Tag Archives: wordsisters

A Simple Thank You

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“I’m not a kid, anymore”, my son said. Why was I then having to cajole him into writing thank you cards? Isn’t that an adult thing? Jody and I had a gathering of up to fifty people to celebrate – and more importantly – to recognize his graduation from Dunwoody College of Technology. 

Our son didn’t want a basket to be set out for cards. “It looks like I expect something, then,” he said.  

He wore a hooded sweatshirt, graciously accepted the cards given to him, and slid the cards into his hoodie pocket. Later he transferred the cards to his cubby.

My son graduated from Dunwoody with honors. Earlier, I had pointed to his Cum Laude and Outstanding Attendance designation on the commencement program. “You did that,” I said. “Me and Mama Jody never once got you up for school. We never once asked you if you had class work to do. You did that.”

He looked pleased. “I know.”

But, to write a thank you card?

Ever since our son and daughter could hold a crayon, the expectation was to send thank you cards for birthday and holiday gifts. In some ways, it was easy for them. A thank you card is made of two halves. Our son would have one half and our daughter the other. They each would draw a picture displaying their own unique personality. Jody and I would address and mail the cards.

Juan balked at drawing a picture. “I’m not a kid, anymore.”

In retrospect, I probably should have expected his pushback sooner.

My son and daughter are members of the first social generation to have grown up with access to the Internet. They are labeled digital natives. Both consume digital information quickly and comfortably through electronic devices and platforms.

Where does that leave the digital immigrants? The grandparents, aunts and uncles, and family friends who grew up dominated by print before the advent of the Internet.

We would like a thank you card, and we would like our children to send thank you cards.

Is it enough for our children to say thank you in person when handed a card? I’m sure that my son did that. He is sociable, polite and courteous. I’m old-fashioned. I haven’t let go of the idea that the written word is important. Our son did end up sending thank you cards. He did the absolute bare minimum.

Will thank you cards, thank you texts, emails, etc. become antiquated? Will it be all thought, all energy driven? Appreciation transmitted without electronics. Mind to mind. A glow of light. If asked, the children will say that we are already there. It’s us digital immigrants that must catch up.

Adventure Travel

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Challenging, uncertain conditions, erratic weather, steep ascents, and descents.

Tour du Mont Blanc (TMB), one of the most popular long-distance walks in Europe, also described my internal climate. The TMB is a 112- mile hiking trail that circles Mont Blanc in France, Italy, and Switzerland.

“Let’s go,” I told Jody. “This is something for US.”

In April, Jody and I volunteered for 25 sporting and entertainment events at 5 different venues to raise grant funds for Juan and Crystel’s schooling. In May we are scheduled for 18 events.

Kosher stand at Twins stadium

Jody and I often manage the kosher stand at the Twins stadium. It was there, while grilling kosher hot dogs and vegan sriracha brats with the smell of onions permeating every piece of my clothing that bad weather started coming in. Overlooking third base, I had the distinct feeling, I don’t want to do this anymore.

The TMB is a classic long-distance hike. Jody and I did a classic parenting move and overextended ourselves. I wanted to bust out of myself. Explode.

I started researching international challenging hikes. The uphills of the TMB are consistently steep and over a long distance. Most days hikers are hiking through at least one mountain pass, though sometimes two or three. Often hikers are not able to see the pass from the trailhead for that day, and if you look too far ahead, it could feel like an endless amount of hiking.

Perfect.

We were hiking that terrain now.

Taking time at the dog park

I don’t want a day to go by without me being in it. Sitting on my patio, journaling, listening to the birds, feeling the sun’s warmth, pausing to see the trees sway and clouds flowing – that is my heaven. Closing my eyes, hearing it all.

Jody and I have shifted our paradigm to us. Less volunteering. More patio time. International hikes on the horizon. Already, I’m feeling more settled.

Though the TMB resembled my internal climate the Alpe Adria Trail (AAT) is more to my abilities. It is a long-distance trail that runs through three countries: from Austria, through Slovenia to Italy. It is often described as a pleasure hiker’s delight. Jody and I have signed up with a group to hike among mountain peaks, green valleys and along clear Alpine rivers and lakes. The trail connects the three countries from the Alpine glaciers to the Adriatic coast.

