ThingsPondered

The first item in this list is primo.  After that, I consider the events equally thrilling, so their order does not imply ranking.

1.        Singing a duet with my son Benjamin for a nursing home gig at Christmastime.   He was in junior high, but was already a baritone.  (Ben wryly attributed this precocious vocal development to all the steroids he has endured for asthma.)  It was joyful to me how well our voices blended, and….duh…I guess they should have coming from the same genetic heritage.

2.       Singing a duet of Amen (from 1963 film Lilies of the Field) with Clark Lash at meeting.

3.       Singing The Verdi Requiem (alto chorus member) with orchestra, guest soloists.  The Dies Irae with timpani —- omg!  Icing on the cake was the small, private party afterwards with some good people from Reading Choral Society and bass soloist Brian Gibson.

4.       Teaching the Sunday school song “The Lord Said to Noah” with full motions, standing up, sitting down and so forth to kindergartners at St. Mary’s R.C. School.  I remember  many times singing “Rise and shine and give God the glory, glory” with my arms outstretched to the sky and thinking “I am getting PAID to do this!  Wow!”

5.       Playing one of my choral compositions (AATTBB) on the piano for a Harvard music major and his gasping with delight at one part.

6.       Singing the Queen of the Night “Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen” aria (from Mozart’s The Magic Flute) in a voice lesson.  I always wanted to do it.

7.       Playing djembe with good, experienced fellow drummers.

8.       Singing in District and Regional choruses in high school.

9.       Teaching and directing the St. Mary parish children’s choir in my composition of the Our Father.  Also, hearing them singing it on the playground for fun because it is lively.                                  (Like God. Duh)

1                – Room for whatever the next biggie will be -

In some elementary schools, the 4-H program provides the opportunity for students to watch chicken eggs in an incubator.  Children learn about development, scientific method, responsibility, and even agribusiness. The exciting, culminating apex; the zenith; the climax of this four-week unit is known as Hatch Day.

God bless those 4-H cooperating people who collect chicken eggs which they know are fertilized and which also were laid on the same day.  This insures that an explosion of chicks should appear on Day Number 21.  Of course, it also insures a rapt group of students who want to see and memorize every moment of this experience.   

When I taught elementary school, I regarded the week with Hatch Day as the most important week of the year.  My urban students showed me miracles of caring, good behavior, and tenderness.  A teacher in a rural school has also shared that Hatch Day affirms for her what teaching is all about.      

How excited the young night custodian was today.  He had never been  through a Hatch Day and had SO many questions for me.  Because three viable eggs remained to hatch, he was checking the progress regularly.  He took pictures with his cell phone and sent them to his girlfriend.  It had me remembering how excited the night custodian was at Northwest Elementary and how carefully she learned how to move a hatched chick, should that occur during her shift.

What a wonder a healthy birth is.  We are awed by it.  As the classroom teacher said,  “we are witnessing a miracle.”

There are many religious mysteries in our world.  Some are phenomena; others are concepts.  Many people are very comfortable co-existing with unexplained ideas.  Others create a reason for accepting them.  Still others must reject anything that cannot be justified to their satisfaction.

Mystic beliefs exist in many sects.  For example, in Christianity, many followers are taught that the Highest Power is one God, but also THREE god-spirits at the same time.  This is the concept of the trinity: that God is one and also a threesome, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. 

 I have no trouble accepting the Trinity as an un-understandable reality.  I can live with this mystery.

However, there is an idea on the God-front and mother-front that has provoked strong reactions in me.  A Christian counselor once told me that God loved my two sons more than I ever could.  Impossible.  No way.  My love for them is limitless.  It is pure and strong and constant.  Such was my initial reaction. 

Many years have elapsed since that counselor’s assertion.  Inevitably, time and reflection have made their marks on my thoughts, feelings, and perception of the inexplicable God.  Now I accept the notion that God’s love for my boys is bigger than my love.  However, this notion belongs in the realm of un-understandable mysteries to me.  It cannot diminish my knowledge of the strength of amount of love I have for them.  What it tells me is that there is a God-love that I cannot begin to comprehend. 

This possibility of a huge God-love which is larger than my infinite mother-love is so mysterious and incomprehensible that I tire trying to imagine it.  Happily, I need not understand it to accept it.  As long as it is the “force of goodness,” I am assured that all is well in my world.  Love you, sons!

The road of parenting is a bumpy one at times.  One tries to follow practices from her own childhood that seemed good and supplement with the current parenting trends that are touted in the media.  Often, I felt that although I did some things right, I wished that way back then I had the wisdom and life experiences I possess now.  Thus, I was surprised when I recently discovered in my heart of hearts that I did a danged good job.

I have been the mother of two wonderful boys, now fine men.  I have taught preschool aged children through college.  In addition to that, I have been involved with youth through volunteer activities in my community and worship center.  As I reflect about the range of children I have known, I realize that I actually did pass along much good to my precious progeny.

