Ten Things I Learned From Everywhere I Went....

There are many things I could write about, but these are the ones that stick near and dear to my heart, because many of them were taught to me when I was about to graduate, whether from high school, college, or graduate school.  In all three cases, the lessons came not from the texts or research, but from encounters with people who really loved what they taught, and wanted more than anything else, to convey something of that love to others who might do the same. 

It didn't matter what the person taught or didn't teach, it mattered who they were. 

Lesson #10    Don't get too hung up on how people are, because they will grow, they will change, and so will you.  --Mr. John Conway upon my grousing about boys, friends, and high school. 

Lesson #9  Expect to make friends wherever you go, and be a good one to all you encounter. --A brilliant teacher at Lamar University, a 25 year veteran of Special Education who taught Teaching Reading, one of the last classes I took for my masters, and one of the best teachers I ever met.  Wish I could recall her name. 

Lesson #8  Read everything and more, but don't be pompous about it. Just read. --Jean Rodes, Professor at Saint Mary's College  on referencing anything else other than what is assigned.

Lesson #7 When things get too rough, read Dickens and eat ice cream.  --Professor Liz Noel, (advice when I caught Chicken pox, and another professor assigned Camus' The Plague). 

Lesson #6 All behavior is communication, no matter how old you are, no matter your condition, no matter your level of education, no matter your status in life.   Your job as a teacher, is to figure out what is being communicated and respond.   --Professor Sandra Einsel of Boston College on Human Development and Handicapping Conditions. 

Lesson #5  Wrap a line around your think...(whether drawing or writing) --Sr. Kelly at Saint Mary's College, on what creating, whether with words or otherwise, is. 

Lesson #4  "You will never be as good as Yeats.   Yates Maybe." --Professor Max Westler at Saint Mary's College on humility in the arts. 

Lesson #3  "A world defined only by science and math is inherently reductive, I wouldn't want to live in it....and neither should you." --Fantasy and Philosophy Professor Sayer, posing a philosophical question to the class, based on the books we'd read. 

Lesson #2  "Push through the pain, it's only temporary." --Kick Boxing Instructor, Jill (lost her last name to time), because she never let me slack off. 

Lesson #1  "How are you going to prevent yourself from being seduced by academia?" --my professor at the University of Texas asked.  "I think my husband and son will handle that problem."  I told him. 

Moral of the story:  Never give God that much leeway.   (We moved two months later, and the rest is history). 

The Problems with Poetry

When I get writer's block, I have drafts that have wonderful titles and nothing in them.  My draft board is filled with half finished thoughts which prove, I did write that day, I just didn't hit "Publish." These days, I have little time, so more half thoughts get started than finished.

The other thing I do when I feel as if I've said everything I can think of, and have nothing new to contribute that will either edify or amuse, is write poetry.   I don't like my poems as a rule for three reasons:

1) It's easy to write bad poetry.
2) It's easy to be pretentious about one's poetry.
3) I can hear in my head everytime I write a poem either my poetry teacher at Notre Dame saying, "We don't need to read her poems." or the Poet who visited Saint Mary's, saying, "I'm very surprised I almosts believed her poem."

Poetry is supposed to use form and words to create an indellible image in the mind, to engrave on the heart something that wouldn't be possible with prose.   Poetry uses active space in language, to create greater meaning in the language that does get used.   I tend to blather on, to cover the whole canvas with words, leaving little space for my poems to breathe.  See problem #1.

However I'm also protective about my poems in the same way any writer looks at their creation and thinks it beautiful.  See problem #2.

Problem #3 is the running tape in my head, which makes me highly supsicious of any praise of my poetry... because I know both problem #1 and problem #2 are real. Fortunately, I have a third teacher whose words also run through my head.

Die hard cub fan, Max at Saint Mary's remained a favorite all the years if only because despite being a poet, he could laugh at himself.  He laughed at me too, but I knew he didn't mean it except in the gentle way a professor might tease a student who needed to grow up a bit.   "Yes, but I'll never be as good as YEETS."  He wrote on the board.   A comment from some frustated student in the course of decades of teaching.   To which he quipped, "YEATS, no, Yeets, probably.  Now get back to writing."

