Betty Duffy

Why Catholic Women Don't Make Good Mommy Bloggers

2012-01-31T20:26:00.002-06:00

It's what I'm talking about at The Anchoress.

I'm Guest Posting this week...

2012-01-30T09:01:00.003-06:00

I'll link here to whatever I upload there (and I do have plans to post new content, not just recycled content from my blog), but you'll also want to check in there, I think, to read what my co-hosts are writing as well. I'm honored to share duties with Father Dwight Longenecker and Kathy Schiffer.

If you're here visiting from The Anchoress, welcome!

QTs

2012-01-25T22:15:00.006-06:00

*
I prayed for detachment from the internet, and I got it. I go through phases where I think there are just too many voices out there. I get online, I flip through a few, I lose my bearings, I wonder what I'm doing here. There are so many teachers, so many gurus positing inspiring new ways to see the world, and yet usually I leave the internet feeling purged rather than nourished, and purged not in the good way--but like any ideas I had about my own writing, or my own purpose are spirited away--to where?

There are so many hairs to split and straw men to battle. People have very clear ideas about what is a sin, and what isn't--and none of them agree. The pink blogs tell me how to put my life together, and there's always some turd somewhere else maligning my sense of order.

So I wonder sometimes about the goodness of adding my own voice to whatever it is the internet is. I'm not asking for affirmation or encouragement. But I don't feel "on message" at the moment. I'm happy with my life, and I don't know what to make of yours.

I picked up Wendell Berry's "What Are People For?" this evening, and felt a palpable relief at reading truly nourishing words, words that accrue meaning the more I think about them. I want to do more of that kind of reading. So maybe it helps that I feel dumbstruck. I can't read well when I'm formulating my own message.

*
My sister was in town last week from Guam. She came to spend time with my granny (we call her Mimi), who has cancer, the aggressive kind, and she's already 89 years-old. It was one of those calls--if you're going to make a 24 hour flight to commemorate someone's life, is it better to do so while the person is still alive, or to come for a funeral? Unable to afford doing both, my sister decided to come while Mimi was still alive.

Almost immediately after my sister's arrival, Mimi was hospitalized with pneumonia. All of last week was caught up in soaking in every minute of my sister's trip home, and also visiting the hospital, and getting Mimi back to my parents' house for rest and recovery. She's there now, and doing well.

But my sister has returned to Guam, and I'm sad.

*
My daughter is preparing for her school play The Cheese Stands Alone, in which she will play "Blue Cheese." Her costume: a blue sweat suit.

Blue cheese is my absolute favorite.

*
The more you spend on a thing, the more you expect from it; maybe not a rule of life, but certainly true of a mattress. If your mattress is the culmination of twelve years of speculation, two years of saving, four weeks of research, and three days of shopping, damn the thing if it doesn't perform.

We sent our mattress back to the store. All ye who said "Don't fall for the pillow top," were correct. The very first night I rolled into my husband's wake, and spent a fretful night dreaming I'd fallen into a financial abyss with a twenty-year guarantee.

The mattress issue, then, became a question: Do we order the bed of roses, the bed of lettuce, or the bed of nails?

I've heard proponents of the bed of roses camp speak out from every financial bracket, saying, "It's your bed. It's your marriage. It's your good night's sleep. It's an investment in many good things, and it's worth every penny you spend on it." My husband speaks from this point of view.

I tend naturally towards the bed of lettuce camp, thinking to get a practical, firm, multi-coil mattress, with no frills for a couple hundred. But my dissatisfaction with everything I tried made me feel bad about myself, like maybe I need to sleep on the wood floor for the rest of my life (the bed of nails) to do penance.

Our mattress question led me to the confessional, where I was told for the first time, ever, in my entire life, that I'm too high strung. That I need to relax, that buying a mattress is not buying Heaven or Hell. Can you afford the mattress? Will it make your husband happy if you quit fault-finding and stressing out? Close your eyes, pass the checkbook, and thank God for the blessing of comfort and a good night's sleep.

So we sleep on a bed of roses, and it's heavenly.

*
My cousin Rachel is ENGAGED! I'm her grouchy matron of honor ("You haven't been a maid for a long time," she says). My husband and I really like weddings. We like dancing and drinking and making fun of people while we eat.

And it's a cowboy boot wedding. I like boots.

But best is that she found a good, good man. I'm so happy for her I could cry.

Cultivating Admiration

2012-01-23T07:49:00.010-06:00

Our adult religious ed is doing Father Barron's study on the Seven Deadly Sins. As with almost everything the Word on Fire ministries produces, I cannot recommend the series highly enough.

There's been a lot of internet commentary on the dangers of comparing ourselves to other people, and finding ourselves inadequate. The party response has been to keep our eyes on our own papers, and be satisfied with our own capabilities. Unfortunately, keeping our eyes on our own papers doesn't really provide us with an opportunity for growth.

Father Barron proposes that to combat to the deadly sin of envy, we should cultivate the opposing virtue of Admiration.

I'm working on it. Here are a few people who no longer make me want to die of jealousy because I admire them so much:

1. Simcha Fisher, who is funny.

2. Marc Barnes, who hits it out of the park (and recently, into the Wall Street Journal) so frequently, and at such a young age, it's just weird.

3. Heather King, who is thought provoking, frank, and fearlessly herself.

None of them need my little link here to keep doing what they're doing. But it helps me.

I would also add Father Barron to my list, but his work is so clearly the work of the Holy Spirit, I fear it would be blasphemy to envy it.

Modern Problems

2012-01-19T14:13:00.003-06:00

My column at Patheos this week might be familiar to anyone reading the blog this time last year. If you're thinking of moving off the grid, think twice.

Rather an irregular week here at the Duffy house--hope to get back in the swing of things next week.

"Can we watch a show, Mom?"

2012-01-16T09:37:00.004-06:00

"...Please?"

".... We'll get out of your face."

Now, why would I want that?

Q & A

2012-01-12T08:21:00.003-06:00

Anonymous said...

"What do you mean when you say you can offer up your Eucharist? I'm a relatively recent revert and this is undiscovered territory, for me."

An Answer:

Hi Anon, I'm glad you asked.

Basically, you can offer up anything in your life--any suffering, any blessing--you accept it as a gift from God, and offer it back to him--because there's really nothing else, no merits of our own, that we can give God that he didn't give us first. And yet, in love, in gratitude, we often feel inspired to offer him SOMETHING.

The Mass is the highest form of prayer because through it, God gives us the greatest gift, which is Himself, the body and blood of his only son Jesus Christ. Receiving that gift from God with humility, provides an outpouring of actual Grace. It cleanses us from venial sin, and provides nourishment for a holy life.

A moment of Theology (because I just learned this last night from our Parish Priest):

(Gen 2:8,9) There were two trees in the Garden of Eden, the Tree of Life, and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Eve disobeyed God, and chose to eat from the Tree of Knowledge. Therefore she and Adam were banished from the Garden, and forbidden to eat from the Tree of Life.

The decree of excluding humanity from the Tree of Life has been revoked by Christ. The Cross of Christ is revealed as the Tree of Life, and Christ is the fruit. We eat this fruit and regain Paradise. So the Eucharist is not just an outpouring of actual Grace, but it is even greater--because it's also the gift of Eternal Life.

So when we offer up the Eucharist we have received, we are recognizing the Supremacy of that gift, and offering it back as the Greatest thing we have to give Him. It's been said that there is enough Grace in one Eucharist to transform the entire world.

When I say I offer these Graces to Mary, it is because she sees the world through the suffering of her son. And she has also adopted all of humanity because of Christ's love for it. So she is Mother to our Savior, and also Mother to us. A mother knows which of her children are struggling the most, so when I offer my Eucharist for Mary's intentions, they are more effective than when I offer them for my own intentions.

I'm sure there's much more to say on this subject, books have been written on it, and I'm sorry I don't have any titles in my head at the moment. Anyone have recommendations for further reading?

