Isaiah 56: 3-8

September 1, 2015June 17, 2022 Sally3 Comments

“Here’s the thing,” says God.
“Don’t you go saying that you don’t belong to My family,
And don’t you go thinking that because you don’t ‘produce’ I’m going to throw you out.
I don’t work like that.
At all.
If you love Me
If you embrace activities and ideas that please Me
If you hold fast to the promises I have made to you
Then I will give to you something better than any fame, fortune, or power you might receive from the world for something you did
What I have to give you is better than a large family or even one successful child
What I have to give you is a name —
A name that will forever tie you to Me.”

“And if you think you don’t belong in My family,
let Me ask you this —
Do you love Me?
Do you serve Me?
Do you help others because you know Me?
Do you set aside time
when you aren’t working
and just think about Me?
Do you lay in a grassy field on a Sunday afternoon,
look up at my blue sky, and utter a simple thank-you?”

“My door is always open to you
because you are family.
Mi casa es su casa.”

“You are family.
You are welcomed with great joy
and big bear hugs
(even though you say you don’t like hugs).”

“Come.
Sit with Me in the quiet.
Whisper to Me.
I am always listening.”

“You may think that you’re an outcast,
but I am gathering you in My arms
and holding you close.”

family

Best Numbers and Peas

August 29, 2015May 5, 2017 Sally3 Comments

“Hey, Mom, do you know what the best number is?”

Karl asked this at dinner because we were discussing numbers.

For the record, I did not know what the best number was, nor did I even know there was a best number.

I mean, I do have a soft spot for primes and squares. Doesn’t everybody?

But I don’t have a favorite number.

And I didn’t know there was a best number.

The discussion had started with the number four. I don’t remember who said it, but someone brought up the fact that four is considered unlucky in certain countries like Korea or China.

“It’s like thirteen in this country,” I said, “but I don’t think thirteen is that bad. It is, after all, prime.”

That’s when Karl asked the best number question.

“Seven?” Bud guessed.

A lot of people really like seven. It’s a prime. And considered lucky.

“Nope,” Karl answered. “But it has a seven in it.”

I started mentally running through the numbers ending with seven. “Seventeen?” I guessed.

“Nope.”

I knew it couldn’t be twenty-seven. It is a cube number which makes it interesting, but not the best.

“Thirty-seven?” I guessed.

“It’s seventy-three,” Karl said. “It’s the twenty-first prime and the mirror of thirty-seven which is the twelfth prime. Twelve and twenty-one are mirrors.”

Kind of cool. For someone who likes prime numbers. And symmetry.

How we got from there to spitting peas I don’t know.

Really. The next thing I knew Karl was challenging Laurel to a pea-spitting contest.

They each took a few peas from their dinner plate and headed to the back deck to see who could spit them farther.

“Mom,” Mary pleaded, “they’re spitting peas.”

“I know,” I said, “but Karl leaves for college soon.”

Would I have allowed this years ago when Philip was heading off to college? Probably not.

But I’ve learned.

At the end of the day, the things we remember aren’t the quirky discussions of numbers but the spitting of peas and the accompanying laughter.

I so want my children to look back at their growing up years and be able to laugh.

Faith · family

The Milk House Window

August 15, 2015January 26, 2025 Sally3 Comments

Across from my parents’ house a little building we called the milk house used to stand. I don’t know that it was ever used for milking animals. We incorporated it into the pig pen at one point and later, when we had no pigs, used it for storage. The milk house was filled with shutters and windows and bee hives and rusty things and broken things and stuff.

And then the roof caved in.

My brother-in-law and my sister drove up from Florida with two carpet cleaners. After cleaning some of the carpets in my parents’ house, Gil went to work on the old milk house. When they drove back to Florida, they left behind the carpet cleaners and had in their car a cast iron pig trough and an old gate. It was the family version of the trading-up game.

Three walls of the milk house are still standing, one with a window facing the road.

A lonely pane of glass remains in an upper corner, dirty and dusty, care-worn. It’s my new favorite place to view the world.

My window in the world — My window to the world

If it weren’t so close to the road, and if trucks didn’t drive past not following the speed limit, roaring like monsters and shaking the earth, I might sit on the bank for hours and watch the spider weave its web and the leaves change color through that window.

I’m quite sure that somewhere in that window is at least one deep spiritual truth.

