The Day My Father Swore

In between his 2-year tours of duty in the Navy my brother and his family came home to Buffalo and often moved in with us.  After a two week break he would go onto his next assignment, arrange for housing, and get settled into new his job while his wife and kids stayed behind for a couple of months.  The time he was off to the Aleutian Islands, my nephews were 8 and 6 and my niece was 3 and the boys started school at my alma mater and where they would return several years later.  One night after homework and dinner, Rusty, the oldest, said he needed more glue for his model airplane project.  Being a fairly new and proud driver, I volunteered to take him to the store. 

We hopped in the green Rambler and headed off to Miller’s Pharmacy, an early version of a CVS where shoppers could find a little bit of everything.  He got his glue and I bought a Seventeen magazine. Backing out of the parking space I hit a pole. We were both ok (this was before seatbelts), however the rear bumper had a big dent.

I dreaded pulling into the driveway.  Rusty thought it was a great adventure and ran into the house announcing that, “We hit a fence!”  Out came my father.  He bent down, surveyed the damage, and said, “All for a G*****M tube of glue.”

That was the first time I ever heard my father swear.   It was also the last.

It’s not that we were prudes or that he didn’t get angry or that we lived in Mayberry.  It was just a different time in our culture.  Some of my friends tried out an occasional swear word, more for affect and reaction than any real sense of it being part of our day-to-day language.  One aunt and uncle had a little saltier tongue, but it was more prejudicial than profane.

I’m known in my circle for not having a particularly broad range of curse words and for using them sparingly, even when losing at cards.  Some friends, I suspect, temper their language around me, and I’m amazed at people who are capable of that type of editing and who show that type of restraint.  It's like they are bi-lingual.

My confession is that I do swear when I’m alone and irritated such as when I’ve dropped something in the kitchen, or forgotten an important step in a task, or am stuck behind an annoying driver.  Again, it’s not that I’m a prude.  It’s just that I remember being so shocked the day my father swore that I try to save my public swearing for the most severe infractions.  That way people know I’m serious.  It’s rather like this quote from Mark Twain, “In certain trying circumstances, desperate circumstances, urgent circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even in prayer.”

Marilyn

The Corner Store

We must adjust to changing times and still hold to unchanging principles. Jimmy Carter

At the end of the block on the street where I grew up was Jordan’s.  You know the kind of place.  Shelves that contain a little bit of everything to save you a trip to the grocery or hardware store and where you could get a grape popsicle for a nickel or a pretzel stick for 2¢.

Since my move earlier this month I now drive a new way to the office and pass several corner stores.  Most of them have red lettering on large yellow signage that simply states Grocery Store and smaller lettering that tells what they offer.  Words like Nachos or Submarines are common, but what has really caught my attention are the various specialties or items that the grocer believes will attract customers.   For example, one advertises “We have meats and greens” while another posts “socks and boxers.”   One says “cigarettes” versus one farther down the street that lists “tobacco products.”  

My favorite, however, is “Full Line of Groceries” on one corner and “Full Line of Human Hair” a few blocks later.  It’s a sign (pun intended) of the changed and changing times.  Grape popsicles with the double wooden sticks are a memory, as is a 2¢anything (except for an opinion).  Local proprietors must cater to the residents of their neighborhoods and maybe those who might be passing through.

The communities I live in are more likely to have a CVS on the corner than an independent store.  So I’ve been thinking.  Those stores that I pass by: what would they need to post that would get me to stop in?  I don’t know that I have an answer but I do know that nostalgia has me sometimes longing for the simple times of Jordan’s.  What about you?

Marilyn

With a Lot of Help from My Friends

If you ever need a helping hand, remember it is at the end of your arm.  As you get older, remember you have another hand.  The first is to help yourself; the second is to help others.  Audrey Hepburn

Two of the incorrect but understandable messages of the early women’s movement were that we could ‘have it all’ and that we could ‘do it all.’  With maturity we learned collectively and individually that neither are true when you get below the surface.  Turns out having it all means sacrifices and difficult choices and doing it all means not necessarily doing it alone. 

