Dishes

"We've got a lot of dishes." I balance a stack of white soup bowls, spoons protruding. I wobble them into the sink around mugs and silverware.

"Why? Why have we got a lot of dishes?" Jack retrieves another bowl from the table, slides around my elbow, sets it down. "Why, Mom?"

"'Cause we do," I say. I blast split pea soup off the bowls one at a time, little boy a pendulum around my elbow.

"Why?" He sloshes two green glasses next to the bowl. Between a staccato of whys, I slide each bowl into dishwasher. "Why, Mom?"

"Because the Lord has blessed us," I say, "with a lot of children."

He pauses, butter dish in hand. "Yeah," he says, "and 'cause you and Daddy laid together in that special way quite a bit."

"Yep," I chuckle. He thumps another plastic cup onto the counter and skips out to gather the last of the silverware. So around dinner dishes, we frame in another important idea in the world.

Gratitude:

3123. I set the timer for 5 minutes then let the children run WILD through the house. They jump off the hearth and ottomans, the kitchen bench. When I ask Jack how he liked it all he can do is HUG me.

3124. Craig points out the veins in his hand and Lucy chuckles, "Oh. Brains."

3125. Myra runs through the house with a sticky note stuck in her hair.

3126. Lucy gets Pop Rocks for her birthday and keeps calling them Pop Drops.

3127. Jack and Lucy help each other with their Spanish.

3128. I make the economy version of split pea soup, and Jack exclaims, "That smells TOO GOOD, Momma. YOU are a good cook."

3129. Jane's assessment, "I seem to get stung every year. I get stung more than anyone. I don't know, maybe it's because I'm not very aware."

3130. Jack confesses to turning the heat up to 83 degrees Fahrenheit.

3131. He tries to enlighten Myra, "Myra, what are farts?"

3132. Lucy examines the baby's ears, "Why do you think the baby has clean ears? Mine are dirty."

3133. She trots in from out back, "Mom, can I have a wet wipe to make sure all the poop is off my feet?"

3134. Then she watches Jack and Jane get paid for their jobs. "Sometimes I don't bring my wallet," she says, "because I don't have any money. One time I tried to make some paper money with white paper."

3135. Joe SMILES on purpose at me when I clap his hands together.

3136. Our friends invite us to see their newborn horse, not even a day old. Lucy and Myra enthusiastically pet their chihuahua/daschund and exclaim, "I petted a baby horse!"

3137. We have planting day at our house and get the first third of the vegetable garden planted.

3138. A dear neighbor gives us a bag of shoes for Myra.

3139. All the neighborhood kids ride bikes, make figure eights through the driveways, while the grown-ups talk and laugh and night falls.

3140. Uncle Dan helps Jack learn to ride his bike with no training wheels.

3141. Homemade chocolate sauce made with browned butter.

3142. More sleep at night.

3143. Less impatience all day.

Daddy

"Can you carry me upstairs?" Jack pulls Daddy's elbow.

Daddy gathers him up all lanky limbs and wiggles. "Yeah, I can carry you upstairs because I am a big strong man like you," he says.

Little boy smiles, lays a cheek on Daddy's chest. "Well," the boy says, "I'm only half a big strong man right now," and he rides Daddy's arms to the top.

Hush

"Jack-Gordon," I say, "hush." Little boy throws a fuzzy duck up at the ceiling, plucks its orange legs out of the air.

"Ok." He flops ducky side to side, "Quack-quack. Quack-quack." He makes him fly and bomb, "Quack-quack. Quack-quack."

"Hush," I cuddle Rosie a little closer. Unflappable girl nurses away.

"Quack-quack. Quack-quack."

"Gordon, you said you would hush."

"Oh," he waggles ducky wings.

"What did you think I meant?"

He tilts his head, "I didn't know what you meant." He zooms ducky into the school cabinet. "But I did know I love Momma. That what I meant."

"Oh. Hush means quiet."

He totters scruffy duck into the step-stool, buries him in blankies, snaps the step closed. "There." He thumps little boy feet through the kitchen, trundles down stairs.

"... in all that he does he PROSPERS," Lulie recites from the table between mouthfuls of boiled beans.

