Tag Archives: Love

Those People

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As we enter our 4th week of puppy parenting/training/love-struck ownership, I realize we have become those people. Doggie treat dust lines all of our jacket pockets. Bernie and I share Hero’s new tricks with excitement equivalent to Teddy’s first swim without the Styrofoam floatie.

Have you seen him FAKE PEE for a treat? IS THERE ANY DOG SMARTER OR CUTER.

I already have a catalog of doggie ditties that accompany mundane tasks, and start each new day singing, “Good Morning, Mr. Wiggles.” I have a dog with an Instagram (@miniberniedoodlelee).

We. Are. Those. People.

To anyone who asks (bless you, fellow dog nutters), I will gush about how thoroughly unprepared I was for living with a puppy. And it has nothing to do with poop, and everything to do with love. We’re all just happier. There are teeny teeth marks on stairs and coffee tables, and we don’t care. Stuff is just stuff. Things on the calendar we’re not looking forward to? Cancel. Hero is taking a nap? Might as well shut my eyes for a spell. I take 26 walks around the yard and neighborhood every day. IN JANUARY. Vitamin D mixed with puppy magic is making dark days of winter so much brighter.

Mere months ago I was an eye-rolling jerk-face when lovely people got all mushy about their pets and now I routinely baby-talk rhetorical questions to a small fur ball. “Who’s the cutest doggie in the world? Hero, Hero, HERO!” (That one is also in the puppy playlist of made up songs.) Last weekend because Hero was napping and we missed him, Bernie and I scrolled through other Bernedoodle Instagram accounts to predict how big our best boy will become. When I hear, “Mom, mom, mom, LOOK!” 138 times a day, it’s no longer a 2nd grader with a Lego creation. Now it’s a teenager who doesn’t want me to miss Hero sleeping with his favorite duckie toy or sneezing for the first time (which frankly, puts the cute-o-meter on tilt).

Those. People.

Hero came with me to Bible Study today. Though I was worried he’d christen the Old Parish House with excrement, he only greeted a dozen Christian women with unbridled enthusiasm—hi hi hi hi love me pet me love me– and then fell asleep in my arms. Alyson called him “furry blood pressure medicine.” But the quote of the day was from Father Mike: “Puppies make you realize that Love is not a zero sum game” and then assured me that it didn’t matter if Hero punctuated the Gospel of John with puppy piddle. Pretty sure Lees (and now Hero!) belong to a Church full of… those people.

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The Cat’s Ass

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Those of you who know me have heard me talk about Paddy. I call him The World’s Most Irish Man, but he’s actually my contractor, my can-fix-or-build-anything, filth-talking, manic, fiercely loyal, and endlessly entertaining friend. With three coffees and a full strength Coke on board, he’s unstoppable. Last month his car was stolen, possibly by joy-riding teens, leaving him without transportation or his tools. I asked Father Mike and Zealot Sister for prayers and find no coincidence in the fact that Paddy’s car was located a few days later with minor damage and all of his equipment. But in aftermath of the theft, when the outlook was bleak, we lent our SUV to Paddy, who almost immediately wrecked it. In retrospect, I’m happy he hit the curb instead of the pedestrian backlit with sun glare. In the moment, I couldn’t understand a thing that was happening because voice-to-text cannot translate brogue. Even in person, a caffeinated, pissy, excited, happy, or most often joke-telling Paddy needs subtitles.

“Paddy, my friend Nicole needs help with something.”

“Ya, Monahan? Happy to help a fellow sun-dodger.” (Insert your best accent)

With my car in the shop, and the building permit finally signed by the architect, we’ve embarked on an expensive entryway redesign. Should I be worried that bad things happen in threes and there is something skulking in the shadows after a stolen car and a crashed one? I am. But Paddy assures me that it’s all right and good and the house will look like “the cat’s ass” when completed. Apparently this is an enviable outcome.

Meanwhile, back at the Cape, the boys and I are enjoying days that still feel long. And by “boys” I mean a tangled mess of teenagers that varies from my own 2 up to 8 each night. Because I have known and cooked for them for nearly a decade, possibly because I used to be a doctor type of person and still carry antibiotic ointment and Tegaderms in my beach bag, and mostly because I’ve spent a billion hours with them at this point, they tell me (almost) everything. One of my favorite kids, who could always charm the Dickens out of any minivan mom, has convinced some pretty little thing his own age to be his one and only. In their world of SnapChatting Instagramming nonsense, it’s refreshing to hear that stomach butterflies and actual, in person dates with park walking and car kissing can still be attained.

