Saturday, January 13, 2007
Blessed Of My Father (Matthew 25, V's 34-40)
It was not a long way to where we were going, but the drive seemed to go slowly. Piled up snow banked the road we turned on to. All around me felt like frozen quiet.
Near the front entrance a flag at half mast hardly moved its ragged edges. "It's for Ford", my son said, and that seemed out of place. Honor being emphasized where many examples of less than honorable were confined.
Cold that made me feel so tight surrounded me as I got out of the car. We both walked fast to get inside, and through a metal detector. Someone who looked much in charge led us through showing ID and clipping visitor tags on.
The walk to where he was seemed long. The buildings and grounds offered nothing but silence.
Someone with many keys let us in a door, and showed us where to wait, and brought and extra chair. I saw him hurrying toward us, and there he was. A big smile covered his face. Before coming, I wondered what to say, but I stood up, and motioned for him to, and said "Let's measure", and we did, and he smiled again.
In the meantime his Dad opened a pepsi he'd brought him, and laid something beside it, Starburst candies. I smiled, remembering all the times I'd got them for him.
I asked him what it's like being there, and how he spends his time. He pointed to what he called his room, one that looked very narrow. Then I realized it was one of several all the same size. My God, I thought, it's a cell.
Something was hanging on the doors of them, but it was far enough away I couldn't make it out. So I asked, and he explained they have to leave their belts like that, on the outside of the doors. I took a slow deep breath.
We talked of many things. He checked out his dad's surgical sites at the side of his face, and they touched on counciling sessions, and he needed a consent form signed. Some social something he earned enough credit to do.
They discussed how he's doing with school, and it seems he's doing fine. Just passed required math tests, he said, and as he said that, I smiled.
When he was in an early grade, I decided to help him learn math, and offered him a deal. Grand mothers come up with things like that, but I still think it was good. I wrote out a contract we each signed. It included a reward for completing it.
He would learn his multiplication tables, all the way from his 1 x 1's to 12 x 12's. but it was a package deal. He had to learn them all. "How can you do math, if you know only part of them", I'd asked him.
When we'd be together I'd throw out some for him to answer, never in sequence, All jumbled up. So on graduating day, we did that for an hour or so. Bam, bam. bam. He just rattled them off, and I was so proud he'd claimed them for himself.
"Five minutes" the man with keys to the doors pointed out. So we hurried with anything else. Then he hugged me again. "When can I come back', I asked, even though I knew, and he said. "Saturday, every saturday", and waited a moment.
"I will, I'll be back", I promised, and we hugged goodbye, and his big smile looked so good that I didn't cry. I hardly noticed the chasing cold following me back to the car, where I looked at the flag again, and this time I smiled.
Near the front entrance a flag at half mast hardly moved its ragged edges. "It's for Ford", my son said, and that seemed out of place. Honor being emphasized where many examples of less than honorable were confined.
Cold that made me feel so tight surrounded me as I got out of the car. We both walked fast to get inside, and through a metal detector. Someone who looked much in charge led us through showing ID and clipping visitor tags on.
The walk to where he was seemed long. The buildings and grounds offered nothing but silence.
Someone with many keys let us in a door, and showed us where to wait, and brought and extra chair. I saw him hurrying toward us, and there he was. A big smile covered his face. Before coming, I wondered what to say, but I stood up, and motioned for him to, and said "Let's measure", and we did, and he smiled again.
In the meantime his Dad opened a pepsi he'd brought him, and laid something beside it, Starburst candies. I smiled, remembering all the times I'd got them for him.
I asked him what it's like being there, and how he spends his time. He pointed to what he called his room, one that looked very narrow. Then I realized it was one of several all the same size. My God, I thought, it's a cell.
Something was hanging on the doors of them, but it was far enough away I couldn't make it out. So I asked, and he explained they have to leave their belts like that, on the outside of the doors. I took a slow deep breath.
We talked of many things. He checked out his dad's surgical sites at the side of his face, and they touched on counciling sessions, and he needed a consent form signed. Some social something he earned enough credit to do.
They discussed how he's doing with school, and it seems he's doing fine. Just passed required math tests, he said, and as he said that, I smiled.
When he was in an early grade, I decided to help him learn math, and offered him a deal. Grand mothers come up with things like that, but I still think it was good. I wrote out a contract we each signed. It included a reward for completing it.
He would learn his multiplication tables, all the way from his 1 x 1's to 12 x 12's. but it was a package deal. He had to learn them all. "How can you do math, if you know only part of them", I'd asked him.
When we'd be together I'd throw out some for him to answer, never in sequence, All jumbled up. So on graduating day, we did that for an hour or so. Bam, bam. bam. He just rattled them off, and I was so proud he'd claimed them for himself.
"Five minutes" the man with keys to the doors pointed out. So we hurried with anything else. Then he hugged me again. "When can I come back', I asked, even though I knew, and he said. "Saturday, every saturday", and waited a moment.
"I will, I'll be back", I promised, and we hugged goodbye, and his big smile looked so good that I didn't cry. I hardly noticed the chasing cold following me back to the car, where I looked at the flag again, and this time I smiled.
