Life School: To protect, to serve, to save in Laconia, NH

Laconia, New Hampshire, located in the Lakes Region of our state does not appear at first glance to be either a good or bad town. Neighborhoods that fringe the lake have a folksy, vacation feel to them. Others are quaint, tree-lined and orderly. Eventually, however, you see the neglected ones tucked behind the convenience store, or the gas station, At once, you realize there are many more tucked behind other things. 

Owing to  poverty and violent drug crime, Laconia now is considered one of the most dangerous cities in New Hampshire. It is also one of the regions served by the Boys and Girls Clubs of Central New Hampshire, where I volunteer as a writing coach. This year, for the first time, I have a teen in Laconia. We meet once a week to discuss how she will tell her difficult life story as she competes for the Club's Youth of the Year title. 

Five years ago, Christopher Adams became Laconia's chief of police after seventeen years with the department. This past spring, he attended a gathering of Club supporters to talk about the Club's presence as a safe place for kids who might otherwise roam, loose and antsy, in those risky after-school hours.

Chief Adams is not someone you forget quickly.

First, he's a big presence, a big presence wearing dark navy blue. And the equipment affixed to his belt – handcuffs, radio, baton, keys, flashlight, and of course, the gun – suggests that no day is predictable enough to leave anything at home.  

And the shoes. Cop shoes are some serious shoes.  

This is a very serious shoe.

I've known self-important doctors, bosses and teachers who enjoy making a show of their authority. There are, of course, police officers as well who swagger into the least significant interaction prepared to show just who is in charge. 

But not this one, not this night.

Chief Adams mixed with the crowd, breaking the ice, conversing with guests who wanted to know "just how bad is it now, up there in the Lakes?"  He didn't interrupt people when they were talking, he didn't lecture. His demeanor in this wine-and-cheese setting was like that of a polite Doberman – approachable, but capable of facing down a threat to those he protects. And then he got up to speak.

He described a community scarred by high unemployment and poverty in which nearly 25% of children live below the federal poverty level. Policing, said Adams was light on the users, heavy on the dealers, and he talked about the resources aimed at finding and rescuing the ones not yet caught in the grip of the region's opioid epidemic.He gave us the visual: aimless kids loping along the streets, parents absent or indifferent to the easy opportunities for their kids to become addicted early. He would never forget, he said, the three-year-old who ran naked and hysterical from the scene of a drug bust, into the arms of a police officer. 

Last week, I met my teen in Laconia and like always, we looked for a place to talk privately while very energetic kids of all ages and heights bounced around, burning off the energy of the day. 

"It's down here," she said. I followed her past an activity room where smaller kids were engaged in arts and crafts and other supervised play.

At the end of a small table, sat an adult figure who seemed to be sharing a story with the little kids congregating around him. He leaned forward as he talked and gestured and nodded and smiled as he listened. The kids tugged at him, eager to tell him things, show a drawing, pepper him with questions about his job. 

I didn't recognize Chief Adams at first through the clutch of kids. But then he turned to look out at my teen and me. A smile broke across his face, and he raised his hand in hello. One of the kids said something and he turned away. 

Had I known that he was going to be there, I might have expected one of those Officer Friendly interactions I've observed in school districts full of stay-at-home moms and kids who want to look badass, but never will. Maybe a serious-yet-kindly figure sitting at the front of the room, offering suggestions for staying out of trouble with the caring but cautionary message:  I can protect you now, or punish you later. 

Some figures of authority do that; keep the wall low enough to look over, but stay on their side just the same. 

But not this one, not this figure in navy blue with his equipment and serious cop shoes, present and engaged at eye-level with one of his smallest at-risk citizens in the community he protects and serves, but mostly aims to save.

I have no doubt, Chief Adams deals with threats to his community that are crushing. I won't forget the talk that all of us heard at that event.

But last week was not about talking the talk. Last week was about those cop shoes walking into a circle of small children who may thrive as easily as fail with the right eyes on them. 

   

That's the thing I won't forget more.

Life School: Stranger-angels

Above, shown in squint-producing
lettering (sorry) is a very true thing that I wish I'd said, 
but which I won't forget.

Some people read something like that Maya Angelou quote and pin it where they'll remember it. Some consider such a tender truth banal, and don't take it seriously. Some applaud such truths publicly but don't really practice them in their own lives. 

I'll cover that third one in Pet Peeves #3, which is scheduled to appear as soon as I must deal with another government agency, or Comcast.

