5 Minute Friday: Belly-up Tender

I came into the room with apprehension. These two don’t get to do this type of meeting much anymore. Life’s ride has taken them differently lately. I didn’t know if I would be welcomed. This pop-in is unscheduled and this is a place for the guys, one of which I used to be. But I was greeted large with hugs, that crook up and pull into the side guy style. I bellied-up, wiggling myself onto the high stool, and ordered.

They were talking football, name dropping and action telling, and I had no clue about stats mentioned without the definitive terms like ‘sacks’ or ‘interception.’ It was a language of their kind that wrapped around me comfortably and loosely like an old high school backpack.

I listened to the stories told of National Championship meetings and dinners and one crazy chic in the stands who at one point was crawling around on the sticky cement. I cringed at him as the adjectives became stronger and the woman crazier then we both made mention of the amount of Purell needed to fix that.

I laughed hard, asked snarky questions, took fun and gave it back.

And when they turned toward each other, lowering voices, I sat back, looked at the TV to read the scrolling scores and upcoming stories because here is where I knew it was about them and their language more secret than sports comings and goings, deep like marrow, was heard in lulls like the sea.

Phones buzzed and clocks were checked. When it was time really go, I received again the side hug. I smiled wide and wished well. I saw my dear friend reach around from behind him, arm strong across neck and chest, and pull him close. He squeezed hard saying something in that way that caused them both to laugh. And I looked at both of their faces but had to turn away. So much glory in the witness.

This is the way it is with dear friends. The parting, the missing, the returning together. Those moments of the call out, the pull from, across a table filled with Mexican. The language spoken in half sentences and looks. The climbing on belly up for a short time. The sitting beside tenderness.

***

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Grandparent Way

There’s a way with grandparents that I don’t comprehend because I am just this side of it, still mothering children who are inch by inch reaching my height and forget to brush their teeth and pick up dirty clothes.

She’s smiling and directing traffic in the midst of the clean-up frenzy. Bodies are moving around picking up scraps of paper and ribbon. She began this big family over 60 years ago and says each time all gather that she is amazed. Sometimes the words are laced with tears of awe and other times she simply shakes her head because she knows she’ll never be able to wrap her arms all the way around blessing.

When she grabs me, here in the middle of all this, I feel as I’m six and tiny, below the 50% mark on the doctor’s chart, despite the fact that in heels I tower over her.

“I saw you in there cleaning and washing dishes,” she grins at me. All I can do is nod with that bit of uncomfortableness that comes from attention.

“You always jump in, don’t you?” she jostles me as if a babe on her lap then pulls me in tighter. “You are a blessing to our family. A blessing,” she draws out the words loudly. “God brought you to us, our family, and into Terry’s life. Such a blessing.”

And here is where I melt. Here is where that little girl inside this woman body, the same one who on her sixth birthday ran to the bathroom overcome because all were singing Happy Birthday, simply turns to watery puddle.

I had not heard this said outloud specifically to me before until I met her years ago, when I still had that new girl shine and all questioned permanancy. I was undone and overcome that day too with strangers, her family, standing around in clumps. I felt as if the whole room shone with a light bright on me even though no true attention was given except by this woman.

A few years ago on Christmas Day, she sat next to me while I ate dinner. Others had finished and were picking up stray napkins and forks and clattering plates into a heaping sink. My small portion of this gathering, that 0n a full Christmas Day is nearly a hundred, were finished also. I watched my husband stand with a boy leaning into his side, talking with his mom and others. I shook the lonely from my head, I remember, and the toxic observation ”Only you would be lonely in a crowd.”

“Here I’ll sit with you. Nobody should eat alone. Especially on Christmas, huh?” she said. Then she talked about the week and the tree. Her face was in her hand and she leaned over the table smoothing the gold cloth. She smelled of garlic and something sweetly feminine. I remember wondering what perfume she had spritzed on wrist and neck that morning inbetween the shuffle of dishes in and out of the oven.

A few weeks ago, I stood in her doorway and heard my name mentioned. I smiled, twisting my foot into door jam. “She’s beautiful, isn’t she Joe?” and she winked.

