Beauty all around us

I grew up in the Pacific Northwest, where upon landing at SeaTac or Portland after far too long away, one’s senses are almost overwhelmed, assaulted, by beauty, whether it be Mount Rainier bathed in pinkish hues of the setting sun, or majestic Mount Hood rising above an ever-burgeoning cityscape.

Evergreens, pungent in an array of adjectives, give rise to any number of emotions and memories of a childhood spent among them. Hillsides are cloaked, not in bougainvillea gone wild or sprawling ice plant, but the vibrant colors of rhododendrons and azaleas, the dozens of shades of spring green, meadows covered in tiny purple iris “flags“ or golden daffodils. In fall, Oregon’s autumnal splendor rivals that of the highly touted Northeast.

Instead of a broad canal delivering water to an arid valley, rivers -- among them the mighty Columbia, meandering Willamette and capricious Umpquas (there are two, after all, before merging into the one that empties into the Pacific) -- descend at times abruptly and others incrementally toward a final destination.

Even today, and it’s been awhile since the last visit and decades since I lived there, the feeling of “I’m home” sets in when we cross the invisible line in the Siskiyous between Northern California and Oregon.

One of my favorite views, though, is not of the mountains and rivers of the PNW, but that of rounding a curve in Colorado as Estes Park unfolds, framed by the icy blue of the lake that shares its name and towering peaks, well over 10,000 feet and cloaked in white against an azure sky. Breath-taking. In its most, albeit temporary, meaning.

But the majority of my life has been spent in the Desert Southwest, where beauty is much more subtle, and the eruption of color, while momentary, is, for lack of a better word, stunning.

And that is part of its charm. One can go along for months tolerating the triple digits of summer, enduring the steering wheel that singes until the A/C kicks in, or the oppressive blanket of humidity when monsoons sweep northward from the Sea of Cortez, wondering why on Earth we stay here. Those who can, escape west to San Diego or head toward the hills, somewhere, until summer eases or vacation ends.

Then the west winds sweep in, cool, dry winds that scrub the air of any debris and leave it crisp and clean. Or the skies fill with clouds saturated with moisture, cumulonimbus towering high into the atmosphere, a study in contrasts of white and grey against that blue, blue sky and green fields below.

The sun, in its rising and setting, flings a palette of colors across the horizon, desert to the east and mountains in all other directions.

It’s a landscape far from bland, with mountains, canyons and dunes that are at turns purple majesty and gilded titian. Rain on the desert nurtures dormant seeds, giving promise to a splendid wildflower season. It transforms prickly ocotillo branches into leafy, scarlet architectural statements, and evokes exotic fragrances. Rainbows, often two at a time, stretch from one pot of gold to the other against a blackened sky.

Temperatures cool. Windows are flung open and spirits lift. There’s an “aha!” moment, one of, yes, we can do this. Especially with this kind of payoff.

Path of no return

Yesterday after church I watched a scene that vividly reminded me of my dad. A gentleman -- and he truly is a gentleman -- and his wife have been coming to church regularly after a few years away; she welcomes the companionship as her husband sinks ever deeper into the world of dementia.

At the potluck afterward, the pastor called for “women and children first” in line, and the wife was among those who headed out of sight to get in line. The husband went looking for her, and a friend gently guided him back to their table.

The momentary disappearance of his “anchor” and his frantic reaction were oh so reminiscent of our experience with Dad, and at once I ached for my Dad and rejoiced that he is with his Savior.

It seems more and more of our friends and loved ones are dealing with dementia in varying forms, and the watching is painful because we have been where they are, and it is a terrifying place to be.

You brace yourself for daily confrontation, for conversations that defy logic and demand extreme patience, for that panicked call for help from Mom, and the need to drop everything and race to their aid.

A couple of days ago a colleague shared that he was traveling to San Diego a lot to visit his parents because his dad had Alzheimer’s. Yesterday at the office we had a chance to talk about that before he clocked out.

My brothers, sisters and I have been in his shoes. We’ve listened to Dad ask the same question 45 seconds apart, for 15 minutes before he moved on to another subject.

My husband and I have listened with growing anxiety to Dad accuse his son-in-law of stealing his license, stealing his car, and argue why yes, he CAN drive, and no one can tell him otherwise. Over. And over. And over.

After he was moved into the San Diego facility, he would call, begging to come home, to come pay the bill at this “hotel” and take him to Mom. He wouldn’t accept ‘No” for an answer, and often the conversation ended with him angry, frustrated, and me in tears. I finally learned to say that I would come get him the minute the doctor released him. And I wasn’t lying. If the doctor had said he was cured, I’d have been there in a heartbeat, or as fast as the car would take me.

Living with dementia is heartbreaking. You learn not to argue, not to fight back, not to try to reason, because there is no reasoning, and you fight to learn not to take it personally, because this isn’t your dad speaking to you like this.

The brakes are off on their self-control. Dad and others like him would say things in the fog of dementia that they never would have even thought to say before.

So when my colleague said he and his family were looking at options of places to put their dad, I told him about the place my sister found for our dad, and how the stability of such a place seemed to help Dad’s mentality, but it also sent him into depression not to be with Mom.

I can think of nothing more terrifying than to be losing your mind and know it, and know there’s nothing you can do about it, and then to be separated from your life partner.

And I can think of nothing sadder than being the family member watching this happen, knowing the release only comes with death. For Dad, that end meant he went home to his Savior, and there is enormous joy knowing that.

