Whose Soul Can Magnify the Lord?

So already, it's hot out there. In light of this, you may be wanting to set aside more active, physically demanding pursuits for the cerebral, sedentary one of reading.

Light Streaming Through Vessels, Magnified Perhaps

Vessel Talk

If that's your decision, and this blog is your choice of reading matter, be forewarned that it meanders even more than my usual wandering posts, ranging from ancient biblical sources to the Bach Magnificat to my kitchen renovation. So you may want to pour a cold beverage into your favorite drinking vessel before settling into your preferred reading spot and putting your feet up on the nearest coffee table or porch rail. Before you do even that, though, please note the array of multi-colored glass vessels through which light gleams in the adjacent photo*--and be forewarned: I am deliberately using the word "vessel" at the start of this paragraph.

 

Ah, vessels! Among the various kinds, there are sea-going ones; blood-carrying ones; shattered ones once filled with Divine light, according to Jewish mystical tradition; and human ones, courtesy of the figurative language employed in the Hebrew and Christian Bibles.  

 

Summer 2024

But wait: let's turn aside briefly from these ancient vessels for a moment for a quick look at the here-and-now. It's been a politically unsettling summer for many of us. And a personally unsettling one for my husband Scott and me since our kitchen is being renovated. Most of our drinking vessels are currently packed in cardboard boxes stashed in our bedroom and closets; other boxes have briefly filled other spaces. Not surprisingly, the project has pretty much swallowed our physical space and disrupted our living patterns.

 

Even before we began this project, I understood that disruption is a prerequisite for major change of any kind. What I hadn't fully understood, though, was that disruption actually creates unforeseen seize-able opportunities when it re-configures time and space.

 

Knowing the first two months of summer would be marked by disruptions of time and place, I decided to use the weirdly placed parcels of time I would have to rediscover, rescue, and jump-start my stalled creativity. The excuses I had all spring for not tackling the questions of "what should I write" and "should I be writing at all" were gone: the Celtics championship season was over, my singing lesson "school year" had concluded, my poetry group had just begun its "summer off," and my periodic deep-cleaning impulses were a complete mismatch with the reality of the renovation moment.

Back to Julia Cameron

As I anticipated having to spend time in my office-kitchen while the power saw wailed and the electric screwdriver revved and punched in the other room, I thought back to the satisfying experience of completing Julia Cameron's twelve-week The Artist's Way course during the summer of 2015. It had provided just enough gentle structure and worthwhile provocation to help me get out of my own creative way.

 

With that in mind, I purchased Cameron's Walking in This World: The Practical Art of Creativity. "Further Steps Along the Artist's Way" the banner at the top of its cover proclaimed, reassuring me that I wasn't the only one who needed a Cameron refresher. I loved that the book's subtitle described creativity as an art, as opposed to describing the book as a practical guide to creativity.

My plan was to start the Walking in This World course right after participating in a vocal recital along with the other students of my voice teacher, Karin Foley. In retrospect, I realize how useful it was to do something artistic, collective, and demanding right before embarking on the next Cameron challenge. For all of us, "serious" solo singing is a stretch that permits us to experience ourselves in new musical ways, creating in each of us a different sense of performance possibility. And we're excellent cheerleaders for one another!

Preparing to Walk in This World

During the week before the recital, I took the time to reread and think about the four poems I'd managed to get published in the past year. When I realized that the two of which I was proudest drew from Jewish sources, I immediately committed to one action step to stimulate my creativity: reading cover-to-cover Here All Along: Finding Meaning, Spirituality, and a Deeper Connection to Life in Judaism by Sarah Hurwitz, a former chief speechwriter for Michelle Obama.

 

When I'd delved into the book before, I'd marveled at the similarity between Hurwitz's Hebrew School experiences and my own, and at Hurwitz's ability to summarize and distill complex narratives and arguments while making sure that her readers never forget that another Jewish writer might highlight different Jewish ideas as particularly central and transformative.

