Let Me Introduce You to Helen...

She was like "So, when should i come pick you up?" and i was like "I have a car!!" and she was like "Really? Wow!!" and i was like "I have a car, and her name is Helen!" and she was like "Helen?" and i was like "it was on the key chain." And then i was like "i have a car!" Guess what? I have a car!! And it's really cute, too. Well, and it's 1/2 my brother's, but still. Once the first rush of "Ihaveacar!!!EEEEEEE!!!"-ness passes, it becomes a rather melancholy thought. I'm glad of the independence it gives me, and it will make life much more convenient transportation-wise. But... I have many unreasonable fears (i.e. dark and enclosed spaces, People, hairy spiders, numbers) and i know they are silly. My fear of driving, however, has always seemed to me to be eminently reasonable. A slight mistake in a speech, or mathematics problem, can be corrected. A slight mistake in an automobile will at the very least cost thousands, and at worst causes irreparable damage also known as death. The first time i drove was in a huge empty parking lot, with no obstacles. My dad got me into the drivers seat, and i held onto the steering wheel for dear life. My dad put the car in drive, 'cause there was no way in tarnation i was going to let go of that wheel. He said "Why don't you take your foot of the brake?" I squeaked "Because then the car will start moving." A few days later i did eventually get my foot off the brake. The first time the car moved i completely freaked - started weeping so badly i couldn't see. Yup, i was making real progress. My hands would be sore for days after driving from holding the steering wheel so hard i would lose circulation in my fingers. My parents realized that all they'd had to do to cure me of slouching was put me in the driver's seat of a car. They had to threaten to stop my horse-back riding lessons to get me to put my foot on the acceleration pedal, but i refused to go above 15 miles an hour. Although i got my permit when i turned fifteen, i didn't get my full license until my brother had also learned to drive (i was nearly eighteen). Dad kept having to go off on deployments, and though Mom tried, she had enough to deal with without my hysterics. I did manage to learn to drive, and am even comfortable enough that my knuckles stay a nice fleshy colour and my heart is content to plod along normally and my stomache pretends that it's much more comfortable in my abdomen than in my esophagus. But... More than that, a car means i am never going back - that my parent's home is no longer mine, that there is a line drawn between my money and theirs, between my books and my brothers, between my clothes and my mom's. Just like the last time Dad came back from deployment, and he was no longer simply my dad but also a man with faults and irritating habits... My relationship with my family is evolving. And while i know it's necessary, and normal, and probably healthy, it's also awkward and uncomfortable and painful. My brothers are no longer little brats but young men; taller than i, tanner and fitter, and with gorgeous baritone voices. My mom is still my mom, but also a gorgeous lady with a complexion that anyone would envy. A car is one more sign that while they are still and will always be my parents, yet i am also become their equal and must begin to take an equal share in the responsibilities of adulthood. And i think it sucks. Bigtime. So. I have a car!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bliss

She is waiting. Her father is gone. Getting shot at. Or whatever. She knows that more people die every year in California in car accidents than die Over There. In the Sandbox. If she had been marking days off a calendar, like some people did, she would know that her father was supposed to have been back by now. She would be impatient and anxious. She was glad she didn't do that. Wasn't anxious. He had told her mom the new date of return. But it would probably change, too. Always did. Better not to know. Perhaps it was today. She could go inside, but then she'd have to talk to people. She'd rather wait outside. The air was brisk, but the sky was rosy and the birds were singing. She looked around. One of the hanging plants had fallen, and someone had placed it in the rocking chair. There was a nest in it. Dead baby birds. It had landed on the mama bird. Bird brains. Well, can't do anything about them now. Don't look. It's just a couple of birds. There's a reason "bird-brain" is an insult. Don't care. Birds are singing. Birds are singing abnormally close. She glances back at the nest. One left. Ugly little thing. About the size of her thumb. About the same colour, too. You're not supposed to pick up eggs, 'cause then the mother won't return. Well, mama won't be returning. And it must be cold. She can see right through it. And it can't see a thing. She looks at the door. Talk to people. She tells them. Asks for something to put it in. She will bring it to school with her, to the biology teacher, Mrs. Pattern. Mrs. Pattern will understand. Will help. They bring an empty jewelry box. The poor thing looks so alone, so cold. It can't grip the slick cardboard. She holds it in her hands. Keeps it warm. It seems to understand, to trust her. It quiets, and lays still. She can see it breathing. Feel it's blood beating against her hands. It's an hour to school. The bird brain stays asleep. He's rather cute, really. In a Smeagol sort of way. Mrs. Pattern hasn't come yet. School doesn't officially start for another hour, and she has choir practice. He will probably like their singing. Make him comfortable. Anyway he's still asleep. He sleeps through most of choir practice. A few kids ask her what she's holding. She shows them, carefully. She doesn't want him to wake. They laugh. She gets someone else to put her folder away, and rushes up to the biology lab. Oh, good! Mrs. Pattern is here. She reveals the bird. Mrs. Pattern gets out a heat lamp, and a towel, and calls the animal people. Mrs. Pattern tells her she shouldn't have touched him. And tells her to come back every hour to feed the bird a few drops of water. At the end of the day, Mrs. Pattern will take the bird to a rescue agency. She leaves class early to feed the bird. Sneaks into the back of the lab. Still breathing! She gets out the dropper, and watches him drink. She can see him swallow - see the water go down his throat and into his belly. His belly gets bigger and bigger throughout the day. There is an air bubble in it. He is still calm. Other kids have heard about him. Come to see him. Mrs. Pattern decides to let a couple other kids pick him up, after they have washed their hands. She is worried. At the end of the day Mrs. Pattern gives her an email address where she can write to find out if he survives. He probably won't, you know. She knows. She gets home. Math, ugh. Dinner time. Clean the kitchen. She turns on the computer. "Dear Dad, Hey. How are you? Is it very hot? I found a bird today. Got my math test back - B. It's cold here. Bye. Love you." Click. Send. She stares at the address. Slowly... "Dear Rescue Agency, Hello. I found a baby bird today. My teacher, Mrs. Pattern, brought it in. She said I could send to this address to find out. So I was wondering how he was doing. Thanks. Bye." Click. Delete. Better not to know.