Offering Them Up

2012-01-10T11:51:00.008-06:00

Last week, my daughter was lector at the school Mass. One of my boys was altar server. Two more of my kids were in the pews, staring up at the gilded ceiling of the Sanctuary, thinking about God knows what, and I was in the vestibule, watching it all through a glass window, with a three-year-old, who loves trying to get his siblings' attention at school.

As the day would have it, I wasn't able to stay for the Eucharist. I had an appointment at nine, and I hadn't thought it would be too terrible to hear my daughter and watch my son, pray a little, and then quietly slip out the back. But once I was there, and Father began the Liturgy of the Eucharist, I started to feel disheartened about leaving.

I hadn't observed the fast, so I couldn't receive the Eucharist regardless, but it felt like a bit of a waste to be there and not partake of the graces of the Eucharist. So I asked God for a minor miracle: Let me have the graces I would have received from actually consuming the Eucharist, and I'll offer them for Mary's intentions. Of course there's no way of knowing how such a request pans out, but I felt a little wash of consolation at the thought.

It occurred to me then that there might be more graces to offer, right here in front of me, because I know my children, and they are very good kids, but there was no chance that they would remember to offer up their own Eucharists. I barely remember to do it myself half the time, and as a matter of fact, I'm not sure I've ever clearly articulated to them that it's something they could do. So just on the off chance it might work out for the good, I offered their Eucharists as well.

Then I looked out on the Sanctuary, at the couple hundred kids there, and, well, I offered theirs too, just in case. Why not? Roughly one hundred innocent little people were going to receive Christ that morning. Let their graces from the Sacrament go to the most needy in the world. Waste not, want not. And Mary will know what to do with them.

Then I made my exit as planned, and I'm not saying I felt good about it, but at least I'd done what I could with my short time at Mass.

***

Over the weekend, one of those little boys at my kids' school, a first grader, was killed in a car accident.

Last week he was in the pew. This week, he isn't. I don't know what to make of it.

***

After having my little experience last week with offering up the Eucharist, I'd been contemplating the idea that our time on earth is too short to waste any graces. There are so many of them, just ripe for the picking, and one grace leads to the next, but I've often been too hasty with my plans, and fearful of where God might take me, so I shut off the faucet of grace from the start.

It's happened with my kids, that the more I invest in my relationships with them, the more I realize I need to invest. I open myself to doing something little, like helping with their homework, and the interaction reveals that I've overlooked some other need of theirs, perhaps for gentleness regarding a weakness, or for more time spent reading together or just being with them. One interaction facilitates the next. And I'm ashamed to admit, that I have preferred at times, to remain blind to the vastness of their needs.

Got to get to my appointment. I'm busy, too busy to make the most of my prayers in the morning. It's good enough just to read the Gospel. Do I have to sit there and think about it too? What if it reveals something to me I don't want to know? What if it requires something of me? It usually does, often something I don't want to give.

I watched the movie Tree of Life several months back, and again on New Year's Eve, and my husband and I have been trying to make sense out of the last scene. All the characters who have presumably died, walk on a beach, reuniting and hugging one another. It looks purgatorial, in that there is still an earthly sort of environment, and people still have bodies and recognize one another.

A woman, who appears to be Mary, comforts the mother of the fictional O'Brien family, whose one son died young and the other lost his faith. We see the mother offering her son to Mary, saying, "My son, my hope, I give him to you," and it's not clear which son she's offering, if not both.

Water flows around their feet and waves beat the shore--and I am imagining this water as grace, poured out like a libation--as much as you want--as much as you can take--a slow trickle, a waterfall, depending on what you are willing to offer, or what you are open to receiving.

It takes one unimaginable death to put my costs into perspective. I have, so far, been asked to surrender only trivial things, the easiest things, my time, my comforts, my attention. There have been occasional bodily costs--the discomforts of pregnancy, the loss of pregnancies--but so far my investments are little in comparison to what others have been asked to surrender.

We all know what matters most in life are relationships, our relationship with God, the relationship with our spouse, our responsibilities to our children, the requirements and sacrifices of love. I haven't always done those relationships well enough, and already I can discern the wounds of my inattention.

I believe that grace flows back and forth through time, and our offerings today really can compensate for the ones we didn't make yesterday. I have the benefit of being able to make reparation while my kids are alive and well, to seize the graces offered to me today, tomorrow, next week, and offer them for the purification of past offenses, and future ones. There will be more failings to come, I'm certain.

And as always, I know Mary administers those graces especially to mothers who've lost children to death or sin. Peace of Christ be with them.

The Fallacy of the Yummy Mummy

2012-01-05T14:17:00.003-06:00

Here's a taste of my most recent column at Patheos:

In the aftermath of Christmas, my mother started to think that she needed to go on a diet. She made one of those, "Ugh, I can hardly stand to look at myself; I need to diet," comments, to which, my dad said, "No, you don't need to lose weight. Grandmothers are not supposed to be skinny. They're supposed to be huggable." Then he turned to me and said, "Tell your mother she doesn't need to go on a diet."

My parents have four children, and nearly twenty grandkids, none of whom have ever expressed a desire for a skinnier matriarch. I agreed with my dad, "Skinny grandmas can be nice, but chubby grandmas seem cheerier." I should mention that my mother is not really chubby at all, and mention of dieting from someone who has maintained a healthy weight throughout sixty-plus years of life is sort of beside the point. She'll take care of herself—she always has.

But I started thinking about the conversation, because I have certainly set goals for myself based on the mistaken perception that what everyone must certainly want of me is not more hugs or a kind and open demeanor, but to be better looking.

Read the rest

Dickering

2012-01-04T14:59:00.004-06:00

(Caveat: If you're highly sensitive to misuse of the words "lay" and "lie" you might want to skip this post.)

Long ago, when my husband and I realized there would be very small children in our bed for many years to come, we bought a king-sized mattress off my husband's Great Aunt Ruth for fifty bucks. It was already old when we bought it, with its gaudy 1970s style floral print over a yellowed background, but it was a Beautyrest with a lifetime warranty. Aunt Ruth died shortly thereafter, and twelve years into its second lifetime, my husband and I have decided to put the mattress out of its misery, mainly because its misery has worn off on us, or on our backs anyway. We went mattress shopping, for real, not in a relative's basement, but in a department store.

Our first salesperson was anxious to discern our sleeping preferences: "Are you a side sleeper or a back sleeper?"

"Side sleeper," I said, my left side--a holdover habit from pregnancy days.

"And you, Sir?"

"Uh, my back?" said my husband.

Our salesperson led us to a giant mattress surrounded on three sides by flatscreen TVs that formed a room around it. He told us to take our coats off and lie down on our backs--that this special mattress would take some measurements and help us deduce the right mattress for our particular body types. He typed our heights and approximate weights into a computer along with our sleeping preferences, then told us to lay still while the computer collected data.

This was a very awkward procedure, something like a mattress cat scan. Once on our backs, we could see that another flatscreen TV was over head, and when the lights dimmed, this TV came on, and a womanish computer animated voice said, "Hello! You are here because you have made a decision to purchase a mattress."

Thank you for telling us.

"Your sales representative will return in just a moment. Your patience is important while we help identify the right mattress for you." A few high tech dots scrolled across the screen which became graphic male and female figures compressed in a computerized mattress. Deep within the bowels of the mattress below us, we detected a movement.

"Uh oh, something's happening," said my husband. It was like one of those massage chairs from Sharper Image, moving up and down the length of our bodies.

"I think it's measuring the divot my butt makes in the mattress," I said. "It's feeling me up."

The computer spoke, "Now turn into your preferred sleeping position while we take one last measurement." I turned to my side. My husband turned to his side.

"I think I might have made a mistake about being a back sleeper," my husband said.

"Yeah, I was sort of surprised to hear you say that. I don't usually think of you that way."