My prayers are with my colleague, my friends who now travel this path.

Living differently

In a few hours, one year ago, we said goodbye to a precious friend.

We stood by her bedside, tears dripping onto the blanket covering her tiny frame, not wanting to leave. I think she knew we were there. She just couldn't express it.
We couldn't stay for long. This was a time for her family, as they gathered for her final hours.

The doctors were preparing to take her off the steroid that was staving off the tumors in her brain, and we steeled ourselves for what was to come.

I don't remember much about those moments after we left the hospital. All I remember is praying continuously: "God, you are the Healer. Please wipe those tumors away. Just erase them. Please show us, show Leslie's friends, her family, that you are the Miracle-worker. Please. God. Please."

Mike and Mickey have been friends for decades, since grade school. Put those two together and you will laugh for hours. Laugh until your sides hurt. Laugh until you have to get up and run to the bathroom, or else.

I met Leslie the summer we moved to Imperial from Bremerton, Wash. I was 19. She was 16. She had a crush on my little brother, for awhile. When she met Mike a few short years later, that was it. He was the man for her and she the woman for him.

Each adored the other, that was plain to see. Just look at their dating pictures. Their wedding pictures. Of first Jenna, then Jeff, making their family complete. Of their 25th anniversary photos. Of shots of Mike tenderly looking at her, wracked by chemo or looking fully healed. Of them with Tyler, their eldest grandson, who will turn 3 in October.

When our Jonathan was learning to talk, he couldn't say Leslie. She became Sassy. And so she stayed. Mike and Sassy.

Our family responsibilities and work intervened, and our regular get-togethers with Mike and Sassy became farther apart, and eventually came to a pause. We'd run into each other and it was as if time stood still. We'd laugh till we cried. And say, let's do this again. Soon.

And then, shortly after our husbands' 30-year high school reunion, Leslie was diagnosed with Stage 4 melanoma. There were tumors in her lymph nodes and a bleak diagnosis. Talk about putting on the brakes. Things that seemed so important became trivial.

She was determined to beat this terrible disease. We were determined to pray her through it.

She began writing a blog chronicling her life with cancer. She and Mike found an oncologist developing a vaccine for her type of cancer, and she was accepted into his trial. One round of chemo. Radiation. Another round of chemo. Surgery.

She blogged constantly, and when she was too weak or too sick to her stomach to blog, her sister or her husband would.

Her blog went viral. She made friends around the world, people she never otherwise would have met. She was determined to keep a cheery demeanor on that blog, never complaining, never letting discouragement set in.

She became a prayer warrior, keeping an organized file of people and things to pray for. And I became her prayer warrior. We prayed without ceasing.

We made a pact to get together for dinner once a month. And so we did. We laughed until we cried. We sat in the back seat listening to our husbands and their antics, and treasured the closeness a car's interior brings.

More tumors grew in her brain, and she was flown to San Diego for surgery. As she was healing she wasn't up to going somewhere for dinner, so we brought it to her. She was hungry for In 'N Out. Mickey convinced her to try it his way -- animal style -- and she loved it.

But those tumors kept surfacing. And it became clear they would never go away.

So when, late that afternoon of Aug. 18, 2011, Mickey called to tell me Leslie was gone, tears welled and fell onto my keyboard. My lap. My desk. Words on the screen blurred. There was work to do, and it got done. But my heart wasn't in it. I was disappointed. Emptied. We had become a pretty good team, Mike and Sassy, Mick and I. And now we were three. And I felt lost.

Daddy had died just a few weeks before, and two days later our newborn grandson would face his own life-threatening episode that put him into the NICU for a week or so. I needed Leslie. I missed Leslie. I knew she was in heaven, with our God, but there was -- is -- a void that can never be filled. I could feel the absence of her prayers.

I felt for awhile that I had let Leslie down, that my prayers hadn't worked, as if it were up to me. Until that gentle nudge came telling me, "Oh yes, they did. She IS fully healed."

Sometimes, sitting in church, we sing precious words and images of Daddy and Leslie singing praises to our King spring to mind, and I'm thankful for the little packets of tissues in the pews.

Her daughter, today, while visiting her grave, said it best: "One year later and life is not any easier without you...it's just different. We are learning to live life differently."

And so we are.

To the beach! To the beach!

We're heading to the beach today, and my heart lifts at the thought.

You see, it's hot where I live. Pretty much six months of hot, we get (that's the Yoda influence). And right now it's blazingly hot. Hellishly (although nowhere nearly as horrendously as, well, aitch-e-double-toothpicks) hot. At 6:30 in the a.m., it's already well on the way to the 115 or so degrees predicted as a high. It's been day after day after day of that kind of external oppression that transforms one's car into an oven, the steering wheel just waiting to singe away fingerprints. Turn on the shower and you don't need the "H" part. "C" is tepid enough.

We live in a place where even plunging into the swimming pool isn't refreshing this time of year, potted plants shrivel and a mid-afternoon walk is at your own risk. And you can never get enough water. Or iced tea. With lemon. Over a full glass of Sonic ice.

So to the beach we go, where adventure awaits the day before our girl flies away for her junior year in college.

Sitting underneath the ceiling fan above our dining room table, I can close my eyes and already feel the breeze, the sun burning through 50-proof sunscreen, my toes sinking into damp sand, gripping as the surf tries to drag them outward.