Exchanges between people, all kinds, fascinate me almost more than anything, but none more than those between an intuitive stranger and another in need.

I can't remember if I fed Gus this morning (that's not really true. I think I did), but like it was yesterday, I remember walking into a psychology stat course where my professor was talking to a student. The student, about nineteen, looked exhausted and near tears. The professor, a doctor with a very intense gaze, looked into the boy's face with an expression of caring I'd never seen before.  

"How you doing?" he asked."Okay?"

The boy nodded, "Yeah, better."

The tenderness of this simple question was perfect, and its effect was obvious. 

I never forgot it.

And it was me once, in need, sitting on a train after a serious writing setback had me thinking I wasn't meant to be in the writing business at all. I still remember the facial expression of a stranger who passed me while I was deep in thought over plan B which was:  I don't know what to do now. She was several years older than I, and she fixed me with a long expression of such knowing it halted my thoughts mid-spiral.  As clear as water, it just said, You're supposed to be here. It's part of it.

I still think of it. 

Last week, a cashier at our supermarket held the line up for so long helping a very elderly lady locate her ATM card in her giant bag-of-everything that everyone gave up and went elsewhere. I stayed.

"That's the one!" the cashier said to her, "That's right, just swipe it right there."
"Here?" she asked.
"That's right. You're all set, now." 

She didn't know the buttons to push and he came around to show her. She looked at me, and I smiled. Finally, after several apologies, she was on her way. 

So visibly relieved was the woman, I wondered how often she encountered the tired tone, the show of patience, the sigh of inconvenience that so many busy people use with others who don't move fast enough to please them. I'll RE-cover that in Pet Peeves #3, which is scheduled to appear as soon as I must deal with any kind of insurance issue, or hold music, or both.

When it was my turn, I thanked the cashier for his patience.

"It's easier for me to be patient than it was for her to get that done with people staring at her," he said. "Also I am a youth counselor with teenagers. You can deal with anyone after that."

He smiled at that, the thought of those kids. Those lucky kids. 

Life School: Tire Store campus

No tires were harmed in the stalking or
posting of this sign on Facebook.

I'm pretty sure that at some point, a science teacher stood in front of a classroom, miles from the back row where I sat, and informed all of us that  a molecule is the smallest particle in a chemical element or compound that has the chemical properties of that element or compound.

In response to this news, I'm pretty sure I constructed a cootie catcher and asked "my neighbor" to pick a color and receive a fortune in return. 

I think of this when I have to talk to Harry, a specialist at our local tire store, because no place makes me feel, and therefore act, as stupid as this place with its garage smell of tread and wall hangings of actual tires. 

If it's a simple deal – changing out of snows for example – we do okay. But if there's an "issue" – a  shimmy, a pull in some direction – Harry and I know we'll have to put on our patient hats because my comfort level with his language ends with "I'm fine, how are you?" 

A month ago, my husband noticed a serious scrape in my tire and asked me if I'd been driving anywhere lately where sharp metal might have been come in contact with the tire, like a construction site. 

Here is a helpful sign 

that explains itself.

I told him that no, I'd not driven through any construction sites and that my driving route is the same as it's been for months: I drive to Granite to see friends for wine every now and then, I drive to the supermarket, I drive to Concord to run errands, and sometimes I stalk signs to post on Facebook. 

"You should call Harry. It's kind of deep, it might be dangerous to be driving on it."

"Can it blow up?"

"Let Harry tell you that." 

Had that blowing up question brought an "Oh, I doubt it!" there would be no call with Harry until much later in the future. But I had to go to Boston soon, so I dialed him up. 

"Hi Harry, it's Susan Bonifant."

"Oh, hey Susan!"

"I have a problem."

"Oh no," he said, "what's happening?" 

Here is where my brain wants to lie down.

"I've done something to my tire."

"Okay."

"It has a gash."

"How did that happen?"

"I don't know."

"Can you describe it for me?"

"It looks like a check-mark."

"Is it in the sidewall?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well," begins Harry, "the sidewall  sjdyfhfhy uuiir. Alskjdhfughhh and vbvhg can mean rsddwq. And cqpmkk, and also jg dfreeaa."

"Uh-huh."

"So," asks Harry, "is it like that?" 

Silence.

Here is where Harry adjusts the pace of his speech and length of his words. 

"Do you want to come in and let me take a look?" he asks.

