Double Post from Alphabridge: N is for Neighbor

If any double posting of mine belonged on SCM, it's this one. I mean, the neighborhood is why I started this thing in the first place...

I met Steve first. We lived here for 2 weeks and he ran into me in the front yard.

"We keep the porch lights on at night," he said flatly. I grasped that this was just his way of speaking, that he wasn't trying to be rude. He mentioned his partner's name was Jerry. The woman who sold us the house had apologized: "The neighbors are gay, but..." I told her that wasn't going to change our minds. I didn't say what I was thinking: "So what?" No need to have that conversation with someone who was leaving.

I met Carol next. She told me that many of the houses on the block were haunted. I didn't ask for details. Didn't want to know who had died in my house, sweating it out in the 1918 influenza epidemic.

Then I met the aforementioned Jerry. He was easier to talk to. Told me he had a hosta factory in the backyard, if I ever wanted any...

And that was it for so long it shames me. The deluge started with a trickle, a meeting about the increase in crime in the area in Anne's backyard. Met Eric. Noticed he had a baby Sophia's age. That next fall, I met his wife in the front. And the house two doors down that had sold three times in three years finally settled into Mary and Brent's hands. And she was pregnant. And there was a three year old. Suddenly, here we were. The watershed moment, their Christmas open house.

A few play dates. A teeny bit of chatting. A block party. Then, Maeve was baptized and I invited Trisha, Mary, and Amanda to learn mah jongg. Mostly because Mike made me. I was so nervous.

It's been a quick 4 years since then. Three camping trips.

Four block parties.

Two or three more meetings about crime. Some testifying at trials and at hearings. Arguments about politics. Honest and forthright discussions of religion. Being amazed that I had more in common religiously with the protestants than most of the Catholics.

That would be kids playing in a legally draining fire hydrant. How urban can you get?

There are downs, too. The week without electricity wasn't any fun. Last May I wanted to bolt. It's my response to bad times: flight, not fight. I moved every two years growing up. And it was horrible. An argument about the condos on the corner. The weeks following were the hardest since I moved here. Trish told me in November: "What hurt most about that was that you actually considered leaving. I couldn't believe you would do that."

It was a pivotal moment, as are so many in this girl's life. I flashed to the past, never knowing the next door neighbors, and I flashed to the future, the shared laughter, tears, staggering home from the corner bar, the endless mah jongg games, the comings and goings and births and deaths and weddings and pain and JD Salinger style dialogue sopping in bourbon slush.

As a Benedictine, I take a vow of stability. Here is where I am, and here is where I stay. For good or bad. My marriage, my parish, my religion, my children, and my place. I have made my mark, and it has cut me deeply.

People Who Can Do Things

Today at RCIA we talked about the importance of coming to church. The idea being that yes, personal prayer is important, but it is not an either/or situation with going to church. It is an AND situation. Yes, find God in the park or the sunset. Yes, pray, read the scriptures, and have a spiritual life. But communal religion has a purpose. We discussed this a bit, and it struck me (and therefore I mentioned) that at church, at mass, I get to do at least two tangible things that I don't, can't, or wouldn't do in personal independent prayer or encounters or such.

*I get to sing. I don't have a soloist's voice. Just don't. But at church, other people do. And I get to sing along.

*I get to listen to good preaching. For free. I sit back for a few minutes and let someone else talk about important things. I don't have to seek it out. I don't have to make reservations. I get to listen to someone else's ruminations on the Gospel, on our relationship with each other and with God (which is a big difference between our current pastor and our last--our current pastor is so interested in folks developing a relationship with God--not that Mike wasn't, but he was more, well, horizontal--about social change, service, other people. John is vertical. At least that's how I humbly have seen it (and I say this with much trepidation since both of them have been known to read this blog)). To sum it up, I get to be inspired.

These two things are not the only reasons I go to church (although when I'm in Cairo, which is bereft of both, I usually cannot make myself go). As I went upstairs after RCIA and did the ordinary, but also meaningful, tasks of tending flowers and watering plants, something that literally anyone can do, I thought to myself how much I like to be around ordinary people who can do things I can't do. Like sing. And preach. And other things:

*I came home after plant watering and there was a package of coffee on the counter. From my neighbors. He already brews his own beer. Now he and she are roasting their own coffee. It was perfect.

*Every gathering at my daughters' school involves a cake made by Sophia's friend's mom. Usually something stunning like 7 or 8 layers. Dreamy. Amazing.

*Renee McMahon, who works out of her home in Clayton, takes such stunning photographs that I cannot look at and say, "oh, I could do that." I don't think I could. Ever.

*Anne behind me can make any plant grow. And knows how to make it look picture perfect. My grandmother, too. I have a yard, sure. But they have gardens.

*My father can envision how to take a bunch of short ends of boards and turn them into a stunning hope chest. He can take a shell of a two-family house and make it look like it has been in his family for generations of loving care.

These are all things that grew out of casual interest. Some of them make money at their interests and skills, like Anne and Renee, but most of them, this is just something they know how to do. Really well. I know there are things I can do, too, I mean, there isn't a fiber art I've met that I haven't liked, and when I limit the number of words, I'm a pretty good writer, but these things above are things I can't, or don't, or won't do. I guess I could brew my own beer, but I don't want to. And I could be a better gardener, but what would suffer in other parts of my life?

I'm not insanely jealous of these people's skills (ok, sometimes with Renee McMahon I am--but that's probably because I do use a camera sometimes and I know how lacking I am in vision by comparison). I've come to a point in my life that I just like that people do things. And that I get to be around to enjoy them.

We can't do all things. But we can do something. Like Charles Winchester on M*A*S*H: I do one thing, I do it very well, and then I move on.

Albums You Can't Listen To #5

Schweissmaterial with their one-hit-wonder album To Be Taken Seriously, which of course cannot be taken seriously at all. Schweissmaterial is actually Jan Grothhof, a boy-wonder on the synthesizer but without much else to back that up. The one song from the album to break into the charts in 1988, Every Good Boy Does Fine, has lyrics so insipid they get caught in your brain and will not dislodge. In an interview about To Be Taken Seriously, Grothhof explains: "It's like, ok if you just want to make money singing pop songs, but I want to be, you know, taken seriously. Every artist does. Like Leonardo da Vinci or Lou Reed, you know."

An Out of Place G is for...

Passed along by Lisa at Clearview, ten things I like that begin with the letter G (She assigned the letter). This is harder than I thought.

1. Girl Scouts: I loved being a girl scout, I love being a leader now. I have great hopeful plans for the future in girl scouting.