Watching them grow up and begin dating themselves makes us (ok, just me) ridiculously nostalgic, and this week I recalled the first time I had to make my sort of secret but definitely official relationship with Bernie public. As a 4th year medical student, it wasn’t exactly kosher for the Chief Resident to be dating me. Maybe. We didn’t ask, and back then human resources didn’t bother themselves with the shenanigans of surgical trainees. But one late night on call in the ICU, the very pretty and super smart intern confessed to me that she had a major crush on the boy I would be engaged to 6 months later. My boys and their friends (and oodles of you) have heard the story of how I met Bernie many times, so you already know how goddamn charming Dr. Lee is on the job. I wasn’t surprised when Sarah asked,

“Do you think he’s dating anyone?”

Umm, yeah. Sarah was tall, gorgeous, everyone’s favorite intern, and liked my boyfriend. A more normal person might have felt a bit intimidated. Or jealous. But I’ve always been me, and frankly, it just made me like Bernie more (if that was possible). Sarah manned the guest book at our wedding.

“Wait. So Bernie is dating YOU and this hot doctor girl is into him? We gotta start talking to Bernie more.”

That was Markie’s take from the teen peanut gallery. He’s not wrong. It’s just that if you’ve met Bernie, you know he doesn’t talk. Throngs of friends and patients and teachers and students and residents and neighbors probably feel like they’ve talked to Bernie, like, had an actual discussion with him. But Bernie is a genius of facial expressions and well timed hand gestures. He’ll pour you a drink, but have me tell the story. If you’ve had a heart to heart with Bernie, you’re in a small circle. He’s not giving up trade secrets.

Like Paddy, Bernie needs subtitles… for everyone but me.

Is being around all of these teenagers with their obsession with Love Island and hardly guarded gawking at physically perfect bikini beach teens throwing me into soupy sappy appreciation for my own husband of nearly two decades? Yup. And it’s the cat’s ass.

Happy still summer, friends.

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Patrick gets married

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My brother got married last weekend. After a few glasses of wine, and with a bunch of tears, I delivered this speech to a patio of people who love Patrick and Jenni as much as I do.

For over a decade Patrick has only ever referred to Jenni as “the love of my life” or “my best friend.” We Stocktons will admit it took us longer than it should have to realize that maybe that was, well, enough. In fact, it is probably much more than many have after a decade of traditional marriage. But because we are lame traditionalists, and Patrick never seemed to be ring shopping, and maybe he was dating Joel or Shane and that would also be fine, or just because it’s, you know, PATRICK, we kind of aborted any notion that we would ever be here in a room full of people who love both of them fiercely… with the white dress and the snazzy suit and the vows and everything.

But here we are.

Only Patrick and Jenni can tell you how we got here. I have my theories. For sure Paige and I have only suggested this yearly, and then more frequently after they bought a freakin’ house together and we could assault him with more practical arguments about tax advantages. But for these two, for Patrick in particular, this moment was all about romance. And on his terms, but on her birthday, my baby brother gave Jenni a ring and his heart, which frankly, she’s had all along.

This wedding is a joyous proclamation of love that already has roots, a history, a mortgage. This celebration is also a unique time when our muddled assortment of family that are friends and friends that are family are thrown together for the first time, or the first time in a long time. For me, half the excitement of flying out here was to meet all of the fantastic weirdos Patrick has been talking about for 20 years. Because growing up, Patrick’s friends were the funniest, scene-stealing characters of my high school days. Half of them were half in love with all of my girlfriends, and there was always one or five hanging around. Even more during the Band Practice Era as Symptoms of Hate, Appetite for Destruction, and finally the mellower Roger’s Tribe irritated all of the neighbors. Patrick has always attracted smart, zany, talented, and almost universally super attractive people into his orbit.

And look at all of you. All gorgeous and whatnot. Typical Patrick.

On our hearts and in our minds today are those that would be here, but cannot in any sort of chicken-or-fish RSVP way. The Stockton side aunties and Walter and Gertrude. Grandma Mid. Uncle Ray. Joe Burke. Chris Horn. To know what stories Chris could have told, to hear Joe’s booming laugh as he made fun of west coast weirdness. To watch Patrick sneak out for a smoke with the cousins or hear Aunt Billie call the bride just the cutest thing west of the Rockies. While we keep them in our hearts in this moment, we get them for a second or two. Or maybe they’re a little bit here for us, because we’re loving and missing them especially now, when there is this huge news to tell:

PATRICK AND JENNI ARE MARRIED!

