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Where I Come From and Where I’m Going

(Apologies ahead of time for neglecting my The Good Kind of Quirky section lately. I receive your rebukes and kind of like that some of you are friend-stalking me through this category.)

The two guys pictured above are my brothers, David and John.

Our sibling group spans eight years from oldest to youngest, which should of course lead you to conclude that I’m by farrrrr the baby of the family (unless saying that gives me away).

They’re the reason I still to this day happily scoop frogs out of our backyard with my son.

And why I even now like working on my spiral in the backyard.

And the reason I’ve cut my nails and left my earrings on the hoods of cars more times than I can count to ~~play~~ get destroyed in pig, horse, lightning, knockout, 21, <insert any game where having 7-foot wingspans is an advantage>.

Believe me, they show no mercy.

It wasn’t always this way. The day I graduated from high school, David and I were eye to eye and John was head and shoulders below that. But that was a short-lived reality.

I remember the first time I realized the new pecking order had been established. It happened somewhere between the moment when I released a snowball and the moment when I found myself being held by my ankles face-down in the snow.

More than nurturing a healthy dose of tomboy in me, they’ve provided a model for peer relationships that has pushed me to deeply enjoy friendships with both genders. And the mutuality and belonging we manage is the near sole inspiration for the pieces I’ll eventually write on a more spiritual expression of brotherhood (no, still haven’t landed on a better word and yes, feminista objectors, I know I have to eventually =).

(I need something that taps into the romantic appeal of inspiring bondedness and deep allegiance. And I just don’t find it in the alternative terms that have been suggested so far.)

I think there’s good reason to believe what is stirring in me on that front will continue to define the role I play as a writer and influencer-of-sorts for the rest of my life.

But like a lot of you, there are projects that you get to now and there are projects that simmer inside of you while you get out from under the work staring you in the eye (like, for example, deadlines for other book projects).

Or while you keep one distracted eye on the three year old that keeps putting a cheeto in your infant’s mouth, candy cigarette style.

So I’m doing what I need to do to get from where I am now to what is to come. But I just wanted you to know that the “in the meantime” is pretty dang good too.

The Thanksgiving Sanity pledge went off without a hitch.

I, the only-mildly-domestic non-diva whose most inspiring cooking sessions occur with my toddler, resisted any stress impulse and kicked back into gratitude despite playing hostess. I, along with Melissa (Dave’s wife), even recruited the guys to pick up the felt turkey placecard-making where the three toddlers left off.

(I have to admit, Dave and Chuck were under-equipped for the task, but John can at least pass as a felt turkey-making hack.)

The day ended up being unnaturally warm, so backyard fare broke out more than once, which included the hill-rolling antics pictured here.

And there was something good and wholesome in standing there, watching life come full circle, knowing I still believed in tossing cheap earrings to the wind for a pickup game…and that I still passionately believe a little grass stains and scuffs are worth a tumble through the dirt and leaves. For us and our kids.

Brotherhood only swells bigger as the days go on. And that’s good, because that’s the direction I want it to move–genetically and theologically.

When Chuck and I lit our Unity Candle at our wedding, some of you remember we moved the other way out…from God to us to community, my attempts at experiencing family having always aimed at being uncharateristically absorbing and un-dependent on DNA.

All that is coming in the steady, baited way good things do.

For now, though, slide some cookies under my door, dear friends. I’ve got manuscripts to finish.

Much love and encouragements to go roll down the nearest hill.