"How am I supposed to know if I'm asleep?"

When our salesman came back, he handed us a computer printout that assigned my husband and I two different colors. My color, indicated that I need a softer mattress, while my husband's showed he needs a firmer mattress. Our salesman raised his arm over the showroom, "Look for mattresses marked with your color; those will be the best ones for you."

"I'm Green," I said.

The sales guy winked at my husband and said, "You didn't hear it from me." Snicker, snicker.

So we set off, towards the showroom, where fifty or so other people were lying down on the floor models simulating their preferred sleep positions while salesmen were standing by.

"This is so weird. You see what everybody looks like when they're sleeping." One guy in jeans and a stocking cap was on his stomach with the side of his face pressed into the mattress and his hands tucked under his thighs. A woman all in black with high heels on, curled up on her side in a fetal position. Everywhere, people were prostrate, but only for a few seconds, before jumping up and moving on to a different mattress. My husband and I would lie down back to back, then flip over face to face. We'd both turn to our backs, then get up and move on. It was like musical chairs, or speed dating, or a slightly off-kilter mix between the two.

New mattresses are expensive, thousands of dollars. Firm. The salesmen insist that terrible things will happen if they come down on the price. So when we went from Kittles to Mattress Firm, and my husband saw a mattress that he knew we both liked for about 700 less than we'd seen it at the other store, he said, "I'm going to go see if Kittles can match this price." This is precisely where I zoned out of the mattress shopping adventure and started reading an old copy of Atlantic Monthly I'd swiped from my parents' house with a jaded woman on the cover saying, "What? Me Marry?"

My husband ran into Kittles, and came back out a few minutes later. "Our guy said he can do a hundred less than Mattress Firm."

"Great. Let's do it."

"I want to see what Mattress Firm has to say about this first. I'm going to dicker with 'em." We drove back to Mattress Firm. They said they would throw in delivery and taxes for the same price, which meant that the final ticket price was approximately three hundred less than originally advertised at Mattress Firm and a thousand less than the ticket price at Kittles. Very firm, these guys are. I was starting to wonder how low we could go, so when I went into Mattress Firm with the wallet to make the sale, I teasingly suggested he knock another hundred off.

The guy looked at me warily. He was sick of our sh*t. "To be honest, I'm only making twenty-five dollars on this sale, and the only reason I'm giving you this price is because I need it out of the warehouse by tomorrow night when we do our inventory."

Alrighty then.

Yesterday, our mattress was delivered by a 19-year-old Italian-sounding feller with greasy hair, who asked at the door before entering, "Do you want me to wear booties?"

Do you want me to wear booties? Booties? It took a minute before I realized he was talking about those little plastic galoshes you put over your shoes, and I waved my hand to dismiss the notion that my home was clean enough to require booties. I showed him to my room, where Aunt Ruth's mattress lay on the floor, as it has these twelve long years, only now, stripped of its sheets and mattress pad so that the voluptuous but faded hot pink hibiscus print looked naked. "Here she is," I indicated the mattress to be removed.

I have to admit, I was a little sad to see her go as they folded her in half and carried her out the door-- even though she'd caused me pain. I probably don't need to mention how many babies were conceived on that thing.

We had downgraded from a kingsize mattress to a queen, which made both my husband and I a little nervous. What if we touch each other in our sleep? Sure enough, our first night on the new arrival, he rolled off of his back, side sleeper that he is, and butted me out of the center of the mattress with his rear end. I butted him back, and so forth, until finally we settled on a spooning position, which, you know, could conceivably result in more children. I tell you this only to note that the downgrade is truly an upgrade.

My husband is making the bed itself, our first actual bed rather than a mattress on the floor. It's a cannonball bed with shoulder-high posts, made out of walnut. In a month or so, it will all come together. Until then, goodnight.

Christmas Quick Takes

2011-12-29T09:55:00.006-06:00

Christmas at the Duffy house was a success by a most standards. I did all the Christmas shopping within comfortable limits of both time and money, and felt satisfied with the potential Christmas morning outcome. Typically, my husband saw things a little differently, a philosophical difference, you might say about what Christmas gifts are supposed to accomplish.

I think of Christmas as a time to buy expensive things that we need, but otherwise might not be able to afford, a time to splurge on things like bedding for the boys who've been in sleeping bags on top of their sheets for a couple years now, so that their room resembles a European youth hostel. I bought them matching comforters, so that we can put those dirty bags through the laundry and box them up for camping--also so that they might start making their beds. To fill in between the bedding, each kid would get their own box of sugar coated cereal, beef jerky, and a giant jar of pickles. Kids fed and to bed, all in one fell swoop.

My husband thought that bedding was sure to disappoint kids, who, while none of them still believe in Santa, are still young enough to maintain a sense of wonder at the possibility of getting exactly what they want on Christmas morning. I have to admit, I have difficulty remembering such a Christmas morning, as my mom had thrifty impulses similar to my own, and almost every article of clothing we received bore Mom's favorite label, "Irregular," stamped over the tag. And perhaps subconsciously, we all recreate the Christmas we experienced in childhood. If disappointment was your most common emotion in the Christmas mornings of your youth, you might think disappointment is good for your kids, and even strive for it. Pickles! All around!

Nevertheless, my husband went shopping the day before Christmas and solved the disappointment problem, so that Christmas morning, in between opening BB guns, sling-shots, and e-readers, I pointed to the comforters that hadn't been touched and said, "Did you see those comforters, Boys? Don't they look cozy and warm?" They had not seen the comforters, and didn't see them until much later in the day when we asked them to take their loot up to their rooms to put away.

Next year, I think I'll bow out of Christmas shopping all together. It occurs to me that I'm not saving money with my shopping.

***
The kids participated in a Christmas Pageant at Church, which was very exciting. On the cast list, one of my boys was listed as a sheep who keeps wandering away, which seemed like a pretty good match for his personality. At the rehearsal, however, the match seemed a little too good, as he was doing some full-on method acting, crawling around on all fours, eating dirty kleenexes out of the trash cans. And his older brother, as a shepherd, was also method acting, and using a large stick to direct his little brother's errant ways.

The DRE, who was directing, said, "I know he's your brother and all, but could you please be a bit more gentle with the stick?"

Gentleness was very difficult for him. It was also difficult for their sister, who, as the Virgin Mary, was the only one NOT in character. An overheard conversation:

Four-year-old: "Are you ever going to be nice to those boys, Janie?"

My daughter: "No, I'm never going to be nice to those boys because they're my brothers!"

***
For Christmas, my husband gave me a membership to the Y, which, of course, was exactly what I wanted, and made me feel bad for getting him luggage, which was exactly what he needed, but didn't particularly want. So I went to check out my new gym the other day and exercised for two hours, and felt really fit and exhilarated with the possibilities of good health.

I recalled a time many years ago, when my sister-in-law had a boyfriend who was not a very good match, and he made a dinner for us one night which was salmon over a bed of greens or something like that. We ate it, and gave our compliments to the chef, even though salmon was not on our list of favorite foods.

He answered, "You guys better be careful or you might break out in healthy!"

A sampling from any of the Duffy siblings' cabinets in those days would have turned up some Diet Coke, Mountain Dew, cigarettes, salami and peanuts. Perhaps, also a case of beer, though those never stuck around for long. There was no chance that anyone in that crowd would "break out in healthy," by eating salmon for dinner one night.

But after a week's feasting this Christmas, during which time, my gums were raw from eating too much sugar, and every night, I went to bed feeling a little bit sick at what all this eating might do to my rear end, "breaking out in healthy" was exactly the sensation that came to mind as I chugged away the calories on the treadmill.

***
Been reading Wendell Berry again, or actually, about him, from "The Humane Vision of Wendell Berry," and am faced, again, with the conflicting interests around which we are making our way in the world. If we desire to build a community of multi-generational families, with strong ties to place, is it a good idea to send kids away to college, knowing they may find jobs and spouses that take them to different regions of the country?

