my childhood

Gritty By Grace

September 10, 2012 by Maggie 6 Comments

When I was little, we moved off the farm and into the city and mom made me wear dresses all the time. Short ones. Remember Cindy Brady? That short.

I wanted jeans. The cousin, who supplied all my clothes, passed down a pair of embroidered jeans. I wore them until they disappeared. When I was in 6th grade, my mom bought me a pair of ‘straight leg’ jeans. In seventh, Hazel took me shopping to dress me like I belonged to someone. I came home with Calvin Klein Jeans. Shortly, I’m not exactly sure when, Levi’s Shrink-to-Fit 501s came in style.

And stayed awhile.

Through the years, my mom did a lot of things to give me a better education than she’d had. We lived in better neighborhoods with better schools. She kept me in church; finally finding the Episcopalians, with alcohol in church and being cool with divorce and incredible networking. I sang in their whizbang choir and my fellow singers were from the best neighborhoods and attended the best private schools. We attended the arts festival ~~for the egg rolls~~. We went to the ballet. We ate at the Magic Pan and shopped (without buying) at high fashion shops.

It was bread and meat to a girl who couldn’t have extra-curriculars because working moms couldn’t pick kids up from practices and needed to spend their money on nachos and vodka (that’s her story and she’s sticking to it).

When I was about 11, this guy decided he was going to get to her by spoiling me (WRONG TREE!!! WRONG TREE!!!). He profiled me– reader, straight As, wearing rags but knows where Balliet’s is. And sent me subscriptions to Smithsonian and W.

When I began to dress myself I was strictly tailored.

My soul wears navy blue and pearls. It believes the rules are there to help us live like civilized human beings. Manners are to help others feel comfortable; not to manipulate them into pretending you aren’t being ungracious (Target Line Cutter Lady, I am talking to you). Education doesn’t stop at the 3 Rs, but extends to the arts and culture.

When I was in high school, I heard stories of wild parties. I never was invited to one.

I dated a college guy at the end of my senior year. On the outside, he was all conservative Republican, Son of a Fundamentalist Preacher. On the inside, he was a monster.

Navy blue and pearls girl may have gotten a little damaged.

Lesson learned: The outside is for your mama, the preacher, and the person who watches ~~rated R~~ movies but condemns people who curse. The inside is what you are. It’s what monsters want to destroy.

One day when I was wearing my navy blue and pearls, my jeans got a little rip. I liked the little rip. Eventually, I’d find a best friend whose jeans had a little rip, too.

When I was in college, I wore my Rockies or my Wranglers when I was feeling like flying my freak flag. Which good girls aren’t supposed to have. But I do.

Jesus knows about the freak flag.

He made it, ~~so I would not have to carry my own books~~.

I lavishly adore buttoned down; it goes so well with barefoot, ripped jeans, and hair loose.

Because grace is sometimes gritty and perfect love sometimes sees you in your lucky pants.

I am linking this post with PYHO @ Things I Can’t Say.

Filed Under: before and after, humor, life lessons, my childhood, where I'm from

That Summer We Lived with Grandma

September 3, 2012 by Maggie 1 Comment

She lived 25 miles from where my mom worked, and gasoline was up to $.60.

Shut up.

It was the Bi-centennial.

Grandpa had retired from the oil field and they’d expanded the garden. Because there were more people there to help work it.

They had these two old apricot trees. They’d been there for twenty years. Never blossomed. Never put on fruit. Until this year. They made up for all the years of disappointment.

For their anniversary, grandpa had made Grandma a swing. Like a porch swing, only it sat out in the back under the mimosa tree.

The days were long and hot. In Oklahoma, the wind blows continually, not in gusts, but relentlessly. My hair was continually blowing everywhere. So mom kept it short.

She would leave for work early in the morning. And I would take all Grandma’s berry baskets (collected since the great depression) and go drop on the ground beneath the apricot trees. I would fill the baskets and take them in. Grandma washed the apricots and returned the baskets to me. At the peak of the crop, I could fill them up to six times per day. Grandma added this to her full time work with the garden.

They also grew zucchini bigger than my leg from the knee down. And green beans. There were, of course, tomatoes and peppers. These grandparents didn’t grow corn(the others fought the good fight for ‘roasting ears’.). But that’s about all they didn’t grow. I was never thorough enough to suit anybody as a green bean harvester. Which was just as well, as my work made it possible to add apricots to the harvest.

