Thirty-two years: Five addresses; two states; four churches; 11 cats; three dogs; six gerbils; one iguana; lots of fish, snails and earthworms; four turtles; seven cars; two pickup trucks; two sailboats; two kayaks; five sets of dishes; two microwaves; two clothes washers; one dryer; four dishwashers; one freezer and three refrigerators--one pink, one avocado and one (thank goodness) white.
Thirty-two years: Numerous squabbles forgotten; way more good tiimes remembered; countless comfortable moments shared.
Thirty-two years: Two bright and beautiful daughters--potty-trained, bicycle-riding, driver-license toting and high school graduated. A Mizzou Tiger and an Arkansas Razorback in the making.
Thirty-two years: Snoring. First soft and cute. Now just plain loud. But that's ok. I'll take 32 more years of Big Guy sleeping beside me.
Happy Anniversary Big Guy!
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Book Treasure
On my nightstand, I have a stack of books brought back from Candy Squared's apartment. Their titles alone are a peek into Candy Squared--The Christmas Tree by Julie Salaman, My Cat Saved My Life by Philip Schreibman, When Bad Things Happen to Good People by Harold Kushner and two books by Barbara Brown Taylor--Leaving Church and An Altar in the World. I feel so lucky to have these books as Candy Squared and I both read, a lot. Already Taylor's books are refreshing my view of the world and faith. As I read Leaving Church, I enjoyed discovering that it also hit home with Candy Squared. I found passages underlined exactly where I'd want to underline also, if I were an underline -type reader. With that book finished, I started to read An Altar in the World. I noticed an index card tucked inside. Another spiritual connection to Candy Squared? I flipped it to find a single word penciled: Hairball. Hairball? Sometimes a index card is simply a handy place marker, I think. I'll make use of Candy Squared's Hairball bookmark. It'll see me through the remainder of An Altar in the World. Eventually, the index card will travel to other books to hold new places. I will lose track of it. Someone else will flip it over, read the smudged scrawl Hairball and think Hairball?
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
The Sudden After
It annoyed me. The late night ring of the phone. I guessed it would be Big Guy--breaking the rule about not calling during The Big Bang Theory. I started to chide him as he was fishing in Kentucky, then I caught the pain in his voice and stopped my inane late night chatter.
"It's Candy Squared. Somene shot her. At the church. It's really bad," he said.
In that moment, I fell into the sudden after. I don't know what else to call. Before Big Guy's call, I knew of violence. After his call, I felt violence with a sharpness. Four states away, someone I didn't know intentionally shot my sister-in-law in her church. Big Guy hung up to call his two other sisters. Birdie had heard every word of my end of the call. She knew it was bad. She felt the sudden after.
I texted Daisy at Mizzou. "Call me now." She called back, impatient in her coral dress--faint party noise in the background. Like a bandage ripped, I told her, "Candy Squared's been shot." Then Daisy, with loud keening cries, fell too, into the sudden after.
In the early morning hours, Big Guy drove home to sleep an hour and then fly to Baltimore. Birdie and Daisy sleepwalked through arranging to skip or postpone exams. I moved Daisy out of Mizzou--it was that time of the school-year. Birdie went to prom. Big Guy wanted her to go. And Aunt Candy Squared would have wanted it, too.
With prom complete, Daisy, Birdie and I began our two-day drive to Baltimore. We had numbed ourselves with our talk to so many who wanted to know, who needed to know. And so, caught in the sudden after, we delved into our familiar Candy Squared tales--she was the babysitting Aunt who made Daisy and Birdie practice violin for two hours straight after Daisy let slip on a Thursday that her teacher expected 20 minutes of practice per day. We discussed the ferventness with which Candy Squared sang in church. I related the terror of riding in a car driven by Candy Squared. I learned the hard way that Candy Squared looks at whomever she talks with--even as she drives 70 miles per hour on I-75 heading into Atlanta.
Our conversation moved on to tales of Candy Squared's misplaced cash and a Candy Squared misplaced wallet. I reminded the girls that Candy Squared used to win baking competitions. We worried over her beloved cat Judith Boy. In typical Candy Squared fashion, she thought she adopted a girl kitty to keep her then kitty Issac company. And so Judith became Judith Boy.
And as I do so often, I reminded the girls that Candy Squared loved them. That even in those moments when her idosyncrasies and theirs clashed, her love was a constant. Like always, they answered back, "Yes, mom, we know."
By the time we arrived in Baltimore, I'd thrown a protective layer of good memories between me and the sudden after.It worked until we met up with Big Guy at the church where an angry person armed with a handgun shot and killed two churchworkers. A freshly painted empty office and a new patch of floor were all that marked the tragedy.
I saw the strain on Big Guy's face. I felt the sudden after creep into my thinking. I pushed back. Yes, I'm on the raw and tender side of the sudden after. I feel the afterprint of violence. But as I think it through, a lot of good people--mothers, fathers, sons, daughters and friends--have had to walk in the sudden after. But no one--especially not a killer--can take away the goodness and good memories of our loved ones. And no one can take away our intention--my intention--to keep doing what's good, even when evil so clearly exists.
"It's Candy Squared. Somene shot her. At the church. It's really bad," he said.
In that moment, I fell into the sudden after. I don't know what else to call. Before Big Guy's call, I knew of violence. After his call, I felt violence with a sharpness. Four states away, someone I didn't know intentionally shot my sister-in-law in her church. Big Guy hung up to call his two other sisters. Birdie had heard every word of my end of the call. She knew it was bad. She felt the sudden after.
