PearlS | The Average Pearl

any old pocket: muslims, mullets, and finding where you belong

A couple days before we made our last move, we had to burn a couple hours at the park while the new owners came by to measure for carpet.
I took the dog along and we traipsed around the lake and enjoyed the sunny spring morning and our Chik-fil-a sandwich biscuits.
Soon we noticed parties forming in two covered gazebos. Families dressed in some middle-eastern garb gathered together, kids on swings and slides in beautiful, jewel-colored clothes.

It was the end of Ramadan. I knew this because our family once attended school with a little Muslim girl named Fatima. One day my husband went to volunteer as a Watchdog Dad and he met all our kids’ classmates. He stuck his hand out to shake theirs, but Fatima carefully kept her hand behind her back.
“I can’t touch a man,” she explained, matter-of-fact.
She also wasn’t allowed to eat school lunch during the day. I’d learned this the year before when I was volunteering in class. Muslims fast during daylight hours for an entire month while observing Ramadan. In the cafeteria she sat patiently next to the other students as they unwrapped and devoured sandwiches and chips.

I wasn’t surprised to see the segregated parties of men and women at the park. Yet it didn’t occur to me in the moment, but much later. As I stood watching my own kids play and admiring the beautiful clothes around me one of my kids came up with a couple young boys. He pointed at the dog and announced it was his, then he urged them to pet it.

“She’s nice. She’s a good dog. She loves kids,” he told them. “She loves it when you scratch her belly.”
The dog grinned and rolled on her back, tongue lolling as if to extend the invitation.
The new friends stood there with frozen smiles and eyes darting. The older one leaned down and whispered in the younger’s ear.
“We…can’t!”

Then I realized what my seven year old didn’t–what I barely knew myself.

“You know what?” I said aloud. “You don’t have to pet the dog.” I kneeled down and smiled at all three kids.
“You can just look at her. Plus, we didn’t come here because of the dog–we’re here to play!”
I scooted them back off to the playground.

I’ve thought a lot about this encounter and our Muslim friends back in Denver.
We were in a strange land, learning new things, sometimes by the seat of our pants. We found ourselves in awkward situations all the time. Life was full of backpedaling and circling cultural roundabouts, looking for the proper exit. We were country bumpkins. But we could still be kind.
If I were to flip the script, I am sure our Muslim friends would assume we were the oddballs, not celebrating Ramadan, but eating greasy sandwiches and parading our dogs around on leashes near people having picnics. But they were still kind.
We accommodate one another’s differences by being kind. We don’t have to be experts on other cultures; we can just be respectful and leave it at that.

To further the conversation–when we moved away, it had nothing to do with how we felt about Muslims, or any other culture. Our departure wasn’t based on rebalancing or desegregating or any racial strife. It wasn’t because we hit a diversity limit or felt stifled as white people. One of the reasons we moved back to Missouri was because we were drawn to our original upbringing. We missed the comfort of familiar lands and people. We wished to reinforce values that made sense to us.
I think it’s fair to say that people do this all the time.

Folks resettle near familiar territory, even in a new place. Muslims will likely be drawn to other Muslims. Pick your nationality, your traditions, foods, language. Customs are not so easily traded in for new ways.
These things struck a deep chord in me in Covid times when we were so very isolated. I’m used to feeling isolated, but through pandemic times it leveled up. Common interactions were frowned upon, so I naturally turned inward and yearned more for the comfort of my original Home.

It’s interesting that this has all happened to my family personally at the same point in American history when politicians are trying to evaluate and correct social climate.
I’ve seen the updated “maps” of cities and counties that brag on being the most diverse. I think there is some sense of urgency these days to rush to the scene and populate it with an equal smattering of dissimilar humans, as if we were sprinkling jimmies on a sugar cookie. Not too many of this color, or it tips the scales. Even things out till the playing field feels level.

Have you ever asked yourself, why?

I’ve even noticed this in the evangelical church. I’ve heard people preach on finding a more diverse community of believers, as if a variety of skin tone and age demarcate a holier picture of the church.

Have you asked yourself, why?
Locally–and more rurally, it probably ain’t gonna happen.

You won’t walk into old German Lutheran midwestern territory and see too many English language learners. You’ll see trucks and dogs and mullets. And that’s actually nothing to be ashamed of (though I will reserve the right to fight against mullets should my own boys stumble off the straight and narrow).

These things are not shameful and bad. They are simply pockets of culture. Those colorful favelas I visited in Rio de Janeiro were exclusively carioca. Most of those kids had never even been to a beach before, even though they lived less than an hour from the best waves in the world. A cultural pocket, zero shame.
My friends who’ve adopted internationally? They bring home traditions and clothing to remind their sons and daughters of the places they were born. Another special cultural pocket.

