Over Christmas, I took this picture of my eighty-five-year-old mother, Geneva, and my five-month-old granddaughter Madison (of grandtwins Matthew and Madison fame).
85 years. 5 months. Two wonderful ages. Old and young.
“How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you were?” ~Satchel Paige
Grandtwins Madison and Matthew:
Grandsons Gabriel and Daniel:
Most awkwardly funny moment of the holiday so far–wait, let me set the scene. We were in the incredibly beautiful and highbrow lobby of the Ritz-Carlton–Buckhead in Atlanta over the weekend. Just past these Dickensian carolers:
Resplendent Santa standing by the fireplace, creating a perfect Christmas tableau, with adoring children all around. Without warning and with great, earnest conviction, five-year-old grandson Daniel yelling, “He’s a Fake!” His parents threatening loss of Christmas coming.
Joyful Christmas to you!
I picked up Grandson Daniel (5) from school yesterday, and, hopping into his back seat, he excitedly showed me his just-completed Turkey Basket (well, that’s what he called it anyway). As I soon learned, the turkey project was two-fold: first the cute little construction paper turkey itself. But as you can see in the pictures below, the front housed a nifty envelope (basket?) which held little gratitude or thanksgiving cards. For each note, Daniel and his classmates completed the statement “I am thankful for ____ because …” for their family members.
What a joy! Little ones expressing their thankfulness so sincerely. Below Daniel explains to me that his plan for Thanksgiving Day consists of waiting till “all the guests” have eaten “some of their turkey” and then “hand out the slips.” And he did just that–for all fourteen of the folks at the table. His mom helped him with some of the spelling, but the sentiments were exclusively his.
Here’s mine:
“I am thankful for Abu (that’s me) because he helps with decorations.”
(Okay, maybe that sounds a bit strange, but the day before, we had decorated for Thanksgiving with some outdoor lights. And a month earlier we had carved two jack o’ lanterns.)
What Thanksgiving Joy! We really all do have so very much to put in our Turkey Baskets.
[For more on “Abu” see “My Favorite Word Is Abu!” post.]
August–the time of year when school bells ring again. Teachers everywhere commence their incredible annual charge of encouraging students to develop their true sight, their true voices, and their intellectual joy. School at every level should be a haven where young learners want to be. And the teacher, though underpaid and overworked, is key. Some years back, as I spent a summer month participating in the Georgia Southern Writing Project, I was asked to write about what birthed the teacher in me. I knew immediately the answer: The World’s Smallest Lady.
The World’s Smallest Lady
As I dialed the telephone recently to check on the condition of the terminally ill father of a childhood friend from my hometown, I kept trying to keep the memory from surfacing. I hadn’t thought about it in ages. An incident from several decades ago surely didn’t still have the power to take control of my thoughts, to interrupt my life. But the truth is, that memory is too powerful to ignore, too embarrassing, too haunting to dismiss. And as I listened to Ricky’s phone ringing in one ear, the years faded, and the jumbled noises of an old Cherokee County Fair started sounding in the other, accompanied by reminiscent sights and even smells, which are such an integral part of a southern autumn carnival…
…I was thirteen, old enough to know better. Ricky, Fred, and I had just staggered off The Bullet and found ourselves walking down Freak Show Alley. Outside one attraction, a hawker was shouting at passersby to “Step inside and see The World’s Smallest Lady! Only twenty-six inches tall! For only a quarter!” So, laughing, into the tent we hurried, just the three of us.
And there, surprisingly close to us on a small black round table, stood what indeed had to be The World’s Smallest Lady. She was dressed in a little gaudily sequined gypsy outfit. A short screaming-red skirt revealed two chubby stumps of legs. But she wasn’t a child, even though she was so tiny. Her face looked old, and I could see wrinkles beneath the cheap, garish make-up. It was her very large head, however, topped with a gaudy, shiny gold crown, which really captured my attention. I couldn’t stop staring, and why should I? I’d paid my quarter.
So we gawked and snickered, three carefree young teenagers at the fair, secure and even innocent in our youth, our health, our futures, our “normality.” Then Fred loudly whispered, “Damn, y’all, look at the size of that head compared to the rest of her body. And her butt is bigger than mine!”
But it was Ricky, the member of our inseparable trio capable of doing and saying anything for a laugh–who, in reckless teenage cruelty, did the unimaginable. Before anyone had time to react, Ricky stepped over the velvet rope, reached out to The World’s Smallest Lady, and jerked her gypsy skirt down to her ankles. He ran out of the tent, followed by Fred, giggling and yelling, “Neal, let’s get out of here!”
But I couldn’t. My feet were glued to the sawdust, and for a second or two, my eyes looked directly into those of The World’s Smallest Lady. The dimension of time ceased, no one existed except for her and me, and those humiliated, prostituted, tiny eyes took away my innocence and my security. As I stared, and stared, the plates beneath my small, comfortable, well-defined earth were shifting, ever so slightly, quaking. Finally, as she reached down, pulling up her skirt to cover her nakedness, The World’s Smallest Lady spoke in a voice that seemed more resigned than angry: “You boys can just go to hell.”
As I hurried out of that tent and away from that sawdust and those piercing eyes, a startling transformation occurred, the full impact of which I wasn’t aware at the time: a sideshow midget, a twenty-five cent carnival attraction, a freak, became a regular human being with regular human feelings in the frightened yet awakening eyes of a thirteen-year-old boy.