(Chris is doing his can’t-see-his-eyes smile, I’m sure.)

And now, I will leave you with a funny story from our youth so that we’re not crying into our cocktails. And this one is called Pizza in the Tree and is mostly about how our mother is bonkers.

Back in high school for a year or two, Aunt Sharon, mom’s twin, was living with or near us in Pennsylvania. This meant, when mom and dad went out of town for a conference or long weekend with the Coys or whatever, Aunt Sharon would come over after school to make sure we didn’t burn the house down. If you know Karen Stockton, you know she was absolutely certain we would burn the house down. Too many boxes in the basement or attic? It’s going to burn the house down. You’d better get rid of that stack of magazines or it’s going to burn the house down. Those Jenn-Air grills that work indoors? No way. Plus, the counter splatters would require her to Bounty roll paper the entire kitchen… and all of that paper toweling? Well, that’s going to burn the house down. Teenage Patrick smoking furtively in flammable corners of the home gave her nightmares. You see how this goes.

Naturally, mom’s strict rule when she was away, and frankly mostly when she was home, was that we were NOT allowed to use the kitchen. Ever. And she had kitchen hours, like, if you wanted a sandwich at 10pm, you’d better be crazy stealth about it. It’s like Mom could literally hear crumbs. But when you are a teenager, if you’re not full, you’re hungry. And so one day after school when our parents were away, we made the insanely insubordinate decision to bake a frozen pizza. This was breaking a bunch of rules. The oven? We totally could have burned the house down. Also, crumbs. But we were starving and really wanted that DiGiorno’s.

It was an uneventful pizza baking and eating event. But there were leftovers that no one could eat and now Aunt Sharon is calling saying she’ll be home in 15 minutes. We stuffed the uneaten pepperoni slices into a Ziploc bag and immediately decided it would be too obvious in the trash. There was no time the bury it. Patrick made the bold decision to hurl the plastic bag of contraband off of the deck. Into the woods. Where it immediately gets snagged on a branch and ends up dangling right in front of the family room window. It’s like oh look Days of Our Lives and to the left, Pizza in a Tree. Only 6 minutes to Aunt Sharon.

We start launching everything we can to knock the ziplock-ed bag of our sins out of the direct view of anyone watching TV. Mom, if you ever wondered why you were missing so much silverware… we’re coming clean. But nothing worked. Still it dangled there. Finally… the hose. We hooked up the garden hose, pointed, aimed, and Aunt Sharon pulls into the driveway. A well-directed spray dislodges the arboreal pizza and it disappears into the woods just as Aunt Sharon is sing-songing through the kitchen, steps out onto the porch, and sees her nephew pointing the nozzle of the garden hose into the thick of the woods.

“Kids? What are you doing?”

“We’re, um… watering the trees?”

Patrick and I then collapse into fits of laughter we could no longer contain nor explain and Aunt Sharon tells us to stop being silly, to put away the hose and come inside already. If she ever smelled the pepperoni, she never told. And I don’t think she did, because the next thing she said threw us into another spell of mouth-gaping, soundless laughing:

“Do you kids want to order a pizza for dinner?”

These are the stories of my youth with my little brother who found all of the same things funny that I did. Many times we exasperated our older sister, Paige, who told us repeatedly on long car trips that we were not funny at all. Our inane nicknames for everyone, inside jokes carried forward through so many years I cannot remember their source, and always our shared inheritance from Dad: the inability to keep a short story short. And to be fair to mom, both of us now act like total Karen Stocktons in the kitchen. I buy those enormous packs of Bounty paper towels that don’t even fit in the cart.

Today, we raise a toast to Patrick and Jenni, who found in each other a best friend, a life long love, and someone to laugh with…. someone who will host impromptu dance parties and would definitely help you dislodge pizza from a tree. We are so happy you found each other and invited all of us to share in it. Congratulations and cheers!

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My baby brother before the bride…

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Patrick gets a wife… I get another sister. 

Home

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Post op day 8. Dad’s hip replacement recovery is going fairly well, but he doesn’t understand why he isn’t 100% already. If you know Dad, this is no surprise. I am here with my parents mostly to provide comic relief and a respite from the boredom of convalescence, to prevent Dad from torturing Mom, to reassure Mom that Dad wasn’t going to fall or die, and to make the 11th hour Wawa run in the snow.