I was just thinking the other day how interesting it will be when my kids are marriageable, and I'll have this virtual rolodex of families I've met online who have children of similar ages and outlooks, with whom to put my kids in touch. If my mom had had such a rolodex when I was younger, I would have been quite thrilled, as good men were sort of hard to find in those days, and I'm lucky to have found the one I did, when I did. I had to date a few toads first, and there was a short time when I didn't believe that anything other than toads existed.

Maybe good men will be even more scarce in the upcoming decades, and I'll have no choice but to send my kids off, away, into the universal membership where they'll make their own support networks and communities that don't include my husband and I except once or twice a year when we travel to see them or vice versa. I'm such a homebody, I can't fathom the concept of my children making a life for themselves anywhere other than Indiana. But it most likely will happen.

And yet the internet has made the Catholic Church in America, at least, seem like a very small world. There's the UD Community, and the Steubenville Community, and the TAC Community, etc. and nearly everyone has a crossover between siblings or spouses that connect those communities in peripheral ways. In short, everybody knows everybody in a way that they did not even just a decade ago. I need to reconcile with the possibility that the future might not be terrible.

***
My youngest has sort of been using the potty, which means he's been running around the house in nothing but his skivvies for several days. Their bottoms always look so cute the first time you get them into underpants.

Talking about Catholic Education

2011-12-22T09:50:00.002-06:00

...and those wonderful Nashville Dominican nuns this week at Patheos:

Holiness, Not Hot Air!

Finding...Being Found

2011-12-18T22:20:00.009-06:00

***
Our hotel in Rockville, Maryland was on Research Boulevard accessed by Corporate Drive on the East, and on the West, by Shady Grove. Every time I left the hotel, I got lost on the wide boulevards that wound through blocks of glass office buildings. Research and Corporate looked the same to me, and also, I refused to use the GPS. My husband says the GPS works very well if you let it warm up for forty-five minutes or so. I say, I have not time to drive around in circles for forty five minutes waiting for a machine to tell me what to do, especially when I can call and ask my husband where I am.

He was in a lab at Johns Hopkins, and keeping his customers happy meant he was just a tiny bit short with me on the phone, and I decided that instead, I would ask strangers for directions.

Many people are uncomfortable when a stranger slows down and approaches in their car. I've had it happen to me a couple times, out running on a country road, and if I'd had a can of mace, I'd have put my finger on the trigger--at least until I knew the person was a friendly element. I stopped a woman in a cul-de-sac into which I'd pulled to turn around. She was in a black SUV, and I was in a black mini-van-- two black cars, on a dead-end road, two wary women, rolling down their windows. She looked at me with razor eyes, until I asked her, "Can you tell me how to get to Hillendale Shopping Center?"

Hillendale is the sight of what --I think-- might be our nation's best thrift store, Unique/ Value Village, and this woman in the cul-de-sac, hearing my desired destination, brightened, smiled, and proceeded to do me, a pilgrim shopper from Indiana, the charity of being my light and guide to her local gem. We had forged one of the quickest bonds two passing strangers in America can share; we were both the same kind of consumers. She seemed to take pleasure at being sought for knowledge, at being asked for something she could actually give.

I listened to her. I repeated the directions back to her: right, left, right. There were street names to memorize, and corresponding directions to associate with each. My brain perked up at the challenge. I took stock of my bearings and proceeded forth towards Unique. Nevertheless, I very soon was uncertain, once again, of my direction. This time, I cornered a man in a parking lot, getting into his car. Again, he seemed glad to help. He leaned in my car window and opened up the GPS application on his I-phone. "I don't know what I'd do without this thing. I just moved here from Miami." Then he showed me how it worked and I was very impressed.

Over the course of the next four days, I would ask seven more people for directions, and each of them seemed pleased to be asked, pleased they had answers to my questions. And I, of course, was pleased to be found.

***
All my children needed shoes. My husband needed pants for work--all of which I found, hardly worn, at Unique, for very low prices. I also found a purty dress to wear for Christmas that has a waistline, rather than one of those empire waists that make you look pregnant at all times. A dress with a waistline is surprisingly difficult to find. I managed to eat chocolate for breakfast every morning this week, and had dinner out with my husband every night; I could potentially turn up pregnant in a couple weeks--so in the near future, I may have no waist to speak of, and I'll be glad I didn't pay much for the dress.

I entered the store at noon, and I left it after dark, feeling like a worm reaching the surface of the earth for the first time in months. Just as I was leaving, I found tucked up on the highest overhead shelf, a cello, possibly handcrafted in the 1700s by a notable Austrian Luthier (currently researching). I'd been looking for a good student cello on which to teach my kids, and I could see that this cello had indeed been under the stewardship of a student in the not so recent past. There was tape on the fingerboard, marking the notes, and it was pretty dinged up. I'm sure I don't need to tell you, I bought it for a scandalously low price, and ran out of the store before anyone could realize what I'd done. I'll need to have it appraised, because it does have some wounds, but violins sold at auction by the same craftsman were priced about 300% higher than I paid. And the sound quality is outstanding.

***
We spent a lot of time with family. I had a long, hilarious lunch with one of my favorite cousins in Virginia, and the next day, a long, hilarious lunch with one of my other favorite cousins who is a Dominican Nun in Baltimore.

Almost every night we got together with my husband's brother and his wife, who are both young and hip, and know how to live the nightlife. The first night I was there, we went to a little pool hall next door to the restaurant where we ate dinner. The bar was well-lit, and mostly empty, except for a few older drinkers at the bar. There was one pool table, a couple pin-ball machines, and an I-tunes jukebox in the corner.

The last time I was in my anti-technology mood, I had a combox conversation with Pentimento about music and radio and the different methods people use to personalize and stream the kind of musical experiences they want to have, and how music, which once brought people together at live venues for a common experience, now often caters to our self-imposed isolation. She mentioned that she nearly always listens to classical music stations on the radio because she enjoys knowing that there is a communion going on between herself and the other listeners in nearby localities.

My brother-in-law discovered that he could create a musical communion in the bar from his I-phone, by sending a virtual request to the I-tunes jukebox to play any song he chose, without ever getting up from the booth. No one would know who requested the song. He selected Andrea Bocelli singing Ave Maria.

From the very first notes, the other patrons of the bar were alarmed. The bartender went to the jukebox to see what was playing. Another patron went with him, and together they tried to override the song. But it couldn't be done. The bartender tried to comfort his customer saying, "Well, it's sort of a pretty song."

To which the patron replied, "I'm going to throw up."

This is one of those very rare cases where technology thrills me: you could potentially request an I-jukebox song from your I-phone, without ever even entering the bar. If you want the pool-hall patrons to spend the evening listening to Gregorian Chant, sit in your car, and request (for a small fee) all the songs you desire, from your phone.

***
The next night, we went to a bar in Baltimore called 8x10 to hear singer/songwriter Kevin Heider play in a battle of the bands. Kevin happens to be my brother-in-law's brother-in-law. But we would have cheered very loudly for him regardless. He's exceptionally talented. Sadly, he faced off against a showy quintet doing the Mumford thing with a banjo and phishy lyrics in shouted harmonies. It's sort of funny to picture Bob Dylan in a battle of the bands against Mumford and Sons. They are really not in the same genre at all--but you know who would win.

***

My favorite thing I ate this week: chicken livers, wrapped in bacon, skewered over a bed of wilted spinach, drizzled with horseradish and balsamic reduction.

For reasons unknown, I've been craving liver lately. I don't even like liver. My parents used to push braunschweiger sandwiches on us when we were kids, served on Wonder Bread with Mayonnaise. I hated it. But in my old age, my palate can override years of negative experience with a particular food and nonsensically demand things I know I dislike.

And now, I like liver.

Conversely, I've always loved seafood. It was one thing I definitely wanted to eat in Baltimore, and one night, I had the Bouillabaisse. I knew, objectively, it was a very good stew. But the palate wasn't having it.

