In Your presence

"In Your presence is fullness of joy!"  The Psalmist has discovered a close relationship to God is a very happy state.

It depends on your concept of God, of course.  If we accept Jesus' God of Love and goodness, that presence give peace as well as vibrancy and joy. 

I discovered that this evening when my grandsons were wound up after dinner.  They were laughing and rough-housing in the living room while I cleaned up in the kitchen.  I sighed.  This could go on for hours -- if past experience set any precedence.  

On the other hand, I pray before I come to spend after-school time with these boys.  Today my prayers were to see more of everyone's Christly nature, that harmony and cooperation that is so natural to all of us.  

Two amazing things happened.  The first was that after school they both got right to their homework without the usual moaning and groaning.

The second was that suddenly, in the middle of the after-dinner rough-housing, there was silence.  The younger boy sat down at the computer and engaged himself in a football game.  The older boy, with a reading assignment, sat down on the couch with his book.   I had brought some paperwork and marveled, as one hour passed another, at the deep peacefulness of the evening.

Every now and then there was a rustle from the living room.  Finally I peaked around the corner and couldn't help smiling!

It's a good idea while reading to change your position from time to time.

Tough love and angels

Boys sledding on President's Day

Thursday was my day for Grandma duty.  As he got out of school, the 12-year old called me at his house where I was fixing dinner. 

“Grandma, can I hang out with Parker?” 

“What does ‘hang out’ mean?”

“You know, just hang out.”

“I need to know where you will be.  ‘Just hang out’ isn’t good enough.  Invite Parker here.”

Silence.  Finally, “All right.  I’ll come home.”

Three minutes later another phone call.  “Grandma, can I go to Parker’s house?”

“Is Parker’s mom there?”

“No, but his brother is.”

“I need an adult I can talk to there.  Invite Parker to come home with you.”

Silence.  Finally, “All right, I’ll come home.”

He came home shortly.  “I have no friends,” he informed me accusingly.  “All the other boys are going over to Parker’s.”  He was not in a mood to listen to anything, so I was quiet.

His younger brother was shooting hoops in the driveway with some buddies.  Today hoops didn’t appeal.  Picking up a baseball and a mitt, he asked, “Can I go across the street to the park?”

“Sure.”  He crossed the street and I watched out a window as he slammed the ball into the soft earth at his feet, repeatedly.  Clearly some prayer was needed.  Turning away, I reached out to our dear Father-Mother.  “What do you know about this boy right now?”  The answer that came was, “He has his own angels.” 

Of course!  I didn’t have to sort all this out.  God was already being God, already communicating to every one of Her children.  Telling each one of their worth, their purpose, showing Her love in tangible ways.  I prayed for some minutes until I could rest in the assurance of the angels, God’s very own thoughts, doing their communicating.

My grandson walked in the door just as dinner was ready.  “I found someone to play with,” he said in a pleased tone.  “He was a third grader, but that was OK.”  He stopped short of saying he'd had fun.

“Oh thank you, dear Mother-Father God!” quietly and to myself.

There’s more.  The other grandma, who was with the boys the following day, and was aware of Thursday's events, added this.

“After school I asked him if he wanted to invite Parker over.  He said, ‘Parker’s grounded.  He had all these boys over yesterday, and he wasn’t supposed to.’ “

Sweet!  Apparently Parker and his parents have their angels as well.

Excellent replacement cookie jar

Have you tried to find a cookie jar lately? It isn’t easy! For all practical purposes, they don’t exist in walk-in stores.

About a month ago, my ten-year old grandson and I were horsing around in their kitchen. Between us, we managed to break the cookie jar lid.

As we swept up the shards we agreed we would need to go out together and find a replacement. This wasn’t going to be an on-line fix, but a one-on-one, time together in the car, and searching-the-shelves experience.

The Saturday before Mother’s Day was our outing. Eventually after walking through several stores, we found a canister which could become a cookie jar; on top of that, the colors worked surprisingly well for the kitchen. We had a good time together and, best of all, his mom was delighted with the replacement.

This was a fairly typical expression of love and caring on Mother’s Day.

But what if you don’t have a mom? Or if you don’t have children? The good news is that mothering and fathering can take many forms.

There are a multitude of opportunities to give of ourselves, if we are open to them. Nearly every school needs volunteer tutors. Nearly every community can use volunteers for various services and organizations. There are different ways to express nurturing, guidance, and caring outside the traditional family structure.