So the last week of June, serenaded by the sounds of the lower kitchen cabinets' being power-screwed into place, I began reading Hurwitz's book from the very beginning. In the first chapter--in which Hurwitz summarizes Judaism's most sacred text, the Torah (or the Pentateuch or Five Books of Moses), in just six pages--I came across an important Jewish idea that, like Hurwitz, I hadn't known originated in the Torah, specifically in Genesis 1:27, in which God creates humans in His own divine image.

 

Made in God's Image

To share it with you, I will quote from Hurwitz, who herself quotes from Rabbi Yitz Greenberg:

The belief that every single one of us is created in the image of God has been cited as the defining Jewish idea, the beating heart of the entire Jewish enterprise. And you don't have to believe in any kind of deity or higher power to appreciate its implications. Drawing on an ancient Jewish teaching, Rabbi Yitz Greenberg argues that this idea is shorthand for three fundamental truths, which he deems the 'three in-alienable dignities':

1. We are each of infinite worth--no one is expendable, and we cannot quantify the value of any human life.
2. We are fundamentally equal--no human being  is any more important than any other human being.
3. We are each totally unique--there is no one else like us, and no one is interchangeable with anyone else. (15-16) **

The first two of the dignities I totally appreciated as rooted in the Creation story. But that third one surprised me. Had it arisen from the language of "His image" and "male and female He created them," I wondered. God's image--the one God's image, His image--was inherently differentiated, made up of two different kinds at least, and by extension many others. 

 

Sparks of Divinity and Individual Difference

And all those different kinds of people so made, according to mystical Judaism, contain sparks of Divinity. Practically speaking, it made sense: if you're going to renovate a kitchen, let alone repair a world, you need people who can do different things: contractors, cabinet-makers, plumbers, appliance-haulers, electricians, inspectors, to name a few. You also need people who want to renovate a kitchen or repair the world. Who want to do a good job of it.

 

David Brook Illustration Accompanying Chabad Reply

As a Jew who believes that everyone contains a spark of the Divine, I had struggled for years to understand the relationship of my individuality to that spark of God within me. How much, I wondered, could and should I cultivate my individuality, my difference from others, which, for reasons that elude me, I believed existed in opposition to this "equal" spark? Eventually I resolved my conflict, in part because I recognized that Stepford Jews was neither the reality I saw nor the goal of the "Jewish enterprise," as Hurwitz called it. 

 

But I might have resolved it sooner had I come across Tzvi Freeman's reply to a question on the Chabad website: "Why do you assume that the divine spark expresses itself identically in all people? Perhaps the opposite is true: It is that divine spark that makes each of us unique and gives us purpose."***

 

"Different" is therefore natural--and intended for the good of a world in need of repair, or tikkun olam. According to the Lubavitcher Rebbe, "Each person contains sparks that they must elevate. The sparks wait for him to come and elevate them."**** Based on these two teachings, divine sparks give rise to different people, who are bidden, no doubt in their different ways, to lift up those sparks, for world's sake.

Chosen Ones: Moses and Mary

Of course, to read the Torah or anything about it is to encounter Moses, and his sister Miriam and brother Aaron, each of whom was made in God's image, made different from the other two, made important, and made equal to the other two. When Moses--who, like Joe Biden, stuttered--recommended that his brother Aaron lead the Israelites instead of himself, God wasn't having it. That got me thinking about Moses' uniqueness and the whole question of who among all of us equal and important ones is most suited to do a particular job or play a particular role. 

 

And that got me thinking about Mary, Jesus's mother--not surprisingly, given that I had taught "The Bible as Literature" for years and had sung, as choral singer, all kinds of music related to the Annunciation and the Crucifixion. Mary's an amazing figure and character: as a young woman, she takes it relatively in stride when the angel Gabriel informs her that she's the "highly favored one" who will bear God's child, accepting his extraordinary news only after questioning him. 

 

The Magnificat

When not much later Elizabeth recognizes Mary's situation, Mary expresses her joy and understanding, and also reveals her considerable skill as a poet, in her praise poem often called The Magnificat. In it, she employs the multiple kinds of poetic parallelism found typically in the Psalms and other writings in the Jewish Bible. She also borrows themes and motifs from the books of Isaiah and Amos to suggest the urgent need for social transformations that will end oppression and inequality. In other words, Mary, a Jewish girl, expresses herself very Jewishly.