The ocean is my healing place. That enormous ebbing and flowing body of water, a living, breathing organism, if you will, that soothes the soul. It teems with life, above and below. Pelicans are my favorite, skimming the surface in military formation and, spotting something delectable, putting on the brakes and plunging toward breakfast. Or lunch. Or dinner. Or a mid-afternoon snack.

Stand with your back to the beach and the surf that entices you to step deeper and deeper erases the chatter of thousands of people behind you.

Yes, I love the beach, because it frames that big, beautiful, blue ocean, the enormity of it an affirmation of a Love that is deeper and wider and more vast than any other.

For My Father

This is being published in the Sunday edition of our local paper, where I've worked for nearly 25 years, and is my tribute to my Dad, who passed away on July 21, 2011.

“The summer’s gone, and all the flowers are dying; ‘Tis you, ‘tis you must go and I must bide,” sang the tenor who the year before was with the San Diego Opera and this day was singing “Danny Boy” at a home for people with dementia. This time, he too was a “resident,” called upon to entertain at a Father’s Day celebration last year, reaching notes effortlessly in a melodic, soothing timbre that needed no microphone.

Dad and I were at a table in the home’s courtyard, enjoying hot dogs and burgers with a decorated Marine colonel who had served in the Pacific Theater in World War II, and his wife. As we ate and talked, the wife prompted her husband to remember some of his war exploits, but time and disease had done their damage, and his voice faltered and stopped in its retelling. He had forgotten, for now.

The hustle and bustle of the day seemed to have worn on Dad, too, and as he went to his room he asked if I would be waiting when he came out. Then he forgot I was there. Visits to Dad often were followed by walks on the beach, letting the sounds of waves wash away the melancholy.

It’s the nature of advancing dementia to alter reality, blur memories, strip victims and their families of normalcy. But there are also moments, minutes, hours of clarity. A couple more visits later, we saw that clarity in what would be our last conversation before he left us within the next two weeks. It was a “gift,” an Alzheimer’s Association official told me, and one my husband and I treasure, especially today, the first Father’s Day my four brothers, two sisters and I will mark without Dad.

It’s the first time I won’t be standing in front of a wall of cards looking for just the right one, or shopping for a shirt for my impeccably groomed father. My teens, 20s, 30s had me sifting through ties. He liked the ties I picked out. Or so he said. Later it would have been a gift card to a home improvement store. Dad had taken up carpentry as retirement approached, and many finely crafted cutting boards, knife holders and benches were gifted at Christmastime, or just because.

Dad’s story is like many others of his generation. Born in Texas to farmers, his family moved to Oklahoma and then, when the Dust Bowl stripped away soil and dreams, came to California. They built a life, and later a welding business, in Imperial. Dad apprenticed for a butcher in his teens and excelled on the ball fields, if not the classrooms, of Imperial High.

World War II was in its waning years and, before Dad could graduate, Uncle Sam drafted him. He returned from training in San Diego to receive his diploma, but instead of cap and gown wore his Navy blues. The war would end as his ship reached Hawaii, where he spent the next year or so finishing his service.

He had become a committed follower of Jesus Christ during those years, and after the Navy went to the Bible Institute of Los Angeles, now Biola University, where he met Mom, daughter of Scottish immigrants.

Many years later, Dad would become a pastor, moving his family first to Oregon, then to Washington, returning with Mom to be pastor of Imperial Community for 22 years.

Today likely will not be tear-free for me, sitting in a pew of the church we attend, listening to our pastor at the same pulpit Dad stood behind those many years. But it will be filled with memories of a Dad who loved his children passionately, who encouraged us in the things at which we naturally excelled and in the ways we didn’t.

He would be the first to admit he wasn’t perfect, a sinner needing a Savior, a man who made his share of mistakes, but he was more than humble enough to admit it. That, for me, is the best example he could have set.

The month of l.o.v.e.

The month of November is all about giving thanks and in December, it’s giving, or receiving, depending on your priorities.

In February, it’s all about the l.o.v.e.

I don’t write much any more, but not because I don‘t want to. Rather, it is an all-consuming passion that consumes passion. An emotional experience that depletes emotion. It wipes me out, but in the process it wipes out those thoughts hiding in the corners of my mind. You know, the ones that gnaw on you in the wee hours of the night or surface when you’re in the middle of something else and make you FORGET WHAT YOU WERE DOING. But it also helps me remember all that is good and perfect.
Cathartic. Cleansing. Uplifting. Inevitably, up come the tears and the computer screen gets fuzzy.

It’s a hard thing to do and try to do well, for me anyway. And it’s been a couple of years of hard things, so everything -- happy as well as sad -- gets shoved to the corners of the mind.

I try to explain that to Mickey. His biggest wish is that I write something to him, besides those few words that cover a card. That would be the biggest emotional upheaval and emotion-depleter of all.

But, because this is the month of l.o.v.e. And because he’ll be bowling on that special night of l.o.v.e. (i.e. Valentine’s Day) and I’ll be working, I’m going to give this a shot and hope one of us survives.

To my Mickey Charles, here are some things I l.o.v.e. about you:
First of all, that face. Or those eyes. Those dark eyes that light up when you’re pleased with something. Or think of something funny. Or something slightly naughty. Or of joy that brings you to the brink of tears.

Like when you see your granddaughter and your grandsons coming toward you. Or when talking to your sons. Or when your daughter texts you something … charming.
I l.o.v.e. sitting across from you in the silence of our home, silence broken by the tap-tap-tapping of your keyboard, and mine. Like now.

