Consider the Fowls

Towards the end of our journey at BYU, my wife and I had one child and another on the way.  As college students with a small family, we were broke, struggling to make ends meet.  The end of November came and December found us with less than $100 dollars in our checking account and rent due in less than a week.  Not knowing what to do, we paid our tithing on what little money I earned from my part-time employment at Lowe’s, and prayed for a miracle.  In the mail that week came a letter from Provo Housing Authority stating that the city would subsidize our rent.  A logical explanation is that 15 months prior to this letter we filled out an application with Provo Housing Authority, and now, with a vacancy in the program, we would be a beneficiary; we forgot about the application—it was almost a year-and-a-half since we reluctantly filled it out hoping we’d never need it—and that the government subsidy simply coincided with our running completely out of money.

But I cannot believe that these two events are mere coincidence.  If, perhaps, I view these events in isolation, coincidence might be a logical explanation.  But can one really understand the nature of the world by observing decontextualized events? When I look at my life holistically, chance is not an acceptable answer.  

If not coincidence, than what?  The answer is remarkable simple: God. 

The Lord declared to his disciples, “Consider the fowls of the air; your Heavenly Father Feedeth them.  Are ye not much better than they?”¹ I am a son of a living Heavenly Father who knows and loves me personally.  And because he knows and loves me personally, he is invested in even the nuances of my life. Knowing of the desperateness of our circumstance, Heavenly Father provided an answer to our prayers. 

 

¹ Matthew 6:26; Luke 12:24

Jack's 1st Birthday Pictures

Gluteus Maximus

Ours is probably the only three-year-old who romps around a museum clasping his buttocks shouting—almost tauntingly—“gluteus maximus!” While other parents might wonder about the mental stability of our child and his brandishing of his butt, I think to myself, Sneer all you want, stranger. My kid will effortlessly ace his junior anatomy class while filling out applications to Ivy League universities.

Joshua has been interested in learning about muscles and bones recently. After he expressed interest, Allison found and printed pictures of a skeleton and the muscular system from the internet. Occasionally, when the need for knowledge gets the best of him, Josh points to a part of his body and asks, “What bone is this?” The queries were easily put to rest when they were simple; most adults can identify ribs and femurs, biceps and pectorals. However, his insatiable pursuit of understanding keeps his parents on their phalanges.

Allison spent one afternoon researching the mechanical nuances of the hand: the twenty-seven bones of the hand and the difference between the hand’s intrinsic and extrinsic muscles. Telling Josh that these are your hand muscles while vaguely pointing to a palm and that these are your finger bones was simply not enough to satisfy Joshua’s curiosity. He wanted more than an indistinct explanation.

While I was tucking Joshua in to bed the other night, Joshua pointed to his stomach and asked, “Daddy, what are your tummy muscles called?” After I lay on his bed, I explained that the muscles in his tummy are his abdominals and then worked on his articulation of the word. Taking his hand in mine and pressing it against my own relaxed stomach, I said, “See, Josh, how my abdominals are soft?” I then lifted my head and shoulder blades into a crunch and described that my abdominal muscles become hard when flexed or contracted. Subsequently he commenced feeling his own stomach as he lifted his head, exclaiming in excitement, “Hard! Soft! Hard! Soft!”

Pointing to his ears one afternoon Joshua asked, “Daddy, what bones is these?” I told him that his ears, are, in fact, not bones, but rather that they are composed of cartilage. I then made an incorrect distinction: bones are hard, and cartilage is soft. And it wasn’t that my distinction wasn’t correct; it was that my distinction wasn’t discriminatory enough to be completely accurate. Josh thought about this newly learned anatomical characteristics, smiled his mischievous smile, and, pointing to his butt, said, “Look at my cartilage, Daddy.”

“No, Josh. That’s you’re gluteus maximus; it’s a muscle because it’s sof—” I then realized my mistake.

“No, Daddy! It’s cartilage. My butt is soft, see?”

Right alongside Josh, Allison and I are learning. We become interested in whatever it is that our son is interested in, and we do our best to become qusi-experts in the field. When the inventible and quintessential question that frustrates every parent comes—Why is the sky blue?—Alli and I will research the question and provide an answer, simple yet sophisticated. Or I might just have Josh call his uncle, who is currently working on his PhD in geophysics, and have him explain the answer. Either way, Joshua will have his insatiable yearning for understanding satisfied, which will inescapably lead to more questions.

