Kathleen M. Basi's Blog, page 90

Moto Perpetuo

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You can see that “TROUBLE” in his eye, can’t you? Like how he’s in the process of climbing onto my in-laws’ glass coffee table?

He never stops moving these days. I could spend my entire day, every day, following him around the house and taking things away from him. Church is a one-hour wrestling match that leaves my upper arms feeling trembly and jelly-ish. I try not to assume that everyone in church is there to watch my family, but I’m sure I’ve seen half a dozen people biting their lips and smiling as they watch me puff and pant, trying to keep him still. It’s a relief when he stands on the pew and flirts with somebody’s grandma…because it holds his attention and gives me thirty seconds of rest. Every Mass, we end up giving up and taking him to the back to let him off the leash and just run, run, run.

Only problem is, he’s discovered the baptismal font, and we all know where that can lead.

He behaves better for Christian, at least marginally, and I’m so grateful that I’m not alone in the battle. This weekend, we were at my in-laws’ church, and my mother-in-law tried to give me a break, but almost as soon as she took him, the dazed look crossed her face. “He’s so strong!” she whispered apologetically as she handed him back.

After Communion I gave up and took him to the back of church, where he ran laps around the entryway, which holds the font, and the cry room/adoration chapel, which interestingly enough was chock-full of adults age 50 and over on the feast of the Holy Family. Maybe the families eschew it because the room also contains the votive offerings. Michael discovered those right away, of course. He padded through the blocks of color streaming in from a stained glass window, the curly back of his head shifting from orange to yellow to green. It was one of those right-here, right-now moments. My heart caught. I wished I had the camera, to capture this moment before it passes away forever.

We’re down to two nursings a day now, and last night he couldn’t decide if he wanted to use his mouth for milk or for saying “uDAH. uDAH. uDADADA.” He’s still more Mommy attached than any child in our house has ever been…and it’s still simultaneously the best and worst thing about him. So far, I can call, “Michael, c’mere!” and he’ll drop almost anything and come running with the biggest wide-mouth grin you’ve ever seen. That’s the best of it. The worst is when he refuses to go to sleep because he’s sick, and being held by Daddy is completely unacceptable, even though Daddy’s just watching TV and Mommy’s trying to get caught up on the scrapbooks.

My favorite personality quirk is his sleep habit. We have never had a child for whom we had to bring his own blankets along on a trip. But at my parents’ house the day after Christmas, the child steadfastly refused to sleep, because he couldn’t perform his normal routine.

You see, when Michael is placed in his bed, he gets on all fours and pads around in a circle until the crocheted blankets are properly wadded up and he finds the best spot; then he plops down belly first on top of them and burrows down like a puppy dog in his basket. He has to sleep on top of the blankets. I wait until he’s settled down before I put his fleece blanket on top of him.

It’s a good exercise, this post, because Michael has a cold and he’s a pain in the neck when he has a cold. He was up three times in the night, though fortunately only once while we were trying to sleep. I was not particularly enamored of my youngest child when I began typing this morning, but now that he’s upstairs talking with Julianna (“Bah-KOH!” she says, and he responds, “u-DAH! u-DAH!” I’m finding myself more charitably inclined toward him. (See? There’s that word again.)

Life marches on.

A Word For A New Year: Charity

Plus haut (Photo credit: iko)

I love the idea of celebrating New Years, but in reality the idea’s not even on the table anymore. Last night we went to bed at 10:30 and called it an hour late…because by eleven Nicholas woke up with a nightmare, and when the fireworks hit at midnight Michael woke up scared. And then there were the “Happy New Year!” text messages beeping on Christian’s phone. (Face palm.)

Well, in any case, it’s just ahead of six a.m. on New Years Day, 2013, and here I sit, reflecting forward. For the last few Januaries many of my bloggy friends have been choosing a word for the year, a word to direct their spiritual focus for the coming months. I’ve never participated before, but there’s been a word rattling around in my head for the last several weeks, consistently enough for me to recognize the Spirit at work. The word is charity.

Charity is a funny word. My whole life I’ve associated it with giving money to those in need, but in Scriptural terms it’s used interchangeably with “love.” It makes sense; love is a series of choices and actions, so it should naturally bear itself out in giving.

