Farewell to Laurie

August 13, 2006

Dear Laurie,

This is a letter from your Birthday Twin, Emily. Your sister called me tonight to let me know that you are taking leave of us. I wish I could be there to hug you and bless you, but please know that my thoughts and prayers are with you. You and I haven’t seen each other as much as I wish we had, but I want you to know that I will miss your friendly cards and letters, and just the knowledge that you’re in the same world with me! I have such good memories of the times that we have shared, Laurie, and I will treasure them forever.

Thirty-three summers ago we shared an apartment with Cordie in Geneva – our first taste of independence! Didn’t we have fun living on our own, swimming at Kashong, and going to Tanglewood with Biff and Debbie? After college I lived near you in Washington for a little while. Remember when we celebrated our birthday together at the hospital? I was so glad I didn’t have to spend my birthday alone in that big city!

You impressed me with your courage when you drove by yourself to visit us in Tennessee, and years later, here in Oneonta. Mark and I also visited you in Virginia, and another time you met us at my aunt and uncle’s house in MacLean. We always had a good time when we got together – we connected as if it hadn’t been ages since the last visit! I’m so glad I got to see you in Reston a few years ago. Even though you and Mark always hit it off, it was fun to spend some private “girl” time together. We had some good talks, and I felt that we got reacquainted on a deeper level than we had in our letters. I especially enjoyed seeing the National Women’s Museum with you. You really spoiled me during that visit, fixing some special meals for me, treating me to lunch at a bookstore one day, and at the art festival the next day. You’re such a sweet and generous soul, Laurie!

You and I have always shared a love of literature and the joy of writing. I still have the story you wrote and illustrated for me about Princess Emily and the Unicorn. You have such a great imagination and you’re so creative, Laurie. I want you to know that I finally got a job teaching one section of freshman composition at Hartwick College this fall. I hope I’ll do well enough that they’ll invite me back for the spring semester. You know I’ve been looking for a non-office job nearly all my life, so I’m both excited and nervous!

Next week Peter will go to Renssealear to start his first year as a college student, studying aeronautical engineering. This week-end Vera is in New Jersey, where she hopes to audition to be an American Idol. Maybe someday Vera will be a star, and Peter will fly to a star!

The sad news for my family this summer is that my mother had a stroke in June. The right side of her body is paralyzed, but her mind and ability to speak are still in good shape. She’s in the nursing home, getting rehab, but right now she still needs two aids to move her from the bed to a wheelchair, and from the chair to the commode. I have been going to the nursing home almost every day – I help her with her lunch, and my dad helps her with supper. We cut her food for her, but she can eat with her left hand. Growing old certainly has its disadvantages!

Laurie, I know that you always struggled with your faith in God and the existence of an after-life. I wish that I could give you some of my faith now, to encourage and uplift you, until you reach that beautiful world on the other side. Soon you will leave that tired old body and enjoy the freedom of an unfettered soul. You will know for yourself – that life is eternal, life is meaningful, and that earth is just a school where we grow and learn and prepare ourselves for a greater existence. People who have experienced the next life say it is so much more real than this one; that their earthly life seems like a dream in comparison.

Laurie, when it’s time to cross the threshold into the next world, you will see a beautiful light. Go to the light and you will be enveloped by the unconditional love of God. You will probably see your father, and perhaps other loved ones who have passed over before you. They will accompany you to your new home. It’s going to be a wonderful experience and nothing to be afraid of. Someday I will join you there. You will be outside of time as we know it here, so it probably won’t seem long to you, even if I die an old lady! Find us a cozy, heavenly tea shop where we can meet and fill each other in on everything that’s happened while we’ve been apart. I’ll see you there!

In the meanwhile, may God bless you, strengthen your spirit, and comfort your mother and your sister. May your angels watch over you and guide you to the divine light that waits for you.

Good-by, Laurie -

I love you -

Your friend,

Emily

P.S. to Kate

Dear. Kate – P.S. -

I wrote my first letter to you when I was still in a state of shock and disbelief — the meaning of your words hadn’t quite sunk in. Prior to the phone message I left you, Mark had been encouraging me to try once more to get in touch with you because he was afraid you might have had a stroke or some other serious illness. Now I realize it was even more serious than that — for it seems that something has happened to your heart and soul that has made you shut me out of your life.