I'm not sure what this is about.

***
We spent the first two nights in Rockville, the next two in Baltimore.

I like Baltimore. It's walkable, residential, gritty, and alive. People are out everywhere, all night long, talking in the alleys, walking up and down sidewalks, in restaurants. It's young and old, poor and rich, all in close quarters. It makes me happy to learn that my presumptions about the world are wrong, that there are still communities and neighborhoods where people interact with one another at all hours of the day and night. Sometimes it's terribly messy, dirty, immoral. Sometimes it's heavenly. But culture is not dead yet.

My husband and I went to the Baltimore Cathedral Friday afternoon, and found ourselves just in time for about ten minutes of Adoration in the crypt before they reposed the Sacrament. I've been thinking more about this idea of clinging to the Body of Christ, of going to where I know the Body of Christ can be found. I realized, kneeling there in front of the literal Body of Christ, that I have been in the midst of it for days, for years, for my whole life. I've thought at times that when we sin, we add something to Christ's suffering--that we hurt someone outside ourselves--we hurt Him. It seems more likely that we don't add to the wounds--we are the wounds on the Body--and this sick feeling I get sometimes about how things are, and how I think they should be, is just part and parcel of the wound that came into being with the origins of humanity.

From the meditation in Magnificat on Friday:

"This is the meaning of the Incarnation. God became tangible in order to teach us to find him in all that we touch and see and feel; for we are necessarily bound to the senses in this life. Jesus did not do away with these external contacts; what he taught us is not to stop at them….We must endeavor, therefore, to cultivate this spiritual "second-sight." It is the secret of the saints, for whom this world is not an obstacle between their souls and God, but a living image, a resplendent mirror of his goodness and beauty…"
--Dom Augustin Guillerand

The future of Catholic publishing?

2011-12-08T09:05:00.002-06:00

Where have all the Catholic writers gone? I have a theory! My column at Patheos today is about Catholic writers, self-publishers, and Ellen Finnigan's excellent book, The Me Years.

Salvation and the Drama of Publication

This and that

2011-12-07T08:49:00.010-06:00

Dorian posts about getting in the Advent Spirit.

Bearing posts about getting in the blogging spirit.

Both the spirit of blogging and of Advent are eluding me as well. I've got a house to clean before we get out a bunch of decorations, primarily a pile of laundry to fold and put away. But have you ever had one of those dreams when you're trying to diet, where people keep bringing you food, and the more you eat, the more food appears? My laundry pile is like that.

Blogging about laundry is interesting, I know. Everybody has it. Everybody struggles. I've told the kids, however, unless they can put their laundry away, without funneling clean clothes back into the dirty laundry, we will not get a Christmas tree this year. We will decorate the laundry pile.

They were actually pretty excited about the idea.

We had our family picture taken for the Parish directory recently. We've honestly never had a professional picture taken of our family, for a several reasons:

1. Cameras take pretty good pictures these days--so why pay for a pro picture with a cheesy background and everybody looking uncomfortable?

2. We live close to all the grandparents; they see us all the time. Why do they need a picture of us?

3. Money.

So this experience of sitting for a family photo was a new one for us. And it was hell.

The photographer started arranging us, and he had my husband sit on a stool with his legs apart. I was to sit on another stool with my back to him, between his legs. I couldn't help feeling a little uncomfortable with the pose, and said so. To which the photographer replied, "It's not like you've never been there before--you have five children."

Yes but, never before in front of an audience--much less a camera. Perhaps we are in a minority on this issue?

Our nine-year-old comedian was out of his mind with joy at having the opportunity to ham for thirty minutes into the lens of a camera. His efforts made no one laugh. So the photographer finally had done with us and funneled us over to the sales people to pick out our "package."

Needless to say, every picture was the essence of overly-casual awkwardness. I picked the best of the worst, and asked for four 5x7s. The sales guy tallied our cost, which came to around $90.

"Yeah, we're not paying that," said my husband and stood up to walk out the door.

"OK then," I said to my sales representative. "Sorry!"

And that was that. Never again.

I've sort of been putting off potty-training the three-year-old. He never wants to sit on the potty when I ask, and I don't like conflict, so I haven't pushed it. (Have you noticed a theme in our family life here? My husband does everything. He potty trained all the other kids, except my daughter, who potty-trained herself. It's great.)

Well, it occurred to me this morning that I've been putting the cart before the horse, by asking the kid if he wants to potty. This morning, it occurred to me that I could ply him with Big-Boy-Pants, and thus-wise encourage him to keep them clean. It's only 10:30 am, but it's worked so far. The kid has been sitting on the potty for about an hour. He gets off for a minute or so here and there to let me know he's been on the potty, then he goes back. There is nowhere else he wants to be.

Before I go whole-hog on poop and laundry blogging, I should mention that I'm really excited about my column at Patheos tomorrow, because I'm writing about a book that I loved.

The Me Years is a memoir about navigating corporate America and romance with an atheist, while grappling with a Catholic faith that has been only a peripheral concern for most of one's life.

Author, Ellen Finnigan, writes:

Upon graduation, I set out to write the book I wish I could have read in my twenties…for young adults like myself, who find that they can't completely turn away from the religion in which they were raised, and yet find that they are largely a product of, and remain mired in postmodern, secular, mainstream American culture.

I'm in my thirties, married with kids, a practicing Catholic, and I still find myself mired in postmodern, secular, mainstream American culture. Except, perhaps, for a minority of believers, who grew up in the homeschool movement and married young, I think Ellen's story is the central drama for Gen-X Catholics. How do you piece together a functioning faith out of a religion whose traditions no longer speak louder than the world around it?

Ellen Finnigan is an incredibly talented writer. Struggling to answer her boyfriend of two weeks about her reluctance to have sex, she stumbles internally through her own concept of love and the sexual ethics shared by her peers:

My first, instinctive answer ("sex is about love") just felt a little bit too childish and immature for even me to be able to say aloud with any real conviction.

Yet on the other hand, my first, instinctive answer also seemed too serious and, for lack of a better word, adult. It was an idea most people I knew never seemed to ultimately dismiss or eventually grow out of so much as temporarily table (Who doesn't want to believe in love?), but like a fine wine everyone seemed to be saving the real deal with a capital "L" for a time when they would, presumably, be more mature and would meet the right, certain kind of person with whom they would be ready and willing to take on permanent responsibilities and commitments, at which time the bottle (having of course only gotten better with age, or so the story went) would be opened in full ceremony, embraced, indulged and enjoyed. But it seemed like it was understood and implicitly agreed to that, until then, everyone was getting by on the boxed stuff, living modestly within their means, respecting the limitations of others and kindly requesting that other people respect theirs, not asking too much, not expecting too much. Looking at it this way, the idea was not childish so much as uncouth, if not irresponsible: It is unwise to splurge!

The Me Years is a love story. You'll be drawn in because of Finnigan's romance with a man, but the real story is about how one woman's faith shifts from a peripheral and vague notion of love as Eros to a central and profound understanding of love as Agape, and in this way she grows into the Catholic faith with which her parents gifted her at birth.

Who is thy neighbor?

2011-12-04T18:43:00.012-06:00

My daughter had a fever over Thanksgiving, high fevers, through which she talked in her sleep as though someone was antagonizing her. I'd go to her when she shouted, and try to wake her up, just so she could escape whatever hell was going on in her mind. But being awake was no comfort to her. "Let me sleep!" she said pushing a glass away when I tried to get her to drink.

For the better part of three days, a smell took over the house, sweet and bitter, and it was her breath. At the doctor's office for the second time, he said, "That's how we know she's not getting enough to drink."

"She won't take anything," I said.

"I know this is difficult stuff. But if she doesn't get enough fluid, she'll end up in the hospital."

