We pull out of the driveway about 2 PM, loaded with food for two weeks, piles of books and magazines, file boxes to be tackled in solitude. We have no deadline but we have a destination.
Michiganders speak of going “up north.” As far as I can tell, up north means anything north of Flint. I-75 is the primary corridor but there are other routes as well. We follow the expressway until we hit the Thumb area when we turn off and head north on smaller roads.
Stopping for a meal before we exit the highway we are greeted by a wait staff looking for customers. “Pretty slow today,” our waitress says. “Not many people going north this time of year.” Exactly why we are here. This restaurant is packed to confusion on a warm day or at peak of snow machine season, but March Mondays are not high on the priority list for travelers. Mud month in the north is to be avoided, except for those seeking solitude.
The sugar beet fields in the Thumb sweep in total flatness to the horizon, sodden with snowmelt, rough and fallow. Moving further north we hit the forests and the road begins to undulate gently like a silver ribbon, straight to the north.
We stop at a gas station before the final ascent to the top of the Mitten. Sunset is approaching. “Are the deer in the road?” we ask the girl behind the counter. Behind us a teen answers, “No, they’re in the fields this time of year.” We’ve seen herds on this highway in winter snow storms but moving north, we pass field after field with a sprinkling of deer picking through last summer’s stalks.
The final stretch takes us through towns with Polish monikers, named by settlers who found this land strangely like what they had left behind. The wide spaces, sparsely treed, and relative flatness look like the central Europe the Prussians, Russians, and Germans chose for centuries as their preferred battlefield. Polish towns with Roman steeples, but the waterways carry the French names the Canadian voyageurs left in the 18th century – Au Gres, Au Sable, and our destination, Presque Isle.
As darkness begins to fall we reach the final road into the “almost island” of Presque Isle. By now snow banks line the roadways, last bastions of a cold and precipitous winter. We reach the gate to the shore community and punch in our code. The gate rumbles open and we enter. A mile down the road and to the right, we spot the drive into Cedar Cove.
The outside floodlights are on the pole barn and the house is in shadow. Just beyond, the lake shines in the glowing dark, rimed with ice and boulders. Keying our way into the garage, we turn on the water, open the house and find the heat. The car is quickly unloaded, food stowed, offices created upstairs and down where the huge glass walls look out onto the wide expanse of Huron, and nothing, absolutely nothing, else. The rig lights of a Laker heading south twinkle on the far horizon. I take off my watch and set it on the dresser.
There are clocks in the house but we’ve reached our destination: no deadlines.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Recipe for sleeplessness
Invite 2 small girls, three and two, for a weekend to give their weary parents a total break.
Remove 1 adult male to a safe distance of 600 miles for most of the weekend.
Disable another 1 adult aunt with a sinus infection and the responsibility of yet 1 more small child.
Stir in trips to the playscape, the library, the grocery store.
Read at least 20 books. Out loud.
Put small girls in unfamiliar beds.
Add 2 curious cats.
Fold in 1,000,000 unanswerable “Why’s”
Toss in baths, hair washes, drinks.
Mix well and bake for 36 hours.
And the amazing thing is we actually made it to church on time and home for the Sunday gathering. The parents, looking very rested, then took the wiggly bodies home.
Now for a long nap!
Remove 1 adult male to a safe distance of 600 miles for most of the weekend.
Disable another 1 adult aunt with a sinus infection and the responsibility of yet 1 more small child.
Stir in trips to the playscape, the library, the grocery store.
Read at least 20 books. Out loud.
Put small girls in unfamiliar beds.
Add 2 curious cats.
Fold in 1,000,000 unanswerable “Why’s”
Toss in baths, hair washes, drinks.
Mix well and bake for 36 hours.
And the amazing thing is we actually made it to church on time and home for the Sunday gathering. The parents, looking very rested, then took the wiggly bodies home.
Now for a long nap!
Thursday, March 19, 2009
The least of these
Old Village School serves the most severely multiply impaired children of western Wayne county. That’s a nice way of saying that OVS takes the kids that no other school is equipped to handle. For reasons of physical, emotional, and/or mental impairment, these kids are the bottom of the barrel.