 

She also speaks more personally, acknowledging that she's at once the lowly handmaiden--no more important than you and me--and the favored one chosen to bear and then raise God's child, and then rejoicing in that honor. In this context, courtesy of her good character, faithfulness and spiritual depth, Mary is a vessel "for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work" (2 Timothy 2:21). "A virgin unspotted," as she is called in William Billings' "Judea," she, unlike many other candidates for "vesseldom," hasn't needed to undergo a spiritual cleansing in order to merit the role and honor conferred on her.

 

So what does it mean that her soul "magnifies" the Lord--and please know that not every translator of the Greek in which The Magnificat was recorded chose "magnifies" as the translation of whatever word Mary would have spoken in Aramaic. Still, since connotations matter, "magnifies" is worth paying attention to. 

 

Magnifying God: How and Who?

Can God--who is often conceived as vast and limitless--become larger through the actions of a human soul? Maybe. If so, the lesson to be learned is that people are really powerful.

 

Or is Mary's choice of verb more figurative: is it intended to reflect how deeply and intensely she appreciates and feels compelled to convey God's boundless reach and eternal commitment to his Creation? When I think of the intent of "magnify" in this way, it suddenly makes sense to me why J.S. Bach's setting of The Magnificat, replete with its trumpet fanfares, its many movements of varying moods and levels of intimacy, and its momentous, multi-voiced Gloria, can succeed at representing a humble young woman's personal and nuanced outpouring of gratitude, thought, and feeling.

So does this mean that anyone's soul can magnify the Lord? Well, potentially, yes. But there would have to be caveats. No doubt magnification would require a forceful, confident, enlightened spiritual effort. I could be very wrong about that, though.

 

A magnified section of a Scott Ketcham painting

There's also a related question: would every soul want to magnify the Lord? I can imagine every soul's wanting to magnify something--to assert, announce, or push something meaningful, valuable, and expressive of itself out into the world. But the connection between this intent and God might be far less explicit and central in the world views of some individuals. And for some, it might not exist at all.

 

Magnification and Walking in This World

So with those two questions hanging out in the air, let me digress even further to explain what got me thinking about the word "magnify" last week. In the second session of the Walking in This World course, entitled "Discovering a Sense of Proportion," Cameron talks about the challenge of--and the frequent necessity of--imagining ourselves as "larger" than we're accustomed to. 

 

What holds us back from seeing a magnified and magnifying version of ourselves? Explains Cameron, "Frightened of being big-headed and egotistical, we seldom ask 'Am I being too limited, too small for who I really am?' Expansion can be frightening."***** (41-2). And when we do feel ready to spread our wings and be public about our expanding wingspan, some friends may continue to see us as smaller for any number of reasons, which doesn't help us. "The tricky part about changing sizes creatively is that we want to keep our old friends but not our old identity," says Cameron (43). 

 

"Hidden Anger #1" by Bob Hunt *(6)

As we begin to change, we can become angry at ourselves and at others. But as Cameron explains in third week of the course, "Discovering a Sense of Proportion," "Anger is a call to action. It is challenging and important to let our light shine. It is important to name ourselves [acknowledge our creative selves] rather than wait for someone else to do it, or pretend that we can bear it when we can't." (67).

Light, Hidden Light, and Names

Light, hidden light, and names: all very Jewish stuff. If you'll bear with me further, I'll say more about each, and then try to make all of them relate to this question of whose soul can magnify.

1. First, Cameron concurs with the Jewish mystical belief that all of us, equally important and unique, contain sparks of Divine light, and she would probably concur that we're bidden to lift them out of their hiding places and manifest them in the world. Cameron also recognizes that for various ones of us, our interior light has become so well hidden for completely understandable reasons that it requires special techniques to be liberated. Our interior light can need help to expose itself to the light of the exterior world.
   
