JourneyLeaf: Life a Page at a Time

Inchie the Worm & the Sandbar

A warm February afternoon with old dear friends (and one tiny new friend)...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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    In December, my second grade teacher came to one of my book signings.  She was brimming with pride, which felt wonderful.  But it also felt wonderful to be able to tell her outright, "You helped put me on this path."  She was one of the first people who encouraged my writing and I'll never forget that.  

    As the month continued on, I mulled over some of the other teachers who made a strong and well-remembered difference in my life.  I'm on Facebook with a few, so I've been able to thank them.  Still, there are a few I've lost touch with and my high school teacher Mrs. L was the first who came to mind.  I thought I'd see if I could reconnect with her in the new year.  Then just a few days into January one of my oldest and dearest friends called, a wobble in her voice.  Frannie shared the news that Mrs. L died on the first day of 2016.    

    I've thought of Mrs. L so often in the days since her death.  It made me realize that she's one of those childhood people who never dropped far from my thoughts as the years went by.  Whenever I meet someone new, I work hard to remember their name because I hear Mrs. L's voice in my head stressing that this is kind and important.  In her "Great Books" classes we learned how to discuss literature and find key themes.  It was the first class where I felt every person's viewpoint mattered, that we were all working together to see a story or issue from various angles -- not to reach her conclusions or to be able to answer test questions, but primarily to know it and ourselves better.  We were allowed to respectfully disagree with her.  We saw how much she enjoyed her own classes and the subject matter.  Mrs. L made it easy to fall in love with learning for its own sake.

    Mrs. L had us keep journals of our thoughts and discoveries, turning them in periodically.  Some of my classmates hated the process, but I found it gave dignity and worth to my natural inclinations.  Years later I wrote a master's thesis on journal writing.  In her phone call, Frannie said, "Sometimes I'd write about something important and she'd always clue in on that.  She had a knack for adding a comment or two that I really needed to hear or that made me feel she really saw me."  That was the magic of Mrs. L.  She helped you feel that you were worth getting to know, that your perspectives and thoughts and dreams added up to something.  For a bunch of teenagers, that was valuable indeed.

    In my filing cabinet I still have a dog-earred sheet of paper that Mrs. L passed out to the class the first day of my freshman year of high school.  It is a two-sided questionnaire and gives 53 statements with beginnings that are followed by fill-in blanks.  My childish responses are there in bubbly handwriting, the letter "i" always topped by cutesy circles.  (Yes, I wrote at least one response that involved boys.)  Deep into the document is one of Mrs. L's smiley faces added as a comment.  She read each and every student's questionnaire.  She wanted to get to know us.

    I liked that quiz.  I liked it so much that my senior year of high school I wrote fresh answers on a separate sheet of paper.  Upon reaching the very adult age of 21, I answered it again.  And at ages 25, 32, and 36.  In those last few versions, I had to replace the words "class/school" with "work."  My one rule is that I never read previous questionaire answers until I've written new answers so I don't muddy the waters.  Comparisons from one age to the next are sometimes quite revealing.   A decade has gone by, but I've pulled out the quiz again and will create a mid-40s version.  I look forward to touching base with myself in this odd, unique way.  

    Thank you, Mrs. L.  Your many gifts live on.

 

If you'd like to try the questionnaire yourself, here it is:

1. My favorite place to be is ___________________________________
2. My favorite time of day is ___________________________________
3. I really enjoy___________________________________
4. To me, school (work) is___________________________________
5. The thing I like best at school (work) is___________________________________
6. I’d like work better if___________________________________
7. I wish my teachers (supervisors)___________________________________
8. My classmates (co-workers) are___________________________________
9. To me, homework (working late) is___________________________________
10. Reading is___________________________________
11. I like to read about___________________________________
12. The last book I read was___________________________________
13. The library is___________________________________
14. I’d rather read___________________________________
15. In the next five years I want to___________________________________
16. I want to be___________________________________
17. People are___________________________________
18. When I was little___________________________________
19. I feel proud when___________________________________
20. Better than anything, I like___________________________________
21. People think I ___________________________________
22. I don’t know how to___________________________________
23. I wish someone would help me___________________________________
24. Long books___________________________________
25. Newspapers and magazines___________________________________
26. Social Studies___________________________________
27. I worry about___________________________________
28. Supervisors I like best___________________________________
29. I wish my parents___________________________________
30. I wish people wouldn’t___________________________________
31. I wish I hadn’t___________________________________
32. Little kids___________________________________
33. I look forward to___________________________________
34. Television is___________________________________
35. I get angry when___________________________________
36. I don’t understand why___________________________________
37. Art is___________________________________
38. Holidays are___________________________________
39. My favorite TV program is___________________________________
40. Of all the books I’ve read, my favorite is___________________________________
41. To be grown up means___________________________________
42. Something that bothers me is___________________________________
43. I like to___________________________________
44. If I could do anything I wanted at school (work)___________________________________
45. Music is___________________________________
46. The thing I feel most comfortable doing is ___________________________________
47. The most challenging part of living is___________________________________
48. When I’m around people I don’t like I___________________________________
49. My previous work experiences have ___________________________________
50. Driving is___________________________________
51. My favorite sport is___________________________________
52. Math is___________________________________
53. Most of all, I wish__________________________________
     

