had worked full time until the baby was born and was now a full time at home mom among moms who had majored in Keeping Home at college. The pregnancy was aweful. I was so sick and so sad and so struggling with my sense of inadequacy in everything I was supposed to be doing.
You only have one daddy!
Poetess, encourager and woman of the Word.
