It’s Gabe’s birthday, and he was feeling his oats, as they say — a little rambunctious; a little silly (as were the other kids, me included). So just before we begin, I look around and find Trevor, lying on his belly with his butt in the air and “aimed” directly at me, as it were.
“What is that!?” I roar, pointing at the pajama-clad rump.
Without missing a beat, Gabe says, “It’s a horrible crime against nature!”
Sometimes it appears that I am unable to go with the flow. This is not true. (No, it isn’t!) I can absolutely go with the flow. But once I have a plan, I have a hard time adjusting it or letting go.
I have a good reason for this — one that cropped up again today. As a writer, I have to push myself to get work done in a reasonable timeframe, and now that I’m able to work from home (surrounded by potential distractions) I have to be even more structured with my time. So I’ve got my work week carved into blocks of time for specific projects, for writing, for catching up on reading and administrative tasks, etc. It is my intention to cultivate discipline in myself…unfortunately, this morning I woke up feeling quite ill and started the day slow. Then I started to spread myself out in my home office space and realized I didn’t have enough open work surface for the project, so I had to do some rearranging. By the time I got situated, I was supposed to be moving on to the next project. I didn’t achieve much that I set out to. Tomorrow must be a better day than today, or I’ll be seriously behind my self-imposed deadlines. And even though they are self-imposed, if I don’t take them seriously, I’ll never accomplish anything.
Similarly, today is my bride’s birthday, and I wanted it to be special. I’ve spent the past several days thinking about how to achieve this and formulating plans in my head: how can I give Jodi exactly what she wants, and surprise her?
What does she want? The bathroom repainted, relit, recaulked, etc.; a new curtain or blind for the kitchen window; and (eventually) new bedding. And to go out for supper. And a pineapple upside-down cake. I knew, based on what we have scheduled this week and weekend, that the bathroom was not going to get done until next weekend at the soonest…and since we’re still trying to narrow down what she wants for the kitchen window, I urged her to consider moving the bedding up on her list of priorities, because we had done a little looking already and that was something I could do tonight. After all, I wanted her to have something to open.
I also planned to have lunch with her today, and supper out, and then cake. It was going to be great!
I was going to pull lunch together with the kids, but people kept calling Jodi, so I was working while she talked…and next thing I knew, she was cooking something for lunch. Strike one.
“Why are you cooking?” I said. “We have plenty to eat, and the kids can do this!”
She shrugged. “It’s fine,” she said. “It’s lunch time and I felt like it.”
We talked a bit about her “home improvement” gifts, and I thought I’d slip quietly out to get what I needed for the cake and come back with the bedding we had looked at…except then she said we should shop some more — at least at JC Penney and Bed, Bath, and Beyond — before we purchased anything. Strike two. At least I could still make a cake.
Jodi and I discussed supper plans. There was a fair chance that wherever she decided to go, we would get dessert. Tomorrow is Gabe’s birthday — we will celebrate it as a family, but he’s having a party (and his cake) on Friday.
“Maybe we should get dessert at the restaurant tonight, and hold of on your cake until tomorrow,” I sighed. “Then there will still be a cake on Gabe’s birthday, and one for his party.”
“That sounds good,” said Jodi.
Strike three.
I spent the afternoon stewing. Jodi made lunch. Jodi had no presents or cake. All she had to mark the day was a card, or best birthday wishes, and dinner out. That had better be good!
We went to Texas Roadhouse. Having no experience with the place or the portions, we thought we would order a couple appetizers as a treat. (We almost never order appetizers.) The boys wanted chili cheese fries. Jodi wanted potato skins. The two younger kids wanted macaroni and cheese and fries for their meals, but we reminded them we were getting fries as an appetizer. We were also snacking on delicious warm bread and cinnamon butter as we discussed it…so by the time we had settled on what we would order, Jodi and I looked at each other and said, “Probably just one appetizer.”
