pieces and ponderings

An unusual thing happened this morning…five people in our family, the five people in our house at the time,  all sat down at the table in our dining room for breakfast.  Well…technically I wasn’t eating breakfast…just drinking a cup of coffee…but my youngest three sons and their dad were all eating breakfast.  That doesn’t happen too often on school days.  It’s usually more a kids-sitting-down-briefly-to-eat and the mom (me) is works on lunches to send off with them to school and the dad is walking around doing dad-getting-ready-in-the-morning stuff.

So when I realized that we were all sitting down together and taking slow, easy breaths and my boys were eating their food and actually taking time to chew it…it was a nice feeling.

I looked at my men and then looked at the table we were all sitting around.  It’s a beautiful table…handed down to me…once belonging to my paternal grandparents.  Other furniture in our dining room was theirs also…a buffet that matches the table…the chairs around the table…a roll-top desk in the corner.  When my family gathers around that table, I’m reminded of my family…past generations…Thanksgiving meals spent around the same table when my two sisters and I were kids, seated with my mom and dad and grandparents and aunt…and then I can almost smell smells from my grandparents home…good smells of my grandmother’s cooking…of her perfume.  I love it that my grandparents’ table now sits in my dining room.

On the back side of our home…just off the kitchen…in a breakfast nook area stands another table.  This table belonged to my mom and dad.  On this table my family ate most of our meals all the years I was growing up.  On this table I did my homework a lot of the time.  On this table, my mom set birthday cakes and Christmas dinners and meat grilled in the summertime.

This table has many, many memories of my growing up years…and now of my kids’ growing up years.  My husband and our five children have sat down to many a meal at this table…and lingered after the food is eaten to talk and laugh.  An extra place is set when my mom visits and we gather around the table again.

Now my own kids do homework at this table…and I am blessed with so many memories of those I love…gathered around tables.

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Every January/February, my family seems to go through a period of mourning.  It happens after all of the college football bowl games are completed and the NFL Super Bowl is a part of history.  It’s an especially tough time for child number 4.  He is now 15 and is grown into this man-child who thinks that football is a 24/7 sport.  If there is a game on TV, it is probably on at our house.  Even arena football will do in the NFL/College ball off-season.  He will even watch games from past years on ESPN.  He will watch games that he has recorded.  Last Saturday there were high school games being broadcast and yes, he was watching.

So today is like a holiday at our house with the beginning of the college football season.  He staked his place on the sofa early and put in his order for pizza.

He says things like, “Is my pizza done, yet, mom?” and looks at me with piercing green/blue eyes and quickly adds a “Please” and “Thank you” when I rise to check on the pizza in the oven.

As for the rest of the family…yes, we’re all football fans too.  Child number 1 is in a stadium right now for his Alma Mater’s opening game of the season…Roll Tide!  Child number 2 arose with pain in her mouth and swollen cheeks from having her wisdom teeth removed yesterday and has also claimed her spot on the family room furniture to watch the games on TV.  Bryan D. and child number 3 are working together today, but checking in for scores.  And child number 5 has in past years set up shrines in front of the television screen with memorabilia of his favorite team.

And me, when I’m not checking on the pizza in the oven or writing a blog post about the joys of football in the fall…I’m seated right next to child number 4 cheering for my favorite teams.

Ahhhh…fall…ahhh…football.

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It’s August…the 29^th exactly…my 320^th month-a-versary (see earlier post).  It’s hot out…though cooler today than yesterday.  The grass in our yard crunches because it hasn’t rained in a while.  I’m concerned about child number 4 having football practice this afternoon in such heat…but, I’m a mom and it’s my job to be concerned about such things.  And this afternoon I will go sit outside in the heat while child number 5 has a tennis lesson…but, I’m a mom and it’s my job to sit in the heat when children have such lessons.

Some of my flowers around the yard have withered because of the heat and the fact that I haven’t watered them as regularly…because it’s August and life got crazy in August.

But the Lantana in my front yard is looking good…in spite of the heat…in spite of the lack of water.  And the Lantana in my front yard is smiling so brightly with its yellow flowers that butterflies from all over are coming to visit.

