Category Archives: Society & Culture

Time is…

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Time is many things. How you perceive it and define it change depending upon a myriad of factors: mood, circumstance, age, etc. There are those who tell you, “Time is an illusion”. Now, I get that on a metaphysical level, where indeed in the big proverbial scheme of things like eternity, time is unquantifiable. But, here in our earthbound existence, our lives are defined by time. You wake up at a certain time to catch the train to get you to work by 9 A.M. You set the timer on the oven for 30-40 minutes so the soufflé you made will be cooked properly.

Why am I going on about time? Well, today marks six months since Mom died and just like my father’s passing 31 years ago, my perception of that time is mixed. This was my first entry about her death. On the one hand, it feels fresh like it just happened today, while on the other hand, it feels like this new reality without her physical presence is not new at all. There are days when I’m doing well and making great progress on the “stuff” of death: closing accounts, opening new ones, paying bills. Time is my friend on these days. Then there are the days when I look around at all the clutter that still hasn’t been given away, sold, or otherwise discarded, the paperwork that still needs to be completed, and the memorial Mass that still needs to be scheduled and held for her, and I feel like time is my enemy.

I’m reading a book that I’ve been meaning to get to for years: The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. I’m about halfway through it, and while the concepts discussed aren’t new to me, I’m finding more of a resonance right now. The importance of living in the present is one such concept. Hey, I’ve read Eckhart Tolle’s The Power of Now, and didn’t the Buddha say, “Be where you are; otherwise you will miss your life”? Having a present-moment focus isn’t revelatory to me.

What is new is my desire to embrace the present moment. For far too long, life “right now” was the last place I wanted to be. The present moment was full of 24/7, 365-day “fight or flight” when it came to Mom and her health. I’d much rather remember the “good old days” before macular degeneration, mystery bleeds, and congestive heart failure. Or I’d dream of some distant future when I’d be doing creative work I loved and traveling. Neither living in the past nor the future was satisfying but they were better than the present.

I just came across these lines in The Alchemist and the profundity of its simplicity shifted something within me:

The secret is here in the present. If you pay attention to the present, you can improve upon it. And, if you improve upon the present, what comes later will also be better.

Here’s to a mindful present for us all.

via GIPHY

The End of the Line

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Here I am at the three-month mark since Mom died. I’m still sorting and clearing and cleaning. That will go on for awhile. As I’m doing all of those things, I’m also doing a lot of thinking about legacy and the “stuff” that’s left behind when someone dies. I touched upon this in an earlier post, but I’m thinking about it more broadly now.

The items upon which I’ve been focusing have been clothes, shoes, handbags, knick-knacks, etc. Basically these are the items that don’t have an emotional connection. These have been relatively easy to part with. There’s a whole other category of items that aren’t things I have to part with now, but eventually someone will. I don’t mean any heirlooms with any monetary or historical value that could be left to family or friends. I’m talking about items that spouses, partners, siblings, children or grandchildren keep. I have none of those people in my life. I am the end of the line. I am alone.

This isn’t some shocking revelation. I’ve been an only child my entire life. I never wanted children and I have no partner. So, what happens to the category of “stuff” that matters more than clothing, isn’t of tangible value, but marks a life and the important moments in it?

What are some of these things? My father’s baseball trophy from Junior High School, my parents’ high school yearbooks, and photographs. Lots of photographs of people I may not even know and someone else will surely not know. Sure, I can keep these now, but what about when I’m gone? These things don’t matter to anyone else. Then there’s all of my stuff. The items I’ve accumulated, but also all of the things my mother kept from my childhood.

You see, my parents couldn’t have children for nine years so when I finally came along, they were ecstatic and they poured all of their love into, and attention onto, me. Part of this meant that my mother chronicled everything. You should see my baby book! Measurements, details of birthday gifts for the first seven years of my life. My favorite songs from when I was two years old. In case you’re curious, they were “Alfie”, “Georgy Girl”, and “Bye, Bye Baby”, (the San Francisco Giants “fight” song). That same year, 1967, my biggest accomplishments were: knowing my ABCs and counting to 18 by the time I was two years and 10 months old. Interesting to me, but worthless to anyone else.