Except that now all four kids were expecting fries. Jodi ordered chili cheese fries instead of potato skins. Then, just before we ordered our entrees, she announced she was ordering a sandwich — one of the cheapest things on the menu.
“Are you sure?” I asked, incredulous. “Don’t worry about the cost because…”
“It’s fine,” she said. “It’s what I want.”
“It comes with more fries,” I said. “Why don’t you get the potato skins instead?”
“It’s fine!”
Jodi was getting exasperated. It occurred to me then that I wanted the day to be special, but only in part for her…that I was also trying to be a Good Husband. I didn’t want her to tell anyone that she cooked, and didn’t have a gift or a cake, and had a pulled pork sandwich and fries for supper, because people would think I was a jerk. (And if she insisted it was a good supper or a good day, people would nod knowingly, because that’s the kind of woman she is: Of course she wouldn’t badmouth Jim, the big jerk!)
She ate her sandwich, her fries, and a small dish of complimentary ice cream and chocolate sauce. We stopped at JC Penney on the way home and looked but did not buy. And I couldn’t help myself: on the way home, and at least once after we got back, I apologized for not making the day more special.
“It was fine, honey,” she said. “I got a lot of reading time, dinner was fun…and the sandwich and fries were perfect for me!”
She may have had a point there: Brendan and I were both miserable from eating too much, and Gabe brought most of his home.
I had plans and couldn’t let them go. I wanted things to be perfect, and wound up driving my bride slightly batty today. In my Second Third, I need to learn when to stick to my plans, when to be flexible, and when to let go.
Blogger’s Note: In my last Second Third post, I dug into the roots of my family tree. Today, let’s examine the newest blossom – and how we got to this point!
When Jodi and I first got together, she wanted six children, just like the family in which she grew up. I, on the other hand, knew I wanted children, but thought one or two would suffice. I had learned in my anthropology classes that large families were irresponsible — that our planet could not support humanity’s continued exponential growth, and that America’s resource-intensive consumer culture would drain the Earth even more quickly that other, faster-growing nations.
So I told Jodi, “We’ll see.” I knew that, over time, things would change. And they have. Earlier this week my bride and I announced the best thing to happen to our December since Christmas: the anticipated arrival of a fifth Thorplet.
The kids are ecstatic. Trevor longs to be a big brother; Emma has wanted to roll the dice on a little sister for years; Gabe adores all babies (and has verbally agreed with Emma that “we could use another girl around here,” which, given his history of rabid anti-sisterism, demands the question, “Use her for what?”); and Bren – our eldest, who wants his own room and has complained that our house is too small – has been grinning for days now. He knows just enough, I think, that this new addition is equal parts miracle, mystery, and science project to him.
My evolution into a father of five (six, when you count Jude, whom we lost last fall) began early on, with the way in which Jodi’s quiet faith drew me like a magnet. There is a peace about my bride that, I recognize now, is not of this world. Most of the time she is unworried, unflappable, confident that the world is unfolding as it should, despite appearances to the contrary. She led me slowly, steadily, to conversion – first, back to the Catholic Church, then to a previously inconceivable closeness with God, then to the gradual realization that marriage and sexuality are meant to be more than the “sum of our parts.”
On top of this spiritual conversion came four important, practical realizations. First, although we had planned to wait until we were more “financially secure” to start having children, we became pregnant with Brendan only about six months into our marriage – demonstrating that A) there is only one fail-safe way to not get pregnant and B) you’ll never be more or less ready than you are right now. Second, we realized that once you have your first, you might as well have more if you want ’em – you’ve got the baby gear, the mindset, and (when you’re young) the energy, plus the sooner you bring them into the house, the sooner you get them out! (For the past several years I’ve taken great pleasure in reminding my friends who waited to have kids that I’ll have all four of mine graduated before I’m 50. C’est la vie, I guess…) So we forged ahead – and Gabriel was born.
Now, I realized right out the gate that I loved being a dad. So when Gabe was born – at the point at which pre-child/Ivy-grad me would’ve said, “That’s it; no more – it’s the responsible thing to do.” – my heart was whispering girl-baby, girl-baby, girl-baby.