I love butterflies…flutter-bys, as some children call them…and some adults like me.  Watching butterflies is a peaceful thing to do.  Watching butterflies makes me forget how hot it is and all of the things on my to-do list that I have yet to to-do.

We think of butterflies as coming in the spring…and I guess that they do…but there are lots and lots of butterflies that come to our place in August.  As I’ve observed the gathering of butterflies over the last few days…I remembered an August long ago…when child number 2 was in kindergarten and would get out of school at noon and children numbers 3 and child number 4 would ride with me to go pick up their sister from school.

To pass away the driving time, which was only about 10-12 minutes…but sometimes even 10-12 minutes needs passing with preschoolers, child number 3 and I would count butterflies.  There would be bunches of them fluttering around the roadside flowers and bushes.  It was a fun thing to do…a peaceful thing.  Sometimes we would count 100 butterflies…that’s a lot of butterflies…that’s a lot of gentle, peaceful creatures helping us pass away the time of hot August days.

And though I’ve already taken a butterfly-break today…I might take another one…and go sit on my front porch and watch dozens of flutter-bys fluttering by.  It’s such a peaceful thing to do.  You might want to take one too.

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I have a series of text messages on my phone from April 27, 2011, around 4:43 in the afternoon.  The messages are from my firstborn, child number 1.  I remember hearing a weather report and thought that maybe I should contact him to see where he was in his college town because the weather was becoming rather stormy.

He let me know that he was safe in the University of Alabama’s Recreation Center, where he works.  In fact, his job that day involved sending tweets…giving weather updates on the approaching storm.

He told me that I could follow him on twitter as he posted updates of what was happening there in Tuscaloosa…so that’s what I did.  I weathered the storm with my son via modern communication devices.  We knew that a tornado had hit the area…we had no idea just how severe a storm it had been…nor of the incredible damage and destruction that had occurred in just a few minutes.

I was on the phone with child number 1 soon after the tornado had passed through the city.  He was heading out of the Rec. when he asked me to hold on a moment.  A man was entering the Rec. center.  He was from a nearby neighborhood.  He was asking my son for help.

“Mom, the guy looked like he had been in a war,” my son told me, as he headed back inside the Recreation Center to see if he could help in any way.  Soon we would begin realizing the horrible toll that the storm had taken.

The University’s Recreation Center would be transformed that afternoon/evening into a shelter for many of the victims of the destructive storm.  The night passed into day and people rallied to help in whatever way they could.  Classes at the University were cancelled as the devastation to the city was beginning to be realized.

The tornado had been an EF5, the rating assigned to tornados with wind speeds of more that 200 mph.  The supercell that produced the tornado lasted 7 hours and 24 minutes, covering around 380 miles.

Many people lost their lives in the path of this storm.  Many lost their homes or workplaces.

The spring semester ended that day.  No more classes would be held.  Graduation would be postponed.

Tomorrow my family will be in Tuscaloosa for commencement.  Those who didn’t walk in their graduation ceremony in May will walk tomorrow.  My son’s diploma already hangs on his bedroom wall here at home, but tomorrow we will celebrate his hard work during the last four years…and we’ll remember those who lost their lives, their homes, their businesses…but not their hope.

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“Please, leave your brother alone!” I heard those words coming out of my mouth yesterday morning, as I gathered dirty laundry from a clothes hamper.  Two of my sons were in one of their bedrooms…one was evidently doing something that the other one didn’t like.  One of them kept saying, “Stop it!”

The other brother simply ignored the “Stop it” pleas.  That’s when I called out, “Please, leave your brother alone!”

I was surprised when the words left my mouth.  I was surprised because I realized that I don’t say that phrase as often as I used to say it.  But…as was proven yesterday…situations still arise where those are the only words for a mom to say.

Then I remembered saying similar words a few days ago when we were driving somewhere.  Three of our five children were sitting in the backseat…the middle seat…not the back, back seat of our SUV.  But because they couldn’t sit in the middle seat without me telling them to leave one another alone, I was threatening to send one of them to the furthest back seat.  He looked at me with astonishment as I pronounced the threatened consequences that bothering brothers would bring.

But it’s not just the younger brothers that bother their siblings; even my older children still bother their siblings.  It leaves me wondering if they will have a desire to bother even when they are several decades old.

