Home for the Pre-Holidays

I just returned from Cleveland, which was a gift in itself. I know what you're thinking.

Oh really, Kendra? Which part was the gift? The returning? Did they pay you to go to Cleveland? Or pay you to say that you did?

Truth is, Cleveburg iz where my peeps be at, where we kick it old skool, where, on dogs, the fam be off the heeeeezy.

And as the story goes, in Cleveland there is a house. A special ranch house where a redheaded Nana lives. In Nana's house is a bed. In that bed, a couple can do the unthinkable.

* * * * * * *

They can sleep in past 7:58 a.m.

::gasp!:: For the first time in ten and a half months.

While their Baby Girl is entertained by Nana Red who knows a thing or two about coaxing a smile out of a ten and a half-monther.

There was even one day where we slept until the decadent hour of...

* * * * * * * * * * *

10:28 a.m.

The best things in life are indeed free.

The bestest things in life cannot be wrapped or inserted into a giftcard envelope.

The bombdiddleyestest things in life are between a pair of flannel sheets in Cleveland. Pajamas on.

A Moment of Vanity

A moment of vanity to start the week. And a moment of gratefulness, too. I have a vast catalogue of pictures. Shoeboxes full of ones I took with my 35mm film cam, poorly composed photos in our dimly lit family room, high school dance photos where I could sharpen a pencil with my bony elbow, messy college photos of bygone debauchery, and eleventy million of my husband, my daughter, and increasingly fewer of me.

Which is why I treasure this photo. It is one of my favorite photos of myself. If pictures tell a thousand words, this photo exceeds its word count.

I am 24. I am working 2 jobs, I have 2 roommates, I am getting married in 2 months. Which is why my church friends, the most faithful of the friends I have met in Boston, are throwing me a surprise bridal shower. I am never surprised. Surprises elude me. At this time in my life, I find most people transparent, most experiences in life a let-down, and nothing really surprises me. I have been rejected from all of the top law schools to which I applied, I have no sense of joy about my upcoming wedding (only stress and disillusionment). I am going through the motions of a confused twentysomething and trying to understand why all of my life's decisions are needing to be made NOW and why they are all hinging on ME.

And then my girlfriends throw me in a salad spinner, rinse me off, pump me up, and whirl me around. I knock on Eunis' apartment door and there is laughter from within. "Here's your notebook back, Eunis. Sorry to interrupt you -- I'll let you go---OH! OHHHH!" I have never been so surprised in such a joyful way. By such joyful friends. It has been a long winter and I am finally feeling the thaw. Lovey Loverpants is there, and I cannot stop hugging him for helping to pull this off. I cannot wait to get married. I am thrilled, blessed, and surprised to experience this combination of feelings all at once, at age 24.

Your turn....

Never Too Old

There is a grandmother at our church whom I have always feared. She is not a cute little old lady. She is little and probably pushing 80-85, but sinewy, you know? She is thin, but I bet she could go demolition derby on her bike over some garbage cans if she wanted. I guess this because true to form, as a Korean elder, she doesn't really have to apologize if she bowls me over. And she doesn't. She is my elder. So when she pushes me out of her way, I submit, albeit surprised every time that SHE JUST SHOVED ME OUT THE WAY AT CHURCH! Lately, though, my heart has softened towards this granny, because she has sought out my baby like she was Tom Hanks and Baby Girl was Private Ryan. When she sees Baby Girl, her usually sour expression goes from one where I suspect she wants to spit on me to that of unbridled joy, of warmth, of a tender kind of delight. She has sometimes snatched Baby Girl out of my arms to hold her up and marvel at something, I say something because it is all in Korean and I do not understand all of it yet. But I am guessing she is saying that Baby Girl is the cutest baby who ever lived, that is just my guess.

This past sabbath, this granny was leading intercessory prayer and she began to cry. I couldn't see her face because I was in a kneeling eyes-closed position, but I heard her voice start to waver and then really tremble in this surprising and beautiful way. Later that day, Lovey Loverpants said, "How 'bout Grandma crying during prayer? She was praying for the youth and for the church and she was getting all emotional." At that moment, I said, "We should all cry during prayer," and I realized that I wanted to be just like this granny when I am her age, if I reach her age. I want to be confident of my place in the world, of my eldership, but I want my face to melt into a large marshmallowy rainbow when I see a baby, I want my heart still to be able to be so broken and touched by a need for prayer that it causes me to tear up and for my voice to quiver in front of a whole church of people. I want to have her wisdom and her assurance but also her vulnerability. Lord that I might one day be half the granny that she is today.

***

Speaking of tears...

If you give a baby a cellphone...

She'll probably want to eat it...

And then she'll cry when you take it away....

Life's tough. But cellphones are expensive. And not good for eating, anyway.

P.S.  I didn't really give her my cellphone for photo staging purposes.  I gave it to her because she wanted to call in her pledge to NPR.