You say that it is my new profession as a celebrant that disturbs you, and yet you know very little about what I do, and you did not give me the opportunity to explain it before deciding to end our friendship. You say that I am celebrating “the lost and dying world” in my ceremonies. And yet, the couples I work with have spirits that are full of life and love! Some of them are Christian; some are not, but I believe that every couple deserves to have a meaningful wedding. I have also performed a funeral, and hope to be doing more of them. I may perform funerals for Mark’s dad, and mine, when the time comes. Neither one of our fathers is Christian, and yet our families love them, and will want to have meaningful ceremonies to celebrate their lives. How could we do less than our Creator God, symbolized by the Shepherd who searches for his lost sheep (Matt. 18:12-14), the woman who searches for her lost coin (Luke 15:8-10), and the father who waits for the return of his wayward son (Luke 15:11-32)?

I saved a letter that you sent me in 2006, when you wrote: “You and I may disagree on many things, Emily, but that doesn’t change how much I truly appreciate you and treasure our long and loyal friendship.” Apparently my new-found profession is even more disagreeable to you than anything we disagreed on three years ago. And yet, in the same letter, you wrote, regarding my search for meaningful work: “Whatever God has in mind, I pray He will direct your path.” I believe that the celebrancy is God’s answer to your prayers and mine.

The celebrancy also gives me the opportunity to share my belief in a greater God with those who have rejected him. Most of those who reject God have done so BECAUSE of their experiences with churches that define God in terms of a jealous and judgmental Being who has provided only one way for the billions of people in his world to know Him. When I point out that God is the Love and Light that can be found in each one of us, as Jesus pointed out: “The kingdom of God cometh not with observation. Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, Lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you,” (Luke 17:20-21), these “atheists” begin to realize that they don’t have to reject God altogether.

You say that I have created a false way to God, but this is the way of Love and Mercy that Jesus has shown me through his life and his words. I never have, and never could believe in God as one who would allow my father and my friends, Mark’s family, Gandhi and the Dalai Llama, and millions of others to eternal damnation. I love the God who is exalted in Psalm 139: “If I ascend to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. . . . If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light around me become night,’ even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you.” This is the God who was with me during the darkest days of my life, before I recognized my purpose.

You say that I am in rebellion against God, but I communicate with God in different ways every day. I see all of Creation as God’s Love Letter to His children. I may be in rebellion against God as you know Him; I may be mistaken in my beliefs about God; but if I am to err, at least I will err on the side of Love and Grace.

With Love and Grace,

Emily

Home in the Catskills

This story was published in Upstate Alive Magazine in 1996. Thirteen years later, our children return from college and graduate school to the same Oneonta farmhouse – now covered in blue siding because Mark got tired of painting the old red clapboard!

Whenever we travel, my husband, Mark, plays a game of “Speculation” with me. “We could live here!” he jests as our little red Nissan sails over “uncharted” hills, through quaint villages or pastoral settings. “I could work at that hospital,” he points, as we pass a tidy brick building, landscaped with Dwarf Juniper and geraniums. Physician’s assistants are usually in demand, so this is not pure fantasy. “There’s a nice looking house for sale,” he exclaims a few minutes later.

I’m not saying anything; he knows I don’t want to move. But if the house in question is a white clapboard farmhouse with crisp, green shutters and a wrap-around porch, I picture myself sitting on the porch swing, gazing out at the White Mountains, or the Berkshires, or the Blue Ridge Mountains, depending on the setting we’re passing through. Foxglove, lupines and columbine tumble over each other if it’s June. On a mid-summer trip, Shasta Daisies, day lilies, and golden coreopsis return my smile with sunny faces. There I am puttering in the garden, some imaginary day. Of course the house, the garden, and the vista from the porch are far behind before my daydream progresses any further.

“We’re not moving!” the children proclaim in a back seat chorus.

“But wouldn’t you like to live on a farm, so we could have horses?” Mark prods.

“Yes, I want a horse!” Peter shouts to be heard over the wind that whooshes through the open windows.

“I’m not moving unless Della comes, too!” Not even a horse can replace Vera’s best friend, who lives up the street.

I recall the traveling days of my own childhood. I grew up on Long Island, near the water. The ocean was empowering, but it was a ferry ride away, or a half-hour drive to a bridge. When you live in the mountains, they’re always around you. My family would drive to New England or “upstate,” where I admired the villages that had town squares with gazebos, and a view of the mountains. That’s where I would live one day!

Now when my new family returns home from a trip, we come back to Oneonta, one of the rural cities my parents drove through on bygone journeys to Cooperstown and Watkins Glen. It doesn’t have a town square, but there’s a bandstand on Main Street where we listen to outdoor concerts and shop at the open farmers’ market. We have two green parks where we enjoy picnics, playgrounds, pools, and baseball games. The farmhouse we live in is red, and it sits at the base of a hill, nestled between friendly homes that were built when the farmland was sold for parcels decades ago.