And then I remembered last night…when I went into child number 2’s bedroom.  She was contentedly busy working on something on her computer.  I decided that it was a good time to tickle her.  She glared at me and said, “Stop it!”

I tickled her again.

Yes…there will probably always be a time in my family’s life when I’m saying something like, “Please, leave your brother alone!”  I guess it’s in their genes to bother.

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I have a friend who used to describe herself as a “goober” when she did something awkward or silly that embarrassed her.  She would call me up and say something like, “I’m a goober.”  And I would reassure her that she wasn’t and then listen to her “being a goober” story.  Usually the story made me laugh.

Lately, I find myself being a “goober” more and more.  Like week before last when child number 2 and I had an appointment in town.  We received some good news during the appointment so we were very happy…downright giddy…as we walked to the elevator and then got into the elevator and stood talking in the elevator in happy tones with smiles and a little laughter.  The elevator doors closed and then opened a few minutes later.   A couple stepped into the elevator as child number 2 and I stepped off the elevator only to realize that we were on the same floor where we had had our appointment.

As we quickly stepped back into the elevator…both of us thinking out loud…wondering how we were still on the third floor of the building…we both realized at about the same time that when we had entered the elevator, we had never pressed the button instructing the elevator to deliver us to the first floor of the building.  This made us laugh…and the couple now standing in the elevator with us watched us…smiling politely…holding their tongues about how silly they thought we were until we parted ways.

After finally reaching the first floor and getting off the elevator and exiting the building, child number 2 and I continued to giggle…even as we had trouble remembering where we had parked the car…and even as we were almost mowed down by a speeding Hoverchair zipping through the parking lot.

Yes…we felt like “goobers” but we really didn’t care…it was funny…we celebrated our “gooberness” by going to get smoothies.  Child number 2 tweeted about it and told me I should write a blog about it because is was “epic.”

I didn’t really think of the incident as “epic.”  Funny…yes.  Silly…yes.  But “epic”…no…not “epic” material.

But this past weekend…this past weekend our “gooberness” reached “epic” proportions.  This past weekend child number 2, and her parents, of which I’m the mom, went to a new student orientation at the college she will be attending in the fall.

The orientation dates have been on the calendar that hangs in our kitchen for two months.  The orientation dates had been marked on my phone calendar for two months.  Orientation for transfer students was to take place on July 29^th.  The date had been cemented in my psyche for weeks.

And that’s why we found it a little odd that child number 2 had received an invitation the week before we were to attend orientation on July 29^th, to a meeting about the school’s honor program on the evening of July 28^th…the day before orientation began (at least it was the day before in our minds…remember that date cemented in my psyche?).

We arrived at the dining hall, where the meeting was to take place in a room off to the side, about the time the meeting was to begin.  We entered the main doors and were very surprised at the number of people there.  “Wow, this is a pretty big turnout for this meeting,” I surmised, still not realizing our mistake.

As we stood there, the three of us, watching college age kids stand in a buffet line, spooning food onto plates…we continued to wonder what was going on.  We wondered why there were information tables lined up around the dining hall with people milling about talking to the folks manning the tables.

My husband asked an official-looking man what was going on.  Bryan Darling happened to find just the right person to ask…the man was the Dean of Students.  As we talked to this very kind man, we realized that we had arrived for the first meeting of orientation 9 hours late.  The two-day orientation had begun on that Thursday morning.  We had had it very firmly planted in our minds that orientation was to begin on a Friday morning, the next morning, but no, it had begun on that Thursday morning.  We were very simply a day late.

The Dean of Students quickly went into action, gathering his student life staff, introducing them all to us as we stood there feeling foolish…feeling like “epic goobers.”  We made the choice to just begin fresh the next morning.  They gave us packets of information to carry to our hotel with us.

When we arrived the next day, we were greeted by name again and again.  A series of appointments had been scheduled for us to catch us up on everything we had missed because WE WERE A DAY LATE!  Child number 2 went with her orientation group for the last session of the 2-day orientation.  We had staff person after staff person checking with us throughout the day to make sure we were having a good experience.  We had a couple of personal tours of the campus.  The entire staff seemed to know who the Browns were…and they didn’t refer to us as “goobers” even once.