2. Grape Soda: Boylan's is very nice. Any of the cane sugar grape sodas, though, with the big big fake fake grape flavor. Yum.

3. Kind of cheating...Gabriel Garcia Marquez. He has two G's...he should count. One Hundred Years of Solitude is one of my very favorites.

4. Girlfriends: I never really was good at friendships growing up, but now that I'm an adult and there are all these 30-something women on my block, women I go to coffee with, women at church, a few childhood and college friends. I like being with girls.

5. German: When I was a Blake, I could ignore my Germanness. I'd talk up the Dawes and Donnelly and and ignore the Wibbenmeyer and Buchheit. They didn't have to exist. I could hide them behind my Irishness. I think there is still some great shame in being German after World War II. But now that I'm a Wissinger, yikes, I don't want to pretend anymore that I'm 100% Irish. I'm about half German when it's all said and done. And that's ok.

6. Glass: I wish I would do more stained glass. I know how; it's just the time. I love the glass in my church, in my house. I love how old glass settles to the bottom of the pane. I love that it's a super-cooled liquid. I have a glassware problem. I love the scratchy sound of the glass cutter over a sheet. Glass seems like one of the things that made us human. Glass, yarn, beer.

7. Grids: I love cities that are laid out as grids. I like to be able to find my way and always know where the river is by the placement of the sun in the sky and the direction of the traffic. I find Dogtown to be a most bewildering little place. It's not a grid. Don't get me started with suburbia.

8. Gardens: I wish I had a better one. Maybe this year. I love a nice garden, not just utility, but spread around for beauty and those all-important tomatoes.

9. Graphite Pencil: The sharp initial scratch across good smooth paper. Sharpening pencils with a good hand sharpener, the ones that bolt to the wall. Blowing off the flakes of wood (not the wood and plastic composites, and never wrapped in plastic sheathing for prettiness--only painted wood or plain for me). I have always preferred real pencils to mechanical. I push too hard and the lead breaks. Plus they look stupid behind my ear, which is where they always wind up. Math should be done in pencil. So should art. I taught both. They're my favorites. Do your work in pencil so you can always go back and erase. Pencil doesn't fade like pen--you can use it on sticks in the garden to mark plantings, and rain and sun will not wash it away.

10. Gabriel: Yeah, the angel. I love the idea of the messenger of God. Standing there in the window at Pius, holding a lily in one hand, proclaiming good news to Mary. Even more, the mosaics at Clyde, the angel kneeling in front of Mary, presenting the lily to her. At one time, if we'd had two boys first instead of two girls (which I wouldn't trade for anything), they would have been Edward Raphael and Gabriel Joseph. I love that name. But that ship has sailed. It feels like we've already spent the name, even though we have a Sophia Esme and a Maeve Beatrix. If the next is a boy, he will be Edward Something. I've moved on to other stories. But I still love the archangel.

Lisa did P. I did G. You want a letter, let me know. I love writing exercises and ruminations....

Linguistic Shift

Everyone has speech mannerisms. Mike has two that drive me crazy, well, not crazy, but they objectively grate on my language acquisition device's nerves. One is "might could" as in "We might could do that." The other is anymore in a positive sense. Most people use anymore like this: "We don't do that anymore." But central and southern Illinois speakers use it in a positive way: "Anymore, we always rent DVDs." It's not like peppering your speech with "y'all" instead of "you." It is not a word-for-word translation. It is different. Wrong, in my head at least.

I have a few that I catch myself using. One is an East Texas/West Louisiana object-subject pronoun-verb-object set up. Instead of simply saying, "Mike and I saw that movie" I find myself saying, "Mike and me, we saw that movie." No unclear antecedents, at least.

I use y'all. And I use come with. This one is a lifelong usage, as opposed to the East Texas influences later. So far ingrained that I didn't even realize the whole English speaking world didn't say it. A professor in college from northern California (Kaylen: Dr. Shore!) pointed it out in class one day. It arises from the heavy German influences in the immigrant populations here. Kommen witten, I think he said. I probably have the German wrong. Either way, it goes like this: "You want to come with?" With has no reference. I suppose the correct way would be "Would you like to accompany me?" I don't even know if "Would you like to come?" is correct. I stumble on this one because it is lifelong.

And then on Tuesday, I was talking to my mother. I mentioned that Sophia and I had gone shoe shopping for me (another story for later). And I said: "We went in to find me a pair of shoes." My mother, the English major with two master's degrees, interrupted. "Find me a pair of shoes! You are so South St. Louisan now!" I paused, trying to find the error. Should it be "We went in to find a pair of shoes for me"? I guess so. Whoa. I have slipped. It sounds almost like a Pennsylvania Dutch kind of error--throw the bull over the fence some hay, make the baby a bottle. Pennsylvania Dutch, Scrubby Dutch. Ah well.

So Sophia and me, we are going to find me a pair of shoes. Come with?

Pie

Last night, Mike and I put the girls down and then went down to maybe watch a movie or maybe reruns of Law and Order on DVD...we had two movies from Netflix that were inexplicable (which is what happens when you let the queue get away from you--you click on a movie months ago, add it in, and then forget why). One was about gay Mormons (really) and the other starred Parker Posey in what sounded like a semi-romantic drama/comedy/indie film called Broken English. I had added both these movies so long ago, I can't tell you why. But here they were. Mike picked Broken English. Parker Posey is in all the mockumentaries by Christopher Guest, and really quite good in those. So then, as we were about to start it, I lamented our lack of pie.

It's not fall. It's not apple or pumpkin pie season. And it's not summer. Not lemonade or berry pie season. But pie sounded good. Mike turned and nodded. "I've been wanting pie since Pi Day."

Pi Day, of course, is March 14 (3.14). Also Einstein's birthday, which I find to be a pleasing bit of trivia. And the way to celebrate Pi Day, of course, is with Pie ((pi)r^2) Pie are not square, pie are round. So two weeks went by and Mike's been thinking about pie.

We made an apple pie. It was gala, not granny, but it was two crust (whole wheat) and full of nutmeg. It was exactly what I was looking for. Had a slice while complaining about how bad Broken English was. Poorly directed, poorly scripted. Real people do not have conversations where there are 2 second pauses between every single exchange. Nor was there a single character I found sympathetic. So we turned it off. The gay Mormon movie was better, at least it had a better sense of timing. Of course, by then the soporific effect of pie would have kicked in. Either way, both movies are going home to Netflix today. To be replaced by who knows what's on the list. I noticed Mike added a bunch of John Wayne era westerns, why, I don't know. Maybe I'll move one of those to the top...

