A Writer's Voice

Finding Inspiration in a Surprising Place

2010-07-20T15:01:00.000-05:00

I decided to join Facebook on a sunny, spring morning after turning my nose up at the social networking platform for months. I was a hardcore Twitter girl. I don’t remember why I changed my mind, but I did.

One of the first people I connected—or rather reconnected—with was my friend Julie. I met Julie in my first year of junior high. We were 12 years old and became good friends. We stayed that way until high school graduation, when life took us in different directions. But I thought of her often and hoped she was well.

We quickly made up for lost time via Facebook. I learned what she’d done in the almost 20 years since graduation. I looked at photos of her family. Soon, it was like no time had passed at all.

However, I was surprised to find myself inspired by Julie. Every morning, she would rave about what a beautiful day it was and wish everyone good morning. She would come home from work and wish everyone a good evening. She’d find five minutes to tell everyone good night.

Julie has bad days, like we all do. The difference is she doesn’t let them hold her back. Her morning may not have been the best, but the afternoon is going to be better. She gets tired, but she’s grateful for the job that allows her to take care of her husband and daughters. If she has trouble sleeping, then she’s grateful for the extra time allowed in the morning for a walk in the countryside. Julie takes life’s lemons and really does turn them into lemonade.

I look forward to Julie’s Facebook posts and messages because they are reminders that life is a blessing, even when it throws everything it possibly can at you. I’m grateful that, almost 25 years after we met (!), I can still call her my friend.

A couple of months ago, Julie posted a note on her Facebook page titled “The Positive Side of Me.” The last two paragraphs moved me:

“Everyday, EVERY person in this world wakes up with a decision to make... be happy and feel blessed with what you have or be pissy and complain about what you don't have... I refuse to complain... It took me years to realize that I have exactly what I NEED: Love, security, a home, a job, and THE best family a person can ask for...

“So each day when you wake up, ask yourself how your day will be... Only YOU make that decision. Only YOU decide how you will live your life...”

I want to live my life like Julie: full of gratitude and counting my blessings while being a good friend.

Love Letters

2010-06-27T16:06:00.000-05:00

I recently read an article in Vanity Fair about the “Romance of the Century” between Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. The article is an excerpt from a new book about the romance and marriages between the two actors.

The article touched on the already well-known facts about the two: they met on the set of Cleopatra, had an affair and were eventually married twice. But what stood out for me—even more than the large jewels that Burton frequently bestowed upon Taylor—was the fact that he wrote her love letters. She shared them with the authors of the article/book, and they quote from them extensively.

The letters are beautiful and passionate. Burton needed no special occasion to write them. In fact, he wrote one letter while Taylor was asleep in the next room. In the letter, he writes “I have decided that for a second or two, the precious potential of you in the next room is the only thing in the world worth living for.”

Reading this article made me wonder: do people even write love letters anymore? In a world of texts, emails, tweets and Facebook posts, is there room for an old fashioned love letter? I’d like to think so.

Among my most prized possessions are love letters my grandfather wrote to my grandmother. He died when I was six, and my grandmother never really talked about him. When she died, she left the letters to me, with a note asking me to treasure them as she did. I am grateful to her because these letters gave me a chance to get to know both my grandfather and the love they shared. My favorite is the one in which he wrote about a baby on the way. That baby was my mother.

According to the Vanity Fair article, Burton even wrote Taylor a letter a few hours before he died. The article stated she would not allow the authors to have a copy of that letter. Instead, she read it to them. She received it the day she arrived home from his memorial service, and it has remained in a dresser drawer next to her bed since.

That’s love.

What is Good?

2010-06-22T09:26:00.001-05:00

One of my goals is to be a good person, so I spend a lot of my time thinking about what that means.

Good is a simple word, yet is has several different meanings: of a favorable character; bountiful; attractive; pleasant; kind . . . and that’s just a start. But do any of these meanings fit my view of what is a good person?

Being a good person means being the kind of friend I would want to have: loyal, caring, unselfish, giving. The person who is always there. The one who never judges, even when you do something incredibly stupid. Someone who follows the “golden rule.”

A good person accepts you for you, both the good and the bad. A good person is honest, but with tact. The intent is to be a clear communicator, not to hurt someone else.

A good person sees the beauty in the world and practices random acts of kindness. A good person forgives others and asks for forgiveness of themselves. A good person loves unconditionally, yet asks for nothing in return.

Some days I hit the mark. Others I fail miserably. I might come close on others. But I won’t stop trying.

Human Nature

2010-06-20T05:59:00.003-05:00

I’ve learned a lot about people in the past week.

Some of us will reach out through our own grief and comfort others, pushing aside our own sadness to make someone else feel better.

Some of us are scared of connecting with others and push us away. Anything to avoid being hurt. Some of us don’t know what we want and send mixed messages.

Some of us are spontaneous. We think nothing of dropping everything and going long distances just because we miss our friends.

Friendship is the tie that binds, and that tie is strong even after time, distance and space. It is amazing how we can pick up where we left off—like time stopped for a moment.

People surprise me, thrill me, disappoint me . . . and never cease to amaze me.

I'm Going to Tell Your Dad

2010-05-25T17:50:00.000-05:00

Today I learned that the high school in my hometown was vandalized over the weekend in an apparent senior class prank. Curious, (let’s be honest—nosy) I went to the hometown newspaper’s website and read the story.

The vandals not only trashed the school, but being in the social media age, they videotaped their prank and posted it to You Tube. The article had a link to the video, so I watched it.

As the camera panned across the building to show graffiti and toilet paper, I realized I never did anything like that growing up for two reasons: Mom and Dad.

See, they terrified me. Or rather, hearing this phrase did: “I’m going to tell your dad.”

My dad was the bad cop in my parents’ disciplinary routine. Mom would give it her best, but if she felt that my brothers and I weren’t responding, she’d trot out the magic phrase. She never bluffed, either. If she uttered those six words, she meant it. And boy was it scary.

To be honest, my parents spanked me twice in my life, and I deserved it. The threat of spanking was enough for me. My dad is a big guy. He wore a thick leather belt. All he had to do after being informed of whatever infraction my brothers and I had committed was to take off said belt and snap it. I’ve never heard a sound scarier than that. The brothers and I would cry and beg forgiveness, throwing out promises to never do it again after hearing that snap.

The thought of being punished by my dad was enough to keep me on the straight and narrow. It wasn’t worth it. I wasn’t perfect (I’m still not), but the thought of punishment from Pops made me think twice before doing anything.

I could hear Mom’s voice in my head (“I’m going to tell your dad”) as I noticed the faces of the guilty students reflected in the glass trophy case in several scenes in the short video. If I had done something like that, I would have called the police myself when it was over and begged them to take me to jail. It would have been safer there.

I was visiting my parents last week when I heard my mom say the magic words while talking to my brother. My heart stopped and my stomach flipped before I realized it was in a completely different context.

It still works after all these years.

A Lesson Learned

2010-05-24T18:58:00.000-05:00

One of the blogs I enjoy reading on a regular basis is The Simple Dollar. While it’s a personal finance blog, the author also writes some great “life lesson” posts.