The Trinity framed out.

The light pouring through.

Now I see through a glass darkly, but with a slight shift of my eyes I see face to face.

The undeniable brokenness, no matter how neatly it is stacked.

What treasures lie in broken things!

My sister and her husband got a rusty pig trough which I have to admit was pretty cool, but I think I got the better treasure — a window to the world.

family · Grief

Howard Talbot

July 22, 2015September 4, 2017 Sally5 Comments

My first job was at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown. Ticket and souvenir sales were rolled into one department. One lucky girl, often my sister, got to sit in the private ticket booth and read books when she wasn’t busy. The rest of us worked the ticket window and the souvenir counter.

Howard Talbot hired me.

“Well, hello, young lady,” he said whenever he greeted me, a big smile on his face. He was a genuinely happy man who intimidated me only because he was my boss.

I saw him a couple of weeks ago and he still greeted me the same way.

“Well, hello, young lady,” he said, and smiled that same smile. He was stooped over a walker and I have some gray hair now, but I was transported to the old BBHofF, before they added on and made it big and fancy.

His office was right around the corner from the souvenir shop so we saw him often.

That same summer that I worked for him for the first time, I also had a part-time job working for a researcher at Bassett Hospital. Dr. Ashford was looking at temperature changes in patients in the days before their death. My job was to pull charts of patients who had died in the hospital and retrieve the data about their temperature from the vitals recorded by the nurses.

Between my work at the Hall of Fame and my work at the hospital, I kept busy which was always a good thing for me. By the end of the summer, though, I was tired of working. Both jobs could continue into the school year, although both employers acknowledged that my hours would be less.

The introvert in me loved the aloneness of the research job, so I decided that I needed to tell Mr. Talbot that I wouldn’t be available to work at the Hall of Fame during the winter. The next time I worked, I asked him if I could talk with him for few minutes.

I had mentally rehearsed everything I wanted to say to him. Still, I fidgeted nervously in the chair opposite his desk after he called me into his office.

“Well, young lady,” he said with a smile, “what can I do for you?”

“I’ve really enjoyed working at the Hall of Fame this summer,” I told him.

He nodded at me encouragingly.

“And you know I’ve also been doing some work for Dr. Ashford,” I said. Dr. Ashford lived just around the corner from the Talbots.

He nodded again.

“So the summer has been ludicrous,” I said.

He stopped nodding. He looked at me. I thought that maybe he didn’t understand the big word I had used.

“You know, I made a lot of money,” I explained.

A smile played at the corners of his mouth. It’s a wonder he didn’t burst out laughing.

“I think you mean lucrative,” he said quite seriously, though his eyes twinkled as he watched me.

I’m sure I blushed. I can still feel the redness in my face. I forgot the rest of my speech, and, as a result, ended up working at the Hall of Fame for the next two years.

It really was a fun job.

Howard Talbot passed away a few days ago. Yesterday I went to his calling hours. I told his wife and his children how much I loved the way he always greeted me and called me “young lady,” whether I was 15 or 55.

I couldn’t bring myself to tell them this story. It still makes me blush. And laugh.

But today it might make me cry.

Good-bye, Mr. Talbot. Thanks for the job and the memories. I’m glad I knew you.

family

“I Can Do It”

July 17, 2015May 9, 2017 Sally7 Comments

Darn it, Mary. You weren’t supposed to worm your way into my heart like you did.

I’m not talking about my Mary. Of course my own daughter is firmly entrenched there. I’m talking about nursing home Mary. I-can-do-it Mary. I-love-you Mary.

My father had pointed her out to me a while ago.

“See that woman,” he said, nodding towards her. “She always kisses me.”

Sure enough, she wheeled herself over to my father and took his hand.

“I llllove you,” she had said, carefully pronouncing each word and leaving a space between them.

My father patiently waited while she held his hand and said these words. Then, she started to sing, “I can do it. I can do it.” I think there may have been a few more lyrics, but those were the main ones. On repeat. Accompanied by an elderly fist pump. For emphasis.

Only one hand could fist pump, though. The other was curled in tetany.

“She had a stroke, I think,” my father told me one day after the hand-kissing ritual.

I would see her around when I went to visit my mother.

“I love you,” she always said. I could tell that the letter “L” took special effort on her part.