"That would be great," I say. "When is it quiet over there?"

"Usually 3 or so. We're pretty busy at lunchtime."

"Okay. It's noon. If I come over in twenty minutes, will that work?" 

Pause.

"Sure," says Harry. 

It is, as Harry predicted, packed because it's lunchtime, and so I signal, I'll come back, and Harry nods in agreement from the counter. 

~~~~~

At three o'clock, Harry follows me to the car and squats to get a close look at the tire. 

"Yeah, that's what I thought," he says in a sad voice. "And how did this happen?"

"I have no idea. Can it be fixed?" I ask. "Patched, maybe?" 

"Nope." He looks at me. "It's in the sidewall." He points to what is the sidewall before I can ask, and says, "See, the thing is, ynfhy uuiir. Alskjdhfughhh and vbvhg can mean rsddwq. And cqpmkk, and alos dfreeaad. Vb." 

I want out of the deep end of this tire talk pool, now. I want to take my napping brain and go where I will not be this way, but I need to know. 

"Am I in any danger if I drive to Boston this week?" 

Harry is uncomfortable with this question. He sighs, makes a  tsk tsk tsk tsk sound, tilts his head left and right and says, "It's really not a good idea." 

"Will it blow up?" I ask. 

"Oh, Heavens! No. I'm sure your car has a pressure warning." 

"What will it do if it does?" 

"A light will come on and tell you if there's a leak."

Back inside, Harry processes an order for the new tire and asks, "What is the best way to reach you?" 

"Home or cell?" I ask.

He looks at me. 

"Either one. You tell me. Whichever is easier."

Every single question he asks brings a response like that from me as my brain slumbers.

~~~~~

Two days later the tire is in, and I arrive for my appointment. Harry writes up a ticket,  takes my keys and says "Okay, you're all set." 

"Oh, did I already pay?" 

Silence. 

"No. I mean you can have a seat while they care of the tire." 

"Oh, okay." 

Later, I will google "stupid behavior of smart people." 

~~~~~

Three weeks later, it's as if it never happened at all.  My tire is replaced, and I am happy as I drive past the tire store en route to meeting my father for lunch at our usual spot.  

I'm a little late. The parking lot is crowded and I don't want him to think I forgot about him and so, I pull into a space between the curb and a dumpster next to an area that is under construction. I feel a little bump, and then hear what sounds like someone dragging the edge of a metal shovel along the pavement.

 Please. I hear myself say. No.

I can't stand to get out of the car but I do, and rest my eyes on this new checkmark. It's a deep one. A piece of rubber is lying on the ground  and I pick it up. 

That's how.

It's three o'clock, the best time to drop by. I pull into the parking lot and carry the small rubber strip from the sidewall in with me. Harry is on the computer and looks over. 

 I hold out the piece.

"Oh, no."

"I was hoping you could just put this back on."

"Nope. Anytime you damage the sidewall..," he doesn't finish. 

We go out to the car together.

"Wow," says Harry. "You got the rim, this time.  That's interesting, because these tires protrude beyond the surface of the rim to protect it."

Interesting.

~~~~~

It is a week later and I arrive for my appointment. 

"Just the one tire this week?" asks Harry. He snickers.

"Harry, that's really funny," I say. But. I like him more for having a sense of humor, because I do speak that language.

The job is finished. I pay and am signing off on my service when Harry says, "Now remember," and makes a wide sweeping motion with his arm, "wiiiiiiiiiiiiide turns." He cracks up. 

"Ha ha ha. You know what, Harry? If you'd suggested that the first time, I wouldn't be here, now. Would I?"

But now we have a joke in common, and he laughs, "Just trying to save you a few bucks, that's all. Just trying to save you a few bucks." 

I leave the tire store and I'm happy.  My brain is up from its nap now, and lighter for already having dumped the tire details.  It asks me, what should we do now, that we are really, really good at? 

I tell my brain we should go stalk strange signs that are not located anywhere near a construction site and post them on Facebook. Off we go.

Here is a resourceful sign that uses backwards 2's for S's,
inverted P's for d's, and doesn't fuss with decimals
because who would ever think kids eat for $199.00?

The giant man at life school

I don't know who this is,
but I don't think
she's  an optimist. 

The advice columnist Carolyn Hax recently explained to a writer why it is easier to be unhappy than optimistic.