I l.o.v.e. listening to you tell stories, about what happened at work. Or on the track or ballfield decades or a few minutes ago.

I l.o.v.e. pulling weeds while you perch on the ladder, snipping away at the sleeping limbs of the fruitless mulberry, and both of us stopping everything to watch our favorite jets slice through the sky above us.

I l.o.v.e. bowling with you on our days off, turning around to see you watching me. With that l.o.o.k. in your dark brown eyes, that erases the almost-31 years we’ve been husband and wife. The same l.o.o.k. that greeted me when I walked down the aisle on Dad’s arm. That l.o.o.k. that looks past everything wrong I see in myself, and every wrong thing I’ve ever said or done in all those years.

I l.o.v.e. the way you play with the kids. When our sons and daughter were little … and our nieces and nephews … and the neighborhood children … you were their jungle gym. And now, when you sit down on the lawn or the floor, our grandchildren take over. That’s their signal that it’s time to p.l.a.y.

I l.o.v.e. the way you love your parents, those tender-teasing-boisterous conversations about O.U. football. Or how ‘bout those Chargers.

And I l.o.v.e. the son-in-law you are to my Mom, and the patience you had with my Dad. You were at nearly every doctor’s appointment with us in the first six months. You could make him laugh, and convinced him to stick with it when the waiting got tough. “Mary, let‘s get out of here,” he‘d say as we waited for his name to be called. And somehow you’d get him to stay.

I l.o.v.e. the friend you are to people of all walks and thoughts of life. That before the sun peeks through our east windows you are sitting in your chair, head bowed, praying for every person in your life.

You are patient. And kind. And long-suffering.

I wouldn’t be who I am without you.
Happy early V-Day, Mickey Charles!

Sometimes, it is all about me

“Crucified
Laid behind a stone
You lived to die
Rejected and alone
Like a rose
Trampled on the ground
You took the fall
And thought of me
Above all”

Those words always bring me to my knees, whether mentally or literally, whether sung in church or through tears with just me and the earbuds.

The months after Dad’s first hospitalization meant many appointments. His GP. Mom’s GP. His urologist. His visits by the home health worker. His kidney specialist. My OBGYN. His procedure. My surgeries. Aly’s senior year events.

On my birthday that fall, the wrapping paper fell away to reveal an iPod Touch. It became the date book Mickey meant it to be, and we put it to use right away as we sat throughout that morning and into early afternoon in Dad’s urologist’s office. Waiting. If I were truly a patient person, that day would have put an end to it. But there would be many more days just like that one, and patience never became mine. Mindless endurance, well, that’s another matter.

But eventually that iPod Touch became my electronic spiritual savior. On the days when it was just me and an empty house, that little chrome device was my best friend. It sat in my left pocket, white strands linking it to my ears while I worked at the computer or scrubbed toilets or pulled weeds or read my Bible or prayed for friends like Leslie or mentally sorted through the hard things at work. And into my ears flowed melodies and lyrics that delivered perspective.

During weeks, months, of seemingly one hardship after another, it helped keep me sane.

Some months ago that little friend went missing. I rifled through the messes in the desk drawers at work, sifted through piles of clutter in our bedroom and in Aly's, poked and prodded between and under the car seats, looked behind and inside furniture -- all to no avail. I missed it terribly, not only because it helped keep me organized but because it helped tune my brain to the things that matter most.

Finally I gave up. It’ll turn up … someday ... I thought.

Well, months later it did. Aly discovered it somewhere I’d never thought of looking and presented her mom with it, all charged up and ready to go. Yet there it sat for the next couple of weeks, beside my laptop, unused.

Until yesterday morning. As I struggled with some oppressingly negative feelings and thoughts, I didn’t even want to go to church -- felt I didn’t belong there with the thoughts overwhelming my mind, that I didn’t deserve even an ounce of what my Saviour has to offer. So I skipped Sunday school, loaded the sink full of dishes and started scrubbing.

But first, that little device started “calling” my name -- a gentle nudge grew increasingly sharper until, before I knew it, the earbuds were in, Pandora was tuned in and the music began to flow.

“Crucified
Laid behind a stone
You lived to die
Rejected and alone
Like a rose
Trampled on the ground
You took the fall
And thought of me
Above all”

And behind the music came the tears. And the prayers. And the gratitude.

It’s not about me, I have to remind myself over and over, when discouragement gets the upper hand.

But in this case, it is. And I’m eternally grateful.

To top it off, on this Sunday, especially, I'm glad I made it to church.

Christmas -- it's a tradition

Christmas in the Jackson household was never about Santa.

Sure, the jolly old elf made an appearance now and again. When that red-velvety figure strolled out of Grandma’s back bedroom on Christmas Eve, a sack full of toys slung over his shoulder, his “ho, ho, ho, Merry Christmas” ringing through that homestead, one look at those twinkling eyes and even the littlest ones knew it was really Uncle Stan and, to the next generation, Uncle Mickey.

From earliest memory Christmas in the Jackson home has been about the account of Christ’s birth in chapter 2 of the gospel of the physician Luke. Grandma’s living room would overflow with her grandchildren, and then great- and great-great-grandchildren, and plenty of presents. The noise must have been deafening, but before eager fingers could tear into those gifts, a hush would overtake the room as Grandpa sat in the recliner and reached for his Bible. At his feet, little ones planted elbows on crossed legs, eyes glued to the man in the chair.

