Small Scribbles

She loves Fred Astaire, Mary does. She knows his footwork, his stats, his signature. At a recent costume party we expected Fred to show and (s)he did not disappoint. Our family loves Mary for this quirky enthusiasm. We know a lot about a subject we didn't care about until Mary cared. Stuart and I caravan through the mountains with two carloads of kids. We drive through the dark, the headlights on in the early morning hours. One by one we pray for comfort and grace for the difficult days ahead. A phone call the night before. "Surgery sometime tomorrow." Would we get there in time? We pile out of the car, meet Grandma in the hospital parking lot. The kids jostle to push the elevator buttons. "Faith, you can push the button to the third floor to see Grandpa. Charlie you can push the button on the way back down." We find Grandpa Tom in his hospital pjs, his eyes light up when we squeeze into the room. "Oh! You didn't have to come! You're missing work. Y...

Come on. You are invited to the fancy dinner. Place: The Living Room Time: After the children are fed Dress: Thrift store fare. Formal (women and girls) Flannel (men and boys) It's become tradition, this fancy dinner. Tonight is the third edition. Women put dinner in the oven, feed the children, exchange jeans for gowns. Doors are shut all over the house as everyone dresses. Little girl eyes sparkle delight. Lithe bodies swish, swirl. "Look, Papa, Grandpa!" "Oooh! You're gorgeous ! So pretty!" Mamas appear from behind the closed doors. Mother bodies swish, swirl. Am I still? eyes ask. Am I still your beautiful girl? Yes. Oh, yes echoes round the room. And the men, the men that we love, lumberjack men in soft flannel, bubble over with good humor and cheer. We sit around the table. Velvet. Flannel. Sequins. Flannel. Taffetta. Flannel. And the children serve. "Would anyone like a glass of wine." Six adults coach five young ones through the art of pre...

"Goodbye!" "One hug more." "See you in a few days!" We pulled out of the driveway, weighted down with two car top carriers, honking, waving to cousins. "Goodbye!" Over Virginia mountains. Weaving through truck traffic, recording license plates, reading, sleeping. And when darkness falls, we leave the highway to the trucks and wind over a ribbon of country roads. John navigates, scatters direction-covered Post-Its, shuffles and reoganizes. We grope tentatively through inky night, stop to read road signs. "We're almost there!" " This is the road. Look for house numbers." Eyes squint and strain. "10057. Almost." Headlights seek treasure, family, at 11164 Frog Hollar Lane. "Come back!" "Back up! You missed us!" A flock of children crows from porch and yard. We do back up, thread though exuberant greeters, burst from the car, trailing empty water bottles and stuffed animals. "You're here!...

"Tim, stay out of the water. You are down to your last dry outfit." "I'll just roll up my shorts. That'll keep 'em dry." "Tim. Stop. I would like you to come up here on the sand." "I'm fine, Mom. See? The water is only up to my ankles." "Tim! Your backside is soaked!" " Only a little. I'm mostly dry. I'm just in up to my knees." "Wow! Look at this shell! I think I can get it." "Tim?" "Tim?"

We just got back from vacation. We spent the last week with Stuart's family on the Outer Banks in North Carolina. October is off season so we pretty much had the place to ourselves. There is a lot to do but we didn't. The children preferred the beach and the pool to museums and the local attractions. We played in the ocean and collected buckets of seashells and dug craters in the sand. Some of the cousins All of the cousins The Outer Banks is a long way from Smallville. We've been sandwiched in the car for the last two days. My flock of nightowls left their half-eaten dinners on the table and crawled into bed and were out by 7:30. Stuart and I took over six hundred pictures so there will be more posts to come this week but for now I need to catch up on my sleep.

All of the people in all of these photos are family. Lots and lots of family. Not everyone is represented in these pictures but what's here will give you a good idea of what Thanksgiving week looked like. We were so busy with visiting and crowd control that we never thought to capture a photo of the whole group.

And now we drive south in cold, crisp Sunday morning sunshine. Charlie fusses in the back seat and the children snap, tired from a hectic week. Chapter One, Book Two of the Merlin series fills the car in surround sound but it is a distant drone to me. Instead, snatches of conversation roll through my head. Bits and pieces that people shared of themselves, strands of kindness and talents and strengths all woven together to make a blanket of memories that I wrap myself in here in the passenger seat. Clink. Clink. “I have a toast to make.” She stood up at the table and we all burst into laughter at the sight of her with a beer bottle in each hand. She’s not much of a drinker. “I just want to thank you Mr and Mrs. M. for bringing me here to spend this week with you. You have no idea how special you all are to me and how much I needed you.” She said this through laughter and tears. Both emotions spill from her simultaneously, always. “It’s no harder raising nine children than it is to rais...

Thanksgiving week has come and gone. All emotions found their place and presented themselves at the appropriate time as they always do. Excitement and anticipation came early in the week. Enjoyment and connection stretched from end to end. Exhaustion and eagerness to return to familiar routine showed up toward the end along with incongruent regret. Regret that the curtain must come down on seven days of delight and surprises. So predictable are these emotions with their entrances and exits, are they not? The goodbyes rang out at regular intervals in the last hours of our last night together. So many goodbyes. Farewells made of hugs and tears and laughter... and more tears. The house wren, who marks twelfth hour on the kitchen clock, chirped midnight and the small party of eight laughed at the aviary announcement and then disbanded. The last goodbyes were the teariest and most heartbreaking...and most beautiful. Three went to bed and five went out into the frosty night under a black vel...

Two suburbans rumble toward New York. One shivers its way down out of the Cascade Mountains. My sister is at the wheel. Four kids play “Cows in the Cemetary” and “Scavenger Hunt” in the back seat. The fifth rides shotgun with an atlas and The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy in her lap. They sing along to Willie Nelson and Taj Mahal as they drive among the western pines and out into the fields of brown grass under the wide open prarie sky. My sister tossed a few changes of clothes, a cooler and some dishes behind the back seat. The kids grabbed a handful of books and toys to keep themselves on their forty hour trip eastward. They press across the country. Each night, for three nights, after the sun sets, nine-year-old Maddie thumbs through the Hitchhiker’s Guide in search of somewhere to lay six sleepy heads. The second suburban is ours. We head north from Smallville through nearly empty countryside in an autumn just past it’s prime. Gold and red leaves, bare branches and evergreens...