I texted Daisy at Mizzou. "Call me now." She called back, impatient in her coral dress--faint party noise in the background. Like a bandage ripped, I told her, "Candy Squared's been shot." Then Daisy, with loud keening cries, fell too, into the sudden after.
In the early morning hours, Big Guy drove home to sleep an hour and then fly to Baltimore. Birdie and Daisy sleepwalked through arranging to skip or postpone exams. I moved Daisy out of Mizzou--it was that time of the school-year. Birdie went to prom. Big Guy wanted her to go. And Aunt Candy Squared would have wanted it, too.
With prom complete, Daisy, Birdie and I began our two-day drive to Baltimore. We had numbed ourselves with our talk to so many who wanted to know, who needed to know. And so, caught in the sudden after, we delved into our familiar Candy Squared tales--she was the babysitting Aunt who made Daisy and Birdie practice violin for two hours straight after Daisy let slip on a Thursday that her teacher expected 20 minutes of practice per day. We discussed the ferventness with which Candy Squared sang in church. I related the terror of riding in a car driven by Candy Squared. I learned the hard way that Candy Squared looks at whomever she talks with--even as she drives 70 miles per hour on I-75 heading into Atlanta.
Our conversation moved on to tales of Candy Squared's misplaced cash and a Candy Squared misplaced wallet. I reminded the girls that Candy Squared used to win baking competitions. We worried over her beloved cat Judith Boy. In typical Candy Squared fashion, she thought she adopted a girl kitty to keep her then kitty Issac company. And so Judith became Judith Boy.
And as I do so often, I reminded the girls that Candy Squared loved them. That even in those moments when her idosyncrasies and theirs clashed, her love was a constant. Like always, they answered back, "Yes, mom, we know."
By the time we arrived in Baltimore, I'd thrown a protective layer of good memories between me and the sudden after.It worked until we met up with Big Guy at the church where an angry person armed with a handgun shot and killed two churchworkers. A freshly painted empty office and a new patch of floor were all that marked the tragedy.
I saw the strain on Big Guy's face. I felt the sudden after creep into my thinking. I pushed back. Yes, I'm on the raw and tender side of the sudden after. I feel the afterprint of violence. But as I think it through, a lot of good people--mothers, fathers, sons, daughters and friends--have had to walk in the sudden after. But no one--especially not a killer--can take away the goodness and good memories of our loved ones. And no one can take away our intention--my intention--to keep doing what's good, even when evil so clearly exists.
Monday, May 21, 2012
To Forgive
Candy Squared, the quirky aunt who stole away with Birdie and Daisy to facilitate Birdie's Thanksgiving weekend, first-ever tattoo, has died.
On May 3, a mentally ill, homeless man shot Candy Squared with a registered handgun as she sat in her church office chair, preparing her Sunday homily. At her memorial service, in Baltimore, Big Guy--brother to Candy Squared--asked that we all move forward with compassion and forgiveness, as Candy Squared would have wanted.
I wondered, at the time, if he were truly right. Would Candy Squared have granted forgiveness in that moment when uncontrolled anger pulled the trigger?
Since that time, I have read some doctoral program writings of Candy Squared and glimpsed the deeper, spiritual side of a sister-in-law Episcopal priest I didn't know well enough. In her homework (not her confidential papers), she admits to long time periods when she feels God's absence. Yet she keeps the faith and puts one foot in front of the other. She counsels souls lost to drug and alcohol addiction, physical and mental abuse and anger; and in working through their hurt, a newborn humility emerges in her writings. She curbs preachiness and perfectionism, learns to like the unlikable, and figures out how to facilitate and be present without assuming control.
In none of Candy Squared's papers does she touch upon handguns or personal safety or unlocked church doors. But clearly she walks the walk with those she counsels, and forgiveness of her killer is what she would offer. The shooter was not among those Candy Squared counseled. He was a client of the church's food bank and he couldn't manage his anger. He was the sort of soul Candy Squared would have made time for, if only he had asked.
And so, because Big Guy asks--and Candy Squared would have asked, too--I forgive the shooter. It is much harder to come to terms with a way of national thinking that legally places a gun in the hands of a mentally disturbed, angry person.
On May 3, a mentally ill, homeless man shot Candy Squared with a registered handgun as she sat in her church office chair, preparing her Sunday homily. At her memorial service, in Baltimore, Big Guy--brother to Candy Squared--asked that we all move forward with compassion and forgiveness, as Candy Squared would have wanted.
I wondered, at the time, if he were truly right. Would Candy Squared have granted forgiveness in that moment when uncontrolled anger pulled the trigger?
Since that time, I have read some doctoral program writings of Candy Squared and glimpsed the deeper, spiritual side of a sister-in-law Episcopal priest I didn't know well enough. In her homework (not her confidential papers), she admits to long time periods when she feels God's absence. Yet she keeps the faith and puts one foot in front of the other. She counsels souls lost to drug and alcohol addiction, physical and mental abuse and anger; and in working through their hurt, a newborn humility emerges in her writings. She curbs preachiness and perfectionism, learns to like the unlikable, and figures out how to facilitate and be present without assuming control.
In none of Candy Squared's papers does she touch upon handguns or personal safety or unlocked church doors. But clearly she walks the walk with those she counsels, and forgiveness of her killer is what she would offer. The shooter was not among those Candy Squared counseled. He was a client of the church's food bank and he couldn't manage his anger. He was the sort of soul Candy Squared would have made time for, if only he had asked.
And so, because Big Guy asks--and Candy Squared would have asked, too--I forgive the shooter. It is much harder to come to terms with a way of national thinking that legally places a gun in the hands of a mentally disturbed, angry person.
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