“And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy,” came the much-anticipated and oh-so-familiar refrain.

It’s a cherished tradition that stayed pretty much the same for decades as the adults edged into frailty and the children grew, marrying and producing little ones of their own.

Somewhere along the line a piňata was introduced. And then duct tape. As the clan grew in size and stature, Dad and oldest son Alan decided that, to make sure everyone got a swing -- or two -- the thing had to be duct-taped. Indestructible duct tape wrapped seemingly endlessly around cardboard and bits of brightly colored tissue and battered repeatedly by great-grandsons and great-granddaughters adept with a bat. By the end of the night that piňata bore little resemblance to its original shape, as did the candy inside.

When Grandpa passed away, Grandma set aside her grief, hosting grown grandchildren and their own broods in her home every Christmas Eve. Her table was covered with sandwich fixings, tamales, casseroles and sweets. Eucalyptus logs in the fireplace that Santa never stepped foot in would glow and flare, embers popping against the screen.

Then it was Grandma’s turn to leave and our tradition underwent a major overhaul: It came to our house. When it was time, Dad would sit in the recliner and read Luke 2. As the years passed it became clear that each one might be the last. Then that day came.

Last year our tradition underwent another major overhaul. We all packed up children, food and presents and headed to San Diego, where caregivers at Dad’s last residence turned over the library to Dad’s family. There we hugged, ate and chatted, cameras capturing every bittersweet moment. The piňata hung from the ceiling, forgotten and unscathed.

Brother Ken handed Dad a Bible and sat on the arm of the sofa, helping hold it as Dad’s voice came loud and clear, “And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy…”

This year our own little clan will celebrate Christmas Eve at our house. There will be a piňata for the little ones -- our grandchildren -- and plenty of food and laughter. And, before tiny fingers will tear into that brightly colored wrapping paper, their grandpa will sit in the recliner and turn his Bible to Luke chapter 2.

Because, after all, that’s what Christmas is all about in the Dale household.

Still mourning.

I miss him, my Daddy, who shared my sense of humor. Who seemed to know what I was thinking. Who definitely "got" me.

















And I miss her. My champion. My hero. My prayer warrior. My encourager.

Heaven got the better part of this deal.

September sunrise

Septembers in the Colorado Desert deliver the most spectacular sunrises. Moisture from Arizona’s monsoon season hangs over the eastern horizon, the perfect canvas for the rising sun. Fingers of light stretch across the skyline, reintroducing the star around which our world revolves. Purples and pinks give way to hues of orange so vibrant they are almost painful in their beauty.

It is such a sunrise that greets me Sept. 11, 2001. The paper was an afternoon delivery then, and for several months out of the year sunrises were part of the seven-minute (if the stoplights cooperate) commute to work. Turning the corner east onto Adams Avenue, I marvel at the brilliance filling the windshield. What a great way to start the workday, I remember thinking.

That was the last positive thought of the day.

It took a few seconds for the images, at first televised and then delivered by satellite to our newsfeed, to sink in. A plane had flown into the North Tower of the World Trade Center, where workers were settling into their workday. The explosion sends shockwaves through the tower and throughout the nation. Twelve minutes later a second plane hits the South Tower.

We watch in horror as the TV in our publisher’s office delivers non-stop coverage and speculation. Stories trickle in on the AP wire, tersely worded at first, becoming more elaborate and detailed as the minutes pass.

I call my husband at home as our second son, then a high school sophomore, and his sister, a 9-year-old fourth-grader, get ready for school.
“Turn on the TV,” I tell him. “What channel?” he asks. “Doesn’t matter. Any of them,” is my reply. I remember this 10-year-old conversation as if it were this morning.

A third jet plows into the Pentagon. Twelve minutes pass and the South Tower collapses; 25 minutes later, so does the North Tower. And then the news comes, an hour to the minute after the attack on the South Tower, that a plane has slammed into a Pennsylvania field.

As the morning unfolds and the rest of the staff arrive, decisions are made on how to cover these attacks. The day’s paper is too small, and we bump up its size and buckle down to do our jobs, stuffing horror and fear and their accompanying bile into corners to be dealt with later.

The publisher decides to do a special section after the daily is printed so we can justly chronicle this morning that mirrors that other “day which will live in infamy” nearly 60 years before.

The rest of the day is a blur of text and images. Revision after revision of AP stories, updated, tweaked, resent. We scour them for fresh news as any inkling of hope in finding survivors dwindles.

With the click of a mouse the now-iconic images of terror fill the computer screen: of fireballs and smoke and people plunging past office windows; of first responders pouring into buildings, climbing stairwells to their deaths as terrified office workers descend, some to safety. Ash is everywhere in these images now so familiar to us all. Images of men and women in office attire, peering with haunting, shocked eyes through soot-covered faces, of fire trucks crushed by falling debris, of the cavernous crater where two enormous skyscrapers stood mere hours before; of emergency workers waiting at hospitals for the rescued victims who will never come, of family members and horrified New Yorkers filling parks with makeshift memorials and pictures of the missing.

Hundreds, thousands of images, springing to life one click at a time. Numbness sinks in. Afternoon gives way to evening. The sun has long set before this day’s tasks are completed.

Home, finally, and tears dammed throughout the day flow freely. No more images, please, especially of people freefalling those scores of stories to their deaths. Of the hopelessness and terror that surely filled their souls before they leapt. No TV. No Internet. Just silence. Audio, visual, mental silence. Please.

