American Honey

Nearly four years ago, we made the difficult decision to sell our beloved home in Ashland to move to Canton to be closer to family. I have not regretted that choice, especially as it placed us nearby during the challenging months before the sweet Emma Belle’s birth. Yet whenever I’ve left a community I’ve grown to love (Ashland, Canton, Cleveland, Philadelphia, and Dover – and of course, Tonawanda), I’ve regretted leaving behind relationships that will never be quite the same, no matter the vows we make to stay in touch. Leaving town also removes the probability that acquaintanceships from that place will be nurtured into friendships, the kind celebrated with long, lingering conversations and shared dreams.

 

As I read “American Honey: A Field Guide to Resisting Temptation,” the memoir recently released by Sarah Wells, an acquaintance and Facebook friend, I’ve definitely wished we still lived in Ashland. If we did, Sarah and I might be spending time at the coffee shop, comparing notes about mud-splattered spats from our high school band uniforms, coming of age in a blue collar family, the escapades of two boys named Henry (her son, my grandson), and the challenges of being a woman with ambition and faith. Those imaginary conversations would be peppered with our mutual love for reading and writing, and our appreciation for the power of words – and yes, my propensity for run-on sentences! 

 

Since I live in North Canton and Sarah lives in Ashland, we’re separated by sixty miles of a ribbon of highway, as well as a generation of living. Thus, I have to be content to soak up the words she’s committed to print, tasting the sand and the salt of potato chips at the beach, and feeling the tear-kissed tenderness she shared with her beloved Brandon over a pan of sweet potato fries. I wish I’d had her ten (or is it eleven?) strategies to manage your crazy (self) person when I was at my craziest. I needed someone to say, “Get up fifteen minutes earlier, for God’s sake, and slow the morning down a smidgen. Start the day with a Word so it sticks to your hips like the pancakes.’ And if even that sounded impossible, I needed someone to tell me it was OK to call a babysitter so I could have time for myself without feeling guilty, for it truly is “better to have a sane mom some of the time than a crazy one all of the time.” Granted, this memoir is no traditional self-help guide to marriage, but that page of strategies is worth the price of the book.

 

How I love to read, and I am loving the pages of this book. As Alberto Manguel explains, “At one magical instance in your early childhood, a page in a book – that string of confused, alien ciphers – shivered into meanings. Words spoke to you, gave up their secrets; new universes opened. At that moment, you became, irrevocably, a reader.” Mrs. Ditmer’s first grade class at Fletcher School flipped that switch for me. Since that moment, I’ve found inspiration, adventure and solace between the covers of a book, and Sarah’s words haven’t disappointed. 

 

As a writer, I’m fascinated at how an image or just a few words can make a lasting impression. My favorite of the many images in “American Honey” came in Wells’ chapter, “The Worst Soccer Mom,” for she sums up the travails of parenting when her husband was out of town by describing the lowest point of soccer practice with a six-year-old, a five-year-old (the budding soccer star), and a sixteen-month-old. “I’m out of Cheerios.” If you’ve been there, you understand.

 

As a teen, I religiously read the monthly magazine feature, “Can This Marriage Be Saved?” As a counselor, I’ve been present with couples who wrestled with that same question. I’ve read scores of books on marriage, written a marriage curriculum (MarriageTools) and even a book on using guerilla warfare tactics to cope within difficult marriages. All too often, the focus is on fixing what is broken, often necessary to preserve vows, to keep promises. 

 

But in “American Honey,” Wells doesn’t preach or counsel, provide a to-do list or a magic formula. Instead, she writes of the love story of Sarah and Brandon. Sue Monk Kidd reflects: “Writing memoir is, in some ways, a work of wholeness.” Ultimately, while Wells acknowledges the fragility of marriage and family, she honors the wholeness of life: “Okay, so our love keeps record of wrongs, but also mercies. After all, we are here. We hold our wrongs and mercies together in careful intimacy.” Not perfect, but whole. 