God sees us, and He sees the separate, He sees the pockets. I think He loves seeing us together, too, but the ends of the world are pretty fantastic on their own.

It might be the American way, to declare equality and fairness by making Diversity the highest goal–but the genuineness of it has been terribly skewed. The majority of folks aren’t declaring equality from a benevolent spirit. There is a loud, ferocious attempt to even things out, but those who think they know best ignore their own tendency to cherry-pick compadres.
Look who is still popular: the wealthy. The richest guy in Nigeria is black, believe it or not. Hugo Chavez was worth $1 billion when he died in Venezuela. North Korea, China, Russia–every country has their king, so to speak. Jeff Bezos isn’t hanging around with any trailer park folk, and neither are his diverse buddies on the Forbes list.

America and its so-called racial tension is a smoke-and-mirrors coverup for the divide that will never be breached– classism. And I don’t hear many people promoting a down-to-earth, blood-sweat-tears existence. The rich are immortalized and given the proverbial keys to the kingdom. The poor are swept under the rug, indentured to their own misfortune. And somewhere between the two most of us Americans fit in, living in the 8th richest country in the world, but a nation divided, forever arguing about who was here first and if FOX news and/or CNN is trash.
None of it is fair, especially the bit where we get to live in this wonderful nation.
It’s a statement of fact.
So the question for the every-person is this: can you turn off the news and find a home in any old pocket?

I think you can–and I think this should encourage you. The majority of Americans have a lot in common.
Isn’t it funny how a body can feel at home among strangers when we have nothing more in common than our common-ness? I’ve had more in common with common people every place I’ve ever lived, if that makes sense–and not many of them ever talked, lived, or looked like me. But there has been understanding. And kindness.
Moms and dads trying to raise their kids, struggling sometimes to make rent, worrying about grades, cheering at the school Christmas concert. Men and women who work day or night shifts and celebrate birthdays even when they’re dog-tired.

Every place has been a joy. It’s been thrilling to me to fumble and learn and fumble in the heavier-sprinkled places, where the playground has hijabs and pathani suits, and little boys slowly back away from unclean, slobbery dogs.

But it’s also been wonderful to find home right where I’d left it, mullets and all.

Far as the curse is found.

My sister just had a baby. He is precious and perfect; waking up to the world and its wonder, his eyes hesitant to open, his throat full of infant song.
I loved him immediately, just like I knew I would. He belongs here. He fits right into his mama’s arms.
I want him to have the best life, and I think he will–because he has amazing parents and because I’m hoping for it. I think that’s why newborn babies are always such a wonder–it’s because their lives are a huge blank slate. Everything is in front of them. You can see it in their sleepy eyes and their quizzical expressions when they dream. They are mystery wrapped up in wonder. We meet a tiny, inscrutable stranger and welcome him like a celebrity. He can do no wrong. We are just getting to know him, after all.

Along the line of new babies, I’ve always pondered how the Old Testament treats birth and babyhood. Historically there were midwives and birthing stools–Exodus is clear on how the Hebrew ladies did their thing–and surely plenty of rest and extra raisin cakes for the hungry mom. Nursing was a common sight back in the day, for there was no alternative. The first thing Moses’ adoptive mom said when she pulled him out of the watery basket was, “go get someone who can feed this baby!” Thank heavens it was Moses’ own birth mother, an immediate comfort to the hungry baby, her familiar voice and softness holding him again.

Isaiah compares the affection of the Father for his children to a nursing mama:

“I will give Jerusalem a river of peace and the wealth of nations like a flowing stream; you will nurse and be carried in her arms and dandled on her knees. As a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you; and you will be comforted over Jerusalem.”
Isaiah 66:12, 13

I can see my sister whispering to her baby, her lips brushing his head, inhaling his feathery little noggin. A mama kissing and loving her infant, gently rocking him, swaddling, changing, feeding. God feels this way about us, his people. He is motherly in his affection, tenderly and endlessly picking us up, dusting us off.

But there is another thing about babies we conveniently forget, charmed by the new baby smell and miracle of life. And I suppose we forget it about ourselves, too.

It is this: we are born with a wicked condition–a broken, evil heart. Our will from birth is betrayal. Our original credo: to know good and evil.

Not to be satisfied in our Creator, but to challenge Him. To question Him, again and again, if He really loves us.

King David cried out, “surely in sin my mother conceived me!”–not that his mother committed sin in the act of conceiving, but that as humans we are steeped in sin from the get-go, incapable of pleasing God in any fashion. It was a crushing blow to the psalmist when he realized it. A revelation of my wickedness before a holy God.

Maybe we are not so precious as we think.

