November thanksgiving finis: Dear Rebecca

Dear Rebecca,
Thank you for the opportunity to follow in your bootprints this month. I thought having a theme of gratitude would lead to fewer postings, give me some time off, make blogging easier. But I found I had so many things to be grateful for, I did not have nearly enough time to blog them all.

Maybe you can lead a trail across the blogs again next year, and we can get some more hardy souls to join. And get our own little icon for the month, "I am a thankful blogger." :-)

It's been real, and it's been good; and it's been real good.
Stay warm up there in the Yukon,
Julana

November thanksgiving 26: our messy house

(hurrying to get this in before midnight tolls :-)
Ever since our son was born, whenever children visit, they leave toys strewn all over our the house. Children love our house, because we have so many toys; I used to buy almost every one sighted in the hands of a therapist and then some. For the first several years of our son's life, I would leave these toys where they lay for days. I was so happy to see the them picked up, played with, and carried around. Usually, they stayed primly in place on their shelves. It took effort to get our son to pay attention to toys; he did not pick them up on his own, let alone carry them around the house.

Since our son began walking independently last summer, at the age of seven, our house always has something lying around out of place.* Last night he took the measuring spoons from the counter, took them into the living room, got them separated, and then they ended up on the kitchen floor. The other evening, he checked out the bathroom and my toothbrush and (lidless) lip gloss ended up on his bedroom floor. His eyes fall on something at his eye level; he finds it interesting, carries it around until he finds something even more interesting, and drops it where he stands.

Today, I am Thankful for a messy house, bearing mute testimony to son's increasing attention span, and continuously developing fine and gross motor skills.

*A partial survey of the floor starts with the ring-stacker star, the Wiggles Big Red car, Casper the friendly ghost (stuffed), Greg Wiggle, and a padded baseball bat.

November thanksgiving 21c: Christmas in the schools (first amendment, contd.)

Barbara Curtis over at Mommylife has posted on a seasonal aspect of the first amendment: Christmas is legal in the public schools. She brings clarity to where the lines are drawn. There's a lot more freedom than you'd think, given the annual hullabaloo in the newspapers about community nativity scenes.

Our son participated in a Thanksgiving program two years ago; it covered pilgrims and turkey, but no religious content. One chanted poem involved a repetitive chopping motion with the right arm that could have come straight from an Atlanta Braves baseball game. Grinning, violent little kindergarteners!

The Christmas programs seem relegated to the higher grades. Maybe I should print Barbara's post out and share it with his principal and teacher.

ADDED: Christie shared the name of David French, of FIRE (Foundation for Individal Rights in Education) , in the comments. He works with freedom of religion at the university level.

November thanksgiving 25: pediatric specialists

Today I am thankful for pediatric specialists, especially the opthalmologist, the ENT (otolaryngologist), the physical medicine doctor, the neurologist, and the neurosurgeon. This morning we saw the opthalmologist.* She is a great doctor. Our son is farsighted, which is normal for children. One eye is slightly more farsighted than the other, but not enough to need corrective lenses at this time.

It is fascinating that this diagnosis can be made for a nonverbal child who follows few directions. The resident(?) dilated his pupils. An hour later, the doctor darkened the room and used a pencil light and some type of magnifiying lens to view his eyes, while keeping his attention with a moving toy. We will return next year for another evaluation.

*My feelings toward the pediatric dentist are almost equal parts gratitude and frustration, slightly weighted toward gratitude.

November thanksgiving 24: the Incarnation

I'm thankful for the Incarnation.

. . . Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness . . . .Philippians 2:5b-7 (NIV)

My favorite Christmas poem is Luci Shaw's Mary's Song.* I recommend reading it, sometime during the season.

*I'm not linking it, for copyright reasons.

November thanksgiving 22: I "chose" a mortal life

In January of 1994, we moved from Michigan to Ohio, back near my homeground. We lived in a temporary apartment for a month, then moved into our first house. WIthin a week or two, I received a call from my OB-GYN's nurse, informing me that the results of an AFP test showed that there was a 1 in 33 chance that the baby I was carrying had Down syndrome. I didn't know much about Down syndrome back then, but I knew enough for the news to result in a good cry, so I had one.

I didn't undergo amniocentesis to obtain a definitive diagnosis, because I knew amnios increase the risk of miscarriage. I knew that I would carry the baby to term regardless of the results. Intellectually, I believed abortion was murder; emotionally, I recognized my baby as a person.

