A Little Touch of God

Many people have talked about the sunsets here in Phoenix. My general practitioner, who has lived in or traveled to many different places, told me once that she has never seen any to rival them, not even in Hawaii. I was surprised, but later I read an article in the local newspaper that validated that statement as it attempted to explain the regular, beautiful phenomenon. Is it the mountains? The particulates in the atmosphere? The kinds of clouds we have here? The smog? I admit that many a time I have driven west in the evening and have myself wondered at the sunset, admired the dynamic strands of color spreading out from the orb resting on the shoulder of South Mountain.

One evening this past week I had the opportunity to witness a 10-year sunset. I was watching my kids play with neighbors in the front yard, but my restless eye was also wandering to a hummingbird nest in the lower branches of our giant eucalyptus tree. Though I am madly in love with that hummingbird mama, watching her through binoculars several times a day and worrying when she's away, I was soon distracted from her astonishingly still form by the western sky.

I got up and kept saying to the kids as I walked around and stared, "Look at that beautiful sunset! Can you believe that sunset? It's amazing."

But apparently they could believe it, for they paid it little mind, glancing up for only a second when I spoke. I didn't understand their nonchalance. The sun had erupted brilliantly and its flames magnified each moment. The colors didn't appear to diminish as night approached. It lingered for ten years as I watched in awe, suspended in time.

And something my parish priest said about sacraments came back to me as I felt the unusually cool wind of May on my skin and faced a majestic sky. As an example about the difference between big "S" sacraments and sacraments with a little "s", he said he might go fishing early in the morning with a friend on a lake, and as the sun rose over the lake, he could be so affected by the beauty of it that it would be for him a profound moment with God, a sacrament with a little "s". For his buddy, however, it could be just another sunrise on just another morning as he waited impatiently for a bite on his line.

That ten-year sunset was for me a sacrament. It pulled me into its mystery on an unimpressive, dusty neighborhood street amid the noise of children at play. I thanked God for the chance to experience it, just as I had thanked God for a cool, breezy May in Phoenix, and just as I had thanked him profusely several times for the hummingbird nest in our tree.

Phoenix is rich in spectacular sunsets, just as our lives are rich in little sacraments, if we are present enough to be aware of and grateful for them.

My renewed determination to fight for Light

The Christophers, a group that encourages people to use their God-given talents to make a difference, has a saying: It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness.

I spend far too much time cursing the darkness. And feeling guilty that I have lived so simple and secure a life, full of love. I oscillate between thinking I should completely avoid the news and live in ignorance of evil - so that I can stop sinning in my anger against and my opinions of human beings - and believing that such ignorance would itself be a crime.

Yesterday I finally decided to read a section of the Sunday newspaper that covered women's and children's rights in Guatemala. Moving from one article to the next, my anger increased, for I was reading yet again an old story, only about a different country, of women and children being maltreated by men in the twisted confines of an utterly male-dominated society: denied education, essentially sold into marriages by poverty-stricken parents, abused both physically and sexually by boyfriends, husbands and fathers, dependent on their abusers because of their lack of means, frightened or wary to approach authorities that statistically do little or nothing to prosecute the males in their lives, betrayed by destitute mothers who are themselves so dependent on these "men" that they do not protect their children or report the crimes for fear of inevitable starvation.

In Guatemala girls marry and get pregnant young; thirteen is not uncommon. Education is seen as an unnecessary investment of their time when they are simply to be married off to often strange men who desire them for their physical selves - not their whole person. How there can be any hope for love or respect in such an arrangement of ignorance....well, I do not think there can be, which is perhaps why these girls often end up in misery, repeating the patterns of their mothers and grandmothers. Boys and girls are raised witnessing the poison of such a culture, and they would be fortunate indeed not to imbibe it, but how can they avoid it?

How many times have I read similar articles about other cultures all over the world, in Asia, Africa, the Middle East?

Every time I read such stories I struggle with my view on men in general. I struggle badly. But how it is that at this point in history there are still cultures and governments on this planet that do not protect women and children's rights with the full force of law confounds and angers me. Are the challenges of acquiring food in these countries so desperate that people's sexual, emotional and mental health, including education, are ignored? It must contribute. One Arizona university psychologist, interviewed for the stories, said it was not enough to blame the stereotypical Latin "machismo", either, for Guatemala suffered terribly for ten years with a civil war where men were acclimated to extreme violence and women were viewed as war prizes or as the objects of terror tactics.