Or, as their teachers and therapists would say, the cream.
Sitting around my table are the principal and six of the staff, all of whom have in some way been a part of granddaughter Keren’s life. We’ve served a meal that engenders conversation and interaction but they would have mingled well in any setting.
The first to arrive was Keren’s teacher for her first two years, a slender middled-aged woman with sharp features. She comes a little early to the door and says, “I’m early, but I just wanted to see everyone.” Everyone is the Dreamer and Engineer, their two little girls, the Driver, and her son. And us, the grandparents. This teacher ensconces herself in the middle of the chaos of small children and toys and parents and immediately engages. We learn quickly that she lost a son many years ago and that loss sent her back to teaching kids who other parents may lose.
Soon the whole group have arrived, talking, laughing, hugging us all, playing with the little ones and reading them books, asking questions about family pictures. We’ve invited them to honor their service and to say thank you for their hard work but they come eager to honor and enjoy Keren’s family. “She was our little star, you know,” one says. “She lit up the room.”
At the table we hear stories. “Our kids” is a common phrase, as if somehow they own the children they serve. These are teachers who change diapers on big children and clean up all sorts of messes. But that’s just the job, not the focus. Their focus is on learning and emotional health and making every day a joy.
“You know,” one woman says, “so many of our kids can’t talk but they have a depth of empathy that amazes me. If I’m down or not feeling well, I find a little hand slipping onto my arm or around my neck. There aren’t words, but I know that child senses my pain and, out of their own pain, they are handing me a piece of love.”
We ask them for Keren stories. The physical therapist talks about loving the squeals she’d get when she worked with Keren. Another woman remembers the white furry coat and red hai rbows. A third talks about lights and music and beating drums in time with the symphony. A fourth remembers Keren’s delight in the big dog that comes to visit the classes.
For a relatively small school, OVS gets the top of the line in entertainment – Redwing hockey stars, Chinese gymnasts, a Christmas party each year from a local Lions club that rivals Santa’s workshop.
One woman tells how a little boy with severe needs of his own pulled them into a circle the day after Keren’s death. He insisted that he needed to lead a “memorial service” for Keren, and set about to preside as priest and comforter for the class and the teachers. “And we were comforted,” she says, “and overwhelmed at his perception of what we all needed that day.”
The principal sits at the end of the table as proud of his teachers as a dad would be of his kids. “I walk the halls and pop in and out of every class,” he says. “These teachers do an amazing job and we’ve got happy kids.” He’s got happy teachers too who know their value is noted.
More than anything else, they pour love on the Dreamer and the Engineer in gallon doses. They ask concerned questions and listen to answers. They dish out hugs like there was no end to the parade. They invite us all to school over and over.
“Come and spend a day. Come and see my classroom. Come and we’ll give you a tour of everything.”
At evening’s end they linger in the entryway, savoring each other and the company of those who have some understanding of the children they teach. When they finally all straggle out the door we step back, spent. In setting out to say thank you, we have been richly rewarded by teachers who give far more than they get.
In the great economy of education in Michigan, OVS will not win awards for advanced placement, or Math Olympics, or the top soccer team. But if awards are to be given out, they should go to the teachers and therapists and aides who serve the least of these, the children who cannot take care of themselves.
They would say it’s only right. “Their kids” love them back unconditionally. It makes it worth getting up in the morning.
"The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these… you did for me.'”
Matthew 24:40
Or, as their teachers and therapists would say, the cream.
Sitting around my table are the principal and six of the staff, all of whom have in some way been a part of granddaughter Keren’s life. We’ve served a meal that engenders conversation and interaction but they would have mingled well in any setting.
The first to arrive was Keren’s teacher for her first two years, a slender middled-aged woman with sharp features. She comes a little early to the door and says, “I’m early, but I just wanted to see everyone.” Everyone is the Dreamer and Engineer, their two little girls, the Driver, and her son. And us, the grandparents. This teacher ensconces herself in the middle of the chaos of small children and toys and parents and immediately engages. We learn quickly that she lost a son many years ago and that loss sent her back to teaching kids who other parents may lose.