When I sit on my front porch, I can just make out the ridge of one of the Catskills in-between the boughs of towering maple trees. In the summer, I stand at my kitchen counter, chopping vegetables for salad, and the mountain breeze wafting through the screen door is the same breeze that greeted me outside a Catskill cabin many memories ago. The place where I live is both a vacationland and a childhood dream. Why would I ever want to move?

Cruising through unfamiliar countryside, it’s always fun to “speculate” about a different life in new surroundings. But last fall, coming home from a trip through the Green Mountains, I was struck by the brilliant colors of the Catskills, more vivid and varied in hue than the famed mountains of Vermont. I realized then, that more satisfying than the thrill of the unknown is a certain, fundamental contentment with life as it is.

Lessons of the Sea

Published in The Suffolk County News August 1997

I have seen the ocean in all of its moods: angry and tumultuous, happy and playful, calm and serene. When I was a child, I hated the huge, haughty waves that caught me unaware and tumbled me over and over in the sand until I could fight my way out, coughing and trembling with relief that I had escaped the powerful grip of my enemy. Still, I was lured back to the ocean beach again and again. After all, the sea was my friends when frisky wavelets darted in and out, splashing my legs with tingling salt while I leaped among them.

When I was growing up, my family lived on the Great South Bay, just a ferry boat ride from the Fire Island shore. I could go as often as I could pay the three dollar fare, or beg a ride over one of the bay bridges. In later years, I moved away, and a trip to the ocean became a rare treat. When I visit the shore with my husband and children, the exhilaration of the fresh, damp wind sends me sprinting and twirling over the crunchy sand, like the child who once feared and loved the ocean with equal passion.

I crash through the breakers until I reach calm water, where I lie on my back, rising and dipping with the rhythm of creation. The sea is my grandmother when her ancient waves roll majestically, holding me afloat as I gaze up at cloud-embrodiered skies.

After a day at the beach, I lie in bed with my eyes closed and feel the whole room undulate around me, gently rocking me to sleep. Or I might feel that I am still stnading on the shore, where the great waves finally end in a thin film of water that ripples under my feet. The sand shifts beneath my toes as the ocean sucks in the foam. Another frothy breath replaces the first as it recedes. Ebb and flow. The ocean never takes back without returning its life-giving breath.

The year after I graduated from college I worked in a dead-end job where the bnoss made me shorten my name for the convenience of our clients, and my first love stopped answering my letters. Feeling lost, I drifted with the flow of life to Yellowstone Park where I worked for a summer and met my future husband. The sands shifted and I was happily married, following my mate to a city I didn’t want to live in. There I found a satisfying job, good friends, new knowledge.

The waters of life carried us to another state where we bought our first house and planned to start a family. Our spirits ebbed when years of infertility and miscarriage shattered our dream. Gradually we picked up the pieces and found hope in the adoption process. Again the shifting sands, the flow of spirit-filled life, brought a successful pregnancy; a healthy daughter.

And so life has continued. Intervals of frustration or disappoinment are followed by periods of fulfillment and joy. During those joy-filled times I’m a child again, finding a channeled whelk or a bit of polished glass that a wave brought to me. When I stand at the water’s edge, the sea is my teacher.

Kate

Soon after posting yesterday’s blog on my multifaceted faith journey, the mailman delivered a letter from Kate, my Southern Baptist friend, telling me that she has to distance herself from me now because I am in rebellion against God.  I met Kate in Birmingham, Alabama, 31 years ago when Mark entered the surgeon’s assistant program there. I saw Kate’s name in my college alumni journal because she had graduated from the same school six years before me. I invited her for dinner and she accepted. I still remember how she looked, a diminutive woman with a pixie smile, holding her one-year-old daughter on her hip as she stood at our apartment door. I think we recognized each other as kindred spirits the moment.we met.

Kate and I ended up working together as editorial assistants for the Southern Baptist Women’s Missionary Union. Kate was a member of a Baptist Church, while Mark and I were Unitarians, but she invited us to a Unity study group on the metaphysical interpretation of Revelations. Kate and I shared a deep interest in spiritual matters, so this was our main topic of conversation during the lunch breaks we shared. Kate was my best friend in Birmingham, where Mark and I lived for two years. After we left, Kate and I stayed in touch with long letters, phone calls, gifts and cards, and occasional visits. We never forgot each other’s birthdays — until this year, when I sent her a card for her June birthday and never received the usual reply, nor a card for my birthday in September. I grew concerned that she might be seriously ill, so I sent another card which she didn’t respond to, and then I placed a phone call that she didn’t answer.

