Author Archives: Janell

Worry Beads

05 Tuesday May 2009

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I am preoccupied by knowing truth, especially my own.  But I wonder:  Is it possible to fully know and understand our original true selves?  And if not, how does one really follow that bit of Shakespearean advice – “to thine own self be true?” 

Like a bunch of Greek worry beads, I move what I believe to be beads of truth from one end to the other.  Back and forth they go, but so far, I’ve nothing to show for my effort.  Not even less worries.  I think I’m waiting for that proverbial lighting bolt to strike, so I can cry “Eureka,” then in a mad dash, grab some pen and paper to get it all down before I forget my discovery.  It would be ideal to write about self-knowledge with a sense of direction rather than from this feeling of lostness. 

Two of my worry beads are biblical sound bites from Jesus.  The first is a promise — “And you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”  And the second, which is housed in another Gospel, so certainly not said in the same breath as the first, is this foregone conclusion, “Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.”  In some hard to express way, these two beads of truth sit together, one against the other. 

This past January, I watched two of my grands on their last day of Christmas vacation.  Jackson is a wise third-grader and his younger sister Karson is growing up fast — this coming fall she’ll begin kindergarten.  Karson and I are ‘old’ pals, as I began watching her a few days a week from the time she was two.  Our days then were filled with just everyday togetherness,  a mix of chores and playtime activities that always included watching a series of favorite cartoons on afternoon television.  And now, with both of them coming to visit, I chose to do nothing more than serve up the best dish of everyday life that a grandma can serve.    

While we were watching cartoons together, Karson plopped down beside me on the couch, and without taking her eyes from the cartoon, kept scooting closer and closer, until her body formed itself next to mine.  Still looking staight at the television set, I heard her whisper  “I love you”   in such a breathless rush, it was as if her love had just bubbled up out of her heart and slipped  off of her tongue, as if her scooting had just jarred her words free.  No big production, no thought of gain, no thought of holding back.  Out came her love as natural as breathing, which I imagine may be something like the way love reigns in the kingdom of God.       

As I sit muddled in my thinking on truth, it strikes me that Karson and I were just two beads of truth sitting close together that January day; Karson was the bead of trusting love, who hasn’t yet learned to be self-conscious in wearing her heart on her sleeve.  And that makes me the wizened old woman, who knows truth when she hears it.  

Every young child worth their salt knows that where love reigns, there’s always a happily ever after.  And every wise grandma worth her salt knows when to surrender to love and give up the lost cause of knowing it all.  Like Karson, I need to just freely share my love the truest way I know how.  And stop worrying.  

Breakfast for One

03 Sunday May 2009

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It’s Sunday morning and a little drippy outside.  Our day at the zoo has been cancelled – even if our party hadn’t minded getting wet, I imagine most of the animals would be hiding under the driest shelter they could find.  Even ‘wild’ beasts know enough to come in out of the rain.

So with no part of a picnic lunch to prepare, I set about to make breakfast for one – just my old standby pancakes and sausage.  There is an everyday comfort in hearing the sound of pots and pans coming out of hiding and the first sizzle of butter melting in the pan.  When my husband’s home, he generally puts aside his newspaper just long enough for us to converse over breakfast.  And while I’m not above talking to myself – in fact, I’m quite accomplished in this art through many years of practice – this morning I opted to open a used book I’d recently purchased from Langhorne’s Antiques:  Savory Suppers, Fashionable Feasts.

The book records the dining habits of Victorian America, and knowing very little about the subject, I now know three pages more.  I’ve learned that ‘three square meals a day” is a twentieth century invention, and that people once got by on only two meals – a late breakfast and a light early supper.  Maybe less food for thought would be a return to a healthier America?

The book describes in detail, the everyday rules that made for good manners at the dining table.   And back in the time of my granny’s mother, America was interested in knowing and observing these rules, as noted by the author,

“Etiquette books by the dozen were written by both men and women in the nineteenth century.” ….The importance of ‘good breeding’ at the dinner table was compounded by two facts that most Americans readily recognized.  Eating, they acknowledged, was a most basic function, common to both man and animal.  Only manners could separate man from beast in the act of consuming food and drink.” 

