sowing seeds

Did you ever say something regrettable and watch a loved one’s face just crumble? Can you remember what it felt like to see that familiar, trusted countenance fold in on itself like a flower? Sometimes, the offending word or phrase comes out in nearly slow-motion – don’t go there, your brain chides, but the tongue can be insolent and willful. More often, though, we crush somebody’s spirit and are on to the next activity before fully weighing the damage we’ve done. Those of us with quick tempers are especially familiar with this scenario. We vent, we stomp, we slam a door or a drawer – and in those few suspended seconds, it’s all very akin to the satisfying scratching of an itch. Something inflames a nerve, ruffles an insecurity, cramps a conviction, and that swift and sudden fury is like a freight train that can’t be stopped. How desperate we are to make ourselves heard. And in the aftermath, how dismaying to realize the destructive depth of our tracks.

We, as human beings, grapple with mighty challenges, and even mightier faults and frailties. Yet I have come to believe that no excuse can outweigh the price of unleashing an undeserved tirade. Those who care for us are bound to trip up occasionally, despite having our best interests at heart. As they fall, they may bruise a belief or crush an expectation. Unconditional love, after all, can be clumsy and groping and awkward. But in the end, it’s about feeling quiet gratitude for the effort – not jumping to condemn its execution.

Even the thorniest path is graced by an occasional wildflower. They are the bright spots we gather up and carry with us on life’s uneven journey, made all the more precious by their rarity along the way. And as any mother will tell you, no bouquet of long-stem roses can compare with a handful of daisies picked by a hopeful and innocent heart.

snapshots

The light is different, somehow. Did you ever notice that about memories that are clearest because they’re closest to your heart? It’s different. Honeyed, diffused – like dandelion tufts suspended in a sunbeam on a warm summer day. I think back to grade school, watching social studies films that had yellowed with age. Do our minds do that too? Do they break down the harsher celluloid of our reality into something softer and gentler? It’s possible, but unlike those films there are no skips or scratches. My dearest memories stand out like beacons, like glowing guideposts on a dark stretch of road. I suppose it’s because that’s exactly what they are: mile markers on a highway that stretches from one uncertain horizon to another.

Peeking out my bedroom door on Christmas morning when I was five, thrilling at the secret sight of glittering gifts against silver lights and tinsel. Sitting at a stoplight on the last day of junior year, summer and the rest of my life stretched before me like Broadway footlights. My husband stooped down on the sidewalk -- treasured face adorned with sleepy, sweet, silly grin -- lifting our dogs by their front paws and making them wave goodbye as I head off to work. And the very first memory, my earliest: Walking hand-in-mittened-hand with my father on a snow-muffled winter morning, watching gray kittens play and caper in soft, downy flakes of white beside an old brown tree trunk. Or years later, finding a weathered black-and-white snapshot of my father on a sled, just a very little boy almost swallowed by his scarf and parka, holding on for dear life, his face overflowing into a wide-mouthed, toothless, jubilant grin.

I used to wonder about the term “halcyon.” I understood what it meant by its context, used in rusty cliches like “those halcyon days.” So on a whim one afternoon, I looked it up. Sure enough: calm, peaceful, golden, prosperous. But I was surprised to see it identified this way too, as a noun: A fabled bird, thought to have had power to calm the wind and waves while it nested on the sea during the winter solstice.

Why do certain memories nestle in our hearts more snugly and companionably than others? Maybe it’s because their existence is not a random process; because they weren’t so much formed as bestowed as an offering. Tiny windows of light to warm us in the wind and cold. Mooring posts that give us something to cling to when the waters get too rough.

Like a dandelion petal carried in your pocket for luck. Or a perfect first snowflake, caught in the palm of a tiny, mitten-clad, upturned hand.

ghosts of christmas past

When I was a kid, bullies adored me. A single menacing look, and I would cower. In third grade, the head bully used to wait behind a tree, jump out and knock down my books, just to watch me cry and hyperventilate. Once in kindergarten, three classmates chased me for six city blocks on their Big Wheels. Do you know how easy it should be to outrun a kid pedaling that low to the ground? But it didn’t matter; I was terrified, and it showed. Haunted houses? Forget it. A snarl or a rattle of the cage was all it took. Those masked monsters saw me coming from the front door. After my first trip or two, I never went back.

