Thanksgiving 2012

Thanksgiving this year didn't suck.  It was nice, actually.  It wasn't the same as it used to be, but it was still good anyway.  Everyone came to our house and we crowded around 3 tables and had too much sweet potato casserole and too much dressing and way too much dessert, but the turkey was all eaten and so was the corn pudding and everybody left with leftovers, which was the plan anyway.

I made a turkey for the second time in my life, the first time without any help.  It was scary, but I followed Alton Brown's instructions on the Food Network, and I think it turned out okay.  It was pretty enough, but I have no way of knowing how it tasted since I don't eat turkey.  But like I said, there wasn't much left, so I'm guessing it was good.

To have some part of the people we were missing, I used Granny's red pot to cook the green beans and Mimi's carving knife and fork on the turkey.  On my table were blue dishes of Mom's that she got by saving up green stamps at the grocery in the 70s.  She was ready to sell them at a yard sale but I claimed them before she could get rid of them.  We used the table and chairs Dad snagged from OLC years ago, and on the table was a vase of flowers from a hydrangea bush that Uncle CJ started from a cutting.  Aunt Jeri gave it to me when we lived on Bellaire Ave., and I moved it to this house 10 years ago and planted in my back yard.  It blooms more beautifully every summer, and this year, it has been warm enough that the blooms are still on the bush.

I love having parties at my house, especially Thanksgiving.  It is such a pure celebration.  No presents, not much decorating necessary, just food and family.  We come together year after year to say, "Thank you," and to remember how very, very lucky we are to have each other to share a laugh and a story and way too much sweet potato casserole.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Help

Prostrate on the floor,
I beg for mercy.
Hear me, O Lord,
Lift me from my despair
Let me know that there is hope
That a light will shine
That somehow, some way
Peace will come.

On Being the Mother of a Boy

Found these two poems/prayers today while working on a bookmark for the St. X MOMs Club:

Nobody knows what a boy is worth, 

and the world must wait and see; 

for every man in an honored place, 

is a boy that used to be.

-Phillips Brooks

   

And I love this prayer...

Build me a son, O Lord, 
who will be strong enough to know when he is weak 

and brave enough to face himself when he is afraid;

Who will be proud and unbending in honest defeat 
and humble and gentle in victory.

Build me a son, O Lord, 
whose wishes will not take the place of deeds; 
my son, who will know Thee, 
who is the foundation stone, of knowledge. 
Lead him, I pray, not in the path of ease 
but under the stress and spur 
of difficulties and challenge.

Here, let him learn to stand up to the storm. 
Here, let him learn compassion for those who fall. 
Build me a son, whose heart will be clear, 
whose goals will be high; 
a son who will master himself  
before he seeks to master other men, 
who will reach into the future, 
yet never forget his past.

And after all these things are his, 
add, I pray, enough of a sense of humor 
so that he may always be serious 
but never take himself too seriously. 
Give him humility so that he will

always remember 
the simplicity of true greatness 
and an open mind of true wisdom 
and the meekness of true strength.

Then I his mother will dare to whisper, 
I have not lived in vain. 

---Unknown

quoted by General Douglass McArthur

We Spotted the Ocean

Walk on the Ocean
by Toad the Wet Sprocket

We spotted the ocean
at the head of the trail.
Where are we going
so far away?

Walk on the ocean
Step on the stone
Flesh becomes water
Wood becomes bone

Half an hour later
We packed up our things
We said we'd send letters
And all of those little things.

They knew we were lying
but they smiled just the same
It seems they'd already
forgotten we came.

Now back at the homestead
Where the air makes you choke
People don't know you
Trust is a joke

Don't even have pictures
Just memories to hold
Get sweeter each season
As we slowly grow old.

Kyle was playing this cd in the car on the way to school this morning.  It has always, always reminded me of my Irish ancestors who emigrated to the US back in the 1880s.  I will never know how they left. As far as I know, Jane, my great-grandmother, only went back once.  How did she leave?  How did they let her go?