“What do you remember about 9/11?”
“How has 9/11 impacted your life?”
We’ve asked those questions dozens of times over the years, several times this week.
The terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, are etched indelibly into our collective national psyche, having changed forever so many things about the way we live.
And I’ve never looked at another September sunrise without remembering this one.

Sweet, sweet music

Some of the ivory keys are chipped on the tips. The pads, hidden, are threadbare. A stain on the front, left long ago. There’s a fairly fresh scar along the edge, left by an impatient child forcing the lid open.
Every time I dust the keys, the darkened wood, it’s as if this piano is calling, “play me.” But it can’t coerce from these fingers the magic it can from Mom’s.
“Stodart, New York,” it reads as the lid is lifted.
If it could tell a story, it would tell of its journey to Los Angeles, given in the early 1940s by loving parents to their youngest child Mary, whom they called Molly. This old upright followed Molly to Pico and then to Whittier. It embarked on its journey first to California’s Imperial Valley when Mom married Dad in 1949, to Melrose, Ore., and Bremerton, Wash., before being loaded into the U-Haul for a return trip to Imperial. It sat for more than 20 years in the Imperial Community Church parsonage and, when Dad retired in his 70s, moved into our home.
It’s been tuned, burnished and played countless times over these seven decades.
My earliest memories are of Mom sitting at that piano. Playing it comforted her in times of stress, cheered her in sadness, shared her heart in times of praise. Her fingers would trip effortlessly over the octaves, cajoling haunting, uplifting, sweet melodies.
Sitting here, looking at this simply crafted music-maker, I remember winters in our Melrose home, huddled in the dining room, the only truly warm place in that home built in the 1800s. No insulation. No central heating. A furnace in the dining room our only source of heat. The pipes froze nearly every winter and we’d slip and slide down the hill to bathe in the church sinks. It truly was a delightful adventure for a child.
And Mom, tired after a day of teaching at Hucrest Elementary, after coming home to feed her brood, after putting some of us to work helping her grade papers, would sit on the piano bench and just play.
“Great is Thy Faithfulness.” “The Old Rugged Cross.” “How Great Thou Art.” “Isn’t the Love of Jesus Something Wonderful?” Scottish ballads. Irish lullabies.
Today Mom’s fingers are aged, gnarled, and pain accompanies her playing. But so does peace.
When Dad was hospitalized awhile back and life as we knew it had changed forever, Mom went indoors, sat down at the piano and played, her aged fingers cajoling sweet music from the aged keys.
Sweet, sweet music.

Not by chance

I don’t believe in chance.
It’s not by chance I’m watching the sun set over Tecolote Canyon. It’s by design.
By design the ridge across the canyon glows like wildfire consuming the hillside. By design the sky above burns brighter, almost painfully so, as the sun sets over the Pacific, just on the other side. By design waves of gold and orange and pink give way to shades of purple and shadowy blue, a crescendo of color set in motion by the one who created the Earth, the universe, and all that is within them.
Nature’s orchestra responds in the song of the wrentits and towhees hopping in the scrub brush and the tiny, demanding squeaks of a hungry hummingbird. The swallows swoop in unison. The hawk glides on the thermals, suddenly plunging toward a branch, seizing it so violently the entire treetop shakes.
It wasn’t by chance the doctors found tumors in glands in my throat. It wasn’t chance that led me to today.
The nurses -- Cynthia, Maricela, Pam, Jennifer, Feven -- it was by design we crossed paths. Pam, prepping me for surgery and chatting comfortably about her upcoming trip to Tahoe with her family. Jennifer, facing layoffs on the floor where she normally works and with her husband long out of work. Nurse’s aide Diane, at 22 mourning the recent death of her father -- who was my age. Cynthia, who joyfully delivered news from the doctor that both tumors were benign, who, when it was her turn as charge nurse to make assignments popped her head in the room and said she had given me Maricela. Sweet, compassionate Maricela, with heartfelt hugs when it was time to go home.
We were brought together by the same hand that traced those vibrant colors across the western sky.
If not, I wouldn’t be sitting here days later on the patio of our friend’s condo above Tecolote Canyon, soaking in the quiet and beauty I so need for spiritual and physical healing.
Nope. I don’t believe in chance.

The dove has landed

This morning, while sitting outside enjoying cool morning air and a cup of coffee, I watched a dove get ready to land on a tree branch. She hovered for a moment, flap-flap-flapping those wings, and then changed her mind and eventually touched down on the grass.

If she'd have been a hummingbird, she'd have zoomed to a stop in front of me, letting me know the feeder was empty. A mockingbird would have just landed and squawked about something, and a seagull would have plopped down and yammered for a piece of bread (that scene in "Nemo" -- "Mine." "Mine." "Mine.")

But the dove put some thought into where she was landing, and if Wally or Mr. Kitty had been in the front yard she'd have picked another yard. You could almost hear the wheels on that tiny mind churning. And I thought how different creatures are even within a species, but each has its own role. The egrets follow a tractor, snatching up whatever critters are unearthed. Hummingbirds pollinate. Doves eat wayward seed (and of course, seed you've just planted). And seagulls scavenge.

And I thought how we as humans are the same. Different roles. Essentially the same purpose.

Then my mind meandered, as it has a tendency to do, and I thought how things mankind has "created" mimics or utilizes something in nature that the one Creator put in place. Flying machines. An electronic brain. Horseless buggies and the fuel that drives them.

