Column

This is a story about a chicken. It’s not an earth-shattering story like so many stories these days, particularly that horrific one halfway around the world that occupies our hearts and minds and plays out a hundred different ways when you lie awake in the dark.

This is a quiet story, but we could all use something quiet about now—a diversion of sorts, if just for a moment.

We have a granddaughter who is one of the sweetest, softest things that ever fell from heaven. That might sound boastful, but it is only by way of contrast that we know she is sweet and soft. Our group as a whole is loud. We play loud, laugh loud and rib one another loud.

But this one is soft. Her voice is soft, her manner is soft and her gaze is soft. Even the hair that tumbles across her face is soft.

She lives in the country in a house her daddy and grandaddy built. She can see the chicken coop from the window in her daddy’s home office. She visits the coop every day.

The chickens flock around her, kicking up dust, cutting in front of her, erratically darting here and there. But one chicken walks a steady path, following the little girl. The two are close, so close that the girl has named the chicken after herself.

And so, Emma the chicken trails Emma the girl as she meanders down a path and ambles up a small rise to a plastic playset.

Sometimes they sit together next to the playhouse or on the slide, Emma the girl with Emma the chicken often nestled in her lap. The two Emmas watch treetops sway in the wind and study clouds floating across the sky.

Little Emma’s face is peaceful. Emma the chicken’s face is well, in my book, a bit too intense with those beady eyes and sudden jerking moves. Yet, once the chicken is in Emma’s lap, the old gal becomes restful, nearly sleeping with her eyes open.

Because you do things for those you love, soft Emma set to work at the kitchen table with yellow construction paper, tape and scissors. The zig zags were not easy to cut. They never are. It takes determination to get them even, particularly on a small scale. As for circumference, Emma the crafter probably doesn’t know what circumference means, but she knew the circle had to be just the right size.

She worked and worked, taping and cutting, cutting and taping, until at last she was satisfied.

She took her gift to Emma the chicken who received it with grace. The bird wore the gold crown and was the princess chicken for one fine day.

Well, not an entire day, but at least until the other chickens began pecking at her crown in fits of jealousy, knocked it from her head and trampled it underfoot. I think I saw that happen at a pageant once.

Nevertheless, Emma the girl was smiling, pleased that Emma the chicken had liked the crown and worn it. And for a brief moment, Emma the chicken didn’t look so intense and high-strung. She looked calm and at peace, as though she was sincerely pleased to be loved.

The good news is that grocery store shelves seemed better stocked these days. The bad news is the little credit card machines at the checkouts that used to say “chip, swipe or tap,” now say, “arm, leg or both.”

The rising cost of food is so bad that one of our girls extended the five-second rule to three days. As a side-benefit, she rarely sweeps anymore.

I find myself studying the grocery circulars like I once studied the stock market. Last week, I hit four different stores to cash in on the specials. I felt good about all the savings until I realized I spent six times on fuel what I saved on food.

We were in Kansas City recently, a city with some of the best grocery stores in the country. We took a cooler and brought home three reasonably-priced beautiful briskets. When we drove to Maine two years ago, we took a cooler and brought back 10-pounds of wild Maine blueberries purchased at a produce stand without the  middleman markup.

Some people run drugs and guns across state lines, we run brisket and blueberries. We all have our priorities.

As a family, we have been playing “The Price is Right” shooting texts back and forth, guessing what someone paid for something at the store. We may rename the game “The Price is Wrong.” None of us seem able to keep up with rising costs.

Nearly all the grands are bacon lovers. On a good day, you can find a pack of bacon for $9. Several of the grands recently asked if I would make some for breakfast. I told them I would. For their birthdays.

The looks on their little faces was heartbreaking. Normally, I would have consoled myself with a piece of chocolate, but who can afford that?

On the bright side, the new weight-loss program is working well.

I keep wondering if costs will rise for streaming the Food Network.

Walmart has said that consumers are aware of rising prices but haven’t changed their behavior yet. Someone needs to tell Walmart it is hard to live without food.

Some of the rising costs are on foods we don’t really need and are better off without. I don’t need Diet Coke and I can live without Diet Coke, but once it becomes forbidden fruit, all I think about is Diet Coke.

I recently saw that you can now place online orders for Girl Scout cookies. I imagine it makes it a lot more convenient to fill out your loan application at the same time. They take that “Be Prepared” business seriously.

My husband said the way I carry on about the price of groceries, it’s a wonder they don’t bring drive-up orders to the car in an armored vehicle. I’m picking up an order tomorrow. I’ll let you know.

If you listen to your voicemails, you may be in the minority. I read a piece claiming that more and more people are ignoring their voicemails. They find the practice freeing.