Still I do not think that should fully explain the depravity. If mankind is essentially good, would he not crawl out of a hell hole, if slowly? Can the most basic unmet needs for food, water and shelter kill his soul?

But can I truly say anything when I live in a country where poor is not poor compared to the poverty that is suffered in third world countries, where laws exist - and more are introduced every year - that protect each individual's rights? Can I judge anything when my life has been so sheltered in the United States of America?

If more people like me worked more diligently to feed the poor in this world, I firmly believe the poor would have more time to worry about their emotional, intellectual and spiritual needs.

Here comes my struggle with guilt. I take my son to a pizza, games and bowling venue and think of all the children in the world who do not even have a full meal that day, let alone fun. I wish sometimes for a bigger house but then imagine all the families in India, Central America and Africa living in shanty towns or measly huts with no running water or electricity. I think of my desire for a few new summer clothes and then feel selfish in wanting pretty outfits when others have next to nothing to wear and no shoes for their feet. I just feel guilty period that others live in misery every day of their lives.

I am unbalanced, because I curse the darkness regularly, ruminating on its influence, but spend far too little time lighting candles.

There is always hope, and I did read of the women in Guatemala working to change the culture for themselves and others, pushing for education, freedom and for better laws and enforcement. Some of those women worked for government agencies, tracking statistics so that they can engender change, or heading schools, enticing families to keep their kids in for the free meals they give each day. Right now I have no doubt there are too few of those women, but there will not always be.

There will not always be.

Personally, as a woman I must stop feeling guilty and start acting, using my God-given abilities to bring about change in my small or not so small way. In speaking with my husband yesterday evening, he told me I should stop talking and find a charity that acts for women's and children's rights, and then I need to support their efforts. He is absolutely right, for if I continue to sit around just reading newspapers and feeling furious with my fellow human beings, I am only adding to the darkness and the despair.

I'd rather light some candles.

Simple Woman

I took my Ella to a birthday party, and, though the house was in an older neighborhood built in the 1980s, I could tell right away that its interior had been artfully redesigned.

"I really like your home," I said to the mother of Ella's friend, fishing for secrets. "Is this the way it was when you moved in?"

"Oh, no, no," she said with a laugh. Then she proceeded to tell me about the dividing walls and tiny halls that her husband had knocked down to open up the space and the special touches she had added to the decor. "Of course, this island wasn't here, and the kitchen ceiling was lower," she added. "We raised all the ceilings."

"Raised the ceilings!" I cried. "Did you do all that yourself?"

"Oh, it was easy," she assured me. "My husband watches videos on YouTube."

The world has left me behind! I'm a simple woman in an era populated by new Renaissance Men and Women created by YouTube, Pinterest, and Facebook. Everywhere around me ordinary individuals are raising ceilings, making cakes that look like hedgehogs, dancing the tango with steps they learned online, orchestrating elaborate games and decorations for their kid's birthday party based on others' pictures, constructing headboards from old barn doors and busts of Elvis from Styrofoam, and plaiting their daughters' hair into hairstyles so fantastic that it makes Marie Antoinette look like a street rat who never heard of Pin boards.

As for me, I never even properly learned how to paint a room or frost a cake. My daughters fix their own hair in simple braids, buns and ponytails, following the instructions of our oral tradition. My husband has to teach me dance steps he learned in college. I am scrimping and saving in hopes of hiring someone to scrape off our popcorn ceilings. My kids' birthday decorations consist of one handmade sign on plain paper done with crayon - marker if we're feeling inspired. I can only raise the ceiling while dancing, and not well.

Ah, I feel my cave woman ways! As I wait for my kids to get out of school, I spread a newspaper across the steering wheel in car line and look through grocery ads I received in the mail. Other parents are uploading digital coupons on their smarty-pants phones, checking email, reading about Bruce Jenner and researching how to apply crown molding and install outdoor showers for the pool. I still have to log on to a computer to access my email, for goodness' sake, and half the time I don't know where my flip phone is, because I forgot to turn the volume up after church! I don't even know how to show my emotions on social media with pictures of bunnies and monsters.

Whenever I drive I am truly a lone ranger. If I get lost I am forced to roam around looking for a landmark, cursing my fate as I strain to read street signs with my astigmatic eyes. If I get too far off course, I simply pull over at a gas station and cry. Meanwhile, other drivers listen to a tiny know-it-all lady in their phones as she guides them to their destination in soothing tones.

