Sarah Shell Teague's Blog

I attended a five-hour seminar at my church led by Greg Love, a sex abuse litigation attorney from Ft. Worth, Texas. He challenged the 100 or so volunteers in our children’s and youth ministries present to learn more about a problem I’d just as soon not think about. A problem I’d prefer to think of as occurring somewhere else. A problem that well0meaning people have been incorrectly thinking isn’t relevant, or ineffectively trying to stop: sexual abuse of minors.

Attorney Love gave a brief history of how he came to the forefront of this despicable crisis. Through his and his wife Kimberlee Norris’s persistent and engaged dedication to actually addressing this problem, they have both become much-solicited experts in this field. And they’re none too early to confront this epidemic: 30-40% of girls and 13% of boys will experience sexual abuse before age 18. Even more unbelievable: 77% of all sexual assault victims are under 18.

Attorney Love demolished our confidence in being prepared by demonstrating ways that we, as practically all good people do, perceive this problem. Only 4% of cases involve a sleazebag in a trench coat, offering candy or puppies to little girls. 90% of all children are victimized by someone they know and their parents trust, someone who “looks like you and me.” He explained that while we think of perceiving the problem visually, we must perceive the problem behaviorally.

Love displayed image after image of clean-cut, successful looking pedophiles, 90% male, 10% female (facts from Department of Justice). These deviants are educated, articulate, and attractive, often married with families. Shocking statistics: the average male predator begins abusing victims when he is 13-14 years old. Y the time he is prosecuted (which is rare, though the average age of the prosecuted deviant is 35), he has molested an average of 150 victims. One abuser acknowledged over 1,000 victims. And less than 4-10% (depending on which source is used) of these abusers will ever encounter the criminal justice system, rendering faith in background checks nearly useless. Another astounding statistic: 66% of molestation  victims will not tell until adulthood (if ever).

Love pointed out patterns when abuse occurs: staff or gatekeepers fail to recognize risky behavior, staff fails to communicate concerns to leadership, leadership fails to comprehend and therefore act on information. We were repeatedly warned to “be prepared for the allegation difficult to believe about someone difficult to suspect,” calling to mind the Penn State meltdown, where such abject evil was so incomprehensible on a campus known for integrity that it wasn’t dealt with. We were compelled to realize that we as responsible adults can’t waste time muddling over it not making sense; we must handle “awful” so that something awful doesn’t happen to a child.

We learned to recognize patterns of behavior leading to abuse: the abuser “grooms” both victim and responsible adult, overcoming barriers by appearing helpful, trustworthy, and responsible to the gatekeepers (rendering policy-dictated probation times for working with children ineffective because the payoff is so worth it to the abuser that he’ll happily wait six months). The abuser uses age-appropriate gifts to meet a child’s needs, from trust and seeming care in young children to money, alcohol and pornography in teens (although a statistic cited claimed the average age of introduction to pornography is now ten years old). The abuser tests barriers, pushes playful or rough-housing behavior beyond acceptability (or with young children consistently tickles, especially at naptime). The abuser keeps victims silent through secrets, shame, embarrassment, and ultimately threats.

A breakdown of perpetrator profiles in churches shows that 50% are volunteers, 30% are staff, and 20% are other children, exposing children who are victims themselves, acting out behaviors foisted upon them. It was noted that a child must cry out (appeal for help) an average of seven times to be heard.

Attorney Love groaned the five-word combinations he hates to hear (and they’re uttered frequently in these scenarios): “Now that you mention it…” or “Come to think of it….” If we get lots of things wrong, we as responsible adults must become proactive in protecting vulnerable children from this life-changing injury. To insure the most inviolate safety of “the least of these,” please call 817-737-SAVE (7233) or reach out to Ministry Safe https://ministrysafe.com/, a “consulting organization designed to help churches and Christian ministries understand and address child safety risks related to sexual abuse,” where Love and Norris are directors.

In many states it’s the law that everyone’s a “mandatory reporter.” It’s a federal law within sports activities. Whatever state you’re in, it’s a moral law to keep these monsters away from children and youth. Please don’t decide it’s too unbearable to think about, or that you’re safe by screening creepy-looking people, or that it could never happen to you. Please be grown up enough to “handle awful” and safeguard the children in your life.

I’ve always heard that if you see dolphins, you don’t have to worry about sharks. I’ve never thought much about sharks. But I’ve often thought it would be great fun to swim with dolphins.

Ever since I was four, my family has vacationed on Anna Maria Island, a sliver of sand midway down the Gulf coast. As grade school children, my brother Jack and I spent hours shoulder deep in the Gulf. We would hop at the right moment to let the waves lift and set us down again gently, like seagulls perched on the water’s surface. We’d strain our eyes for a glimpse of that first fin, when the dolphins would swim by. They’d glide up or down the coast, in that transitional border between their sea and the shallow water man claimed as his territory, and we would fantasize about playing with them.

Jack and I would change into our suits in the station wagon before we arrived. I couldn’t wait to blast out of the car and smell that slightly unpleasant beach scent. As our parents unpacked, we’d be jumping through the breakers. I’d lean over to scrub my face in the surf and taste the salt. It stung my eyes and drops of sea water trickled into the back of my nasal passages, burning out any leftover sinus. Jack could venture shoulder deep immediately, but my hair had to stay dry until my mother set up camp on the sand. Even after she arrived, to read her magazines and consolidate the freckles on her back, if she caught me beyond that halfway mark of the pier, I’d have to sit on the beach next to her for thirty minutes.

Now that I’m grown, my family still escapes to Anna Maria Island every other year. My husband Reese and I unpack as our son, Curt, splits for the pool. I gripe at him for choosing concrete over coast, and then I head for the beach, my shoulders soon tight from sun and salt.  As I share my thrown-together sandwich with the seagulls, my eyes adjust to the gulf. I stare hard for the familiar dark curved triangle that cuts through the surface of the water, and then slides under again. 

Usually this beach drops into a trough after the gradual slope then rises onto a surprisingly shallow sand bar. In past years, I have stood neck-deep at the bar, near the end of the pier, during low tide. While snorkeling, Reese has seen hundreds of sand dollars on the outer edge of the bar. But on our last trip we were unable to locate the incline. The day after we arrived, Reese and I swam out just past the pier, occasionally dropping straight down to sound for the bottom.  He’s six feet, and when the surface was two yards beyond his arms stretched above his head, we quit trying. We were beyond the bar. Maybe the sand was not as shallow. Maybe the bar had shifted closer to shore than we guessed and we had passed it. 

