The Loss of Patience

Once upon a time, a homeschool mommy had to decide on curriculum in May.  June at the latest. You had to place your order by 4th of July to be certain of having your books by late August or Labor Day.  With Amazon Prime now, people don't want to wait a week for an order to arrive.

Once upon a time, there were no answering machines.  If you phoned someone who was on vacation, they didn't answer, and you couldn't leave a message.  And you certainly couldn't call them where they were.  You waited until they came home to ask your question.  Now we tend to freak out if someone hasn't responded in 10 or 15 minutes.

Once upon a time, people had to go to the bank.  And they had to do it during "bankers' hours."  No direct deposit.  No ATMs.  No taking a picture of a check to deposit it via your Smartphone.

Once upon a time, you paid the doctor yourself and filled out the paperwork to be reimbursed someday by the insurance company.

Once upon a time, when you wanted to watch TV, you had to turn on the set and allow it to warm up for 3-5 minutes before you could get sound and a picture.

People today seem impatient.  People don't want to stop at red lights.  People don't want to wait in lines.  People don't recognize that political or economic policy-changes take a while before they have an effect.  People drive up to a window, hand over some cash, and expect a bag of dinner to be presented to them in less than two minutes.  People think that the doctor should be able to provide a pill or treatment that will improve the problem in a matter of a few hours and cure it within a couple of days.

We used to have all sorts of little, inconsequential, unimportant matters in which to practice patience.  Technology has erased many of those things.  (And it sure is nice to be able to talk easily and cheaply with someone who lives a continent away.)  But technology has also made us extremely impatient with the concept of patience.

Measuring Coffee

Accurate measurements are important, right?  We're supposed to measure the coffee with a proper tablespoon or teaspoon, right?

One day, they were all dirty.  I grabbed a cereal spoon and used it to measure the coffee grounds. 

I was inexplicably happy about that.

Then I realized: Dad always used the cereal spoon.  He never used measuring spoons for the coffee grounds.  Ever since, I've been using the cereal spoon and feeling warm fuzzies over it. 

Using the Precious Things

The pretty china.  The beautiful old quilts.  The crystal.  It's silly to hide it in a closet, unused.  But it's uncomfortable to use it, knowing that you're risking ruin in the short-run or wearing out in the long-run.  So I give myself the speech as best I can: use those precious things.  Enjoy the memories.  Enjoy the beauty. 

And then comes a week like this one.  We were overwhelmed in blankets.  I hauled them all out -- out of the closets, out of the storage spaces in the basement, out of the linen cupboards.  I took inventory.  I set aside some to donate.  I set some aside to offer to the kids.  I probably kept too many.  And ...

and ...

I threw some away.

Let me just say, ... OUCH.

Two of these were quilts made by Grandma, for the kids, hand-sewn, hand-quilted.  But they're over 20 years old.  When newly made, they were constructed of old fabric scraps.  These quilts were well-used and enjoyed.  They decorated the bedrooms.  They had to go through the washer regularly.  They are not merely torn, in need of repair.  They are disintegrating.  It only makes sense that they've served us well and are now ready for the garbage.  But I hate throwing them away.

Babies Suck

My class consisted of one [count 'em -- one] kid who was not yet ready for confirmation class with the pastor.  So during confirmation class, he and I would sit in my dining room and work on memory work, basic Bible stories, stuff like that.  One night he exclaimed about something not-to-his-liking, "That sucks!"

My eyebrows went up.  I gasped.  "You will not talk like that around me and my children.  You may apologize and not use that phrase any more while here!" 

"What?  What did I say?"

"You know what you said."

"But what's wrong with that?"

Kid kept claiming to not understand what the big deal was.  He kept asking me to explain to him what the problem was.  I thought he was being obnoxious.  But now I wonder.  Maybe he wasn't being intentionally provocative and ugly-mouthed.  Maybe he just didn't know the origins of that phrase.