The trick was to stop using everyone else as a yardstick, and learn what they did that worked and what they did that didn't, and apply all those lessons to the actual business of writing.   He taught us, be humble, and you can write whatever poem you like.

"That Max
pisses me off."

Possibly the most memorable poem in the semester began with these opening two lines. I can't remember the rest of it, but I honestly can't remember any of the other poems we read during that semester which proves since I didn't write those two lines, I probably made people suffer through #1 and #2, and legitimately helped foster the commentary listed in #3.   He laughed harder than anyone else at that poem, and taped it on his door. These were his lessons.  Wear your problem.  Bleed on the page. Laugh at yourself and recognize, much of what you write, is laughable.  

On top of that, he demanded, "Write until you stop thinking about what you will write, and just as a muscian will eventually be able to play a piece without looking, and a dancer to perform a whole routine without error, the words will flow and you'll only know after you write them, what they mean."  It sounded like nonsense.  It also sounded wonderful.    He made poetry something other than what depressed artsy sophsiticated people do, he made it fun.  

With all those lessons in mind, I give to you, today's poem, inspired by watching the students at my new job funnel out to the buses and cars waiting at dismissal.    



The Beauty We Cannot Yet See

It's three o'clock
and the students swarm out
all talking and walking,
so full of promise
some have already broken.

They stare at their phones,
at the ground,
at the sky
and anywhere at all
except each other.

Determined to remain
insulated and safe
in a crowd full of others
just as wary,
all just as full

of more beauty than we
or they imagine they can bear.
They are stars in the daylight
and every once in a while,
the veil lifts.

Revealing a glimmer
of what could be
of what should be
what would be.
It was always intended.

What I Hope for Her

My third child is going to the college my grandmother, mom and I attended.  I joined a Parents of the Class of 2020 group and somehow, when interacting with them, this bled out of the keyboard.  So since today I'm dealing with two sickies and a mountain of laundry that rivals Mt. Fuji, I leave you with this piece about what I hope my daughter and all others who attend Saint Mary's College in Notre Dame, Indiana, find during their four years.

When I went to my 30th reunion, I looked around and all I could see, were beautiful strong women. I saw women who ran marathons, fought cancer, became lawyers, ran schools, stayed at home with their children, some who worked for non profits, and others in the corporate world, I saw women of every stripe, but all of them Saint Mary's. All of them had a desire to connect, to return to this place that helped shape them to face whatever storm came at them when they left.

I saw women who I remember as girls, weeping over the boy who broke their hearts, now caring for women who are escaping from men who break their hearts and more. I saw women who struggled with anorexia as girls, who now work in counseling and nutrition. I saw artists who now seek out other artists, English majors who now have written books that became movies. I saw a friend who struggled but quit smoking, and another who struggled with depression, now so fully alive, it is luminous.

My friends and I also wept for the missing spaces, the friends who we'll never see in this life again, who lost battles to health issues, but who were at SMC and ever after, women of faith, courage, service and love. Some of them were classmates. Some of them were professors. All of them were dear.

I discovered classmates I didn't know then, who overcame personal loss, in some cases, the kind that can leave you forever stuck in that moment of pain, but who came and were shaped but not stapled by that suffering. It was the vision of Sister Madeleva, the once President of this school, all the girls who came to this college, their divine potential rendered in reality, sitting at the table.

All of these women, all from different walks of life, all from different vocations, all taking joy in each other's company, in the mass, in the meal, in the time remembered and time spent during the reunion. That is my hope for each of your daughters and mine, that they get to sit at a table, 35 years from now, reveling in the rediscovery of who each of them have become.

It is Always Too Soon

My favorite professor from college, Jeanne Rodes, died last night in her sleep.  She'd fallen the day before.  I've written about her husband, who died November 25, 2014. His story tells a lot of hers, as all good real romances do.

I miss her.  It's that simple.  It makes it hard to think, let alone open a vein.

She was someone who lit a fire in me though I didn't know it.

