Okay, I’m going to come right out and cop to the fact that I really don’t know what the word “zen” means. I think I have some vague concept, but my grasp is tenuous at best. I just really wanted to use it as a post title.

I’ve been wallowing in self-pity the last couple of days. I have officially cleared the first hurdle to being an actual novelist: my first rejection letter. Actually, it was an e-mail, one of what I’ve been told are the scores–possibly even hundreds–that await every novelist. And it would probably be more accurate to call it the second hurdle, because I’m fairly certain the first hurdle was actually writing the novel.

While I’ve been wallowing, a big ol’ Texas sized brisket has been sitting in the bottom of my fridge, waiting to fullfill its destiny of becoming a mouth-watering thing of beauty on a dinner platter. I just haven’t been in the mood. I’m in a “fix yourself a bowl of cereal and call it dinner, kids” kind of mood.  I’ve made grilled cheese sandwiches twice this week–only the second time I added ham and pretended it was a whole different thing. I haven’t had the energy to think about the brisket.

For one thing, if you do a brisket right, it’s a little time consuming. First, you have to rub it all down with your own special uber-secret recipe brisket rub. If you’re out of uber-secret brisket rub, first you have to concoct more, THEN rub it down. Then you have to sear it all over. If it’s a whole brisket—which this one is—you really need to cut it in half or even thirds first. Or second—after concocting and prior to rubbing. See, I told you it’s complicated.

And the only pan I own that’s big enough to sear a whole brisket–even one that’s cut up into several pieces–has these big handles that come up on each side, and at least once during the brisket-searing process, I will forget about those hot, metal handles and the whole exercise will suddenly become a forearm-searing process, after which my children will go around calling me “Emo” for several days.

Then there’s the matter of the gravy. That’s right, you heard me. Gravy. Don’t get me wrong–I love me some bbq sauce. But for my brisket, I use the drippings—savory sweet chipotle drippings—and whip up a batch of sweet chipotle brisket gravy. My family would look at me like I’d served unfrosted cake if I gave them brisket without gravy. But it is, like the brisket itself, a labor of love: one which involves the same pan and more forearm searing.

But it’s not just the time commitment. There’s also the matter of the spirit of the brisket. To me, brisket is a celebration. It can be as mundane as celebrating that we’ve survived another week without a trip to the ER, but there’s gotta be some celebrating. I don’t feel like celebrating right this minute.

One of my wallowing rituals–which is a direct result of the fact that evidently Fall released a sneak preview, which has been playing all over North Texas since Saturday— has become sitting on the front porch swing with my mug o’tea several times a day to reflect. It’s one of the veryfine things about living in the country–lots of quiet, punctuated only by crickets and birds.

But this morning when I sat down—-which I did only after thouroughly checking the swing for black widows, which is one of the notveryfine things about living in the country—-there was a whole lot of something going on at the neighbors. Lots of cars–I’d say close to twenty. That many cars at 8:30am is never a good thing.

Turns out, the grandfather is really sick. Really, really sick. As in might-not-make-it sick. Mesothelioma. He has surgery scheduled in a couple of weeks. The doctors hope that it will give him a few more months to a year, but there’s a big chance he won’t survive the surgery.

Dang.

Not only that, but these kids just lost their other grandfather a few weeks ago.

Dang again.

Amazing how our troubles shrink like shadows when exposed to the light of someone else’s. I’m reminded of the words of Psalm 118, “This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” Life is a celebration, each and every day of it. We exist day-to-day along a continuum between grief and elation. Hopefully, we’ll spend more time toward the latter. But in all our circumstances, there is cause for rejoicing: the love of friends and family, the providence of the Creator. Sunsets and singing birds. In good times, we inhale joy through our experiences; in bad, we exhale it in the form of the memories that sustain us. But in all things, let us find our way to the celebration.

Okay, I guess I’m done wallowing, or reflecting, or whatever I want to call my little pity party.