2. Second, in Jewish mystical teaching, "a name is an intermediary between heaven and earth . . . which defines and shapes the light."*(7) So when, as Cameron says, we name ourselves by calling ourselves artists, we channel our interior Divine light so it can manifest itself in the world in a/the way most expressive of our authentic selves and souls. For those for whom making art is akin to being expressive of God--as it is for Cameron--this idea and Cameron's embrace of it may particularly resonate.
   
3. Third, as I learned today in my pursuit of better understanding magnification, telescopes need light in order to make visible distant objects, which often appear dim as well as small. Telescopes both "Gather light (make things appear brighter than they do with the naked eye)" and "Magnify the image (make things appear larger than they do with the naked eye)."*(8) Light, perhaps, might help us perceive light, even light hidden in the remote recesses of our selves.
   

So what does all of this signify? In my estimation, magnification is essentially a ratcheting up of praise to its highest level--praise on steroids. So the question of whose soul can magnify the Lord--or the artistic impulse, or anything else--has everything to do with the effort, insight and understanding, and intention behind it. Names and praise can exist simply as words in our mouths. Or, fueled by the light within us, they can be drivers and bullhorns respectively, forces that, after registering their presence in the world, influence it, or even transform it.

Liberating the LIght Within

Of course, there's plenty that can bury, obscure, or downright snuff out light. Biblical books of prophecy talk about the refiner's fire that burns away the impurities, the clogging dross that taints our souls and thus dims our inner light. The annual Jewish rite of teshuvah, undertaken before and during the Jewish High Holy days, is essentially a process of removing all that worldly build-up that stands between God and ourselves collectively and individually. Though Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak did not use the word "vessel," he may as well have when he compared the work of teshuvah--deliberate, reflective, and focused-- "to cleaning, repairing and rebuilding a soiled or broken container" (Jacobson, 17).

Similarly, the literature written to guide, inspire, and reassure blocked creatives, emerging artists, or artists in recovery emphasizes the necessity of removing or blocking impediments to our creativity, and cultivating methods for doing so. Like The Artist's Way, Walking in this World prescribes the daily routine of writing "morning pages"--three pages of anything designed primarily as "the daily broom that clears my consciousness and readies it for the day's inflow of fresh thought" (8). Only just now as I was searching for this quotation did I realize that the book's cover drawing depicts a man sweeping next to a vigorously flowing stream.

 

In addition, morning pages can give rise to writing ideas. They served up the idea for this blog post, and when they did, heeding a question and answer in and the Week #1 session--"Do I want to make this? If that answer is yes, then begin" (19)--I got writing. No second-guessing, no putting off. And if you're still reading, please understand that as a way of clearing away all of my usual "'Do I dare?' and, 'Do I dare?'"*(10) self-sabotaging, dross-producing techniques, I determined to write everything I wanted to say, even if this blog got far too long, far too geeky and rarefied, and so wide-ranging in its content that its center would not hold. Thank you, T.S. Eliot and W. B. Yeats!

And all this because of a kitchen renovation project that created limitations and possibilities, plus a desire to get back on track creatively? You never know what's going to give you the opportunity to get busy cleansing your vessel. If you've read to this point, thank you for your indulgence: I've enjoyed feeling entitled to write lengthily about topics and questions that intrigue me. This blog and I myself have not magnified the Lord today. But I am feeling larger and braver, and that was my goal. A good feeling and a good goal.

* Photograph on Pinterest, chosen by me because I see the light as streaming through vessels, perhaps magnified: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/f6/5a/34/f65a34bbcd7f0116388506c5358e0c87.jpg

** Hurwitz, S. (2019). Here all along: Finding meaning, spirituality, and a deeper connection to life--in Judaism (after finally choosing to look there). Spiegel & Grau. 

*** Freeman, T. (n.d.). Individuality and the Divine Spark. Chabad. https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/676238/jewish/Individuality-and-the-Divine-Spark.htm

*** Photograph found on prettyblog.com: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/87/e8/ef/87e8ef5460f999887cf60892be47ff9d.jpg

**** Sparks (Nitzotzot). (2024). SPARKS (Nitzotzot). Retrieved July 10, 2024. https://www.nitsotsot.com/t-en-us/

***** Cameron, J. (2003). Walking in this world: The practical art of creativity. Penguin Random House.

*(6) Painting: Hunt, B. (2022) Hidden Anger #1. Artspur. Retrieved July 10, 2024. https://www.artsper.com/ae/contemporary-artworks/painting/1875171/hidden-anger-1*

*(7) Jacobson, S. (2008). 60 days: A spiritual guide to the high holidays. New York: Kiyum Press.  