"Optimism," said Ms. Hax, "demands that you greet new people and situations with an open mind, instead of just lumping them into some lazy category of Things You Already Know." 

There is no better place to witness people and situations you don't already know than the supermarket, or as I like to refer to it, life school.

Sooner or later, we all show up in this place of aisles that reflect our myriad needs, and stand in lines with our choices of how to meet them.  

There is this man I see there at least twice a month. He's a giant guy, several inches over six feet and not fat but, well, "stocky."  He looks like David Crosby does now. 

I notice him because I won't forget the first time I saw him.

It was during the summer last year and we were in Produce. The woman he was with was tiny, just over five feet tall. She wore enormous dark glasses that covered half her face, had a blond beehive hairstyle and was dressed in an expensive looking sheath dress and high-heeled strappy sandals. She looked like she'd just come from a cocktail party in 1965.

She trailed the big man in sullen silence, as if they'd left an unfinished argument in the car.   

As happens when you start with others in Produce, the giant man, his unhappy companion and I began to journey through the aisles together, from Deli, into Beverages and onto Spices and Salad Dressings. Very thoughtfully, he placed things in his cart while the woman said nothing.

  

She erupted in Nuts and Canned Vegetables.

"What the hell did you just say to me?" she hissed.

The man didn't say or do anything, and so, loudly, she repeated the question.

With his silence, she only became more agitated.

They reached the end of the aisle and were out in the open now, in the stretch that separates the registers from the ends of the aisles. 

"You don't talk to me like that!" she said. "You know what? You're the biggest asshole I know."

"And you are drunk," the giant man finally said.

The crowd stepped to the side as they approached, but then clustered in their wake, saying to each other, "Did you see that?" Cashiers gaped. Small children stopped slapping each other in line to watch.

"Oh, man," whispered an employee next to me, pen poised over his clipboard.

"I DON'T HAVE TO BE HERE!" the woman yelled, and wobbled toward the exit.

The giant man rolled up to a line next to mine. Something in the way his gaze traveled, settling on nothing, seemed practiced.  I tried not to look over; nobody wants to see their misery reflected in someone else's expression, but then he looked right at me.

It wasn't a look that said you don't know the half of it, or, I know, right? It was a look that said no big deal.

And then he looked away.

I saw them again about a month later as they left a local restaurant. He walked ahead, she stumbled after him, nipping at his heels.

If you were in your underthings, and the house caught fire, and you had to run outside as you were, because you had no time to grab a robe, you wouldn't care that neighbors saw you in your next to nothing, you'd be worried about what could be perishing inside, in the flames. 

To witness, and withhold judgment, ignore your assumptions – why would anyone put up with that? – like happiness, is harder to achieve sometimes, but worth it. It's something I've begun to do reflexively. Maybe because I've learned that I usually don't know the half of it, or just don't like being judged myself. 

Or maybe it's because we're hearing from so many from different walks who have felt so misunderstood for so long by those people who don't greet new people and situations with an open mind, and do  lump them into some lazy category of Things They Already Know.

Several times since that afternoon in Produce, I've seen that giant man on his own in the supermarket, strolling with his cart, looking at labels, calmly adding things, moving on.

Yesterday, I pulled into the parking lot and had to wait to park behind a big truck that had stopped in front of the door. From the rear view mirror hung a handicapped placard. The plate said "Veteran." I heard yelling.

"Don't you tell me to shut up!"

The giant man was in the front seat, and the 1965 woman was struggling to get into the passenger seat. 

He looked at me as I passed. I looked at him. Again, I glimpsed that veteran plate.

In my category of things I already know, this is an intolerable situation, a house on fire. But in the category of things the giant man already knows, this could be underthings, while more important things have not yet perished, or harder things have already happened.  

I don't know the half of it.

But at life school, is where I have learned how to keep the door to my mind from swinging shut, because those doors lock from the outside. Then, there you are, stuck with the other half.  

Note:  Other campuses of life school are conveniently located at the DMV or the ER, but they don't offer upbeat, overhead music from the seventies that will stay in your head for the rest of the day.

  

Everyone you meet could have a Frankie at home

This is not Frankie. This dog belongs to some friends
 and is here to help create the right mood.

I saw this on the internet:

Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind. Always. 

Most of us read something like that and instantly think of people who really need to read something like that. 

Last week, while waiting to board a flight to North Carolina, I stopped for lunch in one of those places where you probably won't become ill, but would not order lobster salad either. There was no denting my mood. In two days, we would see the last of our four kids graduate college and yes,we are looking forward to the raise. 

