Me and My friend Seth

Gangs of New York, 2002

My friend Seth is forty years old and has outlived at least half of the 9 lives allotted to even the feistiest cat. We now live a thousand miles apart, as we have for most of our adult lives. He has remained in our hometown, built a family and a life there around the seasons, while my husband and I came north fifteen winters ago. Our connection is sporadic but always warm and fraternal, like a big brother who has seen anything I'm about to show him but endures my antics anyway.

Seth's mother braided my hair and baked apple pies for all of our childhood. When his cat gave birth to kittens in his bed -- a handbuilt lofted bed perfect for forts and scary stories -- his stock rose exponentially in my five-year-old mind and has stayed there since. We played hide and go seek among the spruce trees and trailer parks of our densely forested, working-class Alaskan island. The snuggly rhythms of early memory gave way to some chaos in our respective homes, and we've also shared the messier milestones of adolescence and adulthood.  

Our parents are probably more surprised to see us raising ten children between us and baptizing them into a faith neither of us were raised in, than they were to pick us up from the police station together off and on in the early 1990s. Seth taught me about weed, subversive music and the delicate balance of supply and demand. We played F*ck the Police at top volume and did our best imitations of the bravado presented on MTV. His father was my only visitor when I was shipped to a nearby island for residential drug treatment. 


I will note here Seth's physical presence: he is massive. Foreboding, even. An uncle of mine who employed him as a commercial fisherman remarked that Seth is the quintessential gentle giant. He was a wrestler in high school and has always kept his strength in check; never bullying and even using his imposing physicality to defend would-be victims from teasing or worse. There's one particular story about the school bus that brings me near tears each time I tell it -- and the irony seems to be that the boy being bullied was of correct breeding and political class but wispy and nerdy, while Seth was the scrappy hero. That boy from the bus went on to some really prestigious East Coast college I can never remember the name of and now works for a Fortune 500 in the art dept (last I knew), while Seth put down roots in the same neighborhood from which the school bus shuttled him to & fro. When I watch the (glorious) movie Overboard I still see Seth in the oldest son. Noble and quiet but certainly not without spine. Perhaps his power lies in the suggestion of violence without having to deploy it. 


I thought of Seth in a special way after reading this piece. I emailed it to him, along with a half dozen other men and women, childhood friends all, with whom I often share banter about current events. We don't agree on every issue nor seek to convert each other -- we just like to stay in touch and rap about lifestyle and philosophy between diapers, work and errands. We're able to learn from one another without resentment or bitterness, pride or retribution. I see now that our unity may be a threat to those without agency in the present White House. Seth shared the piece on social media only to be accused of racism and effectively silenced. I would laugh if it weren't so sad and entirely missing (or proving) the point of the post.

Today, taking stock as if I were a raven perched in the treetops, listening to the foment of human pettiness in the wake of President No Good Really Bad, reading scribes from all corners, ruffling my feathers -- I see that the erudite leftist minds neatly bunch us all together. We are White. We are to be aggregated and educated, or at least ignored. Our varied opinions and experiences do not matter, for we share the embarrassing ethnicity of being Anglo-Saxon. Our immigrant stories are irrelevant, for we must absorb fresh wisdom, prostrate ourselves to the latest arrival. We're descended from countries that lack the exotic pedigree to grab the audience of National Public Radio with tales of victimhood. 
 
Never mind that Seth's children aren't even white, or that my husband is only second generation American, with grandparents who came as illiterate teenagers hoping to earn enough money to return to Portugal and buy a horse. If that hints at a certain pride, it's simply pride in the achievements and perseverance of someone else. It would never occur to me to ascribe pride to my race. I don't need census bureau stats to validate my existence, and I have 2,000 years of cultural heroism in Christ and His Bride to "fall back on" for identity. My kids attend a school with just seventy students. Laotians, Alaskan Natives, African Americans, Hispanic children from pockets of Central and South America, Caucasians. No one notices. We have families with foster children, families of truckers, clerks, engineers, physicians, pilots, families built by adoption and those with transient children. Our stated goal is to make saints. We look to martyrs, soldiers and scholars with equal fervor. We are not divided and we are not afraid.

As I said in the email scribbled to friends when I shared Dreher's post this morning, the weird alt-right thing gets no traction with me -- but the objective point being made by his commenter is quite illuminating.  Foreboding? We'll see. I do know this: the guidance of a nuanced gentleman who takes no guff is an invaluable force for children. Come what may, both Seth's children and mine have that in their fathers. 