I hear the swell of little boy feet pound back upstairs. He rounds the corner, an encyclopedia of snakes tucked under one arm. "This should be quiet," he splays the book open belly down on the rug and reads the pictures.

Home

"And some day," I say, "you'll grow up and leave home." I smile to Jack, "And, I'll come over, and pick up your kids, and hug them, and hold them, and say, 'Oh, you are co cute!'" He opens his blue eyes wide like plums.

Janie smashes her dinner roll flat like a tortilla. "And someday when YOU leave home," I say. She smiles back, passes a deflated roll over for butter. I smear butter to the edges with the back of a baby spoon and finish with, "I'll hug them and hold them and say, 'Oh, you are co cute!'"

Lulie grins and pounds the table, "And when YOU grow up and leave home," I say. She giggles. The words come out like a Christmas jingle. Then, I sing to Rosie too, and the girls chortle and bump elbows.

"All right now," I say just as Janie almost drags her hair through baked potato soup. "All right," I turn to Jack. Wide blue eyes blink, "Are you okay?" He blinks again and blanches right before my eyes, all splotchy red. "Honey?"

A lip quiver. I furrow my brow. "Oh," I tilt my head. "Oh honey, are you afraid you'll have to leave HOME?"

With that little boy dissolves into a sprinkler of tears. "Uh, huh," he sobs. His little four-year-old hands wrap python-style around my neck. He rubs his face in my ear.

"Oh, honey, you don't have to leave. You don't have to leave." He snuffs. "That's just when you're a grown-up. A GROWN-UP." He squeezes tighter.

Finally, he snuffs and slips into my lap. His little boy head bobs and bumps my chin, an anchor in my arms.








Gratitude:

322. Little boy who calls to screaming Rosie, "Hold on baby, I have to do my job," and scrapes onion scraps into the garbage.

323. Janie who tells Jack, "I'm being my name. Jane means God is gracious," and ignores his boy-pokes.

324. Lulie decked out in striped stretch pants and white shorts for bed when she can't find jammies.

325. Rosie smilin' and smilin' and smilin' all blissed-out at daddy.

326. A haul of carrots and potatoes with Craig's mom, good food and even better company.

327. The boxes of books Momma and I wrestle down stairs, the years of love that spille out as I trundle each spine to a new home on our shelves.

328. Dad spry and chipper after surgery -- makes recovery look simple.

329. Baked potato soup (thanks for the recipe, Ceris) and all the guests we share it with -- lots and lots and MORE yet.

330. Twin boys growing and nursing like champs for a dear friend.

331. A sweet, SWEET girl to be born on Wednesday. My NIECE!

332. Her brave momma steeled for a c-section if she stays breech by then.

333. Homemade ice cream made with homemade vanilla.

334. Gingersnaps with cayenne.

335. A fireplace and Mt. Everest of wood stacked husband-straight.

336. Jungle Book, 1894 original story.

337. Compliments from Craig.

338. A late night puzzling with my grown up little brother while Craig snores on the couch.

339. Packing and planning and writing lists for Thanksgiving.

340. A big hard back book of World War II that Jack pours over in search of The Battle of the Bulge.

341. A box spilling with fabric, remnants of a wedding shop, and the friend who brought it.

342. Banana bread, the kind with 5 bananas in it and no eggs, magnificent.

343. Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and the raucous cousin-filled house that devoured them.

344. Coffee and conversation with their momma.

345. Lucy's eyesight and how she told me twice in one day when the contact popped out and how we found it both times.

346. Lucy.potty.trained.

Boy Talk

"Watch ya thinking?" I ask.

Jack pops a pretzel in his mouth, crunches it. "Nuffin."

"Wow. Nothing?" I raise my eyebrows, "HOW do you do THAT?"

"I dunno. Just," he shakes his head, opens both eyes wide, "like this," little boy stares at a plant across the room, crunches another pretzel.

"That's all? Just like that?"

He pauses, cocks his head, "Momma," he says, "ya have to not talk."

A smile tugs at the corners of my mouth, "Oh."

I pass him another pretzel, pick one with lots of salt. We crunch them together and watch my house plant grow.