A few days later, we woke to drizzle. With rain in the forecast, we decided to blow the morning at a nearby aquarium. While Reese was tying his sneakers, the balcony brightened. 

“I’ve got to take advantage of this,” I kicked off sandals and ran toward the bedroom.

“You’re staying?” Curt hadn’t pulled on a tee shirt yet.

“Sure,” I yelled as I slipped into my suit. “You want to?”

He didn’t respond. I left the bedroom, started on him again. “You can’t pass this up. We might see dolphins. Give it a chance.” 

The previous spring, before his tenth birthday, Curt’s soccer team reached the semi-finals of a city-wide tournament, largely due to Curt, big and strong for his age. But he didn’t like shooting goals, preferring to control the ball from mid-field. The young coach had no children, had never played soccer, and had only read some books. On the field, the kids appeared to play without a game plan, even to the parents on the sidelines, who still couldn’t recognize an off sides penalty. 

The teams were tied 1-1 at the end of the game, sending them into sudden death playoff. The parents watched as coach and players huddled across the field. Then one of the smaller boys donned the jester-like goalie’s jersey.

“Why isn’t Curt playing goalie?” A teammate’s father threw up his hands as he paced the sidelines. I shrugged and we all stared, stunned.

Our goalie did not stop a single kick. After Curt booted in the ball, the other team’s goalie caught every player’s attempt. On the sad ride home, I asked, “Why on earth did Coach Winfrey put in Micah as goalie?”

Curt looked out the window. “He asked me to be goalie and I said no.” 

I almost hit the ditch. “What?”

Curt stared at his cleats. “I was afraid to.” I went cross-eyed but let it drop.

Now, with a glorious morning’s swim as prospect, maybe he needed a little push.

“Why stare at water through glass when you can experience the real thing?”

Curt hesitated. 

“We won’t go out far,” I promised. “It’ll be fun.”

Curt slung a towel over his shoulder. He would swim in his black mesh shorts, the ones he wore day and night, letting them dry while eating hot dogs by the pool. Reese left to find a newspaper. I scooped up my flip flops, and Curt and I scooted down the stairs.

When we reached the beach, the sun was already wavering. The shoreline was practically empty, and I couldn’t see any other swimmers. I stepped through the breaking waves and strode then stroked out to my favorite spot, shoulder deep. I didn’t wait for Curt, who took his time getting used to the water.

I turned to the shore, which looked far away, sixty yards or so, due to the minute grade of the slope. I was two-thirds of the way to the end of the pier to my right. Curt dog-paddled out.  Usually he preferred boogie-boarding to wave riding, but I’d hurried him out the door without his board, and he didn’t want to trek back up to the condo. He floated a little, easy in the salt. 

I looked at my son.  “Don’t you love it here?”

He lifted his head out of the water and gazed as if he were thinking about something. Maybe he wished we’d gone to the aquarium to see the fish up close. If the rain returned, we’d be sorry we stayed, and Reese had the car. The wind blew, and thick clouds choked out the sun’s warmth. 

Curt shivered and stared at the waves. “I’m thinking about sharks.” 

We had never worried much about sharks on this beach before, due to the regular dolphin sightings. However, last summer a boy had lost an arm to a four-foot shark less than five miles south of our beach, and an elderly man had been attacked off his private pier in Tampa Bay north of us. He died soon afterwards. I tried to put the thought of it out of my mind. 

“Miles of sand and sea surround us. Tons of fish. Why would a shark come up to us?”

“Maybe that’s what that boy thought.” Curt replied, not looking at me.

“How many people have been in this water since then, though? We’re well inside the safe zone.”

Curt remained unconvinced. And I couldn’t dispel the thought that, since we were alone in the water for as far as I could see, if one were lurking, we’d make a fine brunch.

“All, right, I’ll head in some,” I sighed. Curt looked a little relieved. I semi-backstroked, in a sitting position with my back to the shore. We stood when I was rib cage deep, half way to the end of the pier. The waves weren’t ready to break yet, were rolling into their head, still good for a lift. I spread out my arms and bent my knees, bringing the water level to my shoulders to get the full effect of the rise and dip. Then I caught sight of the fin far off to my left.

I squinted and focused hard before saying anything. Many times what seems to be a fin is merely a lapping wave. A viewer has to stare straight and hard, but in a general area, because the dolphin won’t surface again in the same place. But the fin rose again, and this time it was unmistakable. There were three of them, still far down to the south.   

“Dolphins!” I turned to yell at the scant beachcombers who had braved the damp weather, none of whom were within earshot but who could recognize my gestures. They covered their eyebrows, salute fashion, and nodded in recognition.

Then I realized: for all the years we had spotted dolphins out in the Gulf, my parents would never have allowed me to swim that far past the pier. But if we hurried, Curt and I could intersect their path.  “Hey, we can reach them. Let’s go.”

Curt didn’t move. He had never mentioned an interest in touching or swimming with dolphins. Though very much in shape, he had never swum a lap at sprint pace, and the dolphins’ track ranged out twice as far as the end of the pier.

How badly I wanted him to share this with me—something he could tell his grandchildren sixty years from now. The fins continued to arc, nearing ten o’clock. I lunged toward Curt and pulled on his arm. 

“Come on, this is an unbelievable opportunity! You have to.”

Curt mumbled, “You don’t need to go out there by yourself,” and reluctantly joined me. We swam freestyle, the stroke for speed, another hundred yards. We were well past the pier, and I didn’t want to think about how deep the water was. 

Curt had not matched my pace. I paused, listened for him, and gauged the progress of the dolphins. To my surprise, they reared up at about eleven o’clock to my left. A hot chill swept over me. First of all they were black. They didn’t look like Flipper at all. They were close enough for me to see their shiny flesh, which made me think of how a runner’s thighs would feel after a two-mile jog in the morning, slick with a slight give, but firm under the surface. They didn’t seem to be mammals. Because of their slow, clockwork-like movement, they appeared to be mechanical replicas. Their alarming progress seemed incongruent to their leisurely pace, perhaps because of their size. They were much larger than I’d expected, and I realized that I was afraid. 

I could hear Curt splashing behind my splashing. He sputtered, “Are you sure those aren’t killer whales?”

“They’re dolphins.” I was so out of breath from swimming that my voice gave out. What if they were friendly dolphins’ malevolent cousins?  What if one were a nursing mother who thought we were trying to harm her young one? If a creature this size could crush my ribs with even a playful roll of its body, what could it do to Curt? 