Le Tour Maison

Some fake French for you after the whole Nazi picture thing.

So I'm the captain for a house on the Grand South Grand House Tour. It would be my parents' house. Come and see.

I already have a headache. But it should be a good time.

Also, psst, if you want to live on my block....there's a house coming soon, very soon.....

Albums You Can't Listen To #4

When I got the name (I go to Wikipedia first) I was thinking, easy, it's Christian music. Then it occurred to me that I wasn't sure Maccabees was in the Protestant Bible (perhaps the first book is?). Then I got the picture, ok, pretty black and white floral thing. Still thinking Christian music, maybe more introspective than pop. Then the quote. So much for that thought. Skimpy little Nazi outfits indeed.

I have a pair of German army boots. And my famous German army parka. But they're both Bundesrepublik Deutschland. And not skimpy.

Good night.

Expletives

That would be my morning.

I asked Christie at school why I hadn't gotten an acceptance letter for Sophia for next year yet--the first enrollment was March 14, and she was part of that round. Christie leans in close and tells me, "Bridgett, your application wasn't complete. Her birth certificate wasn't in there. I should have checked, but I thought since you were in charge of making sure everything was complete in all the files...."

I have several birth certificates at home. In a file folder in the basement. I came home, lo, there they were. A two minute search. I cannot believe I let this happen. Wouldn't that be just. Like. Me.

Fuck.

I'm taking the stuff over to school right now. It's probably no problem--we're close to the full number of kids for next year, but not quite. But if we're going to do this, we have to do it by the book. That's fair.

Of course, if she doesn't get in, it won't seem so fair. All my fault, but still not fair to Sophia. At least I won't have to work with Quickbooks anymore.

Holy crap, I so do not want to homeschool. And I'd already started thinking about how one might spend the $5K we'd save by sending her to a free charter school.

It's always some kind of drama over here.

Albums You Can't Listen To #3

Semantics of Logic, the trendsetting techno band famous for the albums "Real Science" and "Death is Peaceful" attempted to reorganize after lead singer Sally Morgan left to start a solo career. Combining original band members Trevor Mortaza, Argo Johnson, and Joe Gunnarson with Fuse's Masami Moy, the new Semantics does not live up to the former glory of the 1980s. This album, produced in 1993, is like a dying sigh from a once-great legend of its time. The only track worth noting, Pounce, is, at 10:41, far too long and monotonous. Semantics suffers from Morgan's absence. Mockable at the Court indeed.

Albums You Can't Listen To #2

Ah, Sally Morgan's debut solo album. After spending the late 80s with the techno band Semantics of Logic, she left the scene to work on her MFA. Using the poetry set to music method made famous by Rod McKuen, she has taken what she considered to be her "top ten very best poems, written in a feverish haze on the balcony of my third story walk-up overlooking Hunan Wok" and paired them with haunting solitary guitar melodies.

Playlist:
Torca Island
Fish Without a Bicycle
The Legendary Journey
Working Like a Dog
Believing in Luck
Ellis, South Dakota (Missing You)
Radstock Rail Accident
Highway 634 (Still Missing You)
Good Tidings
Not a Jailer

Albums You Can't Listen To

1. Go to Wikipedia. Click on "Random Article". The title of the article is the title of your Album You Can't Listen To.
2. Go to the Random Quotes Page. The last quote on the page. The last 4 words are the title of your Album You Can't Listen To.
3. Go to Flickr's Creative Commons Page. Click on "see more" under the first category. The fifth photo is your cover art for your Album You Can't Listen To.
4. Put #1, #2, and #3 together. Crop the photo however you'd like. I like to make them square like vinyl album covers. Or CDs, but I'm not sure they're actually square...

I have a small but growing collection. This is my current time-waster.

I think Waterfall Bay would be a fun party music band. But I don't think I'd admit going to their concerts. They would put out an embarrassing number of albums in their career, most of which you would flip through at your neighbor's garage sale thinking, My God, I don't know these people as well as I thought I did....

Novocaine makes me loopy

I don't think it's supposed to. It didn't used to. But the last two fillings (both replacements for ones I knocked out while flossing--I have horrible teeth, but good gums, so I guess that's something) have made me downright bizarre the rest of the day. Maybe it's some new derivative of the -caine family. And let me tell ya, getting two shots into your lingual nerve is no picnic.

I came home and went to couch. Maeve played. Sophia came home (my mom picked her up), went and played at a neighbor's. Maeve took a nap. I took a nap. Now I'm ready to go to bed.

I've said it before, and this won't be the last time: I pray the girls get Mike's teeth and my eyes. It would make their lives a lot easier and be a lot cheaper.

One more Catholic moment here

So last night, Sophia brought a book into the library (upstairs loft on the second floor, open to the stairwell, where the computer is--it's hardly a "library" but it is floor-to-ceiling bookshelves all around, jam packed). It was a book of classic Golden Books all compiled together (like the Sagy Baggy Elephant and others I remember from long ago). It has a faux gold leaf edging, is red, actually kind of a nice children's book for being such, shall we say, insipid literature. Sophia said it reminded her of the lectionary at church. Mike and she had a conversation behind me about lectionary vs. bible. Talked about the ambo (that would be pulpit or lectern, for those not up on their Catholic vocabulary). Then she goes upstairs and gets a baby bed from her dollhouse and a drumstick from her resonator bars (read: individual pieces of xylophone). She sticks the drumstick, which is thin, with a round rubber tip, into the baby bed turned on its side. Puts that on top of a box on top of the trunk we use as a coffee table up here.

She places the book on top of the box in front of the odd contraption, and then it is clear. It's a microphone. On a makeshift ambo. And she pretends to read a reading. From the Gospel of Luke. Just the beginning (a reading from the Gospel of Luke/Glory to you, o Lord) and the end (the Gospel of the Lord/Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ). In between she asks questions of Mike about gesture and words and ritual and my goodness, what is that all about?

Back to work...and I finally get that tooth fixed (remember St. Pat's Day? Doesn't it seem like two months ago??) this afternoon...

When I got married...

Today on the way to my parents' for dinner, Sophia asked about first communion. She'll be there next year, but we were rehashing the same conversation (right now it's all about the dress). I said my dress probably would be too short on her, but that yes, we'd get her a new spring dress for the day. "And a tiara? Or a veil?" she asked hopefully. "Like when you get married?" Yes, I responded. Some kind of head gear.

"Like when I got married to Ian?" Maeve asked excitedly. Ian is a 4 year old down the street.

