Our fathers, who art…

Shellie (Daughter One) called me Saturday to say she'd be coming by for a while (she lives across town). How come?

"Well," she explained considerately, "since we're going to the Outer Banks on Fathers' Day, this afternoon we'll be able to hang out together. Plus I need some gas money."

This is why – in her mid-twenties – I still call her a brat. I also gave her gas-money plus.

So while she and my mother, and my sister Mew and her two teen kids (husband Arnie follows next weekend) were on the road to North Carolina this afternoon, I hit the road myself and paid my own dad, and my father-in-law, a visit.

You see, Dad died in 2003, and three days later Norman – my father-in-law – died too; they're buried within thirty miles of each other. So I brought them each flowers, and also left roses at my dad's memorial tree and plaque on the Pennsylvania campus where he'd taught nearly forty years (and within sight of his former office).

Why me? Well, older brother Sarge had office-work that badly needed attention, younger brother Doc is recovering from surgery, Mew was chasing my daughter down Interstate 95, and youngest sister Alicia and her husband (and baby-to-be) are in Italy. So I went – and called Sarge and Doc and Mew each while at Dad's grave, so they could be there too.

(Also gave Spartacus a holler before I left that little town, since Dad's tree is just over the hill (so to speak) from the elementary school Sparks and I had gone to forty years ago. Someday I'll remember to get a photo of that school, send it to him, and see if this can trigger some PTSD…)

Why to my in-laws' grave also? Because Norm and Nan (she'd followed her husband into eternity two years ago) were the only parents-in-law I've ever had, even though their daughter and I separated and divorced over twenty years ago. And they had been devoted grandparents to Shellie (and she was their favorite of eight-some grandchildren), and had remained on friendly terms with me, something I treasured about them.

In her last years, Nan had also been very welcoming of my younger daughter Portia when we'd stop by to visit, and this too I treasured. A kindness to a child is a kindness to the parent.

And kindnesses to the parent, too, should not be overlooked… and not just when it's time to clean the stone again, and leave flowers and a prayer. Since I'm running out of parents, I've tried hard to be especially kind to my mother, and patient with her… and the last several years have made this easier somehow. I counsel friends of all ages to do the same to their own parents.

I'm so greatly relieved, as I've mentioned before, that I was increasingly kind and warm and patient with Dad in his last several years – this is a deep consolation, now that I can't sit down with him in Pizza Hut or Olive Garden anymore. And his equally warm-and-patient response, though more subtle, came to make up for terrible times we saw, growing up and in our early adulthood.

Time heals all.

Hoc Est Enim Corpus Meum

I've been busy of late; and while eager to get more copy up here – a final week of puns with Ben, some more of my writings for you to steal, spiritual and familial meditations, and so on – time's been tight. And even when I've had a good amount of time (e.g., this weekend), anything from household chores (painting, lawn mowing and edging, laundry) to attention-drainers (a staggering several pounds of fresh-received stamps to sort through; mindless, distracted websurfing) have really pulled me from my self-set responsibility to keep this site busy, and both of my readers engaged.

Can't tonight, though! Besides an extraordinarily high amount of stress at work recently (enough so that I'm strongly pondering turning in my badge), I've also been in meditation much of the day – while doing those above-mentioned chores, and distractions – on today's Feast Day in the Church, a day set aside to honor the presence of Jesus in the Eucharist (=Communion)… body, blood, soul, and divinity. And I wanted to write up a good several pages on this core credo/doctrine of the Faith (and a spiritual pivot-point for me), but that will have to wait a few days.

I'll bring in the text of John 6:30-68; you're welcome to read it in the meantime. Our Protestant brothers and sisters will generally read the Bible very literally (e.g., at times even to the great extreme of believing thereby that the universe truly was created in six days, and thus is barely more than six thousand years old)… yet this passage they skip over and almost always do not read literally – even while their Catholic cousins do.

What does Jesus say there? Simply – in advance of his Last Supper – that the bread and wine really do become his body and blood. I'll show how he was not speaking symbolically, and how the Church (indeed, essentially all of Christianity through its first fifteen centuries) believed this absolutely, and taught it from the very beginning.

I'll even tell you how (after thirty-some years) it helped me to have a good several decades of reading and watching science fiction for me to suddenly be able to wrap my intellect around this seemingly absurd notion.

(A priest on EWTN once delightfully pointed out that if Jesus (who is God) as creator could make something out of nothing (which is what “create” means)… can't he make something out of something else?)

