A Hopeful Season

As I was looking for a quote to use in our Christmas card this year, I remembered a line a good friend of mine used in her card several years ago. She handwrote in each of her cards these words: "and with ah! bright wings." The line seemed familiar (I must have paid more attention in my Romantic and Victorian literature class than I realized), and it sent me searching for the Gerard Manley Hopkins poem where I thought I'd find it. It's from "God's Grandeur," and the line captures so well the comfort, hope, and peace the holiday season should bring.

So I thought I'd copy the Hopkins poem here as an early-in-the-season reminder to launch into it at a pace that allows you to appreciate and take comfort in its hope-filled purpose. Enjoy. (The "bright wings" bit comes at the end.)

B.

God’s Grandeur

THE WORLD is charged with the grandeur of God.

It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;

It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil

Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?

Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;

And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;

And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil

Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.


And for all this, nature is never spent;

There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;

And though the last lights off the black West went

Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent

World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

The Sock & The Pig

My kids have a history of insulting people's dogs. They always seem to choose childless people who spend copious amounts of money on expensive breeds on which they lavish affection and pride. Then my kids come along and reduce their costly companions to something cheap and offensive.

First there was our elderly, next door neighbor in Berea, who lived alone with her two daschunds. She walked them several times a day, and during one such walk she ran across Hannah and me as we were getting in the car. Hannah, then two, yelled, "Look Mom! A sock!" while pointing to the brown daschund. Our neighbor huffed at us before turning on her heels and going off in the opposite direction.

I've heard people call them "hot dogs," but I think Hannah was dead-on. They do look like walking socks.

Then, today, John Matthew saw a neighbor walking what I think was a little corgi. John and I were in the front yard raking leaves. John saw the dog and said, "Look Mom! A pig!" Our neighbor (and also a college trustee--ouch) shot me a wounded look and picked up the pace. I asked John why he called it a pig. "Because it's fat and has short little ears that stick up and it doesn't have a tail," he told me.

If someday I get the golden retriever I'm longing for, these folks will be able to get their revenge. (Though what on earth could you say a beautiful golden retriever looks like??)

B.

Back in the swing of things

Karl and the kids got me an iPod Nano for my birthday, which inspired me to get back into my walking/running schedule. I hit the pavement with it tonight, and it was SO much fun to be back out there, listening to my favorite podcasts--"Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me," which is great for laughs; Shields & Brooks from the "News Hour with Jim Lehrer," which probably requires too much thought while running; and "The News from Lake Woebegone" from "A Prairie Home Companion," which can make me either laugh or cry, depending on the episode.

And, of course, there's the music. To be alone again on a crisp fall evening, light drizzle falling, with everything from "Air on a G String" to U2's "Walk On" or Bruce Cockburn's "Pacing the Cage," makes me one happy chick.

I love fall.

B.

Where Soccer Isn't King

I love soccer, and I’m fortunate to live in a place where soccer takes a back seat to football, tee-ball, and little league.

This is a mixed blessing. On the one hand, our fields are so bad that battling for the ball in some sections stirs up a massive cloud that gives players an inadvertent history lesson on what the dust bowl days were like and leaves them coughing and sputtering as they try to see through the grit in their eyes. What would be a simple tumble on a good, grassy field can mean cuts and scrapes from a surface pock-marked with stones. And forget learning ball control when various bumps and hollows can send the ball in any direction at any time.

Then there is the stench of sewage—yes, sewage—that bubbles up in some places in the field and is connected to a problem with the civic center’s plumbing system, and the demoralizing sight of shiny, new, even, rock-less fields being installed right next door for use, I hear, by youth football.

But there is a silver lining to that filthy dust cloud. Our game days and practices are generally and delightfully free of some of the biggest problems that plague youth sports.

I’ve heard parents at soccer games talk about their experiences in other sports. They complain about parents coming to blows during games, coaches and parents screaming at each other, bad sportsmanship that goes unchecked and in some cases is ignored or even rewarded. And they worried about the example this set for their children.

