Thanks so much, guys (Memorial Day, '06)

Patrick's uncle Charlie Ahern was there at Iwo Jima. After getting shot during the first assault, he lay bleeding on the beach for some indetermined time before being rescued. Such courage, such sacrifice, such a debt as cannot be repaid...

Counting the gifts

One more May 25. One more Jeremy's birthday. It would have been his 29th.

How does one count the gift of a human being, of personified love? Jeremy's birth mother gave in such an extraordinary manner, and made us people we had never been before--parents.

So many images scan through my memory, like those face pictures all made of up a thousand smaller likenesses of the same person. There was no countenance like his. I can say without a trace of sappiness that he was and remains my inspiration and hero, as he was to many who knew him. To Jeremy, there was always something grand to reach for, and so what if life got in the way? That was his gift to his world.

Patrick gave Jeremy a rock on which to stand, an anchor on which to pin. He was the constant to the boy driven by restless dreams. Ever loving and patient, Patrick modeled who the Father was and never stopped believing that his beloved Jeremy would one day understand. That was his supreme gift to his son, and we saw it come to pass.

Tonight I started playing a simple melody on my autoharp--G, C, D, C, G; G, C, D, C, G; and so on. I began to cry without realizing that I was hugging my 'harp the way I did my son when he was an infant--only I had to release him from my embrace, from my protection, from my expectations, and out to fight his dragons. That was my gift to Jeremy. The little song I composed today is "Jeremy's Lullabye". I didn't want to finish the song, just as I didn't want to be finished with the baby and the boy and the man. But to everything there is a season; every song has its completion. I made an end to the song and played it for Patrick as a celebration of the incredible gift we were given.

Thank you, Stacey and Patrick. Happy Jeremy's birthday to us.

And thank You, God.

The Fly and I

Patrick often teases me that I can't just walk into a drugstore, mall, or supermarket like normal people do, without something downright Garrison Keillor-ish occuring. "So what happened this time?" is his usual greeting when I return from a shopping excursion. It could be a run-in with a drunken celebrity; finding an envelope with over 200 bucks in it that no one can claim, which cop that happened to be in the same 7-11 at the time tells me to keep; or a chance encounter with someone I knew twenty years previously--on the other side of the continent.

Yesterday it was a fly in the hamburger.

On the rare occasions that I buy beef, it's the expensive, no hormones or antibiotics or anything that would get reported on Oprah kind. It's a treat, and one I was in the mood for. Having already gone to the local produce stand and bought all my veggies like a good girl, I naturally thought of a nice, juicy hamburger to go with them. It's been a year or two since I had one, and high time to indulge. Off to the local supermarket to procure my ingredients. I had just pulled some nice whole wheat rolls off the bakery shelf (how virtuous am I?) and headed back to the meat counter. Yes! "One pound of ground Angus, that'll be a bag of gold and your bicuspids, Ma'am." But oh, I wanted that burger, so I grabbed it.

Now, couldn't I just put my humble little package in my humble little cart and be done with it? Apparently not. Instead, I stood gazing at all the little jewel-colored packages waiting to go home with someone. And then I saw it--three pounds of choice USDA ground round, proudly displayed with a living, buzzing housefly trapped inside the plastic wrap and crawling all over the meat.

Naturally there were no employees in the vicinity to alert to the problem. Furthermore, I couldn't just leave it there or pretend I hadn't seen it. I was forced to carry the disgusting little parcel to the front of the store and wait for a manager. When she arrived, she was as grossed out as I and pitched the whole thing right into a wastebasket. She looked at my other groceries. "Are you purchasing those items?", she asked. At my affirmative, she answered, "Oh no, you're not!" and bagged them for me. Then she marched me over to the till and gave me the price of the fly-infested hamburger as well, with apologies so profuse I began feeling a little sorry for her...after all, it was a fly, not a rattlesnake. At any rate, I got free groceries out of the deal plus more money than I had before entering the store. (Too bad I hadn't done my whole week's shopping right then--but one can't have everything.)

