The Pushback

Well, just when you think you have it all figured out, you find out that you don’t.

If you read my last piece, Here’s My Card, you’ll know that I created a new business card. Not so much as a way to market myself, but to introduce myself. The me, myself, and I that is now 70 years old.

In that blog I make no bones about the fact that I’m not a fan of the camera. It’s the rare photo of myself that I like, which means that every time another photo op comes along, I’m already tense and pretty sure it’ll quickly become another deleted photo. Which it often does. It’s a vicious cycle that’s been hard to break.

In real life, not in front of the camera, I actually think I’m pretty cute. Beautiful, even. I walk through life, into a room, or up onto a stage with confidence. Confidence in who I am, what I bring, and, how I look. But bring in a camera, and all bets are off. It’s like, “Wait, that’s not how I look.”

The blog was waiting for subscribers to my newsletter when they woke up this morning. My eldest daughter texted me about what I had written. She wanted to push back against what she had read. Her text brought me to tears as she talked about how she sees me. In her eyes, I’m beautiful. Always have been, always will be. Even when my hair was permed. (That might be taking it a little too far. If I was meant to have curly hair I would have been born with it.)

After our text exchange, she followed up with a Marco Polo. I learned three things from her beautiful, honest, and insightful message:

Even though she no longer lives in my home, she’s still paying attention.

We are always modeling what it looks like to the generation behind us. More than anything I want them to see what it looks like to age with grace. To embrace the changing face in the mirror with love and respect, wrinkles and all. To fiercely tend to the needs of a body not meant to live forever. To laugh at ourselves because it’s good medicine for whatever ails us at any age. To look through the camera and connect to the people on the other side of the photo.

It’s time to make friends with the camera, because every photo captures an irreplaceable moment in a never-to-be-repeated life.

How we talk about ourself matters.

Our thoughts create our words. Our words create our stories. When we tell our stories, others are listening. What is the story I want others to hear? If, as I profess to believe, that we are all created in the image of God, then every single one of us is beautiful in our own unique way. And that includes me.

It’s time to talk to and about myself as one who reflects the beauty of the One who made her.

Deeply rooted stories require uprooting.

My daughter reminded me that my dad feared old age. He fought it. He denied it. He made some of us a little miserable in our efforts to love and support him well as his time on the planet grew shorter. I wonder if my apple doesn’t fall too far from his tree. There isn’t a ready answer to that question. Maybe yes, maybe no, probably a little bit of both. Regardless, there’s still plenty of time to do something about it.

It’s time to dig in, dig out, and cultivate a better story. A more accurate story. A story that I want my children to be able to tell their children about who I was, how I lived, and, how I left.

Like I said, just when you think you have it all figured out, you don’t. Which is why we need people in our lives who love us enough to push back.

Another Star Is Born

If joy had a face, it would look like Valerie Christine Pierson. Born 34 years ago today, she came into my life when I answered a personals ad written by her dad. From day one she wiggled and giggled her way into my heart, and has never left.

I’m not sure I’ve ever met a more generous human being in my life. If Val has it to give, she will. Whatever it is. Her time. Her talent. Her listening ear and her caring heart. If there is one story that captures the essence of this beautiful woman I get to call one of my daughters it is this one. Heading home from New Jersey after her Granddad’s memorial service, Valerie, Tom, and I were sitting in one of those dark airport restaurants where other weary travelers gather while waiting for their flights home. While I was focused on my burger and glass of wine, Val spotted two women sitting at a nearby table, heads close together, tears streaming down their faces. She didn’t know why they were sad and in pain, only that they were. Val quietly got up from the table, went up to the bar, paid for their lunch, and then as if it were the most natural thing in the world to buy a meal for two strangers, returned to our table. Only as the women were leaving the restaurant did the whole story come out. They were mother and daughter and had just lost their father and grandfather. Val’s kindness was just the balm their two broken hearts needed to remind them that even in the midst of loss and grief there is love and grace to be found, often through the kindness of strangers.

She is a mama bear to her Jonah-bear and I dare you to find a more fiercely loving mom anywhere. They share a love of the Portland Trailblazers, their new family addition, Comet-the-dog, and doing almost anything together.

I’ve never known a happier spirit. Come what may, somehow Val is able to find the silver-lining in almost any situation. Once during a particularly challenging time, when most people would go down with the ship, I suggested she come up with a mantra that she could say when things got tough. She didn’t miss a beat. "Things could be worse.” she said with a smile. At first blush, that didn’t strike me as an especially useful thing to say. But the more I thought about it, that is Val to a T. No matter how hard things are, she knows that others have it far worse and will do her best to make life better for anyone within her reach.

Val has a faith in the God who loves everyone regardless of who they are, what they’ve done, or where they come from. She has the husky voice of a rock-n-roll angel, loves everything glitz and glamour, and is a down-home family girl at heart.

I have no idea where life will take this bright and shining star of mine next, but wherever she goes and whomever she meets, they will be the better for it.

Happy birthday Val.

You are one in a million!

ATG Photography

The Architect’s Daughter

She knew how to bring out the best in him. Often exacting and distant as a dad in his earlier years, whenever he had the chance to spend time with this daughter of his, all of that seemed to melt away. She had a way of coaxing the boy, who never got to be a boy when he was a boy, to come out and play. Nothing made them happier than playing with materials that others saw as trash and transforming them into treasures. Together, heads bent over a drawing of some dreamed of project, their shared gift of exquisitely combining form and function came alive. A mistake that would once have brought his criticism and a list of what went wrong, became a chance to spend more time to together, covered in dust, figuring out how to get it right.  

The daughter loved the architect for who he was, and extended grace for who he was not, and the architect loved his daughter in all the ways in which he could, never fully understanding the ways in which he could not. In the end, she will remember her love for him, and his for her, as an imperfect thing of beauty and a joy forever.

 With deep gratitude to the architect for the gift of his daughter. 

A Star Is Born

Thirty-seven years ago my eldest daughter Haley was born.

I thought I knew the meaning of love before her arrival, but the vastness and depth of love that a heart can hold expanded beyond what I had ever imagined possible the moment I met her.

She took her sweet time getting here, which showed me that she had her own inner sense of timing that she could trust, and that I could too.  

Her innate sense of wonder and curiosity were evident from her first moments on the planet, as she turned her eyes from my face to look out into the world around her in our hospital room. That curiosity has never left, and has led her to explore the world in her own wild and wonderful ways.

She made the perfect decision when it came to the man with whom she would share life.

I know that I was a really good mom, but watching Haley love and nurture her two little boys, and I am over-the-moon in awe. 

She knows who she is and what she stands for. Her faith is her own, and she is willing to stand her ground for what she believes, and, she will walk shoulder to shoulder with any who want the world to be more loving, peaceful and just for all. 

There are many things that I admire in this first daughter, and chief among them are her compassionate heart, fierce loyalty, and deep intellect. Add to that a wicked sense of humor, love of the written word, pie baking passion, and deep love for mending our broken planet, and my mother-cup runneth over.

Happy Birthday Haley.

Our world and my heart are better because of you.

(And to my other three daughters...be ready when your next birthday rolls around. I can’t wait to write about you, because as you know...you are each, in your own way, my favorite!)