Difficult stuff. Give the patient water. It's basic sick care. I pictured Mother Theresa's nuns administering hospice to the dying. When care can only be palliative, water is still not optional. "When did we see you thirsty and give you drink?"

But for some reason it was difficult. She wouldn't stay awake long enough to finish a glass of water. She said it hurt to drink. I didn't want to hurt her.

When I explained the predicament to my husband, he said, "I'll get her to drink." And he did. He lifted her head, holding the glass, giving her no other option but to drink--which suddenly, I realized, made more sense than my gentle cajoling. Love may be gentle and kind, but it is not stupid; it doesn't stand by in matters of life and death for fear of causing discomfort. We worked out a situation, where he would get her to drink during the day, and I'd take care of her at night.

The fever would break on and off over the course of six days, for an hour at a time, then spike back up. Sunday morning when she woke without fever I had no confidence it would stay away. But it did, and the tired, thirsty girl regained her strength.

Meanwhile, I was losing mine. Monday, I did not get out of bed. I spent all day sleeping and reading, while the three year-old drove a toy tractor up and down the length of my blanketed leg.

*
The following day I awoke to the sound of my husband plunging the toilet in the bathroom. The shower was running and emitting a cloud of steam while it waited, empty, for a body to wash. I could feel my eyes, swollen with sleep, and a heart full of dread at the thought of another heavy day. I was awake, however, awake and feeling as though I might actually get out of bed.

The kids were getting dressed for school and one or two of them had already arrived at the breakfast table. I made sandwiches for their lunches. The children ate quietly, which almost never happens. My husband arrived at the breakfast table, plumbed, showered, and dressed for work, and sat holding one of the baseball bats he'd turned on the lathe the night before, showing it off for the boys.

The five-year-old asked, "Which do you think Daddy likes better, me or his baseball bat?"

The older boys raced to get out the words, "His bat!"

"No! He likes me better! He told me!" he looked to his father for affirmation, which my husband gave him by lifting his brows and nodding agreement. And then the five-year-old scrolled through all the kids asking which one Daddy liked better between the child and the baseball bat.

I felt a sinking feeling--failure again--at the thought the boy could even have the question. Why are the simplest things the most difficult for our family?

I could recognize the question as the absurd wonderings of a five-year-old mind, as well as the beginnings of a test, the same one I put my own parents through as a child and young adult. What do you love better than me? Would you still love me if I said I hated you? Would you love me if I was a sinner?

Once I had ascertained that there was nothing I could do that would cause them to stop loving me, I began to take their love for granted. Then I was free to keep myself together for my own sake. There was no reason to do anything for the sake of pleasing or displeasing them, but because I loved them back.

It was the feast of Saint Andrew, and we read about the apostles putting out a drag net, pulling in everything they can catch from the bottom of the sea to be sorted out later. I think of this time, while the kids are little as the drag net. Gather them in. And when they mature, God will sort them.

*
I never let myself be despondent for more than three days in a row, which is either heroic, on my part, or terribly self-indulgent. There's a leaden feeling, and a failure feeling, all of a piece with the fight against the latent virus.

Nevertheless, on the third day, I rose from the bed. I dressed and left the house.

It was Wednesday night, religious ed. at Church, which begins with dinner at 6, followed by class, then Benediction. We were late as usual, which meant that every seat was taken except for a couple near the Smith family, which was no cause for alarm, except that one of my boys is afraid of Grandma Smith, because she's nearly seven feet tall and gray-haired, and there really is no one I've ever seen before who looks like her. Being tall and elderly, she also has a lot of joint and health problems, and that is what one talks about with Grandma Smith.

I thought it might be good to sit next to Grandma Smith because nodding with concern was about all the conversation I was good for that night. One of her grandsons was with her, and she asked him to scoot his chair over and make room for us. He didn't want to scoot over, because he and one of my boys frequently engage in minor competition over who made the best lego spinner of the week. He doesn't usually win.

"And who is your neighbor?" Grandma Smith said to her grandson. The boy looked at her blankly, so she turned to me and said, "I tell them to love their neighbor, and then I say that their neighbor is whoever crosses their path--not just the ones they want to love, and not just when they feel like it." She asked the boy again who his neighbor might be, and finally it sunk in, that we were his neighbors, and we were there to crowd him out of his seat. He complied, though he continued to hover around for conversation.

Grandma Smith told me about a trip she planned to take to Florida that had to be canceled for health reasons. And I nodded with concern.

Then her grandson related a youtube video he saw in which a train raced a tornado and the tornado won. So Grandma took the opportunity to tell me about her computer habits and policies. She told me about her technological confusions. I nodded with concern.

When the bell rang we went to class. I've often thought that there is nothing worse than sitting in a conference room listening to apologetics lectures, but watching videos of people sitting in a conference room listening to apologetics lectures is definitely worse--a point I look forward to writing to our DRE in the anonymous end-of-class surveys.

I welcomed Benediction that night; no voices aimed in my direction, no response required on my part--incense, silence, song. Could it all be so lovely? Could my neighbor always be mute Christ in a Golden Monstrance?

*
Good grief, He's everywhere.

Evil is interesting...

2011-11-28T09:43:00.005-06:00

Which is why, when Jennifer at Conversion Diary asked if I'd like to contribute to her series, "Our Father Word by Word," I jumped on it.

I commend the folks who meditated on words like "this" and "but." It takes some serious spiritual insight to draw the depth and meaning out of those words in the context of the Lord's Prayer.

I also offer my highest praise to all of the excellent writers who led us through this journey of prayer. I hope to scroll back through those meditations this Advent and spend more time with them.

And thank you, Jennifer, for the opportunity to add my humble submission to this amazing project.

A Meditation on Evil

Avoiding the accumulation blues

2011-11-26T09:35:00.003-06:00

I stopped for a coffee yesterday on the way home from the doctor's office, and the man at the drive up window said, "Happy Black Friday! What can I get for you today?"

I almost rolled up my window and drove away. When did "Black Friday" become a holiday? I don't even remember it having a name until a couple years ago. Until then, there was a general understanding among the Sane of this Earth, that one only left the house on Friday after Thanksgiving in the most desperate circumstances--you were in labor, or choked on a turkey bone--lest you get caught up in the rush of madwomen at Toys R Us who would pound one another for the right to purchase a Cabbage Patch Doll.

Forgive me for being a curmudgeon. I'm still trying to get rid of stuff that I've accumulated with much less effort and cash.

My column at Patheos this week: Buying Stuff for a Life I Don't Live.

The Anchoress also has a post on the Black Friday problem, along with some good gift ideas for the person who has everything.

Marian Consecration

2011-11-21T20:25:00.021-06:00

Religious tension has always been the primary drama of my life. I've often wondered whether or not I'm doing enough, or doing right, or in tune enough with God's will, or if I missed out on it somehow in the slow leak of self-preservation.

In September, I began the forty days of preparatory meditations for Total Consecration to Jesus through Mary, also known as Marian Consecration, or Total Consecration. I was not sure whether or not I would go through with the Consecration at the end of forty days, as it was unclear to me for several weeks what exactly Total Consecration even meant. On Consecration day, I went to Mass, Confession (the day prior) and read a prayer of Consecration at our Parish Shrine to Our Lady, privately and without fanfare, and went on living my life as before.

When I started nosing around for some internal shift, the only noticeable difference before and after was that the anxiety and drama were absent. I have no doubts about the fruitfulness of my prayer. It really is all good, even when it's not all that good--because of the offering "All for" or "Totus Tuus." If everything I do is for Jesus through Mary, my sanctity is not my problem; it's not something I can earn of my own will or by perfect performance. I'm a slave, and my intentions are now Mary's intentions, and the graces of my prayers are hers to administer. I have confidence that I also share the benefit of those graces somehow.

My friend Irene consecrated on the same day I did, and she was laughing about how one night, she was having a glass of wine and a bath before bed, and it occurred to her to offer it, "All for!" She felt weird about it at first, but why not offer up our rest, our comfort, our blessings as well as our suffering?

