It’s our favorite week of the year: my brother and his wife are visiting.  It’s a week long feast,  a cornucopia of conversation, a festival of friendship.  Mornings begin with my brother the barrista making lattes for all with an espresso machine that is stored at our house and used just this week.  It’s the only time of the year that I drink coffee!   Blessings heap onto more blessings until they topple over in an untameable fashion.  The music from the garage wafts into the house as the best tenor in the world exercises his voice.  My sweet Valeri, the best organizer in the world,  gives free consultations on kitchen clutter, home decorating, cooking gadgets, medical questions, etc.

One of our favorite shared activities is cooking together and putting on meals for family and friends.  Yesterday we cooked a Bolognese sauce that simmered on the stove all day.  We used it for lasagne, added fresh from the oven foccacia, tender green beans, and the most gorgeous green salad you’ve ever tasted.  The long table was set with linens, the wine poured.  Curt gave thanks, and then we enjoyed four hours of laughter, memories, shared experiences, family stories, photos from recent trips, and time together. 

My firstborn son got the loudest laughs of the night.  We were recounting a trip we made to SF when the boys were under 10.  Dan and Val pulled out all the stops and made us gourmet meal after gourmet meal.  Our boys were starving.  The foreign food was not agreeable to their palate.  They were so excited when pizza was the meal that night.  To their chagrin only one pizza was “normal”.  And everyone scarfed it up. The rest were carmelized onions and gorgonzola cheese, smoked salmon and gouda, pizzas the adults savored and the kids detested.  Chris is building the story up to the climax.  “And then,” he adds, “they served us Placenta!”  We howled as he backtracked and searched the for word he intended……uh, polenta. 

We’ve added another entry to our family lexicon.  In Dicken’s Bleakhouse there is a contemptible character, Smallweed, who is the biggest bully in a wheelchair.  It’s more like a litter than a wheelchair.  He orders everyone, frightens, threatens, skulks, well, you get the idea.  Whenever he is carried into the room, he growls to his mincing granddaughter, “Oh my bones. Shake me up, Judy.”  She comes behind him thrusts her arms under his armpits and shakes him in his chair. 

It is pure Dickensian weirdness.  Before my husband left for work this morning we played with this strange phrase.  It succeeded in bringing smiles to our faces.  I think the words are so rich, so delightful, so fun.

We have several phrases that are private codewords, funny reminders of stories told long ago.  “Not today, boys” comes from my brother Jim’s experience as a medical student.  An old lady in a hospital bed surrounded by students was told that she would have certain tests done on her.  Her tart reply is classic, “Not today, boys.  I know you have to make lots of money for the hospital but not today.”  This is such a useful reply to inquiries by wondering husbands, “Did you think you might clean the fridge out hon?”

“Lovely, Betty” has to be heard with a broad Scottish accent.  It sounds more like Loove-lee, beh-eee.  My brother David and his family were in Scotland enjoying the hospitality of a  ladies tea.  Every time something was brought out one of the white-haired women pronounced the benediction: Lovely, Betty.  I think the ninth repetition of it put my nieces into a fit of giggles.  It has become a very common method of expressing appreciation in our house, where no one is called by any form of  Elizabeth. 

How do you talk in your family?  What are your funny, understood-only-by-yourselves phrases?

I received an email from a friend asking me this question:  How do you deal with the emotional impact of difficult or depressing books?  She abstains from reading books like Cry, The Beloved Country  because it leaves her depressed and moody. 

Mmmm.  I finished that same book this morning and could not refrain from hiccupping sobbing during the last pages. It is a very sad book, but it tells what life is really like for those living in South Africa during the last century.  I would never advise someone to go against their conscience when deciding what to read or watch, nor would I deride their choice. 

I think I have built up a tolerance level for heavier things over the years.  The first time I had a TV in the house I could not watch reruns of  Hawaii 5-0 because it was too scary.  Having grown up without a TV in the house, any suggestion of violence was creepy for me. 

It’s a hard question, isn’t it?  There is brutality, gross brutality in the world today.  Our brothers and sisters around the globe experience distressing experiences daily.  There must be a balance between a compassionate heart that cries for the pain that is explored, and a joyful heart that is thankful for the blessings in our own life.  We can’t be mopey all the time; all the same we can’t live in isolation from the suffering that is out there. Do you have any suggestions or thoughts?

The Valentines Banquet last night was wonderful!  The men prepared all the food and served their wives. 

After we ate, each one stood up and read a poem he had written for his beloved.  Each one was unique: some were funny, some touching, each reflected the husband’s love for his woman. 

One couple will celebrate their 60th anniversary this year.  His poem mentioned the 21,795 days of his marriage being a blessing.  He counted them up, including the leap years! 

One man sang a song to his wife…lovely.  Our inimitable friend and composer, the ever capable Steve,  wrote portions of Song of Songs in verse.  It was tasteful, but biblical, hmmm, and we tittered giggles of nervousness when he started.  But I appreciated the simple, short words from quiet men who are not practiced in word-crafting. 