Soon the whole group have arrived, talking, laughing, hugging us all, playing with the little ones and reading them books, asking questions about family pictures. We’ve invited them to honor their service and to say thank you for their hard work but they come eager to honor and enjoy Keren’s family. “She was our little star, you know,” one says. “She lit up the room.”
At the table we hear stories. “Our kids” is a common phrase, as if somehow they own the children they serve. These are teachers who change diapers on big children and clean up all sorts of messes. But that’s just the job, not the focus. Their focus is on learning and emotional health and making every day a joy.
“You know,” one woman says, “so many of our kids can’t talk but they have a depth of empathy that amazes me. If I’m down or not feeling well, I find a little hand slipping onto my arm or around my neck. There aren’t words, but I know that child senses my pain and, out of their own pain, they are handing me a piece of love.”
We ask them for Keren stories. The physical therapist talks about loving the squeals she’d get when she worked with Keren. Another woman remembers the white furry coat and red hai rbows. A third talks about lights and music and beating drums in time with the symphony. A fourth remembers Keren’s delight in the big dog that comes to visit the classes.
For a relatively small school, OVS gets the top of the line in entertainment – Redwing hockey stars, Chinese gymnasts, a Christmas party each year from a local Lions club that rivals Santa’s workshop.
One woman tells how a little boy with severe needs of his own pulled them into a circle the day after Keren’s death. He insisted that he needed to lead a “memorial service” for Keren, and set about to preside as priest and comforter for the class and the teachers. “And we were comforted,” she says, “and overwhelmed at his perception of what we all needed that day.”
The principal sits at the end of the table as proud of his teachers as a dad would be of his kids. “I walk the halls and pop in and out of every class,” he says. “These teachers do an amazing job and we’ve got happy kids.” He’s got happy teachers too who know their value is noted.
More than anything else, they pour love on the Dreamer and the Engineer in gallon doses. They ask concerned questions and listen to answers. They dish out hugs like there was no end to the parade. They invite us all to school over and over.
“Come and spend a day. Come and see my classroom. Come and we’ll give you a tour of everything.”
At evening’s end they linger in the entryway, savoring each other and the company of those who have some understanding of the children they teach. When they finally all straggle out the door we step back, spent. In setting out to say thank you, we have been richly rewarded by teachers who give far more than they get.
In the great economy of education in Michigan, OVS will not win awards for advanced placement, or Math Olympics, or the top soccer team. But if awards are to be given out, they should go to the teachers and therapists and aides who serve the least of these, the children who cannot take care of themselves.
They would say it’s only right. “Their kids” love them back unconditionally. It makes it worth getting up in the morning.
"The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these… you did for me.'”
Matthew 24:40
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Connections
Living near Metro airport is a deliberate choice that matches the life we lead.. Cruising down the highway on a rainy afternoon, we’re connecting with four friends. My cell phone rings as we exit telling me that Anne is already on the ground.
We slip the van into a spot in short term parking and hop a moving walk to the terminal. We grab an elevator down to baggage with a mom and daughters. Anne comes down the escalator and greets us with, “Did you hear that? They're announcing everything in Japanese.”
Of course. This is Metro. All announcements in Japanese, Mandarin, and then English. But the Japanese is what Ann hears. An ethnic Japanese herself, she was left on a doorstep as an infant, adopted by parents from the Netherlands, raised in Japan, and still lives there. In a comic twist of life, she married a good German Mennonite from Lancaster County. East meets West big time.
As we grab her bags and head down to the international arrival, we catch up on soccer camps, mentoring teens and children, all the things that she and her husband do best in Japan. We play the “who have you seen recently” game we all know well.
Sitting in international arrival we’re surrounded a buzz of Hindi, Urdu, Chinese, and Arabic. An elderly Sikh comes out with his baggage cart, followed by his wife in a bright sari. A bundle of burkas come next. A young Japanese girl is greeted by American in-laws. The mother and daughters from the elevator appear to have found a Russian father. A crew of Chinese businessmen bustle out the glass doors.