I huffed and twisted my face to match my foot to toss off the compliment. And she huffed back solid loud. “Ah, just accept it,” she said turning towards the kitchen then she sung it not once but three times in that heavy French accent.

I am travelling with her this weekend. It is the first time we will be together for days constant, not the scheduled pop-in or holiday celebration that contain a departure time before setting sun. And I am afraid. The “What If” questions began rolling in weeks ago and have picked up speed because I know I’m not that great. I know I’m not a blessing some days. I know all of this and can list each non-blessing out and have before and others still do and I don’t want her to find out.

Then I remember, even though the pull of those hard calloused questions is steady urging me to roll into them, that there is a way with grandparents, a mysterious God way, that knows there are places murky and shadowy – they’ve heard of them in others and have them too -  but sees around them. Or is it through them?

 

In Other Words: Women’s Connection

“We are women, and my plea is Let me be a woman, holy through and through, asking for nothing but what God wants to give me, receiving with both hands and with all my heart whatever that is.” ~~ Elisabeth Elliot

I read the quote and thought of her. I pictured her head bend over the kitchen counter, the one in the corner near the sink and the dining room door. The window is on the left of this makeshift desk and in my mind’s eye she can see the pre-dawn sky. She’s reading the Bible and other books, perhaps even one from the stack she received about Elisabeth Elliot from her dear friend. She’s penning lists and revelation into a bound journal. She’s pleading for God to fill her up, pour into her so her self that she’s listing right now in the early morning fades. She longs for holy and searches for it to cling to daily.

I always smile when I picture her like this because here I sit scrunched over my laptop on the deep freezer top longing for the same but knowing it’ll come differently.

I don’t even own a journal rightly. I have scraps of paper with thoughts and phrases, mine and others, scrawled in pencil, in pen, sometimes a blue crayon that’s handy. Sometimes the words are written on my hand. I think my husband, who cleaned up and out, found these thought remnants laying around and simply shook his head. He dislikes mess and when I spill, I make mess.

Our hearts are made of the same stuff though. Hers and mine and other women I know. Our hearts wait while our other muscles get things done. Our brains mark time by lists crossed off and all together long for deeper and wider and more.

And when women cry we think this. We think “Let me be a woman.” Because deep down we know that we with help will gather up the pieces and put them together better and brighter than dreamed. That’s what we women do.

We take what is given, whether it’s a time to be somewhere wearing matching clothes, cookies and snacks to bring tomorrow morning to school, a pile of dirty clothes, a skinned up knee, a comment that shines brightly on our skin, cupcakes shared with friends and swings on a fall day with all of the family.

And I believe these are the things that God gives us. All of it.

I know the receipt should be with open hands and open heart consistently. I pray that this remembering is enough on those days when I am clenched tight and barely breathing.

Sitting here, I wonder if this is what she seeks too. This solid bravery of open hand for whatever it is.

____

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A List

I don’t know if it’s my love of lists – I am the woman who will add something done in thick lead pencil simply so I can mark it off.

I don’t know if it was because of a recent visit to m About page just to see if anything needed updated beyond the ages of my children and my taste buds.

I don’t know if it’s the sizzle of first month setting in a new year that pulled me in. After all, this is the time some like me are still wrapping arms and brains around what is wanted next, what comes next, which way is next.

When I read the lists, I was drawn in. I recalled throughout the week the way remembered randomly prompts settled on these women like fine shimmer and put a skin on them to touch in a space that’s rather intangible.

I regret… nothing

I am not….. particularly gifted at anything, but can do an adequate job of a lot of things.

I feel….. wimpy and weak most of the time.

I wish….. I could succinctly explain to others how I spend my time.

~ Tami

***

I am the honoured mom of three (still hard to type that).

I fight the clock for enough time.

I smell toast cooking.

I always choose chocolate for dessert.

~ Miriam

They sat me at their kitchen tables, I think, and gave a sort of community I crave. With a nod to them and to Chrysalis I peck out quickly my own list in the pre-breakfast hour.