Let the Words of My Mouth

A meme tells of a young child learning to read from a book about the zoo, when he proudly uttered the words, “a frickin’ elephant.” Not pleased with the child’s choice of language, his teacher asked to see the page in question, and there it was: “African elephant.” Oops!

 

A three-word phrase is currently trending across the United States of America: “Let’s go Brandon.” It began with an interview of a NASCAR winner in Alabama, and it’s been chanted at the World Series and in football games across the country, and spoken on the floor of the U.S. Senate. It’s code for a phrase that begins with a word starting with “f” and ending in “uck” – and isn’t “firetruck.” Use your imagination. This word is directed at the current president of the United States. Google Brandon Brown for the full story. 

 

As the former illustrious columnist for the Ashland Times-Gazette, I’ve had some negative words sent my way, resulting in my determination to “never read the comments” on the newspaper’s website. To my knowledge, my critics didn’t rise to the level of those who’ve responded to USA Today’s Connie Schulz, recently called a toxic progressive misanthrope in a sentence that included the father-uncle-cousin-Kate code word (see above), along with a threat to her life.

 

Jotting these words down on a Sunday morning, I wonder how those who will lift up the name of Jesus in the next few hours can rationalize using words in such a way. I’m tempted to call out names, but it’s in the senate records and recorded on video.

 

What does a believer do with scriptures such as I Peter 2:17 (show proper respect to everyone, love the family of believers, fear God, honor the emperor) or Hebrews 13:17, Romans 13 or 1 Timothy 2? Or even the “love one another” command of Jesus? Do these biblical words belong in the category of the Old Testament prohibitions against eating pork and shellfish, or killing a thief during the day?  Why are we calling each other names, threatening each other, or using words (or code words) that connected soap to our childish tongue?  Do biblical commands mean so little? 

 

Psalm 19 suggests an alternative to father-uncle-cousin-kate, whether encoded or not: “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer.” 

 

 

 

Praying Our Good-byes

When Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs’ boat blew up, it appeared that Mark Harmon’s days on NCIS were over. On Chicago Fire, Matt Casey is moving west to become the surrogate parent for the sons of a deceased colleague, leaving Sylvie Brett behind in the Windy City, just as he had been left behind when a previous girlfriend left the show. Viewers on New Amsterdam have been teased for weeks surrounding the imminent departure of Dr. Max Goodwin and his current flame, Dr. Helen Sharpe, as they prepare to leave for London. Can the iconic Big Apple hospital survive without its passionate and impulsive medical director? If Max goes, who will shepherd it through its next disaster? And what will NCIS be like without Gibbs?

 

When actors wants to leave their long-running roles on a television series, the writers are charged with developing an exit plan. Death is the easiest option, a standard on the soap opera circuit for many years, so viewers can grieve the loss of their favorite heroes and villains. When Eddie LeBec (Cheers) got run over by a Zamboni while working at an ice rink, that was pretty final. And who can forget the scene from M*A*S*H when Lt. Colonel Henry Blake’s plane was shot down after his retirement send-off from the 4077^th?

 

There are other possibilities, of course. In a previous NCIS season, Tony moved away to raise his daughter with Ziva, teasing of a possible reunion at some time in the future. And even Gibbs’ departure doesn’t seem fully final. As NCIS showrunner Steven Binder tells us, “So regarding the future of Gibbs, as long-time fans of the show may have noticed over the years… never count Leroy Jethro Gibbs out.” 

 

In our real lives, we are not exempt from painful good-byes. Like Charles Schulz, we ‘re not pleased when they occur. “Why can’t we get all the people together in the world that we really like and then just stay together? I guess that wouldn’t work. Someone would leave. Someone always leaves. Then we would have to say goodbye. I hate goodbyes. I know what I need. I need more hellos.” Yet even with more ‘hellos,’ we still wrestle with the many good-byes that find their way to our doorstep, to our heart. 