One day when I was in junior high, some high-school fellows drove by and mooned the PE class.  A bunch of us were talking about it at lunch.  When I said, "Yeah, he stuck his a** out the top of the car for everybody to see," gasps exploded around the table.  "Susan said 'a**'!  Can you believe that Susan said that?!"  That's when I discovered that a** is not a substitute-word for hiney or tuschie or bottom.  I didn't know.  I used a word that I heard people using, and I knew what the word meant, but I didn't realize that it was considered naughty.

Many years later, I mentioned something about one of my daughters looking "hot" in a particular dress.  I thought it meant "pretty" or "fantastic" or "especially dolled up."  I didn't know that it had somewhat sleazy connotations until I saw the reaction of the people to whom I'd said it.  Whoa.  Botched it again.  Major embarrassment!

So maybe my student that day really didn't know the implications of the word "sucks." 

When something "stinks," there's a reason we use that word.  If a potato or raw meat or a rotten egg "stinks," it is spoiled.  It makes the atmosphere around it unpleasant.  Thus, if a situation stinks, it is likewise bad and unpleasant. 

I think a lot of young people don't have a clue where the word "sucks" came from in the 60s and 70s.  They're so used to hearing the word as a synonym for "that stinks" or "that's awful" that they never stop to consider what the word is referring to. 

Babies suck to eat.
Babies suck on their thumbs.
Bigger people suck on soda-pop straws or even the cap of their pen.

But can we please please please stop using the word "sucks" to describe things we don't like?

Not Trendy

This evening I noticed something beautiful in the sky.  Venus and Jupiter are very close together.  The computer tells me that this is the closest the two planets will be over the space of a few decades.  The astronomers are saying that this series of three conjunctions (over the space of 14 months) is quite similar to what the star of Bethlehem may have been.

When Maggie and I were first looking up "Sky and Telescope" to see what they said about this lovely sight, I started singing, "... and Jupiter aligns with Mars, then peace will guide the planets ..."  Poor Maggie.  "WHAT are you singing, Mom?!"  So I belted it out: "This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius ..."  Yeah.  Like I said -- poor Maggie.

Singing the song reminded me.  Once upon a time, in grade school, I won some contest at the Y.  The prize was a 45 of my choice.  (For you youngsters, a "45" is a record.  The kind that got played on a old-fashioned turn-table.  The little ones, with one song on each side.  It would be comparable to your winning a $3 iTune giftcard.)  They asked all three winners for what songs they'd like.  The other two girls immediately came up with song titles.  At that point, I didn't listen to pop music yet.  So I chose "Age of Aquarius."  It was something I knew.  The adults didn't know what to do: "That's old.  I don't think that's available any more.  Is it still on the charts?  Can you tell us a second choice?  I don't think we'll be able to find that song."



When my hair was initially cut short, here not too long ago, several people complimented me with how "trendy" I looked.  I was offended.  I didn't respond in a nasty way, but yes, that kind of praise bothered me.  If they liked my hair and I didn't, I could accept their compliment.  If they said my haircut suited me, I could disagree but appreciate their well-intended words.  But trendy?  Yuck.  I don't like trendy.  I don't want to be trendy.

"The Age of Aquarius."  I was already out-of-sync and decidedly behind-the-times when I was just a little kid.

Definitely untrendy.
And proud of it.  Darn tootin'.

Crucifix Shopping

Shhh: don't tell the computer or Big Brother.  I have figured out how to get NICE ads in the sidebar of my computer.  If you go shopping for a few hours on eShakti, they start sending you gazillions of ads.  If you keep clicking on them, pretty soon the ads go away that want you to [ahem] meet singles or buy Bounty or subscribe to some liberal magazine.

Tonight I spent a couple of hours looking for crucifixes.  On ebay.  On Amazon.  On various Catholic church-supply sites.  And now I have crosses and pretty dresses popping up as ads.  Nice!

While shopping, I discovered how

few people knew what a crucifix is.  There were plenty of empty crosses listed under "crucifix."  There were also the kind that some of our kids received as baptism gifts from the congregation -- the kind with a kneeling child in the center.