I forged ahead and tried to determine the length between me and the dolphins as they curved up and slid under, unhurried but advancing markedly.  I guessed they were about two body lengths from me.

I was delirious with excitement. The middle one, the largest, puckered his blow hole and then the hole disappeared as his head cruised under the surface. I charged forward, slapped the water and yelled to get their attention. They ignored me. I tried to scream underwater, anything to reach them. They were practically straight in front of me, but how far? 

Strangling wheezes shot out of my heavy breathing. I had to draw deeply, and I fought to avoid swallowing more salt water as the gray waves kept coming. I felt dizzy. My heart was hammering from the swim; I swam some more. I longed for Curt’s boogie board. They glided on. I was spent. 

Or was I? I couldn’t possibly reach out and touch those huge beasts. Nothing could be holding me back. My fear wasn’t slowing me down, constricting my bronchial tubes, convincing my brain I couldn’t make contact with them. Or was it?

Years earlier, on a summer afternoon in the middle of a freshwater lake, I swam off a rented pontoon with my friends. A ski boat skimmed by, its wake so large that it rocked the pontoon and knocked its detachable ladder into the water. I was closest to where the ladder went in, and everyone called for me to save it. I bravely dove down, but the deeper I probed, the murkier the water became. Sunshine glinted off the aluminum as it floated down, just beyond my grasp. I tried to grab it, but the chill of the thermocline made me shudder, and I scurried to the surface. 

I shook my head, coughing. Nobody questioned my effort. We’d all have to chip in on the $150 to replace it, so surely I had done everything possible to reach it. But I wasn’t sure then, and now I couldn’t tell either.

With these beautiful exotic beasts so close, I wanted to be able to say, “We swam with dolphins.” To crow in front of my brother and tell my friends at home. To be the one at the party to regale guests with this adventure, to share a lifelong memory with my son.  

Runner-up, bridesmaid, also-ran:  there’s no trophy for Almost. Almost hit the ball over the fence. Almost crossed the finish line first. Almost cleared the tracks before the train. 

Meanwhile the dolphins slipped away. They were simply faster, at home in their territory. I angled north but couldn’t reach them. I treaded water while Curt caught up with me. We watched the fins rise and fall.

“We were so close,” I panted. “Maybe they’ll circle around. Sometimes they do.” 

“We missed it,” Curt muttered. 

“You want to stay awhile? Isn’t it neat to be out this far?” I pulled up my legs, wrapped my arms around my shins to make a ball, but began to sink. I scrambled back to the surface, hacking. At least Reese wasn’t around to see how far I’d taken Curt.

He coughed. “We’re out pretty far, and you sound horrible.”

He seemed to spend as little energy as possible to keep his head above water. For the first time, I thought about how tired he was.

The sky had darkened more in our pursuit, and the waves seemed more choppy, the wind more intent. I smelled the storm rolling in toward us, saw the opaque gray wall at the horizon.  We were a long way from the shore. Drops began to ping against my cheeks. I turned to watch and yearn for the diminishing dolphins. And I knew sharks were the least of my worries. 

Theodore Roosevelt was my favorite president long before Ken Burns created his documentary about the Roosevelt family. Aside from his mistaken, historical-context-laden Native American policy, which I do not condone, Roosevelt rose to the challenge of Chief Executive and accomplished much in his eight years in the Oval Office. What makes him unique is that instead of trying to change people and issues on the other side of the political spectrum, Roosevelt tackled the problems that his own party was responsible for aiding and abetting. Through his family’s impressive economic and political profile, Roosevelt represented the party of Big Business. Yet he successfully limited the powers of big business, namely the growth of corporations, during his time in office. As an insider, Roosevelt knew well how to get their attention then motivate them to cooperate, effectively throttling a power that promised to run away with any sort of individual rights for the people and small organizations. His method of operation is one we should all consider and apply to ourselves.

With whatever demographic you associate, look to call down your own trouble-makers instead of pointing across whatever barrier there is, to someone who sees things differently (Notice I didn’t say “wrongly”). I’m speaking in extreme opposites on purpose: Immigration? If you’re a legal immigrant, use your knowledge of families and movements to help the police find law-breaking immigrants. Religion? If you’re religious or atheist, encourage like-minded individuals to find ways to make life better for everyone, instead of acting in destructive ways, which is the antithesis of true spiritual aspirations. Politics? If you’re a Democrat or Republican, stop encouraging the radical 2% fringe on each end, because they don’t represent the best of your party. Economic or social status? Instead of the rich blaming the poor and the poor blaming the rich for all social ills, try to get your “brother” or “neighbor” to see how he might be adding to the problem, in the myriad minor ways people warp and tilt the law in their favor.

With a little forethought and dedication, you can use your situation as an insider in your own subgroup, as Roosevelt did, to appeal to citizens who are acting against the best interests of our country. We aren’t getting anywhere gouging at “the enemy,” whatever side of whatever skirmish we’re on. There’s really so much more that we have in common, if we would quit focusing on another group whose views on one subject or in one area might be opposite our own. Trust that “they” have their reasons, and , just like “your” group, most are committed to trying to make our world a better place.

We extol the courage of our military heroes, and nowadays with the covid-19 threat, our everyday heroes. Does it really take that much courage to look at a bigot or sycophant and say, “hey, bud, dial it down!”?

So call down those in your own ranks who are giving the other side a target. I’d much rather someone I know and trust point out my thought distortions, gross exaggerations, and self-justifications than someone I expect to see the worst in me. I’ll pay much more attention to the former.

Roosevelt became president after the assassination of William McKinley. who knows if he ever would have been elected president on his own? but when he was presented the opportunity, he made a difference. We each have unique opportunities in our own spheres of influence. don’t waste your resources slinging hardballs into a brick wall; that negative energy keeps your hands dirty. See what you can do with the folks on your side of the issue. While you focus on that irritant in your own eye, that speck in your adversary’s eye might become less of a bother, and you might find ways to work together in spite of yourselves.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/about-the-white-house/presidents/theodore-roosevelt/

There’s a reason everyone’s heard of Marcel Proust. There’s also a reason so few people have actually read him. Proust’s prose, labyrinthine and obscure, challenges even the stoutest of readers. I’m not saying I could write a dissertation on Pynchon, nor am I asserting that, like Virginia Woolf’s Mr. Ramsay in To The Lighthouse, I can make it to Q (but not R) in her brilliant suggestion of the extent of an individual’s intellectual development as measured by his progress through the alphabet. But I do like when my mind is stretched, taken out for a grueling run (sorry if pathetic fallacy doesn’t work for you), worked over at the hands of a capable literary master, which brings us back to M. Proust. I have compiled a few of his statements. They’re worth pondering, if chiefly for their brevity in contrast with his usual multi-clause marvels.

