A Moment’s Sacredness
By Tony Woodlief
‘Before her baptism, our Caroline, who was only two, called our pastor “the creature,” which was as close as she could get to “the preacher.” After her baptism, she called him God. I always wondered what she saw or sensed as he prayed over her, to give her a sense of the moment’s sacredness.’
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World On the Web
Ian and I spent quite some time yesterday playing Hide the Shoe. Despite my son’s flair for complex rules of engagement, the game is as simple as it sounds: hide the shoe, find the shoe. Clues are allowed, as are ‘warm’ and ‘cold’ nudges.
Ian’s hiding spots were easy to find; he giggled whenever I entered the correct room. Once he came downstairs holding a stuffed chicken that I hadn’t seen in months; I knew he’d hidden the shoe in the spot where all his animals go to be forgotten.
He told me the shoe was hidden ‘under something cozy’, and I started looking under pillows.
Giggle. ‘Waaarrrm.’ Giggle. ‘Colder!’ Giggle. ‘Hot! Scorpion hot!’ He meant ’scorching’. I found the shoe under the armchair.
His hiding spots weren’t always easy. ‘Cold. Cooolder! Iceberg cold!’
Iceberg cold? This kid is awesome.
My Son the Man
By Sharon Olds
Suddenly his shoulders get a lot wider,
the way Houdini would expand his body
while people were putting him in chains. It seems
no time since I would help him to put on his sleeper,
guide his calves into the gold interior,
zip him up and toss him up and
catch his weight. I cannot imagine him
no longer a child, and I know I must get ready,
get over my fear of men now my son
is going to be one. This was not
what I had in mind when he pressed up through me like a
sealed trunk through the ice of the Hudson,
snapped the padlock, unsnaked the chains,
and appeared in my arms. Now he looks at me
the way Houdini studied a box
to learn the way out, then smiled and let himself be manacled.
Far from a testament to progenitorial prowess, this site has instead been a useful if painful chronicle of a floundering father. If fatherhood is the Petries’ living room, I’ve managed to stumble over most of the footstools.
But I’ve learned a few things.
Last Sunday was a crash day. Kelly’s play had finished the previous night, and we all were in desperate need of snuggleness. Ian had an especially rough few weeks, being neglected by his parents in favor of rushed rehearsal schedules and later-night dinners. He took it in stride, but made his feelings quite clear by doing uncanny impersonations of a barnacle.
In lieu of Ian’s afternoon nap, we decided to huddle under a blanket on the couch, drinking tea and watching a movie together. Our intentions were good, but there’s a reason Ian takes naps.
That evening Ian asked if he could play a video game. Who am I to argue with a four-year-old? But when the game proved too difficult, he asked me to ‘help’. Then complained that I was playing. Then asked me to help. Then complained that I was playing. Then asked me to help. The complained that I was turning off the game, walking out of the room, and starting his bath.
The latter quickly degraded into an incoherent rage of spittle and tiny fists. He was tired, fragile, and at the end of his tether. I don’t have a good history with Ian’s tantrums. My patience is thin by default, and my son is very good at ripping it to shreds. Logic plays no part, and I don’t stop to think of the reasons behind his behavior. I’m too focused on the noise, pain, and my own frustration. So I react, usually by throwing my hands in the air and asking Kelly to step in.
I thought of this as I carried Ian, screaming, to the bathroom. I was calm, reserved. I didn’t yell, or scowl, or threaten, or dump him on the naughty step. I knew he was exhausted and angry, and I understood why.
His fists were locked on his pants as I tried to get him undressed. He held his elbows at his sides, and he quickly grabbed the bottom of his shirt whenever I managed to pull it above his head. His face was red, and he was coughing from the strain of yelling in my face. Ty Pennington in Scobby-Doo underwear. He flailed and threw himself to the ground.
Kelly started walking from the kitchen, and I caught her eye. ‘No, I’m okay. I’ve got him.’ And I said it without a trace of martyrdom. I meant it. I wasn’t dealing with Ian out of obligation. I knew my son needed help beyond his means.