 

When our personal experience is one of shock, such as when Colonel Blake’s plane was shot down, the immediate grief seems unbearable. We muddle our way through Kubler-Ross’ stages of grief, as we deny, become angry, bargain, sink into depression, and ultimately struggle to some form of acceptance, maybe. But even when there is a long farewell, such as weeks in the COVID-riddled ICU or the insidiously slow march of Alzheimer’s or ALS, the grief is still there, often unexpected in its ferocity.  

 

While death is the ultimate good-bye, it is not the only one. When our own Leroy Jethro Gibbs moves to Alaska, we vow to stay in touch, but our hearts break. Writing in “Praying Our Good-byes,” Joyce Rupp helps us to move from the why of departure to the how, asking, “How can I move gracefully through the ache of the farewells that come into my life?” For as emotionally distant as Gibbs appears to be throughout his stint on NCIS, his farewell episode is one I will watch again, as he shares his good-byes with his friends, even when they don’t know it’s a good-bye.

 

Writer Anna Quindlen understands about loss: “Maybe we do not speak of it, because death will mark all of us, sooner or later. Or maybe it is unspoken because grief is only the first part of it. After a time it becomes something less sharp but larger, too, a more enduring thing called loss. . .  it comes as a great surprise to find that loss is forever, that two decades after the event there are those occasions when something in you cries out at the continuous presence of an absence.” 

As she does so well, Anne Lamott provides us with an image to hold: “You will lose someone you can’t live without, and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with a limp.”

As we feel the continuous presence of an absence, as autumn temperatures awaken the ache, might Rupp’s words bring hope. “The word goodbye — originally ‘God-be-with-ye’ or ‘Go-with-God’ — was a recognition that God was a significant part of the going. When you dreaded or feared the journey there was strength in remembering that the One who gave and cherished life would be there to protect and to console. Goodbye was a blessing of love, proclaiming the belief that if God went with you, you would never be alone, that comfort, strength, and all the other blessings of a loving presence would accompany you.” Amen. 

 

Writing without Starving

The world was rocked for a hot minute this week when Facebook went dark. At first, I thought it was an issue with my phone, but when I checked on my laptop, it wasn’t there either. Was I booted off the internet? No, that was working. Channeling Mama Troll from Frozen, I wondered, “what’s the issue, dear?”

 

As NPR explained, “An update to Facebook’s routers that coordinate network traffic went wrong, sending a wave of disruptions rippling through its systems. As a result, all things Facebook were effectively shut down, worldwide.” Imagine being the staff member who had to tell Mark Zuckerberg, especially since “the outage also whacked Facebook’s own internal systems and tools that it relies on for daily operations.” 

 

Facebook explained the outage, indicating it was caused by “configuration changes on the backbone routers that coordinate network traffic between our data centers,” apparently connected to an issue with the Border Gateway Protocol. Kind of like what’s been happing at the southern border of the U.S.  

 

I chuckled at the reports that some Facebook employees couldn’t get into conference rooms and the space where the routers are because their systems are all connected. “Um, boss, I’d fix the problem but my key card isn’t working.” Kind of like Facebook jail, when the offender wants to explain but can’t get anyone to listen to them because they’ve been unfairly booted from the site. Karma, anyone?

 

And rumor has it that poor Mark lost six billion dollars in net worth on Monday – or was it seven billion? I lose a twenty dollar bill and I’m bummed out for days. It sounds like a new book in Judith Viorst’s series is in order: “Zuckerberg and His Terrible, Horrible, No Good Very Bad Week.” Not much sympathy here, I’m afraid.