If physical contact with children isn't an option, most faith traditions offer meaningful ways to pray for the world's children. Children in need aren't picky about your faith; but they are grateful for whatever blessings your prayers may bring.

“Father-Mother is the name for Deity, which indicates His tender relationship to His spiritual creation.” (Mary Baker Eddy)

Looking for, and stepping into, opportunities to express fathering and mothering blesses those who need what we have to give, and bolsters our own sense of worth.

This can be done without breaking cookie jars.

Tree climbling

Staying close to the trunk

My grandsons and I walked home from school yesterday.

First they discovered a tiny park with two good climbing trees. Each boy scampered up a tree.

I may be the only person in their lives who knows about tree climbing (other possibly than their mother), and this became a good time to impart some basic information. Such as:

• Stay close to the trunk.
• Make sure a branch is strong enough to hold your weight.
• If a branch is dead, don't use it.
• If you absolutely must use use a dead branch, have somewhere else to go quickly, put as little weight as possible on it as briefly as possible, and stay close to the trunk.

When I was growing up, we all climbed trees, and basic principles were passed from older siblings to younger siblings, from neighbor kid to neighbor kid. And nobody I knew ever fell out of a tree.

If you think about it, these are not bad principles for life:

• Stay close to the trunk. Stay close to what you can trust -- for me that's God -- Love and Truth.
• Make sure a branch is strong enough to hold your weight. Consider thoughtfully where your next step should be.
• If a limb is dead, don't trust it. If other people's opinions pull you away from your basic values, don't trust them.
• If you absolutely must use a dead limb, keep it brief and move on. If the best of two choices isn't comfortable for you, take it and look for a better choice as soon as possible.

Later the boys found lilacs in bloom on the railroad right of way. They picked a small bouquet for their mom. They added redbud blossoms from their tree at home.

Redbuds, jonquil, and one lilac

Looks to me like their love for beauty and thoughtfulness for their mom is keeping them close to what is strong and sturdy in their lives.

Heaps of giggles

Not having raised boys, I had no first-hand experience until the title “Grandmother” was bestowed upon me. Twice within two years. Boys both times.

Some say the expectancy for boys to like traditional “boy” things and girls to like traditional “girl” things is early conveyed in family settings.

The fact remains that, for whatever reasons, boys play differently from girls. Things that turn girls off, send boys into gales of uncontrollable laughter.

Case in point: Walking home from school with my grandsons one fine spring day, I was embarrassed to pass some gas. It was a very small social faux pas, which I hoped had gone unnoticed. Not so. One grandson, with a grin of respect commented, “Grandma, that was awesome!”

This grandmother sighed deeply. “Of all the things I would like to be considered awesome for,” I replied, “That was not one of them.”

He danced with glee.

When it’s too cold to go out for recess, the boys come home full of unspent energy. After dinner last night, they invented a new game. You could call it belly-flopping down the stairs. It was nearly as good as the sledding they’d done the previous week-end. Up the stairs they skipped; down the stairs they thumped, head-first and single file, until they fell into a giggling puppy heap at the bottom.

For both boys and girls, I love the approach taken by religious author Mary Baker Eddy. Focusing on that purity Jesus loved, she defines, “CHILDREN. The spiritual thoughts and representatives of Life, Truth, and Love.”



This standard supports the best of their creativity, generosity, and (let's be sure to include) intelligence.

Some things are better than winning

Rick Reilly's headline says, "There are some games when cheering for the other side feels better than winning."

This is a "feel good" story that happens to be good enough to be true.

I encourage you to Click Here for an uplift to your day.

Unobtrusive prayer

Everyone has music within them

I have been praying to upgrade my relationship with my grandsons when we are together. If prayer is interactive, I figure my part in this prayer means being aware of the presence of one infinitely good Mind in charge of our day.

This has reaped great results. Last week, for instance, they built a fabulous snow fort – their idea and without my help.

This week the morning began with video games. Ugh. However, putting my prayers into practice, I did not launch into the adult "can't you find something better to do?" lecture; I backed off and thanked God that He/She was already giving the boys good ideas. And that it is their nature to listen to those good ideas.

After an hour or so, they turned the game off, and soon live music drifted down the staircase. The younger boy was plunking away on his keyboard, and the older boy was strumming his guitar. Never mind that neither one had any idea how to play, or how to write music. They were writing a song.