When I met her, I did think, "I want to be like her!"  Then I thought, "What a crazy idea!" However, with her seven children, her infectious zeal for literature, her command of a quick thought and an obvious warm heart, I fell in love.  It was irresistible. I saw her speaking before us, talking to students and being both clear headed and unfailingly kind and I wanted that.  It was a luminous witness and the beginnings of a friendship that spanned 28 years.

One of our most memorable moments was a fight.

I went to see her during my 10 year college reunion. I'd brought my youngest of then three children (6 month old) with me. Fresh from two years of school working toward a doctorate, my head full of smug gobbledygook, I espoused what I thought was important jargon about epistimology and paradigm shifts and she looked at me and said, "KNOCK IT OFF!"

I felt hurt. I thought I'd joined the academic club. I thought I sounded smart, sophisticated, nuanced. I tried again.  She told me to stop it.  "Just stop." It hadn't, but the air in the restaurant felt chilly in that moment.

Sitting down at Haggar College Center's cafe at Saint Mary's, she shook her head.

"That doesn't sound like you.  That sounds like a bad warped version of you that I wouldn't want to eat lunch with." She ordered an ice tea and either an egg or tuna sandwich, I don't remember.  "The real you is much more interesting."  I ordered  a diet coke and hot dog,  and juggled my daughter who played with the silverware.  Impulsively, I gave my baby girl a kiss on the head.  

"That's the real you."   Jeanne pointed at me holding my daughter.
She saw me pull back. I didn't want that to be the real me.  I didn't want to be just a mom.  It felt smaller.  The reality was, it wasn't the role, but the me who hadn't yet grown up into the role yet.  I'd been hiding from the role via graduate school. Hiding from the stretch marks of motherhood.

Jeanne knew it.

Getting me to hear that reality took the rest of lunch, which wasn't as much fun as I wanted it to be, but was what real friends do.  They tell you when you're missing the mark.  They guide you to the better you.  The doctoral program was a way of holding something for me.  Jeanne didn't convince me not to go to graduate school.  She didn't lecture or dismiss my dreams or criticize my parenting or even my life decisions. She just didn't let me pretend there wasn't a cost, and made me think about the costs, the now costs and future costs.

Jeanne didn't let me stay comfortable in a bubble of pride and self oriented feeling of somehow deserving this cocoon from my own life's reality, without knowing  the price would be not seeing my own children grow up.

It was a discernment luncheon.  She knew the process of dying to the self I'd yet to fully allow myself to do.  She also knew the better outcome possible and sat with me and we ate and talked and talked, even ordering dessert so as to not have to leave.

We sat in the parlor and laughed well past the lunch hour. I cannot remember anything of what was said, except to say at some point, whatever it was I held onto, fell off.    Graduate school would fall that autumn.

My real memory of the rest of that day was the echoes of our laughter bouncing off the walls of the student center to the ceiling. Before we went our separate ways, she took some time to talk to my baby girl.  She said she hoped one day she would go to Saint Mary's.  This fall, my daughter, that daughter, is.

We've had other visits, other luncheons since then, and the hallmark of all of them, is the whole conversation, the entire visit is like dessert.  Each memory holds the echo of laughing; laughing until we cry; crying because the joy and the laughter can't quite capture or cover everything we've talked about, or how much we're trying to cram into a few hour visit or phone call.

It is always too soon to say good bye, but I do know, when we get to see each other again, there won't be a need to cram everything in because the feast will go on forever.   So for her life, for her friendship, for the luncheons, for the talks, for all she's given, for all she still gives, for all I miss and all I remember and all I don't,  I thank God for her.

Thank you my friend.  I miss you.

The Alma Mater Matters More than the Score

It's been a while since I allowed myself to care about Notre Dame Football. Even last year, when they were going against Alabama and lost only one game in the season, when they had Manti T'eo up for the Heisman and the crazy scandal of the girlfriend that wasn't, I just couldn't let myself enjoy it.

But I still love the darn place.

