we did it.
it came. it hung around and ate and ate and ate. it did a dance to bing crosby. it talked about politics and gave simple gifts.
it snowed, for crying out loud.
michael and i went on a walk this afternoon, after my dad's new england breakfast of biscuits and sour cream with maple syrup. just the two of us, since mozie and ruah could hang with my mom and levi. we were laughing and doing weird chicken struts down francis when out of nowhere, God smiled a cheesy and wonderful grin and let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.
we walked through creston park, and i swear it looked like england, or cleveland.
our little ghetto neighborhood absolutely looks like cleveland when it snows (or england, depending on your mood). not that i've ever seen cleveland, but i have an intuitive nudge of what cleveland is and am positive that this intuition is based in some reality.
when i think of cleveland, i think working class roseannes, simple and pabst-infused. i think nine-to-fives and greasy, home-cooked meals with ugly kids in old houses and big trees out front, yelling and throwing brown snowballs.
and whether this is accurate or not, it feels comforting to me, for no apparent reason.
every year when it snows in portland i say to michael:
"God, this feels like cleveland. it's so amazing."
michael gave me a wrapped up library book for christmas that he picked up for me last week. the flannery o'connor short stories i put on hold a month ago. what a beautiful, simple gift.
and what a relief, because i'm about to quit on anne lamott. the prelude to "grace (eventually)" is such a trick--it's about 8 million times better than the ensuing chapters. i get to the end of her essays and think, "is that it? is that all you're going to say? and, moreover, is that really what you think? do you actually think Jesus had to learn to like the gentiles? that's not just wrong, it's demented."
and perhaps worse than demented, it feels shallow.
i'm sad. i miss her. i remember the greivous let-down i experienced when i heard patty griffin's last album. where is sweet loraine? where have all the brilliant lyrics gone? long time passing and several cds ago.
i miss travelling mercies. i thought anne might be super-human, but it turns out she's a dork like the rest of us.
michael, on the other hand, is taking it personally. i read him a chapter the other night in bed, and he said: "i'm just annoyed with her."
mozea and ruah had a sweet christmas. we delivered peanut butter balls to our neighbors yesterday, and mozie, in her giant puffy pink coat would shout out from the abyss of her hood: "merry christmas!" after giving a very puzzled look to each neighbor. i know she was thinking: "why in the world are we giving our peanut butter balls away? this makes no sense." i know this because after we'd walk down from someone's house, she'd have a meltdown on the sidewalk that sounded mostly like screaching and wincing, with a few suggestive phrases about her peanut butter balls and when could she eat one.
we give gifts to our drug-dealing neighbors every year. they are actually some of my favorite people on the block. while we waited for them to answer their door yesterday, i snooped in their kitchen window and saw a little calendar on the table with Scripture on it: "even though i fear evil, the Lord is always with me."
we are going to be absolutely shocked to the core about who's who in the heavenly realms.
i have no idea what that calendar means to them. maybe it's a joke. or something to write mean notes on or grocery lists that request items like syringes or small mirrors and razor blades. i don't know, but i will say, i'd rather spend eternity with my drug-dealing neighbors than some other heaven-bound folk i've known.
Lord have mercy.
so our family Christmas ended with a hilarious meal. we made a million really hard side dishes and topped it off with a giant slab of salmon. it was a total fiasco. mozea ran around in her undies and cowboy boots, and dodged the blazing hot oven each time she ran past. ruah zel is sick, so even though she's the light of the world, aside from Christ and mozea, she coughed and cried through most of the prep. three hours after the side dishes were done, the fish came out of the oven, a little black and bruised from the hard and tragic work of being cooked by the havens' fam.
if this fish still had its head when it came to the table, it would have rolled its eyes and called us losers.
mozea prayed for the meal, thanking God that nana could come to the birthday party, referencing the happy birthday she sang to Jesus and the candle she blew outlast night when we ate our christmas eve mexican lentil soup.
i took ruah to bed just after the smoking salmon made his/her appearance, and
mozie said: "goodnight, sissy! thanks for coming!"
yes, indeed, thank you for coming.
thank you everyone for coming--thank you Jesus for coming. thank you for coming to me, to michael, to this house, to this world. thank you, mom and levi, for coming to portland this year and being so enjoyable and fun to spend our christmas with. thank you, mozie and ruah, for coming to us, for being born and created and saying "yes" to the One who sent you, when that One asked you to be in our crazy havenator clan.
i do remember anne lamott writing something beautiful about thankyous in one of her books.
she said something about standing in the street, looking up at the sky and for all of the things everywhere that had ever been good, saying: "thank you, thank you, thank you."