Then the doors open and we see Thomas. Solid, graying, and very German. We’re enveloped in hugs and handshakes to the older Chinese woman traveling with him.
Thomas, who opened his home to our daughter last summer when she had to be in Hong Kong three weeks before her baby was due. Thomas, whose wife fetched us well after midnight on a hot June night and, tucked us into cool, spotless beds. Thomas, who hosted a rooftop grill for more than 40 of us at summer’s end. Thomas, whose home looks out to the mountains, eagles swirling to the peaks, ocean in the distance across Sha Kok Mei village.
We grab the bags and find an elevator to our one last passenger. Debbie has just arrived from Spain via a quick stop in Chicago. We all troop out of the terminal, grab the moving walkway, and find our way back to the van. Bags stowed, people tucked in, we’re off. The three women have never met but share so much in common that they sound like magpies.
Thomas leans forward and says, “It’s very good to be here, you know.”
Twenty years melt away and I see a much younger man with fewer pounds and more hair. I’m standing at the turnstile in Hong Kong and he hands his little son over the bar for me to mind while he goes off to language school. I see his wife, young and blonde, standing in my kitchen, earnestly asking me to help her learn to live in Asia. Now they are the veterans who meet the newcomers.
Years pass, lives intertwine, we raise each other’s kids. This week he’ll come for dinner to see his honorary nephew. One generation mentors the next so that they in turn can be there for the following generation.
Airports are all about connections.
We slip the van into a spot in short term parking and hop a moving walk to the terminal. We grab an elevator down to baggage with a mom and daughters. Anne comes down the escalator and greets us with, “Did you hear that? They're announcing everything in Japanese.”
Of course. This is Metro. All announcements in Japanese, Mandarin, and then English. But the Japanese is what Ann hears. An ethnic Japanese herself, she was left on a doorstep as an infant, adopted by parents from the Netherlands, raised in Japan, and still lives there. In a comic twist of life, she married a good German Mennonite from Lancaster County. East meets West big time.
As we grab her bags and head down to the international arrival, we catch up on soccer camps, mentoring teens and children, all the things that she and her husband do best in Japan. We play the “who have you seen recently” game we all know well.
Sitting in international arrival we’re surrounded a buzz of Hindi, Urdu, Chinese, and Arabic. An elderly Sikh comes out with his baggage cart, followed by his wife in a bright sari. A bundle of burkas come next. A young Japanese girl is greeted by American in-laws. The mother and daughters from the elevator appear to have found a Russian father. A crew of Chinese businessmen bustle out the glass doors.
Then the doors open and we see Thomas. Solid, graying, and very German. We’re enveloped in hugs and handshakes to the older Chinese woman traveling with him.
Thomas, who opened his home to our daughter last summer when she had to be in Hong Kong three weeks before her baby was due. Thomas, whose wife fetched us well after midnight on a hot June night and, tucked us into cool, spotless beds. Thomas, who hosted a rooftop grill for more than 40 of us at summer’s end. Thomas, whose home looks out to the mountains, eagles swirling to the peaks, ocean in the distance across Sha Kok Mei village.
We grab the bags and find an elevator to our one last passenger. Debbie has just arrived from Spain via a quick stop in Chicago. We all troop out of the terminal, grab the moving walkway, and find our way back to the van. Bags stowed, people tucked in, we’re off. The three women have never met but share so much in common that they sound like magpies.
Thomas leans forward and says, “It’s very good to be here, you know.”
Twenty years melt away and I see a much younger man with fewer pounds and more hair. I’m standing at the turnstile in Hong Kong and he hands his little son over the bar for me to mind while he goes off to language school. I see his wife, young and blonde, standing in my kitchen, earnestly asking me to help her learn to live in Asia. Now they are the veterans who meet the newcomers.
Years pass, lives intertwine, we raise each other’s kids. This week he’ll come for dinner to see his honorary nephew. One generation mentors the next so that they in turn can be there for the following generation.