I don’t know what the zoo animals would have to say about this, but I know the two tame beasts I live with observe their own form of mealtime etiquette.  Without fail, both begin their meal from their own food bowls, and then sometime mid-course, by apparent agreement, they switch and sample the other’s food.  They may or may not switch back.  Max almost always finishes first, as Maddie is by far the daintier eater.  And without the benefit of an etiquette book to teach him, Max has learned from the school of hard barks that it’s best not to breathe down Maddie’s neck while she’s still eating.  But once Maddie has consumed her fill, Max knows he can then move in for the kill and finish up Maddie’s leftovers.  These doggie rules of mealtime etiquette are observed three times a day. 

But what about breakfast, I wondered.  With the books detailed index, I found and consumed this bit of wisdom rather quickly:

 “At this first meal of the day a certain amount of freedom is allowed which would be unjustifiable at any other time…” 

Here, I see that reading the newspaper, correspondence and even a book is all okay.  But what about that bit of fluffy pancake I just fed to Max and Maddie that they took so carefully from my hand?  The book breathes absolutely no word of advice.

I guess there are just some mealtime situations where its every beast for himself.   But I’m pretty sure I know what Granny would say…

Hope Chests

01 Friday May 2009

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I’ve been thinking a little about hope chests after reading a short story of Eudora Welty’s last night, titled Lily Daw and the Three Ladies.

Lily is a simple-minded character, not only in the sense that she is unwise in the ways of the world, but in the sense that she’s not ‘all there’. There’s just something ‘not quite right’ about Lily, and while Lily doesn’t seem to know or care about her shortcomings, the entire small Southern town in which she lives does everything it can to protect Lily from the world and from herself.

Especially the ‘three ladies’ who’ve made plans for Lily’s life—and though it’s not said in so many words, it appears they plan to send Lily to some kind of institution, the kind of place that takes care of those unable to care for themselves. And when they discover that Lily is planning to marry some traveling man who they just know has taken advantage of poor Lily’s innocence, who they just know has fed poor Lily a line about marriage to have his way with her, they take off in a conniption fit to save poor Lily from herself.  Like three cruise missiles built in the name of protection, I wondered if Lily’s three protectors wouldn’t instead inflict destruction on their path of salvation.  It takes some convincing to get Lily to finally abandon her own plans to go along with the plan of her three defenders, but go along she does.  With one condition — that her hope chest goes with her.

Well…you’ll just have to read the short story for yourself to find out how it all ends.  But its easy to see why Eudora Welty was considered a master of the short story, with all the lovely and true nuances of everyday life she’s able to pack into eight short pages.  I went to sleep thinking about hope chests.  And woke up remembering my own that I began as a young teenager.  Thinking of my own two daughters, I wonder if  this tradition of young girls sitting aside treasured pieces for a future hasn’t  just shriveled up and died.  But then possessing hope for a good future goes hand in hand with those who are young and have no reason to believe any different, even without a chest.

So then I turned to those who are no longer young, like my daddy, with his own set of launched cruise missiles that call themselves ‘home health.’  With Daddy banging himself up from his many falls, home health has recommended we put Dad into a nursing home.  My sister and I know ‘they’ have the best of intentions, and that maybe these words have to be said  to avoid later threats of medical malpractice, but Daddy would shrivel up and die quicker in a nursing home than if left to his unsafe self in his unsafe home.   

Nursing homes may be safe – more or less– but they’re also sterilized of all hope.   Both my granny and papa died in a nursing home within their first month of calling it home and we’ve no reason to believe it would be any different with Dad.  After all, what sounds good in theory and in intention doesn’t always prove itself  true when it comes to everyday practice and reality.

Even simple-minded Lily knew she couldn’t let go of her hope chest.  And by ignoring the dooms day threats from all the cruise missiles flying around us and Daddy, maybe my sister and I are just tying to offer Daddy a bunker filled with hope and a future.   At least for now, while we can.

I think I’ll keep Eudora’s collection of short stories on my nightstand.   Who knows but that The Collected Stores of Eudora Welty aren’t a treasure chest in their own right.