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Friday, December 21, 2007
peanut butter balls, take 2
yesterday i was pounding them by the fist-full.
it was two after another. i'd only stop to curse my housemate for making them in the first place, and then back to the grindstone: i mean, someone has to eat them.
but His mercies are new every morning the old Book says, and today, well, just after putting my girls down for a nap i saw a group of extremely formidable looking fellows sit down on my stoop. we have two stoops, one near the sidewalk and one near our porch. they were sitting on the former, waiting. i knew what they were waiting for, because since moving into this house i now know what it looks like when someone on foot or in a car is waiting for drugs. i mama-beared up and opened the door, "can i help you?"
they all looked at me with insolent eyes, "no, we're just waiting."
there was a pause, a charged silence, and they languidly got up from my steps and called me some breathy icky names to one another, and we were all on our way: them to the street and me back in my house, with the door firmly shut and locked.
a few safe moments behind my big, thick door and this annoying thought came floating by:
lame.
very lame.
the last thing i want to do is shun people who are looking for something to make life feel better.
and here i am, acting all suburban and freaky.
i need to re-do the slam-the-door-and-lock-it-fast routine i just performed.
and with the very voice used to tell Noah to build the ark, God said:
"peanut butter balls. and fast."
oh, God. the only thing more laughable than my initial interaction with them was to now walk outside and offer these guys some baked goods.
ugh. ugh. any other ideas?
enough stalling.
think fast, malchevich.
without much thought, and with all the neurosis and authority that comes with a pair of mom sweats, i grabbed a handful of these now peanut butter balls turned olive branch and waddled out onto the porch, walked down my steps, right up to them in the street and handed them a bag full of caloric wonder.
i told them we bake a lot, and that i thought they might like something sweet to eat.
they laughed and then looked away. they were too cool for me, but we all knew this already.
the only one who talked to me pointed to his fat-faced friend and said: "he'll eat 'em."
and that was that.
some more breathy icky laughing explitives as they walked down my street, and they were gone.
as were the peanut butter balls, praise God!,
and as was fear and hatefulness.
i felt a tad powerful as i walked back in my house.
extending a moment of love felt more securing and empowering than any amount of thickness in a door, or any number of turns on the old lock.
but maybe the feeling just came from my mom sweats.
i mean, i could do anything in those things.
it was two after another. i'd only stop to curse my housemate for making them in the first place, and then back to the grindstone: i mean, someone has to eat them.
but His mercies are new every morning the old Book says, and today, well, just after putting my girls down for a nap i saw a group of extremely formidable looking fellows sit down on my stoop. we have two stoops, one near the sidewalk and one near our porch. they were sitting on the former, waiting. i knew what they were waiting for, because since moving into this house i now know what it looks like when someone on foot or in a car is waiting for drugs. i mama-beared up and opened the door, "can i help you?"
they all looked at me with insolent eyes, "no, we're just waiting."
there was a pause, a charged silence, and they languidly got up from my steps and called me some breathy icky names to one another, and we were all on our way: them to the street and me back in my house, with the door firmly shut and locked.
a few safe moments behind my big, thick door and this annoying thought came floating by:
lame.
very lame.
the last thing i want to do is shun people who are looking for something to make life feel better.
and here i am, acting all suburban and freaky.
i need to re-do the slam-the-door-and-lock-it-fast routine i just performed.
and with the very voice used to tell Noah to build the ark, God said:
"peanut butter balls. and fast."
oh, God. the only thing more laughable than my initial interaction with them was to now walk outside and offer these guys some baked goods.
ugh. ugh. any other ideas?
enough stalling.
think fast, malchevich.
without much thought, and with all the neurosis and authority that comes with a pair of mom sweats, i grabbed a handful of these now peanut butter balls turned olive branch and waddled out onto the porch, walked down my steps, right up to them in the street and handed them a bag full of caloric wonder.
i told them we bake a lot, and that i thought they might like something sweet to eat.
they laughed and then looked away. they were too cool for me, but we all knew this already.
the only one who talked to me pointed to his fat-faced friend and said: "he'll eat 'em."
and that was that.
some more breathy icky laughing explitives as they walked down my street, and they were gone.
as were the peanut butter balls, praise God!,
and as was fear and hatefulness.
i felt a tad powerful as i walked back in my house.
extending a moment of love felt more securing and empowering than any amount of thickness in a door, or any number of turns on the old lock.
but maybe the feeling just came from my mom sweats.
i mean, i could do anything in those things.