This is how God dealt with sinners according to the Israelites–He gave them rules.
After giving birth, there will be a time of uncleanliness plus time to abstain from sexual relations.
After giving birth, the male child is to be circumcised, specifically on the eighth day.
After giving birth, the parents are to bring a sacrifice to the altar to make atonement for the mother’s bleeding.

These were serious rules, not some hokey-pokey game. I’m afraid I cringed when I would read these non-negotiables in Leviticus in my read-the-Bible-in-a-year plan. Why did God have to make having a new baby seem so ugly? It might’ve served some obscure purpose back then, but how is it relevant now?

Neighbors would know if you followed God’s family planning rule or slipped up after a few weeks (40 days for a boy, 80 days for a girl). Circumcision wasn’t an elective, simple procedure with Tylenol and sugar water waiting on the other side. It was a costly thing to come up with a lamb and a dove. Even Jesus’ parents had to settle for two doves.

These were some serious terms that forced a parent to answer more serious questions.

How committed, really, are you to raising a sinner? To acknowledge the weight of responsibility before God? What is this trade-off, this parenthood experience?

The old rules weren’t to pour rain on the celebration of new life, but to remind the new family of the seriousness of raising a sinner. Yes, you’ll inhale that newborn scent, but it comes at a hefty price–that which is cursed. Surely we are steeped in sin from the get-go!

How wonderful Jesus became the lamb for us, blood spilled to cover my sin, the sacrifice that ended a million sacrifices and gave us peace with God.
I’m thankful for the Word and its parallels to every part of my life: that physical babies are beautiful, unique gifts–but an even better birth to celebrate is new life in Jesus.

The old Jewish rules that seemed so explicit and harsh are now freedom-producing spiritual truths:

Postpartum recovery is a healing time; post-rebirth, there also seems to be a period or periods of abstinence where a believer might remove herself from the world to get her feet solidly planted on the ground. We don’t do these things because we are rule-bound, dogmatic legalists, but because it proves to be beneficial, refreshing, and life-giving.

The circumcision now is evident as the Holy Spirit serving as a seal of our redemption, but there is also a continual circumcision of the heart–His pruning to make us more fruitful. It’s still often painful, as flesh-denying goes–but the world recognizes us as God’s people through this radical spiritual “circumcision”. We are set apart, not forever dabbling in petty sin or swimming downstream with culture. We belong to Him, and people know it.

And we no longer take animals for the priests to butcher, but we offer our lives now as a living sacrifice. This means the stuff of everyday–the coffee-drinking, husband-loving, paycheck-making, child-raising, neighbor-loving life. The I-want-to-sit-down-and-close-my-eyes-but-have-to-bathe-and-feed-another-human-being life. The-God-you’re-going-to-have-to-help-me-out-here-because-I’m-at-my-wit’s-end life.

And so I’ve wondered over the years at baby dedications at local churches through the years. All those precious little people, nursed, swaddled, dandled on their mama’s knees, dressed up in their prettiest. It only tells half the story.
Each of my babies was born and invited to a special service within a month of their birth, but I could never hop on stage, smile the smile and accept the prayers and cupcakes.
I never knew why I felt this way–only that it felt too ceremonial and I was disturbed by how easily the church ladies marked it on the calendar. I mostly remember making uncomfortable jokes with whomever shared our pew that day–welp, guess we’re just raising little heathens!

But truly, I knew we were blessed to be raising even heathens. Sometimes–and especially when we had babies–I couldn’t even be nice to my husband on a Sunday morning. It was enough, letting my yes be yes, my no be no, and not faking a hyper-spirituality to the applause of church ladies.

I’ve learned it is better to gain an understanding of why we do things before we jump in and assume we’re doing what God wants.
Tell me–isn’t it solemn to spiritually mirror the life of the early Israelites? The set-apartness, the awareness?
What is more honorable, to dress the baby up one day and make public promises, your hand on a Bible? You can make those church ladies happy today and send the baby to daycare in the morning–back to business as usual.
Or is it to allow oneself to be reminded, day to day, that our children are in dire need of a Savior? That even though we struggle, it’s also a joy to partake in spiritual abstinence, circumcision, sacrifice–because by living this set-apart life our kids begin to taste freedom in Christ.

What a gift from the Father–to know He adores babies and adores us! Even more, what a wonder–that He provided a substitute for our sin problem, and in crushing His own precious son He delivered us from life under the Law. He redeemed us so we might become His children.

And how incredible, that he gives us our own delightful, precious babes so we might help them grow up, far as the curse is found.

Falling for a Tribe.

Somewhere between the 10s and the 20s of this century there was a shift from blogs to brands. It happened while I was sleeping, or more likely, while I was not sleeping (lots of babies in that decade). Those writers who had extra minutes and change to spare capitalized on WordPress space. Already domain-savvy, they claimed handles and usernames and moved from isolated, virtual landmarks to one common social media neighborhood.
And there they set up kingdoms.