And no, seeing the critter didn't take away my hankering for hamburger. If anything, I was even more grateful for the succulent feast on the whole wheat rolls, knowing it was a freebie. Pass the spicy mustard, please.

Lightenin' up, Spindley style

Sometimes we have to stop and breathe in the midst of all the wackiness and weirdness going on, and just focus on something positive. Those who know me also know about The Spindle Sisters, the duo I put together with my dear friend, the awesomely talented Michelle. Here's our favorite pic and probably future CD cover, Lord willing.

Is it legal to have this much fun?

Take that, ACLU!

Yeah, take this.

Oh, I'm just so glad the American Civil Liberties Union is out there doing the hard stuff, defending me from high school kids reciting the Lord's Prayer at their graduation. Isn't that what the founders had in mind when they put their lives on the line for free speech?

Oh, I forgot. The First Amendment to the Constitution is really there to protect public libraries from having to put porn filters on their PCs.

DaVinci cowed?

Not I.

Who said I have to have read the book/paid good money and time in order to say I dislike The DaVinci Code? I couldn't get through more than ten pages of "Left Behind" either before I ran screaming from the room. (Okay, silently screaming.) I dropped out of a book club so I wouldn't have to read or hear about Opus Dei and the plot to keep women from exercising our goddess-given rights. The ubiquitous articles, reviews, blogposts, conversations wafting across restaurant aisles have left me no desire to fuel the bank accounts of Dan, Ron, and Tom any further. DVC is now an indicator of what I call Walgreen's Syndrome, in which something once trendy is absorbed so completely into the popular mindset that it ends up on a drugstore shelf next to Zen water fountains, Tae Bo videos and power bracelets.

I'm not boycotting, mind you--I'm "elsecotting". I've found something else to read, something else to view, something else to occupy my time. Now I've found something else to talk about, too. See ya.

Pondering Mother's Day

In 1977, during the reign of polyester separates and that ghastly stuff called Disco, and while Jimmy Carter was president, I became a mother. That year, and again in 1985, two incredible kids from two different continents were placed in my arms.

One of them now awaits us in another Land, his sojourn here accomplished. The other is just now moving into her life as an adult, making her own decisions. Some of those decisions cause me concern and even consternation; others make me so profoundly proud I almost can't breathe. Isn't that the way it always is with one's grown children? All the what-was-I-thinking mental smackdowns, in which I rehearse every time I failed them as a mother, mingle with the myriad happy memories in which I know I got it right. Somehow, through all this, two productive human beings emerged. My son left his indelible mark on hundreds who knew him, who were inspired by his courage in facing a life of pain and difficulty with indefatigable faith and zest for life. My daughter will find her way as well. Most importantly, the One who loves her beyond what any of us could, will find her.

This Mother's Day I miss terribly the laughter of the man who always prefaced his call from back East with an apology for not having remembered to send a card in time. I hold him in my memory, the infant already astute enough at three weeks to insist on being carried so he could face the world; the boy delightedly chasing bats through a Brazilian cave, or pulling down the top of a two-piece kitchen cupboard because he couldn't wait for me to get the peanut butter out for him; the demanding, churlish teenager chomping at the parental bit holding him back from the adventures he longed for, then patiently enduring the traumas of multiple surgeries and dialysis after being hit by a train attempting one of those very adventures. I remember driving away from the 18 year-old who wanted to blaze his own trail rather than accompany us on our move to California; and the young man who became more than a son--who became one of my closest friends as well.

I recall, too, the years of longing for the little girl who would complete our family. Jeremy wanted a sister. Patrick and I both wanted a daughter. The doll-sized baby with the starlike black eyes lassoed our hearts the instant we looked into them. How could we not have gone through all the obstacles facing us to make her part of us? How there have been the last 20 years without her? Perhaps someday she'll read this and realize how truly loved she is and always has been.

In the meantime, the cards will be tucked away in a memento folder. The flowers will droop and go the way of all things. The gifts and dinner out will become part of the fabric of happy recollections. But Happy Mother's Day to me, for I am blessed beyond measure.