I was looking them up in Ancestry.com yesterday.  Every now and then, I just get on a tear and want to find out all that I can about them.  I can only go as far back as my great-great grandparents, and then they just fall off the map.  I'm not even sure what one of my gr-gr grandmother's maiden name was.  Mimi wrote it down as Kate Ryan in Dad's baby book, but I can't find a Kate Ryan married to Michael Wilson.  I can find a Catherine (Kate) Heffernan married to Michael Wilson, and they have many of the same children as Grandma Jane's brothers and sisters as far as I can find, but I can't find Grandma Jane listed among them.  There is a Kate Ryan married to a William Wilson, which is the name of Jane's brother.  It's all so confusing, and none of it is centrally organized because the British didn't keep good records of the Catholics.  Each individual church has records but none all in one place.  Anyway, I keep looking for information on Kate and Michael and William and Margaret.

All this to say, that as I was driving home today, and listening to this song and thinking about Jane and John and their leaving of Ireland, I also thought of Elisha and Rebecca and John and Sarah and Lucy and George.  They all left what they knew to come to Kentucky when it was young.   Especially Rebecca came to my mind.  She had 14 children, five of them sons.  Again, I think of my own son, and how different, how protected his life is now.

Last weekend, I let Kyle go out with Will on Saturday night.  They met up with some girls and went to Cherokee Park and then out to get food and then back to one of the girls' houses.  He texted me twice where he was and was home by midnight.  I was still nervous until he walked in the door.

Rebecca's sons, on the other hand, would have been out and maybe on their own by age 16.  Certainly they would have been out.  With a gun.  Loaded.  In territory still inhabited by Native Americans who were hostile to the takeover of their lands by white settlers.  With bears and bobcats and snakes around.  And outlaws.  They would probably be gone for days, weeks at a time.  With no phone calls or texts to let her know they were okay.  No GPS to get them home if they got lost.  How did she stand it?  Did she love her children less than I do mine?  Did she maybe not get as attached since their lives were so precarious anyway?  How does a mother raise up a child and then let them go?  I just don't understand.

And how did Catherine and Margaret let their children leave Ireland?  How did Catherine watch most of her dozen kids sail away to distant lands knowing she would probably never see them again?  Certainly the ones who went to Australia were gone forever.  Maybe the ones in America would be back someday, but maybe not.

As my own children get closer and closer to leaving home, I look to my female ancestors and wonder how they did it.  I try to draw strength from them and remember that it is not like it was.  We have phones and internet and cars and planes.  Life is easy.  It is connected.  Distance is not forever anymore.  Even so, how do I let go?

I just wish it would all go away...

Usually I don't want to change my life.  Usually, I am okay with where decisions, chance, fate has placed me.  Today is the exception.  Today is the one day where if I could do it over I would.  Today is the day that if I could go back in time and send Kyle to Belize instead of Appalachia, I would fork over the money in an instant.  I would say, "$1500?  No problem.  Here you go.  Here is the money.  Go change the world for somebody."

But I can't.

I can't.

I can't.

And we are here where we are, grieving today for decisions made over a year ago to go to Appalachia because it was cheaper.  Closer.  Safer, for God's sake, than Central America.

And here we are, Kyle dreaming about drowning, still, forever and ever changed.  A boy is dead.  His parents bereft.  A community remains in shock.  The world is without a star.  My heart is broken over and over again with imagining how it was, how it felt, what it must have been like for my son, my sweet, sensitive boy to watch somebody go under, thinking he was kidding, doing nothing to help, and then realizing it wasn't a joke.  Feeling like it is his fault that this boy is dead, that if he had moved sooner or dove deeper or yelled louder that things would have changed.

Kyle says that if his not going to Appalachia would mean Finoy would still be alive that he would gladly not have gone to Appalachia.  But if Finoy would have died anyway, Kyle says he's glad he was there because it has made him the person he is today.