Again, no time now; so let me leave you with five simple words: What if this is true?

And PS: check out this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCmLmZDpB4I.

All in the Family: Zeroes, and Heroes

Well!

My sister Mew emailed me this morning – she'd read yesterday's blog! This is actually a bit embarrassing… I mean, I've mentioned to my family that I've been blogging (not as much lately, alas) since late January, and once or twice I've sent them links to an actual posting; yes. But I'd forgotten… and honestly don't write for the accolades, any more than a kid doing cartwheels out in a field is doing so for cheers. 

For me, and for that kid, it's just for fun and for practice (in my case, to improve my writing). So just as that kid would stop and gape and sputter if some people dropped out of the trees and started clapping, a kind word from family (not that anyone would mind!) grinds me to a halt for a moment, has me scratching my head and blushing. Oh, well – not trying to hide, either. 

With an especially complimentary subject-line of "Wonderful!", Mew wrote as much to clarify something I'd misstated:

Sent: Monday, June 04, 2007 10:24 AM

AC,

You had a great blog entry this weekend about your participation in the Susan B. Komen race for a cure! Way to go! that must have been tremendously uplifting (and yes, I'm a blog stalker...)

But I do have a correction for you - JT didn't have bone marrow cancer. Bone marrow cancer usually occurs in the shafts of the long bones - and is usually the result of a cancerous spread from another part of the body. JT's type of Leukemia, acute lymphoblastic leukemia, is a cancer of the white blood cells, with lymphoblastic leukemia being a cancer of the lymphoid portion of the white blood cells. JT was very lucky as his Leukemia was confined to his bone marrow and a few stray leukemic blasts in his blood.

Here's a writeup on bone marrow cancer: And also one on childhood acute lymphoblasticleukemia. 

I'm also attaching a picture taken at the Relay for Life last month -

- the lady walking beside him that has her arm entwined in JT's is a fellow survivor of cancer (not sure which type) as they walk the Survivor's Lap during the Relay. She's the principal for a local elementary school.

Mew

The Relay for Life that Mew mentions was a particularly touching event held last month in that pleasant little town in west-central Maryland, Frederick (I've mentioned it here now and then; even did a run there once). The Relay for Life is a celebration both of survivors of, and loved ones lost to, cancer; Mew had invited me and my daughters to join her and JT there… although it turned out I let other demands get in the way; wish I'd made it! 

So naturally I wrote right back to her this morning:

Sent: Monday, June 04, 2007 10:52 AM

Thanks for the correction, and I'll fix it!

Somehow I'd been thinking JT had had bone marrow cancer; sorry about that particular inaccuracy. Would you mind if I include your email (with the usual change of name for privacy), and the photo, in a followup? You've probably noticed that when time permits, I really try to include links and sources; I want anything I put out there to be as accurate as I can make it (also means a several-paragraph entry like last night's can sometimes take a couple hours to pull together). Not only would this be a lot more considerate of JT (and his mom!), but it would serve to further educate my two or three readers, plus (what I count on even more) strangers stumbling onto the entry. 

Now, blog stalking… what the Helvis (as Mother says)?! Busy as you are, you've got to have more important stuff to do online! Oh, well; I'm not trying to hide, either… just wish I could get stuff up there more often than the once or twice a week I've managed lately. (I've already got a backlog!)

But if you do run out of things to do every so often, and see something that's inaccurate, wrong, or in need of rewriting, let me know.

Thanks again!

Regards,

AgingChild 

I was still shaking my head. And I wanted to give her (and especially JT) credit for their own struggle over the years, and in particular for the type of cancer he battled successfully. Mew has a wonderful webpage up on the Net, detailing JT's long struggle during his youngest years. Touchingly, she calls him her hero. How many mothers say that, most especially from the heart?

Sent: Monday, June 04, 2007 10:57 AM

Sure you can include the email & photo - no problem. I'm not a major blog stalker, I just have a few I check from time to time including yours :) 

Mew

Gulp. How many dirty jokes have I posted? Uh, one, now that I think of it. No questionable photos? Nope. Links to trashy sites? Zilch. Rough language? Well, yes, in a few quotes from either irate jerks, or indignant friends. So I'm clear; nothing to be embarrassed about here. But still… 

So I sent back to her a photo of Edward Platt (of the classic sixties sitcom "Get Smart") rolling his eyes with barely restrained impatience; no words:

She answered:

Sent: Monday, June 04, 2007 11:56 AM

ha ha  

Okay, that kind of accolade works for me.