"When did you get married to Ian?" I asked. Mike is mumbling about not giving his consent to that union, etc., and Sophia is trying to correct her, tell her that Ian is too old for her, it must have been his younger brother.

"No, it was Ian. When I lost my shoe..."

Pause.

"Like Cinderella?" I queried.

"Ess." (That would be her word for yes).

That girl has an elaborate fantasy life.

On a lighter note: silly afternoon meme

From Nutsy Fagan. I'm in the pause between waking up after sleeping in totally decadently until NOON and going over to my parents' house for Easter dinner. My dad's making his cornbread pudding which I may just steal and sit in the living room in the dark consuming all by myself. But before that happens, a few questions from NF about restaurant habits:

1. When you go to a restaurant do you tip better if the server is good-looking? I tend to tip really well. My brother was a bartender/waiter for a long time. Things have to go pretty badly before I'll tip low; and looks, well, charm is more important.

2. Have you ever asked anyone to turn off their cellphone in public because it bothered you? Not yet. I think that's coming soon, though.


3. Is your noon meal called "lunch" or "dinner?" Lunch unless we're in Cairo, and it's Sunday, and thin it is dinner.


4. Do you generally make reservations first? I prefer to; I hate places that won't take them but maintain a 2 hour waiting list. Which is why I don't go back to certain places on the Hill.


5. Do you ask for a booth or a table? If Sophia and Maeve are there...they demand booth.


6. Do you ask for a doggie bag? Often. Sometimes it's to disguise the fact that I didn't care for whatever it was...


7. Would you complain to the management if there were children crying nearby? Not crying. Children coming up to my table and rooting through my purse, perhaps. I'm more tolerant in restaurants than I am at church. I take my kid back when she's obnoxious...why don't you?


8. Have you ever sent food back? One time out with my brother and his wife, chicken wasn't cooked all the way. Other than that, no. I mean, raw chicken? But if it's too salty/too hot/too cold/too whatever, I'm more likely to vote with my feet.

9. Do you find servers singing "Happy Birthday" cute or annoying? So annoying. But I'm shy.

I'd be curious what Ann had to say. If she ever blogs again. :^)

I've Been Churched, How Bout You?

Going to bed post-Easter Bunny duties.

Easter Vigil was 3 1/2 hours long.

It was fabulous.

I am tired.

Night!

Where You Used to Be

Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling into at night. I miss you like hell.
~Edna St. Vincent Millay

Deloney mentioned in his comments last week that there are private anniversaries that we all keep. We don't tell anyone about them, but we start seeing them looming in the future months, weeks, days in advance. We feel them pass over us, thinking, has it been two years? A full dozen? Could it be that it's been twenty-five?

I thought about that the past few days. I sat through the Holy Thursday Mass of the Lord's Supper, watching folks go up to have their feet washed, to wash each other's feet. Loving care of another person, made ritual. And then last night, the Veneration of the Cross, it was hard to sit through, even with Sophia's distractions. Fr. John said in his homily that as disciples of that man, eventually we have to embrace the cross. Sophia literally did when we walked up that night.

Each of us must embrace the cross. It's not the same for each person, it is not literal. But it is true. Part of me hates that we don't get to choose our cross. But I have faith that whatever it is, whatever suffering, trial, loss I go through, it will not be for nothing.

The church is empty, dark, when we walk through those doors tonight. But the fire will spread, candle flame passed to candle flame, until a low fuzzy light is visible throughout the nave, the orange yellow glow on the faces of those we face across the asile. Christ our Light.

It's a two-sided coin. Like remembrance. Happy Easter, all. Keep safe your memories, be good to yourself.

L is for Light (double post from Alphabridge)

A baby's first experience of sight, of course, is light. Focus comes later. First there is light. It may be our last experience of sight, as well, as our eyes fail slowly and we lose the ability to differentiate shapes, color, and edges. Darkness and light. There's a Quaker saying, that instead of beating ourselves up over the darkness in our souls, we should instead turn to the light that showed us the darkness. Turn away from what you've been doing, don't fret, but go on and do what must be done in the light. There is darkness here. But shadows are discernible only in the light. I am sometimes a shadow.

How our eyes are drawn to it. Having been in several dank muddy Missouri caves, I know the tricks eyes can play on us. Flickers up ahead. Imagined pillars and shadows and walls. The light isn't there. Just the memory of what light might be. Coming out into the light after 3 or 4 hours in the darkness, it is overwhelming and we must squint, groping our way back to the cars, hoping that one of us at least will be able to focus and drive. I am sometimes a bat.

Sitting with four lovely people after mass this year, four adults coming into the Catholic faith, for the first time I realized that searching for a spiritual home has nothing to do with what rules you get to follow and what you don't get to eat and how long the church service is. It's about finding a lamp hung on a tree on a path in the forest, taking it up, and beginning to walk that path. The four people who are joining us could not be more different from each other in age, education, or circumstances. But they are all drawn to the same fire. Gathered round the candle in the basement classroom, they say things to me that take my breath away. And I see the light in a new way. I am sometimes a moth.

People come to God in their own time, in their own way. Drawing closer to the light is gradual, with many exposed roots to stumble over and gravel to scoot across, looking up at the vague light of the clouded moon inside our minds. If I whistle a tune and do not allow myself to get waylaid, I might cheerfully lead others on the path, while walking along it myself. Hopefully, I play my cards right, and I am sometimes a guide.

Happy Easter! Happy Spring!

Drug Dealer Season Is Now Open

When I taught at St. Pius V school, right around the spring thaw, we'd comment to each other that Drug Dealer Season was open. We had an owner-occupied drug house across the street from the school--police would do surveillance from our classrooms--but they were never able to eliminate them. "Owner-Occupied" makes it a lot harder. Anyway, the point here is that with that first warm up, crime tends to go up here in south city. Or so it seems to me--the police may have a different set of statistics. Mike's car got tagged on Sunday night, and today, the guys working on the house next door (HVAC) watched a young kid walk up our block, looking at the doorknobs. Didn't try any, but went up to every house that didn't have a car parked in front. Checked it out.

Three break ins right before the thaw, over two blocks south.

Eh. It makes me tired. It's easier to focus on when the people committing the crimes live on the corner (the qat den we helped get removed). Transient crime is harder to handle. Harder to know the faces, learn the routines. But at least we're not novices here. We know how to call the police.

But it does make me tired. I'm a block captain, and I tend towards the hysteria when I'm worried about crime in our area. I don't look at the big picture, I don't take the long view. I did better when I sat in my house in the dark hoping somebody else would call the police. The other day when the officer wanted my name, phone, SSN, etc. for his report, he apologized: "I just need it for the report, if we needed to get back to you." And I interrupted him.

