Author: J. Thorp

Covert Lily

/ J. Thorp / 1 Comment
Here comes trouble…

Our youngest is quite the explorer these days — and she is completely obsessed with anything resembling a cell phone, computer or remote control (which may be an indicator of how we spend too much time, but that’s another topic…). A few days back, Jodi caught her standing and leaning against The Big Chair in our living room, fully extended, trying to reach the iPod Touch someone had left on the armrest.

“No, Lily,” said Jodi, and our monsterpiece plopped to the floor and began to cry.

Jodi went about her work, and Lily soon calmed herself. A short while later Jodi looked back to the chair to see the iPod was gone. She stepped into the living room to see Lily standing next to The Big Chair. Lily smiled her adorable, open-mouth, gasping grin, showing all her budding toofers, and looked adoringly at her mother.

“Hi, baby!” cooed Jodi, her eyes scanning for the iPod. “Are you soooo happy to see me?”

Lily grinning, and bounced, and babbled. Jodi spied the iPod Touch, which had somehow been knocked from the armrest and slipped between the cushion and side of the chair. She continued to banter with Lily while secretly sliding her hand between the cushion and chair and palming the gadget.

“You be a good girl,” Jodi called cheerfully, stepping back into the kitchen.

She watched quietly from just out of sight. The grin left Lily’s face quickly, and she turned to the chair and reached to the spot between the cushion and the chair where the iPod had been moments before.

Then she cried and cried.

Top 10 Highlights Of Camp Lebanon 2012

/ J. Thorp / 2 Comments

http://www.facebook.com/v/3953178462416
Rose’s zip line ride: see number 5, below…

Every year for the past five or so, Jodi and I and the kids have joined 30 or so families from St. Michael’s and St. Albert’s parishes at a camp near Upsala, Minnesota, called Camp Lebanon. The first year I didn’t want to go, a) because with a dining hall, water toys, and showers, it wasn’t really camping; b) because I was going to be surrounded by kids not my own; and c) because I didn’t feel like I knew enough people and wasn’t looking forward to being “on” all weekend.

All true observations…none of which had any impact on my actual enjoyment of the weekend. We’ve been going back ever since, and even organized it a couple of years.

No time to do a complete recap of the weekend, but here are the Top 10 Highlights:

10. Not My Job! I had hoped to be done with my work early on Friday so we could be on the road by 3 p.m. or so. Not even close, and when 4 p.m. rolled around and I was still packing, my blood pressure started to rise.

Then I remembered: We’re not running things this year. We can get up there any time before tomorrow, and it’s all good.

Turns out we made it in plenty of time for Friday evening activities — and with Lily this year, it’s a good thing we weren’t the organizers! Kudos to Sustaceks, Duerrs, and Fredricksons for a great weekend!

9. New Faces. We missed a number of dear friends who weren’t there…but there were so many new families, too, that you couldn’t help but make new connections. I met potential homebrewers, Axis and Allies enthusiasts, future KCs, and just all-around good guys — hopefully next year the old and the new will all show up, and then some!

8. Albany Invasion. Albany, Minnesota, is the last stop for food on the way to the camp. A gas station just off the freeway houses A&W, Subway, Godfather’s Pizza, Taco John’s, and Chester’s Fried Chicken counters under one roof — and Friday afternoon, it hosted nearly every family bound for Camp Lebanon in constant rotation. I’m sure the locals had to be wondering about the volume of strangers greeting each other with hugs and handshakes.

7. Has Anyone Seen… Once we settle in at camp, the kids are off and running with their friends. Jodi and I ate with grown-ups and Lily, and generally soaked up the weekend, only rousing ourselves occasionally to ask around, “Has anyone seen [CHILD’S NAME HERE]?” And we were hardly the only ones.

