Printer, Blogger, Washer -- Just Because You're Paranoid Doesn't Mean They're Not Out To Get You

I noticed that a previous post requires a magnifying glass to read. Blogger and I are in a fight, and I can't face another round trying to fix what surely can't be fixed without too much time, too many choice words, or a stiff drink (and I don't have my glass of wine until 5:00).

Blogger, in case you didn't know, is distantly related to my old friend, Printer. You've heard all the Printer stories you care to hear. Blogger acts up in much the same way. They both have an uncanny knack for detecting any sense of stress or urgency on my part.

It has recently come to my attention that both Blogger and  Printer are close kin to Washer, the little white machine that lives down the hall. Washer has always been a stalwart, dutiful member of the household, wholly unrelated to those trouble makers, Printer and Blogger. Its relationship to the peskier members of the extended family remained obscure. These days he's a wayward son, scarcely to be trusted with anything beyond nasty sweat socks.

A month or so ago I posted on Facebook that I had seen my first laundry disaster. Now, I've had a small slip up now and again. A little bleach here, a color bleed there. But this? An entire load tangled with black ink.

Not fun.

Thankfully not too costly, either. Although a few items were beyond repair, they were old. Nothing of value lost.

About two weeks ago, a huge load went into Washer looking just swell, came out of Washer looking just swell, but emerged from Dryer covered with greasy, raspberry colored stains. Raspberry grease proved slightly easier to defeat than black ink, so all was not lost.

Then there was last week.

Black ink + large number of expensive items = Major Laundry Debacle

If I've learned anything about laundry in these many years of kids (and since I've had three laundry calamities in a month, you could debate whether or not I've learned Anything At All), it would be this:

1. You really can ignore warnings about bleach. Not straight on, undiluted bleach. That's bad and an irreversible sort of bad. But nearly anything can survive diluted bleach. Many persistent stains will eventually cry Uncle in the face of repeated washing with diluted bleach.

2. The theory that once an item goes through the wash, the stain is set -- well, that's not always true either. The big bad load of ink went through Washer again and again and again and after all that only one item was in fact ruined.

I still don't trust Washer.

Or Blogger.

And definitely not Printer.

(Especially if I'm in a hurry).

Meanwhile Tim has spent the past two days feverishly designing a web page for his computer class. I'm half-way intrigued and halfway repelled by the work he's doing. I'm a humanities junkie. I could have majored in about six different subjects -- history, English, art history, linguistics, okay so maybe not quite six. Probably my favorite college class was music appreciation (bitingly dubbed "Clapping for Credit"). I loved music appreciation, though it was called something that sounded much better. I would leave the world of Accounting 101 -- the world of balance sheets and amortization schedules -- and spend the next hour listening to Scarlatti, Handel, and Bach.

Bliss, pure bliss.

In my last semester of college, I came to grips with the fact that I was, technologically speaking, a complete ignoramus. With great trepidation, I registered for a class in computer programming. My hesitation proved a fortuitous decision -- in the interim, punched cards went the way of the Dodo. Compared to current technology, we were barely emerging from the dark ages. I clearly remember watching punched cards rain down from dorm windows on the last day of classes, and I was grateful I wasn't one of those long-suffering students.

So convinced was I that I couldn't do this type of work, I signed up to take the class pass/fail.

Well, I loved it. Loved it! Poured extra hours into tweaking my programs. Loved my Teaching Assistant, a man from Yemen named Ophir.  We became buds.

But there was a certain amount of stress involved in programming, mainly due to the fact that the University of  Michigan was woefully short of computers. We didn't have deadlines; we had "last run times". So, a program might have a last run time of midnight on a Tuesday. From the crack of dawn Tuesday, there wouldn't be a computer available. It was this class more than any other that taught me to avoid procrastination. I finished my programs ahead of time, but still I felt compelled to tweak.

I'd show up at the computer lab and stand in line for one of the "Emergency Terminals." So the deal was you wrote code while you stood in line, walked up to the Emergency Terminal, typed your program as fast as possible for five minutes, ran it, waited for your lengthy list of errors, and got back in the line again to code a little more.

At midnight, silence would fall over the lab. You'd occasionally hear students crying.

Crazy. Totally crazy.

I still loved it.