I came across a plastic baggie containing my baby teeth the other day. I’m sure my mother forgot she even had them. I get why she kept them, but what do I do with them? Or with the lock of hair snipped off when I was born or with the baby shoes my parents had bronzed?  When you’re the end of the line, what does that mean for your past, your history, your “stuff”? What does it mean for you?

The Healing Power of Art

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Today marks two months since my mother passed and a month since my last blog post. I’m still occupied with what I wrote about in that post: clearing out clothes, cleaning up clutter, making phone calls, and signing documents. There is progress being made on all those fronts, thankfully. I still haven’t had a service for Mom yet and I don’t know when that will happen. Mom wanted to spare me the stress and pain of having a rosary and funeral Mass and instead opted for a Memorial Mass whenever I was up to it. For a number of reasons, including emotional and financial ones, I just haven’t felt ready.

What has been helping me, at least emotionally, has been art. I think many of us were reminded during the lockdowns of 2020 just how much art matters. When we couldn’t gather to see live music, or an art exhibition, or take in a movie or a play, there was a sense of loss. This loss, coupled with not being able to be in the company of family or friends, has led to isolation and depression.

When my mother died, I suddenly found myself alone in a house that I had lived in for the better part of 38 years. I had moved away twice during that time, but those times were brief and over twenty years ago. I see her everywhere I look: her furniture, her style, her “stuff”. This isn’t a bad thing, but I knew I had to start making changes so this place would feel more like mine. Hanging some new art on the walls was a place to start. Thanks to a website called Artfinder, I came across a talented woman named Kathy Morton Stanion. Her paintings spoke to me and I purchased this piece that immediately enveloped me in a calming, peaceful embrace.

Kathy and I exchanged many emails back and forth and we found out we shared things in common. Her beautiful painting marked one of the first steps in my healing journey.

The second artist who has helped me is a talented singer, songwriter, and pianist named Natalie Nicole Gilbert. We’ve followed each other on Twitter for a long time and I don’t know how that started, really. We never interacted until after Mom died and her latest album was being released. Its title is perfect: Recovery. This album is all about recovery in its various forms and its release and appearance in my life is more than coincidental. It’s perfectly timed by something more powerful than me.

As with Kathy, Natalie and I have shared some wonderful interactions and again, found lots of common ground. This is the power of art, of connection, and of well, technology. Despite the negative aspects that social media and the internet in general can draw into your life, it introduced me to two women who are bringing beauty into the world one painting and one song at a time. They and their art are making a stressful, sad, difficult time easier for me. This is how art can heal and uplift. We’re all artists in some way. Think about how can you bring healing and joy into the world. You don’t have to paint or sing.  A kind word. A listening ear. A cooked meal. Anything done with love is art. And more love and more art is exactly what all of us need.

What’s Your Number?

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We often hear people say, “It’s just a number” when speaking about age. Okay, I get that, but numbers do dominate our lives. Test scores validate and rank a student’s progress, what the scale says can determine how you feel about yourself on any given day, your salary is an indicator of your worth to your employer, and yes, the date on your birth certificate can affect what you and others feel about your own viability, desirability, and cultural relevance. In essence, numbers can dictate your “shelf life”.

When it comes to age, the numbers game has always troubled me. For as long as I can remember, I’ve felt that time was my enemy. I was always running out of it or wasting it. This “time bomb” constantly ticks under the surface of my daily life, but it’s guaranteed to blow at least two times during the year: New Year’s Eve and my birthday. Unlike people who see both of these days as markers of new beginnings, I see them as grim reminders of all that I’ve failed to do, change, or achieve since the last birthday or “Auld Lang Syne” sing-along. This feeling has only gotten stronger the older I’ve become. Today is my 53rd birthday and to be blunt, this has been a shitty year. I’m not going to bore you with details of angst and woe, but trust me, life hasn’t been some Hallmark Channel, happy clappy, fun-filled adventure. Think Sharknado and you’ll be on the right track.