I think one source of the anxiety I've felt in the past is some sense of shame about the goodness of my life. Am I undeserving of Heaven because my life hasn't led me to any significant suffering? The pleasures of having a good marriage, good kids, good friends, reading good books, eating good foods, seem to offer little in the way of salvific value. So rather than offering up those good things, I would discount them completely, choosing to focus my emotional and spiritual energy on the minute discomforts of a relatively privileged life. If nailing oneself to the Cross is the only way to Salvation--I had no idea what to do with my blessings--blessings that God, in his goodness, made it impossible for me to escape.

Offering ALL of it, the good and the bad, has redeemed the mostly good things that constitute my life. And without seeking suffering, looking for it, wallowing in it, I'm free to administer to those who really do suffer.

***
For those wondering if offering every aspect of one's life to Mary is idol worship, let's say it again: Catholics don't worship Mary. She is a vessel of God. She points always to her son. And Christ is always God. So when Christians offer anything to Mary it sets off a chain reaction, whereby God is the power that draws all good things to himself.

I've found it useful to my Consecration to pray the Shema: "Hear Oh Israel: the Lord, our God is One Lord" (Deuteronomy 6:4). This prayer does not replace the Creed, but I love how it takes for granted belief in God, emphasizing, rather, that God is One. God is not this computer on which I'm typing, or any of the other ways I seek to occupy my time. God is One and the only thing that matters. He is what I need to teach my children, what I wake up proclaiming. There is no one else but God, and everything I have is His. All for. Totus Tuus.

***

When Bearing did her Consecration, she picked out a bracelet to remind her to live her day accordingly. I thought about getting something, but I've worn a Marian necklace for years, and I thought more Mary might be overkill.

Nevertheless, on special days, I can pull out the Our Lady of Guadalupe belt buckle that my friend Biz brought me from Mexico.

Biz also made this Marian toggle for me out of clay. I put it on a thrift store chain, and it's one of my favorite Marian necklaces to wear.

For those with pricier tastes, Instyle Magazine informs me that Dolce & Gabanna have just come out with a new line of luxury jewels, inspired by their Southern Italian Grandma and her religious medals.

Fashionistas might want to be aware, that wearing images of Mary may have the effect of drawing you to Christ. There are, of course, cheaper ways to come to Jesus. Before you splurge on the $17,000 price tag for that necklace, know that you can get a similar look for about a dollar at a Catholic Gift shop.

Today I am Thankful For ...

2011-11-19T12:40:00.021-06:00

* Kleenex

I have allergies. When I was very young, I devised a way of blowing my nose that also itches the back of my throat. I'm not really sure how to explain the technique, except that it makes a honking sound.

This morning, I was doing my thing, and my husband revealed that my nose-blowing was a real source of anxiety for him in the early years of our marriage. He used to wonder how he would live with it for the rest of his life, but by the grace of God, he has, over the years, learned to tune it out.

I was a little shocked by the revelation--how could something so integral to my person, as the way I blow my nose, be a source of anxiety to my beloved spouse? He assured me that the children also discuss my method and find it equally disturbing, and that if I found a quieter way to blow my nose, everyone would be thrilled.

So I'm working on it. And Kleenex is an indispensable tool in my search.

* Artistic people who lack The Artistic Temperament:

My husband works on DNA sequencers for a living.

When people ask me what exactly he does with DNA sequencers, I usually say something mysterious like, "I don't really know--it's complicated."

Ask my husband what specifically he does, and he'll tell you in very straightforward terms about various DNA sequencing technologies and how they're used. No mystery there. No romance. Every question has an answer, every problem, a solution.

When he wants to make something, there's no pining about not having the skills, no aching about bringing his idea to fruition. He studies, he gets the right tools, he practices, and then he makes it.

See here, he wanted to make our bed. He turned a couple prototypes, and then he started making the bed--just like that.

I shudder sometimes thinking about what might have happened if I'd married someone with an artistic temperament. We'd never get anything done. As it happens, my husband and I have a nice balance whereby I come up with ideas, and he makes the ideas happen.

The old man turned forty recently too. Never thought I'd be going to bed with a forty-year-old.

* Guano!--or bat feces, which alerted me to the presence of this fellow hanging from my dusty dining room window the other day:

Sleeping bats in daylight are always better than flying bats at night.

* Fenugreek

My family hates my cooking, and there's a reason why. Many moons ago, when I lived in England, I went to an Indian restaurant (Standard Tandoori in Oxford, UK) that served a dish called Dhansak. It is, to this day, the best thing I have ever tasted. I have downloaded many recipes online trying to recreate the taste, and it has become my great white whale, my Moby Dick. Almost everything I cook is some variation on this dish that, even its simplest configurations, contains two to three pages of ingredients. I haven't been able to recreate it as of yet, and I think that's because of my failure to get my hands on some fenugreek. Well, all of that has passed--I bought some fenugreek--and tonight, I think, is the night that we are eating Dhansak.

*This song: Which has been good for five minutes of downloadable happy sentiment while cooking.

Vignettes

2011-11-14T21:57:00.009-06:00

The weather has been very moody lately--roiling dark clouds pocked with sunlight, paired with unseasonably high and unseasonably low temperatures, all within the same afternoon. It's the weather that has the most to say about my life these days. I think I've handled November very well so far, all things considered. We've been laying low, sticking close to home, housekeeping, and trying to keep the kids' noses clean.

*
On Saturday, I cut all the boys' hair, including my husband's. Cutting my husband's hair is one of those things that sounds really romantic in theory. I orbit around his head, periodically bending over to where he would meet my eye, but I'm squinting just to the right and left of his gaze, checking for evenness and effect.

The problem I've realized is that boys, at least the five boys who dominate my life, are very particular about their hair. They have strong ideas about what looks good, and what minuscule irregularities might ruin the next month for them.

They get up from the chair, to glance at themselves in the mirror and see how things are going. They rub their palms over the backs of their necks, and brush hair off onto the floor. And there is a lot of hair, so very much hair, that the romantic prospects of giving my husband a haircut, much like the romantic prospects of making out on the beach, are over-shadowed by logistics that leave you irritable, and itchy all over.

Plus I accidentally cut the back of my husband's neck with the clippers.

*
Inevitably, one of the boys doesn't want his hair cut at all--and it's the boy with chronically dirty ears, the one whose pants are always too short, the one who most needs a decent haircut, and all the help his mother can give him, really.

I've done the calculation to see what it would cost to send them all to Greatclips--and for five heads, it's about fifty bucks a month, which is about $600 a year in hair-cuts, which is so not in the budget. So there's nothing to do but stand there wagging the fiskers over the boy's head, reigning in tempting digressions about the miseries of pre-adolescent hygiene.

I wish I could say a prayer for serenity, gently squeeze the boy's shoulder to let him know that I love him, but that we've got business to accomplish, and he's going to cooperate. But when the kid keeps wiggling towards the pointed end of your scissors, and you have said, "STILL!" so many times you've quit caring whether or not he gets hurt, it's really best to blow the joint before you earn fifteen minutes of the most unflattering kind of fame.

*

So I went for a run.

I only have to run for two minutes or so, before I'm in the middle of nowhere. I cross a creek lined with the white trunks of Sycamore trees that have dropped their leaves, and then I'm in the open fields. The corn and soybeans have been taken in, so the brown grasses on either side of the road form the tallest line on the horizon. One could feel overwhelmed by such a desolate landscape, or overjoyed by its openness. I was inclined to feel both that day.

Having appreciated the wonders of creation outside my home, I could think more kindly about the wonders of creation within it. Just kids, back there. Just normal kids, doing normal stuff--being caught up in legos, and not wanting to take baths or get their hair cut. Funny kids, with their own ever-evolving rebellions and modes of escape. Hot and cold kids who, for better or worse, have much in common with their mother.