 

One in Forty-Five Thousand

Yesterday morning saw me and three immediate coworkers (among also three or four dozen (plus kids) out of our Headquarters staff) walking the 5K-span of the Susan G. Komen National Race for the Cure right in the center of Washington DC.

Coworker Woodie is especially big on this – he lost his wife to cancer two or three years ago; he'd brought his daughter along. Also present with daughter was Peruvian coworker Tica; she showed her little girl (at eleven, already taller than mom) the headquarters for the Organization of American States as we passed it; she'd once worked there. Cool! And rounding out our particular handful of participating employees was Turkish Gülden (not as round as she was several months ago) and her infant son (in stroller); his feet are made of the softest skin God's ever created.

Over the past few years, I've next-to-never associated with my fellow-workers outside of the office; I think I keep work and not-work very compartmentalized and separated from each other. But I did want to get with them for this event (Aurelio bowed out, due to the need to practice for a fifty-mile (?!) bike race he'll be in next weekend)… and just for the novelty of spending time in downtown Washington.

This was the first I'd been on the DC Metro on my own, though I did ride it a couple times with a girlfriend over fifteen years ago, and also one Friday last month to get to a "workers' night out" event at a DC improv club (a story in itself), but those previous times had been with someone who knew their way around.

There was nothing to it, of course; I'd been able to puzzle out the German Federal Rail system mostly on my own in 1993 and 1996, so this was a ride through the park… and I found myself feeling embarrassed once again for living within a few hours' drive of DC and never going in to the city to look around. Yesterday I almost whimpered as we walked past the National Air and Space Museum near the end of the course. No doubt friend Spartacus will wring my neck for not taking advantage of the opportunity; the world of aircraft has long been one of his greatest areas of interest. Well, I wasn't there as a tourist, Sparky. (Let's do it next time, all right?)

And I wanted to participate in particular for the sake of my older brother Sarge's late wife: Lee passed away from leptomeningeal cancer just over two years ago. Also, family-friend Chuckles' mother died when thirteen-years' -dormant breast cancer returned and took her about four years ago. Plus nephew JT – sister Mew's son – has been in remission from bone-marrow cancer most of ten years now.

The runners started out first, and there must have been several hundred at the least. Then the walkers started – we held back until Tica and Gülden could find us – and we joined with the other walkers like a puddle of rainwater emptying into a great river. We did, of course, stop here and there to take photos – in front of the Washington Monument, before a couple different random fountains (I was able to splash Woodie and his daughter), and various crowd shots. And I mean "crowd"! There were easily tens of thousands; I doubt I have ever seen with my own eyes that many people moving all at once; carrying signs and chanting at times, this cause-centric mass recalled to me the marches of the sixties.

A lot of the folks walking carried banners commemorating loved ones who'd been claimed by this merciless killer; others had these victims' names written on a placard pinned to (or written directly on) their shirts – e.g., "In memory of my wife [name]", etc. One woman's pinned-on sheet noted that she was living with stage-four cancer of her blood, bone marrow, and liver, if I remember correctly. God bless her and keep her.

You can see one of the walkers wearing such a sheet here, although the names don't show up. There also is the tip of the Washington Monument; the building to the left is – I think – the National Museum of American History. At different points we were also within easy sight of the White House (I firmly resisted the impulse to wave a merry half- peace-sign back at its most (in)famous current occupant), the Capitol Building, other Smithsonian buildings, and the long green expanse of the National Mall.

Some groups carried flags of particular countries; early on I saw the German Federal flag twice, the second time followed by the flag of Bavaria. I pointed another flag out to Tica, and she hurriedly got her daughter's attention and showed her as it went by: the Peruvian flag. There was one family (the Scotts?) with a high banner supported from two poles that a pair of the family-members were carrying; one walker under the banner was leading a loud military-style call-and-response with fellow family members, shouting out (and back) loud, proud statements of affirmation and survival. We passed a half-dozen folks playing steel drums loudly and with great talent; elsewhere, a man with a single loud drum; and in another place a group of twenty-something women enthusiastically cheering us all on.

There was a group, too, of Muslim women walking in front of us, carrying a banner much like the Scotts'; theirs read "Muslims care". Gülden got out her camera (pushing her baby's stroller with one hand) to get a shot of them. We also saw several men with long, Indian-/Pakistani-style "kurta" shirts (I really want one!), and, earlier, a woman in full sari. And there were a couple women whose hair was just starting to regrow. Good for them!