I did not choose life for my son. He was given it by Someone else. What I chose was a "mortal" life for myself. I accepted a life that had some limitations it would not have had, if I had collaborated in ending my son's life before his birth.

When I chose a college, when I chose a major, when I chose a husband, I accepted the accompanying limitations. Accepting boundaries was a submission to the truth of my finity. I cannot live forever, experience everything, everywhere.

My life was bounded by many parameters before I became pregnant. Having a child would add to them. So would having a child with Down syndrome.

When I received the phone call from the nurse, I did not see my child as an object of the verb "to choose," but of the verb "to give." He was part of the given. In accepting the gift, and the limitations that would come along with it, I assented to the truth: a mortal life has many limitations, and a person in touch with Reality accepts them.

Crying on the couch, back in February of 1994, I did not so much choose a mortal life for myself, as continue to accept one. And this Thanksgiving, I'm thankful, from the bottom of my heart, that I did.

November thanksgiving 21b: first amendment, flip side

Yesterday the New York Times weighed in on the ramifications of earlier prenatal testing for Down syndrome, with The Problem With an Almost-Perfect Genetic World:

"Where do you draw the line?" said Mark A. Rothstein, director of the Bioethics Institute at the University of Louisville School of Medicine. "On the one hand we have to view this as a positive in terms of preventing disability and illness. But at what point are we engaging in eugenics and not accepting the normal diversity within a population?"

Dear Mr. Rothstein,
You're engaging in eugenics when you remove the patients from their families, load them onto trains, unload them into camps, line them up, and herd them into gas ovens en masse. As long as you kill them one at a time, in a sanitary medical setting, in the presence of one or more family members, and they don't look afraid, and you can't hear them cry out, you can get away with referring to killing the patient as preventing a disability.*
* * * * * * *
Freedom of speech gives people the freedom to say unpleasant things, and to misrepresent the truth. I'm still thankful for it.

Further reading:
Rethinking Fetal Anomalies, Christianity Today
An extra chromosome isn't awful, Boston Globe
Down Syndrome Now Detectable In 1st Trimester, Washington Post
Screening for Abnormal Embryos Offers Couples Hope After Heartbreak, New York Times
The Down Dilemma, Time Magazine
The Abortion Debate No One Wants to Have, Washington Post
One Woman's Choice, Washington Post

*Note: This is one reason people first language continues to be so important. People with Down syndrome are not Down syndrome people. Even a big blogger like Evangelical Outpost still isn't getting this one right.

November thanksgiving 21a: first amendment to the U.S. Constitution

Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

This week I (inadvertently) angered someone in a newsgroup by quoting our bumpersticker:

It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish.
Mother Teresa 1910-1997

I am thankful the First Amendment protects freedom of speech, along with freedom of religion, the press, and assembly.

November thanksgiving 19: neighbors

I have to mention neighbors among things to be thankful for, with both Allthings2all and Wittingshire posting on the topic lately.

The first neighbors I remember were Joe and Ethel, an elderly couple who lived at the bottom of our hill, just to the west. One of them, maybe Ethel, had Parkinson's. Joe kept bee hives and sold us the best honey, some still in the comb. One of my earliest memories is running as fast as I could from one of their hens, after I tried to pet its little yellow chicks. It pecked the back of my legs. (Ye-e-ow-w! The terror was worse than the nip.) Joe and Ethel taught me that the world outside my family and our church could be a friendly place.

Later, for most of our growing up years, our closest neighbors were a large family on the other side of a big lot. One daughter was bright-eyed and temperamental, with a sense of humor. She wore a brace on her leg, and was difficult to understand and a little slow, mentally. I still think of her once in awhile, and wonder how she's doing-- hope she's happy. This family, who had another child in special ed, provided a benchmark for me to be grateful for the advances that have been made in serving children with special needs in the public school system, over the past 30 years.

The neighbors across the valley on the other side were Amish and raised hogs. When the wind was from the north, you could smell Money.
* * * * * *
I'm thankful our current neighborhood is safe and quiet. We are rather newly come to it. Getting to know people takes time, effort, and intention. I am still simmering these ideas on the back burner of my mind.

The duty towards humanity may often take the form of some choice which is personal or even pleasurable. . . .

But we have to love our neighbour because he is there — a much more alarming reason for a much more serious operation. He is the sample of humanity which is actually given us. Precisely because he may be anybody he is everybody. He is a symbol because he is an accident.
---G.K. Chesterton (HT: Read the entire quote at Wittingshire.)