Finally, the letter came. The thin envelope was concerning in itself, because Kate’s letters have always come in fat envelopes stuffed with pages and pages of news. I am still trying to make sense of these words:

Dear Emily,

Forgive my silence. It has not been because I have been too busy. Rather, ever since you chose to become a “celebrant” I have realized I no longer recognize who you have become.

You once assured me that you had surrendered your heart to Jesus Christ. If that is so, Emily, why do you as a “celebrant” accomodate to the world, rather than leading the world to Jesus Christ, ignoring his instructions in Matthew 28:19 to “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations.” YOu are celebrating the lost and dying world, Emily, not the saving Grace of God through Jesus Christ.

I believe you are in rebellion against the only way to God, Emily and that you have created some other false way you prefer. God is not whoever you want Him to be, Emily. He is who He is, and His Word, the Bible is the only truth.

I continue to pray for you, Emily, that your heart has not hardened past the point of repentance. As long as you continue in your rebellion, I must, as a believer, distance myself from you.

Sadly, Kate

I realize that this letter does not emanate the love that I said is the main ingredient of every path. The Kate I knew for 31 years was a deeply loving person, and all I can come up with now is that her understanding of God has led her to believe that sacrificing our friendship is the way to demonstrate her love for God. This was my response to her letter:

Dear Kate,

I am very sorry to learn of your decision. However, I feel that you are the one who has changed more than I have. I never claimed to believe that Jesus Christ is the only way to God. Didn’t I send you a copy of my article, “Many Paths,” that was published nine years ago? And surely you read the chapter in Dream Weaving called: “Many Faiths, Many Paths?” Don’t you remember how we used to be the two “renegades” at WMU – going to the Unity study group together, and sharing ideas about the mystical life during our lunch breaks? I still have the book on Sufism that you sent me one year. I think perhaps you don’t understand what a celebrant does, which is not to “celebrate” a lost world, but to create meaningful ceremonies to celebrate the commitment of love between two people.

I feel sad that you feel my heart has hardened. Actually, I think it’s just as soft as it was when we met 31 years ago. Lately I have been feeling my heart grow and expand as I experience more and more wonderful ways to connect to God and God’s creation. I’ve never been happier than now that I have found my purpose in life – to spread Love and Light through my meditations, writing and ceremonies; my family and friendships; Jesus and my church, and my connections to nature and all of God’s wonderful creation.

I am a believer, too. But what I believe (as I always have) is that Jesus Christ is my Way Shower : One who shows us that the way to salvation is through Love. And I believe in Christ’s teachings to love our neighbors and our enemies – doesn’t that include everyone, especially our friends? You, Kate, are one of the most generous and loving people I have known, and I love you still. I also believe in Jesus’ teaching not to be judgmental, so I try not to judge anyone for believing differently than I do.

I will always cherish the memories of our long friendship, Kate. You and your family are in my prayers, too. And if you ever decide to befriend me again, I will be here for you.

“”This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” John 15:12

Love Always,

Emily

The Multifaceted Path

I have come to realize that there are as many ways to understand the Universe as there are snowflakes in a winter storm, and just as many way to connect with it. Some of us have an understanding that we call God. Some don’t believe in God, and yet believe in a Universal Mind that orchestrates the grand symphony of life. Others believe in many gods: the gods of Nature – one for each little part of Creation. But then, that Creation is connected by One Life Force that lives, and breathes, and has its being in all of these separate gods.

I have friends and acquaintances that include an assortment of Protestants, a Christian Scientist, Hindus, Latter Day Saints, Catholics, Reiki masters, Quakers, and Jews. I count among my best friends a psychic Unitarian who leads guided meditations, a Born Again Southern Baptist, a Yoga teacher who practices mindfullness meditation, a polytheistic Animist, and a Presbyterian who sees auras. Each one is following a path of love – for love is the main ingredient in each of their individual paths. I respect and honor them all.

Mark and I have warmed a pew at the First United Presbyterian Church in Oneonta for twenty years. Belonging to a spiritual community is an important element in our life. I think of church as the trailhead of my spiritual path. I begin my week on Sunday morning with uplifting music, theological lessons to ponder, and connections with church family members. Love fills the sanctuary with a palpable energy!