I listen to voicemails from our auto mechanic, the plumber and any and all health care providers. I find the practice expensive.

The Digital Age has given us so many ways of connecting that we now have a hierarchy of how all this connectedness annoys us. Voicemails have risen to the top; so, many are ignoring them.

But wait. There’s more. There’s always more, and that’s the problem.

Our son recently mentioned that he no longer reads emails. Including mine.

I try not to take this personally. Truthfully, I feel more loved knowing that he doesn’t just ignore my emails—he ignores all emails. He’s always been a very equitable person. Although, as a mother, you never mind a little favoritism from an adult child.

He said that the only way he knows I sent him an email is if I copy in our daughter-in-law and then she tells him that his mother sent something important. Just one more reason why I love that girl.

Selectively skipping some voicemails, depending on who they are from, might be OK but ignoring all your emails can be dangerous. Especially if they are from your mother.

That said, I have to admit that it seems there are days I spend more time unsubscribing and deleting junk emails than I do answering legit emails. My inbox overfloweth.

Our son, like both sons-in-law and countless others working from home, is constantly on the phone problem solving, consulting with associates in time zones around the world and joining conference calls that span hours.

He may ignore the bulk of his voicemails and emails, and even be burned out by phone calls, but thankfully, he still texts. He recently sent a text asking me a question that necessitated a specific answer. I texted back my answer and his “notifications silenced” feature popped up.

Just like that we were back in the teen years—I was talking and he wasn’t listening.

In our overly connected world, it is a challenge to ever disconnect. Naturally, a winnowing must take place to preserve both privacy and sanity.

My better half is so vigilant about protecting privacy that he rarely gives out his cell phone number. A while back we switched banks. Filling out forms to open a new account, he came to the blank for his phone number and froze.

“You trust them with our money, but not with your cell phone?” I asked.

“That’s right,” he said. “You can never be too careful.”

I said it was OK to use my cell phone number. Everyone we do business with has my cell number.

His barber just left a message that I have a haircut at 2.

My husband’s cell number is Fort Knox secure. Well, at least it was until a few days ago when a couple of grands were here and made note of his cell phone number. He had 15 calls to his cell from our ancient touchtone landline in less than 15 minutes.

Like the man says, you can never be too careful.

The flash point of the Thermostat Wars happened recently when you know who cranked the thermostat, fired up a space heater in the kitchen and began fanning the door to the oven where broccoli was roasting at 400 degrees.

Overcome by intense heat, I changed into capris, a tank top and flip flops.

He countered by putting on a fleece pullover and baseball cap.

Trying to cheer my perpetually chilled husband, I remarked that the outdoor temperature had risen to 38, but “feels like” 42.

“Who says it feels like 42?” he asked.

“My weather app.”

“How does a weather app know what it feels like outside?”

I suggested that the “feels like” temperatures are calculated by trained meteorologists using formulas involving temperature, humidity and wind.

He countered that the “feels like” temperatures are bogus because everybody feels temperature differently.

I froze.

Then I melted because the “feels like “temperature in the kitchen was approaching 80.

The man had a point. What a temperature “feels like” to him isn’t what it “feels like” to me. Women over 55, and aging men who like flannel-lined jeans, often have marked differences when it comes to what the temperature “feels like.”

The one exception to such perceived differences is in the far north states routinely blanketed with snow and cold. I know this because I lived in North Dakota one winter. Droplets of moisture on nose hairs instantly froze and made icicles when you step outside in 20-below temps. If your mouth and nose are uncovered, you can feel the burn in your lungs.

Everyone in the state agreed there was only one “feels like” temperature—that of the Arctic Circle.

How cold was it?

I was a newspaper photographer in Fargo and every picture I shot was a polar-oid. The kids all ate Ice Krispies and Frosted Flakes. I hope you believe this, so I don’t have to tell the one about all the farmers having snow plows.

Somehow, the unseen forces of Fahrenheit and Celsius predetermine that polar opposites often marry one another and then spend the rest of their lives slyly adjusting the thermostat.

My better (and partially frozen) half insists more people like a room on the warm side than the cool side. I ask to see the research and tell him there are destination spots for people like that: Florida, Arizona and California.

“The cold is invigorating,” I say.

He says, “Id’s fweewing,” or something like that.

He says no man should suffer from hypothermia in his own house.

I suggest he run in place.

He says he has been for the last 30 minutes.

“I don’t see you moving,” I say.

He responds, “That’s because my limbs are frozen.”

The place we are most comfortable is in the car, where we have dual temperature controls. “Feels like” we may be taking a lot of road trips between now and spring.