If the American Left insists on fragmentation along lines of race, the carnage is predictable and its genesis rests squarely on them. They play with fire. Although the USA is unique, and this experiment of unity is worthwhile, we are all still human beings. I grieve the idea that men like Seth (who I use here without permission and not as a mythic hero; he's just a dude I know) are being trashed. Again to repeat myself --- white men are allowed to be anything except victorious. I would submit that the creepy racism of America was exposed, burst like a boil on Satan's ass, not with the election of a black man to the Presidency, but of a white one. Why is that?

Do Whatever He Tells You: rinse & repeat, mea culpa, happy summer, grateful heart, contented mind

I just can't stop watching this ~ and on all other matters I must withhold comment.

"I have no reason to be ungrateful" ~ Chelsa P at the 9:30

 <3 <3 <3 (is that hip? no? I'm pressed for time.)



repeating myself

Favorite blogger!

What the Mahoneys Mean to Me

It's Father's Day. The guys are a few paces ahead of me on the homestead, as the languid sunshine propels us toward another family's story. I'm following an informal pilgrimage at the speed of happy toddlers and aging dogs, having momentarily left behind the annual Mahoney Grotto picnic. Our kids moseyed up to the barbeque buffet a few hours before, adding bananas, cookies and tea to the homemade sausage, roasted chickens, varied casual food and salads.

In front of the picturesque log home, I watch a guy whose name I'm unsure of pet a horse and smile shyly towards the camera. Another newly sober friend takes his picture with an iPhone. My heart is pierced by the simplicity of what's going on and the profundity I know it to be --- peace of mind, freedom of movement. Walking down a road among friends, without heroin or its effects as part of today's journey. I may not know his name, but I've heard this young guy impart Christian mercy towards his still-drunk mother on a candlelit Mother's Day. He has memorably intimated a Bush Alaska childhood with every abject sadness that can entail --- followed by the despair of aging out of foster care and directly into the dope house. The loneliness of belonging nowhere.

But not today. Today he's with the Mahoney family. And what a fold to be welcomed into, under the crisp blue mantle of Our Blessed Mother and the Alaskan sky, in a space built to honor their earthly mother.

Car after car parks across the outer reaches of Wasilla's Schrock Road, depositing more smiling faces, absorbed into still more giddy embraces.

Two and a half generations of men play football through rain and shine, with a mix of manhood and gentility that comes from staying close to the earth and each other. At one point, there were haphazard games of Frisbee being played through the middle of the football scramble, and our three-year-old son became fixated on possession of the yellow Frisbee. They humor him for awhile, but then a big boy crouches to explain the rules. "You have to throw the yellow circle, you can't keep it for yourself. You can play with us, but you gotta do the game." The shock of being asked to uphold any standards is immediate. He wails for his mother, allows me to hug him and cluck over the injustice. Then he grows quiet and rips straight back into the action. My role fulfilled, I return to the assembled brothers, sisters and cousins who have invited us for the day.

Back at the towering pod of birch splashed near the grotto, lighthearted Jungian psychology ensues, followed by a dissection of comedian Chris Rock's brilliance, then trading of recent travel stories, updates on work and worship, and an absolute fireside contentment with the human condition. Siblings and nephews check in on family business and health affairs, with tears and triumphs quietly exchanged. Babies wander to greet their grandfathers from perches against tree trunks, low-slung chairs and truck tailgates.

Throughout the afternoon, at least seven pots of coffee are brewed and shared. During this particular party I'd come without diapers for my toddlers, not a mishap new to me, and apparently not one they've never seen before either. In fact, I've never met so many grown men with Pull-ups and baby wipes stashed in the cabs of their beefy pickups. Ten-year-old boys stand stick straight and acknowledge children who are new to the fold with uncanny verve --- grilled hot dog in one hand, the other extended to greet friends with a handshake. Children ride past on the golden bare backs of horses, and a four wheeler crawls by with a dozen bouncing faces laughing from its trailer. My kids are in there somewhere. I overhear James, a local cabbie, asking what a grotto is, and Barney explaining it's Latin for crypt and means a place to pray. James asks permission to add his own rosary beads, from an ACTS retreat in Juneau years before, to the offerings inside. A few times I usher my kids away from the votives and statues, but I eventually give in to the friendly, insistent tones of Mahoney mothers young and old: they are perfectly welcome in there. Please.