But as I watch Tim trying arduously to convert a font size, to align this bit of text or that pictures, all the picky, picky details come washing over me. One tiny error, one misplaced backslash or missing comma, and the whole thing's kaput.

Sadly, those little demons of strife that inhabit Printer, Washer, and Blogger most definitely worm their way into HTML.

Note to Tim: Remain calm. They can smell fear from a hundred paces.

Throwback Tuesday - Rend Your Hearts and Not Your Garments

Rend Your Hearts and Not Your Garments

Months ago Father K. offered a homily that included anecdotes from his childhood spent in Savannah, Georgia. He grew up as the youngest -- he called himself a "surprise" -- in a large Catholic family whose home reflected their Catholic identity. He shared about his Jewish neighbors with whom he shared a close relationship and the fact that their home reflected their Jewish heritage.

Father K.'s homily focused on the place that symbols -- physical, tangible items -- have on the life of the faithful, be they Catholic, Jewish, or that of another religion. He stressed the importance of inward disposition over external piety. As always he was articulate and to the point. Weeks later I was the Atrium chatting with children ages five to ten. Two of them distinctly remembered Father K.'s homily and quoted it almost verbatim. They got it. We can wear a cross or scapular, decorate our walls with holy water fonts and blessed palms, fill our bookshelves with Bibles and catechisms. In the end, it is the heart that matters so much more than outward conformity. The life of faith is not to be worn like so many spiritual merit badges sewn on a sash.

If wearing a cross reminds me to take all thoughts captive for Christ, great. If leaving a Bible out prompts me to actually crack the thing open, good. If answering  the phone "Hello, God bless you," restrains me from cussing out telephone solicitors, well, victory!

A growing number of women in my home parish have begun wearing veils at Mass. Let me issue one enormous disclaimer: I have never read more than about a hundred words about veiling. I have few opinions on the matter and almost zero in the way of education on the topic. I do have clear memories of my mother wearing a veil to Mass when I was very young. In a similar vein, I recall the elaborate ritual the altar servers (or was it the priest?) would go through to veil the paten and chalice left on the altar at the end of Mass. Both my mother's veil and the veiling of the articles of  the Mass really, really intrigued me as a young child.

In the Atrium we dwell on (and draw on) a child's innate and natural sense of wonder. You don't have to prod a child to be interested in a bird's nest, a wiggling worm, the story of a miracle, a lit candle. Wonder is in-born and hard-wired.

Veiling drew on my sense of wonder. What's under that veil, I thought, and why is it worth covering?

As I have looked around my church and seen the growing number of veiled women, I have briefly considered doing so myself.  And I conclude -- without judging others in the least -- that at this season, my life of faith would be better served by considering the words of  Joel 2:13:

Even now, declares the Lord, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents from sending disaster.

On this passage, Spurgeon comments:

Garment rending and other outward signs of religious emotion, are easily manifested and are frequently hypocritical; but to feel true repentance is far more difficult, and consequently far less common ... True religion is too humbling, too hear-searching, too thorough for the tastes of the carnal men; they prefer something more ostentatious, flimsy, and worldly; Outward observances are temporarily comfortable; eye and ear are pleased; self-conceit is fed, and self-righteousness is puffed up; but they are ultimately delusive for in the time of death, and at the end of judgment, the soul needs something more substantial than ceremonies and rituals to lean upon ...

Heart-rending is divinely wrought and solemnly felt. It is a secret grief which personally experienced, not in mere form, but as a deep, soul moving work of the Holy Spirit upon the inmost heart of each believer.

The text commands us to rend our hearts, but they are naturally as hard as marble: how, then, can this be done? We must take them to Calvary.

The walk of faith is often more of an amble than a steady trek. As a pseudo-type A accustomed to setting and meeting goals, I grow frustrated at the lack of progress I make in moving further into that interior castle that is a life of deep prayer. But at this juncture, it is this inward transformation I need so much more than a new and different external sign of piety.

Let's be real -- it's so much easier to blog about faith than to live it out, to preach it to my children than to practice it with sincerity and humility, to reach for the externals than to rend my  heart.

{this moment}

Donuts with Daddy at pre-school today. How sweet is that?