A few weeks ago, as we were enjoying a kid-free lunch after Church, Bernie voiced the inevitable: you should be there after your Dad’s surgery. Most moms—even those with young, independent teens—assume we’re absolutely essential. Bernie assured me I wasn’t. In, like, the best, I’ve-got-this way. So we booked a one-way, not knowing how Dad would fare surgery, and I told the boys I was going home for a few days, maybe a week.

Brodie was confused.

“Wait. You said you’re going ‘home’ instead of ‘to Philly.’”

And I had. Home is where your parents live, I told him. I guess that never changes. I’m home: here in the Over-55-on-a-Golf-Course condo complex where I didn’t grow up and where the only vestige of my youth is this trio of high school graduation pictures.

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Paige and I rocked the ’80s scrunch and mousse ‘do.

Home is where I spend the first hours of the day working the crossword with Dad and making him an egg sandwich while Action News announces anticipated weather that mom will fret over for the entire day, even if we have no plans to go outside. Home is also where Wawa is on the corner, the accent is hilariously homey, and I can order a hoagie.

After marriage and kids, it’s rare to spend this much quality downtime alone with your own mom and dad… rarer still when everyone is pretty much healthy. This is lucky, stolen time. On Sunday night, two Proseccos into a Feast Day cocktail hour, Dad and I predicted with stunning accuracy the scores of flipping snowboarders, marveling at the “big” mistakes that cost Olympians a hundredth of a second and a medal. We’ve also logged 6 hours of golf tournament napping, entire mornings of talk show programming, 60 Minutes, and naturally, a lot of Fox News. We haven’t missed an episode of Jeopardy and dammit if that Vanna White isn’t still stunning.

This is 75. I’m writing the screenplay.

Surgery is no fun and being on the other side of it for the second time (albeit, a bit removed since it wasn’t me getting the new hip), I’m ever more aware of how ill prepared patients are for what comes next. Dad only heard that the pain of recovery would never match the agony of an arthritic joint. Well, not so fast, amnesic advice-givers. This was, and continues to be, plenty painful. Dad needed every single pain pill… and they only gave him a handful of days to wean himself, never once preparing him that weaning would be necessary, or that we might feel like dope peddling criminals to want more in the house, just in case. I snort-laughed at the 20 year old secretary who handed me a ‘script for a measly, additional day-and-a-half of pain relief for my dad who was dutifully doing his laps around the condo, icing and elevating, and choking down an entire fruit basket to ward off the inevitably awful effects of Percocet. I stopped short of demanding more. I’m here as The Daughter, not The Doctor.

Because he’s not 100% yet, Dad doesn’t feel like he’s turned a corner. But yesterday, his pedometer counted a good amount of steps taken with little more than Tylenol on board. So I’m going back to my boys in the morning—back to the house where I’m the one who birddogs the laundry and dishwasher, plans the meals, and knows the status of the pantry’s snack reserves. My boys spent the past week in an extended culinary celebration of Chinese New Year, eating an insane amount of noodles and dim sum and fish jerky, and getting taller without me. Their stories will hint at how independent they have become, but their hugs will betray them. As we’ve all witnessed in the past week, teenagers are awesome, and I miss mine.

But until I know my own Dad is feeling like his return to 100% is somewhere on the horizon, my heart will still be… home.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For Dad, on his 75th birthday

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Dad is 75 years old today. This doesn’t mean much, as dad will always be young, and for as long as I can remember says he still feels 19. Naturally, he and mom are spending this weekend with their oldest friends. Dad, Lynn, and Brian went to high school together. To say they’ve known each other for a lifetime is an understatement. They’ve been buddies for three generations, starting in their own magical, Midwestern childhoods and spanning the corporate ladder/baby-making years to the current era with adult children (who are so close we call each other cousins) and grand-spawn (ditto).

Dad never thought he’d see this birthday. At least he didn’t twenty-five years ago, when we were on the screened porch swapping stories and refilling our wine glasses. I was home from college; he had just completed some workshop about financial planning. When asked to estimate his final year on the planet, Dad guessed we’d be arranging a big celebration of life event for him at age 74. (He always says the worst part of dying will be missing the party.)