The husband found a piece of paper titled “Things I want to do before I’m 100 years old” in the family room.

He asked if it was mine. It was on a little table with little chairs where little grandkids sit when they come to visit. I’m short, but not that short.

I said it was not mine, but thanks for asking.

Several of the grands celebrated their hundredth day in school recently. Clearly, one of them had left some schoolwork here. I got to thinking maybe someone brought the worksheet hoping to use us as research.

For the record, neither of us are close to 100. Furthermore, if genetics plays a large part in such things, only one of us will ever get close and it won’t be me.

In response to previous questions about age that we have had to answer, we would like to reiterate that:

No, neither of us ever rode in a covered wagon.

No, life was not black and white when we were kids.

No, we were not alive when Abe Lincoln was alive.

No, neither of us were first to discover fire or invent the wheel.

Two of the girls celebrated Hundredth Day by dressing up like old women, pulling their long hair back into buns, donning cardigans and small print dresses, dangling reading glasses from ribbons around their necks, penciling in lines on their faces.

One of their mothers texted us pictures of these hunched over, forlorn looking creatures. I immediately texted back: “What? No hearing aids?” I also tried to start an #oldpeoplerock hashtag, but it didn’t catch fire. It didn’t even spark.

One of the girls completed the worksheet writing: “Some things I would like to accomplish before I’m one hundred are getting married, having kids, having grandkids, mastering piano and getting braces. But those are just a few things I’d like to do before I’m dead.”

The kindergartener celebrated Hundredth Day counting by 1s to 100, by 5s to 100 and by 10s to 100. Counting by 10s gets you to 100 with amazing speed, which is probably a realistic representation of how fast time passes once you hit 50.

After thinking on the matter, I concluded that things I’d like to do before I turn 100 aren’t that different from things I hope to do by the end of the week – listen more than I talk (doubtful), love others better (needs improvement), summon courage in the face of adversity (fingers crossed), beat the livin’ daylights out of every 24 hours, keep learning, keep doing, keep trying (a work in progress).

In the meantime, I’m just glad none of them who dressed like they were 100 tried to raid my closet.

 

A moment of silence, please, as we mark the passing of one of the great joys of childhood — snow days.

Snow days are a pony ride, birthday party and Christmas all rolled into one.

No two words are sweeter to a child’s ears than “snow day.”

A snow day is a holiday you didn’t see coming, an unexpected reprieve from yet one more day of the same ol’, same ol’.

Before the days of Twitter and email notifications, our kids would sit glued to the TV screen as school closings scrolled by in alphabetical order, waiting to see their school listed. If it wasn’t, they’d sit through the whole loop again hoping it would appear on the list the next time around,

Snow days meant the monolithic school was temporarily powerless over you—you had been rendered untouchable by a thick blanket of snow. Teachers might be at home tallying grades and creating more labyrinths of homework assignments on a snow day, but you?

You would be outside sledding, building forts, snowmen and snow women, making snow angels, having snowball fights, maybe even shoveling snow for the neighbors. When your cheeks turned scarlet, your lips cracked and bled and your lower limbs suffered early stages of frostbite, you trekked back inside, dumped your wet clothes on a heating vent where they would soon smell like wet dog, and went to find some hot chocolate.

Here in the Midwest, we recently spent days tracking pink and blue swaths on weather maps, anticipating a winter storm. Grocery shelves were stripped bare of bread, milk and eggs, shoppers evidently preparing for a French toast bonanza. The snow fell as predicted. Schools closed. Big yellow buses sat idle. Motorists stayed off the roads until the plows had a chance to do their thing.

For kids, the wonderful, marvelous snow day had finally arrived. But it wasn’t a wonderful, marvelous snow day for everyone. For many it was an e-learning day.

Just like that, someone waves a magic wand, and a much-anticipated snow day becomes a virtual learning day. (Insert collective groan here.) Of course, such decisions are couched in loftier terms such as “hybrid learning” or “repurposing.”

Should snow days all be repurposed into virtual learning days and fade into the passing of time, it will be most regrettable—a simple childhood joy sacrificed on the altar of technology.

Only time will tell if snow days remain snow days, or become a day when children once again sit transfixed before computer screens for hours on end.

Snow days won’t disappear like Frosty, dancing their way out of town singing about returning one day. They’ll forever melt into history on the broadband.

The rental car we picked up on a recent trip was bright red, had push-button start and a smart key. A smart key looks more like an oversized thumb drive for a computer than a key with teeth.

We drive old cars with keys with teeth – the kind you put in the ignition and have to turn with your hand. (Oh, the exhaustion.)