*(8) Magnification. (2024). Stellarvue. Retrieved July 10, 2024. https://www.stellarvue.com/magnification/ 

 *(9) from T.S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock": https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/44212/the-love-song-of-j-alfred-prufrock

*(10) Photograph of image fround on Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/516154807269545929/

Reflections on Early June Events In and Out of School

How I wish I knew the name of this NQHS graduate!

So already, let me begin by saying that I had strong feelings about three public events I "witnessed" in the last two weeks. Two of them unfolded on my television screen. One of them transpired just blocks from my house.

I didn't attend the North Quincy High School (NQHS) Class of 2024 graduation*, which happened streets away from my house. But I did watch the steady stream of proud families walking toward the athletic stadium where the Class of 2024 was set to receive their diplomas. As a former teacher, I'm always moved by how joyful and meaningful graduations are for families: high school graduation isn't assumed in every family. And this was a graduating class who began high school during the COVID-19 pandemic and had to adjust to multiple instructional "new normals" over the course of their high school careers. Congratulations, Class of 2024.

 

As I thought about how exciting and consuming the end of high school is for graduating seniors, I wondered whether any of them in the days before their graduation had managed to pay attention to the two national news stories that had had such strong emotional effects on me. Had any of them watched the elevating, humbling commemoration of the eightieth anniversary of D-Day**, and all it represented in terms of the merging of national and personal sacrifice for the sake of preserving freedom? So many whose lives were lost or forever changed on the beaches of Normandy that day were very close in age to those graduating.

 

Similarly, had any of them heard Representative Byron Donalds' discouraging, dumbfounding comments about Jim Crow, which he characterized as contributing positively to the strength and unity of Black families? Or had any of them seen Reverend Al Sharpton challenge Donalds on the June 9 episode of Politics Nation****, also disseminated on social media? Donalds responded to Sharpton's questions with many poor answers and non-answers.

Because I know that such events create "teachable moments," it is possible that in their last classroom moments at NQHS, these students had experienced video and audio captures of these events and had had the chance to discuss them. I hope they did. But even without such teachable moments having been orchestrated at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, where I spent most of my teaching career, few if any students would have felt that Byron Donalds got it right about Jim Crow. 

I have to wonder where, how, and from whom Donalds**** learned about Jim Crow. Since I am almost certain he learned that Jim Crow was a problem and danger for African-Americans, even if its most violent manifestations weren't shared or referenced as part of classroom instruction, I also have to wonder when and why in the last few years, he's happened or chosen to "unlearn" what he understood about Jim Crow as a younger, less political person.

I also have to wonder how many American fans of Nazism and autocracy have relatives and neighbors who fought in World War II against the Nazis and pro-authoritarian forces. How, when, and why did these present-day American pro-fascists become convinced that the fascists and mass murderers were the enlightened good guys? Do their robust "beliefs" reflect a lack of historical understanding; a shared, stoked sense of  grievance and marginalization; social and political pressure to unlearn former understandings; and/or undeveloped critical thinking skills, which are especially essential in an era when conspiracy theories, misinformation, and "herd mentality," as Hermann Hesse called it in Demian, abound?

As an educator, retired or not, I do wonder what role American education--as a set of practices, policies, and priorities--has played in this current state of affairs--and what "education" should do next. These are questions of vision and accountability, though education is at most minimally responsible for our nation's bitter divisions. I also recognize that I am asking these questions in the context of the recent vitriolic Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion debates in which education has frequently been characterized as indoctrinating students. I'm sure there's been indoctrination in some classrooms, but not most.

Regardless of anyone's politics, any talk about school-based education must take into account two realities. The first is that so much of value could be taught in schools. The second is that there are a finite number of hours in any school day or year, requiring hard choices about what content, skills, and habits of mind should be cultivated in the available instructional time.