So, unless I want a sequel of deadly flying sharks symbolically destroying my life again until my next birthday, I need to change my mindset. With the patience of a gnat on crack, “instant gratification or bust” has been my unsuccessful mantra so far. What to do, what to do?

I have a telephone consultation with a therapist this afternoon. That’s a start. I’ve done therapy before. My problem isn’t knowing what my problems are. I can analyze, diagnose and talk my issues to death. The trick is making the changes necessary. I’m looking for coping strategies, a bullet point list of steps to take. No more attempts at past life regression or cooing “there, there” to my annoying inner child. That’s all fine and good, but I need to see some results in the here and now, not in the hereafter.

The other thing I’m going to do is continue to find examples of people who’ve accomplished goals later in life. I stumbled across a great reminder on Twitter this week about the actress, Kathryn Joosten, who didn’t start acting until the age of 40. She didn’t get her big break until 20 years later when she was cast as Martin Sheen’s secretary, “Mrs. Landingham”, on The West Wing. Writer and activist Charlotte Clymer shared Kathryn’s story on Twitter as a response to the ageism she sees permeating our culture. I’m going to re-read Kathryn Joosten’s story every time the time clock is ticking like a time bomb in my head. Just like internalized homophobia, internalized ageism is just as detrimental as anything the outside world can do. My birthday wish? Less sharks and more serenity.

 

Like Sands Through the Hourglass…There Goes My Attention Span

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THIS POST WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON THE ROCKETWHEEL PRODUCTIONS BLOG ON APRIL 26, 2016.

I always tell people that I have the patience of a gnat on crack. I fully admit that patience is not one of my virtues. My impatience got me thinking about my attention span and how it seems to have declined as I’ve gotten older.

Do you remember those reading comprehension tests from school? I used to do really well on them but now, I don’t retain information the way I used to. Is this just the product of aging or is societal change a factor?

I came across an article that says that our attention spans have shortened since the year 2000 from 12 seconds to 8 seconds. We’ve been passed up by the goldfish. Our friendly bowl dwellers come in with an attention span of 9 seconds. Wow.

The article goes on to discuss technology’s role in the decline. So many devices are competing for our immediate attention and our brains have to constantly keep up, and we’re struggling. On a positive note, we’ve become better at multi-tasking!

Here at RocketWheel, we see the desire for “shorter, faster” when people come to us wanting to make videos. Just a few years ago, running times for explainer videos could be three minutes or longer. That is rarely the case now. The “sweetspot” for telling an effective story and keeping someone’s attention is now no longer than 90 seconds. That’s around 210-225 words.

We’re getting more and more inquiries for 30-60 second videos and we have produced videos in that range. The shorter the video, the more precise the message has to be. There’s no time to thoroughly discuss a bunch of features or dive into a problem/solution cycle.

Not every message is suitable for this kind of treatment. But with the popularity of apps like Twitter and its 140 characters and Periscope and Snapchat with their “Mission Impossible” self-destruct set-up, we better get used to consuming and producing shorter, crisper content.

After all, in a couple years we may be vying with the fruit fly and their 3-second attention span.

Oh, Christmas Tree

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This is my Christmas tree. It’s a 7 foot, artificial, pre-lit number that I’ve had for about three years. Growing up, we always had real trees. And while I miss them, I like the fact that I can put my tree up after Thanksgiving and it looks just as beautiful past the New Year. No saggy, dry branches or shedding needles. To get the smell of the tree, I buy a real wreath and hang it on the back of the front door. Voilà!