"I do this all the time." As I said it, I realized, yup, I do. It's been a long time since the Secret Service was sitting in my dining room, but they have been here. After a while, it just seems like part of the routine.

Princess Party on the Plaza

My brownie troop was on Channel 5 today. Mostly as props, but what a great way to be props. Enchanted, the movie, comes out today on DVD...there was a princess party...the people who were running the princess party called Janet, my friend who works at Girl Scouts. And she called me: would my troop like to come be princesses on Show Me St. Louis? Well, duh! So we went down to Channel 5 and they set up this huge table with princess themed food, crafts, props. Had the girls dress up in costumes and play for a while, then do a craft, have snacks. It was fun. And they each went home with a copy of the DVD, which was pretty durned cool, after all was said and done.

Plus, free. Can't beat that with a fairy wand.

I have earned so much Brownie leader street cred with my girls' parents now.

And one more thing gets crossed off my list for this week!

100 year old photographs

Mike just pointed me towards this: Shorpy.com. It's a blog that posts photographs from the dawn of photography to the 1940s. Beautiful. I could spend a lot of time there. But not this week.

Ai Yi Yi

Just a few moments from my day:

*Getting to Dogtown just in time for the parade to end, which was when I was supposed to be there, but meant I got to park in Colorado and walk through Kansas to get to St. James the Greater.

*But getting there in time, drinking a lot of water, trying to calm down. Sophia is so resilient. She got ready, I did her hair, all was well.

*She danced. I watched with Maeve, listening to various Irish-American 50-somethings tell me how adorable she was.

*I drank beer. Only one. But it was a good idea.

*I walked with Maeve after Sophia was done but not released (they all bow together at the end). Noticed the other Irish dance groups sitting in the stairswells and cramming the bathrooms--they didn't have insider connections to the school and access to the classrooms. Bought Maeve a cookie.

*Maeve gave me a bite. And I just about went through the roof. Felt around with my tongue, and yup, missing filling. Whoop-de-doo. Rains, the pouring, you know.

*Oh, and did I mention the police were here this morning, standing at my computer? Mike's car got tagged by a gang last night (or gang wannabes). So did a van up the street, and we had pictures. Good police interaction, but wish I didn't have to.

*Field trip is on! Pray for good weather!!!!!!

Happy St. Pat's, kiss me I'm Irish.

O Holy Week

"Showers and thunderstorms likely, mainly before 1pm. Cloudy, with a high near 58. Southeast wind between 14 and 18 mph, with gusts as high as 25 mph. Chance of precipitation is 60%." -- National Weather Service, this morning.

I am more glad than ever before that we're not in today's parade. We dance at St. James the Greater at 3, but that's inside. It was cold Saturday, but the rain missed us.

And thus starts my busiest week of the year: Holy Week. Dance today, brownie girl scout field trip tomorrow (watch us on Show Me St. Louis tomorrow, at least I think it will air tomorrow!). And then I guess I sedate my kids for three days while I take care of church stuff.

I feel like the twelve days of Christmas song, frankly, although it would probably be total sacrelige. Something like, "on the first day of Holy Week my schedule gave to me, an altar cloth I needed to clean" and continuing on to "six loads of laundry/five green plants/four hours of cleaning/three phone calls...."

Speaking of that, I have cleaning to do, laundry to fold, phone calls to make, and green plants to purchase. So you might not hear much from me (although I'll try to let you know how the field trip goes!). I'll try.

A Few Photos From Our Day

Mike and his mom took pictures right around 11th Street. By that point we'd already walked, umm, 12 blocks. Plus standing in the wind and dropping temps for at least an hour beforehand: note to organizes, can we pleeeez get a number closer to the front next year? The float itself has dancers in front (can you imagine dancing on a moving trailer?).


Behind the dancing dancers, the young girls (8 and under) sit in what is essentially a playpen built onto the back. Wave the flags. Sit still. Freeze.


And then all the moms and dads in their Clarkson gear, holding banners and waving.


Back at McMurphy's, Sophia gets ready to dance the reel.


Reeling...so cute...

Brace Yourself, Bridgett

You know the old one-liner...

Brace yourself Bridgett indeed. This morning we woke up and went downtown to the St. Patrick's Day Parade. It's actually not St. Patrick's Day, and Monday actually isn't, either, this year, thanks to Holy Week, but St. Louis has TWO parades--one on the actual date (March 17th, even this year) in Dogtown, a traditionally Irish neighborhood, and one the Saturday before. That would be the downtown parade and that's the one we were in with Irish Dance.

What this means is this: Mike drops me off at Lindell and 18th (or whatever Lindell is called at that point--a few blocks north of Market). Sophia and I walk to Market and 18th. No Clarkson School. That's where the parade *begins*, not where the set-up occurs. So then we start walking. Five blocks later, we find the Clarkson float. It's 11:20 when we get there. We're supposed to be there by 11:30. Doin' good. At noon, the fireworks go off signalling the start. That's when it dawns on folks that we are float #116 out of 121. So we wait. And wait. And wait some more. Most--no, all--of our waiting is standing up, and most of it involves holding a banner with four other people. Thank God Janine is part of this same group. Sophia's up in front on the float itself, hair curled, in her windsuit. I'm in the requisite black pants (no jeans!), Clarkson jacket, white shoes. We start marching sometime after 1. I don't know exactly when. And we march from 23rd all the way to Broadway, which is really 6th, I think. Then we turn and walk another 4 blocks to disband. Keep in mind that the temperature dropped about 15 degrees in 15 blocks.

Grandparents and Mike and Maeve and neighbors are waiting for us at McMurphy's Grill, which is on 11th street, but in the 600N block. We're about at the 400S block of 6th. Kill me now. So we walk, what, the next 45 blocks? And get there about 2:30. I wolf down soup, Sophia gets dressed (she was so resilient the whole day, really wonderful). And they start dancing at 3:20 or so. By this point, you could blow me over with a sneeze.

And Sophia's first dance is the reel, which she is really shaky on, her arms going up and flapping a bit, when they're suppoesd to be board-straight at her side. But she could not look more Irish, not even with red hair. Her freckles, the curls, the white blouse, the shoes--she had the look, the skill and balance will come. And later she danced a jig, supported wisely by an older girl, and that was better. She was worn out by the end. We were going to dance again tonight, but she was done. And so was I. Maeve was good, Mike was good (even though in the car he said, "that was like 35 of all the same dance..."), all was well.