I felt both bigger – for having been a part of this veritable tide – and much, much smaller – for walking almost literally shoulder-to-shoulder with men and women wounded by the death of someone dear, or/and still fighting the terrible disease themselves. I, too, have seen two women close to me fight, fade, and die as the cancer claimed them… and here was a testimony – in far greater, visual, tangible numbers – of the innocents struck down and torn from our lives, despite how hard we and they clutch at each other, and how much progress our research and fighting have made thus far.

What the Helvetia's Going On??

Just confirming all's well, in case either of my readers (including myself) has been wondering where AgingChild has gotten off to. Still here! And, no; no special trips or events for Memorial Day, taking me away from the computer – stupid to head out and try to hit any beach, or campground, on so big a holiday weekend. I stayed home!

The last couple weekends (that's the lion's share of my online time, and composition time) have seen me doing mundane – but demanding – household stuff. I won't bore you with the details and frustrations of an underskilled forty-something man trying to strip wallpaper, then patch, sand, and paint the wall… after painting a stucco-y ceiling. Doctor says the operation was a success; hallway looks much better… lacking only white-gloss trim where now we still have <shudder> something like cranberry. Nice light-blue spot-pattern on the carpet, too.

Meanwhile, on the work front: our department (~20 people, from Director on down through senior managers, team leads, consultants, to yours truly: chief bottle- and cork-washer) gets together for about an hour once a month to mark individual achievements and milestones. In the past we've convened on- and offsite (e.g., restaurants), and noted new and leaving employees, birthdays, a home purchase, pregnancies (quite a number for a small group, and that just since I joined a couple years ago… but this is only coincidence; look up post hoc ergo propter hoc sometime), and other professional and personal life-events.

The host/emcee/ringleader of this event changes each month… and this month it fell on my scrawny shoulders. I kept this one onsite; and since we're an internationally focused group (within a big, worldwide corporation), I asked everyone to bring in some kind of international snack (wisely scheduling our milestone event an hour or two after lunch). So we had Italian sodas, something like a giant, Twinkie-like caramel roll from Peru, I brought in Japanese sesame (?) hand-snacks and shrimp crackers, boss Mick brought – check this out – Armenian string cheese, and so on.

During this past week, most of my at-home online time was focused on downloading and cropping images of stamps from various (select) countries around the world (no time for the blogging I wanted to do). The kicker to them was that not all of them were from readily-identifiable countries. Yes, yes; we know Republique Française, Deutschland, Repubblica Italiana. But what's RSA? Éire – ah; Ireland. CCCP? The former Soviet Union. Now try Republika Hrvatska, Lietuva, Slovensko, and (my favorite) Shqiperia.

My objective was to exercise staff expertise, and also remind all OF us that meanings to everyday objects are sometimes far less than evident, especially for those of us working in other countries. (One thing our department does involves direct contact with corporate expatriates.) I also had in mind to post those images of stamps around the conference room, but we ended up commandeering a nice patio terrace instead.

Thus in the great, welcome sunshine and fresh air, I held up magnified image after image, inviting everyone (while they were munching and sipping) to figure out which country had issued that particular magnified stamp. Bosnien-Hercegovina, Côte d'Ivoire, Sverige, Norge… 'most everyone got them... even trick-countries like Siam, Abu Dhabi, and Canal Zone were no great challenge. And I was surprised a couple folks didn't blink at "Helvetia" before shouting out that that's Switzerland.

The Director and a couple of his senior managers (Mick in particular) did exceptionally well on this little impromptu group-quiz… but even he couldn't identify Shqiperia as Albania. That was also a surprise to me… and to him afterward, since he's familiar with the Leke, their unit of currency.

Also, among announced departures: both Ben and Hugo are headed out! Ben will be leaving the company after next week, working in Washington DC, where as a technology manager for a particular firm, he will be running the rollout, and subsequent maintenance, of their new HR software/database system. I asked him if he could forward me an email address once he settles in, so I could keep his pun-wit sharp. "Sure," he answered brightly, it's Up.Yours@BiteMe.com." (Pardon me there.)

And a week or two after Ben leaves, Hugo will be transferring to a different department in our corporation, this one (very numbers-focused; he's well suited) in another, though not distant, location in the greater DC-Baltimore area.