That may be so.  Kyle may feel like that, but I do not.  I cannot.  I wish with all of me that I would have given Kyle the money to go to Belize.  I wish I could wipe this event from his life.  That I could change history and his fate would be different.

If Kyle had not been there, then maybe Finoy wouldn't have been swimming across Kinniconick Creek at the exact moment that the current had the ability to pull him under.  Maybe he would still be alive, had gone to Spain, graduated top of his class at school, headed to college and was on his way to becoming the Jesuit priest he had planned on being.  His parents would be happily living their lives watching their children grow, marry, make lives for themselves, better the world.

If Kyle had not been there, maybe Kyle wouldn't be playing guitar in his band or volunteering so much or planning on going into counseling someday.   He might be working at Paul's instead of lifeguarding. He might still be playing football.  I would not be taking him out today to do random acts of kindness in memory of a boy he hardly knew who died before his eyes in a creek full of people having fun.

If Kyle had not been there, there would be a lot fewer tears shed and a lot less sleepless nights.  Life would have been different.  Easier?  Who knows, but I could do without this weight pressing down on me, on Kyle, at odd times.  I could do without watching him disappear into his video games to escape his memories.  I could do without worrying so much about what might happen to one of my kids when they leave the house.  I could do without the guilt that I feel because my child is alive and someone else's is dead and I am so, so glad that the grieving parent is not me.  I could do without the shame at the waves of relief that I felt the moment that I heard, "One of the kids on the mission trip drowned today.  Thankfully all the boys from St. X are okay..."  Thank you, God, that it wasn't my child who died!

Yes, I could do without all of this.  I would happily pay that extra $1000 to make this all go away.  I'd pay $2000, $5000, $10,000...Hell, how much do you want?  How much?  Because if I could make it go away I would.

Roasted Red Peppers

I just roasted some red peppers that I got on sale at Kroger today. Every time I see them, I think of my dad and have to buy some. He was the consummate pepper roaster. I can remember coming in on a Saturday afternoon to the acrid smell of burnt pepper skin wafting out of the oven. I hated that smell, but I loved the taste of those roasted peppers.

Red ones were the best. They were sweeter than the green ones, although Dad had a way of taking the edge off green peppers and making them almost as tasty as the red ones. Still, when red peppers were on sale, we knew we were in for a treat.

Whenever I'd see them for less than $1 each, I'd buy 4 or 5 for Dad and take them out to his house. I'd try to get the big, fleshy ones so that the roasted meat would be juicy and good. He'd put them whole, under the broiler, turning them until the skins were black on every side, and they'd deflated a bit. Then he'd take them out, let them cool awhile, and then peel the blackened skin from the meat of the pepper, carefully saving any juice that dripped down while he peeled them.

Once there was a pile of roasted pepper in a dish, he'd sprinkle some red wine or balsamic vinegar on the slices and let them sit and cool. Then we would feast. It was nothing for us to eat 4 or 5 peppers at one sitting. They were so good. Sometimes, he'd make a batch and bring them up to me. They'd be cold from the fridge, stewing in the vinegar/pepper juice mix, and would taste oh so good. My peppers never taste like Dad's did no matter what I do.

I think roasted peppers are a family thing. Dad's older cousin, Jane, told me once how her grandmother, Jane, used to hold the peppers on a spit over the coal burning furnace until they were black and then fix them up to eat later. She said, "Gran's peppers were so delicious! I could never make mine taste like Gran's." That must be a family thing too...Or maybe it's just that peppers taste so much better when they are cooked by someone you love.

A Letter to Fr. Fred.

Dear Fr. Fred,

You have been on my mind a great deal this Lenten Season, so I was very happy to find you so easily on the Internet!

I hope you remember me...from Our Lady of Consolation in Louisville. I still live here after a brief few years traveling with my military husband from Texas to Arizona to Hawaii and back. Kirk and I will be married 20 years soon and have 3 kids. Our son is 16, and our daughters are 13 and 10.