A post today reminded me of an important lesson I learned myself in the past couple of years. In his post, the author writes about how being negative comes at a great cost. I couldn’t agree more.

We are always going to come into contact with negative people in life, or people who behave in ways that don’t meet our approval. That’s a given. However, while you cannot control their behavior, you can control how you react to it.

That is a simple idea, yet it’s one that changed my life for the better. I used to let negative people drag me down. When I would see someone bending the rules, it would upset me. I would vent. I was not a nice person to be around.

I wish I could tell you the moment I discovered that great life lesson, but I cannot. There was no a-ha, Oprah type moment with bright lights and music. It just simply dawned on me that people are going to behave in ways that either don’t meet my standards or are just plain bad. But that doesn’t mean I have to let it get to me.

Because I cannot control their behavior. I can only control my own. I remind myself that whenever someone does something that upsets me. I have a choice. I can get upset and vent or I can let it go and get on with my day. I have been a much happier and healthier person since coming to this realization.

I have a good life. I am blessed with a wonderful family, friends, and a career that allows me to take care of myself. There’s a roof over my head (and I bought it all by myself) and food on my table. I have two furballs who bring me joy with their silly antics. There is so much pain, hunger and suffering in this world. I have no reason not to be happy. I choose happiness.

Happy Mothers Day

2010-05-09T12:16:00.000-05:00

I was embarrassed by and often ashamed of my mother growing up. She was loud, brash and wore too much makeup.

I felt this way for years, even as a young adult, until my mother was diagnosed with liver disease. She was admitted to the hospital, stayed four days and came home. She made an emergency return two days later after almost dying on the living room sofa.

She went on to spend the next two months in the hospital, fighting for her life. I learned a lot about her in those two months. I learned a lot about myself as well.

Her doctors had basically written her off, and they often seemed annoyed that she was there, taking up their time and a hospital bed. She would ignore them and remind them that she would be going home. She was not going to die, and she “sure as hell was not going to die in this miserable place.”

My mother spent every day of that two month hospital stay being poked, prodded and forced to undergo some incredibly painful medical procedures. Her failing liver meant that fluid collected in her abdomen, and that required the doctors to drain her abdomen several times a week in a process they referred to as tapping. Yes, like a keg. For some reason, the nurses would collect the fluid in mason jars and leave it on the windowsill in the hospital room. One time, there were six jars.

I never realized how tough my mother was until that hospital stay. She beat the odds and everyone’s expectations. She looked death in the face and kicked its ass. She’s never looked back. Her doctor is amazed each year when she returns for her annual checkups, and he uses her as an example to his other patients as someone who faced the odds, didn’t give up and beat them. He even wrote a medical journal article about her progress.

My mother is still brash and loud and wears too much makeup, but I am no longer embarrassed by her. Her brush with death taught me a lesson I should have learned long before I did. It does not matter what a person looks like on the outside. It matters what they are on the inside—what kind of character they are. I am proud to say that my mother is a good person. She is kind and caring, especially when it comes to her three children. I laugh because she still answers “What?” when she hears a child scream “Mom!” in the grocery store. She still insists we have family birthday parties, and she still cooks the birthday child’s favorite foods.

I am grateful I realized this before it was too late. Happy Mothers Day, Mom. I love you.

A Dream Come True

2010-04-11T21:02:00.000-05:00

I have been a St. Louis Cardinals fan my entire life. I have attended hundreds of baseball games in two St. Louis stadiums, but I never met Fredbird.

I fell in love with Fredbird during one of my trips to Busch Stadium as a kid. I loved watching him dance on top of the dugouts and act silly. I’d laugh when he would climb into the stands and tease someone. I wondered if the people singled out for Fredbird’s attentions were embarrassed.

We always sat in the upper deck, so the chances of meeting him were slim. Every time we went to a game, I always hoped he would find his way to our seats, but he never did, causing me to leave the stadium just a little disappointed. Pops would always squeeze my hand and say “next time” when it was time to go home, but I knew that next time would never come.

Next time arrived today when I least expected it.

I was sitting at my organization’s booth at a festival when I looked outside the tent and caught a glimpse of that familiar red costume. Fredbird was there, and I wasn’t in the cheap seats.

I fished through my purse for my Blackberry and ran out of the tent and toward that large stuffed bird as if my life depended on it. “Fredbird,” I shouted, “I can’t believe you’re here!”

I was impatient as he posed for a photo with some kids, but I made sure I was next. The camera flash went off and he turned to me. “It’s you,” I said. “I can’t believe it’s really you!”

I’m sure the people around me thought I was crazy, but I didn’t care. This was Fredbird. I got a hug and someone was kind enough to take a photo for me. In that moment, I was a little kid again.

As soon as it was over, I called Pops. “Guess who I met?” I asked. I was so excited I could barely speak, and I didn’t give Pops I chance to finish. “Fredbird, Pops! I met Fredbird!”

He laughed at my enthusiasm. “I always knew you would,” he said.

Returning the Favor

2010-02-16T19:52:00.000-06:00

I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve taken my father home from the hospital. I somehow got the honor after his numerous heart surgeries. The routine was always the same: I’d wheel Pops and his huge bag of whatever my mother packed out of the hospital to my car, load Pops and his stuff in while lecturing him to watch his stitches. Once, after a triple bypass, the nurse told me Pops had to place “something soft” between the seat belt and his chest. All we had was a teddy bear the heart patients received in rehab (nicknamed “Sir Koffs A Lot”—no idea why), so I drove Pops home with a teddy bear nestled to his chest.

A friend once commented she didn’t know how I did it. It’s easy. I owe him.

I was in a terrible car accident shortly after my 18th birthday. I was a passenger in a car that hit a utility pole. I wasn’t wearing my seat belt and ended up taking out the windshield with my face. My injuries were extensive, especially to my forehead. It was sliced three quarters of the way across and down to the skull. I also had cuts on my chin, a fat lip, chipped tooth and a very bruised face.

I required 300 stitches in my forehead, and I had to wait hours for the bleeding to stop before the surgeon could sew me up. My father had jumped out of bed and made the 15 minute trip to the hospital in eight minutes to be with me. He made my mother stay home after my friend told him how serious my injuries were. He didn’t want her seeing me hurt.

When it was time to start the stitches, Pops refused to leave the exam room. The surgeon was much smaller than my father and didn’t want a fight, so he said Pops could stay with me. And I’m glad he did.

I wouldn’t have made it without him. The shots the nurse gave me to “numb the pain” hurt so badly I insisted she stop and that the surgeon just sew. The surgeon yelled at me for crying. Pops told me to squeeze his hand when it hurt. He told me later he thought I was going to break it.

It was years before my father told me how he almost fainted watching me get stitched up. But I couldn’t tell. I just stayed still, squeezing his hand to block out the excruciating pain while tears silently ran down my face. It took the surgeon two hours to close my gaping head wound.

So, all those times I’ve spent in the hospital with my dad, being annoyed by him, praying he will make it through yet another surgery and then trucking him home are nothing compared to what he did for me.

I haven’t been in a vehicle without a seat belt since then.