Airports are all about connections.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Fathers' grief
Perry, the "doorkeeper in the house of the Lord," greets me most Sunday mornings with a firm handshake. We banter about his ubiquitious cowboy hat and boots, or the weather, or something equally innocuous. But this bright January morning he takes my hand and doesn’t let go. A man of few words, they spill out.
“Just want you to know how much we’re thinking of you. We buried a child too, you know. It was 24 years ago…” I didn’t know. I know very little about Perry, but now I know his heart.
Bill writes my daughter. “I have never met you but I know your mom well. We’ve been trustees together for many years. I don’t get to meetings much now that I’m well into my eighties, but I had to write to say I know a little of what you are going through. Our only son died suddenly when he was just ten. He went into diabetic shock and was gone. It’s been 47 years but I still feel it. It’s always fresh.”
How many times have I talked with Bill? Good conversations about a wide range of topics. Warm, friendly interaction for years, but never a hint of the pain just beneath the surface of his mind.
The night after we lay Keren’s ashes in the ground, Ed writes of laying his little daughter to rest almost 40 years ago, “Very tough time ... and I remember burying Amy almost as if it were yesterday. Burned into my mind ... and it was another bone-chilling, wintry, wind-blown day. Cold beyond cold in mind and heart.”
Young Don has no words. He simply wraps me up in his long arms and won’t let go. “I wanted to come to the service, but one of us had to stay with the kids, and it was more important that my wife be there.” He’s not lost any of his children, but he’s come quite close, and I sense in his silence that he knows this could have been his pain.
Old Eddie calls from Maine. "You all come up here and stay on the island for a while." A huge offer from a grandfather who lost his little Liv, the sunshine of his island, two years ago. Vic writes, "Been there. Know how it feels." He too lost a granddaughter a few years ago.
Losing a child seems to sear the soul. While the women around me speak volubly, I find the deeper words come from men. I watch my son-in-law sit alone in a crowded room, silent, shrouded in grief. Perhaps fathers and grandfathers, ever our protectors, are wounded that death -- the unthinkable -- came on their watch.
As I move toward Good Friday, I ponder the Father who lost his only Son. Easter comes, yes, but only after mourning.
.
“Just want you to know how much we’re thinking of you. We buried a child too, you know. It was 24 years ago…” I didn’t know. I know very little about Perry, but now I know his heart.
Bill writes my daughter. “I have never met you but I know your mom well. We’ve been trustees together for many years. I don’t get to meetings much now that I’m well into my eighties, but I had to write to say I know a little of what you are going through. Our only son died suddenly when he was just ten. He went into diabetic shock and was gone. It’s been 47 years but I still feel it. It’s always fresh.”
How many times have I talked with Bill? Good conversations about a wide range of topics. Warm, friendly interaction for years, but never a hint of the pain just beneath the surface of his mind.
The night after we lay Keren’s ashes in the ground, Ed writes of laying his little daughter to rest almost 40 years ago, “Very tough time ... and I remember burying Amy almost as if it were yesterday. Burned into my mind ... and it was another bone-chilling, wintry, wind-blown day. Cold beyond cold in mind and heart.”
Young Don has no words. He simply wraps me up in his long arms and won’t let go. “I wanted to come to the service, but one of us had to stay with the kids, and it was more important that my wife be there.” He’s not lost any of his children, but he’s come quite close, and I sense in his silence that he knows this could have been his pain.
Old Eddie calls from Maine. "You all come up here and stay on the island for a while." A huge offer from a grandfather who lost his little Liv, the sunshine of his island, two years ago. Vic writes, "Been there. Know how it feels." He too lost a granddaughter a few years ago.
Losing a child seems to sear the soul. While the women around me speak volubly, I find the deeper words come from men. I watch my son-in-law sit alone in a crowded room, silent, shrouded in grief. Perhaps fathers and grandfathers, ever our protectors, are wounded that death -- the unthinkable -- came on their watch.
As I move toward Good Friday, I ponder the Father who lost his only Son. Easter comes, yes, but only after mourning.