They were all beautiful offerings of praise.

The year was 1993.  We had two boys in 4th and 6th grade and a two year old boy.  My husband had gone to a conference. I had planned to go along until our young one got sick. He came home fired up.  Oh joy.  “We’re going to make some changes in our family, hon,” he announced.  “We need to talk.”  Uh-huh.  I’m writing honestly, but I’m ashamed of my attitude and behavior.  I put off the talk as long as possible.  Finally the moment came after the kids were in bed. 

He sat at one end of the table and I at the other.  With passion and concern, he outlined the problems he saw with delegating the government to teach our children.  I listened, refrained from rolling my eyes, and prayed for this awkward conversation to be over.  This was my life he was messing with.  It was all good and well for him to say, “Let’s homeschool” when all the sacrifice was on my end. When he didn’t get much response from me he concluded the first session with these words, “Will you at least pray about it?”  Overjoyed at a way to extricate myself from this discussion, I glibly said “Sure.”

1993 turned into 1994 and gently the Lord convicted me that I had not prayed  about this issue.  “You’re right Lord, I did say I would pray.”  I thought, it can’t hurt to pray.  Hah!  Double hah!  Before I knew what was happening my heart was changing.  My sons came home with stories that chilled me.  What do you mean your friend isn’t allowed to have a New Testament in his desk?  Was he standing on his chair and preaching?  No, just reading it during free time?  I was a room mother for both boys every year they were in school.  But I was soon disabused of the notion that I knew what was going on in their classrooms.

The conference that Curt went to connected us with a new church.  We had been looking for a church with Reformed theology.  And mirabile! there was one in our valley.  We began attending and discovered that 90% of the families homeschooled their kids.  And they were lovely families with engaging, polite, and delightful children. (Oh, these families have become my family and my heart aches with love for them as I write and remember.)  We bonded with them; we were never once criticized for having our kids in public school. Their winsome ways won our hearts. My thoughts flipped from what all my kids would be missing if they homeschooled to what opportunities my children would miss if they were in public school.

Soon I was asking for books, magazines, anything to educate myself.  My husband started to smile as I chirped away, talking constantly about the options, the decisions, the changes.  We were committed.  We let the kids finish that year in school and made our plans for the fall.    

I woke up today, rubbed the sleep from my eyes, and got dressed to work out.  One of the bennies we enjoy from my husband’s job is 24 access to the hospital gym.  This is one of the most gorgeously situated gyms you’ve ever seen.  We live surrounded by the Blue Mountains.  The hospital gym is perched on the west side of the valley with a wall of windows facing east. 

This morning the mountains were backlit by the sun.  An antenna on the top of the mountains 15 miles away glistened in the sunlight.  I smiled, remembering one of my favorite movie moments, Pippin initiating the lighting of the beacons of Gondor in Return of the King.  When we were watching at the theatre, my husband leaned over and whispered in my ear, “That’s a picture of the gospel.”  Goosebumps ran up my arms.  Mr. Sun peeked over the edge, then came head on in the pale blue sky, bathing my face in light.  I closed my eyes and soaked it in, glorying in the bright light.

My son and I were side by side on the two eliptical machines.  We had settled into a comfortable silence.  I had a book, but it did not interest me today. Two regulars arrived, gentle men who are old enough to be my father.  We always exchange hellos and friendly jibes. It’s especially fun to listen to their kibitzing together. Sweat trickled down our faces and it felt good. Showers and breakfast have revived us. We’re ready to read the Christian Almanac, sing a Psalm, attack Algebra and discuss the Odyssey.

La vita e bella! 

I’ve enjoyed reading Shadows On the Rock by Willa Cather during my half hour on the elliptical walker.  There is a nice shelf for a book, and the head bobbing doesn’t bother me.  Here’s a lovely excerpt from this morning’s read. Let me set it up. Cecile is a 12 year old girl who lives and helps her father, an apothecary.  She has run the household, since her mother died.  She spent two nights down the river, away from home for the first time.  The conditions were rustic, the bed she shared with four other girls was dirty (filthy) and she had a fit of homesickness.  She just returned home and is eager to prepare dinner for her father. The “dogs cooked with blueberries” refers to a dish the native Indians had cooked for one of Cecile’s friends. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

She put on her apron and made a survey of the supplies in the cellar and kitchen.  As she began handling her own things again, it all seemed a little different,–as if she had grown at least two years older in the two nights she had been away.  She did not feel like a little girl, doing what she had been taught to do.  She was accustomed to think that she did all these things so carefully to please her father, and to carry out her mother’s wishes.  Now she realized that she did them for herself, quite as much.  Dogs cooked with blueberries–poor Madame Harnois’ dishes were not much better! These coppers, big and little, these brooms and clouts and brushes, were tools; and with them one made, not shoes or cabinet-work, but life itself.  One made a climate within a climate; one made the days,–the complexion, the special flavour, the special happiness of each day as it passed; one made life.