I'm the Only One

2010-02-01T20:20:00.000-06:00

I’m in the middle of taking a course on diversity and leadership. We’re studying gender, and that’s got me thinking about how gender plays out in my life.

I am the only girl in a family of boys. I don’t just mean my immediate family (2 brothers and me). I mean both sides of my extended family. My paternal grandparents have 10 grandchildren—9 boys and me. My maternal grandparents have six—five boys and, once again, me.

I am five of six on my mother’s side, so the real chance of having female cousins fell to my father’s side, where I am two of 10 in the birth order. My grandparents have five children born several years apart. There are 23 years between my father, the oldest, and his youngest sister. I never really thought about being the only girl until I was 11 and my aunt and uncle were expecting their first baby. I used to get so angry when my aunt would tell people they wanted a boy because we had plenty of them already. Disappointed flooded me when we got the call that yet another boy joined the family.

A year later, I got another chance. My aunt and uncle were having another baby. No way could this be a boy. Disappointed again. I didn’t get my hopes up when another aunt and uncle (when your father is the oldest of five, you have lots of aunts and uncles) announced they were expecting the following year. Glad I didn’t because—you guessed it—another boy. We were up to eight grandchildren at that point.

Five years went by before another grandchild was on the way. I thought this was going to be it. I was 19 and still hoping for another girl in the family. But it was Zachary instead of Christina, and I gave up. I accepted that I was going to be it.

My father’s youngest sister married then, but as the years went by and no kids, we just assumed they didn’t want or couldn’t have them. I got the shock of my life in 2003 when my aunt announced she was pregnant. Could I hope? After all these years and grandchildren—could we finally have another girl? This baby would be magic number 10. Surely the odds would be in favor of a girl.

I was visiting my parents when my aunt and uncle stopped by to visit. “We found out what we’re having,” my aunt said. I knew it by looking at her face and accepted defeat. Sean was born in December 2003, three months after I turned 30. I was destined to be surrounded by boys. Holding the tiny newborn at the hospital, I decided that wasn’t so bad.

When I tell people I’m the only girl on both sides of my family, they laugh and comment about how I must be spoiled. I wasn’t. I was treated the same as the boys, especially in my immediate family. I had to mow the lawn and help my father around our farm just like my brothers. My brothers had to help with meals, dishes and laundry like me. My father taught me how to shoot a gun, throw a punch and even drive a tractor. I never once felt like I couldn’t do anything because I was a girl, and I will be forever grateful to my parents for that.

My special place in our family hit me the last time I saw my Grandma Betty. I went to visit her in the hospital the day before she died to say good-bye. I was sitting next to her bed when her doctor came into the room. “Who is this?” he asked her.

“This is my only granddaughter,” she announced, placing extra emphasis on the word only. “She is special.”

And at that moment, I didn’t mind being the only girl.

Skin Deep

2010-01-04T14:36:00.000-06:00

I was waiting in line for coffee when I noticed the woman staring at me. Curious, I held her gaze until she shuffled a bit before blurting out, “You have pretty skin.”

There was a time when that compliment was rare, even unheard of. Growing up, if I caught someone staring at me, they would have done so because of my skin tone.

A polite term for what I am is pale. My grandmothers used to call it “alabaster.” The kids I grew up with called me “dead” or “super white” or “like a corpse.” I am so fair that I can see veins underneath my skin. I have never had a tan, and even the fake tan products can’t help me.

Growing up, I wanted nothing more than a tan. I would spend hours outside in the summers between sixth and eighth grades, with my beach towel spread on the lawn and me poured into a bikini in hopes of getting a golden glow. Despite my best efforts, I would end up pink or red if the sunburn were bad. Then, just as quickly, I would fade back to white. I hated the first day back to school, when my classmates were bronze and I was still “like a corpse.”

The worst part of being so fair was the questions. Why was I so white? Didn’t I tan? Why not try a tanning bed? Or makeup? As if I wanted to be so pale.

I finally gave up on the tanning quest after an eighth grade physical. I asked my doctor why I was so pale, and he did a great job of patiently explaining to me about melanin and skin cancer and sunscreen. Terrified of the word cancer after my grandfather’s death from the disease, I immediately started wearing sunscreen whenever I was outside—a habit that continues to this day.

The name calling stopped after I “embraced the pale,” but there was still a part of me that longed for a tan. Bronzed skin seemed so beautiful and healthy. But then I went away to college and met and noticed people like me. Fair skinned, alabaster, pale. I was no longer alone. I started getting compliments instead of taunts.

And now we’ve come full circle. Thanks to Twilight and True Blood, pale skin is “in.” The trait that caused me so much grief growing up is coveted. It may have taken vampires to make it acceptable, but I’ll take it if it means another kid won’t be teased for not having a tan.

As for me, I’m doing fine with the paleness. I still avoid the sun and religiously wear sunscreen. I have few wrinkles or lines, and I still get carded from time to time. Someone told me the other day that “there’s no way you can be 30.” I’m not—I’m 36. I’ll take it.

A New Year

2010-01-01T09:04:00.000-06:00

A new year brings with it the promise of new beginnings and fresh starts. Many of us have resolutions. We want to lose weight, stop smoking, exercise, read more or a host of other goals too numerous to mention. Today, the first day of 2010, we are brimming with excitement, energy and promise. This will be “the” year.

I have not yet decided exactly what I want to accomplish in 2010. But while I think about what the new year will hold for me, I will also take the time to be grateful for what I have. My wonderful family and friends. A challenging, steady job that allows me to take care of myself while meeting my professional needs. I own my home. There is food on the table and money in the bank. I am in good health, and after years of illness, so are my parents. My two furballs are happy, healthy and bringing joy to my days. I could go on.

Today, the temptation to focus on what to improve is great. But don’t forget about the joys and blessings that already fill your days. Want what you already have—not what you don’t.

Reframing the List

2009-11-21T19:13:00.001-06:00

The request arrived even earlier this year in the form of an email.

“Have you thought about your Christmas List?” my mother wrote. “I’d like to start shopping early this year.”

It was mid-October. She usually waits until early November before she starts asking (or nagging, depending on my mood) and gives my brothers and me a Thanksgiving deadline. But for some reason she decided to start early, and I felt the pressure.

It’s been a month since she first made the request, and I still haven’t attempted a list. I always struggle with it, but this year seems even more challenging than usual. There isn’t anything I need, and I can’t think of anything I want.

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about why I struggle with such a simple task, asking my parents to buy me gifts. I used to think it was about clutter and not wanting a bunch of “stuff” in my house, but I realize it’s deeper than that.

It’s about money. Something we never had much of growing up.

We never went hungry, or were homeless or anything like that. We always had food on the table, clothes on our backs and a roof over our heads. But I always knew that it wasn’t easy at times for my parents. My father worked 41 years at a job he didn’t care for, barely missing a day of work and putting in plenty of overtime, in order to take care of his family.

My father is retired now and providing for my mother and himself with a pension and social security. The same roof remains over their heads, and food and clothing are plenty. In theory, since they no longer support my brothers and me, money for Christmas shouldn’t be an issue.