But there’s still another definition. For me, charity is a call to change my heart.

I’ve fussed often enough on this blog about the way we talk to each other in the modern world: the vitriol, the rigid mindset that causes us to dig in at the extremes of any political, philosophical or religious disagreement. A mindset in which we make assumptions about others’ thoughts and motivations and pass snap judgment based upon assumptions, sound bites and half-truths, while simultaneously refusing to recognize our own self-righteousness in doing so. It’s a state of mind and heart that shreds others’ human dignity, and as such it stands contrary to what we believe as Christians.

But you know, what a person focuses on sheds a great deal of light on their own mindset. I’ve said it a lot recently: religious writing is like one ongoing examination of conscience. And I’m at least as guilty of these sins as anyone I call to task for them. Charity for me this year means changing my internal monologue from judgment to acceptance. It means giving people the benefit of the doubt instead of assuming the worst about their beliefs, motivations and actions. It is an exercise in finding Christ in others, and in myself.

And it’s probably the hardest task I’ve ever set myself for a new year.

Vignettes from the car on a post-Christmas trip

The annual family Christmas shot, taken after Mass. Another one of those pictures that tells you everything you need to know about our family at this point in time: Miss Independent off on her own, Nicholas being cheesy, and Michael trying his utmost to get free.

Loading the car to go to the in-laws’ house takes forever. There’s been snow where we’re going, and a lot of it, so we have to load the snow pants and the boots. Michael’s unreasonably cranky, so I have to run back inside to grab the Basi Pharmacy Du Bebe. We’re going to miss trash day, and post-Christmas the recycling fills two rooms (or maybe that’s just because Michael keeps unloading the bags and throwing paper everywhere), so we have to load up the cardboard and paper recycling for a trip to the bins.

The kids are strapped in, cold, and getting restless. Christian’s taking forever to come out of the house, and when he appears, I realize why: he’s carrying THE BOX. The big honking box that held Julianna’s rocking horse, so big that we stuffed it full of other boxes. The box we had to stash under the stairs during the Great Santa Visit of Christmas Eve, because it announced in giant letters, “ONLY AT TOYS R US!!!” and that seemed like a bit of a stretch to a 7-year-old who’s almost connected the dots.

I see the box proceeding across the garage toward the back end of the van, and I think, Uh-oh.

It takes two seconds. “Daddy, what was in that box?” Alex demands.

“Don’t worry about it.”

“But what was in it?”

“Just don’t worry about it, it was in the basement.”

Alex subsides as the hatch closes behind him, and we take off to get gas and a carwash. But then he can’t hold it in anymore. “Did Santa bring Julianna’s horse or not?” he demands. “Because it says TOYS R US on it.”

“Alex, I don’t know, I found it downstairs,” Christian says, while my muscles tense. This whole season I keep thinking it’s just time to tell him already, but it’s important to my husband to stretch it out as long as possible. (He didn’t find out until 4th grade, which I think is a bit ridiculous. I think I knew in the first grade, and it didn’t throw me at all, whereas he was crushed.) So, as I have done half a dozen times this season already, I do what I have to do: I distract. “Hey, anybody want to listen to Christmas CDs?” I ask. “I brought some for the drive.”

“YEAH!” comes the chorus.

Crisis averted. Barely.

Ten minutes later, they’re talking about the weather. “This is just like summer,” says Alex, who is wearing a heavy coat, to Nicholas, whose hands are firmly encased in mittens. “Only with spots of snow. And it’s a little colder.”

“It’s just like red…only blue,” I whisper to Christian.

*

Today Alex is quite sick. I didn’t think you could get the croup at age 7 3/4, but there it is. I sing again in praise of vaporizers, because yesterday afternoon I thought we were going to have to go to the ER, and in the middle of the night his breathing, two feet from the mist-spewing funnel, was calm. But please pray for him (and all of us) anyway. I’m a little nervous about this virus running laps through the family.