I can now include myself in the tender rank of moms-in-need for whom Barney Mahoney has been known to produce dry clothing, diapers and a hot meal. A guy who knows the ropes once confided that it's Mahoney policy to stop for all hitchhikers, regardless of circumstances or disruption to his own schedule. Barney accepts no money for rides, often towing and fixing the stranded vehicles himself. Sometimes a tank of gas is the solution. Sometimes, single mothers are given the bad news that their cars are broken beyond repair, followed by the gift of a used car that runs just fine. I knew a lady who said his treatment of her was the first noble exchange from any man she'd known in forty years.

The Mahoneys don't fit into any prescribed camp: they're at once sincerely humble and born orators. A five-minute chat reveals them to be philosophically airtight, but with cowboy swagger and grammar to match. They are both wild-eyed and utterly serene. Their devotion, workmanship and credentials make heads swivel. I've seen them diffuse borderline psychotic, volatile characters with a reprimand and a hug. There would seem to be little place for saccharine piety among them -- considering the unflinching duty to truth and mercy they personify -- yet their poetry rings 100% sentimental Irishman. They are trappers, miners, steel workers, storytellers, musicians, entrepreneurs, hunters, fishermen, blacksmiths, woodworkers, bikers, builders, and farmers. (And those are just the six or seven of them that I know...) They are here to honor their mother and their father. They all know how to cook. On this day, they're willing to roast marshmallows for a continual stream of children, provided each one have dinner first and mom's permission.

Photo by Bill Hess

The two brothers I'm closest to share the story of their father's final days, including over six years spent building the grotto by hand, with random stones and statues being deposited by unknown people from all over the world, in hopes of helping the project. The mysterious Canadian squatter who came out of the woods long enough to roll a hulking, man-sized boulder (which became the grotto's roof, after being split lengthwise a few times) down their mountainside in order to contribute. The force of their father's passion for the Eucharist. The quiet heroism of their mother's twenty years of successive pregnancies in the wildnerness. Her fidelity to the establishment of a Catholic church in Wasilla --- a dream dismissed by many, considering there were parishes already built in Palmer and Eagle River. The patronage of Saint Jude.

I spend a lot of time with a lot of people who talk a lot of shit about faith, hope and charity. If the greatest of these virtues is love, why does this day look so different from most stuff I read or hear? The Mahoneys make it look easy. Joyous. Immediately possible. Their sacrifice and toil on each others' behalf is borne without calculation, shrill preaching, or pecking order. They just love. This family overflows with love, heaped on with human frailty, God's strength, and more love. Even though this isn't my first visit to the grotto, and I've logged hundreds of hours with Patrick, Paulie, and Barney, I'm thrown off kilter by the whole experience. Their rough-hewn setting and elegant hearts are healing people, through the grace of God. This is the grit that social workers, municipal food banks, SWAT teams and prisons cannot touch. I feel silly for ever wanting to buy a tapestry with the corporal works of mercy woven into it.

Since becoming a wife and mother, I've been increasingly drawn in by chatter about the Benedict Option, and set out with a hunger for it, visited often by the idea as life unfolds ~ for a fleeting sunny day in June, we were immersed in the fruits of precisely what Alisdair McIntyre describes in the final paragraph of After Virtue. My favorite depiction is contained in John T. Goerke's recent analysis: "The Benedict Option then is not a retreat into a cave, but an advance down the barrel of a shotgun."

Paul and Iona's descendants are indeed preserving their traditional culture, yet standing at the ready to receive the walking dead of modern culture, with a greased wrench in one hand and a rosary in the other. Their good-natured, fearless proclamation of God's Kingdom is magnetic. I felt like a fellow traveler, even among the dozen-plus Mahoneys previously unmet. Supernatural forces were unmistakably present. Part of me wanted to stay forever.

Another part of me knows that I witnessed nothing more than a hardworking bunch of people, hard at play on their family ranch. Let their welcome not be wasted on me, I pray. The good life is within reach --- of anyone who's willing to reach out to the guy next to him.

Surely I'm flattering myself, but I'd like to think the Mahoneys are my kind of people.

Photo by Bill Hess, 2012

"The most extraordinary thing in the world

is an ordinary man and an ordinary woman

and their ordinary children." ~ G.K. Chesterton

"We are a pack of fornicators...."

Anthony Esolen gets jiggy

Will return in May

Catherina of Siena

I'm not blogging during Lent (it's been pointed out that I should share that information. I'm of two minds on that idea, but there ya go ... ) We're traveling soon, my heart is filled with awe and gratitude at the way God pulls us toward His graces.