It sounded far too young to me. But Dad was being practical, and theoretical way-off-in-the-future death is easier to discuss than the realer kind. Still, the idea that he had only another quarter century to do ALL OF THE THINGS had made an impression on him. But anyone who knows John Stockton knows he’ll do all of the things, recognize their importance and impermanence in the very moment, and regale us with the details. Dad has never been able to make a long story short, but excels at the opposite.

As I was thinking about Dad this morning, my phone starting binging with a dozen texts from my cousins.

“Uncle John’s birthday is today!”

“75! Make sure you remind him he’s closer to 80 than 70!”

“Tell him congratulations on his 76th year!”

“Think I can get a Jersey shore liquor store to deliver wine to the house?”

“Sweets on the way!”

Then Facebook reminded me what Joe Burke said about Dad on his birthday three years ago. And as usual, Joe says it better than anyone could:

Your mom raised you best. She just did. She raised you for the long haul. She gave you the dual and mutually supporting gifts of outrageous humor and graceful endurance. She built in you loyalty and integrity. I’ve never known you to equivocate. I’ve never known you to give up on important tasks or people. People may slide but you don’t. You may get exasperated certainly and appropriately — but only to allow for time for things to come around. You are a gifted easy rider with ups and downs. And ride them both with balance and realism and anchored humanity…always with your brand of just barely breath stopping, two feet out in space – appropriately inappropriate humor. You are stunning John Stockton. You are the best friend I ever had. And I hate the space and time and life details that have separated us. Happy Birthday.

I agree with Joe. Grandma Mid raised you best, Dad. (Kinda fun to imagine heaven with those two in it.) I know that the warmth, hospitality, and humor that was classic “Mid” was inherited and even amplified by you. So when my walkway is a tangle of bicycles, our wine rack is depleted, our guest rooms are rarely empty, and the ‘fridge is full of bacon just in case… that’s you. When I can’t tell a story without all of the funny details, that’s you, too. From my oddly-firm-handshake-for-a-girl to a tendency to stay up too late without switching to alternative beverages (which led to a no uncorking after 2am rule), I’ve learned from the best.

At 75, you’re officially off the clock, Dad. The party at the Jersey shore has already started and you’re not missing a single minute of it. Can’t wait for the stories.

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Dad and me, circa 1978

Roadkill

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Somewhere in my mid-twenties, a handful of years into graduate schooling, with a series of rotating apartments and a persistently ring-less finger, my dad and his best friend, Lynn, began referring to my boyfriends as “Roadkill.” I wasn’t particularly promiscuous, but inching up on 30, the sheer numbers of boys who would never be my husband got, well… numerous. More often than not, I was the one who was bored, disillusioned, or unfaithful (sorry, boys) and the one to call it quits. Thus, Roadkill.

Ty was my neighbor and probably one of my closest buddies during senior year of high school. He will always be one of the funniest people I have ever known. Carpooling to school through rural neighborhoods we once saw a horse do a yawn-whinny thing that we imitated often and at impromptu times. It was only hilarious to the two of us. “Are you cereal?” he’d ask. “Not nece-celery,” was the answer. He loved The Grateful Dead, so my Julie Andrews covers were deliciously irritating (to him) and entertaining (to me): Roooolll A-Wheyyyy the Doooo! Do you have that one friend who makes you laugh at nothing—a Jerry Seinfeld with a Pez dispenser? That was Ty for me.

Ty and I spent many bellyaching, laughing-too-hard-to-breathe nights together. Chastely. We were truly just friends. But you can imagine how well Ty went over with The Roadkill. One summer night I brought a new boy home. Ty was over for dinner, which was common. Wine was flowing, which was really common. And everyone was making fun of each other, which is in the Stockton Family Syllabus. Future Roadkill misread the room– or was too thin skinned– and got a little territorial about being the boyfriend (with its implied set of privileges) instead of the friend. Ty didn’t miss a beat.

“Whatever, dude. Next year Britt will be with some other guy, but I’ll still… be… right… here.”

Roadkill was the only one who didn’t find this funny. He didn’t last very long. The next one did, but even he ended up smeared all over the grille. Those were Lynn’s words as he and Judy poured me the tallest and tastiest vodka tonic I’ve ever had, and listened to my latest misadventures in love. After that break up, I drove 7 hours to see them, their daughter, and to languish ring-less-ly on the deck of their gorgeous beach house… and to laugh.

I met Bernie just a few months later.