Regardless, I'm afraid to go somewhere exciting, monumental or "hip" for fear of being clotheslined by selfie sticks in the hands of individuals under forty. As for me, I usually forget my camera, an object apart from my phone, so even if I ran into the Queen of England, I would have to ask her to hang around for a bit so I could make a quick sketch to remember the moment.

Honestly, I can't make it in this brave, ultra-connected world. Yes, there is probably an app for that, but I'm still not entirely certain what an app is, though I firmly believe it's something invented by the government to spy on us. At any rate I just can't keep up, so I have started going backwards. For Mother's Day my husband bought me several vinyl records, and I couldn't have been more thrilled as I listened to CCR's "Born on the Bayou". Dang, I wish I were on the Bayou with my old hound dog - uh, make that Yorkie - right now, or at least in the woods or mountains somewhere. I think I'll start stocking up on candles and kerosene lanterns and wait for a horse and buggy to go on sale. Maybe I can convince my city man to change careers and become a cowboy. I'll take my guitar with me to our humble, non-DIYed home with low ceilings and cramped halls, sit beneath the stars in a rocking chair on the broken-down porch, and play Paul McCartney's "Yesterday" all night long.

We'll be simple folk lost in nature, and we'll never watch a single video on YouTube.

Short, mostly unedited: The Nap

Just a little while ago, my Danny boy was saying things like, "I hate this game," and, "I don't want to put that up. It's boring," and, "I am not tired!"

But he was tired. I was tired. And I told him point blank, "I'm going to set the timer, and you're going to rest with me for 30 minutes in Papa's chair."

I got him a cup of Cheerios. I read him Sleepy Time, Olie by William Joyce. Then I snuggled that big five-year-old boy, playing possum until he put his head on my chest and grabbed a fistful of my hair. I realized just how much my boy had grown as he rested on me, how tall since early December, the last time he took a nap. Only after I started to doze did I realize that he had indeed fallen asleep, and all was quiet except the stupid timer going off.

Now I miss him in this unusual stillness. Such is the paradox of a mother's life! We pray that our babies will go to sleep, grow up or become more independent and then are a bit sad when they do.

When Daniel was a toddler, nap time was an ordeal more often than not. I tried to put him down for naps in his bed, reading books and putting on soothing music, sitting on the floor with my back toward him to make sure he didn't try to get up as he often did when I left the room. I would try to be serene, impassive, keeping my voice soft and my reminders gentle, but the longer it took him to fall asleep and the more he tried to play, pull on my hair or get out of that bed, the more I could feel my insides knotting up in frustration. It was not a calming routine for either of us, as I sometimes ended up yelling at him or dropping him back into his bed none too gently. Then if he - at long last! - fell asleep, the stress would ebb but the guilt over our battles would come, and I would bend over to stroke his blond head and kiss his cheek softly, wishing I could pick him up and hold him and that we could always be in harmony with one another.

For all the articles I had read about children's need for sleep, it was only logical to assume they would want to sleep. But it wasn't so, it seemed. I spent months being frustrated every afternoon, praying my son would not give up afternoon sleep at two-and-a-half as his big sister Ella had done. At that period of our lives, it seemed like the whole mood of our day turned upon whether or not the boy took a nap or not. If he didn't, the early evening saw a tantrum apocalypse. I was stressed, because as any mother can tell you, we need nap time, too. If we go without that recharge break for a few days running, we become desperate and throw our own fits.

Of course, when my husband took over naps on the weekend, my little guy went down like magic. I often wondered what I was doing wrong. I would plague my husband with questions about just exactly what were his methods. But when I tried his strategies, I encountered the same frustrations as always. "It's because I'm not Mama," Matthew told me. "He doesn't play with my hair or try to climb on me. It's just Papa." That made me feel even more hopeless about fixing our nap time issues.

Until I finally went back to an old strategy of mine. It was the one I used for Berto and Ana, so close in age that they napped together on either side of me, sometimes kicking each other for invasion of space or giggling together from across the mama divide as I struggled to keep my eyes open reading a book. It was the one I used for Ella until she decided one summer that she couldn't stand to be left out of whatever her siblings were doing. My rediscovered strategy was to take Daniel out of his bedroom and to the rocking chair. I surrendered and ignored the people and books that told me my child shouldn't fall asleep in my arms, because he would become too dependent. Every afternoon I rocked and read to my youngest and then let him hold my hair as I tilted the chair back, and we both closed our eyes. Though he often squirmed for the first twenty minutes, the routine was much more soothing and loving for both of us, and my Danny fell asleep much easier and quicker. Sometimes I dozed off with him, for he was still waking us up a few times a night then. Once I revived, I slid gently out from beneath him to work on household projects, write or read a book.

