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Apparently, the primary lesson one Sunday centered on honesty. As good parents do, we prodded our children as to what they learned asking questions such as, what does honestly mean? Do you want to be honest? Is it easy to be honest? Do you know someone who is always honest? To this last question, Klark answered, "Not grandpa." Again, we prodded. Which grandpa? When was he not honest? Here is the story as told by Klark:
Grandpa Whiteley lied in church. Everybody thought it was funny. On Sunday, Grandpa gave a talk and he said to everybody that grandma sat in pee then had to stand in a long line with wet pants. He said that grandma used to have a big nose and never makes him any pies. He said she had a very bad day.
The good news for Grandma is that Klark knows those things were not so. The bad news for grandpa is that Klark thinks he was not honest. Don't worry, Grandpa, we rearranged the comments to help him understand better what had happened. Klark can attest to the fact that Grandma does make pies (he has tasted them), he can look at her nose and know it isn't big, and as for her sitting in pee? Well, I think Grandpa can best address this part of the story.
The day began with a late night before. I wanted Klark to have the Thanksgiving lunch at school and knew that I must pay before school at least one day before the day he is to eat school lunch. Hence, Thursday morning I ventured out with my gang totalling four children and one adult to visit Morningside Elementary with the necessary $1.75. I must backtrack a little to create better the imagery I am trying to invoke with this blog post. You see, I left my purse at the Lincoln Log house where I painted doors and baseboards into the night holding one baby and interrupted by three others needing either drinks of water, food, scratches on the DVD to be forwarded through, peace to be restored, or stinky diapers to be changed. That night, however, is a story in and of itself to be left for another time. Too much complaining makes me look bad. My point: no purse, no money. Living half in one house and half in another left me without a penny to my instant disposal and having no husband this week left me without pocket change and a little frazzled. I called on Lanse for help and he had $1. 07 (his piggy bank had been moved, as well, however he somehow manages to always have coins) and I remembered a time when Della had showered me with change one day for no reason I can understand and I believed there was a strong likelihood it hadn't all been recovered. The search began and in the end we had $1. 74 to bargain with. I, still in my pajamas, hair ruffled, and obviously no makeup, took my children still in their pajamas, with the exception of Klark who had to attend school that day, to the school to purchase the Thanksgiving school lunch. Klark was worried about the one cent and we decided to pray that we would find a penny on our walk to the school. Our search was in vain although not due to lack of effort. Klark, particular as he is, was worried to say the least. I assured him and sent him to class. The nice lady in the lunch room came to our assistance and I explained that I was one cent short as I dropped the change with mostly nickles, but some dimes, pennies and even one quarter into her hand. She looked at Lanse wearing pajamas that were at least two sizes too small (surely she didn't consider that they were McQueen pajamas and highly favored by the boy despite their small size), the toddler with out of control hair and her toes sticking our of her footsie pajamas, and the baby with mismatched socks on her hands for gloves and pajamas with her footsies completely cut off. Of course Leah didn't keep her hat on and her nose was runny and her eyes red and gubbery. Lanse looked at the school children eating Fruit Loops in the lunch room and went something like this: "Mom, I want Fruit Loops really bad. We never get Fruit Loops and I love them. We only get oatmeal, oatmeal, oatmeal." Della started jumping up and down saying, "Yeah, Fruit Loops." The nice lady asked, "Do you have reduced lunch?" I answered in the negative. "Let me give you an application," she said. I said something like no thank you. "It is easy," said the nice lady. "Let's fill out the application together right now." Again, I turned down her kindness. Lanse was crying (a forlorn whine, I would say) by this point. "Please, let me help. I will write down your information for you." My lack of response to this was credited to my begging children and the nice lady offered the children a bowl of Fruit Loops which they gobbled up in seconds. I consented to take an application home and the nice lady graciously assured me that my missing one cent was of no concern. On the way home, Lanse found a dime.
Am I to conclude that that is what destitute may look like? Perhaps. Perhaps it is the look of a mother who is two steps behind in life, in a hurry, frustrated, and unorganized. Or perhaps it is the look of a loving, yet sometimes overworked mother of four in the middle of moving and fixing a home with a sick (pink eye) and fussy baby who doesn't sleep much at night. Did this experience weigh on me? On the contrary. I must say that it brought to my remembrance my blessings. I love my husband who works so hard for my family and does everything he does thinking of our welfare, my children who are the delight and hope in my life, my family who, as moving sometimes reminds me, hold tender strings in my heart, a home that is ours and that we can establish as our very own with flowers and memories and everything, and the fact that I can afford school lunch for my child if I choose (just not that day). We may have created the look of destitute, but my life is indeed full.
Della is exquisitely delightful, yet, her youth in all it's bloom is the hardest to catch on paper. Her newest phrase consists of, "member (remember), mom?" to most things whether past tense or present. She now uses "mover (mother), faver, brover, and sister" when addressing her family. She and Lanse have grand adventures together mixing spiderman attacks on their stuffed animal den and superheros and house. Della loves to talk on the telephone. Her language skills are splendid and her ability to tell stories from the past is uncanny as well as comical. She understands Strawberry as if it were her first name and can always lighten my mood.
The orange spiderman can shoot out razor blades. What? You didn't know there was an orange spiderman? Well, there are as many spidermen as there are colors of the rainbow and if you have any questions about any of them, Lanse has all the answers. He knows. The pink spiderman (always played by Della) makes everybody fall to sleep, the red spiderman causes monster trucks to run over you, the yellow spiderman shoots smoke bombs, grenades, and colorful explosives that look like fireworks, the green spiderman shoots glue, goo, and gum sticking you to the spot where you stand, the yellow spiderman jumps as high as the sun and sings a lot of songs, and the purple spiderman is faster than the Flash and has bullets, and the blue spiderman? Dah, haven't you ever seen the movie. That is him (with some red on him). There are of course gold, silver, grey, white, and black spidermen as well. I somehow forget much of there mystical abilities and will endeavor to acquire an interview with Lanse, for I think he is the only one with all the answers.
Here is child who will never leave the bathroom without washing his hands, go to bed without brushing his teeth, wear shoes without socks, lie, or eat an entire piece of chocolate at once. He is a scientist inside out. His love for reading is intense and nonfiction knowledge he has of the world is boggling, to say the least. He knows definitions to words such as "hermaphrodite, cephalopod, mutation, and mitosis" and knows what a double helix is. Today he told me he is ready to learn more about the brain. We will learn together. Certainly this child was designed for something very specific.