You probably know Mom died in September 2005 after a long battle with cancer, and Dad died in July, 2011 from complications of Parkinson's Syndrome (actually we're pretty sure he had Multiple System Atrophy, but Parkinson's Syndrome is easier for people to understand.)

I was sitting in church last night for Holy Thursday services remembering when Mom had her feet washed. I think she was one of the first women in the parish to have this done, and I think you did it. Whoever it was remarked on the nice paint job on her toenails! I remember she got her first pedicure just for that occasion!

Holy Thursday usually stirs up my nostalgia, and I find that Holy Thursday and Good Friday---the incense, the songs, the prayers---take me back to the pews of OLC and the many, many hours I spent in services there. You are the priest I remember most from my childhood, and I wanted you to know how very much I treasure and appreciate all of the times you shared with our family.

I remember when you came to OLC. We had loved Fr. Arnold so much, and we didn't know how you would be, but you were so funny and nice, and we fell in love with you right away. I can picture you walking down the halls of school in your black cassock with the rope belt with the knots tied in it. (Fr. David always twirled his, but you didn't). You were the epitome of a "friendly friar." You used to come into the classroom to pass out our report cards, and I remember waiting nervously as you looked at mine, hoping and praying that I got good grades! Once I got an "N" for too much talking! You looked at me and simply said, "Let's fix this next time." I straightened right up!

One day, I was sent to the hallway during class for an unjust accusation (really!). It was the first time I had EVER been sent to the hall. I was sobbing, and you walked by. I was mortified because I didn't want you to think I had done something wrong when I hadn't. You stopped and listened to me, and I quit crying. The teacher eventually got the whole story, and I was exonerated, but your kindness stayed with me.

You were also very easy to go to confession to. My sins seemed awful, but once I told you, and never felt judged, I felt like a new child of God. Never shamed. Never judged. Always accepted and encouraged to do better next time.

I remember I thought it was so cool how you loved Snoopy. I wanted to get you a Peanuts ornament for Christmas one year. I think I persuaded Mom to buy it for you, if I remember correctly. I was so pleased!

You never seemed upset about anything. I loved how you and the other friars would come to our house for parties. I always felt like we were special because you all came by. Do you remember my mom cooking breakfast for you all one night after Midnight Mass? You and another priest (Fr. David, maybe?) came by after mass, and Mom fried up eggs and bacon and hash browns, all at the spur of the moment. It was so unexpected. It still brings a smile to my face.

And once I remember I was having a slumber party. It was on a Friday during Lent. Mom had accidentally purchased pepperoni pizza for my friends and me. When she realized what she had done, she told us that we would have to wait until after midnight to eat it, but then she got to wondering if it would be okay, since she was worried if we were still on Friday since we were still awake. So she called you to ask if we could eat the pepperoni pizza after midnight. You laughed, she said, and asked, "Wanda, what day is it at 12:01?" She replied, "Saturday." You said, "Then they can eat the pizza!" And we did.

Over the past few years, I have struggled with some of the rules of the Catholic faith (remember, my dad was a dyed-in-the-wool Democrat!). Being raised Catholic is the only thing I know, and I didn't want to leave the Church. I was in a parish with a diocesan priest/cannon lawyer/vicar/tow-the-line pastor. There was not a lot of room for questioning or disagreement or anything. I felt accused and frowned upon and outcast.

Some of the only things that kept me going were my memories of you and the other wonderful Franciscan priests who had "raised" me in my faith. I remember just being surrounded by kindness and compassion and caring. It didn't seem to me that you were as much about the rules as you were about the people---your concern about our well-being, our joy, our feeling the love of God in our lives. Maybe I'm remembering incorrectly, and you were about the rules. If that is the case, please don't correct me! My memories of OLC and being surrounded by compassionate priests who cared about their parishioners is what got me through the past few years, and I just wanted to thank you for that!