I struggled against this urge for awhile and came to a few other practical conclusions. First, although I have concerns about the wider world, our decision to bring another child into it – a child who would be well loved and well supported – would have little bearing on the allocation of resources in the world, but had the potential to sow peace and charity in a world in sore need of both. (For the record, we discussed adoption, as we have many times since, but felt our own limited resources could do more good raising our own children here in our own community.) Second, the more I thought about the social pressures in this country (and regulations in others) to limit families, the more I saw them as questionable means to a questionable end: a society in which freedoms were relinquished and families were engineered (and parenting outsourced) for the “good of the state.” Finally, I began to notice an inverse relationship between family size and per capita resource consumption in the families around us – put simply, most of the childless and only-child families I knew spent more, used more, wasted more, and still wanted more, than the bigger families I knew. Hand-me-downs, left-overs, gardens, and shared bedrooms conserve resources, too!
As if in affirmation of our choice, we were promptly blessed with Emma Rose. Shortly thereafter, we moved to Minnesota. We talked about a fourth child, but faced two challenges, one financial (the cost of daycare for four kids in or around the Twin Cities) and one psychological (the fact that most of our first friends and colleagues here thought it was ludicrous to have three kids, much less four). Fortunately, we had unwittingly settled in a veritable hotbed of Catholicism and big families—so when we had Trevor, we found that we also had support. Ultimately the families we met through St. Michael Catholic Church – and our tremendous priests brought us to an even greater understanding of what a blessing each and every child is: if you believe in God – if you believe that the world is unfolding as it should, despite appearances to the contrary – a new life here, there, or anywhere, is a gift meant to serve a Greater Good.
I remember once, early in our relationship, using the phrase risk of a baby. I was aghast as soon as I heard my own words…but it’s typical of the world today. In Genesis, God tells Adam and Eve, “Be fruitful,” but today, that original blessing is often regarded as a burden that we must sterilize in the act, or “fix” permanently. It reminds me of Christ on his way to the cross, speaking to the mourning women:
“Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me; weep instead for yourselves and for your children, for indeed, the days are coming when people will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed.’” – Luke 23:28
So here we sit, in our Second Third of life, with number five on the way. No more thoughts of “a whole new life together” when we’re 50, but that’s okay – the life we have is pretty spectacular. And the good news is that it gets easier. Think about it: your first child is revolutionary; it completely changes everything you’ve known before. Number two is big – 100% increase over number one; double the trouble, etc. Number three? That’s only a 50% increase over what you have already; the biggest problem (if they’re small) is you only have two hands, so one parent can’t restrain them all at once. After that, number four’s a piece of cake.
And now, with a six-year gap between the baby and our youngest, the first four can raise number five. Y’know, folks in the Twin Cities this might be called ostentatious, unsustainable, even irresponsible – but in St. Michael and Albertville, it’s a comfortable starter family!
I would rate it a solid PG-13. It is violent and emotionally intense at times, and characters are juxtaposed to show virtue and moral ambiguity. Numerous people die in battle, and others die from assassination, murder, suicide, illness, and (thankfully) natural causes. Most of the deaths are not dwelt upon, however, there are a few relatively brief but bloody scenes. There is no nudity, relatively little sexuality (implied or actual), especially for a PG-13 movie in 2011, and a sprinkling of strong language throughout (it is a war movie, after all). Our 13-year-old, Brendan, will see it tomorrow with a friend of ours and her son. Our almost-11-year-old, Gabe, wants to see it, too, but despite his desire to be a priest, and the film’s beautiful portrayal of the priestly vocation, he will wait until we can rent it and I can watch and discuss it with him, pausing as needed.