Older

"I'm just a good running and jumping boy," Jack slaps his knee, stomps a cowboy boot. He clack-clacks up and down the hallway, jumps and stomps, "Running and jumping boy is here," he says and flops onto the couch.

"Jack, shhhh, the baby is nursing," little boy trundles into the kitchen. Daddy flips a pancake and grabs his elbow, "Shhhhh," he says.

"O. K." He tip-tiptoes back on the hardwood, opens both eyes WIDE. "Can I kiss her, Momma?" He pokes her toes, gentle, and strains in loudest whisper, "Can I KISS her?"

I smile, whisper, "When she's done." He tiptoes back to flip pancakes.







Dinner. 14 pancakes, baseball size. Just for me. I love pancakes.

"Thank-you, Momma," Janie says, "Thank-you so much!" I hand her the whip cream, "I just love doing that," she pokes the cream spout, "because it makes me feel older. It's just like pushing on that and the whip cream comes out, makes me feel older." I pass the cinnamon and we shake a puff on top.

Every day, a little older.

Wild Boy

"So," I say, "now, what are you going to do?" I grab his little hand. He wiggles, looks at the ceiling. Dinner guests mill around. "Jack-Gordon?" I raise my eyebrows. "Gordon?"

He seesaws between feet, grins, "I'll NOT be wild," he says.

"What?"

"I'll NOT be wild."

"No," I shake my head. "No, that's wrong. You have to be LOVING. BE loving to your sisters." I lean in, blink at him.

He shakes that mop of a head, slaps his hands together. "I'll BE love," he shouts, slaps his hands again and announces to dinner guests, "I'll BE love." Before I can corral all that love. His manners explode into whoops and gallops. The evening slips away and children scream merriment through the house.




Gratitude:

272. Whoop-hollers and wild redheaded son.

273. Janie on the look-out for brother and sis while they make riot-fun with friends.

274. Her fierce spirit quick to correction -- most times. Her furrowed-brow determination to harness all that will into obedience.

275. Chocolate mustaches.

276. Mountains of popcorn and grapes, the clatter of cups and cousins.

277. Black beans and coconut milk.

278. Salt.

279. Lulie fully dressed, diaper changed -- by herself!

280. Rosie-posie kicking baby feet, pounding the floor to pull me from chores.

281. Rain boots, red like summer poppies in the grey rain.

282. Climbing to bed early to steal more sleep from the night.

283. The fullness of a whole night's sleep inside of me.

284. The soft blanket husband bought me for the winter.

285. Yup. Another puzzle. 1000 pieces of lightening strikes.

286. Train tracks and leggos gathered into bins and toy box.

287. A book in the mail. The green color and book smell.

288. Grammar.

289. That Lucy only cut up her own clothes this time in a tangle with Mommy-scissors.

The Hospital

"Momma," Janie says, "why is it a hospital where they go to die?"

She scoops an almond out of her oatmeal. I crunch cereal. "They don't have some of the things we have, honey." We chew. I sip coffee.

"They have one of the things we do," she says.

"What's that?" I fish around for a pecan, bite it in half.

"Hands," she says.

"And doctors," Jack pipes in.

"Hm," I sigh. "And God."

Jack furrows his brow, looks up, "Why do they have God?"

His elbow brushes my arm. "If people are there," I say, " and they pray, where is God?"

"Right IN there." He doesn't hesitate. As if captured by the idea, he hums between bites, "God-is-in-the-hospital. GOD-is-in-the-hospital." His spoon clanks against the bowl, but all I hear is, God is in the hospital.

Hands and doctors and God.

God is in the hospital.








Gratitude:

197. Emmanuel, well enough to leave the hospital.

198. No malaria in the mosquitoes here.

199. Child prayers.

200. How Lulie copies and prays like a big kid.

201. How Janie practices being easy to correct.

202. The way she erases and makes sloppy letters neat.

203. How Jack JUMPS off rocks, furniture, kitchen benches, the hearth.

204. How WIDE he opens his eyes when something is really funny or scary.

205. The way children memorize -- rote memory -- absorb it and love it until the age of six.

206. How Lulie recites Psalm 1 while she waits on my bed for discipline. How she loves the words before she even knows what they mean.