mama pukes, ruah digs it
ruah and i just got done playing an amazing round of "baby puts her hand in mama's mouth and mama pukes a little" for about 45 minutes.
she's here at my side, helping me write this, making sure i get the facts straight.
llkkkkk....(ruah's side of the story)
jiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiioo[ijoipjioj
she'll probably pipe up here from time to time.
she's a good writer; i'm so proud.
so we sat here on our big, puffy, purple, woman couch and giggled and drooled, both of us.
she'd put her fingers in my big mama mouth and hold my tongue while i would try to say "i love you ruah" in the most intelligible fashion:
"i uv ooooo ooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh"
(my writing, not hers)
and then she'd stealthily plunge her whole fist into my mouth and get me to gag and puke a little spinach we just ate for lunch.
she was thrilled to the point that gagging and puking had to continue or she was going to give no rest to her version of protest: cry and cry harder.
it was like i was finally understanding her, finally speaking her heart language:
gag. puke. repeat.
ruah makes the most amazing sounds. she constantly sounds in awe. she paddles over to some puzzle pieces on the floor and picks one up, crosses her eyes, oohs and ahhs in this amazing heaven-born harp like sound and then paddles off to some dirt balls on the floor, some beard droppings from michael's trim trab, some corners of crusty cheese. her oohs and ahhs are non-discriminatory; she'll marvel at anything.
i'm wondering when she'll start getting attitude and saying "no! mama! no! no!"
it was a shock to the ol' heart to hear mozea say those words for the first time, and now there's no stopping her. mozie's producing neurons and attitude in equal measure. the smarter she gets, the more insane.
i continue to pat my misshapen hip bones, my pushed-out-of-orbit-from-laboring-these-babies into-the-world hip bones, and think about our crazy life with these red-headed bobbing about wonders.
my body will never be the same.
my life, as well.
and my heart, 10 times bigger and better and more exhausted than ever.
i've never been so in love and so grumpy in my entire life.
she's here at my side, helping me write this, making sure i get the facts straight.
llkkkkk....(ruah's side of the story)
jiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiioo[ijoipjioj
she'll probably pipe up here from time to time.
she's a good writer; i'm so proud.
so we sat here on our big, puffy, purple, woman couch and giggled and drooled, both of us.
she'd put her fingers in my big mama mouth and hold my tongue while i would try to say "i love you ruah" in the most intelligible fashion:
"i uv ooooo ooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh"
(my writing, not hers)
and then she'd stealthily plunge her whole fist into my mouth and get me to gag and puke a little spinach we just ate for lunch.
she was thrilled to the point that gagging and puking had to continue or she was going to give no rest to her version of protest: cry and cry harder.
it was like i was finally understanding her, finally speaking her heart language:
gag. puke. repeat.
ruah makes the most amazing sounds. she constantly sounds in awe. she paddles over to some puzzle pieces on the floor and picks one up, crosses her eyes, oohs and ahhs in this amazing heaven-born harp like sound and then paddles off to some dirt balls on the floor, some beard droppings from michael's trim trab, some corners of crusty cheese. her oohs and ahhs are non-discriminatory; she'll marvel at anything.
i'm wondering when she'll start getting attitude and saying "no! mama! no! no!"
it was a shock to the ol' heart to hear mozea say those words for the first time, and now there's no stopping her. mozie's producing neurons and attitude in equal measure. the smarter she gets, the more insane.
i continue to pat my misshapen hip bones, my pushed-out-of-orbit-from-laboring-these-babies into-the-world hip bones, and think about our crazy life with these red-headed bobbing about wonders.
my body will never be the same.
my life, as well.
and my heart, 10 times bigger and better and more exhausted than ever.
i've never been so in love and so grumpy in my entire life.
Thursday, December 20, 2007
obscurity
michael just turned to me and said that he revels in our obscurity.
no one knows who we are or what we do, and yet we're at the center of things that kings and prophets and drooling evangelicals have longed to see.
i like my husband. he just trimmed his beard and he's reading some crazy futurist book and he's all brainy and weird and funny and has been saved from so much utter shit.
in other news, i wept to some christmas carols tonight on the ol' 1908 out of tune biddle in my living room. the lyrics are absolutely radical and gripping. fall on your knees, you weepingly bad piano player on 33rd avenue, his law is love and his gospel is peace!...let your loving heart enthrone him, for this is where the battle is won and lost, in your heart, in your mind, in you...he breaks the chains...the slave is your brother...this is Christ the King whom shepherds guard, whom angels sing...this is Christ the King. wake up! wake up! arise, shine for your light has come! thick darkness covers the earth, covers the people...but joy to the world, the Lord is come. receive your King. receive your King!