The boys conspired together on a macaroni concoction for dinner and were pleased with the results. “Don’t tell Dad it’s spicy!” they begged. “Let him find out!” (Dad likes “spicy,” so it would be a happy surprise.)

Afterwards the older boy wanted to play guitar again, but his brother was busy playing a computer game, so I sat down at the keyboard. Using the five notes to which the guitar strings are tuned, I played little melodies around those, while he strummed away.

Inspired, he reached over and touched a couple of preset buttons on the keyboard, and suddenly we had drum rhythms for my five notes. Soon his younger brother came in to see what all the fun was about, took my place at the keyboard, and by the time Dad came home, the boys were well into a musical evening.

God is so cool!

Why we didn't go to the Arboretum

We went to the library instead

Tuesday the grandsons had no school. The parents both had to work, and my partner in grandmothering had just taken her turn, so it was mine.

Although I was available, and happy to help, I harbored some anxiety, because when the two are together they tend to bounce off each other – exponentially. My comfort zone is one boy at a time, and that has worked very well.

At the same time I prayed that God would show us our useful and constructive relationship together. This down-time from school didn’t need to be stressful for anyone. God's goodness fills each day, and it is our nature to participate in that goodness.

It promised to be one of the last gorgeous October days, and a great one for going to The Morton Arboretum – that wonderful living “tree and shrub museum” west of Chicago. I grab any excuse to go there, and the boys enjoy walking or running the trails.

So Tuesday came, and I arrived at their house. Their dad had already gone, and as their mom was leaving, she mentioned an Arboretum trip to them as a possibility.

The boys fixed breakfast – one preparing pancakes, the other scrambling eggs. This comes of having a dad who enjoys gourmet cooking as a hobby!

They had just created an original Lego village, and spent most of the morning engaged in Lego guy adventures.

Here is where I was pleased to see some progress, some good growing, on my part. An intuition said, "Let the boys chill." Intuitions, for me, are angel messages -- a little voice that gives us good advice. One way to tell that it's good advice is that it is usually unselfish and often blesses many rather than just one.

I'm learning that my day goes much smoother when I pay attention to these intuitions. So for once I didn’t push. The boys didn’t mention the Arboretum, so neither did I.

After lunch it seemed important to get out into the sunshine, so we walked to the library a mile away. We poked around the bookshelves and read awhile until the younger boy was ready to check out a football novel.

The lure of sunshine and the blue sky kept the boys outside the rest of the afternoon.

This day was different in a really good way. It was outstandingly simple and happy. Almost effortless. What a lesson for me in discovering the rewards of listening!

Nineteenth Century religious leader,Mary Baker Eddy, defined angels as

"God's thoughts passing to man;

spiritual intuitions, pure and perfect;

the inspiration of goodness, purity and immortality,

counteracting all evil, sensuality, and mortality."

Watching boys grow - one day at a time!

A time for reflecting on

unexpected thoughtfulness and caring

Kim, who has raised two, remarked early on with great enthusiasm, “I never knew boys could be so much fun!”

Her sincere joy shocked me to the core. At that time we had a daughter who was predictably feminine —dolls, an eye for pretty clothes, cheer-leading tryouts, boyfriends.

I would have had no idea what to do with a boy. So it was amazing to me that somebody my peer was finding this preschool male experience fun, stimulating, exciting. And her words came back full force when our daughter later presented us (one at a time) with two grandsons.

Yup, little boys in our lives for sure. We figured out what to do with them one day at a time, often following their parents’ lead, and praying a lot as well.

It was important then, and it is important now, to remember that these boys, and all children for that matter, have an infinitely wise and caring Father-Mother who looks after them, gives them wisdom to discern between good and bad, gives them good and productive ideas and the desire and ability to follow through with these ideas.

Case in point. The other day when asked if he felt older, the nine-year-old thoughtfully replied, “I don’t feel older; I just feel more responsible.”

In fact, he really is showing more self-restraint and consideration for others. And no doubt there was a conversation with a parent somewhere behind that statement. Boys grow up in very good ways, day by day.

His second-cousin is fourteen. As I was ready to leave the Christmas gathering this evening, he saw I had too many bags for one trip. “Would you like help carrying these out to the car?” he offered.

“Sure would!” I replied smiling inside and out.

Boys grow up, day by day. And it shouldn’t be amazing, but it is a wonderful thing to see responsibility in the form of thoughtfulness and caring replacing the stereotypes.

I second Kim’s statement of years ago, amended slightly. “Boys are so much fun, and they are amazing as well.”