I’m a bit of a snob about Christmas trees, decorations and the like, so it wasn’t an easy decision to go with an artificial tree. I used to scoff at people with who had them. I used to say it was like having “a Bobble head Jesus in the manger”. It just wasn’t right. Now, I just make myself an eggnog, sit on the couch and revel in my excellent taste in ornaments.

Now, let’s talk about ornaments. I’m very picky. I know what I like and what I don’t like. I never liked the idea of having a tree-trimming party because I knew that I’d probably hate most of the ornaments that people brought me and even if I liked some of them, I knew I’d end up re-arranging them properly after everyone left. It’s much too stressful to smile at the tacky “Surfin’ Santa” ornament and exclaim, “I love it!” Then you have to put it up every year because you know that friend will look for it next Christmas. It’s much easier to buy your own ornaments.

You may be asking just what my ornament and decorating rules are. Excellent question. Thank you for playing along. Feel free to adopt these for yourself if you’re so inclined.

1. Stick with classic, old fashioned ornaments

For me, this is Victorian. Among my collection I have porcelain Santa faces, Tiny Tim holding a plum pudding, assorted angels and an antique bird.

There are none of the following on my tree: Disney figurines, folk art animals, cats on skateboards, Santa engaging in any un-Santa like behavior (i.e., surfing, riding a motorcycle, doing the hula, etc.)

2. Ornaments must rest securely and perfectly on a branch

This means that there is enough room below the ornament for it to hang as it was intended. No forcing an ornament into a space where it ends up resting on the branch below. That will not do. You must have a mix of long and short ornaments to make sure proper placement can be achieved.

3. Minimize the number of ornament sets

In essence, try to buy more individual ornaments instead of those boxes of identical green balls, red stars and silver bells. I admit to having some of these sets, but each year I cut down as I buy more individual ornaments. If you must use ornament sets, be sure to space them out around the tree and for goodness sake, don’t put two of the same set next to each other!

4. Don’t skimp on the back of the tree

Yes, I know it may face a wall or a window, but true Christmas tree connoisseurs will look at the back of your tree and judge it just as much as they’re judging the front of your tree. So be sure to decorate it just as seriously as the front. And don’t try hiding the ugly ornaments back there. We see them.

5. Take your time with decorating

This is where that artificial tree helps out. This year’s tree took me about three days to properly decorate. Part of the reason is because I’m getting older and I get exhausted and crankier much faster. But mainly it’s because I want to take care with each ornament and find the right spot for it. It’s not just for show that I do this. It’s because each ornament holds a memory for me.

 

 

 

When I hold this rocking horse, I remember when I bought it at Harrod’s when I was in England in 1990.

 

 

 

 

 

This is one of my few concessions to a non-traditional ornament. I made this bell out of a milk carton in kindergarten. It reminds me of my teacher, Mrs. Schmale and how sweet she was to me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This crocheted Santa was made by an old German lady named Mrs. Mockel who lived across the street from me when I was a child. Her daughter and son-in-law owned the corner grocery store. It reminds me of all the great neighbors who helped shape me into the person I am today.

Perhaps the old-fashioned theme of my tree is about more than the types of ornaments I display. It’s about what those ornaments represent. They remind me of the past, whether that was my own past growing up in the 1960s and 1970s or a time when ancestors of mine decorated their trees with candles instead of lights and utilized whatever materials  were available or popular at the time.

So, if you’re celebrating Christmas and are starting to trim your tree, be sure to enjoy it and make the tree your own. What do you want it to express to the world? It doesn’t have to be like mine (although it would do my ego good). It just has to bring you joy when you look at it.

May your hooks be strong, your branches be firm and your memories be pleasant. I wish you the happiest of holidays, Surfin’ Santa or not.

Talking to Trees and Other Life Forms

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I’ve been told that I can talk to a tree and get it to talk back to me. In my experience, oaks think they’re all wise and enlightened but for my money, it’s the redwood that is the king of the forest. Redwoods possess a quiet confidence that comes from knowing that they’re truly badasses. But I digress.