On OCD and Attics

Dave has a fraternity brother -- we'll call him Fred -- who was well known and soundly abused for his OCD tendencies. Everything had to be just so. Dave laughs about visiting Fred's apartment in Chicago and being stunned to discover several hangers in the closet . . .  turned the wrong way. Naturally, he brought this startling anomaly to Fred's attention only to learn that the hangers pointed in the opposite direction held dirty clothes.

Yes.

Another frat brother was visiting along with Dave. He found a can of Folgers in the pantry, grabbed a can opener, and opened . . . the bottom of the can instead of the top. Fred threw the can away and the coffee along with it.

We all have our issues.

Here are mine:

1. I clean the house from one end to the other before we go on vacation. This is equal parts OCD and my contribution to marital harmony. I pack quickly; Dave packs slowly. Over seventeen years of marriage, I've learned I can breath down his neck or boil over in frustration or put my angst toward some constructive purpose. So I clean.

Funny, funny, funny in retrospect.

On the OCD side, I have visions of dying on vacation and strangers going through my house. What will they think? In point of fact, the people going through my house would be friends or relatives and, hopefully, they would be saying, "Gosh, Kelly sure was a good friend" rather than "Whoa! Take a gander at this closet!"

Still, I gotta clean.

2. I have fears of parking lots, and these fears have become much worse since I've had children. How many times have I leaned in to fasten a car seat and pictured getting mugged? So I have a simple plan. Lock all the doors except the one I'm using. Toss my purse to a far corner of the car. Do what I need to do and do it quickly.

3. Another parking lot issue involves the heat. After unloading bags and securing children, I always leave a door open while I return my cart. I have visions of passing out or being mugged and my children being unable to get out of a hot van.

I should probably note that I have never been robbed or rendered unconscious in a parking lot, but these fears persist.

Order brings peace.

4. I don't like spending time in the attic if no one is home. I think this started when a friend fell from a ladder and absolutely shattered her ankle while she was home alone. She didn't languish for hours or anything like that. She managed to get to a phone and get help fairly soon, but somehow this made an impact on me.

Yesterday I did a grand purge of the attic. I mean, epic. So I took Kolbe out of school for two hours so that someone older than Ainsley could dial 911 if needed. No need to dispatch EMS, thankfully, and Kolbe ended up being a huge help.

The results are so fabulous, I'm embarrassed to admit how delighted I am. (And that sounds just like something my dear and tidy friend Rachel might have written. May my laundry room one day look like hers!)

A place for everything and everything in its place.

Over the past week, as I've gone to put various items away, I've quickly realized that way too many drawers, shelves, and closets have met or exceeded their capacity. Some mothers nest before having a baby. I nest before summer vacation.

Throwback Tuesday - I Can't Do It All, But I Can Fold One Shirt

On a day when I feel especially called to exercise the virtue of hope, to view all of us as works in progress and not finished products, to have the vision to imagine all sorts of possibilities . . .



My friend Susan is facing her third bout of cancer. Her hair is still growing back from the chemo following her first recurrence. Cancer has ravaged her body both inside and out. Side effects from medication have brought a fifty pound weight gain.

After Susan and her husband have spent an evening out, they return home and share an exchange of words that never varies.

Larry: You managed to do it again!

Susan: What?

Larry: You were the prettiest one there.

This is a man who knows how to love, how to encourage, how to build up what disease has broken down.

During the month of April, Small Steps for Catholic Moms focuses on courage. Elizabeth Foss writes today about encouragement. She begins by defining both courage and encourage. The definition that most resonates with me is that encourage means to inspire with hope.

When I think back to the many friends, bosses, colleagues, mentors, and teachers who encouraged me, I think of individuals who inspired me and gave me hope.

I remember my high school English teacher, Miss Kaye Hughes. She had a simple formula for drawing out the very best from us: She treated us like we were smart, thinking people. And you know what? If you are treated like that long enough, you start to act the part. Miss Hughes inspired me.

I remember my first boss in the world of Big Business. As a higher ranking manger, he viewed my success as his primary job. He was my most vocal cheerleader and champion. He gave me courage.

I remember the principal I worked under when I began teaching. He did his job with the passion of a novice teacher coupled with the wisdom of a veteran. Despite decades in the trenches, he was always able to look past the rolling eyes, the sloppy handwriting, the kids straggling in late for class. The joy he found in his subject matter and his love for the art of teaching called out the best in me.