Glennon Doyle, Pioneer Woman, Rage Against the Minivan, Jon Acuff, Ann Voskamp, Smitten Kitchen, Emily P. Freeman. (Can you tell I loved “Christian” perspectives and baking?)
The men and women who were a fun read day-to-day soared into the stratosphere with a new area code. Social media was a boon to their magnetic personalities and witty words.

This is all ancient history to babies who were raised and fed a diet of social media. They don’t even question how the celebrity of such beings came about. But the Nobody-to-Somebody phenomenon was going strong even a decade before that–take, for example, Kelly Clarkson or Guy Fieri, winners of rags-to-riches contests pre-social media.

These events awed me in the moment. (I specifically remember thinking about applying for the Food Network Star–laughable now, because I didn’t even know what cilantro was back then.)
And though most of the awe has worn off and been replaced by a whole family to take care of and cutting way back on screen time, there is still a strong temptation for me to get some skin in the game.

This is the social media tumble dryer, a new and improved version of the 2010’s obsession with blogging and commenting. Log on, keep your screens lit, and always keep the conversation going. It’s exhausting, but everyone’s doing it, and everyone here belongs.

This is why I keep almost falling for the Tribe lie. You know, the one that says we belong, especially on social media, and more especially–with our own personal Tribe.

I think I fall for it because it is a taste of success via association. I missed out on making bank with my old blog and witty words, but this doesn’t mean I can’t board the gravy train and be a part of something bigger than myself.

It’s attractive. It hints at world peace and the pageant-girl, optimistic faith in humanity. It labels us as brave truth-tellers, confident in our own skin and a supreme advocate for self-actualization.
The Tribe lie says you have a home, that you are an ally who requires allies, and that a person or two ought to show up at your doorstep in minutes of a text’s notice–at least long enough to get a good photo.

The Tribe keeps tabs on emotional distress, urges you on in the things you love, compels you to reciprocate at the level you’ve been given. It validates feelings, justifies habits, encourages a cycle of me-first behavior. My responsibility is reporting on me and it never feels shameful or narcissistic.

The Tribe shares a common ideology, rebukes individuality, and passes off bully behavior as support.

The Tribe has one voice, one mantra, and generally one leader to rally the troops.

The leader usually introduces ideas that are accepted immediately, because she is Queen. The Tribe trusts her because they’ve never had a reason to doubt her. Every new declaration is a celebration, every battle cry she utters is one that breaks chains. She is the face, the picture of who we want to be. She embodies our success and represents our potential. The Tribe shakes off any accusations, any questions from the outside that threaten their cocoon.

Fake eyelashes? Whatever makes you look your best. Drugs? Whatever makes you feel your best. Alternative lifestyles? Bring them on, we believe in you.

They defend their leader, even when the queen waivers. Even when the Queen’s own personal life is in ashes, when one and one no longer add up to two. Even when reason has completely seeped out from the bottom, leaving the Tribe naked and vulnerable. Even when their fearless leader has taken advantage of every member as a stepping stone to a higher place.

Gone are blogs–we can be more real, more alive.
The Queen and her Tribe maintain a conversation so the room never gets too awkward and silent.

And I still almost fall for it, because it is lovely. I still desperately want to be a part of some conversation, and I almost believe genuine friendship is found in the Tribe. The Queen and I are just so alike! (If you don’t get the reference, this is what 50% of blog comments were to Ree Drummond–oh my gosh, we’re twins!)

But this is the Tribe lie: that human wisdom and groupthink behavior supersedes an individual’s impact on her world.

That you were never good enough on your own,
That life never held as much value apart from your Tribe.

Jen Hatmaker. Donald Trump. Rachel Hollis. For Pete’s sake, Dave Hollis. (I reckon they’d all hate being grouped together)

But let’s not stop there. History is packed with icons who gained attention and persuaded followers that their version of life was better than whatever anyone else was offering.
And millions of people hop aboard and ride their train.

Why?

Do we catch the scent of an alpha figure and ride their coattails because it’s how we tell ourselves we belong? Are we pack animals who feel safest wedged between the others?

Do we make their rags-to-riches, blogger-to-celebrity story our own? Are our Queens just better at articulating in written media, and we feel so understood?

I can almost go along with it. It’s cozy to have things in common. It’s hopeful to think we’re all on an upwards trajectory, bettering our lives together, day by day.

I’m worried that a lot of younger people do go along with it, not understanding the consequences of not thinking for themselves.

And here is why it is important to put the breaks on and let the train roll to a halt:

Because Tribe-think doesn’t transfer to real life. You don’t owe a social media icon your allegiance.

The sum of you is not attached to anyone else telling you what to think or what to do.