She hugged and kissed my Mary one day. Over and over. My Mary was gracious and allowed it.

“I can do it,” she always said, too. Sometimes she sang out those words to a tune that only she knew.

Sometimes, though, she would come very near and cradle another person’s face in her hand, her one good hand, look them in the eye, and say, “Say, ‘I can do it.'” She would repeat it until the other person echoed the words. Then she would reward them with “I love you.”

I watched her go through the dining area one day and get every single resident to say “I can do it.” It was remarkable.

Since she sat near my mother, Mary took particular interest in her, especially when my mother didn’t eat well.

“I can do it,” she said. “I love you.”

Last week, I heard Mary say something different. She said, “No.”

The man serving dinner asked if she wanted a meatball sub.

She gave an emphatic no. I didn’t blame her. The food was pathetic.

But she refused all the food she was offered. She indicated that she wanted something in her cup. It was already filled with milk. An aide got out the chocolate syrup.

“NO,” she responded, covering the cup with her hand.

The aide got her a straw and got the same response.

“Ginger ale?”

“NO.”

“Juice?”

“NO.”

Finally, Mary wheeled herself away never getting whatever it was she wanted. It must be so hard to communicate with only the words “I can do it,” “I love you,” and “No.”

And I never heard her say the first two at all that night.

Last night, she sat at the dinner counter looking so sad. Again she refused all food with a much weaker “no” before wheeling herself away. I watched her putter down the hall and wished I could help.

A few minutes later a nurse was calling for help. For Mary. She was in distress. The nurse asked someone to call the ambulance.

“No,” Mary said.

The she spoke progressively louder — “No. NO. NO.”

I wanted so badly to hear her say, “I can do it.”

I wanted her to tell somebody, “I love you.”

They got her chart out. “No hospitalization” was noted there. The ambulance was cancelled. Mary was wheeled to her room.

Today I can’t stop thinking about her.

I stood outside her door before we left, but there was too much bustling going on inside, and, really, I don’t know her.

“Happiness dwells in the soul” reads her door. Surely, it dwells in her soul.

You can do it, Mary.

I love you.

family

Ashokan Farewell

July 6, 2015June 8, 2017 Sally3 Comments

It felt like such a private moment. The delicate strains of the violin playing Ashokan Farewell swirled around us in the great sanctuary.

I watched her play, and then I had to look away.

It was Bob Herst’s memorial service. I knew that I needed to be there. Our families’ lives have long been intertwined. Both families, ours and the Hersts, arrived in Cooperstown in 1967. They had four children, we had five — my youngest brother the only one without a corresponding Herst.

In those early years, I sat in the front row and played tic-tac-toe with Calvin on the nap of the velvet pew cushions of the Presbyterian Church while his father stood at the lectern and preached. Calvin knew the Lord’s Prayer and all the words to the Nicene Creed; at the age of 8, I was duly impressed.

We vacationed with them in Myrtle Beach. One time, at a crowded restaurant, in order for our large party to be seated, we had split up — adults at one table, children at another. Ricky harassed our waitress by flipping up his eyelids and batting them at her while he ordered.

Oh, the memories.

When someone at the memorial service talked about the Herst’s hospitality, I remembered sitting in their kitchen while Ricky prepared blue mashed potatoes. I mentioned it to him yesterday.

“You were ahead of your time,” I told him. “I thought of you when they started coming out with blue foods.”

“I thought of me when they started making blue foods,” he laughed.

But their house was always open. I never felt unwelcome there.

And it seems like there was always music there. Sweet music. Rich music. Cello. Violin. Piano. Trumpet. French horn.

Calvin played the organ at my wedding. He has made a living of music.

Jean Herst -- waiting to play — Jean Herst — waiting to play

He accompanied his mother at the memorial service.

Ashokan Farewell — gentle and sorrowful.

She began playing solo and then Calvin joined in.

Although, she had a music stand in front of her, I don’t think she looked at it. Her eyes were closed and the music rose as the bow passed over the strings.

Heartache was etched in the lines on her face, but love poured from the violin. I watched until I couldn’t bear it.

She held the last note and left it lingering over us.

When she stopped, silence fell on the seated congregation.

How can anyone speak after that?

Later I hugged her.

“You were so brave,” I told her. “You played beautifully.”

“It was his request,” she said.