Why am I telling you this? Because an old friend kicked my ass the other day, and I sat still and took it. I took it because life, at the moment, is baring its fangs at me in the worst kind of way, and I needed to be slapped from my panic. What she did was a little bullying for the bright side. Because the sad truth is, you can try to run and hide all you want; but sooner or later, life will bully you into a corner regardless. It will shake your cage, it will rattle your nerves, it will grab you by the shirt and growl full in your face -- and sometimes, it will hit, bite, and leave quite a mark. And it feels like there is nothing you can do. Except thanks to my friend’s tough love, I realize maybe there is. Because you can step up and refuse to back down. You can say I’m making a shift, I’m claiming this moment, and also claiming the one after that, for as long as the clock winds down. You can look around and be grateful, instead of looking ahead and being afraid.

My friend calls this her “coins in the jar” paradigm. We all have a certain number of coins in our jars, she says. And we can try to build moments and memories that add to that collection … or we can succumb to fear and drain coins away. And in my friend’s view, you want to increase that treasure trove as much as you can … so you’ll have something to draw on when times get tough.

She also challenged me to build the most ridiculous holiday gingerbread house I can imagine this year, using graham crackers and gum drops. Roof askew, windows crooked. But sweet, silly, solid. Sort of a symbolic rebuilding that flies in the face of Life the Ultimate Bully. Deck the halls with boughs of holly …

Clink.

interaction warning

What is it about doctors? I understand they’ve logged hundreds of hours of specialized training; that they work long days; that they’ve got state-of-the-art treatment options at their fingertips. What I don’t understand is why so many seem to have lost track of the big picture. When I log into a spreadsheet at work, the spreadsheet does not expect me to speak to it reassuringly. It does not have questions regarding what I’m about to do. It does not expect an encouraging pat on the back. It’s a spreadsheet. It carries no secret aspirations of one day becoming a movie poster. It is my canvas, so to speak, and I understood its limitations when I entered my chosen field.

I, on the other hand, am my doctor’s canvas; and when he’s proposing an action on me I sure as heck want to understand the implications. I am not part of the chair upholstery, and I strongly prefer not to be talked at, talked over, or talked about like I’m not even in the room. It may be a “disease,” a “disorder,” or an “illness” to you, but kindly remember that it’s taking place where I live. I sleep there, I wake up there, and I will break daily bread with the pain and the scars and the void where things used to be. So I am not always going to be understanding, or stoic, or docile, or even polite, because there’s a good chance what you’re dryly pontificating about has me at least unnerved, possibly terrified. And, as your human canvas, I would like to assume you understood my limitations when you entered your chosen field.

What I’m saying is, I think some doctors need to revisit why they became doctors in the first place. Were you trying to help people like me? If so, kindly remember that I am more than a collection of cells to be studied and manipulated. And consider taking a refresher course on what it means to treat actual human beings – perhaps something akin to “art appreciation for the healing sciences.” In the meantime, I’ll draw what lessons I can from my more daunting doctor-related interactions. Because I’d be lying if I said there weren’t a time when somebody really needed me, and I was too busy to look up and talk. I’d be fooling myself if I told you that I’ve always been a perfect listener or a reassuring shoulder; that my eyes were always kind or that I’ve always fought fair. And I’d be ignorant indeed if I assumed the problem I’m describing rests with medical professionals alone.

Chosen or not, we are all each other’s canvas -- and part of what we paint reflects the state of our selves.

animal attraction -- the long way around

I’m going to borrow a trait from my mother here, who could get me to hide as a child just by rattling her car keys. Why? Because, God love her, she is a terrible driver. More specifically, she is terrible with directions. She is incapable of making any trip, anywhere, in a straightforward manner. When I was four, she asked me if I’d like to go to the hardware store with her. The hardware store, mind you, was less than two miles away. They had strawberry Twizzlers there, so of course I was in. What followed was a three-hour vehicular odyssey consisting of four separate trips back and forth to the airport. The airport? Yes. Because my mother kept missing the same highway exit, sending us past the same elderly toll-booth attendant four times. When he finally asked my mother where she was trying to go, and whether she’d like a state trooper escort, it prompted my mother to pull over and burst into hysterical sobs of frustration. As you might imagine, after that trip I had the same reaction whenever my mother tried to take me anywhere.

So today I’m going to explain why I like dogs. But as you can see, I'm doing so by way of a roundabout little detour. A somewhat less traumatizing detour than the airport excursion of my youth, yes -- but a detour nonetheless.

