Yearly Archives: 2010

Back to School

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Birgitta and I spent today with hundreds of students and their parents getting “oriented” to college life at the University of Iowa. Although I was old enough to be the parent of some of the other parents, I tried not to dwell on my Medicare membership. My outfit also bothered me. Although I worked hard on deciding what to wear, in the end I looked like I’d just finished a shift at Target.

Birgitta opted to stay in the dorm these two nights while I slept at a Super 8. But we spent much of the day together getting acquainted with the university, the place she’ll call home in August. Before breakfast she’d already perused her thick packet of materials and was far more knowledgeable about the school than I. But that’s how this whole chapter of her life has been. She did all the phoning, emailing, contacting, questioning and filling out of endless forms. I did nothing, which was evident when she handed me my Hawkeye dinner ticket this afternoon. “You’re all set, Mom,” she said, probably wondering if I’d remember where I put the ticket by dinner time.

I miss Birgitta already. She’s throwing herself into orientation activities and is pumped to get started, wanting to take advantage of more university opportunities than 24 hour days will allow. Her eyes lit up when one speaker mentioned that the school offers 500 student-run organizations, 200 extra-curricular clubs, 22 languages, 100 majors and 24 varsity teams (Big Ten football among them). She also loves the idea of attending a school with over 30,000 kids and a freshman class of nearly 5000. But she’s my baby, and when the time comes to leave her, I’ll probably cry.

Walking between meetings today, we talked about her father and how much we missed his presence at this event, the only college orientation in our family he’s been unable to attend. But we smiled thinking of the gusto with which he would have thrown himself into these two days.

Nate graduated from a Big Ten school, actually two of them: Northwestern University and also the University of Illinois Law School. Although he wasn’t into sports, he was into the countless advantages of a giant university and made it a priority to identify all that was offered as soon as he arrived on campus… just like this daughter.

Nate loved school and the concept of ongoing education. He’d have been a lifelong university student if he could have. When I hear Birgitta talk about shaping her four undergraduate years toward a grad degree, I know this apple hasn’t fallen too far from its paternal tree. If Nate had been with us at the university today, he’d have told his seventh-born to think about the verse of Scripture that had influenced him more than any other. He’d have reminded her she was at the beginning of a brand new race set before her by God himself and should run it with endurance.

I’ll be praying for her endurance… and maybe Nate will, too. And despite what scholars think, I’ll be wondering if Nate is cheering in that multitude of witnesses, watching the race from his spot in a heavenly grand stand.

“Since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us.” (Hebrews 12:1)

Hankie-Help

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Rhett Butler was never without a handkerchief when Scarlett needed one, because he was a classy guy. Having a ready hankie was the mark of a true gentleman.

Nate was a gentleman, too.

I can’t count the times I needed his hankie-help when we were away from home. Coffee spills, make-up gone awry, tears at a funeral or sticky fingers. The uses were endless. His hankie was usually out of his suit pocket before I’d looked up from my sudden need, and he never gave a thought to the fact that he might want it later himself and find it soiled by his wife.

I can remember watching my mother put a handkerchief in her purse each time she went out, noticing that my father had one, too. People of that generation didn’t use Kleenex with abandon like I do. They were “thinking green” well before it was the thing to do.

I also recall shopping with Mom to buy a bridal shower gift. She selected a handkerchief made of gauzy white linen fanned out in a square flat box and wrapped in tissue. The embroidered pink roses on one corner were matched by a pink edging all around. As a young girl I knew the bride would love it and wondered if she might even carry it on her wedding day.

When we were cleaning out Mom’s drawers after she died, she had quite a collection of beautiful hankies. But short of using them in an art project, we didn’t know what to do with them. Times had changed. Although I remember every elderly auntie tucking a handkerchief in her dress sleeve  with the decorative part showing, today’s women were different. And Mom’s hankie supply went to Good Will.

I can see how hankies are wonderful for mopping up moisture — from eyes, noses, clothes, children’s faces and unnumbered other places. And life is fraught with messes that need this kind of attention. Although I’ve never owned my own hankie, I was delighted to be married to a handkerchief-carrying gentleman. I needed him, and I needed his hankies. Both helped me clean up many a mess.

Sometimes I think about the Lord and his expertise at cleaning up after us.   Throughout the Bible he mopped up a variety of disasters, and he’s in the same business today, offering his services to those of us who keep messing up. And the best part about his cleaning is that it isn’t just surface work. What he offers goes deep into the heart and fixes up what cannot be touched with a hankie but is far more difficult to clean. It’s the buried soil of sin.

But the beauty of God’s mess-mopping is that once things have been cleaned up, he’s willing to let the past stay in the past. Although I don’t think God actually forgets anything, he does promise not to keep bringing up the messes we’ve made. They’re as good as forgotten.

I still remember quite a few of the wet clean-ups Nate’s hankies helped me with, and many of the handkerchiefs show stains to testify of their histories. Actually, now that I’m thinking about it, Nate never brought these things up to me again either. Like Rhett Butler, he was just happy he could help.

” ‘Come now, let’s settle this,’ says the Lord. ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them as white as snow.’ “ (Isaiah 1:18a)

Husbands or Sons?

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It’s been said that when we raise boys, we raise them to be either husbands or sons. Their parents train them to either serve others, or expect to be served by others.

Nate and I were privileged to have four sons, and as parents we fell somewhere between those two goal posts. Parental pampering feels good at the time, because we get to take kids to Hawaii, give them motorcycles and bee bee guns, put piles of gifts under the Christmas tee and offer pizza, ice cream and cash. Although it makes for a rip-roaring-happy childhood, it doesn’t do much to promote thinking of others ahead of yourself.

As a wife, I was fortunate in that Nate’s parents raised him to be a husband rather than a son. Although he lived through college and part of law school before marrying, once he became a husband he didn’t expect me to take over any of the chores he’d learned to do for himself: laundry, dishes, ironing, making coffee, running errands, even cooking meals. (His cuisine was limited, hamburgers and hot dogs, but from the start he offered what he knew.)

After we had a baby and I became a stay-at-home mom, he could easily have abdicated all his domestic efforts. But until he crawled into his bed for the last time last fall, he put every item of his dirty clothing into the hamper, kept neat drawers, offered to iron his own cotton business shirts, made all the coffee, took out all the trash and brought me a glass of bedtime water every night without fail. (See “Forgetting and Remembering,” Nov. 14.) Often I’d round a corner and find him bent over in his suit, his tie swinging with the effort to wipe up a spill or get rid of a sticky section of floor, not seeking credit from anyone. Most impressive, however, was his faithful clearing of the table after every dinner, putting the food away and then doing all the dishes. He did that until his disease dictated it was time to stop.

When I think of the tedious, never-done-for-good chore of washing dishes, it reminds me of when Jesus washed the feet of 12 men. That task required finding and carrying a heavy water basin, enduring the smell of dirty feet, making a watery mess, kneeling down, working while hunched over and cleaning up afterwards. But most significant was that it required self-humbling. Jesus, Lord of all, modeled servanthood for us, with perfection.

Our boys watched their father through their growing up years, observing his quick willingness to help at home, even after a high-pressure work day downtown. As they’ve grown older, I’ve seen this same character quality pop up in them, a priceless piece of Nate’s legacy to his boys. If their father was still with them, he’d say, “It’s good you’re helping a little.” And that’s how he saw it, as simply a little help.

Although Nate sometimes spoiled his boys, part of what he did well was showing them how to help in little ways that were a big deal to those he served. And I should know, because the one he pampered most with all his serving… was me.

”Whoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant.

(Matthew 20:27)