It's where my family has been for generations, Notre Dame and Saint Mary's, it's part of me, it's part of my whole family history.  I have generations of family that stayed through the end of disappointing games to sing the Alma Mater. It would finish the experience, everyone staying to the last note, one student body win or lose, rain, snow, cold or shine to sing the Alma Mater.  It comforted and it closed every game.  Here is the song.

However the new policy by Coach Kelly decreed that the football team shall not stay out on the field after a home game loss to sing.  They will only stay when they win.  Most of us didn't know about this change as last year, we didn't lose until the end and not at home until this past Saturday.

Here are the words:

Notre Dame, our Mother
Tender, strong and true
Proudly in the heavens,
Gleams the gold and blue.
Glory's mantle cloaks thee
Golden is thy fame
And our hearts forever
Praise thee, Notre Dame.
And our hearts forever,
Love thee, Notre Dame.

It is a little thing I know, but I have problems with this idea, of only belonging, of only singing, of only praying (and it is a song of prayer), when we win.  There is something to seeing all of the student body, athlete and fan, all of the alumni, all of the people in the stands, saying these words.  The song reminds everyone, fan and athlete, that the University stands for something far greater, far more achingly beautiful than football and winning.  As a member of the Notre Dame/Saint Mary's community, and as a fan of both the university and the football team, I protest, this is forgetting what Notre Dame is to be about,

in favor of what the world thinks when it sees Notre Dame.

And if I were a member of the Notre Dame Football team, I'd protest by staying after every game and singing, as loudly as possible with the student body, because the world doesn't need an undefeated football team (good thing this year too), as much as it needs a humble witness that win lose or draw, we are ND and thus, we honor Mary first.

7 Quick Takes...yeah, it's Sunday...

 

1. The Book of Helen....

I am still in limbo about the final edits of Helen.  That doesn't mean I'm being idle though, I've started reading The Odyssey again and outlining.  Having written a book without the benefit of an outline but with the resources of multiple myths detailing Helen's story, I will now try writing a book using an outline to make up for the fact that Penelope has far fewer stories about her life than Helen.  

2.  What I've been up to...

This past weekend, I had the luxury of journeying to Saint Mary's College for my 25th year reunion.  I'd been a bit down as no one from my key core of five friends would be there. Two are deceased. One has deliberately withdrawn from all contact, and the other two for various reasons did not come.  But not having the people I would have naturally clung to, allowed me to rediscover all the wonderful women I didn't quite know while I was at SMC, as I was busy being the age that I was.  One fellow classmate summed it up as she lamented she had lost out on something of the experience by not going to football games. Another thought she had missed it by living off campus.  A third worried about what she missed in going abroad and another, what she did not experience by not travelling to other countries. 

What we all sensed was glow of each other's college education, and how theirs was somehow fuller than our own, but the reality, was each of us had a limited experience of the school based on our own hang ups and need to grow up, and that none of us could have "the Saint Mary's experience."  Collectively, we were the Saint Mary's experience.  It's as if each of us as the bricks of the building were lamenting that we were not the whole building, because we loved the whole building and could not quite see how we fit into the structure, integrity and strength of the school itself.

3.  What I'm Reading...

I just finished Elizabeth Scalia's Strange Gods while on the plane back from Southbend, Indiana.  I have to say, if you buy this book, don't use a high lighter, or you will find your book is soggy from yellow underlining before you get to the last page. I had to pace myself because my natural tendency is to gallop through reading, as if the finish line is the goal, rather than absorbing what is said.  That being said, I found the whole experience delicious. There were wonderful passages and lines that revealed how we perpetually engage in the creation of idols in our everyday life and stories that made me laugh aloud while pondering my own ability to put many things in front of those I love including God.  I also love the cover! 

4.  Understanding Face

It is a gift I've never fully understood but always been very grateful to have.  Despite being a lousy listener who can't remember names to faces, total strangers tell me their stories. Getting a hotdog in the Terminal C in Chicago in between flights, a lovely woman named Lolita served me.  She also told me how she'd lost 70 pounds on weight watchers but couldn't get her sister to do it, her sister opted for a surgical method of reduction. I told her that was inspiring and she should go on the website and send a testimonial. She showed me a before picture. It was an impressive transformation.  Then she served another customer but before I left, she called me over and whispered how she dreamed of one day helping children between 13 and 17 who had been written off.  I told her I hoped she would.

