When the memories began

I looked at the map. I found the school. I didn't look for the market; I forgot. I changed the map settings and I saw the images. Real images of things I both remembered and forgot.

It's a parking lot. There used to be a small playground with a glorious little sandbox. Not as though we didn't have enough dirt, because we did. We lived int he desert and there was dirt. But there wasn't sand. And I was small. Maybe the sandbox wasn't really as large as I recall. Yet, where's the harm in a child's memory?

I moved the map, panned a bit west. I saw the cattle guard. And the church. And a concrete pad that would have been a bit larger than the now missing trailer.

In my wild imaginations, I have a car and I pull up outside the cattle guard. I'm little again. My lunch box is metal with a red plaid design and I'm terrified that my little feet will slip between the rails as though they were hooves. I draw my hand across the concrete barrier--there's one on either side of the guard--and I recall how I scooted across it every morning, scraping my lunch box. I give a sad little laugh at those days when my fears were so small and no less real.

I now look into the property and wonder if it's still a church. I see the shed is gone. The mesquite tree stands though. 

I can't help but giggle as I remember the races after church to see who could stomp the most loco weed pods. I can still hear them popping. 

I can see where one of the ranchers pulled up in his truck one day to introduce his new dogs. One was named Blue. I remember Blue because she had two different colored eyes. I was amazed.

I see the porch where the fellow brought a tarantula in a jar that we all hovered around after church. Some of the kids held it, but I was too wise. I watched from a distance.

Then, in my dreaming, a woman comes out and calls to me. "Can I help you?"

"My dad was the pastor here when I was young," I answer. "Is this still a church?"

She smiles but doesn't answer. She cannot because she isn't real and doesn't know the answer. But she bids me come and see. I pull the car in and feel the tears.

~~I remember, I remember/ The house where I was born~~

No, not born, but most of my memories begin here.

She leads me into the church and I laugh.

"Pretty much as I remember it, "I say. "I had to come over to practice piano and I hated it. It was so big and so lonely. And dark. I left the door open one day a bird flew in. That's the only thing I remember about piano practice.

"We would walk back through this hallway to the kids' rooms for service, Junior church. My mom taught. They numbered the chairs and chose a quiet seat prize that way. One morning, I saw the number they drew and it was my chair. I was extra good that day.

"Then for business meetings, if there were no kids to play with outside, my brother and I would go back into the trailer. And play Lava. But Jack, one of the ranchers, was smarter than we were. He came in and caught us running on the furniture and he got after us.

"Jack is a pastor now. In Nevada, I think I heard."

We go back outside and I show her where the chicken coop was. I tell her how careful I was gathering the eggs; but it was hard because I had to climb up to get out while holding the basket. I point out where the cows were gathered when my brother preached to them. I pointed the opposite direction and told her that's the way my dad and I were walking home when I was attacked by fire ants.

I share with her local stories, like the one about the  rancher who was struck by lightning on mulitple occasions. I tell her of the girl who collected rattles from the snakes her dad killed.  I tell her of the prison escapee who ended the days of my walking to school. I ask if there's still a prison there.

But she doesn't answer. Of course she can't answer because she isn't real and doesn't know.  But she manages to enjoy my memories.

Handling the hurting

We are supposed to be able to comfort others with the same comfort we were given. We were supposed to learn from the journey through the valley of the shadow of death when we felt like we were losing everything.  

But sometimes, our comfort seems small in the face of someone's hurt. It's not that we don't understand where they are  because we have been in a situation so similar that it might as well be the same.

But we remember how lost we were. We remember how the pangs of death had seized us so tightly that we thought there was no hope. And we remember how hard it was to comfort us.

That doesn't absolve us from sharing the rays of hope we received.  We just need to share with wisdom. We need to listen. We need to be gentle with our hope.  As the wounds begin to heal, there is room for other sorts of comfort. But maybe today there is only room for handing the hurting a box of tissues.

Just a poem I ran across

The Tuft of Flowers

BY ROBERT FROST

I went to turn the grass once after one

Who mowed it in the dew before the sun.

The dew was gone that made his blade so keen

Before I came to view the levelled scene.

I looked for him behind an isle of trees;

I listened for his whetstone on the breeze.

But he had gone his way, the grass all mown,

And I must be, as he had been,—alone,

As all must be,' I said within my heart,

Whether they work together or apart.'

But as I said it, swift there passed me by

On noiseless wing a 'wildered butterfly,

Seeking with memories grown dim o'er night

Some resting flower of yesterday's delight.

And once I marked his flight go round and round,

As where some flower lay withering on the ground.

And then he flew as far as eye could see,

And then on tremulous wing came back to me.

I thought of questions that have no reply,

And would have turned to toss the grass to dry;

But he turned first, and led my eye to look

At a tall tuft of flowers beside a brook,

A leaping tongue of bloom the scythe had spared

Beside a reedy brook the scythe had bared.

I left my place to know them by their name,

Finding them butterfly weed when I came.

The mower in the dew had loved them thus,

By leaving them to flourish, not for us,

Nor yet to draw one thought of ours to him.

But from sheer morning gladness at the brim.