So, alas, there will be far fewer groans among us left behind – although Aurelio and Priscilla have been practicing filling the void. In fact, last week Priscilla asked me whether she'd properly affixed an odd-shaped stamp on an outbound letter; I assured her she had, and that there was nothing to worry about. Still, she was apologetic about having to ask. "You know me," she said; "I'm just clueless about these things. I'm always pushing the envelope."

Back Online... Thanks to the Happy Hookah

The internet connection here at home has been down for nearly a week… and I've been too busy to tie up half an hour with our ISP to trouble-shoot. So meanwhile, all this past week I've been building up a collection of puns, tirades, heart-wrenchers, and so on. 

Late this afternoon I finally called our Service Provider (I won't mention their name… but… Can you hear me now? Goood!). The fellow with whom I finally connected, after jumping through some voice-menu hoops, had a predictably strong Hindi accent, belying the name he gave for himself: Ivan. We repeated the steps I'd tried a couple times earlier this week – power down each unit (router, modem, computer), then twiddle thumbs while counting five-dozen chimpanzees. 

This time it took; likely Ivan gave the line a hard wrist-flick from Hyderabad, inducing a twist that zipped all the way down the line to my end, straightening the kink… much like you'd do with a twisted extension cord. Actually, it's a bit more likely, though, that a hard thunderstorm last week induced e-catatonia in the modem as well. 

Anyway, once I'd confirmed things were up again and that our work was done, I thanked Ivan… in Hindi: "Bahut dhanyawad, mera dost!" He sputtered a moment, then began laughing… but I believe India-side regs prohibit him from speaking anything other than English, so he didn't respond in Hindi. I gave him a final "Namaste!", and hung up. 

Small world. 

Maybe next time I should try Gujarati?

 

Pundemonium: Twin-kle, Twin-kle, Little Pun

As do all great authors and funnymen, I get a hefty chunk of my material from others. Today I shamelessly plundered the great Spider Robinson for a one-two pun-ch to Ben, since he hadn't made any observations of note lately.

(I'll replace the text and add copyright info once I find this dog in Spider's work.)

First off [I began with straight voice and sincere tone; Ben took it hook, line, and stinker], even though many American couples are adopting foreign children (e.g., Chinese, Romanian), there are still some other, very poor American couples (and singles) who are giving up their own children for adoption, even to overseas couples themselves.

So there was this couple recently whose twin baby boys were adopted. Unfortunately, the adoption agency split the twins, and each of them went to different countries – different continents, in fact. One boy went to a loving family in Egypt, and the other to a sweet, warm (and wealthy) home in Mexico.

After a week or two, both adoptive families wrote to the poor American couple to tell them they'd been so very brave and courageous to give up their own flesh. The Egyptian parents related that they had named their boy Amal (pronounced "A Mall"), and the wealthy Mexicans that his twin brother, their other son, was now named Juan. But after this there was very little, and then no, contact from either of these two welcoming families.

[I think something in my tone slipped, because at this point Ben bent sideways at the waist, and slouched a bit – body-language saying that he felt my hand on his ankle, about to firmly pull his leg, and hard.]

As I'm sure most adoptive parents do, over the next few years the poor husband and wife – who'd had no more children – began to wonder, then agonize, over how their boys might be doing in their distant homes. But the adoption agency would not allow communication between the couple and the boys (not until age sixteen or so), though they did agree to relay the birth-parents' request for photos of the twins to see how they were growing.

Shortly afterward an envelope came from Mexico, with a sweet letter and several beautiful pictures of their adopted son, now in school and doing very well. But nothing was heard from the Egyptian family. 

Weeks, then months, passed without photo or word from Egypt. The twin boys' birth-mother was beside herself, weeping about her other son, while clutching one of the photos of his Mexican-adopted brother.

The boys' father tried to console his wife, but was baffled. He gently pried his son's picture out of his wife's hand, flattened it back out on their battered, wobbly table, and pointed out to his wife, "When you've seen Juan, you've seen Amal."

Ben gave me that rare accolade: he slouched further, kind of collapsing a bit more into himself, and limped slowly back to his desk.

But I gave him the opportunity to release his agony about half an hour later. I walked into his cubicle (well, leaned in), and said, "Well, after all, Ben, the shortest distance between two puns…"

Ben looked at me in bafflement.

I made a rolling gesture with one hand and continued encouragingly: "…is…" 

He pondered a moment, then sat up straight, his face bright, grin wide, and manner delighted. He finished: "…a straightline!", accenting the first syllable (correctly).

Thanks, Spider! This kept Ben from leaving the office a-wreck-nid…