Some glorious things happen in secret, on your own, and it stays between you and God.

Not all beauty and pain needs to be documented in pictures and words and shared with the world, but written in your soul.

You might have to just trust me on that. But I think I’ve learned enough to know it.

For Your Own Good.

I came across a stunning news article last month. In it I read that the county health department (the county we recently left) sued three Christian schools over their failure to comply with mask mandates by children aged two and up. Let me emphasize: two and up. Two is the age of a baby still learning to read facial expressions.

I’m not sure I can express how thankful I am to be out of that county, and we weren’t even attending a private school.

We’ve gone from looking out our front window at carnage, hate, and literal signs that said Honk if you think the police are f-ing dirtbags and Don’t be a ****, get your f-ing vaccine, morons!
–to walking into a small country school mask-less where the principal passes out candy and kindergarten teachers give students hugs. They schedule fall field trips to the pumpkin patch and open the gym for kids to shoot hoops.

I’ve sat in on school board meetings. I’ve shaken hands. I’ve gone to potlucks. I’m three hours away from passing out walking tacos (gloveless!) at the school carnival. I’m actually going to use the same spoon to dollop sour cream onto chips and cheese and I’m not going to feel guilty about it.

Sure, some of it is the urban-to-rural cultural exchange that makes it so sharp, but I can’t help but believe that my own life is more humanized simply by being around other people who value people over rules. Folks who develop their own opinions apart from groupthinkers, fearmongerers, politicians, and activists. People who are more caught up in community than scary statistics.

One doesn’t necessarily get the picture of such stark differences by watching the news. Instead, the news makes us feel like we are helpless bystanders watching the world burn down around us. So here I’m going to attempt to describe what I’ve witnessed as a non-journalist over the last six months through the lens of the pandemic.

One of the more alarming things was that Denver mandated vaccinations for all employees, school staff, and law enforcement. I suppose it was a gradual incline over the last eighteen months. When there was a stay at home mandate, the next likely step was a mask mandate, and so on. We got used to people telling us what to do, they talked themselves into thinking it was for our own good. It was logical that enforcing it with an arm of iron was next.

Denver’s neighboring county, where we lived, began this strong-arm approach to this fall’s school plans.

Last year, in our city school, the new language learners were separated from native speakers. Imagine: the six year olds from the previous year were masked up and sorted out: the kids who knew English in a normal room and the Title I kids in another. Child development, mental health, and equal opportunity played no part in the division–we were trying to keep germs from being spread. It worried the parents who spoke Khmer or Spanish at home, because they knew their kids needed to practice normal English conversation with other English speakers. It devastated the kids, who missed their friends.

Of course, this was complicated by months of iPad learning at home with zero human contact. No one was allowed in the school library, no one stepped a foot in the cafeteria. When all was said and done, children had spent two-thirds of the school year at home, a third at socially-distanced, masked-up school. Some teachers quit. Parents were looked at as potential health threats and not allowed to darken the doorway.

This is complicated by non-pandemic “concerns” the district was trying to address even before the current situation, issues like inclusivity and diversity, mental wellness and school violence.

Don’t misread here–currently at our little rural school, parent volunteers are also not invited into the school during the school day for any old reason, which they were in the past. And anti-bullying and mental health are both big talking points. But the unwelcome versus welcome attitude between the liberal culture we left to the more conservative we live in now is alarming.

I detected the general feeling in Colorado was sadness, and it came mostly from the families with whom we attended school. It was a collective shrug, a well, what can we do about it? It’s a pandemic. People are sick and dying. Do what we can to prevent it–and that meant wearing masks, avoiding eye contact at the store or park, and eventually complying with vaccine mandates.

But I also detected from the decision-makers and solution-finders an air of superiority in addressing compliance. Specifically, there was a trajectory of public disdain for people who didn’t immediately jump on board with “science” and “public health”. As a parent in the public schools, I was sent emails urging us to fall in line and strictly obey rules put into place for my health and safety. If you want your kids in school, it’s time to comply. No visiting friends and neighbors outside of school. Mask up; no more than six people in your house at any time.

Fast forward to now, and the governor of Colorado, Jared Polis, stepped up his iron-fist game with the declaration, “we wish their [unvaccinated, hospital patients] misery gets the message out about why people need to be vaccinated,” and “the majority of health care workers across the state are very relieved that a handful of their colleagues who haven’t yet been vaccinated will either be gone–remove that threat from the workplace–or get vaccinated.”

The non-compliant people who sign his paycheck are a threat.