"I don't like that cross, Mom!  I don't want to die on a cross!"

Uh, yeah, that was when those crosses went away.

I also discovered somebody's crafts: turquoise and yellow beads, strung together like we used to make at summer camp to be key chains or lanyards.  In a cross-shape.  Turquoise and yellow.  Ugly as could be.  Mixed in with the crucifixes.  Good grief.  It takes a lot of sifting to shop for something online.



PS: If you need an introductory coupon for eShakti (which also offers free customizing on first-time orders), let me know.  You'll get $25-35 off your first try, and I'll get a $10 referral coupon.

Way Back When I Was Really Young

The previous post included things from the Old Days which were when my first baby was little, or not long before. This one has stuff that I remember from my childhood. At least I don't expect my kids to recall these things because "they just happened." At least I have some awareness that these are from times long-enough-ago that they're in the history books as .... well, ... history.


The milk was delivered to the milk-box sitting by our front door. The milk wagon was pulled by a horse -- the only horse-drawn vehicle I saw in town. When I was learning to walk to kindergarten by myself, I had to watch out so that I didn't step in horse poop when I crossed the street. And I loved it that the milkman put reindeer-antlers on his horse for the week or so before Christmas.

When we dialed a phone number, the phone actually had a dial.

We didn't have to check our Halloween candy before eating it to see that it was safe.

Children walked to a neighborhood school. Buses were for the kids who lived in the country. We went home for lunch too. Only the bussed kids were stuck at school during the lunch break.

The new-fangled ratings system for movies included G, M, R, and X. That's it.

McDonalds ran commercials touting that you could buy a hamburger, fries, and beverage, and still get change back from your dollar.

We sang Christmas carols (and a dreidel song) for the Christmas program (not "holiday program") at the public school.

Getting "only one cavity" at each semi-annual dentist appointment was considered a rousing success for dental care.

Bouncy children were not given Ritalin.

We played cowboys and Indians. Nobody ever heard of "native Americans."

Arcades had pinball machines. There were no joysticks or video games of any sort.

People dressed up for church, and women did not wear pants to church.

Cameras had flashbulbs. Bulbs. Y'know, the round things. Each bulb had one flash and then was finished. And getting your film developed in an hour was unheard of. It was a week or more.

Whole houses then cost less than a car now. Less even than most used cars do now.

Cars then were washed up and old by the time they had 60,000 miles on them.

Kids could go biking all over town and the countryside, riding around for hours on end, and parents didn't have to worry about whether they'd be accosted by strangers.

The bank and the liquor store gave lollipops to the kids who came in with their moms to buy dad's weekly allotment of beer.

Television was in black and white. No color.

Very few people had dishwashers. There was no such thing as a microwave.

"Negro" was a recently outdated word. The new term was "black."

The old people remembered Russia being a country, but we youngsters were up-to-date enough to know that the proper name had become USSR.

Lutherans had one hymnal. For a bunch of different synods. And we used it. No "song books."

People didn't use credit cards. The few credit cards that existed were used for limited purposes, such as a card for gasoline only.

Diapers were made of cloth, and people used pins to hold them onto the baby's tuschie.

Kids pretended to smoke our candy cigarettes and candy cigars.

There were three television networks. It was free. No cable. Just rabbit ears or the big antenna on the roof.

Some cars had seat belts, but they were seldom used. There was no such thing as bike helmets.

In a similar vein, there was no such thing as fire-retardant clothing.

"Ms." hadn't been invented yet.

At the playground, swings had chains that were 10-12' long or more, and slides were so high that it was fun even for the grown-ups to slide down. And you had to wear long pants to the park in August so that you didn't burn your legs on the metal slide.

People thought formula was the right way to feed a baby.

Mom washed our clothes in a wringer-washer and hung them on the line to dry.

Almost all my friends had stay-at-home moms.

