Spring! So lovely and yet so busy! Our town had its annual flower show a few weekends ago. It was a lovely event, well attended, but not crowded. The highlight for me was the book sale by the Friends of the Library. I really intended to buy nothing, but walked away with a few of the little green Beatrix Potter books we didn't have, the first five of the Children of Green Knowe series, an Anthony Trollope book, and a Kate Greenaway nursery rhymes book. I almost, almost bought an old copy of Henry Greene's
Loving, a book I have seen recommended several places, but I haven't read. If I knew that I actually liked Henry Greene, then I might have splurged on the $12 book, but I restrained myself, knowing that books that come into our house rarely leave, and I really don't have room for them.
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I was in a reading drought for a time while I have been busy teaching online, but got a spurt of reading done last weekend. Finished Jason Evert's
John Paul the Great: His Five Loves, which had some interesting history bits about St. JPII's near death encounters and his awareness of God's providence, something I am trying to be more aware of - because I struggle with the awareness of how little control over our lives we have, despite having so many decisions to make that seem life-altering. Also, the perspective of the Cross as a door, and of suffering as an opportunity to both offer up and offer comfort and to become an opportunity for joy, is one that I hope, but fail, to use as my own outlook on life. Bring on the suffering!
Also finished
Mr. Blue by Myles Connolly, an odd little book about an odd, saintly person. Meditations on the need for laughter, for living an "amiable, good life," for a new vibrant art alert to the world and the times, on embracing the cross (God's gift to his friends, as he quotes the Cure of Ars), on the beauty of poverty fill the pages. The introduction, by Fr. John Breslin, compares Blue to Jay Gatsby and his story which was published three years before
Mr. Blue. They definitely represent opposite personalities with contrasting hopes and longings. But Connolly's little book never became as famous as Fitzgerald's, probably because it lacks much plot and has little romance - and what romance it has is spiritual. It was a fascinating read because it is unusual and unsettling, but it is not a page turner.
Notably, Blue does not like books: "Books are for people who can not make up their minds or have no minds to make up."
I folded a lot of corners in Jacques Philippe's
Interior Freedom. I am meaning to copy down some of his advice, like "Often we may journey in darkness, but we sense that our lives are unfolding in a rhythm we do not control but to which we are happy to abandon ourselves and by which all events are arranged with infinite wisdom." More soon.
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Good news of the week: My husband was selected to be a captain in the US Navy! This promotion won't actually take place until September of next year, but it is a welcome relief to know that it will, in fact, take place. After twenty years of service, we are all happy his hard work has paid off. Of course, this means we may have to move earlier than expected - or stay here longer than expected. Or we may actually get to finish the next two years of this tour. Yet another reminder that our lives are in God's - and the Navy's - hands.
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I just shared a picture on Facebook for Military Child Appreciation month. I'm not usually a frequent Facebook "sharer," but this image of a little boy hugging his mom's leg almost made me cry. The caption was "Military children say goodbye to more significant people in their lives by age 18 than most people do in a lifetime." Maybe I'm hormonal, or getting sentimental as I age, but as I think about all the wonderful people who have loved my children over the years, I overflow in gratitude and nostalgia. I wish my kids didn't have to say goodbye to people they love, or to live far away from the extended family members who love them and form their identity, but I am so grateful that they have met people who have opened their homes and hearts to them. From the friends who watched them in the middle of the night as we were having other babies, the friends who let us stay for weeks while we were househunting, the friends who drove them around to activities, the friends who made them feel like they belonged even though they were outsiders, to the people who taught them in school, at church, on the playing field, in the art room, etc., we've certainly been blessed by the willingness of these people to take us in. I didn't share the Facebook post as a cry for pity, although it it is supposed to raise awareness about the challenges of military life, but instead to recognize that they have had these significant people care about them. I know I've said this before but, it doesn't get any easier to say goodbye, but knowing that we'll meet more significant people at the next duty station does offer some consolation.
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Meanwhile, although I am feeling flush with gratitude just now, I've also had a couple run-ins lately that make me titchy. I just want to carp for a minute, so that I can let go of my irritation. One was with a lady who, mentioning she was a newcomer, wrote a letter to the newspaper wondering why some people have signs in their yards that say "A Naval Aviator Lives Here." Why, she wonders, don't we recognize all heroes - the hospice workers, the school teachers, the firemen, etc.? Well, I want to reply, she is completely free to do so - make signs for everyone! There's no limit to how many signs you can place in your yard! My husband deserves recognition, too, for doing such a great job as a public works officer that everyone's plumbing and HVAC systems are humming along grandly! But why begrudge recognition to the people who actually risk their lives for the safety of our country? These aviators may not be flying combat missions right this minute, but they are preparing for them all the time, and deterring our nation's enemies by being prepared. But beyond that (there are also a lot of SEALS here, who don't want their homes pointed out), the signs exist here, not because they deserve a sign more than anyone else, but because Naval Aviation has a long and storied history in this particular community. This place was a military aviation training station before World War I, long before it was a beach community, and many famous fighter pilots, including Admiral Stockdale, whose autobiography of his eight years as a prisoner of war graphically depicts why these guys are honored, trained here. Anyway, it bugged me that she had to rain on someone else's parade.
