Thanks for all the times you carried me.
Sorry for the non-father’s day-related post. We’re celebrating here by weakly cheering on my husband for holding down an apple. Yep, it’s pukesville U.S.A. It’s just as well we didn’t get him the bourbon he really wanted, because Pepto Bismol makes a lousy mixer. The steak is going back into the freezer, the whiffle bat is going back on the porch, and we’re having strawberry shortcake anyway, because what the hell.
Anyway, I need some quick help from you guys, especially if you’ve been reading my stuff for a while. As I’ve mentioned, I’m putting out an audiobook in the fall. Audible.com will be using one of their professional readers, but they are letting me help choose someone. The editor says:
Casting an audiobook is much like casting a film— use any description you like, to pinpoint the voice you imagine.
E.g.: “Greta Garbo crossed with Tom Hanks and a pinch of mustard!”
Any casting notes you give me will go directly to the Audible Studio’s casting director, who will bake them in to the production of your audiobook.
I am not one of those conservatives who hates the environment. I don’t boycott my parish if the priest happens to mention Earth Day, and I don’t set a heap of tires on fire to make reparations for people who use cloth diapers. I even recycle, and use cloth dish towels, and do the laundry in cold water, and have a compost heap that is there on purpose. I like the environment.
But when I am stuck in traffic with dozens and dozens of other idling cars and trucks, and the police have closed off two lanes while a tow truck maneuvers into position to tow one of these
to the nearest Mobil station because it has run out of gas, then YES, I am going to laugh.
Need you ask? It had a COEXIST bumper sticker. I laughed!
We once had this cat who hated our guts.
The kids named her “Cleo.” We thought she was our pet; she thought we were her captors. She was an indoor cat because I couldn’t catch her long enough to put her in the chew-proof box we purchased after she chewed through the pet carrier we purchased to bring her to the vet to get her shots. I tried and tried to catch her, but we lived in a house with staircases on both ends, and I was pregnant — so around and around we would go. She would scamper up one set of stairs, sit at the top and watch me struggle and clamber halfway up, and then -whisk!- away she would go, across the house and down the other set of stairs.
At one point, Cleo chewed a hole in the wall of the laundry room and lived inside the empty space, haunting us like a furry black demon with her scuffling noises. The only time she wanted anything to do with me is when she went into heat, when she would follow me around the kitchen, backing up, gazing at me with pleading eyes, and emitting the most pitiful yowls.
Anyway, she had one particular trick to show us just how much she despised us for sheltering and feeding her. She would sit on the futon, waiting for me to come into the room. As soon as I made eye contact, she would pee. Then she would get up and leave the room, brushing past my ankles in a devastatingly ironic pantomime of normal feline affection, just to show me she could if she wanted to.
Don’t ask me why we kept this horrible animal around for as long as we did. She was our first real pet, and I guess we figured we should keep her for the kids’ sake — although what good it did them to have a pet who lived inside the walls, I don’t know. Anyway, while she was around, I got pretty good at getting pee out of things. I made many batches of this special cleanser, and it always worked:
Gently mix all ingredients in a non-metal container. Do not mix or shake vigorously. Saturate the stain with the liquid, and allow it to air dry (which might take 24 hours, I forget). It should smell fine once it’s dry, but you may have to do a second time. You can use this on any item or surface that can get wet — so, not wooden floors, but grout or concrete floors or just about anything else. It does leave a ghost of a mark on light fabrics, but it’s better than pee!
Oh, so one day, I ran out of kitty litter, and I had a moment of clarity about this “pet.” I opened the door and she took off like a streak. We never saw her again. Other creatures have left their mark on our house and belongings since then, but nothing ever smelled as bad as Cleo’s Anger Pee.
I love Mark Shea. I don’t agree with everything he says, and I don’t always agree with the way he says the things I agree with. But when he apologizes, he apologizes. Take note, everybody who’s ever sinned! I also know through personal experience that he is a generous man to the core. I understand that sometimes the Holy Spirit makes our sins stand out to us in high relief; but I hope that Mr. Shea will also have his merits shown to him. His clarity, honesty, and perseverence have converted my heart more than once.
Also very interesting was this passage in his mea culpa:
I mentioned things living under the rocks. One of the things that lives under the rocks in my heart has been a deep and abiding fear, a kind of heart conviction about the universe that long predates any conscious relationship with God I formed as an adult (recall that I was no raised Christian). I’m not saying it’s a truth about the universe. I’m saying it’s something more like a broken bone in my soul that never knit right. And what it comes down to is a pattern of assuming that I am, at best, a tool of God, not a son of God and certainly not somebody God loves. And with that has been a fear that, at the end of the day, once my utility to God is spent I would be tossed away like a candy bar wrapper.
Do you remember when “six word autobiographies” were all the rage? It can be either a lark or a searing experience to try to distill your life’s story into six words. I came up with a few that made me laugh, but it was a turning point for me when I came up with this one:
It wasn’t anger; it was fear.
That doesn’t excuse bad behavior, but it does help explain it; and understanding why you do the things you do is a huge step toward starting to stop.
Anyway, whether you love Mark Shea or can’t stand him, check out his mea culpa, and say a prayer for this courageous and good-hearted man who has been put into an outrageously demanding field.
Even if your parish is doing a good job, it’s still mainly your job! And no, I am not above offering cash prizes to kids who memorize things.
Here are some of the books I recommended in my post. As always, if you want to buy any of these books through Amazon, I would be most grateful if you would do it through these links! I get a small percentage of each sale, which makes a huge difference in keeping our family afloat, especially during Birthday $ea$on. (If you get to Amazon through one of these links and buy something else besides what I recommended, I still get credit for that purchase.) Thank you!
St. Joseph Baltimore Catechism No. 1. There are many editions of the Baltimore Catechism, but I have found that the St. Joseph ones are the most solid without being dry and pedantic.
Faith and Life series by Ignatius Press. Our Heavenly Father is Book One; there are several in the series.
The Picture Bible – a cartoon version – by Iva Hoth
several by Tomie de Paola: St. Benedict and Scholastica, St. Francis, St. Christopher, The Miracles of Jesus, Our Lady of Guadalupe, Bible Stories, etc.
If the Mass is so great, then why don’t Catholics smile their way through it?
Also: here is a picture of me having a WONDERFUL TIME doing something worthwhile which I enjoy:
(And yes, I know that’s not a proper mallet grip. I was trying to gently tap a leg onto a trampoline, is why I was holding it that way.)
Now it’s stuck in your head, too! Ha ha!
Okay, he loses a few point for naming his daughter “Coco,” since she doesn’t appear to be a chimpanzee; but this is pretty funny:
(via Gawker)