6. Holy Spirit at Work. More than once, someone stopped to share that the weekend itself, or something someone did or said, was just what they needed — that the Holy Spirit was at work last weekend. But the most striking example came on Sunday morning, when one of my own overextended children decided to disobey Jodi and run off to play with friends. I confronted the child and had a long talk about the responsibilities that come with being family — and I thought it sunk in. Only a few minutes later, a local seminarian, Paul, offered a scripture reflection in which he talked about how family is diminished when one person acts selfishly — and I looked over to see wide, staring, glassy eyes. I asked about it later, and was told, “I heard him and I was like, “Seriously?!” Wow.

5. Zip Line! I watched two grown men race over a wooded ravine, brazen in their talk but white in their knuckles. I watched our priest and seminarian zip through the tree tops — Father was pounding his chest; Paul was all smiles and thumbs up. But best of all, I watched Emma nervously strap up after watching the men, whimpering and sighing a bit under her breath; watched her set out across the ravine tentatively, and watched her slide back over, screaming and giggling, barely able to speak “That was awesome!” to the camera. She is the only Thorp to have done it so far. She deserves applause.

4. Dating Survey. A few friends began asking an unofficial survey question of the couples at camp: “Do you and your spouse go on dates?” Jodi said, “Not really.” I said, “Occasionally.” Then we both said, “Unless running errands or getting groceries alone together count.” The ruling came back: if we are specifically going together and leaving the kids behind, it counts. Oh, yes, we are still romantic!

3. Early Morning Run. Brendan rose at 6:45 a.m. on a Saturday to go running with a few of the guys from school — and a few girls. I rose a little after 7, and when I emerged from the bathhouse, they were coming the hill from the lake: four or five girls, graceful and light on their feet, and two clomping boys bringing up the rear. Turns out the girls were all cross-country runners, and the two wrestlers were the only boys motivated enough to get up that early. What motivated them to keep pace with the fleet-footed young ladies over two or three miles? I’m going with sheer stubborn pride…though at that age, who can guess? (For an alternative explanation, see the video below…)

2. Family Prayer. Family rosaries each night, and Saturday evening mass with sunbaked parents and waterlogged kids doing their best to be reverent. Families praying together with families. There’s nothing better, except…

1. Serenading Lily. Every year we listen to The White Stripes on the way to the camp. This year Lily was fussing until the guitars and drums kicked in, and, to a person, all four of her siblings began to sing to her.

Wish I could’ve recorded them doing it — leaning over her car seat, almost in harmony, and her grinning, gasping, laughing face. She’s pretty good-looking (for a girl).

Book Break: What We Can’t Not Know

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You should want to read this book based on the perplexing title alone. J. Budziszewski’s What We Can’t Not Know is an unusual philosophy book: it presents an overview of the Natural Law, its classical roots and Catholic application, in an easy-to-read, relatively-easy-to-understand, often humorous, sometimes disturbing, and always thought-provoking volume. It is also something I never thought I’d see after two college courses in philosophy: a page-turner.

I say that with with a caveat: I’m the type of guy who likes a cohesive worldview, in which the foundation and principles at the root are applicable at the terminal twig of every branch. I believe in objective morality and universal truth — and I believe that, with effort, we can come close to discerning these things. More than that, I want to discern them — and so, it seems, does Budziszewski. In this respect I was a sympathetic reader solidly in the book’s target audience.

The book is packed with insight, and is an easier read in many ways than the shorter C.S. Lewis volume The Abolition of Man. I recommend it wholeheartedly for anyone interested in the ideas of objective truth, universal morality, or the philosophical underpinnings of Catholic teaching. It articulates the ways in which we can discern that there is a Natural Law and uncover what the Natural Law is, and it also suggests practical application of its principles, which is much needed in the materialistic, relativistic, self-consciously diverse, “it’s all good” society of today.