I was feeling generous. 

A seventy-something server, trailed by a young trainee, greeted me and showed me to a table. She was chatty, with a familiar manner I always find endearing. She couldn't have been nicer to me. 

A man came in who looked like he'd just left a serious job or meeting. He was nicely dressed, fit, and carried an elegant brief with a Wall Street Journal poking out of the pocket.  In response to the server's cheery greeting, he quietly hung his coat over the chair and then said, "I'll take an iced tea." 

Next to me sat a diner who was known to everyone who worked there, in that regular customer or former employee way. My server greeted him with a hug and began to update him on goings on. 

She lowered her voice. "Hey. I had to finally put Frankie down," she told him.

"Aw, no. Really?" 

It was a long story, and at points in the telling, I didn't think she'd make it to the end. 

"And what do you think was the last thing that dog did, right after they gave him the stuff?" she asked.

The customer shook his head.

She leaned in. "He licked my face," she said. 

I prayed this how about that kind of comment would not fall sideways into a sob, because already, I was welling up.

When she brought me a dessert menu, I told her that I was sorry about her dog. "Aw, honey," she said. "Thank you." She leaned on the back of the chair across from me. 

"The worst part" she began, "worse than when Frankie went deaf and stopped walking, the worst part was when Jack,  the other one, didn't know where Frankie was when I got back. Wouldn't leave the door. Wouldn't eat. So, now I lost one and here's the other one, won't eat." 

Her chin crumpled. "I didn't know what to do," she said. "I was beside myself. So I got him a brother at the rescue. Ugliest little thing you ever saw." 

This brought a sudden, husky laugh. The serious man looked over, gave her an up and down look.

I asked how they were doing. 

"Oh. My God. Oh. My God. You should see. Can't be apart. One's big, one's little. They're both rescues." 

Later, she came back with the check and I left her a 100% tip because I couldn't help it. "You're the best example that a trainee could have. Thank you," I wrote.

I can get annoyed. I lose patience with people who drive 70 in the left lane or walk too slowly on the sidewalk in front of me, or talk without listening, or too loudly, or too close. I get frustrated when people don't seem to be acting like who they really are, or walk into elevators that are full with people trying to get off. I have to breathe when I'm behind travelers who won't move on people movers.   

But I've thought about the server since I saw that simple thing on the internet. 

I suspect that when Frankie was going downhill, there were probably times when my server didn't count her items before bringing them to the express lane. She may have walked into a building before she let the other person come out. In her work place she may not have gotten to a customer as fast as she should. She might have laughed more than necessary, to fill silence that might have been unbearable. 

And, I've thought about that well put together man too, grim and immune to a warm greeting, whose maybe-meeting might have been of a Frankie nature, over anything, might  have changed his life, and maybe not for the better. 

It won't always work, but I hope the ones who really should, like me, can remember:

Everyone you meet could have a Frankie at home. Be kind. Always.

Yet

---Mark Twain 

Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.

---Mark Twain

There is no sadder sight than a young pessimist except an old optimist

---Mark Twain

So, which is it?

---Susan Bonifant

Nobody likes a Pollyanna. But that "optimism" adage is a little too much like saying if you're happy you must be kind of dumb.  Plenty of young people use their cynicism to avoid disappointment.  Plenty of older people expand themselves because they're optimistic.

I am thinking about age because next month, like last May, I will again, turn older than 50. I'm neutral on this, I was more upset at 49 about being almost 50. I know now how stupid that was, but I know now how stupid it is to dread any age. It insults all those other years that served you well, whether you looked forward to them or not.

Still, you can't help but take stock, consider your opportunity costs  and compare what you're doing to what you are not, and most important, why you are not.

My personal thing now is to say yes to things that aren't always comfy, but are sure to enrich my life more than they will inconvenience me. I've started to travel more, I've started yoga and I'm trading diet soda for club soda with a splash of cranberry. Next, I'm going to start producing more fiction, even if it's hard and complicated, and even if life hasn't answered all of the questions I have for it, yet.

Yet.

Yet is a very powerful word.

Yet means a lot to a good friend of mine who is over fifty and has recruited friends to form a competitive ski team. They are coaches mostly, experts all, and thankfully at least one is both a patrol and a physician. They are all about the same age, but it is the appetite for play that they have in common. They call themselves "The Idiots," and wear shirts that feature intentionally misspelled words.