The Catholic Church is the best "thing" that ever happened to me. This much I know.

It's like Tori Amos came to a different conclusion...

Audrey Assad (who's fairly new to me, but a welcome surprise!)

So, while I have a moment to write ~ this past week has been amazing in weather & busy-ness, and I've tried to keep a stable if random pattern of posting. I no longer find blogging cathartic, but am committed to a few other projects and like breaking the pace a little. Even just snippets are fun ... thanks for continuing to read. I've read a half dozen or so 'new' bloggers, and that's been enjoyable.

It's tricky for me to look around and believe that the shift of seasons will bring a lighter schedule, although Spring tends to do just that. Many tender spots lately have reinforced God's omnipotence, and our family looks toward Lent with immense gratitude. I stand by the first piece of poetry I ever taught a child to recite. That would be teensy Viva, teetering up the cathedral steps to the newly ordained priests with, "TOWANTISTOSUFFER//ITSATENETOFBUDDHISM". I think she also drew me a picture of Boo Dzim, like she figured it was a guy.  : )

I shall not want.

Parisians Enjoy Simple Majesty of Tridentine Mass

A musical soul named Gavin shared this awhile ago, and it's become my go-to office cleaning companion. Apologies if I've posted it tons and forgotten. I just can't find the words so I won't bother trying. The heights and the depths of Love, the mass. I hope you'll treat yourself.

Vote for me!

huh? I barely understand what's going on, but the most reliable thing about me is probably that my mouth continues running, regardless of this ignorance! Howz that for a slogan. Gitchasomevotes, m' hm.

Seriously, I'm flattered to be included and am eager to follow along. My yammering was nominated in the Smartest Blog category. Words are all I've ever really had, so sharing them means a lot to me. I deeply admire the rowdy pilgrims whose names I recognize in many categories of Bonnie's roundup --- this should be a good time for all. Her story is unforgettable.

Speaking of Sling Blade, has anyone seen the new BB Thornton movie? I can't remember what it's called. We've revived the Blockbuster tradition at our house lately and it's been fun.

Okay, double seriously -- go over there and vote for all the blogs! if the Spirit moves you. Thanks.

** edit: Okay, "Words are all I've ever really had" is a bit melodramatic. I don't mean like I was raised in a Honduran landfill or something ~ just that I can barely swim, have only marginally luscious hair, and enjoy talking and writing with people very much. It clarifies a world that sometimes overwhelms me with its demands and mysteries.

Ed and Dorothy

A few years ago, for a few years, I kept a regular holy hour. I had just two children and it was in the middle of the night, a straight shot up a long road dotted with intersections every few blocks in a quiet Anchorage parish. We subsequently moved much closer to that parish, but I floundered at the habit which had previously become a life preserver. I often remarked that I'd barely get into the chapel each week, but had such a sense of spiritual rejuvenation that I knew it was a great aid at keeping me afloat during the week. The Coordinator of Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration at the time was such a gentle prophet --- raising the standard of what I expected of myself and my children without a whiff of patronization that we weren't already there. Do you know what I mean? The kind of teacher whose heart welcomes your heart, and everything else is superfluous. She taught me to use alarm clocks, sure, but suggested above all else asking my guardian angel to prick my brain for the 2 a.m. wakeup call. It really works!

I still long for that hour and that practice --- the solitude, the intimacy with Jesus, and much about the routine. I now understand that it's controversial (or at least debatable) to have a reading library in an adoration chapel, but I'm so glad "mine" did! I discovered a treasure in there and I want to share it with you.

(an aside: I can't overstate my amusement/God's providence/the heart of Catholicism when a book written by friends of Peter Maurin converges with SSPX books on Amazon's "People Who Purchased this book Also Purchased" list. Humanity is a circus. There's something fantastic about what that represents. I want everyone to have this little jewel and be able to discuss it! It's available on Kindle ... and in my opinion, the blue version titled 'Motherhood...' was a memorable read, but doesn't pack the same punch as the red book.)

So. Background --- Ed Willock was born in 1916 to a large, working class Irish American family. He became enamored of the early Catholic Worker movement and went on to publish Integrity magazine for ten years with his wife Dorothy. The couple and their hep cat friends were the main contributors, many writing under pen names. Rather than attempt to summarize the individual essays, I'm going to transcribe them into pages on this blog --- found along the right sidebar and beginning here. The main themes are social action which in turn forms familial vitality (rather than the other way around) being the aim of men, and the father's role at work and home. Attention is also given to the economic philosophy of distributism. The magazine refused any commercial ads, which, along with competition from larger publishers, finally proved unsustainable and the magazine ceased printing in 1956. (Much of their desire to stir lay Catholics found a voice in the intent of the Second Vatican Council.) Peak circulation was around 150,000 copies and a few of the principals went on to work in the Catholic press with some renown. A dozen of Willock & others' essays were compiled for the little burgundy book I found.