“A powerful idea communicates some of its strength to him who challenges it.”

“The variety of our defects is no less remarkable than the similarity of our virtues.”

“A photograph acquires something of the dignity which it ordinarily lacks when it ceases to be a reproduction of reality and shews us things that no longer exist.”

“Our most intensive love for a person is always the love, really, of something else as well.”

Proust, Marcel, Remembrace of Things Past. Translated by C.K. Scott Moncrieff. Random House: New York, 1961.

Corkscrews, sand dollar shards, bivalves, so many broken ones, no value at all.

            Carrie
Struthers didn’t want to sit at the beach by her big brother Rody’s sneakers
and shirt, but all she did was humph her shoulders and look down the south
shore in the hopes that Rody would return soon.

            Rather than proof that
she was heavy, her figure–swayed back, protruding tummy, thicker
ankles–simply revealed that she hadn’t yet lost all her baby fat, typical of a
just-turned-eight-year-old. The wind had whipped several strands out of the
metal barrette that Rody had maneuvered into a slice of her coal, thick hair.
Her bangs were long, and in the middle grew up and away in a widow’s peak,
slightly left center of her forehead.

            Her mother, Marisa Sayers, had left for work before Carrie and Rody got up that morning. Marisa cleaned several motels on the coast farther north, southeast of Myrtle Beach. They lived three streets back from the shore, in a section of older patio homes not yet delivered up to the beach developers who pestered Marisa with letters, thick sheets of bleach-white paper, a letterhead from a whole pack of investment brokers, Dear Ms. Sayers, reduced capital gains, nest egg, children’s education. Marisa, who had inherited the house from the grandmother who raised her there, threw the letters in the trash. The locals stuck together, having cookouts on Saturday evenings, much to the distaste of the vacationers, the car dealers from Asheville, the B-Law professors from UNC, the Fulton County socialites who maintained or rented beachfront property on Pawleys Island.  The vacationers would drive through the two blocks where women in sagging halter tops tended wobbling charcoal grills, youngsters climbed on hoods of cars, and the few men who happened to be hanging around for a while sucked on beer bottles and lolled in lawn chairs. The Sayers home was comfy to Carrie, since she knew nothing beyond saucepans of  oatmeal drying on the table, blotches of dog pee dotting the carpet, perennially damp towels lying on the linoleum.

            She wished she were back at the
house right now. Uncle Terry would be awake, the latest new uncle, been there
about a month. He perched her on his lap, liked to jiggle her as if she were a
toddler. His hands squeezed her in the bend her body made when she sat down.
Terry hung around in the mornings while Marisa worked. With fuzzy hair the
color of a 2×4 board and colorless moles on his narrow cheeks and chin, he took
calls, placed bets, met young adults at the screen door then talked with them
in low tones on the porch a few minutes, after which they left. He had a silver
canine tooth and sunflower-seed-colored whiskers on his neck all the way down
to where chest hair curled up over his T-shirt collar. He gave Carrie sticks of
gum, Juicy Fruit. He also offered them to Rody, but after the first few days,
Rody refused them. Rody wouldn’t call Terry “Uncle” either.

            “Why don’t you like him?” Carrie had
asked one afternoon as they paused at the highway crosswalk on the way home
from school.

            “Wait,” Rody pulled Carrie’s arm as
a motorcycle rider revved his engine. “Don’t expect them to watch out for you.”

            Carrie jerked her sleeve out of
Rody’s grasp. “The light’s about to change.”

            “Doesn’t mean you can go.”

            “What’s wrong with him?”

            Rody peered up and down the street
then stepped off the curb, leading his half sister. “Just don’t go in the house
when only he’s there, okay?”

            “Why?”

            “Just trust me. Don’t. I mean it,
Care.”

            She had always looked up to her
brother, who, though he hadn’t been much of an ally until Terry moved in, had
not let the Foley boys pelt her with their pea shooters, and who didn’t run her
off when he and the Foleys cleaned the redfish they caught surf casting.

            Shivering in the shade on the beach,
she humphed her shoulders again. She set down the library book she’d been
trying to read, Island of the Blue
Dolphins, turned and looked to the north. She had already walked up the
shore off Huntington Beach State Park, past the secretive walkways that snaked
through the myrtles and canes, quiet little pathways that led to a camper park
where old men read the newspaper in lawn chairs while their wives decorated the
camper area, strands of bright Japanese lanterns, a pot with silk daisies on an
oilcloth tablecloth, banners “The Reddings—Lucille, Herb, and Tinker—Waseka,
Minnesota.” There was always a teacup poodle or Yorkie dancing around, yipping
if she happened into its hearing, each little dog conditioned to believe he
were the most important creature on earth.

            Carrie and Rody’s mutt Bastrup was
at home now. One of the other uncles had left him when he returned to Mobile. Bastrup, a
Rottweiler mix, sometimes plodded along with Carrie when they walked on the
beach. But this morning Rody had not wanted to fiddle with a bag to pick up the
dog’s droppings, and Carrie had never managed it all by herself, so they’d left
Bastrup baying on the front screened porch.

            She wished she were sitting next to
Bastrup now, watching reruns. She’d pat the slip covered divan, let him jump up
on the seat, only when her mother was working. Carrie and the big dog would
doze, Bastrup occasionally lifting his ears because of a catfight or speaker-banging
music in a car driving by outside, Carrie shifting her legs as they fell asleep
under his head. She could be there now, instead of rubbing her arms in the wind
on this gloomy day.

            It had pattered a couple of times,
but not enough for her to have to move under the boardwalk. This morning she
had walked all the way to the buoys at the northern edge of the island, a good
mile and a half from where they started. She liked to see the boats, imagine
what kind of people were on them, and she always looked for children. It was
also interesting to see what kind of dogs the boating people had; she sometimes
spied a spaniel or bulldog panting on the deck. Usually when she returned, she
would be tired and Rody would walk her home. Those days, after a lunch of butter-sugar-bread,
she’d fall asleep on the divan, cuddled up with Bastrup, until her mom came
home and made pancakes. She felt that tired now, but Rody had said not to go
home.