It wasn't considered abuse if kids were spanked and had their mouths washed out with soap.

Gas ran about 30-some cents a gallon. When there was a "gas war" in town, prices could even get as low as 19 cents.

Nobody was allowed to pump their own gas. When you drove in for a fill-up, the attendant checked your oil, checked your tire pressure, washed your windows, and who-knows-what-all else.

The word "their" was a plural pronoun and only a plural pronoun. Now --as in the previous comment-- it's also used as a singular pronoun when we don't want to be "sexist" by using "he" or "she."

Only the poor, impoverished, neglected children were sent to preschool.

Way Back When I Was Young

I was always fascinated with "how things used to be." It kinda sorta freaks me out that some things are now seen as the Old Days that were normal when I was already grown up.

There was no such things as music videos or MTV.

A whole floor of a building was dedicated to the computer. The idea of a computer that would sit on your desk was just coming in as a new-fangled idea. Certainly no iPads or Smartphones.

Food at the grocery store was not sealed. You could just unscrew a lid of a medicine bottle or a food jar and have access to the contents of the bottle. No child-proof lids either.


We didn't know yet that Darth Vader was Luke's father.

The new, high-tech video games that had just been invented were Pong, Pac-man, and Space Invaders.

Even if you had no health insurance, you could pay for the doctor and hospital when your child was born. Our bill for our first baby was $800.

Only the fussbudget worry-wart parents made their kids wear bike helmets.

We had fire drills and tornado drills at school, but never lock-down drills. There weren't murders in school.

A Rolling Stone Gathers No Moss

But a rotating fan gathers LOST of dust!

I learned something about dust one day in confirmation class.  (That was not the pastor's plan that day, I'm sure.)   After our section on the commandments, all of us 8th-graders were taking a quiz.  "True or false? Betsy shows respect for God's Word by dusting her Bible every week."  Everybody in class (except one girl) answered "true."  Pastor said the answer was "false."   The class protested.  Turns out that our misunderstanding had more to do with cleaning than with valuing God's word.    Pastor (and the one girl who got the right answer) insisted that a Bible that is used won't get dusty.  Pastor said that it shows more love for God's word to be reading it than to leave it sit unused to get dusty. 

Things get dusty when they're not used?  Who knew?

Anyway ...
According to that logic, a fan should grow dustier when sitting still than when being used.  Guess what?  When I began to keep house, I learned that's not the way it works.  The other day, I found lights and fan on in an empty room.  Buttinsky me turned off the light and the fan.  And this picture shows what I found.  Yuck!  I wonder how long it's been since that fan was off? 

The Handwriting on the Wall

And you, being dead in your trespasses
and the uncircumcision of your flesh,
He has made alive together with Him,
having forgiven you all trespasses,
having wiped out the handwriting of requirements 
that was against us,
which was contrary to us.
And He has taken it out of the way,
and nailed it to the cross.  (Colossians 2)


Remember Belshazzar (Nebuchanezzar's son)?  Big ol' party.  Lots of drinking.  Lots of worshiping idols.  A hand that appeared out of nowhere and started writing something on the wall.  People freaking out.  (You would too, if a bodiless hand appeared and started graffiti-ing up your wall.)  "Hey, remember Daniel?  Let's get him here.  He's really wise."

And what had the hand written?  "You have been weighed in the balances and found wanting" (Daniel 5).




A long time ago, in a galaxy state far far away, there was no midweek Bible study at our church.  The men had 9-to-5 jobs.  The women were stay-at-home moms, and many of them were involved in Explorers, a humongous, city-wide, non-denom Bible study.  They finally talked me into going, due in part to my desire for a preschool-like experience for my eldest kid.  Oh my goodness -- I'd never heard of so many rules for attending Bible class!

I broke rules on my very first day.  Explorers begins with opening worship, followed by small-group discussion of the previous week's lesson, and then everybody gathers again for what is essentially preaching on the week's passages.  You are not allowed to talk in the small-group discussion if you have not completed your at-home study of the passages and written your answers to the homework.  My first week?  I obviously hadn't done homework.  And I dared to talk.  Can you believe it?