My husband’s favorite casual restaurant is Moe’s, and we usually go there about once a week. He likes the bottomless tortilla chips; I go for the free salsa bar. We normally take our dogs with us, and they wait less-than-patiently in the car. Pondering my basket of food last week, it struck me that so many of us are like a Moe’s burrito. Held together on the outside, falling apart on the inside. Melting, cheesy, full of beans, pick your favorite Tex-Mex analogy. My point is, the outer part, the wrapper, masks some degree of insecurity, anxiety, fear, shame, or outright despair. And we work so hard to perfect that wrapper. Why is it in place? Most people would say we’re afraid to let the insides spill out where others can see. But I actually suspect we’re afraid to show our inner selves to ourselves –- because in truth, the sheer depth of those feelings can be frightening. It’s easier to deal with loose ends here or there, tuck them back in where we can. I think behaviorists call this “selective perception." And I understand that it may be a self-preservation instinct, but I don't think we're doing ourselves any favors.

Now here’s the contrast that occurred to me as we snuck some tortilla chips out to the car last week: My dogs are on full tilt, every minute, all the time. There is absolutely no mute button, and they seem incapable of self-editing. Take fear, for example. My cockapoo mix is afraid of –- among other things –- motorcycles, egg timers, and Swiffer dust-mops. Should one of these objects (or God forbid, all three at once) ever cross his field of vision, he either barks frantically, has an accident, and/or wraps himself around my throat. You can imagine the mayhem that ensues when we pass a scooter in the car. Meanwhile, his sister the beagle is less effervescent, but no less straightforward: she growls menacingly, hides, growls, then hides some more. In either case, they wear their fears out loud.

I sometimes wonder what the world would be like if more of us had the courage –- or possibly just the big, dopey, blissful ignorance –- to be more like my dogs. If we weren’t so afraid to let everyone in on our faults. To display the imperfections and insecurities that mix with and mask our most lovable parts. To experience every moment all-out, with brave, defiant, thrumming feeling, despite the fear of what lies ahead.

Cold feet, warm hearts. I suppose it's a trait only a mother could love. Pass the guacamole.

the road less traveled

I drove past myself in the car last night.

What I mean to say is, I was passed by a guy who reminds me a lot of myself ... specifically, the way he sped past me in a huff because I was in a 40 zone doing -- imagine this -- 40. I can’t say that I blame him, because I’ve visited that same state of mind more than I care to admit. It’s almost like I’m offended, maybe even a little threatened, by someone who isn’t moving frantically enough toward an ultimate goal or appointment. In truth, it’s not that my own affairs have typically been all that pressing. It’s just that I’ve felt less vital, somehow, when I’m not moving a few paces faster than average. The thing is, I don’t really know that this has propelled me any further than I would have gotten otherwise. In the case of the guy who passed me, for instance, I watched his taillights fade into the darkness as he revved his engine impatiently. Then I watched them grow larger and larger as I caught up to him at the next stoplight. I smirked but resisted the urge to actually wave or applaud, as that would have come too close to making fun of myself. I did note with some amusement, however, that his vanity plates shouted “GAILFORCE.” Why, of course. Full of sound and fury, still sitting next to me at the intersection. What do we gain from all this haste? I’m not sure. But I am starting to notice what I’ve been missing along the way.

Interestingly, here’s one of those understated details: the decal in this gentleman’s back window. Just two simple words, “Finish Strong.” Now there’s something worth appreciating. In life, we mess up. We lose hope. We fall down, sometimes again and again. And as someone once lamented to me, we can never go back and make a brand new start. But we can start right now, and make a brand new ending.

wrapping up wonder

I watched a little boy fog up a window with his breath the other day. He seemed transfixed: I breathe in, the fog goes away. I breathe out, there it is again. His little nose and chubby cheeks were pressed so close to the glass that he barely seemed to remember the Christmas display he'd been gazing at in the first place. And I thought to myself: When do we lose that? When do we forget to be in awe of little things? My days are filled with tiny miracles -- the garage that keeps my car dry, the huge coat that keeps me warm in the snow, the assurance of a warm meal for dinner, my husband reaching out to hold my hand -- but too often, I'm wrapped up in the crashing stock market and the plummeting economy. I'm worried about health. I'm wondering what others think of me. What was it like to forget to worry? To forget to notice surroundings? To sit in rapt attention at the miracle of breath itself?

As adults, we strain and strive for power, success, control. It's the currency of our society. Yet children, the most powerless among us, are also the most innocently joyful. The most filled with simple wonder. I wonder what that says about our priorities?

And a little child shall lead them.