            This morning during her walk, she’d
had to slide her flip-flops on and off to cross where the water, just receding
from high tide, would pool in lower areas, running in little rivulets turning
into troughs, some places too wide to simply hop over. The sand, ranging in
texture and color from unbleached flour to ground-up corn chips, made
interesting designs, diamond shapes laced with black, shimmers like solid
waves, a smooth buttered-dinner-roll type slope.

            Carrie was hungry, too. She had brought along a cinnamon roll, drenched with white icing, from a package she and her mother had picked up near the checkout at the Stop-N-Shop. This morning she barely had time to grab it when Rody rushed her along.

He had stood by her twin bed and wheedled her as he thumped her ankle through the thin yellow blanket. “C’mon. I told them I’d be there by 8.”

            “It’s Sunday.”

            “I know; we don’t want to miss the
good fishing.”

            “You
don’t. I’ll stay here.”

            “No way,” Rody’s lips contracted.
Terry hadn’t made his usual appearance that morning: no shirt, boxers that
sometimes needed rearranging, shaggy yellow toenails. He would insist Carrie
could stay and watch cartoons if he saw them leaving.

            Rody kept his voice low. “Come on.”

            “Why?”

            He shook his head, squeezed her
forearm. “I’m not going into it with you. You just have to come.”

            “Did Momma say I had to?”

            He jerked her wrist. “I don’t care;
GET UP.”

            And because she was both little and
the sister, he’d persuaded her, still pressing his index finger to his lips and
frowning. Carrie had slipped on aqua Capri pants, the ones she’d pulled on
after school Thursday to go shopping with her mother, plus a white T and
turquoise hooded windbreaker. He helped her wrap the sweet roll in some paper
towel, guaranteeing the loss of half the icing.

            They were almost out the door when
she halted. “Something to drink.”

            Rody rushed to the refrigerator and
pulled out chocolate syrup and milk. He smelled the quart of milk then poured
some in a tumbler from the dish rack. He stirred in the chocolate, trying not
to jangle the spoon against the glass.

“Drink this here. You don’t want to have to keep up with it.”

            “What’ll I do later when I’m
thirsty?”

            “Shhh. I’ll give you some quarters
for lemonade at the Shake Shack.”

            Rody usually balked at Carrie tagging
along to the Shake Shack, a thatch-roofed beachfront hut offering hot dogs,
soft drinks, and Fudgsicles in the summer. It would be a walk down the south,
but worth it. She knew he was allowing her this privilege because he wanted her
to hurry and because he wanted her to stay away from the house, and that another
time he might not let her go with him. She also figured his offer meant he’d
leave her alone for a long time. But she went along with it for nothing. She
gulped most of the milk, creating brown crescent horns at the corners of her
mouth. He grabbed her library book and a towel. He still had to gather his
tackle in the carport, but he carried her items for her.

            They walked south five houses, Rody
bouncing along, Carrie shambling, sleepy and sullen. The sky remained overcast,
the prospect of showers in the air. The street jogged to the left, where they
continued another three blocks east as the paint jobs on the stucco grew
fresher, the landscaping more tended. They crossed the street, walked up the
common path, then the boardwalk spanning the protected dunes, and there was the
ocean, grand and imposing. In the shadow of the boardwalk he had dropped her
towel and book, his sneakers and shirt in the cool sand.

            “If it rains, wait under the steps.
Don’t go home till I get back.” After trapping the barrette in her hair, he
hurried off, waving and calling to Craig Foley, not even turning around to tell
her when he’d be through. She had sat there long enough to wake up on her
terms, helped along by the brisk wind and shadow. She didn’t feel up to the book
right then. When she’d returned from the long walk north and given up on the
book again, she unfolded the sweet roll, the paper towel gooey with icing.
After she swallowed a big bite, she became very thirsty. She licked the fingers
of her left hand and the wind flicked the limp paper towel and the rest of the
roll out of her grasp. Great, now Rody would gripe at her for littering. She
hopped up and hurried toward the towel, which flitted into the foam. She
stopped short of the surf, watched the paper towel dissolve in the laplets, so
that it didn’t really matter, just a tiny piece of paper in the ocean. It broke
apart in the next few waves. She swallowed, licked her fingers some more, bent
down to the edge of the upcreeping water to shake her stretched-out fingers in
the thinnest layer that would dissolve the sugar.

            The water was very cold, not
surprising for April and the cloud cover. Her fingers slightly blue, she rubbed
her hands together and stamped her feet. The wind whipped her hair again and
she tried to pull it back into the barrette.  Cool salt water left on her fingers dripped
onto her ear. The next spent wave rolled a lump of seaweed onto her flip-flops
and she jumped back. Her mother would be angry if she ruined these sandals, the
straps decorated with big aqua and white silky flowers, not really made for
getting wet. She’d begged her mother for them, while her mother insisted she
needed tan or white.

            “These’ll go with more than you
think,” Carrie pleaded at the shoe outlet.

            “They aren’t durable though.” Marisa
pulled at the strap where it was tucked into the sole, the flowers flapping.
“They’ll have to last you all summer. Besides, those floppy flowers. You’ll
catch them on the screen, or drip something on them.”

            “I’ll go barefoot most of the time.
I’ll take care of them.” Every child’s diligent promise:  I won’t
break it. I’ll be good. It won’t happen.

            She had only gotten them Thursday,
and was so proud of them that, without her mother there to overrule her, she
had worn them this morning, to further console herself for Rody’s dragging her
out of bed. She scampered away from the water and back to his sneakers. “They’ll
dry,” she assured herself as she peeled the seaweed off one of the flowers. The
flip-flops didn’t look brand-new anymore. Her toes were bluish, too. She
decided to walk toward the Shack, and wanted to leave the flip-flops, but with
more people walking the coast, feared someone would take them. That would
really make her mother mad.

            She slipped them off, stashed them
along with Rody’s articles, the towel and the book under a broken beach chair,
one tubular arm bent, beneath the boardwalk steps. She picked up the sandy roll
and tore it into pieces for the seagulls. She wondered what time the place
opened. She might get water since the roll made her so thirsty. Simply walking
home and helping herself to a glass of water out of the sink would be so much
easier.

            It wasn’t that she couldn’t walk
home by herself. She and Rody had zipped between house and beach for months,
usually with other children along. The neighbors they knew were safe, the
tourists they didn’t know wouldn’t have anything to do with them. As she walked
away from the boardwalk, she looked for Rody and his friends. Who was he to tell
her what she could and couldn’t do? And why wouldn’t he talk to her about it?
Rody didn’t usually keep secrets.  Last
summer he had shown her, through a chip in the wood fence of one of the
beachfront cottages, a lady on a lounge chair beside a private pool.