During the week I dally on several stepstones of my multifaceted path, making sure not to stay on one wellworn section for too long. I may read some words of wisdom in a book such as The Third Jesus: The Christ We Cannot Ignore by Deepak Chopra, or Crop Circles: Signs, Wonders and Mysteries by Steve and Karen Alexander. I will read The Upper Room devotions with Mark in the morning, and pray with him at bedtime. I’ll meditate with one of my guided meditation CDs: my current favorite is: “Solar Radiance: Becoming a More Perfect Light” with Sanaya Roman. I may go into the Artisan’s Guild and talk to Debbie, a Wiccan high priestess, who creates beautiful crystal jewelry and offers energy healings to clients. Debbie is “a good witch,” who, like Glenda in The Wizard of Oz, casts spells only in the name of love and goodwill.

On the first Wednesday of each month I like to attend Vespers at the Unitarian-Universalist Society, where Diana leads participants in a guided meditation, sometimes to help us forgive those who have “trespassed against us,” sometimes to obtain guidance for our spiritual path. Then we light candles for every joy and every concern that we lift up in prayer. The pool of flames reminds us of the Light and Love that is expressed with our gratitude and intercessions.

Sometimes I’ll have a conversation, online, on the phone, or in person over tea, with a friend who likes to share thoughts about the path she’s on. Lilly serves the gods of nature who she also refers to as “the gods of love.” She speaks of “Loving Kindness” as a goddess, and vows to serve this goddess in all of her actions and dealings. Lilly’s path is peopled with love and joy and beauty!

Anna tells me about the yoga classes she teaches. I attended these classes for a couple of years, and I know that she shares her expertise in a gentle and caring manner. Anna tells her students: “There is a word that is often heard in the practice of yoga. That word is Ahimsa. Ahimsa is a Sanskrit word that may be translated as non-harming. But it is also translated as love. Let us love ourselves in our practice, offering kindness to ourselves. . . . Non-harming, letting go of violence. Love. We might just call it compassion.

Tonight I’ll be attending a meeting of the Oneonta Interfaith Committee where we will discuss our plans for this year’s Interfaith Thanksgiving service. A variety of Christians, Jews, Muslims, and Buddhists will come together to express their gratitude to God for the multitude of blessings that have been showered on us this past year. Some participants may use a word other than God to describe the source of these blessings. We come together to express this gratitude so that we can better understand and appreciate the differences between us. As interfaith minister, Susanna Macomb says: “It is love, after all, that breaks down the prejudice and fear between people of different faiths and different cultures.”

If you live in this area, I hope you will join the Interfaith service, hosted by the First United Presbyterian Church at 2 Walling Ave., Oneonta, on Tuesday, November 24, at 7:30. You will get to meet people of different faiths during the reception that follows the service. As South African Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu says: “We are made for complementarity. I have gifts you do not; and you have gifts that I do not. So we need each other to become fully human.”

Namaste

Life as a Celebrant

This column was published in The Oneonta Daily Star on Saturday, November 7, 2009.

SHOP TALK

About Emily VanLaeys of Custom Ceremonies

How long have you lived in this area?

Twenty years in Oneonta and two years in Walton before that.

Tell me about your business:

I am a certified life-cycle celebrant. I studied online with the Celebrant Foundation and Institute in New Jersey. I create and perform all kinds of ceremonies, but so far most of them have been weddings.

Celebrants create personalized weddings for couples who don’t want a traditional church wedding, but want something more meaningful than a Justice of the Peace ceremony. There is more to a personalized wedding than letting the bride and groom write their own vows and choose readings that reflect their beliefs. I interview couples in person and by e-mail, and use their unique story as the basis of the ceremony. Their own thoughts and feelings about each other are woven throughout each element of the wedding. Consequently, most of the ceremonies evoke laughter from the guests and participants, as well as tears!

Describe a typical day. There is no typical day: The variety is one of tne of the things I like about this work. Most of my work is done on the computer: marketing, website building, blog writing, communicating with clients, researching,and writing ceremonies. I talk to prospective clients on the phone, and if they are able to come to Oneonta, I meet them downtown for a complimentary interview before they decide if they want to hire me. Then there are the actual rehearsals and ceremonies which involve going to the venue – frequently involving a long drive. Before I go to a rehearsal, I make up rehearsal notes for myself, a cue sheet for the musicians, and copies of readings for the readers. I make sure that each participant is comfortable with what he or she will do during the ceremony. We go through all of the choreography, including processional and rituals, and having the readers practice. I feel like a playwright and director! First I write a one-act play – which is the ceremony – I work with the participants who are the actors. Of course the bride and groom are the stars! On the wedding day we produce the play, and I am the narrator.

How did you get started in this line of work?