 

The complaints were fierce, the Twitter jokes even fiercer. I’m guessing some small businesses will even try to sue, as they lost potential sales on FB Marketplace for six hours. But that may not work out too well, because bottom line, Facebook allows us to access all this marvelous content for free! Yes, I know ads pop up from time to time, convincing us that Facebook has spies in our bedroom, and they’re mining our data, whatever that means, but I don’t pay a subscription fee for Facebook or Instagram. So if they have a bad day, who am I to complain? You get what you pay for, right?

 

What am I willing to pay for? The question is coming up quite often these days, as a click on a FB post leadx to a brick wall, a message that says, “subscriber only.” For a while, it was mostly on newspaper sites, a bait and switch that whets our appetite for a story of interest, only to tell us we need a subscription to the New York Times or the East Podunk weekly to read any further. I get it. Journalists have to eat too. If only the bulk of that money was going to journalists instead of hedge funds.

 

But now that model is creeping over to some of my favorite writers, who will tease with a social media post that provides a hint of content and then leads to a paywall. Again, I don’t begrudge their need to make money from their work, especially if the money can go in their pockets instead of into a corporation’s, but if I purchased the number of Substack subscriptions I really want, I’d be broke. The business model in media is changing, and it’s killing me. 

 

I’ve whined for years about paying for four hundred channels on cable television when I only watch five, but that was a bargain before Hulu, Netflix, Disney+, HBO Max, and Peacock came on the scene. Sure, I could subscribe for two months to watch something I really want to see, but those subscriptions renew automatically, and, like the Columbia Record club of my teen years, the records will just keep coming unless I remember to cancel.

 

Now it’s happening in journalism and other forms of writing too. Join my exclusive club for $5 or $10 a month, and you can have access to a special podcast, a longform essay, a prayer of the week, an extended warranty or maybe even a swatch of the Shroud of Turin. I exaggerate, but you get my drift. 

 

I have great sympathy for my fellow writers. Unless you’re Stephen King or Danielle Steele, book contracts are tough to get, and pay for freelance journalists is less than we can make at McDonalds, so I can’t fault anyone for trying to monetize their work. Yet today’s trend is already limiting access to vital voices that bring words to life, and those with limited resources are left out of those exchanges. Not sure what the answers are, but for today, I’m grateful for the platform of Facebook, and the social security check that allows me to write without starving.  

 

 

Turning Into My Mother-in-law

One of my favorite stories about my mother-in-law is when I came to her house one afternoon to find her in tears. When I asked her what was wrong, she said, “Sally died.” I shifted automatically to sympathy mode, wanting to comfort her in her grief, but then I finally asked, “Who is Sally?” “She’s on my show,” was the response. A longtime fan of daytime drama, Myrtle was broken-hearted that one of her soap opera friends had passed away. 

 

After more than eighteen months of the isolation that has come with the pandemic, I think I’m turning into my mother-in-law. I base that assessment on the depth of my excitement as my television friends return to my living room after a long summer break. Olivia, Fin and Rollins are back in the special victims unit, my Chicago friends are hard at work at the hospital, fire house and police station, and Leroy Jethro Gibbs has been saved from a fiery death as his beloved boat exploded on NCIS. The Reagan family is finally gathering together around their dining room table, so all is well with the world – the Blue Bloods are watching out for us. Now if the Pearsons can get their act together (This Is Us), I’ll be a happy camper – or is it snowman?

 

Yes, I’m one of those people who still watches dramatic series on network television. I’m not big on movies, don’t bother with Jeopardy!, and can barely navigate Hulu or Netflix. But if Olivia Benson and Elliot Stabler are on television, I’m watching – in real time. I know I could catch today’s episode tomorrow or next week, but there’s something ingrained in me that  heads to the television at 9 p.m. on Thursday to check in with my friends. I’m OK with that, but when I start bringing bowls of ice cream over to the couch at 10 p.m. as my mother did every night for years and years, schedule the intervention.

 

Two take-aways from this for me. The first is that the pandemic has put a damper on much of the routines we practiced for years. Whether it’s Wednesday night Bible study, bowling league on Tuesday evening, friends at our Sunday dinner table, Monday band practice, or a cup of coffee with a friend on the spur-of-the-moment, we’ve missed the routine activities that provided a weekly rhythm to our lives. 