            He had sniggered, put his index
finger to his lips. Carrie peeked. At first she didn’t know what she was
supposed to see. She scoured the screen door, the windows, the pool, finally
saw the light bikini bra, the color of Cocoa Puffs, draped over the back of the
lounger, which was angled away from where they were watching. Carrie recognized
the bare knob of the woman’s shoulder, the breast, a one-third profile of the
sunbather’s nipple.

            She’d turned back to Rody, shrugged,
and whispered, “Miss Vicki lays out like that all the time.”

            Rody scowled. “Hunh-Uh.”

            “Uh-HUNH.” Her eyes widened and she
shook her head and stared back at him.

            “When?” Rody checked to make sure
the sunbather couldn’t hear. He pulled Carrie away by the arm. “You show me the
next time she does, okay? I’ll let you see my float collection.”

            If they shared so many things, why
wouldn’t he tell her what was wrong with being at home on an old Sunday morning
in April?

            She slipped the hood of her
windbreaker over her head, which pulled all her hair forward around her face.
She tried to stuff it back, down below the collar, but if felt itchy. She
walked a little faster.

            When they first arrived on the beach
that morning, she could only walk along an eight or ten foot band of beach
because of high tide. But now, at least a couple hours later, it was twice
that. Earlier, she had been alone by the boardwalk. In fact, by the Huntingdon Beach State Park
she had snuck up one of the walkways past colonies of seabeach amaranth and all
the Protect Species warning signs. She had slowed her pace in an isolated curve
of the trail, jessamine and wax myrtles sprawling toward her and the dusty
walkway. She listened for a moment, hearing only a couple of birds scratching
in the brush. After looking both ways and listening again, she had slipped down
her capris and panties, and tinkled right off the path. Nobody was around and
she had scuttled quickly back to the safety of the beach. But now she would not
have dared, because of the bird watchers, bumping their binoculars against
their sunglasses above the surf line, and the joggers, making deeper
impressions with their shoe prints in the sand as they hustled up the beach.

            Heading toward the shake place, she
studied the varying patterns left by the joggers: wavy designs, a waffle print,
a honeycomb. She swiveled at the hip to look behind at her own prints, and only
saw a mark much smaller, much shallower than the others, her own little foot
shape. She walked closer to the receding tide, where the sand was wetter, more impressionable.

            A couple of seagulls watched her
approach, then swooped away. Shells littered the shore in a line above the
point where the waves collapsed on the sand. Corkscrews, sand dollar shards,
bivalves, so many broken ones, no value at all. 
Occasionally Carrie would happen across a coquina or turkey wing, still
intact, a treasure. She drew near a jelly-like blob which the waves had beached
on the sand. She leaned over, not too close, for fear it were a jellyfish or
man-of-war. Rody had warned her about those demons, how their sting could make
a grown man howl with pain. The blob was clear, all the way to a central
reddish part, full of tiny grayish pebbles. She lingered to see if it would
move, but it sat there dull and mute, waiting for the return of high tide to
deliver it, which would be too late. She skirted it and beyond, turned over a
weak branch of washed-up evergreen with her foot, her senses alert in case the
jellyfish were to try to strike her from the back. She moved away from the
water’s edge.

            The roof of her mouth and her tongue
felt dry. She churned her cheeks in and out to work up some spit. She stuck her
hand into the flat square of her pocket, right front, for the change to buy
lemonade. No quarters clinked. She plunged her left hand into her left pocket.
No change. She tried the pocket of her windbreaker. Empty. She whirled around,
as if she’d dropped the money on the ground behind her like crumbs,
Hansel-and-Gretel style. She patted the outsides of the seat of her pants to
see if she were mistaken about there being no back pockets. She wasn’t. Rody
had forgotten to give her the change. She kicked at a knot of pine needles,
slowed down. No point in getting thirstier walking that far.

            She plopped down in the sand,
moisture seeping into the seat of the capris. She turned around and looked at
the condos behind her on the beach. What would it hurt for one of them to give
her some water? What would it hurt for her to go home? She could be there in
less than thirty minutes. She wouldn’t have to share the TV with Rody, and
Terry would let her watch what she wanted. She could lie there on the sofa,
Bastrup at her side, peaceful and relaxed. That old Rody, he had just rushed
off with his buddies, leaving her. She looked for him up the surf, but the only
fishermen she saw were two old men, each holding a rod, with another rod stuck
in the sand. They too wore windbreakers and stood well above the chilly tide break.

            A cooler rested behind them, along
with their tackle. Perhaps they had water and would give her a sip. Carrie
stood, dusted the sand from her seat. As she ambled toward them, she could see
a thermos and a plastic bag with chips and cookies tumbling out of it. She
slowed down even more. One of the men turned and saw her, his head tilted back
so he could see her better from under his fishing hat. She was close enough to
address them and the man watched her a minute.

            “Hi there.” He smiled.

            “Do you have any water?”

            “No, sweetheart, I don’t. All I have
is coffee.”

            Carrie slumped. The man shifted his
feet toward her. “You want some? It’ll warm you up.” He stuck the rod in a hole
in the sand next to the other one.

            Carrie shrugged and waited. The man
knelt, picked up the thermos and unscrewed the red cup top and lid. He covered
the bottom of the cup and handed it to Carrie.

            “Thanks.” She shivered but took it.
The thin cup warmed her hands, and steam and a strong comforting smell arose
from it. She tried it, but it tasted so bitter that she spewed it out.

            The men laughed.  The other man turned to her. “You can have
some ice from the cooler.” He opened the cooler lid, looked at his hands.
“Here, you pick up a couple cubes.”

            Carrie leaned over and grasped an
ice cube. Three fish were stuck in the ice, and the whole cooler smelled of
fish. The cube was very cold, and she slipped it in her mouth to get it out of
her fingers. It made her shiver more.

            “You out here with someone?” The
first man replaced the lid and cup top on the thermos.

            She spurted the cube into her hand
to speak. “My brother, but I can go home if I want to.” Then she returned the
fishy cube to her mouth.

“Why don’t you run along home, then.” He had picked up his rod again and spoke over his shoulder.

“Thanks.” Carrie wiped her hand on her pants, turned back the direction of the boardwalk. When they had resumed their fishing, she spit the cube onto the sand. From all the walking, even her arms were tired.