Sophia's down at the neighbor's. Maeve is playing with little people and setting them all up in straight lines next to me. Mike is in bed with a headache. I'm downing the coffee to try to keep my own at bay.

But brace yourself, Bridgett: Monday is Dogtown dancing at St. James the Greater. At least it's all inside. And at least Sophia thinks this is the greatest thing she's ever done. I do too. I could be a stage mom with this in a New York minute. I have to hold back and let her do what she will. But I'm so glad she does this.

Oh, and I wanted to plug McMurphy's. It's at 614 N 11th Street. It is run by St. Patrick's Center, which is a homeless shelter/resource center. They train folks who are homeless or at great risk for homelessness, to cook, wait tables, tend bar, etc. Give a man a fish, teach a man to fish. The food is great the service was awesome (especially considering the frantic busy post-parade crowd). They're open 11-3 M-F.

Today's Maeve Moment Brought To You By Girl Scout Cookies

I woke up with it. Maybe the F-word. Maybe just a viral something. Achy. Cold symptoms plus having no strength to stand. Sack of potatoes lying in bed. Slumped later on the couch. I caught up with it later in the day and I'm feeling just sore and cold-symptomy, but the weakness is here. And the fever.

Mike took Sophia to school this morning. Maeve woke up and found me in a pile in my bed around 9:30. I told her to go play for a little while, come back and see me when she was hungry. When I open my eyes again, it's a little after ten.

"I want food," she tells me.

"I'm on my way. DOn't crowd me. Go downstairs, I'll meet you there."

I get out of bed. Decide pajamas are the uniform for the day. Have a big drink of water. TRudge downstairs, looking forward with dread towards a day on the couch watching Don Bluth classics. She's addicted to Thumbelina right now.

I get to the bottom of the steps and she runs over to me with her hands out like to stop my progress.

"I only ate some of the cookies!" she says in a panic.

I go into the kitchen--we still have some cookies left to sell (meaning, estra boxes, about 5 extra, in fact), expecting to see boxes opened and destroyed and the cookies randomly consumed. Instead, the open pacakge of samoas on the counter is all. I opened it yesterday when I had one with a glass of chocolate milk after dinner. Sophia had one then, too. I think Maeve as well. There are 15 in a box. I look at the little plastic tray. There are two left.

Some = the child's definition of "not quite all."

Maeve's Turn

When Sophia was 6 months old, I took the train to Houston to visit my brother, Ian, whose girlfriend had just had a baby. Kennedy was teeny and I was going there to visit, with the pretense of helping, although in the end I wasn't much help to Ashley, I'm sure. Or Ian. Because while I was there, Sophia developed croup and an upper respiratory infection. My insurance at the time (better than now, but still bad) sent me to a Spanish-only clinic in west Houston. I could not get back there if you paid me. Sitting in the waiting room with croupy sad Sophia. Seeing the doctor who tried to get me to sign forms so he could remove her ear tag. TOTALLY MISUNDERSTANDING the reason for our visit. I had to bark like a seal to get him to clue in that Sophia wasn't here for plastic surgery. As if we'd travel 900 miles to go to a clinic to have that done.

Ian let me borrow his cell phone and car. And the cell phone died while I was trying to tell Mike what was going on. AFter the clinic, we went to KMart to get the prescription filled. They didn't want to fill it because they couldn't read the handwriting. The clinic was already closed. You know: total SNAFU. They finally did based upon my assurance that yes, it was an upper respiratory infection complete with green snot. Please give us our medicine.

It took me all day to get this done.

Monday was Maeve's turn. She was up all night Sunday trying to use the bathroom and failing. Crying. Her belly hurt. UTI. I knew it. The nurse at Children's Hospital who called me back for my doctor's exchange number knew it. She wanted me to take her to the ER, but I'm gunshy about ERs. I figure it will wait till morning. The nurse says that if she gets comfortable enough to sleep, it can wait. So I grab the children's motrin. Expired last January. So at 2 a.m. Monday I run out to the 24 hour walgreens. Wind up behind my sister Bevin on her way home from the Jade Room. Freaky. There we both were, in a city of 300K, at 2 a.m. on Kingshighway. I called her cell phone: "I'm right behind you." She was pretty freaked out.

Anyway, got home to sleeping Maeve. And then not-sleeping. And then sleeping. And then not. I take Sophia to school at 8:30 and have an appointment with Dr. Whiteside at 9. Seen really quickly, and given the specimen cup. The bathroom's down the hall. ARE THEY KIDDING ME? After 20 minutes of cajoling, promising her a trust fund, ice cream, movies all day, nothing. The nurse comes in and tells me I'll have to go home and try there, come back and see us when we have pee. I'm furious. No. I'm exhausted. I grab coats and start heading out. Another nurse stops me--aren't we going to see the doctor? I'd misunderstood the first nurse. We go back to the exam room, where I burst into tears. It's been a long winter. A long week. A long 24 hours.

Sounds like a UTI, Dr. Whiteside says. We go home with cups and I line Maeve's potty chair with saran wrap. Catch. Pour. Return within an hour of leaving the doctor's office.

And the test is negative. What? How can this possibly be? The nurse tells me they'll send it to the lab...

So now I'm convinced I have Munchausen's Syndrome by-proxy. I'm crazy. We go home, where Mike is home with the Real Flu. Then Sophia and I go to an Irish Dance show at Pat's Bar and Grill. By the time my head hits the pillow at 11:30, I'm convinced I'm getting the flu. And an UTI. And a trust fund. I'm a mess. I sleep like a rock, thankfully, so does Maeve, and get up and go go go this morning again.

In the afternoon, the doctor's office calls. It's a UTI after all. Please pick up antibiotics at the Medicine Shoppe on Grand (where we go when it ISN'T 2 a.m.).

And the first thing that pops in my head is "Well, thank goodness." In the "at least I'm not delusional" way.

That girl, she makes me crazy.

Flu Meme

We've been tagged. House of Halliday falls to the flu, March 9, 2008. I won't tag you.

Sunday Morning 7 a.m.

So it was pretty early this morning, what, with the time change last night. But I dragged myself out of bed, and Sophia too, and went over to Atrium. Not many children today--I guess most parents decided that dragging themselves out of bed, not to mention their 7 year olds, was not an appealing notion. Push snooze and roll back over.

Maeve is sick, AGAIN, and so Mike stayed home with her. I asked Sophia if she wanted to go to church with me, or go home after Atrium. Hands down, go home. "I want to change into pajamas and rest." I think that's the first time that's come out of her mouth. So I pulled up. I saw folks coming down my neighbors' steps. Three women, oddly unmatched (older white woman, teenage white girl, a black woman about Bevin's age). They had flyers in their hands.