Three Years and Two Wheels

I taught Josh how to ride a bike today—no training wheels. I ran behind him, steadied his shoulders, and after he got the feel of it, let him go. He rode around the block while I ran beside him, cheering him on. To celebrate we decided to get some ice-cream. He didn’t want to get in the car; he wanted to ride his bike. So we rode our bikes. On the way he saw a park with a few dirt jumps and wanted to roll over them. So he did. Then we rode over to Sonics and enjoyed a large Snickers shake while he sat on my lap and thanked me for teaching him how to ride his “bike with two tires and no training wheels.” Finally we rode home.

Help Us Out!

Argument

Tonight I got into an argument with my two-year-old son. My wife and I are encouraging Joshua to say his personal prayers before he goes to bed, so we get him to kneel down and repeat our prompts. We try to give him as much liberty as possible—he ends up thanking the Almighty for doors, windows, walls (I’m not sure where the interior structural theme came from), giraffes, hippos, and lions. His nightly supplications often conclude with my saying, “Joshua, we don’t end out prayers with ‘in the name of Jesus Christ, *summersault* amen.’” Tonight’s prayer was painstakingly slow. It went something like this:

Me: Dear, Heavenly Father…
Joshua: Dear, Heavenly Father…
Me: (quietly) Josh, what are you thankful for?
Joshua: …Jesus Christ, amen.
Me: No, Josh. What are you thankful for?
Joshua: (assertively) Jesus Christ, amen!

Eventually I got him to squish something substantial—windows and walls, I think—between his introduction and conclusion. You see, Josh knows and understands the conventions of prayer. He realizes that when we say “amen,” it’s over; we’re done, and he gets his juice. So sometimes he rushes to the end.

After I helped Josh with his prayer, filled his sippy with juice, and tucked him in as-snug-as-a-bug-in-a-rug (he insists I use this phraseology), we had our argument:

Me: I love you, Josh.
Joshua: I love you, Daddy.
Me: I love you more!
Joshua: I love you more!
Me: NO! I love you more!
Joshua: (laughing) I love you more!
Me: NO! I LOVE YOU MORE!
Joshua: (laughing uncontrollably) I love you more!
Me: I LOVE YOU MORE!
Joshua: (laughing, between deep gasps of breath) I love you more!

Ultimately, he was only repeating what I was saying; I’m not sure he was aware we were even arguing. But I think he knows I love him.

Stream of Consciousness: Pie

I don’t have much to say about pie. Sometimes I like it; sometimes I don’t. I pour cream—yes, pure cream—on my pie. It’s really good. Pumpkin, apple, blueberry, whatever. Pie always tastes better covered in cream. However, my wife gets mad at me whenever I pour cream on my food. I think it’s because I can eat 500 calories of animal fat in one sitting and not worry about gaining a pound. But I ride my bike to and from school every day, so I get my exercise. Now, however, the weather has turned cold, so I don’t ride anymore. Maybe I should lay off the cream. But Thanksgiving and Christmas are around the corner. And what are the holidays without cream? In Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus, someone gets killed, hacked, and baked into a pie and fed to another—I guess the person-turned-pie didn’t understand the nuances of di-transitive verbs. Never ask, “Can you make me a pie?” Because it just might happen. I watched a movie the other week—what was it called? oh, yeah, The Help—where a lady baked her poop into a pie and fed it to her boss. “Eat my shit,” she said. I wish I would have done that to my old manager at Lowe’s—he deserved to eat my crap dressed in crust and covered in cream. Brian, my buddy who unloaded the truck with me, and I used to fantasize about it. We had it all planned out: I’d produce the filling, Brian’s wife would bake the pie, and we’d give it to him on our last day. As a parting gift. “Thanks for being a great manager, Rick! Here’s something to show our appreciation.” It’s what kept us moving; unloading fifty-seven 300lb snow blowers, along with 9,243 other products, takes motivation.

Clever Title

After a few people have inquired about the title of my blog, I decided I would explain. During my sophomore year of college, I was enrolled in Penny Bird’s writing course. I read Jane Austen’s Persuasion, and I wrote a research paper about how the conflict between old money and new money drove the characters’ actions. During a lesson about titles, Penny informed the class that the title of a paper should be telling yet catchy—it should be clever. She also mentioned that sometimes it’s easier to name a paper when it’s finished, or nearly finished, when the author understands the paper more holistically. While I didn’t know what to call my paper, I went home and took her advice, however misconstrued: I named my paper “Clever Title.” I had a thesis and I knew where my paper was headed, but I still didn’t know where my paper would end up. When it was finally finished, however, I came up with a proper name. Since then, I always titled all my papers “Clever Title” (until I came up with a better name, at least). My teachers quietly laughed whenever I handed them a draft and they read my proxy title, noting my unfinished work and half-baked thoughts.