(The ladies in my class were thankful.  They were confused by how often the Old Testament talked about "So-and-so, son of So-and-so, son of So-and-so."  I knew the explanation and told them the brief history tidbit.  And everybody was happy.  Until a couple of women from my church found out later that I'd broken the No-Speaking rule.  They were not happy.  Apparently, our small group gained a naughty reputation with the leadership for speaking too much and too candidly with each other.)

Over the weeks and months I attended Explorers, I grew to love the women in my small group.  Most of them were Baptist.  (In the South, "non-denom" has a decidedly Baptist feel to it!)  These women were burdened by the law.  They wanted to be good Christian women.  They desired the Lord and yearned for Him, but they were constantly being beaten up by the law.  They did not know Him to be a God of grace, but a god of rules and commands and laws and requirements.

Oh, another of the rules for Explorers small-group is "no denomination-specific discussion."  Everything has to be non-denom.  Uh.  Yeah.  I guess I broke that rule too.  I did manage (most of the time) to hold it in with regard to the sacraments and the office of the ministry and other Lutheran views.  But the gospel?  I had to speak the gospel.  How could I not?  And after all, supposedly all Christians believe the Gospel, right?  We're readin' the Bible here, folks!  How could we keep mum about the mercy of the Lord in Christ Jesus??

So when those dear women fretted that God would zot them for their inability to live as they ought, I talked about Jesus and His cross and the forgiveness of sins.  A few bristled.  Many sighed with relief.  Several hugged me and thanked me. 

Near the end of the year came the story of Daniel and the handwriting on the wall.  "You have been weighed in the balances and found wanting."

Oh, the outpouring of words that day.  The baring of hearts.  The fear.  So much fear.  "I'm not good enough."  "I am going to be found wanting.  I deserve to be destroyed."

Is there any greater joy than to be able to speak to a sinner: "But Jesus was the One put in the balance.  He took your sin.  He was 'found wanting.'  But His blood forgives your sin.  His righteousness is your own.  When God weighs you in the balance, all He finds is holiness and perfection.  No, it's not your own, that you earned.  But it is yours, because your Jesus gives it to you in His mercy and love."  And the person argues with you: "No, it just can't be.   You don't understand.  You don't know what kind of secret sins I have.  You don't know my heart's doubts."  And you get to "argue" back with them, "No, really.  He forgave all your trespasses.  He has wiped out the handwriting of requirements."



Sometimes it's really cool to be with people who aren't Lutheran, people who are tickled pink when they hear the gospel in all its fresh comfort.


Given the age of most of the women, and given how long ago this happened, many of the dear saints in my small group are probably already in heaven.  Someday I'll see them again.  And hug them.  And talking to them, my hidden Southern drawl will creep back into my usually-Northern voice. 

Pre-Verbal Learning

Liz posted this picture yesterday of the competition between the fire departments.  For those of you who don't live in small towns, it's kind of like football or a tug-of-war.  The barrel hangs high on a line between two poles, and the teams squirt water in an effort to send the barrel sliding all the way to the other team's pole.

Whenever I see these contests, I begin to ponder again how kids learn before they are verbal.   You see, many years ago, we attended a celebration in the twin cities of Tiffany and Shopiere.  One of the boys (I think it was Andrew) was too little to talk.  We petted goats.  We watched the parade.  We watched the firemen's contests.  Nice day.  Nothing notable.

A couple of years later, the munchkin-in-question was explaining to me how that contest worked, how the water from the hoses moved the barrel along the rope.  He had questions.  But he also had some pretty clear memories and was able to verbalize what had happened that day. 

I think in words.  I communicate with words.  I attach words to images and sounds and smells and feelings.  It still boggles my mind to consider how those memories (a half-lifetime past for Andrew) were stored, without words, without explanations, but just as images, and how they poured out in words once the words were accessible.