207. How husband corrects Lulie, "Honey, that's just not what people like us do." Like us, identity.

208. Husband's never ending strength for a job well done.

209. How he preaches: Work at everything as if working for the Lord, not men. And how then, on the longest day of his week, he comes home and rearranges the basement every which way. For me.

210. A tall tower of watermelon cubes.

211. The cradle Gramma made when I was a baby. Myra sleeps in it now.

212. That all my children have clothes and shoes enough for winter.

213. How when I get a scratch I just put a little Neosporin on and never worry that it will grow infected and make me lose a limb.

214. That cousins make good family and good friends.

215. Great decorating advice.

216. That I even get to worry about decorating instead of just staying alive.

218. My feet now cold that will carry me to baby and then bed.

Blood

"Hey Momma," Jane swallows a last potato soup bite, "I want to grow strong, healthy, and whole to help other people grow strong healthy and whole."

Hm. Me too.

She clanks a bowl into the dishwasher and runs after Jack. "I won the battle," she hollers.

They tangle into jammies and gallop to the bathroom for toothbrushes. I wipe down the table.

Emmanuel. He received a unit of blood. He's stronger, but weak yet. They hope to get another unit. Soon.

They make do there in the hospital. They encircle gangrenous limbs, flies and all, with prayer. They bathe fevered brows with words to God. To God! And we pray too, half a world away. Lord, let it be good blood.

Craig's mom donates blood as often as they let her. Platelets too. Why, she's probably given gallons and gallons by now. Never really realized what a gift blood is.

"I'm gonna pray about 'Manwell even though I prayed about it at lunch and in my room." Jack squeezes my neck, "God, please heal Emmanuel. Amen."

And amen.


***UP-DATE

Emmanuel has discharged from the Hospital. He has improved!!
Thank-you, Jesus. THANK-YOU.

A Boy

"Tears are coming out of you." I set down the phone. Jack watches my hands, stares at my face.

I crouch down, poke out bottom lip. "I'm sad," I say.

"You have tears coming out of you." I hug him, shoulders to my chest. Four years old.

My momma called. A boy we know in a far away hospital has malaria. And sickle-cell anemia. His daddy died a year ago. Malaria too. The boy, he's four.

When Craig visited the Kenyan hospital far, far away, he told me, "You go there to die."

I gather my children and we pray for four-year-old Emmanuel. We pray and pray and gather strength.

Our God is able.

My four-year old thunders through the house in cowboy boots, and I hear it echo down the hall.

God is able.

He is able.

Please heal, Emmanuel.
Amen.

Faith

"That's not jade green," he says. I poke a green colored pencil into the color can. It splays out with the others.

"Yeah, it is," I say and tip the can to see better.

He shakes his head. "That's NOT the jade green." I paw through pointed ends, frown. Plain green, where's the plain green?

Janie eyes that boy, "Actually Jack," she says, "it is. Whatever Mom says is TRUE." She raises her eyebrows, pauses, pencil poised, then scratches more memory to paper.

I run my fingers through long pencil colors. They clank in the can. True. Whatever Mom says is TRUE. I swing yellow-green into hand and cradle the idea: Everything I say is true.

Well, ok.







Gratitude:

163. The unmade bed that forced me to relax all day.

164. The way Lucy says, "Meditates," when we practice Psalm1.

165. Peach pie made with extra lemon.

166. An invite to Thanksgiving and family and the ocean.

167. 29 cans of dilly beans.

168. Children who ate fist fulls of raw beans when I didn't serve lunch until 2:00.

169. Cousins who picked five gallons with us just before the afternoon burst into rain.

170. Fresh dill.

171. Huge basil leaves.

172. Husband who pulled the potato plants and the children who scooped dirt and taters out of the garden.

173. Homemade hot dog buns.

174. Pepper jelly.

175. Sliced tomatoes still on the table after school work until Janie notices and eats them all.

176. How Jack wrinkles up his forehead when we learn how rain is made.

177. Books and books and books. Books everywhere in this house.

178. My laundry room wiped and scrubbed and rearranged tidy.

179. Glory to God. Even my worst will be turned into good.

180. The window of influence Craig and I have with our children. Complete devoted influence.

181. The closing of that window day by day until they are their own.

182. And that even then, we can still pray.

Notes

"Flush. the. toilet." I shout. "JACK, you have to FLUSH the toilet when you poop."