Because there’s a family next door that needs a brisket.

Tags: agent, bbq, black widow, brisket, Chaos, Clinical Depression, death, Food, novel, novelist, porch swing, rejection, self-pity, zen

I still remember how scared I was when I found out Mason had Down syndrome.

It wasn’t the intellectual disability that haunted me; I wasn’t bothered by the fact that he might not excel at mathematics and foreign language. It wasn’t that he would look different or talk different. It wasn’t even that I worried about other kids being mean to him. They’d have 3 older siblings to contend with, after all.

No, my overwhelming worry was that Mason would be passive spectator and not a participant in the grand adventure of life, watching from a distance, not tuned in to the world around him.

I am happy–and somewhat exhausted–to report that my fears were completely unfounded.

As I write this, I have just gotten back from a walk with Mason. To be more accurate, from a walk-jump-run-fall-monster stomp-sit in the dirt-offer fingers to the neighbors’ dog for a good licking-fire hydrant discovery-gravel inspection-sit in the middle of the road-run the opposite direction when Mom says come here with Mason.

Incidentally, if there are parts of this post that seem inconsistent or that just don’t make complete sense, it is no doubt because Mason has just swiped my notebook and used my freshly penned page to mop up the excess wet pasta slime from his high chair tray. Lovely.

Back to today’s expedition. It started out as a little time on the porch swing after Mason got off the school bus. It would have been a relaxing proposition, except for the fact that he insisted that I sing an original little ditty I composed in his honor called “Swing, swing.” It goes like this: Up and down, high and low, that’s the way we like to go. (repeat) Swing, swing, a marvelous thing, oh how we love to swing. (repeat). I am not a student of music, but whatever that term is at the end of a stanza that indicates “repeat without end,” Mason thinks this song has one of those, because the minute I finish he yells “Again!”

After the 23rd refrain, I took a deep breath and closed my eyes to fortify myself for yet one more round. When I opened them, I caught a fleeting glimpse of Mason’s backside as he headed around the corner of the porch toward the driveway. Now, I should mention that most of the Mo’s have been sick this week, which means Mommy hasn’t had much sleep. Suddenly another refrain of “Swing, swing” didn’t sound so bad.

The caliche was already crunching under Mason’s hiking boots, so I had no choice but to pursue him. I tried to encourage him to stick to the paved road, but he immediately veered off into the high-grown grass along the neighbors fence, like he always does. We’re out in the country, so this isn’t a manicured parkway–it’s dirt and rock and stickers and ants. And stickers. Not those little burrs that are nothing more than organic velcro–no, these are evil, thorned, spawn-of-hell deviant stickers, the kind that have hooks and barbs when you look at them under a microscope (okay, the fact that they HAVE hooks and barbs isn’t dependent upon whether you’re looking at them under a microscope. But I’m tired. I haven’t slept. And reworking that sentence felt like it was going to take a lot more energy than I have at the moment, so we’re going to run with it and keep going).

First stop, the neighbors’ fence to greet Harley, their black lab. We have a perfectly good black lab of our own, who happened to be on our front porch–the front porch Mason recently abandoned in favor of coming to see THIS black lab. My older kids insist that this is a demon dog. I’ve always believed them, because he barks like a demon dog every time I walk down the road. So I rushed to the fence, hoping to beat Harley. He got to Mason first…and proceeded to lick every one of his pudgy little fingers through the mesh, tail wagging, ears flopping. Mason giggled the whole time.

We ambled right down the road onto the adjacent cul-de-sac (our neighborhood is shaped like the number “4.” Well, not the “4″ I just typed, but more the way you actually write it, where it’s open at the top. Anyway…), Mason told Harley goodbye, and we walked uneventfully to the leftmost edge of the ’4,’ then turned around to head home. I was elated at this point, because Mason’s idea of a walk is uni-directional, as in walking “away.” He is not into the return trip at all, and lets me know by thrashing and screaming. But this time he was actually okay with the about-face, which I took as a good sign. Because I’m an idiot like that.