This isn’t unusual. There have been countless stories from all over the country outlining the bad behavior of parents in youth sports. So I feel fortunate that my kids are able to play the sport they love without the depressing spectacle--and disturbing influence--of mom telling little Johnny to go kick that guy’s ass, Johnny’s dad screaming obscenities and threats at an opponent’s father, or either one of them locked in a battle with a referee or coach.

If soccer were king here, we’d have the same problems. And though youth soccer parents and fans aren’t perfect, the culture of youth soccer is pretty positive. You are far more likely to hear Johnny’s mom rooting for Johnny’s teammates and even, God forbid, his opponents when they do something particularly well. Johnny’s dad is probably chatting up another dad, telling him he’s noticed how much his daughter has improved over the years.

There is definite cheering and, sure, sometimes even a disappointed groan or two, but for the most part these parents are relaxing on the sidelines where they belong and letting their kids shine.

Since most kids can’t count on being professional athletes, it stands to reason that youth sports are probably more about physical activity, character, the virtue of competition, and good sportsmanship.

Here, where soccer isn’t king, my kids are able to glean those messages and values while on that pock-marked field, though, granted, their ball control skills will suffer.

B.

Leaving Home

So a few weeks ago, I was walking home from work when Karl met me at the front door. He’d been home with the kids for a while.

“Just want to give you a heads-up before you go in,” he told me. “I think the kids are leaving.”

“What’d you do to them?” I asked. He was perfectly calm and said nothing at all had happened. They were just ready to leave.

I went inside and set my bags down. There to meet me were Hannah and John, with bulging backpacks, somber faces, and big pillows in their arms.

“Mom, we have something to tell you,” Hannah said.

I sat down, feeling intuitively that this was one of those episodes that I couldn’t brush off with “Later guys. Gotta get dinner started,” or “Go put those things up. You’re not going anywhere.” Something about how very serious they looked told me I needed to hear them out, preferably without laughing--which was hard.

So I sat down and Hannah came to face me, with little John flanking her. Her speech went like this, with occasional interjections from John:

“It isn’t that the house isn’t clean,” she said.

(Well that’s good, I thought, because the state of the house is entirely the fault of you and your brother. Besides, if anyone gets to run away because of a dirty house, it’ll be Daddy and me. So hand over those backpacks and remember to feed the cats. But I held my tongue.)

“It isn’t that you and Daddy are too hard on us,” she continued. “It’s just that, you know, it’s REALLY hard to be in the same place every day. It’s boring. John and I…well…we want an adventure. So we’re going away for two days.”

“We’ll miss you guys,” says John, with utter seriousness and with a reassurance in his voice that I found a little jolting coming from a four-year-old.

Hannah went on: “I’ll hold John’s hand and we’ll stay together. We have books to read. We’ll be careful when we cross streets. We’ll sleep under trees.”

“We love you guys,” John interjects again, and I’m beginning to wonder if he’s been coached.

“Really,” says Hannah. “We’ve got it all planned out. We just want to see more of the world, you know? We just want to be on our own for a little while. So can we?”

Silence.

I took a few deep breaths before I answered. Not because I was angry, but because it took every ounce of energy I had to fight back the belly laugh struggling to get out and also because, frankly, I was trying to think of a good answer. I wanted to appear to take this very seriously, in the spirit in which it was presented to me. And, again, I had that intuitive sense that a lot was riding on my response. I had to give an answer that let them know I had listened, I understood, that their earnestness meant something to me.

So I did what any good parent would do: I dodged direct responsibility and kept it simple.

“I hear what you’re saying,” I told them. “And I understand. There’s only one problem.”

“What?” they asked in unison, with expectant little faces.

“It’s against the law.”

I went on to tell them that the police would return them home as soon as they saw them out alone, because children aren’t allowed to roam the streets without their parents. "You have to be 18 to do that."

“Sorry,” I said. “It sounded like a good plan.”

“So, can I do it when I’m 18?” Hannah asked.

“Sure.”

“OK!” she said. And it was that easy. They put up their backpacks and went on with the rest of the day.

When recounting this story later, I told a friend that Karl and I have since wondered why we didn’t just give them 20 bucks and send them on their merry way. Two days alone without the kids sounds like heaven.

“We learn slowly,” I told my friend, “but we learn.”

B.