That's funny. That's even optmistic.

I have another over-fifty friend who recently received her certification to teach yoga. She looks like she did when I met her twenty years ago, but that wasn't her aim. She knows that age brings hardships, but that time brings healing, which brings gifts of peace for the soul. To accept the former, my friend teaches people to use their bodies to embrace the latter, and most of us can do it without falling over now. 

For everybody who doesn't reach a certain age and settle in to kill time, there is a place they have not yet gone. 

Yet.

People who aren't healthy about aging, well, we see them all the time. It's older men who can't tell the difference between the interest and sympathy of a young woman they've hit on. It's women who grow depressed and desperate with every new line that doesn't disappear with a good sleep. 

Viewing ourselves like we come with expiration dates is bad enough. But I think it's worse that if only spared the ageist-culture hand mirror, many of us would not believe we have a shelf life at all.

A person can hurt their own feelings believing that culture knows more about their fate than they do.

Or one can follow the example of two people I know who have shaped their opinions of self around two things: what they do to remain vital, and knowing how to stay in their place which is wherever they wish to be.    

One is a relative who was raised in Europe where, she says, the elderly are not merely tolerated but revered. She has described family members who, in their nineties remain vital and  engaged and ultimately, are cared for by other family members who honor their wisdom and experience. Past seventy, she has an energy level thirty-year-olds would envy and she will likely remain an active tennis player well into her eighties.

Another one is my own mother, who, at nearly eighty, reads two books or more a week, follows a clutch of morning news experts, and of late, has become  outspoken on the political goings on.  We're more than twenty years apart but there is no opinion of hers, concerning anything I'm going through, that I don't value for its roots in simpler, more sensible times.

As I think about being over fifty again, I know that healthy people update. They know when it's time to exit or at least pull over and look at the map again. They don't quit, but recalculate. They change their minds, they honor new or abandoned passions and redirect their energies, because they are optimistic.

Mark Twain was brilliant, of course. He is my choice when people ask those questions ten minutes before a dinner party ends: "Who would you eat dinner with if you could pick anyone, dead or alive?"

Because, that optimism crack aside, Mark and I would probably agree on the subject of beholding one's own beauty and place in life, and just who is in charge of that boat that brings one there.

Love and kindness at life school

Some of the subjects offered at life school

I saw a couple the other day at the supermarket, where I attend life school. 

They were mid-late seventies, although she seemed younger. He wore a cap imprinted with USAF, and he was in a wheelchair. She was dressed simply in a long skirt and sweater. Her hair, which she clipped in the back, was mostly gray with a little blonde. While he wheeled the chair along, she kept her fingers loosely closed around a handle.

They traveled the aisles, stopping when she spotted an item that she wanted to show him. They chatted about dinner.

"Oh, that would be good with..."

"You know, later this week we could have it with..."

"Maybe you could make  that recipe where..."

And so on. 

I'm assuming they were long-married and that this routine was a regular one, spending time at the store, engaged in planning a dinner they would go home and make together.

They were unaware of others unless she needed to wheel him out of someone's way.  

They talked about company they were expecting.  

They shared a story about someone they'd seen last week. 

They commented on the crowd today.

She laughed when he made jokes. He nodded when she spoke, "Uh-huh, that's true." She asked his opinion, "How about," or, "what do you think of..."

I imagined them in their youth. Maybe he was the more outgoing, while she was possibly the quiet one. Maybe he hung around the kitchen while she made dinner, telling stories of his day, and maybe she shared funny moments with their kids. Maybe they engaged in the self-congratulatory boasting that we all do in our own intimate company, when we agree that we are probably the most blessed people on the planet for all we have, all we've done together, and maybe, all we've survived.

I know that life, age, struggle, can weigh people down until it becomes something to deal with, like the days themselves. Conversations, expressions of our minds and hearts, can stall for the effort of launching them. Smiles can creep away, and faces can freeze in a state of half-interest and half-disappointment.  I see it all the time, and so do you.

But if the USAF man struggled to live in and out of that wheelchair, he wasn't bitter in his companion's company.  If his companion was tired, she was gentle, still, in his. One could see, that each looked forward to whatever ritual was in the plans for later, if only the preparation and sharing of dinner. 

It's what we all need, a later.