***

I am a child of God sometimes disguised as the town fool, but His child loved beyond imagination despite all of that.

I want to be told at the end of the day “Good Job” and “You’re Beautiful.”

I have messy hair most days. I’m not a brusher.

I wish I could better show & explain the ways God reveals Himself in my life.

I hate putting gas in my car and washing silverware then putting it in the drawer.

I miss parts of the woman I was – the gentle supple parts that laughed louder and those strong parts that stood tall.

I fear ridicule and judgment.

I feel sticky in humid AL post-storm air.

I hear the wind send drops pinging against the pipes in the roof. It’s not raining so the sound startles me.

I smell the dog, who slept on my bathrobe during the storm.

I crave intimate community.

I search for God every day in the beauty and ugly of others and all, in our home, in this world.

I wonder far too much.

I regret eating that eggroll. I think I’m still picking cabbage from my teeth even after brushing and flossing.

I love so many people and moments so deeply that words escape me and all I can do is brim.

I ache in my right knee. I’m afraid to run on it and I miss pounding it all out.

I care for so many people during the day sometimes it taps me dry.

I always forget to close cabinet doors.

I am not a good knitter, but I keep on stitching away in that hopeful romantic way (or maybe it’s obstinate child way).

I believe unequivocally that cowboy boots go with everything, that chocolate cake is an excellent idea always and a good kiss in the morning can last all day.

I dance in the kitchen when cooking.

I sing angelically in the car, in the shower, with my children. Of course the word ‘angelically’ is subjective.

I cry a lot inwardly not only from pain but from a joy and compassion and love that is deeper than I realize.

I don’t always remember to pay the bills. I write the checks, mark it down then forget to mail them.

I fight to find silence during hectic days – during most days – to fill me up.

I write because I cannot not write. And because I have to relive things twice in order to find a deeper clarity and remember.

I never thought I would live in AL this long. I thought it was just a ping on the radar not a settling in when I came down here over 10 years ago.

I listen whole heartedly when people speak.

I need to remember to do so many things today. Unfortunately, I’ve forgotten half of them already. I’m being real not cheeky.

I am happy most days except when I’m not. Now this is cheeky.

A Love Story: Smoothing Vivid

Your words jerked my head up and went right through me.

“Come here. I’m trying to love on you.”

I obeyed. I placed the debit card in my wallet and walked to you down the the length of our truck filled with children. Your long legs didn’t step over the hose. My short ones did. And as I put my hand on the side of dirty truck to balance myself you laughed and pulled me up into the leanness of you.

I didn’t really want to. I, whose mind was clutter-jammed, didn’t want to go to you, whose prizes perfection and clean. Until I felt your arms reach down and your breath in my hair. Then I remembered and those whisperings became louder than the cars surrounding us and louder than those children laughing and rolling inside the truck. You are mine. And I am yours. And there is no imperfection, only delight. And this is when I breathed so deeply and rested so solidly.

***

The words came while I was stitching and making. The homemade canvas fell and I tried to control the spill of me onto the floor.

“I love you.”

I smiled into your eyes and forced around the lump in my throat the words in return. You have seen me wander around the house with messy hair and rips in my pajamas and toss out harsh words and forget to lay anything out for dinner. You, who know so much more than this outward skin, give me this.

And I need this.

I need to hear those words spoken out loud into the light wind after Thanksgiving Day, into the sun that warms my hands holding satin ribbon and needle, into those places deep where ‘enough’ struggles for definition.

I gathered the words and the smile and the light and my self. I pulled the ribbon taunt and smooth it rightly. I tucked this into my pocket for those threadbare days to use to mend and patch.

***

“Why do you always smile and giggle when I do that?” you said with the sun behind your head. You were the silhouette who had just swooped around my waist like this and pulled me to you like that and kissed me tilted and bound like the photo taken after a war in crowded streets. Our children watched, I know they did. They were skateboarding and ramping and hollering loud and laughing louder in the cul-de-sac, but I know they stopped for a hint of a moment to witness the swoop and the lift and the kiss.

I hope too they each took notes in their own way. Arm glides around the waist like this, pulls deftly up like that, and this is how a kiss works.