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When life gets terribly busy, it is lovely to have a boy around who can remind you about skipping stones, examining autumn leaves, and leaping over the rays of sunshine that make it from canopy to forest floor.

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

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My dad used to call me "Snaggletooth" when I was in the process of losing my baby teeth.  The day Eli lost his second top tooth, that nickname popped right back into my head.  

Eli's two front teeth gone at the same time filled me with a goofy sort of happy.  I've always loved it when kids are missing those top two at the same time, but it doesn't always coincide.  An extra complication was that when Eli was a toddler he had an accident and it was touch-and-go for a while if his right top tooth would fall out or turn dark.  When his tooth hung in there, I was overjoyed.  Still, his dentist mentioned that an injury could put a tooth on a different time schedule, so Eli might lose that tooth very early or very late.  Thus Eli losing his two front teeth at the same time was a victory after a victory.  I took him right to a photo studio!

 

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Of Road Trips and Yucky Jelly Beans

As the vacation miles rolled by between Georgia and North Carolina, Eli heard Harry Potter for the first time via audiobook.  He loved it -- classic good vs. evil with some laughs (and deep friendships) sprinkled in.

As the final chapter came to a close, I reached into my bag and pulled out a surprise.  I'd brought along a small box of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans inspired by the book series.  For those who don't know much about Harry Potter, there are several comical moments about these candies -- little jelly beans that include not only the usual fruit flavors but also awful flavors such as earthworm, grass, dirt, and soap.  I challenged Eli to take turns with me eating one jelly bean at a time.  There was a "map" of flavors on the back of the box, but many of the pleasant flavors looked identical to the rotten ones. We agreed that when it was our turn, we'd accept whatever bean rolled out next and take a full bite.

   

Picture a mama and a 6.5 year-old rolling down Interstate 95 at sunset, passing the little rattling box back and forth, each warily inspecting the next bean before taking a hopeful bite -- a very strange (yet kid-friendly) version of Russian roulette.  "Lemon!" we'd crow.  Or "It's just orange this time!"  I'm only sorry that we were separated front seat and back seat so I couldn't get a clear look at Little Guy's face when tasting the bad ones.  I'd hear a sputtering cough followed by a huge guffaw as Eli scrambled to roll down the window.  In a rush of swirling hot air, yet one more sticky, half-chewed piece of candy was ejected to the asphalt.  (With my awful jelly beans -- and, trust me, some were simply disgusting -- I opened my window to spit them like watermelon seeds that vanished behind us instantly at 70 MPH.  "Oh, Mama!  That's cool!")  Finally, the box now empty, we stopped at a rest stop so Eli could brush teeth and put on jammies.  When I opened his car door, I found several wads of slimy beans that didn't make it out his window -- which just made us laugh like banshees all over again.

There are so many times as an adult that you have to do the hard thing, be the mature grown-up.  I'm so grateful for the times when parenting also means you get to be downright silly.  

 

   

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The Adult Adult Week

One of my friends says that when you do things like painstakingly sorting through family tax breaks, being polite (and honest) when you get a traffic ticket, researching retirement funds, and holding your sick child all night long, you're being an adult adult.  You take a deep breath and persevere in doing the mature thing no matter how tired you are.  I just had a week like that.  Whew.