I knew very little about Fr. Escriva, Opus Dei, and relatively little about the Spanish Civil War, and yet followed everything well enough. The structure of the movie, which features a handful of complex relationships between people shown at different ages and times, and used flashbacks and a present-day narrator to convey the story, can be a little disorienting, but again, I followed well enough. I was struck early on that this is a film shot in an old way: somehow it looks to me like a classic film of the 1960s, and some of the scenes (particularly of the main characters as children) seem more deliberately acted, almost theatrical. It occurs to me that this may help convey the sense of a young boy’s memories, but I will admit, I noticed it as film-making (assuming it was intentional).
Two final thoughts:
The reviews I’ve seen for this movie have been mostly mediocre to terrible.* I thought it was a very good movie, but I’m Catholic and had some idea what I was getting into and what I hoped to get out of it. See it!
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*The USCCB has a complete review of the film online, which may also help parents decide which kids to take. I find they are more conservative than me, and they suggest that older teens could see it, so I think we’re in the ballpark…
Parish Priest: Father Michael McGivney and American Catholicism by Douglas Brinkley & Julie Fenster is a short biography of the founder of the Knights of Columbus and an intriguing glimpse into the struggles of American Catholics in the nineteenth century. Fr. McGivney, like many priests of his day, died young, but nevertheless transformed the communities of which he was a part, and ultimately re-envisioned the role of Catholic men in America. The authors admit he left few personal papers or other items behind, and at times, it felt as though the material on Fr. McGivney was a bit thinner than the book. I was particularly struck by several points, however:
It’s neither overtly Catholic nor overtly religious. It is beautiful. I won’t tell you a thing about the story; I knew very little, and I found my voice choking with emotion throughout as I discovered my kids, and especially myself, in the characters in the story.* I will say only that it is worth reading and worth sharing. Everyone, from six-year-old Trevor to Jodi and I, loved the book. Gabe says it may be his new favorite. Our teenager said, “Will you pick another book, Dad? I really like this!”
If you want just a taste, my good friend Fr. Tyler wrote about The Little Prince, as well, on his Prairie Father blog. The excerpt he used is one of my favorites, too. Read this book!
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Finally, the other night at Adoration I finished Introduction to a Devout Life, a Catholic spiritual classic written in the early 17th century by St. Francis de Sales. The copy I have is a pocket-sized hardcover; an undated old printing of an old translation, I suspect. The book is available for free in its entirety on several web sites; CatholiCity.com describes it this way:
Introduction to the Devout Life is the most popular Catholic “self-help” book of all time. First published in the early 17th century, it has proven its value as a daily spiritual guide and helpful reference for living an authentic Christian life. Written specifically for laymen, it began as letters from Saint Francis to a married woman who was seeking holiness amidst the distractions of her life of wealth and status. It contains treasures of wisdom for every reader, from eager beginner to lifelong Christian.
I came late to the Church and was confirmed as a young husband and father and an aspiring writer.** I picked St. Francis de Sales as my confirmation saint, primarily because he is the patron saint of writers. I read a bit about him and learned that he had a privileged education and upbringing, and he was looking for signs all the time…so it took him awhile to come to the decision to serve God. (That seemed appropriate.) Once he became a priest, he went into fairly hostile areas to convert people, and often used his writings to do so. These details, plus the fact that Francis is a family name on my father’s side, seemed like good reasons at the time. (I never even considered any of the numerous St. Jameses.)
It wasn’t until years later that I realized St. Francis de Sales was a doctor of the church and decided I should probably read my patron’s writings. I searched for a copy of the book and wound up with two (one in English, and one in French, which I don’t read or speak. I’ve been reading it a bit to a time each Monday night in the Adoration Chapel ever since. The sentences are often intricate, but the saint’s voice and genuine joy in serving God shines through. The book provides step-by-step guidance for increasing devotion and holiness in your life, and the saint’s suggestions, while intimidating taken in their entirety, are individually small, practical, and still relevant today. And every so often something strikes you as so profound that you incorporate it immediately into your prayer life. It is a challenge to anyone living in this world, but I suspect it rewards repeat readings.
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* Of course, I am an emotional guy…
** I’m still all of these things except young.
Archangel Stomp 