The butterfly and I had lit upon,

Nevertheless, a message from the dawn,

That made me hear the wakening birds around,

And hear his long scythe whispering to the ground,

And feel a spirit kindred to my own;

So that henceforth I worked no more alone;

But glad with him, I worked as with his aid,

And weary, sought at noon with him the shade;

And dreaming, as it were, held brotherly speech

With one whose thought I had not hoped to reach.

Men work together,' I told him from the heart,

Whether they work together or apart.'

People watching

I  am an introvert. This means that I like to be without people. No one should be offended by this. It's nothing personal. So, when I take Rebecca to tae kwon do, I sit out in the van where I can be unmolested. Think about it, I homeschool five children. I have two large dogs. I don't get much time alone.

Tonight, as I sat out reading The Innocents Abroad, I happened to glance up.

I saw a slight, black man with both ears pierced. He was, perhaps,, the dapperest man I've seen in real life. Oh, he was not Hercule Poirot dapper; no, he was his own sort.

He was in his early to mid-50's. He wore dark jeans, a nice button down blue shirt, and a chipper sort of tie. He carried papers in his back pocket. In his hands he carried a plastic grocery sack of goods, two Slurpees, and black cane lovely in its simplicity. His smallish hands were bedecked with rings. 

He wore a pair of cowboy boots which gave him a sprightly walk so that I wondered at the cane.

Other than what I saw, I can say nothing about the man. I can only say he amused enough to write of him. I believe he might make a good character in a book.

The Gift of the Crow

Have you heard about the little girl that feeds the crows? She feeds them and they bring her little trinkets of tradsies or thanks.  Rod and I decided to feed the crows. We put out fine quality unsalted peanuts in the shell. The crows, jays, and squirrels are all very adamant that they get a share. We even had a little female duck come and give it shot. 

Our crows either hate us or else they think they are very funny.

Gift 1: a piece of concrete from someone else's sidewalk or driveway. 

Gift 2: an empty chocolate pudding container replete with ants.

Maybe they are just new to the whole tradsies thing. Maybe they will improve.

Rita Moffat Died

My mom messaged on facebook a couple of days ago. She told me that my uncle thinks I need to see a neurosurgeon because I have some symptoms very similar to my cousins--and their thing is a hereditary thing from our grandma. Then, in the middle of that discussion, she typed this: Rita Moffat died.  That's nothing to anyone who may read this blog. That's not the point.

Rita Moffat--the girl with a mental age of 7 or maybe 8 years old. Shy, very quiet, speech impediment of some sort, incredibly poor, clothes very old and clearly worn out, and overweight.  As if a mental deficiency wasn't enough, she was overweight. 

Bear with me.

I knew Rita for about 3 years. Three school years. In the entire scheme of life, three school years is nothing, barely a blip.  For poor Rita, every school year must have been an eternity.

She was the butt of too many jokes for the reasons I listed above. I remember watching and seeing that no one seemed to recognize her as a human being. Our small school had several of those, but Rita especially caught my eye.  And my pity. 

Then, one day, stuff fell out of her locker. People walked by like it was a non-event.  And to them that's exactly what it was because they had failed to notice that, for all of her issues, she was a human being. But in that moment, she looked lost. And my pity changed. I stopped and helped her.  It was one moment.

I didn't know what that moment meant to her.  It didn't occur to me that she should have been passed by or mocked.  In that moment, she was a girl who needed a friend.  

This is not an epistle about how great I am.  I am nothing. I am, and I have always been, that temp from Chiswick. But that day I was the most fabulous person in the universe.  From then on, she would give me little waves in the hallway.  I could see she hoped I wouldn't ignore her now that the crisis was over.  I didn't. I waved. I smiled.  

And then, one day after school, I was heading out the door to walk home and she was on her bus.  I saw her. And she smiled at me.  That was the first time I'd ever seen Rita Moffat smile. And she smiled at me.  

I only knew her three years. After 9th grade, I changed schools and I never saw Rita again. I thought of her often. I hoped she was okay. I hoped someone else had bothered to notice she was a real live human being, but I don't know.

And in the end, her eulogy is mine. "She always ask[ed] about you because you would talk to her and be friendly" Mom typed. Oh, Lord, I hope I wasn't the only one who was that person for her. I hope someone else came along.
But there are thousands of Rita Moffats surrounding us every day. Think. Can you see their humanity? Can you care for just a moment?

When Reading Leads to Learning

I was recently feeling curious about the Potato Famine and so began to read about it. One name kept appearing, Charles Trevelyan. I couldn't decide whether he was a good guy or a bad guy or whether he fell somewhere else along the line. He could have been misguided or he may have been utterly self-seeking. I began looking for information about him. What I found was precious little. I had to settle on a biographical account written by a Trevelyan. I guess William Manchester didn't feel that this family was worth noting.

Now, I'm not too far in to the biography but it's caused me to research other aspects like, for instance, The Clapham Sect. I've also got written down to read about Malthus. I think that I may not need to finish the biography because after I research those two aspects, I'll have an extremely fair ruler by which to judge the way he handled the famine. At least, I believe so because from what little I've read about both at this point can only merge into the reasoning behind his actions.

Reading non-fiction isn't easy; it always leads to needing to read about something else. Reading fiction is easy. But, reading non-fiction can be highly rewarding and it doesn't have to be school, either.  It can just be fun to learn something new. Or to remember what you once knew.