It was not without a good deal of noise, that I did my work. I cried at the injustice and mistreatment. And my wishing for rain gave me the opportunity to wish for the sun to come out. It was more pleasant to pick up the apricots from the dry ground than to kneel in the mud.

Grandma didn’t love to turn the air conditioner on. She saw it as needless waste. Not one living person supported her in this. Oh, in April, we all agreed. You shouldn’t need it in April. But in mid-July? There were no prizes for being the last one to close the windows and turn it on.

She had her swing. She worked like a maniac in the blazing sun or the stifling kitchen all day. When the dinner dishes were back in the cabinet, she’d get a cold drink and her cigarettes, and go outside and sit in the swing with the sun at her back. Under the mimosas, she’d smoke and watch the hummingbirds come to the mimosa blossoms. Mom would sit with her, too. She’d put in a day at the medical office, come home and change and join Grandma in harvesting and canning the green beans.

By the time the weather cooled in the fall, I couldn’t eat apricots anymore. I wasn’t filing it in the ‘great moments of my life’ file. But now, I think about my equal role in the work. I didn’t sit around nagging about the two activities I was willing to think of as fun. A lot of hard work made me grateful as a Pilgrim for time to read or write or play or watch tv.

I think I’ll move that summer from the “Argh” file to the “Good stuff” file.

Filed Under: food, Gratittude, life lessons, my childhood, Uncategorized, where I'm from

Music Shapes Minds and Hearts

August 25, 2012 by Maggie Leave a Comment

,A ~~week~~ month or so ago, Jennifer @ Momma Made It Look Easy asked a question on Facebook:

“Let’s talk song lyrics. What do you do about sexually suggestive song lyrics when they come on the radio? For example, Flo Rida’s new song Whistle, Katy Perry’s Peacock, DEV’s Dancing in the Dark. Do you change the station? Tell your kids they can’t listen because it is inappropriate? Does that open up the door for more questions? How do you explain it is inappropriate? Or do you just hope that they don’t figure out the meaning or start singing it in the produce aisle at the grocery store?“

I started by trying to listen to the link to a video that Jennifer had provided. Oops. That’s not one I would even listen to with the kids in the room. By the time I scrambled to stop it, 24 seconds had passed. Plenty of time.

Whistle, indeed. It was an oral sex tutorial.

My simple answer: I turn it off.

Is anything that simple? When your children are small, maybe you can turn it off and if they protest, say,”What? Oh. I wasn’t paying attention to the song. I’m just trying to find a station with the weather on.”

Not here. Not anymore.

When I was a kid, we listened to the radio, a lot. My husband’s favorite freakish gift of mine is that I have a nearly complete catalog of 1970s pop lyrics in my head, accessible at any time. Off the top of my head, I can list several that are about intercourse, oral sex, or masturbation–all hits on the Adult Contemprary Top 40 before 1985.

I went around singing whatever was on. I wonder what boys thought. I wonder what random men in public places thought. I don’t wonder much. Neither, do I wonder, now that I am an adult, familiar with idiom and euphemism, what men think, when my daughters sing along to the greatest hits of their time.

Periodically, I take the lyric of a song and parce it out for my daughters. They hate this.

Yet, I’ve noticed, if they are listening to the AC station regularly, they become ~~even more~~ oppositional, ~~even more~~ self-centered, and begin to dress with less regard to fashion or self-respect.

Some songs have to do with suicide, stalking, infidelity or one night stands. The middle ground is selfish, self-centeredness and inflated ego, mixed with tales of co-dependency and a search for meaning in mediocrity.

We become what our hearts meditate on.

It’s a parent’s privilege, not only to guard their children from too much information too soon, but also to grow those people’s hearts into unselfish, hard-working, imaginative, healthy adults.

Trouble is, the radio station is marketing to young adults aged 18-24, and they like it dirty.

The strategy that works best in our home is a full toolbox:

–Ask them to turn it off.

–If it’s my option, I turn it off.

–If it’s somewhere that the radio doesn’t belong to us– a)distract, b)re-direct, or c)leave the area.

– “Please don’t sing that song. I know it’s just a catchy tune, but it says two things and one of them is not nice.”

“What, Mommy?”

“You don’t need to know. You just have to trust me.”

Just like God says to me, when He asks me to relinquish something mediocre for an excellent promise I will not receive until much later.