no one knows who we are or what we do, and yet we're at the center of things that kings and prophets and drooling evangelicals have longed to see.
i like my husband. he just trimmed his beard and he's reading some crazy futurist book and he's all brainy and weird and funny and has been saved from so much utter shit.
in other news, i wept to some christmas carols tonight on the ol' 1908 out of tune biddle in my living room. the lyrics are absolutely radical and gripping. fall on your knees, you weepingly bad piano player on 33rd avenue, his law is love and his gospel is peace!...let your loving heart enthrone him, for this is where the battle is won and lost, in your heart, in your mind, in you...he breaks the chains...the slave is your brother...this is Christ the King whom shepherds guard, whom angels sing...this is Christ the King. wake up! wake up! arise, shine for your light has come! thick darkness covers the earth, covers the people...but joy to the world, the Lord is come. receive your King. receive your King!
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
eventually....
i finally got anne lamott's latest book tonight at the library.
thank you multnomah county for putting libraries in the world, in my neighborhood, in my life.
thank you whomever, for buying the book so the library could let me read it for free.
and thank you, God, for making anne lamott so i could sit in my living room tonight, by my small and browning christmas tree, and laugh about thighs and cellulite and stumbling around in spiritual chaos.
speaking of thighs and cellulite, i've had about 2,000 peanut butter balls today. i just had yet another one, and then felt so guilty about it i had to remedy the mental anguish with just one more. speaking of spiritual chaos....
anyhoos, i went to bi-mart yesterday with mozie around 9 am. it was amazing. it was so amazingly 1950, just like it always is. bi-mart makes me feel good. like really good. better than peanut butter ball good. everything feels so simple once you're admitted past the swinging half-door. well, even before the half-door it feels simple, because of that smell. smells like tires inside. and everyone is old, amazingly old, and has big, puffy, thinning, 1950s hair with large boney glasses on over-sized noses. mozie and i flocked to the yellow number board with all the old farts and squinted our eyes, stared up, wondered if we could be a big winner on "lucky number tuesday". it was an amazing congregation below that blazing yellow god. all eyes were up, just like church, some people even had their eyes closed, but instead of praying i think they'd accidentally fallen asleep while checking their numbers. one woman with no teeth and a head scarf told me that her friend millie always wins on tuesdays, but not her, never her. she trailed off, in voice and stature, as her body disappeared behind a large display of detergent.
beautiful, say it again and again, i wanted to say.
where else can you go in portland at 9 am on any given day and feel so small? so confined? kept away from problems and bills and spooky thoughts about relevance or the existential crisis you are trying to un-friend? where else can you go where everyone wakes up at 4am just to eat toast and rub their feet and wonder about the day, wonder about what they will do until bi-mart opens at 7am? where else is "lucky number tuesday" the beginning, middle and end?
mozea and i pushed our miniature cart (also adding to the ambiance of the place) slowly down aisles that have products picked right off the set of "the price is right."
i looked at a motorized santa, santa all cheesy and corny and perfect, climbing up and down a ladder, smiling some saccharine and cheesy, corny smile.
our feet squeaked on the shiny floors and we moved to the side for an old man and his old wife, each one hunkering over the cart, over each other, talking about spatulas.
later, around 8pm, i rode my bike down woodstock and looked in all the windows. bi-mart was closed, since it has no clientele after 3pm--they've all gone to bed.
there were no cars out, just pink and blue lights from radio shack and a few wandering cats. a floral shop had a bunch of fake christmas trees in the window. some of them had spray on snow, others had big, floppy poinsettias with fake gems glued to the petals.
everything felt simple and small. bi-mart's spirit of "lucky number tuesday" was influencing the whole street, praise God!
no thighs. no cellulite. no spiritual chaos. no anne lamott.
i'm grateful it exists...bi-mart and woodstock and "lucky number tuesday"
i'm glad those people exist and their spatulas and their vicks vapor rub.
i'm glad for that tire smell and the mini-carts and even that smiling, fat-faced santa.
but back to life, back to the existential crisis and to anne lamott and to my browning christmas tree and those psychotic peanut butter balls piled in my freezer.
thank you multnomah county for putting libraries in the world, in my neighborhood, in my life.
thank you whomever, for buying the book so the library could let me read it for free.
and thank you, God, for making anne lamott so i could sit in my living room tonight, by my small and browning christmas tree, and laugh about thighs and cellulite and stumbling around in spiritual chaos.