 

Here’s the other part. As the pandemic has progressed, we’ve found ways to protect connections with those closest to us, but many of the casual friendships we’ve enjoyed over the years, from that weekly Bible study or the PTO meeting, still haven’t returned to what they were two years ago. Social media helps us keep in touch, but it’s just not the same as seeing someone in person. 

 

Rhythms and relationships – both are essential elements that define our humanity. The pandemic has brought devastating consequences to so many, but it has also disturbed the rhythms of our days and stripped away the unexpected joys that come to us through relationships. No wonder we feel out-of-synch. 

 

As I was plotting out these words in my head, I caught a glimpse of my hands in the mirror, and in a heartbeat, I saw my mother’s hands – just a bit plumper. For one brief shining moment I was my mother – and my mother-in-law. I’d write more about that revelation, but Blue Bloods is about to come on – I might as well embrace that transformation and grab two bowls of ice cream on the way to the couch.

 

 

A Happy Snowman?

When Frozen: The Musical announced it was rehearsing and opening its Broadway touring ensemble in Buffalo, my sister was at the front of the line to buy tickets. Unfortunately for her, the long-awaited performance ended up conflicting with a commitment to her son, so the text came: would you and Madelyn like to come and use my tickets? Is the Pope Catholic? Does a bear . . . You get my drift.

 

What an amazing night. Shea’s Buffalo is a majestic setting. Filled with masked attendees in the 2021 pandemic version of a costume ball, the theater was abuzz with anticipation. The show is coming to Cleveland in August 2022, and it’s worth every cent of the price of admission. Save the date, Madelyn, Lizzie and Emma – we’re going (sorry, Henry, but I’m afraid my favorite Energizer Bunny couldn’t sit still – your time will come).

 

My favorite part of the night was when Olaf sang “In Summer,” the clever composition by Kristen Anderson Lopez and Robert Lopez. There is something about the little snowman’s character that is enchanting. Created of snow, he has only known the cold of winter, but as he sings, he considers the perks of being warm. “But  sometimes I like to close my eyes and imagine what I’d be like when summer does come.” As the song nears its conclusion, Olaf dreams out loud: “Winter’s a good time to stay in and cuddle, but put me in summer and I’ll be a . . .” Into the song’s pregnant pause, the adults in the audience held their collective breath, knowing that the next word, rhyming with cuddle, will be puddle. If Olaf only knew . . . But into the silence of the theater came a tiny voice from the audience, beating Olaf to his punchline: “a happy snowman.”

 

Of course every child in that theater knew those words. So did the grandparents. We’ve head the song a zillion times as the little ones have watched the movie and listened to the song over and over, and we believe with Olaf. Sadly, this precious understanding of a shared meaning won’t last past the Disney experience. 

 

I first heard the phrase ‘post-modern’ about twenty-five years ago. We were moving from modernity, with its emphasis on realism, to post-modernity, a cultural construct that rests on the idea that there’s no such thing as absolute truth. Your truth is your truth and my truth is mine, and we’re both right. In post-modernism, we no longer have a “happy snowman” common experience. Remember when Hulu was a dance, an apple was a fruit, and a fox was a sneaky animal trying to get into the henhouse?  Not anymore. With the internet, podcasts, blogs, and hundreds of cable channels bombarding us daily, our input is so varied that our output is bound to be as well. No wonder we have such varied opinions about what is right and what is true.

 

I sense a meandering in my thinking and writing about my little snowman friend. By the end of Olaf’s song, even his innocent dreaming is faced with a threat, as Kristof says, “I’m going to tell him.” What Kristof knows is that snow melts under the summer sun, and without some kind of miraculous intervention (see Frozen II), Olaf will become a puddle rather than a happy snowman. Olaf has one reality, and Kristof another, but in the real world, there is absolute truth. Snow melts as temperatures rise. 