In fact, it occurred to me, that their mother was the common denominator in all five miserable haircuts administered that afternoon. Perhaps, when that many people are complaining, I can't just blame it on their vanity or immaturity or their male-ness. Maybe I really am not the hairdresser I thought I was.

I'm still not paying for Greatclips.

My Aunt gave us Symphony tickets for Sunday, to the Russian fest: Rachmaninoff and Rimsky-Korsakov at the Cincinnati Music Hall.

Lots of artsy students come to these concerts, along with older patrons, some families with kids. My husband and I parked in a corner of the lobby to check everyone out.

A trio of blond women stood next to us speaking Russian. They obviously represented three generations of mothers and daughters, all beautiful--which spawned a discussion about which Russian lady was most attractive.

I couldn't decide between the eldest, who was approximately seventy, wore her blond hair in a loose bun, and whose mouth full of grey teeth was set off by the bright diamonds on her ears, and the haughty middle woman, approximately forty, with the tight white pants and stilettos and fur collar on her sweater. She went to get their tickets at will-call, and stood with her hip jutted out, and arms folded, glaring at everyone around her.

I was about to ask which one my husband thought most attractive, when the twenty-year-old arched her back, and reached up to tighten her long pony-tail, a move which put all of her remarkable assets on splendid display.

Time to go in.

When the conductor, a petite Asian lady in a silk suit, took the stage, the first thing she did was signal the orchestra to stand up and play the Star Spangled Banner.

My husband and I were confused, because it was the Russian fest, and much of the orchestra hails from various parts of the world, and theater-goers in general are not a very patriotic people, and I've just never seen such a thing done before.

The crowd gradually stood up, a few of us put our hands over our hearts. Some in the balcony stood with their arms folded. One violist really did look sort of disgusted to be playing the Anthem.

I was completely won-over. OF COURSE you would play the anthem at an arts event in America. Americans don't get exiled to Siberia for infusing their artistic creations with criticism of the government.

The concert was fantastic. I've wondered sometimes if Midwestern audiences give away their standing ovations too freely. Really, almost every performance I've been to in the past five years has received a standing ovation. Maybe our ears are not finely tuned enough to catch a mediocre performance.

I really think we're just grateful people. Heh.

As we were leaving town, a Bengals game was ending, and a river of orange-clad fans poured out of the stadium and into the street. Speaking of appreciative audiences, I don't think I will ever understand sports fanatics--the kinds who paint their faces and are noticeably depressed when their team loses. And there are thousands of them. Right here on the sidewalk. Thousands. Someone should tell them that the party's up the road at the Symphony Hall.

On the way home, we swung by Jungle Jim's, because we were on a date, and everyone goes to the grocery store on their dates, don't they? Anyway, I was a little put off at the entry by the sign that said, "Start your carts!" as though I just couldn't get shopping fast enough. Just a little presumptuous on the management's part, I thought--they're so confident I'll find something to buy.

Just for that, I didn't even take a cart, and I spent the first ten minutes or so, pointing out all the ways that Jungle Jim's is just like Wal-mart, until I realized my husband had slipped away to the miles of beer aisles. And when I found him, he was carrying two sixers and wondering why we didn't have a cart to put them in.

And then I remembered we needed milk, and bread, and stuff for the kids to eat, and I found some fenugreek, which I hadn't been able to find in Indiana. So the short of it is, I got over feeling like I wasn't going to buy anything, and we left the place 80 dollars poorer.

Good thing we don't pay for haircuts.

Neuroscience! Addiction!

2011-11-09T21:11:00.003-06:00

My post at Patheos this week is way more fun than it sounds.

Mostly I'm talking about a book by David J Linden:

The Compass of Pleasure: How Our Brains Make Fatty Foods, Orgasm, Exercise, Marijuana, Generosity, Vodka, Learning, and Gambling Feel So Good

If that doesn't sell you, I don't know what will.

Teaching Chastity

2011-11-07T08:57:00.011-06:00

In my last post, I asked to hear from Catholic women with satisfying sex lives: what were the most important influences that helped them reach that point in their marriages? It's not too difficult to get an earful about what's not happening in the bedroom, and why--but positive reports from Catholic women who are happy with their intimate lives are rare. It's not a topic that comes up often in polite company, nor should it. But occasionally, it's good to be reminded that the teachings of the Magisterium do not negate finding satisfaction in the bedroom. Culture so often insinuates the opposite.

The post was in response to an author elsewhere on the internet who posited that her parents' over-emphasis on chastity before marriage made it difficult for her to enjoy her intimate life after marriage.

Pinpointing and addressing the source of sexual difficulties takes a lot of time and effort, and if one is already too tired to think about sex much, it's understandable why she might prefer fixating on one of the only factors that cannot be changed--the past. But present factors are probably way more influential in determining one's interest in sex: hormones, childbirth, emotional intimacy with one's spouse, techniques, time, fatigue, medical concerns, etc. All of these factors are mutable (one's present disposition towards the past is also mutable).

The spiritual and physical danger of premarital sexual liaisons is real. If one has never had the experience of being dumped after sex, of being lied to by a partner, of getting tested for sexually transmitted diseases, of feeling separated from God or from one's family due to imprudent pairings, then I can see how it's possible to underestimate that pain, and romanticize pre-marital sex as some gentle and innocent exploration of the libido.

Advising a young woman to take on the myriad risks of premarital sex, in the off chance she might have a better married sex life someday, is not something I want to do. Parents who promote chastity to their children are not trying to tie up burdens, difficult for others to carry. They are trying to relieve burdens that their children may have to carry throughout the rest of their lives.

As a parent myself, I assume that my children will have and enjoy their many long years of marriage to figure out what makes them tick in the bedroom. Nevertheless, from the responses to my last post, I noticed two trends that may promote that end:

1. Engaging in age-appropriate dialogue with our kids about bodies, reproduction, and its place in marriage.

2. MODELing appropriate affection with one's spouse. Let your emotional and physical openness to one another and God be a visible sign to your kids of the fruits of a healthy relationship.

Even still, there are no guarantees that our children will heed the lessons we want to teach them. I enjoyed Elizabeth Foss's recent post noting this fact. And how it's still worth the effort to teach our children well, to embody chaste, healthy physical relationships with our spouses for our own benefit, and so our kids will have that reference as they make their own decisions about marriage.

Getting in the mood

2011-11-03T20:44:00.003-05:00

In preparation for Hallie's book release, I was thinking maybe we should talk about sex a bit more often around here. I want to start things off by asking a question.

I read sort of a distressing blog post this afternoon by a woman raised in what she called "the purity movement," by which she meant the culture of chastity rings, abstinence promises, and father/daughter purity dances.

Her argument was that by sublimating her sexuality for so many years, she then had difficulty feeling ok with sex once she was married.

In preparation for the chapter I wrote in Hallie's Book, about fifty anonymous Catholic women filled out a survey for me about their family of origin, pre-marital sexual history, and married sex lives. A similar trend definitely made itself known: that some women have difficulty making the transition from "No, no, no," to "Yes, yes, yes."

Here's the question I wish I had put in the survey:

For Catholic women who feel they have a healthy attitude towards sex (i.e. they enjoy it, and see marriage as the proper relationship in which to express their sexuality), what has been the most influential aspect in your upbringing that helped you develop this balanced attitude towards sex?

Please comment anonymously, if you like, but I'd love to hear what you have to say!

Here's some news I don't want my mother to know about...

2011-11-02T21:33:00.006-05:00

Somebody had to put the sex in Hallie Lord's new book. It turns out that person is me.

Of course there are nine other far better reasons to purchase this book:

2. Hallie Lord

6. Rebeca Teti

7 . Danielle Bean

8. Simcha Fischer

9. Barbara Nicolosi

It will be available in the spring, but you can go ahead and pre-order it on Amazon if you're afraid you might forget (We won't let you forget).

Now I'm going to go into hiding for a few decades.