Rody would probably give in if he knew how thirsty, how bored, how lonely she felt. He’d jerk his chin up quick, then click his tongue while he watched her from the corner of his eyes, if she could just explain. What did he know anyway. Wouldn’t even give her a good reason. Probably had hidden the vanilla wafers and didn’t want her to find them. Besides, he wasn’t the boss of her.

Well, he should be here now, and he wasn’t. Couldn’t stop her. She trudged toward the boardwalk and her little pile. She would leave his there and collect her own things. He’d be mad at her, but he’d get over that. She could see the boardwalk in the distance. She would wear the windbreaker and flip-flops, wrap the towel around her waist, and all she’d have to carry home was her book, no burden at all.

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At the end of the day…for what it’s worth…dead as a doornail…what goes around comes around…beat a dead horse…cool…nuke it in the microwave…bad hair day…surreal…

Baptists aren’t really required to give up anything for Lent. We aren’t allowed to do most of what other denominations are renouncing anyway, so why quit the one thing we can do, eat? It has become a trend recently for seekers to “give up” something, and that’s good if it leads to doing penance, mortifying the flesh, and self-denial, which I understand were the original reasons for Lent. Paraphrased.

For the last three years, I have relinquished something related to language, perhaps exposing the near-sacred position in which I place language. Three years ago, I stopped using clichés, trying to find more creative ways to express myself. While a cliché can provide a shortcut to comprehension, it can also be a crutch. In a professional social situation years ago, at a gathering of fellow grad students who were strangers, I began to realize that every sentence coming out of my mouth contained a cliché. I didn’t understand this, but it didn’t keep me from continuing to use them, even stacking them like turtles on a log (which isn’t really used enough to be considered a cliché, is it?). Only later, as I thought about the situation, did it dawn on me that in my nervous emotional state, my brain was defaulting to tried and true phrases that I hoped would carry me. So, I decided to analyze why I was depending on clichés and to expand my speech by avoiding them.

Last year, I tried to completely avoid adverbs, those portly, most lazy parts of speech. People rely on adverbs in a couple of ways. They deny the powerful muscle of the sentence, the verb, the opportunity to flex by instead comping to tired, worn out words, pumped up with an adverb. For example, instead of saying “he sidled over to the hostage,” one might write, “he walked sneakily to the hostage.” I’ve even seen, “he walked amblingly!” Why not, “he ambled?” The second way speakers use adverbs is to gain time and add (insubstantial) substance to a sentence because it isn’t conveying much meaning anyway. They stall or dissemble by uttering, “Well, basically what I’m trying to say”, “Actually, the point I’m making is”, “Practically” or, “Essentially”. When I hear those vapid words used, especially several in a paragraph’s worth of conversation, red flags go up. And everyone recognizes the misuse of “literally” and “virtually.” Thus, in abandoning adverbs, I tried to find stronger verbs to express myself.

This year, I thought about surrendering emojis. Yes, laugh, it’s funny to me too, the sheer insignificance of this minor sacrifice. But remember, I’m not using Lent as a time of spiritual reflection and personal denial. I’m merely taking an already-prescribed portion of time and exploring vagaries of speech and language as a means of reflecting on what I mean to say. What’s the big deal with forsaking emojis? They have a place, with people we don’t know well, as little bridges of meaning, day-brighteners, pictures worth their own thousand characters to convey light-hearted messages, or to show we’re technically savvy enough to produce them. But they become problematic when we can’t think of a way to express what an emoji will express. To avert being stunted in this way, I found other phrases. Thumbs up? Good to go.  Hearts or kissy-face? Xoxo, love you, or thanks–. Balloons? Way to go! Congratulations! Proud of you!

I’ve been tempted to tip in an emoji for my son’s birthday, for a solicitous message to an acquaintance with a teething infant, to a friend who needs affirmation. Make no mistake, though, I’m searching for ways I can express myself without resorting to the little creatures. I close in noting that in moderation, clichés, adverbs, and emojis are good. If Lent in its conventional sense doesn’t lead a person to think differently, not much transformation occurs. So even in my little way, I’m experiencing a change, albeit linguistically.  And in the same way as with the bad habits that seekers attempt to shed during Lent, perhaps success occurs by our realizing and addressing what we’ve allowed to run to extreme.

I attended a five-hour seminar at my church, First Baptist of El Dorado, led by Greg Love, a sex abuse litigation attorney from Ft. Worth, Texas. He challenged the 100 or so volunteers in our children’s and youth ministries present to learn more about a problem I’d just as soon not think about. A problem I’d prefer to think of as occurring somewhere else. A problem that well-meaning people have been incorrectly thinking isn’t relevant, or ineffectively trying to stop: sexual abuse of minors.

Attorney Love gave a brief history of how he came to the forefront of this despicable crisis. Through his and his wife Kimberlee Norris’s persistent and engaged dedication to actually addressing this problem, they have both become much-solicited experts in this field. And they’re none too early to confront this epidemic: 30-40% of girls and 13% of boys will experience sexual abuse before age 18. Even more unbelievable: 77% of all sexual assault victims are under 18.

Attorney Love demolished our confidence in being prepared by demonstrating ways that we, as practically all good people do, perceive this problem. Only 4% of cases involve a sleazebag in a trench coat, offering candy or puppies to little girls. 90% of all children are victimized by someone they know and their parents trust, someone who “looks like you and me.” He explained that while we think of perceiving the problem visually, we must perceive the problem behaviorally.

Love displayed image after image of clean-cut, successful looking pedophiles. 90% male, 10% female (facts from Department of Justice), these deviants are educated, articulate, and attractive, often married with families. Shocking statistics: the average male predator begins abusing victims when he is 13-14 years old. By the time he is prosecuted (which is rare, though the average age of the prosecuted deviant is 35), he has molested an average of 150 victims. One abuser acknowledged over 1,000 victims. And less than 4-10% (depending on which source is used) of these abusers will ever encounter the criminal justice system, rendering faith in background checks nearly useless. Another astounding statistic: 66% of molestation victims will not tell until adulthood (if ever).

Love pointed out patterns when abuse occurs: staff or gatekeepers fail to recognize risky behavior, staff fails to communicate concerns to leadership, leadership fails to comprehend and therefore act on information. We were repeatedly warned to “be prepared for the allegation difficult to believe about someone difficult to suspect,” calling to mind the Penn State meltdown, where such abject evil was so incomprehensible that it wasn’t dealt with. We were compelled to realize that we as responsible adults can’t waste time muddling over it not making sense; we must handle “awful” so that something awful doesn’t happen to a child.