About 15 feet into our back-the-way-we-came, Mason noticed the gravel at the edge of a driveway. Like the black lab, gravel also falls into the things-we-have-our-own-of category. But this was someone else’s gravel, exotic gravel. I tried to channel my “we’re-exploring-and-experiencing” mood as he sat down on the road–I really did–but it was hard. The sun had started peeking out through the clouds, playing mean games on my face with the humidity. I wiped off the sweat and bent to pick him up. Only Mason wasn’t exactly in a being-carried kinda mood. He informed me of this fact by stomping, screaming, and pinwheeling himself across the road.

Just before he threw himself to the ground, he noticed the out-of-service fire hydrant. You know boys and fire hydrants. No, he didn’t pee on it. That’s dogs and fire hydrants. But he did set to inspecting it. In detail. As if when he arrived home he would be called upon to create an exact clay model of it. Meanwhile that humidity is dripping out from under my hat and down my cheeks, and I’m wishing I could convince him to just let me carry him home.

“C’mon buddy, let’s go.”
“Nnnnnnnnnnnno.”
“Can I hold you?”
“No.”
“Look–it’s Harley! You want to go see Harley?”
“No. Nonononono. No.”
“You want some milk?”
“No.”
“Applesauce?”
“No. Nonononono. No.”
“Wanna go watch a show?”
“No.”
“If you don’t stand up, I’m going to carry you.”
“NO! NO! NNNNOOOO!”
“Well, I’m going home. Bye.”
“Bye.”
“I’m serious. I’m really going. See? I’m walking down the road. This is me, going home. See? I’m going.”
“Go.”
My bluff had been called. Dang, this kid’s good. I walked back, my mommy-tail between my legs.

Any mom who’s been on the job for very long knows there’s only one thing to do in this situation: cart the kid’s kicking-and-screaming booty home forcefully. Remember the whole ligament-laxity thing I told you about? (Clean up on aisle 6) Well, another implication of this condition is that a child with Down syndrome who does not want to be held is NOT going to be held. This kid can twist and torque and flip and writhe like that little weasel-ball they sell at the Cracker Barrel gift shop.

I tried anyway. And within seconds I was reminded that Mason had walked the whole way through the sticker patch. With each swipe of his feet, my forearms bore the brunt of those evil spikes.

Then, I saw it–my small, round, flourescent-yellow dimpled hope. Golf ball! See, Harley’s owner chips golf balls all the time. And this little stray baby was my ticket home.

“Look Mason! You wanna play catch?” Yeah, technically I intended to play fetch, but he didn’t need to know that. I tossed the ball down the road. After retrieving it, Mason sat down in the middle of the road and waited for me to do the same.

This would be so much easier if he would just let me carry him.

So I finally got him to stand up and showed him how this game was going to work. I threw the ball, he ran after the ball, I ran a further down the road so he could throw it to me, and all the way we’re making forward progress. Until the little yippy dogs came down a driveway toward us. It is a proven fact that 4 year olds cannot resist little yippy dogs.

Now, at the edge of the yippy dogs’ driveway was a toddler-sized pothole filled with muddy water from the storm the night before. If this were some predictable B-comedy, I’da said something like “Don’t step in that–” and then Mason would have tripped, falling right into the pothole, covering himself head-to-toe in mud.

Ummmm…..yeah….

He pulled himself out of the muck, wiped his muddy face with his muddier hand, stomped over to me with his mud-encrusted-sticker-covered boots, thrust his arms into the air and said:

“Mommy, HOLD ME!”

Tags: ants, black lab, caliche, Cracker Barrel, Down syndrome, exploring, fear, fire hydrant, golf ball, gravel, hiking boots, humidity, intellectual disability, ligament laxity, mud, porch swing, pothole, school bus, siblings, stickers, weasel ball, yippy dogs