Nearly 66 years together. She honored him well.

family

Overlap

June 12, 2015April 20, 2017 Sally4 Comments

The following is the text of what I read at the reception for Sam and Donna, my newly-married son and his beautiful wife. Enjoy.

Once we had a guy re-shingle our carport roof – a mostly flat roof, only slightly pitched downward from house to gutter. Bud uttered a minced expletive when he saw what the workman had done.

I thought the roof looked good with its neat black lines of overlapping shingles.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“He did it backwards,” Bud complained, but I still didn’t understand.

I’m slow to understand construction problems. I had to look at it for a long time before it sunk in. The shingles overlapped in the wrong direction. He had started at the top and worked his way down, so where they overlapped rain could work its way underneath the next shingle.

But this really isn’t about roofing or shingles or mistakes made in shingling.

It’s about Sam and Donna.

And it’s about the way our lives overlap, like shingles properly installed on a roof.

It’s about Sam’s first Christmas.

Not his first Christmas as a baby. He probably didn’t even get any good gifts that year. With him being the third child, I had figured out that babies almost one year old don’t care very much about shiny new toys. Hand-me-downs are fine as long as they come wrapped with paper that can be ripped into tiny pieces and with curly ribbon that can be waved and boinged.

Honestly, I couldn’t even find any pictures of Sam’s first Christmas. It was that non-monumental. The plight of the third child.

No, this is about the first Christmas when, as an adult, Sam didn’t come home.

“I just don’t get enough days off,” he told me, “and the holidays are such a busy time at the store.”

“What will you do?” I asked. “You can’t spend Christmas alone.”

“No worries, Mom.” He likes to say that. He knows I worry. “I’ve got several invites.”

“Who,” I asked, demanding to know, trying to make him a little accountable.

“The store manager invited me to spend Christmas with him and his family,” he said.

Perfect, I thought. Maybe the manager will like him so much he’ll start giving him better hours.

“Dan and Lindsay invited me, but I’d have to get over to the island,” he said.

Victoria Island. I had never met Dan and Lindsay, although I had heard stories about them and their child, Denali. I had chatted with Lindsay once on Facebook about the nutritional value of hemp. That could be a good choice, I thought.

“And a friend from school invited me to spend Christmas with her family,” he finished.

“Who is it?” I asked, like I might possibly know.

“You don’t know her,” he said, reading my mind.

“You should go to your boss’s house,” I told him. It seemed like a good career move.

When Christmas arrived, he didn’t go to his boss’s house. He didn’t go Dan and Lindsay’s house. He went to some stranger’s house, some girl I didn’t even know.

We skyped Christmas morning.

“Hey, Mom,” he said, “Donna’s mom wanted me to tell you that she gave me a hug today. She said that every mom would want to know that her child got a hug on Christmas.”

I laughed, and thought it was so sweet, and wondered how awkward that hug was. We’re not the most huggy family.

Donna. Sam referred to her as his friend from school. “We’re just friends,” he told me. At Christmas.

Six weeks later, around Valentine’s Day, I got this message on my cell phone – ““Hi, Mom, this is Sam. I was just calling because I have some exciting news. I have a girlfriend. Her name is Donna and she’s pretty much awesome…”

The rest, you know, is history, with more history being made here today. Sam and Donna.

Where do the shingles tie in?

It’s in the overlap.

While I was fussing because I would really rather have had Sam home for Christmas, God knew that it was important for Sam to be somewhere else that Christmas.

You see, that was Donna’s mom’s last Christmas.

Ruth Mayer’s last Christmas.

Her only chance to hug Sam on Christmas morning.

Her only chance to fuss over him and make his Christmas special.

No one knew that at the time, but it was a perfect overlap of lives, where Sam could meet her, get more than a hug, actually spend some time with her – and then, months later, be there to support Donna, to cover her protectively, like an overlapping shingle going in the right direction, so that the sorrows could be shared and run off both of them together.

Sam’s first Christmas away may have been his most important Christmas – until this coming one, Christmas 2015, when he and Donna will have their first Christmas as husband and wife, together, building a life with each other.

Sam, Donna — May your shingles always overlap in the right direction.

family

Laughter

May 21, 2015February 16, 2017 Sally1 Comment

Karl placed 2nd in Class C tennis doubles at sectionals. SECOND!