Craig pokes his head in the bathroom, raises both eyebrows. "I've told him like five times today," I say. "JACK," I call again.

"Ok, Momma," he says.

"There you are. Did you hear me?"

"Yeah."

"You HAVE to flush the toilet."

"Ok." He nods serious like, furrows his brow, "Ok."


He makes us notes, that Jack. He cuts up papers, small, like my hands, and scribbles out rocks, people, letters. "Here, Momma," a note. "I'm giving this one to Daddy," he says, "because he can fight the best and this one to you because you normally write words." I smile at mine, zigzag edges. He smiles at me.


Later he sits on the couch, "I wonder why Daddy's so amazing," he says and wrinkles up his brow. He lets the thought turn a few revolutions then slaps his knee, "I wonder why Daddy's so amazing."

I shake my head, "Me too." The boy squints those eyes, and I see it: little boy replays a Daddy-moment there in his mind, memorizes him. He plays it over and again. It lasts forever there on repeat. Those blue eyes give him away. He studies amazing until it starts to rub off.

"Yup, pretty amazing," I say. The boy shakes his head and drums off to brush teeth. I wonder how he has time at all to remember to flush.



Gratitude:

151. Salty peanutbutter pretzels.

152. Mason canning jars.

153. Genius friend who helps me organize my kitchen. For fun. (!)

154. Sister-in-law who laughs when we find red wine vinegar in six different cabinets.

155. Fresh garden cucumbers.

156. New vacuum, orange and gray.

157. Three pies in one week. One blackberry, two peach.

158. Husband gone and back safe from work trip.

159. Gallons of fresh clean water any time I want.

160. Dad able to breathe well enough to run again.

161. A big ol' garage sale to raise money for Spring of Hope.

162. The house tidy. For a moment.

Boy Love

"I get to take care of you," he says. Jack leans elbow-down on the green couch, wads little boy hands into fists and tucks them under his chin. Myra watches. "I get to take care of every single girl in this family," the boy says. He leans a little closer, whispers. "I get to take care of them, with my money." He cups a smudgy hand open, three pennies. The boy raises both eyebrows then kisses her tummy. "Big-Strong-Boy is back," he says.

Summer

"If there was a weed as big as me, it would be REALLY hard to pull." Jack's arm tucked around my neck, I crane to see his face.

"Yup."

"But if it was a big as you it would be bigger." He nods his head. "Yeah. But a weed as big as Daddy would be BIGGER 'cause he's as BIG as God," the boy squinches up one eye, "except not as much, 'cause God is the BIGGEST."






It's bedtime. The children wriggle and squirm in bed, reach for books and pillows, blankies, Mommy. I lean down cheek to cheek and whisper love to them. Small hands behind my neck, the day spills out in tales of weeds, grass nests and the way they filled the tunnel out back with more and more grass. And how Lucy learned to pump on the swings, sort of. They mixed mint water and picked raspberries.






Lulie. She sucks her thumb. She rubs the ends of my hair, folds them in blankie's favorite corner. Then, she smells and smells blankie. And me. And sucks her thumb, breathes in. She traces my chin and lips, watches my eyes, then cries when I leave.

Jack slips out of bed, hugs the girl and croons, "Oh, oh, oh." He pads back to bed, and I slip down the hall. Another day laid to rest.

Jack

"Can I hold my little girlie?"

Towers of laundry surround me, "Ok."

He balances Rose over skinned knees, wedges one hand under her head. He tilts his head to match and whispers warm secrets to her. Between bricks of laundry I lean into their small world. "I will protect you," he croons and presses cheek to cheek.

She squeaks. He rocks. She chirps. He rocks some more and looks up, "She makes that noise because she LOVES me," he says. He lifts her tiny head and begins to sing, "My little Rose, my little little Rose, my baby Rose..." The turrets of laundry fade into the walls, and I watch to see the boy begin to be man.

A man.

The legacy continues. Thanks Daddy, Grandad, Grampa, and all the Greats, Uncles too, our men of renown.