Marvelous, isn't it?

"I'm gonna get your good eye" and other Grandma things

We were supposed to be taking a nap in Grandma's back guest room. It was salmon pink, then. One window looked out where the swingset stood among the trees in the front yard. The other faced east, a patchwork of Bermuda grass stretching across the fallowed field. A string of eucalyptus trees stood along the edge of the nearest neighbor's yard. The summer sun turned that room into an incubator, and sleep was nearly impossible in the afternoon.

Instead, we younger girl cousins huddled on the two double beds, whispering and giggling, We'd hear Grandma's slippers tapping the tile floor in the hallway and flop back into sleeping position, eyes closed.

"Are you girls playing 'possum?" she'd say. "You'd better get to sleep." And then the ultimate admonition: "Or I'm gonna get your good eye," in that remarkably deep voice from such a little woman.

I never did understand those words of caution from my quarter-Chickasaw, fully Okie grandmother, but it always was enough to make me toe the line.

Today, maybe, I'll be a grandma myself for the third time. I can't wait to have a bunch of grandkids taking a nap in the back guest room. I can't wait to sneak down the hallway and, smiling, listen to their giggling, then crack open the door and say, "Kids, you'd better get to sleep, or ...".

Because now I know how much love was in that old saying.

And I want to be just like my Grandma when I grow up.

Grandma

I've been thinking about Grandma Jackson quite a bit lately. This was published as a "From the Desk of ..." column on our Oped page on April 14, 2005, in tribute to Grandma's 99th birthday. She left us on June 20, 2006, and while I miss her presence, her wisdom and her gentle chuckle, I rejoice in her homegoing and can almost hear the Lord's greeting, "Welcome home, good and faithful servant."

Silver threads among the golden memories

The gravel beneath her slippers barely makes a sound as she walks to greet a granddaughter. Trees tower in the yard, the pines sending their spicy scent into the air. Water trickles into the furrows that irrigate the lawn and the wind, gentle at first, bellows dust eastward.

Smell. Sight. Sound. Some things never seem to change, and this greeting is much like any other in the past four decades — a warm hug, murmured expressions of love, every sense enveloping the visitor. But these days the woman's slight frame is a little more stooped, her granddaughter's temples a little more grayed, the greeting a little more poignant. Time marches on, mercilessly taking with it all things beloved.

"Life is hard," she has said many times, "but God is good."

On Friday Arley Jackson turns 99, beginning her 100th year on Earth. She was born on a spring day in a fine two-story home in Wapanucka in the Territory of Oklahoma, mere months before its statehood. Like many Oklahomans, she sports Indian blood; how much she isn't sure. It wasn't talked about much in those days.

A farmer, her father was a sheriff who pursued notable criminals of the day. One of his grandsons recalls the tale of Grandpa Hale, having nowhere else to house one particular outlaw, brought him home and tied him up in the kitchen until morning.
Meanwhile Arley's mother had her hands full caring for a brood of 10 — six girls and four boys. From their earliest memories, Grandma and her sister Arbie labored, cooking for their younger siblings and the field hands.

Indoor plumbing was virtually unheard of those days in that part of the world, and Grandma's nostrils curl upward as she remembers the alternative — the outhouse. Water for cleaning and bathing was brought in from the well, heated on the stove and poured into a tub. Washing was done by hand, knuckles nearly rubbed raw from scrubbing fabric over a washboard.

Ever modest, ever the gentle lady, Grandma still learned how to plow a field, how to coerce the prickly cotton bolls into yielding their precious cargo. Those skills would come in handy later when, as a bride, she helped her Milt plow and harvest their own cotton crop in west Texas and later in Gotebo, Okla.

There also are the horror stories, like the time Grandma's horse, spooked by something not remembered, took off, dragging her along on the cultivator. Grandpa, plowing nearby, raced to her rescue and calmed the frightened horse.

Forever a team themselves, the pair who had known each other from childhood, who were baptized as teens in the Boggy Creek as a symbol of their faith in Christ, moved soon after their Aug. 10, 1924, marriage to west Texas, where eldest son LeRoy was born two years later.

Their second-born, whose tiny Texas grave is marked with the name "Baby Jackson," lived a mere eight hours after birth. Grandma was allowed but a glimpse of the little one, holding him briefly as she attempted to nurse him. Some 75 years later, she regrets not being allowed to choose his burial clothes and wishes the heartbroken young parents had given their second son a name.

Most of all, though, she still can hear the infant's cry.

"The baby had a voice I'll never forget," she softly says to the granddaughter prying into the past.

Each birth was a difficult one, but within a matter of years their family was complete — two living sons and two daughters.

Yet there was more hardship ahead. Black clouds of dirt and debris would sweep across the plains of west Texas. Drought would sap the life out of verdant cotton fields. The farm in Gotebo dried up. Poverty and abject hunger moved in. The Great Depression was in full swing, in league with the Dust Bowl that decimated crops.
Penniless, the cupboards emptied of food, the young farmer Milt swallowed his pride and asked the local merchant to allow him to put supplies on credit so his family would have something to eat that night.

He made good on his word to repay the merchant, but only after the family had packed its belongings and headed west, their destination as yet undecided. Somewhere along the way they chose the fertile Imperial Valley over following sister Arbie to Oregon.
Here they moved around a bit, eventually finding a home, church and many friends in Imperial. The young farmer took a government-sponsored course in welding and blacksmithing, finding a vocation that allowed him to use his creativity and mathematical intuition.