Kris Newton*****, key member of the teacher team

This question of what to teach in the time available reminds me of the disciplined, thoughtful work the teachers of the ninth-grade physics course at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School did years ago. All CRLS ninth-graders--not just the ones who like science and/or are apt to excel in it--take this course, which supports them in developing important understandings of the behavior of matter and energy in the physical world--and, ideally, creates in them a desire to study more physics later in high school. When passing a science MCAS (Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System) exam became a requirement for these students, their teachers worked collaboratively to identify which conceptual understandings, information, and skills had to be acquired by every student; which ideally should be; and which could be considered enriching and thus more optional.

 

Similarly, groups of history teachers, historians, and government and civics teachers have gone through comparable processes over the years to specify the content, skills, and habits of mind needed by all students to succeed in history class and life beyond high school. Given the breadth and depth of history, their challenge is always "selecting from" without oversimplifying complicated realities and/or overlooking historical events and narratives critically important to different Americans. Faced with the need to teach less rather than more, one possible solution has been for teachers to be completely transparent about what the required history course was "leaving out," and where and how it might be explored beyond or even within the required history course. 

 

Though I'm not a history teacher and not part of these conversations, I can't resist saying that I believe that every student in America needs to understand the causes, effects, purposes, and legacies of both Jim Crow and World War II. And every student has to begin to understand them during their  K-12 educations: many Americans don't study American history formally after middle school and high school.

 

So even though I've just talked about important content, I must now assert that lots of educational accountability is not about content. There was a method to my madness above in mentioning both the MCAS and Reverend Sharpton's interview of Byron Donalds. In an educational environment in which exam results are important determinants of their futures, students must develop cross-disciplinary skills related to literacy and logic. In particular, they need to become savvy readers of multiple-choice and open-ended questions who can understand what those questions are asking; what kinds of thinking are needed to answer them; and what responses to them constitute actual answers, not tangential or obfuscating facts or analyses. 

 

Upon recognizing this, we teachers at CRLS recognized that we needed to step up our instructional game. For example, because many multiple-choice questions****** require students either to infer from one or more specifics, to summarize, to compare or contrast, or to generalize, we needed to help students recognize and acquire the language signaling each of these thinking requests. This meant becoming more deliberate about the language we ourselves used to elicit student responses: while asking our students "what do you think" might lead students to infer, conclude, or react, they were better served when we used the specific thinking language they were likely to encounter on the exam. 

 

In addition, we needed to abandon well-intended but potentially misleading teacher mantras such as "the answer is in the text": too often, we noticed when we analyzed test data, when students weren't sure which multiple-choice answer to select, they chose the response that contained language quoted directly from the text rather than the response that inferred something from that language. We also had to warn students about the danger of relying too heavily on prior knowledge: something they understood about climate change, for example, might have nothing to do with the aspect of climate change being discussed in the reading passage about which the test was asking them questions.

As a result of our and their efforts, many of our students got better at knowing when responses to questions weren't actually answers to them and why--which makes me believe that when politicians respond to questions with non-answers, many American students know it. Fortunately, the critical thinking skills students develop in classrooms, even when one of the goals is test prep, are widely applicable beyond the classroom.

 

Meanwhile, it's fun to think of the scores these politicians******* would have gotten on the MCAS, given their penchant for non-answering. Most never would have graduated from high school.

 

Most Americans, especially younger ones who haven't sworn loyalty to particular political parties, employers, and organizations, aren't nearly as stupid, illogical, or hoodwink-able as many politicians think. In my experience, young people, especially when deeply engaged (though engaging them deeply can take a lot of effort),  are observant, astute, discerning, and thoughtful. Too often, if politicians and the media talk about them at all, they are pathologized, pitied, or disdained--or viewed only as a market or future workforce, not as people with lives in the present. Young people know this. They know how they do and don't matter to many of those who have political power.