In response I could do nothing but smile wider and attempt to hide the color rising to my face. I had no words then. And I don’t now because it’s just.

***

And it’s these vivid moments that I smooth out and over these days when there seems to be miles between and each of us are stepping over more than looping hoses at the gas station and our hands are overflowing full of things to put together rightly and the world is loud outside our space.

I know if I sit still, I’ll hear the quiet murmur over the grind of the dishwasher, the tick of the clock and the bubbling hiss of a water heater warming the words “Hello Gorgeous” and “You were made for that” and “Dang!” and enough love to wrap me up tightly and fill the places believed to be lacking.

***
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Marking Time

Because it was easier to be in separate cars on this day, I armed myself with a google map then drove focused into the dark aware of time moving.

But I kept thinking, I miss him. Adam. My son. My firstborn. My seeker and finder of the mother in me. Our movement from having and holding to letting go was breathtakingly short. And now again my breath was being taken away.

And I stretched out thin to remember all and any. And I battled to recall, fearing the fade of time and the pain it can cause. And I searched with every cell longing for a hint of him in this temporal world.

There are few people who understand this I know. Few people tendon and artery deep know the prayers for a God to take a child out of mercy and love because there’s nothing here on earth that can heal. Few understand how the counting of days, sometimes minutes, softens the path to eternity.

And that’s okay. This is unnatural and unimaginable and undesirable. Thus relation to it, to me, is boiled bone hard.

Our car arrived first.

We found the restroom and I smiled that high school bathrooms are the same through the ages with their square tile and one stall with a broken latch.

We were guided to our seats in the busy auditorium by our middle son to wait for the concert to begin. We watched the kids filled with the title musician move about to here then there. We named the instruments that twisted and curled to make breath beautiful. We listened to the tuning up, the scraping of chairs, the voices organize and guide, the scales going up and down, the gently and haltingly keeping of common time.

We searched for the one tall boy that I claim mine by gift. He will be wearing the Santa hat because he will want to be a part of the celebration. He will be over-helping as he does. All of us strained our necks and squinted at the percussion section in the back far right. The littlest tried to stand in his seat.

And when I spotted him, that place deep inside trilled loudly like a horn gathering mightly all. I stood and shimmied my way out to wall. I zoomed and clicked, knowing I should do it twice because of that quaking joy of find and that sad sigh of longing would cause the camera lens to tremble too.

When he arrived, there were high fives, stiff greetings and a shifting of seats. And I watched his eyes search quietly until found. I saw his attention hone in. I handed him the camera when asked.

His counting of days, marking of time, is different, I thought. By common calculation, I have 35 years left. He has days inked off with thick black and days already circled. But as I watched him fumble then click, I wondered if he would take two because of the mix of quake just like mine.

Think Bigger

He was talking about aperture and ISO’s. Terms known but lacking definition in my messy mind. So I leaned in and listened to gleam knowledge.

My sweet husband mentioned our daughter’s photography project. He told the story of how I pushed. And I cringed inside with the thought that all have limits and that – Thank God – this wasn’t the day hers were reached. I listened to him tell how I said “This is a good idea, but I think you can do better. Think bigger.” I wondered if it was admiration or that stubborn inflexible muscle that caused his head to shake and mouth to smile like that when saying these words.

My friend laughed loud. “She does that to me, too! And I want to say - this is all I got!” He pushed my arm like he does. And we all laughed loud.

“I fear they’re going to hate me for it some day,” I chuckle with a knowledge deep and wide of the buck that comes with relationship.

Driving home later, I listened again as I do to that conversation. And that small voice inside said the words I didn’t say then.

I do it too, Husband, Friend. I push myself too. To think bigger than this five foot frame that houses one messy mind and thousands of swirling emotions. And I don’t know why I reign myself in with firm “not yet.” I don’t know why I table ideas and words and emotion and return later to chew slowly.

Is it flat out raw fear? Of ridicule and judgement? Of failure?

Yes. There is a heap of that.