5.     Favorite Moments

I wish I wish I wish I'd brought a camera to the weekend.  But there is a photo in my head of my two favorite teachers, Sister Jeanne and Jean Rodes talking to each other, beaming smiles and arms open across the table from me.  Friday I'd squeezed in eating with them and we took three hours which felt like nothing, I could have listened to their lives all day.  It was a feast in so many ways to just be in their company. 

6.  Other Favorite Moment

Walking to the Grotto at Notre Dame to light a candle, to pray for a family, for all those I carry in the rosary, for all I met that weekend, for all those at home.  It was a walk I'd made so many times but it never grows old.  I love those old trees that cradle the road and the quiet beauty of that prayerful replication of the vision of the Blessed Mother by Saint Bernadette at Lourdes. 

7.  When I came back....

Anna decided I should be a chair.  Paul voted for pillow. Either way, both have determined Mom isn't going anywhere without them.  It's good to be home. 

7 Quick Takes

1.  One week until Helen is due and I am a nervous wreck. I don't know if we'll make it on time. Editing and formatting take time.  I am hopeful.  But I tend to always feel like Charlie Brown about to kick the football, except I just KNOW that she's going to swipe the thing away when I get to the point of actually kicking.   I am excited. I'm proud. I'm also working on Penelope and so I'm ready to see people enjoying Helen.  I also want to see how she all comes together. I've been editing her in pieces so I want to see the whole thing, to read it from cover to cover and experience her as if I'd discovered this book instead of written it.  

2.  There are so many movies I want to see. I've seen Iron Man 3 before, we're going to Into the Darkness tonight (Can't wait can't wait can't wait!) and then there's Now You See Me. That one looks slick and cool. 

3.  I am also considering three new viewing addictions that currently are popular.  Downtown Abby, Game of Thrones...and Dr. Who.  Yes. I'm aware that they are cult phenomena, every one of them. Yes I'm aware I'm late to the party. What I'd like to know is which one should I sink my teeth into next and why.  Sell me. Give me the pitch of why I should watch whichever one you think worth watching.  

4.  Next week, I go to the reunion at Saint Mary's. I hope to walk to Notre Dame and light a candle at the grotto. I'll get to see two of my favorite teachers for lunch on Friday.  It stuns me that this was my life, my whole life only 25 years ago.  The passage of time seems like nothing, and yet there is so much that has been crammed into these past many years.  It leaves me winded. 

5.  Does anyone else feel like the razor of the world is cutting deeper these days?  For me, the news has become a daily assault on my peace and sensibilities.  I think it is why the Church gave us Pope Francis, because his exhortations to be more than a museum piece Catholic, to go out and be salt and light to the world, well we knew this, but it is so heartening, so warming to be invited.  

6.  Two kids are done with school, one has exams next week.  Then we have two weeks before everyone gets out! SUMMER!!!!!!!!I believe I love it even more than they....and I hate their summer math books more too.  I was going to equivocate on that last bit but it's true. I hate those books. Hate hate hate hate hate hate hate them.  I don't care that they are good for boosting math skills. They are evil and ruin summer that should be spent grilling, swimming, reading book after book after book, catching frogs and fireflies (not at the same time) and playing cards with your parents.   You know what's not on that list?  Math books.  There. I said it.  Bleah.

7.  There's a new post over on Facebook page for The Book of Helen.  It is an open page so anyone on Facebook can go over and read it. I would ask if you haven't yet, to please please please like the page.  My goal this week is to break 100 likes.  Next week, we'll work on getting to 200. 