 

These younger Americans, unlike many politicians, are seldom motivated exclusively by money and power. They have hopes and fledgling visions of their personal futures as they embark on the adventure of adulthood. No doubt as time goes on, many of them will encounter the forces in American life that pressure or tempt them to go against their better judgment in the ballot box and their daily lives. I hope the graduates in the high school class of 2024 will hold onto their values, their critical thinking skills, and perhaps, most importantly, their dreams, even if those dreams need altering now and again. I hope they will find sources of inspiration and hope as they make their ways.

* Photo by Greg Durr of the The Patriot Ledger: North Quincy High graduation ceremony at Veterans Stadium under a setting sun on Monday June 10, 2024: https://www.patriotledger.com/picture-gallery/news/2024/06/11/north-quincy-high-school-graduation-2024/74055686007/

** Screen shots of image found on the following link: http://www.outandaboutinparis.com/2011/08/normandy-american-cemetery-and-memorial.html Retrieved on June 9, 2024, and 

*** Screen shot of tweet of @PoliticsNation tweet posted on June 8, 2024.

**** Screen shot of Byron Donalds on The Daily Beast website: https://www.thedailybeast.com/inside-the-push-to-make-rep-byron-donalds-donald-trumps-veep-pick

***** Screen shot of photo of Kris Newton on CPSD website: https://crls.cpsd.us/school_news/kristin_newton_chosen_as_2023_m_a_finalist_for_the

****** Screen shot of photo found on the following link: https://www.palomar.edu/testwritingstrategies/wp-content/uploads/sites/97/2015/04/multiple-choice-test.jpg

******* Screen shot of photo related to the following link on the San Diego Union Tribune website: https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/2019/11/27/standardized-tests-reward-kids-from-wealthy-families/

The Fundamental Things Apply . . .

So already, I write to tell tales of out of school--or really, out of the section of the skilled nursing floor of the senior living community where my mother and about fifteen other people live and are cared for. I debated briefly about whether I should share these stories since they're not my own, but decided to because they have something to teach that, frankly, I didn't know, didn't appreciate nearly well enough until just recently.

 

You will probably laugh at some of what I report below. But I share it not because it's amusing (which it is!), but because it's endearing, heartening, and, frankly, dignifying. The people in my mother's section of the skilled nursing floor, though they've changed in some very significant ways over time, are in some very important ways unchanged. They have pasts, stories, interests, tastes, and personalities; the ability to connect to others; and, in most cases, the capacity and desire to give and receive love.

 

On a recent visit to my mother, I noted that a female resident and male resident, both well-known to me, were holding hands* and smiling at each other.

He was the gentleman who rose late and relished large breakfasts**--and whose first question to me months ago had been whether I was a chemical engineer who had shown up for the chemical engineers' convention that was just about to begin. In his early weeks on the floor, he worried after every meal that he didn't have his wallet with him: how was he going to pay for dinner, his own and everyone else's?

She was a fellow late-rising methodical consumer of large breakfasts who knew the words to many old songs that she could sing with excellent pitch and just the right feeling. But I had also observed her on blue days when she repeated "Hello" to someone or no one and often called for her late husband, repeating his name both hopefully and hopelessly again and again.

But that morning, the two hand-holders were all smiles, and had eyes only for each other. Since my mother and I stayed behind when most of the group went out on the patio, I could hear everything they were saying.

Generally, she was the one who asked the questions. "Do you have pain?" she asked, and was relieved to learn that he did not. She explained that she had volunteered at nursing home as a younger person, and had seen a great deal of pain--so much so that "I began to feel that it was my pain," which led her to take a break at the recommendation of the volunteer coordinator. "You have to have a lot of character to live with pain and not have your life be about pain," she explained.

"Do you visit your parents?" she asked; I was curious about whether their answers would signify an understanding of their parents as living or dead. He explained that he did--at the home where he had grown up; less frequently, they came to visit him--but they did sometimes. The same was true for her, she reported. And she added that she loved going back to her childhood home.

 

"Do you sing?" she asked, "Because if you do, I would like you to sing me a song." He said he didn't sing, which didn't seem to bother her. She explained that her parents had been in the Jewish theater and that everyone in her house was always singing. She knew so many songs as a result, she told him.