Settled at our destination, I met with a book editor at a coffee shop. After a delightful chat, we went our separate ways. I rummaged through my bag and my pockets and couldn’t find the car key anywhere. I glanced in the car and saw it on the passenger seat.

I had locked the smart key in the car. Not smart.

I called my husband to break the news. The place where we were staying was only a mile from the coffee shop; I began walking. Briskly. He was on hold with the rental agency when I returned, so I began Googling what to do when you lock a smart key in a keyless-entry car.

Turns out, it is nearly impossible to lock a smart key in a car because the car senses the key is in the car and won’t lock the doors. Smart. Very smart.

Now the husband and I were both walking (very briskly) back to the coffee shop where our rented car sat in a busy parking lot, unlocked, with the smart key in full view. Not smart.

I might as well have taped a big sign reading “TAKE ME, I’M YOURS” on the windshield.

The car was still there, unlocked, smart key in plain view. So we went into the coffee shop and bought pastries to celebrate.

To document the fun, you know who said he wanted to take my picture in front of the coffee shop. I agreed to a picture and threw my coat and purse into the car.

He snapped a few. I returned to the car to retrieve my purse from the back seat and shrieked, “My purse and coat are gone!”

“Impossible,” he said.

“Well, they are!”

Unless.

Unless I threw them in the red car parked next to our red car. I casually walked over and saw my purse and coat in someone else’s back seat. I opened their car door, retrieved my things and scurried back to our car.

Then we looked over and saw the driver’s door open on the red car next to our red car. I had opened two doors looking for my coat and purse. The husband nonchalantly walked over, closed the car door and returned to our car.

“Do you think anyone saw all that?” was not fully out of my mouth when a man strode up to the red car next to us looking our way. We both popped out and asked if he saw what happened. He said his girlfriend said, “Someone’s getting in your car.”

We explained I was discombobulated by “locking” a smart key in a rental, walking away, then discovering the “locked” car was not locked at all and wanted to take a picture, blah, blah, blah.

Either the man was sincerely congenial, or just wanted to get away from two out-of-town nut jobs and wished us well on the remainder of our trip.

If there is ever a test to see if we are smart enough to use a smart key, our qualifications could be in jeopardy.

The next time we have a family game night I’m going to phone in sick. They’re simply too exhausting. Everyone wants to play me. Grandkids jump up and down and yell, “I want to play Grandma! I’m next to play Grandma!”

They all want to play me because they can beat me. It’s the sort of popularity nobody craves.

On the upside, I have the gift of making everyone else in the room look good.

Take the game Connect Four. (Please, I beg you.) The name says it all, you connect four chips vertically, horizontally or on a diagonal. I’m guessing the box says for ages 3 and up, but I’m too humiliated to look. To my credit, I did win one round a few months ago. My opponent was age 6 and distracted by a commotion in the kitchen.

Someone commented that it’s not good sportsmanship to pump your fist in the air when you crush a 6-year-old. I’ll try to be more gracious the next time I win. Assuming there is a next time.

Monopoly? Hands down the most painful board game in the world. I don’t care about accumulating houses. I can barely take care of the one we live in now. Put me in the jail and take all my money.

Mancala is a game of strategy where you move little colored polished glass pieces around a board trying to fill your till with as many pieces possible, while also capturing your opponent’s pieces. Initially, some of the best strategists among us turned out to be the younger ones. Both a 7- and 9-year-old coached me for awhile, then decided it would be more fun to beat me.

And yet I keep playing, each time thinking, “This will be the time I win.” Hope blooms eternal. Or at least for two or three games.

We had dinner with some of the grands the other night and they mentioned they have a new game. I nearly went face down on the table at the mere suggestion.

“We think you’ll like it, Grandma.”

I offered to clear the table while they played. They said no.

I offered to do the dishes. They said no again.

The game is called The How I Survived Game. A “judge” reads a dilemma from a card: “You woke up to find your mattress floating on a body of water.” “Your arms suddenly turned into spaghetti.”

Players have one minute to choose three picture cards from an assortment spread on the table. You then use three picture cards to tell the story of how you will survive. The judge awards coins to the best stories.

It is basically a game of imagination, exaggeration and hot air. Coin after coin came my way.

Finally. A board game at which a writer can excel.

Packing up the game, I noticed the subtitle, “Where Weird and Wacky Wins.” I finally found my niche in the game market.

 

There were three options for finding our destination in Chicago—two smart phones or the seven-year-old granddaughter in the backseat. The husband was leaning toward a smartphone, but I was leaning toward the kid.