Of My Little (not-)St. Nick, on Christmas Eve

I originally intended this to be an Advent Calendar wrapup post, with pictures from some of our Advent highlights. That’s a much more appropriate post for my last one before the Great Blogosphere Blackout Of The Last Week Of The Year, but I don’t have time or energy to shrink and upload all those photos. It’s easier to type. So today I’m going to share a couple of cute kid-isms to last you until I come back around New Year’s, or earlier if I get inspired (but don’t count on it. Bloggers need a vacation too!).

We have grandparents on the premises, and at dinner last night there transpired an exchange that illustrates my third-born’s character with pristine clarity. “Alex,” Grandpa said, “I’m going to have to leave you tomorrow. I have to go to work, you know. It’s a big night for me.”

It took Alex a minute to catch on, and then he started laughing at the idea that Grandpa was Santa Claus. Nicholas, however, looked sideways at Grandpa and bided his time until the joke had spun out. Then he cocked his head and gave his most impish smile. “Hi, Santa,” he said, making it clear that not only did he get the joke, he knew how to participate in it. At THREE.

Twenty minutes later, he put on his big brother’s Santa hat and came over to me as we were preparing to go visit the “Magic Tree.” “Mommy, what do you want for Christmas?” he asked.

“Oh, my,” I said, and sighed. “Time to write!”

Nicholas frowned, thought for a minute, and then pulled his hands up and held them out, placing empty air into mine. “There you go,” he said.

As Christian said when he was eighteen months old, “We’re gonna have trouble with this one.”

Here’s the Magic Tree, just for fun. Have a holy and peaceful Christmas! See you in 2013!

Sunday Snippets

It’s the last Advent season edition of Sunday Snippets, hosted by RAnn of This, That and The Other Thing. Hope you all have a lovely Christmas!

A Conversation In The Truck

My one and only post about Connecticut

My final Advent Wednesday reflection was on light, and how we sometimes ignore an important facet about this central Christian symbol

And just for fun, there’s “Why Do We Avocado?” and Other Things I Don’t Understand

“When Do We Avocado?” and other things I Don’t Understand

It’s been quite a while since I did an edition of “Things I Don’t Understand” (see here, here, here and here for the others, if you’re really interested):

THINGS I DO NOT UNDERSTAND….

___1___

[image error]Adult-sized footed pajamas. Really, people? What do you do when you need to use the bathroom in the middle of the night?

___2___

The fact that whatever item has been thrown on the floor by one child is prime real estate for another child to stand on while watching the TV/talking to mommy/trying to ruin my computer? I mean, they go out of their way to stand on things!

___3___

Speaking of computers…I don’t understand the baby’s fascination with the computer keyboard and mouse. It’s not like he can tell he’s doing anything.

Photo by brotherlywalks, via Flickr

And speaking of computers, why on earth would they make a command to turn the viewscreen sideways?

(Yes, my children did do this to me one time. I think it was Alex, actually.)

I mean, WHY?

___4___

I am also questioning, this year, why we bother putting up a crèche at all, if it’s going to be used exclusively as a chew toy/action figure set. Nor do I understand why my children think books are better folded backward. I’m sure we singlehandedly keep the packing tape industry healthy.

___5___

I don’t understand about a third of what Nicholas says to me. Not that the words are unclear–they just don’t make any sense. Having spent 8 years around little kids now, I thought I was pretty good at casting about for word substitutions and intuiting true meaning behind seemingly random statements. But Nicholas frequently has me completely stymied. For instance: At breakfast, out of nowhere, he asks, “Mommy, what teacher?” What do you mean, ‘what teacher’? Or in the car, we’re having a perfectly rational discussion about the fire station and cars, and then suddenly he says, “But when do we avocado?”

Ahem. All right, on to other things….

___6___

You need a video of Julianna, right? Here’s a short one to show how her speech is progressing.

Julianna and Brown Bear

___7___

Update on the weight loss thing (I got so many comments last week, I know you all want to hear about it again! )…Plateau problem is solved. (Warning! If you aren’t comfortable with the human body, quit reading and go watch Julianna again.) The problem was my cycle. Around the time of ovulation, I hold onto weight. I knew that, I just didn’t realize it was TWO POUNDS that were completely impervious to calorie reduction and thrice-weekly Jazzercise. I lost those 2 pounds overnight when I went into post-ovulation infertility (what we call Phase 3 in NFP lingo). As of midweek, I was sitting pretty at the top of my ideal weight range. I’ve set a new goal to drop 6 more pounds, which would put me pretty close to what I weighed when I graduated high school. I think that’s a good goal, don’t you?