I sat in the pew tonight, as our new priest (smile!) carried the cross down the aisle before the veneration, and memories of you flashed in my head. It was Good Friday at OLC. Middle of the day. The pews were packed with kids. The lights were out in church, but sunlight was streaming thorough the stained glass windows, casting a mystical light on all of us. I could visualize you holding the crucifix covered in a purple cloth singing, "This is the wood of the cross..." and unwrapping a section at a time as you made your way to the altar. It brought tears to my eyes and a smile to my lips, that memory.

Fr. Fred, thank you for being such a wonderful priest. Thank you for your compassion and kindness and friendliness and caring. Thank you for being a part of our celebrations and our sadness, for shaping the early years of my faith and giving me somewhere to cling in times of trouble and doubt. I always felt safe in your church, at your mass, around you. You were a little bit of Jesus on Earth, and I am so glad to know you!

I hope that your ministry is a blessing in your life, as I am sure you are a blessing to those you serve. I hope you have a wonderful Easter Season!

With deepest fondness,

International Women's Day Shout Out

Thursday, March 8 is International Women's Day. It got me to thinking about all of the strong women I know and all of the men who supported them.

Think of how much things have changed since we were young. How many professional women did you know growing up? How many women worked because they wanted to? I didn't know any female doctors, lawyers, or investment brokers. I did know female teachers, secretaries, tellers, and nurses, but that was it. Most of my friends' moms stayed home or had one of those "acceptable" professions. I think it speaks volumes about how far we've come that my children go to female pediatricians. My doctors are all women. One of my friends at church is the CFO of a major bank in town. Another is a high-powered attorney for a big law firm. Our first financial advisor was a woman.

When my daughter was in first grade, she came home with a worksheet on which she had gotten a problem wrong. I was checking it over to see what she had missed. They had had to put the first letter of the word that described a picture, and she had put "D" under a picture of a woman with a shot in her hand. I asked her to explain her answer, and she said, "That's a doctor, Mom. I don't know why I got it wrong." I sent her teacher a note explaining her confusion, but her teacher, being near retirement, still counted it wrong. "We're on Ns," she said. "That's a nurse." I thought then how cool it was that my thoughtful child would put a "D for doctor" under that picture and not automatically assume that a woman with a shot would be a nurse.

How the world has changed!

I think about my grandmother, whose potential was enormous but whose opportunities were limited. Her father, my great-grandpa Josep, was so forward thinking in 1908 that after he has sent her and her sister through secondary school in France, he sent them to every other possible schooling they could attend. THEN, he sent them to the Isle of Jersey to learn English. When they were adults, my aunt was supporting herself in Switzerland working as a designer in clothing manufacture, and my grandmother was a secretary at a champagne company in Reims. Once in America, my grandmother was able to get a job as a secretary at a tobacco company. She would take dictation from her English-speaking boss, translate it in her mind to French where she would write in in shorthand in French. Then she would translate it back into English and copy the dictated letter in English for him to sign and send on its way. Her father made sure that this brilliant mind did not go to waste! To think that Grandpa Joe was so open minded that he wanted everything for his daughters that they could possibly achieve boggles my brain. My heart swells with gratitude for his support of the women in his life.

Then I think of my Great-Grandma Jane, who left Ireland in 1886 to come to America to be a domestic servant. She took the only opportunity she had and ran with it. She and her sisters started a loan company so that the Irish immigrants could get money from somewhere because no bank would loan to the "papists." She became a wealthy woman. She purchased the apartment building in which she lived and had enough money that when my grandparents went to buy their house, she loaned them the money, not the bank.

These two women defied the odds that were stacked against them and were successful, but it would not have been so had they not had the support of their fathers and husbands. Grandma Jane's husband must have encouraged her, otherwise she would not have had the gumption to do what she did. When he had a stroke in his early 50s, she was able to keep the family afloat. Their son saw in his mother the value of a smart, powerful woman, so when he met my grandmother, his boss's secretary, he knew a good thing when he saw it.

Together, they raised five children and put both daughters through college when women during that time traditionally didn't attend school past 12th grade.