But in reality, there are bills. Both my parents have battled major illness in the past eight years. Both almost died. They survived, but their health requires a large chunk of that retirement income. They don’t mention it, but I’ve seen the thick binder of medical bills that sits on my father’s desk next to the computer.

The thought of them spending money on me makes me feel guilty. The guilt makes me struggle with the Christmas List. Yes, my mother asks for it. But the guilt is still there, hanging over my head like a storm cloud.

I mentioned my struggle to a friend. She suggested I reframe the idea of the Christmas List and look at it from my mother’s point-of-view. Mom enjoys shopping, especially at the holidays. She wants my brothers and me to have a happy Christmas, and in her mind that involves presents wrapped underneath a tree. She also doesn’t want to disappoint and buy us something we don’t want, like or already own, so that’s why she places such value on the list. Write a list, my friend suggested. Don’t worry about if they can afford it. They know their limits. Enjoy making her happy.

And that’s what I’m going to do.

Acceptance

2009-11-04T15:21:00.000-06:00

Merriam Webster defines acceptance as “the act of being accepting.” To accept something is “to receive willingly” or “to agree to.”

I accept that many people do not hold beliefs that are compatible to mine. That is fine. I support their right to their beliefs, as well as their right to support their opinions—even when I disagree. Some of the people I admire, love and hold near and dear have different ideas and opinions from mine. I accept that. That is what makes America great.

However, I do not support name calling. Just because someone does not agree with you does not make her a Nazi, a whiny liberal, an idiot, self-righteous or any other of the host of hateful names I’ve seen people called today. I do not accept name calling.

It is one thing to disagree, but do it without name calling. If you cannot form an argument without resorting to name calling, then work on your rhetorical and critical thinking skills. We are adults. Act like it.

Baseball Heaven

2009-10-09T11:26:00.000-05:00

I grew up in what is known as “baseball heaven,” and I attended my first St. Louis Cardinals game at the tender age of 11 days old. My father’s rationale was they already had the tickets, so why not? Thus, I (like most St. Louis residents) began my love affair with baseball at an early age.

The first game I remember attending was as a five-year-old in what is now known as “Busch 2” since the Cardinals opened their new stadium in 2006. The entire family went, but I got to sit next to my dad. He taught me to keep score with a scorecard and a grubby pencil. I made it until the seventh inning when the game got too complicated. We were up so high that the players looked like ants. Mom bought me a pennant and scolded me for hitting the bald guy in front of me in the head with it. That pennant still hangs on the wall of my childhood bedroom at my parents’ house. It’s yellow with age but the familiar birds on bat logo is still visible.

My family attended at least one Cardinals game every summer. My mom would load my brothers and me into the family truckster and we would pick my dad up from work before heading over to St. Louis. We always got to the stadium early enough to watch batting practice. We didn’t have much money, so we never got to sit close to the field. When I reached junior high, I earned ticket vouchers for my good grades, so we got to go to two games during those summers. I always sat next to my dad, whom I call Pops, and we always kept score—at least until the seventh inning when I seemed to get confused and would give up. The players still looked like ants, even after I got glasses.

I loved those games with my family, but I wanted to sit closer. I asked Pops why we couldn’t. He was blunt with honesty. We couldn’t afford it. The “nosebleed section,” as he called it, was it. But I wanted more.

I thought about my childhood at Busch 2 when I met Pops outside the stadium this past Sunday. It was the final game of the regular season. I was nervous with excitement. He knew we had “good seats,” but he didn’t know just how good. He was just happy to be at the game for a father-daughter day, but when I handed him his ticket, his eyes grew huge. He looked at me and said, “Wow.”

Then I walked into Busch Stadium, the home of the baseball team he introduced me to all those years ago, and led the man who could never afford anything but the nosebleed section down to the seats right behind the Cardinals dugout. It took all I had not to cry. Pops looked like a kid on Christmas morning. Players signed the new baseball I brought along for him. He took photos while never losing the smile on his face.

We kept score on shiny scorecards with new pencils. And I made it to the end of the game.

I Want to Shave My Legs, Not Make Meth

2009-09-27T20:18:00.001-05:00

It started out like an ordinary shopping trip. I decided to stop at the local Walgreen’s to pick up a few things before heading home for the day. I walked down the store aisles with list in hand, tossing items into a basket until I got to this one:

Razor blades.

I stood in the aisle, puzzled for a few moments while I searched for the blades I wanted to purchase. I was getting annoyed and impatient as I scanned the aisle until my eyes fell upon a display case of razors and replacement blades.

It was locked up. As in, with a key. As in, I needed to find a store clerk to open this display if I wanted my damn razor blades.

I briefly thought about going to another store, but curiosity got the better of me. I had to know why some . . . not all . . . of the women’s razors and blades were locked up. I noticed none of the men’s razors or blades were locked in a case.

After several minutes of walking around the store and briefly contemplating just picking the lock on the annoying display case, I finally found a sales clerk. As we walked over to the display, I asked why it was locked. “Oh, it’s policy,” she said as she whipped out a key ring with enough keys for everyone in the neighborhood to get at least two.

“What do you mean, it’s policy?” I asked. “Are people actually stealing razors and blades? Why aren’t the men’s razors locked up as well?”

Sighing heavily, she handed me the package I wanted and said, “And you have to pay for these in cosmetics” before walking away and leaving me with my package and unanswered questions.

If this is Walgreen’s “policy,” then they’ve lost me as a customer. I don’t appreciate the inconvenience and hassle when I just want a package of razor blades. After all, I just want to shave my legs . . . not make meth.

The Halfway Point

2009-09-14T18:57:00.001-05:00

Today I turn 36-years-old. It’s not a “special birthday,” as a co-worker pointed out last week. It doesn’t end in a “0” or “5,” and I’ve yet to see a “Lordy, Lordy, look who’s 36” birthday card.

But for me, it is a special birthday. I have now reached the halfway point.

I have spent half my life with and without the six scars on my face, the largest of which runs across most of my forehead. The remaining five scars are on my chin—three underneath my chin and two smaller ones on my chin. But the forehead scar is the one that reminds me.

I see it every time I look in the mirror. Others claim not to notice it. I’m not sure if I believe them, but I know where to look. After all, it is my face. The doctor who stitched up the gaping hole in my forehead took extra care with his work, and for this I am grateful. He left me with a white line that has faded over time.

When the wound was fresh and held together with black thread (not unlike Frankenstein’s monster), many would look at the white bandage on my forehead covering the wound and suggest “a nice haircut with bangs.” The bolder ones would mention plastic surgery. I often wonder what they would suggest if they saw the wound itself, but I always wore a bandage in public. The first few weeks after the car accident, I had white gauze wrapped around my head, a fat lip, chipped tooth, two black eyes and a swollen nose. It would be weeks before I would get the gauze removed and get by with a forehead only bandage. I had hair down my back then, much like I do now. The first thing I did after leaving the doctor’s office the day he took the gauze off my head was to go to the hairdresser to get my hair washed. When she mentioned there was blood in the water despite all my attempts to scrub it out of my hair, I told her to cut it off. It would be years before I would have long hair again.