My father gave me his copy of the March 2007 issue of Money Magazine where I read about the Celebrant program. I knew immediately that it was something I wanted to do! The celebrancy involves all of the things I enjoy: working with people one-on-one, creative writing, dramatic reading; researching poetry, blessings, and traditions from different religions and cultures, as well as researching and creating rituals.

Where do you see this business in five years?

I would like to expand my business to involve more types of ceremonies. I have performed one memorial service and plan to do more of those. Providing a meaningful ceremony for people who are grieving is a way to help with the healing process. I have done some group healing ceremonies with Diana Friedell as the meditation leader and will do more of those. I can also provide individual ceremonies for healing (from divorce, job loss, whatever someone wants to move on from). I have conducted a wise woman ceremony and would love to see more women do this for themselves as a way of celebrating their transition from the childbearing years to their wise and creative years. And I really want to perform Baby Namings! This is a way to welcome a new baby into the community of family and friends when they don’t belong to a church. Instead of just a shower with gifts and games, the ceremony includes stories about the baby’s family and ancestry, and the meaning of his or her name. Usually the ceremony will also include a reading and well wishes from the guests presented in a special way.

Describe a memorable moment in your workplace:

Every ceremony I perform is memorable! After a wedding, couples, parents and guests always comment on how beautiful and memorable it was. In particular, I cherish the memory of a groom who turned to me during the Ring Blessing Ritual and whispered: “This is beautful. Thank you!”

What have you learned from your work?

I’ve learned a lot of things like how to plan and perform a wedding ceremony from beginning to end, how to set up and manage a website, and how to market a business. Best of all, I’ve learned that this is the work I was meant to do – the profession I’d been seeking all of my life while wondering, “What am I going to do when I grow up?”

What is the most challenging thing you do?

Definitely marketing – educating people about the importance of having a meaningful ceremony, and finding the clients who really want it.

The most enjoyable?

Creating a beautiful ceremony, sharing it with people who love it, and seeing the glowing faces of the bride and groom as they take their vows.

Advantages/drawbacks of doing business in this area:

The advantage is that I’m the only certified life-cycle celebrant in this area. The disadvantage is that people here don’t understand how a celebrant is different from a JP, and when I try to explain, most would still prefer to focus on the reception. They want to keep the ceremony short and sweet so they can get to the party! Most of my ceremonies are only 20 minutes long, plus or minus the processional – and they are NOT boring!

What advice would you give someone wanting to get started in this business?

Take the certification course with the Celebrant Foundation and Institute. I maintain membership with the organization because they support their graduates in many ways. Be prepared to spend a lot of unpaid time marketing and educating people about the value of your work. You can also expect to do a lot of driving to venues where people want celebrant weddings. I have driven to Ithaca, Geneva, Owego, and several places in-between to perform weddings.

The Old Family Table

This story was first published by THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE on March 31, 1995. I was so thrilled when the acceptance came in the mail, I sat at my desk and cried. I thought it was my big break! Well, anyway, it encouraged me to keep writing. The Tribune called it: “If Tables Could Actually Speak,” but I don’t care for that title.

The Old Family Table

When my husband, Mark, and I bought our first house, my parents gave us the old maple table from their kitchen. The legs were battered, and the lace pattern of their vinyl tablecloth was permanently etched in the finish. Laboriously, I scraped and sanded the surface until the bare wood emerged. We had the legs dipped, but the old stain clung stubbornly to the grooves in the spindles. After a leg-sanding “party” with Mark’s sister and her husband, we screwed the legs back into place. Then the table looked fresh and new, as if it had never seen 25 years of family meals, company dinners, birthday parties and board games.

Mealtime was always a family occasion in our home. My father’s parents came from Italy, where food and love are synonymous concepts. For my mother, the manner in which the food was served was nearly as important as the food itself. Every item and condiment had to be placed in an individual serving dish, and candles graced our table every night.

Suppers began with grace, some ended with dessert, and others ended in tears. Dad might make a comment: “I see Chris got some poor grades on his report card.”

If he happened to look at Mom while he was speaking, she’d bristle: “Don’t look at me like that. It isn’t my report card!”

“I didn’t say it was your report card, Mary,” he’d reply irritably.

“Stop yelling at me, Gene. You’re always yelling at me!”

Then Dad would start to yell. Mom would run from the room in tears. At least one of the four kids would be crying, too. Dad’s frustration was usually expressed verbally, but once he rose to slam his chair around and hurl the pot roast at the window sill.

I rubbed the rich brown liquid into the grain of the newly sanded table top. The stain was darker this time. Still wet, the table’s surface glistened like a smooth cheek washed with tears.