Jehovah's Witnesses, I thought. I saw one of them approach my steps, and I cut them off as I got out of the van.

"Don't ring that bell, I got a sick baby in there and I'm sure she's still asleep."

"Oh," said the older woman, "we weren't ringing bells. Just trying to get these out. Letting people know Easter is early this year, giving neighbors a holy week schedule."

She handed me an Easter egg colored piece of paper. Messiah Lutheran. The church round the corner, the folks on my parents' block. I start to laugh.

"Oh," I shook my head, laughing. "No problem. I thought you were Jehovah's Witnesses. You know."

"Ah," the older woman nodded. "I totally understand."

After mass, I went home. I napped. A long time. Now I'm all screwed up, thanks daylight "savings" time.

Five Things From Kaylen

Kaylen writes Happy Cupcakes. And Happy Notions (one of them is to the right). Tonight she posted a Five Things meme which of course is right up my alley right now. I am needing to write but have nothing to say. Kaylen, by the way, is Mike's brother's best girl. Or whatever the kids are calling it these days. That would be Pete the brother, not Steve the brother. (Pete is Maeve's godfather. Steve's on-deck).

5 years ago I was 28. I can't remember anything anymore because I have lived in the same place too long (all my memories are place-based). I hadn't taught the neighbors mah jongg yet. There were still drug dealers on the corner.

5 months ago I was celebrating Maeve's third birthday.

5 hours ago I was saying goodbye to Elliot, in town for a job interview, came over for dinner.

5 minutes ago I was shutting down Microsoft Word and making one last check of the blogs I read. Hence.

5 things on my 'to do' list today: How about tomorrow (Friday): Girl scout field trip. Work. Wash the non-dishwasher dishes. Do a load of jeans and a load of darks.

5 recent pieces of mail I've received: The MSD bill (overdue, like always, it's the only one). The information about being a house captain for the house tour. Vet appointment reminder. And five million random catalogs.

5 things I would do if I became a billionaire: Fund my daughter's school. Fund other schools like it. Fix my parish's financial stresses. Give quite a bit of money towards neurological science research. Become eccentric (right now I'm not rich enough to be eccentric. I'm just odd).

5 of my bad habits: Obsessing over dry hands. Noshing in the evening. Having a short fuse when my routine changes. Biting my cuticles. Laughing at the wrong times.

5 good memories: Saying Goodbye. Saying Yes. Saying I Do. Hearing It's A Girl. And Again.

5 films I watch over and over again: Smoke. Princess Bride. My Neighbor Totoro. Raising Arizona. To Kill A Mockingbird.

5 places I've lived: Palm Desert, California. Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. Pearland, Texas. The Colony, Texas. Columbia, Missouri.

5 songs I love: "Midnight Rider" by Willie Nelson (his version, I know it's the Allman brothers). "Morning Song" by David Murray. "Gringo Honeymoon" by Robert Earl Keen. "Hi-De-Ho" by Blood, Sweat, and Tears. "Arms of the Angels" by Sarah McLachlan

5 jobs I've had: Cashier at Wal*Mart, Pearland, Texas. Face painter, Science Center, St. Louis, MO. Camp counselor, Andrews Academy, St. Louis, MO. First grade teacher, Patrick Henry Elementar, SLPS, St. Louis, MO. Middle school math teacher, religion teacher, art teacher, librarian, and gardener, St. Pius V School, St. Louis, MO.

5 things most people don't know about me: I love to read Dilbert cartoon books before bed. I get carsick almost instantaeously if I'm not driving. I'm a super-taster. I hold the squat-thrust weightlifting record for women at my second high school. Related: I played soccer on the boys' team at my third high school.

5 books I love to death: Nine Stories by JD Salinger. To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Floatplane Notebooks by Clyde Edgerton. The View from Saturday by EL Konigsburg. Dandelion Wine, Dandelion Wine, Dandelion Wine. By Ray Bradbury...

5 things that are out of place around my house: Art supplies in the dining room. Baby wipes in the kitchen. Girl scout cookies everywhere. Books on my bedroom floor. L-A-U-N-D-R-Y.

5 films I want to see: (From my netflix list): My Beautiful Girl Mari, Dandelion, Bad Day at Black Rock, Grave of the Fireflies, Deliver Us From Evil.

5 things I love to eat: tiramisu, strawberries, soft-scrambled eggs with syrup and salt, coffee ice cream, Copperfield salad from my monastery salad book.

5 destinations I'm dying to see: Western Ireland, Northern Italy. Southern Alaska, the whole state of New Mexico. Devil's Postpile.

5 scents I love: vanilla. Cookies baking. Snow. Green apples. Ylang ylang.

5 people (who are not blood relations or in-laws) who have had a positive impact on my life: Br. Stephen OSB. Sr. Mimi. Ann K. Dr. Barmann. Rachel M. (There are so many. Eh.)

More Distractions

Again from Not Mary Poppins, a book meme. Just to randomize my day.

Here are the rules:

1. Pick up the nearest book.
2. Open to page 123
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.

Ok...

These sentences are highly significant to the islander, because he is thirsty, because his island society is threatened, or because he is in the egg business. Such messages he might well call "news." It will be seen that the criteria of the logician and the positive scientist are of no use to the islander.

That would be The Message in the Bottle: How Queer Man Is, How Queer Language Is, and What One Has to Do With the Other by Walker Percy (who was also a Benedictine oblate). I will admit it wasn't the nearest book--that would my senior year book (I was using it for reference last night in an argument about who had the worst math teacher). But Page 123 only had names and pictures. By the way, Message in the Bottle is a good book to chew on. I had to read it in my Catholic Novelists class (Walker Percy, Mary Gordon, and Flannery O'Connor) at SLU. Part of my theology minor. I love SLU.

Don't Think about Winter

Twenty degrees and the hockey game's on
Nobody cares they're all way too far gone
Screaming "Boat Drinks!"
Something to keep us all warm

Not Mary Poppins is in Ottawa. At least I'm not sitting in Ottawa right now. She passes along this "Let's Pretend It's Not Winter" meme...

1. If you could go anywhere in the world RIGHT NOW, where would you go?

I think I would totally waste that wish and go eat black tomatoes with Mrs. Slocombe in Australia.

2. What’s your favourite tropical drink?

Margaritas on the rocks. Or the perennial always a favorite no matter where or when, Bourbon Slush.