The suggested plastic surgery was not necessary, thanks to the surgeon’s skill that long night in the ER. I haven’t researched it, but I sometimes wonder if technology has improved enough for a surgeon to remove the scar. However, I’ve had this scar half my life now, and I’m used to it. The scar is also a reminder. It reminds me of what I survived, how lucky I was to basically walk away from a bad accident. I think of how people pointed and whispered and stared when they saw my battered face and how I learned to stop worrying about what others think and to be more compassionate. My scars taught me words can be cruel and to be careful with mine.

When I think about what my scar represents, I am grateful for these lessons.

For I Love Her So

2009-07-30T21:27:00.002-05:00

The envelope was big and bulky, with my name and address written in an unfamiliar, loopy cursive scrawl. Curiosity got the better of me as I ripped it open.

Nancy is the last of my great aunts and the youngest sister of my maternal grandfather. She was born when my grandfather was 32 years old, so he was more like a father to her than a sibling. She is only 10 years old than her niece—my mother.

I last saw Aunt Nancy almost four years ago at the party my brothers and I hosted for our parents’ 40th wedding anniversary. It was the first time I officially met, and I was stunned at how much she looked like my grandfather. It had been 25 years since I last saw that face, with its dark complexion, high cheekbones and lined forehead. She still had a thick head of coal black hair with a tiny touch of gray, just like my grandfather did in his 70s. I couldn’t help but stare, and she couldn’t help but notice.

Aunt Nancy was very kind and gracious to me, answering the many questions I had about my grandfather. He died when I was six, so I had many. “He would have been proud of you,” she said, squeezing my hand before she left for the evening. I fought back tears and wished for time I would never have.

There was no contact with Aunt Nancy until the bulky envelope showed up in the mail. Inside I found a bundle of letters tied with a red ribbon and a note from my aunt. She found these letters while cleaning out her attic and wanted me to have them.

These weren’t just any old letters. They were love letters, written by my grandfather to my grandmother, and there were dozens and dozens of them. How nice, I thought. Pa wrote Nana letters when they were dating, or “courting” as he called it. But as I paged through the large pile, I quickly realized the letters went beyond the courtship stage. There was a letter written on their wedding day. One written the day after my mother, his only child, was born. And many, many more in between—not to mention after that. He wrote letters to my Nana literally until the day before he died.

I organized the pile chronologically and sat down to read. Some letters were long, while others were short. I noticed a pattern. Pa always dated his letters in the upper right hand corner of the page in the European way with the date first, then the month and finally the year. He always called Nana “My dearest Zelma” and always mentioned the weather. They were always signed “All my love, Deacon.” I still do not know how he got that nickname.

He apparently traveled during their marriage, because those letters were longer and more detailed. The letters written from home were more like love notes, but they were still beautiful nonetheless. His language was poetic in its simpleness, and there was nothing sappy or embarrassing about his prose. His love for my grandmother leaped off the page, even when he wrote about the most unromantic things, such as planting tomatoes in the garden or hitting my mother’s dog with the car for the “umpteenth time.”

As I read, I started to get a picture of a life unfamiliar to me. I laughed out loud when I realized he was writing about me: “Our granddaughter has your hair color and your stubbornness.” I laughed even harder when I realized the letter was written during the weeks I stayed with my grandparents after the birth of my youngest brother. I desperately wanted a sister and cried with disappointment during these weeks. I obviously annoyed my grandfather, but he never let me see it. I just remember lots of hugs and many new Barbie dolls.

My grandfather eventually lost his voice to cancer, so he depended on the written word even more. He tended to reminisce in the letters written during his illness, while worrying about how my grandmother would cope after he was gone. But in the end, he knew she would be fine because she was strong. He was right.

The final letter in the pile wasn’t addressed to my grandmother. It was written to my mother just days before my grandfather lost his long battle with throat cancer. He ended it with these words: “Take care of your mother, for I love her so.”

My tears stained the old pages. I had the answers I was looking for.

Fathers Day

2009-06-19T20:59:00.002-05:00

It was supposed to be another angioplasty, but this didn’t feel right. We had been in the hospital waiting room for much longer than usual. Every so often, the surgeon would come out and say it was “going to be a bit longer.”

But it never dawned on me that something really was wrong when we were summoned to the ICU waiting room so we could go see my father. I was standing next to my mother, stifling my yawns, when the other family in the room became visibly upset. The woman started crying and saying someone was coding.

That someone was my father.

He was having a heart attack while his family stood in the next room, and we had no idea. We just stood there and waited for what seemed like an eternity, until the nurse came and took us back to our familiar waiting room. I still hadn’t put two and two together.

Pops’ surgeon looked exhausted when he finally showed up to the waiting room. Grimfaced, he pulled off his skull cap and sat next to my mother. He explained that the stent he placed into my father’s main artery was not the correct size, and that a blood clot had formed between the stent and the artery wall, causing my father to go into cardiac arrest. They managed to get the stent out, dissolve the clot and insert the correct size stent.

Pops wasn’t even close to being out of the woods yet. He was in intensive care on a lung machine that would breathe for him while his body tried to recover from his latest heart surgery. We had been through so many heart surgeries with Pops, both angioplasties and bypass, that we were expecting the usual routine of a few hours of surgery, stop in and visit Pops and then go to dinner and home exhausted.

We were allowed to go to ICU to see Pops before we were told to go home and rest. He was unconscious. I was 32 years old, a year younger than my mother when she lost her own father.

No one outside the five of us knew about this latest surgery. Pops didn’t want to worry anyone and asked us to call his mother and siblings after it was over. My older brother made the calls while I sat in the waiting room with Mom. My younger brother was living in San Diego at the time and couldn’t afford to come home.

I lived only a few miles from the hospital, so it was decided I would stay with Pops while my older brother stayed with Mom. The long trips to the hospital exhausted her, and we didn’t see the point in her just sitting there. My brother would stay on the farm with her and take care of things there, while I handled the hospital. He got the better end of the bargain, but nothing would have kept me from my father.

He remained on the lung machine for two days before he became strong enough to breathe on his own. I arrived at ICU shortly after the machine was removed. I had tears in my eyes when he motioned to me. His voice was barely a whisper. “Why was I being held hostage?”

I was confused. “Daddy, you’re in the hospital,” I replied. “You had a heart attack.”

He shook his head, insisting that he had been held hostage on a plane. I smashed the call button so hard I thought I had broken my hand. The nurse came running and then sat me down, explaining that my father had been under heavy sedation while on the machine and that was affecting his memory. She assured me it was temporary. She then turned to him and asked him if he knew who I was.

He said, yes, that I was his daughter. I smiled. Then he called me Patty. My mother’s name. The smile faded.

My father has always been a fan of conspiracy theories, and the sedation only amplified this. Besides the plane episode, he told my younger brother on the phone that he had been held captive in Iraq and fed radioactive material that made him have a stroke. He refused his medication and refused to wear his hospital gown. I would patiently remind him each time that he was in the hospital recovering from a heart attack. He would often tell me that he was not supposed to be there. He kept forgetting he was in the hospital.