The six of us had always gathered again for breakfast, no matter how explosive the argument had been the night before. We swallowed our toast down lump-filled throats as we shared our plans for the coming day.

The table had been finished with a glossy varnish when my parents bought it. Now I hand-rubbed it with linseed oil. Memories that had been embedded deep within the wood fibers bubbled to the surface as the oil saturated it. Dad spooning milk from my glass into his coffee cup, and coffee into my glass. My older brother belting “What’s the Matter with Kids Today?” between mouthfuls. My younger brother drumming the accompaniment with his fork and spoon. I imagine the table breathing: blessings in . . . anguish out . . . grace in . . . grievance out. On the occasion of one anniversary dinner, my mother read aloud from the Book of Ruth:

“Where you go, I will go; Where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die – there will I be buried. May the Lord do thus and so to me, and more as well, if even death parts me from you!”

My mother cried, and I cried. My father picked up his fork and began to eat.

My husband and I have had the table for 14 years now and a new generation of children eats peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, spills milk, dawdles and picks, and tells silly stories over the maple surface, now scratched and marred again. Aunt Alyssa, Uncle Chris, and Uncle Steve come with their families to share meals and tales of their new lives. Gramps and Grandma visit and sit at their old places. Mom still offers timely prayers, and Dad delivers passionate speeches about gun control and the injustice of death.

These days Dad spills his drink as often as the kids do. Once he spilled some milk from the creamer and Mark jumped from the table to grab the dishrag and mop up the spill. “You’re so compulsive,” Dad accused. Angry words followed. I don’t remember them. I do remember Mom saying: “At least you have each other,” before they made their hasty departure. The next morning we drink our coffee at the table while the children eat their cereal, and we know that my parents are sharing breakfast at their new table. My brothers and sister sit with their families at their respective tables in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Indiana. Bread is broken and wounds are healed. Shared meals are the hub of a home where love and pain co-exist, and the commitment to family endures, like the old maple table.

Ode to Joy

This story was written when my daughter, Vera, was about eight. Now she is 23 – an accomplished pianist and vocalist who minored in music at college.

Ode to Joy

Streams of hot water pelt my shoulders as I massage shampoo into my wet hair. Piano music wafts up the stairs from the living room to dance with the beat of water hitting the fiberglass tub. My daughter is playing “Ode to Joy,” one of the pieces I learned from Alfred’s Basic Adult Piano Course before I knew Vera would come to be.

I was thirty years old when I started piano lessons: “Mexican Hat Dance,” “Mary Ann,” “When the Saints Go Marching In.” I gritted my teeth through the marches and silly songs we had clapped to in kindergarten. But my heart sang with the “allegro” pieces: “Lavender’s Blue,” “Cockles and Mussels”. . . . My instructor complimented my “legato” technique. “Yes! Smooth and connected!” she crowed as my fingers lifted and fell gracefully onto the keys.

My favorite piece was “Raisins and Almonds.” After I’d mastered it, I played it over and over, singing: “When I was a tiny, sleepy head, Mama gently would tuck me into bed, and sing of raisins and almonds.” Would I ever have a child to sing to and tuck into bed? My husband, Mark, and I had been waiting three years already.

I slide the bar of soap over my belly and the tiny scar in my navel; a reminder of the laparoscopy that had revealed the culprit behind my infertility: endometriosis. The diagnosis has a musical name, but what it does to a woman’s body can be devastating. It meant “gunk” in my ovaries, gunk in my fallopian tubes, gunk waiting to entrap each valiant sperm before it could pierce the shield surrounding the monthly egg.

Gunk, plunk. Vera is plunking out the tune to “Standing in the Need of Prayer,” one of the pieces I had learned too well. When I concentrated on learning a new piece, my mind was preoccupied enough to block out the questions that haunted me most of the time: “Will I ever bear a child? How much longer to wait?” When I learned a piece so well that my fingers knew where to go without conscious direction, my mind was free to wonder if this would be the month when one triumphant sperm would meet the elusive egg.

It had never occurred to Mark and me that our agony would not end after that first conception. But just a few weeks after the glorious news came from the lab, our hopes were drowned in a flow of blood. The death was not the monthly death-of-a-dream we’d grown accustomed to, but the death of an actual child who lived in our hearts, as well as my womb, if briefly.

I had hammered out my pain on the piano. On the day that the doctor confirmed my womb was empty again, I went through the lesson book and played every piece I knew, one after another. Music kept me from collapsing with grief; music helped to keep the flame of hope flickering, ever so dimly, in the center of my soul.