Contrast that kind of talk with the new life I’m living eight hundred miles away from Denver: I am welcome to keep my vaccination status private. I am welcome to apply for a job or enter a restaurant without a vaccine “passport”. It is the same as wearing sweatpants instead of jeans–possibly curious, but certainly no threat.
My kids are welcome in the schools. I am welcome to make conversation with strangers, instead of fearing the worst or assuming I’m endangering myself or them by exchanging pleasantries. I regularly invite more than six unvaccinated people into my home.
I am seen as a person, not a statistic or a threat.

We saw the light last year, which is a major reason our family moved far, far away from the overreach happening in Denver.
Sometimes getting fed up is okay.
Leaving is okay. (Let’s not forget the whole situation with Lot’s family. Moving wasn’t an act of cowardice–it was a survival technique.)

And it is a good reminder that when humans in power come up with human solutions, it doesn’t always work to the public’s advantage. Cross that out–it never works out to everyone’s advantage. Take for example the new study that found the state’s vax-lottery was a total waste of money. That’s five million dollars–five one-million dollar “winners”–of federal dollars used for the purpose of enticing people to get a shot. Now it’s been shown it was in no way effective in achieving the desired herd immunity.
Think if we had, as tax payers, the voice in deciding where that money went! How much money I’ve donated and raised personally to assure public school teachers and students have the supplies they need!

See how leaders often lose sight of what’s important? And freedom is the casualty.

You can pretend you are good, think you are good, believe you are good, convince others you are good, enforce rules that are good. You can coerce and you can punish other people when they don’t adopt your brand of goodness. You can erode their own confidence by continually berating them as fools, and they might comply. You silence them by fear, and you tell yourself their compliance is submission. You might pat yourself on the back for the hard, good work you’ve done.

One day, your exceedingly high standards no longer allow for association with folks who cannot meet them. In your mind you devalue them till they seem sub-human.
How nefarious.

This is how freedom is lost–it is wrenched from the hands of others, and it’s stamped with a seal of approval.
It’s marked GOOD.

I’ll be serving walking tacos at the school carnival later if you want to join me, because it is most certainly your choice to do what you want in this country.
I might look you in the eye when I’m chatting with you about the kids, the weather, and anything but your vaccination status. Because you know what? You’re human, and I am too.

I value your freedom to put sour cream on your nachos, and the freedom to make a thousand other decisions.

banned books and going bald.

In the old days, when men were allowed to have many wives, a middle-aged Man had one wife that was old and one that was young; each loved him very much, and desired to see him like herself. Now the man’s hair was turning grey, which the young Wife did not like, as it made him look too old for her husband. So every night she used to comb his hair and pick out the white ones. But the elder Wife saw her husband growing grey with great pleasure, for she did not like to be mistaken for his mother. So every morning she used to arrange his hair and pick out as many of the black ones as she could. The consequence was the Man soon found himself entirely bald.

Yield to all and you will soon have nothing to yield.

(of Aesop)

I have a bunch of old books I’ve been curating for many years now that I just can’t seem to give away. Tsundoku is the Japanese word for it, I’m told (though check me on it, because my Japanese vocabulary won’t fill a thimble)–the books you acquire that go unread for lack of time; the stacks becoming larger and more unwieldy–this is a disease in itself.
The problem with voracious readers is paradoxical: you simply become thirstier the more you read. A reader is never quite satisfied.
We wade through millions of words, thousands of stories. We have removed the lights in our kids’ bedrooms and closets because we must force sleep upon them.

Once again, it is banned books week, the week most celebrated by the keepers of libraries in the United States.
I marvel every year when my local library notifies me via email of this monumental week. They are proud of their pillars–freedom of censorship, liberty for all, loaning to the public.
I sort of have an ongoing beef with such stalwarts. They are a troublesome lot.

My current library notifies me (discreetly, at the bottom of the receipt) of the total monetary value of books checked out–it is always in the hundreds of dollars. Should I not return the books on time, should my child accidentally destroy one…Well, you can check out up to 100 books at a time, but just remember we will own you if you do.

I’ve read Mark Twain and Ruth Reichl both this month. They are two masters of story, blending and bending biography and fiction into a distilled, single, clear voice.

Twain is dead, but his voice still rings unapologetic, mocking what is generally accepted without question by an undiscerning public. The joke was always on them; their opinions fair game for ridicule. He didn’t publish his final autobiography until he was in the grave a hundred years, no doubt the words were too honest for his contemporaries.
Reichl majors in food memoir, sort of a later M.K. Fisher, but I am mostly struck by her observations on social norms in the sixties and seventies. She tells of a college roommate, Serafina, who is from Guyana, with whom a friendship immediately develops, and the two bond over coconut bread and roti. Eventually ‘Fina’ dramatically discovers her parents adopted her at a young age, and she is not of Guyana, but Detroit. Her roommate then begins to ignore Reichl, choosing instead to associate with black power movement, refusing to be seen with Reichl, a white, Jewish New Yorker.