One more thing: naturally, it turns out that this effort has Dominican roots, with Father Wendell, O.P. being the first to introduce Carol Jackson and Ed Willock, who went on to become co-publishers of Integrity magazine for its ten-year run.

Podcast Rhymes with Broadcast

This guy always gives a provocative argument ~ with the exception of keeping in touch with beloved and faraway friends and family, John Zmirak is probably my most valuable takeaway from wasting time on Facebook over the years.

And this site is a neat peek into how personal tech evangelization can become. SQPN stands for StarQuest Production Network. Cute? His podcast is among the oldest of podcasts, as he tells it, since the genesis was in 2005 upon the death of Blessed John Paul II. Check out 'The Break' for commentary on one of my favorite topics on Earth, Sesame Street and its international versions. The right sidebar has a bunch of other podcasts too. Be aware that the host blathers pretty genially & aimlessly for the first thirty minutes of the link, so it's worth skipping ahead. Otherwise, 5 Stars on that site overall. Its clean, artistic appearance seems very now.

Father Roderick's reflections about the creativity of the Holy Spirit are particularly cool.

Overflowing Brain

Someday I'll re-organize my blog to include a category of overflowing, weekly links posts ~ until then, I appreciate tolerance of the occasional freakout post (necessary since I gave up Facebook, which was my refuge for these cathartic e-moments. Cathartic moments along Muldoon Road at 6 a.m. go in a different category...)

So I read the Acton Institute newsletter and like the tension between the nitty gritty and the ethereal. For example, this video. Father Sirico reports that he handed a copy of the Poverty Cure curriculum to our Holy Father in Rome just this month.

Buon Natale

Dear Pope Francis (standing, second from left), who taught me the word Lampedusa, whose smiling face I felt beaming from Time covers all over New Sagaya last Sunday, and who is celebrating Christmas Mass in Rome this day --- Merry Christmas! May your earthly mother rejoice in her work being carried to such completion and your blessed Mother ensconce you in her mantle.

This is such a humbling, overflowing time of year. The cold weather (-17 this morning as I picked up one final gift) ensures that we'll probably stay parked for the next few days. I do not sled or stroll in single digits. We wish you a Merry Christmas. May your mug overflow and your public radio stay wired. Snuggle in! The miracle isn't dependent on us doing a thing, planning or preparation-wise. God is great.

I'm always in search of a resplendent Christmas(s), and regret that an impressive strain of stomach flu will keep me home tonight. I'll light candles and remember that Mary herself knew the resplendent Soul, with no need of the trappings I'm tempted to chase. It's the warmth of love, from one soul to another, that gives us security. So at this time of year I try to balance my sensory desires with the knowledge that God alone fulfills me. I've been reading a little bit of St. John of the Cross. He rivals Augustine in threatening the allure of my own appetites. Thank you to the friends who passed the book along. The guy is hardcore and I knew little of his biography until now.

I still like sparkly stuff.

 

sthughofcluny.org

 

 

my husband has a phrase for this

I think he says "Satanica Pandemonia". Lord, have mercy. And but for the grace of God, there go I. Too much. Violent topless mob attack men defending Cathedral.

And, lest we rest  in the hope that our shores prevent such incivilities ~ here are some American teens.

St. Francesca Xavier Cabrini, Virgin

November 13 is the feast of one of our family's patronesses for home education. Mother Cabrini is the first American citizen to be canonized, and she established 67 schools, hospitals and missions in her 67 years. She was physically small and sickly all her life, yet a magnetic force of love and piety in all she did. The inclusion of Xavier in her religious name is a nod to her own plans & designs (she hoped to go East), yet Pope Leo XIII asked that she serve the Italian immigrants in New York City.

I think she wouldn't have much patience with me and my tangential flakiness; maybe that's why I like to think she'll pray all the harder for our family.