I chalk up my non-shyness to three things: being a Leo, being part Irish, and being part Italian. (The German part of me only kicks in with my love of order and things running on time.) If you were to ask me to name which qualities I like most about myself (aside from my sparkling wit, magnanimous nature and my humility, of course), an outgoing personality and an unquenchable curiosity would be those qualities.

I was reminded twice in the last week of how grateful I am to be a curious people-person.  The latest was yesterday while waiting for my mother at the doctor’s office. As usual, I started a conversation with the person next to me. He was an older man and we started off by talking about the score of the Giants game. (It was scoreless at the time.) I found out that his name was Angelo, that he grew up in North Beach and that he went to Galileo High School. I told him that I was from the Mission, that my parents went to Mission High School and that I went to Catholic schools.

Then his wife came out into the waiting room and we got to talking. I told her where I had gone to grammar school and to high school. As I mentioned the name of my high school, St. Rose Academy, a woman waiting at the front desk turned around and it was my Godmother. Not only that, my Godmother knew the people to whom I was talking! They lived in the same neighborhood.  It is a very small world indeed.

This is the kind of experience I’ve always had as a fourth-generation San Franciscan. It doesn’t happen as often as it used to since natives are a vanishing breed, and that saddens me. But, I just keep being open to new people and conversations.

This brings me to messages that both my mother and I received on our answering machines earlier this week. A man with a heavy Boston accent named Charlie called and was looking for a Frank Rutterman. He mentioned sports and something about a reunion. Mom ignored her message but then I got the same call.

It isn’t often that Mom or I get a call for my father since he’s been dead since 1991. But since this guy Charlie asked for Frank, I thought that perhaps he just mispronounced the last name and he was some old baseball buddy of my father’s. So, I figured, what the hell, I’ll give him a call back.

After some initial suspicion from Charlie’s wife as to my identity and why I was calling, Charlie got on the phone. Alas, he’s about 10 years younger than my Dad and the Frank he was looking for didn’t play baseball. He ran track. It seemed that Charlie’s track team was being inducted into the some Massachusetts state Hall of Fame or something and he’s been trying to locate some of his old teammates.

Once we knew that my Frank and his Frank weren’t the same guys, he asked me about my Dad. I told him that my Dad played baseball and that Ted Williams was his favorite player. Charlie then told me that he had a 1956 Ted Williams baseball card that was worth about $8,000. I told him that I grew up loving the Red Sox because of my Dad and that I only wish Dad had lived long enough to go to Fenway Park with me when I lived in Massachusetts.

Charlie and I talked for another 15 minutes or so. I wished him luck on finding his Frank and he thanked me for calling him back. He said that I sounded like a “helluva girl” and that he really enjoyed our conversation.

When I hung up, I quietly thanked my Dad for not only introducing me to the joy of baseball, but also for encouraging me to be friendly and to get to know people. If he hadn’t done that, I wouldn’t have had the pleasure of sharing a little bit of him with Charlie from Wakefield. Thanks, Dad.

 

Baring My Soul About Bearing Arms

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This is a 9 mm Smith & Wesson M&P. I bought it three and a half years ago and I’m not sure I want it anymore. The gun itself is very nice. The recoil isn’t too bad and there are interchangeable grips; a helpful feature for someone with small hands like me. The dilemma regarding ownership is purely a moral one.

Just like I didn’t come from a camping or skiing family, I didn’t come from a hunting or shooting family either. Oh sure, my Dad had a .38 Special he kept in his dresser drawer for protection living in the ‘hood and for shooting cans when we’d go on vacation to Guerneville on the Russian River. Luckily, he never had to use it in self-defense. It was never locked in a safe, or had a child lock on it. He did keep the bullets somewhere else, however. Back then, child-proofing involved a talk from Dad:

Dad
(showing me the gun)
This is Daddy’s gun. It’s not a toy.
Don’t touch it. Do you understand?