Armand Gamache, Louise Penny’s lead character in a series of intriguing mysteries set in Quebec, learned a key lesson from his mentor which he passes on to those he supervises.  The lesson?  Four sentences which lead to wisdom: I’m sorry.  I was wrong.  I need help.  I don’t know.

I need help.  Such a short sentence but often so hard to say.  

It hasn’t been wisdom that has driven me to utter those words.  It has been practicality, desperation, or previous good experiences.  I have learned that input from even just one other person can make my idea better and that an additional pair of hands makes a challenging task easier.  When writing my book a huge step in the process was turning the manuscript over to my editor.  Yes, while it was thrilling to say the words “my editor,” it also meant someone would be messing with my words.  The final product is better because he did his job well, because I learned to value his input, and because at times we both said “I need help” tightening up a particular passage.

My recent “I need help” was for my move and here are some of the results:

• 11 women came to a packing party and in nearly 5 hours completed almost all of the packing that needed to be done and certainly all that could have been done 9 days before the actual move. And as they laughed and listened to my stories about a particular item, 3 women had to be told not to come because we had no more room for helpers and because the work was mostly done.
• Offers for meals at the end of long stressful days
• Colleagues carried boxes from their house to the office for me to take home
• 4 people did an early schlep of kitchen and miscellaneous items to help make things easier on moving day
• Someone paid for the move to lessen the financial stress
• 5 people helped unpack and 2 people needed boxes so cardboard got recycled
• 3 people are storing stuff that I just wanted out of the house for awhile
• Those that couldn’t participate offered encouraging words

The Greek philosopher, Epicurus said, “it is not so much our friends’ help that helps us.  It is the confidence of their help.”  While it was lovely that the tasks got done (and I realize I could not have handled this transition without their sweat equity,) what matters most is that they came, they called, they listened, they hugged before they lugged.  What matters is the connection as a response to the “I need help.” 

Can you ask for help?  Serious help beyond the, “honey, come here for a minute and hold the ladder” type help?  I don’t know if it actually gets easier with time.  It can still seem like we are lacking something essential in ourselves.  I do know that while occasionally asking for help is a necessity to get a task done, and that as I mentioned above it results in a finer product, it is essential to growth and to healthy relationships.  It enables us to share our true selves and to be less alone.

Marilyn

The Busy-ness of Life

A colleague recently sighed, “I want some boredom!”

We’ve all been there.  Had times in our lives when the busy-ness of life is so consuming, whether with good or bad things, that we long for a break.  Sometimes I write ‘relax’ and ‘rest’ on my to-do list and have found that actually helped me remember to do so.

On the flip side, we’ve all also had those times of complacency when we are muddling along, not particularly engaged in anything exciting.  We go through the motions of the routine busi-ness of the day to day.  That’s when we might sigh, “Where’s the thrill?”

Last night as I was packing I put a couple of rubber bands around the box of nails and screws.  This morning, I saw that one of them had snapped.   It had not been the right size for the job.  I had asked it to do too much.

It’s a unique challenge to find the right amount of tension for the rubber band of our life.  It needs to be taut enough so we are not lax and lifeless but are involved in the business of living fully, yet not too tight so that we will snap and break.  Have you recently felt that the tension on your life’s rubber band is too much, too little, or just right?  Perhaps one of the following thoughts will speak to where your rubber band is today:

Problems arise in that one has to find a balance between what people need from you and what you need for yourself.  Jessye Norman, opera singer

Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy. Dale Carnegie, author

Doing nothing is better than being busy doing nothing.  Lao Tzu, philosopher

God didn't do it all in one day. What makes me think I can? Author Unknown

The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another. William James, psychologist

Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are. Chinese Proverb

Let’s do one thing today to either create, lessen, or sustain the tension on our rubber band so that we can celebrate our unique contribution to the world.

Marilyn