My father in turn raised three daughters to become whatever we wanted to be. It was never in doubt that had we wanted to be doctors or lawyers or financeers, we would have been encouraged and supported 100%. By choice, my sisters and I took the traditional routes. Two of us became teachers, and one became a nurse. But it was our choice to follow these calls. All of my dad's siblings were educators---two college professors, one librarian, and a high school teacher. My grandmother taught French in her home. My mother's grandmother was a teacher in a one-room schoolhouse in the Kentucky countryside. Education is in our blood, but had we wanted more, we would have been told to go for it.

I look at my daughters, and it is no longer impossible for them to become President of the United States if they so choose. Several very strong women have put that possibility within their reach. It is amazing when I watch movies set in the 1960s to see how far we've come within a couple of generations. I cannot imagine what we as a society have lost because so many brilliant minds have been stifled over the course of centuries, and I am thankful to those who have come before me, forging the path of choice for me, that I can choose to be a stay-at-home mom or I can choose to be a CFO of a major corporation.

We still have a LONG way to go. That we are still debating women's healthcare choices is crazy frustrating to me, but I know we will get past this and move on and be better for it. In the meantime, I send a shout out to Jane, Henriette, Anna, Josep, Maria, John, Joseph, John, Wanda and Kirk for their unwavering belief that women can do whatever they want.

What we leave behind

What struck me too was how little we leave."

God, how true this is. I saw it first hand when we whittled Uncle Bob down from a 3 bedroom house to a 1 bedroom efficiency to what we could haul away in our cars. Again with Dad. What is left? Some furniture? Some letters? Dishes? A class ring? Once the knowledge of who these things belonged to is lost, they cease to have meaning. I inherited things from both of these wonderful men that some would consider junk, but to me, these things are precious because they once belonged to men I loved. Through these things, Dad and Uncle Bob are still part of my life. Once their history is forgotten, what is left?

It is sad what we cling to.

I have a piece of paper that I found in my mother's purse. She had written my phone number on it and then later used it to blot her lipstick. I keep it to remind me that she. was. here. Sometimes I open it up and place it on my cheek as if she is giving me a kiss. But to anyone else, it's just a used up piece of paper.

And Jane. What of Jane? She was born in Ireland, in the middle part of the 19th century. One of twelve children, most of whom left Erie for greener pastures. The girls, all six, came to America. The boys went to Australia and America, save William that we know for sure who stayed in Thurles. And can you imagine their mother? Losing most of her children to the new worlds? Once they left, rarely did they return, most certainly they did not come back from Australia. I can only find where Jane went back once after Willie died. Her sisters pooled their money and sent Jane, John, and JWF back to Ireland to get her mind off things, as if a trip "home" only to leave again would help.

During a crossing to America, she was in steerage. She was traveling with her niece, as the story goes, and it was so rough, that they drank the holy water they had brought with them from Ireland so to preserve their souls should the boat sink.

She arrived in the US the same year the Statue of Liberty was dedicated. I wonder what she thought as she entered New York Harbor. She worked as a domestic for a time before marrying another Irish immigrant she had met here, a carpenter, from a town not fifty miles from her own. She had two sons and a daughter. Her husband had a stroke and had to give up his business and work for the New York Botanical Gardens. Her children were industrious. Her oldest child had his first job lighting the candles in the local Jewish Synagogue on Saturday nights.

She must have been smart and good with math. She and her sisters started their own loan company. Banks wouldn't lend money to Irish immigrants, so Jane and her sisters did. They charged interest and saved and loaned and saved and loaned. By the time Mimi and Poppy moved to Louisville, she had enough money that she loaned them what they needed to buy their house on Dorothy Avenue.

She owned the apartment building in which she lived, so she made money from the renters. I can imagine that she did not tolerate late rent payments.

She looks hard in her pictures. All who knew her, from MJW to Dad to Uncle Bob, said that she was not a "nice" grandma. Not mean exactly, but not warm and fuzzy. She meant business.