Our Monsterpiece

/ J. Thorp / 3 Comments
The Eyes Have It: Lily at a fundraiser dinner, taking it all in. That’s not Jodi holding her…she sucked in countless others that evening to do her bidding. (Photo: Michelle LeMonds at Michelle LeMonds Photography)
monsterpiece – n. – a perfectly created monster;
the pinnacle of a monster-maker’s handiwork*

She drinks you with those eyes. Draws you near in dumb adoration, cute-struck, closer and closer. Her spit-shined pink lips part in an open-mouth smile, toothless except on bottom, and saliva pools on her dimpled chin. She’s close enough now you can smell her baby-ness; she’s reaching with her long little fingers for your clothes, your hair, whatever she can grasp, all giggles and gasping shrieks of delight.
She’s got you.
* * * * *
In earlier December, I made the following prediction: “[W]e are having our tomboy, an active girl of about 10 pounds (plus or minus two ounces; 9-15 like her daddy would be just fine), 21 inches long or so. She’s gonna sleep alright, but when she starts moving about, she’ll be our first climber. We shall have our hands full. She will have a Thorp head, of course, and Jodi’s hazel eyes that look green in the right light.”

Dad always cautioned me that when it comes to children, “you get what you expect.” Six days after the official prediction, we were blessed with Lily, who emerged a little lighter (9 pounds, 4 ounces) and a little longer (23-1/2 inches), but very much an active girl and every bit a handful, with a Thorp head and captivating eyes. She sleeps alright, by which I mean not great, and she is fickle, demanding, and persistent. Perhaps we didn’t get a tomboy, but a diva…
 
* * * * *

If she sees you, then loses sight, she cries. If you initiate eye contact or conversation, then look away or fall silent, she cries. If you pick her up only to put her down – whether in her car seat or among her toys – she cries. If you hold her close and sit, she wants to stand; if you stand, she wants to move…and again, if you look her in the eye, don’t be the first to look away. She cries.

Until two weeks ago she refused to take bottle. She wanted to nurse, exclusively and often, and would accept no substitute. To give Jodi a moment’s peace, for the first time in five children, we decided to try a pacifier. She bit it and spit it out. 

Finally her insatiable appetite got the best of her; now she demands the bottle. And when she wants it she wants it: four ounces at a minimum, no matter how much she’s nursed. Sometimes she still screams when you give it to her, but just try to take it from her…she cannot get it to her face on her own, but lie her on her back and she will clasp it to her chest with both hands. Sometimes if you try to help, she gets agitated — but step away, and invariably she will drop it and scream.

She won’t swallow baby cereal. She’ll eat a little pureed green beans, grimacing and shuddering the whole way — as though she knows the adage, “That which does not kill you makes you stronger.”

Whereas Trevor often insisted, verbally and mentally, the world match his ideas about it, Lily makes it so. We’ve tried to wait her out when she gets owly. Thus far she appears to have more time than we do. She’s like a first-quality air-raid siren: made to be heard in the worst conditions, and just as loud an hour or more later.

* * * * *

And she knows what she likes. One night while pacing the kitchen, trying to get her to sleep, I found myself unable to keep from nuzzling the black fuzz on the back of her head. Our other kids would duck away when I do this – they couldn’t stand the prickliness of my clipped goatee. Lily, by contrast, moved her head slowly side to side against my whiskers, then pressed it deliberately into my chin. I turned away, then back to her; again she rubbed her head on my chin, then leaned hard against it. 

Over time, she began to put her bare cheek against my whiskers, then her open mouth, and now, her nose and rapidly blinking eyes. She can barely stand it, but she persists nonetheless. That which does not kill you…

* * * * *

Will she be a climber? Time will tell. She is strong; she rolls easily, quickly, and repeatedly, and as of last week, spins quickly on her belly to orient herself toward whatever she desires, then arm-crawls across any terrain. If she reaches her objective, she grasps and consumes it, first with her eyes, then with her gaping, smiling mouth, toothless except on the bottom.

She’s our monsterpiece. As I’ve said countless times now: “Good thing she’s cute…”

Daddy’s Girls: Y’all realize the only thing keeping Lily where she’s at is the friction of my whiskers on her fuzzy little head — that’s why my head is tilted to hers. Not snuggling…nosiree! (Photo: Katrina Nielsen at Spiritus Capere Photography)

——

 
*”Monsterpiece” was coined by Rose and me a few weeks back, specifically to describe Lily.