I read another book this week, one for writers and aspiring poets. Two hundred pages in, I had to close it, because it suggested a new author always submit their work to an editor who might read it for “sensitivity”–to make sure no one who reads it is unintentionally offended. Not so one’s conscience isn’t offended (for often it is not–think of all the harlequin paperbacks!), but so that one’s mind isn’t triggered to think objectively.

I don’t like this at all–I appreciate being able to think for myself. Aren’t we all capable of reading and coming to our own conclusions? Is Mark Twain incredibly racist because he writes speech as it sounds, or was he trying to capture dialogue to preserve its integrity? Was Ruth Reichl truly being discriminated against as a white woman in the seventies, or was she just spinning a yarn? I’d like to read and discover it for myself. After all, librarians love juxtaposition and different viewpoints…right?

What is unthinkable is there are people, human beings, who think they are guardians of un-censorship, liberty, and free thought. They put on community “one-read” events, they hold book award competitions. But it must first pass their security screening before they put it on their shelves.
Imagine the idea–that fine expression and the art of honest writing must first pass through the sensitivity police before the guardians determine it uncensorable! It is the bald man wondering where all his hair went–yielding to all until nothing is left.

Cheers to libraries, for at the moment they still hold books.
Pray for the librarians, who try to pluck out gray hairs but are making us balder by the minute.
Read all you can, especially the books that make you think. Yield only when your parents make you go to bed, or when the lights go out.

Who knows when they will become antiquated, the so-called censored books that won’t even be around for Banned Books Week.

Read more in celebration of Banned Books Week!

Hives, Homeschool, and Lemonade.

Last September I was stressing out about homeschooling my kids. The pandemic gave me two harsh choices: remote learning or legit Pearl-in-charge homeschool.
Here is where I was: in a big city, not the safest neighborhood. Removed from my comfortable worldview; my only friends, folks who didn’t even speak English as their first language. They were reliant on whatever education our local school had to offer, and none of them could afford to quit their jobs, let alone “work from home”. They welcomed iPads with open arms; at least their kids would have a checklist when they were left with grandma or the neighbor, or if, forbid it, they were on their own for the school day.

One day a week I still rubbed elbows with people who looked more like me: an upstanding church crowd, wearing their Sunday best, forever befuddled with my family’s choice to send our kids to public school. I was an enigma to them, and they to me, and for the life of me I couldn’t explain how sad I was–the tragedy of being shut off from my public school community, this idea that kids were being literally abandoned to their iPads. So much for learning to read. So much for social interaction, and so much for volunteering at school.

The options weren’t great, but we were all doing what we had to do. The pandemic dealt the cards, and time forced our hand. Move, or be moved. Jump, or be shoved. It’s no secret I picked homeschool after quite some deliberation. I just couldn’t bear the idea of scheduled, intentional screen time with someone outside our four walls calling all the shots. Stick a fork in my eyeball–I know my kids, and I know the addiction of screen time–I couldn’t do it.

So I set out to do what is for me, the impossible: select curriculums, organize our space and our life, create routine, inspire greater learning. Math, penmanship, science, English. The task shouldn’t be so hard. We’d already been home, isolated in the city for six months by then. I could grin and bear it, right?

Alas, I couldn’t. My absent-minded ways were no match for my greatest intentions. My kids, too smart and fast. They read textbooks like comics, rocketing through projects and leaving hurricane-sized messes. Where I wanted them to slow down, they sped up. When I needed calm and deliberate, they gave me intensity and pell-mell. They memorized minute war details and chemical reactions, human body science, how seeds germinate. One boy disappearing to the basement and resurfacing the next morning, eyes bleary, declaring he didn’t really like Lord of the Flies but supposed it was worth reading in one shot. Their noses hidden in books until in a burst of frenzy they’d rush out to the trampoline and ram one another into the net, again and again. Always hungry for new information, followed by releasing the pent-up energy, never pausing to perfect penmanship or color in the lines. Sprinting, then panting, then sprinting again.

It is hard to lasso a tornado. Chalk it up to restlessness, giftedness, lacking executive function or whatever baloney that frames a child as more special than the next. My management skills were woefully inadequate for this job.

One month in, and my heart began racing. I felt the heat in my chest, the faint thrum of an oncoming anxiety attack. Everything required more of me than I could give. It wasn’t a surprise when my immune system started going haywire. But it was a shock.