A great finish for my soccer-playing boy and his soccer-playing partner.

Last week, we had spent a sunshiny day on a Pennsylvania mountain for round one of sectionals. That was the day both Karl and I forgot sunscreen, but I had the luxury of sitting in the shade while he and his partner bobbed and weaved on a full sun court, easily winning all three matches. He was sun-burned, but moving on.

Sectional finals took place on indoor courts. He and Michael won their first match there less easily. Their opponents played in cargo shorts and won the first game. You can’t judge a tennis player by their shorts.

Karl and Michael won the match, though, and advanced to the championship.

Wow, I thought. Could he and Michael possibly be sectional champions?

The first serve by the kid in the backwards hat put a crack in that dream. Whoosh! I barely saw the ball.

Karl started laughing.

Fifteen-love.

The server switched sides. Karl stepped forward, while Michael moved into position to receive the next serve. The dance of doubles tennis.

Whoosh! Michael just shook his head.

Thirty-love.

11165210_10153255409336043_2143988857645962201_n — Karl at the tennis center

Karl was better prepared for the next serve. He changed where he stood and crouched in readiness.

Whoosh! The first serve hit the net. The second serve lobbed over for an easy return. After a few back-and-forths, the server got his racket on the ball and smashed it into a far corner.

Forty-love.

Michael was ready for his next serve. When it came directly at him, he put up his racket defensively. The ball bounced back to the opponents’ side and they had a short volley which ended in a point for Karl and Michael.

Forty-fifteen.

One more serve at Karl. Once again he was crouched and ready. Once more the gold sphere flew.

Game.

I watched Karl as they changed sides of the net. He was smiling and laughing. Part of him was enjoying this crazy game of tennis where he ultimately lost the match 6-1, 6-1.

As I told my father about it the next day, he said, “It’s a good thing he can laugh about it.”

Yes, it was. I had watched other players angrily whack their rackets into the padded walls in frustration. I watched them scowl and get angry. I wondered if any of them knew who John McEnroe was — masterful at tennis, but also masterful at the tennis tantrum.

Last night Karl said, “Somebody at school asked me why we lost so badly. I told him that he hadn’t seen that kid’s serve. No matter where I stood, he got it past me.”

And Karl was still laughing about it.

Laughter is sometimes the closest thing we have to grace.

Thankful for my son.

A to Z Blogging Challenge

Zaengle

April 30, 2015March 20, 2017 Sally4 Comments

Z is for Zaengle.

As much as I loved my retreat at Laity Lodge, I love even more coming home. I am blessed with a family.

We’ve been looking through old pictures here. The photographs are needed for slide shows at milestone events. A wedding. A high school graduation.

Sometimes those years feel like a blur. We worked so hard. With so little sleep. It wasn’t always fun, but it was always good.

Here we are with four children. I ran out of hands at two. That’s why God invented backpacks and strollers.Five children. We would go to Myrtle Beach, driving through the night so the kids could sleep and not complain about the drive. It meant that Bud and I started every vacation exhausted. But it was always worth it.Six children. Five boys and one little girl. Family pictures were nearly impossible because of all the squirming.Eight children. Two girls at the end (shown here in the middle) to help even the score. Although it’s still not even. And I don’t believe in keeping score.I don’t ever want to take for granted this community of Zaengles.

But I also love that, in Isaiah, God addresses both the childless woman (Isaiah 55:1) and the eunuch (Isaiah 56:3-5), essentially the childless man. He promises them blessing beyond family.

Family is a rich blessing, but it’s not the only blessing. Blessings come in all shapes and sizes.

I’ve considered it a blessing to reach the end of this challenge — the A-to-Z Blogging Challenge.

Mark Twain said, “Humor is mankind’s greatest blessing.”

Thoreau said, “An early morning walk is a blessing for the whole day.”

Joseph Addison said, “A contented mind is the greatest blessing that man can enjoy in this world.”

Euripides said, “Man has no blessing like a prudent friend.”

Walt Kelly said, “Every burden is a blessing.”

But then, Lou Gehrig — my favorite baseball player ever, in the greatest baseball speech ever, said, “When you have a father and a mother who work all their lives so you can have an education and build your body – it’s a blessing.”

Which brings me back to family – MY greatest blessing.

What’s yours?

A to Z Blogging Challenge