We learned to recognize patterns of behavior leading to abuse: the abuser “grooms” both victim and responsible adult, overcoming barriers by appearing helpful, trustworthy, and responsible to the gatekeepers (rendering policy-dictated probation times for working with children ineffective because the payoff is so worth it to the abuser that he’ll happily wait six months). The abuser uses age-appropriate gifts to meet a child’s needs, from trust and seeming care in young children to money, alcohol and pornography in teens (although a statistic cited claimed the average age of pornography watching or being introduced to—weak on my info here—is 10 years old).  The abuser tests barriers, pushes playful or rough-housing behavior beyond acceptability (or with young children consistently tickles, especially at naptime). The abuser keeps victims silent through secrets, shame and embarrassment, and ultimately threats.

A breakdown of perpetrator profiles in churches shows that 50% are volunteers, 30% are staff, and 20% are other children, exposing children who are victims themselves, acting out behaviors foisted upon them. It was noted that a child must cry out (appeal for help) an average of seven times to be heard.

Attorney Love groaned the five-word combinations he hates to hear (and they’re uttered frequently in these scenarios): “Now that you mention it…” or “Come to think of it….” If we get lots of things wrong, we as responsible adults must become proactive in protecting vulnerable children from this life-changing injury. To insure the most inviolate safety of “the least of these,” please call 817-737-SAFE (7233) or reach out to Ministry Safe, a “consulting organization designed to help churches and Christian ministries understand and address child safety risks related to sexual abuse,” where Love and his wife are directors.

In many states it’s the law that everyone’s a “mandatory reporter.” It’s a federal law within sports activities. Whatever state you’re in, it’s a moral law to keep these monsters away from children and youth. Please don’t think it’s too unbearable to think about, or that you’re safe by screening creepy-looking people, or that it could never happen to you. Please be grown up enough to safeguard the children in your life.

 

 

I visited the Art Institute of Chicago a week ago. I feel fortunate when I’m able to visit an art museum more than once, to the point that I can remember which beloved paintings are where. It’s always confusing when the Mary Cassatt “The Child’s Bath” painting seems to be moved, but surely it’s my orientation and unreliable memory. This visit I ventured into some rooms I had not yet seen, featuring a favorite subject for me: early American furniture and paintings.

I didn’t recognize the painting subjects, probably individuals who were prominent when our country was still a set of backwoods British colonies. Fine white lace, golden ribbon, light blue silk…I thought not only about the position and presentation of the person painted, I thought about each’s life, trying to imagine one of the days when the person came to sit for the painting.

One auspicious lady intrigued me. Had her husband amassed wealth in shipping or whaling, or did she bring the fortune to the marriage, her man clever enough to earn—and intelligent enough to sustain– her affection?

I often think about other days in other centuries, trying to figure how they were similar and different to my days. Tending to personal nourishment, hygiene, social calls, family needs, household dealings, memories, histories, thoughts and desires: all these characterize common, even daily, activities in any person’s life. So what was going on in that woman’s mind, as she sat for the painter?

Her posture erect, her face smooth, her brow unwrinkled, through youth, a relatively easy life, or the painterly touch? Her skin so white, her eyes open to possibilities, a reserved smile that, taken with her eyes, speaks of kindness, the potential for generosity and mirth or light mischief: again, the personality or the painter?

Surely she had some secrets, from loved ones, from long ago, even ones shared with her by friends. Did she keep them? Certainly she had desires, either to be noticed for her station in life, to be appreciated by her family, or to make her way in her world. Did she act on them? Being human, she had to have had heartaches, for living to adulthood implies that through the years, friends move away, relatives die, prospective lovers fade. Did she weather them? Choices sour, ideas prove unfeasible, dreams dissipate. I looked more closely, wishing I could see beyond the oil. What would have made this placid-seeming woman apprehensive? Did she trust the painter; was there chemistry, not necessarily romantic, between them? Who commissioned the painting and what was the agenda?

I have read that George Washington hated to sit for portraits. Maybe they took too much of his time. Maybe his earliest experiences were unpleasant. Or maybe he just had so much to do that he resented seemingly doing nothing, sitting still. I’m so glad he did, in the time before photography.

To sit for a painting definitely swallowed a part of one’s life. Some subjects might have enjoyed it; it might have made them feel special, or as if they had arrived at some longed-for higher social position. I didn’t know what—if anything–the woman in the painting needed to prove. One thing was sure. After the sitting, on came the regular day: pacifying Mama, tending to hubby, correcting children, managing the household, seeing to the horse. At least on the canvas, the subject is alone with her thoughts, lost to time as clearly as her likeness has been saved to posterity.

http://www.artic.edu/aic/collections/...

 We may be backed in a corner, but we’re heading the right way.

As I walked through an airport terminal last week, I observed a photograph of a celebrity from childhood. As I thought about the photo, I wondered what place childhood held for that celebrity. Was it just a phase to get through, a stage understood as a catalyst, or a magical time revered, treasured, and protected from oblivion through frequent returns?

I then thought about the importance of my own childhood and the place it holds in my present. Is it the equivalent of a tattered tissue in a side pocket of a jacket, carried along without much thought, or is it more like a lucky buckeye in that pocket, intentionally kept for its mythical impact on the present and the future?

Everyone’s childhood has joys and sorrows. Flannery O’Connor stated that anyone who has survived childhood has enough stories to write about for the rest of his life. It’s perhaps the richest mine of experience. And memory is so malleable, I have to understand that what I’m remembering may be one version of the truth. Several years ago my siblings and I produced About As Much Fun as a Child Could Have: A Shell Collection, a book of childhood memories as a gift for our parents. We found that some of us remembered conflicting  details of a single event. We left them in, all different. The truth is in there somewhere!

So I’m saying that I highly value my childhood, I’m grateful for it, the good and the bad, and I find much comfort in recalling those innocent days. The excitement of riding my bike farther than I’d ever been before. The delight of holidays with my cousins and extended family. The contentment of quiet Sunday evening suppers, with each member so relaxed in the setting that we didn’t have to clutter the space with conversation. The security of hearing my parents discussing the day after I was tucked in bed.

I address all females as “girls” with the highest connotation. Perhaps some are offended by being called a girl. I hope I’m always considered a girl; I would much rather be thought of as a girl than a woman or a lady.  My father’s frequent saying, “The past is a great friend but a lousy roommate,” speaks to the importance of keeping things in proportion. But it’s always good for me to spend time with great friends.

What does childhood mean to you?