How My Kids See Me

To them, I am a laundress, a perpetual dishwasher and cook, a nag--"Put away your dish! Close your drawers!"--a chauffeur in a minivan, and an ever-ready editor (even though I can barely see straight, let alone THINK, at 11 p.m., when their first drafts are finally ready for my editing). I am the one who volunteers them for community services "without asking," but also the one they later thank for getting them involved. I am easier to convince than Dad, and quicker to forgive and forget--clearly the one to ask for money or special privileges (does that make me The Pushover?). I am unconditionally loving, even when I'm stressed, and they know it, because one of us always fails to conceal a smile when I still insist on a kiss goodnight, even after an argument.

Because of them, I have a lot of half-finished manuscripts, a lot of double-bookings, and a need to clone myself. Their busy lives make me frantic when I can't find my pocket calendar or my keys, because I struggle to know where I need to be and when, and to do so on time, so that I'm not constantly yelling, "Come on! I'm leaving without you!" Because of them, I'm a liar, because I almost never leave without them, and so I deserve the angst of having late kids, don't I?

They tell me that they hope I won't sell "their" house, that I'll stay in our neighborhood so they can always come "home," that I'll dedicate a book to them, that I'll babysit their kids and always stay healthy, that I'll live to 110 and stay "cool." And I will try to fulfill their hopes as I now fulfill their needs, so they can still see me as cook, a pushover, a guaranteed kiss, and an editor (even if not a chauffeur or laundress anymore)--even when I've finished the half-done manuscripts and am busy squeezing in visits with them between book tours.

That's how I see my kids seeing me.

[This post was written in response to a writing prompt I gave my teenage writing students, a poem titled "How My Father Sees Us," by Kirsten Smith, in her poetry novel The Geography of Girlhood. You can read more about the prompt and how the kids responded on my other blog: www.susanllipsonwritingteacher.blogspot.com).

On Faith

On Faith
by Susan L. Lipson

People often say, “God gives me faith;”
But what faith is it that God gives?
Faith in oneself?
Faith in humanity?
Faith in God?
All of the Above?

Sounds like a kind of conflict of interest to me.
For if God just gives faith to us,
then our faith is not an achievement,
not a blessed state of mind
based on appreciation,
deep understanding,
and our suspension of doubts;
rather, such faith would be
a mere manipulation by God.
And since God does not manipulate us—
for then why would He have given us free will?—
it follows that our faith doesn’t come from God,
But from our coming to know God.
Faith is OURS,
to seek, find, and develop;
The faith we get from God
Is God’s faith in us.

Glowing Cross in Chopped Down Tree--Surely a Sign?!

Every day for the last few weeks, as I drive into my friends' driveway to pick up their kids for the school carpool, I notice the pile of tree chunks--yes, chunks, not trunks--in front of their home, left behind after they had an overgrown tree removed from their yard. The circular chunk of trunk that faces the street has a two-way split through its center in the shape of a cross, and the cross is surrounded by cracks like the rays a kid draws on a picture of the sun. I must admit, the image looks impressively intentional, and if I weren't a Jewish skeptic when it comes to alleged appearances of the Virgin Mary in cheese sandwiches, or tears and/or blood leaking from Christian iconic art, I might fancy that I even heard ethereal music and saw the rays glowing. I might even contemplate calling the Pope to report the sighting of evidence of the holy spirit....

But I'm too jaded for that.

And thus, I've been joking with my kids that any day now, the media will be at our friends' door when we pull up, and they'll be snapping photos that will appear in the local papers with the caption: "Holy Spirit Makes Appearance in Poway Tree"--or something like that. I also joked that my friends should put the tree on EBay, in slices, like the grilled cheese sandwich in which the blessed virgin's face supposedly appeared (I still marvel that people recognized her after so many years!). So imagine my surprise when I noticed on Facebook that a different friend had as her Facebook photo a picture of the very same glowing cross! I sent her a message, asking whether she'd taken the photo on E--- Road, and she wrote back that she had indeed, and was happy to hear that I'd noticed the cool cross, too.

Imagine again my continued surprise when I called my friend, the tree owner, to tell her about the funny Facebook coincidence, and she asked, "What cross in the tree?"

"You mean to tell me you haven't noticed it?!" I exclaimed. "You mean to tell me that you, the good Catholic, overlooked it? You let your Jewish friend notice the holy ghost in your front yard before YOU did?"

We both cracked up (my same friend from the earlier blog about my demented memory), and she had her daughter pull up the Facebook picture so she could see it for herself. She promised to go look at the log in person when it stops raining. It's still raining as I write this, but shouldn't the glowing cross be worth some wet hair and stained shoes?

"Maybe I can sell slices of the tree," suggested my friend between guffaws, "and pay for the backyard projects I can't justify doing right now!"

"Yeah, and maybe you can put the pieces on EBay and finance that new kitchen you want, too!" I added. "You can call it the Jesus' Kitchen Project."

Oy, such irreverence in the face of possible miracles!