Advent Wednesdays: Light

Deutsch: Opferlichter (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Today I want to point you to a post by another blogger: Advent: On Seeing Light And Poverty. It’s been nearly two weeks, and I’m still turning this post over in my mind. Light is a central theme of Christianity: light of the world, Christ our light, light to the nations. When we pray for light, it’s because light symbolizes hope. Security. Warmth. Homeyness. All that is true, but until I read Rae’s post, the obvious never occurred to me: when the light is turned on we see everything more clearly, the bad as well as the good, the difficult and uncomfortable realities as well as that which uplifts us.

During Advent, light is used symbolically every night, in a progressively more expansive way each week. This year, I realize that if Jesus associated himself with the poor among us (as often as you did it for the least of these, you did it for me), then this season requires us to face the unpleasant realities, both in the world around us, as I wrote about on Monday, and in ourselves, as I wrote about yesterday.

My one and only post about Connecticut

Dignity (Photo credit: true2source)

When the first updates appeared on Friday, I searched Google just enough to see what everyone was talking about. Then I went into internet withdrawal. I don’t need to know the details. The whole thing is horrible; me getting cut to shreds about it isn’t going to change anything. I can hurt, I can pray without knowing all the gory details.

But neither do I want to ignore the topic altogether. So today and only today I will share my thoughts.

In the wake of this shooting, all the predictable sound bites are coming out–on both sides of the political divide. What upsets me is that after an incident like this, when our world has lost a slice of its future, people cling to political philosophy more strongly than ever, as if those philosophies, whatever they are, are more important than the people they’re supposed to serve.

This should be a time for everyone to realize that we need to find some common ground, to work together toward a future in which twenty young children dying a violent death in their classroom is impossible.

Things are happening in this world that require us to acknowledge the change. In many ways, humanity is the same from age to age. Every generation thinks the next one is going to hell in a handbasket, all the way back to the ancient Greeks. But some things defy such casual dismissal. The shootings are worse now than they were when we were kids, and there are more of them. We must acknowledge this and accept that something has caused that change. We can’t stick our heads in the sands and pretend like our political, personal and entertainment culture doesn’t have an impact. The violence is worse, and it’s not going to get any better unless something changes. Maybe more than one something.

Some say that something is gun control. Others toss out the usual objections: someone determined to commit carnage will find a way no matter what laws are in place. Or: it’s tragic, but this is the price we pay for a free society.

Some people say we have to treat mental illness; if anything makes clear the need for universal health coverage, this is it.

Then again, maybe it’s the fault of violence in entertainment. If movies weren’t so violent, this would never happen: The great art-imitates-life vs. life-imitates-art debate.

Or maybe we can blame the breakdown of the family, and wag our fingers at culture of 50% divorce, extreme promiscuity and all the associated societal ills–out-of-wedlock birth leading to poverty leading to culture-wide desperation. A return to traditional values would cure all.

You know what? There’s at least a grain of truth in virtually every argument I just listed. If there is a solution to this horrible problem, it’s going to be achieved by abandoning the fringes, and finding common ground.

Common ground. This means everyone has to give a bit of what is precious to them. We’ve got to pry our stubborn brains open and look for the nuggets of truth in opposing philosophies. Even more fundamentally, we need to change ourselves. Because we contribute to the climate of disrespect for human dignity. We are part of the problem, too.

When we hurl unreasoned, impassioned invectives at people who think differently than we do: we are part of the problem.

When we share belittling, demeaning jokes about public figures we don’t like, because we think they’re funny: we are part of the problem.

When we watch murder dramas hour after hour, night after night, in which the writers dream up ever-more violent and horrific ways of knocking off human beings: we are part of the problem.

When we go to movies in which violence is pretty much the story: we are part of the problem.