Gratitude:

52. Little boy who hums at the table and eats deep bowls of oatmeal.

53. Five-year-old sister who pours and cooks oatmeal while I rest on the couch.

54. Eight azure eyes of my children that SEE.

55. A surgeon, all blue scrubs and gray hair, who saved Lucy's sight.

56. Popsicles, watermelon, grass clippings up to the knees, sprinklers, and sop-wet children.

57. My mother, the measure of a woman, friend to me all these years.

58. Husband, bean-sprout-counter who points to each newborn leaf for the children.

59. Slow paced days, little ones gathered underfoot.

60. Cookies, nuts and chocolate chunks, oat flour, real butter.

61. Tides of laundry that ebb and flow like sand over the house.

62. Husband who wades the tide and calls our home a life on the beach.

63. A heritage of man-strength passed down from father and father's father and his father on down the family tree. A legacy of manhood.

64. "Hold me, Momma," and Lulu clamors up my creaky chair, grabs me in a bear-hug.

Jobs

Work. Janie feeds the dogs and shuttles them to the dog run each morning. Jack empties the dishwasher. On Saturdays Daddy pays them. Money. REAL money.

He parses it out in neat stacks. Tithe. Save. Spend. They carry around slips of green and clanking change in zip bags. They roll and unroll them in sweaty hands and wad them into pockets. We find the tattered bags tucked under bunk bed boards, down couch cushions, half emptied in Lulies gentle care.






Bananas. They buy bananas. Janie labels them with Sharpie.






They eat banana after banana until each bunch disappears. Bananas all their own, the sweet joy slides down into their tummies.

A Man

First, they pull the grass. Daddy chops off long sideways roots of quack grass that reach into the garden. The children trail behind and gather armloads of clumpy sod, pile it in the wheelbarrow.

Jane pokes a fresh clump with her toe, "I think I need a MAN'S help." She looks around, and then gives the clod a little kick.

Daddy hacks another clean swipe at the garden's edge. He pauses, "Hey Jack, anytime someone says they need a MAN'S help, you should help them right away."

"Oh. Okay." He grabs Janie's clod and tosses it into the wheelbarrow. Jane grins.

Off to the left, another clump of grass, "I think I need a MAN," she looks around for Jack, "because I don't want to bend down and pick that up." She tries not to smile and raises her eyebrows. He slogs it into the wheelbarrow.






At the end of the garden they race back to Daddy. He saws open bags of coffee grounds and scatters long black stripes over the dirt. They wriggle their toes in it.

As daylight wanes we gather garden trowels and buckets, a pair of old blue gloves, and go inside. Jane pauses at the door, "Jack, I think I need a MAN. Will you close the door after Lulie comes in?"

"Yeah, I will." With a sideways grin he turns to wait for little sis, that same long-suffering streak of his father a badge of honor.

Real Gentle

Jack finds me out on the couch. I squeeze my eyes shut and sigh. Nap's over.

"Momma." I sit up and wedge a pillow in my back. He sidles up next to me.

"Hi, bud." We sit and stare into space, snuggle. I check my watch. We stare some more.

He nuzzles his face to me and squeezes my arm, "I'll hold you really gentle," he says, "because I know you have a baby in your tummy." He looks up, "I won't forget."

"I know," we smile and then sit some more.





Five more days. Wonder if she'll come on time.

Tokens of Love

"You're looking so grown up, Momma." Jane scoots over between our breakfast bowls and pats my shoulder.

Jack nods, "You're lookin' just so grown up."



"Your eyes are green." Jack stares at my face when I tuck him into bed. "I love them," he says. Before I can smile, he pulls my face down, kisses the tip my nose.

Green eyes and all grown up.

Break out the GOGGLES!

That's RIGHT!




It's SWIM weather!




Or rather sprinkler weather.




You know, since the thermometer hit almost 70 today.

***
Also, news flash: Jack is totally set on naming the baby OLIVE. Lucy goes back and forth on the name. Jane is against it. And Craig says the only way he will name a child OLIVE is if she is born with a pimiento in her lips. Plus, it's not 4 letters.

Soooo any more name ideas? :)