I've read that Michelangelo could look at a block of marble and see the finished masterpiece. His job as a sculptor was simply to free it. He was a man of vision.

Last night I sat on the bleachers and watched boys’ baseball try outs. Coaches stood by with clip boards and pencils watching nine-year-old boys miss fly ball after fly ball. Although there was one shining superstar in the pack, for the most part, these coaches didn't have much to work with.

Good coaches succeed none the less. Like Michelangelo, they picture the finished product. They pull from youthful clumsiness the grace of an athlete. They take awkward posture and dicey gross motor skills and somehow fashion a batter and a catcher and a pitcher. They have to see what isn't there and build up what is missing. They have to have vision, and they have to impart that vision to their players.

So it is in parenting. We have to envision the finished product.

Sometimes the masterpiece is well hidden. Sometimes our tools are unwieldy and dull. We whittle ineffectively here; we lop off an unexpectedly huge chunk there. Sometimes – many times, in my case – the block and the tools are just as they should be, but our vision is cloudy.

Parenting takes vision. And faith. And hope. And love.

I have looked at my infant children and marveled at their tininess, their vulnerability, their helplessness. I have looked at my older children and often seen them as finished products when they are still so very young, so very unfinished.

Last week I heard sordid details about a father who relentlessly battered his children emotionally. I knew one of the children. His life ended tragically, and numerous people still struggle to pick up the pieces from his untimely death. As I listened to this sad, sad tale, I wanted nothing more than to go home and hug my kids.

When I returned home, the hour was late. I was tired. The house was a bit of a wreck. Usually all this is the perfect prescription for crabbiness and nagging. Not so last week. I surveyed the scene and said to myself, “In an hour or two, most of this will be set right.”

I hugged my kids, asked them about school, shared a few laughs, gave them a job or two to tackle. In light of the story I had just heard, no haranguing would take place under my roof.

When Tim was five or six and had just started studying piano, a new piece would sometimes overwhelm him. One afternoon he struggled and struggled and struggled to no avail. He burst out crying.

I had just finished loading approximately a zillion loads of clean, unfolded clothes onto the couch. I sat next to Tim and told him how disheartened I was by the laundry.

“I can’t do it all, “ I remember sharing. “But I can fold one shirt.”

It was a moment of grace. Believe me, I can go all Tiger Mother on my kids and have done so more times than I care to recall. But this time, Tim pressed on, not because he was prodded and bullied, but because he was heartened, because he was suddenly more courageous, because he could take that small step.

One of my most treasured psalms is “Without a vision, the people will perish.”

May God continue to renew my vision that I might encourage those entrusted to my care.

Thou Art Graven On His Hand

As we gathered with twenty-two children to celebrate a Seder meal  last Wednesday night, we sang one of my favorite hymns. I especially love three lines in the second verse:

Thou art my chosen

For I have sought thee

Thou art graven on my hand

And I was once again struck by the deep and personal nature of God's love for us.

The other day, Jamie  returned from an amazing retreat and wrote this:

I had an amazing encounter with Jesus this weekend, with a love so tender and humble and patient that it made me say yes, YES, of course I will. I am pretty quiet about my faith in real life, for all that I shoot my mouth off here on the blog, but this morning in Panera I wanted to shout, "Attention, customers of Panera: Jesus really loves you! It's amazing!"

I wasn't sure that would be productive, so I am telling you instead: Jesus really loves you. It's amazing.

God loves you.

He has numbered the hairs on your head.

He has counted your tears.

He knows the plans He has for you, plans for a future and a hope.

He died that you might live forever.

He has gone to prepare a place for you.

He has sent you a helper.

And all this is true  . . .

even if you're bored stiff at church.

even if you've been hurt by institutional church.

even if you're convinced you've sinned like no other.

even if you had parents who tried to beat the love of god into you or the devil out of you.

even if the person sitting in the next pew at your last church was a complete hypocrite.

even if you've encountered dismissive clergy, unkind nuns, bureaucratic church staff.

even if you've sworn you'd never associate with those kind of people.

None of this alters one bit the fact that God loves you.

But you don't know what I've done.

No, I don't.

But God does.

And He loves you.

{this moment}