You know how sometimes the lives of the Saints seem inaccessible, overly pious or just foreign to our times? I'm finally reading "Story of a Family" about the Martins. It's an engrossing read, they're terribly inspiring, especially since they're laity, but overall ... slightly exotic for me. I do love the way the temperaments of holy men and women run the gamut. Something about Mother Cabrini really appeals to us, and I cry when we read this slim jewel aloud during the first week of school lessons each year. While I haven't planned anything Italian or special (our day is too packed and the biggest of the little ones are recovering from head colds) to memorialize her, my constant prayers to conform my will to God's will are boosted by her example today.

Those Dominican men

 

 

(No, not those ones....)

On Finances, Facebook and Pornography as major contributors to divorce: "...But perhaps this trilogy is no great surprise after all. Finances, Facebook, and pornography reduce to man’s three great disordered values: money, power, and sex; and these three in turn are merely the failed versions of the three true values that guide human life: faith, hope, and love."

I particularly like the way Br. Gabriel expresses the necessity of hope.

You should read the rest. It's quick.

On this Eve

The force of true beauty --- here:


I ask all saints ("...and you, my brothers and sisters") to pray for me, that I might minimize the trivia that gets my attention! May God continue to bless the souls who trudge this Earth in various states of desperation and delight.

I Have Too Many Kids

I have too many kids to buy perky cylinders of just about anything. If our family goes on a jag of enjoying certain treats, it's time to consult kitchen-savvy friends, drag out the five-gallon buckets, and start hustling ingredients. Once in awhile I get rebellious, standing bleary-eyed in the grocery near midnight, and just toss that slim dose of French jam into my basket with optimism. "Maybe I'll hide it," I think to myself. This time will be different. More refined.

A week goes by and I'm shaking my head at my silly use of seven dollars. Not because the blueberry preserves were practically chugged straight from the jar by nude, bellowing toddlers --- but because of my own short-sightedness. My fixation on this image of a delicacy, and its prudent dispensation, having some power over my mood. Ain't nobody got time for that. As R.R. Reno observes, "we must be careful of living our theories rather than our lives", a line from this bright yellow volume that recently had me fist-pumping in the midnight sun.

I find myself conditioned to desire the fruits of shiny marketing in place of substance. And I just turned 35, so I'm supposed to know better. Be seasoned and practical in my decision-making, no? Plus I dread passing on such a superficial angst to my daughters. "Enjoy Your Toast. Don't Overthink The Jam." --- maybe put that on my grave.

This revelation goes for so many other jumbo-sized tub o' products, from the hair salon to the car dealers' lot itself. We who claim the quiver's arrow more than twice are banished from the line of polite cars with a simple front seat and back seat. Not for us! The motorcar's features turn from gleaming lifestyle imprimaturs like Bluetooth or sunroofs to purely utilitarian gain: "Washable floor mats? Pish posh. How about a 100% rubber floor in your fifteen-passenger van? Get a power washer and hose this bad boy down." Our cars are so big they have aisles. More to the point, I contend there's nothing quite as cool as barreling down the highway in a motorcade rivaling a presidential lineup, with m'bes'grlfrenz at the helm of every rig. We will mess you up.

I suddenly have too many kids to last very long in public playgrounds, where parents micro-organize every tot within striking distance. Let them play. Visit with your adult friends.

I have too many kids to hitch my calendar to most of the lovely organizations that I'm drawn to. Whether it's ballet for one or a concert for many of us, I'm still learning to consider the "rest of the family" and their limitations when discerning our schedule. For real.

I finally have too many kids to move around spontaneously or hang out at the bus station in Mexico City in lieu of pre-natal care. "...Bloom where you're planted" is the most wretched, promising and elusive of clichés for someone like me. We soldier on.

Perhaps a more astute soul can figure this stuff out with the prescribed 1.7 American children in their midst, but I've always been a late bloomer. As the story often goes, there was more to be revealed.

We have too many children to view our parenting impact as sacrosanct. God imbues each person with a dignity their own. By His grace, our children may live to see decades of opportunity. They could spend much of their adult lives around people we'll never meet. Our time with them is truly just a season, and they are not ours to contain.

We have too many children to believe we can craft them in our image. Should their character be revealed in ways that stir our tears, whether of pride or despair, we know it's their character being forged. Not ours. The journey is theirs. We can shepherd them, and their formation is our duty --- but having 4 or 5 different personalities blossoming together goes a long way to expose the futility of control over another's destiny.

We have too many children to spend time driving all over tarnation for things we can reasonably (re)produce at home. This applies to meals, much of modern entertainment, and certain forms of fellowship. Heroic exceptions are made for exposure to arts and letters, tacky parades, and church stuff.