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I learned from my encounter with The World’s Smallest Lady the danger and horror of living in a world where we construct walls which establish the category of “other”–with ourselves being the privileged, the truly knowledgeable, the valuable, the ones who really count, the normal…and “other” being defined by gender, race, class, IQ, physical disability, sexual orientation, etc. I learned that when we cast our dominant “gaze” patronizingly on others, we diminish ourselves as human beings as well as do violence to those we belittle. I also learned–years later and after much reflection and life experience–that a teacher is one who refuses to allow the binary of “us/them” to operate in (or outside) the classroom.
May the new school year be one of JOY for students and teachers the world over.
Last night at 9:34 and 9:35 Younger Daughter Emily finally gave birth to the much-anticipated TWINS!
Welcome, Welcome. Sweet Little Ones!
Mathew Anthony Olliff met the world first, weighing in at 6.1 pounds and measuring 19 inches.
Madison Noel Olliff yelled hello one minute later, tipping the scales at 4.9 pounds and lining up at 17.5 inches.
Don’t they just look so very intelligent?
We have things to do:
And places to go:
So look out, world!
And look! I’ve already won an award:
(Oh, by the way, Mom Emily and Dad Travis are doing well.)
[More later (much, much more, I’m sure).]
Ahoy, Mates. Pirates in the House!
Pirate Daniel:
Pirate Gabriel:
As I mentioned in a previous post, my father-in-law passed away earlier this week. Death, of course, is difficult for anyone to cope with, but perhaps especially so for young children. Because they are still so close to birth, little beings of the morning, and because their life experience has been with newness and fresh discovery, with joy and giggles, death must seem unfathomable, foreign, outside of understanding.
But like most kids, my four-year-old grandson Daniel likes to understand: “Abu, why can’t I sit on top of your car? I could see a whole lot better.” “Abu, my teacher won’t let me bring my sword to school and fight like the blue Power Ranger. Why not?” “Why can’t I say potty words?” “Why do we have to wear clothes when it’s hot?” “Why?” “Why?” “Why?”
When his parents arrived at the funeral home north of Atlanta the other evening, they told me that Daniel had, as usual, been plying them with questions about the current subject which went beyond his grasp–his great-grandfather’s death. “But if Papa is in heaven, why will everyone be sad?” “Where IS Papa?”
I played with Daniel and his little brother Gabriel in the large kitchen area of the funeral home, where friends had brought mounds of food. Their mom and dad, Amy and Orte, walked through large white windowed doors and down a narrow hall that eventually led to a sitting room where the family received guests who came to pay their respect and offer condolences. Papa looked pre-cancerous in a striking gray suit, snow-white shirt, and brown and gray tie patterned with tiny crosses. He had been a Methodist minister in the North Georgia Conference. A large United States flag, achingly resplendent in red, white and blue liveliness, lay across the unopened lower half of the coffin. Papa was retired Air Force.
Every few minutes, Daniel ran over to tiptoe and peer through the windows of the white doors, gazing down that long hallway which twisted and turned but allowed no view of Papa. “Where are Mama and Daddy? I want to go too.” A few minutes later: “Why can’t I go in?” “Is Papa in there? Where?” “Let’s go in there, Abu.”
A while later, when we were eating lasagna in the kitchen, Daniel was still asking, asking. I made a decision, a decision you may not have made. I asked Daniel’s mom and dad if I could take him in to see Papa. They agreed, mainly (I think) because they trust me, and they know how much I love D.
I picked Daniel up and asked him if he knew what had happened to Papa. “He died,” came the quick answer. I told him that yes Papa had died. “And he’s in heaven,” Daniel added. His confusion centered on who or what was down that hall that everyone kept traversing. He wanted understanding, answers. He wanted to walk down that hall.
So we did.
The kitchen had been noisy with visitors loudly talking, eating, reminiscing, and occasionally laughing at the past. Its tiled floor amplified the clicks of my boot heels as we walked, Daniel in my arms, toward those doors, dividing doors which in my grandson’s mind led to answers. As we passed through them, my heels, like everything and everyone on that other side, grew quieter on the deep carpet.
We entered the viewing room, and walked past adults talking in hushed tones. Daniel kissed his Nana (Donna is the oldest of the four daughters of Papa), then his Great-Grandma, who sat regally next to the coffin. But his eyes were looking, searching.
Not expecting Papa to be lying down (why didn’t I think to tell him that detail?), Daniel finally found his great-grandfather.
He looked for a while, and finally asked quietly (Daniel doesn’t usually do “quiet” very well), “Is Papa sleeping?”
“No, not really sleeping. He died, remember?”
We stood there for about a minute, Daniel getting heavy in my arms.
“Are you ready to go, baby?”
“No.”
Other folks waited patiently for their turn behind us. Daniel started to lean over toward the coffin, paused and looked at me for permission (and like “quiet,” D doesn’t always do “permission” well). I nodded, and Daniel touched the white satin edges of the liner and then Papa’s right arm.
Giggling just a bit, Daniel said, “It tickles.” I smiled.
“You ready now?”
“Yes.”
We walked back through the hall, toward the kitchen. When we got to the doors, I saw through the windows my daughter Amy and Orte, waiting. I put Daniel down, and he pushed open the door. His dad asked him, “Are you okay, Daniel?”
But he was already off, running on the noisy tile, chasing his little brother. Doing “loud” once again.
NealEnJoy 