(I just noticed the parallel to "chosen" and "given" I noted in November thanksgiving 9: family.)

November thanksgiving 18: Tim Horton's coffee

We are thankful for Tim Horton's coffee year round, but especially so when the weather turns cold, as it did yesterday. Dave Thomas started Wendy's in our town, and when Wendy's bought Tim Horton's, it was a happy marriage for us. We got a taste of what those Canadians (Kim, Violet, Rebecca) have been drinking all these years. What is it with Starbucks? I like Tim Horton's, and so do most of the adults I know.

November thanksgiving 16: refining fire

(secular version)
Here is an excerpt from an interview with Greg Palmer, author of Adventures in the Mainstream, and father of a young man with Down syndrome.

If you could give advice to new parents of kids with Down syndrome, what would you say to them?
The first thing I would say is what a very great lady said to me on the day we learned Ned had Down syndrome: “It’s not the end of the world.” Or to paraphrase what Emily Perl Kingsley once said: “You thought you were flying to Italy. You were set for Italy, you’d studied the language, knew the sights you wanted to see. And then you landed in Holland.* Not Italy. A different place. Not necessarily a bad place, just not what you were expecting.” And I would add, “So learn some Dutch, and get on with it.”

I would also say this: If you let it happen—and that’s a big but crucial if—there will be joy, and laughter, and sorrow, there will be tragedies but also triumphs. As quickly as you can, get over your self-pitying belief that the gods have screwed you. Embrace people who embrace your child, and ignore the others. Especially ignore those who want to show you how compassionate they are by sharing your tragedy. You don’t have a tragedy, you have a child, and you can get as much satisfaction from that child as you’d get from any child. But there’s no question you’ll have to give more; give more of your life, of your time, of your energy, of everything you have, if you want to make that child’s life a success. In other words, you’re about to find out just what kind of person you really are.

*For some reason, my husband is always a little miffed at this analogy. :-)

November thanksgiving 15: Jan Karon's Mitford books

Steeple, Episcopal Church, Blowing Rock, NC

I enjoy Jan Karon's Mitford series. The new one, Light from Heaven, hit the shelves last week. Two years ago we spent a week of November in Charleston, SC, and stopped in Blowing Rock, NC, on the way home. Karon lived in Blowing Rock while writing the books, and you can see some of her inspirations in the town.












Entrance, Episcopal Church, Blowing Rock, NC

November thanksgiving 14: Ohio weather

November sky
We have a saying here: "If you don't like the weather, just wait ten minutes."

Yesterday afternoon, on the way home from speech, we stopped by the river, under skeleton trees sporting a few last leaves, and threw a blanket on the cushy green carpet overlaid in yellow. The Boy laughed at the wind and played in the leaves. Pouffy clouds scudded north, shifting the sky from mostly blue to three-quarters gray and white within half an hour. Last night, I took a walk after dark in a balmy, breezy 70 degrees.

During the night, a cold front rolled in, pushing rain before it. Today, the high will be 45.
* * * * * * *
ADDED:

"Don't you like a rather foggy day in a wood in autumn? You'll find we shall be perfectly warm sitting in the car."

Jane said she'd never heard of anyone liking fogs before but she didn't mind trying. All three got in.

"That's why Camilla and I got married, " said Denniston as they drove off. "We both like Weather. Not this or that kind of weather, but just Weather. It's a useful taste if one lives in England."

"How ever did you learn to do that, Mr. Denniston?" said Jane. "I don't think I should ever learn to like rain and snow."

"It's the other way around," said Denniston. "Everyone begins as a child by liking Weather. You learn the art of disliking it as you grow up.

Noticed it on a snowy day? The grown-ups are all going about with long faces, but look at the children - and the dogs? They know what snow's made for.

-C.S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength, Chapter 5. (HT: The Window in the Garden Wall. I couldn't find our copy this morning. :-)

November thanksgiving 13: advocates

An advocate . . . speaks on behalf of another . . . . Implicit in the concept is the notion that the represented lacks the knowledge, skill, ability, or standing to speak for themselves. (Wikipedia)

1. This past Saturday I heard several advocates for people with disabilities speak. I appreciate improvements they have made over the years in the lives of people with handicaps, though they have sometimes been more radical in their demands than I would have been.

2. I recently picked up Art Gish's* Hebron Journal from the "Middle East" table at our annual International Festival. Gish recounts his experiences as part of a Christian Peacemaker team in the Hebron area, 1995-2001. The team advocated for Palestinians: listening to those on each side of the conflict; reporting to those outside the area; taking meaningful, nonviolent action; and working with other local nonviolent groups.