It’s not always, how are the children?  It’s also, how am I?

The Life You Live

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My great-grandmother Octavia had a difficult childhood that probably ended the day her father killed himself in front of his wife and children. The event was chronicled in the Green Bay newspaper because it took place on a public street as his former wife planted fence posts at the edge of their property.  Octavia would marry a decent man who took her on a train trip to Chicago, provided generously, and shared decades of marriage. They lost their youngest daughter, who died after giving birth to my father, then helped raise him.

My father’s life had plenty of ups and downs which meant he grew up in the homes of his grandparents and a few uncles as well as his father. As he waited to die, my father said he was most looking forward to meeting his mother on the other side.

As today’s wars rip apart families and their homes, thousands of children find themselves without the support of biological adult relatives. Many of the displaced children of Ukraine and Gaza haven’t lived this life in their past. But this is the life they now know.

Some of us had wonderful families with great parents. Some of us grew up carefully avoiding an angry parent, a parent with mental health challenges, maybe in families always on the brink of some sort of disaster. Regardless the life we lived, we are now role models and sentinels for the future of today’s children. 

Decades ago, my husband and I cherished the good wishes and Mother’s Day cards that were shared during the early stages of a first pregnancy. The next year we stumbled through Mother’s Day following a premature still birth of twins. The following year we had a five-month-old. We know folks who were not able to become parents, folks who chose to not become parents, babies who were amazing surprises and a few not exactly celebrated surprises. Regardless of how early years play out, all kids grow into adults. Their 

As we celebrate the 2024 parenting holidays, the challenge is to embrace our adult responsibility of helping children and young adults walk confidently toward their futures. A helpful hand, a few kind words, the demonstration of how bumpy steps can be traveled, should be extended by anyone regardless of physical parenting status. For those who have a mother, hopefully the years were good and you’re paying it forward. May your children celebrate the family you’ve created. May others remember your support so the lives they live are more smooth than bumpy.

Gotcha Day

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Ani, Rosa, Juan, Aryanna (Juan’s girlfriend)

“We missed Juan’s Coming Home Day,” Jody said. Jody and I were doing our usual morning routine with her sitting on the dog bed, her back to the furnace. Buddy and Sadie next to her. Jody and the dogs love the furnace heat in the early morning hours. I reclined with a blanket on the couch. Her memory was jogged by reading a Facebook post about a family celebrating their child’s Gotcha day.   

“I don’t mind,” I said. “I’m not sure that it’s important to them. Maybe it just brings up trauma.”

Jody nodded. An unspoken agreement that we weren’t going to raise the issue.

Coming Home Day, as we have termed it, was the day that Juan and Crystel came home to us from Guatemala. Born six weeks apart, they came home within weeks of each other.

When they were young, we celebrated as if it were another birthday. Cakes, presents, MOA visits, concerts, and waterparks.

It was a day to recognize us coming together as a family and to acknowledge their birth moms.

“Oh, your kids are so lucky,” people often say to us. Even Jody will say, “When I come back, I want to come back as your child.” The last time she said it, which wasn’t that long ago, I said, “You do realize that you’re not saying that you want to come back as my partner.” She laughed and laughed at the truth of it.

It would be so easy to not complicate Juan and Crystel’s adoption and rest with the belief that they are so fortunate.

Recently, I had a dream where I was at a large extended family gathering. Aunts and uncles. Cousins. I was in my twenties. I chatted with relatives, played with the youngsters. I kept an eye out for my birth family. They were late. Delayed. Then, I realized they weren’t coming. There was always so much going on in my home that plans often got waylaid. Or it just wasn’t important for them to come even though the celebration was for me.

I felt this void. This loss. This emptiness. A hole where blood family should be.

I woke up wondering about this empty space for Juan and Crystel. Do they have a dream where their birth family doesn’t make it to their celebration?

Crystel’s birth family

There is trauma in being abandoned. Given up. Relinquished.

Jody and I have done what we could to make them whole with travels to Guatemala, birth family meetings, and name changes.

At five-years-old, they asked, “Whose belly did I come from, yours or Mama Jody’s?” Jody and I explained that there was a third mama in Guatemala. The kids persisted, “No! Mama Bef or Mama Jody!?!”

A hole where blood family should be.

Baggage

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