I immediately turned into a miserable person. Moment by moment my skin crawled. I scratched myself bloody. There was no relief. I visited urgent care clinics. I saw my regular physician. Blood testing for allergies, appointments with a dermatologist.
It was chronic hives, my introduction to a backfiring immune system. A festering itch that began on a Wednesday evening after an innocuous walk in the park and bloomed and flared into red-hot screaming madness, welts and bumps up and down my arms, trunk, scalp, legs.
I curled up into a ball on the couch and begged it to go away. The madness of constant itching from my head to my ankle (mercifully not my feet) coupled with the expectation of keeping kids home for schooling was too much.
One afternoon I phoned my dad. The big kids were at music lessons and the little ones played at the playground while I slumped on the park bench, disconsolate.
It rang twice and he picked up. He’s been living with chronic illness since I was a baby (and gives solid advice on weaning oneself from prednisone).

He understood my condition. I blurted out my madness, my fear I was losing control of my body, the relentless, unwelcome urticaria that was beginning to dominate every waking minute.

He was quiet, thoughtful. Then he said,

“Well, Pearl, have you talked to Jesus about it?”

I bit my lip so no sobs could escape.

“Of course,” I said, “I asked Him to take it away.”

The line was silent. Then,

“Well,” he said, “in my experience you have to give Him a choice.”

“What do you mean?” I asked him, miserable.

“‘God, You can take this away, or…’” he began.

“‘Help me deal with it?’” I said.

He didn’t answer.

“I don’t think I can deal with it, Dad,” I admitted, letting a few tears loose.

“I know, Pearl,” he said. “I know.”

His advice was that I lay on the couch some more (“stop trying to do it all”). He assured me my kids would be fine (“they’re the smartest kids I know”). He told me how to handle the prednisone and how to talk with an immunologist (“they need to see how miserable you are, so don’t put on a brave face”).

Thankfully, mercifully, I found a doctor who was able to help me. He did more blood tests and gave me medicine that subdued the hives.
God didn’t choose to take the problem away, but He did help me deal with it.
And that was a gracious thing, because in the interim it was the toughest year of our lives. More stressors presented and compounded over the months, to a point where we asked God to take things away, or… Point us in another direction, God, or…
(Someday I will tell that story, too–once there is more ground between here and there.)

For school, I let kids read books. I laid on the couch until the library notified me we had a new stack ready, and then we’d drive up, park, and open the back hatch where the gloved and masked worker loaded us up with heavy paper bags, fresh pages to peruse.

That was the bulk of homeschooling. I’d push it now and again, insert a few minutes a day on multiplication tables, or building a diorama, or gathering science experiment supplies. I signed one kid up for an online math course. I bribed another with candy to practice his handwriting. We watched musicals and YouTube tutorials.

I refused to step in the gap and do it all. I purposefully ignored the urge to turn out perfection. I blocked all the opportunities to compare myself to anyone else.

Every time the lump would rise in my throat or the hot feeling in my chest, I stepped back, sat on the couch, and remembered the consequences of letting hopelessness and fear manifest in my body, the misery of hives flaring again all over me.

And this is what I’ve learned from the experience:
God gives us a choice, too.

Humble yourselves, under God’s mighty hand, so that in due time He may exalt you. Cast ALL your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you.
1 Peter 5:6-7

We can choose to humble ourselves, acknowledge we are inadequate for the task. We can choose to hand over ALL our worries, or we can try and manage them ourselves. We can play proud and toy around with a few worries, pretending we’ve got what it takes to manage. We can brag on our measly victories, put on a facade that we have it all together when we don’t. We can hide our insecurities and failures and poor relationships behind a big fake smile.
Or we can admit we aren’t fit for the job, and we need all the heavenly help we can get.

My big boy got off the bus yesterday (they are back in school! and riding the bus!) and he came up the steps, solemn, a piece of paper behind his back.
“Mom, I need to show you something. Now. In the back room.”
I sensed he’d gotten in trouble and needed me to sign a slip. I was a little worried.

He whispered so no one could hear him. I braced myself for the worst.
“Mrs. K made the whole class lemonade today. It was, um, really good. And so, um, I asked her if she’d let me copy down the recipe. Here,” he said, thrusting it into my hands.

“Is that it?” I asked.

“Yeah, I thought we could make it sometime. Don’t tell anybody,” he said, and rushed back into the kitchen to fix a snack.

I have talked to Jesus again and again this year. I’ve stopped asking Him to erase my problems. Instead, I just hand my worries over to Him, because that’s what He’s told me to do. I pour out my anxieties to Him like a five gallon bucket of water on a raspberry bush. I give Him a choice to fix it or to help me deal with it, but mostly I hand it over because I cannot physically take on any more.
He woos me every time. He is interested in my kids, their education, my job, my marriage, my health. He uses sickness to produce wisdom and endurance in my life. He cares for me.

I’m not sure I would’ve seen exactly all the ways he cares if it hadn’t been for a horrid, blessed last year.

He provides the lemons and then He hands me the recipe for lemonade (via a kid who is doing just fine in sixth grade, nevermind the last year of pell-mell homeschooling).
It’s up to me to make it.