The phone calls were the worst. Somehow, he managed to have a telephone in intensive care. The nurses were overworked and exhausted and would dial for him after they ran out of patience with him. My number was first on the list. I was surprised to hear his voice when I picked up the phone. “Something’s not right,” he said. “I’m not supposed to be here.” I explained again that he was and asked to speak to his nurse. Once she assured me he was fine, I told her to take the phone away and that I would be back in the morning.

The nurse called at four that morning to tell me that Pops tried to pull out his IV while the nurses were busy with a fellow patient having a heart attack. He told the nurses that he was going home. I got up, dressed and made the short drive to the hospital fuming with anger. I was going to get through to this man, or he was going to be committed.

Even he knew I was angry when I walked into his room. “I’m in trouble,” he said to me. “You’re damn right you are,” I replied, pushing the call button for the nurse, who got a lecture from me about the telephone.

Yet the phone remained in the room. If I weren’t available for calls, then he would call Mom and upset her. He even called his own mother, who could no longer drive. I found myself calling Grandma Betty, crying to her about my own exhaustion and fears that my father would not come to his senses. She let me cry and told me not to give up hope. He’ll come around, she said.

It happened the day my mother finally visited. He was in his now usual conspiracy mode and once again refusing to wear the hospital gown. After an hour, my mother was so exhausted she ordered the nurse to sedate him so she and my brother could sneak out and go home. She was gone when my father woke up, and this gesture finally seemed to wake him up. He was still not wearing a gown when I arrived at the hospital that afternoon, but he was lucid and throwing a fit about how “your mom left me.”

I wanted to tell him I didn’t blame her, but instead I reminded him that he needed to wear a gown. He told me the nurses didn’t give him one. I said they actually gave him at least six before I called the nurse and requested pajamas. You’re wearing clothes, I commanded. He knew who was in charge. He put on the pajamas and took his medication when the nurses brought it to him. I was no longer tolerating this nonsense, and he knew it.

I left the hospital that Friday night after the doctor told me Pops would go home on Monday. The next morning, Pops called me at seven to tell me to come get him because he was going home. I asked to speak to the nurse, thinking it was more of his shenanigans, but it was true. Pops came around—just like Grandma Betty said he would.

It’s been three and a half years, but Pops does not remember any of it. When he starts laughing at how he basically tortured everyone with his conspiracy theories, I remind him that he refused to wear clothes. The laughter stops.

It was exhausting and stressful and scary, but I’d do it again if I had to because he’s my daddy. Now matter how old I am, he will always be daddy to me.

Happy Fathers Day, Pops.

We Are All Someone's Child

2009-05-26T19:43:00.001-05:00

I was driving on the two lane country highway to the small town hospital to say good-bye to Grandma Betty when I promised myself that I would not cry. She was dying—even she knew she didn’t have much time left—and I wasn’t going to upset her with my tears. This would be the last time I would see her, and I was determined to make sure it was full of love.

It was barely nine in the morning when I pulled into the parking lot next to the tiny, one-story hospital. I went inside, not sure where I was going when I wandered into a large group of Johnson relatives huddled in the hallway. The news wasn’t good. There was nothing else the doctors could do for Grandma, so we were going to make her comfortable and keep her company until she left us.

I left my dad and his siblings in the hallway and went into Grandma’s room. I was wearing my glasses, which were not familiar to her, so I spoke first out of concern she wouldn’t know who I was. Immediately recognizing my voice, she turned to the nurse who was combing her hair and proudly announced that her only granddaughter had come to visit.

I reminded myself of the promise I made in the car: no tears.

I took the comb from the nurse and continued fixing Grandma Betty’s short silvery-grey hair. It was unevenly cut and without any real style. I could tell my aunt had been cutting it at home again. I chuckled as I noticed a few strands of black woven into the silver and grey. I am the second oldest of Grandma Betty’s 10 grandchildren and remember when she had a full head of coal black hair. I struggled to remember when she turned grey, couldn’t and gave up.

I put the comb down and moved over to the chair on the other side of her bed. I sat and made small talk with her, telling her about the long drive (“No, Grandma, I did not see any deer and I will make sure to watch for them when I leave. I don’t want to hit one, either”) and listening to her tell me about my brothers visiting her the previous day. She clutched my hand and repeated weakly, “I am so happy to see you.” The same phrase she always said to me whenever I visited.

No tears.

The morning dragged on into afternoon as my family crowded into Grandma Betty’s tiny hospital room. She was the only patient in the room, so we took advantage and spread out. I tried to ignore the obvious struggle for breath coming from the hospital bed and laughed when she scolded my Uncle Mike about trying to access his work servers on his laptop. She even apologized to the nurses he had bring a long cable into her room in what turned out to be an unsuccessful attempt to log in. “My son and his computer,” she said, shaking her head.

After an uneventful lunch of hospital food, my four-year-old cousin, the youngest of Grandma Betty’s 10 grandchildren, arrived with his father. My mother always claims Sean “livens the place up” wherever he goes, and he didn’t fail to disappoint. He jabbered on about his day at summer camp when he suddenly stopped and stared at Grandma Betty. “When are you coming home, Meme?” he asked her, using the nickname all 10 of us called her whenever we first learned to talk and struggled to pronounce grandma. “I’ll be home soon,” she replied. “It won’t be much longer.”

No tears.

Afternoon turned into evening and the breathing got more and more labored. The oxygen mask was worn for longer periods of time and she struggled to stay awake. I sat in the chair next to her bed and held onto her hand. It was warm, just like it always was. She started to slip in and out of consciousness. I would put my mouth next to her ear and say, “I love you, Meme” and feel her squeeze my hand. Eventually, the squeezing stopped.

The nurse came into the room to check on Grandma Betty and announced that we had just a few hours. I practiced deep breathing like I was taught in yoga to stay calm and to keep the tears away. She was struggling and in pain. It was time.

But it wasn’t. Grandma came back to us. The oxygen mask came off and she leaned back into the pillows and closed her eyes. The struggle against death was exhausting.

I calmly walked over to her bed and stood next to her, taking her right hand in mine. This was the hand with all five fingers intact, unlike the left one I’d been clutching off and on all day. The left one had two stubs for the middle and ring fingers after a childhood accident with an axe. That’s why no knives or anything sharp were allowed around her grandchildren. I clutched her hand tight, bent forward until my mouth was next to her ear. I told her I loved her, that I admired her fight and knew she was in pain and that it was OK to let go. My voice was strong and steady.

I kissed her forehead and walked over to my father and watched as the family followed my lead and whispered their private good-byes to the woman who was the foundation of our family. I told my father to go. He seemed hesitant. I said go while she’s still with us and can hear.

My big, strong father—the man who can fix anything, whether it’s a broken bicycle or a broken heart—walked over to his mother’s bedside and took her hand. He began whispering in her ear when I felt the sob rise in my chest. Watching my father—my strong father—tell her mother good-bye was too much. I couldn’t stop the sob as it loudly escaped from me. It was so strong and sudden that it didn’t sound like a sob—more like the barking sea lions I’d seen the week before at the zoo—and it caused my Aunt Pat, the oldest of my father’s two sisters to look at me in alarm. It was my Aunt Peg, the sister who at 40 is closer in age to me than my father, who came running over and hugged me close, allowing the hot tears to spill onto her t-shirt as the sobs I fought all day came rushing forward. I finally found the one thing my father couldn’t fix, and it ripped my heart out.

