Little Kids in PJs

 About 7:30 this morning, while on my morning walk, I witnessed the sweetest family scene. A family was out in the yard seeing the dad off to work. Dad sat behind the wheel of the station wagon with his window rolled down. Before rolling down into the street, he stopped a moment and leaned out to say good-bye. Two little boys, still in their pjs, straddled their scooters beside the driveway, and the mom stood beside the boys and held a big mug of presumably coffee. 

     As Dad eased down the driveway, he waved and said, “Good-bye, I love you. I love you.” 

     The boys cried out over and over, “Bye Daddy, Bye Daddy, love you too, love you.”

      Mom watched her boys and waved goodbye to her husband. 

    The Dad started down the street, still calling “I love you. I love you.”

    I felt this scene of a young family’s love, so openly expressed, to be very moving. It seemed such a beautiful contrast to the constant barrage of negativity with which I begin most days. And it lifted my heart and my spirits.

    Granted, this scene stirred my memories of the 50s when my brother and I wore the pjs, and our dad was the one going off to work. Not that we ever stood out in the yard and sang out our love to the neighborhood. 

    I almost didn’t write about this. I am aware that this picture is one that is unfamiliar to many people - many family experiences are radically different. 

A white man and a woman and two kids, is not the only kind of family who loves each other. And there are many other reasons that others may not want to idealize the scene as I witnessed it. And, yes, this could have been one moment of peace in a troubled family, but I don’t think so.

    The point is not how the family looked or who was or wasn’t in the family. The point is that these people so obviously loved each other and began their day sending one member off to work knowing that he is loved, and joyously so, by the people who are his beloved.

    Any family, of any content or structure, could fit into this picture, where love is the theme. Love that is so beautifully and wholeheartedly expressed that it is a treasured moment to witness it. 

   Sometimes I forget that such people exist. Sometimes I think that there is precious little good in the world. I’m glad to know that I am wrong. Despite that other stuff, I am now reminded that love still lives in us human beings, and it is strong.

    I walked on by and said good morning - you have a beautiful family. The mom said, “thank you so much!” I didn’t stop to tell her how much I loved seeing them, too intrusive. But the clear, unsullied, reality of this is that there was enough love to spill over into my life, and I’m grateful I was there to receive it.

   

The Young and the Restless

I had a long, catch-up phone call with my sweet niece, Hannah, yesterday. Such a good talk. I'm still smiling.

When I talk with her, I'm forced to override some cognitive dissonance I experience. I visualize a precious, precocious 4-year-old with whom I once experieced many pleasant days. The person speaking, however, is a precious, precocious, just-turned-21 year-old - a fact my brain rejects.

I also have to fight against speaking to her in old-fart aphorisms, but I have only moderate success with this. I believe that one of the chief frustrations young people experience in talking with old people is the tendency of old people to try to sum up what they have learned about any subject in the form of "good advice."

Young people have most of their life experiences ahead of them. They are eager to get on with it, to live, and not to hold still and listen to someone else's life or to accept the distilled wisdom of someone else's experiences. I use the word "wisdom" here advisedly.

I don't blame them. I was the same way.  I well remember fidgeting through my parents' well-meaning stories and warnings - "What could you possibly know about it?" floated, unspoken, through my head. "You couldn't possibly know what it's like to be young."

To my niece and other young people I would say, "Please be patient with us. We can't help the way we are either." We have learned things along the way; we want to share what we have learned; and we want to guide you and protect you from some of the pains of living, if we can. Ah, we just love you. That's all.

It's like Holden Caulfied says at the end of  The Cathcer in the Rye, when his little sister Phoebe is riding the carousel and trying to grab the golden ring. Holden wants to stop her; to keep her from falling and getting hurt. But he decides that you can't do it. You have to let them reach out, to try, to go for the golden ring. I don't remember if he says this next part, but I think you also have to stand by in case they do fall and need you.

To my niece's credit, she is a patient listener, and has never made me feel like an old fart. I love her for that and the fact that she talks to me about her life. What a treasure. I love hearing about it. I try to ask questions more and to give advice less, but it just comes out of my mouth. I am an old fart after all.