speaking of thighs and cellulite, i've had about 2,000 peanut butter balls today. i just had yet another one, and then felt so guilty about it i had to remedy the mental anguish with just one more. speaking of spiritual chaos....
anyhoos, i went to bi-mart yesterday with mozie around 9 am. it was amazing. it was so amazingly 1950, just like it always is. bi-mart makes me feel good. like really good. better than peanut butter ball good. everything feels so simple once you're admitted past the swinging half-door. well, even before the half-door it feels simple, because of that smell. smells like tires inside. and everyone is old, amazingly old, and has big, puffy, thinning, 1950s hair with large boney glasses on over-sized noses. mozie and i flocked to the yellow number board with all the old farts and squinted our eyes, stared up, wondered if we could be a big winner on "lucky number tuesday". it was an amazing congregation below that blazing yellow god. all eyes were up, just like church, some people even had their eyes closed, but instead of praying i think they'd accidentally fallen asleep while checking their numbers. one woman with no teeth and a head scarf told me that her friend millie always wins on tuesdays, but not her, never her. she trailed off, in voice and stature, as her body disappeared behind a large display of detergent.
beautiful, say it again and again, i wanted to say.
where else can you go in portland at 9 am on any given day and feel so small? so confined? kept away from problems and bills and spooky thoughts about relevance or the existential crisis you are trying to un-friend? where else can you go where everyone wakes up at 4am just to eat toast and rub their feet and wonder about the day, wonder about what they will do until bi-mart opens at 7am? where else is "lucky number tuesday" the beginning, middle and end?
mozea and i pushed our miniature cart (also adding to the ambiance of the place) slowly down aisles that have products picked right off the set of "the price is right."
i looked at a motorized santa, santa all cheesy and corny and perfect, climbing up and down a ladder, smiling some saccharine and cheesy, corny smile.
our feet squeaked on the shiny floors and we moved to the side for an old man and his old wife, each one hunkering over the cart, over each other, talking about spatulas.
later, around 8pm, i rode my bike down woodstock and looked in all the windows. bi-mart was closed, since it has no clientele after 3pm--they've all gone to bed.
there were no cars out, just pink and blue lights from radio shack and a few wandering cats. a floral shop had a bunch of fake christmas trees in the window. some of them had spray on snow, others had big, floppy poinsettias with fake gems glued to the petals.
everything felt simple and small. bi-mart's spirit of "lucky number tuesday" was influencing the whole street, praise God!
no thighs. no cellulite. no spiritual chaos. no anne lamott.
i'm grateful it exists...bi-mart and woodstock and "lucky number tuesday"
i'm glad those people exist and their spatulas and their vicks vapor rub.
i'm glad for that tire smell and the mini-carts and even that smiling, fat-faced santa.
but back to life, back to the existential crisis and to anne lamott and to my browning christmas tree and those psychotic peanut butter balls piled in my freezer.
Saturday, December 1, 2007
theism
a few weeks ago i sang my prayers over a friend at reed.
we happened to set up camp on a large rug in the chapel that has the reed griffin emblazoned on it. everywhere the griffin hangs out on products, there's usually these words written around it in a circle:
"communism. atheism. free love."
i loved singing to Jesus with and for and about my friend.
and i dug singing to Him on top of the insignia that usually houses the sentiment that reed does not embrace God, because there we were absolutely embracing him, weeping ourselves right up next to him.
it felt like a hefty and beautiful up yours to the whole shabang.
we happened to set up camp on a large rug in the chapel that has the reed griffin emblazoned on it. everywhere the griffin hangs out on products, there's usually these words written around it in a circle:
"communism. atheism. free love."
i loved singing to Jesus with and for and about my friend.
and i dug singing to Him on top of the insignia that usually houses the sentiment that reed does not embrace God, because there we were absolutely embracing him, weeping ourselves right up next to him.
it felt like a hefty and beautiful up yours to the whole shabang.
i'll take that
mozea crawled up on my chair tonight at dinner, per usual since she generally doesn't eat dinner, and stood behind me, playing with my hair and hugging my neck.
she said to the air:
"this is my mama. i love her."
i'll take that.
tonight is british comedy and clean the kitchen night and hopefully in bed by 10 to start all over again tomorrow night.
start the love and the craziness all over again tomorrow.
i'll take that.
she said to the air:
"this is my mama. i love her."
i'll take that.
tonight is british comedy and clean the kitchen night and hopefully in bed by 10 to start all over again tomorrow night.
start the love and the craziness all over again tomorrow.
i'll take that.
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