All in all it went great!  And except that we felt awkward and silly for having arrived at the wrong time on the wrong day, it was an awesome experience.  It confirmed in a way that couldn’t have happened had we arrived on time on the right day, that it is the perfect place for our child number 2.

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319.  That’s the number that I found written on a steamed mirror this morning.  It made me smile.  I knew the moment I saw it, the day of the month, the 29^th.  For a brief moment, my very competitive side (a nature that at times possesses not only a side of me, but all of me) rose up and I thought, “Arrgh, he got me again.”  And indeed he had.

319.  That’s the number of months my husband and I have been married as of today.  Yes, my husband counts the length of our married years in months.  And yes, he remembers the new number every month.  And yes, it’s very sweet.

A few years ago, we developed this “healthy” little competition to see which of us could wish the other a “happy-month-a-versary.”  Bryan D. is really good at the remembering…I am not so good…in fact, I stink at it.  And that’s a funny thing between us because he is not usually the one who remembers things very well.  Me, on the other hand, remembers freaky details…like the birthdays of people whom I’ve not seen in decades.

But when it comes to our “month-a-versary” I just don’t remember…until I find a number written somewhere on the 29^th of a month…or when my husband just happens to drop a number in a conversation we are having on the 29^th day of any month.  As soon as I hear a random number that has absolutely nothing to do with anything we have been talking about…I know…he’s got me again…he remembered and I did not.

There used to be a little piece of paper stuck on the front of our refrigerator with a number on in and a smiley face…I put it there.  It was one of the few times that I actually remembered the “month-a-versary” before he did.  I left that piece of paper, declaring me the winner of our monthly competition, for months…actually for about 3 years.  And in those 3 years that followed my one victory, Bryan Darling, would catch me again and again and again with a surprise “month-a-versary” reminder.

This morning on the 29^th of July, 2011, was no different…he remembered while I was more concerned about getting to our daughter’s college orientation.  I like it that he remembers.  It reminds me that he loves me.  It reminds me that I am blessed like crazy.  It reminds me that sometimes it is important to remember the little things in life.  319…a very good number indeed.

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I stepped outside this afternoon and decided to walk around our house…looking at fruit trees and seeing if weeds were springing up in our flower bed after yesterday’s rain.  The sun was shining brightly, which it has done a lot this hot summer, beating down on plant or pavement, conveying a single message of blazing heat.  But late this afternoon, I was surprised to find a slightly cool breeze was blowing softly across our property.  It felt really nice outdoors…nice enough to sit on our front porch and read a book, which is what I found my oldest doing.

I love our front porch.  I love front porches period.  But,  I’m especially fond of ours.  I have spent a lot of time there…at all hours of the day.  I’ve watched sunrises and sunsets and thunderstorms in the afternoon and lightening displays at night and fireworks shooting up from our front yard.  I have sat on that porch with my husband and with our children, sometimes in bunches and sometimes with just one of our offspring.  I have sat with my mom on that porch and with dear friends.  It’s a great place to enjoy a hot cup of coffee or a cold glass of iced tea or lemonade.  It’s a great place to watch a family football game or batting practice or a heated volleyball or badminton match.

It’s a great place to wait for my kids to arrive home from school or college or to watch for my husband to get home from work.   It’s a great place to listen…to a family member’s memories…or the happenings of the day…or laughter…or just the sounds of the nature around it.

On summer mornings you can hear a buzzing sound made by the hundreds of bees that are busy flying in and out of the white blossoms of the Crepe Myrtle that stands not too far away.  There are birds that chirp and sing and the occasional bark of our dog, Ellie.  It’s a good place to just be quiet and still.  It’s just a good place to be.

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I was reminded yesterday of one of the hardest parts of being a mom…watching our children hurt.  We want to fix things when our kids hurt…we want to make things right…we want to take the hurt away…we may want to hurt whomever or whatever is causing the pain, but, in many situations, we simply can’t.  We can only be there and offer hugs and maybe band-aids or listening ears or tears or reassuring smiles letting them know that they will get through the difficulty.

I was also reminded that these times of pain, which none of us like, can usher us into holy places…places of being close-by while someone we love immensely is suffering.  That is one of the privileges of being a parent, to be available to our children when they are hurting.