Making Mistakes

I think it might be worse to watch somebody else make a mistake at work than to botch it myself.

Almost half of our tellers are new in June or July.  Two were on their own for the first time this week.  The person I was working with today is such a sweetie.  It was really busy.  And, as luck would have it, she ended up with her drawer being off.  She hadn't made a big error, but it was enough to trouble her.  I wanted so much to hug her and assure her.  I wanted to make it all better for her.  I remember those mistakes happening all-too-frequently when I was new.  I wished that things had gone differently during the morning; I wondered if there was something I could have done to be more helpful to her.  I feel awful that she was off, and it wasn't even my mistake.

When I was new, they kept telling me, "Everybody makes mistakes."  That didn't make it any better at the time.  But now that I've been there for a while, and I can see what the new girl is going through,  it's true: everybody does make mistakes when they're learning!

When I was new, they kept assuring me that I would learn from my mistakes.  I didn't like that.  I knew it was true.  But I hated it.  In fact, I still remember my second-grade teacher giving us a homework assignment to come up with a list of homonyms.  I of course, in overdrive, came up with a list of not 10 or 20, but nearly 100.  My list included "our" and "are" as homonyms.  It was wrong!  [gasp]  [By the way, Teacher didn't listen to how folks in that section of Illinois pronounced "are" and "our."]  I still remember being WRONG about that.  Of course, Mr Choir Director appreciates that because I make sure to sing "our" with the correct pronunciation.  And sometimes I edit his writing, correcting the same mistake (because he was raised amongst people with the same accent).  All because of my mortification that my second-grade teacher caught me being WRONG.

During my senior year when I was taking a programming class, my computer program didn't run as it was supposed to.  I couldn't figure out what was wrong.   I went to the prof.  He asked me what I'd done to debug the program.  "What?  What do you mean, 'debug the program'?"  He asked me what I'd done before, when my programs hadn't run properly.  I was stunned.  They'd never not-run before.  I was nearing the end of my computer-science major, and I had never debugged a program.  I'd always gotten it right from the get-go.  That's not actually a good way to learn to solve problems, eh?

I am still stunned by the parable of the lost sheep.  For decades I had wondered about how there is "more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 just persons who need no repentance."   God is not like me.  I would much rather have my kids obey me than to screw up and break things and be sassy and then ask for forgiveness.  I don't understand this verse: how can God delight in repentance more than He delights in so much obedience that there's no need for repentance?!  I mean, He certainly wants us to obey and do what is right!  But this verse -- there is more joy in heaven.... 

I don't like mistakes.
I like to be right.
I like to do things the right way so that there's no need to fix it.
I want so desperately to comfort those who are grieving
over their inability to do the job perfectly.
I know we learn from our mistakes.

I still don't like mistakes.

Maybe I'll get it straightened out in my mind before I die.

Things You Don't Want to Remember

More than 30 years have passed.  I still remember. 

The other day some friends pointed me to an article on watching horror movies and other scenes which impress themselves on our minds.  And I remembered.

"We" were me, my new husband, my father-in-law, and the guy who'd been Gary's roommate the previous year.  We'd been in Washington for a week for my brother-in-law's wedding.  We'd had some late nights visiting and celebrating.  It was a long drive home.  We needed to stop.  We'd been watching billboards, hunting a hotel.  We'd been exiting the highway, scanning for signs of hotels.  Nothing.  At exit after exit, we were finding nothing.  Our eyes were getting heavy.  We really needed to stop for the night.

Finally an ad for a hotel.  Phew!  We took the next exit, followed the signs, pulled into the hotel's parking lot ... and began to wonder.  This didn't look like the kind of hotel I wanted to stay in.  Small.  Not well kept-up.  Hourly rates.  Yeah -- hourly rates.  But we were SO tired.  We checked in.*

We showered, climbed into bed, turned on the television.  And our eyes about popped out of our skulls.  We turned it off.  But 30-some years later, I still remember what was on that screen.  Just that one small experience makes me realize how important it is to guard our eyes and our imaginations from pictures that cannot be erased. 