I laughed when she asked her next question: "Do you think I am too fat?" I had to wonder if, were I to make it past 100 years, as she has, would I still be worrying about my weight? Ever chivalrous, he looked at her and said, "I think you're just right." Oh, did she smile. And then, of course, they both smiled.

 

About fifteen minutes later, he explained that he had to go. 

 

"Where are you going?" she asked. 

"Home," he said. 

"Where's that?" 

"Georgia," he replied. "But I'll be back in six months, so if you're still around, we can talk again," he said.

"I would like that," she said, "But only if you really want to." 

 

As he headed back to Georgia, I was reminded of something I'd heard in an episode from Season 4 of Shetland, which I'd recently been re-watching. Before meeting an unfortunate end on the ferry from Aberdeen to Lerwick, Robbie, seen in the adjacent photo***, had worked at a "home" on Shetland. When he went missing, the director of the home explained how much the residents, mostly elderly, missed him. I'm paraphrasing here, but she said, "Old people seldom get touched, and they need it. Robbie liked them, and he would touch them; he would hold their hands."

 

The next time I visited my mother, I asked the nurse if the two hand-holders would remember their conversation. I was especially wondering if one or the other of them would feel bad if the other one didn't recollect their happy time spent together. "Neither of them will remember it," she told me. "But we've learned to put them together when either of them is having a bad day. Something about being near each other comforts them."

 

I was fascinated. One of the other staff people joined the conversation, referring me to two women who have been living on the floor since before my mother moved there and who were talking to softly to each other. 

 

"You see _____ and _____?" she said. "Sometimes one of them is the mother and the other is the daughter****; other times, the roles reverse." Interestingly, the one who more often played the role of the mother had no children of her own.

Knowing this made me understand a conversation I had overheard between the two of them a few months back. Sensing that her friend was having a hard day, the motherly childless one said, "You should do whatever you want. You've done so much for other people. It's time to take care of yourself now." She paused, and added, "And maybe soon you'll meet a nice man and get married." When the "daughter" looked at her quizzically, she responded, "Well, don't worry about that, dear; you have plenty of time." Such a reassuring Jewish mother!

So often, because my mother is in the late stages of Alzheimer's, I've gotten questions about how responsive she is: to me, to my sisters, to the people who take care of her. If anything, I've learned that different people mean different things by "responsive."***** For some, responsive means nothing less than being able to listen attentively to long stories and respond to them in long sentences. For others, it means recognizing who's visiting them and being able to call them by the right name. For yet others, it means smiling in response to a heartfelt hello.

I recognize the unspoken question of some who ask about my mother's responsiveness: "Why visit your mother if she doesn't respond to you? What's in it for you? And what's in it for her?" At this point, I don't feel obligated to offer answers to those questions. Bright eyes, smiles, and the words "lovely" and "I love you" mean "responsive" to me.

But since observing the two hand-holders, I have a new appreciation for how responsive people with cognitive and memory limitations can be to one another--and how important and gratifying their relationships and interactions can be in the moment, even in a series of moments, even over time--which no doubt feels so different to them than it does to me.

As long as we're alive, we never stop being people--which means we each want and need, by virtue of being human, what everyone wants and needs. There's so much that many elders can no longer do and do for themselves. But there's also so much they still can do for one another--something I didn't sufficiently understand and appreciate until this past month.

* Amanda Madden Pinterest https://www.pinterest.com/pin/old-couple-holding-hands-precious--364862007283583548/

** Photo accompanying recipe for over-easy eggs: https://www.beyondthechickencoop.com/over-easy-eggs/

*** Robbie Morton Shetland Wiki Season 3 https://shetland.fandom.com/wiki/Robbie_Morton

**** Screen shot of an image on Pinterest: Her Campus: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/603200943819962895/

***** Screen shot of an image on the Texas Health and Human Services Commission Website (courtesy of Adobe Stock) https://communityimpact.com/houston/conroe-montgomery/coronavirus/2020/07/27/texas-health-and-human-services-commission-to-post-covid-19-cases-deaths-from-nursing-homes-assisted-living-centers/