She certainly was not sentimental. She burned family pictures so no one would "laugh at how funny we looked," as she told MJW. She roasted red peppers in that same furnace, holding them in the fire until the skin was black and blistered and peeled off the meat with ease. Says MJW, "They were delicious."

She buried her son, Willie, when he was seven years old, dying at the end of July of a rheumatic heart. She buried her daughter, Margaret, when she was in her 30s, dying in child birth. Jane was with her through the labor and could not do anything but watch helplessly as her daughter slipped away.

She raised Margaret's children, living with them, while their father, a fireman, worked long hours. She must have been religious. One of the grandchildren she raised became a priest.

What is left of Jane? Only her name on some documents and a marker in Calvary Cemetery in Queens and the stories about her that keep her alive through the telling. I think that is why I write my life for people to read. So that when I am gone, there will be something left, and I will live once again when my words are read.

Gone

I have found myself to be in a "hunkering down" kind of mood this week. I think the reality of the finality has finally hit me. I am only responsible for myself, Kirk, and the kids at this point in my life, after many years of considering my parents and their needs, and it is a weird feeling. I'm not sure what to do with it or myself.

I spent the last three days going through paperwork and photographs that I brought home from Dad's over the course of the last few months. There are family tree things, cards, letters, First Communion certificates, military papers, etc. I had several filled laundry baskets that had been sitting in our room for months now waiting until I had time to sort through them, which I finally did this week.

It was almost surreal to read postcards from my grandfather (dead 52 years now) to my dad (also dead) written when my dad was a little boy in 1937. There were pictures of my grandfather's family, the corners of the photos snug in the little black triangles in an album, taken in 1909 before he had even met my grandmother. Then as I flipped through the pages, I began to see her smiling face, a young woman in a new country being courted by a handsome Irishman. There were pictures taken at Rockaway Beach but no names to identify the folks posing for the camera on the wooden steps of a beach house. I could pick out my grandpa but I have no idea who the others were.

I found notes left by Dad for Mom telling her that he'd gone to the store and would be back in an hour and that he loved her. There was a note from me to Mom one day in 1974. I was mad at her because she wouldn't let me wear shorts in March, and the note was complaining that everyone else would be wearing shorts except me, and I would have to wear long "pance."

I found an engagement card to my mom from my dad's Aunt Josephine. She was kind to my mom, and I wish I remembered her better. There was a copy of my grandma's will and a letter from Aunt Nanette explaining her side of the event that has estranged her from her sister Marie since 1980. There was a letter from Marie to Dad that started out sweet and then ended up hateful and cruel, full of the crazy that has caused such strife in the Fitzpatrick family for decades.

I read letters from me to Dad and from Kirk to Dad. There was a letter I wrote when I was at summer camp in the 6th grade. It's the same camp Kyle went to when he was in the 6th grade. There were cards with zigzag scratches for signatures and "love, Sharron" or "love, Kyle" written in cursive underneath.

The paperwork for the sale of Granny's house was in a folder along with pictures of the many Christmas Eves we celebrated there. Faces long dead stared out at me from the 4 X4 black and white photograph, and I remembered the fun we had in that 4 room house, the front door propped open to let in some air because it got so hot that steam ran in rivulets down the windows in the family room.

I wondered what was it about this card or this note that made it special enough to be saved for so long. What was Mom thinking? Dad? And if they had saved them, then shouldn't I?

All of this washed over me this week; all of these memories and connections, and the reality that everything and everyone is GONE was just too overwhelming. I retreated into my "safe spot" where I can function without thinking too much and didn't come near the computer except to read. I was afraid if I started typing, I wouldn't be able to stop and all of my sadness would just come flowing out.

