At The Crux

If I had to wrap it into one; to sum it all up; to get to the heart of it.
To find what's at the crux...
these are the words that would rise.

"Do the next, good, right, honest thing.

Keep it simple.

I am responsible for the stitch, not the whole pattern.

Turn the outcome over to God."

~Ashley Judd, All That Is Bitter and Sweet

The Door Latch

I was thinking lately of how many idioms we have using the door as metaphor. Can you come up with a few? Yeah, me too.

• "Bar the door, Katy!" (I don't know what that one means, either)
• Falling through the trap door
• Beat a path to your door
• Door-to-door
• Get your foot in the door
• Dead as a door-nail
• Go back door

And let us not forget the door's most famous euphemism: When one door closes, another opens.

Seems we Americans like our doors...as long as they're gleaming red with polished brass handles, sturdy knockers, beveled glass panes and very - and I mean VERY well-oiled hinges.

I'm reading a memoir about an author's varied, heart-wrenching-and-elating adventures as an ambassador with Population Services International, with which she works to improve Public Health on a global scale. As is always the case with memoir, the reader must enter into a dual willingness: to become - however temporarily - a part of the writer's world while also distinctly separating enough from it to actually consider it. After all, one gets quite little from a life story they become rather than experience.

Needless to say, then, I find myself pulling back from some of her messages and leaning toward others. But there is one - and really JUST one - that grabbed me by the intellectual, and perhaps, emotional collar and held with the grip of human compassion - a tight-fisted advocate, to be sure. What was it? Americans are privileged. And we don't know it. Can't know it. Not really. Because, like reading a fine memoir, you can't experience it if you are it. We are Americans: we don't know any different. Nor do we know any better, actually, but not for the reasons non-Americans think: we're not ignorant or proud or self-centered. At least not all of us, and not all of the time. What we are is, quite simply, what we are. And, for as good as we've got it, there's little better with which to compare.

So what's the point? Let us not stop there! Let's go further! Do more. See more. Go bigger. However, whenever, we can. Let us not stand on the threshold of our contented door and look to the world, near and far, and say, "I am privileged. I have enough. There is nothing better beyond my door." If we do, we are then living - trapped - by our doors...our gleaming red, polished brass handled, glass beveled, oily hinged doors.


Ralph Waldo Emerson writes, "Men live on the brink of myteries and harmonies into which they never enter. And with their hand on the door latch, they die outside."

Whatever view your porch offers, THERE is your place of impact. THERE is your place of purpose. THERE is your place of mystery and harmony, waiting for discovery. THERE is your way to live.

Being privileged, you know, is not a crime. 

Leaving your hand on the door latch is.

Thanks For That Moment

In recent weeks - well, more like months, now that I think on it - I've been purposefully redirecting how I apply the label "important" in my life. I know, I know: sounds like hooey. Yet, with complete candor, I can tell you that it is far better to let the little die before it overtakes the life of the big. I am freer. Happier. And, quite frankly, more likable (I hope). And heaven knows I need all the help I can get in that area!

Before this endeavor to heart-change, I would have heard a little jeer from Grace last night. I might have even chuckled. But, distracted by the little overtaking the big, I wouldn't have been able to dwell on it. Savor it. And laugh uproariously in the middle of a parking lot while standing amidst the happy gaggle of gigglers laughing along with me.

Being in the moment, I couldn't take a picture of the moment.  Still, my heart snapped the frame and stored it fast within the happy vault...to be retrieved on days when the work seems big, the result quite small, and faith smaller still.

So, what did she say? Yeah, I'd be asking that, too. If you're thinking it was profound or otherwise markedly deep in any capacity, you're mistaken. She was simply admiring her new boots (complete with horseshoes embellished on the soles, which makes them Grace's version of shoe nirvana) and noticed they were a bit wider in the leg grip than she might prefer. But, with a shrug and lopsided grin, she summed, "Oh well. Choosers can't be skimpy pickers."

Yeah, that was it.
Not all that funny?
Try living in the small, striving to appreciate each moment for the beauty it simply is.
Yep.
It's funnier then.

"You mean, 'beggars can't be choosy.'"
"Huh? Well, I guess so. If that's the way it's supposed to go." Pause for a beat. "But I think my way is better."

Yes, Grace. I think your way is better, too.

Thanks for that moment.

A Legacy I'm All For

You don't raise a hero, you raise a son.

And if you treat him like a son,

he'll turn out to be a hero,

Even if it's just in the eyes of his child.

Tuesday evening was parent-teacher conference night for team C&C. Both went well, but it was a moment we spent with Elijah's teacher, Kate, that marked the highlight for me. E's class completed a worksheet which answered the question of "Who is your hero?" Kate pulled our son's worksheet from her file folder telling us she teared up when she read it. 

And then I did, too.

There is no one in this world - and I mean...In. This. World. - that I admire and esteem more than my husband. He is, to my grown-up heart, the very best of what a man can be.

It would seem our son's little-boy heart agrees.

 

                                                     

You don't raise a hero, you raise a son.

And if you treat him like a son,

he'll turn out to be a hero,

Even if it's just in the eyes of his child.

That's a legacy I'm all for.

What He Actually Said Was...