We have too many children to revel much in professional goals, whether realized or still being pursued. Kids want to feed the ducks and ride bikes and chase pigs. They want to go swimming and pick up hitchhikers and count the stars. They want truth. My husband will never ask for his (numerous) (just bragging) service plaques and production awards at his deathbed. We hope only to join their struggles and achievements in a sane and sober way --- not eclipse their young lives with misplaced ambition and easy accolades. Kids know.

We have too many children to believe in fake activism. Seriously. Let's take a risk and love someone. May God pierce our crazy, selfish egos with His peace.

We have too many children to believe that "born healthy" is the ultimate gift. Life hurts. We cry out loud and drive in circles with death metal blaring, yelling at God. And He's there.

We have too many children to labor under the illusion that sex is meaningless. It makes new people, and those people deserve a family. The heaving, aching, fussing mound of issues and persnicketies that all families are, at times, but a family. With seven years of infertility at the front half of our marriage, Anthony and I are acutely aware of the life-giving power of sex, gone inexplicably dormant. Babies aren't merely a milestone, or a delay of real milestones, they're whole new people. Life is never diminished by the addition of a baby.

We have too many children to be scared (for long) by the notion of another pregnancy. They're our only lasting gift to each other and to their siblings.

25th of 26 Children, The Spelling of Ciopinno, and I Keep Forgetting I'm Not A Farmer

"God is closer to us than water is to a fish."

Saint Catherine of Siena

 

Today Roman Catholics observe the feast day and memorial of Catherine of Siena, a Third Order Dominican and Doctor of the Church. I chose her as my confirmation Saint in 2005 and have found increasing affection for her mother, who is said to have struggled with a  sharp tongue and impatient temperament (Ahem --- 26 pregnancies!)

 

Anthony and I were married in a parish named for her, and her Dialogue was one of the first books by a Saint that I read after converting. This morning, following a resolution to cut 'screen time' usage in our home, I hastily checked email and made a few notes on the calendar. Although I'm tired of being wired and plan to sever the cord for the summer, I have all the convenience and tools of modern life to replicate in a more rugged way (on paper) before disconnecting entirely. And my cute husband wanted to watch yesterday's episode of Game of Thrones. So, as the saga goes --- I needed to answer two Facebook messages about upcoming social gatherings, before logging out. Real quick like.

Then I noticed that Mindy had a nifty graphic with a bold quote by Catherine of Siena on her Facebook profile, and I thought perhaps a quick tribute was in order. So I trolled around the usual sites for that dose of sighing verve that only the Internet can offer to a bathrobe-clad lady who needs one more cup of coffee. "Yes! All for Jesus! We should have Italian for dinner, in her honor, yah? Truth, obedience, love personified! She was so brave. So, so brave. And her mother? What a soul. Hey. I wonder how Michelle is doing..."

After two phone calls regarding meals for a local pregnant friend, dusting off the toddlers' breakfast crumbs and sending them after a bucket of blocks, I returned with my calendar to finalize a few dinner invites over next month. And then I couldn't remember what goes in ciopinno, and became immersed in Italy's regional food etymology before remembering that Catherine of Siena was a Third Order Dominican. My husband appeared and refreshed my coffee mug just as I wandered into a few sites about their way of life, then visited my own Benedictine Oblate heart strings online for a bit, and found myself halfway to the phone to dial up a rural Texan monastery when I remembered it was time to switch the laundry loads.

Fly Lady. And her snippy tenet about "Don't allow yourself to get sidetracked by the computer." Ah, vice.

We've had so many recent conversations, some with friends, about the modern place of technology and the danger of replacing leisure and rejuvenation with solitude and oblivion.  Useless ingestion of news and gossip.

As the saying goes, "When looking for faults, use a mirror, not a microscope." I've benefitted greatly from hearing peoples' stories about their own overly-connected, hyper-informed habits. It's all terribly amusing. My husband recently acquiesced (he's going to be so annoyed that I used that word. Oh wait, he doesn't read the Internet, nevermind!) on a major scheduling thing which results in him //not// working 16 hour days. Pretty rad.  So our priority-shifting-talk , which has heretofore been largely safe and existential, is really coming to pass. And this, before the mania of Alaskan summer with 20 hours of daylight! It's a great time to plan.

My proclamations are in no way a sweeping condemnation of the webs. Lots of kids do it with impunity. This is just a thing.  It's just my box; as Auntie Leila describes artfully and practically, "Obviously you still have to de-clutter the box. The trap would be to put your clutter in the box and then add more clutter on the tables. The box is not a remedy for Original Sin. I know. Bummer."