Two years ago when I started this blog, I called it “Clever Title.” Looking over my posts, I find a common theme that unites my writings—my negotiating of the demands of both family and school life. You might even say my blog has a thesis: navigating these separate-but-interconnected worlds is difficult. I feel like my blog has a direction and I know where it’s headed, but I don’t really know where it will end up. Whenever I decide what my blog is about, and I probably never will, I’ll give it a real title. Until then, “Clever Title” will have to do.

Truth Be Told

I wrote this about two years ago. I came across it, reread it, and actually liked it (it's not very often I enjoy reading my old writings). So I revised and revamped it, clarifying here, elaborating there. Let me know what you think.

This afternoon, whilst I was reading Dickens’s Great Expectations, Joshua, my eight-month-old son, prowling around the perimeters of the living room, was searching frantically for small, dangerous objects to ingest: a bit of tin foil, a red thumbtack, and even the letter C he had pried off an old keyboard. Mrs. Joe had once again accosted Pip “by the hand” when Joshua decided his carpet adventures were over. He pulled himself across the rug to where I was lazily reclining on the sofa. When he arrived, he let out a crude, babyish lament crying, “Father, why must you always neglect your posterity in your vain search of knowledge and wisdom? Put down that blasted book and tend to my needs.” Who could resist such a request? I let down my book and picked up my son. Joshua rested his cheek on my chest while I massaged the small of his back with the palm of my hand. His whimpers turned slowly into deep rhythmic pulls of air, the child asleep on my breast. We slept and dreamt on the couch while the afternoon drifted gently into evening, deepening our fraternal bond.

That was Wednesday, February 24, 2010. My story, however, may or may not be factually accurate. Often, I am criticized for stretching the truth, omitting crucial details, and frankly, telling lies. You, who have accused me of such, have a legitimate argument. Here’s what actually happened:

1. I wasn’t reading Dickens; I was reading Cristina Rossetti’s “Goblin Market”. Laura had just eaten the goblins’ forbidden fruit—a blatant metaphor for sex—when Joshua crawled over to me. However, I had read the first eleven chapters of Great Expectations the previous night.
2. There was no thumbtack: Joshua has never, in his eight months of existence, come across sharp stationeries.
3. Joshua didn’t actually speak; if you didn’t catch this, God bless you.
4. Finally, I didn’t fall asleep. I tried, but I couldn’t get comfortable.

So why did I do it? Why did I lie? In my mind, what I told was the truth. I wasn’t trying to give people an objective, historical account of my afternoon—I was trying to portray what I felt. Joshua didn’t say, “Why must you always neglect your posterity in your vain search of knowledge and wisdom.” But, in a way, he did. No, I didn’t fall asleep with him on my chest, but it was better than any dream I’ve ever dreamt. The factual “truths” didn’t matter, in this case. What did matter, then? The emotion? The experience? The dream? The truth? I’m not sure, exactly. But here’s something that does matter: on Wednesday, February 24, 2010, I experienced my most profound moment as a father.

Bald is Beautiful

Speaking about the resurrection that will freely come to all, Alma revealed, “The soul shall be restored to the body, and the body to the soul; yea, and every limb and joint shall be restored to its body; yea, even a hair of the head shall not be lost; but all things shall be restored to their proper and perfect frame.” As wonderful as it sounds, I have a small problem with the resurrection: I don’t want my hair back.

For over twenty years I tried to find a hair style that suited me. And for over twenty years, nothing worked. When I was young my mom thought the bowl cut was a good idea—I was just too young to protest. The slicked-over side-part wasn’t much of an improvement, either. Buzz cuts sometimes looked okay, but they made my ears look too big. Spiked hair, the staple of 90’s fashion, was terrible. I tried spiking the hair only in the front, but, unfortunately, because my hair line was already receding, that, too, was a disaster; I didn’t have much of a front to spike. My senior year in high school, I reverted back to the side-part, without the greasy gobs of gel, of course, for a natural, wavy look. I liked it but my friends made fun of me. My hair during my mission was a catastrophe. In college I cut my hair short, about an 1/8 of an inch long, and I was mostly satisfied. On a dare, I used a razor to shave my head completely. My naked cranium looked comical: my face was tan while my scalp white, a natural colorless helmet. But a few days in the sun solved that. Since then, I’ve always shaved my head. Once, when I wanted to see what I looked like with hair again, I let my locks grow out a quarter-inch; but my boss, who otherwise never spoke to me, told me it added five years to my face and to shave it before work the next day. Who would have guessed that when a balding man shaves his head, he looks better—and, believe it or not, less bald? Oh, the ironies of life.

So when that blessed morning comes, when every limb and joint will be restored to my body and every hair restored to my head, I will decline the latter. I’ll say, “Jesus, you can keep my hair—I look better without it.”