Whatever our peculiar phrasing, we daily rebuke statements with: "What you should have said was..." Think about it. Isn't that what we mean, for instance, when our children are thirsty and, holding their cups heavenward like plastic mimics of Dickensian lore, puff, "I need a drink." But, unlike Oliver Twist, their wide eyes brook no mention of "please". So what do we reply? "Say please!"

Yep, that's a "What you should have said was..." moment. And, lest we forget our more overt tendencies, I point out that I, upon occasion and in particular response to disrespect or forceful tongue, quip, "Excuse me? Are you speaking to me?!" Which is a double whammy of "What you should have said was..." and "How you should have said that was..."

This introspection whorled especially in the mind's eye on a particular Wednesday weeks past. Wednesdays (for now) being our most manic evening, I gave specific instructions to the lads and lass to complete homework and prepare themselves for soccer practice (E), running (G), and baggage claim (which is what Judd becomes in the midst of his older siblings' activities on such fine days...poor boy). I even bulleted Elijah's steps for him lest he become distracted (which never happens, no) and find himself horribly late and frazzled (a wild fancy, for sure).

Yet, when I ascended the stairs at 4:30 to round up the wee ones for our 4:45 departure, Elijah scurried from his room wearing superhero undies and shrugging into a soccer jersey (the wrong one).
 

"Where is your practice jersey, son? And your socks? And your cleats? Well, and your pants, for that matter?"

But no worries for, at that precise moment, Grace emerges from her bedroom calmly running a brush through her locks as if she'd no care in the world. 

"Are you in your running clothes? Do you have your water bottle? What do you mean you can't get your hair smooth?" (Are you familiar with the Girl World issue of smooth ponytails?)

And, in the coup de grace of Hump Day Blowup, Judd emerges...no shoes, no socks but plenty of sticky substance about the face.

What did they say? Don't know. It was spoken in a flurry of jibberish amid frenzied finger-pointing to which I could only field-goal my arms in surrender and announce, "Van! NOW!" 

With Judd's face scoured and Grace's hair sufficiently smoothed, I thought I'd made it. 4:40 - Not too bad, I congratulate myself.

Yeah. Obligatory back-pat came way too soon, for it was only then that I snagged the back of Elijah's jersey (the right one this time), pointed to his feet and cried, "You're not wearing any shoes!"

"Um, what shoes should I wear?"
Um, are you kidding me?
"Well, how about your brand new cleats?"
"Oh, are those for soccer?"
Breathe.
"Yes. Where are they?"
"I dunno," he says. Calmly. Shrugging his shoulders.
Breathe.
"Well, let's find them and get them on your feet."

Which we did. While we boarded the Silver Bullet, my effort to breathe was fast reaching reaching fever pitch. In. Out. Look at clock.  

Okay: 4:47. We can still make it. And I can do this. It's a teaching opportunity. Let's discuss teamwork. Responsibilities. Reading a clock.

And so it was as we merged our way north to the field, and so it continued for a few less-than-blessed miles of lectures on such topics as these. To which the children nodded and "hmmm-mmm"-ed and "uh-huh"-ed, all airs of recalcitrance emptied stretches back. I calmly voiced to Elijah, most pointedly, that we were all adjusting our schedules expressly to allow for his soccer schedule, and would it not be prudent to extend himself a touch more to make said adjustments all the easier?

To which he replied.
Slowly.
Softly.
And with much chagrin.

Now, what he should have said was, "Sure, Mommy. You're totally right. I can do that. I see that time's tight on these days and - You bet! - I can pitch in more by, like, say, having shoes on - or even knowing what shoes those are. No problem!"


But, in an ever-present reminder that parenting is nothing short of God's daily bulletin that we are not in control - not of time or bullet lists or smooth hair or sticky faces or superhero undies or soccer cleats or even the raucous, belly-hollowing bliss of the perfect heart-swelling ride...

what he actually said was, "Um, I'm not wearing any pants."

Intimidation Isn't a Sonnet

One of my Fave 5 this fall (and the two before it) is The Good Wife. (If you don't know about the Fave 5, check out the concept here). As is the case with most statements of faves, the first question that comes to mind is "Why do you like it?" The characters are captivating, the plots are crafty, and the subtext is off the map of merely good.

But it's the writing, folks. The writing is what gets me every time. Every. Time.

And this is some goo-oood (!) writing. If the hostage-taker of scripters held his prize Parker 51 to my throat, I'd be forced to choose their pithy one-to-three liners as their secret to rhetorical success. They define erudite and, as key player Diane voiced just Sunday, they "class they joint up." Yeah-huh.

Case in point: last week's episode brought the British to American turf. While the trivia of tweens - US and UK, that is - was entertaining (there were mentions of crumpets and shiny distractions...and who knew the diff between barrister and solicitor was such a red-coat hot button?), it was the peeing contest between Will (sigh) and guest barrister James Thrush (Eddie Izzard) that tickled my linguistic ribs the most.

Check out this monologue...and the rapier response to it:

James:  I am not the England of Big Ben and bobbies. I am not the England of doilies and
            cucumber sandwiches. I’m the England of football hooligans and Jack the Ripper. And this England
            don’t play nice. And they don’t play fair. And they don’t ever stop.

Will: (sigh)
           Here’s some advice, Mr. Thrush. When you want to intimidate someone, don’t use so many
           words. Intimidation isn’t a sonnet.

Intimidation isn't a sonnet.

The Good Wife.

Badass.