Mother

2009-05-13T19:22:00.001-05:00

One of the earliest books I remember reading is called Mom, You’re Fired. It is story of a girl named Tina who was embarrassed by her mother.

I grew up feeling embarrassed by my mother. She was everything I didn’t want to be: married at 18, a mother at 19 and barely earning a GED. She wore her black hair in a short puffy style, weighed down with hairspray and dressed in shabby mismatched clothes. Her makeup looked like it was spackled on with a putty knife and always seemed to be the first thing people noticed when they saw her. She was the original Tammy Faye.

Most women cite their mothers as inspiration. I do, too, but in a different way. She drove me not to be like her. I studied hard, read everything I could get my hands on and counted the days until I could leave for college. I wanted to be a journalist and have a career instead of being an unhappy housewife with three kids and a stingy husband. I changed my hairstyle constantly, making sure to avoid anything short and puffy, and wore lightly applied makeup. I was determined to be better than her.

In Mom, You’re Fired Tina eventually learns to accept her mother and not be embarrassed by her. I didn’t outgrow that. I entered adulthood just as embarrassed of my mother as I was during childhood. I avoided her as much as possible.

I was 27 and just months into my new career in public relations when my mother was diagnosed with liver disease. She entered the hospital and was discharged home after a weekend with not much encouragement from the doctor. She was home 24 hours when my father called me at work, asking me to come home to see if she needed to go back to the hospital. I think he was afraid she would die and he wouldn’t know what to do. After much begging and pleading, I agreed.

She was propped up on the sofa when I entered the living room, holding a glass of water. She put the glass to her lips to drink and water started spilling out of the glass onto her sweatshirt. Her liver was functioning so poorly that bile was backing up into her bloodstream and poisoning her. She would die without medical attention. I called for the ambulance and followed in my car back to St. Louis, not expecting her to make it through the night. I brought my dad home with me and helped him call relatives until he fell asleep on the sofa.

I underestimated my mother. She’s a fighter. She made it through that night, and many rough days and nights after that. She spent six weeks in that hospital, willing her body to recover and start repairing itself so she could return home. Death could find someone else to visit. Mom was busy.

I got to know my mother during those six weeks. I would work all day and then spend evenings in her hospital room watching television or reading to her. She loved The Grapes of Wrath and The Great Gatsby—two of my favorite books. She told me about the first time she had read both books, which was when she returned to school for her GED. Growing up, the only time I saw my mother read was when a copy of the National Enquirer made it into the house. She told me that if she could have had a career, it would have been in the media, and that she was so proud that was the path I had chosen.

But I broke down when she told me she had read my copy of Mom, You’re Fired when I was a kid and liked the story. She read it because she thought the title was hysterical, and the story comforted her whenever one of her children became angry with her. Remembering how Tina came to accept her mother, she hoped that I would accept her. It took 27 years, but I did.

It’s been eight years, and my mother is still with us. I thought about those six weeks in the hospital while waiting with my family to be seated for lunch on Mothers Day. No longer embarrassed, I was proud to be standing next to her and honoring her that day. I think she liked that gift better than her actual Mothers Day present, a subscription to People magazine.

A Better Way to Make Decisions

2009-04-29T09:39:00.000-05:00

I was overworked, exhausted and feeling like my life wasn’t my own. Little did I know my saving grace was in the mailbox that day.

I didn’t pay much attention to the business magazine that came in the mail, tossing it on the dining room table as I rushed to let the dog outside after a long day at the office. It was a beautiful day, unusually warm for winter in St. Louis, so I decided to sit on the deck and go through the mail while enjoying the late afternoon sunshine.

I didn’t recognize the woman on the cover of the business magazine, but I knew the name: Suzy Welch. I had read some of the columns she co-writes with her husband, Jack, and really admired their advice and tone. Curious to see what she was promoting, I flipped to the article.
And it changed my life.

Suzy was promoting her upcoming book about a decision making process she calls 10-10-10. The more I read, the more impatient I was for her book to be released. When it finally was, I immediately grabbed a copy. It’s the best purchase I’ve made in a long time.

What is 10-10-10? Suzy calls it a “life transforming idea.” It’s a roadmap for decision making that looks at the impact of the decision on your life in 10 minutes, 10 months and 10 years. It always starts with a question, such as should I put my freelance writing on hold while I finish my master’s degree? (a recent decision I made using 10-10-10)

Why does 10-10-10 work? It gives you structure and logic for decision making, as well as allowing you a way to explain your decision to others. After reading the book, I realized I was making too many decisions based on what Suzy calls “The Two Gs,” which are gut and guilt. Neither approach worked for me and frankly, I don’t know anyone who has made good decisions based on their gut or guilt. Basing my decisions on The Two Gs left me feeling exhausted and like I wasn’t in control of my own life. Since I started using 10-10-10, I no longer feel this way.

Another reason it works is the process makes you examine that middle part of the decision making process that often gets ignored, the next 10 months. Many of us focus on the present and the long-term impacts when making decisions. By also considering the intermediate impact, we can make better-rounded and focused decisions.

I’ve seen the benefits of 10-10-10 in my life, and I am grateful to Suzy Welch for sharing this wonderful idea. It has truly changed my life for the better, and I am looking forward to the next 10 minutes, 10 months and 10 years.

Searching for the Santa Claus Bandit

2009-04-13T19:22:00.001-05:00

It was the typical Christmas Day lunch. I was sitting at the table with my parents and brothers, listening to my father wax nostalgic for the holidays of his childhood when he dropped this shocker:

“Mom’s brother was the Santa Claus Bandit.”

My brothers and I stopped eating and stared at Dad. “What does that mean?” I asked. “Santa Claus Bandit?”

It was no secret that one of Grandma Betty’s brothers “had done time” in prison, but she would never talk about it, telling anyone who dared to ask that the past belonged in the past. Out of respect for her, I never pressed her on it.

However, this was our first Christmas without her, and my father’s comment caused my journalistic instincts to go into overdrive. Just who was this Santa Claus Bandit?

He was Abraham Dean, the oldest of Grandma Betty’s brothers. Named for their alcoholic, abusive father, he was nicknamed Jock and inherited what my father calls “the bad Dean gene.” He spent most of his life in trouble, having petty brushes with the law until for some unknown reason he started robbing banks. He earned his nickname because he apparently said “Merry Christmas” as he made his escape. He was eventually caught, served time in the state prison in Joliet and never saw his family again.

My father claimed not to know anything else. I told him he would have made a lousy journalist and I must have inherited that particular set of skills from Mom. I was disappointed that someone who grilled me so hard about the buffet at my hotel in Las Vegas that I felt like I was talking to a gluttonous Barbara Walters didn’t think to ask more questions about the Santa Claus Bandit. My brothers echoed my disappointment, claiming that for once Dad had an interesting family story and didn’t bother getting any of the details. They’ve forgotten about it, but I can’t let it go.