When I emerged from the office to give my plain coffee that pinch of sugar which makes it "Brooklyn Black", my husband shrugged off my culinary queries with a hug: "I've got dinner goin' in the crock pot, honey --- chicken cacciatore"

Which obviously made me think of Madonna. (Louise Veronica Ciccone.) Who always makes me think of Detroit. And then Joe Koss.

Saints Catherine, Dominic, Benedict --- Ora pro nobis!

When Evangelize Sounds More Like Scandalize

It's been observed that having a judicious temperament includes knowing when to simply be quiet. What's the opposite of judicious, then? That's the one I have. The temperament of a defendant, or maybe a plaintiff, but I wish to be no one's Judge. And thank God for His wisdom on that. We could take a moment of silence to observe it, even.

Blogging has served a thrilling mix of the accessible and the impossible for me, since jumping in with both feet two years ago, after an annual Christmas letter mailing just left me overflowing with more to say. A convert to Catholicism, I find endless study, joy and conversion in the tenets of our faith. Reading certain blogs has urged me along the journey. It's also been helpful to express these beliefs by writing them down, in the sense that I could refer to authoritative teachings and teachers while paddling alongside them in my own way. It's been cool.

None of this is to say that writing publicly in my limited scope has helped me to become a stronger Christian. It hasn't. With the exception of highlighting my own scholastic and spiritual weaknesses --- a focus I'm thankful for --- this has been mostly an exercise in networking. Still valid, still gratifying and productive. But not growth, for me. There are graceful women who can avoid being unfairly combative while elucidating Truth, and I commend them.

"I write to make sense of my life," is a sentiment I heard twenty years ago and loved immediately. It now sounds slightly vain and limited, but as far as it goes is still true for me. My faith makes sense to me now, and writing about it has been a small but vital part of that.

I am newly sensitive to the formulaic cheapening of our faith for cynical gain, after an exchange heralded by a popular Catholic blogger, in which "traditional" Catholics were prompted to decry the secret anti-Semitism amongst the people they worship with. Hardly a light charge. Stuttering denials and outrage ensued. Crazy anti-Semitic (the word crazy being descriptive, not a qualifier, for there's no other kind) things were typed to the blog author in response. However, all sane voices claiming to run in traditionally-minded circles but never hear such filth were ignored. A pattern emerged: either tacitly cheer the hip blogger and mock the square kids in skirts, or prepare to be shunned. Una Voce, people.

Sometimes I read the posts offered here and see a predictable pattern: "Orthodoxy (from the Greek, 'straight, upright', no?) rules! Believe me and St. Augustine --- and if you don't, allow me to shock you with a sordid, self-referential anecdote." Formulas are tiresome, and if there's one thing I learned from the smirking condescension lobbed my way this afternoon, it's that guilt by association has a formula all its own. When an accuser is intent on proving their point over discovering even a hint of new data, no defense is possible. I trust God alone to direct my soul, and have no doubt that the gift of reason will serve me in discerning the company I keep at mass or anywhere else. I don't need edicts from the internet or a Facebook pep rally about bravery to do so.

And so it follows that I now assess my associations. Let God find me in a Latin mass all day long before He sees me bowing down to self-appointed spiritual directors posing as bloggers, so hungry for plain old meanness and detraction. We must be careful that leaps to rashness and amusement at the expense of charity don't become idols in themselves. I'm comfortable saying 'we' because I mean 'me'. I must be careful of this.

Lox Populi, in its name, is a claim that the voice of the people is not, after all, the voice of God. (Plus my daffy nod to the superiority of Alaskan seafood.) I wonder if that's an irrelevant claim to stake online, where being loud and pithy too often passes for virtue and truth. Mob rule has no charity. It seeks evidence to fulfill a foregone conclusion, and ignores any contrary testimony. There's no judicious temperament required, only a grudge and a megaphone.

If I began writing in this space with at least the clarity of knowing I have much more to learn than I do to teach, that clarity remains. And I want to write about motherhood now, with many of the same intentions (mostly justifying the suspicious amount of reading I like to do). My motivation is growth as a writer --- with opinions and observations about modern culture through the prism of Catholicism coming naturally. Joyfully swimming upstream towards the shared aim of sainthood, and challenging myself to excellence, these all still matter very much to me.

This blog will stay active, but I envision a season of learning and sharing more on the personal topic of vocation: if you'll join me, please find newer posts at The Reasonably Redneck Childhood.