Thinking about Valentine’s Day, these memories shifted to the top of my mind like the big popcorn pieces when you shake the bucket. Suddenly I’m aware of Great Loves in my life who never gave me flowers or chocolates or rings, but made me pee-a-little giggle and poured me gigantic cocktails as I plowed through the dating years that led me to the best one.

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Ty and me on my 21st birthday. Can’t imagine why all the Roadkill hated him.

Dreaming

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In the dream, Joe picks me up like a little girl… high over his head… beaming at me with an imp grin like he might toss me up to the ceiling.

“Put me down,” I tell him. “You’re going to pop my implants.”

Joe laughter. Loud, unbridled joy guffaws from Joe. I’ll miss that the most.

Joe’s last will and testament directed The Stockpeople to join the extensive Burke clan and other good friends to celebrate his life. So we did just that, meeting in gorgeous Shoreham, his childhood home. We came from all four corners of the country to live like nuclear Stocktons before there were any husbands or babies or faraway jobs. The only thing missing was a golden retriever. It was exhilarating and exhausting, full of giggles and tears, ocean panoramas and pink skies. It was perfect.

My favorite eulogy was from Nancy. With classic Burke humor and love, she reminded us that Joe’s bigger-than-life persona included a larger-than-human ego. Joe was quite aware of his handsomeness, seductiveness, magnetism, and crowd-wowing abilities. He wasn’t perfect (who is?), but we adored everything about him. I read The Joy Vacuum out loud. I couldn’t get through that without ugly, gasping tears. But Joe appreciated things that were real… even if they were messy. So there was that.

I miss them already: Erin’s not-aware-how-stunning-they-are daughters, the overtall boys, the staggering beauty that accompanies the Burke genes. Why didn’t we do this sooner? We kept asking ourselves that. Joe probably had, too, as he traveled thousands of miles to visit everyone– one last time. Did he know we’d do it? Did he know we’d quit work early, board planes and ferries, rent houses, and buy cases and cases of wine? Maybe not. But if he knew we did (and we think he knew), it was just what he had imagined. We loved each other all over again and for the first time.

It was supposed to rain. Instead: this.

Joe's Sunset

One thing Joe did beautifully in his later years was to live soberly, with purpose, mindfulness, awareness, and kindness. In the past five years, Joe had introduced me to a handful of people I now call friends. If Joe thought you should probably know so-and-so, he’d broker the introduction, and then watch with great satisfaction as it all played out the way he knew it would. At his own memorial service, we could feel him mayonnaise-smearing his joyful love all over us, forcing us into a huge Dagwood sandwich of piled up people—messy and delicious.

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At least an hour late, the Burke family pulls up to the Stockton home, noisily spilling out of the family car. Joe’s body fills the frame of the doorway, and announcing in his made-for-radio voice he bellows, “THE LOUD FAMILY IS HERE.” I’m 11. He picks me up, beaming at me with an imp grin like he might toss me to the ceiling.

I don’t want him to put me down.

The Joy Vacuum

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Every photo picks at the wound. Every memory aches. Every time I think of you, gone, I stop breathing. But then I smile. And then I cry. And then I go back to Facebook to find your community—your ministry of fun and kindness—to pick at the scab some more. This is where we are today, Joe. Scab picking.

You’d want me to write about it. That I know. You told me some of your best writing flowed through tears. Where you are now is beyond the effects of flattery and clever words conceding your awesomeness. But here on our little island home, we still need them. I want to fill this huge hole, this joy vacuum, with thousands of words that say, “Me, too! I loved him, too! He was the best, most human of humans.”

You were one of Dad’s best friends. The two of you, so different except for the irreverent joy you brought to every room. The two of you, so smart and loyal and hilarious. The two of you, holding court, poking fun, quick to hug, slow to end the party. Booming voices, huge laughter, enormous personalities… the Heroes of my Youth.

It’s so quiet, Joe. Jay and Heather told us about your perfect day. The best haircut, the promise of Spring, and the choice to walk home. (You’re Home now.) That helps us. So does your manifesto from July, presciently outlining this exact moment. There was no “glide path” for you. Neither fear nor anger at Nature’s timetable, you planned the ultimate road trip. I’m happy I was on one of the stops. Reading one of your essays feels like a visit with you, but actually pressing Burke flesh is food.

We’re a little bit more like you today. We’re making plans to be with each other and do the things we say we want to do… or at least figure out if we really want to do those things. We’re reaching out to everyone in your joy orbit to grieve together and marvel at the girth of your Spirit, the enormity of your Love. I think you’d like that.