I still remember being a child terrified of "The Wizard of Oz."  I still remember some of those Godzilla movies.  I cannot understand the popularity of the zombie movies today.  I've never watched "Friday the 13th" or "The Exorcist" or any of those other horror films.  My mom told me we should watch "Saving Private Ryan" (which is history, not billed as Horror) but I just couldn't. 

I have friends who don't want to watch "The Passion of the Christ."  Even though I can't understand (because the awful things in that movie are our life and our salvation and our joy, and because the theology embedded in that movie is gorgeously rich) I do understand because it's vivid, and it's emotional, and it's something that cannot be erased from your mind when once you've seen it.

But when the reason to see a movie is merely for entertainment (?) or because everyone else is seeing it, why do we willingly expose ourselves to such nastiness?  For fun?  Something's wrong.



* The kicker came the next morning.  When we checked out and hopped back on the interstate, the very next exit had several big-name hotels.  If we'd only held out for 15 more minutes.... 

Good Friday Decorum?

As a kid, I remember going to Tenebrae service in the evening of Good Friday.  We were supposed to leave in silence.  At my home congregation, we didn't have the practice of leaving in silence on Thursday night, nor gathering in silence on Saturday evening (because there wasn't a vigil on Saturday night).  I don't even remember anything particularly somber about gathering on Friday.  But leaving?  Yeah.  Quiet.  Serious.  No hand-shaking and chatting.  Just leave the building and go home. 

I know that some people say that's just a tradition that's about feeling and mood, and it's not important.  My brain can acknowledge that.  But my tradition isn't exactly okay with it. 

My parents had some friends; Roy worked with Dad; they were members of the same congregation; and we often went out for pizza with them on Friday nights.  One year, Roy and Carolyn came to church on Good Friday.  That wasn't normal for them.  They were Sunday attendees, and rarely come for midweek services.  After church, they approached my folks in the parking lot.  They suggested we go out to a nearby restaurant for a milkshake. 

We did.  Bright lights.  Treats.  Cheery waitress.

That was weird. 

Way Back When I Was Young

Our math textbook is from the early 80's. Maggie was doing a lesson on graphing. So there's a graph of TV-watching habits of the kids in this hypothetical classroom. A question started with "53% of the students watched the special on Monday night."

And the modern child asks me, "Mom, what's a 'special?'"

I find that question astounding. But just in case I have other young readers who don't know what a 'special' is, they'd need to understand that once-upon-a-time there were THREE television channels and no VCRs or DVDs or TIVO or Netflix or Hulu. Everybody watched what everybody else watched, and at the same time too. And sometimes, instead of the usual Monday night line-up, there might be something different and "special" on. Hence, a math question that starts with "53% of the students watch the special."

It's almost bizarre to consider in today's world of 100's of television channels and on-demand movies.

Katie's Arm

My mom told the story of when she and my sister-in-law were Christmas shopping when my daughter Katie was 10 or 12. They ran across a very cheap deal on a hooked-rug kit. Mom wondered if this would make a good Christmas present for Katie; Tina too questioned the wisdom of a latch-hook rug for Katie. Turned out, though, that Mom was worried about a dust-catcher for an asthmatic child, whereas Tina wasn't sure whether Katie could DO latch-hooking. Mom was taken aback at first. Why wouldn't Katie be able to do latch-hook? Well, because of her arm, Aunt Tina wondered. (Tina was still kind of new to the family at that point.)

You see, Katie was born with only half her left arm. No hand on that side, although you can see the little dents and shapes on the end of her left arm where the hand and fingers would have developed. I often forget that people here don't know if her missing arm was from an accident or a birth defect. She was only 3 when we moved to our former home and church and met all our homeschooling friends there. But now, with Katie being an adult, people are polite and don't ask the questions that were easy to ask when she was a wee one.