Last summer I spent 8 days in a holy place, the seizure monitoring ward of a teaching hospital.  It didn’t look like a holy place when we arrived there on a Monday morning and passed through the large hospital door that had a “sleep deprive” sign on it.  It didn’t seem like a holy place as the nurse pointed out the camera that would be viewing us 24/7 and the microphone that was in the ceiling so that every sound could be heard at the nurses’ station.  It didn’t feel like a holy place as I watched the technician glue 34 electrodes to my daughter’s head.

It felt more like a scary place because we didn’t know what to expect…and seizures are scary and that was why we were there, so seizures could be monitored and information could be gathered that might be valuable in helping with her treatment.

The first day turned into night, but there was no sleeping because sleep deprivation is one of the things that is done to try to cause a seizure.  Sleep was finally allowed in the early hours of the morning.

Day number 2 brought with it strobe lights in our room and hyperventilation techniques because these things might cause seizures also.  Later a recumbent bike was rolled into our room and my daughter would spend lots of time on it, pushing herself physically, trying to stress her body.

The days went on like this for over a week.  I left the room only to walk briskly to the cafeteria, pick up some food and walk briskly back to our room.

My daughter and I talked a lot…watched a lot of movies…played a lot of cards…worked word search puzzles.  We watched and waited.  Our stay lasted eight days…no seizures ever occurred.  It wasn’t the summer vacation we would have chosen…there was no beach or tropical breezes.

Toward the end of our stay, probably around day 5 or 6, is when I realized that this hospital room where we were stuck,  was a type of holy place…a place of great vulnerability for my daughter…a place of her suffering…and not many could enter into that place.  It was a privilege to be able to share that with her. Sharing in someone’s suffering is sharing in a holy place.

Hurting places come in all shapes and sizes.  When a child is small it may be when he falls down and scrapes his knee.  When they are a little older it may be watching them endure mean things that other kids say.  When they are even older, it may mean watching them experience unfairness or broken hearts or physical pain.  As a parent we sometimes have a front row seat on the pain that our children might have to endure.  We don’t want them hurting no matter what is causing the pain.  We want to intervene.  We want to exchange places with them and endure the pain instead of them.  But that isn’t the role we have…instead, we have the role of watching and waiting and praying and listening and crying and encouraging.

It is hard watching someone suffering…but it can also be a place of great intimacy…a holy place reserved only for a few and God Himself.

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11:15 a.m., on Friday, August 19, 2011.  There it is…in black and white.  I just printed it off the website and it lies in front of me on my desk.

Child number 2 told me yesterday afternoon.  She said that she is supposed to move into her dorm on Friday, August 19…only one month and one day away from today.  She looked up the schedule for the “Big Red Weekend,” the name of the  “welcome to our school weekend” for the college she will be attending in the fall…one month and one day from now.

7:30 a.m. begins new student move-in.

11:00 a.m. Orientation leaders and resident assistants: gathering of students

11:15 a.m. New student induction ceremony/parents’ goodbye

What was that last part…parents’ goodbye…Really…just like that?

12:00 noon  Lunch (Students Only)

What?  It’s like those in charge of this welcome event seem to think that there are some parents who might not leave when they are told to say goodbye to their students.  They seem to imply that some of us may try to sneak into the campus dining hall…REALLY!?  Not only do they tell us when we will be saying goodbye…but that they also need to inform us that we will NOT be dining with our students at lunchtime on that Friday…Lunch (Students Only).

I have one month and one day to adjust to the news.

A little while ago, I sat down in our family room with two of my boys.  Everyone else is scattered for the day.  We sat down to watch tv while munching on sandwiches.  I had a flashback…back to last spring…back to last fall…to the many days that I would wait for child number 2 to get home from class so we could eat lunch together while watching t-vo-d recordings of “What Not to Wear,” or “House.”

It hit me right in the middle of my turkey sandwich…she won’t be here this fall to eat lunch with her mom.  In one month and one day…at 11:15 a.m., I’m supposed to say goodbye and leave her there and head back home.  Wow…reality is beginning to sink in.

I’m thankful for this last year…this gift of extra time…to eat a few more lunches with child number 2… and store up many precious memories.

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