3. Last week, as part of the Narnia film hoopla, our local paper printed an article on C.S. Lewis, under the headline "C.S. Lewis: Christ's Advocate." (The title seemed backward. See definition above.) Christ is our Advocate, for which we are thankful.

My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. . . .
I John 2:1, KJV

Speaking up for those less powerful is a risk; it takes time, effort, and courage. I'm thankful for advocates, people who speak for the weak.

*Gish is part of New Covenant Fellowship, a Christian commune affiliated with the Church of the Brethren.

Additional reading: Lisa, blogging at Ability Not Disability, shares a story of advocating for her daughter (which ended up with her picture on the front of NY Newsday!).

November thanksgiving 8: lactation consultant

Yesterday I noticed again, in passing, that Beloved Life is a lactation consultant. I had frequently thought of dropping her an email expressing my gratitude for the role our lactation consultant played in the early days of our son's life. So yesterday, I did:

I just have to tell you how important our lactation counselor was in helping me through the early days of our son's life. I was in shock for awhile. His immediate success at nursing was such a boon. It gave me something to work on; it gave me a vision of him being successful; it created that bond from the physical intimacy of nursing. I will never forget that woman: Diane. I am so grateful to her.

When I was pregnant, I learned that Earth Mothers were not the only women nursing. I took infant care classes at the hospital and read a number of books. I learned the nutritional and emotional benefits of nursing, and decided to give it a try. The Lamaze teacher warned* we would have to be aggressive about getting the help of a lactation consultant, in the maternity ward. The other hospital staff would not make it their priority.

I am so thankful to God that I was prepared to do this, before entering the hospital. Once our son was born, bathed, and awake, the lactation consultant came in to assist. He latched on and was able to nurse right away. She said that he was doing better than some of the babies in the nursery. (He spent two and half days in the NICU, to stabilize body temperature, blood sugar, and bilirubin levels.) This was where my connection to my child began. He was not summed up by the label "Down syndrome." He was a learner. He was successful. There was something I could give him that he needed.

I went to the NICU every three to five hours around the clock for the first three days, to nurse. I had one or two terrible experiences during the night when the lactation consultant was off-duty. The nurse on duty had no patience; she inserted a tube in our son's nose and gave me a bottle to squeeze formula in. By the third day, I raised a fuss and had a staff person from Patient Relations in my room.** Our son was moved out of the NICU and into my room, for his last night in the hospital.

Because I was nursing, this (Catholic) hospital allowed me to stay on in my room, at no cost, after my insurance quit paying for it. They stopped the meals and the regular checkups by the nursing staff, but I got the bed and the shower. If another mother had needed the bed, I would have had to leave. God blessed us, and there was room in that inn, at that time--because I was a nursing mother.
* * * * * * *
Beloved Life noted that another benefit of nursing, for her, was the feeling of control it can give the mother of a newborn with special needs. I hadn't thought about this experience for a long time. I think nursing also gave me a feeling of personal competence: I am successful at nursing this child; I can meet his needs in the future. And the feeling radiated out from there to the hospital staff. I can feed this child; I can take care of him; he is my child, even though you are poking him with needles every three hours, isolating him in boxes of glass and karyotypes, and subjecting him to rock music and conversation about Julia Roberts' latest during the night. We belong to each other.

*This was probably my firstclue to my impending role as an advocate for my child.
**His vitals were in the safe range and stable; he was hooked up to a heart monitor for no reason.

November thanksgiving 6: the things they've handed down 1

When our son was an infant, Art Garfunkel's From A Parent to A Child album was recommended on an email list of new moms. I picked up a copy and purely enjoyed it. One song I found especially poignant was "The Things We've Handed Down." The lyrics refer to specific physical traits, but the underlying subtext suggests deeper layers of meaning, related to family and culture, beliefs and values.

I'm thankful for the people who've handed so many things down to me. Last night I re-read the history of Turkey Run* (the oldest continuing Mennonite Church in Ohio), founded in 1803, the year Ohio became a state. The church has never been large, but the people have been steadily faithful. Stories were collated stories for the church's bicentennial celebration two years ago. This one was included to emphasize an aspect of the church's Anabaptist heritage:

During the Civil War both the North and the South attempted to draft Mennonites and Dunkards into the army to fight for their respective causes. Abraham [Good, my great-great grandfather] was one of those who helped people having a conscience against enlisting to escape from the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. One account is given of a group who refused to take up arms. Some ninety Dunkard Brethren and Mennonites met at Weaver's church late one night in the spring of 1862. They were about to be drafted. Their plan was to flee through West Virginia toward freedom into the Ohio Territory, where many of their brethren had already gone.