Here's one of those crazy Facebook memes that was just how I felt:

  

I had to be quite thick-skinned all week.  My seven-year book project got through the copyediting process and went to press on Monday.  I thought the tough part was over, but the lead editors descended upon it with final recommendations.  Those last changes were the toughest, yet I do trust their expertise and their desire to make the book stronger.  

Also this week, I fell quite behind on sleep and then got slammed by a condescending email.  This past year I took on a leadership role in a volunteer organization because they needed somebody to take the reins.  I feel I've done a good job and had few complaints until a rather relentless woman popped up several weeks ago.  She's never been active in the organization or indeed attended a single meeting, yet she feels sure she knows what it needs.  (Humph!)

The week became one of putting one foot in front of the other, trying hard to focus on being fair, kind, and openminded.  But, boy, did I feel raggedy.

When I woke up this morning, all I could think of was that I had to get through the day to reach the weekend.  Then there was magic...

 

Little Guy, rumpled from sleep but grinning from ear to ear, announced that he'd lost his second tooth!

  

Here's his letter to the Tooth Fairy tonight...

  

This morning Eli's class held a Mother's Day Tea.  If there is anything better than sitting wedged in a teeny kindergartener chair while your kiddo solemnly serves you tea, I really don't know what it could be.

 

And he made me a card.  He explained all about adding the rainbow and flowers because he knows I like nature and colors.  And the orange squares at the corners?  "Those are crackers just for you, Mama.  You like graham crackers, so I drew them on your card because I love you."

      

After school, Eli and I ran errands.  I introduced him to the joys of the car wash.  (We usually wash it at home or run it through a drive-through wash.)  He was delighted.  

     

  

About two seconds after I stowed my cell phone from taking the above picture, Eli turned around to ask me a question...without taking his hand off the sprayer trigger.  He got so flustered when he realized he was spraying me that he just stood there hosing me down.  We laughed so hard we couldn't breathe.  Exactly what the end of the week needed.

I had a lot of love and support from my guys this week, but also from my friends and the others in the volunteer organization.  It was an exhausting week, but I grew a lot.  Next week I may hide from my email account and take up wearing Groucho Marx glasses complete with nose and mustache.

   

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My parents were lovely, warm people.  Watching them die was awful, but being without them has been a whole other challenge.  I was in my early twenties when I said goodbye, so there have been thousands of changes they never saw unfold and thousands of journeys big and small that they never shared.  They witnessed the first steps of my career path, but not the curves or successes.  They didn't get the chance to meet my husband or see me on my wedding day.  They never laid eyes on my child or held him in their arms.

I want my parents to still be a part of my world.  We have photos of them up in our house.  I cook the favorite recipes of my childhood so these dishes are also familiar and comforting to my son.  I sing to Eli the songs my parents sang to me.  I also tell him lots of stories about his maternal grandparents.  

I found, though, that I tripped over my words whenever I tried to explain to Eli his connection to these pictures, foods, songs, and stories.  It was up to me to help my child distinguish an invisible set of grandparents from my in-laws, the living grandparents he knows firsthand.  Yet when I added my maiden name at the end of "Grandpa" and "Grandma" for clarification, it just complicated things more. Those were the names I knew my paternal grandparents by.  My grandparents were important and beloved figures in my life.  I knew them longer than I knew my parents, and I want to share them with Eli as well.  Complicated.  I kept starting into a story only to digress and fumble: "I'm not talking about Granddad, your papa's dad, or my grandfather, but your grandpa that you didn't get to meet..."

Recently I decided that the verbal tangle was ridiculous.  Southern families usually give pet names to grandparents anyway, so I gave it some thought.  What nicknames would my parents have liked?  I told Eli, "From now on, my father is Gramps and my mother is Nana."  Eli nodded solemnly.  As I spoke, it didn't escape me that for first time in over two decades I used present tense language while discussing my parents.

The first time I told a story about Gramps and Nana, I got a little teary as I stopped to remind Eli about the nicknames.  "I know who they are," Eli said.  "They are my grandparents."  And then I got very teary.  It was the first time he seemed possessive towards them.  A connection grew stronger because a name, especially a warm nickname, removes a layer of distance and formality.  Death is a barrier enough for getting to know the generations before you.  Erasing a little bit of barrier felt like a gift to my child, to my parents, and to myself.

I feel sure Gramps and Nana would approve.

 

 

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Not long ago I was heading into my home office, eager to settle in to work after dropping my son off at school.  As I walked past Eli's bedroom, something white in the window caught my eye.  It was his sidekick, Pat the Bunny.