In line, checking out, she looked around at the day's crowd. The tender expression changed to a watchful one, a bit guarded, slightly puzzled.  But when her companion spoke to her, back it came, the other face, lines relaxed, eyes soft, her smile like a pretty day.  

Love and kindness.

It's what's for dinner, at life school.

Older women should be one thing for young mothers and it's not this

If I ever look at a struggling young
mother like this, I hope someone
will tell me to change 
my face immediately

At the supermarket recently, I watched a silent interaction between two women.  They were worlds apart age-wise; one was a seventy-something professional who looked formidable, the other was a twenty-something mother who looked like a good night's sleep would probably change her life.

I'd seen Mom already, moving around the store ahead of me, all business, cart full, kids looking like, if they were phones, they would be down to one bar. Dressed in a skirt and heels, I'm supposing she was employed outside the home as SAHM's only dress like that on TVLand.

The kids were whiney-crying until Mom had unloaded nearly half her cart and then, as though someone had said, "Okay, now!" the four-year-old girl lost it and the younger brother sympathy-lost it. The girl waved a bag of Doritos around which the mother refused to open while she waited to pay for the groceries.

I know this tactic. IF you keep it together and let me get out of here, THEN  I'll open your toy/snack/drink in the car.

And so, Mom wasn't budging. The girl's very loud crying only intensified, her face turned tomato-red, tears traveled down her cheeks and her glazed over eyes were half-closed with fatigue.  

"I want the bag...Mommeeeeeee...(gaspy sob)

"I WANT the bag...(hiccups)

"I WANT THE BAAAAAAG MOMMEEEEE!!!"

And so on.

At first, I thought, it's four-thirty in the afternoon. It's the witching hour. It's time to pay the Doritos bill. Just give her the bag.

But I know too well that teaching children to anticipate and then cope with stressful situations is a long work in progress. Very often there are special rewards attached to specific goals. There are endless just-outs and next-times. How unfair to both parent and child if all that training must be put to the side, in the best place to practice it, only because people are judging you so harshly you can almost hear their thoughts.  

So I made funny faces at the girl, waved "hi" to distract her and tried to make eye contact with Mom to speak for everyone in the store and let her know we understood. But Mom, wasn't having it. Every muscle in her face was tense. Her eyes were fixed on the cashier.

The older woman, clearly not one of the everyones, wasn't having it either. Face twisted into a scowl, she sighed, fidgeted, and kept her folded arms across her chest.  Just loudly enough for Mom to hear, she hissed the word "chaos," and stared at her. Then she glared at the crying girl, lips pressed together in a straight line, eyes narrow.

At once, she looked at me and shook her head. I gave her a look to let her know I was on the other team.

Mom finished checking out and wheeled her chaos away.

The older woman rolled up to the register and said to the cashier, "Disgusting, ab-so-lute-ly disgusting. That we have to be exposed to this nonsense! This foolishness. This is why kids shouldn't be allowed in places like this," she said, as though she were not buying hamburger and paper towels but being robbed of an exquisite dining experience in an expensive restaurant.

"If I'd ever acted like that," she said to the cashier, "I would have done it only once."

"Uh-huh. Do you want the meat separated from the paper towels?" asked the cashier, which made me like him very much.

I made it to the parking lot in time to catch the mother as she lifted bags into the back of the car. The little girl sat in a car seat eating her Doritos. Her little brother was quiet and busy with a toy.

"Excuse me," I said.

When she looked at me, I could see that she was younger than I'd guessed. The deep stress lines across her forehead looked like she'd borrowed them from someone older.

"You know what?" I said. "You did a good job in there. I know how hard that was."

Her face relaxed. She looked like she'd cry. "I'm trying."

I've changed my own judge-y ways, but I know when I was a younger parent with a strong drive to raise conscientious kids, I would have been (privately) asshat-y had the mother handed the chaotic girl her Doritos. And, while in places "like this" I have only sympathy for the struggling parent, in high end restaurants where I've spent a lot of money to be free of screaming, nap-starved children, I've been judge-y indeed. 

But  in line that day, I remembered myself as I once was, and got a good look at who people become when they lose the ability to remember, who can't soften in their acceptance of others while they are hardening toward them. 

So today, I'll have a little patience with inflexible people and realize they might be struggling to find control in those intractable ways. 

They may be tackling much bigger issues than I am. 

They may be facing a trip to the store later with a tired toddler, and the kind of judgement that is so weighty, it makes it risky to even make eye contact with a stranger who's just trying to be nice to you.