But there are times, I want to say, that this push and formal turning over produces something totally magnificent, completely glorious. And here is when I know I moved not by own muscle and sinew but by something bigger, by saving spirit. Then I fall into awe and and intrigue and love freshly, like the first time.

“Nah, they’re going to grow up to be brilliant and creative kids,” my friend said.

In the car, I raise my hand, the same one’s whose rise towards thick dust caked ceiling then was restrained, and say aloud the words I silenced ”Despite me.”

Knitting Genesis

She gives me the details as one does while driving in eight lanes of traffic and looking for the correct exit and as she does with most. Bullet pointed. Outlined form. Before she changes lanes, she laughs in that self-accepting jab way, and delves into the city roads of four lanes total.

And I knit, looking up at sign and cars occasionally before returning to purl two knit two. I listen to stories of emergency surgery of a little girl accidentally shot with a pellet gun and of the in-laws and of mother’s grocery lists and of the funeral he will be officiating soon for a member of the church.

“I didn’t know this about him,” I say. And I feel this weight descend causing needles to rest in lap and eyes to search the sky for cloud and full moon rise.

“Sometimes he calls and I hear Bill say “I see, Son,” and “Let me know if I can do anything to help you.” But really all he needs is a sounding board and Bill was it.”

I nod, pick up sticks and arrange all of the knots inside to continue smooth circles.

The pressures of a man are great, I think.

Of this one man, who has three households and one interim around his waist and in his palm, are great.

Of the one who as sounding board must offer support, listen and not physically act, as is preferred, is great. Of my man, who is off with our three we are raising to become strong is great.

All of those big resume words shoot in – To Lead, To Provide, To Protect – followed by those softer words unmarked by own black & white lines, the ones in between and intertwined - To Love, To Cherish, To Soothe.

Adam was called first by God in Eden after eating the toxic fruit, after sitting idly by watching – was it with indifference? or fear? And he, who named all, was burdened with all in that moment.

I can’t help but wonder in my messy girl mind if he didn’t run back to that grove and that valley in the deepest darkest night wanting entry. I wonder if it was in frenzy the night Abel was born when motions and pain new and out of his control were witnessed. Or if it was after the title of Father was felt stretching places inside wide as his hands cupped the head of firstborn.

“And Emily tries to help the best she can.”

And I think of Eve. Of how Adam exclaimed his joyous”My” at first sight. I wonder if he dreamed this right here, while sleeping that one time, of two becoming one suddenly real, tangible and supple to touch. I think that this is truly the first holding, the first cupping, the first point where all of those inbetween words began weaving themselves inside.

“He’s always been patient,” she said. “Even as a child, he was just so patient.”

I wonder if sometimes Adam went to sit in silence a few yards away from the blocking fire and longed for the stiff breeze to blow the scents he often dreamed to cling to his t-shirt and blue jeans.

The conversation changes to coupons and a journey taken along back roads, but I drift in listening.

Eve must smell it t00 upon his return. She smiles remembrance and yearning deep in his wake when he walks by on the way to the kitchen. The boys follow him bustling around the island as he fills a glass. They explode questions at break neck speed not listening to answers before changing lanes to where and why. Does Adam laugh delight and slowly drink?

When we pull into the parking lot, I look down at the ring of yarn. I smooth stitches into one long continuous pattern growing bigger with each twist. I open the car door and offer quiet Selah.

In Other Words: Genuflect

“If I can’t find God in the ordinary places of life, either I’m not looking hard enough or he’s not nearly as approachable as I need him to be.   This is a paradox too. God appears in all the ordinary places, burning bushes, naked Barbies, plumbing disasters. But when he does, those places become holy. Moses had to take his shoes off.” ~from an interview with Marcus Goodyear, Barbies at Communion

He says he approaches God by writing poetry. He says this is how he offers the formality of incense and genuflection to God who is every detail. This is how he makes Him real and how He makes him real.

I don’t know how I came to this quote. I don’t know how I recalled it during the holiday purge of torn paper scraps and ribbon and cardboard boxes from carpet and couch cushion. It just came.