Kelly
Yes, Daddy.

That was it. He did try to teach my mother to shoot it once while we were on vacation. It didn’t go well. Even with such a tiny gun, Mom kept dropping the barrel and Dad worried that she’d shoot her foot. Or his. Hence, the lessons ended. When he died, Mom and I didn’t want the gun around since neither of us had the skill or the desire to shoot. So, we turned it in to the city of San Francisco for cash.

Fast-forward to 2008 and I found myself contemplating learning how to shoot. Part of my reasoning had to do with not wanting to be afraid of firearms. There was a lot of talk at the time about the Second Amendment and gun rights in general, so it got me to thinking that I should give this “right to bear arms” thing a whirl.

I took classes, bought the gun and for about a year, I went to the gun range almost every weekend. I found it empowering and humbling. Until you’ve fired a gun, you have no idea about the power that it expends. There is definitely a skill to target shooting and I loved challenging myself. I was also pleasantly surprised that the stereotype I had in my mind about “gun people” wasn’t what I experienced. At the range I frequented in Silicon Valley, the demographics included all age groups, men and women, and all different races and ethnicities. I realized that this was the Bay Area, but still, it was refreshing.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve found myself not only disinterested in shooting but actually pondering the karmic ramifications of gun ownership for me. The main question is, am I inviting unwanted violence into my life by merely having a gun? I’ve always been someone who gave credence to the belief that we manifest what we focus on. And if my focus is on shooting a gun and getting better at it, am I somehow inviting the universe to provide me with an opportunity to do just that, but not at a paper target? It’s a frightening thought.

I’ve wondered if I’d have the same karmic dilemma if I decided to take self-defense classes or martial arts. Is there a difference between these two situations? I honestly don’t know. I do know that I’m really curious to get some input from any readers who have an opinion one way or the other.

Making the Skies Friendly for Adults

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I’m sure that most of you have heard about the recent actions of a JetBlue captain when confronted with a disruptive child who wouldn’t calm down before take-off. If not, read about it here. To summarize, he threw the child and her family off the plane. All of us who have suffered through a flight with a child kicking their seat or screaming until dogs in other countries start howling, rejoiced.

What I was most surprised to see, at least on Twitter, was that even the general reaction was favorable. This is progress. People with children are sensitive to criticism about how children today behave and how they as parents, well, parent. I understand that. I’d probably feel the same way if I had children. The fact that I didn’t see an outcry over JetBlue’s actions made me wonder if parents are finally seeing misbehaving children as the rest of us do: as overly-coddled, whiny little brats.

 Maybe this explains the success of Pamela Druckerman’s book about the ways of French parenting, Bringing Up Bébé. It’s been on the New York Times Best Sellers list for three weeks and counting. In the book, Ms. Druckerman discusses the differences between how French and American parents see and treat their children and see themselves as parents. From what I can gather, a pilot wouldn’t have to throw a French family off a flight because of little Monique or Marcel.

 This news story also got me to thinking about an idea I’ve long had for airlines. So, listen up, JetBlue’s Dave Barger and Virgin’s Richard Branson. I think this could be a moneymaker for you. (Feel free to cut me in on some of the action, okay?) I have long thought that airlines should market “Family-Friendly” flights and “Child-free” flights, so that those people with children could have a flight geared towards keeping their children entertained and engaged with other kids. You know, special movies, games, etc. It’s the same idea behind movie theaters having family movie nights. By the same token, the main appeal of child-free flights would be, well, NO CHILDREN! Woo hoo! I don’t have to sell that one very hard, do I?

 When I used to suggest this idea to friends in the past, I was accused of hating children. This is not true. I don’t hate children. I hate the behavior of misbehaving children and the seeming obliviousness of their parents when they misbehave. I will admit to not having the patience gene when it comes to children. I’m impatient about most things. This doesn’t negate the argument for what I think is a fabulous business idea.