If the music wasn’t in print in front of my nose, I couldn’t play it. Vera has inherited her father’s ear for music. One of her homemade melodies mingles with the sound of water cleansing my body as the hope of adoption once cleansed my soul. One year after the miscarriage, we had completed the home study, autobiographies, and numerous required forms. The agency promised us a healthy infant within the year. I put away my Clomid pills, ovulation charts, and the baggy boxer shorts Mark had worn to improve his sperm count. I shopped for baby clothes and child care books. We celebrated with strawberry shortcake and coffee at the Blue Iris Inn. Shyly we shared our news with the waitress.

Vera breaks into her favorite refrain from “Heart and Soul” – loud and louder, fast and faster. I have to laugh at her musical antics as I shake the excess water from my hair. If she had been conceived during those dark days, when our hearts were full of despair, would she be the happy, spirited child that she is? Only when we knew that we would love any child God placed in our arms, and anguish had given way to praise and jubilation, was the gift of life granted to us.

I step out of the shower onto the bath mat and grab a towel to dry myself. Vera is finishing her practice session with an encore of “Ode to Joy.” The music that sustained me through the long months of hopeful waiting, disappointment, grief, and waiting again, had been woven into the composition of Vera’s life as it was forming in my womb. After she was born, mothering duties replaced my piano lessons. Now her music sustains me as I follow my daily routine: “Joyful, joyful, we adore Thee, God of glory, Lord of love!”

The Path of Light and Love

You just never know who or what will be the source of new light on your spiritual path. My mother-in-law was still taking baby steps on her path when she died of smoking-induced causes two years ago. For Christmas 2000, she gave me a copy of The Seat of the Soul by Gary Zukav, which she claimed to have read, but I knew she had just seen Gary on Oprah. I had borrowed The Seat of the Soul from the library when I read it several years earlier, so I put her gift on my shelf to use as a reference book.

I am currently planning an Advent class for church on the Coming of Divine Light, so I’ve been researching references to Light in the Bible, other religious scriptures, as well as mystical and near-death experiences. In The Seat of the Soul I found a chapter on Light and discovered many words of wisdom that I read as if for the first time.   Zukav says: “You are a dynamic being of Light that at each moment informs the energy that flows through you. You do this with each thought, with each intention.” (And in class, I will remind church family members that Jesus said “You are the Light of the World.”)

Zukav continues: “You change the way that you shape the Light which is flowing through you by changing your consciousness. You do this, for example, when you challenge a negative pattern, such as anger, and consciously choose to replace it with compassion, or when you challenge impatience and consciously choose to understand and appreciate the needs of others.  This creates different forms of thought, feeling and action. It changes your experience.” (p. 106)

I am grateful to my mother-in-law, June, for giving me this book. She would not have understood it herself, but she understood me well enough to know that it would be meaningful to me. A very simple lesson in this book, that anyone can understand, is that every choice we make is between fear and love.  For most of her life, June could not stop drinking – she was addicted, but I think she was also afraid of the circumstances and responsibilities she would have to face if she was sober. When she finally stopped, 10 or 15 years before her death, her decision stemmed from love: love for her children who had been begging her to stop, and a desire to love and heal the life she had been destroying.

I can see how my life’s choices have been about love and fear. When I choose because of love for a person, a goal, or a passion, I choose  my higher Light – the climbing spiral. When I choose based on fear of what will happen if I don’t, or what others will think of me if I don’t choose their way, I choose the horizontal path rather than the upward way.

I believe that many religions attract followers because they appeal to their fears about the unknown.  Yesterday while walking through the park, a Jehovah’s Witness stopped her car and handed a “Watchtower” out the window. I said, “No thanks, I’ve already read that.” (Not that particular issue, but I read a Watchtower once!) Of course I didn’t want to have something to carry on my walk, and it would just go straight in my recycling bin anyway. She had a disturbed expression on her face when I turned down her offer. She probably thinks I’m going to hell. I know her intentions were good, so I believe her heart is in the right place. I also know enough about JW’s to know that their religion is based on fear. So she has chosen her religion because of her fear of what might happen to her if she doesn’t follow certain teachings. But she acts out of love when she tries to help save others from the awful fate she fears.

Some Christians choose their path because of their fear of hell. Others choose this path because they recognize the Love in the Light that Jesus radiated into the world.

“There is no fear in love, because perfect love casts out fear.” (1 John 4:18)

Other religions also offer a choice of paths: the path of love and the path of fear. I pray that June, now dwelling in the life of Spirit, has found the path of Light and Love.