3. What’s your favourite (non-winter) activity?

Biking hiking camping swimming gardening schmoozing walking lazing around in the backyard in the hammock listening to the birds yell at me.

4. What’s your favourite article of summer clothing?

My bling bling flip flops.

5. What’s your favourite food cooked on the BBQ?

Salmon

6. You’re on the beach…what do you have on your feet?

toenail polish. Perhaps a flip flop.

7. Canoe, motor boat or white water raft?

I don't like canoes (there's a snake in the boat!!), I don't like motor boats on lazy rivers. Never been white water rafting. I'd have to say...float trip.

8. Do you prefer to swim in a pool, a lake or the ocean?

Salinated or chlorinated. Can't do it otherwise.

9. Favourite flavour of ice cream?

Coffee (duh!)

10. What do you look forward to most about summer in general?

In general? No schedule. This one specifically, though, I look foward to talking to neighbors. Really. Winter has been hard on many fronts for me.

How did I luck out like this, anyway?

So it snowed. And snowed. And they say about 10 inches (but locally, meaning in my backyard, a little less than that) but who's counting anymore? I've given in. On Tuesday, Maeve and Sophia went down the block to play in the snow, play with friends, drink hot chocolate and play their hearts out on their third snow day this year. Maybe fourth. I can't recall. I cleaned house and ironed on girl scout badges and shoveled snow. And then Larry called: we're going down to Riley's for pizza tonight...

I decided, with Mike working late and being more than a tad overwhelmed with work and home and kids and weather, that we were going to join them. I shoveled again, and talked with ym new next door neighbor, who is doing his residency in endodontics. I had a lovely reminiscing about my root canals (I am one of the few people on earth who thank heaven for endodontists and root canals. Pain is not my friend). Eric came by and mentioned Riley's again. I gathered up my stuff, got the girls walking down to our local bar.

Just like when my grandparents would have lived in south St. Louis, we were taking our families to the bar. To eat bar food. And drink beer. Nothing to sing about or write home about, just talk of upcoming camping trips and girl scout weekends, rehabbers, Things Our Kids Do, you know, shooting the proverbial breeze. Halliday took over Riley's that night--there were 19 adults and 16 kids from the block that night. The snow stopped falling and we filled up on provel cheese covered pizza (if you eat it piping hot, and if it's covered in onions and bacon, you can get it down, really). Both my new neighbors and the new guy down the street who promises to remove the big blue spruce in his front yard were there. Mike played some darts (or, rather, Mike lost darts to Clayton) and I sat, kind of bewildered by weather and Maeve demands and loud conversation. I kind of soaked it in and didn't add much. My mind needs spring.

But our new neighbor told us a lovely story. I mentioned to him that since it's a two-family, I worry every time it's for sale, because it might mean a developer comes in and turns it into a rental property. There is only one rental property on the block--all the other two-families have the owner in one half, and a renter in the other. We've been really lucky as the first one-family in the row, our neighbors have been excellent ever since that, umm, first one...anyway, the new neighbor interrupts and says, "well, that's almost what happened."

He fills me in (paraphrased here): They had a contract on the house. They thought. But for whatever reason, Dave, the old owner, was able to break the contract (or perhaps there was a loophole or something, new neighbor wasn't sure) because a developer had come in with a hugely high bid. So they started looking around for another house. And then a few weeks later, Dave calls him. On Christmas Eve. Are you still interested in the house? Yeah, of course. But our bid is the same...and Dave told him that was fine. He and his wife had thought about it, and they broke the contract (or however one goes about that) because THEY DIDN'T WANT TO DO THAT TO THEIR OLD NEIGHBORS ON THE BLOCK. New neighbor said that's when he knew it must be quite a place. Dave was moving to another state. He'd probably never be back, he'd only lived here a few years and didn't have family or other strong ties to the city. He was moving on. The idea that he thought about the impact a rental property (meaning, big developer/business kind of rental) would have on us...it just blows me away. It doesn't surprise me; Dave was a good guy. But it surprises me somewhat that anyone would do that. Just in general.

We sat in the bar and talked about everyday kinds of things. I like these people more and more, and that says something because wow, I really do hold them dear already. I walked home with Trisha and Maeve, getting home to a clean kitchen, no leftovers, and that question in my head. How on earth did I luck out like this, anyway?

Weather (not complaining, not complaining)

Ok. 74 degrees on Sunday. Today, temperatures dropping through the day. Rain turning to sleet turning to snow. Wet sloppy snow. And the predictions get more and more like crazy talk all through the afternoon. They're currently thinking 5 to 9 inches tomorrow. I hope this counts as "in like a lion" because that 74 degrees Sunday seemed pretty dang foreboding for 4 weeks from now.

I can't even think about Easter. Or St. Pat's non-day parade we're in. I just can't go there in my head yet.

But it was nice, just for that moment, sitting on the stoop talking to my neighbor Mary about teaching philosophies and school choice and girl scouts (Mary: the girl scout law is where God is mentioned, I bet that's where the thought got triggered).

I earn my spring this year. When it finally comes and stays a while, it is mine in both hands, squeeze it dry over my head, let it drip down my face and soak my clothes. I am going to live this spring.

The Spiritual Lives of Things

"Sophia, yours is the blue one, and Maeve's is white. Put dad's and mine in there as well." I handed Sophia the new toothbrushes. She trotted down the hall to the bathroom and came back with her old one, white with green stripes.

"What do we do with old toothbrushes?" she asked. I guess I always switched them out before without her presence.

"Go ahead and throw them away, all four," I instructed. Occasionally I will save one to clean grout, but as often as I clean grout, ya know, I don't need that many.

"But I don't want to throw mine away. It's special to me."

I looked over at her, a little suspicious. She's kind of a saver, like her dad can be, and I continuously go through scraps of paper and odd bits of stuff to try to decipher her will--is this trash, or does it go in the treasure box?

"Honey, we don't need them. You have a new one. This one is old and full of germs."

And then her lip started to quiver. One step too far, Mom.

"How about this," I suggested. "You put all four of them on the counter in the bathroom and I'll add them to the bathroom cleaning bucket. That way we can still use them for other things for a little while."

She nodded and smiled through the weepy eyed look.

It had served her well. I could see the uneasiness with just discarding an object that had been so important. I remember being seriously distressed when my mother tried to throw out the little white t-shirt with blue and green flowers printed all over it, a hand-me-down from a cousin, worn out and thin. It doesn't even fit you anymore. But it's my favorite. Safely stored away in the orange box of summer clothing, I was relieved. These things, they get imbued with a sense of life. Our lives.