When we watch “reality” shows that are filled with people shredding each others’ human dignity in the name of winning or ratings: we are part of the problem.

When we refuse to have civil discourse and reasoned discussion, based on facts, with those whose points of view differ from ours: we are part of the problem.

When we leave vitriolic, scathing, dignity-shredding comments anonymously or otherwise on blog posts or news articles: we are part of the problem.

When we refuse to seek common ground–in other words, compromise: we are part of the problem.

I know some may find it offensive to equate how we treat each other with murder. Tough. Disrespect for the human person reaches its climax in murder–it doesn’t start there. It starts small, with us, and builds, layer upon layer, until tragedy strikes. And that means we have to act. We have to change, because right now, our children are paying the price.

A Conversation in the Truck

1995-1997 Ford Ranger photographed in Accokeek, Maryland, USA. Category:Ford Ranger (North America) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

My husband has been driving the same miniature pickup–stick shift, no CD player, no airbags–as long as I’ve known him. We spent our first date, on a November night that sparkled with frost, driving around talking in the darkness of the warm cab. These days, Alex rides shotgun in that cab more than I do. There’s something almost magical about that arrangement–side by side, not chauffer-to-passenger–that facilitates real conversation. I’ve frequently envied Christian the chance to connect with Alex that way en route to school–the chance to listen, and teach, and otherwise get to know the boy my baby is becoming. I’m sure when The Santa Claus Discussion finally comes, it too will take place in the truck.

Last week, when Christian was off work, I got to sit in on Alex’s piano lesson and bring him home without any tiny tagalongs–in other words, in the truck. In the wake of the Peach Pit Lady Incident, it was clear we were facing a teachable moment. The man who had the peach pit thrown at him was asking for diapers–a request that cut me to the quick the first time I saw it, weeks ago, whose persistence has begun to make me a bit suspicious. We talked about mental illness and extremely poor choices. We talked about alcohol and drug abuse, and how many people think you should give money to shelters instead of to the homeless, because we can’t be sure they’ll use it to help themselves–that they might use it to hurt themselves worse.

We talked about the different options homeless people have for shelter and food, and how most of them have rules about drugs and alcohol, so sometimes the people don’t want to (or can’t) go there. We talked about the shelter our family has supported, the one we went to last week, which takes care of “the ones nobody else wants,” as my pastor once said.

And then, as if that wasn’t deep enough, the conversation moved to the reason we care at all. I told him the story about the sheep and the goats, from Matthew 25. When Jesus said, “What you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do for me,” he was making it clear that whenever we see a person in trouble–no matter how bad their choices have been–we’re looking at him. That’s why I’ve been trying to keep a few $1 bills in my wallet, I told Alex. I can’t just drive by and pretend I don’t see them.

Because let’s face it, people, that’s what we do. It’s an ugly truth, unpleasant to face, but there it is. We don’t even meet their eyes, because doing so invites connection; if we’re not going to give them anything, we don’t want them to develop expectations. But money or provisions given to shelters doesn’t fulfill the obligation to acknowledge the face of Christ, person to person.

By this time we were headed up the ramp at our exit, and I knew it was time to stop talking. There’s definitely such a thing as overkill. We were quiet most of the rest of the way home; I could practically hear his brain turning everything he’d heard around and around, shaping and filing it.

What he’ll do with it…that remains for another conversation in the truck.

Sunday Snippets

The weeks are flying by–positively flying. And here we are on the eve of Gaudete Sunday, and only ten days till Christmas. I think I’ve finally, finally nailed an appropriate set of activities to fill our Advent calendar, because we’re not feeling crazed this year. But I digress. Weekends are for linking up to RAnn’s Sunday Snippets: A Catholic Carnival blog hop. And today, here are my offerings:

The most important post of the week was this one: First World Problems. It’s also been the most widely-read.

For Advent Wednesday I borrowed some beautiful reflections from another blogger (with permission!).

I started my 7 Quick Takes with an anecdote that ties into the earlier post on poverty, etc., and ended it with a picture of our St. Lucy buns, while in the middle I talked about kids, dieting and a very Catholic kids’ book I’ll bet some of you will recognize.