Before I was born, you promised Dad to help paint my nursery. There was so much discussion about the wall paint, Chris thought that was my name. I’ve been WallPaint since birth. Except when I was Mewhinney. Or Blondie. Or whatever popped into that clever, fun-loving noggin of yours… and usually stuck. We could fill pages with the silly monikers you gave us. We’ll probably do that. We’ll do lots of things to make you feel closer. Anything to make the joy vacuum suck less.

I miss you viscerally, Joe. Though you had made peace with moving on, I wasn’t ready. But we’ll get there. Just a few more scabs, Joe. And then we promise to get to the hugs and giggles and some sort of serenity. Benny is going to help. Look at this kid so obviously infused with Joe-ness.

Benny

Me too! I loved him, too! He was the best, most human of humans!

I love you in that forever kind of way… your admirer, your friend, your Mewhinney, your WallPaint.

 

 

Grief, the sixth sense.

$100

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$100.

That’s a lot of money, right? Or maybe it’s not that much. It’s too expensive for a t-shirt, but pretty reasonable for a wine-fueled lunch for four. $100 pays the babysitter when we’re out too late, or the airport garage when we’re too lazy to bus in from the remote lot. Those red envelopes always have a Benjamin or two inside. Sometimes I find them at the bottom of whatever purse was seasonal during Chinese New Year and it’s a fun little $100 surprise. And then I’ll just use those crisp bills to pay for play date pizzas, or Halloween candy, or another stockpile of phone chargers.

$100. Is it a lot of money? Sometimes. Could it change a day, a week, a life… a Church? Maybe. Maybe it could.

Recently I had a rare and delicious afternoon alone with Zealot Sister. We’re hardly ever together, and never alone. But we were visiting Aunt Billie for her 80th birthday bash weekend and the two of us stole away for a bit of shopping. Midwestern Law dictates that if a quorum of female cousins assembles, a trip to Kohl’s is mandatory. So we did that. But first, it was just Paige and me in the fancy shopping district of Columbus, Ohio buying unnecessary and unnecessarily expensive stuff.

As I fed the meter with stray, bottom-of-the-purse quarters, a young woman approached.

“Can I bother you for some change? I’m so hungry.”

Who has cash, though… am I right? I was already digging for meter money, so she could obviously see how currently cash-free I was. But then I remembered my secret stash—the bill I squirreled away after the $10 fiasco. So I gave it to her.

$100.

I didn’t know her or her story. And like most people, I’m leery of strangers in general and especially street-dwellers violating my personal space. I hardly have a habit of giving away money in such an unplanned, impulsive manner. And I’m sure even as I was handing over the money, I wanted the whole exchange to end quickly because I’m a horrible person and loathe any reminder of ugliness or pain in the world.

“I have no idea why I did that.” I said to Zealot Sister as she looked at me all beatifically and quoted Scripture from memory because Zealot Sister isn’t called Zealot Sister just because it’s fun to call her Zealot Sister.

“Britt, she said she was hungry.”

Yup.

It wasn’t the last request we received on the mean streets of Columbus. And even though I truly had no cash left to give, I wouldn’t have anyway. First of all, I am a horrible person. Also, no one else was hungry.

Is $100 a lot of money? For some, it is always a lot of money. For fewer people, it might not be. For a lucky handful of us, maybe it would be easy to give $100 away all of the time. Not every single day–though wouldn’t that be super fun? But what about once a week, or at least those weeks when you’re in the pews praying for a safer world and protection of the hungry people who have no home or country or shoes or hope. How about sending $100 along with those thoughts and prayers. Not every day; some days there’s only change in the bottom of the purse. But maybe today is the day to give away the emergency bill—because someone else has a greater emergency.

Is $100 too much? For me, it’s not. For me, $100 is the happiest check I write each week. I put $100 in the Church plate to travel along with my prayers for a broken world, hurting friends, and to accompany one thousand thank yous for the life I have. $100 sounds cheap for that sort of thing. To me, anyway.

There are 175 of us who pledge regularly at Church. I assume most people who send in that yearly Stewardship check sit in the pews at least 20 of the 52 weeks of the liturgical year, even with summers off and unavoidable skiing. I wonder… what if all of us dropped $100 into the plate each week along with our prayers for hope and healing? Is it too much? Is it enough to be considered tithing? Is it too little and we’re already sending a yearly pledge so purse change is sufficient for any given Sunday?