It's hard for us to remember that some people see Katie as handicapped. We have all sorts of stories about her abilities. Of all our kids, she was the one who learned to unscrew jar lids, work snaps and zippers, and unbutton buttons at the youngest age.

There was the story of meeting some new homeschoolers at a state conference. They lived only 20 minutes away, and we spent hours with them on the weekend of the conference and several shorter visits at home. Later, we were planning another get-together. The morning before they came over to play, Abbey (the friend) said something about Katie's only having one arm. The mom told her kids to knock off the stupid stories. WHY would they make up something so outlandish??? The kids argued: "But, Mom, she DOES only have one arm." "That's silly. I've seen her. She's not missing an arm." When they arrived, the kids made sure to point out to Mom Katie's left arm. Even then, the mom didn't believe Katie had one arm: there she was, sweeping out the garage. "Mom! Look again!" Wow. She really does have only half an arm on that side! But she can do everything. You'd never notice the kid is handicapped! Indeed.

Here's another funny story that Katie told me about her paper route one day. She said she reached into her bag to pull out a paper to toss onto a porch. It slipped out of her hand. She reached in again, and again missed grabbing the paper. On her third failed attempt to yank a paper out of her carrier-bag, she realized why she couldn't pick up the paper. She was using her left arm. Well, I figure if SHE could momentarily forget that she didn't have a hand on that arm, then I can't be scolded for the times I forget she has only one.

Long before we moved here, Kantor was trying to figure out one day which kids were mine. He didn't seem them often. I was trying to describe Katie by hair color and length, height, build, prettiness, glasses, and whatever other identifying markers I could think of. Finally it crossed my mind to say, "Oh, she's the one missing her left arm." Oh! Of course! Then he knew right away which kid I meant. But he said he felt like a jerk for having that be the thing by which he finally identified her, and he heckled me for not using "one-armed" as the first thing to describe her. Sorry, but Katie's lack-of-arm is such a complete non-issue that I forget that other people might notice it.

Although Katie has run into a few things as a mom that are a little harder with one arm [much harder to multi-task: nursing a baby, reading to a toddler, and making supper all at the same time] I think Katie's biggest "handicap" is in how other people see her. When she went job-hunting the first time, employers didn't see her. They saw a big fat emptiness where her hand was supposed to have been. I wish I could say "their loss." (And that would be true.) But it's also hard for a person to overcome the manager's First Impression, and thus not be given the chance to show how very capable she is.

Four Dollars

It used to be that a price increase of a penny or two a gallon translated into a 2-5% price increase. Today, a 2-5% price increase is 10-15 cents per gallon, and that's just what we're seeing every few days.

Do you remember when gas prices hovered at 98-cents or 99-cents? Remember the signs at the gas stations which had only 2 digits for the prices? What happens when you spill over from cents to dollars-and-cents? I remember cardboard signs with a big "1" painted on it, taped to the signs announcing the price-per-gallon.

I suppose that now, with digital, we won't have the same problems when the gas prices go to a two-digit price for dollars. Yikes!

(Hey, Congress, can we start drilling in Alaska and the Gulf already? Pleeeeease?)

Back When I Was Young

We had fire drills and tornado drills regularly at school. We even had drills to practice what we'd do in case of a nuclear attack. (I wonder if they still have those, or if it would be too scary for kids.)

But we but never lock-down drills. Murders? In school? Weapons? Who could imagine such a thing?

Back When I Was Young

Back when I was young, you had to lick the postage stamps.

Remember when they first came out with the peel-n-press stamps, and you had to pay extra for them? Maggie doesn't remember. She was reading a comic book today and wanted to know why anybody would lick a stamp.

Maybe this explains why stickers were such a big deal with I was little. It was always a treat to be the one who took possession of the Chiquita sticker off the bunch of bananas. When else did you see a sticker???

Back When I Was Young

... grapes and watermelons had seeds.


(It sure ain't easy to find seeded watermelons anymore. And seeded grapes show up at the store just about as [in-]frequently.)