Non nobis, Domine, sed nomini tuo da gloriam.

My high school choir teacher died this week. Cancer killed her. Years and years of fighting. Chemo. Wigs. Weakness. Her husband is confined to a wheelchair. One of her sons is known as "a disappointment." She taught all of the choirs for the school - elementary, advanced elementary (Wed. afternoons), middle school, high school, and a capella. She was also involved in church choirs. Before Mrs. T, choir was held in a beat up trailer behind the school (band still is), and had been for years. The school focused on their atheletics; the fine arts program existed because all schools need a fine arts program. It is a small high school - around 200 children. Mrs. T got between 70 and 80 of them to school an hour early every school day, and several other days beside. The choir was moved inside, and eventually the room (with the technical capacity of 30) was revamped with more acoustic friendly tiling. The guys wore tuxedos. She got the school to help fund an annual choir trip - to New York, Toronto, Orlando, San Antonio... She continued teaching until less than a month ago. I can't picture the place without her. More importantly, she loved the Lord. She was passionate, dedicated, and tireless. I never saw her without a smile. Her patience with me gave me the courage to continue to sing wherever i can; to volunteer for church choirs. I know how much she means to so many people, and how her example inspired. Now she is dead. Life goes on. Her funeral is hundreds and hundreds of miles away. My brothers still need to be teased and my papers still need to be written. She is dead.

the smallness of it all

I was reading my medieval history book the other day, and i started to get this strange feeling, as if i were a slinky bouncing back and forth in time. Or not quite that, but... Time is linear, they say. Well, it is, but i don't think that's the end of it. Do you ever feel like Time is a sort of telescope, pointing at something? And sometimes you just barely manage to catch a glimpse down the barrel? You can see Time all at once, as in everything is happening on top of each other, and you can see the patterns, and you feel a strange unity with all people in the past and present and future. Truly there is nothing new under the sun. At the same time there is a strange, unfulfilled yearning for you know not what, and you wonder if you are looking up or down the telescope barrel, and if what you saw was the focus of the telescope or the person doing the focusing. you think of all of the small, seemingly insignificant details that have made you who you are and have brought you to this, specific place... and of all the things you thought were significant but aren't, really - at least, not anymore. Time is flying, running up and down, twisting and turning like some vast rollercoaster (and for some reason, it's always blue - dunno why), and all of the sudden it's over, and you're you, and you think how irrelevant it is that you're sitting on a faded green couch that you bought for $100 at a thrift store, drinking a can of apple juice.... everything is slightly out of focus and you think you know how those people in movies feel when they're in slo-mo... and all those famous names and places one can't help hearing about - they're given context. they were born, raised, etc. and you wonder if anyone you know will make it into a history book, and how strange it will seem... you imagine trying to explain to your children what life was like "back in the nineties" or how you thought that those people telling you planes were crashing into the WTC must be joking, and how you felt that after that everything was different, yet nothing had changed or how people used to not have internet and how weird cellphones were when they first come out. You imagine them laughing at the silly outfits people wear in your yearbooks, just like you laugh at your parents... you wonder how people can look at the vast expanse of history and the smallness of you and not believe in a God, and you wonder how, if there is a God, you ever came to believe he might spare thought on your slight concerns, such as finding your nail clippers for that hangnail that's really bugging you and which it now seems almost conceited of you to notice. then you look back at your book and remember that you have a test tomorrow and you really have to study, and where did you put those nailclippers?