The math tells us it could change everything. $100 from some of us, some of the weeks could add up to $350,000 a year, or just exactly the shortfall between what we collect and what we need to keep our Church growing, current, music-filled, and just the way we love it. Is that a coincidence? Not to me.

$100. Is that a lot of money? Is it too much to give a hungry girl on the street, a faraway stranger with no home, programs helping kids living in public housing or those with no homes at all, initiatives to make all of our public spaces inclusive, funds for cancer research, the local food pantry, or to drop into the offertory plate? That’s for you to decide. Giving Tuesday is December 1st. Where is your $100 (or $10 or $100,000) going to go?

Share your $100 stories… the ones that remind us we are One Community responsible for feeding all who ask.

Benjamin

Please add links in the comments to your favorite causes and tell us why you would happily part with your emergency Benjamin to further its mission.

 

The Goddess

Posted by Britt in Uncategorized and tagged with , , , , , ,

She stretched her long legs on the towel and coated them with Johnson’s Baby Oil. Her sun-streaked hair went past her freckled shoulders and when she wasn’t wearing her glasses, Patty was the sexiest girl at the Elk’s Club pool. She let my big sister and me tag along. Paige was thirteen, but I hardly remember a time when her figure and demeanor weren’t an all access pass to the older kids. But at age 11, I was little. I hung on every word Patty spoke—to Paige, and to Patty’s friends who were also exotically adult with their bikinis and bits to fill them. I wanted desperately to understand what they thought was so funny, learn the words to their favorite songs, and smoke those menthol cigarettes that filled them with a cool worldliness. I wanted to be both giggly and blasé about Boys. But I was still so little.

I was 11. Patty was… a Goddess.

I was twenty–home from college with one of the boys I encouraged for probably too long– when Patty and John drove up to show Mom and Dad the new baby. Chelsea was still at the put-her-on-a mat-and-stare-at-her stage. And over a few bottles of celebratory wine, I got a glimpse into newly married life. Patty and John made it look ambitiously easy and fun somehow, with their combined smarts and steadfast love. The baby seemed like a drag, but even that they did well: Chelsea was plump and adorable and mostly happy on her little mat. Sitting on my parent’s breezy screened porch behind their plenty big house, Patty said she and John wanted all the same things. I stared at my older, wiser cousin and her handsome husband and perfect child and I knew Patty would have it—all of the good stuff.

It was close to seven years later when Paige called. John was gone. John– Patty’s forever boyfriend who became her forever husband– gone. One hundred thousand no’s. THEY HAVE THREE SMALL DAUGHTERS. Because everything felt sad and helpless and impossible, we got on planes. And when we got there, Patty made all of us feel better. To date I’ve never witnessed a eulogy so full of love and promise and hope and forgiveness. Patty who had every right to be a keening, catatonic widow instead hosted us in the plenty big home we always knew they’d have. John died happy, exploring every passion, achieving every goal; this is a life to celebrate, she taught us. Patty lost her best friend, partner, and husband and she instructed us to honor a life well lived over mourning a life too short. It was Chelsea who broke our hearts, toddling around saying how this uncle or that cousin was “just like her dad” and then growing up to be an aerospace engineer… very much like her dad.

Always the overachiever, Patty found true love twice. Over the years, I have used My Cousin Patty as an example of how Love surrounds us, how Love is always possible, how there are Second Chances for Love. But that isn’t fair. Were any of us very surprised that Patty would find true love twice? No. Not really.

Patty is a Goddess.

I’m 44 now. Once so young I could never dent her rarefied sphere, now we’re essentially the same age. Seventeen or seventy Patty will always be that gorgeous girl with the oiled legs who graduated early and married young and had it all and lost it all and then found and curated something beautiful all over again. Along the way she has brought two loving, awesome men into our family fold and created five incredible goddess spawn who mirror her intelligence, determination, stubbornness, luckiness, and beauty. Today, on Patty’s 50th birthday, I offer this outsider view of her charmed and cursed and blessed and difficult and gorgeous life. Patty has inspired, impressed, and encouraged me in ways she cannot know. Happy Birthday to the sexiest girl at the Elk’s Club… our Goddess… our Patty.

Patty, on her second wedding day.

Patty, on her second wedding day.

Goddess Spawn

The Goddess Spawn… all five of them.