Ordinarily, I might not be comfortable letting a child guide us through the nation’s third largest city, but she’s grown up here. She knows the bus lines, the train lines and six different ways to get to the zoo.

Plus, the day before, an aunt and uncle had told the girl that they had eaten at a restaurant across the street from where she takes music lessons. She named the restaurant and said, “On Lincoln Avenue?”

“Why, yes, that’s the one,” they answered, visibly impressed.

“That’s not where I always take lessons,” she said. “Sometimes I take lessons at a branch on Armitage.”

Meanwhile, the kid is jumping in her seat yelling, “Let me give directions. I know how to get us there!”

The husband reluctantly relents.

“Go two blocks and then turn right, Grandpa. Right is that way (she points), Grandma’s side of the car.”

It never hurts to be specific. We have a general idea of where we are going but are vague on details. We also have a general idea of right and left.

“Keep going until I say turn left,” she says. “Left will be—“

“Got it,” Grandpa says.

“Look! That’s where my daddy goes to the dentist.”

“She’s good,” I say.

“OK, not this light and not the next light but that light, waaaay up there, you’re going to turn left.”

The kid is doing great.

“Now we need Fullerton, Grandpa.”

We drive and drive and he says, “I think we missed Fullerton.”

“Nope, we didn’t miss Fullerton,” she says.

She is correct. Two more lights and we hit Fullerton.

“See that restaurant on the corner? It used to have a black awning, but then they replaced it with that red and gold. It’s pretty, don’t you think?”

I shoot him a look that says, “How could you ever doubt her?”

She tells him to take another left with short notice. We change lanes and zip through on a yellow.

“That was a tricky turn, wasn’t it, Grandpa?”

“I think we need to head right soon,” he says. “Shouldn’t we map it?”

“I know where we are, Grandpa. Oh, and see that over there? That’s the interstate you need to go home, only you’ll need to get on the other side.”

She’s right, that’s the way we’ll go home.

“I know we’re close,” Grandpa says.

I look back and see her scanning the side streets with a twinkle in her eye. And then she yells, “YA MISSED IT, GRANDPA!” She laughs wildly like she doesn’t know how we get around on our own.

After our event she says, “Why don’t you get out your smartphone?”

“Why do we need a smartphone when we have you?” I ask.

“So you can look up the nearest pizza place.”

Later, as in after pizza, we humbly consult our smartphones to get us to the interstate, feeling not so very smart.

 

It is nearly an act of bravery to scan the headlines these days. Violent crime is up, each new senseless murder triggers another wave of sorrow and the politicization of almost everything rips at the fabric of our being.

The official response to these events is usually hand wringing. Someone steps before a microphone and demands an end to the bad behavior, as though the perps are glued to the nightly news, hanging on every word.

The building blocks that hold us together are crumbling. Many of those building blocks are beyond our spheres of influence. But one is within reach. The family.

As Pope John Paul II famously said, “As the family goes, so goes the nation and so goes the whole world in which we live.”

Why is the family key? Because families are the parts that compose the whole. Families are microcosms of the pillars that sustain cultures, communities and nations.

Every family is a microcosm of government. A family is where children learn about accountability, rights and responsibilities, checks and balances. A family is where children learn how to resolve differences and to respect the rights to property and privacy.

It is in the family where basic economic principles are taught: the link between earning and spending; how to plan and budget; the consequences of not planning and budgeting; and the importance of giving, whether you have a lot or a little.

Every family serves as every child’s first school. Every parent is a child’s first teacher. It is parents who bear the ultimate responsibility for education. Parents are the first to nurture curiosity and an appreciation for books and music, and create spaces where children can create and explore. Above all, a family is where children learn how to think and reason and separate fact from fiction.

The family mirrors a place of worship as well. The family is where children learn first lessons of faith, ideas about who God is, the meaning and purpose of life, and that every human being is our brother or our sister, for we are all of one blood, created in the image of God.

The family even serves as a microcosm of health care. It is in the family where children learn personal health habits, how to care for someone who is ill and, sometimes, even how to care for the dying. Tenderness and compassion usually take root in the home.

All that said, you can be intentional about family and still have family members who make awful choices for a variety of reasons. There are no guarantees with family; even so, you don’t throw in the towel at the starting gate or give up short of the finish line. None of us can afford to give up on family. Family is the most important investment you can ever make.

So, who is my family? Phrased another way, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

Yes, a thousand times yes. You don’t have to “be” family to act like family. We can all lend a hand—when we see a small everyday need, someone needs a word of encouragement, or someone is facing a crisis and needs others to stand alongside them.

The health of families is key to returning the nation to good health, because the whole is only as strong as the parts.