I finally went to my parents' grave yesterday. I haven't been since the day we buried Dad. I took a rock that has a shamrock on it and says, "Irish Blessings." I looked for and found my grandparents' grave as well. I visit Granny and Grandpa's grave whenever I go to the cemetery, but I've never been able to find Mimi and Poppy's. I stopped in the office and asked for explicit directions and finally, after over 30 years, I found theirs too. I needed to connect with them in someway, and that was as close as I was going to get. It was good, and I'm glad I found them. I saw Uncle Bob's grave and reflected there too.

I have never felt so alone as I do now. It is a sad and lonesome feeling, and I'm not sure what to do with myself.

Because I Said So

"Wach mom I'll be the only one on the street with long pance on Wendy will have them on every one will have them on except me.
To you mom From Sharron"
March, 1974 It was warm and Sharron wanted to put shorts on.


I found this note I had written to my mom almost 40 years ago in a box of papers I'd been going through. It struck me for several reasons. First, I thought it was sweet that my mom had been amused enough by it to keep it, date it, and explain why I was mad. Then I remembered the time (maybe not this time because this happened a lot) when it was warm outside on a spring day, and my mom wouldn't let me wear shorts. My best friend, Wendy, got to wear them. Our other friend, Bert, got to wear them. I could wear a tee shirt and go without a coat, but I had to wear long "pance." When I'd press my mom for a reason, she'd say something like, "Because it's March, and you can't wear shorts in March." If I would keep on pressing long enough to cross the line, she'd look me in the eye and say, "Because I said so." That was it. End of story. No more arguing. I'd hang my head in defeat and accept the reality that someone else besides me was in charge, and I had to let it go.

It used to drive me crazy. I hated the reasoning behind, "Because I said so..." I didn't make sense.

"But WHY do you you say so? Why can't I..."

"Because I said so," would be the reply. Again, end of discussion.

And I vowed when I was a parent that I would never use that as a reason why one of my children couldn't do something. I read parenting books out the wazoo that said, "Give your child a reasonable answer for your decision, and he will accept it better than the old 'because I said so' reason." Made sense to me, I thought. That's how I am going to parent. Not necessarily better, just different.

So when my children would ask if they could do something like ride their bikes in the street without a helmet or use a ladder to climb a tree, I'd sit them down and explain, "Because it's not safe. What if you are riding your bike and a car comes along and doesn't see you?" or "Because if you need a ladder to get started climbing a tree, then it's too high for you to be climbing." It seemed to work for most everything. Occasionally, I would get the, "But why?" and I'd explain again in more detail. And I'll admit that a few times I resorted to, "Because I said so." But those were usually few and far between and when I was particularly stressed out or didn't have time for a lengthy explanation.

Yes, reasoning worked like a charm. Until the kids hit their teenage years and started developing their higher order thinking skills and the ability to turn anything into a debate.

"No, you may not ride in a car with your friend who just got his license...Yes, I'm sure he's a good driver...He's never had an accident? Well I hope not. He's only had his license for 3 months!...No, you can't just drive with him to Taco Bell...I know it's not that far...I'm sure he'll only go the speed limit and use his blinkers and come to a complete stop at each red light. You still can't do it...Stop arguing with me. You cannot ride with him...Because I said so."

"You may go to the movies on Friday, but I am going along. I won't go to the same movie as you, but I'm going to be in the theater...Why? Because I love you, and it's not a safe place for a 12 year old girl to be at night without a grown up present...I don't care if your friends live nearby and do it all the time. You are not your friends...No, you can't walk to your friend's house after to the show...There is a nightclub in that mall and a lot of drug use nearby...I'm sorry that you feel that way, but these are your options: Either I stay at the theater and bring you home after or you don't go...Because I said so."

I am beginning to see the wisdom in my parents' parenting. "Because I said so" works. Yes, my kids get mad when I use it. I got mad when my mom used it. I totally get it. "Because I said so," means, "That's It. No more arguing. You are not going to change my mind. " And that sucks when you are a teenager and trying to look cool and exert your independence. Oh well. Sometimes you don't get your way. Sometimes you don't know best. Sometimes you just have to be the only one who doesn't get to do something.

Because I said so.