 I think this is a much more positive solution than the other one I’ve come up with: The Brat “Watch List”. Just like Homeland Security has a database of names of individuals who want to terrorize our skies with bombs and the like, maybe there should be a database of misbehaving children. Perhaps airlines should set up a “three strikes” type of policy. You get warned and/or reported twice without being thrown off a flight but, if it happens a third time, it’s back to the terminal for you, Junior.

 If it took off with airlines, it could be expanded to movie theaters (except on those designated family movie nights) and restaurants. The possibilities are endless! Going out in public could once again be enjoyable for adults! You can thank me now. And, Mr. Barger and Mr. Branson? I’m open to negotiation. Call me.

 

 

Yes, Sister Gabriel, There is a Santa Claus

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This is me back in 4th grade in 1974. I can hear the giggles and see the pointing all the way across the blogosphere. God, that was a bad look for me. Although, the hair and sweater may have made me an excellent candidate for a spot with the Bay City Rollers. All I needed was a little tartan and a Scottish accent. What do you think?

It was before Christmas when this woman, Sister Gabriel, my 4th grade teacher, decided to drop a bombshell. No, she wasn’t retiring immediately and thus making 4th grade safe for children once again. That would have been too wonderful. Her announcement wafted over our heads menacingly like the smell that occurred when she made a boy named Tony sit on the heater to dry his pants after he peed them. And it was just as disturbing.

I can’t remember what led up to it but this is what she said:

Sister Gabriel
There is no Tooth Fairy. There is no Easter
Bunny, and there is no Santa Claus!

 Miscellaneous Children
(Whimpering and Screaming)
No!

As you can imagine, we were distraught and all ran home crying to our parents. Kids back then weren’t as jaded or grown up as kids are today. Our childhoods, and in many respects our innocence, lasted longer. All of my friends still believed in Santa at the age of nine, so Sister Gabriel’s announcement caused a bit of a moral dilemma. On the one hand, there was this authority figure, and a nun to boot, telling us this “truth”. On the other hand, she was a mean old biddy who hated children. What to think, what to think.

When I informed my mother what Sister Gabriel had said, she was very upset, saying that Sister Gabriel had no right to say such a thing, who did she think she was, etc. Then Mom calmed down and proceeded to dazzle me with her explanation.

Mom
Well, I feel sorry for Sister Gabriel
because the only thing she’ll get in
her  Christmas stocking is coal.

That was an excellent passive-aggressive response, wasn’t it? Fake concern for Sister Gabriel’s stocking contents while delivering an insult. Give my mother some props! Mom then went on.

 Kelly
But, is she right? Is Santa a lie?

Mom
Let me ask you a question.
Do you fill your own
Christmas stocking?

 Kelly
No! Who fills their own stocking?

 Mom
That’s right. Mommy doesn’t fill
hers and Daddy doesn’t fill his.
Let me ask you another question.

Do you see how my mother has mastered the art of deflection? Like a smooth politician, she never answered my original question but went on to distract me with other questions and answers. Brilliant!

 Mom
(continuing)
Do you fill Daddy’s stocking?

 Kelly
Of course not!

 Mom
How about Mommy’s stocking?

 Kelly
No! You’re silly.

 Mom
Well, if you don’t fill your stocking and you
don’t fill Mommy’s and Daddy’s stockings
and Mommy and Daddy don’t fill their
stockings, who fills them? Hmm?

This reminds me of those annoying word problems in math class that would include lots of extra information not needed to actually solve the problem. Instead of focusing on the trains traveling in opposite directions, I’d always get hung up on what the conductor’s name was or what kind of sandwich he was eating. Now I see why.

 Kelly
Well, it has to be…Santa!

I proceeded to hug my mother and I ended up believing in Santa Claus for another couple of years. Mom gave me more than answers that year. She gave me the permission to continue believing despite the protestations of others.  And she gave me love. These two things have always been the most treasured gifts. They certainly beat coal. Do you hear that, Sister Gabriel?