I was thinking honestly of a woman who didn’t want to lose sight during the rush of gifts, of ribbon, of parties and baking. She said she wanted to stay focused on Him, to remember the bumper sticker slogan “Remember the Reason for the Season.” I told her I would pray for holy vision. And I did and do because I battle myopia too.

I was scooping up, sorting bits and shoving into a bag when I stopped to read what I had written on wood and given to my husband in that silly girl homemade way.

It was our first anniversary – the paper anniversary. I created on a plain wood slab this mosaic of sorts from bits. I remember sitting cross-legged on the tile floor contemplating placement of this image and that image and twirling with messy mind to the process of making paper - the grind of rough bark and sweet insides into pulp, the pressing into shape, the purge of impurities, the heat – most of which to me is a mystery that could be cleared by Google or the public library. Perhaps it was the thought of flame that led me here to the place where shoes are taken off.

I remember I was holding the bag, looking through the living room door into the kitchen. The children began to bang a drum with steady intent. Their voices were muddy sounding groans instead of lilting melody and chorus. They were playing Cowboys & Indians. I had seen each head adorned with the feathers earlier. And I thought of Mary nursing a still sticky babe in a filthy manger and of those who would arrive weary from travel and how the Holy Spirit deconstructs groans then shoved the scraps gathered deep.

“What is it about the everyday that appeals to you?” the interviewer asks.

“It’s where I live!” exclaims Marcus Goodyear. I smile and wonder if his words were blurted internal with that joy of obvious and hint of duh like I would have said it.

I look at the homespun again this morning, amazed that I offered my thick preschool  handiwork to a real artist. The words were scrawled in flurry I remember. “Holy Spirit you are welcome and wanted here.” ”A plan bigger. A mystery bolder.” This is my marriage prayer, I remember musing with Crayola marker in hand. To have and hold and stay together solid in that plain paper way that goes unnoticed. Now three years later, the ink is blurred and messy because time has sunk it deep into the grains and this makes me smile contentedly wide.

“It’s a way of taking my shoes off and showing respect to God when I catch glimpses of him.”

I wrap his words tightly around me and genuflect.

____

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All thru Him,

Cin

The Halves

The world is divorcing, I think. And she is right. My friend who shook her head clear and said not to drink the water at work because three divorces have been announced in as many weeks.

I know the statistics of 50%, of half. That marriage as an institution is on the decline. That more couples are living together, doing daily dishes and scrubbing bathrooms and having children without commitment of better and worse, without the commitment of stay.

And I think of those days, my days, filled with bits of both in a battle for strongest perspective before bodies fall weary into bed.

I think of the man who brought Merry Christmas sticky sweets on plastic trays into work. “From the New …” he said and listed himself and the dogs in a clenched voice. I smiled and clenched too because the familiar searing pain was hard to witness. Then I prayed for him and for her and the dogs and filed away last year’s work.

I think of my dear friend, who asked out loud and “Why would I do something that would ruin my marriage?” as old habits shrouded the gentle light reflected in white satin and crisp linen of yes said less than a year ago. “ ”What wouldn’t I do to make this marriage work?” And I knew it would be hard for her, that she wouldn’t be supported by some, that a battle was raging for identity.

Days later at the dinner table, her husband said “Thank You” and she thought it was for the pork chops and the green beans until he said “for standing up for us,” until he said “it means a lot.”

The fact is we are on our second chance at have and hold. The fact is we are statistic too.

When the woman says not to drink the water, there is wisdom found in cliche. Because isn’t what we take in what we believe? And aren’t we sometimes the ones who poison the well, drink from it and offer it to other and all?

When my dear friend asks the questions, I see truth sought and coming forth as truth always does. I see how flesh choses to bind into one, each grafting the other to make stronger the places once weak.

I know too the statistic that half of those who are unmarried want to be married, crave from this day forward, and most likely seek it daily with either flood or gentle persistent tides.

I wonder if this half stands tall when labeled romantic and ridiculed for rose colored glasses.  I wonder if they tremble at the dangers exposed and the pressure placed by the other half, but continue to raise their cup in salute of happily ever after as I do.