Here is a moving article that tells about why the signs were originally posted during the 100th anniversary of military aviation.
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I hope someone writes back to her to share the history of the signs and naval aviation here, but it won't be me because I'm already becoming a nosy busybody myself. At the most recent middle school track meet, I confronted first a high school girl, and then her pole vault coach about their language. Some of the middle schoolers, whom I'm helping to coach as a volunteer assistant, were sitting on the edge of the pole vault mat. Apparently they've been asked before not to sit there, but the high school girl felt compelled to use a volley of f-words to ask them to get off the mats. I went up to her to ask her to please use respectful language to ask them to move or ask one of the coaches to talk to them. Meanwhile, her coach, a thin, sun baked, hard looking woman, went up to a couple of the 7th grade boys and called them "stupid retards" for not remembering that they've been told not to sit there. My fourth grader reported this. Normally, I do not like to act on a child's tattling on an adult. Usually a kid who is complaining about an adult has done something wrong and doesn't like getting in trouble for it. Now I know those kids shouldn't be on the mats, but I couldn't believe that an adult in a position of leading kids would talk this way, so I asked her. Her reply was "Well, they've got to be either deaf or stupid not to know they aren't supposed to be there. They've been told a hundred times, year after year. It's the same kids..." Her tirade went on for a minute, before I said, "Well, the language you used was really offensive. You've really upset them." Her response was a hardlipped, "Fine."
The truth is, she didn't really upset them. She really upset ME. I feel like the use of the word "retard," even though I know that when I was growing up, unfortunately, we regularly used it as a derogatory name, has gathered enough negative usage that it is now on par with calling someone the N word. I wish I had said that to her. Or I wish I had said, "Are you either deaf or stupid because you don't remember your mom telling you a hundred times not to call names?" Woulda, coulda, shoulda.
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Anyway, now I've got that off my chest. My last gadfly moment was when I wrote a letter to city council about the need for a safe pedestrian crossing at the intersection in front of our house. The street that runs on the side of our house is a three lane, one-way street that is the main exit off the peninsula for all the employees of the Naval base. And 90% of them leave between 2-4, right when kids are getting out of school. The school is a couple blocks down our street. A crossing guard is there most days. Some months back the council voted to reject an independent consulting firm's recommendation that stoplights be installed here because a loud portion of the community didn't want stoplights.
But about a month ago, an eighth grade girl was hit on her bike as she crossed the intersection on her way home from school. I was sitting at home grading papers on the computer when I heard a noise that sounded like a cat dying. It took a minute for me to register that it was an odd sort of noise, so I went outside. By the time I got out, the police had just pulled up and were leaning over a girl lying still and prostrate in the street. Her mangled bike was on the sidewalk. Her friend was screeching. A young guy was standing next to his big pick up truck parked in the middle of the intersection. It was obvious what had happened. I couldn't tell if the girl was alive at first. The ambulance came wailing up, and as the crew surrounded the girl, she regained consciousness and was responding to them. Multiple police personnel were questioning witnesses, including the girl's friend who finally switched from wailing to just crying. I was asked if I saw anything. The little I saw left me shaking the rest of the afternoon.
The guy in the pick up hadn't seen the girl, and the girl wasn't using the crosswalk to cross, although I have had a crossing guard tell me bikes aren't supposed to use the crosswalk. The ideal is for bikers to dismount and walk their bikes in the crosswalk, but the reality is that even if she had done that, it is hard for the third lane to see pedestrians.
The end of the story is that the girl missed school for almost a month with debilitating headaches and blurry vision. She didn't break any bones. Her helmet saved her life. I bought two new bike helmets that week for my older kids who don't wear properly fitting helmets. And I've become paranoid about the crossing. The city now has a large sign warning of pedestrians and has placed big orange pylons along the lane lines to slow people down. I should write a note to thank city council, but it's still a dangerous spot. Though we live in a small community that likes to call itself a village, this road is a highway. On the advice of a friend, I've taken to giving each of the kids a blessing as they leave the house. The baby blesses them, too. They are in His hands!