That is how nap time was for Danny and I until he gave it up at the beginning of December. Today I remembered the old feeling of badly wanting him to sleep, holding him in my arms until he drifted off and then suddenly missing him in the strange quiet as I stroked his hair. I took a picture of my big boy sleeping on that trusty old rocking recliner, the one with the splitting upholstery that has helped all my babies sail to afternoon dreamland in my arms. I wanted to capture the moment, for Daniel goes to kindergarten next year. It may be the last nap he takes until college.

England Anthology: High Tea at The Wolseley...and then the royal residence

Have you even been someplace so beautiful that you couldn't quite believe your luck and joy in being there? For me such a place would likely be in the shadow of an enormous tree in the middle of a great forest or verdant field or by a bubbling creek. It's not going to be in the midst of a huge, noisy city.

Unless that city is London.

No, I don't speak of Buckingham Palace or even Westminster Abbey. I speak of The Wolseley on Piccadilly at which I took high tea with my sister-in-law, Natalie, and my good friend, Holly.

I have been fascinated with the idea of "high tea" since I was a little girl. Reading of its delights in many novels and having a passion for pastries, I have yearned to taste the assorted pretty little cakes and to hold the delicate cups and saucers just so. When the Hobbits mourned their loss of afternoon tea while on the journey with Frodo in Fellowship of the Ring, I sympathized. It has always sounded like such an indulgent, perfectly English tradition.

So, when the chance presented itself, I took tea at a few cafes here in the States, quaint little places where tea cozies were often used, the Union Jack was ubiquitous and hand-painted roses abounded.

To take tea in an ornate London café parallel to the Ritz was something else entirely.

 

Getting to the Wolseley was an adventure. Holly and I left the Underground, and immediately took a wrong turn, continuing our error for quite a distance before my good friend and traveling partner had the chance to observe my obnoxious habit of asking random people for directions in order to avoid figuring things out for myself. A kind motorcyclist directed us to a line of cabbies waiting between hotels, saying "they know everything", and I hurried to them and frantically waved at one gentleman's window. My pronunciation of "Wolseley" threw him for a minute, but then he asked, "To take afternoon tea?", and I nodded urgently, for now time was running out to make our reservation. He then pointed in the other direction, very courteously explaining that the café was back the way we had come, right next to the Ritz - in fact across from the entrance to the Underground! (I wish I had taken a picture of this cheerful cabbie; he was quite unusual. Little did I know that he was the friendliest, most helpful stranger we would ever meet in London.)

 

I had no time for more than a quick thank you as he indicated other cabs with noses pointing in the right direction. Anxious, I could have run full out down Piccadilly in my most lady-like dress, jostling frowning Londoners out of my way, but I had to endure twitching in my seat as our cab crawled. At last we hopped out and jogged to the beautiful façade, not looking one bit like prim, proper, tea-sipping patrons.

 

As soon as we walked in the door, we saw Natalie, whom we were to meet, and were greeted in turns by a maître d and servers so suavely attentive and apologetic for any delay that I, a middle-class American so frugal that I avoid any pampering that exceeds chocolate candy bars on sale, could feel myself blushing.

 

But I got used to it the minute I set my purse by our table. I was in love, not with our courtly server but with the architecture influenced, so it would seem, by Venice and Florence and the Far East.

 

 

Surroundings this sumptuous were bound to thrill a lady so unused to extravagance. I had never eaten in such a gilded, beautiful place!

 

And Holly didn't seem immune to The Wolseley's charms, either.

 

 

As I sampled the sweets, exotic sandwiches and Darjeeling, I stared at the gleaming walls, windows, bar, and chandeliers in the unabashed and silly way of a male admiring a red Ferrari or a voluptuous woman. I reveled in its ambience and felt that my presence there in the company of a dear friend and a sister that I seldom see was the pinnacle of my first London day.

 

Natalie and me -photo by Holly

Later we did pass by that other gilded place, Buckingham Palace, when we took a stroll through lovely St James's Park post-tea.

 

 

 

But here the simple nature girl within me was resurrected, for I far preferred the vibrant tulips to the edifice.

 

Photo by Holly

 

Perhaps I just have no love for royals unless I'm being made to feel like one.