 

This is what flashed through my head...

  

 

 

 

 

 

I walked over and picked Pat up, gave him an appreciative squeeze.  
He makes a darn good play buddy, bad dream comforter, and sidekick.  Then I found myself squinting at him.  Although he appears in our bed every morning for snuggle time, supervises breakfast from mid-table, and is known to frequently whiz past riding in toy cars (or flung by the ears as a cheerful projectile), I hadn't looked at him closely in a while.  

Pat isn't actually white anymore.  Sort of gray, actually.  The last trip through the washing machine tied in a pillowcase has been a while, but it is more than that.  His velour is losing bits of fluff, whole parts of Pat's hide rubbed and cuddled away to nothing but mesh.

 

Aw.

Even his nose is missing fluff.

  

I stood there for a moment thinking about The Velveteen Rabbit, Winnie the Pooh, and Woody from Toy Story.  I thought about little boys grown up, their sidekicks dropped and forgotten.  

Pat has been a fixture in Eli's life (and thus mine) for a half dozen years.  In a half dozen more, my almost-teen son will surely have let Pat slip by the wayside.  That will be well and good, all part of the process.  But right now?  This moment in time?  Right now there are still guppy kisses and morning snuggles and footie pajamas and dragging Pat around by the ears.  Thank goodness.

Pardon me.  There's a still-small person I have to go pick up and squeeze just now...

   

  

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The Failed Seed

I recorded this conversation with Eli in my journal a few months back.  
The other day I was cleaning out his schoolwork box and thought I'd snap a picture to go with it...

  

Eli came home from school with a plastic petri dish.  Inside was a damp slice of sponge and a watermelon seed.  As he munched his snack, Eli explained, "Everybody got a plastic round thingie and a squishy thingie and a seed.  We watered 'em and put 'em in the window.  We waited a while.  Then the seeds sprouted.  Well, everybody's seed sprouted but mine."

"Oh, Buddy."

"Yeah.  I watered it just like I was supposed to and it was right in the window with everybody else's.  I did all the right things and it just didn't do anything."

"Oh, Buddy.  I'm sorry..."

"It just happens like that sometimes.  You do the right things and it just doesn't do what it is supposed to do," he repeated with a shrug.  "That's how it goes sometimes.  There will be other seeds."  Then he smiled and zoomed off to find his Legos.

I stood there for a moment, a little stunned.  There were all these things I'd been about to say, comforting words about how hard it is being the only one and about trying hard and about Life.  But sometimes a kindergartener does just fine all on their own.  I'm thinking I might just put that now-dried-up dish and seed on my desk as a nice reminder when I get a bad book review or my new blog post stats are in the drain.

That's how it goes sometimes.  There will be other seeds. 

   

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When Eli attended a Waldorf preschool in California, we participated in an autumn lantern walk for kids that was quite magical -- sunset, kiddos, and candles glowing in homemade lanterns.  Thus when I heard there was a similar event here in North Georgia, I tracked down information about it.  
We found the group wonderfully welcoming.

This morning after breakfast, Eli and I made a candle lantern out of a jar, tissue paper squares, thinned glue, and some wire.

 

This evening as the sun began to set...   

 

We found the group and hung out with them in the cool evening.  
Kids ran across the grass in packs and waited for the darkness to settle.

 

Apple cider made it a little easier to wait.

 

Lanterns were ready.

 

There were extra lanterns for folks who forgot theirs.  The organizers thought of everything -- spare candles, lighters for the grownups, and even flickering electric tealight candles for the lanterns to be carried by wee tots.

 

There were various designs of lanterns, everybody bringing what they'd like.  Next year we want to try this sort of lantern made from paper wrapped around a balloon and stiffened with glue.  Once the glue is try and the balloon popped, the resulting lantern is held aloft by strings and a stick.

 

But Eli was pretty happy with his lantern too.

    

The group paused to read a poem in unison from little cards printed out on thick paper and brushed with autumn watercolors.  (Such a lovely little touch!)

 

 Ready?

  

 

Off through the Historic District...   

 

  

We made a detour through our favorite independent book shop...

 

Then through a dark, leafy alley...

 

 

Into the neighborhood...

 

 

 

And back at last for a rest on the grass. 

   

 

 

To see our lantern walk in California beneath the eucalyptus forest, click HERE.