These men chose as their guide, the mountain hunter, Abraham Good. This capable backwoods man knew the ridges of the Shenandoah Mountains like the back of his hand. Some called him "Sawmill Abe"; others called him "Bear Abe," because he had sometimes shot bears at close range in their dens or, if no bear was in evidence when he arrived at a den, had holed up there himself for the night.

Abraham led this group heading north-west over steep mountains to the Potomac River, where they were stopped by Confederate scouts who demanded they dismount and hand over their horses and guns. One of the men in the gorup insturcted his men "Oh, brethren, pay mightily to God, He will deliver us." Reluctantly the men gave up their mounts, but they carried no guns.

This group was escorted back to Staunton, Virginia, herded on a train and sent to Richmond, Virginia to be imprisoned. As they were called before the examiner of the War Department and stated the reasons why they would not take up arms, the officer became impressed and commanded the Dunkard and Mennonite brethren to be set free. In October of 1862 exemption for conscientious objectors** was enacted. This law provided for hiring substitutes for service by paying conscription fees of $500.00 into the public treasury, of which many families took advantage.*

Following this incident, Good suffered harrassment and narrowly escaped execution, after being accused of carrying war news during trips to Ohio. As a result, he moved his family to northern Ohio. One of his sons, my great-grandfather, settled southeast, near Turkey Run. The church went through many changes over the years, deaths from smallpox, tensions related to language change (from German), migrations for cheaper farmland, etc.

A few years later, a traveling bishop visited. Concerned about retaining the young people, he prayed,

"May God grant that the glorious doctrine of our church, the doctrine for which our forefathers fled from one city to another, and from one country to another, for which thousands laid down their lives at the stake, on the cross and at the block, may still have its divine influence on the hearts and souls of many and lead them to be faithful followers of the meek and lowly Jesus." Grant M. Stoltsfus, Mennonites of the Ohio and Eastern Conference, 1969, p. 94.

Since then, the church has sent a disproportionately large number of its members to serve on the missionfield, in countries including: Somalia, Kenya, Central America, Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Canada.

But there were also many who faithfully served at home, teaching Sunday School classes, cleaning the church, mowing the cemetery and the multitude of other jobs that needed to be done, and without which the service abroad would also not have been accomplished, and which so often are overlooked and unheralded.*

I look back at these people, and at my own grandparents, and am so thankful for the faith and values they handed down, and for the vessels of tradition it was carried in. I wonder how well I am doing at preserving the essentials I received. To whom am I responsible to pass them? In what forms should I carry them?

*All quotes are from The History of Turkey Run Mennonite Church, researched and recorded by C. and L. Wesselhoeft, 2003.
**Law at state and Confederate levels related to conscientious objectors varied over time. Not sure which this is referring to.

November thanksgiving 5: public libraries

I am thankful for the public library system in this country. We owe much of the credit for it to Andrew Carnegie.

In our town, we are especially blessed. Our library is ranked number one in the U.S. this year, in its category.*

*Serving a population of 500,000 or more.

November thanksgiving 1: financial stability

Rebecca at Rebecca Writes has declared November "gratitude month" on her blog, and invited readers to follow suit.* I am going to take her up on it. (It is good for one's character, and might reduce blogging time a little, and give me time to work on my lengthy to-do list.)

With the advent of cooler weather, the furnace goes on, and the humidity in the house goes down. The dry air causes our son to have sinus problems, resulting in difficulty getting to sleep, and late nights all around. We had a humidifier put on the furnace of our old house, but our current house (since last February) doesn't have one. I just called a relative, who owns a heating and cooling business, to arrange for the installation of a humidifier on our furnace. I am thankful we are able to afford to have this done. I know that financial stability is not something to take for granted; we could lose it tomorrow. We have it today, and I am thankful.

*Her choice is intriguing. She lives in the Yukon, where Thanksgiving is in October. She is originally from the U.S., and just recently became a citizen of Canada. I'm wondering if she's homesick a little homesick for her old November holiday. We'll share. :-)

Homing, October 2005
(for Rosa Louise McCauley Parks
February 4, 1913- October 24, 2005)