The two, who themselves never finished elementary school, sent all four living children to college. All married, producing 18 grandchildren — granddaughter Melody died as a child and her sister, Esther, as a young adult. There are also 45 great-grandchildren and three "great-greats."

In her nearly 100-year lifespan, what most has changed? Would it be technology? Time- and labor-saving appliances? The family structure? Morality?

As she ponders the question, Grandma giggles — a trademark sound in that house.
"The dress code," she says decidedly, shaking her head as she describes some of the things she's seen while watching Dr. Phil on TV.

Her greatest blessing?

"Getting the family together. ... I've always wanted the family to be together."

And how has she endured the trials of life — births, deaths, material losses?

"The Lord. He said He'd never leave me and He hasn't," she replies. "He has helped us through hard things."

Life is hard, but indeed, God is good.

Happy birthday, Grandma.

Ode to Rusty

My heart sank the morning Cameron, our neighbor, carried Rusty out of his house and gently lifted the old dog into the bed of his pickup. I just knew.

When Cameron came home, Rusty wasn't with him. I cried.

Cameron moved next door a few years back. Rusty came with him. For awhile we knew Rusty better than Cameron. If we were in the back yard, Rusty would talk to us through the fence and leap -- bounce, really -- in joyous celebration. The ground could have been a trampoline, for with each bounce Rusty would inch a little higher, his speckled ears flopping on the downward cycle.

Whenever one of us spent a little time in the back yard, we could count on Rusty's company. If we spoke, he spoke back. If our little yapper dog howled at his master's urging, Rusty's sonorous voice replied. Rusty was later joined by Katie, a Doberman pinscher replete with energy and personality plus, and Rocky, a high-pitched miniature Dobie. It was Rusty, though, who stole our hearts.

A German short-haired pointer, he was a faithful companion to Cameron on his bird-hunting excursions. On many a sweltering dove-season morning Rusty and Cameron would hop into the pickup and head out to the fields before dawn. They'd come back dusty, sweaty and pleased with their morning's work.

But not anymore. Crippled with age, Rusty had to be put down. For now that side of the fence is silent. No talking. No howling. Definitely no bouncing.

But maybe not for long.

Cameron parked his pickup in front of the house a couple of weeks ago and carried out a little guy, eyes the same greenish-gold as Rusty's, floppy ears speckled with brown and white.

His name is Tim. He's already part of our family, even if he does live next door.
　

little, mysterious ways

The big picture is so hard to comprehend sometimes.
So if I remember to, I sit back and admire the little pieces of it.
Answers to prayer in ways I'd never dreamed. How He takes the thorn, more like a tree limb sharpened by years of bitterness and hard living, and shows you how fragile it really is. How it needs soft answers in response to the biting stings and prods. How the knots that tangle me inwardly can be slowly picked apart by His gentle fingers, and how easy it then is to just lean back into those arms. And He'll work on the thorn, that sharply honed tree limb. All I have to do is pray for the complete healing of this one I love but hate to be around. He's in control of it all.
Gentle reminders. Mysterious ways.

Sucker punch

"A quick punch delivered without warning; an unexpected blow."

Yesterday the sun came up, as usual, sunshine springing across the back lawn and into the bedroom window. Darkness, as usual, crept away, banished to the shadows for yet another day.

A dad, his two young sons, left the house to go fishing. Maybe goodbyes were said to mom and little sister. Maybe hugs, a "see you in a few hours." Maybe mom turned over in bed for a few more minutes of sleep; maybe not.

Then the sucker punch. An unwise traffic move. Two vehicles collide. One much bigger. The 10-year-old dead at the scene. Dad dies in one hospital. The 5-year-old hours later in another.

Word spreads quickly in this little Valley. If one were listening, they could hear a gasp, a sob from house to house, from neighborhood to neighborhood, from town to town.

The phone rang.

"Mom," she says through her own tears, her own struggle to speak through the sorrow a 16-year-old should never have to feel. "Jen's husband and oldest son were killed this morning. And the little one is critical."

Jen, her swim coach. Cody, who posed at 9 in last year's yearbook as the team's manager, just because, she said, he wanted to be in the picture. Tanner, who borrowed her swim fins at practice Tuesday, an exuberant 5-year-old flopping the fins around on the pool deck while mom coached. And Wes, their husband and dad.

How does a mother walk past the bikes strewn on the front lawn, past the little lawn chairs, past the evidence of the three men in her life? How does she step into her home, knowing the two sons she gave birth to and the man who helped her raise them will never again step in there with her? That little sister won't have two big brothers to help keep her safe?

How does a driver, who was in the right, overcome the knowledge his bigger vehicle took the lives of two little boys and their dad out to catch fish that morning? How does one ever erase that vision?

If it hurts this much to see a fresh-faced fifth-grader in a ball cap and think of another little boy who never again will be playing ball, or drive past the little home and not have to slow down for boys on their bikes, how much more Jen's pain?

Scripture says for those who love Jesus, "to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord." We know when we step from this life we step into another far beyond our wildest dreams. We know this isn't all there is. That's small comfort to those still denying Christ's existence, but maybe, just maybe, they'll see Him because of this. Maybe not.

God be with you Jen and Haley. Jaan and David. George and Rita. Siblings, grandparents, neighbors, friends. All in the periphery of Wes', Cody's and Tanner's lives, God be with us too.