Notre Dame Our Mother, Pray for US..We are ND

When Mario Cuomo came to speak at Notre Dame, "official" people and political fans of the man went into logistical moral pretzels to assuage critics who felt the university was betraying its Catholic identity in the process. The University opted to host him, saying a university must be open to all ideas and that it was important to hear dissenting views of prominent Catholics. His arguments that one could “not impose” one’s morality on others allowed countless Catholics to check themselves out of the abortion issue entirely. They “washed their hands” of this moral issue. He set the stage for John Kerry and others on how to parse the abortion question such that if no one paid too close attention, they could have their virtuous Catholic faith and the endorsement of NARAL too. They felt Solomon like, but in actual reality, they split the baby.

Our current President used the votes of those who embraced the Cuomo argument, to help him to get elected. People who were Catholics for Obama argued that we can’t be one issue voters and thus the public good offered to the poor of the world in health care and social programs outweighed any good that might be gained for the unborn, as abortion would still continue. This type of thinking drove me nuts before the election, because it wasn’t like poverty and sickness and suffering for the living would vanish because this guy became president! But the election happened, and for those who think all souls have meaning and specifically for those who hold Catholicism to be authentically true, it’s hard not to be fighting mad with how things have thus far turned out. Eight weeks in, we have embryonic stem cell research, funded abortions overseas, talk of FOCA being signed, and a repeal of the Mexico City policy that banned federal funding to all organizations that either promoted or provided abortions.

Based on all these policies and using statistics the way the global warming crowd does, the unborn of our nation are the most endangered life form on earth; for all practical purposes, it is open season on all stages of neonatal development. 50 million and counting have been served by Planned Parenthood and similar minded institutions, and there is no sign that the fiendish beast that loves abortion desire’s to devour those not yet born is in any way abated. Shouldn’t we be jumping up and down or something? Holding a concert? The devil salivates at all the souls scarred and potentially lost through this procedure: the mother, the father, the nurses, the advocates, the doctors and the politicians and the duped.

Over and over again this past year, we have seen Catholic public officials and Catholic citizen alike, check their moral compass at the Election booth or behind the policy making door. Those who advocated for President Obama amongst the Catholic community, specifically, Biden, Pelosi, Sebelius, Douglas Kmiec and all who joined Catholics for Obama, who felt that one could vote for the most pro-abortion candidate in the United States history in good conscience, have now found a strange and to my thinking, terribly sad ally in the University of Notre Dame.

Now it is a big deal to have a sitting President come and speak at a University. Having the sitting president speak at commencement is many things, heady, impressive, and publically good for the institution as whole. It is a draw to future applicants of the school. We’re important; we get the President of the United States. It will look good for both the President and the University.

What it won’t be, is Catholic, because it is also the obligation of every Catholic to speak out and provide correction when people of good character go wrong, and to refuse those who knowingly engage in wrong moral behavior, the cover of tacit approval by association. Here was the opportunity to speak truth to power as was once popular, to be a clear moral voice in the world of relativism that seeks to dismiss all debate as partisan and symbolic rather than necessary and substantive. To my thinking, the University failed in its core mission, again.

One hopes when the cock finally crows and the University has denied Christ in disguise a third time, that those in positions of leadership will weep and become the rocks they always could be. I love this place. I met my husband here. My father and mother began their great romance story here. My sister and her husband went here. My grandfather went here. My Aunt, my Uncle, cousins I care about deeply, people I call and write and love went to this place or just across the street at Saint Mary’s. I know the University of Notre Dame is still Catholic and that perhaps those in positions of authority see the situation differently. But they should know that we don’t just want the Irish to win on the football field, we want them to be scholars and gentlemen. We want them to be good sports and kind souls. We want the whole package, undefeated, perfect in all things, shining like the Dome itself, humble, virtuous, good. We’re THAT Catholic, we want all.

And so we worry that Notre Dame will become like Georgetown, which once took down the crucifixes in its classrooms rather than offend those who did not know Christ crucified, or Boston College, which considered back 1989, selling condoms in the bookstore might somehow not a betrayal of Catholic values. If Notre Dame wants to return to its once former glory which did not rest on the football field, but on the steeped Faith and Beating Catholic heart of the University and its people, it needs to reassert its Catholic identity.

I’d say, it’s time for the sacrament of Reconciliation….and maybe it’s sister school, Saint Mary’s College should invite Sarah Palin.