As children, my sons had respect for authority.  Thankfully, it was a balanced common-sense respect for adults, rather than blind obedience.   They could analyze and decide on personal safety issues regarding adults.  After that important issue was settled, they had the pragmatics to know whether, when, and how to raise questions to their teachers and leaders and when to raise the issues with me as their advocate.

They had internalized a sense of right and wrong.  Like any human beings, they may have been swayed by temptation on small matters.  However, on the big questions, they knew absolutely what was fair and right and they did the right thing.

My sons also had impulse control.  A few decades ago, this capacity would not be mentioned.  Parents ingrained it in children.   Conversely, these days it is nearly frightening how many children have not been taught at home that “no means no,” or that nobody gets everything he wants when he wants it all the time.  I am proud to say that my sons reasonably mastered delayed gratification.

From kindergarten and early school years, other parents regarded my boys as good kids, not “wild” ones.   They were kind-hearted.  They weren’t frequent flyers in time out chairs or student assistance conferences.  But, the best testament I have to whatever credit any parent can claim for her own efforts is this.  My sons were the kids in late elementary years who were permitted and welcomed to play at other kids’ houses after school in instances when the other stay-at-home-mom might have to run out for a short period, leaving the pair “home alone.”  The OTHER moms trusted my boys as so well-behaved that they would neither instigate trouble nor follow along if their buddy suggested something wrong. 

I guess I did some things right for the two greatest blessings of my lifetime!

Kids’ Gift Ideas for Lean Economic Times

Step One

Tell the kids in an age-appropriate way about the economy.  Explain that people are losing jobs and Santa wants to help them, so he is giving some non-elves work.  Some of the work is fixing up slightly used toys that silly families gave away.  Continue to explain that because these regular moms and dads are beginners in toy fixing, they might not do as good a job as an official North Pole Elf. So, if Santa decides to give our family any of these toys we will feel privileged to help him and the whole world.  We will feel grateful that Santa trusted us to be grown-up enough to enjoy these gifts.

Step Two:

Go on-line to your local Freecycle.  You can find yours by going to http://www.freecycle.org.  Arrange to secretly pick up some perfectly useful items.  Some may need a smidge of cleaning, but often the toys or items are in great shape.  While you are at it, consider what you might be able to offer to others.

Step Three:

Go on-line to your local Craigslist.org .  Under the large “For Sale” category, there are sub-categories.  You will want to check under “Free” and “Barter.”  Many win-wins can be gained at craigslist.

Step Four:

Greatly reduce your children’s television watching.  Alternatively, if you have the capacity to record the programs and then skip the commercials, please do that.  Our kids are victims of mass marketing efforts now.  If you can reduce their exposure to commercials, you will help reduce their TV-induced greed.

Step Five:

Similarly filter print materials, such as newspapers and flyers, which your kids see.  In my area, the Sunday newspaper is the edition full of toy store flyers and inserts.  That is not hard for me to “edit” before it reaches the little ones.

Step Six:

(Optional)  Whisper a prayer of thanks that you have children, that there will be a Christmas of some sort, and that, in the grand scheme,  this is a lighter challenge.

Although I do not have my own recollections of baking cookies with my mother, we must have, for when my father first saw me baking cookies with my toddler son, Matthew, he exclaimed, “Aah -  baking cookies with the children – just like your Mother.”

Yes, in my family’s traditions, cookie baking means love.  Even if I didn’t remember it on a conscious level, the importance of the activity imprinted itself on my heart.  There was no question that part of my “momming” would be cookie-baking.  So, as soon as my sons Matthew and Benjamin could stand securely on a sturdy wooden chair pulled up to the kitchen counter, I sewed them tiny aprons of their own.  Planning for years of enjoying this together, I even made the neck strap adjustable by using a safety pin to fasten it at the perfect length for the moment. 

This was not a spectator sport; my sons participated.  I would measure out an ingredient and hold the cup or spoon over the mixing bowl.  Then my sons had the critical job of dumping the ingredient into the bowl.  Such a crucial task and always done with the appropriate reverence combined with little-boy GUSTO!    And, oh, all the quality control!  All the intermediate tasting!  I soon learned how to adjust my cookie recipes by using extra margarine and sugars (the first ingredients), to compensate for their diminution as we tested, tasted, and continued forward.

It was such a wonderful time which still warms my soul as I remember it.  We would talk, think about sizes of cups and spoons or qualities of the ingredients, reflect on the world, and work as a family team.  I passed along to them the tongue-tantalizing act of removing every last trace of batter from the beaters.  Two sons – two beaters – it worked out perfectly.  The delicious flavors of dough before baking have a pleasure of their own.  Savoring the feeling of the gritty, white sugar sitting in the soft, creamy butter, with just enough flour and other “stuff” is part of our traditions, as well.

The boys were permitted to decorate one or two “special cookies” for themselves, the ownership and details of which were, of course, unmistakable.  These they absolutely buried under carefully chosen delights of sugar toppings, the excess of which slowly slid from the “sugar mountain” onto the baking sheet to become welded in an outline around the cookie.  No matter.  It was the doing, the creating, the loving, and the fun that were so important.

In my heart of hearts, these memories are some of my most precious.