 

No tidy little package this morning, I’m afraid. Speaking in the courtroom of “A Few Good Men,” Jack Nicholson indicts us all: “You can’t handle the truth!” If he’s right, then at what cost? That’s what I’m wondering this morning.

So Long, Farewell

When the Salvation Army Kroc Center first opened in Ashland, our welcome center staff fielded a variety of phone calls. Potential visitors inquired about the hours of operation and the feeding program menu for the day. One of my favorite calls asked if Ray or Joan Kroc was in, and another wanted to know if we did exorcisms. No. For quite some time, the daily calls included a complaint from Jim Becker, aka Mountain Man, telling us “there’s no such thing as homeless.” 

 

As part of the county’s Homeless Coalition and heavily involved in ACCESS, the church-based sheltering program, we knew Jim’s premise was incorrect – there definitely were unhoused and precariously housed people in Ashland. To pretend there weren’t was a disservice to those who needed stable housing. But as I look back on his words from the perspective of a decade, on some level, Jim was correct and perhaps even prophetic in his words. Vocabulary is changing, and now we are more likely to speak about people without homes, or unhoused people, rather than “the homeless.”

 

It’s happening in other fields as well. American Indians became Native Americans and are now spoken of as indigenous or First Nations people. Mental retardation services are now programs for those who are developmentally disabled, adjusting our language to use descriptors rather than shaming labels.

 

It’s a good reminder to me that words matter. How we speak about each other and how we speak about ideas make a difference. For the past fourteen years, I’ve had the absolute privilege of crafting words to offer my perspective on all kinds of topics, with the hope there might be a reader or two who responds, “I never thought about it quite that way.” Early on as a newspaper columnist, I came to grips with Brett Stevens’s guidance: “What a columnist owes his readers isn’t a bid for their constant agreement.” Judging by a few vocal critics, I succeeded in that.

 

I’ve written as a smitten immigrant to Ashland, and as an even more smitten grandmother to the lovely Madelyn Simone, the delightful and determined Elizabeth Holiday, the charming Henry Kyle and the sweet Emma Belle. Nearly every year, I’ve claimed that hope springs eternal for the Browns, the Cavs, and the Indians. Together we’ve grieved the loss of Ashlanders we’ve loved, and celebrated amazing accomplishments within the community. Although not primarily a column on faith, a columnist writes from where they sit, so that’s been present as well. It’s been a good run, much longer than I expected when I first stuck my head into Ted Daniels’ office with a hesitant question about an occasional column. Thanks for saying yes, Ted.

 

However, this will be my last column for the Ashland Times-Gazette. I’ve written before about the struggles of small town newspapers, and now that struggle has impacted regular contributors to the paper, myself included.

 

I’ll miss writing about the food at the Ashland County Fair, the Cleveland Guardians, Ashland’s  incredible Women of Achievement, and the excitement of the Kroc Center’s upcoming production of Frozen Jr. And what about Bishop Sycamore, the high school that’s not a high school? I was hoping to tackle the topic of how I am becoming my mother – and mother-in-law, and wanted to be able to write about Lizzie’s on-going wish coming true – the end of the Corona. But as Elsa of Arendelle knows so well, sometimes we just have to “let it go.” Ingrained habits are hard to break, however, so I may be writing and posting for families and friends on Facebook, keeping up a blog for lack of a better platform at the present. 

 

Rogers and Hammerstein’s “The Sound of Music” was one of the first movies I saw in a theater, and I still have the dog-eared copy of its tunes that I played day after day on the piano. Madelyn, Lizzie and I listen to its soundtrack often, so I’ll conclude with a song. With deep gratitude for the opportunity and for my faithful readers, I join with the von Trapp children to say, “So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, goodbye, I leave and heave a sigh and say goodbye.”