I knew he needed his father.
a song in the front yard
By Gwendolyn Brooks
I’ve stayed in the front yard all my life.
I want a peek at the back
Where it’s rough and untended and hungry weed grows.
A girl gets sick of a rose.
I want to go in the back yard now
And maybe down the alley,
To where the charity children play.
I want a good time today.
They do some wonderful things.
They have some wonderful fun.
My mother sneers, but I say it’s fine
How they don’t have to go in at quarter to nine.
My mother, she tells me that Johnnie Mae
Will grow up to be a bad woman.
That George’ll be taken to Jail soon or late
(On account of last winter he sold our back gate).
But I say it’s fine. Honest, I do.
And I’d like to be a bad woman, too,
And wear the brave stockings of night-black lace
And strut down the streets with paint on my face.
On the way to school this week, Ian asked me about stars and wishes. We’d been there before.
‘Daddy, do stars have wishes? Do they come true?’
‘No, honey. It’s just pretend.’ And the sentimentalist in me wondered if Kelly and I were killing our son’s childhood.
We don’t do Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny. The Tooth Fairy doesn’t stand a chance. Wishes and magic are kept soundly within the realms of Harry Potter and Daddy’s dragon books. We’ve drawn a distinct line between fact and fiction.
We feel that’s a good thing. So many lines in childhood are blurry enough without tossing flying reindeer into the mix. If stars grant wishes as they convert hydrogen into helium—which is pretty cool by itself—then what about the really important questions, like prayer and faith and God?
Yet as the words left my mouth, I couldn’t help thinking that somehow, on some level, Ian’s imagination was being stunted. As though I were shackling my son’s innocence, and other metaphors you’d expect to hear from a commentary on NPR.
Ian was quiet for a moment. ‘Daddy?’
‘Yeah, buddy?’
‘Did you know that there’s a new planet?’
‘Really?’
‘Yeah! It’s inside the Earth and it’s very dangerous because it’s bigger than you but don’t worry because I can protect you.’
Take that, Michele Norris!
Are We There Yet
By R. Virgil Ellis
you’d say, tired of our prompting
to see the world as you should:
train-thunder as we go under a trestle,
smiling face painted on a barn.
You’d even get bored looking for signs
that had the rare q, x, or z.
Are we there yet?
So we gave up telling you the miles
and just said, we’re closer, getting closer,
whenever you asked, so
you made it into a chant:
closer, closer, closer,
until, turning onto our road,
we joined in, and then
we all rocked in our seats,
making the old car bounce and sway,
closer, closer, closer.
(Via The Writer’s Almanac; thanks, Walker!)
If there’s one thing I learned in Mr. Murphy’s Chemistry class—apart from using a bunsen burner to make peanut-brittle—it’s to always specify units with your measurements. Thirty what? Six-point-five what? Knowing this crucial information was the only thing keeping your test-tube from exploding, or your test from losing twenty percent of its grade.
For the past few weeks, Ian has been neglecting his units.
‘Know how much I love you, Daddy?’
‘No. How much?’
His eyes spread with his hands. ‘Forty-five seventy-two! That’s a lot!’
Cute and endearing, if only temporarily. Forty-five seventy-two what? It didn’t make sense. The Father in me was touched: a number so large that it was meaningless. The Editor in me was simply frustrated.
Why forty-five seventy-two? And what did it mean that yesterday it was twenty-six three? Or fifty-one eighty-two, the day before? Am I being graded? Is there a curve?
So I’ve tried to explain. ‘But, honey, that number doesn’t mean anything. I’m glad you love us so much! We love you too! But you can just say “a lot” or “tons” or “bunches”.’
Nothin’ doin’. He loves us twenty-eight forty-four, eighty-nine six, thirty-one thirty-three.
I looked into the review mirror this morning, on the way to school. ‘I love you, kiddo!’
‘I love you, too, Daddy.’
And, without thinking, I replied, ‘Well, I love you six!’
Oh. Ohh. Ohhhh!
Totally like whatever, you know?
By Taylor Mali
(Thanks, Phil!)