I am no longer a full time journalist, but I still know how to research a story. I could find out who the Santa Claus Bandit is. The question is do I really want to? See, I could find out the facts about the Santa Claus Bandit . . . who, what, when, where and how. But what I really want to know is why, and that’s not as easy to find. And I know I won’t find the why I really want to know because the one person who can answer that for me is gone.

What I really want to know is why Grandma Betty never talked about this brother, why she clammed up whenever anyone tried to ask her about it. She took his secrets to her grave, and I want to know why. I’m not sure that answer could be found in dusty old court and prison records.

But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to try.

The Garlic Necklace

2009-04-05T18:26:00.001-05:00

I noticed a bit of annoyance creep into my mother’s tone when I asked how my father was doing. “He’s wearing garlic again,” she sighed.

I knew what she meant. I first encountered the garlic necklace a few years prior, when (ironically) I visited my parents the day after watching the remake of the Salem’s Lot miniseries. The faint odor of garlic hit me when I entered the house and got stronger as I approached the living room where my father sat watching a baseball game. I noticed an old green Army sock knotted on a leather chain wrapped loosely around his neck. I couldn’t keep the look of disgust off my face when I realized he was the reason for the garlicky smell.

“Are you wearing garlic?” I asked. “Is there garlic in that sock?”

“Yes, yes I am,” he replied without even looking at me, as if wearing garlic stuffed inside an old sock around your neck was something everyone was doing and I was behind on the trend.

I lost it then. Not even trying to stifle my laughter, I asked him if he had invited vampires into the house—just like in the previously viewed Salem’s Lot. “Why no,” he replied, as serious as ever and not getting the joke. “I’m fighting off a cold.”

My father is legendary for bizarre health remedies and conspiracy theories. When I was growing up, he was convinced chlorine in the drinking water caused cancer. I quickly learned to keep colds from him after the time he made me eat an entire baked onion because he was certain it would cure whatever ailed me. He was right in a way—I forgot about my cold because I was too busy throwing up after choking down layer after layer of that huge baked disgusting mess.

But the garlic necklace took the cake. His remedies and theories usually only involved him, so the family tolerated them, but this one was different. It looked weird. And Lord, did it smell terrible. I swear every room in their house reeked of garlic, like garlic seeped into the fibers of every bit of furniture and fabric in the place. And I’m sure being stuffed inside that nasty old Army sock only made the smell a million times worse. It was years before I could even think about cooking with garlic again after being traumatized by that necklace.

My poor mother tried everything she could to get rid of the garlic necklace. She bought him garlic tablets. She threw out all his old socks. She pumped him full of vitamins in hopes of keeping his immune system strong in order to fight off colds. Hand sanitizer became a requirement if you wanted to visit. But nothing worked. He somehow managed to find another old sock to stuff full of garlic in order to make his magic necklace whenever he felt a cold coming on. My mother finally shrugged her shoulders in defeat. My brothers and I still enjoyed vampire jokes.

But I think the garlic necklace may be in the past. Tonight on the phone, he mentioned his latest theory. It involves the beef industry, heart disease and the drug companies. I tuned it out after a bit because it was long and complicated. But as long as it doesn’t involve garlic in socks, I’m fine with it—unless he tries to make me eat a baked onion.

The Power of Words

2009-04-04T19:33:00.001-05:00

As a professional writer and communicator, I spend a lot of time thinking about words: their meanings, which ones sound better in a sentence, different interpretations of them, learning new ones. But it was a family tragedy that hammered home to me just how powerful words can be.

It was a cold Saturday morning in April when the phone rudely woke me from a rare deep sleep. I knew it was my parents before I picked up the receiver because I assigned them a ring. I grabbed the phone, wondering who was sick. Having two parents battling disease makes a person assume certain things. However, my assumption was wrong.

“Nick died. He killed himself last night,” my father said quietly, before I even had the chance to say hello. Nick was my cousin, the youngest son of my father’s youngest, troubled brother. I was 12 whenever he was born, and I remember going with my parents to the hospital to see him, disappointed that yet another boy was born into the already large Johnson family. His parents were young, not even in their mid-20s at the time, but they seemed old to my 12-year-old self.

I never really got to know Nick. His family moved away to a small town in central Illinois before he started school. But I didn’t have much hope for him. The son of an alcoholic father and a neglectful mother, he struggled in school and was recommended several times for special education classes. But his father refused, claiming no one would make fun of his son—the way his father had made fun of “those kids.”

Nick stumbled along through life, barely learning to read and getting passed along in school by teachers who didn’t really know what to do with him. His parents divorced when he was 11, and he spent the rest of his school years shuffling back and forth between his parents, who seemed determined to hurt each other instead of putting the needs of their two sons first.

I wasn’t surprised to see Nick smoking outside in his brother’s car at Grandma Betty’s house during one Thanksgiving. He didn’t even try to hide it, even though he wasn’t old enough to drive. It made me wonder what else he was doing.

My assumption that he was drinking turned out to be right. His body was found earlier that April morning, in an old beat up Dodge parked in the garage at his father’s former home, which my uncle had tried for years to sell with no success. The engine was still running. His stepmother found him slumped behind the wheel with beer cans haphazardly strewn all over the front seat. She told my father Nick’s skin was blue with carbon monoxide poisoning and asked him not to tell his brother. Nick was 19 and never graduated high school. He never held a job or seemed to have much of a chance. Now any future for him was gone.

I wondered about the eulogy as I drove along the two lane highways and country roads of central Illinois to the tiny town where Nick’s funeral and burial would take place. The priest was an old family friend. As a child, he worked on my grandparents’ farm. As an adult, he still visited the farm and traded stories. He married Nick’s parents. As a favor to the family he’d known for so long, he was making the long trip out of his parish to give the eulogy for a 19-year-old boy whose life seemed to be a waste. I had no idea what he would say at the funeral, and I did not envy his task.

The parking lot was crowded when I arrived. I was grateful we were at the large church and not the tiny country funeral home where Nick’s wake took place the day before. The church could hold this group with room to spare. I found my parents and brothers and took a seat with them.

The funeral started like most funerals do, with songs and prayer. The air seemed to be sucked out of the room when Father walked up to the pulpit. He was empty handed, which made me think he would be brief.

I don’t remember how long the eulogy was. What I remember is how Father took the life of a child who seemed to have no life and make it sound like he was something. He never mentioned how Nick died—after a night of drinking, he drove to his father’s old house and passed out in the garage with the car running—but instead, he took tiny details about Nick’s life and used them to paint a portrait. He talked about Nick’s love of animals and how he helped his mother bake and decorate cakes. He told us of Nick’s close relationship with his older brother, eventually leaving the audience with a picture of a young, sensitive and caring man who left us too early. That replaced the image I’d had of Nick in my mind before, as an idiot who died with a blue face. That was when I realized just how powerful words truly are.

I will always view Nick’s death as an untimely tragedy and a cautionary tale about drinking and driving. But I no longer view his life as a waste, thanks to Father’s carefully chosen words. That’s better than any lesson I’ve ever been taught.