.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
The Gathering
We linger at the table, afternoon sunshine streaking in the windows, coffee cups in hand. The little girls, hands washed, have left for play. The weekly "Gathering" at Sunday noon, a tradition of Sabbath, is waning.
Conversation wanders to our corporate loss, a month ago. Keren’s absence is palpable at this point when she would have lingered with us, unable to go and play alone. Tears are still close to the surface for her parents, the Dreamer and the Engineer.
They tell us of a letter they received this week from an older woman, an honorary auntie of the Engineer’s childhood. Over thirty years ago this woman stayed with the Engineer and his older brother in a time of family trouble. His dad and mom, due with her third child, had flown to the capital city for an emergency delivery. Word came back by radio to the remote Central African village that the little girl was stillborn. The adults mourned, but this “auntie” was asked to leave the telling to the little boys for their father and his return.
Three decades later the Dragon was caring for her nieces when she received word that their sister was gone. Like the auntie in Africa, she had to backpedal and keep the information to herself till their father came home to tell them.
In Africa, the auntie looked for a way to prepare the little boys without telling them. She took them on a walk around the center that included a postage stamp cemetery where another child had been buried. Carefully she talked about the little boy who had died and where he was.
A month ago the Dragon talked with her nieces about the house being prepared for them in Heaven, something they brought up and wanted to discuss. A house that their sister would go to first, but they didn’t yet know that.
The Engineer remembers his father coming home, relieving the auntie of her charges, and telling him about the little sister who would never come home. And he now speaks of coming home himself and telling his own children about their sister who would never come home.
Tears are close to the surface. For him. For all of us.
The Gathering is a tradition of many generations. A time to stop in the busyness of the week and sit back to eat and drink together, to talk. Though some weeks it doesn’t happen, it is still well worth the effort when it does. Sabbath is a lost convention. Conversation, a lost community. Sorrow and joy, something best shared face to face.
The Gathering will continue. The little ones will grow and stay longer at the table, punctuating the conversation with their ideas. Like their parents, they will someday become the adults, and perhaps, if they are wise, they will institute a Gathering of their own.
A time for tears and a time for laughter. A time for everything.
Conversation wanders to our corporate loss, a month ago. Keren’s absence is palpable at this point when she would have lingered with us, unable to go and play alone. Tears are still close to the surface for her parents, the Dreamer and the Engineer.
They tell us of a letter they received this week from an older woman, an honorary auntie of the Engineer’s childhood. Over thirty years ago this woman stayed with the Engineer and his older brother in a time of family trouble. His dad and mom, due with her third child, had flown to the capital city for an emergency delivery. Word came back by radio to the remote Central African village that the little girl was stillborn. The adults mourned, but this “auntie” was asked to leave the telling to the little boys for their father and his return.
Three decades later the Dragon was caring for her nieces when she received word that their sister was gone. Like the auntie in Africa, she had to backpedal and keep the information to herself till their father came home to tell them.
In Africa, the auntie looked for a way to prepare the little boys without telling them. She took them on a walk around the center that included a postage stamp cemetery where another child had been buried. Carefully she talked about the little boy who had died and where he was.
A month ago the Dragon talked with her nieces about the house being prepared for them in Heaven, something they brought up and wanted to discuss. A house that their sister would go to first, but they didn’t yet know that.
The Engineer remembers his father coming home, relieving the auntie of her charges, and telling him about the little sister who would never come home. And he now speaks of coming home himself and telling his own children about their sister who would never come home.
Tears are close to the surface. For him. For all of us.
The Gathering is a tradition of many generations. A time to stop in the busyness of the week and sit back to eat and drink together, to talk. Though some weeks it doesn’t happen, it is still well worth the effort when it does. Sabbath is a lost convention. Conversation, a lost community. Sorrow and joy, something best shared face to face.
The Gathering will continue. The little ones will grow and stay longer at the table, punctuating the conversation with their ideas. Like their parents, they will someday become the adults, and perhaps, if they are wise, they will institute a Gathering of their own.
A time for tears and a time for laughter. A time for everything.
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